pyr·rhic - (of a victory) won at too great a cost to have been worthwhile for the victor
Summary: In which the Inquisitor Dihris causes an avalanche in order to escape Corypheus's wrath. She is afraid that her actions will have cost her not only her life but those she holds dear.
Pairing: Cullen Rutherford and Female Lavellan Inquisitor
Warnings: survivors guilt, last hope, almost freezing to death
Word count: 2738
Authors note: This is my first time posting to tumblr so I'm learning the ropes... please be kind to me, thank you. This fic can be found on Ao3. If it is posted elsewhere, it has been stolen!
The first thing Dihris registered when she regained consciousness was the ringing in her ears and the dull throb of a headache. She couldn’t remember how she got to where she was and took a moment to lie on the floor to regain some sort of memory. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale.
Ah yes. Corypheus.
She remembered launching the trebuchet at the mountain above Haven in hopes that an avalanche would potentially weaken Corypheus’s assault on their camp. It worked to an extent. Corypheus ceased his attack altogether. But Haven was destroyed. She single handedly destroyed her home, Dell’s home, and the home of her new friends. The home of people trying to survive.
As much as she wished to, her eyes could not produce tears. Her body knew the routine of survival. Despite the pounding in her head, she sat up and took in her surroundings. Some sort of cave had protected her from the avalanche. Thank Andraste. After standing up and regaining her balance, she slowly began walking towards the tunnel that hopefully led out of the cave. It took some time and fumbling, but she managed to reach the mouth.
This wasn’t the view she wanted to have. In fact, she couldn’t see anything. The air above was a sheet of white, snowflakes flying across the sky at high speeds. The winds sent a chill down to her bones. She couldn’t see anything off in the distance, and she wasn’t even sure how far in front of her she was actually seeing. The only sound in her ears was the sound of the wind streaming through the air, cutting against the stone of the cave behind her.
She sighed and trudged on.
She trudged on for what felt like hours.
Her ears were cold. She was convinced they would fall off.
She trudged on.
Wolves brushing against her thigh, nature's guidance forward. For a moment she felt Dalish again. She was not unfamiliar with snow and rough terrain. When she would scout the woods, she was well equipped. But as far as she could remember, there was no darkspawn god attempting to obliterate her. And she always had Dell scouting with her, watching from a distance.
She trudged on.
The wind stung her eyes. Had it not been so cold, she would shed a tear, but she was sure her tear ducts were frozen over. She could use a good cry right about now. Everything felt horrid and bleak. She was alone, utterly and abysmally. The presence of another person would be a prayer made true.
She trudged on.
Her breaths were becoming more laborious and difficult. Her thighs burned with every movement through the deep snow. The cold bit through her leather boots. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could handle it.
She trudged on.
She stumbled upon a campfire with embers still warm from a fire. She allowed herself to run her hands through the coals, the tingling warmth igniting feeling back into her palms. There was not a care for her hands being stained black. She was warm. She let out a sigh and gave herself a few more moments of respite. She could not stay forever so she forced herself back up with temperate hands and she trudged on.
She blinked and her eyelids were heavy. She could see a light in the distance but couldn’t place a source. Maybe this was death. Her steps became clumsy, her body failing.
“There she is!” yelled a commanding voice, jolting her awake momentarily.
“Thank the Maker!”
Dihris let herself collapse, but didn’t remain in the snow for long. She opened her eyes and saw Commander Cullen looking down at her with his palm cupping her cheek, warm leather heating her flesh. His gloved fingers quickly began unclasping his furs from his shoulders.
“Thank the Maker you’re okay, Dihris. We were worried sick.”
Dihris couldn’t move her lips at all so she blinked and a stiff sound left her lips.
Cullen effortlessly scooped her up in one arm and wrapped his furs around her, the sudden warmth a shock to her system. She huddled up and buried her nose into the soft furs of Cullen’s cloak, thankful for his generosity. He smelled like Ferelden pine and leather, and it calmed her anxiety.
The commander easily hoisted her in a bridal carry and walked surely in a direction that Dihris couldn’t keep up with anymore. She let herself close her eyes in his arms.
“Stay with me, Dee,” Cullen said quietly. “Can’t sleep yet. Wait until we get you to Mother Giselle.”
Dihris reluctantly opened her eyes with a hum and watched his face as he moved through the snow. Frostbitten and chilled to silence and she still loved watching him. He looked determined, hopeful, confident. That was what Dihris loved about Cullen. It’s what she came to admire and adore.
