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arrowfortea · 8 days ago

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love flush in our sinew (da:i solavellan oneshot)

basically: lavellan goes down. hard. solas does everything within his power to save her. i saw an angst-inducing solavellan text post and i just.. yea. (spoiler for the oneshot's ending, but this is the post!) rating: T (16+) words: 4k content warnings: skippable metaphorical descriptions of severe throat injury (ctrl+F "snow" if you start getting squicked to skip to her being conscious and A-OK). lotta blood fr. girlie nearly kicks the big bucket big time.

“Scared.” Magic was readied over her muscles. Harpists’ fingers. Daggers. “Tired.” “Both will pass. As will the pain. I’m sorry—we are running out of time. I’m sorry to force you alive, vhenan, but in all of existence, there has never been a life like yours. I won’t surrender you to something so common as death. Live. Learn why.” The skin under Elanna’s teeth flexed; whatever it was had tendons beneath. “Bite instead of screaming. Never stop thinking. Dareth shiral.” Every bone burst out of her body.

🏹 read on ao3, or ↓

Pressure slid across the side of her throat, a quick, sharp tug; needle and thread, pulled taut. One of the trees ahead had an arrow in it. Sera? Ellana moved towards it. She could ask, of course, Sera was close by, somewhere behind, back, so, of course, backwards, she stepped back, and over, and—the world spun, her ribs jumped free, then ricocheted, slamming back against her insides.

Heat bloomed behind her tear ducts, shimmering, simmering, until the sky seared to white. Burning. Candle wax. Hands around her throat. Squeezing, to try stop the candles that speared down, one after the other, melting inside her, melting her insides; she swallowed flame after flame after flame, gagging through thickening, pliant spikes of agony—a searing pain lanced through her ears, and Ellana stilled, brainless. Her eyes baked under the white-hot sun. Thinking would not help, nor moving; she didn’t need to do anything. Oh. That was a relief. All she had left to do was to die.

“In..tor!”

Green light broke across the sky. Andraste took her hand—for certain, this time?—and pulled Ellana head-first into the Breach, upside-down-and-all-over-again—wet slams of pressure hit her throat and mouth, pushing her breath back, pushing her back into her blood, drowning her in red, red, red—stiff sounds across the reddening air—gurgles, pushing mushed flesh away—

“.. lease! Atish! Lethallan!”

An elf. An ally. Lethallin. Help.

“Atish. Atish. Peace. Peace, Ellana, it’s Solas.”

Solas. Her love, hidden somewhere in the encroaching dark. Don’t go.

“Listen to me, and do not speak. Do nothing but breathe, shallowly, and through your nose alone.”

Thank you. I love you. Please stay.

“Almost. Breathing must start here, Ellana.” Soft voice. Soft pressure, middle. “Yes. Yes, excellently done. Continue. Good. I know what is wrong, I am healing you. The pain cannot go yet, but I will not leave your side, I promise. Be completely still, and breathe exactly as you are now.”

The world was a pillar of blue light. I love you. Don’t go.

“Shh. You must not speak. Please. Please, it’s important.”

Blue light over her eyes. I love you. Blue on the breeze. I lov—he stabbed her, he must have, under the skin of her jaw, up into her head—a spear, it had to be, it would reach her brain if she didn’t—“no, no, stop, you’re safe, you’re safe, Ellana, stop, I am here, I know it hurts—I know, my—shh, atish, it will stop soon, you will be completely well. I’m sorry. It has to hurt. It has to. I know. I know. Please stay in the pain with me.”

A chill on the breeze. Perhaps her pulse could carry love to the blood beneath his hands. Her heart beat it out as best it could.

Night fell.

“.. our.. do.. lan.. Ellana.” Tugging on her skull. “Look at me. Here. Inquisitor Lavellan.” Get veilfire. Can’t see. “Move your eyes.” Don’t have any.

Her head was a boulder, rolling down a hill. In the rain. Thoughts were mud.

