My DA Trick-orTreat is for @aslinncosplay!! (sorry about low-key stalking you for a while to figure out stuff about your Inquisitor lol)
I had so many ideas and so many that didn’t pan out but in the end I give you a trick and a treat. ;) I hope it all works out.
And have a safe and happy Halloween!! :D
Find it here on AO3 (posted with permission)
Words: 3,070 (look, I’m as shocked as you are, okay. lmao)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: post DAI but pre Trespasser, a bit of angst, a bit of fluff (it is a trick or treat after all), makeouts, mischievous spirit shenanigans
This Time, Forever - Solas x Aslinn Lavellan
Aslinn was drifting. She felt the weightlessness in her limbs and her toes, in the gentle curve of her spine and the tilt of her head. She drifted, half conscious and half asleep, dreaming between worlds as she had done so often before in the stolen moments she had to herself. Before, her only pillows were ferns and twisted roots where she hid away from her clan. Here, in the quiet of her quarters in Skyhold, she had luxuries she could never have dreamed of back then.
They were too much for her, she had once protested to the Ambassador. She didn’t need all this. Not the satins and the silks and the Antivan cottons. She didn’t need any of them when ferns would do. It was only after hours of arguing that Josephine had relented.
But it was Solas that had brought them anyway. Despite her protestations and despite her reservations, Solas had brought her the gifts she had scorned. He had kissed her softly and bade her take them. She melted for him, relenting, as she always did. As he knew she would.
She did every time.
“Vhenan?”
A swirl of consciousness and she knew Solas was beside her. He cradled her into his chest, her head on is shoulder, her cascade of white hair flowing over his arm. She felt the warmth of the sunlight on her pale skin, the cool dampness of the earth beneath her hips, the smell of grass and water sharp in her lungs. She knew she was out with him and that made her heart leap in her chest.
Aslinn smiled to herself.
She was drifting, floating, and Solas was there beside her, warm and real and—
—this is the Fade. Nothing is real.
Sudden bubbles of laughter, like that of a child's, broke Aslinn’s dream. The summer afternoon napping with Solas was gone. Aslinn floated, drifting. Alone.
Her eyes snapped open. Angrily she searched out the reason her vision was stripped from her.
All around her were swirls of green and unformed shapes. Half-structures peeked from the mists, solid for a moment before her eyes were upon them. Focusing on anything for too long made it disappear. Then the old structure reformed with a new and different half-truth, mostly obscured by swirling dreamers and a shifting Veil.
Another giggle echoed from behind her, childlike, the same sort of sound that she herself might have made if her life had been a little different. If there had been less death. Less pain.
“Who’s there?” she demanded into the shifts of color. Her green eyes darted over the Fade’s shapes, searching for any indication that she should leave. Was there a demon lurking beyond, drawn to her in her Fade-dreaming and waiting for its chance to strike? Was it only a curious spirit? One of many friends she had made in her time drifting long before her days as Inquisitor?
Strange, they never usually interrupted her. The spirits she had known were never invasive like this one. If she dreamed, they only watched, and then would lead her to a new and brighter vision. Excited to share but never to overwhelm, they had not woken her before, but waited patiently. This one...this one was different.
Aslinn swallowed and smoothed her hands over the soft leather of her pants. Stay or flee? She was loathe to abandon her only moments with a dream-Solas who would never leave her. Fleeting and forged as they were, she valued these dreams too much to abandon them at the first sign of trouble.
“If you do not wish me harm, I demand that you show yourself.” Her words could have been more believable if her voice had not shaken.
But all the same, a little spirit appeared amidst the shadows. Faded and blue, ethereal and never quite becoming solid the wisp of a spirit wavered before her. It shimmered and it hovered, seeming as if it waited for Aslinn to make another demand of it.
