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moonlightheretic · 10 months ago

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Seven Eyes (Scene 3 Rough Draft)

Spoilers for The Heretic and Tevinter Nights--Dread Wolf Take You

Curtains of rain lashed at the Keep’s window, lightning punctuating the gray silhouettes of the city topography below. Viscount Tethras tugged the crown from his graying head and cradled the precious metal in his hands. Lightning sundered the sweeping monoliths entrenching the city reflecting in the polished gold; it was time for all this to end. He set it on the desk before him and leaned into the plush chair, he had never felt comfortable with the weight, and now he no longer had to endure it. The restoration of Kirkwall was complete, the city much restored and prospering among the legion of city states in the Free Marches. But no matter the number of bricks laid, of foundations set, and fancy ribbons cut, it would never bring back who he lost, who the world lost.

The Inquisitor was gone, all reports hinting at her death had long been accepted by the public months ago, and to his great disdain, the news was subject to great adulation. A wicked agent of a would-be god, dead. He had failed to protect her as Viscount or even as her friend, all his efforts resulted in failure. At least he still had Hawke, it was the only thought that lifted him through the haze of grief.

Any inquiries he had made into that day…the day he failed to stop Leliana, and her rogue Inquisition were met with dead ends and unreliable trails. The saddest part of all was Moon’Hwa’s daughter. Just like her father, she was a mystery yet to be solved. Gone in the blink of an eye, no one could recount what had happened to her. Void, only a few knew what had transpired in the first place, for only a few had managed to walk away with their lives still intact.

But a stack of reports in his locked drawer conveyed their deaths, one by one. All witnesses to the great calamity near Ostwick were mysteriously dying off. Their deaths weren’t of the natural kind. At least no mortician could provide insight into the matter.

The great Inquisition army was humbled, dwindling into a few thousand that splintered off into the orders of the Templars and Seekers and private armies. Disillusioned with the Inquisitor’s proven betrayal they sought others that promised similar salvation. A few hundred surrendered to the combined forces of Kirkwall and Ostwick and pledged themselves to the protection of the Divine. Something she ruled herself as a final mercy for their loyalty, she had called it. But now, some members of her esteemed honor guard were numbered among those ill-fated parchments, a name listed next to the same fate. Deceased.

The cause of death was unknown, but one thing was for sure, the poor bastards never woke again. Seen the evening prior looking fit and healthy and by the next morning found dead in their beds. No struggle, no evidence of an intruder, nothing to indicate a cause of death, other than the dried blood trailing from their eyes, mouth, nose and ears.

Whatever had slain them, had done so from the inside, the weapon was biological.

The similarities described in those reports jostled him from any decent night’s slumber, whatever had killed the carta and templars over two years ago in that fucked up heist over the Red Lyrium Idol, was now taking aim at former Inquisition soldiers. The motivation seemed unrelated, and the incidents were sporadic, there was hardly a pattern to be gleaned. But there was a killer on the loose with what looked to be a very determined vendetta.

And it was time Varric Tethras investigated this personally. He owed it to Moon’Hwa to stop the Dread Wolf and he owed it to Solas to stop him before he made such an earthshattering mistake. If he followed the bodies… perhaps he could find him at the end.

Varric massaged his temples with his weathered fingers, a headache churning as his thoughts circled back to the same question that had been haunting him for months: Who would he target next?

But Varric did not need to deliberate for very long---a flurry of footsteps assaulted the hallway behind his grand doors, and the guards shouted, their voices rising with alarm, alerting to an unknown presence.

Varric rose, pulling Bianca from beneath the desk and trained her at the doorway, his finger draped around the trigger and he closed one eye.

But a new voice joined them, ringing with familiarity and strained urgency.

“I need to see the Viscount! I was sent by her Holiness Divine Victoria!”

“Let her in, Boys!” Varric hollered at the door and retracted Bianca, gently sliding her under the desk.

She stormed in with the chorus of thunder, hair matted to her face, and water droplets beading off her leather duster with each stretched step.

“Maker, Charter it’s been…what? Four years?” Varric couldn’t help the sheepish tone creeping into his words. The serious look on her face did not relent and the former viscount dropped the mood lifting chatter. “What’s wrong?”

“The Nightingale is dead. I was sent this.” Charter pulled a bundle from her coat and slapped a hastily wrapped parcel on the desk.

Varric unwrapped the swaddling with quivering fingers and unveiled the tome, his hands jolting backwards as if he had been scalded. “Is this what incriminated the Inquisitor?” A leaf of parchment peaked out purposefully, disrupting the perfect bindings despite the tome’s palpable aging. “Yes.” Charter confirmed and pursed her lips, it was a heavy topic. “You need to see this.” Varric nodded and grimaced, carefully hooking his thumb into the wedge of pages and pulling the stuffed parchment out.

A folded sheet, old, but newer than the paper of the tome, bloodied and torn, greeted him with trepidation and sorrow, smeared sentences jotted in evident haste; descended into the fold. Varric turned the paper around and unfolded it.

“This is…” He breathed, as his eyes scanned over the bloody writings.

“Inquisitor Lavellan’s last missive to Sister Nightingale.” Charter finished for him with the peaks of her knuckles pressed into his desk. “We believe…well I believe it was written from inside of wherever Solas kept her.”

“Moon’hwa wanted Leliana to find her and Solas?” Varric’s gaze grew pensive as he read downwards, meeting the poorly drawn map at the bottom corner. “Why? She knew Leliana would kill her.” Varric slapped the paper with the back of his hand, “What in the world? She made herself bait?! This confirms it!”

“It confirms more than that.” Charter frowned “I was sent this tome by the Divine when Leliana was condemned to Weisshaupt…then I received this parchment with word of her death. I… don’t know who it came from. But someone wanted me to…have it.”

“You are the Informant to the Divine now, right? Quite the entrance you made in my keep for a spymaster.”

The auburn-haired elf nodded and bit into her lip, shame tinting her cheeks, but nevertheless she steered the topic back to the subject at hand. “You should…flip the page over.”

Varric leveled with her with his brows raised, he wasn’t sure he wished to see more, hell he hardly had time to digest what he had just read. But appetite be damned, and he willed himself to flip the page.

The infamous dwarf deflated into his chair; his fingers splayed out over the illustration. “Well, shit.”

A perfect rendition of the Red Lyrium Idol sketched in obsessive strokes and shaded in with crimson charcoal. He only knew one artist so skilled.

Varric scrubbed his face with his palm and sighed, a confession perched on his lips.

“She tried to warn us before…but at the time Hawke and I couldn’t see the relation. The idol was stolen, and I failed to track it down…the trail went cold in Tevinter. Hawke has been looking into it for me.”

“He may already have it…” Charter swallowed the knot in her throat and fidgeted on the spot as she recalled the memory. “Over a year ago I was entrusted with searching for Solas independently from Leliana. The Divine wished for me to call a secret meeting with some notable individuals that claimed a sighting of the Dread Wolf. Remember I asked for your Carta Contact regarding that night?”

“Yeah, I remember. I had no idea it was in relation to Solas!? Could have tipped me off about that! Maker, I would have joined you at that meeting!”

“I…don’t think it would have been the best idea.” Charter’s jaw clenched, “He was there. Varric, Solas showed up himself…and he killed everyone at that table. I was lucky to have been granted amnesty.”

Varric was thankful he was sitting down as he absorbed the full weight of her account, his belly filling with despair and…guilt.

“Everyone at that table had a story regarding the Idol. But Solas…he claimed that he already had the idol in his possession.”

“Bullshit.” Varric growled, shoving his fists into his pockets and grinding his teeth. Despair surrendered to rage.

Charter dug her finger into the weathered tome, “He strives to bring down the veil and restore ancient Elvhenan…he tried to convince me that life will be better for those like me.”

Varric ripped his hand out of his pocket and gestured to the window, “If he already has it, why hasn’t the world been flipped yet?! Why delay this wonderful reset? Chuckles doesn’t have it; I’d bet coin on it.”

“Varric…I understand your frustration…but Solas is no longer a friend. He asked me to write to the Inquisitor…it’s a report I could never deliver. Lavellan was lost to us at the time. Leliana was rampaging all over the Free Marches looking for her. In hindsight we speculate Solas knew that but feigned otherwise. It was a deflection. We believe that Solas already had Moon’hwa in his custody and he wanted us to think otherwise. Why would he boast about the idol but hide the fact that he harbored the Inquisitor?”

“Because he wanted you out of the race.” Varric grumbled.

“What?”

“He is drawing you away from the search by making himself the target. If you believe the Idol has been claimed by Solas then the Divine will stop looking for it and instead, she will refocus her efforts on him, leaving one less contender he needs to deal with. He is bluffing to keep you out of the search, Kid.

Charter’s brows scrunched, the skin between them smashing together as she paced back and forth. “The real threat slept in our camp every night. I have never forgotten that. The world won’t either.”

“Imagine how Moon’Hwa felt. She absorbed the brunt of that. A holy scapegoat to suit the needs of an ungrateful world.” Varric shook his head and closed his eyes. A dreadful thought trespassed into the light and a shiver tumbled down his spine. He pushed his elbows onto the desk and leaned in, glaring up at the fretting elf before him. “How did Leliana die?”

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jacklyn-flynn · 3 years ago

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I finally finished my Fenris pysanky and this time I thought I would share a little bit of the process for those who are interested. Below the cut, you can find a summary of all the steps this egg took over a 10-ish hour period! Not crazy happy with how the star motif turned out (and the linework is shaky in parts) but I'm really happy with the ribbon and lyrium tattoos!

These doesn't include the steps of emptying and cleaning the egg as I do that in batches. (It's pretty gross and not very interesting.)

Step one: I measured and applied grid lines to sketch the lyrium tattoos using a reference I kept up on my computer screen to zoom in where needed.

Step two: Covered everything I wanted white in wax. In this case, the lyrium. Traditionally, white is the main color for linework but I wanted mine to be black for most elements so only the lyrium was covered. The star and ribbon weren't even drawn on at this stage because it would have disappeared beneath the black dye anyway. Before dying it, I dipped it in a diluted vinegar solution to make sure any oils from my fingers, eraser residue, or other debris were removed as they would prevent an uneven coloring.

Step three: I dyed the egg in "orca" black. I'm also including a picture of what the wax looked like after it was dyed. (That's still the black wax from above!)

Step four: I sketched out the other two elements with blue pencil and then I waxed everything I wanted to stay black using white wax so that I could see what I was doing.

Step five: I "washed back" the egg to white so that I could do the blue and red dyes. I didn't wait to do the lyrium at this stage because you run the risk of not getting a true white without doing a light acid wash, which you can see. This is just to give the next colors a base.

Step six thru whatever: Dyed the egg "jay feather blue", waxed, dyed it "Niagra blue", waxed, dyed it "Huron blue", waxed and then dyed it "glowing hearts" red. I was pretty absorbed in the work and forgot to take pictures of those steps but here's the red! (it looked like the below...only blue)

Step seven-ish: Waxed AGAIN to cover everything I wanted to stay true red and then gave it a good soak in "kalyna red" which was the final color. After that, it was finally time to remove the wax! Here are some before and during pictures. The after pictures are the ones at the beginning of the post! Removing the wax is definitely the most satisfying part of the process. Until then, you can't truly tell what the final product will look like behind all the wax! The wax removal also gives the entire egg a really nice shine.

If you have any questions, lemme know. I'm happy to talk about pysanky and while I'm not the best at it, it's an important part of my heritage that I'm extremely proud of!

#dragon age #fenris #dragon age 2 #da2 #pysanky #pysanka #proud to be a first-generation born in america but not so proud to be an american....#lyrium and hawke's ribbon

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transfenris-truther · 4 years ago

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Tagged by @merrybandofmurderers to share my WIP and holy shit do I have a thousand baby chunks written of a million things, but not a whole lot that's ready for human eyes atm. So here's a little bit from WAY ahead in No Town More Barren Than Our Town. For context, Fenris is transgender (as he is in all my fics) and this takes place after the chantry explosion, when Hawke, Fenris, Isabela and Anders are briefly on the run together. Tagging @blarrghe and @tea42 if you have anything to share!

"Fenris, I, uh- Listen… I know I've healed you plenty in the past and I've never mentioned it before but…"

Fenris knew why he hadn't mentioned whatever it was. The two had barely been on speaking terms until recently. "Go on, mage."

Anders rolled his eyes at the habitual term, "Did you know you have an unfinished spell on you?"

It was Fenris' turn to be annoyed, "It's been a decade. You could have mentioned it. Just dispel it. Probably some curse I acquired following Hawke."

"It's too old for that. And too complex. It was something done on stages. A long time ago."

"The lyrium then."

Anders shook his head, "If that weren't complete you'd be dead, right? It's a delicate ritual isn't it? I doubt Danarius was just going to leave the ribbon untied on that little gift."

Despite himself, Fenris chuckled. Then froze in realization. "I know what it is."

For most of his life, Fenris has simply chosen not to think about the peculiarities of his sex. After the lyrium, he had not remembered what his body had been like before. To his knowledge, he had always been this way. He had assumed himself intersex, male in every respect but what was between his legs. Yet, with the return of his memories, he knew that wasn't the case. The maleness of his body had been a reward. Danarius' first boon. Left unfinished for decades for reasons beyond Fenris' understanding. All the discomfort and strangeness he had felt. All the explanations he had to make. That could've all been avoided if Danarius had just finished the spell. Fenris swallowed tightly, unsure what to say. What tumbled out of his mouth embarrassed him, but he had to know, "Could you finish it?"

#WIP Wednesday #fenris #da2 #Anders #Not fenders sorry y'all #dragon age #Fanfic

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midnightprelude · 6 years ago

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Her Favor

A ficlet written for my beloved @lethendralis-paints based on her stunning angsty Fenris portrait. It’s set some time before the first chapter in the Ariverse and a bit of a backstory into how the Hawke and Lavellan families initially met. Artwork belongs to Leth, words to me, and Fenris to Eris and Ariadna.

It seemed as though the sun would never rise again, but inexorably the night marched forward, light growing and dew collecting on leaves. A messenger had come to visit them in the darkness. Nobody would send them a courier, not here, not unless there was some dire need.

And that there was. Hawke isn’t just troubled with the problems of men any longer, but with the sundering of the heavens themselves.

Fenris shouldn’t have been surprised at Varric’s letter. He had seen the breach. It was hard to miss, after all. They had been lucky to avoid demons thus far, but the rumors had approached them as secluded in the Hinterlands as they were.

And of course Varric would find himself in the middle of the madness. He has a nose for it after all. Though I had made him promise to not involve Hawke. She has suffered enough as it is.

He tried to suppress his anger towards the dwarf. It appeared as though the world truly was ending, if that swirling green hole was any indication.

They had heard a knock and Eris Hawke had rolled over.

“Your turn,” she had mumbled, almost incomprehensibly.

Neither of them had been sleeping much, not with their new baby. Eris, in particular, was almost delirious most of the time from lack of rest.

Ariadna. Our miracle. She’s almost enough to make me believe in a higher power, if I didn’t know what it took to get her. Sebastian would be proud.

Amazingly, the noise at the door had not woken the babe. He pulled a light robe around his shoulders, tying it at the waist, and padded silently through the hallways. The floorboards were cool. It was somewhere near midnight, by his calculations.

He opened the door, staring at the messenger, who stared back at him in return. A soft glow from his lyrium markings cast the stranger in shadows, his features deepening.

“Letter for Mistress Hawke, ser,” he said, softly. “From Master Tethras.”

The man reached into his knapsack and pulled out a sheet of folded parchment, stamped with Varric’s iconography: a crossbow loaded with a quill.

He nodded to the man, searching the table by the door for a few coins to offer for his trouble. He offered him tea, but the man frowned. “It’d be best if I head back to Skyhold. They’ve no shortage of work for me to do, what with the rebuilding and all.”

Fenris closed the door, frowning, letter in hand. He knew that the words were for Hawke’s eyes, but he could scarcely help himself. Hawke was… so tired. And if Varric needed something…

He broke the wax seal, turning the letter over.

Eris,

I’ve delayed this letter as long as possible, but we’re growing desperate. We need allies. If you haven’t noticed, there’s a massive hole in the sky spitting out demons. I’ve joined a group that’s trying to stop it (and don’t go rolling your eyes at me, it was Seeker Pentaghast’s fault).

The Wardens have disappeared. The Orlesians are ignoring us. The Chantry fears what we represent. We’ve sided with the mages, angering the Templars and the common people both.

We need a miracle, Hawke, now more than ever. And I remember you having a penchant for those.

Skyhold, they call it. A castle in the clouds. Should you wish to join us here, I will send a caravan for you. I await your response.

We cannot allow your daughter to grow up in a world that’s falling apart.

