I've had this in mind for some time - looking forward to sharing it with you! I love to hear from you, and I welcome suggestions and constructive criticism. Enjoy!

Like a song of love that clings to me,
How the thought of you does things to me.

Unforgettable
In every way,
And forever more
That's how you'll stay.

- Nat King Cole

Cullen rolled over, seeking a cool place in the sheets. The hole in the ceiling above his bed kept the room cool—too cool, sometimes, when the snows of Skyhold blew, but he preferred that to the alternative. The heat of his body, burning with the need for lyrium, warmed the bed uncomfortably. Still deep in his dream, he moaned, a familiar voice purring softly in his mind.

"Cullen … Cullen, yes … please …" Her voice was barely more than a breath as she threw her head back against the wall, eyes closing in ecstasy as he filled her. Their brief time together rarely allowed for anything slow; they took their pleasure from one another swiftly but all the more intensely for the brevity of it. He tried to keep his eyes open to watch Leyden's face as she achieved her pleasure, but he couldn't; the way she squeezed him within her was rapidly pushing him to the edge.

Biting back their cries, they shuddered against one another. Cullen let her down, one hand passing over the unruly black hair she could never keep tamed. She rarely bothered, too busy. If there was one mage in the Tower who was determined to pass her Harrowing with flying colors, it was Leyden Amell. She was everywhere, learning whatever she could, working as if there was some goal before her, some plan for her life beyond what the Circle offered.

"We—I should go," she whispered breathlessly as Cullen pressed kisses along the side of her face.

"A few more minutes," Cullen begged.

"And be caught?" She pushed at him. "Sometimes I think you want us to be caught."

"Sometimes I think you dally with me for your pleasure alone," he snapped. He grabbed her wrist as she tried to turn away from him. "Tell me you love me."

"You know I love you, Cullen. But you know the consequences for me if someone finds us."

"No greater than those for me."

"Really?" Leyden's blue eyes sparked at him. "Will your mind be severed from all emotion, all connection with dreams or love?" When he didn't respond, she spat, "I didn't think so."

"I would never let them make you Tranquil!"

"You wouldn't have the choice. Now let me go!" She tore her wrist from his grasp, leaving him standing there as she hurried off in a huff. Why did every encounter have to end in an argument, when he loved her so desperately?

"Leyden," he sighed, the word a broken whisper lost to the wind that blew through his room, and he rolled over again, lost in the shifting landscape of the Fade and the dream memories it brought him.

Leliana leaned on the battlements, hardly feeling the chill wind as it blew about her. She was lost in thought, her mind far away in an even chillier place—a flimsy tent high in the Frostbacks, near the entrance to Orzammar. A guttering dark lantern dimly lit the space, but it gave more light than she had needed …

"You are tense, my darling. Let me massage you."

"It's no good, Leliana. The darkspawn …" Leyden closed her eyes and shuddered, pressing her face against Leliana's chest. The Deep Roads had been long and dark and had weighed down on Leyden and on Alistair until both the Wardens had nearly broken from the pressure. "It's too much. I … I don't think I can go on."

"Hush, now, of course you can." Leliana put her arms gently around the slim form of her lover, drawing Leyden closer, stroking the long black braid of the mage's hair. She rocked her back and forth, humming a comforting song, feeling Leyden begin to weep against her. "There, yes, that's it. Let go, just for a little while."

Leyden rarely wept, preferring to present an unflappable face to the world; Leliana treasured this moment, the trust implicit in being allowed to witness her lover's tears.

She pressed her cheek against Leyden's hair. "It will pass. Tomorrow will bring a new challenge, a different challenge. And in the meantime, I will keep you safe." She kept humming, the melody a counterpoint to the sobs of the woman in her arms.

Leliana hummed that song again now, her eyes on the mountains that ringed Skyhold. In the end, she hadn't kept Leyden safe, had she? Hadn't kept her at all, in fact. She sighed, drawing her gaze back to the present, to the Inquisition, and turning around to go back inside the rookery.

