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WHO: Gavin and OPEN
WHAT: After returning to the Mire, Gavin goes around delivering any mail that had arrived at Skyhold for people.
WHEN: Now
WHERE: Fallow Mire
NOTES: There's probably going to be some shippy shit with him and Maxwell sorry not sorry

Open.

Gavin has two satchels slung over his shoulder, full of mail, humming as he walked through the camp. For the letters whose recipients he knew by name, he simply went directly to them with a smile and a wave, to hand them their post. It wasn't until they'd all gotten their letters that Gavin started looking through the ones with unfamiliar names.

He frowned - because reading was hard - and had to spend several minutes mouthing out each name, or asking someone else to read it for him, before calling out for the person in question and just sort of hoping they, or someone that knew them, would hear him.

For Maxwell.

"Maxwell! Got something for you," Gavin called as he jogged up to the man, grinning from ear to ear as he pulled out the scroll. The seal had already been broken - by Leliana's spies, of course - but they'd done a pretty good job of putting it back together.

"Letter came for you, at Skyhold."

For Varric.

Of the two satchels, one, in its entirety, was for Varric. So he left the dwarf for last, and went to find him once the rest of the deliveries were finished, before holding the entire bag out to him.

"Here, you ah - you got a lot of mail. They asked me to bring it back for you, from Skyhold."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"I didn't exactly leave anyone who would bother..." Maxwell mused, reaching for it. He turned it over, looked down, and stopped. Dead. "Or I would have thought."

The Trevean crest.

There were only three people it could have reasonably come from.

Gavin's ears pricked with curiousity, walking around so that he could lean over Maxwell's should to get a look at whatever he was looking at, but it was just the same wax seal that he hadn't recognized before. (And what was personal space, or privacy, anyway?)

"Well? Do you know who it is?"

"Home."

It was one word, but it was heavier than a copy of the full canticles, his gaze fixed on the scroll, as if he might be able to read as it was. Then, suddenly, he held it back out.

"Nothing worth reading, I'm sure."

Gavin wasn't really sure what to make of that - whether or not he was being offered the scroll, or if it was just meant as a meaningful gesture - so he hesitated, his hand just sort of floating near it. He couldn't help the dull, sympathetic thump of pain in his chest.

"You're not going to read it?" He asked, carefully. He knew that Maxwell and his family didn't get along, that Maxwell had essentially left everything behind to come, but...

If hovered between them, Maxwell not wanting it, Gavin not taking it, for a long moment... then it fell, awkwardly, hanging loosely at his side as he shook his head.

"Likely just confirmation. Making sure I know my place now."

"Maxwell..." His ears drooped as his voice trailed off. He didn't care, at all, what Maxwell's family thought of him - thought he was well shot of them, actually, but he hated to see Maxwell like that. He finally did reach out and take the scroll, cracking open the seal once more. Sure, he wouldn't be able to read much of it, but--

"Dear Maxwell," He pretended to read aloud,

"You were totally right - your father is a complete ass and ignoramous and we've been much too cruel to you our entire lives and by the way I have sent a recipe for cheesecake, you should make your elf friend some."

He could try to make him laugh, at least.

He looked over, mouth twitching slightly into a small smile. Not one he felt, but in appreciation for the effort.

"Strawberry cheesecake?" he asked softly.

"I have no idea, I can't read," Gavin pointed out, wryly. The smile was a start, though it didn't reach Maxwell's eyes. He looked back at the letter and really squinted at it this time, trying to read it.

It was always worst, with hand-written things. Ever single person in Thedas seems to have a different way of writing letters which he found incredibly annoying, and Maxwell's mother in particular had these odd sharp loops that were very distracting.

"God, this uses a lot of big words," He muttered, mostly to himself. "Maxwell... something something, Haven, your decision to join the In... Oh, Inquistion -- can something be - uh. S-a- Salad? No. Salvage? Salvaged. What does that even mean? Um - something that starts with a C... are always worth a great deal in... No, I have no idea what that word is. D, o, m, r, y. Domry. What? Something, something, negotiations..."