Be safe, my old friend.

-V

He sat the letter on the table, his heart rate quickening. He knew that this would happen eventually. They would seek her out and draw her back into the madness.

And she would go, willingly.

Unthinking, he grabbed his sword from the mantle, strapping it to his back. He threw the front door open, stepping out into the night air.

His walk was almost meditative. The only thoughts that crossed his mind were on how difficult it would be to say goodbye to her. He wore only his breeches and a thin ribbon at his wrist, blowing in the wind, his robe discarded on the floor of the kitchen. There was a bite to the air, but it was not entirely unpleasant. It suited his mood: sharp and bitter.

Eventually he clambered atop a great hill. For a time he sat alone, staring at that breach in the sky.

We are all so small, all of us. What can mere mortals do against reality itself being torn?

After a time, he stood, unclasping his blade and holding it before him. He fell into a trance, running through exercise after exercise, until sweat beaded on his forehead and ran in rivulets down his back.

The hours passed in silence. He felt no desire to return, choosing solitude over seeing her eyes, filled with terror and need, both.

She would go to them. And I will be left behind, where I cannot protect her.

He remembered her body, less than a year ago, when she was nearly rent in two by the child she carried. The mess of scars on her stomach from previous duels had been pulled against her growing belly. He had kissed it, nightly, speaking softly to their child in Tevene, words that he did not remember being spoken to him.

I will give this one the world and all it’s tiny pleasures.

Eris would laugh and say that he was smitten sight-unseen and would wonder what he would do if their child was unfathomably hideous.

And in turn, he would laugh, assuring her that there was no possibility that a child born to them would be anything less than immaculate.

She would agree with him wholeheartedly.

He remembered what their mutual desire to start a family had done to her afterwards. Her injuries made the birth particularly challenging. Varric had resorted to summoning Anders to try and save her. There was so much blood.

He blanched thinking about it, swinging his blade all the harder.

Dusk was giving way to dawn and he still had no answers.

How can I tell her goodbye? Words… There are no words for this.

He studied her favor, running the ribbon through his fingers, which he still wore through the passing of years.

A voice broke him out of his reverie.

“Fenris!” She panted audibly. “There you are! I’ve spent the last hour looking all over for you! You never came back to bed last night.”

Eris Hawke clutched a swaddled Ariadna to her chest, the letter in her other hand.

“I needed some air.”

“Air? You were gone all night! And I found this!” She looked at him sternly. “Does this have something to do with your sudden disappearance?”

He frowned, nodding. “I did not want to tell you. I knew you would want to leave.”

She stared at him. “Of course. Varric wrote to us after all. But we need to make preparations. There’s so much we’ll need to bring…” She looked past him considering. “Do you think they’ll have a bassinet in this Skyhold place?”

“I’m sorry… What?” he said, his eyes widening. “A bassinet? You don’t mean to take Ariadna with you...do you?”

To lose them both…

“If my arms were free, I would have my hands on my hips, fixing you a particularly stern glare. Of course, we’re bringing Ariadna. What, would you have me leave her here in our home by herself?”

“What? I thought…”

She laughed. “You thought that I would entrust the raising of our child to you? You’d spoil her rotten before I’d even made it out of the door. No, Fen. We are a family. We go together, to the end of the world, if we must.”

He sighed, feeling as though a weight had slid from his shoulders. He moved to embrace her, tucking his head against her shoulder.

“Hey, you’re all sweaty! You’re going to muss my new robes.”

He laughed. “And I know that you do not have a care for your clothing, given the number of times you’ve set them on fire.”

“You’re right.” She kissed his forehead. “But we should return. Packing and all that.”

He looked at her, strong and beautiful and fierce in the morning light. “I love you.”

Her smile widened. “And I you, always.”

#midnight writes #lethendralis paints #we both sob #draw this in your style meme #except I can't draw #dragon age fanfiction #fenris #eris hawke #ariadna hawke

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kaerwrites · 6 years ago

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What about a fenhawke training scene? I can only imagine the sexual tension between them and gosh i need this

He paced, like a trapped animal, a tiger in a cage, and whenHawke stepped on a loose floorboard he was met by the quick turn of his head,the eyes that glowed, ever so slightly, in the dim light, the lips pulled backfrom his teeth. Fenris’s stance was slightly hunched, protective, and Hawkecouldn’t tell if he looked more ready to defend or flee. He held his own handsup, silent, waiting, as those eyes narrowed and those hands flexed, almostclaw-like as they clenched and unclenched.

“I should have known youwould follow,” Fenris spat, and Hawke set his jaw, and told himself not to takeit personally.

“I’m becoming predictable in my old age,” Hawke answered,dryly, and Fenris snarled. He added, “I’m not leaving. Not until I’m sure – “

“That I won’t do something drastic? No. How chivalrous of you. How – fucking –perfect.” Fenris’s voice remained low, furious, his accent more pronounced ashe cut the syllables of each word so precisely, sardonic, sharp enough towound.

“Fenris – “

“Don’t.”

Hawke closed his mouth, but he remained where he was, therein the entrance to the stolen mansion’s main sitting room, the space between himselfand the elf as wide as it had ever been, these last two years. It seemed milesstretched between them, the trust and the comfort and the friendship lostsomewhere between too many unsaid truths, and Fenris’s fury.

“I can’t look at you,” Fenris announced at last, and hebegan to pace again, and Hawke scowled, and crossed his arms, and missed thetimes when he thought he understood the elf.

“Then don’t look at me,” he answered, his own voice growinghard. The Hawke Voice, Varric calledit. “I’m still not leaving. Not yet.”

“Stand there till you rot, then.”

“Fenris – “

“Stop saying my name like - !” Fenris cut himself off, andHawke didn’t push. Fenris glared. Hawke glared. Things had been simpler, once.Finally Fenris threw up his hands, and a string of furious Tevene flew from hismouth, too fast for Hawke to catch.

“If you would just tell me what it was that set you off,”Hawke began, and Fenris interrupted.

“You’ll make it right, I assume. Like you always do.”

Hawke didn’t flinch. “For you?” he asked, knowing it wasn’tfair. He said, “Yes.”

Fenris picked up a chair, hurled it into the wall. Then herounded on Hawke. “Fight me,” he snarled.

“You have got to be kidding.”

Fenris stalked to the couch, where he had earlier flung hissword, and he pulled it from its scabbard with one violent tug. “Fight me,” hesaid again, and Hawke lifted his stave in time to catch the blade, and for amoment they were locked, eye to eye, and Hawke could see the pain and thepanic that the fury fought back, and as the elf recovered, he swung his staveat him.

Hawke was no swordsman, but he didn’t reach for his magic.Fenris’s swings were wild, anyway, his anger and his desperation robbing him ofthe skills that would have ripped Hawke to ribbons. Hawke knew something had happened at the society party - something that had been enough to send Fenris fleeing, furious, murderous, and so he did his best to give him what he needed. He didn’t need to know details.

Hawke lost his stave fairlyquickly, and tackled the elf as he raised his blade, sending them both to theground, wrenching the sword from furious hands and getting a fist to the jawfor his troubles as he threw it away. Another to his kidney, and then Fenriswas on top, lyrium flickering. His hand raised, and Hawke’s lifted too.

Fenris stopped himself, just barely, in time. His hand hadpenetrated the fabric of Hawke’s shirt, but not his flesh. The mage’s warmthseemed to radiate between them like a living thing, the pulse of the heart thatbeat beneath the surface, strong and steady and yet still so, so vulnerable.Hawke’s hand was at his throat, but had not closed, his thumb resting againstthe beat of the elf’s own furious pulse. Careful. Careful. The gentleness was at odds with their situation. Hawke tasted blood. Slowly, he began to easehis hand away, and Fenris moved.

The crash of the elf’s lips against his own was something hecouldn’t quite comprehend. Time stopped being a thing that made sense – there werehands tugging at clothes, and skin pressed to skin, and mouths, hot and hungry,breath, lips, taste, hands fisting inhis hair, tearing at his shirt.

Eye contact was an electric jolt that froze them both inplace. Fenris’s eyes held something haunted, horrified. Hawke knew whateverrested in his own had to be just as damning. In moments the elf was up,scrambling back, away.

Hawke took a little longer to rise.

“Fenris,” he began.

“I think you should go,” was the answer.

#fenhawke #hawris #my writing #mid-breakup tension #I have to think something like this happened at some point #idk #Anonymous

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lazysupernova · 6 years ago

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i was tagged by @pink-lyrium ♥ the idea is to post 3 things i associate with my ocs. this is sorta a mess, since i literally wrote the first things that came to my mind lol, but i hope it still makes sense

Here we go:

DAO:

Antenor Cousland – dirty songs, honeyed mead, sharp knives

Eltra Aeducan – golden ring, polished steel, woodcarving

Bellenora Cousland – bruises, scowl, Alistair

DA 2:

Edvard Hawke – red*, smirk, vain (* I should probably explain that red is in relation to his hair color, not dialogue options lol)

Arys Hawke – warhammer, loud voice, drinking straight from the bottle

DAI:

Faelys Lavellan – [in Sera's voice] arrows, thigh high boots, feathers

Ashter Trevelyan – whetstone, spearmint, sunburn

Astrid Trevelyan – purple ribbons, dried herbs, clean linen

Bonus OC:

Berwyn – nightmares, lizard, danger

#dragon age #my oc #my antenor #my eltra #my bellenora #my edvard #my arys #my faelys #my ashter #my astrid

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katalyna-rose · 7 years ago

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for dadrunkwriting 25 from the ways to say i love you list with fenhawke? <3

25. In a blissful sigh as you fall asleep

For @dadrunkwriting

Bliss

Hawke was sore all over, and loving it. They’d taken a weekend to do something special, banished everyone from their home and locked all the doors so it was just them and they could indulge. Fenris’ touch was perfect, hard and then soft, exactly what she’d needed, as she’d told him repeatedly as he bathed her when they were done. She lay in his arms and listened to his heartbeat and felt happier than she could remember ever being. It was bliss when he took charge, a release she’d never known before that she cherished. He held her loosely as they relaxed toward sleep, but kisses kept falling upon her hair every so often and she couldn’t quite manage to take her eyes off the red ribbon on his wrist, which he’d pulled out of her hair as they’d begun. It made her smile every time she saw it.

His kisses tapered off after a while and she thought he was asleep, exhausted by their exertions. She leaned up onto her elbows to look at him with a smile, though fatigue weighed heavily on her, as well. She smiled at him, so relaxed in sleep, and bent to lightly kiss his lips. His hand found her cheek, surprising her, and his eyes opened to slits and reflected the dim light in their bedroom.

“You’re supposed to be asleep,” he growled, slurring slightly with sleep.

“But you look so sweet, how can I sleep?” she replied with a smile. “I’d rather gobble you up!”

He groaned and rolled over to trap her beneath the weight of his body, burying her in blankets and limbs but making sure she could still breathe. “I already did the gobbling, Alie,” he grunted at her. “It’s time to sleep.”

She smiled and settled under the comforting weight of him, kissing the space between lines of lyrium on his shoulder as she relaxed. He was an anchor to her, keeping her in reality and away from the demons in her thoughts. Whenever she found herself growing gloomy and dark all she had to do was ask for a kiss, or ask him to take her, and she could throw off the pain. With a smile on her lips, she settled in to sleep.

On a sigh, he whispered the words that would fill her mind as she slept, the ones that had filled her body all weekend with every touch, every bruise. “I love you,” he breathed into her ear. Then she knew he was asleep, and she followed quickly.

#katalyna writes #implied dom/sub #fenris #F!Hawke #Fenris/F!Hawke #hawke/fenris #alie/fenris #alie hawke

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jawsandbones · 8 years ago

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@dahalloween ★ DAY THREE || HERE LIES THE ABYSS: demons, spirits, ghosts and possessions… good and evil collide on the third day of the week, and your favorite characters find themselves trapped in the middle. are they stuck in the fade? were they struck by a spooky vision, haunted, or do they wind up being at the mercy of a desire demon?

Recommended Listening: Camelot in Flames - Daniel Pemberton

A fingertip, and then another. Cold of a different sort against her flesh, a hand around her neck. Stuck in something like mud, foul smelling swamp, pungent water. She sinks and the graves sink with her. Bodies that float under the water, arms crossed over their chests. “The last,” it tells her, “you are the last.” It reaches down, places something in an open palm. It keeps its other around her neck, whispers in her ear. She breathes fog, and listens.

“Where is Hawke?” He asks it as he stands, pulls his sword from the corpse. Stepping back, letting the corpse fall into the fetid puddles that plague the Darktown tunnels. The torches on the wall barely hold their flame, weak and unsteady, and he doubted it would be any different if they were unlit. The only thing he can truly see clearly is Merrill, who holds a fire of her own in her hand. She turns, points her staff towards the entrance of a different portion of the underground.

“She chased one this way!” No one went with her. Reckless lately, more than usual, charging off on her own. Fenris keeps the sword steady, palms around hilt, as he storms past them. Listening to the sound of footsteps, the drip of water down cobblestone. His own shadow walks before him, as Merrill and Varric follow behind him.

Standing alone in that room, her back towards the entrance. Head lowered, staff slipping through her fingers. The torches flicker, the light recedes from her. He can feel the air shift the moment he steps through. Her head lifts. She slowly turns. Eyes wide and white, oceans banished somewhere colder. It starts to materialize, a ghost with arms around her neck. It weeps, and she weeps with it, the staff falling from her hand. She holds something close to her heart, and the demon keeps two hands around her neck. “Despair demon,” he barely hears Merrill say it.

Hawke breathes out smoke and ice, and the snow crystalizes on the walls. There’s bleak in his blood, a chill in the bone, and Fenris grips his sword even tighter. “She hasn’t given in. She’s just a little stuck,” Merrill says, “We have to kill the demon.” It opens its mouth, and the piercing wail rips through them. A thousand screams in one, a howl, a shriek, a cry, a sob. The ground shudders and shakes, hands digging upwards, and they are pulling themselves out of the dirt.

Leandra’s broken nails scrabbling at the ground, still in that wedding dress. They had buried her in black, just last week. Carver, all purple and pale, the taint pulsing underneath his skin, gone but not forgotten. Bethany is barely held together, all mangled and broken, precious and good. Malcolm spews sickness, the Hawke of Hawke’s. Decayed remnants of themselves, skin tight, a color not their own. “What are we waiting for?” Varric says as he pulls the bolt, lets it fly. Hawke recoils just as the bolt hits Bethany, pain that mirrors just the same.

He feels Merrill’s magic before she even raises her staff, but he is pushing himself off and away. Meeting Carver’s blade with his own, and these specters bar their path to Hawke. Fenris can hear its whispers, the mourning it unleashes, “the last, the last,” it’s saying, “let them die.” This is not Carver. Fenris pushes forward, the lyrium cascading its glow, breaks the defenses, cuts him down. Bethany and Malcolm are reaching, grasping, but vines are twisting around them, pulling them back down to the earth.

Varric works away at Leandra, keeping her pinned, and they create the opening. The demon cowers behind Hawke, draws blood as it holds tighter. Making her step back, making her open her hand, present the gift given to her. Red unfurls from where she holds it, a cloth, a ribbon, a token. A match to the one wrapped around his wrist. “Left,” it whispers, “alone. The last.” Despair he’s given her. A pain she never speaks of. A weakness he’s created in her, a void that allowed the demon in. The lyrium thrums in his skin, his blood, his bones, and he thrusts his hand through her, finds the heart of it.

Crushing it completely, listening to it screech. Bolt after bolt, fire and wood, and the ghosts of Hawke crumble away just as the demon does. Hawke falls forward into Fenris’s waiting arms. Holding her up, and that cloth is still in her hands. He hates the way it’s the same, holds her tightly as it fades into ash. Reaching downwards, carrying her in his arms. Merrill takes Hawke’s staff, Varric half drags his sword. They barely speak to each other as they make their way back through the tunnels.

Hawke wakes not with a gasp but with a whisper, blinking blue. Shaking her head as she focuses, a hand curling around his breastplate. Reaching upwards even still, fingertips at his cheek. “Fenris?” she asks, “are you – real? You’re here?” His hands dig into her arm, her leg, as he holds her a little tighter.

“I’m here,” he tells her.

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the-jade-goblin · 8 years ago

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Fadewalker - a fenhawke fic

“Save her.”

Fenris’ plea was desperate, the lost, slightly crazed pain in his eyes hurt the Inquisitor to look at. He did his best to avoid Fenris’ piercing eyes, but found he couldn’t. That stare was just too intense. So full of pain. The red ribbon he gripped so tightly in his shaking hands was fading, wearing slightly at the edges, but it had been lovingly looked after, and Assan could see the lighter patch of skin on Fenris’ arm where he had worn it, so dutifully, his mark of the commitment and the love he felt for the Champion of Kirkwall. Everything about Fenris hurt Assan - he was not the tough, unsmiling, dangerous elven warrior Varric had told him about - he was a broken man on the edge of desperation, and it killed Assan to know he had reduced someone to this with his actions.

