killedwithlove | PSL: For kremdelacreme

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PSL: For kremdelacreme

Following this.

Cole had things to do during the night. There were nightmares to be soothed and dark spots to be softly lit. He banked the fires that needed tending and borrowed a cloak from Blackwall to tuck in a cold halla in his stall.

He went back to Krem's room for a little while, watching him sleep before slipping off to beg some food from the kitchens. The bread was softest and warmest from the ovens and he managed to convince the cook to give him a couple of fresh rolls with some butter and fruit preserve with the freshly arrived milk.

A brief detour to Cullen's room to make sure there was poppy juice and fresh, cool water when he came to and he headed off again.

He brought it all back to Krem's room and sat down on the chest in there to wait for Krem to wake up. He wasn't in a rush, Krem was peaceful asleep, it was nice to enjoy some quiet and the soft sounds of the castle waking.

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"Don't be ashamed. Most people don't know all the levels that work in a settlement. We need lots of flies, because spiders like flies. The rats stay healthy and feed the mounts and other animals. Life is a big net, spinning everywhere, interlace and related."

He looked to the stairs that led down to the entrance and stables. "Do you want to meet some of the mounts?"

"Not used to being around animals much. Never had much luck with mounts either," Krem pointed out, but he still stood to follow Cole down. Even if he wasn't good with animals, Cole was bound to be.

The stables were cool in the shade of the early morning, and most of the mounts were awake and eating. He lingered at the entrance, watching the massive Amaranthine Charger shaking its head out then turning to watch them as they came in. Krem was approaching slowly, a hand up to be smelled when he got close enough.

Like most situations, Krem adapted easily enough and before long, he was able to run his hands down the horse's neck, giving it a quiet murmur of approval as it nosed at his face.

Cole loved the animals. The animals loved Cole in return, turning and following him as he moved among them, before coming up to Fluffy's stall.

Fluffy was the newest acquisition. She arrived two days ago and barely fit in a stall, so she was tethered outside while a new stall was built for her. Her massive weight rested on her knuckles and she ducked her head for Cole to rub between her curling horns while he watched Krem get to know one of the horses.

A dracolisk was watching him, nosing at his arm until he paid it attention too. He had to admit that he was enjoying himself, though the smells of the stable reminded him quite a bit of how the Chargers tended to smell when they got off of long missions.

He joined Cole before long, looking the nugalope in the face when she turned to look at him, his face immediately scrunching up in disgust when she snorted at him, spraying him with a fine mist of what he hoped was only spit. She nudged at him with her muzzle until he rubbed her nose and up between her horns as Cole had.

"Thanks for the bath, really needed that," he muttered sarcastically, wiping his face off on his arm.

Cole had ducked under a horn and was rubbing behind one ear, dragging his fingers along the long length and massaging with his fingers.

"She wants you to smell like her, not like the horse. Nugs have fairly sensitive noses, they can smell very well. Not as well as they hear, but fairly well." He patted her stocky neck. "Their eyesight is very poor. Little nugs are mostly blind, the pink ones, anyway. The brown ones can see a bit better."

"There are better ways to make something smell like you, nug," Krem huffed, wiping off the last of the moisture then scratching at her ear. "Cats do it just fine by rubbing on things or- ...no, you're not allowed to piss on anything. Blackwall'd throw a fit."

As funny as that might be, he would just as soon wait until they had the new stall ready for her before she did her business anywhere.

"Bull will probably give me shit for smelling like nug later."

"I like nugs. I like little nugs, and big ones."

Fluffy responded by headbutting Cole in the chest and sending him staggering back a step before he caught himself. "That means she likes me. And The Iron Bull will tease you, and then he'll find out you were down here with me and he'll tease you about that, instead."

"Not like that's anything new at least," Krem replied with a quiet snort, then reached over for Cole and pulled him by the hand, leaning up and rubbing some of the smell off his face and onto Cole.

He smirked up at him, still holding onto his hand."Now you can stink like nug too."

Cole wrinkled his nose. "I smelt like nug anyway."

He kept hold of Krem's hand, though. "So now I smell like nug and you."

Krem's smile grew some, and he lifted Cole's hand to rub the back of it against his neck. "Now that's even worse." A joke at his own expense, the sort that the Iron Bull would have made if he were there as well.

"You don't have much of a smell of your own. Is that because of the spirit thing?"

"I don't know. I suppose so. I don't sweat like mortal creatures." He might one day, but right now, he never had. "And I don't eat or drink, so there's nothing for my body to get rid of. Why is it worse?"

Obviously, making jokes around Cole wasn't the best idea. He was pretty sure he'd never even seen the other laugh.

"Nevermind," he sighed, then reached a hand up to Fluffy again to rub around the base of her horn, before nodding out into the yard again. There were more people roaming around by now, the guard rotation changing shifts and the vendors going to tend to their stalls, chantry sisters coming out to greet the day and start their chores.

with an easy tug on Cole's hand, Krem started out toward the training ring. "Come on, before it gets taken over by Cullen's men."

Cole had never been moved to laughter. He was too much inhabiting his body, rather than living in it.

Again, Cole followed. He was good at that, usually.

"He'll put them through their drills first. He didn't sleep well, so he might be a bit late this morning, as well."

Krem let go of his hand as they approached the training ring, leaning against the fence around it and watching a couple of the men as they went about their warmups. Cullen wasn't anywhere to be seen yet, so his routine would be delayed.

