Ash coat his mouth and smoke stung his eyes. He coughed and wheezed as he struggled to sit up in the small, hidden room off of his master's bedchamber. But the more air he sucked down the more he felt like he was choking on sand. His throat ached as he crawled off the cot that served as his bed to reach the door that would open to his master's room.
The hidden door swung away and Fenris felt the blistering heat of the fire before seeing it blazing his master's curtains and fine Orlesian rugs. It appeared to have started from the fireplace, which ironically was empty, and traveled, with a mind of its own, throughout the room in licking white-hot tongues of flame. The scorch marks on the marble told him so. Fire magicks, judging by the way it danced along the intricately embroidered bedspread in yellows and reds and oranges and the unmistakable pinks. Fenris coughed as he surveyed the room; Danarius wasn't here.
Neither was the slip of a girl he took with him for company tonight.
On bare feet he crouched to avoid the smoke and raced out of the room. Shards of a mirror bit at him but he paid it no mind. Screaming came from all around. Slaves ran from one way to another in sheer terror, sheep incapable of functioning without their shepherd. He grabbed three as they tried to run towards the fire and shoved them the other way. "OUT!" he roared and they scampered down the halls and to the stairs. Stumbling and coughing and screaming as the magicked flames coated the walls and licked the fine rugs at their ankles. In the back of his mind, he wondered why there weren't more slaves panicking about.
Something crashed bellow him, followed by a vile voice cursing someone to the darkest depths of the Black City. More crashing, the familiar sound of conjured lightning tearing the marble entryway to a crumbling mess leaving the bitter taste lightning always left behind, before the cursing became louder and more crazed. He knew that voice intimately, in every horrible way he could possible know it. But lightning was not his master's favored spell. Rarely could Danarius control even the simplest flickering trick. His actions typically favored more towards the bloody kind.
Before his mind could catch up his feet took him downstairs where he finally found his master on the defense of another mage. He turned the corner to take the stranger from behind when the soulless gaze of Hadrianna stared up from him and froze him in his tracks. Her body lay in a contorted mess of flesh and bone – a mind blast that hit at too close a range. He looked up and the wall just above the body was cracked and indented.
Her death gave him pause.
This stranger was killing the very people he despised!
What was he, to come to Danarius's rescue?
Shouting shook Fenris out of his shock and he sped down the once grand hallway to the courtyard. His master was bleeding from a cut on his palm that he had made himself and another at his temple that looked as if something heavy had struck him, hunched over as if in pain as he glared savagely at the stranger. Fenris stayed to the shadows as he assessed the situation.
Whoever was causing such havoc was a woman, though she covered herself with a thick, silk hooded robe. The hood was large, sweeping her features in shadow. Her staff was coarse wood, etched with several hundred runes from tip to base. Tied to the top were two stone wolves, mouths open, howling at the full moon and baying for his master's blood.
She was a small thing, lithe in what he could make of her – elflike almost. Her hands were bare, not a scratch on them as she held one out between her and her prey. She muttered something in a language he could not catch but knew it wasn't Acarnum before she shot another bolt of lightning at the cobblestones inches in front of Danarius's feet. His master raged at the woman, one eye was swollen shut and beginning to bruise a sickening purple. The woman ignored him as she shot again.
But her spell rebounded off the man's shield. A pale, pink bubble of magic separated him from certain and immediate death; and he laughed at the face of his demise. The lightning sailed through the air and hit one of the statutes that guarded the courtyard. Rock exploded, half the guardian erupting in destruction that rain down on the woman – who held up her hand to protect herself – and Danarius's bubble. There was a growl and Fenris realized it came from the woman before she pulled her staff up and slammed it to the cobblestone, tentacles of ice expanded from around the stranger, spreading out in every direction, climbing the walls like possessed ivy, dipping their tips into the fountain at the center and chilling the décor to a block of ice, stretching out like boney fingers towards his master.
He spat at her, but already frost decorated his robes and beard – puffs of air obscuring his features for a second. Fenris felt the first stirrings in his blood that had nothing to do with the lyrium there as he shivered – freedom, the hint of freedom. Relentless the woman charged forward as if she were a warrior, her hand held out in front of her before she sent a mind blast straight at the bubble. It shattered…tiny, glittering shards burst into the air like confetti and Danarius was sent flying onto his back as the woman crouched and covered her face with the cloak before standing tall again, the fabric fluttering about her frame like a bird's wings.
Finally, Danarius's cold eyes found Fenris in the dark. He called out to him "heel my Little Wolf, obey me" the words tumbled over the venom he spat. For one horrible second he did not move. Disobeying would only lead to terrible pain and misery for days, but for the life of him he could not break the frozen enchantment placed on his soul.
Then the woman turned towards him. The crackling of spreading fire lit her face for one moment. Sharp eyes, her bright gaze fitted him for a breath. All he needed to know his saw in her eyes.
Fenris took two steps out of the shadows, the fire rising into the night painted the scene in light and shadow. He spoke to the woman, "You will kill him?"
"I will kill him." She spoke in the trader's tongue, but her voice sounded far too refine for the rough language. He nodded. When she did not move he crossed his arms and leaned back against the column behind him. The woman turned back without giving him a second glace.
She called out to the man looking up at her, "You murdered my family, Danarius. Stabbed my father in the back. Butchered my mother. Bled my sister dry. And burned my brother alive." Her even steps and even voice unnerved Fenris as he watched. "For your crimes against the name Hawke, I will reap my vengeance and leave no stone unturned. Everything that was once yours I will take away from you."
When he tried to attack again she twisted her staff and the base of it hit the blood mage sharply against the jaw. She did not hesitate to bring the heavy, etched wood against the other side just for good measure. Standing above him, she put her staff away and pulled out a sword far too big for her body from across the other side of her back.
"This was my brother's blade," she spoke in conversational tones. His eyes only had a moment to widen in shock before she chopped off the mage's head. Fenris pushed himself up as the flames suddenly exploded above them, glass showering the courtyard. He rushed to the woman and pushed her out of the way, under the alcove, his body covering hers as tiny pieces nicked the exposed parts of his flesh.
She shoved him off to stare up at the fires devouring the estate. Fenris turned too and watched with no small part of satisfaction as his living nightmare became nothing but smoke and ash. When he turned back the woman was gone. He caught a glimpse of her dark cloak fluttering around a corner. His first instinct was to follow her, but he held himself still for a second to breath in a cloud of smoke. Then he turned around and stared at the remains of his master. When there was no twitch, no spasm, no proof that it was nothing but a trick Fenris picked up the sword she used on Danarius before racing after the elf-like woman.
More slaves ran about outside in frenzy states of panic and horror. Some were trying to put the fire out while others cried out to the night sky. He sneered at them, poor fools had no idea their master was dead. Staring at the scurrying creatures, he wondered what would become of them. Another master's prize? Would they die in their attempt to live freely? He frowned sharply when he realized that there was less than a quarter of Danarius's property on the lawn. Had the other's understood and capitalized on the chaos? To the remained few Fenris yelled at them to run, to flee this place and never look back. They jerked and froze at his voice but before they could follow through his command the woman suddenly burst from the stables on Danarius's black steed.
She ran towards him and called out in a voice worth taking pause, "All those who wish it are now free! Danarius is dead!" She threw out an arm westward, "Go to the guardsmen in the city to claim your lives for your own!" The men and women looked at her with owlish eyes for only a second before they scurried like rats.
Fenris watched as the horses from the stables raced out as an ember in the breeze lighted the roof on fire. He snatched a grey mare from the stampede and pulled himself up in one move. He scanned for the woman and watched her race off towards the woods behind the estate. With a sharp kick the mare was making get strides to catch up.
In minutes he found the woman; in seconds he lost her. He pulled the beast to a stop and listened for a breath. Suddenly the snap of a twig brought his attention behind but it was too late. The woman had knocked him off the horse, pinning him roughly to the ground. He struggled for a moment then stilled as a thin, twisted knife met his chin.
