museyboxy | Soulmate AUs

Soulmate AUs

1: your soulmate’s name is on one wrist and your enemy’s name is on the other and you have no clue which is which.

2: your heart (and chest) glow when you first meet (or touch, if you prefer) your soulmate. Hopefully it's someone you like.

3: you're colorblind until you first see (or touch) your soulmate.

4: you're born with the first word your soulmate will say to you tattooed on your skin.

5: it's impossible to lie to your soulmate.

6: only your soulmate can kill you.

7: after you meet your soulmate, the two of you hear the same background music during important moments/events for the rest of your lives. not always romantic, lmao.

8: wild card!

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Llomerryn was far from the Chantry, but not far from slavers. Slavers, or Vints who would recognize the markings of a rare prize from their homeland, or mercenaries unscrupulous enough to try their luck selling a fancy glow-elf to the highest bidder. Varric didn't have his web of influence here, only a few scant tendrils of information and contacts, substantial though those connections were, and it made him uneasy.

"Not on your life, porcupine." Varric bid Isabela and Merrill goodbye (until they could meet up at some form of lodgings later) and, together with Fenris, found their way to the Merchant's Guild.

As predicted, they found help there, in the form of some distant relative or another who was all too happy to help the scion of House Tethras. They got free room and board for the three of them, and Varric saw to writing a pile of important letters that needed to go to Kirkwall. The tricky part would be getting his affairs in Kirkwall in order, and having some of his belongings retrieved, without alerting anybody important to their new whereabouts. In the end, he wrote to Aveline herself, instructing the Guard Captain on what to send - from his belongings as well as Fenris's and Merrill's - and who to send it with.

It was a week or so before they started feeling settled. They knew it would probably be a month before they got any replies. With those replies would come news, personal effects, and Varric's ability to reestablish contact with his business network outside the Merchant's Guild. The Guild helped him get certain things done; he had no doubt about his ability to run certain businesses from Rivain.

However, much else remained uncertain. While things were uncertain, he couldn't be sure of his ability to make sure Fenris stayed untouched. In Kirkwall, he had been a powerful, connected, wealthy deshyr, one of the richest men in the city. Nobody fucked with the people he cared about. Here, he was just one more dwarf businessman in a city full of liars and thieves better than he.

The worry was writ large on his face as he sat on his third cousin's balcony, overlooking the city below. Varric rarely slept anymore, ate little, and wrote often. He had taken to resisting any attempts to get him into the city below, save what he needed to do for business, and didn't like seeing Merrill or Fenris go without him. They were so small, so frail next to the hulking, unscrupulous pirates and traders of Llomerryn- how easily two elves, or one, could be lost in the fray.

He sat, and stared, and worried his signet ring until he thought the metal would smooth over.

Fenris had watched Llomerryn from a distance for the first while. Trained eyes had showed him those who thought they ran things - and then those who really did. He now knew which three Vashoth, which two Qunari, which six Carta dwarves, and more were the ones that needed to be watched.

And through it all, he had spotted one very clever elf who kept private, running her own spy ring throughout the city. It was she he had gone to speak to, careful but confident, and though she'd denied it at first, he had left and come back with one of her higher agents. That was when she'd agreed to work with him, and sent along a contract that he'd yet to sign.

He'd learned to read. He hadn't, however, learned to spot every loophole.

The contract was in his bag full of groceries when he walked into the sitting room where he knew he would find Varric. "I've brought lamb for dinner," he said, "with plums and mint jelly. And some surprisingly good Fereldan turnips."

At the sight of him, some of the tension on Varric's face melted away. He really needed to stop underestimating Fenris: the elf had proven, time and again, to be one of the most resourceful, adaptable (sort of), quick-witted people he knew. More than himself, apparently, judging by Varric's own pathetic behavior lately.

"Turnips, Broody? My goodness, you do know how to woo a girl. I expect bouquets of leeks next."

That was particularly easy to answer as he sat down, delving into his pack to hold out a stack of paper, coiled neatly and tied with a neat leather strip. "No leeks, I'm afraid. Will an intelligence contract do?"

