When Master Wade is finished, there's another layer between the breastplate and surcoat -- the same woven cloth, but with the gold border more visible, a little more ornate.

"It's -- a red lion's mane, isn't it?" Cullen's read of the giant cats of the Frostback Mountains, seen drawings, heard frightful tales by the hearth (embellished horribly by his older sister, less believably by his younger brother) -- he'd never thought he'd see any part of them himself, much less wear it. "I see why the Avvar were interested. Do you have a glass?"

(Honnleath is -- was -- in the foothills of the Frostbacks.)




He nearly doesn't recognize himself, as Wade herds him to the mirror. He looks -- older. Calmer. More... settled, within himself. Perhaps it's the new scar; perhaps it's spending the last several days knowing that his work is building something for his friend (not to mention his homeland), instead of desperately trying to prevent further death and destruction in a place he hates.

(Perhaps it's the red lion's mane.

Perhaps it's the very thin, tentative notion that maybe, just maybe, it might be possible to conceive of a life that doesn't involve the Templar Order. If he can look like this --

It's not who he is, not yet, but he could be -- )

Without taking his gaze from his own reflection, without any hemming and hawing, he says to Wade, "All right."