Everything was easier, in the Fade. It always was. It was an escape, and he knew that - an escape he had taken for thousands of years, and one he needed to put behind him... But he still could not fully resist. Not when he needed to rest. Not at night, when all of Skyhold was asleep.
So he walked, the Fade-mirror halls of Skyhold, breathing deeply as he touched the stone.
As he slipped into the dreams of those that shared its roof.
It was easy enough to joke about what he saw when he slept. Everyone expected grand adventure or saucy tales and spinning them was simple enough. Meeting those expectations, leering, joking after being woken about missing out on acrobatic triplets in oil- that was what most thought he should see. So it was what he let them think. The truth?
Was not half so kind.
Antiva, again, in a small apartment near the tanneries. The wash of the ocean and the call of the whores in the allies the only lullaby a crow is ever given- aside from the steady crack of a lash along his back. He does not flinch- he cannot flinch or the knife at his throat will cut across. No, he must swallow and continue telling the offhand tale he'd been in the middle of when the whip came down.
To others, it might have been strange, to step from cold air into thick and humid, the salt the barest taste as he breathed in. But to Solas, it was as natural as that very breath, taken as the lash came down, the crack echoing through the Fade. He stepped forward like a ghost might - unworried and unperturbed by who or what would see him. It didn't matter.
It was just another dream, another mirror of a reality that was hardly real in itself. A passing thought, for him to ponder and then release before he stepped into the next.
Or so he expected.
The truth was more complicated. The truth was when he stepped further into that dream, when he found the man bent, the knife at his throat - half a child, flickering, half the full grown man, remembering, and the recognition hit him. Zevran. This was no dream of desire, no antivan silk and endless whores. This was pain, and rage, and wounds so deep he couldn't see the bottom.
"What was that?" One of the shadows with the whip- a master, a Crow, an elven woman with red hair and blood at her throat, asked between one lash and the next. Those holding his arms shifted from face to face- Crows he knew, masters he served, nobles he'd killed.
The one constant was the man with the knife. Tanned skin, broad jaw, dark eyes and on his face a smile that was proud. Encouraging. "Almost done, Zev."
Murmured with affection. As though this was no torment, as though they were discussing the weather rather than lashing into his back. Zevran laughed, clearing his throat- never flinching. He could not afford to flinch. "I said he wanted to buy my hair. Can you imagine, Tali, me with a shaved head and a pocket full of sovereigns?"
Down snapped the whip and Zevran did not waver. "Of course I could not."
"You know why that is?" Taliesin's free hand slipped back to curl in the aforementioned hair, yanking Zevran's head up harshly, eyes glinting with something darker than pride, more vicious than the whip. Possession. "Let me hear you say why, Zev, and we'll be done. I promise."
"Because-" A lash too close to his spine, a stuttered breath Zevran twisted into a laugh, low and crackling. "Because I am yours. And you like it long, yes?"
"Enough." The word snapped out sharper than the whip had, a real, raw anger
behind the word. He had seen it, so many times. Had heard it...
He would not be witness to it again. Not here. Not now. Taliesin
disappeared into smoke as Solas stepped into the place where he had been,
the dream disintegrating around him. He took the knife, and dropped it
clattering to the floor.
"You are no one's, Zevran. You have paid dearly for your freedom. You
should not have it stripped from you again. Even here."
As welcome as the end of the dream was- Solas slipping in was just as jarring. That wasn't where the memory ended even if it was where the whipping stopped. Tender hands on his back, a mouth on his shoulder, Taliesin branding his skin and teeth and breath into Zevran's skin as he ever did when he thought for even a moment Zevran's attention might stray.
He remained on his knees for a moment, the pain fading, the marks, fading as the child curled up into nothing in the center of his chest and the man remained.
Solas walked in dreams, this he knew. He simply never thought Solas would go so far as to intrude in his own. "What, that?"
A laugh, hollow as the rest as he found his feet. "Mm. I knelt willingly for that. I do not know if you are aware but there are some things done in the bedroom that aren't all courtly gestures, my bald friend."
"And you think others have not knelt and willingly given up their freedom?"
He was bald, yes. Now. Only from practice. He could not afford to slip into
a younger version of himself, here. Could not afford the Dread Wolf bearing
its fangs, regardless of how the words stirred an old, bitter passion in
him.
He knew the difference, between the sweet scent of bedroom pleasure, and
the scar tissue of the Fade. He knew the latter far too well.
He offered a hand as Zevran stood.
"Or that courtly gestures can be as heavy a chain as any other?"
