"Love. What does that even mean?" A soft snort accompanied the words. Large hands with scarred knuckles plucked at the frayed edge of her tunic.
"You're asking the wrong girl. Never had much use for that word myself." She felt the corners of her mouth lift as she added, "I like the other 'L' word better."
"Large?" The warm baritone of his voice turned playful. "Limber? Oh, I know. Loquacious."
"No, you lummox."
"I like this game. Lewd?"
"Close."
"Licentious? Lascivious? Lubricant?"
"I barely even know what those mean . . . except for that last, of course."
"Of course." He said, with a magnanimous wave of one hand. A hand that immediately found its way back to the tattered hem to worry at it some more. "How about la-"
"Lust, you stupid man."
"Ah, well, that's just too easy, isn't it?" He smiled at her short laugh. "C'mon, make it a bit challenging, eh?"
"Have I ever been that much of a challenge?" She turned her head to look him in the eye and found her gaze lingering on the lines that had appeared on his brow. Faint, but present. Lines she didn't remember being there three years ago. She searched his face and found more signs of the hardships this man had endured before and since coming to Kirkwall.
Isabella said, "So what brought on all this talk of love?"
"What's a little existential philosophy between friends?" He shrugged, and those worry lines deepened. She couldn't help but notice that while his body had gone rigid and still, those hands wrung even tighter on the edge of her tunic. They were his tell. While he could make his face and voice sound lighthearted or flippant, no matter the circumstance, she need only glance at his hands to see how he really felt.
They flitted and flew, speaking a language of their own with every sweep and gesture. Whether clenched in rage or slicing through the air to illustrate a point, they never stilled.
It made taking his money at diamondback far too easy. Not that she regretted pocketing every single sovereign. Neither did he begrudge her the winnings. She'd never met a man as unconcerned with gold as he, but she figured he had larger worries now. Like this whole Champion thing. He could seem to take it all in stride, but when they were all out and about, she saw how his hands twitched every time the people called to him by that title.
"Do you ever wonder if - if only you had . . . if there had been a path you didn't . . .." His words trailed off. Isabella watched his eyes un-focus and stare into the middle distance. She shifted around on the grass so she could pull him to her. He came willingly and sighed, wrapping those large arms around her waist.
"You really are bothered by something this time, aren't you?" She smiled and planted a kiss on his crown. "Well, rest your head on my ample bosom and tell Auntie Isabella all about it."
That earned her a rumbling laugh that lingered on the still evening air. They lay like that in the silent camp for a long while until Hawke finally said, "I'm plagued by 'what ifs' these days. Too many to count. If I had done this or that, would it all have even happened? And why my actions seem to only take me further away from wh- . . . what I want."
"And what is it you do want, sweetie?"
His silence answered her, though his spine stiffened under her hand. Isabella ran her fingers through the scruff of his beard until he relaxed against her. She said, "Oh, I see, it's not a what. It's a who. Hence all the love talk."
"Six years and I can't . . . I don't-" He lifted his head from her quivering bosom and saw that she was laughing at him. Hawke scowled and scolded, "It's not all that funny. And what if I'm trying to confess my undying love to you?"
"Oh, Hawke, I know better than that. And for the record, it is very funny." She pressed his head back to her breast and continued, "So, who could have caught the Champion's eye, hmm? Let's see, since you like word games and it's my turn since you didn't guess right last time-"
"I knew the word you meant. I was just taking the p-"
"Lean." She took pleasure in the way his breath hitched. Her hands teased along his back, feeling the cut of his muscles under his thin shirt. So brawny, an odd trait in a mage. She massaged his taut flesh, feeling it warm to a startling degree. In her best seductive growl, she said, "Lanky."
"Isabel-," His tone warned. The word cut off with a gasp as her teeth seized the tip of his ear in a nip just this side of hard. Under her hand, his heart started to pound.
She breathed through her teeth and felt him shiver at the hotness of her breath over his sensitive skin. "Long-eared."
He moaned, soft and nearly inaudible. Isabella felt him stir against her hip and smiled a dark smile. She delivered the deathblow while slipping her tongue around the curl of his ear, whispering, "Lyrium."
