#emmaera lavellan

[ruxandralache]

Emmaera Lavellan for @eight-of-pentacles, as part of my headshot commissions offer!

Thank you so much for the opportunity to paint her again! I absolutely adore your Lavellan! <3

Here's another piece I've done with her, she is so lovely!

[shivunin]

An Open Door

For Day 3 of @rutherfest, I wanted to revisit how Cullen might have been feeling during the romance lock-in scene. I may expand on this at some point, but for now:

(Cullen/Emmaera Lavellan | 877 Words | No warnings)

It was a relief, in some ways, to have one’s path decided in advance. 

Being a Templar had given him that. Cullen could remember well what it had meant to wake and know what the day would bring, for good or ill. His role had necessitated some decision making, of course, and at the time he’d been honored at the chance to provide direction for some of the others. But—in the end, it hadn’t been so much freedom as all that, had it? 

Every Templar who’d been with the Order as long as he had would have been hard-pressed to remain ignorant of this path’s termination. He’d seen it plenty himself: the loss of memories, of faculties, the slow slide into oblivion. Some had called it a just price to pay for acting as sword and shield for the Maker’s Bride. Others had turned their faces from it, had hoped that they would somehow be the exception to the rule. 

Cullen—well. After the Circle tower in Kinloch hold, he’d had little interest in thinking so far ahead at all. His path had been decided for him, and there was a relief in that. There was no after. If he tried hard enough, there was no before either. 

But after—after haunted him now. 

Cullen understood war and its tactics. He understood training and supply lines and strategy. Fighting—preparing to fight—neither surprised him nor worried him. By now, he understood it all too well. They would win or Corypheus would, and any actions their people could make to impede the would-be god were worth the price. 

No, it was not the war that worried him. He had faith in their forces, in their leader. But—there would come a day when the Inquisition was no more. Or it may yet exist, but would do so with another Commander. There would come a day when he would have to decide what that meant, who he might wish to be beyond this crisis. He had put his head down and turned his attention to strategy and the troops and his work, but that decision had loomed ever more present since the day he’d realized how much he wanted a future that included the Inquisitor. 

Desiring anything at all was still so profoundly foreign. The idea of wanting something that depended so utterly on a hundred other factors—not the least of which among them were her own plans and desires—was all so dreadfully complex. How could he even begin to seek an answer when he struggled to define the question? Untangling his own thoughts to produce something coherent was forever falling lower on the list below the constant updates, patrols, meetings, intel, and (pleasant though it was) the time he spent with her. 

It did not surprise him that this, like so many other admissions, spilled from him before he’d planned it out properly.

“I find myself wondering what will happen after,” he said now, turning to face Emmaera. She tilted her head, eyes tracking him. They caught his and he found, as he had a thousand times before, that he could not bring himself to look away. 

“When this is over,” he went on, and touched the angle of her jaw, “I won’t want to move on—not from you.” 

Only the corner of her mouth lifted, as it so often did when he said things like this to her. He could be caught like this—could find himself staring at her with no memory of what he’d been about to say. It was—quiet, still, looking at her. It was as if her presence muffled the endless round of thoughts circling his head. 

But no—not now. Now that he’d started this discussion, he had to finish it. 

“But I—I don’t know what you,” he turned away, clutching at half-formed thoughts and incomplete sentences, “that is—if you—”

His name was gentle and fondly chiding on her lips—as if her answer ought to have been obvious. 

It was odd—for so many years, he had been focused on everything but the future or the past that he had very rarely been actually experiencing the moments he was living. The past was a horror; the future was a slow descent into nothingness. The present was a refuge, a bulwark against both, but he’d never especially wanted to be there either.

In this moment—when he was at last assured of some future worth turning toward—he was finally aware of everything that the present entailed. There was neither past nor future, only now. For the first time, it was not a denial of of worry or regret, but a refuge from it. He was here, he was now, and she was with him.

This—the texture of her skin, the soft sigh she made when his mouth found the edge of her jaw—was all the world that need matter right now. Cullen held himself to the immediacy of the moment as tightly as he could, surrendering to the uncertainty of the future.

