To the Void and Back Ch2

Title: To the Void and Back
Author: ElCapitan18
Game: Dragon Age
Characters/Pairing: F!Lavellan and Cullen
Disclaimer: All recognizable content belongs to Bioware

(Spoilers All)


“Herald—” he called after her and Delani bit back a smile.

Without turning to look at the shemlan and watch him hurry up behind her, she rebuked, “That’s not my name, Commander.”

The feeling of his fingers gently grazing her shoulder pulled her to a stop. Delani turned to face him then, a smile on her lips as she stared up at the tall human. His nose and cheeks were rosy from the cold, his eyes a brilliant golden color under the light of day. There was concern in his expression, his brows pinched and his lips pulled slightly downward as worry found its way onto his handsome features. Was he worried for her, or for the Inquisition? Perhaps both, though it was probably only the latter; she brushed the thought away as irrelevant.

Cullen huffed, annoyed by how often she refused to be acknowledged as what he obviously believed her to be. “Fine, Lady Lavellan,” he corrected himself and his eyes narrowed slightly at the sight of the smile growing on her lips. “You should not be pushing yourself so soon. Your injuries are still healing.”

“Nonsense, Commander,” she returned, grinning up at him to demonstrate that she was feeling fine and any concern he had about her well being was misplaced. Delani placed a hand on his bracer and felt her heart leap in her chest, summersaulting with the contact. Ignoring her body’s startling reaction to touching him, she cleared her throat and continued. “I’ve had healers tending to me all night. I’ve rested, I’ve eaten, and I feel fine.”

Releasing him from her hold, she returned her hand to her side and turned on her heel. Delani adjusted the fit of her gloves as she walked, smiling to herself when Cullen easily kept stride beside her. “At any rate,” she said, her attention on making sure all of her straps were buckled and what sparse armor she was wearing was secured. “Solas knows of a place where we can regroup and rebuild. Corypheus isn’t going to wait for my injuries to heal completely, and neither should we.”

A sigh sounded from Cullen, defeated. He rubbed the back of his neck but he knew that she was right. Delani gave him a side long glance, a smirk playing at the edge of her mouth. When he looked down at her she ripped her eyes back from him and pointed her gaze forward.

“You’re sure that you feel fine?” he asked, concern obvious in the undercurrents of his tone.

The curl at the corner of her lips completely unfurled and Delani grinned to herself. He was worried about her, how cute was that? She wouldn’t lie to him just to ease his concern. Honesty was important to her, and being upfront and transparent was even more so. Delani had been called many things in the past, but hard to read was not one of them.

“I’m a little sore,” she admitted only to immediately amend, “but it’s nothing that I can’t handle.” Playfully nudging his arm with her elbow, Delani teased, “I’m a big girl, Commander. I strapped my own boots and everything.” before motioning his attention to her knee-high boots.

Cullen dragged a hand down his face, grumbling, “Andraste preserve me,” under his breath. When he looked back at Delani there was a laugh in his eyes that didn’t quite make it onto his lips. “Just be careful.” It was a request but came out sounding more like an order.

She stopped and turned to look up at the tall human. Delani took a small step toward him, standing close enough to make him a bit uncomfortable but far enough to still seem respectable. She watched as his eyes dilated before contracting. He noticed her proximity but didn’t know what to make of it, or whether or not he should react to it. Her smile turned peckish as she folded her arms against her bust.

Quirking an eyebrow, she challenged, “Now what fun is there to be had by being careful?”

His head shook with disappointment but the smile was finally starting to break free from under his lips. Cullen answered her question with a question. “What’s more fun than being alive, my lady?”

A laugh sounded from Delani and his smile fully emerged at the sound of it. For that smile alone she would allow him to win that round. “I have my team, vhenan’ara. I’ll be perfectly fine.” She wanted to reach out to him again but didn’t, uncomfortable with how she’d reacted to it before. Instead she offered him the most reassuring smile she had. “There’s no need to worry.”

