An AU where Lavellan meets Solas just as he’s awakening, before Inquisition.  Agent of Fen’Harel, indeed.  @solverne, you asked for it.

The Elvhen

Atisha = peace or calm
Sathan = please
Sa’sahl = one moment
Gara = come

Part 1 

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On the slope below, a line of aravels stretched through the pass, their sails like bloodied blades against the white drape of snow that blanketed the mountain.  The lead ship of the formation was beyond sight, lost beneath the pitch of the landscape and the hazy gusts laden with dry snow.  Niyera was perched atop a boulder to the side of the path, silent in observation as the vessels passed; the Keeper was at the head of the line, and as First, she brought up the rear to assure that none fell behind or were lost to the storm that worsened by the moment.  Sharp viridian eyes squinted past the snowflakes that settled on the tips of her lashes as she gazed from between the upper edge of her scarf and the lower hem of her hood.   A tremor shuddered through the rock that she felt in the soles of her feet, and distant thunder followed, accompanied by frigid winds that worried at the edges of her cloak as her eyes scaled the peaks.  Though it was early in the afternoon, the craggy line held up a sky dark with high blue-grey clouds made smooth with the promise of a heavy snow.  If they kept their pace, they would make it to the lowlands before the bulk of it fell.  She was stirred from her thoughts by a shout that carried through the pass and summoned her attention to the rear of the caravan.

When she hopped from the boulder to the ground, snow billowed around her legs, and she waded through the calf-deep accumulation toward the disturbance.  The hunters had their bows drawn and nocked, though that seemed not to deter the third figure, who advanced steadily toward them in a manner that was more stumble than stride.  The winds tore at his clothes and made an indistinct blur of his form behind the haze of snow.  As she neared, she noted his ears marked him as an elf, but that was was where the resemblance ended.  He was easily half a head taller than their tallest, broader through the shoulders, and with more bulk.  Despite the blue tint to skin and the way his face was drawn, cheeks hollowed and eyes sunken, his features were refined and structured.  The hunters barked out a warning as the elf staggered closer, drew back on their bows, while the stranger answered in a language she only barely understood.  “Hold,” Niyera called as she quickened her pace to step between her clansmen.  She laid a hand on one hunter’s shoulder as she moved forward, and both lowered their bows in response.  “Atisha, lethal’lin,” she said as she extended an upturned hand to the gaunt elf.  Eyes that had only dully regarded her snapped into acute focus.

Elvhen spilled from his lips in fragments, words broken by the violent clatter of his teeth.  Even had he spoken clearly, the majority of it was beyond her comprehension, but he seemed not to notice or care as he latched onto her meager offering as if he found in the pair of words a solid anchor to the world.  As he made his way, she took quick account of him and was alarmed at his attire.  Or rather, the lack thereof.  Linen pants hung loose from his hips, and only an elaborate silken robe covered his arms.  His throat was sheathed in a tall gold collar that dipped past his throat to peak at the top of his bare chest, and a blackened jaw bone hung lower from a two-stranded leather thong.  He surged toward her and managed to weakly grip her shoulders before he faltered and crumpled at her feet.  His weight bore her to the ground with him, and the hunters instantly set upon him to pry his hands from her.  Despite the fuss, the moment narrowed around them as she braced her hands on his arms to keep him upright, and his breath barely clouded the air between them.  Nearly nose to nose with him, she could see his lips were tinted blue, and the shade of his eyes was not unlike the clouds overhead – blue-tinged grey and heavy.  They made him seem older than he appeared.  

