Archive of Our Own

The Bull was dead to begin with. Or, at least, that was the least agonizing place to begin, the worst of the pain already over and done with. The Bull was dead, his parents were dead, his homeland nearly-destroyed and laid to waste, and Dorian was languishing in the dungeon in Weisshaupt, awaiting the Herald’s judgment. The Bull was dead, all but murdered, sent on a suicide mission which had no chance of changing anything, and Dorian had attacked the Herald in a fit of rage. He hadn’t gotten far- the Herald kept her Templars very tightly on their lyrium leash- and now here he was, waiting to hear was his fate would be. It would be Tranquility, of course: or rather, to be made a subject of the experiments with Tranquility the Wardens were conducting, to make a mage just Tranquil enough to remove free will and independent thought, but leave the magic for the Inquisition’s use. He hoped that would be the case, at least: the alternative was being left to Erimond’s nonexistent mercy.

He knew better than to hope for the leniency of a swift execution.

Of course, it was also possible that he’d been forgotten and left to die of thirst. Presumably someone would notice when his corpse started to stink. Provided his corpse would noticeably stink in the Blighted wasteland that was the Anderfells.

He couldn’t summon up the energy to care. The world had ended, that day when they named a monster the Herald of Andraste, and it was no use pretending that their current existence was anything other than Thedas’ death throes. It had been that way for over three years now, even if he was only acknowledging it now. The Breach was a slow way to die, it seemed, much like dying of thirst.

“Belly hurt like knives, throat cracked dry.”

Dorian blinked as a young man materialized in front of him, holding of waterskin.

“You should drink,” the young man said. “It will help.”

Dorian was less than convinced of that, but it was difficult to protest with the water being held to his lips. That was the point of death throes, was it not? Thrashing around in a vain attempt to keep living, even when you were beyond help.

No sooner had the young man helped him to drain the water than there was a rattle as the door was opened. It was then that it occurred to him that the young man should have made some noise when he entered, but by that time he had vanished.

It wasn’t a Templar, or a Warden, or Erimond, or even the Herald herself who entered the room and began to unlock the manacles keeping him chained to the wall. It was an elven mage he’d never seen before, bald-headed and unassuming.

“Dorian of House Pavus?” the elf asked.

“For what little it’s worth,” Dorian replied, cradling his right hand to his chest. His wrist was broken- had been since he was thrown in here. That had been a week ago? Something like that. He’d had visits from the guards at first, largely consisting of being kicked and having his head dunked in a bucket of foul-smelling water. They’d stopped at some point, perhaps two days ago, probably not much more, seeing as he still wasn’t dead. “Has the Herald made her judgment then?”

“Yes,” the elf replied. “She has granted your freedom in exchange for my services to the Inquisition.”

Dorian stared. “How?” he demanded.

“I am a mage of peculiar skills, and it was the price I requested,” the elf said evenly. His calm was maddening.

“Why?”

“As I told the Herald, we are lovers.”

Dorian gaped until the elf reached out and gently shut his mouth.

“You’ll catch flies,” he said, as though his words made sense. He reached down and undid the saarebas collar he was wearing, but Dorian was too far gone to appreciate the return of his magical talents. “And the ones around here carry the Blight.”

“Did they not tell you how I ended up chained in the dungeons?” Dorian demanded. “I attacked the Herald for ordering my lover to his death. And you don’t have the horns to be mistaken for the Bull.”

“Yes, I was told. It’s not surprising that you found someone else. You were always a passionate man, and you left home such a long time ago. It is not as though we made any promises to one another.” The elf shrugged laconically. “Still, the end of the world makes you notice your regrets.”

He held out his hand. Bereft of anything better to do, Dorian took it, and allowed himself to be pulled to his feet. The elf guided him out of the cell and up into the throne room. There was an assembly gathered there, to hear the Herald judge him divinely forgiven for his sins, but the actual event was but one big blur. He didn’t even remember the walk from the throne room to what was presumably the elf’s room, merely sitting down heavily at the table and having half a loaf of bread shoved into his hands.

“Eat,” the elf ordered. “You must be starving.”

Of course he was starving- who wasn’t starving these days? Who could grow food in all of this? He stared down numbly at the bread instead of eating, however, not really sure if he even wanted this to be real.

The elf twisted his staff this way and that, defensive wards Dorian recognized, and other spells he didn’t but which presumably served similar functions. Dorian continued to stare at the bread.

“She has some way of watching,” he said after a moment. He’d learned that the hard way, when the Herald had paused her Templars in the middle of dragging him off to the dungeon to throw some very private words the Bull had said to him back into his face. He’d never wished for the skill to kill someone with his bare hands before, but he had then, and the desire remained somewhere beneath all the apathy he was currently comprised of. “Something which circumvents the wards.”

The elf frowned, muttered something under his breath, and then strode across the room, plucking a crystal off of the bookshelf.

“I do not wish this reunion to be watched,” he said, and ground it into dust.

Dorian stopped staring at the bread and started staring at the elf. The egg provided just as many answers as the loaf.

He should probably say something, ask a question or try and needle the man into explaining what was going on, but he was just so-

“Tired, trampled, tarnished, dragging like weights for limbs, heavy like waiting to be crushed.”

It was the young man from before, appearing seemingly out of nowhere. Dorian couldn’t even bring himself to be surprised.

“You were Magister Gereon Alexius’ apprentice, were you not?” the elf asked, as though someone hadn’t just materialized right out of thin air besides him. Maybe he hadn’t. Hallucinations were certainly a reasonable explanation for all this.

“I was,” Dorian replied, wondering what the question meant. Perhaps he’d dallied with this elf whilst he was apprenticed?

The elf reached into the pockets of his robes, and withdrew an amulet.

The amulet, the one Alexius had been so anxious to perfect, in order to prevent his wife’s death and Felix’s sickness. Suddenly the logic behind the elf’s actions was clear.

Dorian started eating. This wasn’t going to end well for him, but at least he could have something in his stomach when it ended.

“Do you recognize this?” the elf asked him.

“Yes,” Dorian replied, and stuffed the remainder of the bread into his mouth. He swallowed before continuing. “We were never able to get it to work.”

“You were never able to get it to work before the Breach,” the elf corrected gently. “There is considerable evidence to suggest that your former teacher was able to get it to work and use it to travel between any points in time occurring after the Breach was opened.”

Dorian stared. He’d thought that Alexius must have made some advancements in their theories- otherwise he never could have arrived in Redcliffe before him- but he had been working on the assumption that he’d been able to create a wider field of temporal displacement, where things moved more quickly on the inside than the out, and then managed to mobilize it, rather than using actual time travel.

They’d never considered actual time travel to be anything more than a diverting thought exercise. Or, at least, they hadn’t until the attack on Felix’s caravan. And then Alexius had gone mad with his grief, or so it had seemed to Dorian at the time.

Apparently, he’d been saner than he’d looked, if not quite sane enough to avoid helping to bring about the end of the world.

“I don’t know how he did it,” he admitted. “I don’t even know what must have changed to make it possible.”

“Then it’s a good thing that the last expert in time magic is now sharing a room with the foremost expert on the Breach,” the elf told him.

Dorian turned to the human man, who shook his head.

“I am the expert,” the elf said. “Cole is a spirit of compassion.”

“He is?” Dorian asked. The man-spirit-Cole looked human, rather than the monstrous forms spirits often took when pulled into this realm.

“I want to help,” Cole said. “This is the only way to help. The whole world has to forget, to unhappen. This can never be. It must be undone, and you can do that.”

“Right,” Dorian said, nodding automatically.

So, to sum up: he was not to be killed, made Tranquil, or turned over to Erimond, but he was to work on turning back time in order to keep the world from ending, with the aid of a spirit bound in human form and his elven master, who had as good as announced to the whole of Weisshaupt that they were a couple.

That seemed about as reasonable as he could expect things to be, when all was considered. He didn’t feel particular bothered by the lack of sense, at least.

“Do you have a name, or shall I just call you ‘darling’?” Dorian asked.

“I am called Solas,” the elf replied firmly. “Now, I believe the first order of business should be your wrist. I am no healer, but I should be able to set and bandage it correctly.”

Dorian had been young when he left Tevinter, had still been young the first time he journeyed to Redcliffe- he’d turned thirty after he’d arrived.

Now, for all that there was a mere four years of space between their ages, Dorian looked down at the terrified features of his younger self and he felt impossibly old.

The feeling had the distinction of being a new flavor of weary, at least.

“What the fuck are you?” younger him demanded, reaching for his staff.

He remembered this encounter- or at least he remembered how it had happened when there had only been one version of himself to worry about. He’d been cornered by Templars- not the first time he’d run into them since he came to the South, but the first time since the war began in earnest, when all pretense of proclaiming there to be a need for a veneer of civility had crumbled like so much dust. It had taken many hours of panicked scrambling through the Brecilian Forest to lose them, and in the end it had been the trees that had taken care of them while Dorian ran from the screaming and hoped that he managed to avoid incurring the wrath of the sylvians.

Things had gone differently this time around.

Dorian raised his eyebrow. “You’ve been Smited. Your mana is inaccessible for the next thirty minutes at least, unless you’ve got a lyrium potion. You don’t. You last used a lyrium potion in Cumberland, trying to escape the start of the Mage-Templar War. You still had several left at that point, but you lost them when you had to flee Jader, along with most of the rest of what you brought with the money from selling your birthright.”

This time, Dorian had stumbled across himself during the initial confrontation. It hadn’t taken very much effort for him to kill the Templars when they refused to back down. Four years of absolute damnation, picking up various survival tricks from first a Ben-Hassrath spy and then an elf whose nature stretched the bounds of credulity, apparently did that to a person.

Younger him stared. Dorian pulled the amulet out of the front of his robes and summoned a bit of veilfire, so that it was clearly illuminated.

“And in answer to your question, I’m you, after the world ended,” he told him.

Younger him continued to stare, the gears in his head visibly turning.

“You suspect that Alexius had managed to use your work to reach Redcliffe ahead of you,” he continued. “It’s worse than you suspect, however. The Breach didn’t just tear through the Veil; it warped the fabric of the world so badly that it is now possible to travel between any two points occurring after its creation.”

“How long?” other him whispered.

“About four years,” Dorian replied, putting the amulet back on.

“Oh.”

Dorian helped himself to his feet, and handed him a lyrium potion.

“Come on,” he said. “There’s a tavern not far from here that should still be doing a reasonable amount of business. I’ll buy you an ale.”

“An ale?” he repeated incredulously.

“You like ales,” Dorian told him. “You’ll see.”

It took about two hours to convince his younger self that he was really, sincerely telling the truth; one more hour to get him to agree to the plan; and practically until daybreak before he conceded that shaving off the moustache was a vital part of the plan, not to be skipped. He looked a good ten years younger without the moustache, and between that and the actual four year different in their ages he was hoping that no one will look at them and think ‘time travel’.

Well. There were only a few people for whom that would be considered as a serious option. So that it would be difficult to look at them and not suspect some sort of obscure blood magic ritual or simulacrum gone horribly wrong, then.

Not that he had the slightest intention of seeing the other Dorian ever again. If this worked, his younger mustache-less self would steer well clear of the Inquisition, perhaps fall in with someone like- well, someone tolerably decent and able to watch his back, and as for himself… he knew all the Herald’s tricks by now, and she had no idea that he knew them. With luck, that would be enough to rein her in a bit.

“Stay as well clear of the Inquisition as you can,” he advised. “Use a different name. And don’t-”

“Tell anyone who I am,” was the reply. “Yes, I know. And you take care of Felix, when you see him.”

He’d almost forgotten about Felix. Or rather: he remembered all the details of the man’s existence well enough, but it wasn’t until he had actually arrived in Redcliffe that he actually remembered Felix.

Felix, all sweetness and light and mischief, as determined to change Tevinter as Dorian, but never discouraged by their lack of progress. Sick, dying, brave Felix who looked at him with horror in his eyes and asked “What happened to you?”

Dorian didn’t respond, merely staring at Felix as he remembered that this too-sweet man who liked trouble was one of his oldest and dearest friends. Apparently that was answer enough; Felix pulled him in for a fierce hug, surreptitiously checking him for injuries. “Oh, Dorian.”

