Sooooooo….. this was getting to be a bit too long and I’ve decided to break it up into different parts. There will be 2 more parts about the rest of Lavellan family, one more part about what happens right before Inquisition and Lavellan Deamon finally deciding on what form to settle into, and then Inquisition. Inquisition may or may not be broken into smaller parts as well. Still not sure if I’ll be doing much with Looking Glass. Tagging @feynites just cause
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There’s no reason to stay in the clearing anymore. Their child no longer sees them, she hasn’t for a while now, and the loneliness Aenea had warned them about feels suffocating. The only thing that had prevented them from leaving earlier was the twinges of pain in their ribs and the memory of the angry she-demon hissing in their mind. Eventually, the pain faded and so too did the fear of what may lay beyond the safety of Deshanna protection. So, with one last look at their child, who remains unmoving and unseeing as she had been, they leave the clearing.
It is surprising to see the world had changed while they had been healing. No longer were they in a dense forest as they had been before, instead the forest had turned into a large sprawling plains. Tall grass reached up and swayed in a nonexistent breeze, a shade of gold that they had never seen before. From their vantage point, up on a hill, they can see within the field of grass similar rings of blue flames and the shadow of Aenea as he wings his way from one circle to another.
Still, it takes some moments before they pluck up the courage to enter the tall grass. They don’t know a form big enough to see over it. They suppose that they could turn into a bird, but they had never been very good at flying. Instead, they become smaller, ears sharper, and tiny paws padding silently across the dirt. They relish for a moment in their ability to change. They had not been allowed to while they were still healing and it was stifling to have to remain in one form for so long.
Their whiskers twitch and they can scent a change in the air. There is a scent that they can’t recognize, it sorts of reminds them of Aenea but at the same time it does not. The uncertainty of it causes them to drop low to the ground. Ears twitching as they searched for sounds while their tail twitched uncertainly. Their wariness allows them to hear the rustling of grass as something big makes it way towards them. The fear that they had been trying so hard to ignore comes bursting back into their chest, making it hard to breathe and freezing their paws in place as they watch the golden stalks before them part.
Out lands a massive hoof, easily bigger than their head, and a massive head follow soon after. Giant horns swinging low to the ground and missing them by mere inches as the beast finally catches sight of them. He stills (large brown eyes so big that they can see their own reflection within) staring at them in silence before a great gusty sigh escapes him and sweeps over them. His large soft nose hovers over their head and the great hart breathes in deeply. Enough so that they can feel their fur pull towards the nose above them, and they can swear they just saw a leaf go flying into his nose. Which appears to have happened, because the hart is rearing back, shaking his head in a sharp swinging motion before a massive sneeze explodes out of him, and look there goes the leaf flying into the distance.
It’s so silly that they can’t help the laugh that bubbles out of them. It comes out as a low rumbling purr and the fact that it even happened at all causes them to fall silent. They had not laughed since the night their child refused to see them. The hart is looking at them again. He has the same look in his eyes that Aenea had, and it is then that they realize the beast must be someone’s deamon, just like them. With that realization, their fear leaves them and they find themselves finally relaxing in the great hart’s presence. At least until he sweeps his large horns at them and scoops them into the curve of his massive antlers, and suddenly they’re much, much, much, higher than they were before.
Their tiny claws did little against the sturdy spikes if the hart’s horns, but it did sink in just enough so that they no longer felt as if they would simply slide off from such a great height at a moment’s notice. Which was good because no sooner had they settled into the crook of the hart’s horns, he was off. Trotting swiftly through the sea of endless golden grass and heading towards a ring of blue flame further away from their child than they would have liked. While a part of themselves could only feel the rapid beating of their heart and the sinking dread that this probably wasn’t the best idea, another part of themselves watched in awe as from their new vantage point they could see miles and miles out of golden grass sea. Could spot shadows as things moved in the grass and rings of blue flames that dotted in numbers that they couldn’t even begin to count.
Then they were stepping over blue flames and suddenly they could hear their child laughing. They spun around and found their child, and yet at the same time it wasn’t their child. She was there, but not, like a shadow that looked and acted like her but didn’t feel empty. They watched, stunned, as their not-child ran towards the center of the clearing, towards a man who knelt laughing to catch the shade. The man was like their child, solid and real in a way that they had only ever known their child and Deshanna to be, and they watched as the man spun around lifting their not-child into the air. They didn’t understand, not until their not-child began shrieking “Papae! Papae!” and it is then that they truly begin to see. To see the similarities between their child and the man who obliviously spun in circles before them. The same shade of color in their eyes, the same chin and nose, and they remember their child who at times would ramble on and on about her papae and mamae.
Oh, they had known the words, but only now did their importance truly begin to click. This was their child’s papae, this was their child’s family, their kin, their clan. They recalled suddenly the many rings of blue flames that Aenea was watching over and the sheer enormity of it suddenly crashed down on them. They had always thought that they needed no one other than their child, they had assumed that their child was the same, but that wasn’t true. Their child was loved, the man before them proved that, and their child in return loved them back. It hurt to realize that their child didn’t need them. Another sharp stinging pain that hurt worse than any of the wounds the she-demon had left on them.
Suddenly, the hart lowered his head and unprepared they tumbled to the ground. It didn’t hurt, they had faced worse against the she-demon, but they found to their confusion tears springing to their eyes and rolling over their furry cheeks. They hadn’t even known they could cry in this form. The hart lowered his head and nuzzled them with his wide nose. A tongue darting out and dragging through their fur on their left cheek. He turned in a tight circle around them before lowering himself gently to the ground. His warm body circling around them in a way that reminded them of how Aenea would hide them in his wings.
His warm brown eyes stared at the man, who was now chasing after their not-child, with the same sad eyes that Aenea had. Except it wasn’t the same. They could see it now, the longing that lingered in the hart’s eyes as he watched over the man who ran in circles in the clearing. He looked at the man the same way they looked at their child.
Aenea was wrong. The Hart was this man’s deamon. This hart was the deamon to the man who was their child’s papae. This Hart was theirs just like their child was theirs, and they too belonged to the Hart like their child belonged to her papae. Even if their child refused to see them, they weren’t alone. Like a dam breaking, relief rushed through them and they couldn’t stop the hiccuping sobs that escaped from them. The Hart nuzzled his warm nose against the fur upon their back, his solid warmth a reminder that they didn’t have to go through their life alone, and for the first time since they had met the she-demon they felt safe.