As she was drifting through her thoughts, the man looked down at her, his expression softening upon locking eyes. His eyebrows relaxed and a smile played upon his lips. He was reassuring her in a silent way only he knew how.
“You’re a strong woman, Dee. I admire you for how resilient you are.”
She hoped he couldn’t feel how hard her heart was pounding. But hearing that a great warrior such as he admired her made her feel flustered. She was just a woman from a Dalish clan forced into a rather undesirable situation. But he was grateful for it. And she couldn’t help but admit that she was too.
Her face nuzzled closer to his body and she tried to pretend the chuckle Cullen made was one of endearment and affection. She would give herself this if she would never have it again. She had to imagine that the entire Inquisition, whatever was left of it, was fuming with her, near death experience or not.
Her voice found a bit of power and spoke. Cullen looked at her.
“What was that?”
“I’m sorry.”
Their eyes locked for a moment and Cullen couldn’t help but smile. “You did what you needed to in order to survive. You drove Corypheus away. You saved a lot of people. If not for that, we would all be dead in the snow. Do not apologize for persevering. I can never fault you for that.”
His face hardened as an approaching fire illuminated his face.
“Mother Giselle,” he said. “I found Dihris.”
“Bring her here. Thank you Andraste for bringing her home.”
She mumbled softly and groaned at the movement and loss of Cullen’s body against hers. But she lied down and finally let herself drift off into an uncomfortable slumber.
It felt like no time at all had passed when she was awoken by shouting across the camp. She slowly sat up and gazed over where her advisors were standing with Cassandra, bitterly arguing about something. It took Dihris a moment to register what was being said.
“And what would you have me tell them?” Cullen said through gritted teeth. “This is not what we asked them to do.”
“We can’t ignore this,” spoke the Seeker, standing her ground.
“And who put you in charge?” Cullen spat. “We need a consensus or we have nothing.”
“Please,” pleaded Josephine. “Please use reason. Without the infrastructure of the Inquisition we are hobbled.”
Voices clashed together until Cassandra let out a roar. “Enough! This is getting us nowhere.”
The sudden silence was painful. Giselle came back to her side and urged her to lie down. “You need rest, dear.”
The guilt of this heated argument gnawed at Dihris’s stomach. “They’ve been at it for hours.”
“You’ve afforded them that luxury,” she said as she wrapped Cullen’s furs tighter around the elf’s shoulders. “Our leaders struggle because of what the survivors had witnessed. They saw their defender fall, and rise again like a phoenix.”
Dihris rubbed her forehead, trying to ease a growing migraine. She didn’t provide a response.
“The more the enemy is beyond us,” began Giselle, “the more miraculous your actions appear. And the more our trials seem ordained. What have we been called to endure? What must we come to believe?”
Soon both hands covered Dihris’s face. “I know deep in my heart that I was meant for this but… what good did that do for Haven? So many people died. I caused that.”
When Giselle didn’t answer, Dihris stood carefully and began to wander, Cullen’s furs still keeping her warm. She locked eyes with the former Templar and she looked away in shame. She didn’t see the look of admiration and care in his eyes before they fell.
She couldn’t stand to look in her Commander’s eyes. She was full of guilt and shame for letting her people down once more. She got them into this situation and she didn’t know how to get them out.
Finally, her eyes relented and a tear fell down her cheek as she stood by a fire. After moments of silence, Giselle’s voice began to emanate through the makeshift camp, and voice after voice began to join. Dihris looked at the people around her and watched each individual solemnly add to the song. It was a sound of hope, no matter how tired or fatigued.
While her voice could get lost in the sea of harmonizing voices, she covered her eyes and allowed tears to slide down her cheeks. The sounds of the voices draining into her ears made her cry harder and she couldn’t calm herself down. And when she heard Cullen’s voice singing along, her shoulders began to shake. A hand on her forearm distracted her for a moment and she looked to the person that touched her.
“It’s okay, kid.”
“Varric…”
“C’mere.” He opened his arms out wide and Dihris fell into them gratefully. She let out a sigh, hiding her face in the top of his head. They stood like that for a few moments until the singing finally died down. The two pulled away, Varric flashing a soft smile at Dihris, who wiped the tears away from her face. His expression shifted slightly and he straightened.
“Hey Chuckles.”
Dihris turned to look at Solas who nodded only towards Dihris. “A word with you, please.”
It wasn’t a request, it was a demand, that much was obvious to the Herald. She looked at Varric who looked back at her with sympathy. With a sigh, she followed the elf. He stood on a cliff side overlooking the mountain pass, his profile illuminated by a veilfire torch on a stone.
