*A/N* This is the first of the Anders/Hawke stories. So... Cassyndra Hawke is a rogue, just in case I don't make that obvious. Please review and let me know if you're liking the stories. Thanks! As usual, to listen to the song, just remove the spaces in the link.


Dead Inside: Rightfully Unrequited Love

http:/ www. youtube. com / watch?v=UBQYrkIEqrw

Alone in his room in the back of the clinic, Anders starred up at the stone ceiling. The Undercity was really a catacomb of tunnels and the rooms were caves –it was the fate of the poor and the refugees from Ferelden. Tonight, however, as he lay awake for hours, he was not thinking about his patients or even the plight of the Kirkwall mages – tonight he thought of her. Late at night his thoughts were always consumed with her, the beautiful and deadly Fereldan who was making a difference in a broken city. His thoughts were consumed with the woman who he wanted more than anything.

To find this love of mine

I'd walk through wind and fire

Forever and always

Cassyndra Hawke was completely perfect and priceless. If he closed his eyes he could imagine her dark curtain of hair and light skin. The tattoos over her eyes only added to the dark and mysterious part of her nature and Anders loved it. In his mind, he imagined a simpler world where he was holding her close to him, kissing her, making love to her – but it was just a dream.

Hollow hands reach out

For you to touch me now

Forever and always

For the thousandth time that night, Anders tried to shake her from his thoughts. There was no simpler world and he knew that things like love and family were beyond him now. Justice would always be an uncompromising part of him and that would never change now. He shuddered at how empty and dead he felt inside since he and Justice had come together. Being around Hawke brought out something in Anders that he had hardly felt in years – he felt alive again. In her presence, he was acutely aware of his heartbeat – of the feeling of the blood in his veins.

Dead inside

My heart and soul flatlines

Put your mouth on mine

And bring me back to life

Dead inside

No other satisfies

My blood runs dry

Take my life

Save me from this death inside

What would he give to hold her – just once? He shuddered at the thought of what his love would do to her. She was not a mage – she was not an apostate or an abomination like him. He couldn't let her be in that kind of danger. He'd meant it when he'd said that to save her, he would drown them all in blood. It would defy everything he believed in and Justice would have a tantrum, but Anders knew he would do it for her – not that he thought he'd ever need to. She fought like an archdemon and his mana rarely ran out, but that was not the point. He loved her desperately – but he knew his love had to remain unrequited. She didn't seem to want him to stay away though. She flirted with him rather unabashedly and he found himself returning in kind – calling her Love and Sweetheart like he was entitled to believe that he could be with her.

I can't escape this love

I want it the way it was

Forever and always

Don't you leave me here

Alone in all this fear

Forever and always

What had he been like before Justice? Could he even remember? He'd asked the Warden Commander and Queen, Kalirosa Theirin, once right after he'd left the Wardens. He'd stayed at the palace with her and Alistair for a few weeks but by then he'd been with Justice for nearly two years – Vengeance had already become a part of them. She tried to tell him he wasn't that different, but he knew better. He used to be carefree and funny and flirty. That was what he missed most – making people laugh and appreciating beautiful women – having beautiful women. Justice thought them all nothing more than distractions.

I can't escape this love

I want it the way it was

You remind me of a time

When I felt alive

Now, Justice and Vengeance had a firmer hold than he did much of the time. Vengeance whispered to him and Justice like a demon in the Fade, convincing them of things that both knew weren't true but were powerless to resist. It was like watching his own life through a distorted window. Nothing ever looked the same to the three people in Anders and they would never agree. There was only one person in the whole world who gave him hope – Hawke was like the one shining light in his life and he couldn't let her go. It was startling and beautiful and simple how much light she brought into a room just by entering it. Maybe she would be the one to save him from himself and bring him back to life.

Dead inside

My heart and soul flatline

Put your mouth on mine

And bring me back to life

He was stuck in this love – he knew he would cling to her for the rest of his life even if his love remained… rightfully unrequited. He would never pull her into his personal chaos, but he would never let her go either.

Anders sat up in his bed and began pacing the little room, pushing back Vengeance and his reminders of mages and Templars as he thought of her. Her presence – even thoughts of her were enough to silence Vengeance because, quite simply, there was no fault that the spirit could find in her. She reminded Anders of a simpler time when escaping from the Circle was less a survival and more of a game. He remembered a time when he could sweep women off their feet and leave a bar in stitches. He felt so much like himself when she was there – like there was so much hope to be normal again, but it was temporary and when she left he was left alone with the spirits again and the revenge and the plotting. There was no end to it.

Dead inside

No other satisfies

My blood runs dry

Take my life

Save me from this death inside

Maybe this was all he'd ever be now. He would spend the remainder of his life a tireless renegade –fighting for a life he'd never have and clinging to a fantasy when living became too much for him to bear. Eventually, he'd die a martyr to inspire the mages to seek their freedom. Justice would have it no other way.

My blood runs dry

Take my life

Save me from this death inside