"A problem which could be solved with a spoon," Cullen said. He stared at the white blob disseminating into the brown liquid in his mug. "What if I wanted to add more milk? I couldn't do it if the tea came after."
Lana pivoted on her hip and eyed him up, "You're over thirty, I'd think by now you'd know your preferred ratio of milk to tea." Her dead serious face didn't crack as she turned back to the shelf, her fingers drawing across his offerings as if hoping it had changed since she last looked.
The offended mug of tea sat idle as Cullen slipped away from his desk. His hands resting upon the sword, he stretched his neck. "Wouldn't adding the milk first scald it?"
"Oh, this old fallacy," she sighed, pinching her nose. "If you are drinking tea that warm, you clearly already despise your tongue and throat, and it doesn't matter what you do. Milk before tea, it's the only proper way to do it."
Running his tongue against his teeth, he gazed up at the ceiling. "This is the hill you intend to die upon, the proper addition of milk."
"I'm afraid so, Commander," she ruefully said, a trace of a smile breaking up her words. "The only solution to this impasse is a duel at dawn. Since you're the offended party, I'll let you have first choice of weapons."
Falling in behind her, Cullen slipped his hands around her waist to clasp tight to her stomach. Lana leaned back into him, her hair cushioning against his chest as she sighed. "I choose my arms," he whispered. To back up his claim, he increased his hug and bent his knees enough he could rest his chin upon her head. Whether it was her natural warmth or the sweet floral oils in her hair, peace curled through Cullen whenever he held her. Any dark or bitter thoughts vanished the moment she slipped into his arms, and when she'd touch his cheek or traipse her fingers through his hair, he'd dare to hope that for once in his life things would go well.
"I love you," he whispered. Contentment. That was what holding her was, like sliding into bliss personified. Happiness. Maker, how did he find that?
She twisted her head against him, then turned in his grip. Those deep brown eyes gazed up into his and she smiled. "That's cheating."
"I do what I must for the sake of tea drinkers who add milk later everywhere."
Lana chuckled then rose up on her toes to kiss him. Her lips wrapped around his, pressing them together in a hug of their own. It was an odd way to think about it, but that was her kiss as of late. Not the heated need to drag him off to a bed or blanket on the floor, but a gentle reminder that she was here and she was glad of it. He wished he could do the same for her, assure her that he had no intentions of ever turning away. Then his tongue would trip over itself, his mind would stutter to the usual smattering of un-words and he'd curl in on himself. At least he could kiss her.
Slipping away from him, Lana reached behind to pick up her tea cup. "Here," she tried to push it in his face. Reluctantly, he released his hold on her body and took it from her fingers. "At least try it. To see how much better it is." Taking a small sip, Cullen's face contorted. Lana sneered, "Oh, now you're being difficult."
"It's gone cold, nearly ice cold, in fact," he rushed to defend himself.
"Hm," she dipped her fingers under the porcelain cup and slipped her eyelids closed. He watched them flutter as she dug into the fade, her eyelashes as thick as a paintbrush. A silly part of him wanted to run his fingers over them to feel how soft they had to be. Opening her eyes quickly, Lana grinned, "There, it should be warm now."
Tipping the cup in thanks, Cullen brought it back to his lips.
Lana grabbed onto his wrist and shouted, "No, wait!" But she was too late. It only brushed against his bottom lip, but the burn was instantaneous, pain flaring across his flesh. He yanked the teacup away and less than gently tossed it onto the desk.
"Maker, I should have warned you. I'm so sorry," Lana rushed to apologize. "I...don't control it well, so they overheat and have to wait and... Is it bad? It's bad."
He tried to lick at the wound, but reared back from the attempt. The air itself bit into his burn but he hid away as much of the obvious pain as he could. Lana already felt bad enough from his own stupidity. Her entire face crumbled at the hurt she didn't mean to cause, hadn't planned on. Continuing to apologize, she blew on her thumb and placed it against his bottom lip.
Expecting it to sting, Cullen instinctively leaned back, but a cooling sensation radiated off her skin as if she turned her thumb into a block of ice. Gripping onto the back of her hand, he pressed her thumb tighter and her magic broke the burn.
