Work Text:
In life, love gnawed my skin
To this white bone;
What love did then, love does now:
Gnaws me through.
Sylvia Plath
Dialogue Between Ghost And Priest
Harp practice had been Ashur’s favorite pastime since he was young. He was around ten when his mother deemed it appropriate for him to begin tutelage in music and, much to Ashur’s delight, she allowed him to choose between winds and strings. His selection was immediate; he had coveted harps from the moment he first laid eyes on one attending a performance in one of Minrathous’ spectacular, vaulted theaters.
Throughout the whole concert, he was transfixed by a pair of harpers. Their instruments were graceful and so tall, much more substantial than the violins or even cellos, yet the sounds manifested were subtle and sweet. They conceived an ethereal, dreamlike softness that he heard nowhere else in the orchestra. He’d thrown himself into those lessons with the same fervor as his magic studies, ravenous to improve.
Adept as an adult, Ashur settled into a calm, meditative trance when he allowed himself proper time with his harp. It was easy to get lost in song for hours. He played his favorite pieces over and over, until he was positive his fingers would never forget how, then rearranged the scales into a different key just for the excitement of hearing it brand new again.
Nothing had ever appealed to Ashur’s happiness like his harp.
Tarquin was not doing well.
He’d been sluggish on his assignments of late and had adopted a dull, translucent complexion that made him look rawboned and weary. He brushed off Ashur’s concern with assurances of allergies and long hours at work, but it was poor cover when he ran out of breath on short walks between rooms or forgot mid-sentence what he was talking about. He had a cough that wouldn’t shake, and if Ashur pressed him about it, he said, “It’s just smoker’s lung, don’t worry so much,” or “I quit a few weeks back, it’s fine, just hacking up the leftovers.”
When the exhausted slump of his shoulders became a predictable feature and he ceased to quarrel when a chair was placed behind him at the war table, Ashur could no longer ignore it. He whispered his fears into Tarquin’s hair while they were tangled in warm, generous communion, and Tarquin kissed him, deep and strong. He conceded to a recent lack of stamina but, “Getting old is hell, Ash; it’ll happen to you too if you don’t watch out.”
A day later, convenient explanations ran out at the top of a staircase where Tarquin collapsed and could not pick himself up again.
If one wished to compose paradise from humble strings, a robust skillset had to be cultivated and keen rhythm sense was critical. At first, it was difficult to keep the details straight in his head, but it became instinctual to find the ebb and flow of perfect tempo. A steadfast 60 beats was a sufficient standard, but he did enjoy the challenge of a rapid allegro when he had to correct for hypotension. To play with vigor required undivided focus, years of technical refinement, and an unbroken, meticulous dedication to the craft. Rewards for such proficiency were songs that danced in cascades of neurons; notes flushed bright and pink and alive, gravid with the promise of faith fulfilled.
Other times, when his spirit was discontented, Ashur reached for the slow, solemn sighs of a dirge to remind himself it had not always been this way. Once, he played his harp for the pure joy of it. He could submerge and stimulate himself in the ecstasy of sympathetic vibration because it was fun or because he overflowed with emotion he could express no other way. It seemed a distant memory now. Back before his fingers were deadened and callused from the years of plucking sinews because to play was his oath.
Ashur didn’t understand how someone could be in “end stage” heart failure without passing through a “beginning” or “middle” stage first. Tarquin’s decline had been so sudden; he’d gone from a bit unwell to completely bedbound in a matter of days and continued to deteriorate at a shocking pace.
Vesperian pedigree could buy physicians and sages from all over Thedas, but it did no good when one by one, each arrived at the same grave diagnosis of an inherited cardiomyopathy. All concluded it was exacerbated by years of hard living and hard fighting and that smaller indications of sickness were likely present but overlooked his whole life. It was also unanimous that nothing could be done about it. He was advised to take Tarquin home and make him comfortable.
Tarquin wanted a place back at The Shop where he could fade among friends, but Ashur determined the risk of work-related crossfire too high and brought him to a suite at the Argent Spire. The room was filled with incense and books and voluminous, down feather beds that cradled Tarquin through long, bottomless dreams that left him confused of where he was upon waking. It upset him, and he said as much, but Ashur was there to remind him he was safe and loved, always.
