faderift | her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you

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her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you

WHO: Solas and Galadriel
WHAT: A farewell before a journey
WHEN: Before the trip to the Sunless Lands
WHERE: Galadriel's 'rooms'
NOTES: Elves being elves

The arranged travel to the Sunless Lands does not come as a huge surprise to Solas; once he had found out the reasons behind it he could understand the justification well enough. As the man who was often given charge of leading the Inquisition to new Rifters he knew it was paramount that he attend - he was the one that knew their location and had told the scouts where to go. Whatever happened, the Rift and the Veil must be involved somehow and, therefore, he must be as well. It's a part of the role he plays here and he has no reason to shun it just yet.

What strikes him, however, is the fact that there are people he genuinely wishes to bid farewell to before he leaves, or at least check to see if they are venturing out as well. It has been some time since he has had anyone that he has considered a close enough friend to visit and the realisation that he has those people is a startling revelation - it's something he has to consider from the future onwards, if only for the impact they might have on his plans. An unfortunate side effect, perhaps, but one that cannot be ignored.

It seems clear to him that one of those people ought to be Galadriel, especially given her uncertainty and confusing in the wake of her binding. A part of him thinks that he should have checked in on her sooner, but he had no wish to push or pry too much where it was not welcomed and so he had given her the space he had imagined she had wanted. Now he is feeling the distance between them and wants to repair it, even if he cannot place exactly why the urge has overcome him - another thing that might be better not to think too hard on.

Approaching the rooms he had been shown before, he lifts his hand and knocks gently. When she opens the door, he speaks gently.

"Gin suilon."

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"Ah, hannon lle! Gui suilon," Galadriel replies, a smile already spreading over her face.

When she had opened the door she had wondered who it might be, she had guessed it might be Herian or Beleth come to speak with her or offer sparring, but to find Solas come to visit is a pleasant surprise indeed. She considers him a moment before she catches herself and steps aside to offer him entry.

"Please, come in and join me for a time," she says warmly. "What brings you here, mellon nin?"

While his language skills have been coming along, it does take a few moments for Solas to process exactly what's being said in response. It doesn't help that the smile she gives him catches him a little off guard.

"I thought to check and see how you were." It's not an easy thing to admit; confessing to worrying about someone is admitting to caring, and Solas is careful about how to handle himself around others. It seems impossible for him to disguise the way he feels about her, however, considering the lengths he went through to cure her from the sickness not so long ago.

Stepping inside, he smiles gently.

"How are you?"

Solas's admission is as unexpected as his visit and does nothing to temper Galadriel's smile. He had done her such kindness and been so very gentle with her when she needed it most, it was hard not to feel a swell of gratitude as he reminded her of his deeds. More than that, however, was the fondness that sprung up as she regarded his careful posture and soft expression.

So few people treated her with delicacy and care, she could barely recall half a dozen of them over the course of her long life. To have found him, to have his care and regard now, in this place, was so very wonderful.

"I am much improved," Galadriel assures him and closes the door in his wake. It is a novel thing, living in a building with doors, and she is still not entirely used to it. Interacting with them still feels...clunky and unnatural, somehow. Awkward as it is, she does not mind the close proximity it places them in as she does.

"Both in mind and body, thankfully. Even the Fade has been kinder to me as I rest. My dreams have been very nearly pleasant since last we spoke."

The room is plain and has few affects. The only items of real note are a spinning wheel--it seems broken but in the process of being repaired--and a loom, that currently has the beginnings of something white strung across it. The threads are so impossibly fine that they look, for a moment, like she has strung a sheet of fog or hazy cloud within the frame. Her bed is small and hardly worthy of note and there is a table with a single chair against the wall nearest the door. Galadriel gestures to it and moves to sit at the loom.

"I cannot recall if I thanked you, I was so addled that the whole event is rather like a blur, but if I did I cannot imagine it was fervent enough."

Whatever his relationship is with other people, Solas has learned that he can let some of his guard down around Galadriel. She sees things that other people do not and she reminds him so strongly of the people he had left behind that it's a struggle for him to rationalise the fact that she is not one of the People. It would be so easy to picture her as one, to see her draped in the finery of the Elvhen of ages long removed from this time.

