Hunger
by rubypop
Chapter 2

Fenris crawled, could do nothing more than crawl, along the baseboard of Hawke's bedchamber, feeling the wall with shaking hands. He picked through splinters and shards of debris, shredded wallpaper and daggers of glass. He muttered to himself, counting out paces that he could not take, checking for crevices, hollow spots, something, anything to indicate the hidden recess that he knew was there, behind which was a passage underground, and a path to Darktown, the only place he could think of to go.

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Hawke held her head there in the blackness of the cavern, staring back at the white glowing eyes. They did not blink, and their gaze was penetrating, all-seeing, immobile.

She heard then, when the pounding in her head had ceased, the deep reverberations of something breathing.

She did not move from the dripping boulder, and dared not look away. She swallowed hard, gathered her courage.

"Hello?" she called out, though quietly, and her voice carried on the air, echoing against the rock walls. "Is someone there?"

The eyes stared. The breathing, slow and even, continued.

Then, a voice:

"Hello there, little thing."

The voice was sonorous and rumbling, so low in pitch that its words were nearly indistinguishable. She felt a deep vibration run through her, as subtle and unsettling as the tremors from some distant earthquake, and it gave her an odd sense of being physically sick.

She hugged herself tightly. "Who — who are you?"

A long pause.

"A friend," said the voice.

"You sound — scary," she said.

A soft chuckle then, that quivered the rock underneath her.

"I can't see you," she said.

The eyes glinted, and from beneath them a slow light grew.

A long shape emerged from the darkness, indistinct and pooled in shadow, what appeared to be a man, but was not. She saw wide shoulders behind a bowed head, flesh that shimmered like nacre, long arms, impossibly long. A smooth chest, and beneath it the dramatic jut of ribs. Its abdomen was a cavity, emaciated, it seemed hollow to her, as though no internal organs could possibly be housed within. And between the legs she saw the dark genitals, that mysterious male organ that she had glimpsed only on farm animals and wild beasts, that brought her a curious shame now to see, as though she should not have.

The creature sat cross-legged, its arms trailing on the ground, hands folded — but they were not hands, she could see this clearly for the dim light that bloomed from them. They were claws, large gnarled things much too big for their skinny arms, with powerful fingers that curled into thick, barbed points.

The creature lifted his head, and she saw a startlingly human face, save for the unblinking white eyes.

"What is your name, little thing?" he said, his rumbling voice sounding tired.

"Marian," she answered, was too afraid not to answer.

He stared at her. His broad chest, so incongruous to the cavernous stomach, the skinny arms, moved gently as he breathed.

"Wh-what's your name?" she stammered.

He tilted his head. The shadows shifted; she saw now that he had not hair, but a bristling spray of spikes that rose from the crest of his brow like a myriad of horns. When his lips parted, she saw long, pointed teeth.

"Hunger," he said.

They gazed at one another in silence. She shivered in the damp chill. She wondered how someone with so human a face could have so bizarre a body, proportions so wrong that they confounded her merely by looking. But as she observed him, she began to feel less afraid — in some way, he seemed sad to her, as though he were just as lost and weary as she.

"Do you live here?" she asked. "Is this cave your home?"

He shook his head slowly.

"Why are you here?" she said.

A low rumble resounded through the chamber, as though the entirety of the cave sighed in resignation. He lifted his claws, and the light with them, and he raised his head.

A thin, dark vine was lashed about his black neck, stretching taut to the wall beside him. The vine had been wrapped, tighter than a ship's rigging, around a boulder that jutted from the wall. A small brass pin gleamed in the light, stuck fast into the knotted vine.

"You're a prisoner?" she said.

He lowered his head and nodded.

"Have you been here for a long time?"

He nodded again.

"Did someone do that to you for a reason? Because you did something bad?"

He shook his head.

She hugged her knees to her chest.

"Where did you come from, little thing?" he asked her then.

"Outside," she said softly. "A village outside the Wilds. I'm lost. Some — some bad men chased me."

"I see," he said, and said nothing more.