Ashur had no need of an assistive tuning device, having long mastered the notes by ear. Of all requisite techniques, that had been the most difficult for him to develop. His harp was a complex system with eccentricities and structural variations where the assorted drops and falls of life had left their mark. There were special, secret places on the frame that demanded respect while tuning, else the strings would retch and shudder, no matter how precise he was twisting pins up the thoracic arch.
His peers liked to remind him that newer, less obstinate options were available, but he felt privileged to have an intimate understanding of how to handle this specific harp. Perhaps it took more effort to play than something fresh from a lutherie, but it was his, and he valued that understanding its unique flaws meant no one else could make it sing so serenely as he.
Tarquin had been unable to walk or bathe unassisted since he first crashed, and it infuriated him that these base exertions were beyond his grasp. To be denied bodily independence again was a great fear of his, and he was feeble as a lamb now, with Ashur as his devoted shepherd. Even with so little resilience to spare, he still somehow found the muster to grumble his displeasure whenever Ashur carried him to the toilet or washed him. Ashur took no offense, well aware of his lover’s temperamental sense of pride.
Poor circulation caused a build-up of fluid in his limbs, which kept him in a state of constant, dull pain. One evening, while Ashur removed the compression wraps to again massage sensation back to his legs, Tarquin all at once broke into a bitter rage and cursed The Maker for condemning him to a death that lingered. After a turbulent life defined by incongruence and strife, was he not due the mercy of a gentle end? Some kind hand to ease his way just once in this short, pathetic existence?
Ashur held him and spent all night kissing away his tears. At daybreak, when he knew he was alone, he prostrated himself under the fire of the Maker’s eastern sun and blazed in pure, white-hot gratitude for each minute He denied Tarquin bliss.
Excess overtone was a common quirk of his harp that Ashur had to manage while playing to keep its resplendent sound from being muddied. It was an error, but in a way, it also served a practical purpose. Sudden rashes of discordant notes were a good signal that Ashur was not in proper union with his instrument and needed to correct his form or refocus his attention to mend any broken links. When there was pain present, even in the mind, the songs came out twisted and hopeless, and that was an issue that could take a while to locate and fix. He did his best to ensure those periods did not last long, even if he had to sever a few strings to achieve it.
By now, it was not strung to the dimensions of a standard concert harp but nonetheless rang out a bright, glorious glissando when Ashur’s fingertips brushed the full length of its body. He’d adapted so much to retain that clear sound. There were twenty-four strings he fondly remembered as sensitive and ticklish before he’d been forced to remove most of them to make a wide enough gap for his hand to repair more vital components. That whimsical element had been lost in reassembly. It was easier to play, but he had to admit some of the charm was gone without little shivers for him to chase.
Maybe it was childish to think so, but those jumpy strings had been cute. He missed them.
A letter from Mae found him a month after he left Minrathous with news that Tarquin was in his final days and Ashur was a despicable coward for not being at his side.
She was right. He had sunk to depths of selfishness he deigned lesser men should repent for. But Ashur simply couldn’t accept that in this ancient crucible of magic, Tevinter held no cure for a withered heart and had set out to find it. He’d recklessly burned through favors seeking access to power outside the Magisterium. Blackmail and bloodshed and threats of worse led him to institutions of omnipotence that were not meant to exist in this age, far from the laws of man or Chantry. Their circles hid no panacea. However, there were clerics among them enlightened in matters of life and death, pious scholars who toiled for understanding in the name of the old gods. They blessed Ashur with hope in the form of a centuries-old piece of tattooed human hide.
When he made it home, there was a death rattle on Tarquin’s lips, but Dorian and Mae blocked the bedroom door. Ashur begged their grace to meet this moment with him alone, and Dorian slapped him hard, furious he hid Tarquin out of their reach and then deserted him to the care of servants and strangers. It was not for the sake of Ashur’s peace that they dried their tears and departed to inform everyone the time had come to build a pyre for Tarquin to bring the light with them one last time.
As soon as they were gone, Ashur tore the blankets off the bed. His own chest was inflamed where the patch of new (old?) skin had been sewn in, and part of him was glad Tarquin was too far gone to feel when Ashur’s blade sunk to his breastbone and furrowed out a matching square of flesh. He placed and cauterized the other half of the resonant talisman, then straddled Tarquin’s hips, held down his hands, and waited for him to die.