His maul was still leaning there against the fence where he'd left it, untouched; the troops knew better than to even think about doing so, unless they really wanted to be punched by someone shorter than them. He picked it up and slicked the clinging dew off it with his hand, flicking the water from his fingers then starting to run his own drills as a warmup.

"You don't have to spar with me, but I would like a new challenge," he called over to Cole. He didn't like the idea that Cole would just follow along with whatever he asked, just because it was asked of him. He wanted to give the option to just sit and watch, if that was what Cole wanted.

Cole watched the men briefly, then Krem and then wandered a little distance away before coming back as Krem hefted his maul into his hands.

"How do you spar with a maul? A knife, you can use a sheath, or a wooden double. But a maul..." He didn't know how it would work, since the weight of the weapon WAS the danger.

"I know I don't have to, but I'd like to. It'll be fun, and a challenge." He hopped over the fence and then up to sit on it, like he had the day before.

"Very carefully," Krem replied, though in all honesty he hadn't exactly planned on using it during the sparring match. He did still have his own knife, and he needed to work on his hand-to-hand regardless. He was simply running his warmups as the rest of the men were, waking up his muscles with the easy maneuvers.

He shook himself out when he was done with his set, then plucked his knife from its sheath on his belt and began to spin it deftly in his hand, walking it along his fingers then tossing it in the air and catching it and tipping Cole an easy, almost sweet smile.

"Come on then. You're the guest in this match, I'll give you the chance to strike first."

Cole didn't understand how one could use a maul very carefully, but when Krem pulled his knife, he realised they would be sparring hand to hand, with knives.

He didn't warm up like the others. He never stopped moving, really, he had no need to work into it. He set aside his good weapons and pulled his two small knives, dropping down into a combat ready stance, low and slightly difficult to focus on as the Fade reached to tug at the edges of his self.

"All right."

Cole moved fast. He had to, it was his advantage in hand to hand combat. He darted straight forward and then jinked to the side and spun, knives flashing to go for the sides and back, careful not to let them bite hard.

The upside of his having grown up in Tevinter and then taken up with the Chargers meant that Krem had the advantage of both being incredibly observant, and quick to react. He twisted as Cole swiped toward his side, blade spinning around in his hand to block one knife while his free hand closed on Cole's wrist. He planted the ball of his foot in the dirt and ground it in, spinning on the spot to bring him right up against Cole's back.

It wouldn't last long, with as slippery as the other could be, but he at least had a chance to smirk to himself over it.

Krem spun and Cole kept moving with him, like they were dancing, like he knew what Krem was trying to do, using Krem's grip on his wrist to twist himself from the hold and slide with a supple movement under one arm, rolling backwards and back onto his feet.

His hat somehow didn't come loose during the motion.

Krem followed the movement a little more stiffly, definitely not as graceful as Cole, not by a longshot. He released his hold on Cole's wrist as his knife swung up, blunt side first, aiming for the underside of the other's chin. His stance was held low and solid, free arm now protecting his center.

It shouldn't be possible to do a mix of a backflip and roll with that hat on and keep it, but Cole managed. He got some distance between them, in a similar low stance, but frighteningly open, knives held wide and apart, pale eyes glinting from under the brim of his hat, expression oddly empty for a man fighting.

If Krem didn't know better, he might have thought that the hat was glued to Cole's head, with the way he could move and still keep it on. He was distracted from the thought when he looked Cole in the face as they circled eachother. It worried him more than it probably should have, seeing that strange emptiness.

He wouldn't be deterred though, and he ducked forward, feinting in one direction then dipping low, aiming to take Cole's legs out from under him.

Krem thought it and Cole was reacting. Fighting on the defensive made more sense to him, plucking thoughts and intentions and moving to counter them. He darted in close, almost like he was about to tackle Krem but then he was flinging himself to the side and over one arm, using the sturdy shoulder to counter balance himself.

It left him open. It also left him able to follow the motion through and bring a knife hard and low, under a breastplate. He didn't drive the knife hard, but he was intending on completing the motion, for a touch that with extra strength would be an instantly killing blow.

Krem knew that Cole was picking up his intentions and moves straight from his head, and while it irked him, as it likely did most of Cole's real opponents, he could respect using the knowledge gleaned directly like that. Cole was very good with the tools that he had, most definitely a worthy opponent.

If it weren't for the chain mail layered between the leather and metal of his breastplate, that strike would have done a hell of a lot worse than simply knocking the wind out of him. Krem stepped back, holding his breath until his core wasn't quite as painful, then taking it shallowly. His blade spun in his hand, then flickered out of sight. A thud in the dirt marked where it had ended up, a centimeter away from Cole's foot, quivering slightly with the blade half buried in the hard-packed soil.

With the blade out of his hand, Krem was free to make his move, his arm wrapping around Cole's and holding it straight, locking his elbow, while the other hand shoved up toward his chin hard enough to crack his teeth together if it connected squarely. Cole might have pulled his punch, so to speak, but Krem doubted he could really damage the boy, not close-range like this.

Up close and in knife range, Cole was devastating in combat.

The locked arm would hold almost anyone else. Cole twisted, tried to move, couldn't get away from the blow he knew was coming and so instead he moved

Moving wasn't like walking, or shifting, or anything else mortals did. Moving was Cole tilting his head back, almost anticipating the blow and then vanishing from Krem's grip, leaving black and green smoke in his hands as Cole slipped into the cracks in reality and back out of reach again.

"You're very good," he said mildly. As if he hadn't just tweaked reality to let him move.

PSL: For kremdelacreme

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