“Fenris, elf...she’s gone.” Varric murmured, resting a gentle hand on Fenris’ arm.

He still had the letter he’d written to Fenris - one that had been crumpled into an angry ball and shoved back into the dwarf’s hands the minute Fenris had arrived in Skyhold, before he had gone in search of the Inquisitor.

Dragged from an important war meeting to face an angry, heartbroken, extremely dangerous glowing elf had not been at the top of Assan’s list of ways he’d like to spend the evening. He was no good at this sort of thing. Diplomacy and understanding was one thing, but how did you look into the eyes of a man who’s wife you’d all but killed? In the name of the greater good no less?

Fenris angrily threw off Varric’s hand, glaring at the Inquisitor.

“You can open rifts! You can walk in the Fade! You have done it once, do it again! Go back there and save her!”

Assan’s eyes bulged in his head. He wanted him to go back to the awful place? The place of horrors and nightmares that kept him awake at night and haunted his every waking moment?

“You want me to what?” he spluttered.

“If you will not help me, at least get me into a rift, I can take it from there!” Fenris said.

“Fenris you can’t be serious!” Varric cried. “That’s suicide!”

“I don’t care!”

“Fenris, the Fade is an ordeal under normal circumstances, but you’d be there physically.” Assan said. “That place is a carnival of horrors, you’d be walking into your worst nightmare.”

“I’m already walking in my worst nightmare.” Fenris replied.

Assan went quiet.

“Do you suppose I fear anything the Fade has to throw at me, if I am already living the worst possible nightmare I can imagine? A life without her is not a life at all.”

“Fenris...”

“As Inquisitor I can’t knowingly send you to your death Fenris.”

“Please.” Fenris’ eyes went glassy, and he looked down at the ribbon clenched in his fists. The last desperate attempt. The final effort. This man was gone long before he had arrived in Skyhold - he was probably gone the moment he’d read Varric’s letter. He had nothing to lose now. Assan knew he would find a way to kill himself one way or another without Hawke. “She - Marian...she’s all I have.”

Varric stepped forward, about to try and explain to Fenris that Hawke was gone, that there was nothing that could be done, but Assan stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. He thought about Dorian, and what he would do if he was in Fenris’ place, and Dorian was stuck in the Fade, left behind and he had lived, faced with the one person who could possibly help, only to have them refuse. He knew he would do anything to see Dorian safe. He could expect no less from Fenris.

He looked at Fenris as the other elf look up to meet his eyes.

“I’ll try.” he said. “I’ll take you into the Fade.”

They went to Adamant, to the place where Assan had walked out of the Fade for the second time. The Anchor crackled with barely controlled Fade energy the closer they got to where the rift they’d escaped through had been. Inquisiton soldiers surrounded the perimeter, ready to face anything threat that came through the rift.

Assan raised a hand, concentrating hard. The Anchor fizzled, and he snatched his hand back with a hiss of pain. Dorian looked at him worriedly.

“Amatus...?”

Fenris’ ear twitched at the Tevene endearment, and his gaze moved to the Inquisitor and Dorian briefly.

“I’m fine. Not used to opening rifts.” Assan dismissed. “Do you think you could stablize it with magic? Be my focus?”

“I’ll do my best. Let me know if it hurts.” Dorian took Assan’s hand with such tenderness Fenris nearly snapped the hilt of his sword in half watching it.

It reminded him of Marian. Painfully.

Channelling magic into the Anchor, Dorian held Assan steady as he once again raised his marked hand, and tried to draw on the power of the Fade. He felt it, and he began to pull. It struggled and resisted him, but he only pulled harder.

Gritting his teeth against the resistance, ignoring the painful fizzle of the Anchor, he locked eyes with Fenris, and nodded. Fenris nodded back.

“When I give the word everyone jump forward!” Assan ordered. “Ready...now!”

They leapt, and the rift swallowed them up. They hit the ground with a thud, unlike the first go around. There was no graceful landing this time.

“And here I’d hoped to not make falling into the Fade a habit.” Varric muttered as he picked himself off the ground and dusted himself off.

“I’d hoped to not make a lot of things a habit until I met Assan,” Dorian replied crisply.

Fenris took a moment to look around him, and he felt his skin crawl. The lyrium over his flesh was reacting strongly to the energy of the Fade, and they seemed to almost hum in tune with the magic around them. He didn’t like it.

“This is where you came out of?” he questioned.

“Yes, just over this ridge here is where we fought the Nightmare.” Assan stumbled forward, always a little disorientated after stepping through the Fade.

The others followed him.

“Maker’s Breath…” Dorian whispered.

The giant corpse of the Nightmare enveloped the entire clearing that Assan remembered from the battle. Smaller nightmares scuttered around it, nipping at its rotting flesh. The little spiders didn’t bother them as they moved forward, too occupied with their meal. The Nightmare was bigger than Assan recalled, and he unconsciously shivered as he thought of this great beast looming over him, whispering in his head all his fears and doubts. That Hawke had managed to kill it was extraordinary. But where was she?

“Hawke’s staff!” Varric cried, holding up a broken mage’s staff from one end of the clearing.

Assan heard Fenris inhale a sharp breath at the burnt and broken wood in Varric’s hands. Assan turned his eyes back to the Nightmare, running his gaze along its bottom where the little nightmares scavenged. He walked around the corpse, following the line of spiders, until he came across what he was looking for.

A single hand, sticking out from under the corpse.

“She’s here! I found her!” Assan yelled.

The team ran to him, and were quick to follow his orders and attempting to flit the imposing corpse off Hawke’s body. Dorian pushed with all his magic, and with help from Fenris and Assan, the lifted the body just enough to Varric to pull Hawke out from under it. The Nightmare corpse fell with a bang behind them as they rushed to Hawke’s side. Fenris cradled her lifeless form in his arms, holding her broken body against his tightly.

Several minutes of tense silence engulfed the team, the only sound being Fenris’ muffled sobbing. Varric turned away. Assan wrapped an arm around the dwarf, and reached out for Dorian’s hand. The Tevinter gripped it tightly, eyes glued to the sad scene before them. Assan sighed heavily. Too late.

“…She’s still alive…” Dorian murmured in amazement.

Everyone, including Fenris, looked up at him questioningly.

“She’s breathing. Look – Assan pass me a dagger.”

Dorian came down by Hawke’s body, and held up the dagger to her lips. Fenris stared as the faintest fog formed over the blade. She was indeed breathing. She was alive.

“She’s alive.” Fenris let out a chocked sound, and turned his stunned gaze to a grinning Dorian.

“….nris…..?”

Fenris’ eyes snapped back to Hawke’s face. A tiny frown had formed on her face, though she was still unconscious, her fingers blindly groped weakly in the direction of Fenris’ voice

“We have to get her to Skyhold, she needs medical attention. Now.” Assan said urgently. “Dorian, can you do something for her on the way?”

“I believe I can keep her stable until we get back to Skyhold.” Dorian confirmed.

“Let’s get you out of here Marian.” Fenris murmured, picking up her fragile form in his arms. “I’m going to get you home.”

Hawke heard the sound of birdsong, and for a moment she thought she’d died. Honestly if this wasn’t the Maker’s bosom, again, she’d resurrect just to smack a Chantry sister.

But birdsong didn’t quite go with the Fade, and so she opened her eyes to investigate. The light invaded her eyes and they stung, she squinted against the light to see her surroundings. She was in a bed. In a stone room. Skyhold? Yes, she recognised the Inquisition’s banner on the wall.

“Hey, Hawke you’re up.”

She turned her head slowly - her neck screaming in protest - to see Varric look up from his manuscript on the chair next to her bed. She smiled.

“Varric? That you?”

“You know any other devillishly handsome dwarves?” Varric joked.

“Well, there was this one dwarf in Orlais...”

“Oh har har. Good to see you again too.”

Hawke chuckled quietly, struggling for a moment to sit up. She heard a whine, and then a great big mabari head plopped itself onto her lap. She smiled, lovingly scratching behind Asher’s ears. Her trusty mabari.

But, if Asher was here, then that must mean...

She looked at Varric questioningly.

“He’s with the Inquisitor. You’ve been asleep for a week. I managed to kick him out for a few hours to get some sun.” Varric said.

“Is he...? Can I...?”

“You feel well enough to get up?”

Hawke nodded. It was a lie, but she had to see Fenris. Using both Asher and Varric as makeshift crutches, she slowly got herself out of bed and shuffled out the door. Leaning heavily on the dwarf, Varric lead her down the hallway towards the entrance. She was quite the spectacle to the nobles gathered in the hall, but she paid them no attention as she passed, dressed only in her night shift, leggings and robe. Her bare feet pattered across the stone.

She heard the Inquisitor’s voice before she reached them, and as they rounded the corner near the door, she saw his familiar profile on the steps, looking up as he spoke. A small, deep chuckle hit her ears. Fenris. She was already beaming even before she could see him.

A wave of cold air from the outside hit her, and she shivered, coming to a halt. Varric looked at her worriedly, and with just a glance suggested she stay where she was. Varric would bring Fenris to her. Leaning her hand on Asher’s back, Hawke nodded in agreement. Varric went on ahead to the door.

“Sorry to interrupt Inquisitor, but there’s someone Broody needs to see.” Varric said with a smile.

The Inquisitor looked up, beyond Varric, and smiled when he saw Hawke standing there. Fenris also turned, and Hawke finally saw his face. Fenris looked like he’d seen a ghost as he stared at her, mouth hanging open and eyes wide.

“Fenris,” was all she said, and then he was running to her.

It took him less than four strides to reach her, before he was holding her face in his hands, gently, as though she were made of glass.

“Marian.” he whispered.

Hawke smiled up at him. “Did I oversleep again?”

Fenris gave a breathless laugh. “Yes, yes you did. But I’ll forgive you as long as you promise to never leave my side like that again.”

“It’s a deal. I missed you Fenris.”

“I missed you too.” then he was kissing her, and her arms wound around his neck, his around her waist.

The he was picking her up and spinning her around. Hawke let out a delighted laugh, threading her fingers through his snowy hair and kissing everywhere on his face that she could reach. It felt wonderful to be back in his arms.

He cradled her gently, holding her in his arms like a bride, and she simply beamed up at him as he leaned his head down to kiss her again, and again, and again.

“Get a room you two!” Varric laughed.

“Good idea!” Hawke grinned. “Fenris?”

At once Fenris was carrying her back down the hall towards her room. Varric and Assan laughed.

“We won’t be seeing those two again for a few days,” Varric commented.

“No,” Assan agreed. “But that’s all right. They deserve a break.”

Varric took out his manuscript, and started to write. This was going in the amended version of The Tale of the Champion for sure.

#fenhawke #dragon age #da2 #da:i #fanfic

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klrkwall · 8 years ago

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Ribbon red

— his organs are ripped to ribbons, he has flirted and danced with death.

garrett hawke accepts the arishok's duel.

fenhawke, hurt/comfort.

trigger warnings: mentions of gore,

i finished this at the ass crack of dawn so theres probably errors enjoy im crying

Fenris watches in horror as the lyrium blue magic surrounds Hawke and his wounds, Anders exhausting himself to heal Garrett to the best of his ability. The mage was exhausted, falling once again to his hands and knees.

Still – the new Champion lays there, bones crushed and fingers lost, wounds to leave nasty scars for the rest of his life, he was barely hanging onto his life and all Fenris would do was watch. Merrill pipes in. “Is.. Is there anything I can do?” Fenris immediately answers. “No. Do not attempt to help Hawke with your blood magic. It will kill him and perhaps everybody else in this place.” Anger was clear in his voice, but so was desperation.

He was desperate, desperate for Hawke to make a fast recovery like he normally did with any injuries. Yet, faith was leaving him – stubbornly, as he watches his amatus lay on the ground of the place where he fought the Arishok. Hawke’s face was bashed in, from when the Arishok bashed his weapon in his face when Hawke had attacked him from the front – surprising him after a smoke bomb. Red almost looked to be his new skin color as blood bled from his nose and mouth, his eye was basically glued shut with skin and oozing blood, his eyeball was pushed so far back in his head, it may never recover, Anders quickly predicted.

Bones. Hawke’s ribs were crushed, most – if not all, broken. His right arm was twisted the wrong way, clearly broken as well. Although in rough shape, his legs were fine. The worst areas were probably the Champion’s torso, hand and eye. Fenris shudders, goes back to biting whatever nails he had left when flashes of Hawke and the Arishok’s battle intruded his head.

The Arishok and Hawke were doing a dance, Hawke immediately is swept off the ground by the Arishok’s weapon piercing him through the stomach, ribboning his organs. Garrett coughs, splatters blood staining the weapon and his chin from his wheezing. In the air, the Arishok is squinting and Garrett very quickly glances at the ash shade eyes before ehe Arishok whips his body around, yanking his weapon out of Hawke who fell to the hard ground, howling loudly from the impact and the increasing pain in his stomach.

The dance was not over, The Arishok simply had one of his few dips with Hawke.

Isabela – the original reason for this whole catastrophe, brings the exhausted healer back up with her arms and supports him with her side. “Don’t you fall asleep now!” With the motivation, electrifying healing auras leave his hands and he focuses on Garrett’s torso. The magic made the pain decrease in small amounts, running blood became dry stains to his armor and wounds held as best together they could be.

Hawke is on the ground, quickly recovering from the blow he took, he is swift to get up but not swift enough as the Arishok’s weapon comes swinging down, catching Hawke’s hand in its grasp and burns through the skin, the muscle and through the bone. Three of Hawke’s fingers and half of his thumb flies off, scattered along the floor of the Viscount’s office.

He shouts in pain, but is not slowed as he just fights with more menace. His bite was worse then his bark.

Fenris looks away from his stomach, the gory scene slowly got to him – perhaps it was because it was Hawke who was laying in the pool of blood, near death with ribbon organs. Instead, he focuses his attention on Garrett’s hands. The hand Fenris could see better was the one in worst shape. Three fingers were absent, in their leave were ripped open wounds into Garrett’s hand, half of his thumb was missing. His fingers were somewhere in this very room.

It was the same hand that lightly grabbed the night he left.

“Fenris…” His name was a plea. Fenris didn’t turn his head around, just stood up from the bed and fastened the belts on his complicated armor. “Please, Hawke.”

His arm is grabbed at, Fenris jumps slightly – on alert and looks down to see it’s Hawke’s hand who is grabbed around his wrist. “Please, just look at me for a moment. A moment is all I ask.” Fenris owed him that, he’s convinced. He turns his head and looks at the vulnerable Fereldan.

The words do not come out easy like they always did. “I…. Will I see-“

Fenris nods. “I will follow you everywhere, Hawke.” The promise is well kept, he followed Hawke everywhere when he asked – and not asked.

Garrett’s hand twitches, blood that glued his hand down to the floor stubbornly coming up. From the simple few twitches, it is clear Hawke is fighting. He is fighting to stay alive.

Anders exhales deeply, withdrawing his hands away from Hawke’s stomach. “There is permanent damage, but I have done all I can with his torso. Fool is lucky I’m as good of a healer as I am.” Anders is doing the best he can, Fenris knows that – yet he can only feel bitterness as he takes his news with a spoonful of salt, a moment to brag about himself.

“And his eye?” Anders sighs – that is all Fenris needs to know in order to not get his hopes up, not that he does anyway. The Warrior walks over and crouches down next to Garrett. His good eye is slit open, the familiar moss green eye is comforting to Fenris who softly smiles down at Garrett who he hopes sees it as it disappears seconds after. “What is the plan now?” Fenris asks with a stern tone, eager to move past this process.

Anders wasted no time in answering, he had this down to a system. It was alarming to some but to Fenris, it was comforting. He may have personal disliking towards the mage, but he was glad Garrett was being healed by somebody who knew what he was doing. The chances of a good recovery were higher, thanks to the mage. Fenris would be thankful for that, at another time.

“I will need help to carry Hawke to his house, I would prefer not to continue healing here.”

Merrill chirps in. “I can help!” Anders takes note, of Merrill’s much smaller body but smiles. “I will probably need you to carry him halfway, my body is exhausted and I need all the energy I can get to continue healing him.” He turns his attention to Fenris.

Without being asked or told to, Fenris volunteers. “I will help carry him, let us be off.”