"It is a rare thing when they do not." It was a different matter entirely if it was the game he would rather play it of as, rather than one of many incidents of Taliesin attempting to assert his right to do with Zevran what he willed in exchange for his life.
What manner of life that had been.
His lips pressed thin as he took the hand- and made a gesture all his own, tugging Solas' up to press a kiss to the back of it. "Well if you are promising chains..."
Playing the part was simpler when he was awake. When he could prevent bruising from blooming onto his skin where he'd been manacled in the past at the thought.
Everything has pretty much blown over, and for the most part, everyone has forgotten what happened in Emprise. Even Beleth has been overly forgiving, moreso than Cade can comprehend, and with the Inquisition moving on, he has more or less slipped through the cracks once again. Now he doesn't even have drills and patrols to occupy his time, still forbidden from carrying weapons or going into any kind of combat scenario. He works for the Seeker during the day, and spends his idle evenings either wandering the battlements (not patrolling, just walking, he tells himself) and occasionally sequestering himself in one of the empty towers with a candle and a book, passing the time in total solitude and without the judging eyes of those around him.
Apart from Aleron, there isn't a soul he talks to. It's better this way, withdrawn from the people who were beginning to know him, avoiding contact with those he wronged and from those he might wrong in the future. It's either this or walk off into the mountains, or step off the edge of a tower, just disappear without causing any more fuss. Sometimes he longs for that, but the Maker frowns on those who waste themselves.
At present he is curled up in one of the aforementioned towers, a wool blanket over his shoulders and some stupid book in his hands, a thing for which he has no interest but which is here to pass the time until it's time to go to sleep.
Walking the battlements does much to clear the mind. Checking points of infiltration isn't exactly his job but it does ease the tension in his shoulders to be certain that getting in and out is not something quite so easily done. Finding every nook, every cranny to be certain there are no caches of tools that ought not be there, no stockpiles of poison or food or weapons helps him sleep, as much as he bothers to do so.
Tonight it is the towers. Normally empty and thing quickly done, he pokes his head inside for his usual cursory check only to blink at the man curled in the corner. Cade. The templar that struck Beleth, that was struck by Merrick.
He doesn't know much of the man other than he seems on edge and off center- even now this? Does not speak well of a mind settled. "Not the most comfortable place to study, I should think."
Zevran keeps his voice light, easy. Without weight as he slips inside and closes the door behind him.
Cade almost resembles a frightened dog when the door makes a sound, on the verge of scrambling out of sight and out of mind, but he's already been seen. He breathes out through his nose, blinking rapidly, trying to remember that other people come through here, other people in Skyhold who have no business with him at all.
"Um..." he murmurs, hoping this will be enough to end the exchange, "it's. Fine, actually."
"Private, though, if you remember to lock the door." There's a small click of the lock falling into place behind him- for however this conversation goes? Zevran prefers not to be interrupted. The man doesn't look terribly vicious- the description of Beleth's attacker sits poorly against the image of the man huddled under his blanket.
"You are Cade Harimann, yes? The Templar?" As though he isn't certain.
The click of the lock is a deafening sound to one so constantly on-edge as Cade, and he immediately glances toward the door on the opposite side of the tower, and then to the crumbling stairs, as though they would offer any escape. Heart suddenly hammering in his chest, he slowly stands, back to the wall, blanket still around his shoulders, cringing preemptively as he awaits the attack.
"...yes," he says faintly, watching Zevran's hands and giving an involuntary wince. The elf is considerably smaller than he is, but he knows better than to think that will matter.
"I think we ought to have some words, you and I." Something so friendly, said with a smile, probably shouldn't have quite so much weight to it. Zevran walks across to the second door slowly, if he gets there before the man bolts? It too shall be locked. "Or rather I have a few questions I do not think you will mind answering."
Cade's feet are like lead, and on a deep and primal level, he already knows that bolting for the door would be futile. He's stuck here, until he is allowed to leave, when he will pretend nothing happened and go back to his life, another piece of him missing.
He feels the bile rising as he watches Zevran traverse the room, barely hearing what the man is saying, the sudden onslaught of horror and disgust and shame overtaking all his thoughts. He looks at the floor, blanket wrapped tightly around him, his knuckles white where he grips it. And he waits.
This is not the reaction of a man with a temper. A man that lashes out at provocation. This is not the face of a man ready to snap at someone that looks at him oddly. A man resigned is not a man on the edge. More pieces to the puzzle but he's not entirely certain they even go in the same box. Not anymore.
"...you are the same templar that had a violent disagreement with the elf Beleth, yes?" He is having a hard time picturing this man attempting to kill anyone, let alone his student.