There is no urge to do anything more than offer her kindness and support; Solas wants to make sure that she is comfortable, that she is settled and at peace, that she has a place for herself here. He's struggled to do more than carve out a spot in the library, make a place for himself as more than just the strange man with a fascination with the Fade.

"I am glad to hear it." An easy enough thing to admit. He steps inside and gives her the space to shut the door, moving forward but not too far without her permission. It's still her space, even if she hasn't made it entirely her own yet, and he doesn't want to do anything she wouldn't want.

While he might not credit himself for her improved dreams, Solas would like to think that he might have encouraged it, somehow. He had spoken to many of his spirit friends in the last few weeks...

"No thanks were necessary. I was glad to help you find a means of making yourself comfortable," he turns his head to look around the room with quick eyes. He goes to the stool and sits, settling down and focussing his attention entirely on the woman before him. "I am thankful to hear that you have found yourself better than you had been. I think the sickness frightened many of us by the end."

"Sickness is such a strange affliction, I doubt I will ever grow used to it," she comments, almost offhand. She has no reason to point out how afraid she had been, he knew full well the weight of her terror.

"I find I do miss the energy, it was nice to avoid the weight of slumber and dreams...it's odd, though. I found, after a time, that I missed them."

Given that she knows only nightmares (excepting the odd occasion when someone else had built the dream for her) that is something of an admission. She is uncertain if Solas would realize it but she is also not eager to wax on about the dreadful nature of her dreams to a man who is checking to see that her terror and ill health have passed.

"I accomplish less, now, but it is definitely preferrable." She gestures idly to the standing loom beside her. "I have never shown you my weaving, have I? It is not in a terribly interesting place, at the moment, but it shall become something lovely soon.

"If you return in a few days you might see the beginnings of the embellishment. I am told that is the most entertaining state of it, ere it is done."

"It must be strange to experience it for the first time in a world that is already so distant from your own." That, at least, Solas can somewhat empathise with. While he was born to Thedas he knows well enough that what he knows and what he experiences are two very different things. It's an adjustment and he's still not entirely capable of accepting this as his new reality.

"There will be ways of finding that energy without risking your life. If not, then I think the promise of your survival is worth giving it up."

He can't ignore the gentle offer of information, though - that dreams are hard for her, dangerous, that she had been glad to find them elusive for a time. It makes him consider what he might be able to do to help with it, if he might be able to find whisper of her in the Fade and guide her dreams into something better, something that she might appreciate rather than turn away from in fear.

Something to keep in mind.

"You have not," he admits, leaning forward to look upon it. "I admit to having no talent for it myself, beyond the ability to mend my own clothing should the situation call for it." But, ah, he hesitates. "I'm afraid I'm to join the Inquisition on a venture for some time. There are newcomers to Thedas and the group that was sent to bring them to Kirkwall appears to have gone missing."

"Missing?" Galadriel repeats and her brows lift in surprise. In truth, she has never kept close track of these missions, the Inquisition's affairs are things she largely ignores, but in all her time here she has not heard of a party gone missing from such a mission.

"The situation must be dire, indeed." Her own boasting, however muted, is forgotten in the wake of such news. She is not surprised Solas intends to travel out and meet them, in her experience he is the picture of compassion, but if a previous team has gone missing and now there are new, frightened Rifters that await him, it will be dangerous.

He is more than capable of travel, she trusts that, but she cannot help the concern that wells up in her heart.

"To where do you venture?"

"It seems so. Contact with them was lost and some are beginning to anticipate the worst. It has been decided that we should search for both them and the newcomers to make sure that they can all be brought back to safety." Solas' part in the venture is obvious, at least; he is still the one who tracks the new Rifts for the Inquisition. He is a much needed resource on a journey to try and track two missing groups of people.

He's not too concerned himself - it will be a journey in itself and there might be some danger to it, but if they are travelling as a well armed organisation then he doubts too much danger will befall them. Preparations will need to be made, too, and his mind is already documenting the things he needs to bring, to pack away, to hide until he returns to his rooms in Kirkwall proper.