She cocked her head and chewed on her lip as she regarded the strange being. It was unlike anything she had encountered in the Fade before. And the fact that it refused to show its true form unnerved her in a way she could hardly express. Still, she knelt and bent the Fade to her will. Their surroundings steadied around them as she held her hand out to the spirit. Walls formed around them, bright frescos towering to the ceiling in their circular hall. The room was inhabited by nothing but a desk strewn with loose papers, a well-loved couch, a spirit and an elf. This one was the calmest room that Aslinn knew, and one of the most familiar.
She tried to ignore the painted tale of the past two years of her life bearing down on her. She tried to forget the lithe painter with his soft smiles and soulful eyes. Her story seemed far less heroic to her when she remembered the one who had made it worthwhile was gone.
The spirit shimmered again and seemed to grow. It lit up as it moved, danced in light circles as it seemed to look about the room. Aslinn waited, an encouraging smile on her lips. She kept her hand outstretched and hoped the spirit would take it; perhaps even explain to her why it had roused her from her dream.
Then it lit up. Burning a brighter blue, the spirit giggled once more—
—and sped away.
“Wait!” Aslinn cried, leaping to her feet. “Wait, come back!”
Pounding after the fading light, Aslinn rushed up the stairs after it. Her breaths came in heavy pants as she tried desperately to follow the spirit. She wanted to ask it so many questions. Why had it bothered her? Why was it hiding? Why was it running away?
The moment she left the rotunda the Fade shifted again. It tried to form the rest of Skyhold fortress around her but her thoughts were too blurry. So the stones too, became blurred and haphazard, angular and disproportionate. Furniture was also confused. Chairs stood waiting on walls, chandeliers hung vertically from the floor. The books of Dorian’s library floated, arranged and neat, nestled together with no bookcases.
Another ethereal giggle kept Aslinn’s feet moving. The spirit climbed the next set of stairs into Leliana’s rookery. Candles and feathers were strewn over the floor. Upon the desk, a letter wrote itself. Leliana’s fancy quill scratched away with no hand to guide it and no ink pot to dip into.
But that hardly caught Aslinn’s attention.
Her gaze focused upon the undulating blue spirit who stood before her, balanced precariously upon the railing.
It was a child! Or the closest a spirit in the Fade came to one.
Her form still shifted, her edges blurred, but the small child before her was unmistakably elvhen. She struck Aslinn with familiarity and the more she looked, the more she saw it. Her hair was wispy and light, her cheeks full. If Aslinn didn’t know any better, she might have thought the spirit was herself as a child. Perhaps it was someone who had seen her in those days? Who had chanced upon her tiptoed trips into the Fade after she had come upon her magic? It seemed so far-fetched to say the least and yet, here she was.
But the child wasn’t her, she thought with sudden disbelief.
This Fade-child had soulful eyes and the moment recognition struck Aslinn, the child smiled at her. The smile was soft. It was endearing. And the way the small puckers of dimples creased her cheeks and her chin…
In the same way Solas’ did.
Before Aslinn could recover, before her heart had stopped thudding in her throat, the child giggled again, spread her arms wide—
—and fell backwards.
Aslinn forgot herself. She forgot the Fade and the loneliness for a moment and she shrieked in terror. She launched herself forward to catch the spirit, stop her, something! But where the rails of the rookery should have stopped her, they too had disappeared. Her stomach dropped as she glimpsed the long fall back to the rotunda floor.
Squeezing her eyes shut, she screamed. Panic kept her from doing anything sensible. There was no destroying this dream or commanding her way out of it. She was falling, hurtling towards the floor, and there was no way to stop it.
Aslinn was drifting. She felt the weightlessness in her limbs and her toes, in the gentle curve of her spine and the tilt of her head. It lasted a moment before she settled, softly, slowly. Her weight spread over her back as she was cradled to someone’s warm chest.
“Vhenan?" someone chuckled. "You may open your eyes now.”
One at a time, Aslinn’s eyes opened. She blinked.
She didn’t understand.
Solas smiled down at her, the same dimples appearing in his face as the child had had just a few moments ago. He was so beautiful, more fantastic than she seemed to remember in the sharp curve of his jaw or the bow of his lips. His soulful eyes bored into hers, searching and relieved. But the longer the silence that stretched between them, the sadder he seemed to grow.