“You know,” Solas started, “the humans haven’t raised one of our people so high in ages. Beyond counting even. Lethallan’s faith is hard won and worthy of pride. But Corypheus… the orb that he carried is ours. It caused the Breach to open in the first place. And unlocking that power must have caused the disaster at the Conclave. We need to figure out how he survived and prepare for whatever reaction might come out of it. We don’t know what they will do when they learn the orb is of our people.”
Dihris rolled her eyes. This wasn’t a conversation she wanted to be having in the first place. The last thing she wanted was a lecture on her own culture by someone who didn’t know her or what her life in her clan was like. “It won’t matter if we can’t get out of… wherever we are.”
“That much is true. But, Dihris, you must remember that you did save the Inquisition at Haven, even if the avalanche is not what you wanted to happen.”
She glanced at the other elf with a grimace. “I didn’t want to cost the Inquisition it’s home.”
“You can save them again, you know. There is a place you can take them.” He looked at her with a cocked eyebrow and a weak smile playing at his lips.
The conversation left Dihris with her head hurting more and the anxiety returning to gnaw at her stomach. She wanted to go to bed and sleep until the Inquisition was over. But this was a dire situation. She needed to break the news to the advisors first. So when she finally rallied them all together, she let out a deep sigh.
“I know where we can go. Where the Inquisition can go.”
Cullen crossed his arms, the steel clanging together a little too loudly for Dihris’s liking, as he looked down at her. She forgot she was still wearing his cloak. Josephine and Leliana looked at her with disbelief.
“I know, I know, I just… I need you to trust me, please. There is a location north, if we continue to follow the mountain range. It should not be too far from here, hopefully a days worth of travel if we begin the move by sunrise tomorrow. Cullen, do you have a map? I need your trust and your hope.”
Leliana and Josephine looked at each other. The spymaster shrugged. Cullen opened up a map and set it down on the table in front of them. Dihris leaned forward and traced her finger over the mountain range. “We just need to follow this path. It will be rough but if we keep steady progress, we should make it within a day.”
Leliana looked at the map and nodded.
“We don’t have much to lose. I don’t think it’s a bad idea to go somewhere. We have a destination in mind and that’s better than what we have now. We’ll move at sunrise. I’ll begin to spread the word.”
“I’ll assist you, Leliana,” Josephine spoke. The two of them split in different directions, stopping to talk to different people to spread the news of what the morning would bring. They left Cullen and Dihris alone, standing next to a fire.
Dihris felt like a child again, nervous and bashful around the Commander. She could feel his gaze on her. Slowly she lifted her eyes to meet his.
“Cullen, I-”
“Dihris-”
They both stopped short, a soft laugh leaving Cullen’s throat. “My apologies. You should go first.”
“Are you sure?”
“Of course. I always want to hear what you have to say.”
A blush grew on Dihris’s cheeks. She hoped the lighting of the fire hid it easily.
“I just… wanted to thank you. For saving me and believing in me. I don’t think I would be able to do this if I didn’t have someone like you on my side.” Subconsciously, she pulled the collar of the fur tighter around her neck. “I’m not good at leading. I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m scared, I don’t know what’s going to happen and I’m so scared.”
“Fear is normal for a leader, Dihris. You’re doing a fine job. You have a plan to lead us to safety and that is more than what we asked for.”
Dihris sighed and rubbed her forehead. “Thank you. I don’t know what I would do without you, honestly.”
She caught her breath after the statement, cursing herself internally in all different tongues for letting that slip. But when she glanced at Cullen, he was smiling, the grin stretching his cheeks.
“I uh… I’m flattered actually. I’m sure I’m not the only one.”
“Well… No, but you’re the one I’m the most grateful for. You put up with me a lot.”
“I’m not putting up with you, Dee. I mean everything I say.”
Dihris was fiddling with the fur on his collar and she swallowed nervously. “Well, I still appreciate it. And here, before I forget.” She shrugged off his cloak and handed it back to Cullen. “Thank you for letting me borrow this. And again for saving me.”
Cullen laughed quietly. “I would do it again, you know.”
She could fully feel the heat of her blush in the tips of her ears and she stifled a laugh - a nervous habit. “Thank you.”
He put a hand on her shoulder and gave a reaffirming squeeze. “You should get some rest. What with you stumbling in the frozen wilderness and a pilgrimage to make in the morning.”
“I agree. Thank you again.”
Cullen smiled at her and bowed politely. “Goodnight, Dihris.”
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