“I’m fine, Felix,” he protested. “I’m fine, really. I made it all the way down here to the other side of the world, and now we’re going to stop your father from ending it, right?”

“Right,” Felix replied.

Solas had been adamant that the first change that had to be made was the recruitment of the mages; the Herald had only gone to the Templars after she’d arrived in Redcliffe to find that they were already indentured to Alexius in service of the Venatori. The first time around, Dorian had still been playing hide and seek with the Templars, malificars, and bears that called the Hinterlands home, and had arrived in Redcliffe just in time to watch everything go to complete shit.

This time, he waited in the Chantry for the Herald and her company to arrive.

Her company included the Bull, which was a possibility he really should have anticipated-

“Watch yourself. The pretty ones are always the worst.”

-but somehow did not until it was no longer a possibility, but a reality that was regarding him with his eye narrowed suspiciously.

Dorian managed to get through the introductions and explanations without stammering, laying out the promise of a treasure-trove of forbidden magic and the sort of power only an army of mages could bring out before the Herald like a buffet. He was pretty sure she didn’t suspect him of anything underhand; Maker only knew what he’d given away to the Bull. Not the truth- not the whole truth, at least. The Bull might be singularly perceptive, but you’d have to be quite a bit more than perceptive to come up with ‘we were lovers for several years in an alternate timeline where the world ended, you died and there was nothing I could do, and then I came back in time, and have just now realized that I was probably in love with you’, even if that was the truth.

“What was that about?” Felix demanded once the current Inquisition members had left the village. The Herald had promised to return- Dorian knew better than to trust her word, but he could certainly pretend otherwise for the greater good- and they were planning the best way to interfere with Alexius’ plans without needing to kill a bunch of desperate rebel mages in the meantime.

“What was what about?” Dorian asked.

“You couldn’t take your eyes off of the male Qunari,” Felix said.

Dorian snorted and was about to make some kind of quip about half-clothed savages in wintertime when Felix added “Not like you were checking him out or anything! It was like you recognized him, or- Dorian! You’re crying!”

“Oh,” Dorian said numbly, swiping a hand over his face. Sure enough, it was wet with tears. When had he cried last? When Sera was disappeared? Years ago- or some months from now, depending on how you counted it. “Oh.”

“What’s wrong? I-”

He’d left Tevinter three years ago, for Felix at least. That was enough time with sporadic and only half-truthful communication for him to be honest now.

“Would you believe that I fell in love with a Qunari mercenary?” he asked.

“You what?” Felix squawked. Whatever facial expression he was making at the time must have convinced him that Dorian was being utterly sincere, and he softened. “Oh, Dorian,” Felix repeated. “It ended badly, didn’t it?”

“He died,” Dorian told him, and Felix made a sympathetic noise. “His boss made a bad call and he just never came back. I didn’t even get to build a pyre for the body.”

Felix handed him a handkerchief, and Dorian carefully blotted the tears from his face.

“What was he like?” Felix asked once Dorian had gotten himself under control.

“Kind,” was the first word that sprang to mind. “Intelligent- very observant, and I never did get a handle on just how many languages he could speak.”

“And this was a Qunari mercenary?”

Dorian shrugged. “Don’t get me wrong, he was also a loud, crude brute without a discreet bone in his body, but… honestly, I think, that was at least half because that’s how people expected him to act. And the other half was that he genuinely enjoyed singing and roughhousing and dragons- Maker’s breath, did he ever like dragons. It was terrifying, how much he liked dragons. The only thing even more terrifying than that was how much he loved the color pink.”

“Pink,” Felix repeated, a carefully suppressed giggle evident in his voice.

“You would not believe how much he liked pink,” Dorian said. “We’d move into a new area, and it was like everything pink within a two-mile square radius would attach itself to him, or find its way into his room. I got some kind of fever not long before he was killed, I was completely out of it for the better part of a week. When I came to, the room was just stuffed full of pink tchotchkes, and there he was, sitting next to the bed, trying to crochet me a pink blanket.”

“No,” Felix said. “I don’t believe it. Do you still have it?”

“No,” Dorian replied sadly. It, along with most of the rest of their accumulated possessions, had been divvied up amongst the rank and file of the Inquisition while Dorian had been locked up in the dungeon. “No I- when I heard what had happened, I lost my temper, and attacked the leader. I didn’t win that fight- I would have been killed, or worse, but one of the other mages intervened. Still, it wasn’t a good idea to stay. I had to leave pretty much everything behind.”

“I’m sorry,” Felix said. “Will you be alright, doing this?”

“I’ll be fine. If this past year didn’t kill me, the memory of it certainly won’t. I can handle a pair of Qunari,” he replied, rolling his eyes. “It took me by surprise, that’s all. I wasn’t expecting him to be here.”

If that was too specific to really fit with the rest of his story, then Felix was good enough to not mention it.

One year or five days later, Dorian was not so sanguine about his place in the universe, as it seemed to involve more time travel and watching people he cared about repeatedly die than he’d really wanted in his life. He was managing, thus far, to play things rather glibly, but he was so, so very done with this. He understood Leliana’s fury, he really did, but he had to focus his energy on getting through this without the world ending a second time.

Or would it be for the third time, now?

The Herald- Adaar, as she was professing to prefer to be called, which was strange, as he wouldn’t have put ‘false modesty’ on his list of tricks the Herald had- was at least as competent a fighter as ever, and slightly less odious to put up with than he remembered her being. She seemed genuinely distressed to find the Bull and Sera in their corrupted, half-dead state, and there was no one there to impress with the display who would remember it, other than himself. That should probably make him paranoid, that he was apparently so easy to read that the Herald was able to divine that he appreciated displays of empathy, but he was bit distracted by the awful feeling that he was about the watch the Bull die again.

If nothing else, he could comfort himself with the fact that they had made a difference the first time around after all. Things were approaching this level of bad when he’d finally fixed the amulet, three years after this point in time. With neither himself nor the Herald in evidence, it had taken much less time for the world to realize that it had come to its end.

And now he didn’t even need to contrive of a way to warn the Inquisition of the coming assassination of Empress Celene! He was less certain about how to warn them against making an alliance with the Wardens but…

But the Herald was staring out towards the entrance hall where Sera and the Bull were fighting, past where Leliana waited to meet her fate, looking like she wanted to rush after them.

But it had taken him a year to figure out how to fix this damn amulet before and he had no tools to speak of.

But the door had come crashing open, revealing the Bull’s too-still form and Sera’s broken bow and he couldn’t-

He pulled out the amulet he’d used to arrive here, and was relieved to find it still worked. He’d switch them back out before they returned- no sense in giving the Herald a working time travel device.

“Ha! You’ll have to do better than that!”

It certainly sounded true.

The first time he’d journeyed to Haven had been less of a journey and more a panicked flight through the Frostbacks, stumbling wounded and half-blind through the snow hoping against hope that he was moving in the right direction still, that he hadn’t gotten turned around.

He’d reached Haven just ahead of the Elder One’s army, and had been deemed useful enough to be evacuated ahead of the avalanche along with the more useful members of the Inquisition whilst someone- Leliana, probably, though he honestly didn’t recall- set off the avalanche.

The Bull had carried him: that had been the start of things.

It had been that start of things in more ways than one- he gathered that leaving the civilian population of Haven to be crushed alongside Corypheus was the first of many atrocities the Herald had committed: taking over Crestwood via blackmailing their mayor, impressing the citizens of Sahrnia into service to provide ores for the Inquisition, installing Florianne as Empress, welcoming Erimond and his Wardens with open arms and a dungeon full of dissenters to fuel their blood magic…

It would be different this time, Dorian promised himself. He would be clever, he would be strong, and above all he would be forewarned, and the Herald would never be given the opportunity to grow so powerful again.

He’d intended on setting up inside the tavern, which in addition to being a warm place which served alcohol, was where Sera had set herself up. He wasn’t quite sure what had happened to her the first around- actually, no, that was a lie, he didn’t know what had happened to her in the same way finding the grimoire containing the blood magic ritual didn’t tell him why he hadn’t seen Lucretia all week- but he was quite determined to protect her.

He was also fairly certain that being around the Bull was bad. The Bull would be able to read him just as he always had, and that could only end poorly, with more suspicion been thrown onto him when he could really do with less. He needed to prevent the end of the world, all else was secondary.

All else had to be secondary.

So it was for the best that he remove himself from the temptation that was the Iron Bull.

His resolve didn’t waver when he’d actually taken a turn around Haven and noticed that Solas was there, so much as it shifted. Solas. Ancient, otherworldly Solas who had appeared out of nowhere just when all hope had been lost and provided him with the means to get it back was here, in Haven, and apparently already a member of the Inquisition.

Dorian boggled. Solas gave him the sort of aloof, distrustful once-over that told him in no uncertain terms that this wasn’t the Solas from his timeline. Or that it was vitally important that he act as though they hadn’t lived through a sequence of events that never happened.

What was certainty? He just didn’t know.

He set himself up outside, in the cold, where he had a good view of the elf, just in case.

It wasn’t just Solas, however, or even the mages that were trickling in from Redcliffe and beyond. Civilians he knew to expect, and the Chargers too, though they was a bit weird to see. They hadn’t lasted very long, the first time around, though the Bull had told him all about them. It was very strange- he knew a lot about the Bull’s boys (more than they probably wanted him knowing, in Krem’s case in particular) even though he’d barely met them, and they’d never met him. There were also plenty of people in the Inquisition he’d never seen, and hadn’t even heard of: the infamous Varric Tethras who disappeared after the Chantry exploded in Kirkwall, a harsh Templar woman from the Pentaghast clan, and a bearded Warden whose regurgitations of common wisdom were almost comical in their force.

And the Herald, who seemed a lot less inclined towards having people cringe in terror before her, and a lot more interest in rescuing Inquisition soldiers from a place with the auspicious name of the Fallow Mire, and actually doing the job she had supposedly been sent to do.

Maybe they would be able to seal the Breach this time. Maybe with the mage’s help, that would work.

It worked.

It worked with such ease and speed that Dorian was left feeling a little unbalanced. This couldn’t be it, surely- end of the world avoided, good work, well done, happy party time for all?

He was a little too uneasy to imbibe very much during the post-Breach festivities, a fact which he was very grateful for when word came that Haven was being attacked.

By the Elder One, who was apparently as enraged by the loss of the mages to his cause as he was to the loss of the Templars, if he was parsing Cole’s sentences correctly.

Cole was there. Cole had come to warn them of Haven’s collapse, much as Dorian had done in a world that never was. He seemed unharmed, but then again, Cole was sneaky, able to make people forget he existed, and not human to boot.

Things progressed not quite as he remembered them: their trebuchet plan failed, foiled by the sudden appearance of the archdemon, and then Haven was burning. She stopped to help- the Herald stopped to help- and they managed to save everyone they could, but it wasn’t as though there weren’t still bodies of civilians, soldiers, scouts, and mages alike scattered around the burning wreck of the village.

Chancellor Roderick was still wounded- fatally wounded, it seemed. Cole broadcasted his knowledge better than Dorian ever could have and then they decided to set off the trebuchet.

They were evacuating the wounded and the civilians first, the Chancellor leading the way. He saw Alexius being escorted out in chains between two Templars, and then he, the Bull and Sera were off the set the trebuchet off personally- and buy time for the others to evacuate.

The Herald was putting her life at risk to help people who were of very little use to her ego escape. It was a good thing Dorian had long since mastered the art of fighting Red Templars in his sleep, because the entire notion left him feeling a bit dazed to properly process the practice.

“You should go,” she said, once the trebuchet was primed. She pushed the few curls of hair that she could never keep tied behind her head up and tucked them behind her horns, where they promptly escaped and fell across her face again.“All three of you. Now, before he arrives: I can cause the avalanche myself.”

“That’s shite,” Sera said.

“He’ll kill you if you stay,” she said.

“Stop talking piss- he’ll kill you too!”

“Not right away, I don’t think. He’s too interested in me- in this,” she held up her hand, the Mark glowing faintly. “If I can keep him talking… you should help the evacuation. Get everybody out, if you can.”