“You can move now. You can move, or say anything you like, you did so well, now, show me you’re here. Inquisitor. Inquisitor Lavellan. Anything at all. I know you’re here, just show me—forgive me, forceful language is not necessary. If you show me you are here, I could take you to Skyhold. I could. I can take you almost anywhere in Thedas. I shouldn’t, but I think I would, for you, vhenan, I think I would take you anywhere you wanted to go, just you and I, for as long as you��d like, if you could please..”

Wet.

“.. orry, your hair, I’ve ruined it, I can fix it, when you’re—no. No, I’ll fix it now. And if you are trying to speak, or move, please keep trying, we do not have much time until—until you—Ellana. You are alive, I know you are, but you need to try very hard to show me that, or I can’t—I can’t—please, vhenan. Hurry. I'm sorry to rush you, I am. You have Wicked Grace tonight, as well, everyone would miss you. You—you—you invited me. I declined, which I now regret, and I regret every time I did so. I would like to attend tonight. Could I? Let me play cards with you tonight, and I don’t know what went wrong. I don’t understand! I can feel your spirit, my love, I know you're here, but what did I do to you? I meant to save you, ar lath ma, vhenan! Vhenan, vhenan, my heart, my home, my love, Ellana, my heart, what did I—ir abelas, ma sa’lath, ara tela laima ma—”

Mud. Mud. Incomprehensible, incomprehensible, mud, incomprehensible, incomprehensible, incomprehensible, incomprehensible, mud, incomprehensible, incomprehensible, incomprehensible.

Asking would only embarrass her. And give him false hope, right before she died.

With death on its way, anything she learned wouldn’t matter.

Then again.

Death was always on its way.

“Sssss.”

“Y—vhenan?”

Rustling.

“Please continue. Ellana. Please. You spoke. I missed the end of it.”

“Lass.”

“Yes. Yes, yes, Solas is here, vhenan, thank you, you are—you are marvellous—I am sorry to say we cannot converse properly.” Skin, wrenching her teeth open; skin, shoving between them. The Anchor thrummed up her arm and reached over her chest, languid as a lover.

Solas’ voice, velvet-soft, by her ear. “Because you need to listen to me. Pain is coming. I know. I’m sorry, it has to, ir abelas, it has to come very soon. But it will pass, and I will be with you. And you will forget it, you will forget all of this, afterwards, I promise. But when the agony takes your spirit—when everything hurts, or death wants you, you must think, and not stop doing so. Full, complete words. Reach the end of every word. Then move to a new one, continuously.”

“Hchhh.. oh. Me.”

“Home, yes. Full words. Follow nothing but the words you think, complete each, and let them carry you back to me. I can take you home. Skyhold. Your clan. Anywhere. I can take you almost anywhere you’d like to go. Come back to me.”

“Scared.” Magic was readied over her muscles. Harpists’ fingers. Daggers. “Tired.”

“Both will pass. As will the pain. I’m sorry—we are running out of time. I’m sorry to force you alive, vhenan, but in all of existence, there has never been a life like yours, and I won’t surrender you to something so common as death. Live. Learn why.” The skin under Ellana’s teeth flexed; whatever it was had tendons beneath. “Bite instead of screaming. Never stop thinking. Dareth shiral.”

Every bone burst out of her body.

Warbling, guttural, agony emerging from the primordial deep of her, out of the red wet world, gasping for air, dying on land—

“No!”

No movement. No blinking. No screaming.

But Ellana needed to scream. She needed to scream as regularly as she once breathed. Her bones were dribbling over their exit wounds. She needed to scream. Liquid marrow was leaking everywhere and burning her skin and she’d only hurt her neck a little, why was Solas doing this to her?

Syllables crushed against her skin. His voice, breaking and rushing. Fresh-fallen leaves. Autumn. Ellana would put leaves in piles, and scoop her foot through them. She was a child once, and those all grow up to die, after all, so it makes sense she was—

Solas’ voice, broken and rushed. Dry. Dry as leaf over leaf over leaf over leaf. Ellana used to jump and crunch the leaves, then gather them all over again, back into a pile. She’d do so for hours, with only the sound beneath her feet and the pulse in her ears for company. Eventually enough leaves were too flat for there to be any fun. There was no limit to what Ellana was capable of fatiguing. Anything could get tired of her if given the time.

