A Candle in the Darkness (A Dragon Age: Inquisition fanfiction)

Oh, That Question

17 Wintersend, 9:42

Antonia was at breakfast, eating with a hearty appetite, when Cullen appeared. She stifled a laugh at the look on his face.

He took the seat next to her, leaned over, and said, "Where is it?"

She couldn't hold back her laughter any further, and took a few minutes to get it under control, minutes in which Cullen watched her, trying to keep a straight face himself, and then eventually lost the battle as well. Whether the rest of the room could tell that they were really laughing out of happiness and not because it was a particularly funny joke, Antonia neither knew nor cared.

At last she managed to get herself under control. "I believe, Commander, we agreed on certain parameters. Besides, it looks better."

His ever-present breastplate was missing, along with the ridiculous fur-collared robe, and the lack of them made him look more casual, more dressed-down somehow, and fairly breathtaking. She would have loved to be able to drag him back to her quarters right now, but there was a day's work to be put in, the cares of the Inquisition not so light that they could be put aside that easily, even for love.

"You're really going to make me go looking for it?"

"Oh, I don't think you're going to have to look very hard."

His eyes darkened in a way that was coming to be deliciously familiar, dropping to her mouth.

Antonia bit her lower lip, soothing the bite with her tongue, as she had done to him before. Cullen caught his breath, looking away. "That's not fair."

She grinned. "You should have some breakfast, Commander. You've got a long day ahead of you, got to keep up your strength."

Leaving him there, she took her plate to the sideboard. Dorian joined her as she left the main hall. "Congratulations, dear girl."

She winced, knowing her cheeks must be aflame. "Is it that obvious?"

"Well, that, and everyone knows Eustace is up there putting locks on the office doors. Not a bad idea, that."

"It was his. Eustace's, that is."

"And?"

"Dorian, I'm not telling you a thing. From here on out, if you want to know about someone's love life, you'd better go get one of your own." She glanced at the tavern significantly.

"You don't know what you're saying."

"I know exactly what I'm saying. Stop moping about it. We can all see it's mutual, so go after it!"

"Easy for you to say. What's it been, eight months waiting for you two to get this far?"

"About that, yes. The Conclave was over a year ago now. It seems unbelievable." She closed her eyes, not wanting to think of it. They had performed a ceremony on the anniversary, but the pain was really too fresh; it had been a brief service in the Chantry, nothing more. "On a brighter note, Wintersend is coming."

She had received another note from Mia Chaffee, confirming their arrival in another week; Flissa was hard at work preparing rooms and making out lists of the people in Skyhold and organizing when they could all invite families or be spared for visits home, and keeping it all impressively under wraps. Yvette Montilyet had confirmed that she and a few other family members were on their way. The special visitor Varric had been trying to contact hadn't been heard from, but Antonia hoped it would work out.

The rest of the day was busy with a thousand details. Antonia tried to keep her mind on her work, but she kept remembering moments from the night before, touches and kisses and sounds that had her in a near-constant state of arousal. She wondered if the same thing was happening to Cullen; she certainly hoped so.