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This was not Solas’ plan. It was never his intention to bind Rook to himself, to be trapped in a prison of his own making. The bond was thin, a crumb of a thought floating through the fade, it wasn’t much to go on.
The last thing he’d heard was that Rook was intending to meet a possible ally somewhere in Minrathous. His patience was wearing thin. Had it not been for their meddling, the veil would have been torn, nature restored to balance. And perhaps, Solas could… No. He won’t dwell on that treacherous thought, on the impossible.
The Cobbled Swan is empty, save for Rook sat at a small table. The situation weighs heavy on their mind. They’d been anxious about this, more so when Morrigan and Harding had started speaking about utmost privacy, just you two, we shouldn’t be here for this.
Rook seems to be incapable of sitting still, bouncing their leg as they look around the empty pub. How curious. What kind of person would have an entire establishment shut down? They glance through the window, eyes studying the movement of people living their day to day. A sigh escapes their lips.
A cold hand creeping up behind their ear and down their neck.
“Boo.”
Rook jumps in their seat, hand clutching onto their chest. Their head swivels in the direction of the voice, and they’re even more taken aback. They bow their head in greeting.
“Inquisitor.”
A sound of a raspberry being blown. “Wrong. The inquisition’s been disbanded. It’s Gan’freya now, or Lavellan if you wish to be formal. May I?” The woman gestures towards the chair in front of Rook, and they motion for her to sit.
Gan’freya sits down, folding her arms across her chest, her gaze bears no steeliness and yet it’s not entirely kind. She studies Rook for a moment. Their face, their outfit, the way they hold themselves. Rook notices the glint of metal on her hand, a prosthetic.
“You’re not entirely what I expected.” Rook speaks.
Gan’freya has to hold back an eye roll. “I suppose you expected a saviour, someone who invited you here with words of encouragement.” Her arms slip down to rest on the armchairs. “I’m afraid I don’t have any to spare. If you think what’s going on here in the North is horrid, you have yet to see the scourge released on Southern Thedas.”
“Why ask to see me then?”
“Morrigan and Harding had asked so politely, and what with Varric hiring you on my expense, well.” Her voice trails off, eyes looking out the window. A snort escapes her mouth. “Apologies, I think we both expected something different when you went to disrupt that ritual.”
“Do you think I failed?” Rook’s mouth runs dry, knee bouncing faster and faster.
Gan’freya looks at them, and there’s a hint of pity in her eyes, it’s gone as soon as it had arrived. She reaches her hand out to clasp Rook’s. “No.” She says, voice firm. “Nobody could’ve predicted the consequences.”
There’s a warm roll of familiarity that washes over Rook, but they can’t pinpoint why. They’d heard tales of the Inquisitor, and the stories had brought comfort on the long days chasing the Evanuris and the Venatori. The very stories Varric regaled.
But this felt different. As if a foreign mind had bled into theirs, trying to reach for her through Rook. They zero in on her speaking, shrugging off the sensation. She tells them of a statuette, and in return Rook tells her of what they’ve found.
It’s a glimmer. A foggy window, but Solas knows that figure better than he knows himself these days. Surely, the prison mocks him. Every move, every plan made in his lighthouse, buried under secrecy until Rook seeks him out. But now, the fade ripples and opens itself as if arms outstretched, daring him to confront himself.
Her hair is shorter, and there are bags under her eyes. She is both how he remembers her, and more. Yes, he had watched over her in her dreams, even before the night of the ritual. But seeing her, physically seeing her, through the eyes of Rook, it makes his heart leap into his throat.
The humour in her voice, quick to deflect Rook’s questioning. Always so perceptive to what others want from her, always ready to keep them at arm’s length.
He did not want this for her. Did not want her to follow him, to resign herself to a role she never wanted to begin with.
Herald. Inquisitor. Martyr. A symbol larger than life itself.
When she reached for Rook, when her hand had touched theirs, it’s as if that warmth washed over him too. How he wished he actually did bind that fool to do his bidding, if only to feel the softness of her hand in his once more, even through a proxy body.
The image becomes clearer upon her touch. And the punishment continues. Her pained cry, from when he’d removed the orb from her arm, echoes through the fade. The very sound mocks him, as his gaze falls on her prosthetic arm. He’d saved her, had given her another chance at life, or so he told himself.
His hand reaches for her, and the view ripples in between his fingers like water. His heart hammers in his chest, as if trying to break through skin and flesh and crawl out from the fade into her arms.