He really had gotten better, was Maxwell's first thought as Gavin began to read. That friend of his was truly doing a good job.... Then the meaning of the words began to sink in and whatever warmth had appeared in his eyes, disappeared just as quickly.

That was not the letter he'd been expecting.

"Domry?" he echoed, eyebrows veeing over his nose. "Let me see."

He looked up from the letter, with a helpless shrug, and passed it over. "Sorry, I have no idea. Is this really from your family?"

It was so... cold. Even the notes that he got from the Keeper were warmer than this. At least, he thought so. He could barely read half of them.

"My mother," Maxwell replied flatly, almost the instant the letter touched his hand. The handwriting all he needed to see to know that.

He fell into a brief silence then, his eyes scanning over the words, putting the pieces Gavin had given him together. Expression numbing as the reality of it sank in.

"...Dowry," he corrected softly, after several long moments. "It's dowry, with a 'w.'"

"Dowry," Gavin repeated, frowning. He'd heard the word somewhere, he knew, but it still made almost no se-- "Oh! As in that thing that human nobles do, with giving each other huge presents to bribe them to mar--"

Hey paused there, his brow twitching slightly. "I don't understand. What does she want?"

"It appears that the revelation of an ancient darkspawn magister makes my decision to join the Inquisition less foolhardy than they originally believed," Maxwell said, the letter lowering, his hands neatly - slowly - folding it together again.

If he focused on one thing, and one thing only, at a time, he didn't have to think about the rest.

"They believe they can use it as a bargaining chip while arraigning my marriage. They're in negotiations now."

It took a minute for the implication to actually settle in - marriage, in human terms, was different from bonding. He'd known that, intellectually, from the stories that were told, but it was still a different thing all together to actually be face with the reality of it. Something twisted, dark and painful, in his chest, and it was an effort to keep his expression mostly neutral. In the end he failed - his frown pulling his eyebrows together.

"Negotiations. To marry you off? That's- No, they can't do that, that's ridiculous. You left--"

"It's all they've ever done," Maxwell murmured, gaze distant, fixed on a point near Gavin, but seeing nothing present. "Their exasperating son; he doesn't understand, but if they push and connive and insist, eventually he'll do as he's told."

He tucked the letter into a pocket inside his coat, movements stiff, as if the direction were coming from elsewhere - some puppeteer in the low-hanging fog. (Too late to just toss it in the fire now. The weight would remain, regardless.)

"...It's what I get for thinking disowned would be the worst they could do."

Instead they were using the Inquisition, were turning his choice against him - taking it away from him.

Gavin didn't say anything for a long moment - his ears tight back against his head, his expression flickering from incredulity to annoyance to rage and back again. The energy under his skin was making him twitch. Finally, in a sudden (and rough) movement, he pulled open Maxwell's jacket, grabbed the letter, and ripped it up right in front of him.

"Over my dead body, they will," He said, with an incredible amount of venom, as he dropped the pieces into the mud. The wax seal, however, stayed in his palm. He need to remember it. "No, Maxwell."

"Gavin--"

He started, a hand lifting... but then it fell again, dropping back to his side, his fingers curling slightly in a small flex. Uncertain.

He'd never seen Gavin like this. Upset, yes. But not - angry.

And it was on his behalf.

No one had ever done that.

"...They're not worth that much," he said quietly, eyes lingering on Gavin's. Something warm flashing in his gaze.

Gavin, however, his anger now stoked, would not be so easily mollified - and used the toe of his boot to grind each piece of the letter vengefully into the earth, as if he hadn't heard Maxwell at all. He had, of course, and he even agreed. They weren't worth anything. His eyes didn't raise to Maxwell's, glaring at the torn, muddied shreds on the ground.

