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Where is Cullen during Veilguard?

Thank you for asking, exposition fairy!

As soon as he's sure that his family / the entire damn town of Honnleath is safely evacuated, he is at the inquisitors side in an instant. He goes wherever he's needed and steps directly back into the role of command. It may have been a decade, but without the stress of lyrium on his body hes maintained form and skill quite well.

duete

"Whatever happens, you will come back." "Is that an order, Commander?" "No. But as one of your advisors, I strongly recommend it."

duete

It's important to note that extended use of Lyrium in Templars ( and yes, I'd consider Cullen to be at the 'extended' level shortly before Inquisition starts ) causes permanent memory loss, and delirium. Short term memories are the first to go, forgetting what you did just a moment ago and going to do it again, to forgetting events, people, and even words.

For Cullen, this means that a large chunk of his memories from both the circle in Ferelden and Kirkwall are missing. There are bright spots of course, memories of training, of relief and something close to excitement when the mages in his charge succeeded in their harrowing. But the strongest memories he has from the Circle are the horrific events before, during, and shortly after the fall. He still has brief instances of believing people important to him are illusions, thoughts that he can usually talk himself through quickly. He still has moments where he can feel the scratching of blood magic on the inside of his skull, digging for any and everything to use against him.

Kirkwall is clearer. In fact, it's when he started to have difficulties remembering the earlier days in Kirkwall that he realized he couldn't quite recall Ferelden either, and explaining away the memory loss as just trauma quickly became understanding that his use of Lyrium had reached a tipping point. Continued use would lead into powerful delirium, stronger pangs of need and anger, as well as the increasing likelihood that he would never be able to cut off the use of it without dying.

Despite that, he continued to take the Lyrium he needed until the end of the Kirkwall disaster, and only after he arrived back in Ferelden and he was off that cursed boat did he stop.

Through the withdrawal, both immediate and long lasting, there are moments when he has difficulties differentiating between dream, memory, and waking. Hallucinations of auditory, visual and physical varieties, superimposed over the day to day activities of the inquisition, occasionally only abated by using his abilities to strengthen the veil around him and fully define the reality of the moment.

These are not things he'll talk about, and for the most part they are very difficult to notice. If he's asked about it, he will answer honestly but the topic will not come up otherwise.

idyllisk

“Do not unsheath me without reason. Do not wield me without valor.”

inscription on the sword of a Giovanni della Bande Nere statue on the facade of the Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy.

duete

at the ripe hour of 1.5 am, how much would you all hate me if i said cullens first full gay experience was something exhausted, desperate, and needy with raleigh shortly after he got to kirkwall

edit to add that okay maybe he also smooched a recruit or two before they all took their vows. maybe he smooched alistair once

duete

it's two am who is letting me post this shit, someone tell me to go to bed.

I always thought that Cullen and Samson had the sort of thing in Kirkwall that happened without talking, when it was needed, and it was never brought up or mentioned. and it's the same sort of shame that he felt after falling for a mage that he felt whenever he thought about it.

something he was told was wrong, a connection that if strong enough can be dangerous to everyone involved.

duete

Very important info.

If your character uses Blood Magic.

No they don't.

Cullen Can Not see it. Can Not learn about it.

Cullen and I both would like to say he grew more lenient about it as long as the blood in use is your own, but being around it makes him feel like someone dragging a red hot dagger along the inside of his skull. If the blood being used is your own or explicitly willing, he will not get violent about it, but he will leave, and romance is completely cut off.

birintiharmelegi-deactivated202

duete

all of this bullshit is nice and fun, but in the middle of it i've decided that cullen was left in kinloch for over three months before the situation at the tower is addressed. Every time I think about it and look at the state of the tower when you get there it makes more and more sense that this horror has been brewing for longer than a week.

Three months for every other templar left in the circle to break. Three months for the retreat to the other side of lake Calahad to be called. Three months for the petition of annulment to me writ, sent and considered. Three months of being fed just enough to be kept alive, just enough water, just enough sleep, just enough lyrium.

Over those three months one of the most common things taken from him was blood. Blood needed for the magic around him, blood needed to reach their fingers inside his mind and pull out the faces of his loved ones, blood needed to tempt, bind, and weaken him.

Daily cuts, mostly in the same spot, healed time and time again, leaving a litany of little scars all along his forearms that can be easily recognized by people who know what skin looks like when it's stitched back together by magic. This is one of the major things he still remembers.

But there is worse there, lingering at the edge of his memory

At the end of it all, the only thing left to break in that tower when the warden finally arrives is him. By the end of it Cullen has so fully removed himself from his body that he's nearly catatonic, every voice, every face, every touch, nothing is real to him because nothing can be.

Another sign that there is something wrong with the order when they want him to stay.

okthisway

Zevran please

fadewalking

It's... A book. That meaning, it's a package very clearly in the shape of a book, and with the wight of a book. In lieu of anything new to wrap it with, the gift has been carefully folded up in a square of worn red and gold fabric. Despite it's age the fabric is still strong, color fading at the edges where a golden design had once been.

The book itself is far older than the fabric Cullen had wrapped it in, the leather of it's bindings aged and cracking, any lettering that had once been so proudly displayed now worn completely from it's surface. On the outside, the book is indecipherable.

But on the inside?

The words are clearly Elvhen from some age past. Tucked inside is a scrap of plain undyed and unadorned fabric, folded carefully over a small handwritten note.

' I recalled seeing this book in the library at Kinloch recently. It never left the shelf other than the few times I flipped through the pages, but I was still surprised to see it here after my inquiry. I had it retrieved for you. For your Name Day. '

-- C. Rutherford. '

If the note were to be flipped there is a small secondary scribble on the back, still in the commanders handwriting, but written quickly as though an afterthought.

' I do not know the contents of this book. If it's of an offending nature, I apologize in advance. As a young templar I thought the illustrations charming. '

It's Solas' Name Day (kinda) // @duete

Solas was surprised to find the carefully wrapped artefact sitting on his desk as he entered his rotunda. He unwrapped it with ceremony, folding the fabric into the shape of a neat triangle and which he set aside with equal care. He brushed his fingers across the indecipherable cover, trying to see if he could discern anything from it, which he could not.

He opened the book, and out slipped the letter, which he skillfully caught before it hit the ground. Setting the book back down, he unfolded it with the same meticulous attention before reading its contents. There was his second surprise. The gift had come from their lion-hearted commander.

He arched a brow at the unexpected gesture. That Cullen would think to recognize the day he'd haphazardly thrown a dart at was... well, it was something.

Next, fate would find its whimsy to surprise him with a gift from Dorian, then perhaps Vivienne.

Not only was it something, but it was also something rather thoughtful. He turned the letter over where he saw the hasty scrawl of post-script, and could not help a faintly amused lift at the corners of his lips.

He set the note atop its cloth wrapping, and properly addressed the book itself. From the first page he flipped to, he could roughly interpret the volume's origin and context. It was not from his time, but from the era when the remnants of his people still clung to ground at Halamshiral. The tome chronicled the Elvhen warriors of that age. Their armors, magicks, and a selection of tales of triumphed battles. It was no wonder Cullen was drawn to its illustrations.

Charming, indeed.

He smoothed his index finger across one of the portraits of an Elvhen warrior, and thought of home.

Cullen would need a proper thanks.

#save