Title: My Baby, So Tender
Rating: T
Summary: On the run and split up from the party, Varric and Hawke get closer now that Anders is out of the way. Varric/FemHawke
A/N: Thanks for reading. Review please.
My Baby, So Tender
"This is where we're going to stay?" Hawke whistled. "Varric, you've got some very wealthy friends that I want to meet."
"All in due time, Hawke," Varric responded, lugging the backpack further up on his shoulder.
The marble floor in front of them was buffed and shined to perfection, laced with intricate black patterns that curled and coalesced like flames. Heavy bookshelves lined the walls, filled with old, musty volumes with tattered covers and scrawled titles. Each one was accompanied by a plush, red velvet chair to sit in and read. A silver coatrack gleamed in the corner by the door, twisted into the faces of eagles with spread wings. As Hawke moved out of the breathtaking entryway, she came upon a decidedly larger room with a high ceiling. In front of her was an arching stairway that led both to the right and left of the estate. The rail was made of chased silver and sparkled with inlaid lyrium.
Clearly labeled doors were set deeply into the white walls behind the staircase. The lush carpet beneath their feet gave under heavy, mud-caked boots. Varric looked at her as she took in the surroundings with her mouth slightly open. Her blonde hair was stringy with grease, blood, and rain. They were both soaked to the bone from being outside, and he felt at least twenty pounds heavier with all his gear on. Her engraved sword hung loosely at her side in the tattered remains of her sheathe. "Maker, this place is beautiful. How do your guild friends keep bandits from robbing the place?"
Varric glanced away from her to take in the painted ceiling and decorated walls. "By making sure that at least one member and his guard is staying here."
Putting one hand on her hip, she smiled down at him with a raised eyebrow. "I'm your guard?"
"You, my lady, are my escort," he grinned back at her, petting his crossbow affectionately. "Bianca is my guard."
She pursed her lips as though unhappy, but her eyes still sparkled with amusement. "I'm sure she's quite jealous of that. How am I to be sure she won't murder me in my sleep, Varric?"
"I'll keep a watchful eye on her, don't you worry your pretty little head."
Hawke laughed and took in the place one more time. Then she touched her bloodied, rain-soaked armor and said, "I feel so…unworthy of all this elegance. I think I'd be more at home under a tree or in a broken down shack with rain dripping on my head."
"Now, Hawke," the dwarf began, "we both know that you could be as pompous and elegant as the best of nobles if you wanted to be. Besides, we'll be back on the road and out in the rain before you know it."
Hesitantly, she curled her fingers around the stairway railing and set her heavy boot on the first step. "I suppose a bit of overindulgence wouldn't hurt me."
He clapped her on the lower back. "That's the spirit. Now, it's ladies to the right, gentlemen to the left." Varric was already climbing up the stairs.
"Wait," she called as he reached the top and went toward the left, "don't I have to take Bianca with me?"
…
Hawke was sitting in one of the large, red chairs near the fire. Tongues of flames licked at the hearth, spilling heat into the room like a tidal wave. It was a nice change after the cool, damp air of the forest. On her lap was a very familiar embroidered pillow, and Varric heard a sniffle as he inched down the stairway. If she hadn't turned her head to see him, he might have ran right back into his room. Instead, he smiled awkwardly at her and came to stand at her side.
Dressed in a simple tunic and black pants and clean for once, she looked good. The bruises on her neck were healing nicely, and she had some color in her cheeks. "He gave it to me after you didn't take it," she gave a strangled laugh. "I suppose he liked you more." She traced the shape of the flowers with her fingertip.
"You know that's not true, Hawke," Varric sighed. "A pillow doesn't mean much in the face of six years at your side, does it?" He didn't know how to comfort a crying woman, especially one that had just killed her long-time lover.
"I'm sorry," she said at once, wiping her eyes quickly. "I'm being silly. We're in this lovely house, and I'm ruining it by being maudlin."
He put his hand on her shoulder, squeezing. "No schedule here, Beautiful. Do what you need to do and get it out of your system."
She met his gaze through a curtain of blonde hair, and more tears rose in her eyes. As they spilled over, she ducked her head and sobbed as quietly as possible into the old pillow. Varric moved his hand from her shoulder to the back of her neck and rubbed soothing circles with his thumb, politely staring at the fire and keeping his comments to himself. He was a storyteller after all and understood tragedy well.
