heorte | when i go towards you it is with my whole life.

"I'm not worried about what's done in Thedas, or in Kalvad."

Easy for Ellis to say, having so thoroughly excised himself from the patter of life in Thedas.

But once the ribbon in question has been attended to, Ellis catches Wysteria's hands up in his own. His fingers are not much warmer than hers, but he folds them up within his own all the same.

"I'd like to know what you would do. Apart from what's expected."

There's no need to press her, not really. She has been honest with him, clear about her concerns as to the scrutiny of others. But this small thing—

He'd like to know her preference in this. Would she rather hold on to her own name, carried the long way with her from her home?

Here, she hesitates. She isn't uncertain. That much is clear from the lines of her expression as they work this way and then that. It is only as if he has submitted some bizarre theory for her to grapple with and she is now turning it about in an effort to discern the best direction from which to attack it.

What would she do? What a ridiculous question. And after a moment's struggle with the question, a more sensible one occurs to her.

"Would you like me to keep it? My name."

By now, after all this time, Wysteria must be able to read the initial reaction as it washes across Ellis' face. That immediate inclination towards deflection, a slight frown wrinkling into his expression.

It cannot be surprising that his first thought is That is not my decision to make.

But Ellis in turn understands that isn't an answer Wysteria would care to receive, and so he offers, slowly, "I've always liked your name."

A smile edges in alongside the frown. From the very beginning, the first time she'd introduced herself before they'd schlepped out to agitate a rift, Ellis remembers being charmed by the way she'd offered her name as much as the way the pieces of it fit together.

"Wysteria," he says first, before his head lowers to her hands in his, so he might say, "Miss Poppell," right against her fingertips.

A little teasing. He's never called her by her last name, but he's liked the way she'd used it, the way she'd signed her letters with it, all the neat flourishes giving way to something more worn in as they'd grown used to exchanging letters.

Her kisses her fingertips and yes, yes, it's very charming and he is very funny but that's hardly the point, and so Wysteria turns her hand just a little to tug his beard as Ellis withdraws. It's a chiding little pinch.

"I can hardly be Missus Poppell. Everyone will inquire as to the identity of Mister Poppell. And do you really like it so much more than Wysteria— Something-or-other? That is the matter we are interrogating at present, Mister Ellis."

What a firm statement of purpose.

He cedes his grip on her hands to cup her face, make a little examination of her beneath the brim of her hat. The wind has whipped color into her cheeks. Wisps of her hair have come loose, blown free as they made their way uphill. Wysteria's expression is very determined, and he would like to kiss her rather than talk further on any point, but he has a sense she is not inclined to be distracted.

"I've not used that name in a very long time," shouldn't come as any surprise. In their whole acquaintance, he has never invoked it. Just as he had not invoked family until pressed, not related to her any part of what had happened until cornered.

His thumb is very gentle, where it strokes along her cheek.

"I don't know if I like it applied to you."

Does dredging up the name he'd left behind and linking it to her create something new of it? Wysteria has made something new of Ellis, yes, but all the rest—

Despite the seriousness of her demeanor, she is perfectly content to allow him to take her face into his hands. Her cheeks her cold, and his hands are warm if wind bitten. And it and the direct quality of his attention means he is giving the question serious consideration, which is all she had asked for so she could hardly object now.

(And because she like it, when he shows himself to be so sweet and tender. It's charming to see such impulses illustrated in someone so naturally suited by the width of his shoulders and the strength of his arm to anything but.)

"Is it really so dreadful a name? Are you embarrassed by it, or is it for some other reason? I only wish to know."

Is almost certainly a trap. The last time she had only been looking to satisfy her curiosity, she wheedled him into asking to marry her.

I only wish to know pulls at the corner of his mouth, drumming up some immediate, muted amusement. Wysteria never quite only wishes to know. Wysteria has questions that follow after. Ellis understands this about her.

But he gives this assertion due attention as well, weighing it up to try and pin down something gone unexamined for nearly half his life. It is like feeling through the dark in a long-abandoned room. He has an idea of the contours, but must feel his way through it so as to guide her through it

Or allow her to stand in the doorway, and call back to her.

"I'm not ashamed."

Not of his name. Ashamed of what he became in the wake of losing it, yes.

