Chapter Text
The house was quiet, but Aurelia could not find her way to sleep. Cullen lay beside her, though she did not think that he was asleep just yet. He turned over with a huff, clearly awake, trying to find a comfortable position in a bed that was too small for the both of them. Their home was still under construction, so they were staying at Cullen’s sister’s home. Mia had welcomed Aurelia with enthusiasm, and before long Branson and Rosalie had made an appearance as well. Aurelia had the suspicion that they had come mostly to see her and confirm that she was real. She had worried that they would not care for her, she was a mage after all, but it seemed that as long as their brother was happy, the Rutherford family found no fault with her.
However, since the whole family, including spouses and children were in residence, that meant that bed space was in short supply, and they had to make due with a closet of a room and a single bed. Meeting the whole family had been a delight, though, and in particular she thought of all the nieces and nephews she suddenly had, adding to the count provided by her own brother and his wife. Mia had five, and Branson three. Though Rosalie had none as yet as she was only engaged, and Aurelia doubted either Rutherford brother would take kindly to seeing their youngest sister pregnant in advance of her wedding day.
Still, all those children running about, getting into trouble, making messes, no end of frustration and amusement both. It had made her think of things she had not in a long time. Not since she had been told mages of the Circle were not allowed certain things.
“Cullen,” she whispered into the dark. “Have you ever given any thought to children? To having a family?” His breathing stopped, and she could just picture his carefully blank yet somehow still poleaxed expression. She sighed, shifting about to face him, to see him as best she could.
“I know you need warning for this kind of conversation, but I think I want that, children, a family. With you,” she told him, her heart in her words. By the touches of moonlight that came in through the shuttered windows, she watched as he struggled with the concept suddenly thrust upon him.
“Do you mean instead of our original plans?” he asked, parsing out his words slowly, carefully. “To help Templars and Tranquil? The farm? And—”
“Are you trying to gently tell me ‘no’, or are you surprised and stalling for time to think?” she asked dryly.
“Surprised and stalling,” he admitted. Then he pulled her close, arm wrapping around her waist under the blankets, and she held her remaining hand over his heart, the steady beat of it a reassurance in and of itself. “You never spoke of children, and I thought, perhaps, well, you had your apprentices. They seemed very much like your children. And, oddly enough, Cole. You were a mother to him in many ways, I know.”
“I had them yes, but I try, I try not to speak of things I cannot have. After you and I started to become close, Solas,” she bit out the name, the anger at her once-friend never far away. It took but little to stoke that fire into a full blaze, but Cullen touched his forehead to hers and she held onto his calm. “He warned me what the Anchor would do to an unborn child. Truth to tell, I had already reached that conclusion myself. The energy of the Anchor was phenomenal, it would have harmed anything so fragile. It was a kindness, in a way. Perhaps it still is.”
“Maker’s breath, Aurelia, you never said a word.” In the moonlight she saw his eyes go wide with a sorrowful shock, and in his voice she heard his ache for her.
“You never spoke of children either. If it was not on your mind, then the matter would have been moot. If it was, I had no way of knowing until you said otherwise.” Her tone was even, but she could not disguise the sliver of regret that twisted her mouth. Gently, he cupped her cheek with his hand and kissed her softly, tenderly, not as if she would break, but because it contained all the words he didn’t know how to say.
“I am fine, Cullen, truly,” she insisted, but was heartened and steadied by his kiss, by him. “You need not think you were negligent in any way.”
“Truly? I feel as though I should have been there for you, somehow,” he said, regret laced through his voice.
“You were, believe me, you were. Besides, at the time I had thought there was no room for children in our life. I did not feel any lack.”
“But now, now you have changed your mind.”
“I have. Look at where we are. Life is different now. There is room for children in it, and when I held Mia’s son I felt… I knew I wanted a child of my own, our own,” she said, nuzzling close to him, his warmth, his quiet, and she smiled. “So, have I given you enough time to think on it?”
“You know me too well, my Lady,” he said warmly, a smile of his own just visible.
“I do like to think so, ser Knight,” she said archly, and waited a moment to see if he might volunteer an answer to her original question. When he did not, she felt compelled to prompt him, “Well?”
He sighed, brows furrowing.
“I love you, Aurelia. More than I could have ever imagined loving anyone. To have children with you, a family, it would be more than I could have asked for. Yet,” he said, drawing the word out, fear a catch in his throat. “I am not certain.”
“Not certain of what?”
“What kind of father do you think I would make? I am not, I am not—”
“Not what? Not gentle? You most certainly are. Not loving? Demonstrably untrue. Not good with children? Your nieces and nephews adore you. What is it you think you are not?” she asked, the steel and lightning crackling along her voice as she refused to allow him to deride himself. Her good hand curled into a fist, her ire flaring through her again. Cullen merely placed a hand over her fist, breathing a moment, and again he grounded her.
“Brave enough,” he said simply, his vulnerabilities laid before between them. “To bring a life into this world, knowing what we know of Solas’s plans? Aurelia, it’s madness.”
“It’s defiance. I will not live my life in fear of one madman’s plans. He will be stopped, but I will not wait until then to live,” she said in strident tones, the tones of the Inquisitor, of righteous determination. Of a woman who had been told how she would live most of her life, and now was free to live as she chose. Silence stretched between them as Cullen remained quiet for several moments, and then he let a breath of laughter escape him.
“I’ve married a madwoman,” he declared, though not without affection.
“You’re realizing that only now, my love?” she asked, a teasing lilt in her tone, touching her nose to his. Gentle, easy affection that spun and wove between them.
“No, love. Simply stating the facts of the matter.” He sighed, closing his eyes for a moment before gazing at her with a cautious hope. “Do you, do you really think I would make a good father?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I do,” she told him in a voice that held no doubt.
“Then… yes. Children, a family, yes,” he answered finally, and she grinned brightly. Then her smile turned sultry and captured Cullen’s lips with her own, opening her mouth under his, even as her hand traced around his shoulder, his arm, his back. His thumb stroked her cheek, but then he broke away, wide eyed and a touch incredulous.
“Do you mean to start now?” he asked, voice straining on the last, as if he could not believe what she had just done.
“Why not?” she asked indignantly, with half a mind to be offended at his question.
“The farm is not yet ready for us, and then your brother and his family are going to visit, and we will be rather busy with,” he rambled, listing off all the mundane details that occupied them at the moment. Pressing her fingertips to his lips, she stilled his voice, and gave him a level look.
“Cullen, are you actually going to forestall the part where we make a baby?” She accompanied the question with a touch, fingertip tracing the line of his jaw, his neck, her leg hooking over his hips. He sucked in a breath, the space between them vanishingly small and increasingly warm.
“… oh. No. No, I suppose not,” he replied, started for a moment before his voice became husky, low in her ear. One of his hands reached up, his fingers tangling in her golden hair, pulling her head back to expose her neck to his attentions.
A sigh escaped her, and she smiled into the moon-lit darkness of the room they shared. “Good answer.”