He's waiting for the hands and the hushed, sickly reassuring voice, but they never come. Squeezing his eyes closed as he endures a wave of nausea, Cade catches enough of Zevran's question to comprehend it, and he nods.
It helps, he thinks, that he had grown up a ways away from the lights and noise of the city and around a dad who didn't do much for kicks other than hunt or fish or get drunk at poker games. Fire-building without matches and learning to set rudimentary traps are just the sort of things he and Nick had fun with as kids what feels like a lifetime ago, neither of them thinking they'd ever really need to. But few ever do.
Zevran's not like any survivor he's ever met; he doesn't just scrape his way from one day to the next out here, he thrives. But Luke, knowing what little he does about him, realizes it isn't all that surprising. After all, Zev's been a survivor from before the dead refused to stay dead - and he never had the luxury of fire-building and learning to set rudimentary traps just for shits and giggles.
It's thanks to one of his traps that they've got themselves some squirrel for dinner, which means they can save the last couple cans of green beans in his backpack for a rainier day. It's risky building a fire in the hearth of the cabin they've been hunkering down in the past week, but fuck it -- it's their first taste of meat in a while and he's willing to wait for it to cook over a dim flame even if it's fucking torture sitting close enough to watch it crackle and drip with glistening fat.
"Look, I hate to be that guy, but... is it done yet? 'cause it's smellin' plenty done to me."
"You do know there are a great many illnesses that come from eating poorly cooked meat, yes?" Not that it'll be poorly cooked when he's done with the spit, but the point remains. He'd rather have meat a little overdone and take longer than have either of them laid out from some manner of cramping sickness due to food poisoning. Much as he has not been thrilled with the idea of traveling with someone he did not trust (which is everyone), Luke has been kind and capable enough company.
More than enough to warrant ensuring his health and safety. Two sets of eyes are better than one- and it is a nice change of pace to talk to more than a wall or dead radio in hopes someone on the other end might hear him.
"At least this will taste of something. Remind me to leave a thank you note to whoever left spices in the kitchen."
He sighs on both counts. The sad reality is that the owners of the place are either dead or long gone, run off by walkers or bandits; he tries not to think about it too long, as if their luck might take a turn for the worse if he does. Shit'll hit the fan inevitably, like always, but they can hope for a longer smoother ride until then.
"Next time we're on a run I'll keep an' eye out. Figure there's plenty where that came from seein' as grabbin' the pepper ain't exactly a priority these days."
He feels spoiled with just a little taste of salt, but spices? Now that's fancy eating.
"Whole pepper would be best- or a jug of vinegar. If we can brine or pickle the next one the meat will last us twice as long. What I would not give for time and space to properly cure jerky." It won't taste quite so good, but they could carry it without worrying as much about where they would find their next meal. After this? it is the canned vegetables and that will not hold them much longer. Heading into any kind of town is a fool's errand.
"We should check the basement again, see if we cannot cut the lock. There is bound to be something down there." The kitchen had been bare- as were most they find lately. The spices had been a blessing.
His nose wrinkles slightly at the thought of vinegar; in a world gone rank, that sort of sharp sourness might be too close to the smell of decay for his tastes. "Pretty sure I'd bust my machete on it, but if we could jus' find an axe or somethin'..."
Just another thing on the list to look out for. He looks to him after a moment, swallowing against a dull pang in his throat. Mom would've liked Zev's company, he thinks, sharing her best recipes and techniques for making preserves. Well, maybe second-best recipes. Some secrets were hers to keep.
"So where'd you learn all this?" Luke asks suddenly, feeling an urge to stray from their usual business-like discussions. It'd be nice to know something more about a guy he'd be spending an indefinite period of time with. While he can strike out on his own - and he's had to spend more than a few nights on his own, here and there, over the last two years for some reason or another - there's power in numbers and much more. He hasn't scarred over and hardened enough to be like Jane, struggling to keep all the world - the good and the bad - at arms' length.
"Bolt cutters, a file- it would take time but we might as well since we will not be moving on in this weather." Too much risk of being seen or caught unawares. For now? Remaining where they are is the better option. In the morning they would have to reevaluate but a roiling drizzle like this? Tends to linger. It makes for poor hiking, too many tracks, too many traps.
He'd have to set out snares if they remained. Hope they find something more than this.
"The cooking, the hunting, the surviving? Ah..." He tips his head to the side as he rotates the spit, eyes narrowing at the drippings. "I suppose you could say it was something like military training, yes? Not that it was anything official or even all that tied to the government but...it has helped me survive so far!"