"I do not take kindly to stalkers, Pretty Boy." Her language was different now, Ferelden, if his memory served him correctly.
He held his hands up. "I merely wished to thank you."
Her eyes narrowed, closer now he realized her eyes were a sharp blue. Quick, clever eyes, belonging to a mage who used a warrior's sword to kill his master and a rouge's knife at his throat, and by the way she held it he knew she was skilled with it. "Thank me?"
Nodding he reached up slowly so as not to startle her and touched the hilt of the sword – the sword that was pressing uncomfortably against his back. Her impossibly blue eyes flicked once to the sword before pinning him with her accusatory gaze. "For killing Danarius."
She scoffed harshly, "Since you were too cowardly to do it yourself." He narrowed his eyes. "You were his pet. You were with him every hour, of every day. You had plenty of opportunity."
Fenris took a moment to revel in the word "were" for Danarius was dead and he was no longer his slave. But he only glared at the woman, "What would you have me do? A slave does not dream of freedom or wonder at possibilities! Slaves are not taught to think!"
Her sneer was vile as she pressed the tip of her knife closer to his jugular. "Tell me why I shouldn't kill you right now? Why Danarius's pet wouldn't take his late master's revenge?"
That startled a dark chuckle deep in his throat – when was the last time he laughed? Ever? "Why did you send the slaves to the guardskeep?"
"I have friends there. They will take care of them. Smuggle them out if they wish, send them somewhere safe if they have nowhere else to go." She angled her head; he would have said she was amused, if he could have seen her face. "I managed to convince most of them to head over there before Danarius took me to his room."
"Why do you care?"
Her scoff was less violent this time, "They are people! I just destroyed their home! It would be pretty irresponsible of me to have my revenge only to have eighty people suffer for it."
"One hundred and four."
She blinked, her sparkling eyes winking out in the blackness of her hood. "What?"
"He had one hundred and four slaves." Revulsion seeped into her gaze before she pulled slightly from him; the pressure much less but not completely gone from his throat. "That place was not their home, either," he continued, "it was their prison. They just didn't know it."
The knife disappeared entirely before she pulled away from him. He drew himself up slowly, keeping his hands out for her to see. "I came to thank you for setting them free, and to return your brother's sword."
She waved a hand at him as he reached for the blade. "I have no more use for it." Blue eyes pierced him for a long moment, looking him up and down, before she said "You may keep it if you wish." He was about to refuse when she rushed ahead of him, "or sell it if you like, use the money to start a new life for yourself." Not quite turning her back to him she settled the gray mare that had been stamping in agitation since her rider was tossed off her back. A pale hand stroked the beast's muzzle until it quieted.
Memory struck Fenris like a brick when he suddenly gaped at her, "You were the girl Danarius took to bed!"
Her grin was feral in the dark. "Guess he got more than he bargained for," and she flicked her hood back to offer a face he could not remember because he had not deemed her a threat. Black hair flowed and curled in soft ringlets down to her chest. It shimmered in the moonlight and danced in the light breeze. Her bright eyes were lined in thin lashes, thin eyebrows rose at his dumbfounded expression. The bridge of her small nose was dusted in freckles and marred by a small cut from her battle. A full mouth painted in red for the evening spread to a catlike grin, showing off pearly white teeth.
Strong jaw, for a woman, broad shoulders, almost nothing about her screamed dainty and feminine, but she had a feline grace and a warrior's tenacity. And no dainty, little girl could have sent Danarius to his knees – sent him flying onto his back.
For a moment rage took over Fenris, he allowed such a dangerous threat near Danarius. His death was his fault!
When he remembered himself again he realized the woman had her staff held tight in both hands, eyeing him with quiet wariness. Her hood was back up, too, blotting out her features. He took a step back and held up a hand.
"How long have you been a slave?" She asked – her accent soothing in a way he couldn't describe.
"All my life."
She flinched; he wasn't sure why. "What will you do?"
"I don't know what to do," he sighed. "Yes, he is dead, and I am free but it doesn't feel like I expected." He paused, maybe because his freedom was so new he couldn't believe it. "What do I do now?"
"We are not exactly friends…" she waved her hand, gesturing towards him.
"Fenris," he offered but continued to wait for her to answer his question. He liked this woman. She doesn't even bother staring at him and his lyrium markings, hardly gave them a second glance.
"You…" she trailed off as if she isn't use to giving advice. Nonetheless he remained as her eyes narrow in frustration at a pebble at his feet. Her face cloaked in shadow turns to him. "You have your whole future laid out before you. Take it!" She made a fist in the air. "Do whatever you want! Go wherever you want!" throwing her hands up her voice sounded excited as if the adventure didn't terrify him.
"Where would I go?"
"I don't know. Where would you go?"
Pondering he watched as she goes over to Danarius's steed, stroking the muzzle before climbing on the beast's back. He was free, but he doesn't know what to do with it. The open expanse laid at his feet overwhelmed him.
"What will you do now?" he asked to keep her with him.
The air fell silent. Words come to him softly, "you murdered my family." What will she do?
"I have a ship waiting for me," her voice was rough, pressing against a lump of emotion. "It will take me somewhere other than here."
He raised an eyebrow, "Somewhere other than here sounds like a pretty good place to start." Realization dawned on him slowly as she glared down at him, waiting, expecting. "May I join you?" he rushed at her pointed glance, "Just as far as Not Here, I promise."
A tired sigh escapes her, "Who am I to deny the first request of a free man?" He liked the sound of that. Liked it more on the tip of her tongue. With a push, her horse stomped next to the mare and she watched him to climb on effortlessly. "It is three days, if they're good days, to the port." Quick as the lightning she shoved her fist in his tunic. "Do not try to cross me, Free Man."
"Fenris," he countered automatically.
"Fenris," she nodded and lets him go.
"And your name?" he asked as she sets a brisk pace.
"Hawke," her answer was strong, whatever emotion he thought he heard before gone as if it had never been. The Last Hawke, flying to Not Here.
OfSmokeandAsh
He doesn't say much. Not that it bothers her…Okay, it does. He was readily willing to travel with her, but he made such poor company. She would have been better on her own. But two was safer than one and she was running low on juice from her fantastic revenge.
They stayed clear of the roads, her suggestion. Who-knew-who could be willing to avenge Danarius; worse if anyone saw her leave the estate they would have her tried for murder. She could always say it was self-defense. But the slaves that would testify – if they were allowed, probably after being bribed they would be – would definitely say she started it.
She had started it.
Danarius expected pleasant company when he took her to his chambers. The homely woman he found setting the table earlier that evening – her greatest disguise yet – piqued his interest. The newest toy in his sandbox; and he was not a patient child. Nor did he like to share since he sent his bodyguard away.
Fenris was an extra surprise. According to her sources that got her this far, he was Danarius's bodyguard, his little wolf, and she thought her greatest challenge. But the man had simply watched as she beheaded his former master, a sigh shuddering through him when the deed was done. How much had he hated Danarius? More than she?
But Selene was not of the prying sort. Everyone had skeletons in their closest; she should know that more than anyone! So Fenris gave no information, and she did not ask for it.
Needless to say, the first day had been nearly excruciating in its silence.
They rode hard that first night and far into the day until high noon. Before sunset they rested the horses only twice. Just as the red sky began to see a smear of purple twilight Selene started a small fire to cook the two rabbits Fenris caught easily enough. He cleaned and dressed the meat before she skewered it. Before he bit into his meal Fenris asked, "Did you start the fire with magic?"
Selene snarled at his accusatory tone. "No," she snapped and did not offer any more than that. But he seemed satisfied with her answer and tore into the meat with gusto. His lack of formality, the way he tore at his meal made her think of the mabari that she found when she was a little girl. It had looked stringy and savage. Fenris was much like a starving animal.
When was the last time he ate?
