#Modern person in thedas fics never cover this
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Logically Speaking
I see all these fics where a person is transported into Thedas, but like...what about the diseases this person has? I never see this being talked about, but a modern human is basically a petri-dish to Thedas people. It would be like the Spanish coming to the Americas, they have no resistances to our diseases. Imagine a person being transported to the world of Dragon Age and they have to worry about killing everyone around them just by coughing, especially if they aren't the Warden or the Inquisitor. They could potentially kill the hero of the story. Along with that, what if Thedas has diseases that the mc has never even heard of-- if the mc gets infected, they're screwed because they don't have immunity either. This is never brought up, and I wasn't sure if anyone else considered this? Anyway, just a thought I was sitting on.
#dragon age#dragon age inquisition#dragon age origins#Modern person in thedas fics never cover this#and im so interested in what would happen.
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Guess who forgot to post to Tumblr last week?
Me. It was me. And then both @lunadys and I dropped the ball and missed the day we were supposed to upload on AO3 this week.
Sooooooo. Last Week's chapter is up, and you get 2 this week as an apology. ❤️
Link to our Fic and Summary below the cut cause why not?
The Path Not Taken (147323 words) by Heldpeach, LilllithDraagon Chapters: 24/? Fandom: Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age Rating: Explicit Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death Relationships: Other Relationship Tags to Be Added, Solas/Original Female Character(s), Solas (Dragon Age)/Original Character(s), Original Female Character/Original Female Character, Herald of Andraste & Original Female Character, Zevran Arainai/Orignal Character(s) Characters: Original Female Character(s), Solas (Dragon Age), Other Character Tags to Be Added, Varric Tethras, Kitty (Dragon Age), Cassandra Pentaghast, Original Inquisitor Character(s) (Dragon Age), The Iron Bull (Dragon Age), Sera (Dragon Age), Vivienne (Dragon Age), Zevran Arainai Additional Tags: Canon-Typical Violence, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Unreliable Narrator, Tags May Change, Blood and Gore, Eventual Romance, Romance Secondary to Plot, Modern Girl in Thedas, MGiT, Modern Character in Thedas, Eventual Smut, Slow Burn, Dark Shit is Dark, They almost die a lot, It only gets more unhinged as you go, Major character death - Freeform, Ocs are musicians, they're all idiots, trust the tags, Dubious Morality, Fake Pregnancy, Fake Miscarriage, allusions to rape, gross and dumb plans, it's not dumb if it works, Angst, Heavy Angst, Depression, reference to suicide, Flirting, Also all the sexual tension known to man, Swearing, Music, don't do drugs, this has TV show formula, It Just Does, i don't make the rules, who paused the slow burn?, fake lovers to real lovers Series: Part 1 of Worth It Summary: Use of Australian Spelling Added Cover Art 7/11/2023 {Do you ever get that feeling of wanderlust? Like you want to travel but nowhere quite evokes the emotions you want? Sometimes, I have this yearning for home, the place my heart belongs. I left pieces of my heart in Thedas, though I’ve never been there in person… In Haven, in Skyhold, in Crestwood. And travelling to those places always feels like I’ve found myself again. For what is home but the first place you run towards when your soul is weary? A heart doesn’t know the difference between reality and fiction} - LillithDraagon. All Stories must start somewhere. Two Australian women are suddenly transported to the world they have only seen through a screen. Containing their excitement at their fresh start, they must face this new world and all of the dangers within it. It won’t be easy by any means. Especially not when they find themselves embroiled in the events of Dragon Age Inquisition. What fate awaits them? Will their new lives be worth the struggles they face? (Asterisks mark smut chapters.) !!!NOT A SELF INSERT!!! (lmfao) Part 1 is complete. Part 2 is currently being posted weekly.
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Ao3 is back up so have a link to the fic. Tags below cut.
The Path Not Taken (117245 words) by Heldpeach, LilllithDraagon Chapters: 20/? Fandom: Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age Rating: Explicit Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death Relationships: Other Relationship Tags to Be Added, Solas/Original Female Character(s), Solas (Dragon Age)/Original Character(s), Original Female Character/Original Female Character, Herald of Andraste & Original Female Character Characters: Original Female Character(s), Solas (Dragon Age), Other Character Tags to Be Added, Varric Tethras, Kitty (Dragon Age), Cassandra Pentaghast, Original Inquisitor Character(s) (Dragon Age), The Iron Bull (Dragon Age), Sera (Dragon Age), Vivienne (Dragon Age), Zevran Arainai Additional Tags: Canon-Typical Violence, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Unreliable Narrator, Tags May Change, Blood and Gore, Eventual Romance, Romance Secondary to Plot, Modern Girl in Thedas, MGiT, Modern Character in Thedas, Eventual Smut, Slow Burn, Dark Shit is Dark, They almost die a lot, It only gets more unhinged as you go, Major character death - Freeform, Ocs are musicians, they're all idiots, trust the tags, Dubious Morality, Fake Pregnancy, Fake Miscarriage, allusions to rape, gross and dumb plans, it's not dumb if it works, Angst, Heavy Angst, Depression, reference to suicide, Flirting, Also all the sexual tension known to man, Swearing, Music, don't do drugs, this has TV show formula, It Just Does, i don't make the rules, who paused the slow burn? Series: Part 1 of Worth It Summary: Use of Australian Spelling Added Cover Art 7/11/2023 {Do you ever get that feeling of wanderlust? Like you want to travel but nowhere quite evokes the emotions you want? Sometimes, I have this yearning for home, the place my heart belongs. I left pieces of my heart in Thedas, though I’ve never been there in person… In Haven, in Skyhold, in Crestwood. And travelling to those places always feels like I’ve found myself again. For what is home but the first place you run towards when your soul is weary? A heart doesn’t know the difference between reality and fiction} - LillithDraagon. All Stories must start somewhere. Two Australian women are suddenly transported to the world they have only seen through a screen. Containing their excitement at their fresh start, they must face this new world and all of the dangers within it. It won’t be easy by any means. Especially not when they find themselves embroiled in the events of Dragon Age Inquisition. What fate awaits them? Will their new lives be worth the struggles they face? (Asterisks mark smut chapters.) !!!NOT A SELF INSERT!!! (lmfao) Part 1 is complete. Story will be on hiatus until part 2 is ready for posting.
So... AO3 is down right now as I'm sure everyone is freaking out over. However, I went ahead and drew the coverart for our fic because... reasons. Took me 15 hours. Black & white and outline versions under the cut.
#da fanart#my fanfic#the path not taken#dragon age#ao3 fanfic#Lavi#Deka#my beloved children#I cannot get over the cover art tho#egwopihgfoiehgfiwefewf
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I posted 2,093 times in 2021
53 posts created (3%)
2040 posts reblogged (97%)
For every post I created, I reblogged 38.5 posts.
I added 763 tags in 2021
#dragon age - 311 posts
#cats - 95 posts
#mass effect - 86 posts
#solas - 64 posts
#tes - 46 posts
#long post - 36 posts
#lord of the rings - 35 posts
#tas talks - 33 posts
#star trek - 30 posts
#signal boost - 27 posts
Longest Tag: 135 characters
#she cuddled with more way more last night. was it a birthday treat? or bc its getting cool at night? or... does she fear replacement...