“AH - ! FUCK! Maker’s balls!” Garrett howls, blood curdling to his friends in his home (and the neighbors, Hawke predicts.) Merrill had slipped, Hawke’s freshly broken arm banged against his wall. Merrill winced in remorse and sympathetic pain. “I apologize, Hawke!” He understands, Garrett truly does he just can’t bring himself to nod or say anything else now, everything hurt too much. His body was on fire.

Fenris finished carrying him up the stairs, Anders lending himself as support for the warrior and gently laid Garrett down on his bed. “A king…” Garrett groans. His friends look puzzled, exchanging silent questioning gazes with each other. It’s Varric and Fenris who know what hes trying to say and both smile, Fenris rolling his eyes.

“If this is your idea of being treated like a king, I would hate to see how you look if you were treated like a peasant, Hawke.” Varric laughs, yet it is shortlived when Anders interrupts. “Alright, I need everybody to please give me space to finish the healing process.”

They all step back – and watch as Anders exhausts himself for long hours, collapsing multiple times as he did before.

It is late into the night when Anders is finally finished. He steps back and wipes his forehead, turning to face Fenris. “He.. is damaged for good.” Alright – the bad news was out on the table. Fenris would help Garrett cope with the permanent damage. He would be there for him when nobody was there for himself when his body – and mind – had permanently changed.

“Alright. So, what exactly did you heal?”

“The organs… that the Arishok chopped up as if it was his fine end of the week dinner-“ Fenris rolls his eyes as the joke, clearly unamused as he awaits for Anders to finish. “No sense of humor. Tsk, Hawke will need that when he wakes up,” A thought comes to him. “I suppose it wouldn’t matter anyway, it isn’t like you’ll be sticking around. You’ll be running right home, yes?”

Fenris drops the glass of water he is holding, stepping towards Anders and slits his eyes into a squint to intimidate him. “Mage.” He warns. “It is of no concern of what I will be doing, I will be assisting Hawke with what he needs for the next little while. Now please, for the love of the maker. Tell me, what. Did. You. Fix?” He was on his last nerve, the constant pressure and questions from Anders about his and Hawke’s relationship pushed him further to the edge. Some days Fenris wouldn’t entertain Anders with an answer, just ignore him and continue walking. Other days, he’d snap and say it was none of his business and that he regrets his actions, but it was for the good. But today, he simply had no patience. The man he loved had flirted and even danced with death today, and now lay perhaps barely alive in his bed upstairs and Anders just kept. Pushing. Buttons.

“Alright, alright! His organs are delicately back together, but any wrong movement that stress them could rip them open again. Think of it like an unwelcoming present from your mother you don’t want to open. His arm’s bone is also delicately healed, he must be careful to not strain it. His ribs, healed, may have trouble breathing a little bit.” Anders finishes, turning his back to walk out the door. The eyebrow over Fenris’s left eye raises, he calls after Anders.

“What about his eye?” Anders sighs quietly, regret hits him along with the exhaustion. He only turns his head, avoiding eye contact with Fenris. “The… eyeball was too far back, the Arishok did too much damage to it and long story short, it isn’t there anymore.” He cringes internally at the words of the gore he had watched for the past few hours as he finally verbalizes it.

Fenris comes to the realization. “He… He is blind?” He asks quietly, gently. Anders nods. “I.. am afraid so, his other eye is fine. The other one is lost, I’d be careful not going in there if you have a queezy stomach. His right eye is all bloody, it’s gross.”

“Thank you, Anders.”

And with that, Anders left to head back to Darktown in the dead of night.

Hawke sleeps through the last few hours of the night, Fenris sits at the end of the bed and listens to the soft whimpers as Garrett accidentally hits a sensitive spot – or his eye hurts.

Fenris sneaks a glance at the injured Champion, he feels two things. Regret and disgust. He regrets not stepping in, slaying down the Arishok himself. He understands the formality of a duel and the Arishok was a very formal – and by the book, man. Yet, Garrett laid here with permanent damage to him and Fenris regrets not coming in, perhaps he could’ve minimized the damage. Perhaps, but he will never know. He feels utter disgust, these towns citizens have all just been saved by the Champion and they do not give a damn that he lays here, barely clinging to life these past agonizing, hell filled hours. They just care that they are all saved.

Fenris lays a hand on Hawke’s torn leg that still wore torn, damaged armor.

“I am proud of you. Thank you.” He slowly dozes off near the end of the bed, beside Hawke, resting just against his back.

Morning comes quick, sunshine pools into the windows and it wakes Fenris before Hawke. Fenris slowly gets up, holding his yawn in and rubs his eyes. Getting up, he walks straight to the windows and pulls the velvet curtains over, shielding the sun away. He then heads downstairs, to make some sort of meal for Garrett.

He makes the meal with ease, Bodahn and Sandal helping him prepare the small breakfast. Garrett is awake, the memory of the day before intrudes his head as he looks around his room – the view only being taken in one way. “Maker…” He groans. Everything hurts, pain is shooting through his body and his head throbs like hell. Like every morning, he brings his good hand up to his face and rubs one eye – then the other and howls.

“Maker’s balls!” He shouts, pulling his hand away and sees dried blood flutter against his skin. Horrified, he glances around the room again and notices his hand on the just healed arm was missing three fingers and half his thumb. His throat goes dry, sweat rapidly grows from his forehead and runs down, words croak out. “Wh… What the f..fuck?!” He attempts to shoot his body up, howling once more in pain as he realizes he isn’t a god, he’s a man who had just got his ass beaten by the Arishok and was needed to have a few days rest.

Fenris walks in, followed by a concerned Bodahn who was holding the meal they had prepared for over an hour. Seeing Hawke was awake and in clear pain, looking horrified, Fenris rushes over and crouches down next to him. Fenris comes to a quick realization that tears are coming down from the clouds of Garrett’s eyes.

“Maker… I probably look like some abomination, heh.” Fenris sighs, wiping the tears that fell down Hawke’s face away gently, mindful of his eye. “A handsome abomination.” Fenris adds as Bodahn settles the meal beside Garrett and exits the room silently. “Eat, you need the nutrition.”

He eats, most of the nutritious meal Fenris had prepared and is glad to feel full. Glad to feel anything but this pain and misery. “Thank you, Fen.” Fenris nods, eating the rest of the food so it doesn’t go to waste and sets it on the floor. He knows not to waste food, to ration it if you must.

“So… Am I that fucked?” Fenris looks at him with a worried look as he sits next to Hawke. His shoulders lift up then down quickly, a shrug. “It depends what you classify as fucked.” Garrett looks unamused as he points to his eye and lifts his nearly fingerless hand. “That, is what I classify as fucked.”

It was time to break the bad news. “Well, the mage says you are permanently blind in the eye as your… source of vision was so deep, and I guess he removed it, I’m not too sure. And your hand – the fingers will grow back, give it time.” Garrett winces. “So… I gotta walk around town, saving the people looking like a horror.

Finally, Fenris could wear a smile on his face.

A small smile tugs at his lips as he pulls out a red piece of fabric from a pocket in his tunic. “This… you could wear over your eye.” It was red, the same shade of red as the scarf that Fenris wore around his wrist after the night he and Hawke had, where he left afterwards. They matched. Garrett nodded, silently giving Fenris the ‘go’ to put on the matching fabric on.

The warrior gets up, goes behind Hawke and skillfully – not terribly gently, ties the red piece of fabric over his eye, hiding the horror from everyone and instead replaced it with something with much more meaning. “It is not an Orlesian eye mask but,” Fenris shrugs. “It is nice.” Garrett chuckles.

“Thanks, Fen. I appreciate it.”

Fenris nor Garrett stop him from Fenris placing his hand connected to the wrist that had the red scarf tied around his wrist over Hawke’s chest, and pressing a very soft, lingering kiss to his cheek.

“I’m proud, Hawke.” The words Garrett had been aching to here for the long years he had been in Kirkwall, he finally hears them from the man he longs to have and desperately loves, and tears are once again brought to his eyes.

#fenhawke #hawris #garrett hawke #fenris #da2 #dragon age 2 #fanfiction #dragon age fanfiction #male hawke #bloodyfruits;writing

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sopheronipepperoni · 8 years ago

Text

mansuetude

“Oh!”

Fenris looked up from the book, seeing Hawke hunched over the rough hewn table, clutching her hand. She set the knife down on the surface, away from the berry tart in its parchment wrapping.

“Are you alright?”

She glanced at him, a sheepish grin on her face. “It’s just a scratch.” She put the finger to her mouth. Knowing her propensity to underrate wounds, he rose from the bed and went to examine her for himself.

“Really, I’m fine, Fenris.” Taking her hand, his calloused fingers ghosted over her pale skin, and in the flickering firelight he saw a thin line across the tip of her finger. A bead of blood welled.

“It is fortunate that you are a mage, Hawke, if your skill with this knife is any indication.” There was a wry twist to his mouth.

She scoffed. “Honestly, Fenris. You’ve seen me use a knife plenty of times.” Embarrassed at his concern, she removed her hand from his and turned away. He felt her magic slide into the space between them, its presence soothing to him as it mended her skin.

The small glow faded, and Hawke reached for the knife again.

“Allow me.” She shot him a withering glare, but let him finish cutting the berry tart without complaint. When he was finished, she ate her piece with her fingers. Small crumbs caught on her bottom lip and the fabric of her tunic. Fire danced in her hair; Fenris turned away in a sudden fit of shyness. In that moment, he felt so underserving of her, undeserving of this time with her as they moved to stay a step ahead of the spreading mage rebellion.

The tart was sweet and sour and buttery on his tongue, a bright note against his darkening thoughts.

Her hand was cool on his skin as she touched him. “Are you alright?” An echo of his words not long before. “You seem distracted.”

He shook his head. “I could ask the same of you.”

Hawke flushed. “I don’t—”

“Really, Hawke. Not only did you cut yourself, but you had been hunching over the table for near on a quarter hour.” He had her and he knew it.

All of the air rushed from her in a sigh. “I guess there’s no point hiding it, then. I’ve received word from Varric.”

He felt a smile tugging on his lips at mention of Hawke’s friend —his friend too, now— before he registered that Hawke should be happy. Instead, her lips were pursed, and that thin line of worry was visible between her brows.

“What is it?” He himself frowned, and a knot of worry took root in his stomach.

“He’s decided to ally himself with that rising force we’ve been hearing about. The ‘Inquisition,’ they’re calling themselves, after the late Divine’s wishes.” She removed something from underneath the tart’s wrapping —Varric’s letter, he assumed. “What he’s written…it’s troubling, Fenris.”

He took the letter, scanning it himself even though only a handful of words were discernible in Varric’s messy scrawl. Demons and army and magic and breach stared up at him from the page. “We shall keep an eye on it, Hawke.”

She looked like she wanted to say something, but she swallowed her words instead. He set down the letter and reached for her. The knot of worry hardened inside him.

First Kirkwall, and now this?

Another month passed. They continued to move from town to town, avoiding pockets of mage-templar conflict, and staying off of the roads when they could. Hawke refused to discard her staff, instead settling for removing the blade and disguising it as a walking stick. Even tucked away from the Waking Sea, they still heard tales of Kirkwall, and the fires Ander’s actions had sparked.

Through whispers in forest and tavern alike, Hawke determined to find the Wardens and learn more about Meredith’s cursed sword. Rather, what they heard was news of the spreading rifts into the Fade, of demons coming in the night, of the growing Inquisition and its so-called “Herald of Andraste.”

Snow lay on the ground, and at nights they huddled together to stay warm.

One such night, Fenris woke to find the space beside him empty, the blankets of the inn bed tossed aside.

Lifting his head, his eyes roamed around the room blearily, finally settling on Hawke. She was sitting before the fireplace, paper in her hand. Varric’s latest letter.

A spark of anger ignited in his gut, joining the cold ball of worry that had made his stomach its home ever since Hawke received the first epistle. He knew it was not anger at Hawke; he thought it was not even anger at Varric for writing to her. Rather, it was anger, hot and sharp, at the injustice of it all, of finding some modicum of peace and hope with Hawke, only to have even that comfort shaken.

He dragged a hand down his face before rising from the bed and joining her in front of the hearth. He didn't bother pulling on a shirt; Hawke had taken to wearing his, anyway.

“Hawke.” He saw her flinch at her name, saw the way she seemed to draw into herself. Frowning, he took the letter from her hands —they were trembling, he realized with alarm.

“Hawke.” His voice was gentler this time, and he gathered her to his side with one hand, reading the cursed letter in his other. It took some moments for him to puzzle out the letters into words. This time, he made out attack and Frostbacks and Wardens missing and red lyrium and—

and—

Corypheus.

He sucked in a breath, the air hissing between his teeth.

“Did I do this, Fenris?” Hawke’s voice was small and uncharacteristically bleak sounding, under his arm. “Carver…Maker, I haven’t heard from him in ages…I just thought he was so busy with Warden business, I never thought…do you think…?” She trailed off, a note of panic entering her words.

“Hawke—”

“And Corypheus! I should have just left well enough alone—”

“Be reasonable. He was trying to make an attempt on your life.” His voice was fierce, and he felt some solace to hear her fall silent at his admonition.

Heartbeats stretched between them, a regular counterpoint to the crackling of the logs in the fire. He tried to dispel the feeling of mounting dread and panic by shifting to wrap her more firmly against him. Her fingers traced patterns against the lines of lyrium on his arms. “I feel so guilty. So responsible.”

He had no words to heal her, not these wounds. He had been there, fighting next to her against the twisted and ancient Magister. “You don’t have to shoulder this weight alone, Hawke.”

But he knew she would not listen to him. Corypheus had been after her blood, not his.

“I failed to destroy him, it seems. Therefore, I helped set him free, Fenris.”

His brow furrowed even more, deep grooves etching into his face. He heard an unspoken decision in her words. “I will remain at your side, Hawke. You must know that.”

He felt her shudder, and was surprised to feel wetness against his skin. “I cannot ask that of you, dear one.”

“It would be folly to ask otherwise.” He rested his chin against her hair, his hands smoothing over her. “If you wish to commit to this path, I will go with you.” There was finality in his tone, brooking no argument.

Her fingers scrabbled against his shoulder as she moved to sit up. Her eyes were wet, and her lips tilted upward against the tear tracks down her cheeks. She cupped his face in her hands. “I know you will, Fenris.” She brushed her lips against his, voice a tremulous murmur. “I know you will.”

He was on the edge of sleep, later, with Hawke curled against him, when he heard her say, “It is decided, then.” The odd note in her voice was forgotten in the new day.

A week passed, and they were leaving yet another town behind them. They were unsure of where to go next, only seeking to gain any information about Grey Wardens and the Inquisition. But even north as they were, the Inquisition was still just a specter, and reliable information of any sort was hard to come by. Here, even fears of demons were talked about in tight-lipped whispers.

Even so, a smile flitted across his face as he picked his way across the ground, ducking beneath a snow-laden tree bough.

Hawke, insisting upon going to the market to get more supplies by herself, had flitted away through the crowd, promising to meet him at midday at the river a mile outside of town. It had cheered him to see some of her liveliness restored, even though that knot of worry still stayed inside him.

He did not relish the idea of yet more conflict, bringing yet more opportunities for something to happen to Hawke—ah, but that was why he was going with her, he mused. She was his, and he would protect her until his dying breath.

A breeze whistled through the wood, and Fenris hunched his shoulders. Above him, the tree branches creaked and bent around him like a chantry’s cathedral. The small parcel he carried sat warm and unassuming in a pouch next to his skin. It was a small token of his affection, but somehow just as symbolic as their red ribbons. Within the first weeks of fleeing Kirkwall, they had made their vows, their fates forged hot and strong through the years. Hawke’s desire to split up and gather supplies alone had finally given him a chance to purchase a pair of simple metal bands.

He knew she deserved better, and that she did not require a ring, but he was excited just the same to finally slip the token onto her finger.

The forest around him was still, with only the intermittent birdsong. He saw rabbit tracks in the new snow fall. His breath crystalized in the air. The thought of Hawke waiting quickened his steps.

Ahead, he could see the glint of sun off of ice. Stepping out of the trees, he shaded his eyes, looking around. The river wended away from him, partially frozen. Cattails and rushes clung desperately near the bank.

Hawke was not there.

He paused, checking the sun’s position in the sky. Turning, he scanned around him, looking for her. His heartbeat was loud in his ears. Despite the unease he felt, he hunkered down underneath a gnarled tree at the edge of the wood, determined to wait.

The sun climbed higher, and then began its descent. As he sat, huddled against the cold, the conversations over Varric’s letters came back slowly to him. Along with it came Hawke and the feeling of renewed purpose she had adopted over the weeks since, the way she had kissed him last night as they had lain together—

With blinding clarity, Fenris knew.

He knew.

The ball in his stomach frosted over as pain lanced through his heart. His vision flashed white, impossibly hot. Without looking, he knew his brands burned on his skin.

