Who: Gale & Leliana, guest star Schmooples the Nug What: Gale stumbles upon things he shouldn't really see and shit gets complicated. When: Tonight! Where: Leli's wittle place~ Rating/Warnings: Medium for language and mentions of assassinations. Status: Complete!
Errands. Leliana had more errands to run, which wasn’t a big deal. She ran them often, pretty standard, right? Even left Gale at the house to watch Schmooples and make sure she didn’t get into anything too weird, and to keep the pig-bunny company (or maybe she just knew how attached to each other Gale and Schmooples were). He wasn’t sure when she’d be back or what she was doing but he’d already given the greedy nug scraps to chew on, leafy greens, and she’d gone around digging holes in the backyard before deciding she was tuckered out and opted to take a nap amongst her minefield of toys near her bed.
Gale hadn’t gotten much sleep the day before, he’d been at work for a longer shift than usual, so he found himself dozing on the couch too, lying lengthwise and taking up the whole stretch of it. Only to be awakened by the familiar snuffsnuff and that nose of someone’s poking around the small, comfortable house. It wasn’t a mansion of corridors and secret passageways, but Gale always noticed that Leliana kept the door to her office closed and probably locked. He had no reason to go in or ask about it so he never did.
Until now, when the door creaked open (must have been left unlocked after all) and Schmooples worked her way in. Snuffsnuff.
“Hey,” he called to her, as if she’d respond. “Get out of there, nosy.” Standing up with a satisfying stretch of muscle, Gale shuffled along with full intent to just bring Schmooples back out. But once he was in, it took a full minute for him to comprehend what he was looking at, rubbing his eyes sleepily.
Instead of wallpaper, the aesthetics consisted of a series of news articles, clippings and photos and all sorts of other notes - mostly about someone named Jane Doe who had been washed ashore on the beach, dead as a doornail. It was the weapons though, that got his attention. Leliana had never shown him these, and he gravitated toward a particularly deadly-looking set of knives, feeling his heart start to beat faster. What the hell was all of this…
Trusting Gale with her home seemed like a natural inclination. Their routine had become as natural as breathing - nothing felt forced, nothing felt terribly awkward. Sometimes she’d catch herself with little extra shows of affection that were deemed inappropriate, but as time passed, who cared? They were friends, she’d be affectionate to a friend, it wasn’t anything ludicrous.
It was how she convinced herself anyway, and she’d done an excellent job at that.
Then an agent had been compromised and murdered, her body recovered off the shores of San Clemente, and she’d known in the most horrible way possible - by turning on the news and seeing a close up of her lifeless face, bruised and ashen. Another one of her birds had given her a heads up, but needless to say the entire problem swallowed Leliana whole. It was now a personal matter. And she’d been doing her own investigation of it (even procured her morgue records, autopsy results - they’d been displayed on her wall too), connecting the dots, finding out what went down. The secret relationship between the agent and their target.
It was a messy case. Leliana was determined to take the reigns on this. Expose the son of a bitch for who he is and what he’d done, all while making sure he’d take his last breath by her delicate hands.
Today, the ‘errand’ was meeting with a couple of her agents, gathering intel in a prostitution circle that the number one person on their shitlist had been getting himself serviced by, and they’d come up with a skeleton of a plan to develop and orchestrate. It was a brief meeting, and when she came back home with a set of groceries - organic wraps, fresh produce, cream cheese, a couple other things - the first thing she’d done was call his name.
“Gale?” His car was outside, he was still here, yet she hadn’t spotted him in the common areas. Leliana was about to poke her head into the bedroom (maybe he’d taken a nap?), but discovered a door that had been always locked wide open, containing her handsome and giant bedmate, and the hairless pig-bunny that looked like she wanted to chew on laptop wires.
Fuck.
Rabbit’s out of the hat. “Like what you see?” Arms crossed, she leaned against the door, eyes narrowed in annoyance.
Gale turned, his own eyes frigid - pale and silvery, like a lake iced over in the winter. The annoyance was matched, cold, maybe even a bit of...well, betrayal seemed stupid. They weren’t together. There wasn’t a label for this, but still, Leliana trusted him with most everything else. She couldn’t trust him with whatever the fuck was tucked away in this secret chamber of hers? It bothered him but he didn’t know why, because he knew it shouldn’t. The confusion also bothered him, nagged at him, asking him over and over why he should even care - and he didn’t have an answer.
“I just followed her in, I didn’t mean to - “ He exhaled angrily. “What even is all this? What are you? Who are you? Or do I not get to know that?”
The thing to do was probably to storm out, if they were really just casual friends. Pretend like he’d never seen anything at all, or simply just laugh it off. Tell her it didn’t matter. But Gale didn’t.
