justcullen (justcullen) wrote in valloic, @ 2020-11-13 09:38:00 |
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Entry tags: | !: action/thread/log, ₴ inactive: cullen rutherford |
Ghost Narrative: Cullen and his sister
His habit of early rising was unusual for this world, he'd found. When he'd last lived at Skyhold, there would have been dozens of soldiers assembling in the training yard at sunrise, the kitchens would be bustling with activity, and Leliana would already be holding her morning meeting with any scouts currently assigned to the keep. Sunrise was a busy time back there and then. The comparative quiet of Skyhold at Vallo had seemed unsettling at first. After a few weeks, though, he'd come to appreciate the serene silence. There was time for contemplation in the cool morning light, space to get himself in order mentally before going out to face the day.
"So, even swapping universes isn't going to hold you back from fixing your hair, hm?"
The sudden sound of a voice in his quarters was unexpected enough to startle Cullen into jumping. He whirled around, his hand going to where his sword would normally rest, and instead of an proper intruder, he was faced with a pale, translucent vision of his elder sister.
"Mia?!"
Cullen's mind ran very quickly over a series of worst-case scenarios. Mia was dead. He was hallucinating like he had in the worst days of lyrium withdrawal. He'd been caught by demons again, and they were putting images in his head that didn't belong there.
"Oh no, love, it's nothing like that!" Mia said quickly. She'd led with teasing, but now she looked concerned. "I'm alive and well back in South Reach, and you're not seeing things that aren't here. Well, not exactly. I'm only sort of here - an echo of me, really, just coming to pay you a visit."
"How...how is that possible?" Inclined though he was to believe his sister's reassurance, this still didn't make any sense. Lots of things in Vallo didn't make sense, but this one was especially mad.
"Magic, of course," Mia replied, punctuating the response with a shrug. "I don't know, really - I understand it, though, somehow? I understand a lot of things here that I know I normally don't. Including a lot of the things we don't talk about back home."
Cullen knew what things she was talking about. What happened to him at Kinloch. What happened to him and because of him in Kirkwall. What he'd seen with the Inquisition, and in the many battles before. Why he hadn't written to her or the rest of his siblings for years. Why he hadn't gone to find them after the Blight. Why he came to visit the family now, but avoided so many topics of conversation.
"I don't know how to talk about them," he quietly admitted. Cullen was better at bearing the weight of his past now, even without lyrium to grind down the edges on it, but there were times that were still hard to even think about, much less talk about.
"I know that, too," Mia said. She stepped forward to place a ghostly hand on his arm. "I also know that at home. And you don't have to talk to me...but you should talk to someone. You don't have to bear it all alone like it's some kind of punishment."
Trust Mia to call him out, even when she was ghostly apparition. Cullen snorted faintly and gave her a sad, sideways smile. "You think I deserve a break from it?"
"Maker help us all if we start getting what we deserve," Mia sniffed. "I just think that when people are willing to show you kindness, you should let them. That's all. Let your friends be your friends, and your family be your family. Let someone love you without thinking they shouldn't."
"You say that like it's easy."
"Since when did something being difficult stop you from doing it?" Mia gave him a pointed look, a raise of her eyebrows and set of her chin that hadn't changed since she was a girl of 10 summers. It was the look she got when she was absolutely confident that she was right. The look softened more easily now, though; she was a grown woman with a family of her own, and being right wasn't as important to her now as being kind.
She was right, probably. Cullen knew that it was hard to find the line between acknowledging his mistakes and torturing himself with them, and he knew just as well that torturing himself wasn't really productive. He'd given that advice to residents at the Sanctuary dozens of times. He'd told them, too, that burdens were best carried by sharing them.
"I'll think about it," Cullen said, which was as close as he'd usually get to telling his sister she was right.
"Good." Mia nodded, satisfied with that response, and then gave a ghostly smile. "Now, what do you say we have a game of Battlefield before I have to go back to myself? I saw a board and pieces on my way through the bailey, and it's been too long since I got to destroy your ego."
The suggestion lightened Cullen's spirits immediately, pulling a laugh out of him. "Yes, I'm the one with an ego about board games. Just me, certainly not anyone else."
"Exactly," Mia replied with a grin. "Come on, let's see if I can even touch the pieces."
WHAT Cullen encounters a ghostly apparition of his very much alive sister Mia
WHEN Friday, November 15, as the day begins
WHERE Cullen's quarters at Skyhold
RATING Some vague references to bad past events, but basically nothing
STATUS complete