Nobody ever asked to play with me.

In the simmer of death, a comfort arose: that finally wouldn’t matter.

And death would be happy to see her. It’s where she was meant to be, after all; it's her end, ready and waiting. An abyss, as eager and empty and lonely as she.

Warm. I'm warm. Dark. Black. Like hot ink. Ink. In.. Incomplete. Incomplete word. That is bad. Ink.. In.. Ink. Inquisitor? Ink. The Inquisitor. The ink. Think. Think and do not stop. Solas is waiting for me. Solas had been waiting, somewhere, but likely forgot all about her by now. Smiling over her corpse, even, relieved to be free of her. He smiles even when I talk too much. Out of pity. Historically speaking, she was smiled at in pity; forever, she’ll presume a smile true, and will later learn it’s out of pity, until the day she died. Best to avoid further disappointments.

Solas was only one person, after all, compared to how many have hurt her? There are other people that like me. There could be more, one day. They’re not here now. They’re only not here because I’m not with them. Inkwell. Inkstain, ink, ink, Ellana screamed as she would in a dream, uselessly, inkstain, inkwell, inkstain, stained, all stained, towers all stained, gates once bright golden, forever shut. Having run out of words, Ellana had begun to recite the canticle of a prophet that wouldn't choose her at all, as if anyone would lower themselves to do so!

Indeed. What a lowly thing she was. Half in the ground. Hardly the gates of the Golden City. Stiff. Cold. Easily passed over. Easily unnoticed.

She was a cellar door in a blizzard.

C-e-l-l-a-r. D-o-o-r.

Solas threw her open.

Her neck swung back, away from his hands; desperation slammed its way inside—organs shrinking from the air—noise, everywhere, vibrating her ice-crusted innards, stalactites spearing her—wind against her face pleading at her mouth—begging her to breathe—if she didn’t breathe, the wind was sure to break her ribs apart to get inside, it needed a home, thus, she needed ribs. Her teeth clacked together and stuck shut. She drew one long, freezing inhale through her nose, endless, taut, endless and taut and this is how rifts must feel, she thought, delirious. Sealing.

The sky nudged a soft light between her eyelids.

Then exploded.

Clouds spun above her, spun and spun, wool on the spindle. Above her. Ellana was safe, below. And her eyes were exhausted; their whites must’ve stretched out to relax, leaving her to look at their pale, foggy expanse.

Her ribs dripped. Snow-melt on branches.

The shy green spear of a tree. Lingering. It swayed, and sharpened; she could see the bristling of the leaves—she could see. And feel—and the wind caressed her, but the dirt was scared, stock-still beneath her hands. Her hands soothed it. She could move those, so too her leg—into a tent-like peak, before her foot slid and her leg thumped down; she was flat on her back, then. On solid ground. Ground solid as she was. Solid, whole, painless.

Ellana had never experienced bliss. Now that she was in bliss, she was blissful, as well. Full of bliss. Nothing else will fit. She laughed, and hiccuped, without wincing, without ache. Even the pain long-folded into her heart had evaporated, or melted, or died along with her. Falon’din or the Maker must’ve taken pity on her. Sped her across the Fade, right into the Beyond. Wherever she was, however she’d gotten there.. she made it to a place where pain couldn’t reach her. Without having her soul snatched up halfway by the Dread Wolf.

A pair of hands slid under her armpits, up to the forearm. Heaven leaned forward, and Ellana watched her legs drag along the dirt. Blood-speckled. Whose? Not mine. Wouldn’t make sense. It’s on top. Lower in her vision, more red—on the hands, avoiding touching her, some spirit, a fastidious one, pulling her along with its forearms.

Solid ground behind her back. Textured. Another tree? She was sitting.. in a forest. Possibly. The grass paled and blurred.