Just as she was about to walk away again, Cullen grabbed her by the wrist. His touch was soft and easy to break, but she allowed him to gently pull her to a stop. Delani tried to ignore the fluttering feeling in her gut when they touched, knowing that it was unrequited. When he released her, she couldn’t decide if she missed having his gloved fingers around her wrist, or if she was relieved to be free from warmth his touch ignited inside of her.

“Vhenan’ara,” he repeated, testing the word, feeling it tumble gracelessly out of his mouth. His golden eyes sought hers, his eyebrows curved with curiosity. “You’ve called me that before. What does it mean?”

The smile on her lips was mildly panicked. She hadn’t expected him to pick up on it, which had been foolish on her part. During every last one of her previous interactions with humans, they’d completely ignored her. They hadn’t cared for her elvish tongue, and didn’t care to learn it. But being the Herald of Adraste meant that she was no longer invisible. This was the first time that she’d been asked to translate, and of course it had to be a term of endearment that would make the Commander uncomfortable. She almost told him the meaning, if only to watch his reaction to it, but she couldn’t. His embarrassment was not worth suffering her own.

Not wanting to end their conversation awkwardly, Delani answered him with a treaty. “I’ll tell you what: I will tell you what vhenan’ara means the day you actually address me by my name.”

Dissatisfaction creased his features. “But I already called you by your name.” he argued. When Delani’s expression tightened in challenge, he reminded her, “Lady Lavellan. That’s your name, is it not?”

The sincerity of his statement pulled another laugh out of her. Shaking her head, Delani started walking again and shouted back at him, “My real name.”

Relief washed over her with every step. Cullen was so professional, she doubted that he would ever address her as anything other than the titles they’d forced upon her. The closest he would come was ‘Lady Lavellan’ which meant that she’d be saved the embarrassment of telling him the truth. They barely knew each other to start with, she had no business calling him vhenan’ara. But saying it felt right and she couldn’t bring herself to stop. If he ever found out its meaning, and decided that it made him uncomfortable, then she would desist. Until then she was going to have her fun.

Her team was waiting for her some distance away, ready to go on her word even though she doubted that they’d encounter any danger during their trek through the mountains. The Iron Bull, Solas, and Varric were talking; or rather, Iron Bull and Varric were joking, and Solas was quietly observing the two of them with an amused smile curling his lips. She didn’t need all of them present. Solas knew the way and Delani had tracking and navigating skills, but she enjoyed the company.

The men greeted her with smiles of varying degrees. Varric was the first one to receive her, his arms held wide in welcome. “There she is, our illustrious leader.”

“You ready to head out, Boss?” asked Iron Bull, a friendly smirk twisting his lips, his one good eye shining with mirth.

Delani nodded with a sigh. “More ready than you know, Bull.” Allowing a small smile to spread over her mouth she admitted, “If I have to see one more healer I think I might scream.”

Though he laughed, there was sincerity in Varric’s eyes when he next spoke. “It’s good to see you on your feet.” His facial features did a good job disguising his concern with amusement. “You gave us a bit of a scare last night, Elf. Try not to make a habit out of it.”

“Oh I don’t know,” she said with a shrug, tucking her thumbs behind her belt and standing nonchalantly, a playful smile toyed at the edges of her lips. “Now that I’ve had a taste of being missed, I think that maybe I should get attacked by arch demons more often.”

Solas lifted a disapproving eyebrow and shook his head, a laugh spilling out of him in the form of a cough. “Perhaps not,” he advised.

Laughing in agreement, Varric concurred, “He’s right, Elf. You get attacked by an arch demon, we all get attacked by an arch demon.”

Her shoulders jumped with another careless shrug, as though it were a trivial fact and one they shouldn’t have concerned themselves with. Looking down at Varric, Delani narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms in front of her chest. Pointedly, she observed, “You know, Varric, there are three of us now. You’re going to have to come up with a better nickname for me than ‘elf’.”

The sigh that expelled from the dwarf was disheartened. “I know, I know,” Varric admitted. “Elf was just a placeholder until I came up with something better.”