She sat, shivering, on the boulder for some time. The creature remained by the wall, tethered fast, with his great head bowed. The pair of lights that were his eyes had gone out, and she wondered if he had fallen asleep, though the level cadence of his breathing went on, uninterrupted.

She sneezed suddenly, and his eyes opened again.

"I'm sorry," she said, without knowing why.

He chuckled. She glanced at him shyly, saw his hands working, though at what she could not tell.

"Tell me, little thing," he said then, as one set of his claw-tipped fingers picked over his other palm. "Are you frightened?"

She shook her head, although she was, very much so. "No."

"You are not? Truly?"

"No, serah."

He chuckled again, though whether it was at the honorific she used or the obvious lie, it was unclear.

"And what of the bad men that pursue you?"

"They don't scare me," she said, staring back into those strange eyes. "But . . ."

He waited for her to continue.

"But I am afraid that, if they do not find me, they'll — they'll get my brother and sister and my mummy."

"And why is that, little thing?"

"I did something bad."

He lifted his head once more, gently, and offered his hands. His arms, with their odd length, stretched a great distance, and he reached much more closely to her than she'd thought he could.

His fingers opened, and upon his smooth glossy palm was a tiny wooden horse.

"Did you make that?" she whispered.

He gestured with his hands: take it, take it.

Tentatively she reached out. His great curving claws formed an intimidating barrier around the little horse, and they gleamed in the low light, so close that she could see every detail of the stinger-like barbs at their ends. They parted when her little hand came near, and she had a sudden vision of them snapping shut, of being dragged back into the darkness, but his fearsome claws remained still, and she took the wooden horse without incident.

It was rudely carved, clearly the result of those thick talons, though inured with detail, and its resemblance to Ser Clerval's great roan was not lost on her.

"How did you know?" she murmured.

He retracted his hands, and tapped one claw against the side of his head.

"I walk the Fade, little thing," he said.

She clutched the horse.

"Your thoughts weigh heavily," he went on, "on this side of the Veil, and the next."

"Are you a demon?" she whispered.

He smiled.

Her words quivered. "Somebody tied you up here for a reason."

"And I presume that someone chased you to this place for a reason as well, little thing," he said lightly.

"They —" she said, and swallowed her words. The rough edges of the wooden figure bit into her palm.

"The Templars," he offered.

She began to tremble.

"Little mage," he said.

"I —" She groped for words, could find only few. "I — I ran from them. They were going to — to kill me, or lock me up in a tower. I didn't mean to hurt anybody."

"Of course not," the creature said, with a note of pity.

"And now — they — oh." She cast her eyes upward, into the dark pit from which she'd fallen. "Oh, I hope they're still searching for me," she said softly. "I hope they haven't gone back. They must be . . . terribly angry with me. And if Ser Clerval is dead . . ." She fell silent at the horror of it.

"And I was glad," she said at last. "I was glad to think I had killed him."

The creature's spiked head listed from side to side. "Do not fear, little thing," he said. "Do not fear."

Her eyes dropped to his.

"The Templar of which you speak still lives," he said. "He and his men wander the Wilds even now."

"Is it true?" she said, her heart giving a flutter. "They haven't turned back?"

"Well. For three lyrium-consuming mage-hunters, a pup such as yourself is not difficult to track, one might say." He looked up, as though his gaze penetrated the very ceiling. "Yes. They are nearby."

She felt a momentary surge of relief, followed instantly by an influx of dread.

"What can I do," she whispered, "when they find me?"

She pulled her knees to her chest, as though she could pull herself smaller, shrink into herself and disappear.

Silence then, punctuated by the minor clicking of the creature's claws. She buried her face into her arms, and did not look up again until she sensed movement.

The creature had extended his hands once more. He held out three wooden figures — little soldiers, each wearing a miniature suit of armor and carrying a tiny sword.

She couldn't help but smile as she took them, one by one, from between the parting black claws.

"Maker's breath," she said with delight. "The Templars."

"See how tiny they are," the creature said, "even when held in your little hands?"

She giggled at the absurdity of it. Three little Templars, small enough to fit in the palm of her hand. Harmless dolls, no more than playthings now.

"They're cute," she said. Then, "Thank you."

The creature had folded his hands again. He nodded to her.