"But it reminds me of painful things. And I don't want to see any of that when I look at you."

He's given over part of that to her. Those painful things, Wysteria can call some of them by name. Not all but enough, maybe, that the point is understood.

"Well," she says, which is prevaricating to the extreme. Well, yes. She supposes she understands some of that sentiment, knowing what she does of the life Ellis had enjoyed and how it how been taken so abruptly from him.

Well, yes. But—

From between his hands, she takes a deep breath. It's the tell-tale and all too brief warning sign that a rambling response is imminent:

"But is it not possible that perhaps by sharing it with me that you might, as a matter of course given the general pleasantness of our association, begin to instead be reminded of how very charming I am when am trying to be persuasive when you hear it? Not that I fail to see your point, Mister Ellis. Only that I will say that some time ago, you expressed considerable hesitation over lacking anything to 'give' me, such as it is, in exchange for my hand. And that it would be very strange in Kalvad, you see. Were you to withhold such a thing from me."

Having spent such an extended amount of time in her company, Ellis understands what follows that deep inhale. Were he so inclined, he might disrupt her. Ellis has some idea as to how he'd accomplish it.

But he allows her to fortify herself, and unspool her argument. It's not poorly argued. Ellis isn't sure he finds it persuasive, but there is a softening in his expression as she speaks and he watches her. His fingers slip along her jaw, thumb stroking softly along her cheek as he realigns. There is some intent in it, as if he might simply bend to kiss her rather than continue the discussion.

It's tempting.

But first, Ellis questions, "Suppose I'd rather be reminded of other things?"

Which is not exactly a yes or a no. It's flirtation, while Ellis considers the point and wonders how long it will take Wysteria to trap him into some kind of agreement.

"Please, Mister Ellis," Wysteria chides, her mittened hands batting vaguely in the direction of his forearms. His wrists. "None of those things would make for a very appropriate surname."

She can hear it when you are being coy, sir.

"Have you considered you might not care for my surname?"

Were he not wearing armor, it would be easier to bow his body into hers, crowd her a little as they speak. Instead, her face remains bracketed by his hands, fingers tucking just so at her hairline, the ribbon securing her hat against his palms.

"Of course I've considered it," is no nonsense, brusque even. She has considered it extensively, thank you. What young lady doesn't spend some time considering the shape of her new name?

"Which is entirely the point. How am I meant to weigh my options if I'm merely guessing after one half of the equation? I can hardly make an informed decision when I have been kept so strictly uninformed."

She's very good at talking very quickly, even while wrapped in the security of his shadow and fixed between the points of his fingertips.

"Will you be very upset? If you tell me and I dislike it."

"No."

Because in contrast, Ellis has not thought at length about Wysteria taking on his name. But he has given it some consideration now, as they stand together, with her face cupped between his hands. The wind zithers around the edges of the wall, ruffling stray locks of her hair. Wysteria's expression is so very intent, earnest and focused in her pursuit.

He is so in love with her. There is no point in which he is not aware of it; that truth lives at the edges of his awareness always, but is drawn so close to the forefront now as they stand together like this.

"Kiss me first," he bargains. "Then I'll whisper it in your ear."

As if there is any danger of being overheard.

"That is extortion," is a strict and rather high handed reprimand. She will not be charmed, Mister Ellis, and how dare you make the attempt.

And yet, beyond her scolding she delays no further. There in the imperfect shelter of the crumbling wall, she tips her face up to him and rises on the toes of her well worn field boots to meet him demand. The crumpled brim of her much battered hat becomes slightly more crumpled still against his forehead and hairline, but there can be no helping it. Not when her kiss is so very firm, her mittened hands having secured themselves sturdily at his wrists.

She will have to decide, she thinks. What she would like before he even speaks the thing aloud. For it would be very unsporting to let only the sensibility of the name inform her opinion now.

It is a good kiss, all the better for the ways in which they must navigate his armor, the brim of her hat, the wind nipping around the edges of the ruins. Wysteria is so decisive, and Ellis likes that very much. There is no wavering in the way she bestows her affections. That is something Ellis finds reassuring, particularly now, after they've made such promises to each other.

Ellis draws the kiss out. They are bartering for something weighty, after all, even if Ellis has no real expectation regarding her decision. He kisses her until they break to draw breath and then remains there, his forehead against hers, catching his breath.