Grin expanding over her lips, Delani quickly moved to rectify his predicament. “Oh, I have a suggestion,” she said. “You should call me Razor, or Daggers.”

Varric stared up at her and shook his head, his laugh was mocking, as though those were the two worst nicknames he’d ever heard. “How about Stalky or Reckless? I feel like those would be more fitting.”

Narrowing her eyes, she replied, “Your words wound me, Varric.”

“Oh, Varric, I’ve got one.” Iron Bull chimed in, a mischievous smile splattered over his lips. “How about Eyes, because of her creepy big elf eyes?”

Nodding as though it were a legitimate candidate, Varric rubbed his chin and said, “It has a certain ring to it, Qunari, I’ll give you that.”

Looking from the stout dwarf to the hulking qunari, all Delani could do for a moment was shake her head. Waving off the conversation as though it were a swarm of flies, she tried to back out from what she’d started. “You know what, Bull? Boss is fine. Let’s just stick with Boss.”

It was Solas who spoke up in argument. “I don’t know, da’len. Iron Bull might be on to something.” His eyes were glittering with mischief.

“Not you too, Solas,” she exclaimed, exasperated. Waving at the other two men, she stated, “I expected it from these two, but not from you.” When all three of them started snickering, Delani playfully narrowed her eyes. Her expression tightened with pseudo distaste, and she grumbled, “I saved the whole lot of you yesterday. You should all be nicer to me.”

Tightly clutching his staff, Solas’s expression was light with amusement even as he helped them move on from their repartee. “We’re losing daylight, da’len. We should be moving.”

Varric looked up at her with a shrug. “Baldy’s right.”

Rolling her eyes, Delani turned on her heel and waved for them to follow. “When isn’t he?” she asked before sucking in a deep breath of the fresh mountain air. An excited grin spread over her face before she said, “Alright men, let’s move out.”


Cullen watched as Delani and the others left the camp, setting out in front of the rest of them to mark the safest and quickest path through the mountains. There was an ongoing conflict of emotions waging inside of him. His earlier interaction with the Herald left him feeling… for lack of a better word, bubbly. He felt a smile hiding just under the surface at the mere thought of her. But he was also concerned that she was pushing herself too hard too soon, and that was preventing his smile from unraveling.

He knew Delani was right. They needed to find a place to rebuild, a place that was theirs, where they could grow and expand. Solas claimed to know of such a place, and them going ahead of the main group was only logical. Yet all Cullen could really focus on was the fact that she’d nearly died. She’d avoided the avalanche by some miracle, and had made it back to camp by the Maker’s grace. Delani should’ve been resting, at least for another day.

Too wrapped up in his thoughts, when a mage came to stand beside him, the suddenness of his appearance surprised Cullen. “She’s resilient,” Dorian commented, his eyes shining with curiosity as he watched the small group fade into the distance. Without looking at Cullen, he finished, “I’ll give her that.”

After everything he’d seen it was easy for Cullen to agree with him. “That she is,” he replied, turning around to head back into the encampment and make sure that everyone was prepared to start moving within the hour.

He gave Dorian a sideways glance when the mage kept pace beside him. A part of him was pleased to see the that the other man had stuck around, a larger part of him was surprised because of the same. Yes, he was Tevinter, but he was also different. Cullen couldn’t have explained it if he tried. He didn’t trust the mage, per say, he just didn’t quite distrust him either.

Accepting a report from a soldier as he walked by, Cullen commented, “I see you’re still with us, Ser Pavus.”

He could hear the smile in Dorian’s voice when he replied. “Oh, do try not to sound so disappointed, Commander. It is horribly unbecoming.”

Cullen allowed the corner of his mouth to curl into a half smile, his gaze still on the report as he read it through. When he looked up at Dorian his expression was schooled to seriousness once more. Tapping the report against his leg, he admitted, “I would like to thank you for your help. Your arrival, your warning, it made all of the deference.”

“It did, didn’t it?” Dorian returned, twirling the tip of his mustache with an attitude both fitting of and mocking his station. After a second or two passed, his haughty mien dissipated and Dorian’s shoulders slacked at bit. “Though it is difficult to acknowledge my astounding sense of timing when so many were lost.”