His heart guttered once, twice, then fell silent. But Ashur would not allow it. The charms flared, and control over the frail organ snapped to Ashur like a new sense unfolding in his mind; all he had to think was ‘beat,’ and so it did. Beneath him, the rest of Tarquin’s body seized and bucked and fought the intrusion of unnatural magic in raw, screaming panic.
“It’s only for a little while,” Ashur whispered. “Just until I can find a way to fix you, Quin. I promise.” He gazed down at Tarquin’s face, a frozen mask of wide-eyed betrayal, and bent to kiss him (“I love you”) again (“I love you”) and again (“I love you”) and again. “I will not leave you to die this way.”
Cleanliness was another crucial aspect in extending the lifespan of a harp or anything else built from natural materials. Humid summers made the frame sweat and flex, which invited bacteria and mold into hard-to-reach places, and a devouring rust built up around each pin unless treated with an oil Ashur had to import from Nevarra. If not tended to promptly, contamination could spread and mutilate parts that were not replaceable. To swap out a string or screw a lever back into its joint was simple enough, but if the pillar rotted or stressed and shattered at the harmonic throat, rehabilitation would be impossible.
So Ashur took great care to maintain a flawless instrument. He kept it covered while not in use and after practice, fastidiously ran a cloth over the exposed areas to gather up any dust or moisture produced by a long session. But it was the deep scrub he conducted every two days or so that kept it in exceptional shape, particularly now that it was getting on in years. It was not Ashur’s favorite thing to do with his harp, but he had learned to approach it as an act of love and found a content satisfaction examining the life-giving pieces one by one and kissing them clean of pollution.
He'd struggled through tears the first time he had to peel the case apart to perform this work, so terrified of breaking something. All those intricate, connected parts overwhelmed him, and there was no guide to follow, just intuition and reactivity. He had forgotten that his harp included several additional parts not commonly found on its model, and a festering corruption was overlooked due to his negligence, requiring a permanent extraction. It had been damn lucky that only unwanted, vestigial pieces were affected instead of a component that was actually in use.
Over the course of two seasons, Tarquin’s other organs failed, but Ashur just absorbed command of them too, until magic was threaded through him like a marionette. Ashur found that a distasteful comparison, though. A puppeteer made and played with toys, and Tarquin was so, so much more than that to him. Perhaps Ashur did feel some amount of proprietary concern due to their relationship, but he held no desire to control Tarquin. He wanted only to support him until a cure was found and he could be returned to his place in Ashur’s arms, just as fierce and free as he was before. He was not some doll to spruce up and put away. His upkeep was more akin to the preservation of an heirloom: delicate, specialized, and extremely careful.
The passage of time did make certain damages unavoidable. Tarquin never had much bulk to start with, so to lie in rest without food or exercise meant fat and muscle wasted quickly to a fragile, sunken condition. It was often painful to look at him. His fine, sculpted features were lost because he had sharp angles all over now. But he was bolstered by the knowledge it was only destruction of the surface and inside, Tarquin still thrived because Ashur took good care of him. It was Ashur who willed the blood that pumped through his veins, drew oxygen into his lungs, and connected arcs of electricity in his brain; Tarquin felt no pain, hunger, or thirst, all senses numbed in comfortable half-life.
To sustain a connection that deep while going about normal life was a challenge. There were proximity limits to the magic that necessitated he and Tarquin were never far from each other. His solution was the commission of a crystal reliquary aflame in grand, copper filigree. He nestled Tarquin inside, draped in fire-red silks and a golden mask of Andraste, and delivered him unto the public as an incorruptible symbol of The Maker’s love. He attended service duties with Ashur. He traveled as a dignitary with Ashur. He consolidated power with Ashur.
Ashur cared only that Tarquin was with him at all.
Primed and ready to play, Ashur took a moment to appraise his harp before positioning it against his shoulder. It was skeletal, milky-eyed, and still the most exquisitely crafted instrument his hands had touched in all his fifty years. Tuned to perfection, Ashur plucked the muscles of its mouth and tongue and pushed a gust of air through the larynx so that it sang “I love you.”
It remained the loveliest melody Ashur had ever composed.