Hawke rolled his hips into her in an uncontrolled spasm. She giggled as he rolled on top of her, those large, expressive hands making short work of her lacings. The salt-sea air of the Wounded Coast, sweeter than any perfume, rolled over the pair as they spent their passions in the lee of a grassy dune. She breathed deep, watching him toil above her. Just feeling, just being. With a fury he normally only showed in battle, Hawke soon had her calling out to the heavens in mindless pleasure.
Sated, Isabella sighed and dropped her head onto his broad chest. He cupped her buttock with affection, drawing her close. She lamented for a moment that she didn't own Hawke's heart. But what would she do with it anyway? Probably break it. There was far too much hurt going around these days for her to want to add to it. Better this pleasant and meaningless diversion.
The afterglow faded. Those hands began their dance again, shifting and moving. They signaled the return of anxiety. Hawke said, "The hell am I going to do, Isabella?"
His wistful tone saddened her. "Has he ever shown interest?"
"You know I'm a shameless flirt."
"You don't say?" She lifted her head and rested her chin upon the back of one of those wandering hands, pinning it. Isabella let her eyebrow curve up in mock disbelief. Hawke rolled his eyes in reply.
"Yeah, well, sometimes even I don't know if I'm being serious or not. I think he thought . . . not."
"And you didn't bother to press suit?"
"Oh, I did. Every opportunity that showed itself. And some that I created for just that purpose."
"You could just pounce on him."
"Oh, yeah, that would go over so well. Another mage pouncing on him. Plus, I rather like where my heart is, thank you. I feel no pressing need to have it ripped out and crushed." He bit his lip, his great glorious golden eyes flicking away from her to the campfire. "I think it's too late anyway."
"The great Hawke giving up so easily? For shame."
"No, seriously, I think . . . I think three years ago, I made a-a mistake." Now he looked down at her with something like guilt and looked away again just as quickly.
With her fingers on his chin, Isabella turned his face back to hers with an understanding smile. She'd been called worse things in her lifetime. And she knew he didn't mean it like that. He didn't regret their dalliances any more than she did. It's just the unforeseen consequences that hurt sometimes, in the most unexpected ways.
Hawke rubbed at his eyes with his free hand and frowned. "And you should have seen the look on his face during that whole Zevran thing."
"You always did have trouble saying 'no'."
He snorted. "What can I say, I'm impulse driven."
Isabella let a soft laugh escape her. "Doubtless, he would say that makes you even more dangerous an apostate. Still doesn't explain why you think it's too late."
"I can't really explain it myself. It's different now, somehow. He's distant, cold. Sometimes, he looks at me and I can hear him thinking, waiting for me to screw up and show him that I'm just another Danarius." The words, little more than haunting whispers, chilled her. Suddenly, she had an inkling that sometimes Hawke thought himself capable of such. It would be all too easy to fall.
Hawke sighed. "He came to me one night. The night my . . . my mother was killed. I half expected him to start ranting about the evils of blood magic. Don't know what I would have done if he had. But he didn't. He just . . . listened. I wish he'd held me. I wish I dared touch him then. Instead, I'm sure I just made a drunken mess of myself. I don't remember much of that night. But he was gone when I woke."
She made a soft noncommittal noise in her throat, remembering how low all their spirits had been at that time. Leandra, who did her best to mother them all, lost to the horror and bloodshed they couldn't seem to escape. It had taken weeks for Hawke to regain some of his former humor, only to have the death of the Arishok steal it again.
Isabella never did find a way to understand how Hawke could stand the giant qunari, but even she had to admit that she saw the deep and abiding respect the mage held for the Arishok.
Hawke's voice became thick with tension and some other darker emotion she didn't care to name, "I disgust him."
Isabella stilled his shaking hands in hers and kissed those scarred knuckles. "No, Hawke. He wouldn't still be at your heels if you did."
"Don't say it like that. He's not a dog." Sharp. She just kept herself from smiling at his quick defense.
"Tsk. You know what I mean. We trust you. We trust you so much that we do whatever you ask of us without question."
"Ha! Says the woman that ran off with Koslun's book."
"Hey, I brought it back. Anders didn't kill that girl. Merrill smashed her mirror. Aveline finally got laid. Without you, all of that would have turned out very different."