“Ellana.” Savh. Or. Hello. Silk-smooth fingers nudged under her hair, pressing to her neck, seeking a pulse. Don’t worry. I promise I’m dead. “Can. You. Blink?”

The fingers folded into a weight that tucked itself beneath Ellana’s chin; the forest rushed over her. Shining through the blur were eyes too soft for hers to catch onto. Clouds. Her chin sagged, mercifully, the pressure beneath held it, so those kind eyes could sharpen into view as the tree had. Solas’ eyes. Not clouds. Lavender. And catmint. On a misty day.

“Continue trying.” His mouth quivered—firming and shaking, firmer and shakier—and his brow twitched. Tight-slip-tighten. Solas’ composure was an ill-tied robe he could not spare time to fix. Still, he spoke as if perfectly calm. Liar. “Keep looking at me, as you are now. Now, try to move your eyes.”

She did.

“Ellana?” His voice cracked her name in two. Lightning to a tree. “Move any part of your body.” I did, she thought, exhausted. I moved my eyes. She did so, again. And again, and again, until finally, Solas’ composure fled.

“Thank you,” he breathed, relief laid bare. “I saw that. Ma serannas, lethallan. You will be well soo—”

Ellana canted her head to the side in a bid for him to stroke her cheek, setting the world to spinning again; when it steadied, the back of his hand was against the nape of her neck, bracing her awkwardly. It stank. Coppery.

"I would advise you do not move. We are safe. You need not rush yourself. Even speech will take time.”

She'd forgotten all about speaking. Seemed greedy, really, since she was lucky enough to be alive. Before she could decide whether to chance it or not, Solas’ other hand reached for her, and her brain turned to affectionate mush.

“You will not bear lasting injury.” Blue flickered around her vision, and he began to stroke the sides of her neck, knuckles tenderly skimming over her skin. Back and forth. Back and forth. Patient. Loving. Her heart stirred. “There will be scarring, but.. tomorrow, perhaps, removing it will be no trouble at all. If you’d like that.”

“I..” The inside of her throat felt sunburnt. “Want..”

“Rest your voice,” Solas murmured, watching his hands caress her. “You can tell me soon.”

Ellana pushed it to the front of her head instead: I want a kiss. She smiled, which he returned instantly, though his was smaller than hers, and far quicker. Echo, echo. Read my mind next: thank you. Thank you. When Solas clearly did not, Ellana closed her eyes, and leaned her jaw into his touch. He nudged it upright again with his thumb.

“Please don’t,” he said. The gentlest of rebukes. “Your wounds were severe, Inquisitor, I am doing this to clean the blood away. When we rejoin the others, it would be best to not alarm them any more than necessary. And..”

He glanced at her, lingering; his gaze traced her features until his eyes were half-lidded and her heart was skipping over itself. And he knows she can’t stand the feeling of blood once it’s caked. And he doesn’t want to leave her like this. “.. And.. Sera already has no dearth of opportunity to insult my appearance.”

Flashing a smile even weaker than the last, he began to pull away. “I hope you will forgive me some time to cleanse mys—” With the little energy she had, Ellana caught his hand in one of hers, fumbling against his knuckles.

He stilled.

Steadily, her fingers climbed until they rested between his—only a little, to avoid the red trim on the other side. His palms were still damp with her blood; she didn’t want to spoil the effort he’d made to clean it off her. Worth the risk. Red was red, and not as important as the desire to hold her love. Ideally, she’d like to hold him properly, in her arms, but considering her condition, she’d settle for his hand. Smooth, slender, delicate—beautiful, even when so bloodied—Solas’ hands were always beautiful. Just as he was. The only belief of hers he ever truly disputed.

“I..” Words broke to splinters in her throat. I love your hands, she thought, loudly. They saved me. You saved me.

Ellana hoped her expression could press against whatever forlorn thoughts lay behind his. Or, came the slow remembrance, there may only be one. A fear. Removed from reality, placed long ago, cold, heavy—even now, with his vhenan before him: the fear of dying alone.