Who he would become remained indefinite, vague, impossible to predict. As long as he knew this one thing—that the future would include her, too—Cullen found it was an uncertainty he could accept.

[star--nymph]

A commission for @shivunin/@buridanshorse of her Inquisitor Emmaera Lavellan!

Emma is featured in her fics Wander the Drifting Roads and Book of Memories, both of which you guys should absolutely read.

[shivunin]

The Looking-Glass

For Day 1 of @rutherfest, Past, Present, and Future, I've finally finished this piece about Emma going through the eluvian for that last fight in Trespasser as it would have been in canon. I wanted to explore what waiting for her to return would have been like for Cullen, and (lbr) put that man through it c:

(Cullen/Emmaera Lavellan | 1,098 Words | No warnings)

Cullen had no business standing around in the mirror room when there were a thousand other pressing matters to take care of. 

If things went badly for Emmaera—if things went badly for her party—they would be facing far greater threats than a mirror. He ought to be organizing the troops, communicating with allies, planning for eventualities…

He paced in the room instead, wall to wall, to restless to be still and wait. The mirror did only what it had done for, presumably, hundreds of years: it watched. 

She’d never said she was frightened; that wasn’t her way. But she’d held him tightly before she’d walked away, one hand curled into a rigid claw that pulsed intermittently with green energy. Cullen had passed a hand over her hair, holding her through the faint tremors that’d shaken her body. They’d whispered quickly to each other while the final preparations had been made. 

“If I don’t come back…”

“Don’t say that. You will.”

“But if I don’t—don’t tell my mother how I went. It will be too much like my father and…”

“I won’t tell.”

“Thank you.”

Emmaera been so warm in his arms, so alive. It had been easy to pretend that they were alone in an empty room, that they had all the time they wished. She smelled of lavender and elfroot, as she always did. Cullen had tucked his face into her hair, breathing deeply, as if to etch the memory of how she felt into his mind forever. 

“I wanted more time,” she said softly. “I…wanted to see the world with you.”

“We will,” he’d said. Only the practice of long, disciplined years kept the telltale crackle from his voice. “We will, when you return.”

“Cullen…”

“We will,” he said, and withdrew enough to clasp her face in his hands.

Emma's eyes, red-rimmed and tight with pain, had searched his for a long, silent before she nodded. 

“I…alright. We’ll see the world. I love you, Cullen. I—I am glad only to know that we had…the time we’ve had together."

There had been doubt in her eyes. She had been humoring him. He had known as much immediately, but it hadn't mattered. When she could, Emmaera always kept her promises.

Though it had been over an hour, he paced this room now and saw that last look in her eyes endlessly. The room was too small, only a handful of paces to one side before he could turn. It brought back other memories, dark ones; the taste of rot and fire at the back of his throat, the blood beading along his cracked lips.

A handful of steps, reach the wall, turn. She would return to him. She'd said she would.

Someone had said something to him several minutes ago, had asked if he needed water. Cullen could not recall if he had answered them at all, if he had simply kept moving. He ought to work on contingency plans; he had a duty to—if things did not go well, if she—if she—

He paused at a wall, passed a hand over his face.

For a great deal of his life, his will had been enough to hold himself rigid, to held himself together — no, to hold himself apart. His will could be enough now. He could try to wall it all away, could leave the room and the uncertainty behind and make plans with the relevant military parties.

Emmaera was willing to give her life away on the behalf of this world. He could honor that sacrifice by moving to protect it. She would not fault him for it.

Cullen turned again. The eluvian waited, its reflection infuriatingly mundane. Nobody in this room possessed the key to open this door; it had gone still and static once Emmaera had passed through it. Now, he saw only the reflection of a weary man, hair returned to ragged curls, uniform mussed from his constant readjustments.

He passed a hand over his hair, as if setting it to rights mattered at all, and caught the faint gleam of light as it caught the pale white and golden hue of the ring on his finger. Volcanic aurum and dragon bone, wrought so they twined together—the ring she had given him as a gift when they'd exchanged their vows.

Cullen lowered his hands and looked at them, tracing his thumb over the lines of the ring one at a time.