The feel of his grip as it tightened and his blunt nails as they scraped the leather of her cloak brought her out of his stare, and she shouted against the howl of the wind.  “No!  Help me get him to his feet,” and she rose from the snow without relinquishing her grip.  “We have to get him in an aravel,” she insisted and guided him as the hunters hooked their arms beneath his to lift him.  One of the hunters flagged down the last aravel in the caravan as it came near, and it slowly drew to a halt with the brittle crunch of ice beneath its wheels.  Her hands fell away from the elf to open the gate of the aravel, but his icy fingers bit deeper into the stiff leather of her cloak.  “Sathan,” she heard him whisper, the sound no more than a specter on the snow-laden winds, and she met his eyes again with a shake of her head.  “Sa’sahl,” she answered in turn, and his grip relaxed somewhat, though she was forced to pry herself from his hold.  The rear gate of the aravel swung open as she released the latch, and her staff was discarded inside before she brought down the short wooden steps and climbed into the cabin.  “Gara, lethal’lin,” she called and motioned with both hands, which she braced on the stranger’s shoulders as he was assisted into the cabin.  With her guidance, he shuffled toward her, and she nodded to the hunters, who closed the gate behind them.  

As Niyera led him further, he numbly fumbled for a grip on her arms, but failed to find a firm handhold before his slow shuffle ground to a halt.  The shivers broke through him in violent waves, and the muscles in his neck stood out as she watched him struggle.  Beneath the shield of her scarf, her lips creased downward when she noticed that his eyes had grown distant.  “Lethal’lin,” she said in an attempt to get his attention before the aravel abruptly lurched back into motion.  All at once, she found herself with her arms hooked around the trunk of his body, his knees having buckled, and she swore.  “Creators, you’re heavier than you look,” she muttered as she struggled to hold both her weight and his, but ultimately she failed, able only to slow their descent to a less than graceful collapse.  The rigid bend of his arms drove his elbows into her ribs as he fell atop her, and she was momentarily winded as she laid trapped beneath him.  He was still somewhere else as she struggled to breathe, each desperate inhalation hampered by the thin layers of her scarf.  She felt smothered by it, and she scrambled the yank the fabric from over her mouth and nose, then greedily gulped in air.  As she willed the harried rise and fall of her chest to calm, her eyes settled on his.

There was a vacancy in his gaze, a loss that made him appear more haunted and sorrowed than the darkened skin around his eyes would initially suggest.  Eventually, he blinked past the distance in his gaze, and his chapped lips parted, a breath shuddered out, and he rasped a faint, “I…ir abelas,” as he attempted to tug his arms from between them.  Together, they awkwardly maneuvered themselves until he was able to roll off and onto his side and she to sit on the narrow bench that hugged the cabin wall.  His arms immediately folded in against his bare chest, hands in rigid fists as he shuddered and his knees drew up reflexively.  She could hear each breath hiss past his teeth, and she unwound her scarf, and the fabric tugged several strands of her white hair from the braid that fell freely down her back.  “How long have you been out in the snow?” she asked as she yanked off her gloves and threw them aside with her scarf.  While she didn’t expect an answer, she couldn’t help but give voice to her thoughts as she drew down blankets from where they were tucked in overhead cubbies.  Each was snapped out to its full length and draped over him, three layers before she moved to kneel at his feet.  

His eyes trailed her as she moved, too disoriented to be appraising, but cognizant enough to be wary of her.  She shrugged off the scrutiny as she reached beneath the blankets to grasp one of his feet.  As she massaged, she willed heat to her fingertips, and she continued to carefully work warmth back into his foot and toes.  The deep groan that left him pulled her eyes up, and his features were contorted in a grimace.  “I know.  Ir abelas.  It has to be done, though.  That it hurts is a good sign,” she said reassuringly as a healthy pink tint began to return to his skin.  When she moved on to the other foot, he tried to tug it away, but she held tight and said nothing.  When she was satisfied, she tucked the blankets beneath his feet and glanced up to find his eyes closed and his jaw set firmly.  A tiny muscle in front of his ear pulsed, and the corners of his eyes creased.   Silently, she unlaced and removed her boots and followed with the remainder of her clothes until she was in nothing but her smalls and breast band.  His eyes were still squinched shut when she came to kneel by his head, and as she began to fumble to find the clasp of his collar, his head tipped forward to rest his brow against her knee.  