In a fury, he scoured the terrain for her boot tracks, anything to give a clue about which direction she had taken, if she had even come this way at all. But there was nothing, only the soft susurrous of the wind. His knees buckled beneath him, and he fell to the snow.

Betrayal and rage warred within him. He let them, giving them their heads; better to feel those so strongly, rather than give into the sense of despair and despondency that loomed heavy on the horizon.

Had she thought she was doing him a kindness, by not telling him goodbye? Had she thought she was being gentle, by making his choice for him?

Memories of his confessions to her danced through his mind.

Nothing could be worse than the thought of living without you.

If there is a future to be had, I will walk into it gladly by your side.

A wolf howled in the distance, a haunting and mournful sound.

Stepping from underneath the overhang, Hawke raised a hand to shield her eyes against the bright morning sunlight filtering into the courtyard. The crisp mountain air was a welcome change from the somewhat stuffy infirmary, clearing her head. She rolled her neck, feeling the ache that still lingered from the fighting and marching from Adamant. The unsettling fatigue of depleted mana hovered over her, a malaise that was retreating with each day. She refused to take lyrium potions, as a sort of atonement.

After escaping from the Fade, Hawke had felt paranoia and fear seep deep into her bones. In her sleep, shadowy figures haunted her, taunted her. The images of demons that visited her each night set her nerves on edge, one of the only times in her life she had worried about possession. She had hardly slept since returning to Skyhold.

A footstep sounded off to her right, and she tensed. Her line of thinking stopped. “Feeling more restored, serah Hawke?” One of the Wardens. After Stroud’s sacrifice, the remaining Wardens had deferred to her without hesitance; Hawke felt out of her depth, and sensed underlying confusion and resentment flowing among the soldiers.

Forcing herself to relax, she dropped her hand from her neck. “Yes, I quite think the worst has passed. What of yourself?”

“We’re ready to move at any time; the troops are getting restless.” He drew up his shoulders. “I would recommend moving out in the next few days. Inquisition scouts tell of a storm front blowing in; we would do best to put at least a day between us and it, or we must stay here until the passes clear again.”

“What would you advise?”

Approval shone in his eyes as he straightened, more at attention. Hawke wondered if it was a conscious move. “I would suggest readying to move by tomorrow, and setting out with the dawn. We would keep the sun on our side.”

She nodded her agreement, and seemed to look at the Warden for the first time. Exhaustion still lined his visage, despite the refuge offered at Skyhold, but he still stood straight and proud. Unbroken by Corypheus.

For a moment, she envied him.

Refusing to pick at that particular wound, she turned away as he moved off to tell the other Wardens. Instead, she braced herself for the coming journey, trekking through the Frostbacks and all the way through Orlais. They would need to pass through war-torn lands, crawling with demons and Maker knew what else, and Weisshaupt loomed heavy in her mind.

That wound was too painful, too. From the Warden stronghold, where would she go? Where could she rest, with the world so in turmoil? Kirkwall surely would not be ready to receive her as Champion yet; she was no Commander of the Grey to remain in Weisshaupt. And Fenris-

The bundles of letters, wrapped in oil cloth inside of her pack, seemed to accuse her for her silence.

She was a coward, Hawke.

For nearly every day after leaving him, she had penned a letter to Fenris. She hadn’t even sent one herself, instead telling Varric to send one on her behalf. He had managed to keep her abreast of Fenris’s whereabouts as best as he could for the past months, and the rumors the dwarf had shared of a lyrium-lit demon hunting down slavers in a hellish rage had near broken her heart.

The fear that the Nightmare had brought out in her, the sheer terror of losing him for good, was fresh in her mind. And because of that, she had resolved herself to helping the Wardens, at least for a time. She viewed it as a kind of penance, for running from him, and for surviving when in many ways it should have been Stroud. A bitter smile stole onto her face. After all, she was very good at running, at surviving.

The flight from Lothering.

All of the years in Kirkwall, fighting for justice while running from her feelings.

Fleeing Kirkwall after the destruction of the chantry.

And now Fenris, her faithful ghost who would have gladly marched into Hell itself at her side, the only home she had come to care for the past three years.

An icy breeze swept around her, and she stared balefully up at the keep itself. She supposed she should consult with the Inquisitor about leaving.

Hawke stood, holding the letters in her hand, when the knock came late that afternoon. Curious, she opened the door; the air rushed from her lungs.

There he was, right in front of her. Windswept hair and green eyes, with relief written clear on his face. She noticed that he wore a fur across his shoulders and a thicker tunic under his breastplate. Her breath hitched, and despite her fears and doubts, Hawke threw her arms around him with a wordless shout.

He fairly crushed her to him, and it settled her to feel him around her, like no wounds were between them. After a moment—too short— Fenris released her. “May I enter?” She shivered at his voice, so rich and achingly familiar. Her heart stuttered a bit, though, at the deeper meanings behind his question. She ushered him inside, dimly aware that she was not eager to have it out with Fenris in view and hearing of the garden and mage tower both. Fenris set down his pack before turning back to her. His olive eyes were unreadable in the room’s light. “Hawke.”

“Fenris…” His eyes burned into her. She had imagined their reunion a thousand times, and still she knew not what, exactly, to say. She settled for honesty, and braced herself for his anger. “Fenris, I’m incredibly sorry.”

For a moment, his face was stone, the air in the room brittle. She couldn’t breathe. Then something about him softened. “I am somewhat mollified to see that you are in one piece.” He seemed to struggle with something.

“I understand if you are angry—”

“Angry?” There was a sardonic twist to his lips, and she felt the tension harden, momentarily shadowing his relief. His voice was quiet in the deadly still way he had. “Anger is a quaint word, now.” She flinched, turning away and hugging herself. It felt like another failure of hers; she couldn't even face his anger. “I nearly went blind with rage when I discovered what you had done. I lost myself for a time, before the quiet acceptance came. I could not even bring myself to keep hunting after you, taking my fury out on slavers, instead.” A fresh wave of heartache broke over her. “To leave, after all that…” She felt, rather than saw, him take a step towards her. “I would have walked anywhere by your side, Hawke—”

Something within her broke. “I couldn’t let you, Fenris. I was so afraid of something happening—”

“So you made the choice for me?” His face screwed up at that. “It was never yours to make.” The echoes of the cold fury—the anguish— in his voice pierced her, sharp with unvoiced accusations. “I would have followed you anywhere.”

Now she felt tears prickle. “ ‘Would have’?” She felt she was in another nightmare, this one somehow more terrible than anything from the Fade. While she had expected their reunion to be…turbulent, she had also hoped for more time before they sifted through the jagged edges between them.

All at once, Fenris quieted, and heaved a sigh. “Will. That has not changed, now that I am here.” She saw a glimmer of hope in him, buried beneath his relief and pain. She remembered another time, where she had carried a similar hope within her, when she had visited Fenris in his mansion after three long years of waiting.

Her voice was a quiet, fragile thing when next she spoke. “I am willing, if you will still have me.” She tried to convey all of the unspoken things through her gaze. Fenris took another step towards her, and another.

Numbly, she felt his gauntleted hand brush against her cheek. “I told you before, Hawke. Nothing could keep me from you.” His green eyes bored into her, but this time she did not shrink away from him. “We have much to discuss. I was angry; I felt abandoned…” He sighed, glancing away. “And then I was resigned, once I received Varric’s first letter, that you would send for me when you were ready…” Her breath caught, at the last bit, and his eyes snapped back to hers. “ I will remain at your side. Should you have me.”

Hawke broke into a watery smile, choking. “After everything? It is a wonder that you do not hate me.”

Fenris scoffed. “Hate you? No.” She could still feel the emotions surging within him, but he mustered a half-smile, in that slightly exasperated way he had.

“I wrote to you.”

His brow furrowed, the smile fading as confusion crept into his voice. “Varric was the one who told me you were safe, when you first arrived, and when you returned from Adamant. I heard no word from you.”

She backtracked, shame bubbling to the surface. “I was too much a coward to send them, but I saved them all. They are yours to read, when you desire.” She pressed her palms against the sturdy stone behind her. “Perhaps I am a coward still, but they contain all of the things I have wished to say to you. I understand that this has caused a great rift between us, one that may never fully heal.” A shaky breath found its way into her lungs, and his gaze sharpened. “I had my reasons for acting as I did. I could not let you die; but now I see that, in a way, would have perhaps been kinder than what my leaving did to you.”

Her heart wrenched at the look he leveled at her, and tears came anew to her eyes. Silence hung in the room, softer than before. After a moment, he said, “I will read them.” His eyes searched her own. “I heard rumors, that you came out of the Fade.”

She closed her eyes, trying to shut out the terrible memories, and he moved closer, his hand resting on her shoulder. “Yes. We went into the Fade, and fought an Aspect of a Nightmare demon, a terrible thing of fear. It spoke of our deepest terrors; to hear it taunting me of you…” Hawke shook her head to clear it, catching Fenris’s concerned look. “I offered to stay behind, to give the others time to escape, but Stroud took the task on himself. Now I feel responsible for the Wardens, in his absence.”

She forced out her next words, a rueful smile stretching her mouth. “Selfishly, I was, and am, relieved that he stayed, giving me a chance to reconcile with you…” Hawke trailed off, feeling the old familiar ache of survivor’s guilt.

“Even there, I would have come for you.” The rough certainty in Fenris’ voice was as an anchor, and she felt warmed from within. He reached out with his other hand, fingering her hair in the sudden stillness between them. “It is shorter than last I saw you.”

A small laugh startled its way past her lips. “And yours looks a bit shaggier.” Fenris flashed a brief smile, before fumbling for something at his belt. Hawke’s cheeks colored, her heart racing at the abrupt shift in his demeanor, before she felt something cold being pressed into her hand. As she registered the simple shape, she felt a peculiar lightness blossom in her chest, at odds with the heaviness she had carried with her out of the Fade, which had further retreated at Fenris’s appearance.

His voice was gruff, answering her unspoken questions. “I suppose it is presumptuous of me, with all that remains to be said. But I had long wished to give you a token of my own.” His fingers found hers, and she let him slip the simple band onto her finger. New emotion welled within her; she reached for him.

“Fenris.” She tried to impress all of her longing, her shame, her fear into his name.

“Hawke.” He took her in his arms again, urgency coloring his embrace. His lips were warm on hers, and it felt like coming home. She knew, as he kissed her, that this reunion was treacherous ground they would need to navigate with care.

Both of them had deep wounds that were still tender to the touch, wounds that would only heal with time. The pain of the past months had changed them, and Hawke feared still to see the consequences of those changes. But they would rebuild and repair the ruined time between them, as they had done so often —too often— in the past.

As the years had proven to her, Hawke knew that they would weather this storm together. She and Fenris would yet again grow to be something more, something stronger, than they had been before. Maker willing, there would be time enough for words later. For now, she was content to press him more firmly against her, mansuetude and ferocity all at once.

After a moment, Fenris pulled away, resting his forehead against hers. She reveled in the feel of him, here with her. “What are your plans now, Hawke?”

She closed her eyes, feeling his breath puff against her lips. “I had planned on leaving with the Wardens, tomorrow. With Stroud gone, it falls to me to inform the Wardens at Weisshaupt what has happened here.”

The words burbled out, more a formality than anything. But she felt they needed to be said, just the same.

“Will you come with me, Fenris?”

His smile was full. “Gladly.”

#dragon age #dragon age 2 #fenris #hawke #fenrisxf!hawke #dragon age inquisition #fanfiction

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katalyna-rose · 8 years ago

Text

Becoming Champion

Rating: Teen and Up

Warning: Graphic depictions of violence

Pairing: Fenris/f!Hawke

Tags: Angst

Summary: A duel to the death between a mage and a powerful Qunari warrior can't end well, yet Fenris has to watch as the woman he loves attempts to hold her own against the Arishok to save Kirkwall. He has to struggle not to throw himself into the fight beside her and violate the terms of the duel, begging, praying for just a little more time, one more chance with her to do it right. He needs her to know that he loves her.

Read on AO3!

Watching a mage who wielded a bow fight a nearly unmatched warrior whose sheer brute strength seemed almost impossible felt a lot like watching a ritual sacrifice to Fenris. It was made worse by the fact that the mage in question was the one person he loved above all others. His heart had leapt into his throat the moment the fight began and his stomach had joined it with the first near miss. He almost wished he was physically capable of turning away, terrified to see her hurt but terrified of missing a single second as well. It was a conflict that left him feeling raw and unable to so much as blink.

Hawke kept moving, retreating in a complicated dance that kept her exactly where the Arishok least expected her to be. But despite never receiving even a glancing hit she couldn’t seem to hurt him, either. Her arrows were brushed away by those enormous blades and her spells seemed to mostly slide off of him. They fought in circles, the captive nobility pressed back against the walls as far out of the way as physically possible. Fenris was the closest to the fight since he couldn’t seem to move away. Aveline had a tight hold on his wrist since he had almost charged in to fight beside Hawke despite the fact that it would violate the terms of the duel. Isabela stood beside him, a hand pressed to her mouth and tears sliding down her face. Every few seconds she muffled a sob or sniffled. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Anders wringing his hands at his other side. He hadn’t actually known that was something people did before, but the mage rocked on his toes and wrung his hands, his eyes glued to the fight. Fenris couldn’t see Varric, but he could hear the dwarf’s breaths echoing the fight. Each time Hawke leaped or the Arishok’s blades cut into the carpet where she had stood less than a second before or an arrow was knocked away or a spell merely glanced off of him, the dwarf took a ragged breath.

Then came the moment they had all been dreading, the reason their eyes had not strayed from the fight. Hawke’s heel caught on the carpet where one of the Arishok’s blades had pulled it up when he yanked it free. She didn’t fall, but she did falter, having been unable to see the uneven spot as she retreated backwards. But it was enough to give her enemy the opening he had thus far not been able to find.

She grunted when the blade sank into her belly and thrust through her back. She didn’t yell or cry or even drop her weapon. She was lifted up into the air, blood pouring from her wound onto the Arishok as he all but bathed in it. He grinned at her fiercely, certain in his victory, and Fenris became aware that he was shouting, his throat sore already from the sheer volume of his yell, when Aveline tugged at him sharply. Hawke looked over at him and he was stunned to see her smile at him. Her body had slid down the blade that had impaled her until she was resting at the hilt and she was already losing color from blood loss, but she smiled the same way she always did when she looked at him. He had hurt her, left her alone and devastated in the wake of their pleasure, and yet she never failed to give him that beautiful little smirk. It felt like a goodbye to see it from her now.

But it wasn’t the end.

Her proximity to the Arishok, achieved only through his assured victory, gave her the opening she needed. She hadn’t dropped her bow, and while her enemy was watching her face to see the light leave her eyes she drew the string back, an arrow still ready, and shot him point blank in the throat. Her magic flowed up the arrow shaft and froze his choked gurgle. Fenris could only see his profile, but his eyes widened in shock as his body fell limp, his life leeched away far more quickly than hers would. As he fell, so did she. He sprawled on his back, his weapons dropping. Hawke, still impaled on that damned sword, lay on her side and did not move for long moments.

The crowd of nobles rushed forward while Fenris was still rooted to the ground in shock and fear. Anders raced forward but was pushed back by the crowd. He growled in rage and began shoving his way through.

“I’m a healer!” he yelled. “Let me pass!” But the crowd would not. Fenris stalked forward, his lyrium flickering on his skin, pulsing like lightning and drawing attention.

“Move!” he bellowed, and the crowd parted in waves, their shouts dying into silence.

“Thank you,” Anders said over his shoulder as he raced to Hawke. Fenris was hot on his heels, needing to see her, to be near, to make sure she would live. He fell to his knees beside her as Anders assessed her wound. Her eyes were closed but her chest moved with shallow breaths; there was time.

“Hold her steady while I remove the blade,” Anders told him. He blinked stupidly, then gripped her shoulder tightly in one hand and pressed the other to her hip, holding her torso stationary. The wet, meaty sound of the blade slipping free of her flesh caused nausea to threaten, his last meal sitting in a lump in his throat. Behind him, Isabela choked on a sob and was soothed by Varric. The moment the blade was free Anders rolled her onto her back and poured his magic into her wound. Fenris lifted her head into his lap and cradled it, bending over her and rocking back and forth. He smoothed her hair out of her face, but he needed to feel her skin. The buckles on his gauntlets broke as he frantically pulled at them, but he didn’t care at all. He dropped them as soon as they were off and pressed his hands to her cheeks. Her skin was cool to the touch, an effect of blood loss, but the pulse in her neck remained. It was unsteady and weak, but it was there. She was too strong to die now. She had to be. He began to mutter in Tevene.