"I found them years ago and saved them especially," she'd told him last night, while they'd lain awake in bed. Her finger had traced the lines one at a time, following the dragon's bone all the way around and then beginning on the aurum. "I told myself it was for something special, but it was for you. They reminded me of you as soon as I saw them."

He'd had nothing to say to that; he so often could not find the right thing to say to her. Cullen had turned his head and kissed her instead, as if such a thing might act as sufficient replacement for words.

The man still watched him from the eluvian. Cullen watched him square his shoulders, watched a muscle in his jaw twitch.

He would not leave. He had been there when she had returned from the final fight with Corypheus, had bowed to her as she deserved. Had given in to the temptation to hold her close, though everyone could see them plain. He had been there at the gates when she'd returned from dozens of missions he had not accompanied her to, when she had returned from her long sojourn in the Deep Roads.

Cullen had waited before. He would wait again, would be here when she returned to him once more. He had no desire to continue as the Commander of the Inquisition in any case; if there was a resistance to be raised for the protection of Thedas, he would not take up his blade until he knew the fate of his wife. This, he promised himself as he met his eyes in the unforgiving glass.

The man in the mirror watched as he stepped back, as he set his back to the wall and braced himself to wait. It would watch him until the mirror rippled, until the door opened once more and she returned to him.

She would return to him. He reminded himself of this, still and watchful, ignoring the ache that gripped his neck and shoulders.

Emmaera would return. She had told him so, hadn't she?

[shivunin]

Dawn Will Come

For day 1 of @dragonagekissweek: Morning, I wanted to revisit my Inquisitor during the events of Veilguard. Here is a quiet moment with Emmaera and her daughter in the Inquisitor's quarters of Skyhold:

(Inquisitor Lavellan & Cullavellan child, background Cullen/Lavellan | 1,374 Words | Mentions of the Blight and ensuing disasters)

In the midst of a Blight to end all Blights, dawn stretched weary fingers over the Frostbacks near Skyhold. 

Emmaera watched them from her balcony, her legs threaded through the pillars on the balustrade. Her bare feet were cold in the early air despite the enchantments woven around the old keep, but she could hardly complain. Here, at least, she could have a moment of solitude to grieve all that had been lost. 

The room behind her was full, bodies tucked into most of its available spaces. Emmaera’s sister and niece slept sideways on the oversized bed in the center of the room, wedged in beside Dagna and Sera. Somewhere on the balcony above, the Hawkes had set up an odd sort of encampment formed of blood-red draperies Emmaera had never once seen during her first occupancy in this place. Merrill and Isabela had curled against each other in the corner beyond, while Cassandra slept armored and vigilant beside the stairs, one hand resting on the unsheathed sword across her thighs. 

There had been days when Emmaera had loathed coming up to this room, had despised its stone and its solitude. Crowded as it was now, it was not nearly so packed as the grounds beyond were. Refugees from every country she could name had found places in the courtyard and along the ramparts, among the bookshelves and the cellars and even in the half-shattered prison cells below. The scant space between bodies in her quarters was a veritable wealth of privacy. 

And yet—here she was, seeking true solitude on the cold stone of the balcony and watching the sun climb slowly over the Frostbacks. 

How could they make it through this alive, let alone intact? How much more would it cost them to survive the horrors that had been brought to their collective doorstep? Would the wild animals she’d watched and chased as a child remain after all was done? Would the flowers, the butterflies, the elfroot she’d so carefully gathered for her potions? It was said that wide swathes of Thedas had been so ruined by Blights past that almost nothing could bring life to them. If that was the case everywhere the Blight touched now, what would be left to them even if they did live beyond it? 

Her hand wrapped around the stone and squeezed, squeezed, the stone unyielding and cold beneath her palm. 

Hope had never been her strength; to her bones, Lavellan had always been a pragmatist. She wanted to have hope. She wanted it badly, had tried to will it into her face and her voice whenever she spoke to the people huddled below. It felt like a lie no matter how much she knew they needed it, felt dishonest even if it improved morale. 

How long could they have here? How many more cities had fallen while she slept? How many more days of rations could they provide, how many—

“Mamae?”

