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It’s dark out by the time Dorian finally arrives in his block of town. This is partially his fault.
Lanterns sputter as he passes them by. Signage flickers out in his wake. The occasional shopkeep runs out to complain, Vishante kaffas they paid for that spell to be cast, only to see the assembly robes, mutter a quick apology, and flee back to the safety of their hovel.
It’s not the first time that political meetings have sent him home late. Though the persistent, inescapable feeling of defeat and hopelessness is relatively new.
Standing there in that hall, surrounded by burning lyrium and laughter. Endless circular debates and jibes as more and more ground was lost.
“Good job you weren’t dragged down with them, eh Pavus? No one needs friends like that. Especially not a man in your…position.”
The goad nearly worked on him. Dorian can feel his temper shortening as the years go on, unable to flit above the stupidity and social games the way he once had. His fist had clenched, his teeth had set, the crackle of fire in his belly that he had first felt as a child picking fights with boys twice his age.
Just to hear Maevaris’ voice in his mind, advice from many senior years of politicking. You’ll need to learn to pick your battles, Dorian. That sharp tongue of yours is going to get you in trouble.
Only, she was the one who had lost the game, not him.
The only one left. The only strand left to tie them to something.
Because she had shielded him when she should have let him drown.
“Well. None of us are strangers to embarrassing cousins, isn’t that right Erimond?”
Teeth clenched around a sugared almond. A sip of wine. It all tasted rancid. He’d left as soon as he was able, which was not soon enough.
A familiar face greets him at the door to his home to let him in, prim and well-kept despite the hour. The manager of his household. Not liberati—one of the few paid attendants that had been kept under house Pavus employ, having inherited the position from her mother.
She is the only servant with such late hours. Outside of estate guards, everyone else has gone to bed for the night. Which is frankly unfair to the poor thing, because it means that Dorian is beginning to associate her with the foul mood that late night returns to his home generally herald. But then, she is a remnant of when this place belonged to his father, so a warm relationship doesn’t seem to be in the cards either way.
Dorian brushes past her, muttering a vague apology for his tardiness and heading for the study where he keeps the liquor cabinet. It’s only when he’s already pouring the bourbon that he notices she has followed him.
“My Lord,” she says hesitantly, “There is…something in your quarters that requires attention.”
“Unless it’s an assassin that will do me the courtesy of killing me instantly, I’m not particularly interested,” he snaps, downing the shot and pouring another.
“Well it—he—”
Dorian pauses and turns to look at her properly.
She flushes. Pauses to press a knuckle to her lips and furrow her brows in thought. It’s unusual to see that professional façade falter. He sets his glass down.
Eventually she finds her composure again. “…Forgive the impertinence, My Lord. I was asked to let you find out on your own. But that was several hours ago.”
Despite the overtaxed slog of his mind, he does put the pieces together rather quickly at that.
“…Oh. Best not to keep him waiting any longer, then,” he remarks blandly.
And then hurries to his room.
The scent of roses is the first thing that hits him. Roses and scented smoke. His room has clearly been the scene of a murder, except instead of blood splatter it’s the remains of a dozen blooms, what had evidently been an attempt at a coherent trail that has devolved into just sprinkling petals wherever they looked nice. Where there are no petals there are instead candles—tall, thin ones in glass bottles, mostly spent down to the wick, wax in congealing soup.
Judging by all this it does look as though his return home is several hours overdue, yes.
But all of this is a secondary concern.
Because there, lying curled up and dozing on his imported mattress, covered only by a thin sheet, is Trevelyan.
They planned, usually.
The two of them, excruciatingly comparing schedules. Of course, Dorian’s is the one contributing most of the difficulty, unable to deviate from mandatory social gatherings and lawmaking sessions without risking losing what fragile ground he’d managed to gain. But then, even after all this time Trevelyan is not without his own engagements. When asked, he has an endless roster of deeds to perform, quests to follow up on for his newly recovered sister or errands to run for his brother, invitations onto Charger missions or tasks to be performed for the Red Jennies. He just never seems tied down by them. “They’ll get done when I do them”, he’d say. The freedom from a rigid timetable looks good on him, but the lack of structure makes arranging a rendezvous an endless pain.
When they don’t plan, it usually goes like this. A surprise spoiled, candles wasted, petals wilted.
Still. There is a man in his bed.
Dorian feels a smile tugging at his lips, sour mood wedging itself into the back of his mind. He snaps his fingers and brings a nearby lamp to life, gently pulling the sheet away with his other hand as he does. Delightedly, it appears Trevelyan is completely naked underneath; a trend that only asserts itself during these visits North. Even in the beginning of their relationship, when they were making love regularly, Trevelyan disliked being exposed for long.
Thank the Maker for the humidity.
