Chapter Text
It had been awkward at first. Adjusting, that is. Adaar had been a mercenary for years. She knew the ins and out of the trade; do exactly what you have to to get paid and, don’t be a hero. Never show weakness, you can’t ever flinch or doubt. You have to do what you have to do. Nobody cares if a “Qunari” dies, they just want the job done. In the Valos-Kas, many faces had come and gone. Some died, some left and some stayed. She had always stayed, she was a mage, she couldn’t leave. But more than that, she loved the comradery. Growing up in a human village, surrounded by the chantry and suspicious eyes, she had scarcely any friends. There was an elf from the village she got along with well enough. She had no parents and no home, that made her equal to Adaar, who had parents and a home, but her race was all wrong. Their friendship was a strange one, made up of loneliness and desperation. They never fought, but they never got close. It was a strange, twisted relationship that never let them close. Once, when Adaar was old enough, she had kissed the elf. Pulled her vastly smaller, pliant frame into herself and pressed her lips to her. The elf had kissed her in kind, exploring each other for the first time. It was new to them, so very new.
Soon their clothes were forgotten, and their breaths came in gasps and moans. The night seemed to span out for years and years, the sun creeping down behind the mountains and the crickets came out to sing. When they had finished, they lay beside one another for a while. They never said anything, there was nothing to say. After what felt like forever, and yet no time at all, the elf had dressed and left without a word.
Adaar never saw her again.
Soon after that, her mother sat her down and braided her hair like she always did when she wanted to talk, and told her it was time to go. Adaar hadn’t cried until she had got into bed, and then she had buried her face into her furs and screamed. That night she had cursed and hated and fumed over everything. She hated herself more than she could fathom. A Vashoth that had never know the Qun, a Qunari among humans and elves that would never accept her, a mage spending a lifetime of hiding it for fear of death and she was gay. She could stand it no longer, being defined by what she was rather than who she was.
When the sun had come up, Adaar was forever changed. No longer did she flinch and apologise when the humans hated, no longer would she hide. With her head held high, she grinned and joked, even to a crowd she knew would never laugh. She would never be weak. Her smile was her armour and she wore it so well, it might as well have been her skin.
The Valos-Kas had accepted her without a single question. She was a powerful mage and she carried herself well. Her jokes and quips made her the life of the group, and for the first time she had real, lasting friends who understood her. They didn’t even care that she only ever kissed women in the taverns, that she rebuffed the men that flirted with her and talked excitedly about the low-cut dress of a woman a town back. With the Valos-Kas, she could be as much herself as she wanted, and they liked the hell out of her for it.
Writing to her parents had been easy at first. She did it constantly, so much so that she had bundles of unsent letters in her pack, promising she’d deliver them by hand one day. But as the days slipped to weeks, to months and then to years, Adaar stopped writing. She loved her parents, they had raised her as well as any Tal-Vashoth parents could. But now that she was with the Valos-Kas, it was the first time she had ever felt like family. On the longest, saddest of nights, Adaar would pull out parchment and quill and would find herself lost for words. She had forgotten how to tell them, had forgotten if they even wanted to know. She would sit and try to remember her father’s laugh, or the smell of her mother’s perfume. It all felt so vague and so far away, that she wasn’t certain it was real anymore. Then she would stuff her parchment away, and think of something else. Anything else.
It was the most awkward when she had gone home. They had a job near her village and had passed through one day on their way. Adaar had approached their little cottage, and knocked on the door. Her nose was full of her mother’s cooking, the scent of hot bread wafting through the open window. It made her feel surreal and sick. Her father had answered and had stared at her in astonishment. There was a very long, strained silence until she had broken it the only way she knew how; with a joke. Her father hadn’t smiled.
Her mother, hearing her voice, came from within and gaped at her, before dragging her only child into her home. She had fussed, making tea and sandwiches, stammering out meaningless gossip and chatter. Adaar had sat, under the silent stares of her father, barely touching what her mother had served. Hours of her mother probing her for details and asking how she had been, without any substantial answer from her daughter, passed in a slow agony.
When the sun started to set, Adaar suddenly made up that the Valos-Kas had to leave at nightfall. She had stood up, and realised she was taller than her mother now. It was then that she had realised;
She hadn’t seen her parents for ten years.
Leaving felt impossible. Her mother had hugged her with such force that Adaar felt her ribs crack. When they had parted, the smaller woman could not meet her daughter’s eyes as she forced bread and cheese upon her, and sent her on her way. Her father did not say goodbye, but when she looked back at the little cottage for the final time, she saw his large silhouette framed in the window. Adaar picked up a single gloved hand, and had waved at him. Her heart ached so painfully, she was certain she was going to die. Her heart did die, when he waved back once and then closed the curtains.
Adaar had cried. For hours. She had cried hot and thick tears while she pressed her back into a tall tree, and swallowed down her Mother’s homemade bread between sobs. At some point, she had fallen asleep and had woken again to the sounds of birds chirping in the silence before dawn. She made her way back to camp, and knew then that her home was gone forever.
The Valos-Kas had not asked about her parents, they could all see that she had changed again. Her jokes came out more forced and her laughter died first, when it normally died last. She was somber for months, but came back around and it was as though nothing had happened. But to Adaar, she felt as though she had lost the last thing tying her down. No longer did she enjoy the tavern women, or the sovereigns in her pockets, nor the glory of a good battle. All she felt now was a vast lostness, as though she were out at sea with no direction.
That was when direction had found her. And it was awkward, at first.