“Please, please, my love, stay with me. I need more time with you. I need a second chance to do things right.” He pressed a kiss to his wrist, where he’d tied the crimson ribbon that she’d worn in her hair the night they’d laid together. He had untied it carefully and gently slipped it free. Before he’d left he grabbed it, though he couldn’t say why. Ever since, he’d worn it on his wrist, never taking it off. She was never far from his thoughts. “You can’t die now. There’s so much left to do. I couldn’t bear it if you left now. You are strong, stronger than anyone I’ve ever met. Don’t go. Don’t leave me alone.”

Vaguely, he noticed Isabela fall to her knees beside Anders and take Hawke’s hand. She pressed it against her forehead, openly sobbing and babbling nearly incoherent apologies.

“Remember… Remember when we danced on the tables at the Hanged Man?” she muttered to Hawke. “I was so drunk I almost couldn’t stand up straight, but you always had more restraint than me. You’d only had half as much to drink, but you were right up there with me. You never made me feel like I had to change to be accepted by you. You always just take everyone as they come. Live and let live, you told me. And I’m so sorry.” She choked on a sob, then took a deep, shaking breath. “I’m so sorry I did this. I should have told you the truth from the start. We could have figured something out, avoided all of this. I’m so sorry I didn’t trust you. Don’t… Just don’t die.”

“You’re too stubborn to die,” he heard Aveline whisper somewhere behind him. “You won’t go now. You can’t. You survived the Blight and a witch-dragon and the journey here and the Deep Roads and countless attempts on your life. I always thought you’d live forever just to spite everyone. Prove me right, Hawke. Just this once. Please.”

“Come on, Hawke,” Varric murmured. “Your story isn’t over yet. I just know you have more crazy shenanigans in you. Let this be just one of a thousand stories I’ll tell about you someday, and not even the most interesting.”

Fenris brushed Hawke’s hair out of her face with gentle fingers, unable to stop touching her, as if his touch could anchor her in life. He looked up at Anders, hoping for good news, but the mage’s face was turning gray, deep shadows at the corners of his mouth and tension in every line of his body. Fenris pulled a lyrium potion off his belt, one of several that he always carried for Hawke since she frequently forgot them. He uncorked it and held it out to the mage, who looked at him with wide eyes, surprised. Fenris didn’t say anything. Needing both hands for the healing, Anders took the potion with his mouth and tilted his head back to drink the contents. When it was empty he let it fall beside him, where it shattered on the floor.

“Thank you,” he gasped, some color returning to his face, then returned his full attention to his patient.

Fenris knew, intellectually, that the healing couldn’t have taken more than fifteen minutes, but by the time Hawke’s breathing evened out and her heart steadied into a strong, sure beat and Anders all but collapsed beside her in exhaustion, he felt like it had been years. He pulled another lyrium potion off his belt because the mage looked like he was about to fall unconscious. He accepted the potion gratefully.

“Give her an elfroot potion, if you can get her to swallow it,” he said hoarsely before downing the potion he held. Fenris grabbed the elfroot potion off his belt and uncorked it with trembling fingers; if Hawke still needed a potion after the healing, it could only mean that she was still in danger. He held her head up with one hand and dripped a little of the potion into her mouth with the other. When she swallowed reflexively he breathed a sigh of relief and slowly fed her the potion until she’d taken the entire thing.

“Can we move her?” he asked, surprised when his voice sounded rough and his throat felt like sandpaper. Anders nodded wordlessly, and Fenris carefully lifted Hawke into his arms. He stood, and the others followed suit though Isabela still sobbed. They moved to leave, but Meredith and Orsino burst in just as they turned for the door.

“Is it over?” Meredith asked, looking around the room.

“She saved us!” the nobles cried.

“Hawke saved us all!”

“She’s a hero!”

“She’s a champion!”

“We all owe her our lives!”

Meredith was silent for a moment, her narrowed eyes fixed on the woman in Fenris’s arms, her small body limp against him and covered in blood.

“Does she live?” Meredith asked. Fenris nodded mutely. “Then it seems that Kirkwall has a new Champion.” She didn’t sound pleased, but Fenris couldn’t care less. All he wanted was to get Hawke home and clean and in bed where she could rest and recover. Meredith stepped out of the way and he walked past her. Orsino’s worried gaze followed them.

“Does she need a healer?” he asked. “I could-“

“No,” Fenris barked. He wouldn’t let strangers near her when she was vulnerable, especially not mages under Meredith’s thumb.

“I’ll take care of her,” Anders said, and though he sounded exhausted Orsino must have conceded because Fenris heard the mage’s steady footfalls right behind him, his boot heels striking the floor hard.

Everyone followed them to Hawke’s estate, though Aveline and Varric remained downstairs when Fenris took Hawke up to her room. Anders followed, and so did Isabela after a hesitation. Fenris laid her down carefully in her bed, then began to strip off her soiled armor. He wanted to bark at Anders and Isabela to leave while he changed her but he knew it was useless. Isabela helped him to lift Hawke’s prone form to make it easier to remove her clothing, and Anders was needed in case she required more healing. Isabela fetched a bowl of water and a pair of rags and the two of them carefully scrubbed away the blood. The top sheet had to be changed after that, and once it was done Isabela brought over clean smallclothes. Fenris scowled at her, but she rolled her eyes.

“I’ve slept with her, too,” she reminded him. “There’s nothing here that I haven’t already seen. Besides, this will be much easier with an extra pair of hands.”

“Fine,” he finally said. “Turn around, mage,” he barked at Anders, who grunted but complied. Once Hawke was wearing the clean smallclothes, he and Isabela tucked her under her blankets. Anders came over and washed her in magic, continuing to heal her. Fenris pulled up the chair that usually sat in front of the fireplace and sat beside the bed. He rested his chin on his hands and his elbows on his knees and watched. He didn’t notice when Isabela slipped away, but she was gone when Anders finally finished his spell. He felt the mage’s eyes on him, but he didn’t bother to meet the other man’s gaze.

“Are you staying?” Anders asked quietly.

“I will not be moved,” Fenris replied.

“Good,” Anders said, surprising him. “I’m going to rest downstairs. Call for me if anything happens.” Fenris nodded silently. Only once the door closed and he was alone with Hawke did he allow the tears the fall. Once they began, they didn’t stop for hours, or maybe days. Who could really say how much time passed as he watched Hawke breathe?

The door opened quietly and the footsteps of the intruder were soft and wary, which told him who it was without having to look. He didn’t know how long he’d sat there, only that the light under the curtains was gone again. He hadn’t slept, still afraid that she’d slip away if he took his eyes off her.

“Messere?” Orana said quietly. “I brought you some food.” He heard her set a tray on the nightstand beside him. “It’s been a day and you haven’t moved.”

“I’m not hungry,” he said brusquely, hoping she’d leave. She was silent for a beat and he wondered if perhaps he’d been too harsh.

“Just some water, then?” she whispered. “Please, messere, she won’t want you to neglect yourself.” Fenris turned to her, scowl in place and biting words on his tongue, but he cut himself off when he saw her wide eyes, red rimmed from crying, and the concern she showed for him. He let out the breath he would have used to yell at her in a sigh. None of this was her fault. She was only trying to help in the only way she knew. She didn’t deserve his wrath and Hawke would be livid if he upset her. Orana was very precious to her and he suspected that the former slave somehow reminded her of her sister, though since he’d never met the other Hawke he couldn’t say how.

“Some water would be nice,” he finally said, his voice hoarse from disuse. He picked up the glass from the tray beside him and drank most of it without even stopping to breathe. He gasped slightly, feeling better already. “Thank you,” he told her softly. She smiled and nodded, pouring more water into the glass from the pitcher she’d brought up. Then she left.

Light was peeking out from beneath the curtains again when Hawke finally stirred. Fenris was instantly alert, his reverie broken. He sat forward in his chair and nearly grabbed her hand before he stopped himself. Hawke took a deep breath and let it out on a groan, then opened her eyes. When her gaze met his, she blinked in confusion, then smiled and allowed her eyes to slide shut again.

“How long?” she asked, her voice a hoarse croak. Fenris grabbed the water glass and held it for her to drink from.

“I’m… not sure,” he said as she drank. “A day, maybe?”

Hawke emptied the glass quickly and he reached for the pitcher to refill it. “You’re not sure?” she asked. She managed to bring a hand up to the glass but she didn’t have the strength to hold it so he pressed it to her lips.

“I haven’t left the room,” he admitted softly. Her eyes widened as they met his over the rim of the glass, but she preferred to drink rather than answer and he was grateful. She drank most of the second glass of water before she was done.

“How are you feeling?” he asked her, shifting uncomfortably. He didn’t deserve to sit vigil for her like a lover. He’d hurt her in this very room. Though she’d accepted his company when her mother died, had cried in his arms for hours, she had sent him away once the tears dried. She had every right to be furious with him and he deserved whatever retribution she could dream up, yet she had never once lashed out at him. He didn’t deserve her.

“That’s a stupid question,” she said with a grimace. “I feel like I got impaled by a Qunari. Oh, wait. I did get impaled by a Qunari. Bad comparison.” Fenris chuckled and struggled not to fall into hysterics. His relief that she was awake, that she’d be alright, was powerful and left him feeling lightheaded. He leaned his head in his hands and just breathed for long moments. When he looked up again, her eyes were glued to the crimson ribbon on his wrist. He paused, certain for a moment that she was going to demand he give it back and unreasonably terrified by that prospect. She said nothing, however, and he unfroze when her gaze slid away. He wasn’t sure what it meant.

“I’ll get Anders,” he finally said, though the idea of sending the abomination to her while he retreated made him want to retch. “He’ll want to know you’ve awakened.”

“Fenris,” she said, and her voice stopped him. He looked at her, her icy blue gaze sending spears of relief and guilt into his heart in equal measures. “Thank you for watching over me.” He almost broke down sobbing as she offered him a weak smile, but managed to keep his composure long enough to nod and stand, though he wavered on his feet, and go downstairs and rouse Anders from his sleep on the couch in front of the fire and send him up to her. He held in his emotions as he left Hawke’s estate and returned to the run down old mansion that he had been squatting in since the night he met her. The moment the door was shut and locked behind him, however, he felt the tears fall. His leaned against the door and slid down to sit on the floor, weak and shaking with relief.

Hawke would live. That was all that mattered. He had time now. He had the opportunity to find some way to make it up to her. He only needed to find a way. And even if she never forgave him, at least she would live and laugh again. He would rip his own heart out of his chest to hear her laugh again.

#katalyna writes #f!hawke/fenris #fenhawke #dragon age #dragon age 2 #ueue wait your turn

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jawsandbones · 8 years ago

Text

Sanctuary - Part 1

Dragon Age 2

Chapter: Part 1

Rating: E

Pairing: Fenris/Female Hawke/Sebastian

AO3 Link: Click Here

He’s never seen Hawke looking so plain. An older tunic, pants thrice patched with fabric of a brighter quality. She tucks a lock of hair behind her ears, scans the Chantry as though every corner holds enemies. She plays with the bottom of her tunic as she makes her way up the stairs. Fingertips light on the banister, eyes focused on taking step after step. She lacks her usual kohl, the stain on her lips. She lacks her usual cheer. She sits down beside Sebastian, her hands fiddling together in her lap. There’s no hair to tuck this time but she goes through the motions anyway, pausing to pinch a lock between her fingers. She looks at him with red-rimmed eyes.

He smiles, closes his book. “Hello Hawke,” he says, “What can I do for you?” The Chantry is quiet save for the hum of the sisters, the murmuring of prayer. It smells of incense and lilacs, something soft and comforting. Candles cast their glow upon the walls, try to outshine the sun. None of this seems to touch Hawke today. Not that she was ever a present figure in the Chantry. She would always only come on some errand, quick feet against the floor, out the door again.

“I was wondering,” Her words are hesitant, tone quiet, “if I could ask a favor of you?” Her eyes flutter between her fingers rolling the threads that escape her tunic, and his face. He resists the urge to reach out and place his hand over hers, to still the nervousness that knits, to offer what calm he can. Instead, he keeps a tight hold on the book in his lap.

“Of course. You only have to ask.” Her smile is brief, but the relief is shown in other ways. He sees it in the way the hard line of her shoulders relax, hunch. The way she moves slightly closer to him. The way her eyes begin to linger on his face, able to find the strength to stay.

“I was wondering if you might check on Fenris for me? Keep him company? Perhaps bring him food as well. I can give you coin,” she blurts it out quickly, keeping her hushed tones, not wanting the attention her full voice could bring. “If it’s no trouble.”

“No trouble at all.” He smiles at her again. “If I might inquire,” he says gently, “why are you asking? It is no secret you are the one he feels closest to.” She flinches as though he has struck her. This time, when her fingers begin to tear at the threads, he does not keep his hold around the book. He reaches out, takes one of her hands in his own. It’s cold, clammy, shaking underneath his touch. She stares at the back of his hand, bites her bottom lip.

He allows her the minutes she needs to collect herself, to find the words. “I might have done something awful,” she whispers, “I think he hates me now.”

“I’m sure that isn’t true,” Sebastian tells her. “Whatever it is you think you’ve done, I know Fenris will forgive you.” She gives him a smile that isn’t really a smile, a sad ghost of thing.

“I wish I could believe that.” Her hand slips from his as she rises, pausing only to pull coin from her pocket. “For the food,” she says, holding it out to him. He shakes his head, standing with her.

“Not necessary. I require only one thing in return. Let me come see you afterwards,” he says. She holds her fist to her chest, nods slowly. He watches her go and sighs, picking up his book, holding it in his hands. He taps it against the pew thoughtfully, sees raven-hair disappear through the doors of the Chantry, out into the sunshine.

He places the book back on the shelf, sliding it into its proper place. It’s not a book bought by the Chantry, but one he brought himself. It’s different than the rest - a spark, a bit of life, brought to the endless shelves of dour Chantry law and history. He taps his finger against it, shakes his head and turns, heading for the same door Hawke had left.

He buys things that require no cooking, more than two men could eat in one sitting. After a moment of thought, he buys a bottle of wine as well. A Starkhaven vintage. Something familiar, the taste of which he has long since forgotten. Starkhaven was something difficult to think about. He hated the way his chest grew tighter with the thought of returning home. He had been away so long. He moves up the steps of Hightown, taking a familiar path to Fenris’s mansion.

He knocks with the hand holding the wine bottle. Three taps of his knuckles against wood, ones he knows Fenris will hear. A light sleeper, he’s woken the elf with less before. Sure enough, the door opens, and there stands Fenris. His hair disheveled, white strands licking this way and that. There are dark circles under his eyes as though he hasn’t slept, his ears drooped with melancholy. His tunic is half undone, a sleeve slipping off one shoulder. His pants barely hang around his waist, and he is barefoot although that is not unusual. In one hand hangs an already half-emptied bottle of wine. Sebastian feels sudden regret at showing up at his door with another.

He seems disappointed to see him, as though Fenris had expected someone else. The corners of his mouth drop just so as he looks at Sebastian. “What?” He asks it curtly, quickly, his voice hoarse with lack of use. Sebastian shakes off his doubts, pushes his way inside. It is dark, as usual, but Fenris generally has the fire lit. Not today. He makes his way up the stairs, clears room on the table for the basket of food and the wine.

Sebastian kneels before the fireplace, throwing wood upon cold ashes. Fenris mills about behind him as he sparks the fire. It brings more light than the few holes in his roof could. Fenris looks through the basket, and finding nothing of interest, moves to sit upon his bed. He rests the bottle by his feet, rubs a hand over his mouth. “What do you want?” Fenris directs this question at the floor, before planting his elbows on his knees, looking at Sebastian.

He pulls forward one of the boxes nearby, takes a seat. “I was asked to check on you,” he says, “by Hawke.” A flinch that looks the same as Hawke’s had. Fenris falls backwards on the bed, feet still planted on the floor, hair splaying outwards. He presses his hands against his eyes, bites the words out.

“I left her,” he says, “together, we… we had – so much – and I left.” His hands fall to his sides, staring up at the ruined ceiling. “She deserves better.” He speaks these words with utter calm, a resignation to the belief. It’s clear to see exactly how wrong Hawke’s assumption is. He doesn’t hate her, not in the least. Sebastian quirks a quick smile at the thought of these two ridiculous friends of his.

“Have you spoken to her since?” Sebastian asks it lightly, looking at the hole in Fenris’s pants. Directly on his knee, he can three little dots of lyrium in a triangle on smooth olive skin. He makes a mental note to buy Fenris some new clothes. Perhaps he should also bring a broom, as Sebastian eyes the shards of broken glass against the wall. His thoughts trail off as Fenris finally speaks.

“No.” Fenris grunts out the word, his hands clenching into fists.

“How long has it been since you have?”