“You’re everybody too!”

“And don’t think I won’t coming running for the exit when I can,” the Herald smiled. It looked like it hurt.

Haven had been enveloped in eerie silence, save for their conversation, but now there was the distant rumble of approaching dragon wings.

“Go,” ordered Adaar.

They went: the Bull picked up Sera and sprinted away towards the Chantry before she could protest and Dorian took off after them.

There were but a few stragglers left in the Chantry when they arrived, being ushered out down the tunnel by the dark-skinned Chantry mother who had taken up residence in this hall. Dorian noted where the exit was, and then turned back around.

The moons were full and waning gibbus, and their light joined with the fires still burning in Haven and reflecting off the snow. It made it easy to see as Corypheus lifted Adaar up as though she were a ragdoll.

“Move that pretty ass of yours, ‘vint!” the Bull called. “I will pick you up too if you don’t!”

Dorian hurried towards the tunnel, leaving the door open behind him.

They were two days march away from the burning ruins of Haven when the inevitable happened.

“You remember me,” Cole said, appearing in the vicinity of his right elbow. “But I don’t remember you.”

“Yes,” Dorian confirmed. “That’s me.”

“Why don’t I remember?”

“If you take a dip into my head you should be able to figure it out.”

Cole frowned beneath the brim of his hat. “You don’t let it hurt,” he said after a long moment of uncomfortable staring. “You think it shouldn’t hurt because it didn’t happen- you can’t miss them when they’re right there- so you tangle it up and push it down and try to pretend it didn’t happen too.”

“I told you you’d be able to figure it out,” Dorian replied.

Cole’s frown deepened.

“Just don’t tell the others?” he asked. “I know you like to lance people’s festering emotional wounds, but I don’t think anyone needs that kind of sentimental puss oozing all over the place, alright?”

“Alright.”

He was gone the next time Dorian looked.

Business as usual, it seemed.

Except business with Inquisitor Adaar was not business as usual at all.

For one thing, there had been no Skyhold in that other-when: or, at least, there had been no Solas around to point it out to them. No Skyhold, no Herald’s Rest, no wine cellar, no frescos, no gardens and certainly no library. There had been any number of throne rooms, of course, and dungeons too, but those were the only constants.

He wasn’t quite sure what to make of it. He stuck close to Solas, just in case he might gain some insight through osmosis. That being close to Solas also meant staking out a corner in the library was merely an enjoyable side benefit. That the view from his nook meant that he could look out at night and see whether or not the light was on in the Bull’s room above the tavern was a fact which he tried not to notice.

When it came to Adaar herself, things were even more confusing. She was not the woman he remembered: aloof, superior, and cruel were simply not qualities she possessed. She was a foul-mouthed rogue with the temper of a rabid honey-badger, but those were comparably desirable flaws.

She flirted, which, in addition to being new, was initially rather terrifying. He didn’t know what happened to people who tried to tell the Herald ‘no’ in much the same way he didn’t know what happened to Lucretia and Sera. Once the initial fear had passed, however, he was able to tell that she actually flirted with everyone: Cullen, Varric, Cassandra, the Bull (and Maker, that had almost been more nerve-wracking to watch than being flirted with himself) and Sera.

Most especially Sera. There was a lot of blushing and giggling involved with Sera. It was awkward, which made Dorian suspect that there were genuine feelings involved. And that her disappearance in that other-when had more to do with the Herald being a jilted lover than Sera’s dislike of authority figures, especially those who abused their position.

It was a terrifying concept, the Herald having feelings, but the sentiment was lost in the nagging thought that Adaar really truly was not the woman he remembered. He wasn’t sure how that might have come about but she simply didn’t act on her every impulse to have all the power, all the control, all the attention.

Oh, it was there, he could see it when she lingered on her throne after judgments and when she swaggered out of the war room. But it was reined in: she not only allowed Alexius to live but allowed him to work, when he’d expected Tranquility or death for his former mentor. She hadn’t gone mad with the power handed to her.

He didn’t trust her, of course. He wasn’t an imbecile. But he found himself in a place to be optimistic about the potential for not being in the employ of a mass murderer.

He tried to avoid the Bull, which would have been a much easier task if Adaar didn’t insist on bringing the Bull and Dorian out with her and Sera all the time.

In terms of tactics, he couldn’t fault her decision: it was a fairly well-balanced squad in terms of varieties of fighting styles. He and the Bull had often operated as part of such squads, in a past that would never be: the two of them, an archer- it rotated at first between various former Templars and hunters and scouts, but once they’d been pushed far enough north for the Qunari to take a very keen interest in the war the position was normally Gatt’s- and a backstabber from any number of faceless Inquisition or Wardens troops.

Come to think of it, his recollection of who was wielding the daggers then was so nonexistent as to be suspicious. He couldn’t remember if any of them had died, had told funny stories, had worked with them more than once…

Which begged the question: just how long had Cole been with the Inquisition anyway?

He’d had the thought in Skyhold, which just meant that Cole appeared next to him as it occurred to him.

“I can’t tell you if that was me, sorry,” he said.

“Quite alright,” Dorian assured him. “Let’s just focus on making sure it never has to be you.”

When next he looked up, Cole was gone.

It was besides the point anyway. The point was when it came to speaking and any sort of non-life-threatening day-to-day interactions, he could lie fairly well. Who was going to contradict him, after all? He was about as far away from Tevinter as you could get for one, and a refugee from a timeline of events which would never happen for another. But when it came to fighting…

He had three years of experience watching the Bull’s back, three years of fighting side by side where the Bull was the only solid thing in a world which seemed determined to suck him under. There was probably some sort of Ben-Hassrath technique for hiding your fighting style, but Dorian had never learned. They didn’t merely click- they worked in perfect harmony, Dorian instinctively knowing what the Bull was going to do before he did it, used to checking their positions against that of the archer and the assassin before casting spells with wide areas of effect, knew when the Bull needed to bleed a little to help push his Reaver’s rage and when to keep replenishing the barrier around him until his mana ran dry.

He tried to regain his reserve after every fight- to snap and snipe and generally push the Bull to a safe distance. The Bull let him retreat, mostly, but he could tell that the Bull knew he was covering for something. Probably he assumed, like so many in the Inquisition, that he was secretly a Venatori spy.

The idea bothered him a lot. Actually no, that was a lie: the idea that the Bull might believe him to be a spy hurt, cutting through the low-level hum of anxiety and tiredness that was always with him. He couldn’t say that he liked the change.

Solas concerned him, but how exactly did he go about expressing that concern, when they could barely discuss magical theory without the elf trying to snap his head off?

“Hello there Ser The Dread Wolf, I was wondering if you could spare a moment to discuss what it is exactly that you’re doing here, as I was under the impression you were having a nap somewhere and wouldn’t wake up until the world had well and truly ended.”

Yes, that wouldn’t end badly at all. He said nothing about it, and let them fall into a pattern of angry elf and oblivious Altus.

The fact that ‘oblivious Altus’ was less of an act than he wanted it to be just made it that much easier.

Cullen was not on the lyrium, he could taste it. Or rather he could not taste it: lyrium was a rather pungent substance, after all.

That hadn’t been entirely unusual. Cullen had tried to break his dependence on the lyrium several times in that other-when. It had never lasted long: sooner rather than later, the Herald would find him in a weak moment and dangle a vial out in front of him, and that would be the end of it.

This time, it lasted longer. Much longer. There was no end in sight, as a matter of fact. Cullen worked too hard and blamed paperwork and stress for the bags under his eyes and made no mention of the lyrium at all.

With luck, he might be able to break the addiction entirely. With luck, he might never become the sort of person who would stop Dorian from killing the Herald, who would have him locked up knowing full well what he would be subjected to. With luck, he would stay the surprisingly sassy, sweet-faced ex-Templar who took their chess matches far too seriously and Dorian would never have to deal with the man he might have been.

The most concerning thing about this new history they were writing was Calpernia. Or rather, she wasn’t in it. Samson appeared to have utterly taken her place as Corypheus’ lieutenant.

It would be something Dorian could explain away as a shift in internal politics, but for the fact that there was no mention of Calpernia at all. He remembered hearing of Samson in a few intercepted missives the first time around, but now? It was as though there had never been a Lady Calpernia leading the Venatori.

It bothered him. It bothered him so much that he took note of where Leliana’s agents had dead-drop points and started placing anonymous tips concerning what he remembered of the Venatori’s leadership and activities in them. He took care to disguise his handwriting, to misspell a different word on each tip, to change up syntax and abbreviations. He thought he was rather clever about it.

Not clever enough to fool Leliana, as it happened.

“My agents have been receiving anonymous tips concerning Venatori activities,” Leliana said one day, leaning casually against the bookshelf so as to block the stairs from him. “Funnily enough, they only seem to receive these tips when you’re in the area.”

“Ah,” Dorian said.

Leliana regarded him coolly, waiting for him to speak.

“Alexius wasn’t the intended leader of the Venatori,” he began. “He was just… a convenient way to ensure that the rebel mages were able to believe they’d one day be welcomed into Tevinter as citizens, to say nothing of the potential applications of his research.”

“Who was intended to be their leader, then?” Leliana asked.

“A woman going by the name of Calpernia,” Dorian replied. “She’s liberati- a freed slave. Well. I say freed- as far as I know there was never any legal change in status. Legally speaking, many would consider her stolen goods. Corypheus did it- got her away from her master, and made her a leader of the Venatori. I think he was expecting that to make her loyal.”

“Wouldn’t it?”

Dorian shook his head. He remembered, months of searching for information on the mysterious Lady Calpernia of the Venatori, uncovering her secrets and her virtues along with them, only for the Herald to destroy her, rather than using what they’d learned to make her into their ally. “You must understand, mages aren’t supposed to be enslaved in the Imperium- and neither are slaves supposed come from outside the Imperium’s borders. It’s also illegal to be a malificar and the class system is purely meritocratic.”

“Your point?”

“My point is that Corypheus handed Calpernia a rosy fantasy of the Imperium: a slave with magical abilities, recognized for their worth and rising to become a leader on the basis of their abilities alone, bloodlines and politics be damned. She’s no fool, for all her faults: she knows it doesn’t really work like that and he must have some kind of ulterior motive.”

“And how do you know all this?” Leliana asked.

“We’ve met,” Dorian replied, which was more or less the truth. He’d been there when she’d died, the first time around. “I’ve spoken with her. We share a similar interest in saving our homeland from itself- though, obviously, we disagree over methods. At the end of the day, I am utterly unwilling to join the Venatori, but Calpernia was less than certain of her path. She let things slip. I thought they should be checked out, but considering the suspicion with which I am regarded, I thought anonymous tips might go over better than coming up to you and saying ‘So, I was talking to the leader of the Venatori not terribly long ago…’ I’m sure you can understand.”

Leliana was probably going to have her people follow him around for the next forever and take notes on where he shit, but she nodded in an accepting matter nevertheless. “It never occurred to you that the information she provided might be a trap?”

“On the off-chance that I, the Tevinter Altus mage, was accepted into the Inquisition’s inner circle?” Dorian replied wryly. “Actually, yes, it did. You’re a smart woman, Leliana: you can’t expect me to believe you don’t treat anonymous tips as potentially hostile.”

Leliana dipped her head in concession of his point.

“Incidentally… have any of them panned out?” Dorian asked.

“Some. It seems as though your Calpernia had expected a position of greater power for the mages,” Leliana told him.

“Have you heard anything about Calpernia, specifically? I haven’t since Redcliffe. I’m hoping that means that she’s wised up and run, what with the Templars making up the bulk of Corypheus’ forces.”

Leliana’s gaze sharpened for a moment. “Do you consider her a potential ally to the Inquisition?”

“Well,” Dorian said, momentarily taken aback. “Do you mean did I think she’s trustworthy? Because… I honestly don’t know. But I do think that if we can find out what Corypheus intends for her, she’ll turn on him. Presuming she’s still with him. Otherwise… I would like to try, if that counts for anything.”

“She appears to have made quite the impression,” Leliana observed.