His cutting green eyes locked on hers and for a horrible second she wondered if she had asked aloud what her mind was pondering. But his gaze flickered from her to the rabbit and she realized she hadn't touched it. With methodical movements, she bit into the flavorless and chewy meat. Since losing all of her family that horrible night eating had become a chore, if she remembered to do it at all.
When they were finished Hawke held a hand out over the fire and closed her fist to put it out. With a hiss they were bathed in darkness and Fenris's eyes sparkled at her like a wild beast in the folktales her father used to tell her. Fade-beasts that roamed the night. If you were lucky, you get a glimpse of one before it pounced on you!
"You said you didn't start the fire with magic." His tone was accusatory again.
And she doesn't have the patience for it. "I didn't"
"Why did you put it out with magic?"
"I'm an apostate if you hadn't noticed." She flings her arms out as if that would offer more proof of her bloodline. "Using magic on a daily basis is kinda detrimental to my health. But it isn't completely useless."
He snorts at her, "Your health would be perfectly intact if the Templars found you."
Without meaning to her voice turned cold, her palms frosted over, ice prickled to gather at her boots. "What would you know of how Templars treat mages?"
His eyes flashed; his marks flashed. She had put out the fire to hide them and he was offering their location like the traitor she secretly wondered he was. It happened all in a matter of seconds before the glow dimmed and the man is nothing more than a man again. For a long time neither said anything, still as statues.
But Selene broke the silence first, "I'd rather die than be locked away like a prisoner for a crime I did not commit." Or at the very least, a crime that she hadn't been justified in committing. Being through into prison for avenging her mother and father, her baby sister and brother did not mean the same thing as being arrested for murdering a man.
Glittering eyes disappear in a wink as he blinked to steady himself. Whatever he had done, it had unnerved him. Selene's contacts were not specific on Fenris's abilities. All she knew was that he was powerful, that Danarius had branded the flesh himself with lyrium. Now she knew that it seemed to cause a physical discomfort whenever he accessed his power.
"I apologize, Hawke." He sounded like he meant it but it pained him to admit it. "I will not turn you over to the Templars. I swear it." The last few words came out rough as if he were ripping them out forcibly.
Not quite convincing, if anyone were to ask her about it.
Selene sneered at him in the dark. It didn't matter what he said. She wasn't planning on sticking with him long enough to betray her. To the boat. That was it. Then she'd be rid of the last thing that reminded her of the monster that destroyed her home. The monster that stole her father's cheerful laugh and strong, warm hands; her mother's kind lullabies and ability to make any place they lived feel like home; her sister's lively voice, of mornings weaving flower crowns before their father took them out for practice; and her brother, her dear, dear, brother who was too hot-headed for his own good but a boy who would one day grow up to be a very fine man if given the chance.
But none of them would have another chance.
All that was left was Selene. And what did she have left?
"Would it help to talk about them?" She flinched at his rough voice. He seemed closer but when she found his shape in the dark he was sitting exactly where he had been before.
"Who?" she didn't mean to bite, but the word came as if he had torn it from her throat.
"Your family," he answered.
A shallow breath filled the silence as Selene glared hotly at the dying embers between them. "What would make you think it would help?"
When he didn't answer she turned away to lay down with her back to the forest. For now she would assume Fenris to be her biggest threat. After a long time, where the moon rose high and the nightly insects began their chorus Fenris spoke, "It is something people say. You look pained when you think of them."
Pushing herself up she glared at the lump of him, his silver hair easily spotted in the black. "What would you know?" her hiss offered all the evidence that he had unnerved her.
"I know a few things about pain."
With a huff she laid back down, "We will not talk about my family."
"Very well," he didn't sound too disturbed by her venom.
When sleep evaded her, Selene stared up at the stars. The sounds of the forest were a small comfort as the cacophony took her to sleepless, hot nights in Lothering. "Is there anything you would like to take off the table?" She wasn't sure why, but it seemed fair to offer even footing with the man she was going to travel with for the next two days.
A grunt answered her and she wondered if she woke him. "I do not have any memories before my time with Danarius." He held out a hand and she caught the shimmer of the lyrium decorating his skin before he continued, "I would appreciate it if you did not ask about it."
Don't ask about something he couldn't remember. She frowned, sometimes when she tried to focus too hard on her memories of her father she would come up short and the agony that followed her failure stung like nothing else in the world. Her father's face was already blurring into something like an older version of Carver. But Selene had received most of her father's features. Bethany and Carver got his hair and his height, but Carver would not have grown up into her father.
But it was all she had. It was all her mind could do for her.
More was beginning to slip of her sister. She could get an echo of a laugh or the light weight of a hand at her elbow, but Bethany's sweet voice was fading. Would there come a time when she wouldn't remember it at all?
Selene quietly answered, "Fair enough." But a cold stone weighted on her heart.
OfSmokeandAshes
Whatever his first thoughts were of her, Fenris long forgot. All he knew now was that she was neither a patient woman nor one who traveled among companions often. She was quiet, reserved, and she set a grueling pace. It took all within him to break their common silence just to tell her to give the horses a break. She only seemed to eat when he reminded her to. As the day wore on and they stop for the second time after racing at breakneck speed since dawn, Fenris began to question his choice on following her.
In a fit of sudden anger he snagged the reigns from her hands and pulled the horse to the side. They crashed not too gracefully in the empty field she decided to "shortcut" through, and in three seconds Fenris found himself flat on his back with her on top of him again. The twisted dagger pointed at his Adam's apple.
"What are you do-"
"Silentium!" He spit the word as if he could curse her with it like a mage. His breath was rough, the horses fared no better. "Quaeritis interficere nos?"
She glared hotly, her blue eyes shining down at him. Sweat dripped from her brow to his and Fenris closed his eyes to gather his rage. The dagger pressed slightly closer, but whether she had moved or he had was unclear. But the sudden pressure of danger at his tattoo triggered the response from him regardless.
He sprang like a coil wound too tight, flipping her smaller frame with great ease and knocking the weapon aside when he slammed her wrist against the earth. Her cry of alarm did not deter him as he leaned heavily upon her; their hairlines brushing with every gasp of breath.
"Pacem," he said quietly as he tried to catch his breath. When he opened his eyes again he pleaded to her fury, "Amabo, sile."
"My Acarnum is a little rusty." She spoke in the trader's tongue with the strange sing-song accent. Her blue eyes blazed like magicked fire.
"Be still," he said again in her Ferelden. When he took another breath his white hair mixed with her black curls.
"We are almost there-" Again in the rougher trader's tongue of Tevinter. For some reason he did not like her speaking in such vulgar tongue. Her voice was for softer places, if her attitude wasn't.
"Would you kill the horses just to reach the ship? I trust it will still be there tomorrow."
At her silence, he sighed with his small victory and moved to free her. She watched him with an intense focus that Fenris could only compare to the looks he received from the magisters that wished to use him. The hunger and the need burning in their eyes could not lie. But Hawke's gaze spoke nothing of hunger or need, only an intensity that was something like hunger and need that he did not understand.
When he did not move again, knowing he most certainly startled her, she turned and looked at the horses. They lay on their sides, drenched in sweat as their heavy huffing could be heard at their distance several feet away. Her thin eyebrows drew inward as she bit her bottom lip.
"Dammit!" she hissed. Tossed his way was a muttering of apologies as she collected her booted feet and strode over to the beasts. Fenris caught his breath as he watched her speak softly and stroke the dampen hide of the black steed. Her cultured voice carried and he closed his eyes to her Ferelden apology.
Something blotted the sun behind his eyelids and he looked up to find her standing before him. He had not heard her coming. It unnerved him. She twirled the dagger in her hand for a moment as she mulled over what she wished to say. Slipping the blade away she finally held a hand out to him, "I'm sorry, Fenris."
Her voice, caressing his name soothed the ache in his chest, only mildly quenching his irritation, and he reached up to take her hand. The action surprised him but Hawke didn't seem to notice as she pulled him up. "The ship will still be there tomorrow," she echoed and for the first time he watched as her raspberry lips twitched into a small smile.