Hawke laughed, tight and restrained. "Especially that last one."
"Yeah, no one else could have pried that stick out of her ass long enough for Donnic to-"
"Alright, alright, I got the point." He grunted and rolled away.
Isabella draped her leg over his naked hip and embraced him from behind. "My point is, I've never seen you give up on something you really wanted. It's not too late to try anyway."
He sounded miserable as he replied, "How?"
"With that pig-headedness you cloak inside your glib and snide remarks." She poked him in the shoulder. "You defeated the qunari. You went into the Deep Roads and came back with treasure enough to make all of Hightown bend over and drop trou to gain your favor. You killed a bloody high dragon. A little matter of walking up to a man and saying, 'I like you. Want to have sex?' should be a cakewalk compared to all that."
He turned onto his back again and spoke, "That's the thing, though. I didn't really do all that because I wanted to. It just sort of . . . happened."
Isabella took in his earnest expression and helpless little shrug and let out a loud guffaw. Laughing loud and hard until her sides ached from the strain of it. Sometime in the middle of it, Hawke joined her. She clutched at sore ribs and wheezed out from between mirth-laden gasps, "It . . . just sort of . . . happened . . .. Priceless!"
That set off another round of riotous laughter until they were left holding each other in the dark, heaving huge breaths, trying to dispel the absurdity of it all. Hawke gulped and managed to say, "I . . . I know. It's ridiculous."
"The fact that . . . all this . . . seems to have . . . happened on accident? Or the whole . . . Fenris thing?" Breathing came easier with conversation.
"Definitely both. Lucky we already cleared this area out this week. All that noise would surely have brought a dozen Tal-Vashoth down on our heads." Hawke shivered as a cold breeze ran through camp. He pulled his shirt and pants back on and offered her the crumpled tunic that had somehow gotten flung to the other side of the fire. Isabella shook the sand out of it and pulled it on over her head.
"Wouldn't that have been fun?"
Hawke peered at her. "Can't tell if that was a sarcastic statement or if you really think fending off marauders in our smallclothes would be fun."
She made a noise that indicated that it could be either and said, "Do you want to head back?"
"No. I mean, not yet. It's nice out here. Quiet, but not . . . silent, like the mansion is now." He settled back on the sand, head pillowed by some felled timber, and pulled a stoppered bottle from his pack. After a long pull, he offered it to her. "Besides, these days I'm finding myself becoming more and more reluctant to return to Kirkwall."
Isabella took it with a grateful smile and reveled in the bitter bite of the rum as it coursed down her parched throat. One, two, three large swallows and she felt it start to take the edge off.
Hawke whistled. "Gives new meaning to the phrase 'drink like a sailor'."
"Don't you just know it." She hummed in amusement and scooted over to his side. He made space so she could lean on the same log.
The mage leaned his head against her hip and whispered, "Thank you."
"Hm? For what?"
"Listening. Not . . . judging."
"Well, sweetie, we all have our talents."
"Sure you don't want to take vows? You'd be a great confessor."
She smacked him on the shoulder. "And be surrounded by those dry old cunts all day? I'd go mad."
"That might just be true. I don't think celibacy would suit." Comfortable silence reigned for a time. Just the quiet crackle of the flames warming their toes.
The pirate caught his eye and grinned with mischief. "Mmmm, lithe."
He groaned, but his answering grin told her that he was going to play. "Mmm, indeed. How bout . . . looooongsword."
"Ha! Those pants don't leave much to the imagination, do they?" She giggled and passed the booze back. "And speaking of pants. Just think of all that leather."
Hawke blushed, even as he laughed. "Oh, I'm thinking of it. I'm always thinking of it. And those lips."
She crowed in delighted agreement. "g-Lis-tening!"
"That doesn't count, Isabe-" The playful argument lasted until near daybreak when the pair finally succumbed to an exhausted and drunken sleep.
Neither was aware of the watchful eyes that peered down into their camp from a ridge high above. Or the ears that strained to hear their lengthy conversation, to no avail. The sound echoed in the ravine, becoming distorted to the point of incomprehensible. But he dared go no closer without fear of being discovered. He settled in to wait. And think about everything he'd seen.