Sometimes the heroine just needed to cry.
…
For a house made for dwarven guild men bringing their wives and lovers out on a vacation far away from the intrigue and dangers of Kirkwall, the mansion had far too many doors. Varric found himself getting lost on more than one occasion, and his short legs only carried him so far so quickly. It had been years since his last visit, but he surely couldn't have forgotten the entire layout in such a short time.
Somehow he managed to stumble into the female side of the house and into a room draped with gold. Hawke was standing there, holding up a dwarven surface silk dress dyed azure that would probably only reach down to her mid-thighs. It also was generous in the chest area and would need to be taken in for a human woman. Dwarves tended to be much more curvaceous and lacked the long legs that Hawke had in spades.
Varric leaned on the door. "If you wanted a dress, Beautiful, all you had to do was ask."
Hawke startled so badly that she nearly dropped the gown. "Oh, Maker, Varric, I hope you know how to restart hearts because mine just stuttered to a halt." Her teeth gleamed as she smiled at him, hair wet from a recent bath. The robe she was wearing was her own, taken from the mansion in Kirkwall in a rush. It wasn't one of her better ones, just her favorite.
"I would be careful what I touched," Varric replied, ignoring her last comment. "You don't know what's clean and what's not."
"It just reminded me of the dress my father gave me on my fourteenth birthday," she explained, setting it gingerly on the bed. "He saved up for five months to buy that dress for me, and I outgrew it so fast that Bethany started wearing it only a year later. I wasn't going to put this on or anything."
Varric stepped into the room. "If you lengthen it a bit and take it in, it might work. And washed it."
"The only thing that's the same is the color," she sat on the bed, and they were almost of equal height. "Mine hardly had a plunging neckline like that, and it was much longer. He was my father after all."
"And crazily protective of his little girl, I'm sure."
"Bethany more than me," Hawke smiled, "but definitely. Set more than one boy on fire and quite a few smooth-talking dwarves that snuck up on me after a bath."
Varric threw back his head and laughed heartily this time. "Is that a 'get out'? Ah, Hawke subtlety is something to behold." With that, he gave a short bow and ducked outside. He swore he heard her giggling as he closed the door.
…
Her talents were varied and plentiful, but there was nothing Hawke was better at than fighting with a sword and shield. The way she twirled the sword and thrust her shield about, skin glistening with beads of sweat…it almost made him attracted to humans. Her chest heaved, and her lips were pursed in concentration. Her blonde hair was pulled back and tied with a bit of string she found in a drawer the other day.
Varric brought her a mug of water. "You're training awfully hard considering we're supposed to be hiding out."
"Don't want to get soft," she replied, swallowing huge mouthfuls. "Carver would never let me live it down." She leaned down and kissed his cheek. "Maybe you should practice, too."
"Why, Hawke! Are you telling me I'm getting soft?" he demanded.
She winked and took her place again. "Maybe I just want to get you out of your shirt."
…
"The guild's more curious about you than I thought they would be," Varric confessed one dark evening. He'd confiscated some poor soul's desk for all his work. Hawke was leaning casually back on one of the couches with a book in her hand.
"You think they'll attack me?" she raised an eyebrow, letting her wrist with the book go limp.
"No, not if they're smart," he chuckled. "I was just letting you know. It isn't exactly dwarven policy to have a human escort. Elves are fine; humans not so much."
Hawke blinked. "That's…incredibly racist. And mean."
"What can you do?" Varric shrugged, shifting through his papers. He'd amassed quite a few for the short days they'd spent in the house.
"Well, now I'm hated by a guild of very dangerous, money-grubbing dwarves," she rolled her eyes and tilted her head back. "Wonderful."
"Don't worry, Beautiful," he replied. "If there's anything I've learned about you in the last six years, it's that you can kill anything."
"Thanks, Varric," she frowned.
…
The first thing he noticed after four or five days was that Hawke hadn't exactly been generous when grabbing clothes. She only owned that one bathrobe now and two or three simple tunics and trousers. All the elegance she had amassed over the years was sitting in the Amell mansion covered in dust while the Seekers plundered it. For a woman who always dressed her best when she wasn't wearing armor to be reduced to rags somehow made him incredibly sad.
