#which was completely avoidable if only i simply didn't have this compulsive need to pick at all and any imperfections. anyway | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

ladylike-foxes · 5 years ago

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Thank you, Anon!! ❤️❤️ Have some awkward Solavellan hurt+care and a weird Dorian+Solas bromance moment for @dadrunkwriting 👉😉👉

TW: Blood, painful wounds, sutures, first aid.

~~~

She was relieved to see she was the first to wake up. Although they'd stopped arguing after Solas had screamed at her, she had a feeling it was more a pause than actually considering the matter closed. Though the cot proved an added obstacle, she managed to extricate herself from it and his limbs without rousing him. Despite the screaming pain throughout every inch of her body, it had been worth avoiding picking up the argument first thing in the morning. Her Anchor arm felt so weak as to be almost useless, and she realized she wore the tattered remnants of her clothes from the previous night, stinking of stale sweat and dried blood. Wrinkling her nose, she pulled her shirt off with a barely swallowed yelp; remembering the claw marks on her stomach only after she tore the ripped shirt from where it had dried to the gashes. Her left arm throbbed, threatening immobility should she attempt to raise it again. After a few moments to catch her breath, she loosed the laces of her breeches. Once more, she forgot the burn on her hip until she was peeling the leather away from the angry red wound, unable to help but cry out as the material took several layers of skin with it.

"Come here," She'd woken him, and he moved to sit on the edge of the cot.

She shuffled over, wincing, ruined pants still clinging to her upper thighs. He grasped her kindly, hands firm but soft as they framed her waist and situated her before him. He leaned in closely, she could feel his breath across her hip bone as he examined the scratches left by the Shade. When he hummed thoughtfully, she could swear ushe felt it reverberate through her. Breath came a little faster, pulse picked up slightly, skin flushing warm across her chest and face, standing there half naked under his scrutiny. After a second, he turned her slightly to look at the burn: his warm breath scalding against the raw flesh. Lips pursed as he pulled a face, sighing deeply before waving his hand over one wound and then the others. Releasing her, he rested his elbows on his knees, breathing slow and controlled as he squeezed his eyes shut. He hadn't been able to heal either one completely, and they would certainly scar, but at least the lacerations had closed and the burn was a smaller, healther scab.

"Thank you," Muttering quietly, still wary of a fight.

"I would have done more, but I am attempting to conserve my mana, should it be direly necessary later," Still hunched over, eyes shut, "Dorian and I spent the evening helping to heal the Chargers. No doubt he is exhausted as I."

"I'm sure Bull's people greatly appreciate it," Having turned away to quickly don fresh clothes, "I certainly do."

When she faced him again, he was rubbing his face, and she saw his arm was sloppily bandaged. Impulsively, she moved to grab his wrist for a better look, but he snatched out of her grasp with a startled look. His eyes are particularly stormy today, thinking distractedly.

"You didn't bother to heal your own injuries first?"

"My skills were needed elsewhere," Slightly defensive and a touch accusatory, "I was already weaker than usual."

"Okay, but you should at least let me look at it," Reaching again but slow and deliberate, "I know shit-all about healing magic, but you know shit-all about first aid. Let me see."

Scowling, he reluctantly offered his arm. She unwound the bandage carefully, glad to see it hadn't been dried to the injury as her clothes had been. Running the length of his forearm was a long, deep gash. He had packed it with gauze, but she could see clearly it required stitches if there was any hope of keeping it from infection. She straightened up with a sigh, hands on her hips, anticipating his doubtless objection to her magically-lacking treatment.

"I'm gonna need to stitch that up—" Holding a hand up to cut off his refusal," At least until you feel better enough to heal it yourself."

He didn't attempt to speak again, but looked at her with dubious ire. She shrugged, gesturing for him to follow her outside.

"I'm going to need to see it in the light, if you don't want me to butcher it."

After a minute taken, she was sure, to bitch quietly to himself, he emerged from the tent after her. He turned immediately to Dorian, who looked immensely hungover sitting on the nearest side of the fire, but the Magister was already waving his hand in a weak dismissal.

"Sorry, Solas. As I've already told Halie, I'm too weak myself to tend to your arm," One hand remaining a makeshift visor over his squinting eyes, he pointed to his bag with the other.

"The distilled spirits are in that bottle in the side pocket of my bag, Love."

Halesta grabbed the bottle and then a few clean rags and other things from amongst their own supplies before sitting down, indicating Solas sit beside her.

"What are the spirits for?"

Eyeing her with confusion, but she merely grinned, not allowing him a chance to pull away before pouring half the bottle over the gaping wound. He hissed and spat curses in Elvhen, jerking his arm away again. She smiled to herself and took a small pull from the bottle before setting it aside.

"You might have simply warned me!" Pouting like a child.

"Where's the fun in that? Now, c'mon, lemme see it."

