Chapter Text
They act as though the matter was all but assured to deprive themselves of the blame for being outmaneuvered. My, look how they revel. It must be divine to be so deeply undeserving of the title you are allotted because you’ve suppressed your subject’s expectations of what you can accomplish.
True to the Empress’s musings, the storm had not abated, but for the thunder of the orchestra, who could hear emptiness left in the wake of white lightning. In this ivory tower, the courtiers, the monarchs, and the privileged humans would endeavor to forget the plights of those cold, damp, and hungry. And who was the Empress of Orlais to appreciate them, anyhow?
Celene grew weary and blamed the storm for the headache as she withdrew from the festivities to the empty corridors where guards looked more like statues and her victory lap felt hollow.
There was simply no other alternative. Losing in the Game was too often a finite matter.
There was too much to do.
Upon reaching her destination, the Empress turned to note her Chevalier had at some point fallen into step with her. Celene was getting distracted if anyone could startle her.
“We are not to be disturbed.” It wasn’t a request.
He opened the door, uttering a respectful though brief, “ Oui , Your Radiance.”
The door was sealed behind her, but her steps did not slow. Nor did she send for her handmaiden. Instead, the Empress approached her desk and dipped a quill into the thick, viscous ink in oxblood. The quill tip touched paper before she had even fully sat down.
Much like any other political survival, it came with enacting, beginning, and ending carefully carved out plans.
---
It must have been hours before the sharp ache in Celene’s head breached the intense concentration.
She rang the bell across the desk, Emeline likely placing it there because she recognized her charge was more likely to be at a desk and require aid, than in bed or reclining on the lovely chaise across the way.
She had yet to confront Emeline, her elven handmaiden, about the peculiar appearance of Briala, nor how a courtier of Orlais breached the heavily guarded privacy of the Empress.
But the Empress kept her tongue still as the elven woman set a cup of hot Rivaini tea before her. The scent of the blend caused an involuntary relaxation down her spine which, in turn, reminded her of the sheer weight of her dress.
Celene lifted her assessing eyes to the woman until she disappeared behind her, making quick work of the laces of her gown.
What could Emeline say? Oui, I serve the Marquise, as do all elves who value their lives, Your Radiance. There was no answer that would satisfy the Empress. The notion of depriving her an outlet that granted her reprieve from the daily horrors of racism wrought throughout Thedas felt like a betrayal of her promise to Briala.
Instead, she sipped her tea, thankful it was prepared perfectly. Thankful when she could stand without an ache in her spine as Emeline removed the burdens from her body.
The handmaiden coaxed her Mistress to a warm bath that chased away the last remnants of the headache.
--
When Emeline finally left her side for the evening, she did so with a genuine smile. “Congratulations on the victory, Your Radiance. There will be many men and women that will fill their bellies and their family’s with work at the docks thanks to you.”
She parted her lips to say something more but shut them and bowed instead, leaving by way of a hidden passage built into the wall of Celene’s bedroom.
She might have gone to bed if the absence hadn’t felt so palpable upon Emeline’s disappearance. Perhaps it was due to the sight of the panel that reminded her of summer nights in Val Royeaux, trading her mantle of Empress for lover as easily as untying her mask.
Perhaps that is the easy answer, no? Briala was a tragedy that paid interest. Anora was the travesty of her own making.
Her gaze shifted to the bedsheets, remembering fondly their passion-filled night. She refused to be victim to what-ifs , so as the memories filled her thoughts, she didn’t allow them to linger. The warmth of her body, the shared miscommunication they suffered for one another, the indignities they endured—as the end had come it was plainly no longer worth it. If it had been, would Celene not be dabbing perfume at her pulse points in anticipation?
It ended as it began, with one assumption and fear prevailing beyond basic communication. A fitting end for an ill-fitted love.
Then there was a tightness in her chest that, at first, Celene assumed was a poison. Perhaps it was some kind of deathroot extract, constricting her breathing. She moved to her bedside, sliding the dagger from beneath her pillow and pressing a plate at the base of the hilt. The mechanism ejected a powder upon her finger. Just as she brought it to her lips she heard a sob.
It had come from her own body.
If I can sob, I can breathe. The thought did little to reassure her, lowering her hand to replace the mechanism and steady herself as another sob wracked her.
Her gaze burned, and tears threatened to fall, but Celene endured the brief betrayal with slow, controlled breaths. As if this, too, was a poison for which she needed to steady her heart rate in order to survive.
