k!meme fill, under the exquisite prompt asking for realistic
hate-sex shenanigans. They aren't friends, they don't become
friends (or fall in love), but as two thinking adults with healthy
libidos they can at least respect some physical attraction. :D

The first you see of him, you mistake him for a mage. His accent is undeniably Tevinter, and he dispatches Hawke's enemies (his enemies, your enemies) with a passionate disgust that you recognize but can't quite name. The magic is physical, though, raw lyrium drawing nothing from the Fade, arcing through his corporeal with ruthless surety. He's a bundle of anger and prejudice, and does not hesitate to throw that out in front of himself like parade confetti.

Sharp parade confetti, made of furniture tacks and orphan tears. Slave orphan tears, no less.

Hawke, bless his dumb bearded head, tries his best to use Logic and Charm whenever speaking with his newfound blade-o-indebted-friendship, but to little avail. The elf had been monstrously wronged, uneducated and alone in his struggle, grown into a stubborn reactionary with little vision of long-term gain beyond earning the coin for his next meal.

You'd pity the blighter if he weren't such a damn hypocrite; and that's more pity than he'd spare any other slave, providing the accident of their birth was that of magic. The longer you fight by Hawke's side, the more you see of the elf, the more your pity diminishes. He isn't uneducated so much as academically stymied, and catching up on his own terms besides.

He's clever, and capable, and not so the lost lamb of indiscriminate violence as first supposed by all in your happy little sellsword family. You come to magnificent arguments, the two of you, which is the inevitability of sharp minds with nothing to struggle against but the philosophical concepts as posed by modern Kirkwall; something to which he might have greater understanding if he ever read your manifesto.

But no, Fenris' thoughts are perpetually stuck back in Tevinter, where corruption reigns as powerfully as it does in Orlais - merely under a different banner. Mundanes do not handle government better than mages, they simply handle it more subtly. And this, perhaps, is the greater argument; because Fenris sees evil in only one type of personage, whereas you (and Justice) know that evil is an equal-opportunity agent of corruption. Slavery would still exist without magic.

Magic can and should exist without slavery.

"I think you simplify the concepts of authority too starkly, mage. Tower supervision is hardly the yoke and chain of indentured servitude."

And it's moments like this, without Hawke there to caper your 'discussions' (which aren't arguments so much as the war-front of basic humane concepts) from the years-old topic (seriously, you've known Fenris all of two and a half years, and your debates only become the more convoluted) - moments like this, by any rate, that you have to step back and regard Fenris at a different angle.

It's not respect; you only respect him as far as his sword can reach - at least in the sense that you respect all life (even the lives of misguided templarate enemies who fall to Justice's colder sense of - nevermind). But if Fenris weren't such a broken parody of underclass angst and frustrated retribution (much of which you have seen in your time in Lowtown), you would have to admit that he is, in fact, merely a stubborn hot-head who wouldn't know sympathy if it bit him on the arse.

If you had ever mistaken Fenris as a mage from Tevinter, it were not only to the fault of that glowy-punchy thing his lyrium facilitates; but also to the credit of his sheer egoism, of the way he reacts to each event as if it were personal slight or retribution, of his disdainfully arrogant and clearly educated sense of wordplay. But are you allowed to point that out? Noooo, far be it for you to upset anyone under the wing of Garrett dimple-cheek Hawke, even if he should keep you two hours overdue at the Hanged Man while he runs around the city hunting out the provisioner of your latest blood-letting fracas.

"Hawke is late," as if to echo your lack of rebuttal, Fenris sneers a drink order at the bar maid and perches himself on a nearby stool, there to cross his arms and scowl out at the tavern like a particularly sour gargoyle.

"Hawke is always late. And always forgiven." You lean in conspiratorially, because if you're going to be mean-spirited you'd rather not do it alone. "It's the beard. It holds unplumbed magics of persuasion."

Fenris scoffs. "And here I always thought it were the bald-faced flattery he so liberally backs with each apology."

"'Can't do this without you' this, or 'we need our healer' that."

"'Sure I could defeat the Haverly Raiders alone, but what kind of woodprint would it be without your striking profile carved in our midst'..."

You scoff into your ale. "Really? All I get is a guilt-trip disguised as appreciation for my skill, and there you are succumbed to his flattery in earnest."

"Who says I succumb?" The hard edge of suspicion, and you sigh.

"Well. You're here, aren't you?" The ale goes down bitter, and at second glance Fenris is studying you with something removed from his usual contempt.

"As are you, but not dressed for the usual fight." There is a question in there, suspicion ever-present.

You hum into your empty mug, wicking foam from your upper lip before answering, "Templars are out in force; thought it better to keep to the dress-code of the peasantry." Not that it would do any good if any Templars actually wandered in actually looking for a mage; but all the better to not give the 'peasantry' any inspiration in terms of rewarded tip-offs.

Fenris' response is, as always, laced with the nasal half-sarcasm of his nationality. "Congratulations, then, you very nearly do appear normal; I can almost see what so preoccupies Garrett."

That is worth a raised eyebrow; since when is Hawke 'Garrett' to anybody but his mother? That statement had been colored with the low gravel of Fenris' usual begrudging tones, green eyes gone distant in some memory over the clay rim of his mug.

"Not that that isn't... the weirdest thing I've heard out of you in all the years of Hawke's foul-ups, but what? If Hawke isn't busy making moony puppy-dog eyes at you, it's Merrill who has his undivided affections. Man's got an elf occupation that'd be embarrassing if it weren't so -" You search for the word, Fenris glancing balefully at the bar maid as she refills your mugs. "- understandable."

Fenris regards you again, a flash of jeweled green behind thick white bangs. You look at Fenris, your eyes narrowed and jaw pushed thoughtfully forward. The smug grin that he hides behind his ale tugs something out of place, and even Justice is too preoccupied with the overpowering song of lyrium to voice his abjection. Suddenly, Fenris isn't just a bundle of ill concepts and misguided grudge-bearing. He is a full-grown elf, a lean build relaxing and tensing as if every shift of weight were an attack, and a cutting jaw (that surely no woodprint could do without) and -

Luckily, it is Isabela who saves the evening with a message from Hawke, and you and Mr. Scowly McIndentured-Friendship leave the tavern with a busty boisterous murderess clamping each arm around either of your necks, nattering on about 'interrupted atmosphere' and lewd suggestions therein.