i’ve literally never broken up with someone in a video game before but i think i’ve decided that hollis (my fem!inquisitor) is ultimately going to break up with blackwall post-revelations and end up with cullen.
and it’s not because of what he did — she really does believe he’s changed and still would trust him with her life and at the end of the day, she honestly has even more respect for him because he was able to genuinely change and own up to what he did. but i think him leaving and not even saying anything is the last straw of the growing feeling she’s been having of “i would gladly spend the rest of our lives fighting for what we have, but not if you’re the one i have to fight for it.”
obviously both of them are sad about it for a while, but they eventually realize that actually, it’s so much better that way? they’re still friends and traveling companions and side by side in battle and generally flirting with each other for fun again and they’re like, oh yeah, the whole reason we fell for each other was this really natural chemistry and affection we have for each other, and trying to turn it into a serious relationship was actually kind of destroying it…we were so caught up in what we could have that we forgot we already had something really fucking great.
but during the harder parts of it, hollis leans on dorian a LOT because he’s her best friend and actual soulmate and she knows that he’ll always be even angrier than she is when she vents to him which is SO satisfying even if it’s not actually justified and that she can count on him to pull some crazy shit out of his ass if she needs a distraction and that he’ll let her drag him into her quarters for the night if she doesn’t want to be alone (it’s very important to me that they cuddle) and she’s like “oh my god all of this sucks why do i even bother, who needs stupid complicated boyfriends when i have you?”
and she’s also been steadily getting closer to cullen the whole time. they knew each other back when both of them were training to be templars (they weren’t close or anything, but they crossed paths enough times to remember each other) and at first that’s an “oh god you remember me when i was at my most embarrassing” thing, especially for cullen, but eventually they both realize that when everyone’s treating you as this larger than life figure responsible for saving the world, it’s kind of nice to have someone who remembers when you were just an annoying know-it-all teenager.
and yeah, they’ve both been lightly crushing on each other since everything started, but there was always so much going on that both of them were responsible for dealing with that they never really got a chance to act on anything outside of their duties for a long time (hollis does try, she’s better at loosening the fuck up than cullen is, but it takes dorian joining her and varric in prodding him to get him to actually start letting himself be a human being again). eventually they’re able to find little moments to just be together just as people, and there’s so much trust and respect there from everything that’s happened that it translates easily to them relying on and confiding in each other as people, not just as the inquisitor and her military advisor. it definitely takes some intervention from their friends (specifically dorian and josie, who are absolutely scheduling regular meetings to coordinate their efforts) for them to actually get together, but once they do, they’re so painfully perfect for each other (dorian would say disgustingly so) that everyone’s like “okay maybe it’s for the best that this took so long because if they were any less shy about this they would be absolutely insufferable”.
when everything is over, dorian goes off to tevinter and blackwall sets off on his travels, and hollis and cullen run off to start a nice, quiet life together. they get a dog and talk with dorian well into the night over the sending crystal, and the rutherfords love hollis and the trevelyans love cullen and all of their nieces and nephews (and eventually kids) love when their uncle thom or uncle dorian comes to visit, which thom does often and dorian does as often as he can possibly manage because there’s always a spot at the table and somewhere to sleep and a collection hollis has accumulated since the last time they came of little gifts that reminded her of them, and it’s just a known fact that the house may be hollis and cullen’s but there are in fact four people who live there — the other two just happen to spend a lot of time away from home.
basically, all three of them are Hollis’ Boys and they know it. don’t save them, they’re exactly where they want to be. she loves them so much and she’s never letting any of them go whether they like it or not. fortunately, they also would never want her to.
(they also stay really close with josie and varric, and all of them are just constantly sending letters back and forth. hollis is always the one writing but they all know cullen is getting the updates and isn’t afraid to make her add a million “cullen wanted me to ask/say”s if he has Opinions On Things. which he often does. blackwall may not officially be part of the letter network because he doesn’t technically have a consistent place to send letters to, but they all know he’ll be back at hollis and cullen’s place eventually, so anything for him just goes to them and he’ll join cullen in backseat letter-writing to respond.)
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