A soft voice, the quiet pad of bare feet over stone. Emmaera turned her head and found her daughter, hair a nimbus of gold in the soft light of dawn. She must have woken recently, for there were blanket wrinkles pressed into her cheek and sleep drying in the corners of her eyes. 

“Good morning,” Emma told her, uncurling her hand from the pillar one finger at a time. “Is everything all right, darling?” 

Adhlea shook her head and moved closer. 

“Someone’s snoring again,” she said solemnly, as if delivering dire news. Circles rimmed her eyes, and for a moment she looked so much like her father that Emmaera could think of nothing to say in response. 

Adhlea, still unused to sharing a room even after the past few months, was more sensitive to noise than the other children. Hawke had sworn she’d slept like a log the entire time their group had been running through the Fade, but since their arrival at Skyhold she had been fitful and restless. More often than not, Emma woke to find her somewhere other than where she’d gone to sleep, often with a blanket or pillow or cloak tucked over her faintly pointed ears. 

“What are you looking at?” she asked after a moment, fist scrubbing over her eyes. Emma shifted backward and held out her arm. Without hesitation, Adhlea slumped into her lap and leaned her head against Emmaera’s chest. 

In Kirkwall, before the lot of them had been forced to flee or die, Emma had worried that her eldest daughter had grown too old for this sort of affection. She had a sort of prepossession beyond her age, an occasional fervor for being right and seeming independent that had already begun to preclude public expressions of affection. Lavellan had mourned this loss, had thought many times of how small Adhlea had been only a year ago, how she had fallen asleep in her lap when they’d read together in the evenings. 

Perhaps she should be worried that Adhlea had gone back to curling up against her of late. Lavellan could not find space within her for more worry, and considered it a rare gift instead.

“The dawn comes up over that peak there,” Emma told her, pointing to the mountain in question before smoothing her hand over her daughter’s golden curls. “See how it splits the light into stripes?”

“Yes,” Adhlea said through a yawn. “Like a drawing.”

“Just like,” Emma agreed.

 The sun was rising in truth now, bringing life and color to the dull grey below. Already, people were moving from place to place along the ramparts and in the terraces. She did not watch them. She watched the sky instead, the broken lines of morning slanting through the clouds and bare, frigid air above. The peak cast a shadow over them, shattering the light to pieces as it struggled upward. 

How long? She thought, and stroked her fingertips through downy golden hair. How long do we have left?

“You’re going to win,” Adhlea said unexpectedly. 

Emmaera looked down at her, startled, but her daughter’s eyes were closed. Veins ran under the skin, delicate traceries of pale green-blue. She was so very fragile, would be so easy to lose. What was one child against the loss of millions? What was one life against the destruction of their entire world?

“You won before,” Adlea went on, the syllables stretching out as she yawned again. “You’ll win again. You will, Mamae.” 

Emma watched a teardrop spill onto the mass of golden hair, darkening it from wheat-gold to the color of fresh-baked bread. She bent and pressed a kiss over the spot, shutting her eyes tightly against the pressure of more tears. 

“I love you, my dear,” she told her daughter, and cradled her head against her chest. “Of course I will.”

“I know you will,” the child murmured. 

Slowly, her body went slack and loose in Emma’s lap. She sniffled as quietly as she could manage and pressed another kiss to Adhlea’s head. 

When she opened her eyes, the sun had had last dragged itself beyond the nearest peak of the Frostbacks. It shone unbroken on the snow below, refracting from a thousand, a million crystals of ice until it seemed that the air itself was made of light. A tear slipped down Emma’s cheek, but she pressed her face against Adhlea’s head before it could fall. 

They had beaten impossible odds before, she and her allies. They had no choice but to do so again. There had been a great deal at stake in those days, but she had even more to lose now. Pragmatic or not, Emmaera had to hope that there would be a world left for her children to live in. She had to hope that the light of dawns like this would reach for them regardless of the world that waited beyond, regardless of what had been lost.

She had to believe that they, too, would see the dawn scatter over the snow of the mountains and light their path forward, as it had done for Lavellan so many times.

What other choice did she have?

"We will beat this," she whispered to her sleeping daughter, and closed her eyes as her husband's steadying palm rested firm against her back. "I promise."

