Hawke easily locked up her work room with lightning speed and sprinted for the six lengths of iron ladders to get down to Level 8 faster than most of the rest of the ship so she could get a good meal. There was no hope for her to get the choice portions reserved for the military, but she was happy enough with what she got as long as there was more than just one piece of meat in her stew. And, if she was fast enough and sweet enough, she could get another roll of bread or two. Today, however, with both Red and Blue teams on board, Cricket had a sour look on his face as he doled out her portion, and that meant that she wouldn't get any more.

But it was enough, and it was hot, and the mess hall was much, much warmer than Level 14 since it was closer to the ship's engine floors. Hawke was always happy to take her time and savor her dinner here, and she leaned over to take a deep whiff of the vegetables next to the chicken on her plate. When the teams came back successful, there was fresh produce for a while, and Hawke was grateful for small things like food in any other color than brown.

Two metal trays of food slid onto the table to flank her, and just by looking at their contents, she knew that Varric would sit on her left, and Merrill on her right. The dwarf had a large helping of chicken and potatoes, and his partner's tray held nothing but greens. When there was fresh produce to spare, the elf would take both her portion and Varric's, and he'd help himself to her share of brown food.

"So, anything new and exciting today?"

Varric started a dramatic sigh, but Merrill cut in. "He started a new set of cadets today."

"Oh. Can any of them see straight?"

"Gods. I don't know where these came from. If they're going to be the next fighter squadron, we're doomed. Daisy here doesn't know how sweet she's got it with the young 'uns."

Merrill was humming softly, curling tendrils of boiled greens around her fork. "Oh, you old lout. Always so negative."

"I have to be, sweets, or they won't be able to fly worth a damn!"

"Maybe they're just not cut out for it, hmm?"

Hawke's eyes wandered to the group of people seated a few tables over. Red Captain Isabela must have been teasing Carver something fierce, because he was as red as his bandana and staring at his steak, and the woman had her head thrown back in laughter. Sebastian found it funny, too, a small grin offering a glimpse of a bit of green stuck in between his white teeth. Next to them, Blue Captain Aveline had her face buried in her hand as Donnic practically inhaled his dinner, and Sergeant Fenris ate slowly, with his fork in one hand and a book in the other.

Isabela turned to her, and Hawke startled a little before she focused back on her chicken, feeling her cheeks burn. As if she needed to feel any more awkward. In her peripheral vision she could tell that Isabela had mentioned her to Carver and Sebastian, because all three were looking at her now, talking about her, no doubt, and she wanted to melt through the metal grate of the floor all the way down to Level Zero.

Hawke finished her meal quickly, making small noises and short answers to the rest of her dinner conversation, and quickly got up to leave. Besides, she had a necklace to look into. She went back into the queue and signed for Anders' meal, and started to head up the stairs.

"Hadley!"

Only one person ever called her that, and she knew she could not avoid him, so she turned to face her brother.

"Good to see you back, Carver." She had to crane her neck up to look at him, he had grown so tall, even for his young age.

"Corporal says you have his find."

"Indeed I do. It's old, brother. You know what that could mean." And he did, she could see it register as something their father warned them about. "If he's sending you after me, tell him I'll be done when I'm done." She turned to leave. "I should get this to the doctor before it gets cold."

Private Carver Hawke couldn't help the small smile at her words. "Well, we wouldn't want that, would we?" Whether he was poking fun at her favor for Doctor Feelgood as he liked to tease or how trivial cold chicken would be, she didn't care - probably both.

The chicken was almost frigid by the time Hawke made it back up to Level 14. Thankfully the door to the clinic was wide open and she didn't have to do any balancing acts to get in.

Anders took in a sharp breath at her arrival, but did not look away from the terminal screen. "Chicken." Another whiff. "Thank you, Hawke. But you shouldn't have."

She set it down on his examination table. "You can thank me by eating," she smiled, but the smile quickly vanished as she held her hands over the tray andfocused. Heat was harder than Fade sight - at least, it was harder now that she was so incredibly out of practice. "Find anything yet?"

"Something, anyway. It looks a lot like this one from the Dragon Age," but I highly doubt it. Maybe it's more like a copy."

Hawke was staring holes into the chicken. Come on, dammit, warm! "Isn't that a little, I don't know, dangerous to assume it's a copy? I mean, it could still be enchanted."

"I don't know. It just looks ... weird. What are you doing?"

"Warming your dinner." Her hands hurt a little. "Or failing to."

Anders wheeled his stool over to her. "That trick only works with Mages, sweetheart." There was a smile in his voice, and Hawke bit her tongue to keep herself from confessing. She had been on the run for ever and ever, her and Bethany, and even telling Anders could mean trouble and conscription. But then it could get me on the Red or the Blue teams.

Hawke shook her head, and forced a smile. "Ah, well. It was worth a shot, eh?" She nudged the tray closer to him, and Anders almost smirked as he reached for the tray. Less than a minute in his hands, a small amount of steam rose from the food, and the look on his face was adorably smug.

