Garrett woke to the pleasant crackle and warmth of the fire. In the flickering light he searched for his lover, but apart from himself the bed was empty.

His eyes widened and he sat up quickly, his heart already pounding as he thought he might be able to catch Fenris before he left the estate, but before he could fling aside the plush covers of his bedding, he realized that Fenris wasn't yet gone.

The elf stood at the hearth, fully dressed and bracing himself against the mantle as he stared down into the fire. His visit had been poorly planned, if planned at all; what he had been wearing when he came to the Hawke manor tonight was his battle gear, fresh from their latest adventure, complete with spiked gauntlets and heavy pauldrons and covered in the dust from the road. And that was what he wore now. He had even fastened on the trappings, and when he turned, his expression was twice as broody as it ever had been, and Garrett's heart sank.

"Going somewhere?" Garrett asked, trying to control his voice and his emotions. It had been damned hard to get close to Fenris in any capacity, let alone in a romantic way; he had never expected anything like tonight to happen, but now that it had, he wanted to savor it. But it appeared Fenris had other plans.

"I'm…sorry," Fenris sighed, hanging his head.

"Was it…bad?" Garrett asked, not without embarrassment. He'd certainly been satisfied, but the feeling mustn't be mutual if Fenris saw fit to leave now.

"It's not… It was fine," Fenris said, lowering his head.

"That's not a very flattering remark," Garrett muttered. But then he had a thought and smiled. "Come back to bed and let me try again." He drew the covers back invitingly.

Fenris frowned with no amusement. "Perhaps you don't realize it, but I'm upset."

Garrett's expression became more concerned. "No, I can see that," he assured the elf. "I'm just not sure what I've done that was so terrible as to earn a mere 'fine' for what was, at least to me, one of the most pleasurable experiences of my life."

Fenris looked ashamed and more than a little regretful. "Forgive me. I chose my words poorly. In truth, it was better than anything I could have ever dreamed."

"Then…?" Garrett prompted to no reply. "What is it, Fenris? I can't help if I don't understand what's wrong. Was it…strange to be with another man? Is that why you can't stay?"

"It's not that," Fenris said quickly, a flush creeping over his typically pale cheeks and spreading all the way to his pointed eartips. "I began to remember…things."

Garrett knitted his brows, trying desperately to understand. Fenris had told him that as a slave he had been robbed of all his memories of his life before. He had never mentioned recalling anything of his past befeore, but whatever he had remembered tonight seemed to be greatly troubling him now. "Bad things, I take it?"

"When I received these markings," Fenris explained, examining his own scarred arms, "the pain was so blinding that I forgot everything I ever knew, even my own name." He looked up at the human. "But suddenly tonight I began to remember my life before—just flashes, but…"

"After we made love?" Garrett pressed. "During?" What sort of memories might their passion have stirred to the surface? He thought he understood now. "There's…someone else," he guessed, disappointed.

Fenris shook his head adamantly. "No. No, I've never had a chance to be with anyone of my own choosing."

"Of your own…?" Another thought dawned on Garrett, one almost too despicable to put a name to. But he couldn't help it. "Danarius." He snarled the name of the elf's slaver, whom he had grown to hate almost as greatly as Fenris himself did.

Fenris swallowed visibly. "I didn't want to tell you. Not like this, not ever." He expression was beyond pained as he added, "Not tonight, of all nights."

Garrett swung his legs over the edge of the bed, the sheets barely covering his lap. "If I ever get my hands on that son of a—"

"Please—!" Fenris interrupted, backing away and waving his arms as if to ward Garrett off. "I don't wish to speak of it. It is painful enough to remember…" He shook his head again, and looked as if he might bolt from the room. "It's too much. This is too fast. I cannot…do this."

"Fenris, wait!" Garrett called out, grasping for his robe at the foot of the bed. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said his name."

The elf didn't seem as if he would stop. He only wanted escape now. Already he had turned away and was moving quickly toward the door. "I'm sorry. All I wanted was to be happy, just for a little while. Forgive me." He was reaching for the doorhandle.

Garrett had thrown his robe on and hurried to tie it loosely about his waist. "May I say one thing? One moment, Fenris, please!" he cried. "That's all I ask. Then if you still want to leave, I won't try to stop you."

Fenris's hand hovered over the door handle, but he didn't turn around to face Garrett.