"That it has." A mercenary, then, if he had to guess. But he doesn't feel it's his place to pry. "Well if y'don' wanna talk about it, that's fine." And he means it. He pauses, the crackle and sputtering of the fire filling the room. "S'long as we're on the same side, then I guess some a' the details don' matter all that much." The apocalypse has leveled the playing field and past lives are irrelevant; for some, this means a second chance at life, if this could be called living at all.
"It is not so pleasant a story- and a great deal of it is no longer relevant. Why or how I was trained matters little in the face of what we...face. Mmm. That sounded better in my head." As things so often do. Content, now, that the meat was cooked enough Zevran removes it from the spit and carves out a full portion for both of them. When they can eat well, it is best that they do so. "You watch my back, I watch yours, yes? It is easier to survive when one has another pair of eyes looking out for the walking dead."
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So he walked, the Fade-mirror halls of Skyhold, breathing deeply as he touched the stone.
As he slipped into the dreams of those that shared its roof.
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Was not half so kind.
Antiva, again, in a small apartment near the tanneries. The wash of the ocean and the call of the whores in the allies the only lullaby a crow is ever given- aside from the steady crack of a lash along his back. He does not flinch- he cannot flinch or the knife at his throat will cut across. No, he must swallow and continue telling the offhand tale he'd been in the middle of when the whip came down.
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It was just another dream, another mirror of a reality that was hardly real in itself. A passing thought, for him to ponder and then release before he stepped into the next.
Or so he expected.
The truth was more complicated. The truth was when he stepped further into that dream, when he found the man bent, the knife at his throat - half a child, flickering, half the full grown man, remembering, and the recognition hit him. Zevran. This was no dream of desire, no antivan silk and endless whores. This was pain, and rage, and wounds so deep he couldn't see the bottom.
This was wrong.
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The one constant was the man with the knife. Tanned skin, broad jaw, dark eyes and on his face a smile that was proud. Encouraging. "Almost done, Zev."
Murmured with affection. As though this was no torment, as though they were discussing the weather rather than lashing into his back. Zevran laughed, clearing his throat- never flinching. He could not afford to flinch. "I said he wanted to buy my hair. Can you imagine, Tali, me with a shaved head and a pocket full of sovereigns?"
Down snapped the whip and Zevran did not waver. "Of course I could not."
"You know why that is?" Taliesin's free hand slipped back to curl in the aforementioned hair, yanking Zevran's head up harshly, eyes glinting with something darker than pride, more vicious than the whip. Possession. "Let me hear you say why, Zev, and we'll be done. I promise."
"Because-" A lash too close to his spine, a stuttered breath Zevran twisted into a laugh, low and crackling. "Because I am yours. And you like it long, yes?"
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"Enough." The word snapped out sharper than the whip had, a real, raw anger behind the word. He had seen it, so many times. Had heard it...
He would not be witness to it again. Not here. Not now. Taliesin disappeared into smoke as Solas stepped into the place where he had been, the dream disintegrating around him. He took the knife, and dropped it clattering to the floor.
"You are no one's, Zevran. You have paid dearly for your freedom. You should not have it stripped from you again. Even here."
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He remained on his knees for a moment, the pain fading, the marks, fading as the child curled up into nothing in the center of his chest and the man remained.
Solas walked in dreams, this he knew. He simply never thought Solas would go so far as to intrude in his own. "What, that?"
A laugh, hollow as the rest as he found his feet. "Mm. I knelt willingly for that. I do not know if you are aware but there are some things done in the bedroom that aren't all courtly gestures, my bald friend."
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"And you think others have not knelt and willingly given up their freedom?"
He was bald, yes. Now. Only from practice. He could not afford to slip into a younger version of himself, here. Could not afford the Dread Wolf bearing its fangs, regardless of how the words stirred an old, bitter passion in him.
He knew the difference, between the sweet scent of bedroom pleasure, and the scar tissue of the Fade. He knew the latter far too well.
He offered a hand as Zevran stood.
"Or that courtly gestures can be as heavy a chain as any other?"
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What manner of life that had been.
His lips pressed thin as he took the hand- and made a gesture all his own, tugging Solas' up to press a kiss to the back of it. "Well if you are promising chains..."
Playing the part was simpler when he was awake. When he could prevent bruising from blooming onto his skin where he'd been manacled in the past at the thought.
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Now he doesn't even have drills and patrols to occupy his time, still forbidden from carrying weapons or going into any kind of combat scenario. He works for the Seeker during the day, and spends his idle evenings either wandering the battlements (not patrolling, just walking, he tells himself) and occasionally sequestering himself in one of the empty towers with a candle and a book, passing the time in total solitude and without the judging eyes of those around him.