A single crease appeared between his eyes, uncertainty crossing his face. “I…I know what you must think, vhenan, but I assure you—”
Aslinn grabbed Solas’ face and crushed his lips to hers. His arms tightened around her as he pulled her closer and Aslinn could have wept for joy. She kissed him now for all the times she could not, her lips greedy and wanting. She had never been able to do this before. She could never conjure Solas to her, not truly. At first, she had tried, and it had been far too painful and she had felt his loss cut her deeper than anyone knew. In the Fade she had bandaged her heart, reliving all her pleasant memories and sharing afternoons cuddled with a dream. She had always known it was never real, but it was a relief to pretend.
But here Solas was! More real than she had ever made him and Aslinn would take it. There were no more excuses to make. Shyness and fear be damned!
She kissed him as if she never would again, kissed him as if her life depended on it, and he kissed her back with abandon. Their lips bruised against eachother’s, reckless and needy as eternity passed. Let it, Aslinn thought. Let eternity pass if only she could stay here with Solas, if only he would not leave again.
He broke their furious kiss, gasping and flushed and breathless. Aslinn laughed at him, about to remark that she was glad he was the one blushing for once, but the words failed her. She was still in awe. Still glad to be reunited with the piece of her that had been missing.
“I must admit that…I was not expecting—”
“Won’t you just kiss me more?” Aslinn interrupted. “You’re not really going to use this precious time talking, are you?”
Solas shook his head at her and placed her feet on the floor. For the first time she noticed they were in the rotunda again, the way she had imagined it. She glanced up over her head. The plunge had seemed real, and yet she had never reached the ground.
Solas followed her gaze and then smiled. “You did fall, but when you did not move to save yourself, I was forced to intervene. Although…” Solas looked over her shoulder with a stern expression, “None of that had been part of our plan.”
Aslinn whirled and found the blue wisp behind her, glowing, and with a short giggle, it zoomed away.
“Friend of yours?” Aslinn asked, remembering the form it had taken with a degree of unease.
“Yes. I tasked them with leading you to me, but I had no idea it would be so…dramatic an entrance. Ir abelas, vhenan.”
“Strange,” she murmured, squinting up at Solas’ face again. Many pieces did not add up in her mind and Aslinn was still without a doubt shaken by the spirit and the fall.
Solas watched her carefully, as if waiting for her to explode.“Strange how?” he prompted when she didn't respond.
“I don’t remember wanting to go through so much trouble. I never thought up of all this. I just wanted a cuddle with you out in the Dales. So...how is it that you are here with me?”
Confusion crossed Solas’ face for a moment then, “Ah.” He shook his head at her again. “I am not an apparition of the Fade, vhenan. Nor am I a demon, before you ask. I am here before you. Truly.”
“What?” Aslinn took an uncertain step back, her eyes growing wide. Solas marked the movement and forced his face blank. But not before Aslinn saw the pain cross there for a moment.
“I…I know what you must think of me,” he begun lowly. “I shudder to believe it. Were I in your place, I would not be understanding, but I can only hope that you shall be. I hope more than anything that you might come to forgive me for my actions, though I myself to not believe I deserve it.” As he spoke his words came out faster until they jumbled together in a rush. Aslinn never recalled seeing Solas so…vulnerable before. “I am hopeful because you have always been more than I deserved, Aslinn. You who are so joyous and pure and loving. You are kind to all creatures and look upon the world with such wonder. I hope to be afforded only a fraction of your kindness now. You are perhaps the only person with whom I could find redemption, I…I just…”
Aslinn smiled, tears prickling at the corners of her eyes. As if she would never forgive him. As if he was never not in her thoughts. As if there was any other choice for her.