My Top Posts in 2021
#5
Six Sentence Sunday!
Here’s the modern Thedas fic I’ve been working on b/c everything else is for the zine/calendar. A small snippet of texts that I haven’t figured out how I want to format yet.
Also ty to the ppl who tag me! I don’t have new stuff to share every week b/c work sometimes be like that, but I appreciate the tags!
[Ian]: Feeling cute. Shame you’re not here to enjoy it.
[Solas]: I can admire it from here.
[Ian]: Not the way I want you to. ;)
A breath of laughter parts his lips, which he covers with one hand to disguise his smile. That premise in mind, his mind is drawn to different details: how the strap drapes part-ways off his shoulder, how the sheer fabric allows an impression of what lies beneath, how high the hem falls across the thigh. It’s easy to imagine how he might ‘enjoy it,’ as Ian puts it. His thumb drags across his phone, curiosity piqued.
[Solas]: What did you have in mind?
17 notes • Posted 2021-10-17 15:02:50 GMT
#4
My, uh, actual current personal WIP is nsfw and I don’t really want to post it on this blog atm. The finished work will likely be linked to AO3 with only SFW stuff here. My focus rn besides that is the Solamancy zine or the DA Calendar fics which I can’t share much of, so I hope you’ll accept meta writing instead!
This is a piece from my WIP that takes a look at spirits throughout the DA series and reinterprets their actions so they’re not just conveniently non-human cannon fodder, beginning with Mouse (the first spirit/demon any Warden possibly meet). This section is about the rage demons we fight in Origins in the Denerim Alienage’s orphanage.
Rage
We meet many Rage demons in Origins and throughout the series, but the spirit I’m referring to are the ones we meet in the Alienage’s orphanage. The recent site of a massacre, the orphanage is now home to a spirit of Rage who attacks those who enter. Rage, I thought, was a curious choice, when Despair and Terror exist. Although the fact that they probably didn’t want to make a new spirit model for this one sidequest would probably explain it on a development level, but then I wondered— whose rage?
The spirits don’t seem to embody the rage of the people who massacred the orphanage, or even the rage of the victims. They tell the Warden and Ser Otto that they “do not belong here” and one is furious that the party has killed “my brood.” I think the presence of the spirits here is indicative of how helpful or benevolent spirits can be twisted by the horrors of our world, that they were drawn by the misery of what happened at the orphanage and upon witnessing it they became enraged. They are ultimately protecting nothing, just an empty building that’s probably best torn down or cleared out, or whatever the elves of Denerim’s Alienage decide they need to properly mourn. Yet as we walk through the building the screams of children still play around us, it’s still happening for them. In the final encounter of the quest, the Rage demon targets and kills Ser Otto (assuming those mabari you encounter like two minutes in don’t get him first) out of your entire party. It makes sense, he is representative of the human justice that allows horrors like this, and what’s more— how many orphans were taken from the orphanage’s midst by people wearing armour just like his, never to return?
The rage demons had every right to be angry, even if their anger manifested in a harmful way. The real tragedy is that, outside of Denerim’s Alienage, most people weren’t.
17 notes • Posted 2021-10-27 14:52:00 GMT
#3
Happy Sunday! Here’s the first few lines from my fic that’s kind of a sequel to @/theshirallen’s fic With No Heart to Recall. It begins with Solas plotting a little trip to Crestwood with Ian. Don’t let this very gentle slice-of-life opening fool you it’s gonna get angsty in here. No one is gonna have a good time.
“What are you working on?” Thora asks her question quietly and close to his ear, hanging over the couch with her feet suspended in the air to get a look at what Solas holds in his lap. “Is that a map?” As he jerks away she slides onto the couch cushions, a little laugh upon her lips.
“Yes.” An annoyed flap of his papers punctuates his answer, straightening the drooping corners so they point towards the ceiling. “Though I don’t see what business it is of yours.”
“It is my castle,” she says, “and my room.” In that respect, she’s correct, though it’s difficult to forget the fact. The entire room is sized for her, from the library shelves to the very couch he’s curled on. Should he choose to stretch his legs he would find his knees jutting a foot off the floor, angled awkwardly toward the ceiling. Thankfully, he is comfortable enough as is.
21 notes • Posted 2021-11-07 15:20:06 GMT
#2
We Tame the Sky
Pairing: f!Cadash / Josephine Fandom: Dragon Age: Inquisition Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No warnings apply
In the quiet before the final approach on Haven, Thora Cadash and Josephine share a moment together in Skyhold's chapel.
Written as a fill for Spronky as a part of the @/sapphic-solstice event!
Read on AO3 here.
Sitting in the quiet of Skyhold’s chapel, Thora begins to see why her ancestors favoured the stone so. Being born Casteless she had always been as likely to choose a sun-soaked field over a well-lit cave, but tonight is different. Outside, the light breaks in a sickly green over the Frostbacks, scattering across the sky like a spotlight through the pieces of a shattered mirror. Thunder rumbles without storm clouds, booming with Corypheus’ ambition. Beneath the stone chapel ceiling it's not easy to forget the chaos that threatens to tear their world asunder, but peace seems a little more feasible here. The harsh light of a Breach wrenched open is blocked out by a heavy wooden door, and she sits awash in the scent of incense, beneath the watchful eyes of the Maker’s chosen.
She kneels before Andraste, her hopes and dreams clasped between her palms as they come together in prayer. She sings a prayer for those who will ride beside her into the abyss, perhaps never to return, a prayer for those she’s leaving behind, with nothing but belief to buoy their hopes for the future.
And one for herself, should Andraste have any grace to spare.
“You have walked beside me Down the paths where a thousand arrows sought my flesh. You have stood with me when all others Have forsaken me.”
The prayer for the despairing comes too easily to her, the hymn had played a companion to her countless times through the years, but never had its words rang more clearly in her heart than tonight, as she steeled herself to face Corypheus one last time. She can’t pretend she knows what was in Andraste’s heart as she stood before the gates of Minrathous with her army at her flank, but this is likely the closest she’ll ever come to knowing.
“I am not alone. Even As I stumble on the path With my eyes closed, yet I see The Light is here.”
Though the chant evokes the Maker’s light, it’s no longer His face she sees as she closes her eyes, lips pressed against her thumbs in reverent devotion. Before Him come the faces of her friends, the brilliance of Cassandra’s sword as it cleaves through their foes, the glow of Solas’ staff as he cuts through the Deep Roads’ dark, the soft gleam in Josephine’s eye as a smile spreads her lips. Heavensent or no, those were the lights that had gotten her this far.
“There you are.” The sound of Josephine’s voice startles Thora from her prayer, with thoughts of her so near at hand she’d almost thought she imagined it. She looks over in time to see her step lightly through the door, her slippers just a whisper against the floor. “I had thought to find you in the garden, but…” The distant roar of the Breach completes her thought in fewer words. She’d often take her evening prayers beneath the bows of the maple trees, preferring their sanctuary to the small chapel that harboured most of Skyhold’s believers, but she’ll find no peace under them tonight— nor any night until her job is done. Josephine’s lips turn in a smile, a practised expression Thora had seen persist in the darkest circumstances, but it strains now. “Well, what matters is I’ve found you now.”
Thora’s words stick in her throat, all she can do as she rises to her feet is stare dumbly. There always seems too much to say between herself and Josephine to know where to begin.
