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Rook was twelve. The seer before them came from distant shores, far removed from Rivain. Unlike those outside, what little skin of hers was visible beneath the sheer layers of fabric was pale beyond belief. The beads sewn onto her shawl glistened in the soft candlelight within the tent. Between the patterned red and purple strips, her eyes, surrounded by smudged makeup, were the only parts of her face shown to the public. Each strip softly blurred the features beneath, distorting her lips into an ever-shifting blot with hazy edges. With a battalion of golden bands slamming into each other, the seer motioned at the chair opposite her.
The wooden piece of furniture was a simple thing. Nothing grand. Just some dark wooden legs and a seat woven from reed with a feather-stuffed pillow on top. Rook swallowed. It hardly felt real. Such a momentous moment: the revealing of their future, and yet this might as well have been a weekly visit for spiritual advice. Had everything been different, they might not have been so nervous or…
Rook swallowed. That was a lie. Even if the reading would have unfolded while drinking ale within a volcano, their fingers would still behave as they did now: thumb rubbing over the far-branching tree embossed in their lucky coin, its gold growing warm within their clammy grip. At the same time, oddities might have prevented their brain from circling around this one particular worry.
Communication.
Heart pounding against their ribs, Rook turned to their father. Most people were not familiar with sign language in general, let alone Rivaini’s body-voice. How would they understand a single word if they could not even read the seer’s lips?
Their father’s wide mouth eased into a reassuring smile, its corners hidden beneath the whiskers of his beard. Broad hands signed firmly as if he owned the very air around them, “Don’t you worry, sweetie. I’ll get her to write it down.”
Rook nodded. The chair’s hard and flat surface pierced through the pillow’s thin cotton and stuffing as they sat down. Awkwardly, they fumbled with their fingers beneath the table’s cloth, careful not to bump into it. Leaving their coin—ancient elven!—hanging from its brightly coloured thread. A comforting weight hanging from their neck.
The crystal orb, displayed proudly at the centre of the table, twinkled a mixture of green and pink around its edges. Carried by nothing more than a pair of golden claws whose black tips barely reached halfway through the orb, one accidental touch could be enough to release the orb. Enough to send it to the floor and shatter it into a billion fragments.
The seer’s eyes twitched from their father to Rook and back as the braids of his beard brushed against each other with each uttered word. The woman’s pointed finger jabbed at them in the air, paired with a quizzical eyebrow. Further in the past, this used to irritate Rook. Why wouldn’t a dwarven couple take in a human child? Now, the shock and disbelief ceased to faze them.
An understanding passed between the adults, for the seer reached for a piece of vellum, a bottle of ink, and a half-banged-up feather with which she scratched a single word near the top. “Greetings.”
Straightening their back as their mother had taught them, Rook licked their lips. Their first prediction. A time-honoured tradition. Upon the sighting of the first signs of blossoming maturity, a child was to be taken to a seer for a glimpse into the future. Such an act was to be repeated once a year till the butterfly had fully left its cocoon, well-prepared to go forth into this world.
Rook raised their hand, reaching for the feather, but everything was pulled back before they even got close. Apparently, responses weren’t necessary.
With the feather back in its inkwell, the seer floated her ringed hands across the orb’s iridescent surface. Thick clouds grew and swirled inside the orb, their dark colour muddying its see-through material. Each swirl took on a shape held for only a few seconds. A man, regal, seated upon a throne. Rising from his seat, the ruler’s body twisted. His crown and staff melted into a stream which formed another humanoid. The new figure embraced the other, causing them to fuse into each other. Two sides of the same soul, both masculine and feminine. This new being stretched and curled. Handles spread across its body to form a ship’s wheel. At first, it spun in the same direction as the hands of those fancy clocks their parents sold: left to right. But as it calmly continued, a force interrupted its path. It twitched once, twice, attempting to break through, and changed course: right to left.
A deep crease formed between the seer’s eyebrows. Slowly, the clouds dissipated within as the seer raised her hands. Writing as if possessed, the tightly held feather raced across the vellum. Blobs of ink still glistened wet as she shoved the sheet in their direction.
“One day, you will meet a powerful man. Through time, the two of you will come to recognise the manners in which you complete and mirror each other. Fate will throw an event in your path that shall change your life forever. Do not fight it, for you are destined to be together forever.” Vague. Rook bit their lip, fingers pushing the prediction sideways for their father to read. Was that it?
About to raise their hands to speak, their father clapped them on the shoulder with his mouth bursting wide open, stopping them in their tracks. Joyous, he spread his arms wide. “My lass is going to marry well.”