“Does it matter?” Fenris snaps, sitting back up, frowning at Sebastian. He doesn’t know how he didn’t notice it before. That new red around his wrist, a ribbon bound like a shackle. Fenris’s other hand plays with it, holds tight to it as though he cannot bear to let it go.

“She believes you hate her.” Sebastian says the words earnestly, keeping his eyes on Fenris’s face. He watches it fall, the guilt that flashes through him. He runs a hand through his hair, brushing away that snowfall, and his eyes fix upon the floor.

“No. I could never,” Fenris says it so quietly, as if it hurts him to say the words. “I wanted her to hate me, so that she could move on, find someone else.”

“She doesn’t want anyone else, Fenris,” Sebastian tells him. That flinch again, that guilt, clenching his teeth and shaking his head, unable to look at Sebastian. He reaches for the bottle at his feet, but Sebastian gets there first, placing it out of his reach.

“No more of that,” he says, rising and placing it with the wine he brought. He’d take both when he left. He instead roots through the basket, finds a pastry, passes it to Fenris. “Eat.” He holds it in his hands, staring at it, before giving into Sebastian’s command. He takes a tearing bite, devouring it with the hunger of a wolf.

“Now,” Sebastian says, sitting on the bed beside him, “we’re going to talk about how to properly hold a bow.” Fenris looks at him, once, twice, glancing at him in disbelief. He falls into silence however as Sebastian begins to speak, allowing himself to drift away from all thoughts of Hawke. They end up with their feet on the bed, their backs against the wall, talking side by side about everything and nothing at all. Fenris leans his head back, his hands in his lap, quietly listening to Sebastian speak. When he does speak, he speaks low and carefully, but Sebastian listens to each one of his words as though they were priceless treasure. Attentive and focused, a small smile on his face.

When Sebastian moves to leave, hours later, Fenris stops him at the door, the barest of touches against Sebastian’s back. “Thank you,” he says, “for this.” Sebastian stops, breathes out deeply, gives him a warm smile. He carries Fenris’s bottle in one hand, the Starkhaven vintage in the other. He holds to them tightly, resists the urge to swallow Fenris in a deep hug.

“You know I am here for you, my friend,” Sebastian says. Fenris looks almost surprised for a moment, then his face falls back into neutrality and he nods. He gives Sebastian another quiet thank you. “You should speak to her when you feel you are able.” Fenris frowns, plays with that red on his wrist.

“Yes,” he murmurs. “I will.”

Sebastian leaves him thoughtful, likely preparing what he should say to Hawke. He’s relieved when Hawke opens the door with a smile, eyes bright and clear. He presses the half-empty of bottle of wine into her hands. She looks at it, amused, then shakes her head and steps aside to invite Sebastian end. “Is he well, at least?” She asks, leading Sebastian to the living room. She stares at the bottle for a moment, takes a sip, and then puts it on the mantle of the fireplace.

“He doesn’t hate you,” Sebastian tells her. “Quite the opposite.” They sit together, side by side, on the couch, Hawke thoughtful and relaxed as she clutches a pillow.

“I’m not – I don’t think he…” her words trail off into a frown and a sigh, biting at the skin around her thumb. Sebastian places a gentle hand over her knee and smiles.

“Have faith. I have reason to believe he’ll come speak to you soon.”

“Thank you, Sebastian, for everything,” she says ever so softly. She pulls her legs up to her chest, resting her chin on a knee, fingers pressing at the tops of bare feet.

Her head turns twice when she sees him, as though she cannot believe her eyes. Hawke leaves Sebastian, Aveline and Merrill standing by the gates of Hightown, turning back to walk to Fenris. The three of them watch from afar as Fenris rubs the back of his neck, stares pointedly at his feet as he speaks. The tender way Hawke’s fingertips touch his cheeks, direct his gaze upwards. She gently reminds him that he is an equal and that he never has to lower his gaze to anyone anymore.

She’s speaking back to him, saying words with a smile that make him frown. Eventually he nods, and her hands fall back to her side. There’s a moment of hesitation before she leans forward, hands brushing against his shoulders. She stands on her toes, and her face is suddenly hidden behind his. She plants a small kiss to his cheek before she pulls away. She leaves him standing there, a hand slowly reaching for his cheek. He watches her go with a type of hopelessness, all his emotion laid bare to her back.

Aveline makes a sigh at the sight of it, while Merrill coos. They collect themselves as Hawke returns to them, makes no mention of the intimate moment they have had the privilege of witnessing. Sebastian can only smile, greet Hawke cordially when she returns to them. “All is well?” He asks.

“It will be,” she answers. She seems happy enough as they make their way to the Wounded Coast, in search of a Qunari patrol which has gone missing. It’s easy to see how much it weighs, the growing responsibility placed upon Hawke’s shoulders. She bears it gracefully, does not utter one word of complaint. Her first concern is always for the safety of her friends and family, and it’s something he finds so beautiful about her.

She rubs her brows when they find the patrol, and the abomination which has slain them. They make short work of him. Aveline leads the charge against the demon and his shades, and Sebastian lets fly his arrows. Hawke and Merrill work their magic together, weaving protection around the others, unleashing destruction upon their enemies.

They build a camp against the cliffs, watching the moon rise and the run set. The fire burns with a flick of Hawke’s hand, and Aveline is pulling food from her pack, passing it around. Hawke prefers no tent, loves to sleep under the stars and the sky. When Merrill and Aveline clamber off to bed, Hawke is sitting on the edge of the cliff, her feet dangling over. Sebastian takes a seat beside her.

“He told me, after we had… He remembered things, his life before. And then poof… all gone. I understand why he left, why he can’t be with me, I really do,” Hawke says. “I want to help him, but he won’t let me.” Water spills against the rocks below, the last few gulls cry out as they fly overhead. Wind rustles through the long grass, chasing sand across the shore. It smells of salt and smoke, and everything is so bright from the fullness of the moon. “Maker, I just want him to be happy. Find some peace.”

“I know.”

“I love him,” she says, shoulders hunching over, pressing her hands against her face. Sebastian slips an arm over her shoulders.

“I know.” Water continues to rush against rock. Something howls in the distance. Crickets sing from hidden corners. The world continues to spin but they sit still, taking in as much silence as there is.

They trudge back to Kirkwall after eating lunch, and it takes them most of the day to return. Merrill is distracted by every unique butterfly, every snapped branch. Hawke is happy to allow her her fancies, watching over the elf with a smile on her face. Aveline is less than patient, ready to return to the barracks. “Oh, you need to come to my estate first,” Hawke says, “My mother baked something for you all. She’d be cross with me if you didn’t get it.”

They wait patiently in the foyer, listening to the voices that rise in volume. Gamlen is shouting something, storming past them, slamming the door behind him. Hawke comes out next, clutching her staff in her hands. “My mother is missing,” she tells them. All of Aveline’s eagerness to return to the barracks dissipates immediately. She is instantly at Hawke’s command, following her to Lowtown. Merrill is the same, less stoic than Aveline, feeling the same panic and worry that Hawke is showing.

“More blood,” Hawke says, breaking into a run, following the trail all the way to a foundry. “Mother must be here somewhere. We need to look around.” They break off immediately, searching the place from top to bottom.

“Hawke,” Sebastian calls out, moving a bag from a trapdoor. Hawke is by his side instantly, opening the trapdoor and jumping down without any hesitation. All they can do is follow her as she rushes forward, try to protect her as best they can as they fight through demon and shade.

“That portrait…” Hawke says, walking past scattered page and parchment. Sebastian picks up one of them, eyes scanning the page. Books on necromancy, on forbidden magic. The feeling of dread grows in his chest.

“That woman looks like Leandra, doesn’t she?” Aveline says, sword still in her hands. Hawke turns without a word, heading further down into the tunnels. She rounds corners, runs down stairs, turns a corner and stops in her tracks. Her next steps are slow and careful, every line of her stiff and suspicious. Sebastian keeps an arrow notched, ready to fly. They approach a grey-haired man, wearing tattered robes and carrying a twisted staff.

“I was wondering when you’d show up. Leandra was so sure you’d come for her.” Every word oozes slime and dirt. He reeks of blood and something fouler, the corruption clear in the air about him. Sebastian raises his bow a little higher, Hawke keeps her staff light in her hands.

“Where is she?” A curling smile crosses the maleficar’s face.

“You will never understand my purpose. Your mother was chosen because she was special, and now she is part of something… greater.” Part of Sebastian hopes she isn’t here, that Leandra is simply gone. Hawke is stepping forward, even closer.

“I don’t want to hurt anyone,” she says, always so optimistic, too kind. “Release my mother, and we’ll go.”

“She’s here. She’s waiting for you.” That knot in Sebastian’s chest binds even further. “I have done the impossible. I have touched the face of the Maker and lived. Do you know what the strongest force in the universe is? Love.” He feels the dread bottom out when a veiled woman rises, wearing a tattered wedding dress. “I pieced her together from memory. I found her eyes, her skin, her delicate fingers… and at last, her face… oh, this beautiful face.” The maleficar pulls back the failed, reveals the stricken face of Leandra.

“I’ve searched far and wide to find you again, beloved, and no force on this earth will part us,” he says, spreading his arms wide, pulling at every bit of foul air, bringing forth shades a plenty. Hawke does not move, her eyes locked on Leandra, stricken to her core. Aveline forces her way in front of Hawke, shield up and sword out, while Sebastian and Merrill close in.

Hawke wakes with a type of horrified fury, her magic pounding like drums of war. It’s too much, it’s not enough. She catches her mother in her arms after the maleficar dies, and they fall to the floor together. Hawke is cradling Leandra so gently, so lovingly, brushing wisps of grey hair away from her face. “I knew you would come,” Leandra says and for some reason, Sebastian finds those words so utterly cruel. Yes, she had come, but she had come too late.

Aveline pulls Sebastian and Merrill away, allows Hawke to say her farewells in private. “I’ll need to fetch the guard. Have some of my people take the… take the body,” Aveline says. She turns to Sebastian, “can you take her home?” He nods instantly.

“What should I do?” Merrill asks in a whisper.

“Find Fenris,” Sebastian tells her.

It takes long minutes to pull Hawke away from her mother. Sebastian kneels down beside her, wrapping an arm around her, helping her to her feet. She’s mutely quiet, the tears rolling silently, and she does not say a word as Sebastian leads her away. She clings to him, her fingers around his breastplate, wedging herself as close to him as she possibly can. Sebastian holds her just as tightly, knowing grief would need the hardest touch to be banished.

Sebastian speaks to Bodahn while Hawke changes out of blood-stained armor. When he enters Hawke’s room once again, he does so with a tray of sweet pastries and a warm drink. He kneels down before Hawke as she sits on the edge of the bed, presses the warm cup into her hands. She cradles it carefully, her eyes on the dark swirling liquid, and the steam that rises from it. “What can I do?” Sebastian asks, putting a hand on her arm, rubbing small circles with his thumb against her skin. She squeezes her eyes closed, and when she opens them, she finally looks at him.

“Please, just stay.” He nods, takes a seat beside her. She places the cup upon her nightstand, reaches for a pastry. She splits it, passes him one half. They eat in silence, Hawke moving closer to him, leaning against him, resting her head upon his shoulder. They watch the fire burn and crackle, wood shifting as it’s eaten away by flame. Ashes fall to the bottom, grey and lifeless, all that remains of a life that had once burned so brightly.

Hawke sits up straight with a sudden start as the door to her bedroom swings open. Fenris stands there, one hand still upon the door, breathing heavily with sweat on his brow. His hair is messy and windblown, and it is clear that he had run with all his might having heard she was in need. He takes a deep breath, collects himself before he speaks. “You have… Sebastian. I can leave,” he begins to make the motions to turn but Hawke is on her feet.

“No! No. Please. Fenris,” she pleads, stretching out her hand towards him. He stares at it blankly for only a moment, before reading out and taking it. She leads him to the bed, makes him sit. She leans back into Sebastian, his arm wrapping around her shoulders. They flank her on either side, Hawke’s hand still wound in Fenris’s.

“Thank you,” she says, “both of you. For being here. With me.” Fenris says nothing, simply holds her hand a little harder. Hawke has her eyes closed, and Sebastian turns to look at Fenris. Fenris looks back, and Sebastian smiles sadly at him. Fenris’s eyes drop to Hawke, and he leans forward to ghost his lips onto her shoulder. Such a small thing, but Sebastian can feel the deep breath Hawke takes in response to it.

She begins to fall asleep, but refuses to let either of them go. They refuse to leave her. She sleeps peacefully in the middle of the bed, Fenris at her back and her head in the crook of Sebastian’s arm. She sleeps untroubled, any nightmare she could have had banished by their presence.

They stay in the morning. They stay for the rest of the day. They help Hawke plan the funeral. Sebastian takes a more active role, suggesting things here and there, telling Hawke that he would talk to the Chantry for her. Fenris simply stays close to her, always in range, ready to be at her side in a moment’s notice.

The funeral is a small and private thing, one where Hawke does not shed a tear. Gamlen weeps openly, Bodahn joining him as well. The rest worry after Hawke, but she keeps her shoulders square and does not make a sound. When it is over, she goes home alone. “I need some time,” she tells Sebastian, her arms around him, closing her eyes with her head at his chest. He obliges her the hug for as long as she needs it. She reappears two days later with a smile. She doesn’t mention her mother. They don’t bring it up.

Hawke races through the burning streets of Hightown. She skids to a halt seeing grey skin, large horns. The Qunari have finally made their move. Sebastian strikes first, an arrow in the Qunari’s chest as Fenris dashes forward, his sword sparking on the ground behind him. Hawke makes a fist, pushes it upwards, and ice swallows the feet of the Qunari which surround them. Aveline smashes into one of them with her shield, deals the finishing blow with her sword. They follow in the wake of Orsino and Meredith, the group of them cutting a path towards the Viscount’s Keep.

The steps of the Keep are red from more than just the rug. Orsino and Meredith have left to deal with the remaining Qunari in the city. Hawke goes to deal with the Arishok. She looks over her shoulder at them, one last look. Her eyes linger on each one of them before she pushes open the door to the throne room. She doesn’t expect Isabela to come back with the relic, but she does anyway, standing beside Hawke and proclaiming that it’s Hawke’s damnable influence.

The Arishok demands Isabela come with them. Sebastian and Fenris both look at each other. They know that Hawke would never give up one of her friends. Sure enough, Hawke steps protectively in front of her, shielding Isabela behind her back. “No,” Hawke tells the Arishok, “she stays with me.” The fight was inevitable. Fenris thought he would be fighting it by her side, sword in hand. Instead, they are forced to the sidelines, forced to watch a duel.

They are circling each other, Hawke’s staff twirling in her hands. She looks at him with eyes darkly, this beast who has threatened her city and her friends so. The Arishok holds a heavy axe, a broad sword. His weapons are larger than Hawke is. Fenris moves involuntarily, taking a step forward. It’s Sebastian who reaches out to him, wrapping a hand around his wrist. He holds him still with that touch, and Fenris can feel Sebastian’s hand shaking.

Hawke turns, plants her feet, staff striking forward with two quick bolts. The Arishok shrugs them off as though they are nothing, begins to march forward. She’s taking steps back, and the air in the keep is growing colder. Hawke is warm but her magic is cold, breath visible in the air as the blizzard begins to take shape. Snow settles on her eyelashes, and she is pulling forward snapping ice at the Arishok’s feet. What might have stopped another does not stop him.

Hawke weaves around a pillar, and it is stone that catches the Arishok’s axe, not flesh. Hawke bursts flame from her fingertips, and the Arishok roars and slices his sword through it. She’s nimble, stepping to and fro, dodging every swipe of shining metal. It is the thrust forward that she does not expect. Sebastian’s hand tightens around Fenris’s wrist, the both of them struggling not to move. Hawke looks down at the sword through her belly, the one that pins her against the pillar. The Arishok is moving away from her, thinking victory assured.

There’s blood in her mouth, and all the cold has gone. She’s reaching out with her hand, stretching forward fingers. With a cry, she pulls downwards. She pulls down the very fist of the maker, pressure unending atop of the Arishok. He turns back towards her with a frown, a look of surprise when he drops to his knee. He struggles to stay straight, propped up upon his axe, trying to keep his head held high. The snap echoes through the Keep. The Arishok’s head lolls, his neck broken, his body slumping to the floor.

Hawke makes no sound as she pulls the sword from herself, cutting her hands on the edges of the sword. Fenris races forward, no longer needing to be held back, his arms outstretched. She falls forward into them, and Fenris easily lifts her into his arms. He turns, wide-eyed, staring at Sebastian. “A mage,” Sebastian tells him. Sebastian pushes nobles out of the way, clearing the path to Orsino’s band of gathered mages.