Drawn out of his thoughts, he offers Galadriel a small smile.

"The Sunless Lands. It appears to be something of a frozen wasteland, so we are making sure to bring suitable supplies."

Galadriel doesn't grimace, not in the traditional sense of the word, but her expression does shift. A slight tension and a flash of apology glance across her face--her fondness for frozen wastelands is, in that instant, made utterly apparent. She might've offered to travel with him, were he headed anywhere else.

That does, however, give her pause.

"Perhaps I might contribute something, then, to ease your travels," she says and rises from her seat.

Draped across the foot of her bed is a span of greyish wool. It is unremarkable, or seems that way, until she lifts it and gathers it about the neck. It is a cloak, plain and simple of weave; it is almost impossibly plain, in fact, so much so that the eye slides over it with alarming ease. She crosses the room to him as she folds it and then holds it out.

"Please, take this," she requests. It is her own cloak but she is already weaving a replacement, there is no sense in grasping too tightly to something that might aid another. "It may seem thin, but it will stave off even the most biting cold."

Truly, Solas isn't shocked by the reaction; he doubts there are many people embarking on this quest that are particularly thrilled at the idea of venturing forward into a frozen wasteland. He's already had to prioritise getting himself extra foot wraps because the ones that he use now will simply not be good enough for something as cold as actual snow.

What does surprise him is the fact that Galadriel gets up and moves, his attention diverted for a moment from their conversation.

It seems like a simple, unremarkable gift, but he can tell that it's more than it seems. Any item of clothing made by the People had many enchantments and aspects of its making that created something special and unique, and if Galadriel's people are anything like his own then the same will surely be said of this cloak. Reaching out, he takes it into his hands carefully, fingers brushing along the trip of the fabric.

"Thank you. This is a kind gift." The scraps of clothing that he called cloaks would hardly be enough in the Sunless Lands and this saves him much energy and effort to get his own - and whatever he might have been able to find would have been far worse in quality.

When his eyes turn back to her his face is coloured with his simple gratitude.

"There is nothing I could give you that would match it."

A brief flicker of confusion darts through her expression and she tilts her head, just slightly, as she regards him. His thanks are honest, but his offer, the very thought that he might give her something material in return, is a strange one. It was an eventuality she had not considered and her smile takes on a level of fondness it did not carry before.

"You have already given me more than its worth," she assures him. He has given her kindness, understanding, and reassurance in the darkest times. A cloak, by comparison, even one of the Galadhrim, is hardly fair recompense. But his face is pink and his expression both surprised and gladdened, and she cannot stop herself from what she does next, ill-advised as it might be.

"Wear it and be safe, it is yours now." she adds and, on impulse as much as anything, leans forward and places a kiss upon his cheek.

There is a time and a place for gifts, and Solas knows that most in this world expect equal trade. He is prepared to give her something in response, to offer her some kindness, to do something to show his appreciation for what she had given him, but her earnest joy at his acceptance seems to startle him. Solas doesn't know what he could have given her to come close to matching something that is clearly so well made, but he feels the warmth in his chest all the same.

"I am not so certain," he admits, even as his smile settles on his features. "But I thank you again all the same. I will wear it and think of you." Which is a bold thing to admit, but how could he not imagine her when he has it on his shoulders? She is the one who gave him something so lovely and fine and there would be no way for him to pretend his thoughts won't turn to her.

When she leans in to kiss his cheek, however, Solas pauses, a little overcome. The urge to reach and touch the place her lips were overcomes him, but he smothers it as best he can.

"I will do my best to return to you safely."

"I would appreciate that," Galadriel says and draws herself back upright. She has given precious few people in Thedas a cloak like the one he now carries, but it is not the time to extol its virtues.

"When do you set out for the Sunless Lands?" she asks and steps back, granting him a bit of space as she does.

The loss of closeness settles around him awkwardly, and Solas refuses to let himself dwell on it. He doesn't want to think about his enjoyment of her company, or how pleased he is to be given a gift from her - it makes him consider things that he doesn't have the time for, that he's not prepared for, especially with how much he still has to consider and think about.

"In a few days, I should think. We are still making preparations and tracking the progress of the group."

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