Alistair looked forward, between the horse's ears to the road ahead, the members of his retinue preceding him, and couldn't help contrasting it with another time, when his own feet carried him forward, ill-fitting boots raising blisters, when instead of this careful military silence, afraid lest assassins sneak up on the King while he passed, there had been chatter, the singing of Leliana, Zevran's endless innuendoes, Morrigan's cool sarcasm, and Leyden …

"It will be mine to do. I am the King, Leyden! It's my responsibility to my people to save them from the Blight!"

"It's your responsibility to your people to be the best king you can be, not to throw your life away."

"So instead you expect me to stand by while you sacrifice yourself? I can't, Leyden. I can't! I love you too much to let you do that." He pulled her against him, breathing in the scent of her glossy black hair, holding her tight so that he could pretend nothing would ever part them again.

She leaned back enough to look up at him, enough so that he could see the tears pooling in her beautiful blue eyes. "Do you think I love you any less? Do you think I could live knowing I had let you die in my stead?"

"If only there was another way, a loophole …"

Leyden blinked, looking away, a spasm of pain crossing her features. "There isn't. And if you won't promise to let me take the last blow, I'll leave you behind here, under guard if I have to."

She would do it, without hesitation. It was that strength he loved in her; what would he ever do without her?

"Promise, Alistair!"

"I promise," he whispered now, to the horse, feeling the pain again as if it was all new.

"Your Majesty?" His captain of the guard, hearing him speak, spurred his horse closer. "Did you need something?"

"No, nothing, Panos. Thank you."

"Very good, sire."

"How long to Skyhold?"

"Another two days of easy riding, sire."

"Thank you."

Panos nodded, dropping back again, leaving the King of Ferelden to ride alone with his memories.

Varric stamped his feet, wishing himself back in front of his cozy fire. He had taken rooms in a seedy tavern, over Bartrand's loud protests about how unseemly it was, and he looked forward to going back and settling in at a table, maybe making up a story or two. If this contact from the Merchants Guild ever showed.

"Looking for someone?"

He turned and found himself face to face with the brightest eyes he had ever seen. "I, uh …"

"Scintillating. Come on." The owner of those eyes turned around and walked off, apparently trusting him to follow her.

He did; he couldn't have done otherwise. The rest of her was put together pretty well, too, he couldn't help but notice. Maybe this whole escapade would turn out to be worth it.

She led him down an alleyway. At the end of it, she touched a couple of bricks in the wall and a secret door opened up, smoothly, as if it were on springs.

"Impressive," Varric said, studying the mechanism as he went through.

"You think so? Hardly my best work."

Looking around, he muttered, "I guess not." The walls were hung with blueprints and schematics, and every table was cluttered with parts and tools and what appeared to be partially built prototypes. "You must have a lot of time on your hands," Varric observed.

She shook her head. "There's never enough time in a day." As if she had forgotten he was there, he watched her run her hands over a partially built something-or-other, her touch gentle, almost reverent. With a start, she pulled herself away and turned to look at him. "Sorry. I have the payment over here. Tell Bartrand the next shipment needs to be on time."

"Yeah, I'll do that." He could just see himself telling his brother that, and then sitting through the rant that would follow. Not a chance.

The girl smiled. "No, you won't."

"You're right. I won't. But I will look into the shipment for you, see if I can get it rescheduled without bothering Bartrand about it."

"Thanks." She held out one of those small, capable hands to him. "I'm Bianca Davri."

He shook the offered hand, staring into those bright eyes. "Varric Tethras."

"Pleasure to meet you, Varric Tethras."

Varric sighed, running his hand over the wooden body of Bianca the crossbow. He didn't like to think about how long it had been since he saw the original Bianca, or how long before that it had been that he had the chance to run his hands over her in the supple flesh. It was the price he paid for loving a woman who cared for her work far above anything else in her life, and usually he was … well, if not willing, at least philosophical about the need to pay that price.

Not that anyone else he knew had exactly been successful in the love arena; at least he was in good company. He had his stories, the people in his head who looked almost but not quite like the ones in the real world, who acted and spoke the way he told them to. And he was saving the world at the Inquisitor's side, making up for the failures of his past, for not having killed Corypheus thoroughly enough. That would be enough, he told himself. It would have to be.

