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Blackwall’s spent most of his life sharing close quarters with others and now the camp tents of the Inquisition are no different. Bodies find their own ways in sleep, for warmth or company or comfort, he knows. Awakening to a fellow soldier nestled under his arm or a leg carelessly thrown over his means nothing, he just pushes them aside, rolls over, and returns to sleep.
But when he finds the Qunari Herald of Andraste curled against his back, he doesn’t.
Instead he lies awake, motionless, heart pounding in his ears.
Are all Qunari this warm, he wonders, or is it just her?
The night wind dies down and all he can hear is her soft steady breathing. Her arm drapes over his side and he can feel her fingers just under his ribs. His large body fits into her still larger frame, his head just under her chin.
He recalls nights when he’s slept holding a woman the way he’s being held now and wonders if any of them felt as he does now—small but sheltered and safe.
You’re oddly charming, she says.
He’s still uneasy around others, let alone a woman a full head taller than he, and he barely knows what to say. He brushes her remark aside with self deprecation—how could someone like her be interested in him?—but she keeps coming back.
He says I suppose you’ve earned my girlish enthusiasm to make her laugh but when she stands close to him, so close he needs to lift his chin to see her, he feels almost giddy, a strange sort of light-headedness that washes over him. It’s the truth and he finds more and more that he wants to tell her the truth. About everything.
So, he asks, is there something large and heavy you need moved?
I'm sure you have better uses, she says.
After they kill the Abyssal High Dragon, they gather in the tavern to celebrate and the Iron Bull insists they all drink together.
Maraas-lok, Bull says but Blackwall doesn’t ask if that’s the drink’s name or just what one says before drinking it but he’s never tasted its like before, a vile burning liquor that goes to his head in an instant.
The Qunari woman plants her elbow on the table in front of him and challenges him.
C’mon, she says, and the liquor makes her words softly run together. Whoever gets pinned first has to pick up the next round at the bar.
For a moment, he’s just drunk enough to believe he can win and accepts. Her much larger hand envelops his and the instant after Varric says start, Blackwall knows she could beat him.
He uses all his might and she stays stock-still, her eyes downcast. Even after he grips the edge of the table for leverage, she still keeps him in check. For a moment, her hand begins to fall, but he realizes she's allowing this.
She lets him linger on the edge of winning for a moment, then raises her gaze, and looks right into his eyes. He’s seen what she can do in battle—no shield, no need for a shield, just her two hands around a greatsword, splitting men in half like kindling—and the look in her eyes on the battlefield is the same as it is now, watching his face as she pushes him back down again.
Is she… enjoying this?
Her pewter skin is flushed slate-dark as his hand hovers just above the filthy tavern table. He knows she could end this at any moment and feverishly hopes she won’t.
Varric slams three tankards of ale down, foam spilling over the sides.
Call it a draw, he says, this is taking too fucking long.
Blackwall staggers into his hayloft bed later that night, all he can think of is the feel of her hand in his, how easily she could have pinned him, humbled him, dominated him, and suddenly he can’t bear it a moment longer, thrusting his hands down the front of his pants and stroking his thick cock until he comes with a gasp, spilling over his hand, a hand he wants to be hers.
He walks the ramparts of Skyhold with her and tells her she shouldn’t—she can’t—care for him.
Whatever you want this to be, he says, is impossible.
She tilts her head and the sun glints on the golden caps covering her horns.
Why not? she asks.
That night when the moon rises, he opens the door to her quarters, knowing she is there at the top of the tower.
She should say no, he thinks, she should send him away for good this time, it would be best for everyone but every step propels him toward her because he must know—what it could be like, to be subdued by arms stronger than his own, to be overpowered, conquered, if only she willed it.
The stairs fall away two by two under his feet, each tread a drumbeat: I have to know, have to know, have to know.