When the emotions subsided to a level she was accustomed to, she took a seat at her vanity and applied a salve to her eyelids. She smoothed her lips with a balm, noting a thinness to her face that called for a change in diet upon her return to Val Royeaux.
“--the devil do you think you are?! If I have—” muffled indignation caught her attention, and suddenly the Empress was alert.
“—command me, I serve the greatest monarch of the greatest Empire in a—”
Celene rose to her feet, slipping on a mask and winding on a robe of cerulean silk, lined in golden thread. Her hands busied with a bottle as she moved toward the door, setting it down on a side table in the dining area just as she dabbed the sweetened honeysuckle on the quickened pulse her throat.
---
The sheer audacity of this minor Lordling was unacceptable . He did not possess the authority to deprive the Queen of Ferelden an audience with his better.
“With all due respect to your age-old ancestor’s achievements, you are a guard dog who should be informing your great monarch that she has a visitor, you half-wit! The Empress would be better served with a mabari who’s twice the brains and half the trouble.”
His jaw was so tight it could ground bone into meal. He didn’t get the opportunity to respond to the personal slight as the door opened, announcing they had both managed to disrupt the no interruptions command issued by his Empress. He had the decency to lower his head in equal parts respect and shame.
But Celene’s gaze was locked on Anora’s, “Your Majesty,” the shock was evident, but her recovery seamless. “It is fine, Our Champion,” she soothed the battered ego. “We will be leaving Antiva City so soon, a brief discussion before Our final hours is permissible.”
The Empress moved into the room, expecting the Queen and Champion to manage their duties well enough to enter a doorway without more dissent.
The sound of the door shutting softly informed Celene her faith had not been misplaced. She felt the silence distinctly and opted to enter her drawing room, putting away her writing tools and sealing letters shut. In hindsight, Anora’s entitlement to reading her correspondence would have been grounds for a rather testy fight. But to the Empress’s surprise, the Fereldan Queen resisted.
Instead, she moved to the other side of the desk as though a physical barrier were a boon.
“…Jader,” Anora began, letting her fingertips stroke the unoccupied pen slot engraved at the edge of the desk. “… We made arrangements for this year and next, but it will not suffice for your plans.”
Celene steadied her movements once everything was neatly ordered and let her gaze trace the red silks adorning the blonde woman, the sight of her stirring her passions anew. The statement, however, softened the tempest she had prepared herself for. Anora came to discuss business, at least on pretext. It was a welcome reprieve. Pouring herself a cup of tea, she gestured toward an empty teacup and Anora shook her head.
Celene suppressed bitter mirth as she observed that keeping their lips shut was proving the most effective communication thus far.
“ Oui , Your Majesty. We thought that goodwill could be had in the two years of this contract. That if you observe Our calculations are correct, and your country prospers, we could have grounds for renegotiations.”
To Celene’s scrutiny, that was not the answer that pleased the Queen of Ferelden.
Anora continued to trace the indention as though it were worthy of her notice and, more obviously, nothing else was . She parted her lips to espouse the protest she was always eager to serve, but a sigh escaped instead.
So it was a pretext, Celene concluded.
The emptiness of the shared silence left a weight that seemed to cut right through both women. If it wasn’t about Jader, it was about the morning and the barbed words wielded like blunt weapons—Ferelden against Orlais, the eternal battle started by long-dead men, and ended by their more sensible heirs. Yet here they stood, regardless, at the beginning of yet another conflict. To hope for more, the Empress accepted, was a Sisyphean task. And in the end it was simpler just to keep battered bonds severed. It was cleaner than attempting to fit them together.
Anora spoke first, though lighter in timbre than she’d begun, “I was surprised you retired so early. I’d have bet good coin that we’d see a victory lap.” There was mirth in her voice, and a smile that softened the sting.
Celene remained passive, observing the Fereldan Queen dodge yet another honest attempt for closure. The Empress’s lips curled, offering the shadow of a smile. It was another nonverbal communication which evoked a fracturing of Anora’s mirth.
Finally, the Empress lifted the teacup to her lips and took a private moment for herself, enjoying the sudden rush of spice as it warmed her throat. It felt as if it was the only warmth in her at all.
Lowering the base of the teacup into the grooves of the saucer, Celene met Anora’s unwavering gaze. Something lingered within it.
“You wore a ring earlier today, one that conjured images of arranged marriages with courtly Ferelden Lords,” Celene began, “It was from Cailan, no ?”
