Chapter Text
The conversation started when Taash found a bottle in the pantry that nobody recalled purchasing.
The mission that day had gone well.
No one had suffered poisoning, possession, impalement, abduction, or undergone any limb-altering transformations.
Compared to Veilguard’s usual intensity, it had been quite peaceful.
Ivy sat curled in the corner of one of the long sofas, her boots abandoned beneath the table, a glass of whatever Taash had found turning warm between her hands as she cradled it. Emmrich occupied the chair beside her, his posture elegant despite the lateness of the hour and a second measure of amber liquor in his glass.
He spent a large part of the day watching her. During the mission, he observed her leading the Veilguard into peril. Afterwards, he watched as she checked on her companions and ensured they all returned to their quarters to freshen up before supper.
His hazel eyes followed her in a way that wasn’t obvious. Emmrich was too skilled to make it clear. Yet, Ivy understood the cadence of his focus: his gaze upon her over his drink, the faint smile that appeared when she laughed, and the way her words commanded his undivided attention.
Taash leaned both forearms on the table, eyes gleaming with sudden inspiration.
“I’ve got one.”
“Oh, shit,” Ivy muttered.
When they had a few drinks, their conversations invariably veered into the indecent, the improper, or a combination of the two. Ivy usually enjoyed it. However, with Emmrich seated next to her, exuding warmth and elegance, and their relationship in its nascent stages, she hesitated before giving answers she’d typically offer without deliberation.
Taash looked around the table. “Everyone says one thing they’ve always wanted to try.”
Neve did not look up from her drink. “No.”
“You didn’t even ask what kind of thing.”
“We all know what kind of thing.” The ice mage shot back.
Bellara brightened. “I don’t.”
Lucanis took a slow drink.
Harding laughed into her hand.
Taash said, “Sex,” as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
Bellara nearly dropped her cup. “Oh.”
“See?” Taash replied. “Now you know.”
“I knew what sex was,” Bellara frowned at them. “I just didn’t know that was what you meant.”
“That’s why I clarified.”
Lucanis finally glanced up. “You clarified by detonating the conversation.”
Davrin leaned back in his chair, a grin already tugging at his mouth. “Finally. A sensible question.”
Taash pointed at him. “You’re first.”
“Gladly.”
Harding laughed. “You didn’t even hesitate.”
“Why would I?” Davrin said. “Some of us are comfortable with our answers.”
Neve lifted one eyebrow. “That confidence usually means the answer is going to be disappointing.”
Davrin turned towards her. “Keep telling yourself that.”
Davrin reached for his drink, then glanced toward Emmrich. “Although I don’t see why I should be the only one volunteering. Emmrich looks thoroughly entertained.”
Emmrich swirled the liquid in his glass. “I was under the impression that quiet observation remained permissible.”
“Not after all those rumours about you and Rook.”
Ivy nearly inhaled her liquor.
Emmrich’s expression did not change. “What is your latest hearsay?”
Davrin looked delighted to have been asked. “Making eyes across the Lighthouse. Disappearing at suspiciously similar times. Warming the cockles of your heart. Tugging at the old—”
“That is quite enough.”
Taash snorted into their drink.
Davrin raised both hands. “Just saying. If anyone here has something interesting to contribute, it’s probably you.”
“My dear young Davrin,” Emmrich said, smoothing one finger along the rim of his glass, “you may rest assured that I require no instruction.”
Davrin’s grin widened. “There. Knew you had something useful to contribute.”
Taash pointed at him. “That was not an answer!”
“No,” Neve said, watching Ivy over the edge of her drink. “It sounded more like a warning.”
Ivy turned towards Emmrich. “Then perhaps the professor should tell us exactly what he requires no instruction in.”
The words were out before good sense could catch them.
Her fingers tightened around the stem of her glass.
Beside her, Emmrich gave the faintest hum of amusement.
Ivy glanced sideways at him. “You are enjoying this far too much for someone who claims he requires no instruction.”
Emmrich’s attention shifted fully to her.
Then he leaned closer, near enough that the warmth of his breath brushed her ear.
“Well, dearest,” he murmured, “you would be the one to know.”
Her breath caught.
Emmrich eased back into his chair, entirely composed, though the quiet satisfaction in his eyes made it clear he had enjoyed her reaction immensely.
Harding poured herself a little more wine. “I still think everyone should be allowed to pass.”
Taash frowned. “That defeats the point.”
Ivy lifted her glass towards Emmrich. “There. You have an ally.”
“I am not entirely convinced Lace intended to champion my silence, my dear.”
“No,” Neve said. “But it gives you another excuse to avoid answering.”
“Detective Gallus,” Emmrich said, turning towards her next, “I have survived several decades without disclosing my private predilections to a room full of colleagues. I see no reason to abandon a successful strategy now.”
“That sounded rehearsed,” Lucanis observed.
“It was not.” Emmrich scowled.
Ivy leaned a little closer. “Careful, professor. The longer you make us wait, the more interesting everyone assumes the answer must be.”
Something darkened in his expression, slight enough that no one else might have noticed it.