Muscles screaming with effort, she turned her hand, brushed her knuckles against his, and hummed. His fingers trembled. Then tilted. Solas’ breath was shuddering in and out of him. He grazed his fingers between hers, gently. Barely. Even still, the stench wafted to her nostrils—vile, like the worst morning breath she’d ever had, alongside fresh and stale blood. The inside of her throat had been all over his hands.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I.. I shouldn’t have..”

Ellana dragged her eyes up; Solas was looking at their joined hands, while he was looking miserable. “Did I.. upse..”

“You, Inquisitor, have never upset me.” With the back of his wrist, Solas eased her hand down. “I am the cause of our distress,” he muttered, pulling away.

“Don’t.. under..”

“Please—” His mouth snapped shut. Far firmer, he continued, "please don’t speak. Your throat needs rest, as does your mind.”

Solas straightened his posture. Ellana's heart fluttered wearily. This was another tradition he liked to keep—some profound sorrow sat within him, which he usually kept neatened, and out of sight; misery hidden within a sachet of lavender, half-rotted, tucked in linen, perfuming a scholar’s poetic melancholy to passers-by.

But in the void between her falling to the ground and then awaking in bliss, truth had slipped free; truth from Solas’ intense, miserable, messy something. Which he’d now gathered. And was folding back up. Soon, he’d shut it away. Ellana was too weak to distract him. She could do little but lay against the tree, obediently slack, as her own lover avoided looking at her.

His brows twitched with effort. After a few seconds, blue light bathed his palms. Following their movement strained her eyes, but Ellana wanted to stay present; ‘stay in the pain’, Solas had said, once. It strained her head to think of when, so that, she gave up on.

When his hands moved to the wet outline of his knee, her stomach roiled. His lower half was soaked with blood. Boar drained after a kill left less behind. From his waist to his knees, the fabric of his robes had been drenched until it was thinned, and clinging close, her blood was sticking to him. Impossible, that she had lost so much; impossible, that Solas could’ve healed such a goring, and retain mana with which to cleanse its dregs. Impossibly, beneath the blue glow of Solas’ hands, her blood steadily evaporated.

As if it had never been there at all.

“Oh,” Ellana croaked. Solas’ eyes, lit to lyrium-blue, flicked up to her. Then back down. A frown tugged at his mouth.

Memories of the last few days dropped into her head and seeped through her; nauseating ripples breaking over her stomach, oh, my vallaslin, in Crestwood, when he left. Oh. We’re done.

“It’s good that I was here,” he said quietly, and began to cleanse his other leg. “You wouldn’t.. I.. I don’t believe you’d have survived, if I was not. But I conducted myse—”

Whooping sounds in the distance.

Sweat broke across Solas’ brow. The blue light blew white—Ellana winced—he panted a broken apology, then sagged forward, elbows carving into the dirt to brace his weight; a pair of leather boots skidded into view, stopping just short of knocking Solas over.

“Bleugh! Ew, ew.” Revulsion flopped around Sera’s mouth. “Ick, yuck, and bleugh.” Words like asphyxiating fish in a wet grip, wiggling up and out, desperately plopping to freedom. No. Just words. “What in the saggy—you’re like a—like a fucking—fuck, Solas! Do village apos-whats take your baths in people?!”

Said apos-what pushed himself upright. Half the blood had been cleared, if Ellana's slow brain had to guess. Still, his robes were so saturated that, as he panted, the muscles of his stomach were visible. Wine-dark in places—a wave of nausea breached as high as Ellana’s throat, and she looked away. She fixed her eyes on Sera’s boots in the dirt. Dark brown against brown. Larger boots, landing beside.

“Damn, that’s, bad,” Bull. Huffs rolling over rumbles. Breathless. They fought something. “Seen, blood mages, with less on ‘em, Solas, shit.”