This room was always locked. Even when she was by herself. The key had been stored away, and she could have sworn she’d done just that. Locked it, like every other day. Maybe she’d been distracted. Maybe it slipped her mind. Leliana was under some stress, a burden she veiled well, so it must have been that - a slip up due to distractions. There wasn’t a point thinking of ways how this could have been avoided, though. He was in there, eyes having already seen too much. Too late.
Marjolaine’s protocol would have been to kill him.
“Those are some demanding questions, no?” Demanding questions from someone who didn’t live here. Demanding questions from someone that she saw a couple of times (actually, very often) for a stringless (?) fuck into the mattress. Leliana made an attempt to grasp at anger. Remove him from the house, forget this ever happened - but the way he looked at her was unsettling. Because she’d taken it to heart, and she was more afraid that he’d leave without her demanding it. On his own, because of all this.
Fingers snapped to get the nug’s attention. “Schmooples. Out.” Snuffsnuff, maybe a little whine. “Now.” Tone was all it took for the beast bunny to hit hit her strange little hands against the hard floor and scurry out. Not that they needed much privacy, she very much doubted Schmooples would announce her dirty secrets to the world.
“I am exactly who I said I was, if you must know. A couple of details were withheld for the sake of privacy. Which I believe I am allowed to have?”
Was she serious?
His expression was a melting kind. Not in a way that caused swooning, but it was a blast of intense heat. Searing. Interesting, because the eyeroll Gale just executed could have brought winter forth right the fuck then. Sharp as an icicle, and just as frigid.
“This - “ He extended his arms, a gesture to indicate the entire room, their whole surroundings. “This is more than a couple details withheld. I mean, fuck. You could be dead tomorrow or some shit, or gone, or whatever - “ Wait, Hawthorne, did you actually care? And were just complete shit at conveying that? Yeah, seemed about right. “And...okay, but it doesn’t matter, does it? I’m not supposed to see this, or know anything about you? If I’m just a dick for you to ride then I’ve fulfilled my purpose so fine.”
One knife grabbed roughly by the handle and he flicked it expertly with ease, then thwack. It stuck into the wall.
“Take that one, cut my throat. I guess we’re done here.”
What in the world?
His reaction was explosive. Almost literally, with the amount of anger he seemed to exude, and Leliana didn’t necessarily know what to make of it? Her stance and expression, they stopped being defensive and icy and actually became a little more confused. A response to all this was expected, she knew that, but he’d rather focus on the risk of her life rather than--
Thwack, went the knife. In the wall. Not that she cared about the damage, but was that really necessary?
“I have been doing this for most of my life, Gale. And I am a professional at what I do, which often involves separating this,” a gesture to the room and all its contents, top to bottom, “from everything else.” Gale was angry, Leliana was astoundingly calm, that frostiness returning. “I’ve yet to explain details, but you have made your assumptions. So if you want to continue and throw a temper tantrum, then yes, we’re done - take your leave. But if you would be so kind as to not further damage the inside of my house, and listen, then I will be willing to explain.”
Maker, no, she didn’t want this to end badly. She didn’t want this to end period, but Gale was lashing out, and all Leliana could do was fight fire with a little ice to eliminate some of that flame. If he wanted to leave, that was on him, but there was a window, a chance, she wanted to work with. To talk, explain, and if he still left…
Well, then it really was over, wasn’t it?
Gale always had too much fire, that was the problem. He burned hotly, hatred fueling those flames more and more - the more he changed, and he knew it was coming, barreling at him like a hurricane on a warpath with no chance of changing its trajectory. And he also knew that he couldn’t stop it, or even hope to prevent it. It was why he and Katniss would never work, not in the dreams. Or anywhere, really. Heat met ice and the reaction was steam; steam was neutral. So at least Leliana got him to calm down. Not like he knew how, or was even analyzing it at the moment - but steely eyes flashed, Seam grey, and cautious. She had his attention.
“Fine,” he grumbled, arms folded across his chest, in a move that looked to holding himself together - or self preservation. He backed up a little, finding the edge of the desk to halfway sit on, half lean against. Mostly just assurance that he wasn’t going anywhere. “I’m listening.”
There was no turning back now, was it? He wanted an explanation, there was no point in denying it - otherwise he’d make all kinds of assumptions, this would end on a disastrous note and Leliana didn’t want that. And the uncertainty of it all was what hurt the most; like an unrelenting twist in her stomach becoming a knot that refused to unwind. It felt...odd.