[shivunin]

August '25 Event Fics

Because there are a bunch of events going on this month and it can be hard to keep up with all the posts, I've compiled all of my event fics together in this post for easy reference. These will also be added to my ficlet masterlists (linked in my bio post).

DA Kiss Week

Siren's Call (Isabela/Arianwen Tabris, 840 Words): Post-threesome, Wen tries to find the words to say goodbye to Isabela

At the Gates of Weisshaupt (Zevran/Arianwen Tabris, 1,098 Words): Tabris has been summoned to Weisshaupt. She and Zevran say goodbye at the gates.

Dawn Will Come (Emmaera Lavellan & Adhlea Lavellan, 1,374 Words): After a sleepless night during the events of Veilguard, the former Inquisitor waits for the dawn on the balcony of her rooms in Skyhold

When Night Climbs Slow (Rook Ingellvar/Spite, 843 Words): While walking through the Fade in her sleep, Rook encounters a familiar face

City Elf Week

Lightning Before Thunder (Adaia Tabria & Arianwen Tabris, 2,186 Words): As a child, Tabris sees the Templars in the alienage for the first time.

A Pouch of Pebbles (Hawke & Merrill, 1,348 Words): Hawke and Merrill discuss what makes a place home. Hawke offers a gift.

Ash and Bone (Lenore Ingellvar & the Necropolis, 2,042 Words): As Lenore works on preserving the body of a city elf, she contemplates her own origins.

Rutherfest

The Looking-Glass (Cullen/Emmaera, 1,098 Words): As Cullen waits for Emmaera to come back through the eluvian at the end of Trespasser, he wars with himself over how much he fears her loss.

An Open Door (Cullen/Emmaera, 877 Words): An exploration of Cullen's thoughts during the romance lock-in scene during Inquisition

[shivunin]

From the wip game: A Permanent State of Self? 👀

Hi Arja!! <3

This is a fic set just after Solas has the conversation with Emma about whether she's changed since she had the Anchor on her hand, in which she is trying to figure out whether she has:

Emmaera heard Cullen before she saw him: boots on stone, the soft creak of his metal armor, the intake of breath when he reached the top of her stairs. She turned to look at him, but didn’t say anything and didn’t move from the balcony. She’d felt rooted here ever since Solas had gone away. She was too full of—something—to move now. She had to hold still until she’d thought it all through.  “Are you all right?” her lover asked, slipping through the doorway and stopping beside her. After a moment’s thought, he rested a hand on her shoulder.  Her chest felt tight. She exhaled all at once, only then realizing that she had been holding her breath.  “I—don’t know,” she told him. He stood with his back to the sun, so that it lit the fine strands of hair that stood above the others. She closed her eyes against it and leaned into him, taking comfort from the solidity of his body beside hers.  “I don’t know if I am who I was,” she told him, all at once, as if the words couldn’t bear to wait behind her lips any longer. 

[shivunin]

In Golden Ruins

For Day 2 of @ockissweek I borrowed the lovely Eurydice from @star--nymph. I was considering what to write and I decided that the world needed baby Eury and Emma c: Thanks for letting me borrow your gal!

(Eurydice Lavellan & Emmaera Lavellan | 1072 Words | No warnings)

Emmaera sought Eurydice an hour or so before dusk, when the clan was busy trying to cook meals and count halla. Her friend had vanished from the tents and trees, had slipped away during someone’s argument after lunch, and she hadn’t been seen since.

This was not a surprise. Eury had a habit of leaving without a word when she’d had too much, and today had been no different. Emmaera knew all the sorts of places her friend would hide in the woods. She found her easily, some fifteen minutes from the camp, huddled beside a log and watching a bird on the branch above her. 

Emmaera settled beside her, tucking her very first staff against the log beside them. For a time, the two of them sat in silence broken only by the distant singing of some bird and the soft sound of wind through the leaves. 

“I found some old ruins close by,” she said at last, speaking with all the confident assurance a ten-year old could muster. She even folded her hands in her lap like the Keeper did when she was teaching Emmaera something. “We could go see it if you want. There are halla drawings on the walls. Some of them are gold.”

