AN: A little something I put together after falling in love with the Solas/Lavellan pairing.

Musical Suggestion: Thedas Love Theme (by Trevor Morris)

Please note that this is a post-game fic and thus DOES have spoilers.

Disclaimer: As per usual - I do not own DA:I or the characters, nor am I making any money off of them.

Enjoy,

Voi

She thinks of him often, dreams of him every night, though she says nothing to anyone of the nightmares.

The months of fighting mages, templars, venatori and demons have all taken their toll, and even now she is plagued with visions of that terrible future soaked in blood and red lyrium. Of Solas dying, locked away in that prison while the poison of that unnatural stone sickened him.

But mostly she thinks of him as he was the last time she saw him. Wonders silently at where he might be and when her heart might stop its piteous weeping in her chest.

She is not sure she has the strength to carry both the mantle of Inquisitor as well as this leaden weight that has settled between her lungs. Her every breath is a trial, and for all of her silence her throat remains raw, aching with the force of some soundless scream that started the moment he disappeared.

Cole knows, or at least, he very likely senses the direction of her thoughts. That he keeps silent says as much about their close relationship as it does the fragility of her own state.

Her loss has been one borne with dignity, with the iron determination responsible for saving Thedas. But even now she can feel the exhaustion in her limbs, the heaviness on her shoulders, a weariness no amount of duty can overcome. If this continues for much longer it will be more than just her heart that suffers, and she refuses to let the Inquisition down.

Something must be done. But she cannot imagine what that might be.

Days filled with leading, fighting, serving the people of Thedas, she remains a steadfast servant to the Inquisition. But the slipping has already started, and more than once has Dorian come to her with that look in his eye that let's her know he suspects something.

The business of ruling is also more solitary that one might expect, and though the days spent traveling to familiar places are easy to ignore, the true test comes whenever she returns to Skyhold.

She has all but abandoned her bedroom, and she avoids the room of murals at all costs. It is not just the sight of those paintings but everything about it that threatens to undo her, and she cannot, will not, go there and stand in the shadow of where he should be.

But there is one thing she cannot avoid no matter how hard she tries. A burden and a gift. The cloak she has used to hide her looking glass does nothing to help, its presence just as damning as the reflection she knows would look back at her if she but raised its corner.

A face without vallaslin.

His last gift to her.

"Bare faced and embarrassed", Cole had said when he had confronted Solas, "She thinks it is her fault and she does not understand."

It had been nearly a month and she could not say she was any closer to understanding what had driven him away. But somehow, someway, she had to find a way to weather this storm that raged, had to find a way to free herself from the stifling hurt.

Ar lasa mala revas.

His words whisper to her across time, slip from the darkness of the evening to wrap around her.

You are free.

But no matter what markings he removed, or how far away he traveled, freedom was not something he could grant her with his disappearance.

Her heart was bound by something far stronger than that.

Silken thread tied by tender glances and the timbre of his voice.

By the brush of his lips and fingers.

Lover's Knot.

Left behind but ever binding.