Thankfully, Josephine always seems to find a way. “I suppose it won’t be long now,” she says.
“It’s just a matter of time.” She wishes they could find anything other than the oncoming fight to talk about, but it may be asking too much of them both. Corypheus is difficult to ignore even at the best of times, now that the ruins of Haven tremble at their doorstep every thought is stained by his influence. “I thought I’d see if I could get a few words in before we set out.”
This time the smile that graces Josephine’s features sneaks up on her, chased by a short breath of laughter. “If it’s good fortune you’re after, I may have just the thing.” Before Thora can so much as ask, the ambassador produces a flag of cloth from the folds of her doublet, flourishing it with a street magician’s flair. “Do you recognise it? The pattern, that is.” She proffers it forward, supporting the fabric with the tips of her fingers so the image lays flat before her eyes. She doesn’t need long to know what she’s looking at (she’d spent far too many hours looking for the blasted thing to ever mistake it): a proud ship sails across an unruly sea, the bow cutting through choppy waves and rendering them calm.
“Your family crest…”
“Soon its likeness will fly above a fleet of ships that will rival the great houses of Antiva, but this one is yours.”
“Mine?”
She nods. “My favour may not have the same weight as Andraste, but if it can accompany you where I cannot, then I give it gladly. May I see your hand?”
Thora immediately extends her right arm, then draws it back just as quick. “No, wait,” she says, offering forward the other, fingers closed into a loose fist to contain the faint buzz of the Anchor. “This one could probably use it more.”
“Naturally.” She winds the handkerchief up so it resembles a bracelet, coiling the fabric up like a rope and measuring it against her slender wrist before she tries Thora’s. Curled ringlets coil around her ears as she leans over to tie it properly, and in all the chaos of Corypheus’ attack she’s still found the presence of mind to perfume herself. Thora discovers this herself as she breathes slowly, and tries to forget her daydreams. “I’m afraid I’ve little else to offer but my hopes, Corypheus has proven most resilient to my charms.” The fabric slides across the smooth finish of her gauntlets without purchase, and then again, each time reset by the patient hand of Lady Montilyet. At last it catches against the details, winding around dwarven runes that spell the Cadash house words in an alphabet that rarely saw sunlight. The sight of her words and the Montilyet crest winding together around her wrist moves something in her. It creeps up her ribs and into her throat and blossoms. Not for the first time since they’ve met, Thora finds herself grateful you can’t choke to death on love.
She ties the knot once, twice, and Thora thinks she sees some reluctance as they fall away to her sides. “May you tame the sky as we tamed the sea, Lady Cadash,” she says in a trembling voice, her words straining against her fears.
“Josephine, I—” Brown eyes rimmed with tears look up at Josephine. The sharp end to her sentence is a keen reminder that while she can’t choke to death on love, she sure can still choke. “I’m…” What she wants to say more than anything feels selfish to say, now more than ever, when her death is so near at hand. What good would it do her to die with no regrets, if it meant sentencing Josephine to a lifetime of them? She grinds her hopes beneath her heel, and tells herself that, should she live to see morning, there’ll be nothing stopping her anymore.
Even if it’s a lie, it’s a lie that can get her through this moment.
“Thank you,” she manages after a moment of tear-induced silence. “I’m... I don’t- I don’t know what to say.”
“You don’t have to say anything.” She folds her hands around Thora’s, cupping the armour-clad knuckles between tender fingers, like her glove was wrought with silk and not steel. “Just come back to us, please.”
Her heart constricts with the burden of a promise she may not keep. The sky calls her name, spelling her doom in the air with the ruins of her first failure, but Josephine’s words have worked miracles for her before. “I’ll do my best, I always— oh.” A distant horn blows, signalling her departure, and their farewell. Eyes laced with tears, she turns to the statue of Andraste as though she were a friend forgotten in the tide of the conversation. “I didn’t get to finish.”
The threads of Josephine’s smile start to unravel, grief twisting the manners from the corners of her lips. “I will finish it for you, Inquisitor,” she says in a voice laid thick with tears she wants desperately to dab from her cheeks. “Go with Andraste’s grace.” Her hands tremble as they release Thora’s, only finding stability as they lace together in prayer. As her footsteps echo with her retreat, she hears Josephine’s voice lift in song, words burdened with her weeping but warm with the Maker’s light.
See the full post
28 notes • Posted 2021-07-06 15:50:56 GMT
#1
It is a disquieting revelation, knowing his worth does not lessen the more he is known; all the rage and misery Ian witnessed in him these past few weeks hasn’t lessened the love in his eyes. (x)
I had the pleasure of commissioning @/artist-rat (commission info here!) to illustrate a scene from a Solavellan fic I wrote earlier this year. They did such a great job bringing the moment to life and I’m still screaming!! Look at them!!! They’ve in love and the world is a mess!!!!
Ian (he/him) is created and written by @/theshirallen. He’s non-binary so please don’t tag this m!solavellan or f!solavellan please and thank you!
144 notes • Posted 2021-11-28 02:09:43 GMT
Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →
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How to Win Wars and Influence Nobles (Ch. 1)
Rating: E for Explicit/NSFW Content!
Check it out on AO3!
You'd think a video game lawyer could just drop into a pseudo-medieval universe filled with magic and demons and be totally okay with it, right?
Nah.
In the wake of her brother, Spencer's, disappearance, Belle dropped into Thedas with luggage, but without a clue. After brief but memorable panic attack, she resolved to be the best goddamn lawyer Thedas had ever seen. Even if she was the only goddamn lawyer Thedas had ever seen. And even if that obstinate asshole, Cullen, wouldn't stop giving her the side-eye every time she walked into a room...Or every time he walked into a room with her in it...Or every time they walked into a room together...Or--Fuck it. You get it.
Hey everyone! With very little fanfare or introduction, and many prayers that you like it, welcome to my pseudo-self-insert/self-indulgent, modern girl in Thedas fic! I know, I know, the trope. In my defense, I had no idea this was a thing until after I started writing. So...whoops. ^_^;;
In any case, I hope you enjoy!
Chapter 1: The Big-Ass Hole and the Big Asshole
“Max!” Belle’s voice was being drowned out by the long-winded worry of her paralegal. He was such a smart guy but she’d be good goddamned if he wasn’t just a scared little puppy sometimes. On and on he went, barely taking a breath as he went over the plans for her two-week absence from their firm—as if they hadn’t been discussing them for weeks already. She represented a number of video game companies in various actions, but Max was more concerned about her general counsel work for a larger company. She’d already notified her clients of her impending absence and told each of them which associates would be handling her caseload, so she had no earthly idea why he was so stressed.
Of course, stress management had come naturally to her for a very long time. Working as a 9-1-1 operator through law school would do that to a person. It had also made her very impatient with nervous people who screamed or spewed out copious volumes of information at a pace no one could keep up with, much like Max was doing at that very moment. Her hands balled up into fists on instinct, jaw clenching in an attempt to manage her irritation before she shouted at her friend and colleague while standing in the street in front of her apartment complex. It didn’t work.
“Max!!!” she shouted again, so loud she attracted the attention of a passerby. Belle ducked her head, staring at a particularly dark gum stain in the sidewalk below. This was Orange County, and everyone yelled at people on their cellphones in the street, but it didn’t make it any less embarrassing.
