Pairing: Cullen Rutherford & f!Amell. Alistair Theirin / f!Amell
TW: Some angst, but not too bad
Summary: After Ferelden’s Circle has been retaken from Uldred’s blood mages, warden Constance Amell attempts to calm the mage children down with a song. This time, though it’s not working and when she asks for Cullen’s help the way he used to… but Constance is faced with a man whose views on mages has changed. Yet she hopes that it won’t be forever...
You can read it on Ao3 too, and follow the series for my Amell/Alistair
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“First Enchanter Irving! Very well then, if you have made it, and if you give me your word…” Knight Commander Greagoir clearly hesitated, unsure of whether he was making the right decision to trust so easily. A young templar the group of heroes had rescued sure tried to convince them all that these mages could not be trusted in the slightest – but it was Cullen’s fear and paranoia and… hatred that convinced Greagoir that he was making the right decision: he would not stoop to unprecedented fear and hatred like his fellow templar had. Greagoir was there to guard these mages with the help of the First Enchanter. There was meant to be trust between Knight Commander and First Enchanter.
So… trust he would have.
The Circle was safe again.
But the fear was still present, and everyone needed a moment to recover. This included the warden Constance Amell, who had just witnessed the place she’d known her entire life be devastated by demons and abominations. A man whom she had looked up to when growing up had just attempted to murder her in the name of mage rights…
Yet, when Alistair reached out to her arm to check on her, her mind was not on her own feelings anymore. Her eyes, wide with sympathy, had caught sight of Wynne moving over to the children.
There were 5.
There used to be 7.
Her hand reached out to Alistair’s hand, and she squeezed tightly as she let her emotions take over – but instead of saying anything, she guided him and Leliana over to Wynne and the children.
“Amell!” one of the children, still chubby from her toddler years, rushed over to Constance and clung onto her leg. The other children hurried over too, completely ignoring Wynne.
Constance knelt among them, reaching out to each of them to try and offer a gentle touch instead of squishing them all against her chest in an attempt to calm their fearful eyes like she wanted. That would not help them. “Calm now, children,” she spoke quietly. “Everything is over now. You are all safe.” They didn’t calm, and the youngest’s bottom lip quivered in a dangerous anticipation of a wail. “It’s okay,” she tried again, reaching out to the poor child and offering her a hug at least. “It’s…” She hesitated, unsure of whether this would work… but perhaps giving them something nice to remember would bring their minds away from the darkness they had just witnessed. “It’s like those stormy nights, hm? You all were afraid then too, but nothing happened.”
They were quiet at that, but their gazes were on her now, anticipating further reconciliation.
Wynne moved over, the woman kneeling by the children too, listening to Constance’s admittance with intrigue.
“Do you remember?” Constance asked.
“We’d sing,” one of the older children dared to say.
“We would. You would wake me, quite rudely, in the middle of the night,” Constance said with a little sassy twinkle to her eyes, earning a few faint smiles from the children, “and we’d go somewhere safe… and we’d sing until the loud thunderstorms were over. It’s like that, but the thunder is over. We’re all just still… shaken. But it will pass.”
“It doesn’t feel it,” a little girl said quietly, breaking Constance’s heart.
“Oh you poor child,” Wynne murmured.
From where he was standing with Leliana, watching, Alistair felt entranced with the way Constance interacted with the children. He’d seen her maybe once or twice with a child during their travels, mainly though it was just to talk. This…. This was gentle, soothing and with a calming smile on her lips that she didn’t offer anyone else.
She was good with children, and Alistair wasn’t too sure what the strange pull in his stomach meant upon seeing this… but it was nice.
“We can sing again now, if you like?” Constance offered.
The children nodded.
…
When in the Maker’s presence, my heart wants to beat like the wings of the birds that rise,
From the lake to the trees.
Cullen knew he couldn’t sneak when dressed in full templar armour. Everything on his body clinked and clanked with each step he took, no matter how carefully he stepped. But the group of mages were too loud to even hear him.
When he approached the little corridor, Cullen stood in the doorway for a while just watching them. The second he realized that it was Constance Amell that was missing from her bed, Cullen didn’t have to worry. This woman was the epitome of kindness, and there was not a single bone in her body that could ever have decided to suddenly go do something sinister in the middle of the night.
So he had calmly begun to walk around in search for her.
Maybe she walked in her sleep.