"I just want you to know that I understand how badly you've been hurt—how much it still hurts." Garrett ached to go to the door and envelop Fenris in his arms, but he knew that with the elf's history of imprisonment and abuse, that would be the wrong move. So he stood at the foot of the four-poster bed they had just shared and clung to it instead to make sure he wouldn't. "I would never push you to do or say anything you're not comfortable with," Garrett continued. "But I want you to know that I care about you. If you feel you must leave, if it's easier to walk away than to let me hold you, then that's fine. You're free. It's your decision. But I will be here, Fenris. Whatever you need, whenever you need it, I will be here."

Fenris seemed to shrink in on himself, his chin lowering with every gentle word Garrett spoke. "I feel like such a fool," he admitted just when Garrett thought he might be crying, his voice sounding only a little weak. "You are far more patient than I have any right to ask you to be."

"I'm trying to be," Garrett sighed softly. "I know you're in pain, Fenris, but I also know you're worth waiting for. It just tears me apart that I can't do anything for you right now. I can offer you nothing but my arms tonight."

"And that is the one offer I cannot accept," Fenris said, his voice ringing with remorse. He felt too anxious, too keyed up. He already knew he wouldn't sleep tonight, and all he could think of was getting back to the abandoned mansion where he was squatting to raid Danarius's liquor cabinet.

They were quiet for a moment. Garrett wished Fenris would turn around and look at him once more. And if he had to go, then he wanted to see the elf out; walking him home would have been the next-best thing to keeping him safe in his bed and arms. But Fenris had done as he'd asked and listened to his last plea. All he could do now was let him go.

"Then you've made your decision," he murmured, "and I'll do as I promised, and say goodnight."

Fenris finally turned the handle and the door swung open. "Goodbye, Hawke," the elf said quietly. Then he was gone.

Three years later…

Hadriana was dead. Danarius was dead. And so was his sister. All by his own hand. But that didn't sate the desire for vengeance Fenris had thought he felt, nor did he feel any safer for escaping those that would have enslaved him. If this was freedom, maybe he hadn't missing out on much.

"You don't need to stay in this pit anymore, you know," Varric was saying. "Not that you haven't, er…fixed it up nicely."

Seated behind Danarius's desk, Fenris cocked his head to the side and gave the dwarf a wry smile. "Sure. If you like peeling wallpaper and garbage littering the floor."

"Nobody said you didn't have to clean up around here every once in a while." Varric shuddered as a roach crawled across the surface of the desk between them.

Aveline was in no mood for jokes and games, and she was disgusted by their surroundings. The guard captain and Varric had come here to talk some sense into Fenris, and playing nice was no way to hold a serious intervention. "This place is falling apart," the woman reasoned, then tacked on meaningfully, "And my ability to keep the seneschal from noticing is at its end."

Fenris had heard enough. Even if they succeeded in convincing him to leave, where could he go? The alienage? He was too proud to let himself be banished to the slums just because he was an elf. And, besides, he had another reason for wanting to remain in Hightown…

"I appreciate what you've done, Aveline," Fenris said, standing, clearly implying his company was being dismissed.

Aveline sighed and headed for the door, but Varric didn't take the hint. "You're staying?" he exclaimed. "But, why? You could go anywhere now!"

Fenris shrugged. "Perhaps I don't wish to go anywhere."

The dwarf shook his head. "Freedom must be a terrible burden…I guess."

Fenris couldn't tell whether Varric was being serious or sarcastic, but he seemed repelled either way and was following the trail Aveline had carved to the door. The dwarf passed by Garrett Hawke on his way out, the other man on his way in. Varric nearly stopped to talk with their mutual friend, but Aveline at least had the sense to know that Hawke might wish to speak with Fenris alone, so she shook her head sharply at Varric and nudged onward down the hall. Fenris had just encountered a great tragedy along with his triump over Danarius, if losing a sister you barely remembered could count as such. If anyone could console the perpetually depressed elf, it was Hawke.

"They don't understand," Fenris sighed at the sound of the door closing behind Garrett. His was company Fenris would never rush to leave. He sank back down into his chair heavily. "Yes, I am free. Danarius is dead. Yet…it doesn't feel like it should."

"You aren't happy?" Hawke took a seat across the desk from the elf. The others may have been turned off by the debris that littered it—empty bottles, dusty papers, and even a bit of drywall that had fallen from the cracked ceiling—but this was where Fenris preferred to stay, so Garrett had long ago made his peace with it and now felt quite at home. "Seems like you should be dancing for joy," he commented, cocking his head at the handsome elf.