Max’s voice abruptly ceased it’s prattling, giving Belle a moment’s peace to collect her thoughts before speaking again. After a slow exhale, she said, “Max, we’ve been over this. Several times in fact. Everything will be fine. I’m just going to my parents’ house for a couple of weeks. They don’t even live that far away. I can catch a flight back if there’s some life-threatening emergency. You. Need. To. Chill. Dude. I’m gonna hang up now because my Uber is supposed to be here in, like, two minutes. Deep breaths, Max. It’ll be fine.”
As promised, Belle dropped the phone away from her ear, giving the red symbol on the screen a little tap to disconnect before dropping the device into the purse slung over her shoulder. “Ooooh,” she groaned, dropping her head back with her eyes shut tight. “Lord give me strength.”
The fresh silence dropped her back into her own mind to focus on what she should have been worried about. It had been almost three months since her half-brother, Spencer, went missing. He and Belle lived pretty close to each other, and were just generally pretty close. She’d never really understood why he wanted to be a firefighter. He was smart as a fucking whip—could have been anything—but he was a damn good firefighter. He promoted like a rocket after finishing his Bachelor’s Degree, only twenty-two and already a lieutenant. It made his disappearance all the more confusing.
He’d gone out for his morning run and just vanished into thin air. He’d had his cellphone on him, and took the knife he used for protection. And Spencer was no small man. His build made men and women swoon and fawn over him in bars. It was rather obnoxious, really. Belle always thought him the prettier of the two of them, his attractive bronze complexion a stark contrast to her easily burnt alabaster skin—he was more like his mother than their father—and striking blue eyes much brighter than her hazel ones. He was tall, fit, and well-muscled where she was still tall, but a bit chubby with a round face and ample bosom and backside. She liked chips, cheese, and chocolate—appetites she was unwilling to abandon to save her a little spare flesh.
All that said, Belle had been paying the rent on Spencer’s apartment in addition to hers for two months in the hopes that he would come back or be found, and the police still had no leads. It was time to go see her father and stepmother and find out what they thought the next steps should be. The idea of giving up hope on her little brother was still too much, but she was, above all, a pragmatist. She couldn’t afford to keep paying double rent every month, and she didn’t have room for all of his stuff in her apartment. But there was no way in fresh hell that she would get rid of even a scrap of it. So she was hopeful their parents would be willing to chip in for a storage unit, one close enough to Belle’s apartment that she could go and visit Spencer’s things from time to time.
Their parents had once given them matching hamesh necklaces—the Jewish symbol for protection—hers in gold and his in white gold, though he rarely wore his in public. He thought it was too gaudy. But Belle knew for a fact that he’d been keeping it in with his turnout gear, and had dug it out of his duffle bag two weeks after he’d gone missing. She took to wearing his charm on the chain with hers. The religious symbolism of it didn’t really bring her any comfort—she wasn’t terribly religious, after all. It was more the feeling of having something of him with her that kept the charm fastened around her neck.
She ran her thumb across the back of his gleaming hamesh as she stared down the street in the direction her phone had told her the Uber would appear. The app said two minutes five minutes ago, but it wasn’t unusual for them to get caught in traffic. The fingers of her other hand tapped at the smooth plastic handle of her rolling luggage, a combination of nerves and impatience conquering her resolve in their tiny physical manifestation. Half her life was packed in the carry-on check bag duo, including outfits for nearly every foreseeable occasion. Much of her family thought it would be wise to convene at the same time, since Belle and Spencer were so rarely able to visit, so she had to be prepared for any eventuality.
Always prepare for any eventuality. It was a mantra that made for a good first responder and a good lawyer. Predict, prepare, preempt. Her mind chanted it over and over, even as she took stock of herself one last time before the Uber’s supposed arrival.
Her curly-wavy copper-red hair was freshly washed, her curtain fringe meticulously straightened over her forehead and just brushing against the top of her oversized prescription sunglasses. The overall length had been growing out well with the painstaking care she’d taken of it after chopping off over two feet a little over a year ago—it was already to her armpit. The gauzy, short sleeved lavender tunic she’d chosen for the day shouldn’t set off any detectors at the TSA checkpoints, and was heat-appropriate given the unseasonably hot autumn weather. Her skinny jeans hugged her curves tight, likely because they, too, were freshly washed. She twisted and stretched her legs a bit awkwardly at that thought, hoping to loosen her pants up a bit before getting on the plane where the waistband would undoubtedly cut uncomfortably into her gut. She already knew the black yoga mat flip flops on her feet would be shucked the second the wheels left the ground. She preferred her feet bare.
The thumb that had been stroking Spencer’s hamesh moved to massage the back of her left earlobe—a habit she’d developed to cope while her right ear had still been perpetually covered with a headset. It stuck with her long after she left dispatching to become an attorney, though she learned to manage it when clients were grating on her nerves. But in that moment, her aggravation mounted with every passing second the Uber driver didn’t appear. Geoff. She stared at his picture on her phone. He was older than the average Uber driver, his cheerful smile and more gray than brown beard at once welcoming and unsettling. What the fuck was taking him so long?
Belle’s skin crawled as goosebumps raced down her arms and legs, her hair rising skyward. She glared down at her arm, and caught a glimpse of her red curls spreading and separating, lifting away from her shoulders. It was like that time she touched the static ball at the science museum. The faint hum of electricity buzzed in her ears and coursed through her veins. Her eyes darted about, fear rising rapidly in her gut. Nothing around her was moving. Nothing seemed at all affected by whatever was happening to her.
A deafening crack made her scream and flinch, her right hand still clutching her bags even as her left flew up to block her face from what she was certain was an explosion. Instinct dropped her forearm away from her eyes. If someone was hurt, she could help.
No one was hurt. What she saw was worse than carnage. Less than two feet in front of her hung a hole. Not a hole in the ground, but in the air. It was surrounded by neon green tendrils of light that seemed to reach out like paralyzed lighting, striking the ground constantly and in only one place per filament. At the center of it was something her mind would only describe to her as a wormhole. It was black inside, but also not black inside. Faint images of something peeked through the darkness, distorted by space and time.
Belle didn’t know enough about wormholes. In her Wikipedia wanderings, she’d read some wild theories—stuff about time travel and inter-dimensional transportation—and some more scientific works that mentioned how a wormhole could connect two points that were trillions of lightyears apart in a distance of just a few feet. In all her random reading about wormholes, however, she’d never heard mention of one popping open on an actual planet, let alone in a crowded metropolitan area right in front of someone’s face.
But there it was. Or at least that was the most her mind could comprehend of what floated in the air before her. Predict, prepare, preempt, she thought. How, exactly, would her mantra apply to a random green glowing wormhole in the middle of a residential street in Orange County? She considered her options, her static-frizzed hair rising up around her cheeks, almost crackling in the charged air. Run. She should run away. That’s what people were supposed to do when disruptions in the space-time continuum opened in front of their faces, right? Run? Run.
Before she had the chance to finish pivoting away from the anomaly, another cacophonous crack pierced the air around her. The opening seemed to come alive, the green glow and lighting rolling and fluctuating and reaching. One bolt of green lightning snapped, and she felt it hit her. But not like lightning. It didn’t strike and leave. It held onto her. It pulled her.