His hand was wonderfully warm when he touched hers. "Thanks again. If not for you, I'd never eat."

"Guess I'll have to stick around, then." What the hell was she doing? Hawke busied herself with the image on the computer screen. "So what's this?"

"It wasn't unheard of for nobles to have copies of famous pieces made, like that replica of Starfang in the general's office? That's really not the real thing, obviously." Anders instinctively covered his mouth with the back of his hand as he chewed. "This looks a lot like an amulet associated with ... Asha'bellanar. I'll have to ask Merrill or Feynriel what it means, I think. No Elven translation. Ever since the First Seheron War, the database hasn't gotten much attention."

Hawke hoisted herself up onto the exam table, trying to ignore the cold metal. "Well, there's job security for me."

He kept reading off the screen, his lips smacking softly as he chewed. "At any rate, this Asha'bellanar can't be good. It's also ridiculously old, and I highly doubt Sebastian's find is this amulet. So if it's a copy, it should be alright."

"I don't know, Anders. They say those scorch marks on Level 10 were from the last time we thought something was safe."

He set the empty tray on the table beside her and stood up, suddenly very close, the light fabric of his scrubs brushing against her knees. "Let me put it to you this way. I looked and I didn't see anything, alright? It's fine. Let Vael hang it around his neck or give it to some harpy or whatever. It's not worth your time."

And, after a moment, "He's not worth your time."

His choice of words surprised her a little, and Hawke couldn't think of anything to say in response, and so she just looked at him. He had leaned over, his hands on the table with his arms bracketed around her. He was tired, with dark circles starting under his eyes, and she wanted to reach up and smooth them out, and before she could stop herself, she was brushing a strand of hair out of his face. Anders closed his eyes and leaned into her touch, his stubble tickling her palm, and the sensation stole her breath right out of her lungs.

As soon as he opened his eyes, he closed the distance between them and covered her lips with his, and he was so warm and she couldn't remember how long she had wanted this.

But he's wrong.

Hawke jolted backwards. "I ... have to go," and she was off the table and out the door.

She didn't stop until she was down the stairs and behind the closed door of her quarters on Level 13. "Stupid, stupid, stupid." His lips had no reason being that warm, and if he had kissed her, obviously there was some attraction there, and if she had stayed perhaps she could be very warm if he wrapped his arms around her and do those scrubs he wears have an elastic waist, or would I have to untie them stop it, stop it, stop it!

For once, Hawke was grateful for the lack of hot water in her cabin shower, and the shiver gradually brought her back to her rational mind. It had to be the Asha'bellanar amulet, a mere trinket copy wouldn't have survived so long, even if it was well-made. Her father often warned her of strong, old magic and he wouldn't have been surprised to find an amulet that was at least six hundred years old.

She'd have to bring it to the Ship Captain, and he'd tell the General, likely, and they'd both want to see it. Maker, she didn't want to be on the samelevel as that man - for sure he'd be able to smell her and then she'd be whisked away and conscripted. The thought of General Cullen's incredibly keen senses made her rub harder at the shampoo in her hair.

After she rinsed off and dried, she dressed in thick, loose pants and a sweater and curled into her favorite blanket on her bunk. The familiar smell of her mother's soap from the blanket pulled her mind away from the amulet in her work room above her, and Hawke buried her nose into the fabric, wrapping it tighter around her, and she fell asleep to dream of brown eyes framed by wisps of long blond hair.

The next morning Hawke wasted no time, scurrying down the narrow ladders to Level 12, where she found Merrill surrounded by ten children listening to her read. She took advantage of the wait and finished her breakfast of dry bread that she found in her stash in her quarters, and she wanted butter, but she didn't want to stand in line.

The elf saw her, and she must have seen the look on her face to mean something, because she roused her students into some drawing to keep them busy and came out into the hallway to meet her. "Something you need, Hawke?"

"Have you ever heard of Asha'bellanar?"

Merrill frowned and her forehead crinkled a little, and she leaned up against the wall. "I haven't heard that name for a long time. Sometimes it's used to frighten the children, but it's not a story we tell much anymore."

"What is it, or who is it?"

"From what I remember, it's another name for a witch. Probably the worst of them all if the name's been around all this time." She crossed her arms. "I think it's the Dalish name for Flemeth." A small squeal came from the classroom. "Oh, dear, maybe it's not quite time for sharp pencils. Why do you ask?"

Hawke couldn't lie to her friend, but she didn't want to pull her in, either. "It came up in something I've been working on." She didn't make eye contact. "And there are usually gaps in the database when elven culture comes up, I figured if the name was a dead-end in the system, it was probably Dalish."

"I thought the database was pretty extensive."

Hawke scoffed a little. "It is, but I'm not complaining of any gaps. It gives me something to do." She smiled at Merrill when a cloud of giggles erupted inside. "You should get back. Thank you."

"Oh, no problem. Long as someone hasn't put an eye out." Merrill went back inside, and Hawke raced back up to her workroom. Flemeth. She had seen the name before, and she remembers noting something about it, but she couldn't remember what.