The sincerity in it warmed Fenris, and the ache that had subsided was suddenly back but he was certain it was for different reasons entirely. He nodded and as she turned from him he frowned. He had not known sincerity all his life. How could he possible trust this woman? She had killed Danarius, freed him, let him come with her to the ship that would take her away from this country, but he did not know a single thing about her.
Wrong. He knew Danarius murdered her entire family. He knew she cared enough about the lives she had inadvertently changed forever. He knew she took responsibility for her actions, even selfish actions such as revenge.
But did knowing all that mean he could trust her? She didn't even know when to stop to rest a horse before its heart gave out!
"Fenris?" He turned on her abruptly to find her looking at him expectantly. Had she been calling him? Had she asked him something?
"I apologize…"
She smirked, something that lit her eyes up and chased away the shadow in them. "I asked if you wanted to start the fire while I get some water." She pointed off to the distance to a well. Fenris glared at the field they were in. They could be on a magister's property and not know it. But the greenery went on and on as if it were a sea, waves crashing as the wind whipped the tall grass about.
"Very well," he answered. Perhaps a moment without her company would give him peace. He could collect his thoughts and mentally prepare himself for her mannerisms.
Still smirking she pulled the hood up since it had fallen during their tumble, took their water skins, and made for the well. He watched her leave, tracking her like a predator let out of its cage for the first time. Unpredictable. Dangerous. But she didn't turn on him, didn't slash her palm and resort to blood magic. She just took even strides down the small hill the horses passed out on and towards the well.
He had training in a number of very useful skills. Trap-making he was moderate – at best. Survival he excelled at due to his actual interest in the habit, not because Danarius would rip open a new wound if he couldn't prove his mastery in a matter of days. Herbalism was important to know and his least favorite since Fenris was instructed to create potions for his former master when the time called for it. What slave didn't know a thing or two about Herbalism when they lived under the boot of a magister? His mastery in Combat Training and Tactics came to him the easiest.
He thought of his old blade, which lay in the claustrophobic room off of Danarius's suite. And for the first time in his life Fenris was glad to be rid of that sword. The gallons of blood dripping off the polished silverite could not have outweighed the familiarity and worth of it.
Hawke's old, worn leather hilt and brushed, white steel were too light for his strength but without the extra weight Fenris found that he could move much faster.
His Vitality and Clarity were of course mastered since he had to survive as Danarius's favorite. His play thing. His Little Wolf. Without his enhanced health and stamina Fenris would have probably died a long time ago. His former master losing a hefty investment far too soon.
He could tell Hawke of his usefulness and maybe she would feel less hostility towards him. Or he could keep his skills to himself and maybe find some honest work out past the Waking Sea. Stay with Hawke? Work for himself? Earn a living? Get a house? Have a home?
The possibilities sounded endless and overwhelming. After tending to the horses, feeding them the oats that had been packed in Danarius's – now Hawke's – steed, Fenris got the fire going and glared at the normal orange and red flame as he pondered about his future. Hawke had asked him where he would go. And he had no answer. He had no recollection of his life before Danarius, no family to go back to. Even if he did have one out there, he had no way of figuring out where they were. Under Danarius's thumb Fenris had no hope, no desires of his own.
And yet, he wasn't under a dead man's thumb anymore. Where did he want to go?
He might as well as open a map and point at anywhere on it.
Gritting his teeth Fenris realized he would have to find someone to tell him where exactly he pointed since he couldn't read and then someone to tell him how to get there since he had never been anywhere outside of Minrathos.
The thought hit Fenris square in the chest, knocking the breath out of him.
They were still in Minrathos. They weren't safe yet. And here he was, making a fire in the late of the day with the sun still out, separated from the woman who just murdered his former master, and to top it off he had lapsed into fanciful delusions of his life no longer a slave. His head whipped around so fast his felt something crack as his eyes scanned the open field for Hawke.
He found the well, but Hawke was no longer in sight. Without thinking he ran towards it, growling furiously as he took Hawke's sword off his shoulder.
OfSmokeandAshes
She stared up at the too-blue sky, not a cloud or a blemish to be found and felt like she was drowning. Too open, too exposed, she couldn't remember if she ever felt this vulnerable. Oh, wait. Yes she could. If she closed her eyes she could remember what it was like to be alone and bleeding and left for dead. It had been like drowning.
Her father's blood running through her fingers.
Her mother's broken body, not three feet from her.
Her sister's scream of agony that just wouldn't end.
And her brother, the smell of her brother as magic fire wouldn't stop, wouldn't go out until there was nothing left to burn.
She heard panting and Selene shoved the memories away like a spider's web. They clung to her in her futile attempts to return to the too-blue sky and the rustle of tall grass and Fenris's glowering fury as he stood above her.
With a vile curse she flinched away from the man who really stood above her as if he meant to kill her. Carver's blade was out and ready, seeking blood shed much like its former master use to in his adolescent attempts to find glory in the backdrop of Ferelden. Fenris watched her with sharp, keen, green eyes. His gaze followed as she pushed her body away from him and gathered her feet beneath her.
"Dammit, Fenris, where's the fire?"
He sneered and it was cold and ugly. "Over there," he nodded behind her but she didn't turn to look. "Mind telling me what you were doing?"
She got defensive without meaning too. Fenris was an unnerving individual. The sooner she was done with him, the better. The sooner she could be left alone.
Alone…and bleeding, and left for dead.
"Took a break," she brushed past him without flinching and she was damn proud of herself for that. Before she could snatch up the bulging water skins, Fenris's metal claws wrapped around her wrist in dizzying speed. "Let-"
But he spoke over her, "Do you realized where we are?" She meant to spit back a vile comment but he rushed over her. "This is Minrathos," in case she forgot, "This is magister territory. We are not safe until we are off this Maker-forsaken cesspit."
His little speech might have been to induce terror but Selene was too tired of fear to have any more to do with it. "Let go of me."
If anything, he held tighter. "Listen to me puellula!" He almost begged this time. And Selene relented.
"Did you just call me 'child'?"
He looked away, "You are acting like one."
When his grip slackened she pulled her hand back as slowly and gently as she could. If she jerked it he'd probably strike like a snake. "And you are acting like an overprotective parent." He caught her eyes and she gave what she hoped was a chuckle. But she hadn't laughed in such a long time…
"I'm a mage, Fenris. If anyone needs protection out in the open, wouldn't it be you?" He glared at her for a moment and she grinned suddenly, "Don't worry, puer, I'll protect you!" Her hand came up and patted his head as if by sudden demon possession.
At one time in her life Hawke had been a sarcastic bundle of witty joy; everything was a joke to her when she was young and foolish and lived innocent to pain and suffering. Where others would have solemnly handled the situation with delicacy, Selene danced through it without a care in the world.
But everything that made her world joyful was gone and all that was left was a hard shell.
For some reason, when Fenris touched her Selene felt that sudden urge to pull a smile from the elf. To jest and laugh and live carefree as natural as it had once been so long ago. Fenris raised an eyebrow as he swatted her hand away. His indignation spurred her on.
"Don't worry! Helping people and killing people are what I'm best at!" at his sniff she felt her lips break into a grin. Leaning forward she invaded his personal space, "You know, I might be able to help you with your problems," his dark green eyes caught hers and for a moment she lost all sense of the bitterness that welt up inside her. "Or give you a few more!"
His chuckle startled her, much like the first time he laughed when she asked him why he hadn't kill Danarius. But that had been bitterness staining his laughter, whereas right now it seemed startled out of him and surprisingly real because of it. "Just a few?" he countered and his deep voice was light and playing. Selene's grin burst forth uncontained now. A dam broke; the weight of her anger and sorrow washed away with the tide.
It seemed now that she had started it was difficult to stop, "It depends if I really work at it." She flicked her hair with an air of carelessness, circling him with a ridiculous grin that hadn't seen the light of day in seven years, her pointing finger touching her chin in false pondering.