Dorian lets out a small noise, sitting back on his heels and appreciating the view. He does feel sorry for (albeit unintentionally) ruining what was probably intended to be a very lovely night, but he is fairly confident that his lover will accept his apology.
“Alexiel.” He brushes his knuckles over the scars on his right cheek. “Wake up.”
Trevelyan is a light sleeper, so he begins to stir immediately. Dorian kneels down to kiss him on the mouth.
“You delightful man,” he says softly when they part. “I’m afraid I kept you waiting.”
“It’s alright.” Trevelyan is still blinking away sleep as he speaks, wiping his hand over an eye. “I like this room. Everything in it reminds me of you.”
Another kiss. Dorian watches Trevelyan lick his lips.
“Bourbon?”
“Just a little bit. Don’t nag. I didn’t realize I had you to look forward to.” He puts his hand on the back of Trevelyan’s neck the next time, another long pull. “Would you like me to go fetch the bottle?”
“No. Stay here.” Fingers scrabbling. Reaching for clasps and buckles, but this is a new set and Trevelyan just has the one hand to work with. Dorian laughs as he kisses him again, lightly shoving him back to the mattress.
“Patience. You can wait a minute longer.”
Trevelyan lies there, looking up at him with that sappy, dopey little smile as he undresses. Scanning the planes of his skin as they’re uncovered. Dorian slows his movements for him; a bit of cheek where once before it might have been an earnest show. He just can’t help the fondness on his own face.
When he’s freed of his Magisterium robes, it’s easier to breathe. He has always hated how heavy they were, how stifling. The uniform of a politician, defined primarily by excessive fabric. And Trevelyan sits up, head lolling on his shoulders, eyes glittering in the dim light.
“Get over here,” he rumbles. Dark. Pleased.
It still does things to him. Still makes his core shiver. Dorian tangles his fingers in his birthright, jewelry the only thing left on him. “A bit too tired for anything elaborate, I’m afraid,” he admits.
“That’s alright.” Trevelyan opens his arm for him. “C’mere.”
And Dorian crawls into the bed with him.
Maker, Trevelyan smells so good. His preference for rooftop travel always acquires him this pungent tang of burned magic. Close to cast signs and street lights. Dorian rather adores it. He sighs it out, “Amatus”, and Trevelyan takes this as invitation to move on top of him, legs tangling, arm bracing beside him on the mattress.
He feels whole again. Happy again. This is it, the pleasure he can only get here. Not something sharp and intense but leisurely, warm, tingling all the way down to his toes. Their bodies squirm together, mouths locking, lazily drifting in and out of that peaceful glow as they chase their release…
Dorian came to sprawled out on the mattress, alone.
For one dizzying moment he tasted the remains of the alcohol on his tongue and thought he was miserable and twenty again. Only to realize, no—he was still in his own room, sans headache but very much approaching forty, if his joints had anything to say about it.
Oh. He’d fallen asleep. Kaffas.
Trevelyan was still there. He sat on the edge of the bed, vaguely illuminated by a moon, back turned as though to display the scars patterned there, old and new. If he’d noticed that he wasn’t the only one awake anymore, he gave no indication. From this angle, he appeared to be examining his face in a mirror, though to what end it wasn’t clear.
For reasons he didn’t like to think on, this made him uneasy.
Dorian let out an inarticulate whine, and Trevelyan stirred once more. There was a small clatter as he set the mirror down on the side table and then fell back and rolled to rejoin him. Nothing abnormal about him, none of that disturbed blankness he sometimes had. Just awake. …Probably unsatisfied, too, judging by the sheets.
“It usually takes more alcohol to get me to fall asleep during sex,” Dorian finally grumbled, still muzzy.
“You really did have a rough day.”
“Politics,” he grumbled; helpless to let it come out now. The moment was over, of course, it had come and gone without him. “The worst thing my father ever did to me, throwing me in with those sharks. Giving me just enough rope to hang myself trying to tug the Magisterium just a little bit further from crushing the rest of the country under its weight.”
Trevelyan hummed. “You did budge it. If only a little.”
“Fat lot of good that’s done in the long run...”
“Oh Dorian…”
They kissed again, slow. They talked on the crystals so much that it was hard not to spend all of their time in-person just doing this. Locking themselves together until it would need a pry bar to separate them. The physical intimacy that was impossible so many days out of the year. Making up for lost time. If it were up to Dorian (and by the Maker, Tevinter had done absolutely everything to let him know it was not) then he would probably never leave this room, not as long as it had his Amatus inside it.
And Trevelyan was so very sweet with him. It was sickening, really. There was a delicate dexterity in those hands, even the mechanical one (though he wasn’t wearing it now), displayed most often when they were pulling the guts from animals or the villains felled by his bow. He made Dorian feel like so much soft meat. Something visceral and physical and tender, to be unspooled and caressed and then lovingly put back together again. He was probably the only man in the whole world who treated him so nicely.