Apart from Aleron, there isn't a soul he talks to. It's better this way, withdrawn from the people who were beginning to know him, avoiding contact with those he wronged and from those he might wrong in the future.
It's either this or walk off into the mountains, or step off the edge of a tower, just disappear without causing any more fuss. Sometimes he longs for that, but the Maker frowns on those who waste themselves.
At present he is curled up in one of the aforementioned towers, a wool blanket over his shoulders and some stupid book in his hands, a thing for which he has no interest but which is here to pass the time until it's time to go to sleep.
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Tonight it is the towers. Normally empty and thing quickly done, he pokes his head inside for his usual cursory check only to blink at the man curled in the corner. Cade. The templar that struck Beleth, that was struck by Merrick.
He doesn't know much of the man other than he seems on edge and off center- even now this? Does not speak well of a mind settled. "Not the most comfortable place to study, I should think."
Zevran keeps his voice light, easy. Without weight as he slips inside and closes the door behind him.
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"Um..." he murmurs, hoping this will be enough to end the exchange, "it's. Fine, actually."
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"You are Cade Harimann, yes? The Templar?" As though he isn't certain.
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"...yes," he says faintly, watching Zevran's hands and giving an involuntary wince. The elf is considerably smaller than he is, but he knows better than to think that will matter.
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He feels the bile rising as he watches Zevran traverse the room, barely hearing what the man is saying, the sudden onslaught of horror and disgust and shame overtaking all his thoughts. He looks at the floor, blanket wrapped tightly around him, his knuckles white where he grips it. And he waits.
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This is not the reaction of a man with a temper. A man that lashes out at provocation. This is not the face of a man ready to snap at someone that looks at him oddly. A man resigned is not a man on the edge. More pieces to the puzzle but he's not entirely certain they even go in the same box. Not anymore.
"...you are the same templar that had a violent disagreement with the elf Beleth, yes?" He is having a hard time picturing this man attempting to kill anyone, let alone his student.
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Zevran's not like any survivor he's ever met; he doesn't just scrape his way from one day to the next out here, he thrives. But Luke, knowing what little he does about him, realizes it isn't all that surprising. After all, Zev's been a survivor from before the dead refused to stay dead - and he never had the luxury of fire-building and learning to set rudimentary traps just for shits and giggles.
It's thanks to one of his traps that they've got themselves some squirrel for dinner, which means they can save the last couple cans of green beans in his backpack for a rainier day. It's risky building a fire in the hearth of the cabin they've been hunkering down in the past week, but fuck it -- it's their first taste of meat in a while and he's willing to wait for it to cook over a dim flame even if it's fucking torture sitting close enough to watch it crackle and drip with glistening fat.
"Look, I hate to be that guy, but... is it done yet? 'cause it's smellin' plenty done to me."
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More than enough to warrant ensuring his health and safety. Two sets of eyes are better than one- and it is a nice change of pace to talk to more than a wall or dead radio in hopes someone on the other end might hear him.
"At least this will taste of something. Remind me to leave a thank you note to whoever left spices in the kitchen."
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"Next time we're on a run I'll keep an' eye out. Figure there's plenty where that came from seein' as grabbin' the pepper ain't exactly a priority these days."
He feels spoiled with just a little taste of salt, but spices? Now that's fancy eating.
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"We should check the basement again, see if we cannot cut the lock. There is bound to be something down there." The kitchen had been bare- as were most they find lately. The spices had been a blessing.
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Just another thing on the list to look out for. He looks to him after a moment, swallowing against a dull pang in his throat. Mom would've liked Zev's company, he thinks, sharing her best recipes and techniques for making preserves. Well, maybe second-best recipes. Some secrets were hers to keep.
"So where'd you learn all this?" Luke asks suddenly, feeling an urge to stray from their usual business-like discussions. It'd be nice to know something more about a guy he'd be spending an indefinite period of time with. While he can strike out on his own - and he's had to spend more than a few nights on his own, here and there, over the last two years for some reason or another - there's power in numbers and much more. He hasn't scarred over and hardened enough to be like Jane, struggling to keep all the world - the good and the bad - at arms' length.
"If... you don' mind me askin'."
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He'd have to set out snares if they remained. Hope they find something more than this.
"The cooking, the hunting, the surviving? Ah..." He tips his head to the side as he rotates the spit, eyes narrowing at the drippings. "I suppose you could say it was something like military training, yes? Not that it was anything official or even all that tied to the government but...it has helped me survive so far!"
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