Her eyes flickered down as her fingers found the clasp of the collar, which turned out to be many clasps attached to thin chains that spanned the open back of the piece.  With each unfastened, she gingerly slid the sheath from his throat and sat the collar aside.  His shoulders slumped and rolled forward, and her hand was gentle when she gripped his shoulder to tilt him back.  She turned the blankets down from his arms, and the invasion of cool air made his eyes open.  Brow furrowed and lips pressed tightly together, he regarded her with an unfocused stare.  Without a word, she guided his arms out of his robe’s sleeves, and her eyes ticked back and forth between her work and his face.  Discomfort registered plainly in the pinched muscles of his expression, though he gave no resistance, and when she released his arms, he began to curl in on himself.  A hand flat against his chest halted the motion, and he helplessly let his arms sag against her knees.  “This will be uncomfortable,” she cautioned as she took up one hand and forcibly unclenched his gnarled fingers.  Between her palms, she briskly rubbed warmth into the joints and kneaded each hand with her thumbs.  The occasional pained sound escaped from behind his blue-tinged lips, and she murmured in response, wordless sounds meant to soothe and quiet.  When the unnatural white of his nail beds blushed and the joints of his fingers moved more freely, she stretched out beside him and drew close.  

There was a subtle shift in the knit of his brow and a feeble sound from the back of this throat when she guided his arm over her side so that she could lay flush against his chest.  Whether it was the cold that lingered in his limbs or the situation, his arm laid unbending over her side.  “It’s alright,” she assured him as she gently coaxed him to close his arm around her.  The ice in his fingers as they grazed her back stole her breath, and she flinched toward him before she could stop herself.  “I know this is not ideal, but we can’t warm you too quickly,” she said as she tugged the blankets over their arms and reached across him to arrange the upper blanket like a cloak over his head and shoulders.  “Lean into me, if you can,” she urged as she settled her arm around him and her hand against his back.  The noise he made was neither consent nor a denial, so she drew him closer, and his weight shifted.  Woodenly, his legs brushed hers, and she unconsciously averted her gaze as she eased her thigh between his.  Snugged as close as possible to him, she focused on willing her body temperature to rise.  A flush rose on her pale skin, painted her cheeks and the tips of her ears pink, and in time, his convulsive shivers subdued to tremors that raked through him only every other moment.  His head dropped forward to rest against the front of her shoulder, and his breath was a cool caress against her skin.  Concentration made her breaths slow and even, though it hitched when his fingered spasmed against her back and his embrace tightened.  

Small sounds, a muffled groan or a sharp hum, alerted her to his pain as warmth stole through his body to cast out the chill.  Her hand would smooth across his skin in response, along the line of his back and shoulders, the side of his neck, the tips of his ears.  Before long, the noises became sighs, and the tension began to bleed from his muscles as the cold departed.  His limbs twitched involuntarily from time to time, and on other occasions, he tested his joints with subtle movements.  Fingers explored her spine in segments, toes tickled her calves as he flexed and stretched his legs and feet.  And, she measured the length of time that passed by the tension in his limbs as it drained away, by his breaths as they deepened.  The even rise and fall of his chest was a comforting cadence as he seemed to drift into sleep, and she cradled the back of his head in the palm of her hand.  She had so many questions.  Where was he from?  Why had he ventured into the elements so unprepared?  Who was he?  She hadn’t realized she’d spoken the last aloud until his face nuzzled into the side of her neck and she felt as much as heard his reply.  

“Solas,” he said, then seemed to fall truly into slumber as his hold on her went heavy and limp and he sagged against her.  She laid motionless for quite a while before her heart slowed from its hammered pace to something more reasonable, and she let out a deep sigh.  She hadn’t expected an answer, much less the one she got.  Pride?  Was that his name?  Or the reason he found himself in this predicament?  Nothing he’d said provided any sensible answers, and she was left with a curiosity that gnawed at her.  He was all at once so foreign and so familiar to her, clearly an elf, but unlike any she’d seen.  She didn’t know what to make of him, so in the meantime, she held him close and focused on the rhythmic side-to-side sway of the aravel as it moved.