There was no way for him not to look at least slightly proud, a gleam in his eye as he held the pages out toward Varric with full expectation for them to be taken. "I refused to sign it until you read over it."

And that said likely more than Varric expected.

If Fenris looked slightly proud then Varric looked damned proud, taking the papers with an incredulous gleam in his eye.

"Broody, you do know a way to a girl's heart!" he crowed triumphantly, looking over the contract with a grin. "This- hold on a second, is this Ancita? Shit, I've heard of her from all the way in the Free Marches! Fenris, this is brilliant!"

It was the happiest he'd been in a while. Having a foothold in a spy network again- it was the only way he felt anything less than blind and deaf. This? This was what he needed to feel settled here.

There, Fenris thought. Mission accomplished.

"Read," he said, reaching out to tap the papers with one finger. "I'll get our food and some payment down to the kitchens and see if I can't find some bread."

He was satisfied with himself. More than satisfied. Maybe that would erase some of the worry from Varric's shoulders, stop him pacing like a man haunted. Varric would never be at home in Llomerryn the way he was in Kirkwall, but at least he'd gained a little ease.

"I have a meeting with the leader of the Ar-Kaas Mercenaries tomorrow. Talvaas' second liked that I could speak to him in Qunlat."

And with that said, he stepped from the room to go downstairs. A bit longer and they'd have a good meal, and Varric might actually sleep tonight.

By the time Fenris returned, Varric had had ample time to pore over Ancita's contract with a fine-toothed comb, spotting every loophole and every questionable turn of phrase. He circled each one in pencil and made notes, the better to remember his questions when he accompanied Fenris to meet her.

More than that, though, he'd had time to think about Fenris's activities in the city, and be somewhat shamed. Fenris was clearly thriving- he'd gone out and about, despite Varric's best efforts, and had learned the lay of the land as Varric hadn't been able to. Perhaps it came from having already lost everything twice before in his life, or having never had an "everything" to lose in the first place- maybe that made him more adaptable. Maybe Varric's roots were too deep to so easily survive ripping up.

It gave him something to think on, by the time his brilliant porcupine returned.

"You know," he remarked. "I'm actually pretty impressed by this contract. The number of ways she could've dragged you in is... kind of impressive."

"And that's why I brought it for you to read," he agreed, settling in next to his pack once more. "Half of those words are still too long for me."

But as he spoke, he was digging through the pack he'd brought in and he began handing things over to Varric. A coil of finely-made crossbow string. Three new shirts, four new pairs of pants. He stacked much the same for himself by his feet, the tunics sleeveless as ever, the pants ending at the ankle when they didn't have the stirrup as he preferred, all topped by a good whetstone for the Blade of Mercy he still carried. "Don't fret. I didn't invade your privacy enough to buy you new smalls."

What he didn't mention was how he got the money for all this because he doubted Varric would like it much, even if, to him, it wasn't much at all. A bounty was a bounty in his eyes.

Varric just... stared. Of course Fenris got the money from either stealing or bounty hunting, that much was obvious. What wasn't obvious was when he had the time to go out without Varric noticing such lengthy absences.

"Did you sneak out at night? Seriously?"

When the hell did they turn into a parent and teenager. Or possibly a married couple. Damn.

"No. It was a particularly easy bounty," he said, folding his new clothes to suit him. "Freshly posted, and as I was reading the poster, one was stupid enough to walk by and say to his friend, 'Isn't that Joraf?' All I had to do from there was follow them and tie them with their own breeches once I reached their little hideaway. I got a bonus for turning all of them in with no stragglers."

He glanced up. "You're beginning to fret like a fishwife."

Varric tried valiantly to meet his gaze with any seriousness. He really did. Bless his heart for keeping up the good fight for as long as he did.

But after about five seconds, he burst out laughing at the always-glorious stupidity of people. "Seriously? Isn't that Joraf? Come on, elf, that can't possibly be true. Nobody's that stupid!"

Except they totally were, and he loved it.