He twisted to follow and she was awarded another half-laugh as he muttered, "Tempting," but he shook his head as he took her wrist, gently this time, to stop her. "I am nothing more than an escaped slave-"
"A newly free man," she corrected. The idea that he belittled his status bothered her a great deal – and not because she had decapitated his former master. Freedom was supposed to be a beautiful thing.
He cleared his throat, "Yes, newly freed, with no prospects, not a coin to my name. Nothing to offer. Doesn't that bother you?"
She giggled, and Maker it felt so good to be this woman again! "I'm an apostate mage, Fenris! Doesn't that bother you?"
The fingers at her wrist moved an infinitesimal fraction, slipping down to her palm. "An interesting point…" he trailed off as his eyes caught hers and for a frozen moment she thought the darkness she had seen in them earlier was gone, leaving in its wake the palest green she'd ever known.
There was only the scrap of metal on metal and the whinny from the horses that brought them crashing down from their little reprieve. They were surrounded – bandits. Even this far out there were bandits. The only difference was that half of the six thugs were mages – mages, out in the open! Their rotted wooden staves with the pointy, twisted spikes common of the darkspawn marked them as pretty weak prey, but the leader, the burly brute with more hair than an aging dwarf, had fine armor and a finer silverite broadsword.
"Infortunatus tempore," Fenris muttered as he pushed Selene behind him in a strange form of protection.
One of the mages snickered to his companion, "Puella est pulchellus," as he pointed to Selene and licked his lips. Oh, so he was going to die first, then? Thank you for volunteering.
Selene turned to the well behind her, where her staff sat propped up against the stone, useless. She touched Fenris's arm, the skin just above the elbow to give him a hint. But the tattoos there lit as if on fire. Shielding her eyes with her hand she turned sharply to avoid the worst of the glare. Shouting came all around as the bandits thought Fenris was attacking first.
Moving quickly she grabbed the man by the back of his armor, the lip at his neck and hauled him down to the dirt. He growled sharply but the fireball that flew right above their heads drowned the sound out. Cattails burn quickly it seemed. Already smoke rose, thick and black as thunderclouds as Selene flung lightning in the direction the fireball came from. Someone cried out in shock before they heard a hollow thud.
The smoke was as thick as mud now. Good, she was Ferelden; she could handle mud. On silent feet she slipped to the well, pulling Fenris along and hiding her mouth and nose with her cloak. Just as she reached out to the familiar wood her father and she carved together a metal boot obscured her vision and a sharp pain exploded from her hand as it lay under said boot. The hairy man spat down before he grinned without warmth. Selene cursed and meant to follow it with a hex but Fenris was already there.
He swung the sword like a man born to it. The leader ducked, unfortunately, but the sorry sap behind him didn't even have a chance to scream. Selene tackled the man with the metal plating and silverlite sword. Fabric ripped as her cloak caught on the end of the weapon. Better that than her spleen on the end of it.
He hit the ground with a mild "Oof" but Selene was already up and jumped the last few feet to take her staff. Before she could even raise it the man had his broadsword pointed at her chin. His footing was poor and she twisted her body to place her staff between his ankles and with a sharp twist he landed with no amount of grace at her feet. There was a sudden gasp, a wet and disgusting sound from behind her and Selene turned in time to see one of the mages staring at her with wide, horrified eyes. Beyond the shock of being snuck up on, she wasn't looking at the mage, not the wide eyes, not the blood that gushed from the corners of his mouth; she stared at the familiar black gauntlet that protruded from just shy of the center of his chest. Her eyes flickered over the mage's shoulder, like she knew exactly what she was looking for.
Fenris's green gaze held hers for a breath, the mage's last, before he pulled his hand back and the man crumpled to the ground chocking on his own blood. For a second everything froze, as if she had power over time while they stared at one other. What was he?
There was a twathk! as an arrow landed an inch away from Selene's boot which shattered the magic that held her as Fenris's captive. In one move she turned and channeled her spell, when she stood facing the man with the bow he was already gasping in her Crushing Prison. Fenris moved a second later – faster than light his sword plunged into the dying man's stomach and he pulled the blade free at a terrible angle, leaving a cooling corpse in the spell.
Three down, Selene grinned and it held no more warmth than a blizzard. The leader had regrouped with the last mage and his last man. He pushed the warrior forward as he signaled the mage to take care of Fenris. Well, she couldn't have that. The man just didn't like mages and he would no doubt be rude to the balding mage who might have already soiled himself.
She gathered her mana and held the spell close to her heart as she remembered the first time her father taught it to her. It was one of the first spells she learned after she handled the basics of fire and ice. The man with the battered shield didn't see the butt of her staff until it was too late and he was nursing a broken nose. Without stopping Selene got as close to the mage and his leader as she dared and let loose her Misdirection. There was a great deal of screaming while they fumbled about, blind as newborn kittens.
Fenris came up behind her, his blade drenched in fresh blood and she glanced at the bandit behind her. He didn't have to worry about the broken nose when his head was chopped off his shoulders like that. She turned in time to see Fenris rush the last of their foes with incredible speed no man had any right possessing. In one swing their insides spilled onto the dirt.
Selene looked away feeling a little green.
But she composed herself right before Fenris turned in her direction. Well, it wasn't nearly as bad as her Walking Bomb. Not one to court trouble she sidestepped the mess of blood and guts to meet him closer to their horses and small fire.
The magicked wildfire near the well was still spreading, smoke trailing a black cloud marking the destruction known to all the world of Thedas.
"We should go," she said with a small smile.
He raised an eyebrow. "You don't want to ask…" he held out his hands after he put his sword away. The Lyrium almost glittered in the sunlight, his gauntlet still dripping with blood.
"If you want to talk about it, sure, later." She glanced at the mess they made. "But for now I'd really rather not be here."
"Agreed," he pulled the stamping mare steady as Selene slipped elegantly on the steed. Before they took off she put out their small fire – no need to add to the problem.
OfSmokeandAshes
"Well at least it can't get worse," she huffed. "Today anyway. It's pretty late."
Fenris grunted at her lighthearted comment. It was nearly midnight when they finally stopped at the edge of the sea, near a set of caves used by shepherds in the warmer months. They were not using them now, much to his relief. The waves were a light balm to his fraying nerves, however, and he could hear the happy huffing of the horses as Hawke did her best to clean the filth of their travels from their hides.
He sat at the mouth of their designated sleeping area watching the woman as she held her arms up to defend against the slashing mare. Laughter greeted him and it held no malice, no resentment or foreshadowing of terrible nightmares to come. It was the laugh of a woman who deserved to live freely.
A free mage…Fenris never thought he'd live to see the day he would want a mage to live free. Maybe it was her lighthearted flirting before the bandits interrupted. Maybe it was because she had freed so many with Danarius's and Hadrianna's deaths. The way she had handled herself in the skirmish, when she and he had executed their attacks almost…flawlessly.
Clear, blue eyes found his in the light of the moon and she flicked her hair over her shoulder as she looked away, too quickly…Ah, but she's looking at him now…
Why does he care if she looks at him? She knows what he is now. She'll want to use him just like all the others.
"What are you doing?" He asks to distract his dark thoughts.
"Washing the horses," she says as she flings water at the mare and rubs her hands over its back.
"Why?"
"To make them presentable."
"Presentable?"
"We need to sell them before we board the ship." Blue eyes find his again and she pauses for his reaction.
"Why" he asks again and he feels slightly like a puer.
"We cannot take horses on the ship, Fenris. It would be best to sell them first, and we need the coin." He likes the way she says his name. She uses it freely as if they were old friends. And he likes that she still refers to them as we even if it will not last long.
Nodding, he waits until she finishes; the moon past its zenith. As she sits down before their fire he assesses her outfit now that the cloak lies in tatters and has been dismissed as a pillow. The pants are tight, clinging to her as she rolls them down her calves now that she is no longer in the water. The top hangs off her shoulders, the same dark fabric as her trousers and embroidered in white swirls and flowers. It was meant to catch Danarius's eyes. And he understands why it did.