“She did, I suppose,” Dorian replied. “It’s just- that lie Corypheus is trying to sell her on: it’s not his lie. It’s the Imperium’s lie, and if there were even a grain of truth to it, she would have been made the Archon’s apprentice long ago, rather than being ‘indentured’ to a dusty old academic who couldn’t see anything that wasn’t at least five ages old. But it shouldn’t be a lie. It shouldn’t be an ideal that got quietly smothered when it imperiled the prestige of someone’s imbecile of an heir. It’s- I understand her frustration with the Imperium’s deceptive principles. I guess that’s what it is at the end of the day.”

“This is the first I’m hearing of her,” Leliana told him. “But I’ll have my agents keep an ear out from now. If we learn any more of her, I’ll let you know.”

“Thank you,” Dorian replied.

“And Dorian?”

“Yes?”

“I expect a full report of what she told you on my desk by tomorrow. No more drips and drabs. Tell me everything you know.”

“Yes ma’am,” Dorian lied.

He’d almost forgotten about his father very much not in the same way he’d almost forgotten about Felix. Like Felix, he remembered all the facts: unlike Felix, there was nothing good about the emotions associated with his father: there was disappointment, grief, hurt and pain and so much anger that he had to lean against the bar for support, trying to stop himself from either crying or setting his father on fire.

“Andraste’s sanctified tittyfuck, Magister Dorian’s Dad,” said Adaar, sounding as though she was in the same tears-or-violence boat as he. “What is your fucking damage?”

His father made a sound that might have been the beginnings of a word. Adaar cut him off before he got any further. “No, that was a rhetorical question, the word rhetorical here meaning ‘I don’t care what kind of shit you came up with to justify that fuckery to yourself’ so just don’t say anything.” She settled next to him. “Do you want to yell some more or should we just get you out of here? I’m good with either.”

He almost left. But he remembered then, the moment when he’d learned that his father died in that other-when. His mother had told him: she’d turned up at the Inquisition’s headquarters of the time (the Circle of Vyrantium, denuded of all its pupils and enchanters to better house their troops) and let herself into the room he’d been sharing with Bull before he’d even known she was in that part of the country.

“How are you doing?” he’d said on pure reflex.

“Your father is dead,” she’d replied. “I could use a stiff drink, but I’ll settle for turning Qarinus into a trap that will hopefully blow off the Elder One’s head when he tries to sink his claws into it. Is this the Qunari you’re allegedly involved with?”

“Erm?” Dorian had said, still stuck on Your father is dead.

“Yes ma’am, that’s me,” the Bull had replied for him.

“Well, the world’s ending, so I’ll skip trying to make my son choose someone a little less exotic and go straight to assuring you that if I find you’re mistreating him in any way the Elder One will no longer be your most immediate concern.”

“Dorian’s my most immediate concern,” the Bull had told her.

“Ah. You’re a smooth talker, then.”

“Father’s dead?” he’d finally managed to say for himself.

“Yes. Poison: presumably Venatori, but even in these troubled times one can’t discount the possibility of good, old-fashioned internecine politicking,” Mother had said. “In either case, the only thing for it is to make things as difficult for the Elder One as possible.”

She’d been as good to her word as it was possible to be. The Siege of Qarnius, when it came, had lasted three month- the longest Corypheus had been denied a victory since that Dalish malificar in Kirkwall had managed to turn a third of his demons against him- and it ended with Mother burning the entire city to ash, and herself along with it.

The Qunari had, upon the Inquisition’s recommendation, withdrawn from Seheron to fortify Par Vollen. The Magisterium had immediately become mired in a debate about whether or not they should abandon the island as well. The Inquisition had fled West to the Anderfells, and things had progressed until he was standing here, nearly three years earlier, regrets and questions he didn’t know he’d even had time to accumulate churning in his gut.

He stayed.

“Are you safe here, Dorian?”

“We’re in the middle of a warzone, Father.”

“Yes, well- the Inquisition needs researchers, surely?”

“If you’re hoping that I’ll disprove any rumors you maybe have heard about me wandering around the South killing demons and whoever else attacks the Inquisition, then you’re out of luck.”

“Ah. Why?”

“For one thing, someone has to, and for another, I’m rather good at it.”

*

“What happened to Lucretia?”

“Lucretia?”

“Yes. Lucretia, my milk mother, went missing around a week or so before I discovered what you’d been planning. What happened to her?”

“Nothing! She’s fine, Dorian, do you really believe I would hurt her?”

“Well, that would be out of keeping with your principles, so yes, I could believe that very easily.”

“That’s... not uncalled for, I suppose.”

“No, it isn’t.”

*

“But you have a duty-”

“My duty is to keep the world from ending.”

“And when that’s over?”

“Ah yes, let me pencil that in after we’ve finished destroying a thousand year old sentient darkspawn claiming to be one of the magister to corrupt the Golden City. Does 10:41 sound like a good year to you, or should I add in a second age to account for all the political turmoil and damage to the Fade which would need to be dealt with before things were truly finished?”

“Do you not intend to return, then?”

“I… honestly don’t know. But, if I do return, I will certainly not be marrying.”

“I… understand.”

“Do you, now?”

“I’m trying to understand.”

“…fair enough.”

*

“Have you met someone?”

“Define ‘met’.”

“Someone that would make you want to stay.”

“Yes. Several someones. I don’t trust as easily as you might remember me doing, but I’ve found more than a few people worthy of it here.”

“Good. I’m glad. I never wanted you to be alone.”

“No, you wanted me to be someone else.”

*

“Is there any way I can tempt you to come home where you’ll be safe?”

“Considering I would not be safe at home? No.”

“I understand that you don’t trust my word, but I won’t be performing any rituals on you, I swear it.”

“That- look. The Veil is being torn asunder, Thedas is being flooded with demons, and people are using the chaos to make all kinds of foolish power grabs. Tevinter isn’t safe, it’s just not near the epicenter of the quake. Sooner rather than later, the tremors will reach home too.”

“Unless you stop it.”

“Which I intend to.”

*

“You’re different, Dorian. Harder. I’m not sure I like it.”

“Me neither, but it is what it is.”

“Can I ask what happened to you?”

“You can ask, but I won’t tell you the answer except to say that you wouldn’t believe what I’ve been through.”

*

“I was wrong to try to change you, especially without your permission. I’m sorry.”

“I- thank you, for admitting it. I know that’s not easy.”

“We’re too alike. Too much pride.”

“I haven’t decided not to forgive you.”

“But you won’t today.”

“No. Not today. Give me some time when the world’s not ending to consider it.”

“So I should check back in 10:41?”

“No need to wait an entire age. 9:91 should do it.”

“Ha.”

“Or you could try writing, directly to me, instead of trying to use a Chantry Mother as part of a convoluted gambit.”

“Would you respond?”

“…I promise to consider it.”

“Just let us know that you’re still alive, and still with people you trust. For your mother’s sake, if not mine.”

“I’ll do what I can.”

He thought he was doing alright, and all things considered maybe he was. But something changed after that run-in with his father. Something… broke.

Everything annoyed him, everything made him angry, everything made him need to choke back tears lest he have a breakdown in public. He had terrible nightmares, and it was only a matter of time before someone snuck up on him and he accidentally set them on fire. He wasn’t sure it was anything to do with his father, even, though that was what Adaar and the others assumed it was. It was just-

Adaar and Sera were dancing around one another, Sera taking two steps back before taking one giant leap forwards, Adaar following her every move, and he wanted to scream, to warn her off, because she’d had her killed the first time around, she’d been amongst the first to be disappeared, Adaar was going to hurt her.

And then Adaar would stop to help every single person whose paths they crossed, and take the time to suss out whatever it was that Cole was doing with parsley and scissors and mabari pups, and she was so unlike the Herald that he was beginning to doubt his memories. Maybe she’d never been a tyrant. Maybe there had never been a tyrant. Maybe he ate some kind of poisonous mushroom on the way down and hallucinated the whole thing. Maybe he’d gone mad, and just hadn’t noticed.

He found himself outside the Bull’s rooms one night. He hadn’t even meant to go there, and when the Bull opened the door he burst into the tears.

The Bull pulled him into the room, set him down on the rug by the fire, and started piling on the blankets, because of course did. What else could you expect from the Bull, really.

“I miss,” Dorian choked out. You. I miss you, even though you’re right here, and I don’t know how to bear up under it all anymore.

“It’s alright, big guy,” the Bull said, running a soothing hand up and down his back. Dorian crumpled against him, too tired to pretend this wasn’t exactly what he wanted. “You don’t have to explain yourself. Just let it out.”

Thing didn’t get better once he’d cried himself out, but they were more easily controlled, and he stopped feeling like he was a moment away from cracking completely. It might have been the crying, but it was probably the Bull.

This was dangerous. More than anyone else, he understood the folly of temptation. He would have to work twice as hard to ensure that he could keep his distance from the Bull.

Gatt was not the most pleasant of people to work with: too angry and snappish and yes, Bull, the mirror treated him just fine. But when you got right down to it, he could work with him. As deeply as he cared about his homeland and as much as he dislike hearing it dismissed as irredeemable, there were certain people from certain backgrounds he was willing to grant some leeway to. ‘I was eight when the Qunari rescued me from slavery’ put together with ‘my master had brought me to Seheron for company’ entitled one to a very large number of cheap shots at his homeland’s expense.

Not an infinite number, though. There were limits, and the idea that the main consequence of red lyrium being smuggled into Minrathous was the effect it would have on the war on Seheron was beyond them. He’d seen how his people responded to the Elder One, and even with the Venatori and the festering pustulent societal corruption that had plagued the Imperium for the past five ages when push came to shove, his people had fought. They had been no less willing to go out in a blaze of glory, hoping to do enough damage to make it easier for the next nation to defeat him, than the Qunari were.

So, they’d gotten off on an even more wrong foot this time around than they had before. Still, in the interests of cooperation, Dorian was still willing to work with the elf. He was a friend of the Bull’s, and while Dorian had been languishing in the dungeons, Gatt had attacked the Herald on his behalf with marginally more success than Dorian had enjoyed. He’d ended up an elf-size smear on the ceiling, true, but he’d also broken off most of the Herald’s left horn.

And Dorian did expect to work with him. This was the same choice that had been presented to the Bull in that other-when, his boys or his people, and with Adaar right there the Qunari would come out on top. How could they not? As fond as the Bull was of his Chargers, they were a mercenary company, and the Qunari were a major military power with an unparalleled naval force.

He was still expecting that the Bull would lose his men for the sake of his people when the dreadnought exploded. He was, perhaps, the only person truly surprised by this turn of events: the Herald was fretful, Gatt was disappointed, Varric and the Bull were relieved for different reasons, but none of them were surprised. That was Dorian’s emotion alone, it seemed.

If he had to pinpoint the exact moment when he started to believe that the Herald and Adaar were two entirely different people, that would be it: standing on the Storm Coast with the scent of gaatlok filling his nostrils and the Bull standing next to him, unflinchingly surveying the carnage even though it must be tearing him apart.

He had been prepared to offer his metaphorical shoulder up to the Bull to metaphorically cry on, and extricate himself before any literal touching could happen. That had been when he’d thought he would be consoling the Bull over the loss of his family, not on being exiled.

He had no plan for this. Somehow or another, he ended up seated across from the Bull in the tavern anyway.

“I sold my birthright,” he said, after an indeterminable amount of ale. Probably not enough that it was actually impairing his judgment, but if anyone asked later, that was definitely why he started talking.

“Your literal birthright?” the Bull asked.

“If I could sell metaphysical concepts, I’d have had a much easier time getting to Redcliffe, so yes,” Dorian replied. “Strictly forbidden, of course, but I was desperate, and angry and…”

“And what?” the Bull prompted.

“And, it came down to a choice between clinging to a symbol of Tevinter- and my place in it- and parting with it in order to go after the very worst my country has to offer,” Dorian finished. “I think I chose wisely, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have regrets.”

“It’s not just a symbol though, is it?” the Bull asked rhetorically. “A magister’s birthright is proof of identity. Without it, you can’t access any funds or alliances your house has down here, and it’ll make going home a lot harder.”

