Dragon Age Inquisition: Viewpoints

[sisyphus]

Title: Viewpoints
Fandom: Dragon Age Inquisition
Warnings: Implied end game spoilers. Nothing spelled out.
Word Count: 1360
Characters: Kalethe (Dalish rogue Inquisitor; diplomatic, very focused on what's important, and the off one in her clan), Cole, Solas. Mentions of Varric, Morrigan, Kieran, Blackwall. Vague mentions of another.

Notes: I had to wonder if Cole would start to forget what he knows about the others, the further human he gets.
I also don't think Sandal's prophecy was about Corypheus.

Summary: "When he rises, everyone will see."


“Never trust an elf.”

“…Cole.”

“Oh. No. Not you.”

-

Kalethe hurried up the stairs in search of the boy. He vanished after they returned--except it was with Varric, and after everything that had happened, she thought to leave the pair together. Except she had seen Varric ten minutes ago and he had said the kid took off.

And Kalethe just wanted to make sure he was okay.

She cleared the last stair and a sigh escaped her. He was exactly where he always was, exactly where he was always surprised that she found him at. Taking a slower pace, she strode up to him, wondering at his mood.

“Cole--”

“There is no other man. He becomes the other man to do the things he can't.”

Kalethe blinked, and for once, Cole did the same, as if realizing what he said. “What was I…. I was somewhere else a moment ago,” he started, and Kalethe wondered for the first time if she shouldn’t have influenced his shift to more human. “I was… somewhere else… and I knew other things. I can’t… I can’t remember now.”

Wary, she tipped her head in question. “I thought being more human meant you remembered things better.”

Cole nodded up and down, like a child. “I do. I remember how I accidentally tripped the cook while putting cheese near the shelves. I remember the Left Hand catching me watching her when she cried. I remember the cupboard.”

That--the bad place--had been referenced before, and Kalethe thought to steer him from it. “Then what don’t you remember, Cole?”

He looked at her and furrowed his brow. There was something lost in his expression. “I don’t… I don’t know now. There were things I knew… People I knew… But now it’s….” The boy shifted his shoulders and held his palms up, staring at them. “Gone.”

A sharp burst of guilt hit her behind her eyes. “Cole, I’m so--”

He reached a hand to touch her shoulder, smiling gently. “You should never apologize. Not you. Not for this.” She wondered--wondered, wondered--at his intonation, but a moment later, the subject was changed. “Did I tell you that Varric is going to teach me to hit people right? He said… There’s a wrong way and there’s… A right way, and I want to… I want to do it right.” Lower then, with his gaze on the floor, he muttered again. “…I want to do it right.”

He was trying. Trying so hard, and she wasn’t going to bother him for something that likely meant nothing. Kalethe smiled at him, reassuringly, and nodded. “You will, Cole. You’re already doing so much.”

“Not at all,” he replied lightly. “But I’d like to do more.”

Kalethe thought about the Inquisition, about Cole and Cassandra and Dorian and--and Solas, and she thought she was the same. “Me, too, Cole. Me, too.”

But he was nodding again, that up and down motion. “You will. Don’t worry.”

“It’s not something I can help,” she said ruefully. “But I’ll try. See you later, Cole.”

“If you like.”

-

With Morrigan and Kieran around, there hadn’t been much time to check up on the others with all that had happened. But eventually Kalethe made her rounds, wondering where Blackwall could be, and found herself by Cole.

“Cole, have you seen--”

“He was their enemy the whole time, but she made him forget, so he could change.”

The elf froze warily, something strange in that statement, more than most. Logic attempted to win over. “…Do you mean Blackwall?”

Cole blinked. “What? No….”

Their enemy the whole time… “Cole, who were you talking about, just now?”

“I wasn’t talking about anyone. I had been thinking… about the Fade. I still remember it, but sometimes….”

Sometimes it’s harder. He had told her before. And his knowledge, his strangeness and his gift, it came from there. So if he was beginning to forget…. “Cole, are you…”

“Solas!”

Cole’s happy voice made her look to the side, at her paramour, stepping out from the shadows by the stairs. “Hello, Cole.” A look to her, private and soft. “Inquisitor.”

“Solas,” Kalethe greeted warmly. “I’m surprised to find you away from your studies.”

“I wanted to check on our resident spirit-who-isn’t,” the elf replied fondly, looking at Cole. Cole nearly beamed under his hat, a change to be told above all others. “But it seems you have been watching over him.”

“She keeps me from the darkness,” Cole replied, doing his strange nod. “She tries to protect me.”

“She tries to protect us all,” Solas corrected gently, and Kalethe felt a complication pass through her chest. But Cole was already nodding again.

“She does. And she will. But not all.”

Solas moved his head, the smallest amount, as if trying to find something in Cole. “…One cannot save each soul they are accountable for.”

“No…,” the boy replied sadly. “Not the people she doesn’t know to protect either.”

The conversation was quickly turning alarming, and it must have shown on her expression. Solas nodded in her direction. “However, we are worrying the Inquisitor for something unworthy of her. Think nothing of it, my heart.”

Except Kalethe already was, and if Solas couldn’t read it on her expression, Cole would be able to pry it from her heart. …But she made him forget, so he could change. “I was only thinking of Blackwall, in all honesty. I haven’t seen him today.”

Solas placed a hand to his chin, shifting his weight in a now familiar manner. “The last time I believe I saw him was--”

But Cole was looking at her, seeing the rest of what she hadn’t said. Blackwall was her worry, but it was his words that held in her heart. What he had said upon her appearance and what he had spoken just now. Cole tilted his head, then interrupted Solas, speaking to her. “I don’t… I don’t know anymore. Bits and pieces, all of it. The puzzle that it used to make is scattered, torn. I… like myself. But I don’t know if I can help you now.”

It was heartrending, all of it, and she reached to grasp one of his hands in her own. Cole jumped slightly, and Solas watched the interaction carefully. Kalethe stared at the boy, thinking him in that moment her own blood, her own brother, shem or spirit or nothing of the sort. “I just need you to be all right, Cole. That’s what matters. The rest will come later.”

He fidgeted in her grasp, but she didn’t release him yet. Cole opened his mouth a few times with nothing before shaking his head slowly. Then pointed at Solas with his free hand.

Beside her, she sensed the other elf tense.

“…He does care for you,” the boy said sadly. “If nothing else, remember that.”

Kalethe pet Cole’s hand, smiling at him. “I will, Cole. Thank you. I know that Solas cares.”

There was a release of pressure at her side, and Solas gave an off-beat laugh. “Enough to take strength in, ma sa'lath?”

She shifted, letting go of Cole’s hand at the endearment; my one love. Attempting to keep her dignity, she arched a brow. “I would say yes if you would believe me.”

Solas watched her for a moment, before bowing his head in recognition. “You will always do what is right,” he said in non-sequitur. “I know that now. You are different from all of the People.”

Cole had left at some point, the space to the side of them empty. Music from the bard floated upward, empty, without Bull’s Chargers to laugh the chorus. “That used to be a bad thing.” A weak retort.

Solas moved to take her hands, to lift them to his chest. “Not at all. You have set yourself apart, and made it so that one who changes slowly allowed it all at once.”

An odd phrase, a strange one, and it reminded her of-- But Solas was continuing, lifting her hands further to brush his lips over the back of her hands. She fought the urge to shift and see if others were nearby. And yet he caught her attention by speaking once more. “You have taught me that there is more in this world than I previously had seen.”

“And what does the world look like,” Kalethe found herself saying. “Through your eyes?”

Solas’ eyes rose to hers, and he smiled, small and subtle. “Different, my heart. Very different.”