"One should think," Fenris agreed. "I always thought if I didn't need to run and fight to stay alive, I would finally be able to live as a free man does. But maybe I don't even understand what that means. I thought it meant having the chance to try and track down any family I might have left, to reconstruct my past from the fragments of memory that occasionally come to me, but apparently there was only Varania." He spoke of his sister, who had betrayed him to Danarius. In the end he'd killed them both, and he regretted nothing. "Whatever past I had died with my sister. I have nothing now—not even an enemy."

Hawke listened patiently. He knew Fenris wasn't saying that he wished things had turned out differently; besides, if Fenris hadn't killed Danarius, Hawke would have, and he probably would have enjoyed it. But he didn't say as much.

"You don't have 'nothing,' Fenris," he argued gently. "You have your whole life ahead of you. The past may be no comfort for you now, but you still have a future. There's nothing standing in your way."

Fenris shrugged. "I suppose I just don't know what to do with myself."

Hawke smiled. "The only way to go is forward."

"Yes, but…I just don't know where that leads." Fenris hesitated, his voice softening as he asked, "Do you?"

Garrett's expression shifted. It became more serious, and his posture was suddenly less casual. Fenris held his breath, realizing that he'd made a grave misjudgment. Hawke would turn him down. How could he have expected anything more? How could he have been so stupid as to actually think—

"I don't know, Fenris," the other man said quietly, "but I could make a suggestion."

The elf swallowed down the lump in his throat. "I feel as if I owe you an explanation. An…apology. We have never discussed what happened between us three years ago…"

"I didn't think you wanted to talk about it. I thought…" It obviously pained Hawke to recall, if the way his brow furrowed and his jaw clenched was any indication. "I assumed you just wanted to forget, to go on and pretend it never happened. So…I pretended—for your sake. But I couldn't forget."

"I cursed myself every step of the way for walking out on you on that night," Fenris admitted sincerely. "I came back to this house and drank everything in sight and cried like a baby. I felt like such a fool. Afterward, I thought it would be better if you hated me—I hated myself, and I deserved no less from you. But it isn't better. That night…" He could restrain his feelings no more, and stood up from his chair to walk around the desk to Garrett's side. "Hawke," the elf whispered, "I remember your touch as if it were yesterday." He ached to reach out for the other man, but didn't dare. "I should have asked for your forgiveness long ago. I hope you can forgive me now."

Garrett was just as hungry for the elf, but he didn't want to frighten him away when they were only now reconnecting on such an emotional level. So he gently reached out to take hold of Fenris's hand. "I never begrudged you for leaving," he said. "I understand why you did. And I have waited patiently for an answer to a question I never got the chance to ask. But," he added hopefully, "I would ask you now, with your permission."

"Have you really been waiting for me all this time? I've been such a coward," Fenris groaned.

"No," Hawke protested. "Don't ever say that." He squeezed Fenris's hand and felt the elf's fingers tighten around his, as well. "You've been brave to face your inner demons, to confront your past and to fight back against the people that have tormented and oppressed you. You're the most courageous man I know, and I love you for that."

Fenris's brows lifted with rekindled hope. "Did you say…love?"

Hawke slowly rose to his feet, slipping his arms around Fenris's waist this time. "I did. And I'll say it again: I love you, Fenris. I always have." The elf's arms raised and encircled his neck. "And I want to ask you…"

"Yes, Hawke?" The elf's eyes were wide and his heart was thundering in his chest.

"Of your own free will…" Hawke prefaced, "will you come to me, and be mine?"

Fenris searched Garrett's eyes. "Do you mean…go to your manor? Live in your house…with you?"

"Yes." Hawke nodded solemnly. "I know it's a big step, especially when we haven't…talked much in the last three years…about us." He licked his lips nervously. "You could have your own room, if you wish it, and your own things, all the space you need. I just…I can't take not being together. I need you, Fenris. I want you near."

"Oh, Hawke," the elf sighed, cupping the other man's face. "I can't bear the thought of living without you. If there is any future to be had, I will gladly remain at your side for all of it."

All the pain of the last three years spent apart was forgotten in an instant as Hawke lifted Fenris into his arms and kissed him passionately.