The white on black had always been a kind of fetish for his former master, from the décor to the slaves' uniforms. Even Hadrianna wore royal blue with white gold to appease her teacher. But that sniveling social-climber would have sold her own children to appease Danarius. Holding out a hand in front of him, Fenris suddenly found another reason to despise what had been done to him.
The anger fled as soon as it was summoned. Danarius was dead. Hadrianna was dead. There was no more reason to hate them. They could not hear his curses from where they suffered in the Black City.
"What do they mean?" Hawke's soft voice broke through his shadowed thoughts.
He stared at her sitting closer to him now, off to his right instead of putting the fire between them like their first night on the run. "The markings?" At her nod he shrugged, "They have no meaning as far as I am aware. Not like the Dalish have meanings to their tattoos." Her eyes looked dark in the cave as she hung on his words.
"I did not receive these markings by choice," he began and strangely it felt easy to speak of such things. "Nevertheless, they have served me well.
"My first memory is waking on a slab of stone, Danarius standing before me, calling me Fenris and…" shaking his head he pulls away from the vision of Danarius's face. "Whatever life I had before I became a slave, it is lost."
Hawke chewed on that for a moment before she asked, "Do they hurt? Your markings?"
"The agony of the lyrium being branded into my flesh makes me…" he paused, thinking of a proper term for it, "dislike the idea of someone else touching it." But that wasn't true, not completely.
Hawke seemed to pick up on it, too, the clever girl. "Will it hurt if I touch you?" her hand twitched at her side and she did a fantastic job of keeping it still. But he caught it nonetheless. She wanted to touch him.
"Hadrianna and Danarius were not gentle…" was all he said past the lump in his throat that made speech difficult.
Pressing her lips together she mulled that over, fingers twisting the fabric of the cloak for a moment. "They were bastards," she finally snapped. The words came out harsh and he knew it was directed at the magisters and not at him. "And they are dead now."
"Yes, they are dead," he echoed, but her fingers did not stop fidgeting. "I have never known another's touch, Hawke." The words were true but he wasn't sure why he was saying them. "Perhaps it would not hurt…"
She was at his side in his next breath. "Are you sure?" but her hand was already resting on his forearm, lightly tracing a crack in the old metal brace. Lingering for a second, not long enough for an answer to be formed but long enough that if he wished it he could have stopped her, before her elegant fingers brushed over the metal and landed on his skin.
He wasn't sure if she meant to avoid the tattoos on purpose.
For a moment she merely sat there, fingertips barely a caress and he chanced a look at her face to see her blue eyes focused so intently on him that his breath caught in his throat. When he made no other move she slipped her touch up and over the lyrium swirls not halting in a path only she seemed to know.
No glowing. No pain.
Her hand reached his shoulders to slide down the metal of his chest plate. When she stopped he let go of the breath he'd be holding.
"Are you alright?"
Alright? Alright? He was better than "alright," far better than he had been in so long. He thought the pain would come night and day; a lasting wound Danarius left him as a demented keepsake. His stain to remember his former master by until the day he died.
None of that was true.
Fenris was free! For the first time since he watched this little mage decapitate his former master like a fog warrior of legend Fenris felt the chains of his old life fall to the floor; he could even hear the hollow thud.
And for the first time he could remember, Fenris was glad.
OfSmokeandAshes
Selene waited with no large amount of patience as Fenris stared at her, judging to see if she had hurt him. Impulsion was not one of her redeeming qualities. She'd been scolded all her life by her mother that it would no doubt get her killed one day.
Impulsion drove her as a child to impossible places, much like her wit and charm had. It also served her in finding a way into Danarius's mansion to murder him in cold blood. If she ever stopped to actually think about dressing as a homely slave, pretend to be weak and frightened, to stash her staff in his rooms earlier that day, to let the man think he could have his way with her…If she'd even stopped to think she would not have done what needed to be done.
Although she told herself that once they got off the boat, she'd never see the freed man again – not so much as a backward glance – when he began telling her of his torture she could not contain herself. It wouldn't be right if still, after his death, Danarius won.
Selene could count on one hand the number of men she loved, with fingers to spare, and all of them were before she lost her family. There was no room for romance now. No need of it, actually. And before had been stupid enough as an apostate with an apostate father and apostate sister.
Not that she was romantically interested in Fenris. He could still kill her if the thought struck him. Surprisingly quite easily, it would appear. And yet, she felt a kinship with him, comparing battle scars and hating the same man for so long.
Danarius was dead, and they were finally free!
A breath ghosted over her cheek as he sighed in relief. "I had thought…" but he didn't, maybe couldn't, finish as his clawed hand pressed against her cheek. "The pain of the markings, waking up to it as my first memory, was extraordinary and the memory lingers." His voice was deeper, stronger, ready to get the weight of this off and cast it out forever.
"But you are unlike any woman I have ever met," his green eyes held her frozen as if by some spell. "With you it…It is different." She put a hand on his neck now, emboldened by his words, as his arms, armored and all, wrapped around her waist.
And neither flinched at the touch.
The hand at his neck pulled on his remarkably white hair while the other unbuckled one of the gauntlets poking her. Just a touch, just a taste…the phrase repeated in her mind over and over again. Touching didn't hurt, her heart didn't ache and her body didn't pull inwardly to hide. Just a touch couldn't hurt. Just a taste and they could celebrate their freedom.
The metal hit the earth but the sound didn't register. She switched hands to work on his other gauntlet while his freed hand pressed against the middle of her back, pulling her closer as he watched her watch him. The black metal of his chest plate poked and prodded and she huffed at him before she pulled away. His eyes questioned her and she noticed that her hand was a tangled mess in his hair.
"The armor should go," she said and her voice came out breathy as if she had been rightfully kissed. Just a touch – what harm could come from a touch?
He chuckled, that dark, pleasing sound and she found that she needed a taste, too. As he slipped his arms away to begin working the buckles and straps she used the leverage she had with his hair and kissed him like a drowning woman. He tensed at her boldness, making her fear he was going to shove her away. Yet when his fingers threaded through her hair she relaxed and moved against him to deepen the kiss.
A groan left one of them, but Selene could no longer hear over her heartbeat. It thundered in her ears, blood rushing in her veins, his passion overwhelmed her and she welcomed the amazement in his abandonment to this moment. Like a taunt string snapped, perhaps he made the same conclusion she had.
When he pulled back she only gave him enough time to breath before she followed and kissed him again, bit his lip before loosening her hold to stare at him. She found his eyes closed, the furrow of his glare disappeared. And something warm unfurled and spilled from her heart into her bloodstream. Her limbs relaxed as a whisper of a sigh escaped her lips. Carefully she carded her fingers through his fine hair, stroking his scalp as she did so.
Green eyes of the Bracilian Forest meet hers and he offered a little quirk of his lips, the smallest and most fragile smile she had ever bear witness to. Quickly they worked the armor together. Beneath his gauntlets he had leather wrapped between his thumb and forefinger – to prevent blisters with the sword – attached to that, more leather went up his arm and connected to the black feather detail of his armor. Three buckles and she pulled first one then the other and he peeled off his chest plate like a second skin leaving him in a sleeveless tunic.
The toggles were a bit difficult as she kept diving in for another kiss every few seconds, only to bite his bottom lip, the corner of his smile, his tongue when she coaxed it into her mouth. His hand abandoned the tunic to grab one arm to pull her closer as the other was lost in the curly mess of her hair. Caressing his neck with long fingers, she stroked the markings there delicately.
This time she knew he groaned – a dark and promising sound. One she hoped to drag from him again and again. The hand at her arm rubbed the flesh of her forearm, slipping higher to dance over the vein at the crook of her elbow. She gasped suddenly at the feeling. It was strange and exciting all at once and she wouldn't mind if he continued the slow circles there all night.
But Fenris was still in his tunic and Selene was on a mission. Lips met one last time, a slow and needy demand before she sat back and worked the last few toggles with one-tracked determination. When she flicked the last one apart, she stared for a moment.