“Anticipation has its uses, my dear.”
Heat curled low in her stomach.
Ivy took a drink simply to give herself something to do.
Beside her, Emmrich did the same.
Davrin gave a knowing laugh. “Knew you wouldn’t answer.”
Emmrich lowered his glass. “I did not say that.”
“No?” Davrin leaned back, looking thoroughly pleased with himself. “Sounded like a very elegant refusal to me.”
“Then you were not listening closely enough. I have several answers. You may have one.”
Taash tilted their head. “Why only one?”
“Because the remainder is reserved for considerably more private conversations.”
His hazel eyes moved briefly to Ivy.
The glance lasted no more than a heartbeat, yet it felt as intimate as a hand settling on the back of her neck.
Ivy lifted one eyebrow. “And should I make an appointment for one of these conversations?”
The corner of Emmrich’s mouth curved.
“No appointment will be necessary, dearest. You already enjoy rather exceptional access.”
Davrin barked a laugh.
Taash pointed at Emmrich again. “Answer.”
He regarded them over the rim of his glass, unhurried and entirely composed.
“There is something remarkably intimate about being trusted with another person’s complete surrender.”
Davrin’s brows rose. “That’s your tame answer?”
“You asked for one answer,” Emmrich replied. “You did not specify how tame it ought to be.”
Ivy raised her glass to him. “Complete surrender sounds rather demanding.”
His eyes met hers, warm and intent. “Only from someone who wished to give it, dearest.”
For a moment, Ivy forgot that there were other people in the room.
Emmrich held her gaze just long enough to make the words feel less like an answer to Taash’s game and more like something quietly offered between them.
Then he lifted his glass and took one final, measured sip.
“All right,” Harding said quickly, before the exchange could become its own category of entertainment. “Mine is not exciting.”
“That means it’s romantic,” Davrin said.
Harding glared at him.
“Absolutely,” Neve agreed.
Harding sighed. “Fine. Somewhere outdoors. Somewhere beautiful. Not during a battle, not because we’re hiding from anyone, and ideally somewhere without darkspawn.”
“That’s sweet,” Bellara said.
“I knew I should have passed.”
Taash considered it. “Outside is good.”
“Thank you,” Harding said, with the wary gratitude of someone accepting support from an unpredictable animal.
Bellara answered next, though her confession was vague, breathless, and so thoroughly tangled in nervous explanation that Ivy never entirely understood whether it involved dancing, a balcony, or being kissed while standing on a table.
Davrin, true to his word, answered without the slightest hesitation.
“Somewhere warm, somewhere private, and, for once, somewhere no one expects me to make the plan.”
Taash frowned. “That is not a sex fantasy.”
“You have clearly never had enough responsibility.”
Neve lifted her glass. “Suspiciously wholesome.”
“I never promised scandalous.” The warden tried to reason.
Lucanis refused to answer until Neve suggested that his reluctance implied something involving ropes, rooftops, and professional-grade knives.
“It does not,” Lucanis stared into his coffee with the expression of a man reconsidering every choice that had brought him to the Lighthouse.
The bottle made another circuit of the table, and the conversation loosened further. Neve evaded every question with the skill of a woman conducting an interrogation of everyone except herself, while Taash answered with enough blunt detail to make Bellara hide behind both hands.
It should have remained harmless.
The room was cosy, there was an abundance of wine, and friends playfully teased each other, celebrating their survival of another day.
Then Taash turned towards Ivy. “What about you?”
Ivy blinked. “What about me?”
“You haven’t answered.”
“I was hoping no one had noticed.”
“Everyone noticed,” Neve said.
“Traitor,” Ivy shot back.
A few quiet smiles went around the table, but no one pressed her for an answer. Ivy looked down at her own glass and, for at least the second time that night, wished she had stopped drinking one glass sooner.
Emmrich sat beside her in composed silence.
Somehow, that made him the most noticeable person in the room.
His response still lingered in her thoughts.
There is something remarkably intimate about being trusted with another person’s complete surrender.
He had spoken without embarrassment, as if surrender were not a weakness or defeat, but rather something precious offered willingly into another person’s keeping. Ivy had understood his words when he said them.
She hadn’t realised until now how deeply those words had reached her.
“I don’t have one,” she said.
Taash gave her a flat look.
“I don’t.”
“Bullshit.”
Ivy narrowed her eyes at them, but there was no real malice in her gaze. She could have easily passed; Harding had already established the rule, and despite Taash’s complaints, no one would have insisted she answer.
“I suppose…” She traced her thumb along the stem of her glass. “I have wondered what it would be like to be followed.”
The room fell silent.
Not dramatically—the fire continued to crackle softly in the grate, and Assan remained asleep beneath Davrin’s chair. Yet the easy amusement around the table shifted into something more serious.
Ivy immediately regretted not having fabricated a story involving a balcony.
“Not by a stranger,” Neve said, her tone more assertive than inquisitive.
Ivy looked at her and shook her head. “No.”
“Someone you trust?”
“Yes.”
Taash leaned forward slightly, but for once, they did not interrupt.
Ivy stared into her wine, watching the firelight tremble across its surface.
