Confession: I think once he gets over his shyness, Cullen would love keeping eye contact with his partner as he fucks her into a blissful shaking mess.
Hey, I managed a second one-shot! Another combined prompt, this is for Day Four: Exploration and Day Six: Mourning.
Scar Tissue
Rating: Mature
Pairing: Cullen Rutherford x F! Lavellan
Word Count: 2,211
Notable Tags: POV Cullen Rutherford, Flashbacks, Cullen Rutherford Has Issues, Hurt/Comfort, Battle Scars Discussion, Post-Coital Pillow Talk, Implied/Referenced Torture, Mage-Templar Relationships, Name Undefined Inquisitor (Dragon Age), Kissing It Better, Cullen Rutherford in Love, Almost Smut, Cullen Rutherford's Lip Scar, Lorebuilding
"Was this an arrow wound?"
Her hands were playing softly over the skin of Cullen's arm as they dozed together in the fading light pouring in from an open balcony door. Safely ensconced in her quarters and happily tangled up in each other in the afterglow of her return to Skyhold, he could scarce understand how he'd earned the good fortune to be here—laying abed with his lover in his arms. Lavellan's lithe body curled into his, her head tucked under his chin and her leg thrown easily over his hip, their sweat-damp skin cooling from the faintest movement of chill mountain air from outside. Her slender fingers toyed with the golden hair on his arm, utterly fascinated as she was by the myriad differences between human and elven bodies. How amusing was her wonder, how endearing!
Cullen looked to the diamond-shaped scar in question halfway up his bicep.
"Yes, it was," he smoothed his palm over her hip as he spoke, because even he could admit that moments like this—touches like this—had been what he missed most while Lavellan was away, "That is from my first field outing, after my assignment to Ferelden Circle. One of the mage apprentices there had a knack for… well. Perhaps that's a tale for another time. Needless to say, the other greenhorn knight who came with us could have stood for much more practice before declaring herself an archer."
Her smile crinkled the corners of her vibrant eyes, setting her willowy vallaslin to dancing. It warmed him through to see it.
"Are all of your scars accompanied by similar stories?"
He hummed and focused on the smooth, warm skin under his hand; petted her from her ribs to just under the curve of her bottom. All of this, it still felt so new to him, so fragile. Like this kind of intimacy was not really meant for one such as him. Like he was taking advantage, an interloper on someone else's deserved happiness. He recognized, however, that this was the shadow of guilt and regret still clinging to him; still serving him falsehoods. And that was a start.
All the more reason to revel in, indulge in, and adore her need to touch.
Or was it his closely-held wish to be touched?
While he often marveled at the notion—and occasionally disbelieved it—he was beginning to understand he was truly wanted here, wanted by this beautiful, incorrigible, inexplicable woman. The heavy, earthen scent of lovemaking lingered in the close air around them, the heat and damp of her sex still palpable against his thigh. If he could burn a memory into his psyche so that it might never leave him, it would be this moment.
"Most of them, yes. I imagine it depends on whether I can remember how I got them anymore. Some are very old."
And some I do not wish to remember.
Lavellan propped herself up in his arms. "Could I ask you about some of them? I have guesses for a few, and I'm just so curious!"
"Of course, sweetling," he swallowed, "but I should warn you, many of the stories are… unpleasant in their nature."
"I know, vhenan, but aren't battle scars ever thus?"
"Well…"
The unease in his belly was surprising. Lavellan knew much of his life already, in broad strokes at least; even his ugliest secrets—his weakest, most cowardly, most shameful moments. Nothing he had shared with her so far had sent her running, so why did the fear persist? Would a more specific examination of his faults and deficiencies really give her pause? Turn her cold? Make her hate him the way he sometimes believed she ought? Would they row the way they did in Haven?
"How about this. If I ask about a scar and you'd rather not tell the story, you can pass and I'll move on. And you can ask me a question, if you want. I've got a few scars of my own, you know."
"Oh, I'm well aware," he laughed, "I am made to learn of your injuries via field reports." Cullen breathed in a centering breath. "Alright," he smiled softly, "The proposal seems fair. Where would you like to begin?"
google show me a fictional character who wants love so badly but they can’t tell the truth to save their own life and they have like sixteen complexes that stem from their childhood and probably just as many vices to offset those complexes and ideally they’re a bonafide yearner underneath it all but my god to say so would be too vulnerable so they never get what they want ever. google show me that
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Thanks to @dragonagekissweek for hosting this event!
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age - All Media Types
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Depictions of PTSD, Mild description of wound caused by fire
Relationships: Female Inquisitor/Cullen Rutherford, Cullen Rutherford/Original Character(s), Female Lavellan/Cullen Rutherford, father - Relationship
Additional Tags: Father-Daughter Relationship, Father-Son Relationship, Brothers, Family Dynamics, Family Issues
Summary:
Cullen finds his life come full circle(no pun intended, or maybe it is) when his daughter's magical powers manifest themselves.
Procrastinating/ Pondering on the Dakiss writing I'm doing and randomly decided I wanted to make a visual aid of Cullen's family. So this is how I picture them. From right to left and in order by age we have Mia, Cullen, Branson (with the family cat Chompers. I generally see him as stockier - think Kristoff or the baker in Cinderella 2.) and young Rosalie.
Bonus image under cut of Cullen's nephew, the son of Branson. I've named him Tobias, Toby for short.
As Cullen was proving incompetent, Shepard had no choice but to investigate the docks herself, slipping out of her quarters just after sunset with her stash of knives and a cloak to conceal herself. She had planned on leaving him to it after seeking out his help; she already risked too much with her work from Anders, and she shouldn’t tempt fate by sneaking out more than was necessary. But she’d learnt long ago that if she wanted a job done properly she’d have to do it herself, and Cullen had demonstrated that perfectly by doing nothing except drag his feet. It made him even more irritating than usual.
It was all too easy to locate the dockside warehouse. Her trusty passageway out of the Gallows worked so well because of how innocuous it was; no passerby would give one tapestry in a string of many a second look, and the door beneath it was indistinguishable from the surrounding stone. She could instantly tell which warehouse was the supposed safe haven for mages: the last building on a dark alleyway, dank and squalid, yet no cobwebs in the doorway and a well-worn stoop outside. The door was even unlocked, practically inviting in stray mages — but the smell as she eased into the warehouse made it clear none had gotten further than where she stood in their search for freedom.
She’d become too familiar with death not to recognise it by smell.