Anora’s eyebrows pinched together in obvious distaste, “You seriously think I’d bind myself to some other man after what happened?” The Ferelden Queen bit back the reply that burned her throat.
Though incredulous, the Empress felt a fool the moment Anora spoke. She did not enjoy being the thrall of a man, her body used for his pleasures, her obedience her greatest asset to them. No, her Ferelden counterpart was orders of magnitude more competent than any mabari-for-a-brain beau that sat upon the throne.
“…Were you jealous?” The Ferelden Queen posited, studying the masked face of the Empress.
Celene bit back her instinctive disdain. It left them both to silence once more. Though the night air was warm, the Empress clutched her robe tighter as though she felt a chill. Cutting her gaze to the storm outside as a crack of thunder filled the quiet, Celene drew nearer to the window and steadied herself along the frame.
Finally, “It is too risky. To marry and have a lover.“ The Empress put much more thought into the cost-benefits analysis than her words conveyed. How many years had she conjured ways to keep Briala? How many ways did she reach the same, disappointing conclusion? “If you’d have married, I--… We wouldn’t have interfered.”
Anora bit back the poison she wanted to spit at her, choosing instead to assess the woman behind the sudden bout of conscience. The Ferelden Queen never wore a physical mask, but her face was impassive.
The silence that followed caused the Empress no small amount of discomfort. She turned sharply, studying the sudden restraint from her guest. Anora seemed, at times, incapable of control. Something was different—changed, even.
The Ferelden Queen did not flinch by the sudden scrutiny, instead shaking her head. “Appreciative for the sudden marital respect years late.” The sting was sharp, but only a glancing barb. “But I am not wedding any Lord, Fereldan or not.” She let the words linger, searching for reactions.
The Empress was unreadable behind her moonstone half-mask.
Anora lifted a single, manicured eyebrow. “Your answer has not changed, then? You mean to end our… dalliance ?”
“ Oui ,” simply put.
Pain shot through the Fereldan Queen’s vision like lightning spearing a tree; blinding, sharp, and suffocating. Beside the burning in her eyes, she bit back the tempest. “Tell me why.”
Heart ache left a kind of lingering fatigue beyond pain, sickness, poisons, or even exhaustive effort. It seeped into one's bones and made them brittle. It fogged the mind, and shadowed the sun. Celene felt it acutely in that moment for the second time in her life.
“If not now—then when?” The Empress’s voice was drained of its usual melodic tone.
“When? When should we end the dalliance? What are you prattling on about? Why is what I asked.”
Celene chuckled and it was hollow. She moved from the window, standing beside her former lover, pouring herself a fresh cup of piping hot tea from the enchanted teapot. “Should We not ask you the same? If you do not accept the answer given, then explain to Us why it should continue? Has it caused you anything but self-loathing and strife?” She lifted the teacup to her lips and imbibed.
Anora set her jaw.
The Empress continued, “Between your obvious disdain for the people of Orlais, and the flimsy pretense that surrounds every rendezvous, We cannot fathom your purpose for asking such a silly question.”
The laissez-faire flippancy of Celene began to fray at Anora. But it became apparent to her, in this moment, that if she did not provide the Empress a reason, she truly would lose her.
Celene lowered her teacup to the grooves of the saucer once more, but for the slight tremble in her hand, it failed to fit its base. It never spilled. It felt as though its grooves no longer puzzled together as they once did. The Empress felt that acutely in that moment. How long had it been since her edges fit anything quite right?
Anora moved closer, lifting a jeweled hand to the teacup. Taking the handle carefully between her thumb and forefinger, she slid the teacup forward. Its lopsided angle leveled. The base fit perfectly.
“It may end--Maker knows we carry more scars than the sky.” Anora found the widened eyes of the Empress and studied the eyes beneath the painted precious metal. “But when Darkspawn invaded Denerim, I didn’t abandon it to save my skin.”
The Empress turned, but two fingers slid beneath her chin and coaxed her back. Anora’s gaze speared hers with the heat of a still-beating—still-breaking heart.
“When the bastard son of Maric walked into the Landsmeet to sever my tie to the country I love , I didn’t suffer him. I fought .”
She took another step forward, closing the space between them.
“They demanded my father’s head, Celene. The entire country demanded I put my father to the sword, my father, who rescued us from Imperial rule. My father— the hero —for choosing his daughter over his philandering son-in-law.”