"You must be this Champion I've been hearing so much about." His smile was wide and genuine, and he held his hand out like they were two companions meeting on a battlefield, not at all like he was the King of Ferelden and she a jumped-up peasant. "Alistair Theirin."

"Lilias Hawke." Her answering smile was distracted; she was angry about Meredith, and a little annoyed to find the King of Ferelden and the Knight-Commander of Kirkwall shouting at each other, albeit politely, in the middle of the Viscounts' Keep. And over the fate of Fereldan refugees, too, the same ones Lilias had been fighting on behalf of all these years. Where had these two been then, when the city had been overrun with refugees starving and freezing and terrified? It was too little too late, in Lilias's opinion.

"I'm sorry you had to see that," he said. He looked toward the door, watching Meredith and her retinue exit. "Is she always that … forceful?"

"For her, that was lenient."

"I see. So if I'm going to convince any of the refugees to give Ferelden another chance, it'll have to be quietly?"

"I'd say so."

"Well, in that case, maybe I should start at the top." His eyes were on her. They were brown, warm, with gold flecks.

Why was she staring at his eyes? Get a grip, Lilias. "I could give you a list of names, I suppose."

"That … would be a start. Yes." He smiled again.

Hunched miserably on the back of a horse, Lilias tried to banish the memory of that smile. It had brought her nothing but trouble.

Crossing the mountains into Ferelden again felt like coming home. But it wasn't, either, she reminded herself. Her father, her mother, her brother … all ashes, somewhere between here and the Golden City. The hovel they'd called home in Lothering, no doubt burned long ago to destroy whatever taint lay inside it.

"Remind me why we're doing this again?" she asked her companion.

Merrill's cheerful laugh dispelled some of the gloom that had settled on Lilias. "Because Varric asked us to, and because I've never yet known you to be able to refuse Varric."

"He is perversely charming," Lilias agreed, smiling, as Merrill had no doubt meant her to, at the mention of her dearest friend's name.

"It will all come right, Hawke. I feel it."

"Can you sense the future?"

"Well, no," Merrill admitted, "but isn't it nicer to look on the bright side?"

"I suppose." Lilias squared her shoulders and tried to think of the Fereldan mud clinging to her horse's hooves as a sign of home.

"Put the knives down."

Did this woman think he was nuts? Thule shook his head. "They're daggers."

"Whatever. Put them down."

"And leave myself totally defenseless against whatever that thing was you just fought? Not a chance, lady."

Cassandra paused, folding her arms over her chest in a gesture that had already become familiar to him in the brief time they had spent together, her eyes coolly making their way over him. He had been more thoroughly studied by women, he supposed, but never with his clothes on. He put on a cheeky smile that probably didn't make him look any more trustworthy, but made him feel a damned sight better.

"Fine," she snapped at last. And then, less aggressively, "You're right. You should have the tools to save yourself; we are bound to run into more demons." A glint of humor came into her eyes, lighting up her whole face in a way Thule found fascinating. "Besides, if you had any brains at all, you would have killed me already."

Thule chuckled. "I may yet, you never know."

He sighed, studying the sketch pad on his lap. He liked to draw—it was entertaining and kept his fingers limber. But he had never had any luck at all capturing on paper what it was that made Cassandra so beautiful. Her bone structure was easy, so defined and strong in her face, and her fine carriage, which proclaimed her noble upbringing, but … the spark that livened her, the determination that drove her, the occasional flashes of humor that made Thule constantly hungry for more of that side of her … those eluded his pencil strokes, no matter how many times he tried.

Thule put his feet up and stared at the latest drawing, as if he were willing it to come to life and call him a romantic fool for imagining that she felt anything similar to what he did. But … sometimes … her eyes would warm with humor, or soften with something else altogether, and he couldn't help thinking—

He leaned his head back against the wall, closing his eyes and letting himself imagine what it might be like. His head nodded, his chin coming to rest on his chest, the paper slipping from his fingers and fluttering to the floor, and he slept.