Brittle Eyes, Brittle Dreams

1

She didn't waver as Skyhold's gates opened. Her chin was staunch and stalwart. Her eyes shone, but so did every other soldier's against the stiff winds. Her hands were quiet fists in bulky gloves, clenched to conserve their warmth as much as to keep them from shaking. One huddled mass looked much the same as another to a tower guard. It was nothing noteworthy. It was nothing strange.

Her shoulders were hunched, as ever, but anyone glancing at her wouldn't have seen the convulsions. They were disguised too well.

She had borrowed another soldier's armor that very morning, knowing that Inquisition scouts were so prodigious at clearing the mountain paths that she wouldn't need the best of armor for the final leg of the journey. The set she'd chosen was two sizes too large and made of thick plate, nothing at all like the delicate scales of her favored equipment.

The extra metal set a chill in her core, but it almost completely concealed her shaking – and, despite its extra weight, it was stiff enough to keep her standing upright, a proposal which would have otherwise proven challenging.

In the main courtyard, sentries coming and going from watches or missions observed the usual courtesies as she passed by, but she hardly acknowledged them.

No matter. Every able body who had managed to return with her was in the same general state of dumbfounded weariness. As she shuffled through the atrium, the lingering smells of a hearty supper only served to turn her stomach further. Each crackle of each inviting hearth and torch only made her twitch and flinch on this night. The vibrant hues cast by the flames did little to brighten her ashen face. Her heavy plate boots – also borrowed, though for the purely practical reason of support for a sprained ankle – imposed a grim, echoing patter through the hall.

She abandoned the idea of scaling her private stairwell in armor when her foot buckled after just three steps. She tugged her gloves off with her teeth, which only made her gums ache when she accidentally bit down on metal instead of leather. Her fingers shakily plucked at straps on the boots, which she heaved against the wall with a clatter when she was finally free of them.

The process to remove the remainder of the armor was similarly lengthy. Her face was flushed by the time she completed the ritual. Her nose reddened. She sat in silence, momentarily satisfied that she had at least found a solitary corner to retreat to.

She stayed fixed in place for an hour. Finally craving her quarters and a more hospitable material than ancient stones to lean her head against, she managed to scale an entire flight of stairs before pausing again. She struggled on as far as the forgotten Red Templar banner, the one whose presence utterly baffled everyone in Skyhold, including her. She watched it flutter slightly in an invisible draft, transfixed by the color otherwise absent in the passageway.

Her ankle actively throbbed. She sat again and sobbed, but it gave way to something else when her throat was raw enough.

She slept.

* * *

"There must be easier ways to bring discomfort on yourself."

She jerked awake and reflexively gasped at the sound of a voice – any voice. She drew a few chaotically rapid breaths before she fully processed the face before her. "Who told you where I was?" she rumbled.

Solas kept a neutral look, though the light in his eyes seemed to shift to something still and careful. "No willing person would choose such a place for sleep without a reason."

She blinked, slow to realize both the apparent passage of time and her place within it. "And what about you? It's an ungodly hour for anyone but a bandit."