Belle screamed as loud as she could, emptying her lungs until they ached and holding onto the only things she could reach—her luggage and her carry-on. Stupid. The fucking things rolled. So fucking stupid. Still, she clutched at them with everything she had.
One sharp tug from the wormhole wrested her feet from the sidewalk. She shrieked again, still holding those stupid fucking rolling bags even as her body was sucked into the not-black blackness. They followed her into the wormhole. Maybe.
Oh God. I just died, didn’t I?
*****
“—econd one. I think it’s safe to assume that this was not a coincidence.”
“If it’s not a coincidence, then perhaps Corypheus is sending them through to infiltrate the Inquisition. She should be locked up in the cells until we find out why she’s here.”
“Or perhaps there is something less sinister at work here. The young man has proven himself quite useful to you over the past several months, hasn’t he?”
“And to you. While that may be true, I am nevertheless considering locking him up as well!”
Arguing. A French-sounding woman and a British man were arguing over Belle’s dead body. Or maybe her not dead body. Maybe her still alive and once again conscious body. What a coup it would be if she hadn’t died in a wormhole. Huzzah.
She chanced opening her eyes, praying all the while that she’d somehow been dosed with acid and made it to the airport where she passed out. Belle abhorred narcotics, but anything would have been preferable to what in absolutely no way could have happened. So she cracked her eyelids apart.
Subtle daylight peeked through a couple of thin slits that she supposed purported to be windows, skinny and useless as they were at providing any substantial form of light. They did manage to illuminate the space enough for her to tell that the walls were made of gray stone. Her sunglasses had been removed, and no one had bothered to replaced them with her regular glasses. Typical. Her vision wasn’t too terrible, though, so she squinted to make out her surroundings. The room was moderately sized, and filled with very old furniture. It all looked sturdy enough, if not terribly odd and plain. She wondered offhandedly about the decorating choices of the security staff at John Wayne Airport.
Her bags lay open on the smooth stone floor, her belongings ruffled, but not quite strewn about. Another tiny victory, she supposed. After all, it’s not as if one’s bags come flying through a wormhole in tow every day, let alone come out the other side intact. But she hadn’t gone through a wormhole, had she? She was still alive, and the man and woman were speaking English, so she must have been somewhere at least vaguely familiar. Right?
A tentative tilt of her head brought the still-arguing pair into Belle’s blurry view. The woman’s back was turned, though her figure—even hidden under some sort of old school chainmail and purple cloth hoodie—made it quite obvious that she was a woman. Wide-cuffed brown leather gloves and boots enveloped her extremities, making quiet shuffling noises as she shifted her weight to uncross and recross her arms.
The man, from what Belle could see without her glasses, may have been rather good-looking. His golden-blonde hair seemed slicked back away from his sunkissed face, though it was all a little…smudgy. She could make out a ridiculously large surcoat with a poofy collar made of…fur? Something? It draped over silvery armor that gleamed even in the weak light. His hands balled into fists at his sides until one would rise to point a very stern finger at the French woman.
Belle squinted hard, confusion prickling at every one of her senses. Something was definitely wrong. More wrong than the hallucinated wormhole.
“Did someone drag me to Medieval Times while I was unconscious?” she rasped, not realizing until she spoke that her throat was really goddamn dry. “Did the fucking Uber driver bring me here instead of the airport?” Fucking Geoff.
Perplexed, angry, and still indistinct eyes landed on her. The woman turned only her head, giving Belle the barest peek at her bobbed red hair and blue eyes. Her gaze was critical, appraising in its depth. Nothing new. It was something Belle had to contend with every time she walked into an executive’s office, or every time one walked into hers without having bothered to Google her first. She could always tell.
She sat up a little too quickly, and her head swam for a moment as she reached for her sunglasses on the small table beside the bed. Her purse was too far to go for her regular glasses, and she had no intention of staying wherever she was anyway. The other woman turned and the man scowled as she perched the plastic frame atop her nose, giving the bridge a tiny push with her middle finger.
Ah. Everything was much clearer. And the guy’s surcoat collar was definitely fur. Or faux fur. Fuck it, it had a fur-like consistency. His eyes had been just far enough from hers to stop her making out their color without her glasses. But even through the shaded lenses she could tell, then, that they were a very unique shade of amber. And he was good-looking. A years old scar bisected his upper lip just to the right of his nose to a flattering effect. She wondered if it was stage makeup for the show.
“Medieval times?” the French woman asked. “Are you referring to a place or an age?” The inner corners of her eyes narrowed almost undetectably.
“Oh God, here we go. So not Medieval Times, then? What are you guys, LARPers or something? That’s fine. That’s cool, man. I make my living with clients like you.” Belle slipped off the bed onto her knees as she prattled, closing and zipping her suitcase and carry-on and haphazardly throwing her purse over her shoulder. “Didn’t have to rifle through all my shit, but whatever.”
She stood with a sigh, all of her bags in hand and ready to move. “Okay, so I appreciate you both helping me out after I obviously went all…hallucinogenic and wandered away from in front of my complex. But I’m pretty sure that I’ve missed my flight by now, and I really need to get to the airport so I can get to my family’s house up north.” The faces staring back at her were unfazed—still assessing and agitated. Great. “Sooo, I’ll be going now, then.”
The little plastic wheels on her luggage rolled and clacked against the stone floor as she headed for the unfinished wooden door. These people took this shit far too seriously. The hooded woman’s arms never unfolded, though her eyes and head followed Belle as she passed. “A place or an age,” she thought. They can’t even be bothered to get out of character after a drugged woman shows up and passes out.
Just as she was about to reach the door, the large blonde stepped in front of her. Her chest nearly crashed into his silvery armor, and she staggered back a step to avoid the collision. She had to admit he cut a pretty impressive and imposing figure, even with his stupid red and black pimp coat. It was a thought that might have carried more weight had he not been looking down his nose at her. Unacceptable.
“Please move so I can leave.”
“You cannot leave. Not until we’ve uncovered what happened to bring you here.” His scar twitched with his almost imperceptible snarl.
“Thank you for your concern, but I’m fully capable of investigating that on my own. Now, please move so I can leave.”
“You cannot leave.” He spoke slower and louder. She could feel her blood starting to boil. No one was entitled to treat her like she was stupid.
Belle used her middle finger again to slide the bridge of her sunglasses down to the tip of her nose, tilting her chin up to meet the man’s unyielding amber eyes with her own. “I’m a lawyer, and even though it’s my job to stay out of court, I should tell you that I went to school with some very good plaintiff’s attorneys. If you do not move out from in front of the door and allow me to leave, I’ll be happy to sic one or two of them on you for false imprisonment, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and whatever other causes of action they can come up with to decimate your likely meager bank account.”
The arch of a blonde eyebrow was the big asshole’s only reply.
Okay, fuck this. “Listen, bro,” she said, letting her luggage stand alone in favor of poking him in his stupid chest plate. Her painted fingernail tinked against the metal. “I did not somehow get dosed, hallucinate myself through a fucking wormhole, and meander my way here just so I could be kidnapped by some overgrown, thick-skulled, takes-himself-too-seriously, LARPing motherfucker in a ridiculous coat and some weird hooded chick who likes to watch. So allow me to address you as you’ve seen fit to address me.” She cleared her throat. “Get. The fuck. Out. Of my way.”