She studied the figures for a moment, and singled one out as Ser Clerval — for it was the only one with a tiny beard — and she pretended to make him walk, moving him across the curve of her knee.

"My, but the little mage has grown big," the creature mused. "They do not stand a chance."

She laughed.

She sat playing with the figures, making them scamper to and fro across the boulder, and dueling with their little swords, as the creature looked on.

He leaned his head to one side, away from the tethered boulder, as though testing the vine.

"Little thing," he said then, gesturing with one hand.

She looked up at him.

"To me," he said.

She was holding Ser Clerval aloft, about to place him on the back of his resurrected steed. She did not move from her perch.

His fingers paused, then motioned once again. "Little thing," he repeated, sweetly. "Why do you hesitate?"

"You're," she said slowly, "you're a demon."

"Am I?"

"Your name. You said your name was Hunger."

He smiled.

"Mummy told me," she said, "that demons . . . they're people's desires made real. Bad desires. Things so strong that people do evil because of them." She named them off her little fingers. "Rage, lust, pride, sloth . . . and hunger."

"A clever child," he said. "A learned child."

"You must have hurt someone," she said, "to end up here."

"As did you," he said mildly.

"I didn't," she stammered, then, glancing at the horse figurine in her hand, "I mean, I didn't mean to . . ."

"Many things are said of my kind," he murmured, "that are simply untrue. Slanderous. Many things said, too, of mages, who are then locked up, put to sword. A tragedy, yes?"

She fidgeted with the dolls.

She heard, then, a distant echo — far-off clamoring steps, exchanging voices.

Hunger lifted his eyes. She stiffened with fear.

"They've found you, little thing," he said.

She scrambled from the boulder, slipped on the condensation. She fell.

He reached out and caught her.

She supressed a yelp of surprise, and he drew her toward him. His large hands gripped her easily, and gently, the claws slick and yielding to her form, and never did their barbs meet her flesh. He lowered her to the rocky floor, huddling her against the hollow cavity of his middle.

"You are a fellow Fade walker," he whispered. "You are a friend."

The barbs ran through her hair.

The voices, the footsteps were growing louder.

"You must do something for me," he said.

She twisted about and stared up at him. The vine stretched, strained against his neck.

"You must pull the charm from the rock," he said, so quietly, his voice the faintest rumble now, the distant shifting of earth. "You must release me."

Her eyes traveled the length of the vine, and settled on the brass pin that pierced the boulder.

"I," she stammered.

A shout from above — Ser Clerval's, close now, distinct.

"I will protect you," he said, and it was strange how delicate those thick claws had become, how gentle were the great fingers that stroked her cheeks. "I will let no harm come to you."

She could see torchlight now, it emanated from the pit overheard, along with voices that shouted inquiries.

"Marian," called Ser Clerval from above.

"Release me," Hunger said, and he hunched down over her, he whispered now in her little ear, "and I shall owe you a great debt. And I shall give you a gift — one that would guarantee your own freedom for ever."

She pushed him away. She dove for the boulder and plucked the pin from the knotted vine.

The tether snapped back from the rock, so quickly that she instinctively shielded her face, and behind her Hunger had lunged forward, yanking the vine from his neck. He scooped her up in one arm and bounded to the dripping boulder where the wooden Templars lay scattered. Hawke clutched the tiny horse as she clung to his chest. His smooth flesh was startlingly hot now against hers, felt likely to burn her, and she broke out in a fevered sweat.

His long arm reached up, up into the pit from which she had fallen, and his claws bored easily into the solid rock, and he lifted himself at once, ascending.

She saw the Templars then, all three of them, as Hunger burst over the lip of the pit, and the shock on their faces was almost comical, though laughter was far from her mind now. And how bizarre a sight it must have been, how unexpected to the Templars who'd pursued a mere child of eight, and saw her now clinging to this heaving beast with eyes like blazing torches.

"Andraste preserve us!" one of them cried. "An abomination!"