He was beautiful; she had never seen anyone more beautiful than him. There was not a scratch to his name, not a scar but the ones that ran too deep to be seen. The pattern of the lyrium danced across his flesh, twisting and twining in paths she wouldn't mind mapping, even if it took hours or days. There was a terrible beauty to the design of it, enticing and alluring and dangerous. Her hands trembled to touch but Selene could only admire him. Muscle played on muscle but he was lean. Tan skin alight by the fire, white hair glittering in their small sanctuary.
Remembering herself and where she was and what she was doing, Selene jerked to Fenris's face. What must he think of her, ogling like a pup? Horrified she offended him she blushed violently and stuttered an apology.
"Why must you apologies?" He sounded amuse and Selene thanked the Maker for that. She could handle amused, even at her expense.
"For staring," she grinned in embarrassment, shoving her hair out of her face.
"If you like, you may stare," it didn't appear as if he were jesting. Was he ogled often? Did Danarius ogle him?
No. She wasn't going to have a dead man ruin this.
"I might take you up on that offer," she grinned hoping she sounded playful while she leaned forward and pressed her hands against his exposed chest. "Later," her lips brushed against his at that last word.
His smile grew stronger, his shoulders slumping slightly – she had upset him with her gawking. But he seemed to be better as his palms began tracking the edge of her shirt, hesitant almost, perhaps asking permission. They didn't know a damned thing about each other.
Maybe they will…
Selene kissed him suddenly, a series of hurried and rushed kisses to shove the thought away. Fenris may not even wish to stay with her once they got off the ship. It was pointless to think about such things.
He was with her now. That was what mattered.
Fenris may not have known anything about her, but he sensed that something had startled her. He took her shoulders gently and held her steady. "What's wrong?" She shook her head, worried she was ruining the moment. But she needn't have worry. Fenris trailed his fingertips down her bare arms and took her hands as if they were made of glass.
"We can stop if you wish. I did not …" his perpetual frown darkened as he struggled with words.
It brought a genuine smile to Selene's lips. Her fingers kept him from saying anything more, "I've never done this before, with someone I just met – I mean."
He gave another half-laugh, smoothing the frown to something less brooding, "Nor have I." After a moment's pause where he combed her unruly hair a moment, he said, "I have nothing to offer you, Hawke."
"Selene," she sighed nearly blessed that she would not have to hear her father's name.
Without a hitch, "Selene," he practically stroked the word, caressing each syllable carefully and endearingly. "Selene," strongly now, practicing the way he would call her out from across a room.
"I have not heard my name in seven years," she whispered as she pressed her forehead where his neck met his shoulder.
Chuckling again, coaxing the playful creature inside of her, "You are a beautiful woman, Selene." Flattery? Was he trying to unwind her, make her comfortable?
Without permission her hands brushed the fringe hiding his eyes away and held his jaw steady, before she pulled back to lock their gazes. "What do I have to offer you, Fenris?" She meant it as proof of equal footing but he ran over her goal.
"Besides my freedom? Besides a ship to take me away from this cursed place? Besides ending my waking nightmare?"
"No," she shook her head quickly as tears pricked her eyes and damn him for making her want to cry. "No, Fenris. Don't put me on a pedestal. Don't think I'm more than what I am. I wanted Danarius dead. I murdered him in his own house because I'm selfish."
Her forehead met his. "I'm only human, Fenris. An Apostate!" in case he forgot. "And I have been living in hatred's shadow for far too long." He nodded, that was something he understood. And he kissed her temple, her cheeks, the bridge of her nose, the edge of the scar there, the underside of her jaw while she pushed his tunic off his shoulders and sat a little closer to take in as much warmth as possible from him.
His skin was smooth, the muscles rippled under her touch. A shudder ran up his spine and she grinned at the thought of losing all control with him.
Oh, right, control…
Selene kissed his neck, avoiding the lyrium to stare at him, "Have you…with a mage?" she blushed, why couldn't she just say it?
Like a wolf lying in wait, Fenris watched her stoically and there was something dark in his gaze she didn't want to touch.
The blushed deepened, "I haven't….in a while…in so long… My control over my magic…" she bit her bottom lip. Maker! This was so hard!
But Fenris took her hand and held it out closer to the fire. She clenched her fist and doused them in blackness. Without the flickering she realized Fenris was glowing. Subtle, soft, not like during the fight with the bandits earlier. Bathed in the glow of white-blue Selene felt a weight lifted, the thought of touching him, tasting him, being with him no longer embarrassing or frightening in the least.
"My control might be questioned as well."
She kissed him again, soft and slow and needful as she began unclasping the formfitting bodice. The black fabric fell away, forgotten and Fenris gasped in the quiet of the cave. It echoed and sounded far louder than it should have.
"I suppose," she spoke softly, as she leaned slightly over him and he leaned back to accommodate her, one hand stroking her spine, "there are worst things – than to lose control with someone you trust."
"I suppose," he lay back completely now. "There are worst things."
OfSmokeAndAsh
The port city Ostia Antica was a wild and unruly place. Fenris had only seen the Imperium's second largest port twice in his life. On both occasions he had not been allowed to look, unless it was for potential assassins. Today Selene Hawke let him peruse the bustling city with little qualm.
She was a wonder, this woman who set his past on fire.
Her Tevinter tongue lacked the eloquence needed to trade two very fine horses, and so she had Fenris do the talking for her. In fact, they had managed to make an outrageous profit and she even thanked him as she handed him half the bounty.
"I don't…" he looked at the sack of gold in amazement. He had never had a bit to his name and now…he had gold that belonged to him.
"I only stole one horse," Selene answered his unspoken question. "You stole the other. Half belongs to you since you managed to help me sell the beasts. I couldn't have done that without you." And she smiled at him, dismantling the strong warrior he had known since before last night.
He followed her around the port, and she would let him do the talking as she decided whether she wanted one trinket or another. In the end she never bought a single thing.
"What is the point of this?" By now, Fenris was beginning to feel the eyes of the Imerium on him. Judging him. Knowing him and what he was. Would they have guessed he had fled his former master's estate? That perhaps he had a hand in destroying him?
Selene smiled as she held a coat up to his chest. "We are blending in. It would be a tad too suspicious if a woman and an elf of your…notable characteristics merely showed up at port, sold two mighty fine war horses, and then dashed away.
"Another hour and we will be nothing more to their memory but fleeting faces in a crowd."
He arched an eyebrow as Selene discarded the red coat for a dark blue one and again held it up to his face. "Where did you learn such thinking?"
"My best friend is a fiendish dwarf." She answered as if it were the best answer to all his questions. Truly, how did that explain how she learned to run from the law?
"Is this ship of yours even at port?"
At last her bright eyes met his, "You can see her from here." He looked behind her and scanned the masts that clouded the horizon. There were many. "The Lady's Call," Selene whispered in his ear and he had not realized he had leaned over her shoulder to get a better look until her mouth brushed against his hair. It reminded him of last night, of longing and kisses that left her breathless, of moans and sighs and soft sounds he had no history to judge before last night.
"In an hour tops, Fenris, we will be gone from this place." He stood stone-still as he watched her take the coat to the salesman and purchased it with her new funds. As she came back the sun glittered in her dark hair and her bright eyes while she smiled at him in a way he could not name. It was soft and unthreatening.
"What is this," he asked as she held the coat up to him.
"A gift," her smiled grew, "for not killing me, I suppose. And for…" she shrugged. "Just try it on."
He looked at his clawed gauntlets and wondered where such a soft thing belonged in his life. Surely it would tear if he wore it over his armor.
Selene huffed irritated, "It's wyvern hide, Fenris. It is no delicate garment." Still he hesitated. "You're hair, Fenris. It's too showy."
Conscious of her remark he reached up and combed his taloned fingers through his long bangs. Perhaps she was correct in that regard. However… "You stand out, as well, Selene." He had noticed the eyes and the gazes and the way they lingered as she had flittered through one stall after another.
