Work Text:
“Is it over? Is she coming round?” Cassandra cannot keep her voice from shaking as she watches Nyeni twitch on the tiles of the Well of Sorrows . “I knew this would happen.” The Maker rarely sends me something I can keep. She chews the inside of her cheek, hands curling into fists at her sides, watching and waiting. The water in the Well had vanished almost as soon as Nyeni drank, but diffuse blue light still flickers across the floor, and she dares not interfere with the magic which holds the Inquisitor in its thrall.
That hesitance vanishes when Nyeni gasps, rolls over, and gets to her hands and knees. Cassandra is the first to reach her, though she slows as she draws close, stopping a few feet away to give the Inquisitor room as she climbs to her feet. Nyeni seems… dazed.
“Not dead! Well, that’s a relief,” Dorian says. “So - good? Bad? I’m dying to know.” There’s a forced chuckle in his voice that, after so long travelling together, Cassandra knows is a cover for his true emotions. Nyeni ignores the question, brushing past all of them without a word and staring back into the body of the temple, brow furrowed as if contemplating some problem unknown to the rest of them. It’s not like her - she is spare with her words, but never to the point of rudeness. Never such that she wouldn’t reassure them of her well-being.
Something in her gut clenches at the thought, but she doesn’t have time to consider, or to ask questions - Corypheus’s scream of rage echoes across the courtyard, and Nyeni bursts into blinding blue-white light (and a chill runs down Cassandra’s spine) and beckons them through the eluvian back to Skyhold.
She turns those moments over and over again in the days that follow, hacking and slashing at training dummies as she tries to understand what she saw. There was something real there, but was it truly an Elven god? Or was it a demon, even now possessing the Inquisitor and manipulating all of them like puppets?
When Nyeni next approaches her, she seems little different. She still shifts nervously from foot to foot, and her fingers are still laced tightly together in front of her, and she meets Cassandra’s eyes for brief moments before glancing away again - all the little gestures that Cassandra has come to know are still there.
“How are you holding up?” she asks, and Cassandra slowly lowers her practice blade. Only as her arms loosen does she realize how sore they are, and she holds back a wince.
“I should be asking you that question,” she says, cautious. Nyeni’s expression tightens minutely, and she sighs.
“I… think I’m alright,” she says. “It’s a strange feeling, but… I know so much now, Cassandra. Some of it is beyond my grasp, but perhaps someday…” Her voice trails off, and she looks up. Her eyes are wide and imploring, and Cassandra sighs.
“Are you still yourself?” she asks, softer.
“So far as I know,” Nyeni replies. “If… if it worries you, you could try to dispell me.”
Cassandra studies her face - those leaf-green eyes, soft cheeks marked with vallaslin , the determined set of her jaw - and shakes her head.
“I trust you,” she says. “If you believe you are not possessed, that is answer enough.”
Nyeni smiles, and something in Cassandra’s heart feels lighter.
“I’m glad of that,” she says. “Would you… walk with me?”
To Cassandra’s surprise, Nyeni leads her through Skyhold’s main hall to her personal quarters, high in the north tower. She’d expected to walk the walls, as they often did when they talked, but as soon as the door to the great hall was shut the Inquisitor sighs, leaning back against it.
“Is… everything-” Cassandra cuts herself off as Nyeni nods, then steps past her to lead the way.
“The silence is a relief,” she says. “After the Well… I hear whispers. The less noise around me, the easier it is.”
The easier what is? Cassandra wonders, but does not ask.
Standing on the tower’s private balcony is not unlike walking the walls, it turns out. The view is even better: she can see so far down the valley that it seems to almost fade into the distance.
“I guess this isn’t much of a walk,” Nyeni says, leaning on the railing next to her. “Sorry.”
“It is lovely,” Cassandra says, though she’s not looking at the view below them as she says it. Nyeni blushes, but she doesn’t glance away this time.
“Thank you… for believing me,” she says. “Solas was furious that I drank from the Well, but I… it belongs to the People, whatever it is.”
Cassandra swallows down a lump in her throat and then moves her hand, resting it halfway on top of Nyeni’s.
“I cannot say I was not afraid for you,” she says in a low voice. “Unknown magic, and so ancient - but if there is one thing I have learned, it is that you always survive the impossible.” She pauses, trying to find the right words. “I must simply have faith that you will do so, even when I am not at your side.”
Nyeni turns her hand under Cassandra’s, lacing Cassandra’s fingers with her own.
“I won’t leave you behind again if I can help it,” she says. “Cassandra, I-” Her grip on Cassandra’s hand tightens. “I-”
Cassandra leans over and presses a kiss to Nyeni’s temple, just at the edge of her hairline.
“I know,” she murmurs into Nyeni’s hair.
They are still kissing as they fall back onto the bed, Cassandra catching Nyeni’s weight on her arms and easing her down. The Inquisitor is a delicate woman to hold the responsibilities she does, slender and light in Cassandra’s arms, but the warmth of her body bears no relation to her size. She breaks away from the kiss to fumble at Cassandra’s belt, swearing in Elvehn.
“ Fenedhis , Cassandra, do you need all these buckles?”
“Not at the moment,” Cassandra retorts, reaching down to unfasten them herself and tugging the belt and sash away. Nyeni nods as they fall to the floor and begins to work on Cassandra’s breastplate; Cassandra responds by tugging at her scarf and throwing it to the floor, and then running her hand up Nyeni’s bare neck and into her hair. Nyeni shivers under the touch and fumbles the last breastplate buckle. She gets it free a moment later, and the armor gets dropped over the edge of the bed with some care lest it be dented. Nyeni pushes herself up on her arms to survey Cassandra, a satisfied smile on her face that makes Cassandra catch her breath.
“That’s better,” she says, leaning down to kiss Cassandra lightly. She moves downward, trailing kisses down Cassandra’s jaw and neck and then light touches over the fabric of her tunic down to her hips. Slowly, glancing up at Cassandra as if for permission, she tugs the tunic free of Cassandra’s trousers and lays one hand on Cassandra’s stomach, skin on skin. Cassandra’s muscles jump.
Slowly, carefully, Nyeni lowers her head and presses a kiss to each side of Cassandra’s hips. Something in Cassandra quakes, and she is helpless - but it is a different kind of helplessness from watching Nyeni in the well, or seeing her disappear in a flash of light and magic at Redcliffe all those months ago.
This helplessness is… safe. She is undone in the hands of someone she trusts, and she does not fear.