“Well, yes, there’s that,” Dorian replied. “Even so… I know it’s not the same thing, but I think you’re allowed to feel a little regret for doing the right thing, when it separates you from your home.”

Somehow or another, this lead to the two of them tumbling into bed. Once again, Dorian blamed the ale.

Fucking was a lot like fighting: he was sure there was some way of doing it that didn’t betray his familiarity with the Bull, but he had no idea what it was. Just about his only saving grace was the way that it had been over a year for him, and he’d changed a bit since then.

There was the wrist that had been broken and then left out of joint in the dungeons at Weisshaupt for a week before Solas took care of it. Solas was a shit healer, and he still didn’t have full range of motion in it. As a result, when the Bull went to pin him down by the wrists, it hurt, and not in a good way.

And then there were scars. They’d all been old news to the Bull in the first time around, seeing as he’d been there when he got most of them, but they were a revelation to him now. He took his time tracing them with his fingers and tongue, time Dorian didn’t really want to take. It had been over a year: since he’d had sex, had the Bull, had the Bull touching him at all…

Thankfully, he knew all the dirty tricks that would make the Bull lose himself a little, lose some of that control and get a move on. He knew how to grip onto the Bull’s horns so that they were supporting some of his weigh, how to throw a leg around his hips, with his heel pressed against the Bull’s sphincter and their cocks aligned and grind up against him. He knew exactly where to bite, where to scratch, how to smirk and look up at the Bull through his eyelashes and demand to be fucked.

“Dorian,” the Bull murmured like a prayer. His pupil was blown wide, and his eyepatch had been knocked askew. “Fuck, Dorian...”

“That’s the idea,” he reminded him loftily, tightening his grip on the Bull’s horns a little.

He was a little too good at knowing what the Bull liked, as it happened. It took them three tries to get that far.

Of course, when the morning light started streaming in through the hole in the ceiling, rousing Dorian from his stupor, he realized that this had probably not been a wise decision. The Bull would be able to tell that he was far more familiar than he should have been, and Maker only knew what sort of conclusions he would draw from that.

Dorian was not inclined to find out- he gathered his things and fled as quickly and quietly as he could.

Maybe, he thought as he frantically reshelved the books on the shelf outside his nook, Just maybe, I can play it off as- as satisfied curiosity. No, he knows I must have had some experience- perhaps a fetish? Or-or-

The problem was he didn’t want to play it off as anything at all. He wanted- he wanted things to be as they were. It was such a selfish thing to think- the world was in so much better shape this time around, his relationship with the Bull was such as small price to pay in the grand scheme of things, but he wanted it back. He wanted the feeling of safety that came with being in his arms, he wanted the smiles he got when the Bull noticed something pink that had managed to somehow migrate into his room from Dorian’s pack, he wanted the utter surety of knowing that no matter how much shit the rest of the world was falling into, he could trust the Bull, and that the Bull trusted him in return. Maker, was that even going to be possible this time around?

“Dorian.”

Dorian managed to not shriek, but couldn’t quite stop the book he’d been holding from toppling to the floor. The Bull raised the remains of his eyebrow above his patch.

Dorian coughed. “The Iron Bull,” he said, aiming for aloof and overshooting it by a truly ridiculous amount.

The Bull’s eyebrow cocked at a slightly more severe angle.

Dorian settled back against the bookshelf, crossed his arms, turned his head slightly in such a way as to show off his profile, and waited.

“Dorian,” the Bull repeated more gently.

“That is indeed my name, if you require confirmation,” Dorian replied, turning his face upwards to meet the Bull’s gaze.

The Bull snorted. “I don’t need it. You might have noticed how often I was saying it last night.”

Dorian could feel his cheeks heat, just as involuntary as the fond smile that twitched at the corners of his lips before it could be suppressed.

The Bull grinned back, all soft edges and the potential for more. “You’re glorious, you know that?”

And Dorian suddenly felt terribly, horribly guilty. The Bull wasn’t suspicious, he wasn’t wary, he was besotted. He had no idea that last night wasn’t Dorian’s first time with him- how could he? He knew about the time travel, true, but that was an abstract idea he’d barely ever seen put into practice. It was far less concrete than the way they moved in near-perfect synchronicity on the battlefield- something he was also unlikely to ascribe to time travel.

He thought they were just like that, without any need for there to be any underhand machinations of his part, or even any work needed at all.

It hadn’t been like that- it wasn’t like that, and it never could be. They argued over things both big and small, harried each other over small annoyances, compromised and changed, proximity and time wearing down their sharp edges until they fit comfortably together. But Dorian already knew that he was never going to win certain arguments, that the Bull would cave to others, and that there were still more that they could have until Thedas had disintegrated into dust around them. He already knew how to fit himself around the Bull.

And the Bull had noticed that. Any excuse, any attempt at backpedalling, would only open him up to more questions than he knew how to answer. It would be better to keep the Bull close.

That keeping the Bull close was exactly what he wanted to do was merely a happy accident. That was his story and he was sticking to it.

“You’re not terrible yourself, I suppose,” Dorian replied eventually.

The Bull’s smile took on a predatory edge. “Not terrible, eh? Let’s see if we can’t fix that.”

Dorian continued to have nightmares. They were less severe, now that the Bull would wake him when he was starting to thrash, but they still happened.

This was not one of them exactly. It looked like a nightmare, and felt like a nightmare, but the events hedged too close to his memories of the fall of the Grand Necropolis and he was too lucid for it to be a nightmare.

And also there was a fucking wolf following him around. He kept forgetting about it until it was right in front of him, which meant that it took several tries before he actually managed to snap “If there’s something you want to know, Solas, you could just ask.”

The wolf cocked his head inquisitively.

“Don’t give me that,” Dorian retorted. “I’d recognize that smug expression anywhere.”

Solas turned back into an elf, and regarded him curiously. The chaos of the memory muted, froze, and then fell away.

“You don’t make sense,” Solas said at last.

“You’re still not asking,” Dorian pointed out.

Solas’ eyes narrowed and suddenly they were in an entirely new memory.

“We can fuck, if it’ll make things easier,” said memory-Dorian. “I don’t mind.”

“What,” said memory-Solas.

“What,” said Solas.

“Oh, Maker,” said Dorian, burying his face in the palm of his hand. He’d just about managed to bury this memory.

“She’s not going to stop asking about it otherwise, you know,” memory-Dorian continued. “She can tell we’re not sleeping together. It’s a Qunari thing, something to do with smell. The Bull did the same thing, even if he was less malignant about it. So, you know, it might make things easier. I don’t particularly care.”

“This is easily the least arousing conversation I’ve ever witnessed or participated in,” remarked memory-Solas. “And I have witness the memories of countless sexual mishaps.”

“Oh?” memory-Dorian asked.

“Embarrassment is as strong an emotion as any,” memory-Solas explained. “For example, that time in the baths of Asariel where you slipped on the tiles and nearly-”

“You are a terrible person,” interrupted memory-Dorian.

“Shall I consider your offer rescinded?” memory-Solas asked.

“You should consider fucking off,” memory-Dorian griped.

“This never happened,” the real Solas stated, confused, as the memory faded.

Dorian rolled his eyes at his continued refusal to ask. “It’s a memory from the year 9:44,” Dorian told him.

“But that must mean-”

The scene shift abruptly: a new memory, taking place later, Dorian and Solas bent over the amulet, arguing about magical power sources, while Cole kept watch for any potential intruders.

“It requires so sort of charge-”

“With the Breach still going it will only be a matter of find a Rift to-”

“And I’m tell you no amount of ambient energy is going to-”

“We can put this to the test very simply, there are Rifts-”

Suddenly a portal opened up, interrupting their argument. Solas, Dorian and Cole cam stumbling out, Dorian reached out to grab Cole before he fell headfirst into the first, the momentum sending him careening into their table instead.

“Fasta vass!” said both memory-Dorians at once.

“It works?” asked the first memory-Solas.

“It works,” replied the other memory-Solas.

“I helped you to travel back in time,” the real Solas said.

“It was your idea,” Dorian told him. “You weren’t in the Inquisition when I joined, the first time around. You came later, much later, when it was becoming obvious that we’d lost, and I was- I was in a bad way.”

The memory shifted. He wasn’t surprised to find himself standing in the Herald’s throne room at Weisshaupt, but he wasn’t pleased either.

“Really, you can just ask,” he protested, though it was becoming increasingly obvious that Solas wouldn’t. Probably he wouldn’t trust the words coming out of his mouth without the memories in his head to back him up.

“-placed strategically around the Warden mausoleums around the base of the Broken Tooth, it might provide some defense against the Elder One’s demons,” said memory-Dorian. “Erimond has his people working on it. He sends his love, by the way, and this.” His withdrew a scroll from inside his robes and handed it to the aid, who presented it to the Herald on her throne with a bow.

The Herald settled in to read. Memory-Dorian leaned heavily against his staff. Dorian studied him. He didn’t know how this memory of his appearance was generated. He hadn’t exactly been checking his reflection, so there was no way of knowing if he’d had that much grime on his face, or if he’d truly appeared that pinched and worn. He wouldn’t be surprised to learn that was the case, though.

“Is there anything else, Your Worship?” memory-Dorian finally asked.

“Eager to get back to the Bull?” the Herald asked. “Don’t be. He’s dead.”

Memory-Dorian blinked. “Beg pardon?”

“The Bull is dead.” The Herald said. Memory-Dorian staggered, while the Herald continued. “I tasked him with finding Avernus’ Grimoire- the Hero of Fereldan was supposed to have had it with her when she fell. He failed to retrieve it. Our spies have reported that his body was hung from the spire of Fort Drakon.”

“You-but- Fereldan is- you can’t possibly have expected him to succeed!”

The Herald gave him a level look over the edge of the scroll. “I expect every man, woman, and child who swore fealty to the Inquisition to do as I command, or die trying.”

Dorian watched his younger self snap, fireballs manifesting and then fizzling out as he was hit with five separate smites. He barreled forward bringing his staff up to bear, and that was as far as they got before the memory faded around them.

“I ended up the dungeons. You made some kind of deal with her for my pardon, and we got to work on the amulet,” Dorian said.

“She wouldn’t do that,” Solas protested.

“The Inquisitor Adaar of our timeline wouldn’t, I don’t think,” Dorian said. “This one, Adaar, the Herald of Andraste? She would, could, did, and had done worse to many others.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Solas argued.

“No, it doesn’t,” Dorian agreed. “I’ve been puzzling over it ever since I started entertaining the notion that they might be two different people. I have no idea what could cause it. But I think you knew something.”

“Go on,” Solas said.

“We went back to Fereldan. You’d promised the Herald something- it was part of the deal you made for my freedom. I have no idea what you promised her, but it drove her mad. After we got the amulet to work, we went to Denerim. The plan was for me to slip back in time while she was distracted, but… I delayed. I wanted to offer you the chance to come with me, one last time.”

The memory sprang forth and enveloped them.

“Power beyond imaging, you said,” the Herald spat. “I would become a god, the envy of all, an equal to Corypheus himself!”

“I promised to show you the way, Herald,” memory-Solas said serenely.

The Herald snarled.

“Have you heard the story the Dalish tell about why their gods were sealed away?” memory-Solas asked.

“No, I do not care what the fuck the ancient elves said or did.”

“You should. It’s one of the stories the Dalish got right, you see, if only in the broad strokes. There was a war, a terrible war that threatened to destroy everything it touched, and a weapon which would end it. Fen’Harel told both sides where the weapon could be found, and then sealed them away, leaving the Dread Wolf as the sole survivor.”

“Touching story, but what the fuck-” the Herald began.

In his memory, Solas cut her off with a feral smile. His appearance stayed exactly the same, but there was something other about him now, something bigger, something more.

“I am Fen’Harel,” he said. “You are no god, and even if you were, I would still be able to stop you.”

Next to him, the real Solas gaped. In his memory, the Herald charged at Solas, who batted her away, a howling noise filling the room as rifts opened, bringing out spirits in the form of wolves to encircle her.

“This is about the time Cole pointed out to me that I should probably leave,” Dorian said, and the memory abruptly cut off.