With a frown she sighed. "I will buy one as well if it will make you happy." Fenris watched the way she skimmed the coats with her brows furrowed inward. He unlatched his shoulder guards, nonetheless, and stuffed them into one of the saddlebags Selene had taken from the stallion. That done he slipped the coat on as he kept the woman in his peripheral.
It was the finest thing Fenris had ever worn, ever owned. It was the first gift ever given that had not come at a price. Fingers still covered in steel, he stroked the hide and committed the dark blue coloring to memory.
"Alright," Selene's cultured voice stroked him from his musing and he looked up to see her dress in a tight fitting red coat that hugged her waist and flared out dramatically around her legs. There was a glitter in the underlining that spoke of its mage-influence and yet Fenris could not bring himself to hate her birthright. It looked…fitting on her.
"Do I have your approval, ser?" she smirked as she showed off different angles of the coat before bringing the hood attached up and over her wild hair.
"It suits you," he said as he stiffened when she stepped too close and reached up to bring his hood up as well. Before she pulled away her hand stroked his face, a small and fleeting gesture and yet it left in its wake all the heat and passion from last night in the caves.
"Thank you," she smiled as she led the way down to the docks.
Her hips swayed and her coat swished with each movement. Fenris grit his teeth; she was still drawing too much attention. Yet he kept his mouth shut. This woman was more than capable of taking care of herself. Her staff alone could be what was drawing the eye of every male in port, but more likely Fenris suspected it was the shape of her legs as she confidently set a brisk pace. And as of yet she had made no move to leave him behind since she allowed him safe passage out of Tevinter.
The ship itself was grand, grander than anything Fenris had expected. For a moment he wandered if this was a magister's ship, and that thought nearly seized his heart. But the tan woman at the gangplank to meet Selene had the velvet accent of Rivani as she gushed and cooed at the woman as if she were a long lost pet.
No…not quite like a pet, more than just a pet. Like family? But Fenris had no basis for such a comparison.
"And who is this?" the dark-skinned woman eyed Fenris and for one terrible moment he couldn't breathe. It was as if Hardrianna was looking at him, eyeing him up and down, counting weaknesses and just waiting for the moment his master would let her have him. He stiffened but tried not to insult Selene by attacking the woman.
"This is Fenris; a passenger on his way out this damned country." There was an edge to Selene's tone and the woman straightened her posture and pulled back from Fenris's personal space, much to his appreciation. "Fenris, this is our…prestigious captain, Isabela."
He shook the captain's hand. "Pleasure, ma'am." He spoke in flawless Common.
"Ugh!" she grimaced and danced around Selene to put her between them. "I am not old enough for that ma'am nonsense! Call me Captain and we're square." Her gleaming gold eyes glittered as she eyed Fenris a second time. This time he felt immensely more comfortable with her calculating gaze, sizing him up and determining how threatening he was. It was familiar territory he did not mind.
"This is no pleasure cruise, Hawke," the captain cooed in the woman's ear.
"Aye, aye," she waved her friend off. "Fenris has means to pay." She gestured and he pulled out the coin purse in answer. He nearly handed the entire bag over to the captain when Selene seized it, fingers deft and swift as any rogue. Without looking she counted an appropriate amount before handing the rest of his coin back to him and giving a decent sum to Isabela.
The captain eyed the transaction with mild interest and a knowing smirk that made Fenris wonder how much the captain actually missed.
"Right, then," she took her coin and immediately began shouting orders among her crew. Before the sun set that evening Ostia Antica was already out of sight and Fenris found that the ocean air did wonders for him.
It was as the sun fled and the moon rose that Selene finally found him in a corner out of the way of the crew where he watched the waves and the glittering of the stars.
"Feel better," her soft voice stroked his nerves and soothed what tension had strayed.
With a nod he turned his gaze upon her and was glad to see her smirk. "I had not realized…" why was it so difficult to articulate his thoughts to her? "It's as if it is real now. Danarius cannot come for us. The Imperium will not follow us. For the first time I think my mind and body are in agreement; I am not a slave."
She leaned against the rail next to his crate where he perched himself. Blue eyes pinned him and her smirk twitched a tad higher. "You are no a slave, Fenris. You are free to do with yourself as you will."
"I never considered…what does a free man do?"
She laughed, throwing her head back, "I cannot answer that, only you. However, I'd like to give you an opportunity to figure it out." He raised an eyebrow to inquire further. Another chuckled she slid slightly closer as a breeze threw her already wild hair about. "We are heading to Kirkwall."
"What's in Kirkwall?"
"Templars, mostly," she grinned, "And my home. I have friends that can help you set up somewhere nice and comfortable. My dwarven friend owns a tavern, worst ale you've ever had but the rooms are clean and dry. If you need to make some coin I have a business set up in Hightown."
"Let me guess, helping people and killing people?"
More laughter and it warmed Fenris down to his bones at the sound of it. "Something like that. Mostly I answer the Chanter's Board or take a job from the Merchant's Guild. A favor from a noble here, a request from a carta's raid victim there. It's all rather, mostly, legal."
"You would have me…work with you?"
"For me," she corrected with that smirk. "And properly compensated when the job's done. And should someone come looking for you from your past," her body was suddenly leaning over him as her hand took his, "know that you will not be alone should that time come."
"Selene," deftly Fenris twisted her hand so that he was holding it captive now. "Thank you." Owlishly she blinked, confused. "Thank you for freeing me, for helping me get out of Tevinter, for the coat, and for this." He pressed a kiss to her palm, a superstition in the Imperium. Although he was not one to believe in such foolish things, there was some merit to the act itself. Sealing words upon her hand, sealing his feelings into her flesh.
She blushed in the moonlight.
It was suddenly too much and he kissed her gently. When she pulled away she appeared uncertain.
"What is it?"
"Do not feel obligated, Fenris. I helped you because it was the right thing to do. Please do not think you owe me anything."
This time he laughed, and it sounded foreign and peculiar to his own ears and yet strangely right. "I do nothing out of obligations. I kissed you because I wanted to. Would you rather I didn't?" All traces of laughter gone now he asked, "Do you regret last night?"
"Oh, no!" more blushing as she rushed the words out. "I wouldn't mind at all if you…" a cough, "We could keep doing that… Maker," she finished on a sigh. Her stuttering brought back a chuckle and it still felt and sounded odd while refreshing all at once.
"Last night…was special, to me." The words were softspoken, the softest he ever heard her speak, in fact. Those enchanting blue eyes locked onto some knot in the wood at her feet.
Without hesitation, Fenris brought one hand to her soft cheek and managed to get her to look at him. Then he kissed her, wild and abandon and with all the passion she had from last night. Minrathos at his back, Kirkwall on the horizon, and the terrifying and amazing woman in his arms, Fenris knew he was truly free.
But perhaps with time, perhaps with this woman he could laugh freely. Eventually the strangeness would lessen until all that was left was the sense of how right it felt laughing with this woman. He could live freely. With Selene Hawke he could even, one day, love freely.
So this had been one of my first attempts at a one shot and took me way too long to edit until I was happy with it. It had originally started like two years ago and I left it to dust accidently. But now – Now it is finally completed.
Please read and review. I would like to know what you thought of this "small" AU.
For those of you waiting for updates on my other stories: I am very sorry it has been so long. I need to revamp both pretty heavily and without a beta I also must edit my work. I hate seeing errors when I go and reread things. Anyway, if there are still those out there waiting for my Inuyasha and Devil May Care stories, then I commend you – but don't hold your breath for anything updated any time soon.
Google Translation – most probably not accurate Latin.
Silentium = Silence
Quaeritis interficere nos = Are you trying to kill us
Pacem = Peace
Amabo, sile = Please, be still
puellula = girl, lass, child
puer = boy, child, lad
Infortunatus tempore = Unfortunate timing
Puella est pulchellus = The girl is pretty