They attempt to take Hawke from Fenris but he only holds tighter. It’s Sebastian who helps lift her from her arms, into the waiting embrace of magic. When she is gone, Fenris is looking at his arms, wet with her blood. Sebastian covers his arms with his own, wrapping his hands around them. “Fenris,” he says, “she’ll be alright.” Fenris trembles, steps forward, rests his head on Sebastian’s shoulder and takes a shuddering breath. “She’ll be alright.”

They make their way back to Fenris’s mansion, and it is a single finger at Sebastian’s breastplate that pulls him inside. Fenris closes the door to his mansion, then turns to him. Arms that wind around him, clinging to him desperately, Fenris’s head in the crook of his neck. Sebastian places hands upon his warm back, allows Fenris to get used to his touch before tightening the embrace.

Bodahn finds them at the mansion the next day. “The mistress is awake, and asking after you both,” he tells them. Sebastian leaves his armor and his bow where they lay, and Fenris does the same. They make their way to Hawke’s estate, plain clothed and worried, side by side as they walk up the stairs to her room.

She’s sitting up, surrounded by pillows, a hand over her gut. “I’m going to have a wickedly badass scar,” she tells them with a grin. She’s pale but in good humor, and Sebastian chuckles, shakes his breath as he pulls up a chair.

“It is good to see you,” he says to her. She smiles, reaches out to him, her fingers brushing against his cheek.

“And you,” she says. Fenris sits at the end of the bed, one hand over her ankle. His other hand he wraps around the poster of the bed, leans his head upon it. He closes his eyes, lets out the breath he didn’t realize he was holding.

“Is there anything we can do?” Sebastian asks her, taking her hand in his as it falls away from his face. She gives his hand a squeeze before replying.

“Read to me? It’s been so boring stuck here, and I have no way of properly holding it up,” she says. Sebastian laughs, pats his hand as he rises.

“Fenris,” Sebastian asks, “would you like to choose the book?” Fenris’s eyes snap open, and his cheeks color red.

“I, ah, no. You can,” he says. Sebastian cocks his head, looks at him pointedly. The red deepens, and Fenris looks away. “I cannot read.” He admits this silently, to the floor, looking away from both Hawke and Sebastian. “Slaves are not permitted to learn.”

“It’s not too late to learn Fenris,” Hawke says, “We can teach you.”

“I don’t want to trouble you with this,” he says.

“I’m sure Hawke would appreciate the distraction,” Sebastian says, “and we are more than willing.” Fenris’s fingers tap against the wood, until he finally looks back at them.

“I don’t mean to seem ungrateful. I just… I never thought that I would have the chance to learn. I – thank you. Both of you,” he says. Sebastian shows up at the estate the next night with a beaming smile and books in his arms. Fenris comes bringing food. He lies next to Hawke on the bed, a book in his hands, following along with her as she reads to him, her finger under each word.

Sebastian sits on the side of the bed, beside Fenris, shows him letters. Fenris’s jaw clenches when Sebastian passes him a piece of parchment, a single word upon it, and tells him that it’s his name. Fenris stares at it for long moments, then folds it and tucks it into his belt. When Sebastian goes to collect him at his mansion, he can see that parchment on his bedside table.

Weeks pass, and Anders finally allows Hawke to rise from the bed. They follow her as she limps around her mansion, unwilling and not wanting to stay still any longer. Fenris makes stumbling progress, growing frustrated with each failed attempt. Sebastian and Hawke possess nothing but patience, helping to turn him down the right path. “And the Maker, clad in the ma- the maj – the…” Fenris grits his teeth, slams the book down upon the table.

“And the Maker, clad in the majesty of the sky,” Sebastian says as he sits on the floor next to Fenris, putting a cup of wine in front of both Hawke and Fenris. They crowd around Hawke’s coffee table, next to the fire, a blanket over each their legs. Hawke sits across from the both of them, smiling as she brings the cup to her lips.

“Do you have the entire chant memorized?” She asks.

“Not the entirety. There are a few favorite passages I know,” Sebastian says.

“Of course that would be the one thing you want him to read,” she teases gently. Fenris smiles, planting an elbow on the table, looking at Sebastian with amusement. Sebastian huffs, crosses his arms.

“It is what I first learned to read from,” he says, Hawke breaking into laughter as he hotly defends himself. They’ve fallen into an easy rapport, having spent each night for the past few months side by side. “The two of you are relentless.” He shakes his head, and Fenris gives a low chuckle as he drinks. He looks at the wine in the cup, then pushes it towards Sebastian.

“You never drink with us,” he says, taps the rim of the cup.

“Ah, the Chantry frowns upon it,” Sebastian says.

“We won’t tell,” Hawke says. Sebastian’s brows knit, his fingers wrapping around the cup.

“Drink, and I will tell you a secret,” Fenris says. Sebastian raises an eyebrow, looks at him skeptically. A grin quirks at Fenris’s mouth, his eyes sparkling with mischief as he taps the rim of the cup once again. Sebastian thinks for a moment, then sips from where Fenris’s lips had once been. His face sours as he slams the cup back upon the table.

“I seem to have lost my taste for it,” he says. Hawke laughs, both elbows on the table, holding her chin in her hands.

“Then you’ll just have to drink more,” she tells him.

“I do believe I am owed a reward,” he says, turning with a flourish towards Fenris.

“Hawke has three freckles on her hip. They look like –” Fenris mimics a face of surprise, his eyes wide and his mouth open.

Hawke immediately makes a noise of disbelief, an exhaled “bwuah!” and leans over the table to punch Fenris in the shoulder. He falls backwards, his arms around himself, laughing as he moves out of her reach. Sebastian throws back his head and laughs, drinks the rest of the wine left in the cup. It’s refilled many times throughout the night, and their conversation has steered from reading to any topic that flits into their heads.

It’s much too late when Fenris rises, tells her that he needs to go home and sleep. Sebastian leans against the entryway of the foyer as Fenris and Hawke say their goodbyes. Sebastian is just as surprised as Hawke when Fenris leans down, his eyes closed, pressing a soft kiss against Hawke’s lips. She’s still touching her lips after the door closes and Sebastian walks up beside her.

“I’m happy for you,” he says warmly, putting a hand on her arm. She smiles, cheeks a pleased pink. Her hands land on his arms, rising on her toes, to return the favor that Fenris had given her, upon Sebastian’s lips.

“Thank you, Sebastian,” she says, her heels back on solid ground. He finds he has no words, simply nods and takes his leave. The cold night air does wonders for the wine coursing through his system, his thoughts becoming clearer. His thoughts lingering on the kiss, on the laughter, on the taste on the cup that wasn’t wine. He half-barricades himself in his room, quickly shedding layers, crawling into bed.

He tries to ignore the thoughts that plague him. Hawke and Fenris, firelight flickering on their smiling faces. Three freckles on her hip. He tries not to picture it. Still, the ghost of Hawke swims before him, glorious and beautiful, lips parted and eyes half-lidded. He stirs at the image, and Sebastian rolls over onto his stomach. The pressure of the mattress against his cock does nothing to calm his growing erection. It only gets worse when the ghost of Fenris joins her, pressing kisses to her nape.

He sits up in his bed, leaning against the wall, his hands clenched at his side. He knows Hawke would be a gentle, understanding lover. Tucking hair behind pointed ears, suckling at his earlobe. Her hand drifts down lazily, over muscle and lyrium skin, her hand wrapping around the base of Fenris’s cock. It’s the thought of the sounds Fenris would make that does him in. That low voice, a guttural groan, and Sebastian’s fingers are slipping underneath his waistband.

He aches with the thought of them, throbbing and needy, an unsteady hand touching the salt that leaks out the tip of him. Fenris is a powerful warrior, and in his mind’s eye, he can see the way Fenris’s back moves, all controlled strength and grace. Stretched out over Hawke, shoulders tense as he thrusts inside her cunt. Sebastian wraps a hand around himself, groans as he begins to slowly stroke. Hawke’s legs wrapped around his waist, her hands fluttering on his shoulders. Her voice in harmony with his, light and dark, crying out together.

His grip tightens, and his hips move so that he may fuck into his hand. It’s not enough, it’s not enough. He wants to be there, to run his hand down Fenris’s spine, to cup Hawke’s ass, to taste them both on his tongue. All he can do is imagine Hawke pinning Fenris to the bed, riding him like a stallion, her breasts bouncing with each heavy thrust. Fenris would have his hands on her waist, moving his hips in time with hers, burying himself ever deeper, all the way to the hilt.

Sebastian comes with a strangled moan, to the thought of Fenris spilling his seed inside of a writhing Hawke. His hands are sticky with it, streaks of white upon his shirt. He leans his head back, sighs as he stares at the blue ceiling of the Chantry. Maker forgive him, he was fantasizing about his closest friends. Maker forgive him, he wanted them both. He closes his eyes, steadies his breathing, and feels his racing pulse drift back to normalcy. How could he face them now?

Little does he know, Hawke is on all fours in her bed, a desperate hand inside of her smalls. She moans as she pumps a finger in and out. She imagines winding her hands into Fenris’s hair, Sebastian tugging at her own. He would expose her neck for Fenris to bring his teeth down upon, sucking a mark onto ivory flesh. She would shake as Sebastian pounded into her, holding to Fenris to keep herself steady. His hands would be at her breasts, pinching at her nipples. She would feel their heat on both sides, seek wet kisses from them, have them both, and have them both.

Fenris has his forehead against cool stone, feet planted upon the floor, mouth open and eyes closed. He knows the secret places of Hawke and that spot on her back that upon being kissed makes her moan. He pumps unceremoniously at his cock, knowing the face that she would make. Her eyes closed, fist at her mouth to stifle her cries. It would be Sebastian who would pull her hand away, encourage every little noise of pleasure. It would be Sebastian whose hand would drift upon his back, whose hand would fall upon the curve of his ass. Whose fingers would press inside of him, would stretch him, would make him ready. It would be Sebastian who would take him, just as he takes Hawke.

Hawke’s eyes move towards the heavens, and she raises a hand to block the glaring sun from her eyes. She sighs as her hand drops back down to her side, and she looks out over the endless wastes. “This is miserable,” she says.

“I know!” Varric says, throwing his hands up. “This is where my sources tracked those dwarves who attacked you though.” They had come without warning, shattering windows and breaking through the door. Sebastian and Fenris never brought their weapons with them to the estate. It was Hawke with her magic that did all the hard work, protecting them as they fought off the dwarves who sought to draw her blood. “Carta usually isn’t stupid. Don’t know why they’d attack you.”

“Let’s ask, shall we?” Hawke strides forward, going towards the ruins that rise in the stand. Varric trucks off beside her, Sebastian and Fenris at their backs. “Let’s hope the next people who attack us have their base at a nice beach, or a flower field.”

“You’ve come!” The dwarf that greets him has his eyes clouded, his arms spread, and his grin fanatical. “Everyone! It’s the child of Malcolm Hawke! She’s come to us! It began with him and ends with you.” Hawke looks over her shoulder at the others and shrugs. “Corypheus will walk in the sun once more.” Another eyebrow raise from Hawke, and she summons her magic. They fight their way from sun to tower, down into the depths.

She pulls a staff from the corpse of one of the leaders, hisses as she feels the power pulse in her veins. “This is a key,” she says, “It will take us to Corypheus.” Two dwarves emerge from the shadows, begin to run from them. They are quick to run after them, quick to fall into the trap.

She looks at the barrier that bars the way back and frowns. She leans against her staff, her knuckles white, rubbing a hand against her temple. “The last time I was in the deep roads, Carver died,” she says quietly. Her eyes close and she sighs, pinching her brows. Sebastian puts a hand on her back, while Fenris moves to stand in front of her.

“We will protect you,” he says while Sebastian nods in agreement.

“I’m sure there’s another way out,” Sebastian says.

“We’d best go find it,” Varric says, walking away from the barrier, Bianca in his arms. Hawke sighs again, standing up straight, her staff in her hands. They walk over ancient rubble, coarse dirt and dust, sand permeating every inch. It piles in dark corners, lumps of shifting earth. It is from these piles that they emerge. Genlocks snarling on all fours, bounding towards them.

Varric is quick with the bolts, while Sebastian raises his bow. Hawke lifts her hands to the air, the crystal of her staff shining, and Fenris feels protective magic wash over him. Fire ignites inside one of the genlocks, who falls back screeching. They are hardy, this creature, and Fenris has to hack again and again and again. Without Aveline, their battering ram, the genlocks break past Fenris.

Hawke only grunts when one slams into her, beginning to bash at it with her staff. She’s pulling at her magic, unleashing invisible and forceful punches. Varric is being surrounded, but so is Fenris. He cries out when a gunlock swipes at his arm, draws blood and forces the sword from his grasp. “Fenris!” Hawke’s cry is desperate and panicked, and Sebastian instantly races towards Fenris.

He brings down his bow upon the face of one, burying an arrow into the eye of another. It buys Fenris enough time to snarl, to collect his sword, to exact vengeance upon them. Hawke has electricity sparking between her fingertips, sending lightning flying forward with a shout.

When it is over, when it is done, the four of them stand panting heavily. There is blood upon their armor, blood not their own and Varric sinks down to his knees. Hawke makes her way towards Fenris, reaches for his wrist. She places a hand over the wound, closes her eyes as she focuses on the healing. When it is done, her eyes open, and she knocks her forehead against Fenris’s, breathing relief.

They fight more on their way down, until they’re too exhausted to stand. “I vote we make camp,” Varric says, shouldering Bianca.

“I’m inclined to agree,” Sebastian says. Fenris shrugs, takes the pack from his back. Food is eaten in silence, bedrolls unfurled in the same manner. Varric is soon upon his, his back towards them, a light snoring arising from him.

Sebastian and Fenris are both sitting up still, against a wall. Hawke rises from her bedroll, makes her way towards them. Fenris looks up at her in wonder as she straddles him, settling down, winding her arms tight around his neck. “The darkspawn today… I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you,” she whispers to him. When she pulls back, her hands cup his face. He tilts his face upwards towards her, closes his eyes. Sebastian rests his arms upon his knees, leans his head back against cool stone. Fenris’s hands travel the length of her back, up and down, and Sebastian tries not to listen to the way their lips sound against each other, the way he can hear Fenris breathing into her mouth.

Hawke leans back in Fenris’s lap, her cheeks pink, turns towards Sebastian. “And you,” she says, “you saved him.” She reaches out, a touch starting at his shoulder, drifting down his arm, taking one of his hands in hers.

Sebastian shifts where he sits, turning towards them. “Of course, you are both very dear to me, I couldn’t-” The words die when Fenris reaches out, places a hand at the back of Sebastian’s neck. He pulls him in, his eyes closing, and Fenris’s nose brushing against his. Fenris pushes the kiss, pulls at Sebastian’s bottom lip. He opens his mouth to him, finds a tongue wet and warm. Fenris tastes earthy, minty, and good.

Fenris pulls away, his face flushed, and Hawke puts a hand at Sebastian’s chin. She turns his face towards her, moves in. Her kiss is lighter, less forceful, and Sebastian finds himself weak to it. She tastes sweet like strawberries, and when she pulls away, the both of them still swirl in his mouth. He’s drunk on them, his eyes half-lidded, and his cock half hard. Hawke leans towards Fenris again, her hips rolling over his, wrapping arms around him once again.

Her head in the crook of his neck, her piercing blue eyes look towards Sebastian. He pulls himself closer, his chest leaning against the two of them. This time he is the one seeking. Hawke watches breathlessly as Sebastian swallows Fenris’s mouth, groaning against him, a hand slipping between them both to rest against Fenris’s chest. Hawke is rolling her hips again, closing her eyes as she moves methodically, Fenris’s hips rising unconsciously to meet hers.

Fenris’s hand slips down the front of Sebastian, fingers at the buttons of his collar. He undoes them deftly, pressing a hand against his bare chest. His hands are warm, and Sebastian surrenders utterly to his touch. He feels one of Hawke’s hands flutter at his shoulders, at his neck, winding into his hair. He mixes mint with berries, Hawke stealing another desperate kiss. Fenris’s hand is moving downwards still, and Sebastian cannot help the guttural moan he makes when he palms his cock.

“Stop!” Varric’s back is still to them, but he has a hand over his ear, “you do this and I swear to the Maker I am putting every detail into a book. I will not change names! Also, I will absolutely tell Isabela the instant we get back.”

A line of spit breaks between them as Hawke pulls away, from both Fenris and Sebastian, moving back to her own bedroll. Fenris moves his closer to Hawke’s, motions for Sebastian to the same. They curl up close to each other, Fenris in the center. They look at each other breathlessly for long moments, eye to eye to eye, coming to complete understanding. Sebastian takes one of Fenris’s hands, Hawke takes the other.

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