Work Text
That dragon was ripping the city apart. Minrathous, a place that had seen far too much of Dorian Pavus in his alcoholic era, now seeing far too much bloodshed. The Venatori—ever the tasteless bastards—used that as cover to march on the capital to seize control. Such brain-dead cultists they were! What nationalist in their right mind would take power by force to get their way? History books laid it all out plain: Nothing taken against the will of the people ever lasted. Decades or centuries later, the corrupt collapsed. Sometimes a group like the Inquisition helped things along.The Venatori were only a loud and rich minority that didn’t know how to fend for themselves. They would not outlast the true people of Tevene even if they did manage to control the Archon’s Palace. In the end, it was only a building.Even fighting for his life against the fools who would ruin it, Dorian loved Tevinter. Rather, he loved what his home nation could represent if it stopped being such a racist, classist, generally intolerant nightmare. One did what one must to separate the good from the bad. Particularly when the Venatori tried so very hard to embody all that was bad about Tevinter. They felt free to frame his friend for treason, all for daring to think all lives were equal. For years right up to the present, the Venatori merrily slaughtered innocents in the name of their own pursuits of power and influence.While they foamed at the mouth for so-called glory days of killing people unchecked and forcing others to carry their dead weight, Dorian held himself to a higher standard. And how lucky for them! If Dorian had tried the same uncompromising approach as the Venatori instead of founding the Lucerni that became the Shadow Dragons under Maevaris, the narrow-minded cultists would be in an uproar.“Rules for thee, not for me,” Dorian muttered and sent a wave of lightning through the crowd of power-mad mages. He’d refined the craft of culling Venatori. Most dropped dead in an instant. Really! They sought to take the Archon’s palace, knowing the most capable mages of the nation would be there. Not that many were fighting. Raising his voice as he blast the survivors with magic-induced fear before finishing them off, Dorian let out some of his own festering anger. “All that eugenics, inbreeding, and bigotry, only to produce the most powerful cowards!”“Hey, kadan,” Bull interrupted. The qunari had a brace on his arm as well as his knee so many years later, but he still hefted an axe over his shoulder as he walked up to join Dorian. One would think he was wandering through their garden, not a city covered in blood and scattered Blight pustules. “You’re complaining. This fight can’t be that tough, then.”“I cannot believe you’re here, not where the dragon landed,” Dorian teased. He wasn’t decked like he usually would be reuniting with his beloved. Given the circumstances, the big sap would understand. It was his tradition to be delighted to see Dorian regardless. Terribly sentimental, truly, and that was all the more reason he loved the man.“Varric’s friends have that one covered.” Chuckling, Bull got closer to kiss Dorian’s head. “Besides, I heard there’s a mage here with a hot ass. Couldn’t miss that.”Dorian laughed just before he heard Maevaris sigh, turning a corner from another wing of the Palace.“We make Tevinter more accepting, and now I have to listen to your husband hit on you at all hours.”“Isn’t it the paradise you imagined, Mae?” Dorian got on his toes to kiss Bull again, for dramatic effect and because it was a cherished pastime when he wasn’t saving Tevinter from itself. He glanced around at the strangely still battlefield. “It seems we’ve killed all the Venatori here. Shall we go hunting, amatus?”“Shouldn’t be too hard to track these wash-ups. They shout a lot.”“Indeed,” Mae agreed. She did that far more often with Bull than with Dorian. Tapping his shoulder with her staff, she nodded ahead into the Palace. “Easier still to track them if you both look forward.”“Put Dorian in front. I’ll watch his backside.”“Aren’t you the warrior? Shouldn’t you be protecting me with your big muscles?”“I’ll go first,” Mae relented, shaking her head and getting some distance from the two of them.“She adores us,” Bull decided against the evidence presented. That was simply how she was, though. Dorian had always known her to be a bit blunt and wonderfully precise. Maevaris never had a problem telling him how it was, and that made her a crucial part of his life. Particularly while he was still a Magister. So many liars among Tevene elites, it did well by Dorian to have someone tell him off when he needed it. Leaning into Bull for a moment, he smirked at her marching ahead.“I think she adores it more when we’re at the villa together.”“Hey, me too,” Bull wisely took her side, or perhaps it was more accurate that she’d taken his. Mae insisted he would be wise to take a chance to retire to that safe haven if he ever got the chance. He wouldn’t need to ask her, and she would keep guiding the Shadow Dragons to stand up for all that Tevinter could be. She lost her love, tragically, and it made her ruthlessly practical and a hopeless romantic. The qunari beside him nudged Dorian and smiled. “Maybe you put her in charge with all her good judgment and retire to the country with me, old man.”“Call me old again, I dare you,” Dorian pushed his arm uselessly with an open palm, but the laugh rather ruined any illusion of offense.“You’re timeless to me, kadan.”