“You know?” Solas demanded. “You’ve known this entire time?”

“Yes,” Dorian replied simply.

Solas was shocked into silence. Dorian took a few moments to enjoy the event.

“Look, I’m not an elf, I’m not Dalish, the only connection I have with Old Arlathan is built upon what my ancestors stole from them,” Dorian said. “Maybe if I was less… Tevinter it would bother me, but as it stands, you’re the person who rescued me from what looked like a point of no return and helped me travel back in time to prevent to world from ending. Whatever it is you’ve done, whatever relation that has with what the legends say… it doesn’t matter. You’re helping us now, if it becomes an issue, I’m sure we can deal with it.”

“I- suppose that’s not an entirely misplaced loyalty,” Solas said.

Dorian shrugged. “Don’t get me wrong, I’ve still got questions. I mean, the things you must have- the history you lived through-”

“It was uncomfortable and almost everyone I cared for died,” Solas said flatly.

“I- know how that feels,” Dorian said.

“I suppose that you do, a bit,” Solas conceded.

They stood in silence for a time. Dorian was still asleep, but he’d be waking soon, he could tell.

“I don’t suppose you could tell from any of that what happened?” Dorian asked, finally.

“You should spend more time with the Chargers,” Solas said cryptically.

Dorian woke up.

It was perhaps two weeks later when he heard Krem’s tale of fighting the envy demon that had escaped from Therinfal Redoubt, who assumed the form of everyone from Krem himself to the Inquisitor before being put down, that he put things together. He begged out of the revelry and went back to the rotunda.

“Are you allergic to giving me straight answers?” he demanded. “Is that your secret weakness?”

“If I told you, it would hardly be a secret,” Solas replied.

To say that things fell into a pattern was a gross oversimplification, but things continued on in a manner he didn’t find objectionable, at least.

He and the Bull fell into one another, easily, happily, steadily. He worried, at first, that things might be less … emotionally fraught, now that the world wasn’t in such immediate peril, but it proved to not be the case. The Bull didn’t mind when he slept in his room, even though there was little need for someone to watch his blind spot. They had the arguments about Dorian’s drinking habits and the Bull’s propensity for getting stabbed (and would continue to have them until the Maker smiled upon humanity once more), Dorian’s morning ablutions (which Dorian won, handily), and the Bull’s pants (which Dorian knew he likely would one day concede to, but so much else had changed, so why not this?), amongst other things. The Bull smiled when Dorian found a little shop in Val Royeaux that carved figures out of dawnstone and somehow or another made several in the likeness of the Chargers, and he swept Dorian up with his legs hooked over the Bull’s horns when he found the shop which carried men’s lingerie in the same color of pink.

That was when they were in Skyhold, however, or one their own time, at least. Simply because things were less dire this time around didn’t mean that they weren’t kept busy: dizzyingly, wondrously busy as the differences between the two histories was made all the more stark.

There was the matter of meeting Hawke’s Warden friend in Crestwood: not something which had happened the first time around. They’d come to Crestwood because they’d heard there was a Keep the Inquisition could use: if there had been a Stroud in that other-when, Dorian has no doubt that he’d been swiftly dealt with. When Adaar took over Crestwood, it was not the dictatorship he’d witnessed before. With the mayor fleeing the consequences of his actions during the Blight and the Inquisition occupying Caer Bronach, it was barely a takeover at all- just a bit of de facto policy setting until a suitable leader can be chosen.

“There’s a dragon,” the Bull said, all excitement and what might look to the untrained eye to be childish glee.

There was nothing child-like about the Bull’s dragon feelings, thank the Maker.

“There are also several private rooms,” Dorian pointed out. “Some of them may even have beds, or bed-like surfaces.”

“We’re not going to hunt the fucking dragon today,” Adaar said, sounding bored, her hair in complete disarray. They’d left Sera behind on this mission, and it would appear to be having a dampening effect of the Inquisitor’s mood. “Your two crazy kids have fun.”

Dorian spluttered.

“We’re both older than you, boss,” the Bull pointed out.

“Pbbbt!” Adaar replied.

Then it turned out that Livinus Erimond was one of Corypheus’ people. He was not surprised in the least. It made so much sense: the Envy Demon had been Corypheus’ creature, it would have known who the other lieutenants were, and so long as they were all working towards Corypheus’ victory, why not align with them?

The Wardens obviously had no idea, and Dorian had to admit that it was eminently satisfying to watch them turn on him as the wool was pulled back for their eyes.

And then the archedemon showed up, and things went to complete shit. That was beginning to become something of a running theme.

When Dorian fell into the Fade, it was a nasty surprise, though not as bad as it could have been, he supposed. The demon taunted him about ending up like his father and his tombstone declared his greatest fear to be falling to temptation, and there was such a complete lack any mention of time travel that he doubled over laughing. Shouldn’t the demon be picking at the secrets he was keeping, rather than the painfully obvious hurts Cole had already aired to what felt like all of Skyhold?

“Are you feeling alright there, big guy?” the Bull asked.

“I rather feel like I should be asking you that,” Dorian replied, motioning to the dark bruises he could see forming across the Bull’s chest.

“Eh, it knocked some of the crap in my head loose, I’m better now,” the Bull said dismissively.

Dorian raised an eyebrow.

“Dorian,” the Bull said, in the very serious tone he used when he was anything but serious. “Do you need me to hit you with the feelings stick?”

“I’ll presume that’s a metaphor,” Dorian replied archly.

Later still, they had the peace conference/ball at the Winter Palace to contend with. The first time around, there had been no forewarning that the Elder One wanted Empress Celene’s death: they’d gone to Halamshiral for a time after Crestwood had fallen, on the behest of her successor, Empress Florianne.

Adaar brought Sera, Dorian, and the Bull along with her, because, and he quoth “Fuck ‘em, that’s why.” He had the terrible suspicion that he would end up being the adult in the party, and he couldn’t even console himself with getting a decent set of formal wear out of the debacle.

He sighed, trying to adjust the collar in a fashion that made him look less like a toy soldier.

“You’re still pretty, big guy,” the Bull said solemnly. “Pinky promise.”

He extended said finger towards him, still looking quite somber. Dorian glowered at him.

The horrible thing was, the Bull looked resplendent in the uniform: it clung to him in a terribly flattering way, at least.

Dorian sighed again, and turned away from the mirror to join the others he could hear already congregated in the foyer.

“I suppose we had to come across an outfit that didn’t suit me sooner or later,” he said.

“Nah, you still look good enough to eat out,” the Bull told him.

Dorian stopped, one hand on the doorknob, and slowly turned back around to face him. The Bull stuck out his tongue and waggled it a bit, just in case Dorian had missed the meaning behind his words.

“You are the most ridiculous!” Dorian accused, face flushing. This was the man he had fallen for, of all the galling, wonderful men he could have met. He had the Bull.

“Are you two fucking done?” Adaar yelled. “Or are you not done fucking?”

“Keep your tits on, Dorian’s got his hand on the doorknob right now!” the Bull bellowed back, which wasn’t untrue.

It turned out that Florianne was another one of Corypheus’ more important minions. That was slightly more surprising to discover than it had been with Erimond, but certainly made a lot of sense in hindsight.

When he had worked up enough courage to ask the Bull for a dance- most of it not even in liquid form- he was pleasantly surprised by how little people stared. To be fair, Sera and Adaar were probably just as noteworthy a couple if not more so, but it seemed to him as though they were very nearly the only people in the room who could see one another. Or perhaps they were the only people who Dorian cared to notice.

They’d never had time for this sort of thing before: no dancing, no public displays, nothing that frivolous. The closest they’d come was nights when they were too exhausted to do much, but too anxious to properly rest, and so they just laid there, curled careful around one another and jumping at every sudden noise. The thought made Dorian shiver, which made the Bull pull him even closer.

Throughout it all, Adaar came to him for advice. Adaar was very interested in his opinions in general: everything from areas of his expertise like the Venatori and Tevinter politics to areas not of his expertise. Actually, she seemed almost more interested in the latter than the former.

Adaar came to him for romantic advice. Adaar wanted his advice on what she could do to make Sera happy. He hadn’t the slightest idea what to make of that, aside from refreshed disappointment at the way Josephine had restricted his access to the wine cellar, because Maker, someone considered him a source of relationship advice, there was no way for him to process that sober, let alone process the way he’d been in a solid, not dependent on needed someone to watch your back at all times relationship with a Tal-Vashoth qunari for months, and therefore was a semi-logical source of advice.

And it didn’t stop there. No, he could expect that, on any given day, the Inquisitor would bring herself around to his little corner of the library, and asking him some kind of pressing question, perpetually fighting a losing battle to keep her hair from her face.

“Is Vivienne secretly evil or some shit?”

“Uh. I don’t think she’s been keeping it a secret, precisely. Why?”

“Because she seems to want me to give her a fucking wyvern heart so she can make some kind of eternal youth potion.”

Dorian suddenly remembered that Vivienne’s lover was rather ill, and if they hadn’t done anything to change it, would soon die. “I don’t think that’s for her. And I doubt it’s eternal youth she’s after. More a cure for whatever is ailing the Duke of Ghyslain.”

The questions never stopped. “So, do you have any idea how to stop someone from fucking themselves up on that lyrium shit? I’m asking for a friend.” “So now Cole’s becoming more human, and I think you should help him, because he’s still a weird-ass kid, but now he’s a weird-ass kid who can’t make people forget he’s a weird-ass little kid, and that's bound to be rough, you know?” “Do you have the first idea what crawled into Solas’ ass and then died?”

He was a trusted, valued advisor, heavily relied upon. More than that, Adaar had become a dear friend to him, and he to her. No wonder Mother Giselle clucked at him so.

Not that she had time to do much clucking. Things only accelerated after foiling Corypheus’ plans at the Winter Palace.

It turned out that Leliana might very well be the next White Divine. He was rather pleased by that.

When Dorian saw Calpernia in Val Royeaux, he wasn’t quite sure what to do. His indecision cost him some discretion, and Calpernia noticed his stare. In the end, he gave her a little half bow with his arm folded over his chest, as though they were magisters of the same caucus, and walked away. He left Leliana a note about it, of course, but he wasn’t terribly surprised when nothing came of it.

They all but destroyed Corypheus’ forces in the Arbor Wilds, and then defeated Corypheus himself in a field of floating rocks. Solas disappeared. He doubted they’d seen the last of him.

Things were good.

But they were not perfect.

There was, of course, the moment when the Bull rolled over and asked Dorian if he would ever tell him about the qunari he’d been in love with before.

And there was the constant feeling that he should go back to Tevinter, that he should save his homeland now that he could be reasonably certain that the Imperium was still going to be standing for some time to come.

He told himself that he was waiting. He was just going to stay a little while longer, until they’d finished dealing with the rifts scattered around in odd places, until Leliana has ascended to her place as Divine Victoria I, until he managed to get his birthright back, until he told the Bull the truth.

He owed him that much. He just had no idea how to say it.

And he didn’t want to lose the Bull, who would probably be more than a little angry to discover the deception.

And… he didn’t really want to return to Tevinter, exactly. He wanted to change it, to save it, but Maker, he wasn’t sure he could stomach living there after so long away. After so long of not being on his own, let alone on his own in the midst of the pit of vipers that could be the Minrathous political scene.

He liked who he was now, he liked where he was and who he was with and it was tempting, oh so tempting, to stay here, reaping the benefits of the forbidden magic he’d used as a last resort, for the world’s own good.

It wasn’t permanent. He wouldn’t stay forever. Just a little while longer, and then he would leave.

‘Just a little while longer’ stretched on and on for months, until one day Leliana greeted the Inquisitor’s party with the news that Calpernia was in the library, wanting to speak with him.

“What?” Dorian asked. “Why?”

Leliana shrugged.

“Who’s Calpernia?” Adaar asked.

“A hopefully-former Venatori of my acquaintance,” Dorian replied.

“A what now?” the Bull asked.

“You’ll meet her soon enough,” Dorian replied, hoping he didn’t sound as strained as he felt.