For a time, Eury said nothing, but at last she uncurled herself and stood, rocking slightly on her feet. Emmaera didn’t offer her hand. She stood instead, taking her staff in hand and starting off through the woods. After a moment, she pulled a soft cloth from her pocket and held it out behind her. There had been tear stains on Eury’s cheeks; she couldn’t do anything about what had happened, but she could at least offer some comfort. If there was time when they got to the ruin, she could see if Eury wanted help with the twigs and leaves tangled in her pale hair. She liked it when Eury helped comb hers; maybe her friend would like help with the same. 

“Almost there,” she said after a moment. A tug on her sleeve, a cloth pressed into her hand. Emmaera took it and tucked it away again, pretending not to notice that Eury was still holding onto her sleeve. 

They reached the top of the hill over the ruins and stopped, looking down on a loose connection of ruined buildings in a familiar style. When her father had been here, Emmaera would have fetched him to look at them, to tell her what they all meant. Now, nobody but her seemed to remember how much he’d cared about mosaics and stonework and all the little things he brushed free from the earth. 

Well—nobody else remembered, but at least Eury cared enough to listen. 

“Here,” she might say, pausing in front of a mosaic. “I think this one is supposed to be Andruil—see the bow?” 

Or— “This is Elgar’nan, don’t you think? Look at the crown.” 

Eury didn’t speak for most of it, but stopped before the painting of Ghilan’nain as Emmaera had known she would, tiny bare feet twisting to and fro in the dirt. 

“Do you want to hear the story again?” Emmaera asked. Eury nodded, hands lifting to her hair, fingers tangling with the silvery strands. 

She’d brought snacks in her pack; it was always difficult to tell if Eurydice had snatched food on her way out, but she hadn’t thought so today. If nothing else, the fruit and crunchy bread would be something to tide her over until the evening meal. She set them next to Eury on a crumbled piece of pillar and sat, tucking her feet up before her. 

It was a familiar story, one she’d shared with Eurydice since she’d first learned how to tell stories. There was something about the idea of being remade in new skin that she liked. Or—maybe it was the idea that trying hard enough, doing well enough would always be rewarded. It was hard to say. But she spoke and Eury listened and that was well enough of a success for her to count it. 

“White fur sprang from her skin,” she said at last, when half the food was gone and Eury had finished untangling her hair, “so that she would always bound free over the plains, never caged or tied up—”

“—and Ghilan’nain would always find her way home,” Eury said, voice rusty from disuse. 

“But as for how–that’s a story for another time,” Emmaera finished, and nudged Eury’s elbow with her own. “Better?”

“Better,” Eury said, and nudged the bundle of food closer to Emmaera. “Eat. You’re hungry.”

“Am not,” Emmaera said, but took an apple from the pile and bit into it. 

“Can hear your stomach,” Eurydice murmured, pulling a face. “You forgot to eat. If it’s loud, it needs food, yes? Yes.”

She couldn’t argue with that; she had forgotten to eat yesterday when she’d found the ruins and she couldn’t remember if she’d had lunch today, either. Emmaera took another bite and studied the mosaic, thinking. They ought to head back to the camp soon. The sun was starting to set now, painting gold and orange over the ruins around them. Though she knew her way back to camp in the dark, it would be better to start back while they could still avoid the roots and rocks on the pathway back. Eury had a deft way of dodging most of them, but Emmaera hadn’t yet gained the same skill. She’d trip over most of the roots and rocks between here and the camp if it got too dark before they headed back. 

She unfolded herself from the cold stone now, stretching her arms and taking her staff from the forest floor. 

“Come on,” she said. “You can sit between me and Mirwen at the fire. We won’t let anybody bother you.” 

Eury grimaced and stood, stealing a kiss from Emmaera’s cheek once she’d found her feet. Emmaera offered her staff and Eury took it just under her hand, an easy compromise for someone who often disliked being touched. 

They walked on into the woods, not talking for the moment. The forest grew quieter as the light fell, birds tucking themselves into the nests for the day, deer finding their dens. The girls passed their way into the shadows, leaving no trace behind save a handful of crumbs before an old mosaic, overgrown and all but forgotten in the oldest part of the wood.