It almost felt like their positions had reversed since the old days. When it was Trevelyan carrying the weight of everything on his shoulders, and Dorian whisking him away to get his mind off it. Sweet-talking him until he was docile as a lamb, at least until duty called and the battle found them again.
But even that wasn’t right because that hadn’t ended with abject failure, had it?
They parted, and Dorian pressed his lips together, scowling.
“Have you thought about it?” he heard in that soft Marcher intonation, lips almost on the skin of his shoulder. “What you’re going to do now?”
Dorian sighed. “I’ve already decided, haven’t I? …Carry it all on my back alone.”
“Like a turtle.”
“No, I’m so much more charming than a turtle.”
He felt Trevelyan run his fingers over the new streak of grey in his hair. “Grumpy little turtle with shiny silver buttons on his shell.”
“My body might be getting soft in the middle but my magic is very much capable of cooking you alive.”
“Your body is fine.”
The silence that once more fell between them felt thicker this time. It raised the hairs on his neck. Dorian had this way, now, of being able to tell when Trevelyan was getting ready to say something important. When it was a topic that caused him hesitation instead of just an inanity to thoughtlessly blurt out.
“Have you thought about where it ends?” And then, smaller, more delicate, “…Is there an end?”
The bedding rustled as Dorian sat up, trying to look somewhere, anywhere else other than those probing green eyes, picking at him like a bug in a bell jar. “Must we talk about this now?”
“—No. I’m sorry.”
“Let’s just sleep. Alright? Let’s not…I’m too tired for this, just keep me warm.”
Always the dutiful lover, Trevelyan slotted himself back in beside him as he fell back down. Always a bit too hot, body built for colder climes than this. Dorian let himself sink into it; again he felt that sensation, that he could get this nowhere else but here.
…That these precious few moments were all he was ever going to have.
And even though he didn’t want to think about it, he couldn’t stop himself. In the beginning, they had tried to convince themselves that there was some kind of domestic happy end for them down the road. Once all the Good Laws were passed and there were Good People in the Magisterium who could maintain them, he would retire and Trevelyan would put down his bow and rapier and they would find someplace to live the rest of their days in obscurity together. Oh, maybe it wouldn’t look like that, but it would be something. Lots of people had something. Why couldn’t he?
But now with the Lucerni dead in the water it looked impossible.
Now…any progress looked impossible.
So what was the new end supposed to look like? Give up and slink away with his tail between his legs? That was the only way he could get out of the Magisterium without it killing him first, it seemed. He couldn’t accept that, though. He couldn’t tolerate anything less than make a difference or die trying.
And what kind of answer was that to give to a lover?
Especially one who had already served his time changing the world. Already won. The blighted magister was dead, the South was saved, Divine Victoria was out there freeing mages and uplifting elves, all hail the Inquisitor.
If he were a different sort of man, he could just say something reassuring. Let Trevelyan sleep easier knowing that one day it would be different, one day they would share all their evenings instead of these frightfully scant little trysts punctuated by months of scattered conversations on the sending crystal. But making promises he couldn’t keep had never been a tactic available to him to smooth things over, and he knew that Trevelyan wouldn’t have believed him anyway. And so no words came to mind.
He didn’t want to have to choose. It was such a monumental injustice to make him after everything that sometimes his throat closed at the thought of it.
In the darkness, Trevelyan asked, “Do you have to be anywhere tomorrow?”
Another painful swallow, another wave of that itchy guilt. “In the morning, yes. Though an idle rich man’s idea of morning, so a bit closer to luncheon.” Still too early to have much time together. Maybe a meal.
There was a pause, and then “Should get you to sleep, then.”
In the early days this might have led into in an argument. They might have said things that hurt each other. Sometimes Dorian wished they would.
“…I’ll make it up to you,” he said, hating how insincere it sounded in the darkness of the room, but meaning it with every fiber of his being nonetheless. “I swear I will.”
“Make it up to me? Make what up to me?”
Trevelyan pulled Dorian in, arms twining around his back. Warm, always so warm. The dry heat that had kept him sane in blustery Skyhold nights. So different from the muggy heat of Tevinter…
“Right here, this is all I need. This is what I want.”
Dorian buried his face in his chest.
“I bet you stomped all the way down here with a thundercloud over your head and you smiled when you saw me.”
It wasn’t fair.
“You don’t know how happy that makes me.”
How was he supposed to deal with this, when pain and relief mingled into the same emotion?
“We can handle anything, you and I.”
His voice came out then. Tremulous and weak as sleep started to attack him once more. “Promise?”
A soft hum rumbled through Trevelyan’s chest, deep and rich. Grip relaxing as he too sank down below, eyes flickering dark and wide before they closed. His lips twitched, and beneath them his teeth looked unusually sharp.
“Promise.”