Rook was seventeen. Seventeen, and raw and bleeding. Torn clothing provided barely any protection against the bite of the sea’s breeze. Each shiver came followed by a wave of sharp stings rushing all over their back. Softly, Da’Glandival’s fingers ran through their short-trimmed curls. The captain. Rook’s throat constricted. He was a man of power, and he was different from them too. Different in many ways. Maybe that’s how they ‘completed’ him, or perhaps completion simply referred to the services he desired of them.
You are destined to be together forever.
Rook burrowed their face deeper into Da’Glandival’s lap as if the elven woman could protect them from their fate. Cursed, they stuffed their fingers into their mouth for they must not make a sound.
Rook was thirty-one years old. With the tears still drying on their cheeks, his lips gently brushed against theirs. Solas. His name floated through their abdomen like a butterfly unchained and uncaged. With his hands delicately placed against the base of their skull, he kissed them, or maybe they kissed him. Difficult to say. Did it matter? It felt right to lose themself in his touch. His presence. Even through the layers of gold-tinted metal and leather, the pleasant heat of his body rose to meet theirs within this barren prison.
As their lips parted, Rook, biting the bottom of their lip, smiled. Solas fit the bill. Powerful because he was magically skilled and contained the knowledge of millennia past inside his skull. Knowledge which, so far, had aided Rook and their team in the battle against the Blight and the Evanuris. Both were mirrors with a similar past and present: slave and leader.
For that reason alone, it was not difficult to understand why his lips fit so perfectly onto theirs. Soft, like being touched by the Fade itself, his mouth nipped at their bottom lip. Rook leaned further into his touch, hand snaking behind his head to keep him close. A powerful man. As an ancient mage, Solas fit the description to a T. Fit it in manners the captain could never. Nothing. That’s what the captain had been. A seedy little man whose only source of empowerment came from lashing, beating, and raping. Solas needed none of that.
The dark leather covering the midst of his hands flaked. Its material floated into the air, alight. Specks of teal and green dimmed as it rose past their cheeks and faded into the prison’s greys. Fingers roughened from fighting with daggers and the like slipped beneath their tunic in search of his mark.
Catching their breath, Rook was the first to break the kiss. The diffused light surrounding them scattered and broke up within his blown pupils: two inky black pools of water. Each second spent staring into him was a second which tugged and pulled until they could do no more but to dive even further. To give in.
Hands found the knots and the wolf’s fang that kept his belts strapped to his waist with ease, undoing the leather without looking down. The earth trembled where the straps landed, clouds of dust billowing and clinging to the tips of Rook’s boots. Perhaps… Rook grinned, biting their bottom lip. Perhaps they should take a peek, explore just how well they completed each other. Complete and mirror. Protective plates clattered to the floor. Layers of fabric and leather were peeled back, all to reveal the naked truth beneath.
Scarred skin standing before scarred skin, Solas held out his arm and beckoned. Rook marched forward, each step a slow and carefully crafted tease. Their toes stretched, ready to firmly plant themselves on the soil closest to him. Solas bent closer for another taste, except Rook pulled back.
“You want this?” The pounding of their heart spread through their body, the thrill of what they were about to do coursing through their veins. “Come and get it.” With the final sign flowing from their fingertips, Rook turned on their heel and dashed towards the edge of the isle.
The clump of floating earth shook behind them, evidence of Solas’ pursuit. Rook increased their pace, short curls of hair swaying in and out of their vision as the isle’s end neared. Stone hands, stuck forever reaching out to one another, grew with each second.
On the count of three, Rook. One. Two. Goosebumps rose across their back as his nails grazed their skin. Three. Rook launched themself forward, soaring through the air and landed with both feet on the cobbles of the next torn piece of land. Triumphantly, they turned around.
Empty space. A stroke of light was the only thing to move where he should have been gaping back at them. Confused, Rook’s eyes raced across the prison. Dirt. Broken statues. More dirt. A decaying tree. Even more dirt. No Solas. How? They leaned back, heel hovering above the cobbles. Did he not enjoy games?
Two arms grabbed them from behind and pulled them against his flesh. Burning and moist, his cock pressed against their spine. Rook’s breathing faltered, lungs frozen with anticipation. The Dread Wolf now possessed his prize. Hungrily, lips pressed and sucked, bruising the skin beneath. A sign which would, luckily, remain hidden from the realm of the waking.
Rook gasped, rivulets of heat dripping to their stomach. If this was what fate had in store for them, Rook did not mind. His narrow nose drew a line across their skin, flesh following the muscle beneath as he sniffed and caught their scent. This, Rook knew for certain, was the man they were destined to be with forever.
