I was tagged by so many wonderful friends and writers to share a snippet of something older that I've written, to give it a little boost/ICYMI.
Thank you @kunstpause @cartadwarfwithaheartofgold @hobo-apostate @queen-kass-the-writer @noire-pandora @kemvee 💖
I cant believe I started my long fic a year ago! You can read 'Believe Again' here on my Ao3. I've not updated it since August, BUT that will be changing soon...
Here's a snippet from chapter 2 aka. When Elsie and Cullen first meet in Haven, before the explosion at the conclave...
They walked the rest of the way in silence until Cecelia gasped: “There! By the doors! That’s her, my sister!” she pointed.
Cullen followed her pointed finger and saw a tall woman, perhaps only an inch or so shorter than him, leaning against the stone by the Chantry doors. Her arms were folded across her chest and her ankles crossed in a very relaxed fashion. Her clothes were worn, her boots and breeches crusted with mud and slightly damp from what Cullen guessed was from trudging through the snow. Her face was tilted towards the low winter sun, a wry smile on her lips and her olive skin glowing. He wasn’t sure why he found himself studying her so closely, but perhaps with everyone usually rushing around with no time to spare, to see someone look fairly relaxed despite it all was perhaps what he found most and usual, and perhaps it also helped that she was quite pleasing on the eye; what with her chestnut hair shining in the sun, her curiously long neck and -
Her eyes snapped to his - misty grey surrounded by dark, thick lashes. Her frank look almost left him breathless but then he saw the staff slung over her back and her eyes had rested on his Templar vambraces.
“Elsie! Elsie! Over here!” Sister Cecelia called from beside him, obviously unaware that her elder sister had already clocked him. The faint, wry smile that had touched her lips had all but disappeared and the look she was giving him now was so plain and expressionless that Cullen had to wonder if he had imagined it. Finally she looked at Cecelia.
“There you are,” she said in a warm, almost melodic voice.” I thought perhaps you had found Evelyn and gone up without me.”
“Is Evelyn another sister you’re looking for?” Cullen jokes aloud, but his smile faltered under Cecelia’s sister’s steely cool gaze, when she replied: “Yes, actually.”
Cecelia looked between them and coughed. “Elsie, this is Ser Cullen - he was kind enough to help me look for you.”
Cullen held out his hand to shake hers. “It’s Commander Cullen, actually,” he said lightly, trying to ease the strange tension between them. “It’s nice to finally meet you, my lady.”
Elsie looked down at his outstretched hand and then back to his face, making no move to shake it. Finally she said; “I was not aware that ‘commander’ was indeed a rank within the Templars,” she said casually, examining her gloved fingertips. “But then I am merely a mage and not privy to the details of Templar hierarchy.”
Cullen started at her with his mouth open. Not since he’d met a particular Champion of Kirkwall had someone spoken to him in such a… condescending way. He bit back a retort, refusing to take her bait.
“Ordinarily, you would be right,” he ground out as calmly as he could. “But I am not a Templar anymore.”
Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Indeed,” she said. “I may not be part of a Circle anymore, but that doesn’t stop me being a mage now, does it?”
He opened his mouth then quickly shut it, unusually at a loss for words. She has an excellent point, he thought to himself.
She took his silence as confirmation. “As I thought.” Elsie kicked herself off the wall and wrapped an arm around her younger sister’s shoulders. “Well, as enlightening as this has been, we really ought to be off. We’re going to be late.”
Tagging forward any other writers who wish to take part! 💖