One of the great claws lashed out and struck the closest Templar. In a brilliant display of red the barbs caught the flesh at his throat and ripped in an upward arc. The flesh tore — it shredded, she realized, for such claws were not capable of slicing cleanly — and blood wet the man's neck at once, spattered in thick drops across his silver chestplate. He fell, gurgling, and Hawke was horrified to see the meat-red muscles in his throat working, the gobs of flesh that hung like tattered fabric from his jaw.

"Oh, Maker," she stuttered. "Oh, Maker, oh."

Hunger's claw came down, wet and shining. With one liquid movement he pivoted and deposited her gently on the ground. He turned back just as Ser Clerval and the remaining Templar charged.

He caught Ser Clerval's sword in mid-swing, and though the sharp edge bit into his palm he gripped it savagely in his claws. He knocked back the second sword with his elbow and seized the Templar, lifting him from the ground.

She heard his laughter all around her, it shook through the walls, raucous, joyous.

The Templar thrashed, his armor rattling. Hunger's lips had pulled away from his long teeth, stretching wide, wider. He threw Ser Clerval back, who fell still gripping his sword, and Hawke looked on in terror as the demon's mouth opened, kept opening, his jaw seemed to unhinge and the yellow teeth glinted like knives, they could have been as long as her arm now. And the Templar screamed, oh, how pitifully he screamed, as he was lifted to that great mouth, and the fearsome teeth snapped shut.

Hawke shrank back against the wall, staring between her little fingers. From behind him she saw Hunger lower the man, saw the armored legs twitching, the streams of hot fragrant blood, and then the great dark cavity where the man's shoulder should have been, the chestplate bent and ripped away, exposed ribs and splintered bone.

She heard the terrible grinding of powerful jaws, and glimpsed the dangling human arm that swung free from the demon's mouth.

She slumped forward in what was nearly a dead faint.

Ser Clerval had bellowed a name, surely it was the name of that poor wretch whose eyes now stared, distant and cloudy, up at nothing, as Hunger leaned down again and ran a long, dark tongue along the ruined shoulder, lapping up the sumptuous blood.

"Oh, please," she whispered, though to whom she knew not.

She met Ser Clerval's eyes for the briefest moment — they were blue, pale blue, and she saw in them that hint of softness he'd betrayed in the Wilds, and she wondered how she must look, pale and shivering in the wake of this great monster.

"You will release him!" Ser Clerval cried then, launching from the floor in a fearless sprint, his sword held aloft.

Hunger turned to him, swallowing flesh and nerves and bone. She saw, from this angle, how his face had lost any resemblance of humanity — may never had truly looked human at all — and instead it was now twisted and gnarled and grinning. He flung down the maimed wretch, his arm no longer emaciated and lithe, but thick and roped with muscle.

He ducked low, and Ser Clerval's sword glanced from the chitinous spines on his head.

He snatched with one hand and five barbed points pierced Ser Clerval's back, his ribs.

He lifted Ser Clerval from the floor, plucking away the sword from his hand as though it were a mere toy.

Hawke moaned, covering her eyes.

"Marian!"

She looked up.

Ser Clerval had twisted toward her, was staring at her over the rise of Hunger's shoulder. Blood dotted his bearded mouth in a fine spray. The five claws were buried deep, had penetrated his armor with ease.

"I'm sorry," she found herself whispering. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

"Marian," he said again, and his face was suddenly paling, going slate gray. "You must run. Run now, far from here, far from him . . ."

Hunger's great jaws sprang apart and he howled with laughter.

"Run to your mother's arms," Ser Clerval went on. "Go! I will not let him come for you."

"The Templar lies, little thing," Hunger crowed. "He cares nothing for you. He desires only to see your kind locked away, slaughtered and trampled underfoot, until none are left to walk free."

"This creature is an abomination," Ser Clerval said firmly, though his voice was growing weak. "Be strong, you must be strong. Do not give in to him. Do not believe the things he says."

"Silence, fool!"

"Safeguard yourself," Ser Clerval said. "For the worst things he can take from you are your body and mind."

Hunger lunged forward, his jaws stretching wide. Ser Clerval held her gaze as that razored maw descended over him.

He must have only whispered them, though she could swear that she heard his final words loud and clear.

"Don't look," he said.

The mouth closed over his head.