“I did not cast any blood magic," Solas hissed. "The Inquisitor was gravely wounded, so I moved us both, to heal her undisturbed. I was about to—”

“Hey, you’re good, you did good. Got her out, fixed her up.” Bull crouched in front of Ellana. He moved a stocky finger back and forth in front of her eyes; the bulk of him blocked her view of the others, so she had little trouble focusing on the path he drew across her vision. “Shit. Seriously fixed her up. But, uh, next time, just yell what you’re doing when you’re doing it. Save us a sprint.” The finger disappeared, leaving a broad grin. “Looking alive, boss, glad to see it.”

Ellana blinked to greet him.

“Yeah,” Sera chirped, “save us a spri-i-int! Oh, and save us taking on six shits each while you wiggly-whoosh off for a pissing hour—”

“Do tell me, Sera.” Don’t worry, Ellana tried to tell Iron Bull’s eye as it looked her over. He doesn’t argue with her anymore. “Would you have preferred I remained? Reduced the count to four? Awaited your instruction and left—”

“Knock it off,” Bull grunted, then frowned at whatever Ellana’s face was doing. “You with us, boss?”

When she nodded, exhaustion saw opportunity, seized it, and thumped her chin to her chest. Ellana watched her legs disappear beneath creeping, fuzz-soft darkness.

“Alright!” One broad hand behind her back, another under her knees—“and up we go.” The world brightened, lurched along with her stomach—then was a soft thump against a broad chest, solid. Solid as the ground, the trees, solid as battlements.

“Home. Sklyhlold,” Ellana mumbled.

“Ambitious. How about I meet you in the middle. Camp’s close.” The muscled cradle of Bull’s arms rocked up, shifting Ellana a little higher. She could see his arms, his armour, and nothing else. Blurs. Grey on grey on grey.

“Uh, his most elfiest, where’re you going now? ”

The response was distant. “Toward the slightly responsible arrow, which may have been poisoned.” Don't go. Even further away, “I will meet you at camp.”

“Saved her all dramatic like," Sera called, "but when a big strong Benny-Thing—what's it again?—big Qunari scoops her up, ooh, the heroic looover can’t bear to look for envy, ooh!”

“Ben-Hassrath,” Bull grunted, and began to move; if Solas gave Sera a response, it was lost beneath the squeaking of leather and rattling of buckles. Ellana closed her eyes, laced her fingers together, and pretended Solas was holding her hand. That he hadn’t left them—and didn’t leave her, that night—and wouldn’t. That they were still together, as they both wanted to be.

“Er, why’s—”

“Hey. Sera. If your mouth stays shut ‘til we’re at camp, I’ll introduce you to a big strong Benny-Thing chick I know.”

Surely Solas still wanted to be with her, deep down. It had only been a few days, he was in love with her, even if he wasn’t with her. Surely.

“Get off. You swear?”

“Yep.”

Throat closing up, Ellana pressed her face against the cool metal of Bull’s armour. Solas had love for her, at least. Enough of it to perform an evident miracle, and pull her back from the brink. Isn’t my love enough to do the same for him?

“Nobody but us for a mile or so. He teleported off,” Bull mumbled. “So. Let it out, boss. I got you."

─

Thank you so much for reading! If you enjoyed it, please consider going to ao3 and leaving me a kudos (you don't need to be logged in!) or dropping a Like/reblog here. Comments/replies are immensely appreciated too, but thank you for reading this far regardless!!

#solavellan #solas #dragon age #dragon age fanfiction #solas x lavellan #i cranked this thing out in a fugue state #i feel so bad for the inspo post they absolutely did not mention THROAT-RIPPER SIMULATOR 5000 #my fic #this is kinda my lavellan but also just. ellana lavellan(tm) so i named her ellana

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hrtiu · 5 months ago

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I finally got around to writing some Solavellan fanfic! Thank you to @namedbrina for the prompt! It's not exactly what you suggested, but hopefully the spirit remains. Also sorry it took me so long to actually write 😅 You can find a link to the fic on AO3 here, or simply read below. I have a whole long story plotted out, but we'll see how much actually gets written ><

Solas has never liked necromancers and is surprised to like Lavellan. But she has always respected spirits and wisps, so perhaps it shouldn’t be as surprising. She who wears Falon’Din’s marks, who even Dorian is a bit in awe of/scared of, and who never leaves a battlefield without using the last of her mana in a Dalish ritual to soothe whatever might remain. As the only elf and perhaps mage around, she teaches this ritual to Solas so he might be able to do it if she has no mana? Idk.