"Heat I'm bad at, but cold I can handle," Lana explained. "Is that helping or...?"
Cullen nodded appreciatively, the burn already dissipated to little more than an annoyance. Gently, he nipped his lips against her thumb, savoring the chill melting into his mouth. A soft sigh reverberated in Lana's throat as he kissed her thumb. Moving downward, Cullen pressed his lips against every inch of her palm. When he reached her wrist, he grazed the thin skin with his teeth. Lana's body shuddered, her eyes tight as joy twisted up her lips.
"How..." her throaty voice strung against his own lustful heart, "can you still be hungry?" Lana's eyes opened and she chuckled while smiling at him.
Gripping around her waist, he brought his lips next to her ear. His warm breath tingled against her skin and she softly moaned. "It's not difficult when you're around," Cullen whispered.
"Only this morning we...Maker's breath, you're insatiable," she chided with her words while her body molded into his, her own fingers dipping lower to skim across the top of his backside.
Yes, he was. He'd kept himself aloof for so long, his libido locked away in his chest for the sake of his promise to chantry. To have it finally set loose like a caged animal turned him into a hormone addled young man all over again. He wasn't about to waste a second of it. Curling his fingers against her cheek, Cullen twisted up a strand of her errant hair and followed it down her buttery skin to rest upon her collarbone and that birthmark. "What of you? I believe it was your idea to 'skip the noon meal.'"
Lana laughed, her head thrown back, her cheeks stretched like apples in joy. She never fanned her flames in laughter, never dampened it down to a quiet smile. There was no pretense with her and he adored it. Still chuckling, she hopped up on her tiptoes and kissed him with that old fervor. Her tongue lapped against his bottom lip, pulling it into hers as she sucked upon it. Cullen's fingers dug into her hair, pulling the strands back the way she liked. Releasing her hold, she smiled into his eyes, "I never said I wasn't insatiable."
A knock broke against the door. Cullen shook his head, his nose crinkling up as the smell of salt and rotting fish rolled through the office. "Come back later," he shouted to the knocker, but it didn't stop them. The rapport continued louder, each beat thudding against his head, through his entire body. How was that even...
"Hey, wakey wakey now. We just struck land." The king of Ferelden filled Cullen's vision, the sight of Alistair's nose peeling from the sunburn inches away almost enough to turn his stomach. Not that the ship wasn't doing a wonderful job of it already.
Memories snapped back at him as he realized where he was and Cullen steadied his hand against the wall beside his hammock. But that was what he'd been in before, not a dream but an old memory. He and Lana had prodded each other about milk, he burned himself on the cup, and then they... Sorrow stirred in his heart from the bitter emptiness left behind after every dream he had about her. They felt so much stronger than his other dreams, sometimes even more so than the bad ones, as if the fade adored torturing him. Unless, Lana's being in the...
Cullen scrubbed his hands across his face, wiping away the thought. He rose carefully off the hammock, making certain to not smack his head on the low beams of the ship. Alistair already scampered off to do whatever he kept up to on the ship. Reaching for his shirt, Cullen slipped out of the hammock and tried to wipe away the last of his dream from his mind and body. Maker, did the king notice? Would he wonder? Andraste's tears, would he ask? That would just add to his mounting miser
y.
Dressing slowly, and taking the time to scratch Honor's ears, the king's word suddenly broke against Cullen. Snapping up, he shouted through the hold, "What do you mean we struck land?"
By the time he got out of the hold, he could see for himself. The Siren's Echo drifted beside a port side city like none he'd ever seen. Houses with curved roofs and lacelike tiles dripping off the eaves leaked out into the sea, hoisted above the lapping waves on poles. Without a care, denizens would leap off the wooden walkways into the water, or slide down ropes canvassing the area. A good hundred of the houses leered above them, all colorful like stained glass from multi-dyed canvas stretched from one house to the next.
"Where are we?" Cullen whispered to himself. The people sported the same bronzed to dusky skin as the pirates, but despite a willingness to dive headfirst into the waves, they wore longer robes even more colorful than their abodes. Jewels and gold glittered through the braided hair almost as ostentatious as the ones in display at Orlesian estates.