Then, as promised, he kisses her mouth one last time, before leaning in to her to whisper into her ear, "My family name was Ginsberg."

His beard tickles there at the shell of her ear, all rasping and prickling and somehow more stark there against that sensitive skin than even under her mouth. Which makes sense. Her lips are a little chapped from the wind, and her ear has been relatively insulated from the weather and—

In any case, the point is ghat she squirms a little, squawking softly in reply to the soft scrape before she has even fully registered what he has whispered there.

Ginsberg. It's very like the tingling feeling of his kiss on her mouth, all warm breath and well rounded. Straightforward and pleasant. After a moment, still clutched (or clutching) close, she announces—

"It's very provincial."

Edited 2021-11-05 05:05 (UTC)

What does this assessment mean? Ellis finds himself without a clear read on her proclamation, but in no hurry to draw back from her. She is keep close, hemmed in even with Ellis' careful awareness of the proximity of wind-chilled armor. His mouth moves against the hinge of her jaw, and it's there that Ellis replies, "Aye, it is."

Does it suit her? He cannot say.

But it does feel like drawing close a whole bevy of ghosts. It feels like trying to hold the pieces of a shattered vase in his hands. His fingertips press just a little further into his hair as he breathes out, steeling himself before straightening by degrees to look into her face.

No question is forthcoming, but there is a prompting quality to his expression. Go on, hanging in the quiet between them.

At this rate, he is going to knock her hat mostly off. Which she ought to scold him for, but despite the looming chill of his breastplate the rest of his closeness if appealingly warming. The brief rumble of his breath at her jaw, for example, elicits a little spark of heat. And so it's almost a disappointment when he draws back enough to actually look at her.

But it's good to look at him too. Better in an instant such as this, where she will likely have to struggle to decipher all the little hints his face does or doesn't give with respect to the shape of his thoughts behind it. She makes up for that lack of forte by being instantly prepared to answer his searching look, so ready is her next remark that she hardly even requires to be prompted before saying it:

"It is far less robust than I had guessed it might be. I had estimated you for a Chadwick or a Landrin or an Arnott or something similar which you will agree wouldn't have suited at all. Whoever heard of a Wysteria Arnott? No one, as it's terrible. Is it spelled with a 'u' or an 'e'?"

"An 'e'," Ellis answers, obliging. It's hard to make out exactly what she's made of it, only that it is perhaps less objectionable than her imaginings.

His fingers run along her cheeks, before his hands lift and relocate to her hips so as to allow conversation to flow more easily. He is still considering putting his mouth back to hers rather than navigate the question of his family name.

She is a little flushed, and Ellis cannot make up his mind whether it is the cold or their kiss. He'd like to experiment more thoroughly, but rather than interrupt, he tucks his hands beneath the fall of her cape, studying her as she processes his answer.

He might prompt her, had he any doubt she will offer up her opinion freely in due time.

"Good."

It is a statement with such conviction that one might think there really was some difference between the two—as if the presence of an 'e' was in some fashion legitimately somehow more aesthetically or aurally pleasing than a 'u' might be, when in fact that could be no functional difference whatsoever. Only—

"I find 'e's much more charmingly written, you see. And it would be a great shame to interject a droopy 'u' into the whole arrangement. Which I wouldn't have said if it were spelled that way, but I'm pleased that it isn't. Do you think," she says suddenly, with no warning for the impending subject change. "That it would be acceptable if I were to take it and for it to he a secret? It's not as if anyone in Thedas uses a surname as they ought to, which is very shocking by the way. And anyway I will have to continue working under the name Poppell or risk being forgotten entirely.

"So I think it could easily be hardly spoken of at all, if you preferred it not to be. But I shouldn't wish to steal it, of course. Only to keep it rather like one might something in their pocket, you understand. A private sort of name. Wysteria Arnott is very terrible, but Wysteria"—a humming mumble of syllables as a placeholder for Ginsberg; she staunchly refuses to apply it without permission—"Well, that isn't so dreadful."

In retrospect, why he had he thought to predict her response? Ellis has so rarely been right in his assumptions.