Of all the titles Solas had carried in his long years, his favorite was healer.

Perhaps that was why he was enjoying his time with the Inquisition so much. To many of the folk around Haven, he was known only as the reclusive, slightly odd elf healer. There was something freeing about the many centuries of baggage his name and face carried being stripped away. Solas the healer. Mender of bones, salver of wounds, fixer of broken things. He quite liked that.

Atishal, the so-called Herald of Andraste, enjoyed no such reputation. Oh, the people of Haven respected her, and were all too willing to place their hopes on her thin shoulders. But her Dalish traditions and strange magic warded off any reputation for wholesomeness that might otherwise develop. Necromancy had a way of doing that.

There was something mesmerizing about her magic. Necromancy had always left a bitter taste in Solas’s mouth, but the Herald made it seem natural, almost elegant. Together with Varric and Cassandra, they fought through the chaos of apostate mages and rogue templars, but always his gaze was drawn to her. He was so preoccupied by the sight of spirits from the Fade willingly lending Atishal their strength that he never saw the templar’s arrow coming.

“Ah!” He let out a pained grunt as the arrowhead buried deep into the flesh of his shoulder. He sank to one knee and grimaced, the hand not holding his staff moving to grip the shaft of the arrow.

“Solas needs help!” Atishal shouted above the fray.

Varric tossed a red bottle his way, and Solas managed to catch it with one functioning arm. Solas pulled the cork out with his teeth and drank just enough to muster the energy for a fade step. He stepped through the veil and ended up on a small hill just out of range of the still-battling templars. He caught his breath, intending to reenter the fray when he got the chance, but Varric, Cassandra, and the Herald didn’t seem to need his help any more.

“How are you doing, Chuckles?” Varric asked, hefting Bianca over his shoulder as he trudged up the hill towards Solas.

“Let’s get back to camp,” Cassandra said. “He can rest up there.”

“No need to wait until then,” Atishal said.

Her soft footfalls barely seemed to depress the grass as she made her way to Solas’s side, kneeling down to get a better look at his wounded shoulder. Ginger fingers tested the flesh around the injury, and she hissed in sympathy.

“I don’t have the strength right now to numb it, but I can heal it after the shaft is out,” she said. “Do you want me to do that now? Or should we wait until we get back to camp and we can get you some willow bark for the pain? Or a lyrium potion so you can heal it yourself?”

“Just do it now,” Solas said, not wanting to make the hike back to camp with an arrow in his shoulder. “I’ve dealt with worse.”

“Got it,” Atishal said. She gripped the arrow shaft with one hand and braced her other hand against Solas’s shoulder.

“One, two, three.”

Searing pain shot through Solas’s body, his grunt of pain pushing through gritted teeth. Then, in an instant, the pain disappeared.

Atishal’s hand against his shoulder felt warm. She was still murmuring words of healing under her breath, her eyes closed and her brow unforrowed in an expression of peace.

He blinked in confusion and surprise. Her spell had worked marvelously—he couldn’t have cast it better himself. That was… unexpected.

“Are we ready to go, Herald?” Cassandra’s no-nonsense voice broke through Solas’s daze. “It isn’t safe to stay in one place for too long.”

Solas pushed himself to his feet as elegantly as he could manage, nodding to Atishal in thanks. “Yes, Seeker. I am ready to go.”

They moved in near silence down the rough Hinterlands trail. The battle had taken a lot out of them, and with nothing but more long days of closing rifts, facing down rogue templars, bandits, or mages, and struggling to make a name for the Inquisition, nobody was in the mood for chatter.