His expression turned contemplative for a moment before he looked up to meet Cullen’s gaze once again. “Chancellor Roderick, to name one specifically. He didn’t make it through the night.”

Cullen clenched his jaw, unsurprised. Roderick’s injuries had been grave. The fact that he had been able to show them the path, and made it as far as he did, was surprising enough. “That’s a shame,” he replied, sincerity in his voice. He and the chancellor might have had words on numerous occasions, but he was a good man undeserving of the fate he’d been dealt. “We all owe him our lives. Even if he didn’t believe in the Herald, he really pulled through when it mattered.”

Dorian nodded in both agreement and understanding before he said, “Ah, yes. Perhaps he thought it best to err on the side of caution when dealing out hefty titles like ‘Herald of Andraste’. Especially to a dalish elf.”

Feeling himself become defensive over Delani, Cullen took a slight step forward. His eyes were narrowed, his brow furrowed with displeasure, his lips sneering slightly as he demanded, “Do you have a problem with her being an elf, Ser Pavus?”

“Me?” he pressed a hand to his chest as though there were someone else he could possibly be speaking to. “Maker no.” Dorian retreated back a step, reclaiming the space that Cullen had stolen from him. Once Cullen had relaxed, allowing them both to fall back into casual conversation, Dorian explained himself. “I don’t know her well enough to attest to her worthiness one way or the other.”

He looked away from Cullen then, slowly scanning over the camp and taking in the sight of all of them preparing to move on and follow after Delani. When his green eyes met Cullen’s again, a small smile twitched at the edges of his lips. With a shrug he said, “From what I’ve seen, Lady Lavellan seems capable, courageous, determined, and strong. And perhaps that’s all that she needs to be.”

Dorian smiled at the surprised expression that took Cullen’s features. “We don’t need a Herald,” he then gestured to the soldiers, Haven’s towns people that had left with them, the people that they’d picked up along the way. Also looking at them all, he finished, “They do. All we need is a leader, and she appears to be filling that role quite nicely. Don’t you agree?”

Thinking over Dorian’s words, Cullen returned his attention to the report in his hand. He didn’t bother rereading it, he was just stalling as he considered the truth of the mage’s statement. The Inquisition needed a leader. While its four current leaders were all capable, their opinions often clashed, their methods conflicted, and most times it was difficult to come to an easy consensus. They needed a single person to turn to, to make the final call and instruct them on how best to use their resources.

Delani had already had a taste of leadership and had handled it admirably. She accessed every situation before deciding how best to act, and which resources to use. They already looked to her for many things. Unwittingly, she had fallen into the role and, unconsciously, they had welcomed her initiative. If he was going to be honest, she was already their leader, all that was left was the formality and ceremony of making it so. It was something that he was going to have to discuss with the others, though Cullen didn’t see why any of them would disagree with him.

Having stalled long enough, Cullen looked up from the report and met Dorian’s expectant gaze again. Rubbing the back of his neck, he finally answered, “I suppose I do.”

The smile that pulled at Dorian’s lips was of self-satisfaction, which then turned departing. Inclining his head, the mage dismissed himself. “I’ve stolen enough of your precious time, Commander. There is still much to be done.”

Cullen nodded in understanding and appreciation. As the Tevinter mage turned to leave, he said, “Thank you again, Ser Pavus.”

The other man walked backwards for a bit, a grin on his lips and his arms spread in a haughty display of conceit. “Gratitude and recognition, two things that I don’t receive nearly as often as I should. I think I might stick around a bit longer for that alone.” He then turned back around and continued on his way.

A short chuckle expelled from Cullen as he watched Dorian depart. Shaking his head, Cullen started toward the far edge of camp, where he knew the women would be. Dorian had been right in his observation of Delani’s adeptness for leadership, and Cullen knew that they would recognize it as well. It was painfully obvious that the Inquisition needed a voice and a face, a person standing at point. It was just as obvious that that person needed to be Delani. If they could agree on anything, he knew that it would be on this.