He sent out a letter to a tailor with her sizes—something he had learned from Isabela a while ago when trying to buy her and Blondie an anniversary gift. The note simply asked for something silk and beautiful she could wear, namely nightgowns because he was tired of seeing her in that ratty bathrobe. Maybe a decorated blouse and a dress or two would work.
The drawers were full of kinky clothing for mistresses and misters, he learned after searching through them one afternoon. A few elven things were littered about. Mostly, though, they were dwarven. The guild members did love their pure blood.
Forking over the coin was easy enough, and he soon had a box full of clothing he didn't look at or touch. He wanted to be surprised as much as she would be. He set it on the bed that she had chosen, a room doused in deep blue and white, and went to his side of the mansion to join her for dinner.
…
She squealed like a nug when she found the clothes on her bed.
He smiled as she pulled out a long, green dress and twirled around with it pressed against her chest. It was just the right length and trimmed with lace, beautiful just like she was. "Oh, I haven't had anything this gorgeous in so long. Did you do this for me?"
"I said all you had to do was ask, Beautiful," Varric shrugged. "You didn't ask, but I delivered anyway. I'm a gentleman like that."
Hawke rushed over and sunk to her knees, a great smile on her plump lips. Up close he saw that the dress was velvet, and it spilled over her fingers like water. That was quality cloth. "You are quite possibly the best man I have ever known."
Something in the way her eyes sparkled when she said that made his throat close up. "Oh, go on, Hawke. You know I hate it when you see me cry."
"Everyone knows the best way to get into a woman's heart is clothes, Varric," she beamed. "You asked for it." Then she reached up and kissed him on the mouth, just a peck. Before he could think, she was off again, shifting through the clothes in the box. He made a solemn note to himself that he would buy her clothes at least once in a while if that was the response he would get.
…
"Brooding, Hawke?" he asked from the doorway. She was on the balcony with a blanket wrapped around her naked shoulders. The dark forest stretched on forever as Varric joined her at her side.
"Sorry, I'm just not used to sleeping alone," she confessed. "I've been having trouble since he's been gone. It's strange since he was never really there when I went to bed, but he was always under the sheets when I woke up."
Varric had the short desire to point out that it was she who killed him but reined it in. He knew how much she was hurting. The pain in her eyes when she stabbed him in the back—the same way he had done her—was more than he'd ever seen in a person. A woman shouldn't be so haunted. He hadn't even thought it was possible.
"Nothing I can do about that," the dwarf sighed. "I'll stay up with you if you like."
She was quiet for a long time until a breeze blew sleepily through, and she pulled the blanket tighter around her shoulders. "Will you sleep with me tonight? Just sleep?"
His jaw nearly hit the ground. "I don't think that's a good idea, Beautiful," he finally managed to say through his shock. There had always been sparks, casual flirting. He wasn't sure he could keep himself in check if he were that close to her.
"Please, Varric," she kneeled down, goosebumps erupting along her thin, bare legs as they hit the cool stone. She was always looking him in the eye, always getting down to his level to talk to him. "I know you didn't sign on to be babysitter for poor, broken Hawke, but you're the only one here. I need you."
Those last three words broke him, and he gave in with a half-hearted sigh. "Of course, Babe," he reached out his hand, gloved fingers small compared to her long, human appendages. He mustered a smile. "Sure thing."
…
It was strangely satisfying to have someone in his bed again. There were plenty of women, that was for sure. Other members of the guild: humans, elves, and dwarves. They were all people he could kick out in the morning—politely of course, he didn't want a knife in the back. This was different. This was Hawke, Blondie's woman. Though Varric had an appreciative eye for beautiful things, he hadn't thought of Hawke that way since the day he caught her storming angrily out of Bartrand's office.
He found it hard to concentrate on sleep with her large, human breasts pressed seductively against his side, her long leg flush against his. Her soft belly brushed his hip while her hand lay on his chest. It was a firmly chaste embrace, actually. He was just overly sensitive.