He hadn’t expected her to show up in Skyhold. He had no plans in place for this, and it was going to be immediately obvious that Calpernia had never met him before and-

And it took all his considerable willpower to walk to the library, instead of doing something unforgivably dramatic like saying ‘I just want you to know what we had was real,’ and disappearing into the Frostbacks. By the time he reached the library to find Calpernia waiting for him, flanked by Ser Belinda and Ser Leonid, he still wasn’t sure he’d made the right decision by not doing so.

“Ave, Dorian of House Pavus,” she said, turning around to face them as they approached. She ignored the Inquisitor, and everyone else in the room, for that matter.

“Iterum obvenimus, Lady Calpernia,” he replied.

She smiled briefly. “You have no idea,” she murmured.

Behind him, the Bull shifted uneasily, and Sera muttered something unflattering under her breath.

“I take it you’re the one responsible for how many in the Inquisition have been looking for me?” Calpernia asked at a more normal volume.

“I tipped them off, yes,” Dorian told her. “You have been singularly difficult to find.”

“I’ve had to be. I broke away from the Venatori shortly after the attack that destroyed Haven,” she said, looking at the Inquisitor for the first time. “Corypheus was not the most forgiving of men.”

“We met. Saying he was a man at all is a bit of a stretch,” Adaar said.

Calpernia gave an eloquent, one-shouldered shrug, and turned back to Dorian. “It wasn’t long after that when the group I was leading encountered another from Tevinter. A mutual friend of ours.”

The only person that immediately sprang to mind was Felix, which didn’t make a great deal of sense.

“He’s been operating under that name ‘Gideon Adralla’, on your suggestion, or so I was told,” she added.

Oh. Oh. Oh, dear.

“Oh,” Dorian managed aloud, he coughed. “I- well, of course he would join with you, if you’d left the Venatori. Why am I surprised?”

Calpernia looked at him, nearly burning with curiosity.

“I take it he explained something of the nature of…” he trailed off, uncertain how to phrase that in such a way as to not cause panic.

“He’s told me as much as you told him,” Calpernia said. “He’s been an invaluable asset to my group, and a dear friend, which is why I’ve risked coming here to ask for your help.”

“What do you need, and what are you offering?” the Inquisitor asked.

“My group intends to return to Tevinter shortly,” Calpernia said, shifting her attention back to Adaar. “With the remaining Venatori scrambling in the wake of Corypheus’ defeat, now is the best possible time to strike and rid the Imperium of their corrupting influence once and for all.”

“With you so far,” Adaar said.

“Our intelligence is that the border patrols in the Imperium have been overzealous of late,” Calpernia continued. “That makes getting back home a little problematic.”

“So you want our help getting you over the border?” the Inquisitor guessed. “That’s no problem- we’ll send word to Movran and-”

“We already know how we can get across the border,” Calpernia interrupted her. “Gideon is an Altus. He has a birthright. Or he had one, at least.”

“A birthright is proof of identity, amongst other things,” Dorian explained, forestalling Adaar’s questions. “Gideon sold his some years ago to a merchant in Val Royeaux, who is unlikely to part with it easily.”

“He wished to trade a favor for a favor,” Calpernia explained. “Which we could not provide. I was all for stealing it, but Gideon is an honest man whenever possible. He wanted to try talking some sense into him first, and it seemed to be working… until he disappeared.”

“The merchant or Gideon?” Dorian asked.

“Both, actually, though I can’t say that I care what happened to the merchant,” Calpernia said. “We found two recognizable things in the wreckage of his shop: a ransom note and this.”

She withdrew the birthright to House Pavus from her robes and handed it to Dorian, who took it numbly.

“What did the note say?” the Inquisitor asked.

“It asked for a meeting with you, in Serault,” Calpernia told her. “I’m willing to give you the note for your people to examine, provided you promise to go.”

“You want me to trade myself in for one of your people in exchange for a note,” Adaar said flatly.

“No. I want your help in getting my man back and killing the person responsible,” Calpernia said. “In return, I’m offering you the use of myself and my people as Inquisition agents in the Imperium. We are skilled, determined, and our interests already align. It would be to your benefit, Inquisitor.”

“But why me?” Adaar asked. “I mean, why would they think you’d be able to bring me to Serault? I mean, if you’ve really left the Venatori then we’re not exactly enemies, but-”

“They thought he was me,” Dorian interrupted her. “It’s not an unforeseeable mistake, merely one I’d hoped to avoid.”

“So, if they discover that he’s not you, there’s a chance that they’ll just kill him and come after you,” the Bull surmised.

“Well, yes, there’s that,” Dorian said.

“I don’t like the sound of that,” said Adaar, brushing errant strands of hair from her face. “Alright, you have my assistance, provided you agree to my terms.”

“Name them,” Calpernia said.

“Firstly, my people scout out the area before we move in,” Adaar said.

Calpernia nodded in ascent.

“And… I reserve the right to name no more than four terms once we have some idea what we’re looking at,” Adaar said.

“I will not see my people impressed into service,” Calpernia replied.

“Oh fuck no, I don’t want to impress anybody,” Adaar protested, adding after a moment “Into my service. I mean, people join the Inquisition because I’m super fucking impressive, but that’s not the same thing.”

“I trust her,” Dorian added.

Calpernia nodded slowly. “I reserve the right to withdraw my support if your terms are unreasonable.”

“Fair enough. You won’t need it though, I’m a bastion of reason,” Adaar said.

Calpernia turned to him questioningly.

“I wouldn’t go that far, but that’s why she has advisors,” Dorian explained. After a moment’s hesitation, he held the birthright back out to her. “I suppose you’ll be wanting this back?”

“Keep it, for now,” Calpernia said, after a moment to think.

“We’ll have rooms set up for you,” Adaar said. “In the meantime, maybe you want to avail yourself of the tavern? It’s a pretty sweet place, if I say so myself.”

“Thank you, Inquisitor,” Calpernia said. “I’ll do that, provided your Templars can show me the way.”

Neither Belinda nor Leonid appeared to have any difficulty showing her the way. No, the difficulties started once she was out of earshot.

“Who’s Gideon Adralla?” Adaar demanded. “Friend? Lover?”

“Brother?” the Bull asked, eyeing the birthright. “That’s the House Pavus crest, right? It’s got a peacock on it.”

“Shit, do you have a brother?” Adaaar asked.

“No, I’m an only child,” Dorian said. “The truth is… complex.”

“Your father didn’t actually do anything fucked up to you with blood magic, did he?” Adaar demanded.

“No, it’s- not an explanation I’m capable of giving more than once, and it’s one that should be heard by everyone,” Dorian said. “Do you think you could gather a meeting in the War Room? I need to gather a few things to do this properly.”

In the end the actual explanation was relatively easy.

“This,” Dorian said, putting down the first amulet, contained in a specially enchanted chest on the war table, “Is the amulet Alexius used to send us forward in time. And this,” he put down the second chest, “is the one we used to travel back to the year 9:41 again from that future.”

He hesitated for long enough that Adaar prompted him with “With you so far.”

He took a deep breath, and withdrew his amulet from the lining of his robes. “And last but certainly not least, this is the amulet I used to travel back from the year 9:45, to stop the world from ending.”

The assembled leaders of the Inquisition stared at it in shocked silence.

“Gideon Adralla is me,” Dorian explained. “The younger me, the one that never lived through any of that. I met him on his way to Redcliffe, warned him off the Inquisition, and then carried on and tried to do things better this time.”

“You..?” Adaar managed.

“It was a success, if that makes any difference,” Dorian continued. “By this point in time, Fereldan had fallen to the Elder One, Orlais was under the banner of Empress Florianne and therefore no help at all, Livinus Erimond was named First Warden, which effectively gave the Anderfells to him, most of you were dead, and what survivors there were had dug into Kirkwall. Or, well, we tried. It didn’t last.”

That broke the dam, and the War Room was suddenly a riot of noise.

Adaar asked him: “Where’d I fuck up the first time around?”

That was an easy enough answer to give. He gave her the rundown of their missed connection, of the envy demon that had taken her form, of the atrocities it had committed in her name. He spoke until it felt like his lips should be bleeding.

Sera asked him: “What happened to me?”

And he spoke of the certain uncertainty of her fate, of knowing she hadn’t disappeared but rather been disappeared, and shrugged helplessly when she asked if he knew whether or not she’d managed to get in any good jibes before she went.

Leliana demanded: “Tell me everything. Yesterday.”

Dorian looked down at the amulets, and then back at her before saying “I don’t think that would make anything better.”

The Bull asked him no questions, made no demands, didn’t speak to him at all, and was the first one out of the room.

Dorian broke into the wine cellar, got spectacularly drunk in his room, and woke up as he had fallen asleep: alone.

He didn’t stay that way for very long. He was in the middle of round three of ‘should I leave my room and get one of Cabot’s hangover cures, or just stay in my room and get drunk once more’ when the knock on his door came.

“What now?” he snapped.

“Can I come in?” the Bull asked.

Dorian considered that for long enough for the Bull to call out again. “Dorian.”

“Yes,” Dorian replied, forcing himself to sit upright facing the door. “Yes, come in Bull.”

The Bull came in. Dorian barely let him close the door before he started to speaking. “If you’ve come to break- to break this off, I-” he swallowed, looking resolutely anywhere that wasn’t the Bull. No small feat in a room this size. “I understand completely, I just- get it over with quickly, please.”

“Hey,” the Bull said gently, in the tone of voice he generally used for when Dorian had used his watchword. “Hey, Dorian, I’m not looking to break up with you.”

“Oh?” Dorian didn’t know if he meant it to be an expression of shock or a challenge, and the syllable mostly came out as desperate.

“No, I just want to talk a bit,” the Bull assured him, hunched in upon himself in a effort to appear nonthreatening. As always, he only succeeded in making himself look ridiculous, which, he supposed, did have a similar effect. “Ask some questions.”

Dorian chuckled bitterly. “I certainly owe you some answers.”

“Were we together, before, in that alternate timeline?” the Bull asked.

“Yes,” Dorian said. “We started having sex in Crestwood- shortly after the destruction in Haven. We sort of… fell in with one another from there on out. The world was ending, and the Herald of Andraste was, unknown to us, a literal demon, and ran the Inquisition accordingly. It wasn’t safe to sleep alone.”

“Were you in love with me?” the Bull asked.

Dorian didn’t know how to answer that. ‘Were’ implied that he had stopped, after all.

“Are you in love with me?” the Bull asked.

“Yes,” Dorian admitted.

“With me or with him?” the Bull pressed, adding when Dorian looked at him in bewilderment. “The other me, from your timeline.”

“You’re the same person,” Dorian told him. “And this is as much my timeline as it is Gideon’s, thank you very much.”

“Yeah, but, after he went through all that shit, you think we’re really the same guy?” the Bull asked.

“It’s not like you haven’t gone through shit,” Dorian pointed out. “And, while there are certainly differences, it’s not like you aren’t still you. If anything, you’re more you. You, the other you, lost your Chargers the first time around.” The Bull’s eye widened. “You were… less because of it, I think. It wasn’t something you could recover from, you just- you told me all about them. I barely met them, the first time around, but you talked of them constantly. I learned about them from you and I’m really glad they weren’t taken from you, this time.”

“What happened to me, if I didn’t die with them?” the Bull asked.

“You were sent on a suicide mission. Something to do with a relic the Hero of Fereldan was supposed to have had with her when she died,” Dorian told him. “I wasn’t there- I’d been ordered to assist Erimond in his efforts to mass produce necromancy mines. It was a trying experience, to say the least. You were already dead when I returned. I- I attacked the Herald. I tried to kill her. You were- my parents were gone, my country was gone, you the only thing I had left and she just threw you away. I didn’t win that fight, obviously.” He held up his ‘wonky wrist’ as the Bull had taken to calling it. “By some miracle, this ended up being the only lasting damage.”

The Bull eased over to the bed and sat down next time him. He pressed a kiss to the inside of his bad wrist- not the first time he’d done it, but it was a gesture unique to this timeline, and that was-

“I didn’t even realize I loved you until I’d come back in time and met you in the Redcliffe Chantry,” Dorian confessed. “I didn’t expect- and then you were there, and alive, and I’d never let myself picture it, and-”

“And I told the boss not to trust you, because the pretty ones are always the worst,” the Bull finished for him. “Is that why you took so long to come to bed with me?”