She threw her arms around his shoulders and hugged him close. Hope and fear warred in her chest as she pressed her nose into his neck. She wanted so desperately to keep him here, to believe he would stay this time. But what if? What if... Solas’ arms wrapped around her waist and she relished in their weight, in the way he pulled her hips close to his. She had missed him! She had missed him so much. Aslinn only had one answer for Solas and it was always the same. “Ar lath ma, vhenan. Ar lath ma, ar lath ma...ar lath ma.”
Solas took her chin between his finger and thumb and tilted her face to his. When he pressed his lips to hers again, the kiss was far more gentle, more pleading, saying more to her than any apology could. He was hers. He was here. And he loved her.
And, by the Creators, that was enough.
“Ar lath ma, vhenan,” he whispered against her lips. Aslinn pressed herself forward, stealing more. One, two, three kisses, and then she pressed herself to him, wanting to forget the softness, wanting more before their time was up.
Again.
A small sob escaped her lips and she pulled away from Solas and crushed her face into his chest. It was all she could do to keep the swells on emotion at bay. All the loneliness and the fear, it was coming back. It came back to her as surely as hope rose in her heart.
He would leave wouldn’t he? Their time together had an expiration? The night of dreaming did not last. The sun would rise, and with it… With the light, Solas would be gone. Nothing but a fleeting memory.
“What is it, Aslinn?” Solas asked gently, his long fingers combing through her hair. “Why are you crying?”
“You’re going to leave me again,” Aslinn breathed. Her voice was barely more than a whisper. Any louder and she knew it would break. But Solas would hear her. He always heard her.
“Not this time,” he sighed, pressing a kiss to her head.
“What?”
“I left—left you—because there was something that…that I had to do. It was something that I had promised myself I would do long before I met you. I thought that I would still be capable, but I…” He heaved a heavy sigh. “I cannot stay away from you. Not anymore. You have made me a weak man, vhenan. A weakness that I gladly accept.”
“But this is just the Fade, Solas. When I wake—”
He smiled. “I shall be there.”
Aslinn searched his face for a sign, some indication that he could have been lying but found none. In his eyes was honesty, grief, and hope.
“Do you swear it?” Aslinn breathed.
Solas leaned down and captured her lips in a final and lasting kiss. “See for yourself.”
For the first time that Aslinn could remember in a long while, she woke up at peace. The sun shone its weak winter rays into her room, casting filtered light through the curtains. Far away, a lark twittered merrily. There was no anxiety, no horror, no disappointment that a new day had found her only…ease…
She bolted upright in her bed, heavy duvet falling from her shoulders and scattering her numerous pillows all over the floor. She searched for a mere moment.
And there he was, just as he promised.
Solas smiled down at her as he sat by her side, perched on the edge of the bed. He waited patiently as her brain made every sluggish connection. He was here. He was here. He was here. Aslinn hardly dared to believe it to be true.
He reached out and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear, his fingers grazing over its pointed tip. The movement sent a welcome shiver down her spine.
“You will stay?”
“For as long as you wish.”
Grinning, beside herself with happiness, Aslinn launched herself into his arms. She knocked them both back onto the bed and their loud chorus of laughter echoed off the walls.
There was never a more beautiful sound.
He kissed her. He held her close. They fit together as seamlessly as before, no trace of broken hearts or abandoned duties. They were here and they were together. This time, forever.
Since my spiel was okayed by aslinncosplay,
Support me on Patreon for a chance to get your own fic written for you (like this one) for DA content before it arrives anywhere else, and for full chapters of my novel (which updates as we are going into NANoWriMo)!
Okay I’m done. :D (I’M SO GLAD YOU WERE HAPPY WITH THIS PIECE!)
I hope you liked it! And if you wanted, I could share the half written WIP I had too. It was Halloweeny and kinda fun but I just couldn’t make it work.
Anyway, happy Hallowen! Your Aslinn was super cute to write and read about. She’s too good for Solas and that Egg-butt had better come back to her like this!! I’m rooting for her!
My DRAGON AGE TRICK AND TREAT gift for @simbelmine. I thought some dark!solas would be perfect for Halloween, along with one of my favorite and fitting quotes from Hawke. I hope you like it and Happy Halloween!