He continued his low muttering in Elvhen, so soft and quickly she was only able to catch the occasional word. Hearing her People's tongue spoken so naturally, regardless of his agitation, was strangely calming. Even his largely nonsensical string of curses had a sort of musical quality. Bending one of her smallest needles into a hook, she sterilzed it along with a pair of tweezers in a small flame she'd easily summoned. Deftly threading the needle, and with one last splash of spirits over the length of colored floss (sage green, of course), she turned her gaze back to him.

"This isn't going to be painless...."

"What in life is?" Sarcastically quipped, "I have had worse, I am certain. Go on."

A strange compulsion came over her. She leaned up and pressed a brisk kiss to the corner of his mouth, then quickly sat to focus on her work before it could be acknowledged. She studied the laceration again; it was fairly deep, though there wasn't too much damage to the actual muscle, which was good. There were a few different sutures she had learned from Mamae. Judging by the width of the wound, the "U"-shaped sack stitch would probably be best. She moved to start, but hesitated...it'd been years since she'd done this. A nervous reflex, she glanced up to see Solas watching her with a small—albeit, slightly wistful—smile, slow blink and nod of confidence. Rolling her eyes at his reassurance, and her apparent need for it, she tucked in. Deliberate, fluid motions, like her mother had taught her back when she thought she'd be without magic. Back when it seemed there was no in studying under her mother as a healer, as Aura had. So Halesta and Laleal had stuck with basic field first-aid; learning to set bones, suture, and a cursory study of medicinal benefits of some common plants. Laleal had never been squeamish about sutures, but Halie’s were always neater. The notion that that she had once been squeamish made her laugh aloud.

“What is amusing?” Her glance flickered up briefly to see her patient arching a brow wryly.

She shook her head, smiling as she continued her mending, “Nothing, really. Just a funny old memory.”

“Pray, tell.”

“Oh, yes!” Dorian turned toward them, Bull appearing at his side, “Story time.”

“Ehh, I don’t know,” Ducking her head with a chuckle, “Even if you did believe me, you’d laugh at me.

“C’monnn, Boss,” Bull leaned in with a drowsy grin, “Spill the beans.”

Sighing dramatically, the heat rushing to her face even as she maintained a steady pace with the stitches. She let them wait for a moment as she knotted and cut another suture.

“Mamae was a healer, and people would come from the nearby villages whenever word spread that our Clan was in the area. Even the worst of the humans were careful to watch their tongue, in case they should need Mamae’s help, which they had the courtesy to assume they’d be refused if she heard them calling us ‘Knife-Ears’.... Though, honestly, she’d have helped them anyway. Wellll, so,“ Trying to focus more on her hands than the story, that old embarrassment creeping up in her throat, “I, uh, was actually very squeamish about this sort of thing as a child. Blood and such, I mean.”

Dorian, Bull, and the more familiar Chargers roared with laughter. Even Solas wasn’t attempting to restrain his chuckling, making it difficult for her to see what she was doing.

“You? Squeamish?” Varric had joined them at some point, his voice emerging from somewhere behind her, “Our Little Bit? I don’t believe it.”

Gently stabbing Solas with the needle so he’d sit still, “I know, I know. The irony, right?”

They teased and laughed for awhile; and maybe it was the time that’d passed or how much she’d changed, but it didn’t seem as embarrassing as it once had. She dabbed at the blood that had started from his wound again, her mind drifting slightly from everything but the repetition of her movements. The conversation around her drifted too, though it sounded distant and indistinct to her at first.

“—You and the Chief were actually quieter than those two,” Krem’s comments to Dorian snapping her out of her reverie, “Between the four of you, I’m surprised Maryden and I got any sleep at all!”

“Yeah, he really laid you out last night, huh, Boss?” A teasing undercurrent to Bull’s tone as he set up the punchline for her.

“And not even in the fun way,” Mock disappointment and a sly sidelong glance to her friends.

They were surrounded by laughter, but the easy kind. The kind that indicated that the subject had been dropped. Solas pouted quietly for a moment; she didn’t dare look up at him and risk his glaring daggers at her.

“Dorian,” His voice low and smooth overhead, nearly distracting her from looping a knot, “May I see that bottle? Is this what you were drinking last night?”

“The Massaad?” Passing the bottle to his free hand, “I didn’t take you for a Sommelier, Solas.”

“Hm,” Amused hum as he examined the bottle in his hand, “I am not. I, however, do need a drink if I am to deal with this heckling all day.”

She looked up in surprise to see his head tossed back and bottle bottom-up, finishing it off with a mere three swallows. Bull barked a laugh while Krem looked nervously at Dorian’s appalled expression.

“That was an extremely rare vintage!!”

“Ir abelas, Falon,” Smiling apologetically, “But, I do have...countless resources at my disposal. I swear to procure you another to replace it.”

Dorian seem to consider this, appearing mollified.

“Wait,” The Magister’s tone surprisingly lighthearted, “Before or after you destroy the world?”

Solas actually laughed along with Dorian, while Halie looked between the two men, needle frozen in the air and her mouth slightly agape.

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