Somehow, he finds himself without any clear idea of what to say. The furrow of scrutiny doesn't ease, but the line of his mouth softens as he watches her work her way to her conclusion. That stretch of vaguely familiar mumbles very nearly fits into a shape that Ellis is surprised to find pleasing.

"I wouldn't want to impede your work," he tells her first, settling one aspect between them. Or so he thinks. Was this ever something that needed to be settled? Of course she would continue her work, and of course she would use whatever name most benefitted her to do so. What is there to question?

But the rest—

"Would you want it to be that way? A secret?"

It seems unfair, to saddle her with a secret. Wysteria has to his knowledge kept every secret he's asked of her, but their marriage, his name, that seems like a different matter than asking her not to repeat confidences about his past.

"No, naturally not. But I think it's very charming—the name, I mean—but I shouldn't wish to abuse you with it."

She is so matter of fact there in the shelter of his shape, her face tipped faintly up to him so that she may deliver her opinion in the most straightforward fashion.

"So as far as everyone else may be concerned, I will simply keep my name as that is apparently acceptable and not completely outrageous. You will be Warden Ellis and I will be Madame or Messere or whatever is ordinary Poppell, who is his very headstrong and independent wife who has refused to give up her own name. But secretly, as the sort of thing we need not tell anyone at all, I might assume the other thing. And it never need be used or uttered, but I will know and that would be fine."

And abruptly she adds— "Unless you should care to use it. But of course you will not."

No, maybe he won't. But agreement doesn't come immediately to him, and he can consider what that means later, after they've found the ruins and after they've trekked back to the shoreline, after all is said and done and perhaps Wysteria is dozing against his arm and Ellis is alone with his thoughts.

In the moment, he is left to contend with the full force of her consideration for him. He feels it much like he had felt her profession of love, like all the little ways she expresses preference and care for him. It stops his breath for a moment as he considers the offering in its entirety, along with her expression, the sweetness of her face tipped up to him.

She is good to him. He has nothing to say for a moment, but he bends back to kiss her again in lieu of an immediate answer. He kisses her very softly, hands spanning her waist, slipping just so along to her back even as he maintains careful distance to spare her the chill of his armor. When the kiss breaks, Ellis remains close. His nose bumps Wysteria's as he breathes out, murmurs against her mouth, "Missus Ginsberg."

To say it aloud is not without a kind of pain. It's shadowed with some other life that he might have had still, but there is some breathing room maintained in this space between them.

"It's yours," he tells her, punctuated with a second, soft kiss.

He will have to deny her something, one of these days. But not today.

"Oh," she says in that little instant between the assignment of his name and his kissing her a second time. It's an automatic little sound which precedes the abrupt flush of shock and pleasure flooding through her.

For an instant, she doesn't fully register all that his happened. Just the softness of his kiss and the careful set of his hands and—

In a haphazard but fully genuine burst of enthusiasm, Wysteria surges up against the soft press of his mouth and throws her arms about his neck despite any inconvenient poking or touch of cold from the shape of his armor. That kiss, so delicate and sentimental, turns into a clumsy, laughing thing. It narrowly avoids some clash of teeth by little more than Andraste's grace.

How fine it is to be so well loved.

Any time he manages to please her so simply and straightforwardly drums up the kind of glowing satisfaction that warms all the way through his body. It is eclipsed, of course, by how quickly Wysteria presses in close, her arms about his shoulders. She is laughing and Ellis smiles into it. They are hardly kissing anymore, simply keeping very close as if they might return to it.

The wind is still whipping at her hem and the fall of his cloak when he lifts her, spins her a turn in some silent mirror of her enthusiasm. (An echo of a man he'd used to be.) It wouldn't be entirely comfortable, where he to lift her into his arms, so he refrains from doing so. He doesn't care to cede his grasp on her regardless. His hands have come round her tightly, spanning her back, catching her up against him.

"I love you," is said low against her mouth, more weighted down with affection than amusement. Is this the first he's said that particular string of words aloud? Perhaps.

There's some novelty in that, in the speaking of it. But there's hardly any novelty in the sentiment. It's been couched in all that he's done for ages now, concealed just beneath the surface. It has always been close at hand, withheld for so many reasons that have now dwindled away.

when i go towards you it is with my whole life.

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regret to report this feels like a it has reached bow-tying status

tragic but true