Caught in his arms, Rook grabbed his hand and bowed their head, rolling their tongue around his thumb. A promise of what was to come. Getting to experience something like this for all eternity could hardly be a reason to struggle. The seer must have spoken of their current predicament. The Evanuris and the Veil. The latter was not much of a problem. As much as he might still aim to tear it down, never would he truly follow it through. Not on Rook’s watch. Being with them. Talking with them. It would be enough to change his ways. Reveal a different forward. It was not a battle against destiny if Rook’s arguments rang true.
Rook was thirty-one years old. The treacherous tip of his dagger glinted before the rivers of light tearing down the sky. From each glowing crack spilt the colours of the Fade into reality. Flares of raw magic radiated heat against their skin, singeing the fine hairs on their face. Rook struggled, pushing their body back and forth against his spell. Fat lot of use it did. Their shoulder had some leeway, so they trashed, again and again and again. Each time, the barrier pushed back, slamming their sore flesh into the tiles beneath.
Fate will throw an event in your path that shall change your life forever.
Tears pricked at their eyes. Shades of purple and green spread and twirled around the statues. Around Taash with their mouth spread wide in a petrified battle cry and around Neve frozen with her staff mid-swing.
Solas, alive, blurred on top of the stairs, pale skin melting into his dark armour. High and mighty, he turned and gazed down at them. His words were soft brushes of a thumb against their cheeks, and pats upon their shoulders as his thoughts invaded their mind. I know it hurts, Rook, but I promise once you have seen the world restored, you will understand. Between the bruises clinging to his jaw and the lines of blood dried black, his mouth dared to curl into a faint smile. Given time, you will even come to love the world again.
For one final time, Solas slashed his dagger across the sky, cutting through the last thread that kept the Veil in place. Unleashed, the spurts of raw magic coalesced into one giant tidal wave and slammed into their team. Taash’ arm shattered and fell. The glint of their golden axe dulled as it got swept up by the tide and torn away. Neve’s face crumbled apart the second it touched her.
Mouth wide open, Rook’s vocal cords vibrated till their lungs were on fire. The magic did not reach them, did not touch them. Why? Why?
A slight shimmer clung to their vision. Sparks of blue jumped at every speck of dirt. Rook bit their lips, the tang of salt and copper attacking their senses. A barrier. Its creator approached, a shadowy figure embraced by the light of Thedas’ doom. One word, one command, pressed against their eyelids. Sleep.
Rook was a couple of millennia old. Maybe even more. The end of old age had made that a rather pointless thing to keep track of. It was like counting minutes. Useful for the first one hundred and twenty, but pointless thereafter.
You are destined to be together forever.
They rolled onto their side, sleek sheets slipping from their shoulder, and watched him. Steadily, his chest rose and fell while Solas slumbered. In the first fifty years, it had seemed so easy. For their team. For their world. Grab his own dagger and slit his throat. A man asleep could not defend himself. But there were the fears. A familiar body slowly transforming, growing strange. Round ears sharpening, eyes growing in size and gaining a reflective edge.
Rook shivered, tugging a long curl behind their ear. It wasn’t as long as his. Merging the Fade and the Waking World had merely awakened the parts that the Veil’s existence had robbed them of. Once this thief was slain, their body grew into what it should have been from the start. Or at least, that was his view on the matter.
Fully themselves now. Perfect. Vhenan, his heart. Repositioning the blanket over their shoulder, Rook moved closer and curled their arm around his waist. Asleep, he appeared innocent and young. The worry lines etched into his forehead were but echoes of a pain far away. All that remained were the soft smile crinkles near his closed eyes and his slightly parted lips. Lips which, on occasion, twisted and rounded as speech lost to them left his mouth.
Too bad each movement was too small to read. Rook rested their head against his shoulder. They would love to know what he was muttering at this very moment. Pleasantries or admittance of wrongdoing. Sure, they liked the world, but to claim they loved it was to spout lies. A part of them, Rook closed their eyes, was never going to forgive him for that.
The gentle pulse of his heart pressed into their jaw, a two-part pattern. Short-long, short-long. Its presence soothed them, a balm to their aching mind. After all these years, the memories still hurt. How naïve they’d been, thinking they could ever change his mind.
Rook focused on their own breathing, taking deep breaths in and out. A pattern to accompany his. Time to pretend again that the past mattered no more. Erased from their head until it dug its claws again in the cracks of the facade. It hurt less this way, and that was for the best. After all, this was forever, and forever knew no end.