A lot of mages did… it could be a haunting image, really, to find them with eyes wide open but not present mentally.
And sometimes they said funny things to which Cullen would have to try not to laugh when in the presence of his fellow templars.
But Constance wasn’t sleep walking.
She was with the children, who no doubt had woken her up knowing fully well that if they would get sympathy from someone despite waking them in the middle of the night, it would be Constance.
Cullen had cursed his fellow templars when they hadn’t placed more people on guard duty by the children’s chambers. Everyone knew that children disliked thunderstorms, and it was obvious there was going to be one. The templars needed to be present and vigilant in case someone got frightened and accidentally set fire to the curtains – or… as Cullen had initially thought, in case someone woke up in fear and wanted some comfort.
Templars were there to care for the mages, after all. With children, sometimes that care meant to soothe their fears.
Knight Commander Greagoir clearly didn’t care about that too much.
When in the Maker’s presence, my heart wants to sigh like a chime that flies,
From a chantry on a breeze.
Constance did, and Cullen admired her for it.
He recognized the song. It was a familiar one sung by Andrastian mothers to calm children down.
His mother had sung the same song to him once, which was why, when he entered the room dimly lit by candles, he joined in on the singing.
To sing through the night,
We let our hearts pray.
He wasn’t surprised, nor offended, when Constance and the other mages gasped in fear and went to huddle away from him. But he continued to sing, a smile on his helmet-less face, until Constance relaxed and joined back in on the song.
The two would continue to sing until each child was calm and smiling again, one even daring to reach out to Cullen and ask for him to carry her back to bed.
He had, Constance carrying another child, whilst the others followed holding each others’, and their, hands.
It turned into a routine as well as the only time he and Constance could interact without other templars scrutinizing and waiting for Cullen to step over the line.
As they’d tucked the children back into bed, Constance had turned to him and thanked him – with a little kiss to his cheek. He’d stood frozen on the spot for what must have been hours, or it had only felt that way to him as the wind got knocked out of him…
But he knew that from that day on, that routine had become his favourite. And sometimes he selfishly hoped the weather would be bad during the night…
…
None of that seemed to be on Cullen’s mind though as he watched Constance and the children sing the familiar song. None of the good memories were anything good to him in that moment after Uldred’s attack.
He didn’t trust it anymore. For all he knew those memories were either fake, put into his mind by those demons and blood mages… or they were a way for Constance to manipulate him to lower his guard and miss that she had actually been working on Uldred’s plans all along.
His crush on her might have been fake. His feelings of admiration toward how she was with the kids might have been fake.
All of it might have been.
The only thing he knew existed was his fear, and he clung to it, glaring at her as she turned her brown… oh so beautiful… eyes to him with a beckoning look to help –
He looked away with a snarl.
Constance, shocked, stopped singing and stared at the one templar at the Circle that she remembered was even slightly decent.
She had to admit that part of her crush on Alistair was because sometimes Alistair’s ways of interacting with others reminded her of Cullen… but there was something deeper with Alistair. He made her feel safe, wanted, and most of all, he made her laugh. Cullen had held agency over her… and despite her having some sort of crush on Cullen, she had to admit that the agency had scared her.
As if he had read her thoughts, Alistair kneeled down and blocked her sight of Cullen, breaking her gaze on him and forgetting her fears… and her aching heart at Cullen’s treatment of even the children, who had done absolutely nothing to him.
Alistair distracted her further by attempting to sing the song too but his… singing skills were perhaps not fully on par with her and the children.
They, however, seemed to instantly forget their fears, succumbing to giggles and laughing upon Alistair’s singing. The little smile Alistair was trying to hide as he pretended he took his singing very seriously reassured Constance that it was alright for the kids to rudely laugh him in the face – he was doing it on purpose.
And her heart warmed for Alistair as she inched slightly closer and smiled at him whilst he continued his act, pretending to be hurt at them mocking him.
This silly man was the one she truly cared for. She could see that very clearly now.
But her eyes still drifted over to Cullen… worried what his future would be like now that he seemed to have such a sour outlook on mages…
One day, she prayed, Cullen would find someone who would change his mind on mages again and turn him back to the man he truly was.
I’ve finished the Broken Circle quest and when my Warden found Alistair in his dream I about cried. He was just so damn happy and I had to take that away from him. Granted, Goldanna was actually a demon and we all know it was a dream but still.
But hey! Now I have Wynne so it’s all good. She seems nice.