He seemed shocked when her two-handed shove knocked him off balance, his eyes going wide as his back slammed into the unfinished wooden door. Self-satisfaction and adrenaline roiled through her body, flaring her nostrils and squaring her shoulders. Served him right.
But she hadn’t anticipated how fast he could move in heavy armor—an oversight she regretted instantly. She didn’t even see him move before she felt his hands squeezing her biceps, locking them to her sides. He wasn’t hurting her—she suspected that was an impressive level of self-restraint—just holding her in place. Under his furrowed brow, his warm, furious eyes darted back and forth between hers, searching for lord knew what. The woman’s voice sounded from Belle’s back just in time to save the asshole’s testicles from her knee.
“Let her go, Cullen.”
The creases between his eyebrows deepened as his scar stretched, reaching for his cheek. Belle could feel the slight heat of angry puffs of air leaving his nose. He looked to the hooded woman, disdainful as he spoke. “Let her go? Leliana, you cannot be serious. You, of all people, should seek to discern the reason for her presence here.”
“I do. And I have a feeling we shall have a better opportunity to find out if you let her leave.”
Belle craned her neck to glimpse the woman—Leliana. Her right arm had uncrossed itself, and her knuckle brushed to and fro under her chin. She had a look of certainty about her that was rather unsettling. The whole situation was rather unsettling. Something was so wrong. Belle’s mind screamed it over and over, pleading not to be ignored.
She turned her gaze back on the man still pinning her in place. Cullen. He was looking down at her again. She narrowed her eyes at him. “You heard mommy,” she snarled. “Let me go.”
The muscles on either side of his jaw expanded and contracted. “Fine.” He removed his hands from her arms, throwing them out to his sides in an impotent gesture of futility. “On your head be it.”
Belle nearly sobbed out her relief when he stepped out of her way. She talked a big game, but doubted she could have stopped him if he really wanted to hurt her. He was so much larger than her, and the self-defense she’d learned didn’t cover fighting an armored man. And threatening to sue someone didn’t always work. It certainly didn’t work on him. Pushing her glasses back up her nose and taking her luggage up behind her, she shoved the door open with her shoulder.
The first shriek that left her throat was reflexive. An icy gust of wind swept across her body and hurled the hem of her light tunic up to her chest. Why was it so cold?
The second shriek acted as a pronouncement of her terror and rage. Her surroundings were…not what they should have been. She stood atop a stone pathway on the outskirts of what looked like a huge castle. All around her, mountains jutted up from the earth to impossible heights, forming impossibly low valleys below. Everything but the castle—every fucking thing—was covered in a thick layer of snow. Blasts of freezing wind rushed sideways across her path, making little whistling sounds as they passed through gaps in the stones.
Her head whirled around to look behind her. Leliana and Cullen had followed her out, and stood just outside the doorway. Belle’s lip quivered. Whether it was due to the cold or her fear didn’t really matter.
“Where the fuck did you take me?” She backed away from them as she cried out her question, desperate to go home. She just wanted to go home.
“Only a few miles from where we found you,” Leliana said. She was calm. Too calm. Too fucking calm.
“Only a few fucking—Fuck you! It’s hot. It’s a hot September. They said it on the news. It’s supposed to be hot for weeks. There’s no snow.” Belle’s breath came in erratic, heavy puffs. Panic attack. Asthma attack. Who knew? Who cared? “There’s no snow for four hundred fucking miles. Where did you fucking take me? Where am I? Who the fuck are you people?” An unbidden tear trickled down her cheek, turning her skin to ice along its slow path.
The hooded woman was still too calm. “We are the Inquisition. We found you at the Temple of Sacred Ashes and brought you to our keep, Skyhold, in the Frostback Mountains.”
“God, just drop the fucking act!”
Leliana took a step forward. “I assure you, I am not acting. The year is 9:41 Dragon. I am Sister Leliana. This,” she held out her hand toward the blonde, who still eyed Belle warily, “is Commander Cullen Rutherford. We work with the Inquisition. You are in our keep—our home, Skyhold. We are on the Orlesian side of the Frostback Mountains in Thedas.”
“The—Thedas? That’s not—Not a place.” Belle’s every utterance was halting and disjointed, fragmented by wheezing breaths she couldn’t control. She was getting very dizzy. She was losing feeling in her fingertips and face. She was going to pass out.
“And Drag—Dragon is not…” Her eyelids fluttered. Her knees wobbled. Her head bobbed. “Not a year. It’s not even…”
Mercifully, everything went black before she hit the ground.
*****
Notes: Alright, so it's out there! I hope you liked the first chapter!!!
I'll be updating this fic as often as I can, but like my other two, it gets uploaded only if I have time to write it (because I still work full-time). I'll also be working on this at the same time as "Trial by Fire" (incidentally, if you haven't checked it out, give it a once over ^_~), so don't worry, that's still VERY much alive and kicking.
Anywho, thanks for starting this journey with me! I hope you have fun along the way!
#cullen#cullen rutherford#commander cullen#belle dolan#cullen x female#cullen x human#cullen x oc#mgit#self indulgence au#dragon age#dragon age inquisition#fanfic#htwwain
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In Which Blackwall Somehow Manages Not to Kill His Coworkers
A Knight Shop AU fic
So yes, the Knight Shop AU. Which involves so many people that I’m afraid I’m going to forget some. @trulycertain, @aphreal42, @sarcasmfish, @celeritassagittae, Tru’s mum, um... tell me who else and I’ll add them. It’s brilliant and so much fun.
It’s a modern-ish AU, basically Thedas/modern England, in which there exists a shop where one can hire knights. A knight shop. Hence the name. Typically, knights are hired to do odd jobs, attend social events, act as bodyguards, etc. etc. And many of our favorite Dragon Age characters are knights-for-hire.
The first chapter of Blackwall/Mirevas ridiculousness is here. Huge thanks to Tru and Aphreal for use of their characters and contributions to the writing.
“She’s absolutely brilliant, you know.”
Blackwall sighed and set down his magazine, bracing himself for more lovesick rambling about the accomplished young lady Alistair refused to admit he had fallen for. Blackwall should have known he wouldn’t be able to concentrate on transmission schematics when Alistair was on duty with him.
“I’ve never seen anyone who fights like her.” Alistair’s voice was dreamy as he scribbled in the margins of the ledger. Josephine was not going to be happy when she saw he’d doodled in her official paperwork. Again. “She spent all of yesterday teaching me all of the moves from the guy who beat her last time, so that if I learn to fence like him, she can practice against me-as-him and beat him next season. She’ll probably win the whole thing then. I told you she placed third this year, right?”
“Once or twice,” Blackwall said drily. In point of fact, Alistair couldn’t seem to shut up about it. Every time he was in a room with Blackwall, he found something new about his lady to rave about. And the tournament had been nearly a month ago.
At first, Blackwall was genuinely impressed. In his time in competitive fencing, he’d seen a handful of women qualify to compete in men’s tournaments, but he’d never heard of one placing so highly. Alistair’s lady was clearly a skilled fencer, and the boy had every right to be proud of her.