"If it had been any more complicated than that, you would be having the communal stew for supper instead of the lamb I bought." A tap to Varric's forehead and Fenris stood, not quite managing to hide his own smile of satisfaction. "You worry too much, amicus. Put your new clothes away."

None of them had left Kirkwall with anything but their armour. New clothing would do them good. Isabela had already tended to Merrill, to a point. And with Varric's mood being as it was, well, Fenris had seen it was up to him to make sure he could carry himself day to day.

Between the rather endearing forehead tap and the fact that the clothing was obviously Rivaini human in style if not necessarily in proportion (Fenris didn't buy him dwarf clothing, how thoughtful), Varric had the sudden, fleeting urge to lean up and kiss him. It fled as quickly as it came, but left him blinking rather stupidly after the elf, a smile tugging faintly at the corners of his mouth.

"Thanks for the clothes, Broody." The nickname was more ironic than anything. Lately, Varric had been the brooding one. "Did you ever find bread, or will we be sadly bread-bereft this evening?"

That was easy enough to answer, at least. "It's keeping warm in the kitchen now, along with some yellow rice the cook was generous enough to offer after I paid her for preparing the lamb," he said as he placed his new clothing into the chest at the foot of his bed. And, as he was now 'home' for the evening, he began stripping off his armour, too, shedding the pointed metal in favour of freedom. If anyone attacked them inside the Guild hall, he'd just have to yank out their heart before his armour was needed.

And though the weather outside was nearer to that of his home Tevinter than Kirkwall had been, he still found it needful to strip off his tunic and sponge off some sweat from the day's work. Nothing he thought twice about after spending so much time in the close quarters of Isabela's ship.

If anything, after all the travel, his skin was even darker, his markings standing out all the more vividly, though he didn't really notice. He was too busy wiping off his face and enjoying the feel of salt soaking away.

"Thankfully I do still have some gold left after all this." Some. Not a lot - not as much as he'd like, but there were new bounties posted every day, and Fenris had no issue accepting what work was there.

As ever, Varric half-watched Fenris undressing, mostly for the way the lyrium lines caught the light. It never failed to amaze, the elegant, branching lines curving around his body like smooth calligraphy.

"After the meeting tomorrow, we should start having a lot more to work with." He started unbuttoning his tunic, eager to try on his new threads. Something new, in a novel human style (with no dwarven stylings, thank blessed Andraste), something that doesn't remind him of Kirkwall- it's just what he needs.

"Mm," Fenris agreed from where he stood, still sponging off. One of the benefits of being in Rivain was that they had the Qunari way of purifying seawater. No matter that they were on an island - that only made it all the more plentiful. And that was why Fenris nearly luxuriated in it. It was good to wipe away the grit of sweat, to let his skin dry in the island air before pulling on a tunic that fit with an easy looseness, clearly not meant to be worn under armour but to be worn indoors or on open balconies while lazing through sultry Rivaini evenings. And this looks to be one of those evenings - so he wears light silk dyed as blue as the night sky.

"I was able to find her," he mused as he wandered back in. "But the deal I made was... Well." A chuckle. "She tried to deny her identity for a time. Apparently I'm the first to discover her in quite a while. I told her that if she agreed to let us in, I'd keep my mouth shut - except for you."

"Ha!" Varric cackled, delighted at Fenris's craftiness. "I bet she loved that. So, information for information- I'm sure a spymaster in Llomerryn would love to know how Kirkwall is doing."

He lapsed into thought with a subdued, "The only people getting trade in will be the pirates. For a long time."

And, most likely, any information out of Kirkwall would be... limited, for a while. Except through the pirates, and the black market merchants able to bribe or fight their way in.

"True enough," Fenris agreed, sliding into one of the low-slung chairs. He liked these. They let him stretch out his legs before him, practically lending themselves to laziness and snoozing which he didn't usually approve of - but there was something about Llomerryn that he liked. Even with all of the scoundrels and thieves, there was still a certain fashion to the buildings, a way that the sea air blew in, that reminded him of...

The times hadn't been so pleasant, but...

It reminded him of home.

"I told her we'd meet with her tomorrow, mid-morning."

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Soulmate AUs

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