The prison echoes with more cries of anguish, the hiss of words in anger, mistakes that had been made before he’d met her. Solas dares not acknowledge them, their very existence a heavy weight upon his shoulder.
So he closes his eyes. His ears tuning into her voice as if it were a guiding melody. Everything else is just noise.
Rook scratches their temple, it feels as if a fog has fallen upon their mind.
“Are you alright?” Gan’freya inquires.
She’s no mage, not well versed in anything arcane, and her brother has been no help what with his speciality being healing. But something about Rook’s behaviour feels odd.
Morrigan had sent word, updates after the ritual was disrupted, when blight had descended upon Thedas once more like a disease. Harding had urged her to meet with them, to alleviate their fears now that Varric was gone. And through Morrigans eluvian she went.
She knew of Rook, in a way. Varric had written enough letters for Gan’freya to make sense of who this person was, what they could do. Yet something about their eyes fighting not to glaze over as they scratch and prod at their temple, fingers moving towards the back of their head, makes her eyes zero in on them with an analytical gaze.
“I am. It’s just…” They place their palms on the table, as if willing their body to still. “Ever since I hit my head when we disrupted the ritual, it’s like there’s this buzzing in my head.”
Her eyes give them a once over. “A concussion, you mean?”
They shake their head. “No it’s like, like something crawling around in there, biting on my brain.”
“What like something controlling you?”
“No..” Rook trails off, eyes cast down at the table, fingers scratching on the surface. “It’s more like... Something’s watching me, or at least trying to.”
“And by someone you mean…”
“Solas.” Rook finishes. “But it’s not constant, sometimes it’s a dull throb, but right now it’s like… Like my brain is on fire, in a way.”
Gan’freya hums, eyes giving Rook a once over. She rises from the table, approaching Rook as her hand reaches for their scalp, a questioning look in her eyes.
“May I?” She asks.
Rook simply nods. Unsure of what her fingers carding through their hair might achieve. Her touch is soothing, in more ways than one. It seems she’s inspecting their wound, fingers gently prodding the scab.
“I’m not oozing, am I?” They jest.
Something between a laugh and a snort escapes her mouth. “No, no you’re fine. No oozing, no bleeding, no tentacles or horns.”
Their body stills, and they hear the rustle of a bag, and a smear of something wet on their scalp. It’s cooling, relaxing almost. They listen to her hum as she layers whatever she’s smearing over their head.
Solas wonders if smell can travel into his prison, the scent of lavender and verbena overwhelming him. He cannot feel her touch, nor feel the balm she’s generously slathering Rook in. But he remembers, remembers how she used to tend to his wounds and his scrapes, how she used to bandage him and place soft kisses upon his scars afterwards.
And now all he has is this. A memory. A faint touch that cannot reach him.
The sting of tears in his eyes, his throat closing up, fists clenched at his sides.
“You’ll be fine.” Her voice, hushed, reverberating through the fade.
A part of him hopes she knows he’s listening in, another doesn’t dare to assume this kindness is aimed towards him.
It’d be so much easier if she had come to the lighthouse. The veil is thin there, he’d have more opportunity to reach out, to engage. But he cannot, he’s resigned to being a backseat passenger.
Solas watches her pull away, a solemn expression on her face, lips downcast in a frown. He’s always hated seeing her like that. The view grows foggier as Rook begins getting up, Solas watches as Gan’freya’s hand slip the jar of the salve she rubbed on them between Rook’s palms.
“You need it more than I do. Whenever you feel an itch just… you know, smear away.”
But there’s something in her voice, a tone that’s indecipherable to Rook, but all too familiar to Solas. There’s no bite, no sadness, but there’s a lilt of knowing. Her eyes catch Rook’s gaze, but it’s as if she’s staring through them, right at Solas.
When they bid their goodbyes, the image blurs altogether. As if it were never there with him to begin with.
And when Rook comes to him in the fade, he tries his hardest to bite back the upturn of the corners of his lips as the all too familiar medicinal smell wafts into the air, paired with something far more familiar, and sweeter.
Just as Rook pretends they did not meet with her under secrecy, Solas pretends he did not watch it through their eyes, hands folded behind his back. Their conversations clipped, filled with jabs and insults. But when they leave, and Solas is alone in his prison once more, the smell remains.
And it sparks a feeling of hope in his chest.