Anora swallowed back the emotion that clung to the back of her throat, “ So I sent him from my side . Despite the constant threats to my rule; the assassination attempts—the discontent. Sometimes, even if you ultimately fail…”
Some things are worth fighting for.
Before the words could breathe life into a relationship fraught, and suffocating; the Empress of Orlais silenced her Fereldan colleague with the pressure of lips against hers.
Celene’s lips tasted salty, and her mouth—spicy. The scent of honeysuckle invaded Anora’s mind. It blanked her thoughts, and numbed the despondency. Her hands responded, finally, as if from a stupor, winding her arms about the Empress’s waist. The silk of Celene’s robe felt luxurious against her hands, and she let her fingers sink beyond the few layers and grip muscle, sinew, and bone. Her body was a marvel; lacking all bulk for dexterity at any cost. She was lean, and wiry—Anora could feel every quickened breath in her abdomen, and the traitorous heart that warmed the Empress’s body anytime the Fereldan Queen laid claim to it.
After a long beat, Celene finally broke the kiss. Lifting her hand, the sound of rustling followed as she slid the mask from her face.
“If you believe this is a worthy fight...” For all the melancholy that plagued her voice, there was a fire among the embers. “But I am not your enemy. I am your lover —and I am the heart and soul of Orlais. Learn to love her; flaws and all.”
Anora bit back the trained response, dismissing the bile that rose and forcing herself to listen to each word. In the best possible light, the Empress was a visionary. In the worst, an entitled imperial without a hint of remorse for the damage her predecessors have caused the Ferelden people. It was impossible for the Fereldan Queen to dismiss the atrocities out of hand, but she couldn’t continue down the old path, either. Instead, she moderated her impression.
Studying Celene, Anora spoke firmly but softly, “Foreign policy between Ferelden and Orlais has been strained from scores of atrocities primarily executed for Orlesian conquest. That said, I do not believe warmongering is what you want. I recognize Ferelden is not yet an equal partner on the Greater Thedas stage. I intend to see that it is. Thus, I welcome a new relationship. One that does not leave room for those that succeed us to thwart.”
It wasn’t love, but it wasn’t hate, either , Celene thought to herself. After a moment, her lips warmed with a smile. A smile that chased away the fatigue in her eyes, and tension in her neck. It coaxed the headache to a dull throb.
If nothing else, the Empress Orlais was a skilled diplomat in and outside of the game.
“I will never forget what has been done. Orlais stands prepared to make right what was wrong. I give you my word, mon chou .” Though the smile melted away as she rapidly watched confusion etch the lovely features upon the Ferelden Queen’s face.
“Cabbage?” Anora puzzled over the meaning.
The Empress’s eyebrow lifted high, and her own confusion surfaced. “You understand me? You speak Orlesian?”
Anora narrowed her eyes, having been caught in her omission. There were numerous conversations she’d overheard in the presence of Orlesians with their ignorance believing the Fereldan Queen would deprive herself a tool to use against them simply because her last name was Loghain.
Before the caged Fereldan felt she was under attack, the Empress lifted her hand and stroke the contour of Anora’s jaw. “It is a term of affection. One given by lovers, “ her fingertips slid down the length of her long neck, dipping into the hollow softly before studying the puzzle of her dress.
The tension in the Fereldan’s shoulders ebbed with every Orlesian stroke. Anora allowed the touch to soothe her, granting herself that bit of reprieve before her lips curled in a flash of mirth. “Then that shall be your name from me, too.”
It almost took Celene’s breath away. How long had it been since she felt safe to sink into arms? She did just that, winding her arms up and around the backs of Fereldan Queen’s shoulders, drawing Anora against her and resting contentedly. “Stay with me tonight, mon trésor .”
Anora’s hand rose from around her waist and traced up the Empress’s spine. She lowered her chin, letting her lips brush the shell of Celene’s ear. “I had no intention of leaving, Cabbage.” She punctuated the statement by lowering her chin and pressing her lips in the shadow of her jaw.
Celene’s eyes snapped open at the literal translation of the pet name. The protest, though, died in her throat as her eyes disappeared beneath their lids at the touch of Ferelden lips.
--
In a similar fashion to the laws of nature—all matter attracts all matter. The pull, too, of antimatter towards antimatter. In nature, molecules conform to others, changing their structure to fit their pieces together. Though neither molecule remains the same, they nevertheless become something new together.
In this way; nature mimics love.
The end.