“Partially. Not really,” Dorian admitted. “It just- it didn’t seem fair. I already knew all about you. I already knew you, and I couldn’t hide it very well, and it just seemed- things were going better, so much better this time around, and it seemed like... giving you up was a small price to pay, considering, it wasn’t like you were going to stay alone without me, I was the one who’d recreated that damn amulet, I was the one who changed things, if there was a price to be paid for it, it should be mine.”

“You know something, Dorian?” the Bull said after a long pause. “Sometimes you’re such a fucking ‘vint.”

“Only some of the time?” Dorian retorted. “I must work on that. It wouldn’t do to go native.”

The Bull snorted. “Look. It’s weird. It’s pretty fucked up, actually. I’m not going to pretend to be entirely comfortable with it. But that can be said of pretty much everything I’ve done for the Inquisition. This isn’t an end for us, unless you want it to be.”

“I very much would like us to continue,” Dorian assured him.

“Good. Because I’ve got one more question.”

“Go on.”

“Did I rock your world the first time we had sex on your end? Because this time around you were incredible, and I’ve kind of felt like I wasn’t giving you what you were giving me, you know?”

‘Yes’ Dorian almost said, before reconsidering his words. “My end has never been the same,” he said instead.

The Bull laughed.

Serault was a strange part of Orlais: a strange ruler, a strange Chantry, and a strange woods where they were to meet the person holding Gideon hostage. Cassandra spoke of her last trip to the marquisate ahead of Divine Justinia V as they passed the strange shrines to the ‘Masked Andraste’ worshipped here in an almost cultish fashion.

The Inquisition’s scouts had turned up contradictory, impossible, sinister and wondrous information about the place. As a result, no one had the slightest idea what they were walking into. The Inquisitor had arrange for an entire infantry company to be stationed there, and Josephine and Leliana were making small talk with the Marquis while Adaar took Cole, Dorian, and Cassandra with her and Calpernia to meet the hostage taker.

Once they finally reached the pre-ordained meeting sight (a section of the Applewood Scout Harding had informed them was known as the Greenvault) everyone was on edge, gripping at their weapons and jumping at the slightest noise.

So when Cullen stepped out into the clearing, he was immediately accosted by the business ends of several weapons.

“What the fuck?” Adaar demanded, because they’d left Cullen in Skyhold.

“That’s not the commander,” Cole informed them.

“No, he isn’t,” Dorian said shifting his grip on his staff so that he could better use the blade if he needed to. “Not from this timeline at any rate.”

“Dorian,” Cullen acknowledged flatly. “I’d say it’s good to see you-”

“But let’s not start this off by lying,” Dorian finished for him.

“Or by having a dick measuring contest,” Adaar interrupted. “Spoiler alert, guys: mine’s bigger.”

Cullen turned to face her, but it was Calpernia who spoke next. “You asked for a meeting with the Inquisitor. You have now met the Inquisitor. Where is Gideon?”

“Safe,” Cullen said, with a small smile. It was not a pretty smile. “Nothing has been permanently broken, except perhaps his pride.”

Dorian snorted, but didn’t comment.

Adaar took over. “What it is you want exactly?”

As Cullen began to explain his demands- fragmented and angry, as apparently he’d hit the part of lyrium withdrawal where he couldn’t focus on anything for more than a few seconds at a time- Cole stood next to him and said “He’s not right. He thinks like him, but he’s not him.”

“Our Cullen kicked the lyrium, and developed some qualms about kicking mages. This one was forced not to,” Dorian explained.

Cole frowned. “I don’t think so.”

“Oh?” Dorian said, turning his attention back to Cullen. He supposed that there was something off here- presuming that Cullen had come through the same portal as Dorian (and how else would he be here?) he was looking relatively clean and well-maintained. And how had he gotten to Serault from Fereldan anyway? And why would he-

And then Cullen pressed his hand upon over his forehead, like he was trying to clear his view of stray hair, and he knew-

He strode over between Adaar and the thing masquerading as Cullen. The latter put its hand back upon its sword. The former squawked “What the fuck?”

Dorian ignored both gestures, too angry to see much past the haze of red clouding his vision. “Four years is a long time to hold a single form for you, is it not?” he said. “You kept some of her mannerisms.”

The envy demon wearing Cullen’s face smiled as Dorian’s hands closed around his throat.

“At last,” it said, laughing as they fell and fell and fell…

Dorian landed in Weishhaupt at the Bull’s feet. Flanking the Bull were Cullen and the Herald. Before he could struggle to his feet, the Herald snapped her fingers and Cullen ran the Bull through.

“I’ll kill you,” he snarled. “I’m going to kill you, you-”

“You’re so angry, Dorian,” the demon chided as the Herald. Cullen and the Bull’s body melted away. “Defiant to the last- or so you want to be. You can be broken. I’ve done it before.”

“You’ve tried and failed,” Dorian retorted.

“Oh no, Dorian of House Pavus,” the demon said, its voice distorting until it sounded less like Adaar and more like himself. “I never tried at all. But being you would be so much better than being Cullen. And after that-”

The demon disappeared, laughing all the while. Dorian picked a direction and ran. The demon would not leave him alone. It would test and poke and prod and then Dorian would pummel it back into the Fade with his bare hands if he had to.

He reached a door and wrenched it open, and abruptly found himself in Qarinus, in his father’s study. His father- or a facsimile thereof, at least- was pacing, while something that looked like a poorly constructed simulacrum of himself: featureless and colorless save for glowing green eyes.

“You have a duty, Dorian!” his father was roaring. The scene wasn’t exactly like the one which precipitated his flight from home, but it was close enough. “A duty to your House, your country- your family. Does that mean nothing to you?”

The not-him grumbled indistinctly. Dorian crossed over to the set of door behind them- ones which very much did not exist in the real world- and left.

And found himself in the Chantry at Redcliffe.

“Watch yourself,” the Bull growled. “The pretty ones are always the worst.”

“Ah, but you do admit I’m pretty,” said his simulacrum self, looking no less defined, but sounding much more human.

Dorian hummed in mock thoughtfulness. “That’s more a caricature than a characterization, I believe.”

“Mocking, deflecting- that does sound like you, doesn’t it?” the demon said, before cackling and disappearing in a puff of smoke.

The room began to fill with brackish water until Dorian had no choice but to sink or swim. Eventually he found his way to land- to the Storm Coast, surrounded by dead Chargers.

“Envy tried to hurt you,” said Cole, who was standing perpendicular to the cliff face, sticking straight out over the blood-tinged foam. “Is trying to hurt you. I tried to help, and now I’m here. It’s not normally like this, but I’ve done this before.”

“Get out,” the demon snapped. “Get out, this is my place!”

“No, it’s mine,” Dorian corrected.

The demon’s roar of frustration echoed.

“You’re frozen,” Cole explained. “I reached out, and then in, and then I was here. It wants your face. I don’t want it to have your face.”

“Neither do I,” Dorian said. “How do I stop it?”

“I was hoping you’d know,” Cole said.

“Did you not just say that you’d done this before?” Dorian demanded.

“I tried. I went in. Delrin didn’t believe me- he thought I was Envy. He kept trying to make it stand and fight. He fell.” Cole frowned, and jumped down into waves. “It’s hard to be one person. Being many- envy would stretch, when it needs to be strong. You could break through.”

“So I need to make it be many people,” Dorian said. “So I need to keep moving.”

“Yes, I think so,” Cole said doubtfully, and disappeared.

He hadn’t done that since he confronted the Templar who had left the first Cole to die of thirst and starvation in the White Spire. Dorian hadn’t missed Cole doing that in the slightest.

He kept moving: through Felix’ sickbed and Skyhold’s library and the Circle of Vyrantium and his first encounter with a demon and meeting with his father in Redcliffe…

And, finally, the Greenvault.

Dorian ran, ignoring the bears and boars that hounded his heels and finally reached the spot where envy had taken him and-

He came to with a gasp, as the envy demon, now formless, pulled away. It didn’t get very far, Dorian reaching out and with every inch of stubbornness that had made him such a talents necromancer, he pulled at it until it stopped.

He got his feet, panting.

“What the fuck?” Adaar demanded.

Dorian ignored her. “Burn,” he commanded, and with an unearthly wail envy ignited and burned to ash.

It was over.

“Seriously, what the fuck?” Adaar repeated.

“I do hope you learned where Gideon is being kept from that thing before you killed it,” Calpernia said.

“Do you know what the fuck?” Adaar asked. “Because what the fuck?”

“That was Envy. The same demon that had assumed your form in my timeline,” Dorian explained.

“And where is Gideon?” Calpernia asked.

“Belly hurt like knives, throat cracked dry,” Cole said, making him jump. “I know where he is. I’ll take you to him.”

He wandered off. Cassandra made a disgusted noise and went after him, and the rest of them followed her example. Cole led them across a river, and into the roots of an overturned and impossibly large tree. Rot had hollowed it out: inside they found a very dead body wearing Cullen’s uniform, and a still breathing if decidedly grimy bound-and-gagged version of himself.

With a very strange feeling of déjà vu, he watched as Cole removed the gag from his mouth and pressed a waterskin to his mouth.

Judging by the shape of the stubble on his face, he’d managed to resist the temptation of regrowing the moustache. It also looked like he’d grown out his hair a little, and was keeping it in topknot.

“What the fuck?” Gideon croaked once the waterskin had been drained.

“A man after my own heart,” Adaar sniggered.

“You’ve been rescued,” Calpernia told him, offering him her hand. “Let’s get you set to rights: then let’s go home.”

It was perhaps a week or so later when Dorian left Calpernia and Adaar to discuss the terms of the Inquisitions future involvement in Tevinter’s affairs and tracked himself down.

Gideon, predictably, had scorned the healers warnings about pressing himself too far and was seated on the battlements, obviously not feeling up to getting back down off the battlements but also too stubborn to ask for help.

“This is yours, I believe,” he said, holding out the birthright to him.

“You aren’t going to fight me for it?” Gideon asked. “I must admit, every time I pictured us meeting over this, it ended in a duel.”

“You’re not exactly in peak dueling condition,” Dorian pointed out. “There’s a point where you can be too hard on yourself, you know.”

Gideon rolled his eyes, but he took the birthright.

“Do you really not want to go home?” he asked.

“Do you really want to go home?” he countered.

“I really want to change it,” Gideon countered. “And Calpernia… she’s a marvel, she-”

“Should be Archon,” Dorian finished for him.

“She can change things, I know she can, and I want to help,” Gideon explained.

“The Inquisition has changed things, and there’s still so much left to do,” Dorian agreed with a shrug.

“Including Qunari mercenaries?” Gideon challenged.

“You know how these things are.”

“I really do not, nor do I wish to.”

“You… don’t mean that.”

“I- just. A Qunari.”

“A very kind, intelligent gentle Qunari, though you absolutely did not hear that from me,” Dorian told him. “Because then he’d become insufferable as well.”

Gideon smiled crookedly. “So. This is to be it, then. You’ll stay Dorian Pavus of Inquisition infamy, while I stay Gideon Adralla but keep the birthright and return to the Imperium.”

“It will certainly confuse our enemies,” Dorian said.

“I could do with a little less of that, to be quite frank,” Gideon grumbled and he put the birthright back on and tucked it beneath his shirt.

They sat in silence for a time, each lost in their own thoughts. Dorian couldn’t help but feel like this was cheating somehow- like he’d managed to have his cake and eat it too.

You’re such a fucking ‘vint, he could very nearly hear the Bull chide. Did you ever think there might be more than one cake?

The next time the Bull went on one of his fear spirals about losing control Dorian was going to tell him that he was such a fucking Qunari and see how he liked it. He was rather looking forward to it, in fact.

“There’s something you should know, before you return,” Dorian said at last. “It concerns our father.”

As he related everything that had happened when Father had come to Redcliffe, he couldn’t help the feeling of a weight lifting off of his chest. There was no press of unwanted duty, no guilt at lies, and no need to hide. He was finally safe. He was finally himself.