"Welcome to Rivain," Isabela called from her perch next to the wheel. She didn't spin it seeing as how the sails were roped down and the ship tied to the dock, but she seemed in no mood to abandon her post to rush ashore.
"Why have we stopped?" Cullen rounded up the five stairs to the command deck with an ease that'd been foreign to him only a few weeks prior. Grabbing onto the railing, he pulled himself past the first three stairs, jumped on the fourth and landed in front of Isabela. Her eyes drifted across him for a moment, but he'd grown used to that once over as well.
"Same reason anyone stops; re-supply, check the news, get in a bath or bit of fun before hitting the waves again. Don't worry, it won't be more than a day. Right!" she called to her mariners who all grumbled.
"You don't seem excited about staying."
"It's not one of my top favorite places to dock, and we need to hit Tevinter before winter sets in. The northern seas are a favorite for storms," Isabela answered him before facing back to her ship. "By Andraste's tits, if you drop that again I'll hang you off the mast myself!" she shouted to her overworked crew.
Turning away from Isabela, he stared across the worn faces of the pirates. He may not know a thing about sailing or ships, but Cullen honed his sense for measuring the morale of an army years ago. With each passing day it grew more evident that they weren't ecstatic about this trip. Even the admiral would shake her head and mutter something under her breath whenever they passed another potential port, though she gave Kirkwall a wide berth.
"I find myself curious why you're helping him, doing this mission," Cullen said.
"There's a lot of coin in it. Plus, it's good to have a king in your back pocket, just in case." She tried to shrug it off as if the pirate queen had no cares beyond gold, but darkness circled under her eyes.
"It cannot be a matter only of gold."
"There is a lot of gold involved, and he paid upfront. Mostly. Look, I don't know a thing about all this magical fade shit, and I'm quite happy never going near that place again. It was bad enough with Hawke," Isabela glared at the deck and a shudder ran up her shoulders. "But sometimes you owe a thing or two and, maybe I'm doing my Andrastian duty. I don't know, it feels like the least I can offer."
"I..." Cullen bowed his head. In his own solipsistic grief he kept forgetting that Lana touched other's lives, that they too would mourn and miss her. "Forgive me for prying," he retreated back into his cushioned shell. After her death, people from the blight would stumble across him, learn that they served in the same tower or knew each other and they all felt the need to bring up their great story of the Hero of Ferelden. How they watched her ride a flaming horse across the plains to strike down a line of darkspawn. Or that she obliterated an ogre and rescued them. They meant well, he could see that in retrospect, but every tale wiggled that nail in his brain - the one that told him there was so much to her he never learned. So much of Lana's life passed him by, both of them operating alone separated by the breadth of a sea and unable and unwilling to take the first step to close the gap. While her journal gave him peace, it was also a reminder that he wasted so much time only for the sake of punishing himself.
"If you want to find your friend," Isabela spoke up, "he's wandered off to the market."
Cullen frowned at labeling Alistair his friend. They'd spoken a paltry sum of sentences for the past month, keeping abreast of each other while pacing the decks. About the only advice Cullen took from his was to keep a tight watch on any lantern sparks, and that he needed to eat a lime every once in awhile. The rest was water off his back. But, a chance to stretch his legs off the ship and walk amongst actual land that didn't bob and weave with every step sounded tempting. Slapping his leg, he called Honor to follow him down the gangplank and into the heart of Seere.
It was easier to find the king than he expected. In spite of the city in the middle of a typical market day with every manner of ware being peddled up and down the docks to hungry and lonely sailors, the path of Alistair practically glittered in his wake. Even with the burn shifting into a pathetic tan upon his cheeks, the pale skin and yellow haired man stood out in the sea of Rivanians like a speck of sand in rich earth. Cullen stumbled as he realized he probably looked much the same, perhaps even worse as he'd been avoiding the reflecting rays off the water down in the hold. Not to mention the dog walking primly by his side.
