This was a little muse I had running around in my head while helping Melismo with her story. So, I dedicate this little snippet to her story, A Tainted Hope Redux! :)

Unexpected Pleasantries

Warden estate: Midnight

The walk to his office seemed like it would never end. His feet felt heavy, and all Mark wanted to do was lock himself in that room and drown himself in paperwork, to try to forget. He had read the reports, and even went to Amaranthine to investigate. But the loss of his fellow Wardens, his recruits and friends from Orlais, never fully hit the Warden Commander until he was back in Denerim. The plate armor that he wore still had the blood of the darkspawn he killed in vengeance, and the blood of the brothers and sisters lost at Vigils Keep that he took upon himself to burn. Each step he took felt heavier and heavier as he made his way to the wooden door at the end of the hall. He did not even realize he reached it until he felt his hand touch the handle.

And then Mark groaned. He forgot she would be in there, like always, working until she fell asleep on the desk. The one person that could grate on him enough to make him want to kill something, the woman who took every opportunity she had to make him feel miserable, insulting him and teasing him. Mark surmised that she went out of her way-no, she made it her daily goal to humiliate and berate him, as if the act itself made her feel like she had done something good.

But then again, Mark always ended up at this room, like he was enjoying their banter. Perish the thought.

He sighed and opened the door, stepping in, not even bothering to say hello to the elf that sat at his desk. The sound of the door closing was enough to make Ariel sit up from her paperwork, but then he realized from the red mark on her forehead that she had been asleep. Three, two, one-

"Where have you been? I have been waiting for hours for you to get back so I can finished this darned paperwork!" Mark rolled his eyes and walked towards the fire, leaning against the mantle and staring into the flames. "Honestly if you intended to prance around Denerim and neglect your duties, you could at least have given me some warning?"

"Why don't you take tomorrow off?" he said.

"And then you go and leave for a few days, without telling me, and leave me stuck with all these requests for help! What were you doing? Was killing darkspawn getting too much for you? Did you decide to take a vacation?"

Mark just grunted in response. He did quite the opposite, going on a vacation to kill darkspawn.

"Typical shem. It's just like you to leave, not even bothering or caring for that matter to-"

"Ariel," the next words that Ariel had for her Commander died on her lips. This was the first time he has used her name. "Please…I don't feel like arguing with you right now. Take tomorrow off." His voice, so quiet that she had to strain to hear it, sounded so tired. Mark sat down in one of the chairs by the fire, peeling off his armor and running his hands through his hair. To Ariel, he looked like he was much older than he appeared, and he seemed so worn down. Wherever he went for those last few days must have really gotten to him.

She sighed to herself, weighing her options, before she got up and walked over to where Mark was. The Warden looked up at her in slight surprise as her hands worked the knots out of his shoulders, massaging him, and surprisingly, it felt good.

"What are you doing?"

"Just shut up and relax." Wow, she had not called him a shem. That was a first. But then again, she never actually took the time to give him a massage either. Maybe he should offer her more days off in the future?

"So what exactly happened?" she asked.

Mark sighed, his hand coming up to rub his head, warding off the oncoming headache he knew would be there. "I went to visit Amaranthine to see how the recruits were doing, and when I got there it was over run by darkspawn. They had ambushed the Wardens, and slaughtered so many." Ariel must have felt him tense up, because he relaxed again once she applied pressure to his shoulder blades.

"There were Orlesian Wardens there too, right?" He nodded in response. "Well maybe if you were fast enough you could have saved them. Really, I probably would have done a much better job. You're much too slow with your shem legs and all that bulky armor."

"What? Like that night you were attacked? If you couldn't defend yourself from 'worthless shems' then what makes you think you could protect a whole garrison of Grey Wardens?"

The moment the words left his mouth, Mark instantly regretted them. Ariel's hands squeezed his shoulders in an attempt to stop shaking, but the sob she half-managed to hold back alerted him to how deep those words bit her. He turned his head to see her staring down at the floor, her eyes rimmed with tears. She was trying so hard to be strong and not show weakness, but Mark knew that she was just like everyone else. Everyone had their own demons they dealt with.

He sighed and grabbed her hand, bringing her in front of him and pulling her down on top of his lap, wrapping his arms around her. She buried her head into his shoulder, her quiet sobs muffled by his tunic. He held her close, but not too tightly so she did not feel confined . Mark found solace in the fact that the woman who loved to tease and insult him, whom he actually looked forward to seeing during the day was just as soft and vulnerable as anyone else.

"Were they your friends?" Mark looked up from his cup of water to his secretary sitting next to him on the two-person couch, a cup of water also in her hands.

"Yes, I guess in a sense they were also my family. I stayed with them for a little over a year on a request from Duncan, the former Commander. And now…" he sighed, the grip on his cup tightening, "now it brings back what the King and Queen told me about Ostagar. The people I had come to know as my friends and family, all gone. And it's all my fault."

Mark almost dropped his cup as Ariel got up, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him roughly. "Listen to yourself! Do you think you'd want your fellow Wardens to see you this way? You're their commander, damn it, and you have to show them that this is just a stepping stone. It is not your fault. You picked the best people you thought were able to lead. Everyone makes mistakes; it is part of who we are."

"Even crazy little elves, whose goal is to make her superiors' life a living hell?" The smirk that was on his face was enough to make her see that he was just teasing.

"Yes, even those." The two of them sat in companionable silence for the rest of the hour, staring into the fire and drinking, each thinking about different things.

Ariel sighed and yawned, stretching her legs as she got up. "Well I think I better get to sleep if I am to finish your work."

Mark looked up from his cup to her, "I thought I said you didn't have to come in tomorrow? I can pick up the slack and finish."

"And miss the chance to insult and tease you some more, I don't think so. You are not getting off that easily. For all I know, you could botch up the whole pile of work, and then where will I be?"

And they were back to the normal routine.

"Ariel?" The elf in question stopped in the doorway; looking back at the man she called her Commander. His forest green eyes locked onto hers, and she almost felt her breath hitch in her throat. "Thank you, for everything. I would be lost if you weren't here to keep things in order. You helped me a lot, so I thank you."

The small smile that she gave him as she walked out the door was quite possibly the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.