“To know they were there without being able to see them,” she continued. “To hear something behind me and turn, but find nothing. To feel watched. To know they were getting closer, even if I couldn’t tell from where.”
The words sounded more intimate once they were outside her head.
She felt everyone’s attention, but Emmrich’s silence stood out the most. He didn’t move or reach for his drink. He just sat beside her, perfectly still… listening.
“I would want it to feel real,” she said. “Not staged. Not as though we were simply going through steps we had already agreed upon.”
A faint crease appeared between Harding’s brows.
“You’d want to be frightened?” Taash asked.
Ivy gave a small, self-conscious laugh. “Yes.”
The admission sent a strange heat beneath her skin.
“Properly frightened,” she went on, before she could lose her nerve. “Enough that I believed it for a moment. Enough that I didn’t know when they were going to appear, or where they would catch me.”
No one laughed now.
She curled one leg beneath herself, suddenly too aware of the warmth in her face and the careful rhythm of her breathing.
“And then they would…” she said.
“Catch you,” Taash supplied.
Ivy nodded. She could have stopped there. Perhaps she should have. But Emmrich’s answer remained in her thoughts, quiet and patient.
Complete surrender.
“They would hold me still,” she said. “Not gently. Not once I knew who it was.”
The fire cracked sharply.
“They would make me be quiet. Keep me from drawing attention. And they would be rough with me.”
Taash’s expression sharpened with interest, but they seemed to understand that another blunt question might break whatever had opened inside her.
Ivy swallowed.
“Rougher than I have ever trusted anyone to be.”
That was the truth of it.
Not rougher than she had imagined.
Not rougher merely for the sake of pain or force.
Rougher than she had ever trusted anyone enough to permit.
The difference seemed to settle over the room. Neve’s face softened. Harding looked down at her glass, giving Ivy a bit of privacy. Even Davrin had gone unusually quiet.
Ivy finally glanced towards Emmrich.
He was already watching at her.
There was nothing crude in his expression, nothing triumphant or amused. He watched her with a concentration so complete that for one disorienting second, everyone else seemed to fall away.
His voice, when it came, was quiet.
“And the fear itself is part of what you desire?”
The question was precise enough to find the one detail she had not quite managed to explain.
Ivy shifted beneath the weight of his attention.
“Yes,” she said. “But only if I knew I was safe.”
Something in his face softened.
“Naturally.”
The single word settled her more than reassurance ought to have done.
He understood.
Not merely the roughness. Not only the chase, the restraint, or the darkness. He understood that the fear mattered only because trust existed beneath it. That she wanted to be allowed to lose control without ever truly being beyond his care.
Ivy lowered her gaze to her hands.
“I spend most of my life knowing what happens next,” she said. “Or pretending I do.”
The room had become very still.
“I walk into danger first. I make the decisions. I tell everyone else where to stand and when to move, and if something goes wrong, I’m usually the one expected to find a way out.” She paused, searching for the words that had been buried beneath the fantasy all along. “I think I would like to, just once, trust someone enough not to be the one in control.”
Her voice softened, but no one strained to hear her.
The confession no longer felt like something shameful dragged out over drinks. It had become something quieter and far more revealing.
She wanted to be followed because she was always the one who led.
She wanted to be caught because she spent her life finding everyone else.
She wanted to be held still because she was so rarely permitted to stop.
And she wanted someone to be rough with her because trusting them to do so would mean knowing, without a doubt, that they would also understand when to be gentle again.
Emmrich didn’t make any promises in front of the others. He refrained from turning Ivy’s confession into a spectacle or offering a clever remark that might shield them both from the intimacy of what she had revealed. Instead, he simply set his glass aside.
His hand came to rest on the sofa between them, palm open, positioned so close that she could see the long shape of his fingers and his grave gold illuminated by the firelight.
Ivy stared at his hand and then placed her own over his. His fingers curled beneath hers, closing around her hand.
The gesture was subtle enough that it shouldn’t have felt like an answer, yet it did.
The conversation gradually resumed, initially in hushed tones as if no one wanted to disturb what Ivy had shared. Taash soon directed their attention to someone else. Bellara began asking Harding a question that grew more complicated with each word. Meanwhile, Davrin woke Assan when one of his wings obstructed the walkway.
Through it all, Emmrich kept hold of Ivy’s hand.
His thumb moved once across her knuckles.
“You didn’t say much,” she breathed out when the others’ focus had moved.
“I was paying attention.”
“I noticed.”
His gaze lowered briefly to their joined hands.
“Do you regret telling them?”
“Them? Perhaps.”
A hint of amusement played at the corners of his mouth.
“And me?” He inquired.
“No,” she whispered.
He clasped her hand tightly.
“Good,” he whispered, his voice barely audible to anyone but her.
A shiver ran down Ivy’s spine, and Emmrich sensed it. Their eyes locked, but he said nothing more.
He didn’t need to.
He had conveyed his desire: the intimacy that comes from being trusted with another person’s complete surrender.
And Ivy, had just revealed that, perhaps for the first time in her life, she wanted to give it.