"Just ignore them, Maxwell," He said finally, his voice heated but steady - the furnace at a slow, steady burn. "If they push, they push, but this isn't - they can't just take your life and use it however they want. No."

He finally did raise his eyes then, his brows pulled down tight and his ears flat back. "If you wanted - if it was something you wanted, Maxwell, if it was a path you chose, then I-- I wouldn't voice any argument, and if later, that's what--" He was getting ahead of himself, which only made him angrier, his fist clenching at his side. "Until you say to me 'Yes, Gavin, that is what I want', then I won't let them. And I won't let you, just to appease them."

Maxwell didn't speak; even if he could have managed around the thick knot that had formed in his throat, what could he have said? Did words even exist to say what the support meant to him, after so long - his whole life - without it?

Gavin had inspired him, those years ago. And now...

He reached out again, and touched Gavin's arm. Just a squeeze, at first, his fingers around his elbow. Then he moved closer, and pulled the elf into a fast hug.

He thought Maxwell was about to argue with him, when he touched his arm, and he was already cutting him off.

"I mean it, Maxwell, I wo--" But then he was being pulled into a hug, tight and fast, and he blinked for a moment, the motion so completely opposite to what he'd expected that his brain didn't process it immediately. A fraction of a second later, however, he relaxed, letting out a breath and bringing up a hand to touch Maxwell's back, leaning his head on his shoulder.

"Sorry," he murmured lowly. "I just don't get why anyone would... Humans are frustrating," He decided, at the end, still leaning on Maxwell as he was hugged, and obviously not including the man in the sentiment.

Maxwell sighed a low laugh, more wry than humorous, chest shaking lightly against Gavin's.

"Don't I know it," he whispered.

He held onto him a few heartbeats longer - the urge there again, like on the battlements, but worse, knowing how easy it would be to just tip his head - but then he finally drew back, and offered another small smile. It still didn't quite reach his eyes, but there was something there, in the depths of the blue.

"Thank you, Gavin. It means a lot to me, that you'd-- that you're here."

He was a bit mollified, at least, knowing that he at least wasn't going to have to fight Maxwell on the subject, but his ears were still low.

"Of course I'm here," He said, almost grumbling it out, his brows still furrowed. "I will be, until you tell me to bugger off, and even then, I'll probably keep annoyingly checking up on you." He shifted, somewhat awkwardly, the frown deepening. "... If she's in - what happens next, if she actually is going to do this?"

"You know... I don't really know," Maxwell replied, with a sad little twist of his mouth. "It's not as if I've ever done this before."

There had always been talk, of course. But it had always been some nebulous someday; someday he would need to settle down; someday he would need to start thinking of the Trevean lineage and his dynasty; someday he would have to finally be the son they wanted him to be.

He'd always managed to stave them off, and had thought leaving for the Inquisition had ended it once and for all.

"...But I assume, once an agreement has been reached between both houses, I'll be informed as to the name of my apparent intended, at least. Knowing my mother she'll expect me to drop everything here to run home to march down the aisle as all a date is set."

Gavin's discomfort was obvious - he looked like he might squirm out of his skin at any moment - but at least the rage was cooling.

"But you don't want her to." He said, as if reassuring himself. "Right? Regardless of who - or what house - she makes an 'agreement' with?" There was a slightly nervous question there, but he continued. "You can't go marching anywhere from here anyway. How could she even hope to make you agree to it? How would she force you to go? Kidnapping?"

Maxwell had stepped back, just his touch lingered, hand still gripping loosely at Gavin's elbow. It seemed okay; and as upset as Gavin was, maybe it would even help soothe him too.

He kneaded gently, fingers squeezing and flexing.

"If it was what I wanted, I would have done it years ago, when they first started pushing," he said. "As for how they'll try to get me to agree now... I expect they'll continue with their old tricks. Threats, and good old fashioned guilt are popular. Kidnapping would be new."

But then, he'd never actually been so far out of their reach before.