Honor was on her best behavior. Despite every version of tempting foodstuffs drifting beside her snout, she'd only twist her head, her tiny tail thumping madly in anticipation. Not once did she launch forward to nab her own samples. Either she was hoping for a treat later or she'd already worked out some plan to sneak treats when Cullen's back was turned. Someone on the ship particularly loved slipping her cheese when he was unaware, leaving him to nearly die of poisoned gas in the night.
The stalls lined along the shore all looked out upon the sea itself. There wasn't the usual fluff he'd expect for someone trying to sell their merchandise as the best in all of thedas. Sailors wandered up to the counter, threw down whatever coins they had, then left. This was the staging area, where you ran out quick when you needed a few supplies and not the unwinding section of the city. Judging by the pink petals painted along the cobblestones leading west away from the sea, Cullen had a pretty good idea where the shoreleavers went. Maker, at least the king didn't head that way.
No, instead Alistair was leaning against one of the stalls facing away from the glittering waves. Cullen called for Honor to sit and then he approached from behind. He'd been expecting to find an array of weaponry, or fancy foodstuffs, even the possibility of ointments, but this shop offered up nothing but jewelry. The king's fingers rolled around a golden necklace with beads of turquoise and sapphire dripping off it like a waterfall.
"That doesn't strike me as your type," Cullen said.
Rather than grumble or even sneer in embarrassment, Alistair only chuckled. He did that a lot. "Really? I thought I pulled off blues rather well." To show off, he placed the necklace against his skin and smiled wide. The woman at the counter shouted something Cullen couldn't understand, then pointed at Alistair's neck. "See, confirmation," he said, nodding at her.
"You speak Rivanian?" Cullen started. Somedays he was surprised the man could even handle Ferelden much less anything beyond its borders.
The king placed five coins in the woman's hand, then smiled and added another silver. "Not much. Just enough to ask where the bathroom is, how much for this piece of bread, and can I borrow your quill."
"And 'I would like to purchase this necklace,' evidently," Cullen continued, pointing at the jewelry still laying against the counter. "A piece of jewelry which you intend to give to..."
He said something to the shopkeep and she dropped down to a knee, hunting through the back of her stall. "Hm? Oh, it's for the wife. She loves trinkets, and doodads, and other bits and baubly shiny stuff."
"Right," Cullen shifted from jealousy to indignation in the span of a syllable, "you are married."
"Forgot about the Queen? That's got to be grounds for some kind of treason. Maybe one of those 'we chop off your hair' types. Make you wear a shirt made out of itchy wool while whipping noodles at you."
"Only surprised that you could be bothered to remember."
Alistair chuckled mirthlessly. He banged his fingers gently on the counter and tipped his head back to stare at the sky. "So, who are you sitting in judgment of now? Me for being married and still enjoying those extra curricular activities?" He turned to Cullen and an edge ran through this next words, "Or Lanny for that fact not stopping her."
Bunching a fist up tight, Cullen fought down the urge to smack his smug face off. Beside him he felt Honor tighten, her lolling tongue slipping inside as she focused on her master. "You made those vows, not Lana. Her only mistake was in trusting you."
"Ouch, you don't let the crown slow you down," Alistair shrugged and he turned back to the counter. The shopkeep popped up and passed over a small box to slip the necklace into. "At least you don't hold Lanny responsible. Maybe there's some hope for you after all, templar. Chantry has a lot of very concrete thoughts on adultery."
"All of which seemed to pass you right on by," Cullen bit back with. He bounced on his toes wishing he'd stayed on the ship with Isabela. Even if all the pirates ignored him it'd have been better than this humiliating torture. In their little remaining time together, he never asked Lana about Alistair, didn't want to know. Certainly never wanted to think about it, but now the man couldn't stop bringing it up. It seemed to be his favorite pastime after playing pirate.
Cullen's attack didn't sting. The king only shrugged again as he wrapped up the necklace and slipped it into his pocket. Smiling at the woman, he said what was probably thank you. Then she spoke a few words quickly, her finger jabbing at the king and then Cullen. Alistair's eyes opened wide and danced from the woman back to the even more uncomfortable man beside him.
"What?" Cullen pried, "Did she ask you to find the bathroom? Or need to borrow your quill?"
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