But being proud was one thing. Sharing the depth of his pride with every person he could corner into listening was another. Blackwall had retired from fencing nearly a decade ago, and for good reasons. He simply couldn’t maintain the obsessive level of interest in fencing he’d had when he was younger. And no one could maintain Alistair’s level of obsessive interest in this particular fencer.
Alistair prattled on, oblivious to the ever-increasing exasperation of his one-man audience. “I was able to copy the bloke’s remise pretty easily, once she showed me all the steps he’d used. Don’t ask how she remembered them all, by the way, because I have no idea how she can perfectly copy a set of attacks made against her one time weeks ago. I mentioned she’s amazing, didn’t I?”
“Once or twice,” Blackwall said again. As far as he could tell, it was Alistair’s favorite adjective when it came to his lady.
“The passata sotto took longer to get right.” Alistair winced, and Blackwall smirked into his beard at that typical novice reaction to a move that relied on a controlled crouch. “A lot longer. My legs are going to be sore for a week, at least. But she’s such a patient teacher, and I eventually got it, and then…”
The recitation was cut off by the shrill ring of the shop phone.
“Thank the Maker…” Blackwall moved to answer it, eager to hear any other conversation at this point, even if it was someone calling to complain. Or the persistent woman who kept insisting they stage some sort of joust for her son’s birthday party and refusing to accept it was not possible. Where would they even get and train the horses for that, much less transport them across town?
But Alistair was closer, and he grabbed the phone before Blackwall could get to it. “Knight Shop, how can we help?”
He paused, listening, then glanced at Blackwall. “Sure, let me just take a look at the rota.” Quickly, he flipped open the scheduling book. “Ah, sorry--Mirevas, was it? Blackwall is booked on Friday evening. Would you like someone else--”
Blackwall’s heart jumped into his throat. He sprang up from his seat, waving his hands wildly.
Alistair frowned. “Er--hang on a minute.” He pressed the mute button. “What?”
“I want this job,” Blackwall hissed.
The other knight raised an eyebrow. “But you’re already booked. Mrs. Renfrow.”
Blackwall grimaced. Mrs. Renfrow was a seventy-year-old woman who hired one of the knights to move heavy furniture around her house every week -- and then, unfailingly, decided she wanted it back the way it was and snapped at the knight for changing it. She had a nasty temper and a terrible superiority complex, and every single one of them hated working for her.
“Cover for me,” Blackwall begged.
Alistair let out a bark of laughter. “No way. I did it last week. It’s your turn.”
“Please. I’ll take your next turn.”
“Uh-uh. Friday’s my day off, and I have plans.”
Blackwall was getting desperate. “You can have the fee for both jobs.”
Alistair’s eyebrows went up.
Blackwall gritted his teeth. “Please.”
With an immense sigh, Alistair crossed his arms. “You’ll take my next two turns.”
Blackwall bobbed his head in agreement.
“And cover for me on Monday.”
“Yes, yes.”
“And--”
Blackwall growled in frustration. “Alistair.”
Alistair put up his hands in surrender, clearly aware that he’d pushed his luck to the limits. “All right, all right. I’ll do it. My plans are earlier in the day, anyway. Keep the fee for the second job.”
His plans were --
Blackwall glared at Alistair. He didn’t have plans at that time at all. He’d tricked Blackwall into--
Alistair held out the phone quickly. “Er, you’ll take this, then?”
Furious, Blackwall snatched it from his hand, then took a deep, calming breath. He didn’t want to sound angry when he spoke to Mirevas. When his breathing was even, he jabbed a finger at the mute button. “Hello. Mirevas?”
“Blackwall!” The golden tones of Mirevas’s voice were music to his ears. “Hello!”
“Hello.” He’d said that already. “Er--I understand you wish to request my services on Friday evening, my lady?”
“I do, yes. My artwork is being featured in a gallery show, and the opening is on Friday. I thought maybe -- if you were available -- well, I don’t think anyone else there will have a knight on their arm.”
Ah. So it was the novelty of bringing a knight that she wanted, not Blackwall himself. He pushed down his disappointment. It was a job, nothing more. Beautiful young women did not notice middle-aged men like him.
But--she’d asked for him specifically. She could have asked for Gal; she knew him better, after all. That meant--that had to mean--she wanted to see him. Blackwall.
“I would be honored to be on your arm, my lady.”
“Always a gentleman.” He thought he could hear the smile in her voice, and he closed his eyes and imagined it. “The opening begins at six and goes until ten. It’s at The June Gallery. Should we--do you want to meet there? Maybe fifteen minutes early, before the guests start to arrive?”
“Your wish is my command.”
Mirevas chuckled. “Right. Good. I’ll, ah, print the contract from your website, shall I? And...I’m looking forward to it.”
“As am I, my lady.”
“Goodbye, then.”
“Farewell.”
The line disconnected. Blackwall opened his eyes and gently set the phone back in its cradle.
“Does she fence?”
Blackwall turned to face Alistair. “What?”
Alistair tilted his head. “The lady. Does she fence?”
“No.” Blackwall didn’t even try to hold back his exasperation.
“And she’s worth two weeks of Mrs. Renfrow? Even though she doesn’t fence?” Alistair’s teasing smirk made Blackwall’s jaw clench, and with his usual instinct for recognizing a line right after he’d crossed it, Alistair quickly changed the subject. “So about the passata sotto…”
Blackwall put his head in his hands.
When he saw Mirevas the next day, he was completely caught off-guard. It was Wednesday; he had two days until the art gallery. Two days to spend every waking hour daydreaming about her, or so it seemed. Somehow, he couldn’t manage to think of anything else. Two days. Just a little over 48 hours, now. And then he’d have four whole hours in her presence.
He sat on a stool behind the shop counter and tried to follow the debate about music, but with little luck. Any other time, he would have had plenty to say about the merits of heavy metal as compared to the traditional jazz Gal’s Tevinter client was raving about. But Erren seemed to have the matter well in hand, and Blackwall knew that if Gal or Cassandra decided to join in, he’d likely approve of what they said. So Blackwall’s mind kept floating away, going back to--
Mirevas.
Mirevas.
Mirevas was stepping through the door.
For a moment, Blackwall thought he was still imagining her. But no, she was there. In the flesh. Physically standing before him. Her eyes scanned the shop, then focused on him.
Maker’s breath, this was real. He all but lurched off his stool, coming round the counter to greet her.
“Hello, Blackwall.” Mirevas smiled. Maker, he loved the way his name sounded on her lips. The two syllables had never been so beautiful.
“My lady.”
He couldn’t think of what to say next. Her brown eyes blinked as she tilted her head up to look at him, and Blackwall became aware of exactly how huge he was. Andraste’s ass, he had to be a foot taller than her. Suddenly his body seemed to take up entirely too much space.
As Mirevas continued to look up at him, Blackwall realized that he was staring at her silently like an idiot. Quickly, he tried to pull his thoughts together. “I wasn’t expecting to see you today, my lady.”
“Oh.” Mirevas looked down at her hand, and he realized she held a folded-up paper. “I thought I should come in and drop off the contract.”
Somewhere in the background, Blackwall dimly registered that music had started coming out of the break room.
“The contract, yes, of course.” Maker’s balls, he was a bloody git. “Thank you.”
Mirevas bit her lip. “I suppose I should have just emailed it to the shop.”