It took her less than ten minutes to find an entry in the system, and if the amulet was hers, nothing good could come of it. It had to be locked away.

That meant going to Ship Captain Dumar, and presenting her findings to him and General Cullen. And Hawke didn't want to go down to Level 7 unless she absolutely had to.

Like now.

Shit. Why did Sebastian have to unearth it and bring it back? Hawke leaned back, propping herself up against the edge of the table for support, and started chewing on her thumbnail. She'd have to prove that the necklace was at least six hundred years old, if not more, and that there really could be something very sinister in its enchantment. But then how could she prove that it was, other than "I got a feeling when I looked at it, and I know it's bad because I'm really a Mage?"

She swiveled around and took a long hard look at the amulet, carefully laid out on a thin bed of gauze on the tray. The longer she looked at it, the more convinced she was that there was a heartbeat, beating a steady rhythm within the locket. How could she get the others to hear it? And why couldn't Anders? He was a Confirmed Mage, after all, and he could practice freely as long as he kept the ship's population alive. And he had such control over his magic that it should have been so easy for him to look at it and see it too.

A sharp, hard knock at the door startled her, and she realized that she had turned the bolt closed when she came in, so she got up to turn it back and open the door. Sebastian Vael stood before her, his eyes narrowed and focused. "Hawke," he greeted her curtly, "Is this a bad time?" Oh, never. She nodded and pulled the door open wide enough for him to step in.

He busied himself with a glove seam, and didn't look at her. "I ... owe you an apology." Next, he fidgeted with his vest, pulling it down. "I was too brash with you earlier, and I should have respected your opinion. You're the relics expert, after all," and a side of his mouth tugged into a sheepish grin, and his blue eyes snapped up at her. "I'm sorry."

If she wasn't busy being keenly aware of how close he was to the necklace, Hawke might have felt her heart flutter, but she caught his eyes darting to the tray.

"No, don't!"

She was too slow, he was too fast, and Sebastian had it in his hands, and all the breath in her body was caught in her throat as she braced herself for a scorch of fire, eyes shut and her arms suddenly up in front of her face.

But there was nothing.

Nothing but her anger.

Hawke reached for the chain, but Sebastian was at least a head taller than her, and he only had to hold it higher to keep it out of her grasp. He turned the locket in his hands, blue eyes narrowed again as he tried to make out the worn engraving. If she wasn't so sure that it was cursed, Hawke would probably be intrigued by it as well - jewelry was so rare now when Salvage recycled every metal available.

"Damn it, Sebastian! You don't know what you're doing." She made another dash for it, but to no avail. "I'm telling you, it's dangerous, would you fucking trust me?"

"It's mine. I know what to do with it." He was entranced and mesmerized and enthralled, holding the locket up to the dim overhead lamps, squinting at the detail in the poor light but still keeping it away from her. He raised his other hand to it, his fingers finding the frail latch and twisting it open.

When she dared to exhale again, her breath steamed. A shiver ran up Hawke's back as the room got much colder, and yet her nose stung with burning sulfur, and her eyes threatened to water at the putrid smell. It felt as cold as the ship in the Anderfels that she eagerly left after just a week, but it smelled like Carver's hair when he came back from the Deep Roads.

She looked up at Sebastian, ready to yell at him and snatch the locket back, but he was wide-eyed and staring at something on the other side of the room, and he was reaching for his weapon.

Hawke was afraid to turn around to face it, and then a painful vice of a grip that seemed impossible from the gray bones that came into her peripheral vision. The pain shot up her neck and down her back and threatened to bring her to her knees, and Hawke reached out for Sebastian, watching his jaw set as he drew his rifle.

She felt an incredible gravity try to pull her whole through the metal grate. A searing heat of pain started to pull her muscles from her bones, and when her knees finally gave out and she fell to the floor, she saw her attacker, a gruesome, ancient form towering over even the corporal, its head brushing against the ceiling and its deceptively frail form wrapped in dark red and purple cloth that looked like they had been dragged through a thousand fires.

Its face, hollow and ghastly, immediately burned itself into every nightmare she had ever had, and Hawke screamed, but she couldn't hear anything above the pounding of her heart as it frantically fought to keep her alive.

I can't die like this.

Hawke struggled to raise a hand up to the abomination and reached into the Fade to pull a memory she never wanted to see again.

She was fighting to get up, to spark a light, to get him off her, but she was pinned under the weight of him, and she told herself she wouldn't cry no matter what he did. A sharp tinge of cold, and the sound of cloth ripping, and her mind was frantic, trying to find something in her mind to push him off. But the stench of his sweat was overwhelming and she was drowning in her self-loathing. How was she so stupid that she let herself get caught by a Knight Templar when she had been doing so well? A sear of heat pierced her chest, and instantly Hawke felt her entire body fall, the pain pushing down on her lungs and shooting out to her limbs.

A hot burst of light blinded her, followed by dozens of flashes, she still couldn't hear anything beyond her heartbeat as it drummed in her ears, and then there was nothing.