“Jane Doe was one of my people,” she began, approaching her board and tapping her figure on one of the pictures - the lifeless woman that had washed up. An actual photograph from the autopsy reports. Getting them wasn’t beyond her capabilities, clearly. “Her name was Marcella, but for the sake of the job, she’d gone under a false identity. Tasked to get close to a politician suspected of certain activities and she’d report back to me, but she got close in a fatal romance sort of sense - and I am certain he did this, personally, after discovering she’d been sent to watch him. This is his warning, which is something I take very, very personal.”
Leliana hadn’t gotten to the clear-cut part of ‘I run my own underground circle of killers and spies,’ but she’d been getting there. Slowly. First, see how he reacts to this.
Her people. It made sense, a little. And Gale immediately felt guilt and a feeling of ‘tail tucking between his legs’ wash over him. Leliana had been close to that person, and she’d ended up taking an eternal nap on the bottom of the sea because of some scummy politician - admittedly, there were few things he hated more than that. Even if Leliana and whoever Jane Doe was had just been work acquaintances or whatever, like she stated, she still took it personally. Why else would the wall be covered with all this stuff?
“I’m sorry,” he said, eyes downcast and lowering. “I...your people for what, though?” Was she in the mafia or something? He wasn’t really sure where this was going.
A little less fire there, how impressive. Good progress, she supposed, and his lack of sheer aggressiveness had managed to relax those shot nerves. “Best way I can describe it is...an independent wetworks division. Not strictly affiliated with one government, but when the Big Men in Suits prefer to keep their own kind uninvolved…” Leliana’s shoulders shrugged. “In return, my security is enforced by harboring personal secrets they do not want outed. It is a balance that has been kept up well.”
Not that she had founded this entire thing, not even close. Marjolaine had formed it from nothing and it flourished. All Leliana did was take over after her death and evolved it in her own image. Less betraying of her own people and more of actually being there for them.
It was family.
Now the basics were laid out in truth, and she didn’t know what direction this would take. If there was any other direction outside of ‘we’re ending this,’ and if that was the route, she wouldn’t blame him. Couldn’t blame him. Part of her hoped he’d walk out. It’d make things easier to decide.
Leliana wouldn’t deny that it would sting, though.
Blackmail, corruption. Murder. It was all a lot to take in and deal with, but Gale wouldn’t shrink away from anything - he’d opened this can of worms, he had to see it through. “So you’re basically blackmailing the government, using its own dirty secrets against the system,” he couldn’t fight a little tinge of amusement and glee at the information, because he had to admire that, at the very least. “I knew...I mean...I should have guessed. What you said about your dreams, and then the idea of crossover, how that happens...”
He really should have had an inkling. But maybe he just didn’t want to think about it too much, because it meant digging in deeper to...whatever this was. Deeper into who Leliana really was. If she was just a friend it was all surface level but there was so much more he wanted to know.
“But you can’t exactly set up shop in one spot forever, can you? You might have to leave someday.” The way he said it, as not even a question, spoke to how he really felt about it - that the potential of this was what he’d been afraid of, why he lashed out.
Blackmail. It was a hideous word but he wasn’t wrong. His summation was actually very much on the money, though her description was a little more fluffy (for her own sanity mostly), and his was, well...blunt. Honest with the bullshit trimmed from the edges.
Most who knew had a little blood in the past, they understood and it was connection of allies outside her own mess. Leliana chose them very carefully, her judgement always fairly sound - telling Gale, however, had been met with hesitation. The time was never right, and when would it be? After a night together? After she’d soak his scarred back with oil? After he made her pancakes?
“I do have to leave someday, Gale,” she said, her eyes carrying a degree of regret, and she approached closer. Not too invasively, but still in arms reach. “I told you I travel. I go wherever the job takes me. Sometimes I come back. Sometimes I do not.” It was the harsh reality of it. It’s why things like this never lasted with Leliana.
Gale didn’t really know what to say to that - if he tried to change her mind, he couldn’t, not right now. Even someone as stubborn as he was, and as prone to heated arguments, could see that. Instead he closed the distance between them, carefully, but really wasn’t careful about the way he kissed her just then. It was like the drunk feeling of the very first one, weirdly, like being underwater. Her mouth tasted like roses, still, but also the slap of death - the finality of an ending, the promise of one.
However, he really didn’t have to accept it. Maybe Leliana thought that there was a finality, but he would continue believing that there would be more. And that was his burden to bear, then - no wonder the first time with her was a razor-sharp turning point. He was taking all the risks, and he was stupid to think otherwise.
“Then I guess I’m with you until you tell me to go,” he told her, kissing her forehead next, her cheeks, the corners of her mouth.
Merde. A kiss like that wouldn’t dare go to waste, even if it had been unexpected - after all that, his anger, the knife that was still perfectly pointed into the wall. Leliana didn’t think, she just did, kissing him the only way she could even express the utter relief that he was still here and not out the door, driving away. It wasn’t over.