Lyrics began floating out to him. You catch his eye from across the room, you catch his eye…
“Not at all,” Blackwall said. “I’m--I’m very glad to see you, my lady.”
You think, oh my, he’s got quite the beard, oh my…
Blackwall’s head jerked up.
And now you want to but you can’t look away. His beard is black and bushy with a hint of grey…
Horrified, he turned back to see Erren standing next to the break room door looking entirely too casual.
And now you find yourself walking his way...
“Excuse me a moment--”
Without waiting for an answer, Blackwall lurched in the direction of the music, just in time to hear the song continue with the words, Hey hey, you should consider having sex with a bearded man!
Fucking hell, he was going to murder Erren.
You’ve got these feelings that you can’t understand, sex with a bearded man!
He banged through the door and lunged for the music player.
You think you can’t, but you can! Don’t try to fight, just get freaky with a beard tonight!
Desperately, Blackwall jabbed at the stop button, and the music thankfully cut off.
He slumped over in relief, but it was short-lived. Andraste’s fucking tits, how much of that had Mirevas heard?
He growled. Erren was going to regret the day she was born.
With barely controlled rage, Blackwall emerged from the break room, his eyes settling on Erren where she still stood, leaning against the wall. He took a step towards her.
Erren glanced at a non-existent watch on her wrist. “Look at that, it’s time for my break!” she trilled. With that, she darted for the front door and disappeared in a matter of seconds.
Blackwall took a deep breath, trying to calm himself. Later. He’d deal with her later. Right now he had to face Mirevas again.
Dear Maker, what would she think?
“...and I was thinking about what I could do on my other calf. Something to set off the work you’ve already done. I’m not sure what’d work best. Do you have any ideas?”
That was Gal. Blackwall looked over to see him standing next to Mirevas, who was nodding with interest.
“I could put together some sketches using the themes we’ve been discussing. You’re wanting to complete what you have into more of a coherent whole?”
“Exactly. I’d love to see what you’d come up with.”
Blackwall realized what was happening, and he wanted to kiss Gal. Which was not something he’d ever thought to want. But Gal had saved him. He’d distracted Mirevas with tattoo talk to keep her from noticing that horrible song. A weight lifted from Blackwall’s shoulders. All was not lost.
Gal glanced over at Blackwall. “You have business to take care of?”
“Indeed.” Blackwall pulled himself together as best he could and approached Mirevas once more. She stepped towards him, smiling that smile that always did him in.
“This is for you, then,” she said, holding out the paper.
“Thank you, my lady.” He reached to take it from her, and as she put it in his hand, her fingers touched his, sending a jolt of electricity through him. Had she done that on purpose? He hoped she’d done that on purpose.
He didn’t want to take his eyes off her, but if there was anything he’d learned from the last time he’d accepted a job with her, it was that he ought to be prepared. So he unfolded the paper and scanned it quickly, satisfying himself that there was nothing unexpected in this particular contract. A social obligation at an art show. It seemed simple enough. A Friday evening spent with the most magnificent woman he’d ever been lucky enough to lay eyes on. There was nothing he wanted more.
Mirevas tucked a strand of black hair behind a long, pointed ear. “Does everything look all right?”
“Perfect.” Blackwall set the paper down on the counter. “I shall count the seconds.”
Too much, it was too much. He shouldn’t say such things. She’d come seeking professional services, not a date. But Mirevas just ducked her head with a grin. “Such chivalry,” she said. “I look forward to it, too.”
She looked up at him once more, her piercing gaze locking him in place. For a moment, he thought he saw something in those dark eyes. Something...something…
Then she nodded and turned away, crossing to the door. With one last glance in his direction, she stepped outside, and he watched through the window as she walked quickly away.
Blackwall let out a breath and realized how wobbly his knees had become. He leaned his weight against the counter and tried to calm the fluttering of his heart.
“You’re going to her gallery opening, then?” Gal said.
Blackwall nodded.
“A gallery opening?” The Tevinter client -- Blackwall thought he’d heard him called Dorian -- squinted at him in undisguised scrutiny. “Is that...a common sort of job for you?”
Blackwall frowned at the man. “Not exactly.”
“I hadn’t thought so. No offense, but you look the sort one hires to lift heavy objects, that sort of thing.”
He bristled. “I can handle myself at an art gallery.”
“Of course you can,” Dorian said smoothly. “Tell me, what are you intending to wear?”
Blackwall opened his mouth to reply and found himself stuck. What was he going to wear?
The Tevinter nodded smugly. “That’s rather what I thought.”
Blackwall was caught between anger and despair. He would be fine at an art gallery. He would wear--erm, he would wear--
“Fear not.” Dorian stepped forward and patted Blackwall once on the arm. Blackwall’s answering glare caused the man to take a step back, but he continued in a patronizing tone, “I can help.”
“I don’t need help.”
The Tevinter ignored him. “You don’t want to look like you’re trying too hard, but you don’t want to look like a prat, either. Do you have anything in brocade?”
Blackwall glowered at the man.
“No, of course you don’t.” Dorian sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “You may need to make a shopping outing. A waistcoat, perhaps. Double-breasted. Yes, with an ascot. Very nice.”
Blackwall tried to picture himself in a double-breasted waistcoat and ascot, and immediately shook his head. “No.”
Dorian tilted his head. “Not an ascot? No, I suppose that might be a bit pretentious. Well, for you, anyway. A jauntily-tied scarf may be a better choice.”
In frustration, Blackwall looked towards Gal, who looked back at him blankly and shrugged.
At that moment, Cassandra made a disgusted noise, and all three of them turned to look at her. They’d entirely forgotten she was in the room.
“Wear a blazer,” she said. “And dress slacks. With a button-down shirt in a nice color. That will be enough.”
The Tevinter frowned. “I suppose, if you don’t want to be creative--”
“I don’t,” Blackwall interrupted.
“It’s better that you’re not.” Cassandra folded her arms. “You’re not an artist. You don’t want to make a spectacle of yourself. It may work for some--” she glanced at Dorian “--but it’s not for the uninitiated. No. Blazer, trousers, shirt. Top button undone. That’s all.”
They all blinked at her for a moment.
She huffed. “If there’s one thing you learn as a child in the Pentaghast household, it’s how to dress for social events. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have something to discuss with Josephine.” With that, she stepped past them all, knocked on the office door, and entered, closing the door behind her.
The three men looked at each other. Then Gal turned to Dorian. “We should go,” he said. “If you want me to sort out those shelves today.”
“Yes, yes,” Dorian answered in distraction, and followed Gal to the exit. Just before he left, Dorian looked back over his shoulder. “Cornflower blue,” he told Blackwall. “For the shirt. It will bring out your eyes.”
Then the door closed behind him, and Blackwall was alone.
Cornflower blue. Surreptitiously, Blackwall examined his reflection in the glass window. Hmm.
He’d think about it.
The song: “You Should Consider Having Sex With a Bearded Man”, by the Beards, from the album Having a Beard Is the New Not Having a Beard. It’s not exactly what I’d call an explicit song, but it’s not innocent either, so listen at your own risk.
Continuing on: Chapter 3 - In Which Blackwall Is Not Dalish
#knight shop au#blackwall#mirevas lavellan#dragon age au#trulycertain#aphreal42#cherie writes things#mentions of sex sort of ?
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