Leliana may not know who the boy is—could, if she wanted to—but heart is a fortified thing. It is a scarred and bruised and battered thing that has experienced too much loss in her relatively short life. She has loved two men with her whole heart, given her all to them, and felt that love turn to poison on her tongue. She had felt the dagger of it slip between her ribs. She had felt it tear her apart.
After watching Vulgaris fall into the mouth of the volcano, swept away by the magma, she had not thought she would ever recover. She had felt the pieces of her calcify and harden, the destruction in the aftermath of it washing away the shores of the rest of her life. But love had brought him back from the afterlife. Love had given them a second chance—a third, a fourth—and she glories in it.
Her smile is kind as she regards Jakub, her laugh breathy. “Oh, I don’t know about that,” she says with a dip of her head, but before she can engage further, she sees another approaching out of the corner of her eye. This—this she does not need magic to decipher. Her heart leaps into her throat regardless of the disguise that he wears and her brown eyes soften as she looks to him, seeing through the facade.
It doesn’t take long for him to spot her in turn and when he arrives at her side, she glows all the brighter for it, almond eyes peering up. She laughs again, the voice that is not her own ringing like silver bells. She reaches out and nips at the corner of his mouth playfully. “Easy, love,” she whispers against the velvet of his skin, feeling that familiar zing of nerves up her spine as she retracts to look at Jakub.
“Well, he has gone and spoiled the fun, hasn’t he?” She teases her husband as she looks back down, feeling radiant. She had not been certain she would ever feel joy again; she would feel guilty for it later, perhaps, while watching the ash blow across the parts of Tephra still ruined, but she cannot bring herself to do it now. Instead, she just smiles. “There is no need to give up your identity, should you wish to play the game.” Her shoulder settles into the familiar curve of Vulgaris’. “Not everyone need be so blunt.”
it's only you and me there until the darkness calls
let's face the dawn together; we'll brave whatever comes
@[Jakub] @[vulgaris]