He was broken, and he was on her doorstep.
Her mouth turned down at the corners and she recoiled ever so slightly before controlling herself, her face smoothing into an impassive mask. "Anders," she said flatly.
His eyes were still the same, still molten brown in the golden light, still hopeful as he turned his face up to her. She fought her memories of them even as she fought her inclination to fall into them.
"Hawke," he rasped, the huskiness of unused vocal cords and illness.
She crossed her arms. "Why are you here." It wasn't a question.
He half shrugged, shoulder bony beneath moulting remnants of feathered pauldrons. "I was in the neighbourhood..."
She took a step back, face twisting in anger and disgust, and he blanched, desperate. "Wait!"
His fingers reached out for her, thin and gnarled and dirty, and she wondered why she no longer found the thought of them on her enticing at all. When had she lost that desire for him that had made her overlook all his deeds? She twitched her robes out of his way defensively and watched as his face fell and his hand retreated.
"Hawke, please... I just need somewhere -" he coughed wetly, a tearing hack that made her wince internally in sympathy "- I just need a place to sleep." He hunched around his lungs protectively, breathing uneven, and looked pleadingly up at her.
Her lips thinned. He always did know just the strings of her heart to tug upon. She could no more turn him away than she could ignore a wounded animal.
Which of course he was. Wounded and rabid and dangerous.
She jerked her head at a low, sprawling outbuilding. "In the barn. You can rest in there."
He inclined his head to her, the remnants of nobility in his bearing that she would not let tear at her composure further.
"Thank you, Hawke," he murmured in that old familiar voice that once upon a time, in a warm, firelit room glowing with kindness and warmth, had told her lies about love and cherishing and freedom.
But her heart was harder now, and his blandishments were only words.
She stepped back inside and started to swing the door shut, fixing him with a hard gaze. "I want you gone by morning, Anders. Sleep well and peacefully."
The latch clicked and he stared at the whorls in the wood for a long moment before turning painfully away. "There can be no peace."