Musing over what this could produce brought only dark thoughts. Hawke was a dangerous woman, wanted by the whole of the Templar order. He was embroiled in dwarven politics. Aveline would cut his balls off. Fenris would be incredibly pissed. He had always gazed longingly in Hawke's direction and hated Anders even more so when he snatched her off the map. What would he do to Varric? That was another thing, as well. Varric didn't want to be a Blondie substitute. That wouldn't be healthy for either of them.
Into early morning he debated what this meant until he finally made himself go to sleep. It was a troubled night.
…
"I'm sorry that I did that to you," Hawke blushed furiously in the morning, combing her wet hair with a brush. "I hardly ever kick people out of bed."
"Bianca's revenge," Varric sighed, shrugging on his jacket. "Her jealousy knows no bounds."
Hawke gasped conspiratorially and glanced at the crossbow leaning casually against the wall. "She's controlling my mind, now? Oh, the horror!" She burst into giggles.
"Take this seriously, Hawke," Varric lectured playfully. "Bianca could really harm you, you know."
"I have a handsome dwarf to protect me. Don't you worry."
…
He didn't know how, but he found himself at her door the next night. She blinked in surprise and let him in as he explained awkwardly that he wasn't sure if she would need him again tonight. He crawled into her bed as she blew out the candles with sensuous sways of her hips. They found themselves roughly in the same position as they had the night before, only this time her hand was carding through his chest hair and she was humming a melancholy tune with a smile on her mouth as she fell asleep.
…
The fire wasn't really what he had expected to wake up to that morning. He smelled the smoke well before Hawke did and shook her awake with more violence than intended. They managed to escape after pulling on their armors and jumping off the balcony. Outside were ten or eleven men with metal suits that glinted with the symbol of the divine on their chests.
After the Templars were slain, Hawke lay panting in the grass a few miles away with her face and hair covered in blood. She wiped at her busted mouth as Varric wrapped her upper arm. "Maker, that was a rush I'd been missing."
"You're crazier than I thought, Hawke," he muttered as an aside, finishing his bandaging.
Her deep eyes searched his, and she sat up the grass and kissed him flush on the mouth. Varric didn't respond at first, surprised as he was, but he eventually kissed back. His hand touched her neck, feeling the speeding pulse beneath tender flesh. When she pulled away, it was with a great smile.
"I was hoping you'd do that for days now," she admitted, running a finger over the stubble on his cheek.
…
Isabela met them at the next port a few days later, tapping her foot impatiently as she waited in the harbor. Hawke kissed her on the cheek as she boarded, and Varric was nodded curtly at by a brooding elf with eyes more for his human counterpart than anyone else.
Isabela glanced at Varric. "Didn't go as you planned?"
"How was I supposed to know the Templars would set the place on fire? The guild is going to have my head on a pike," he growled.
"Not before I have the Templars'," Hawke frowned as she hugged Fenris. "All my clothes were in that bloody house. Now I'll have to sleep naked. Again."
"I can help with that," the pirate licked her lips.
"Aren't you dating Fenris?" Hawke glanced at the elf.
"I think he'd let me off the hook for this," Isabela shot a smile in his direction.
Varric stood debating before finally taking Hawke's hand and entwining their fingers. He might as well get it over with and show them before the innate questions popped up.
"Oh, Isabela! I get it now," Merrill shouted as she came out of the cabin before the pirate could comment. The mage took a look at their entwined hands, and her eyes widened. "Oh, I get the one from the other day now, too! That's what they were doing!"
…
Hawke's mouth was hard and insistent against his, fingers exploring and tugging at his hair. He hastily removed his gloves and jacket, hands all over her chilled skin as the storm raged outside. When she broke away to breathe and he kissed along her jaw, she hugged him close. "Maker, Varric, I need you."
"I love it when you say that, Babe."
…
Later, when she was sleeping softly, he traced the shape of the tattoos on her face, swirling lines of curious origin. He wasn't sure where this was going, especially with the danger they were in and the impending problems that would come with courting a Hawke. He was glad he'd run into her that day that Bartrand turned her down, though. He was glad that he met her, and when the Seekers caught him three months later while they were nearing Kirkwall, he was happy to tell their story.
I was reading through my old files and found this. After deciding that it wasn't as atrocious as I originally thought, I re-uploaded. There isn't enough Varric/Hawke fiction. Here's my contribution. Thanks for reading. Review please.