It was dizzying afterwards, lashes fluttering half-lidded. A warm tingle spread, the feeling only comparable to the buzzing euphoria after a shot of alcohol. “Must be the nug,” was her joke. Except it came out throaty and raspy, like her voice had been on the verge of cracking with emotion. It didn’t make a lick of sense. Every logical cell told her to slow down. Think it over. A splendid idea to be contemplated after a second kiss, in which she initiated sweetly - and briefly, because let it go too far, and...
“We should, ahm…” Leliana cleared her throat. “Are you hungry? I did pick up a couple things to make.” Since, you know, she’d been out running errands, and figuring things out about a prostitution ring (or ‘escorts,’ as they so emphasized) jumpstarted her appetite?
Surely.
“Not too much, but...” If Leliana was, then Gale would go with it. Mostly he was just hungry for her; food was secondary at this point. His hands cupped her face, thumbs stroking along her cheekbones, and his nose nudged hers - those Eskimo kisses, the stupid things. Not that he knew what the proper term for it was. “We can get out of here. Find something else to focus on for now.”
He smirked, reaching for the knife he’d flicked into the wall - it was still there, had stuck and lodged in firmly, but he took the bladed weapon out with a yank and put it back where it belonged, since it really was a pretty, deadly thing. What could he say, he just knew his weapons. Continued to prefer snares, however - the balance of it all, the instinct, the satisfaction that came from knowing the exact moment when prey would cross the trap.
“It was a good throw though, you have to admit.”
Those eskimo kisses almost did her in, she was this close from not letting him go to pry the blade out of the wallpaper and return it to its home. Best to not allow little shows of affection get the best of her, no? Their arrangement involved the removal of clothes and the activities that followed, and it sometimes (often) did involve those little touches of intimacy. When clothes were on, it was friendship as usual.
Except their clothes remained on, and it didn’t feel like friendship as usual. Perhaps why she nodded to getting out of the room, focusing on something else - a distraction, making food even when her appetite suddenly felt squashed. Otherwise that goddamn office would have been properly christened and--
“It was a decent throw,” Leliana insisted, that internal battle smoothly veiled by a smirk of her own and daring eyes. Well, in actuality, it was a very good throw, but she wasn’t past giving him a hard time. Groceries were still on the nook, untouched, and she began pulling them from the bags. Then came a snuffsnuff, and out came Schmooples from hiding. “A bit more practice to hone the technique, you could almost pass for a professional.” Nose wiggled, eyes crinkled, and after a chuckle she blew him a kiss.
“I’m guessing that was a compliment from you,” Gale deadpanned, but he chuckled, and as he scooted past Leliana to help her with the groceries he couldn’t resist a love tap right on the ass - more of a grab than a smack, really. Then he stealthily went to take the groceries from bags too, the ones that went up on high shelves in the cabinets - because he could reach them easily, and didn’t have to stretch.
Snuffsnuff. Schmooples probably wanted food - she was circling Gale’s feet, so he found her stash of leafy things in the fridge, in plastic baggies, and dropped a few treats for her. Nomnomnom. “One day I’ll get something decent from the dreams besides scars. And I’ll show off more of my weaponry skills.”
Frisky, wasn’t he? And throughout their strange show of what could be considered an example of domesticity too, how appropriate! Leliana’s vengeance was maneuvering through the tightly fitted kitchen, and if he wanted ass, by all means - she shamelessly rubbed it against his dick in passing before the last bit supermarket items were stuffed in the fridge. Aside from what she’d laid out for food, which carried healthy ingredients like avocado, cucumber and turkey slices, the cream cheese being the guilty pleasure.
“Scars are actually quite attractive. It is an example of what you have survived - but I suppose weapons are a much preferable option. Less chance of you scaring me at night,” she kissed his shoulder. “So I will take your attempts of showing off and proving your penis size over that, gladly. Now shoo.”
“I don’t need to prove that at this point, do I?” Gale asked, with another laugh, but okay - ass against dick had sufficiently distracted him, but also ensured that he’d do Leliana’s bidding for now. And he didn’t want to crowd her. “You’re tougher than some of my commanding officers.” Grumble, grumble. But he did scoot out of the way, and decided to go into the other room for the time being. Besides, if there was cream cheese involved, he was good.
Schmooples followed him, of course. Hot on his heels, that pig-bunny was.
Maybe how everything was working out was completely unconventional, but that was just it - all of it seemed to be working. Unanswered questions and ‘where to go from here’ still remained. But Gale wasn’t going to push his luck. He had Leliana now, and he didn’t know for how long.