They reached camp—a cluster of tents by a tranquil pond—and Solas gratefully took the stew Scout Harding offered him. He didn’t usually eat much, but he was famished. He pressed carefully at the place in his shoulder that had held a templar arrow only hours earlier, but the flesh was whole. A little tender, but whole.

Atishal sat next to him on a large rock by the water’s edge, a short distance from the gathering of Inquisition scouts around the campfire. Far enough away to create some sense of privacy. Solas wondered if she thought they were in some kind of Elven guild, and the thought brought a grimace to his lips.

“How is your shoulder?” she asked, her deft fingers unbraiding her long, brown hair.

“Feeling good,” Solas said, rolling his shoulder in demonstration.

“I’m glad.” She let her hair fall in thick waves over her shoulder, still lovely despite the sweat and dirt of the day weighing it down.

The conversation lapsed, and Solas let the ambient sounds of the dusky forest fill the silence.

“You are quite a skilled healer,” Solas said eventually.

“You sound surprised.”

“I don’t think many necromancers make the effort to learn the art of healing.”

“Really?” she said, turning to him with a raised brow. “I don’t see necromancy and healing as being so different.”

“Healing the living versus drawing wisps into the vessels of the dead? What could be more different?”

She didn’t respond for a long moment. Solas looked over at her, noting the tense line of her mouth. He recognized her expression, of course. He’d grown used to offending people since waking from his long sleep.

He waited for her to leave. He knew her well enough by now to know that the Herald of Andraste tended to shut down rather than confront. But though he gave her plenty of space to make her exit, she stayed.

A mourning dove let out a plaintive cry, and the sun slipped behind the trees. Twilight transformed the woods around them, marking a boundary in time and space.

Atishal picked a stone up from the ground and tossed it into the pond. It made a satisfying thunk as it landed in the water, and she watched the ripples slowly expand for a long moment.

“I used to be a healer,” she said quietly.

Solas raised his eyebrows. “Ah?”

“Do you think a Dalish tribe has much use for necromancy?” she asked, eyes still trained on the last remaining ripples in the pond. “For the first twenty five years of my life, it never entered my mind to practice necromancy. I soothed scrapes and bruises, mended broken bones, guided women through difficult childbirths. Easing peoples’ pain and healing their bodies was my calling.”

Was. There was pain in that word, pain that felt familiar to Solas. He, too, used to be a healer. He could no longer claim such a simple title—at least not by itself. No matter what the people in Haven thought, he knew the truth.

“What happened?” Solas asked.

“A plague. It wiped out more than half of my clan in a single year.” She said the words plainly, without sentiment. “After that, I realized among those who needed healing were the dead along with the living.”

“Healing for the dead?”

“Yes. I know… I think their souls are gone. Inviting spirits to inhabit their bodies doesn’t change that. But so many spirits clustered around our tribe, feeding off of sorrow and tragedy. I found that allowing these spirits space to act, to work through the pain… It was beneficial both to the spirits and to those loved ones who remained.”

The way she talked about spirits… Solas began to regret the condescending tone he’d struck in their earlier conversation. She clearly had a conception of spirits that was much closer to his own than he’d realized—much closer to his than most of the people in this strange half-world. And the way she interpreted necromancy was novel to him.

“I’ve never considered that,” he said. Words rarely spoken.

“I hadn’t either, before the plague. Necessity is the greatest teacher, after all.”

“True.”

Silence fell between them again, and Solas pondered her words. It made sense, in a way, that necromancy would develop new depth and meaning in this hellish world he had created. The people here were so numerous, their lives so cheap.

“You have given me much to think about, Herald,” he said.

She looked over her shoulder at him, a rare smile gracing her lips. “Somehow, from you that feels like a compliment.”

From him, it certainly was.

#dragon age inquisition #dragon age: inquisition #dai #solavellan #solavellan hell #dragon age fanfic #solas #solas x inquisitor #necromancer inquisitor #I know in game you don't specialize in necromancy until later but i think this is more interesting #i have a whole lot of emotional plot stuff in my head and hopefully i'll get to it before veilguard comes out and invalidates all my ideas!

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