Hawkquisition Part 3: Patchwork Families
Chapter 2

Wherein a Champion is confined

Carver Hawke had gotten turned around in Skyhold Keep. There seemed no end to the hallways and stairways and, Maker, half of them seemed to not really go anywhere, or to double back around to the same place the last hallway had taken him. Snagging a biscuit from the kitchens the time he had ended up in there brightened his mood only temporarily, but the biscuit was long gone and he was lost. Though that should be no excuse, it may serve to explain why, when he rounded a corner and collided suddenly with a solid breastplate coming the other way, Carver exploded with, "Maker's blood, why don't you watch where you're - "

Unfortunately his tongue ran ahead of his eyes, which were just now recognizing the frown above the breastplate. To be fair, he'd have recognized it sooner if Cullen were wearing the Templar armor in which Carver was accustomed to seeing him. "Knight-Captain!" Carver stammered, "I - I - oh, blight it. Sorry, sir, I didn't see you there."

"It's not Knight-Captain anymore," Cullen pointed out with the weariness of one tired of correcting this detail. "I am Commander of the Inquisition forces now. And you...I know you, from Kirkwall, don't I? You were a Templar. The younger Hawke?"

Carver nodded, biting his tongue about the implied (and inevitable) comparison to his sister. (And given that his sister had never been a Templar, you'd think the former Knight-Captain could at least know him merely as Recruit Hawke?) "Carver, sir," he finally supplied.

"No longer a Templar yourself, from what I hear," mused Cullen, looking the young man over thoughtfully. "Not that there's technically an Order to go back to, now, what with the newly crowned Divine talking about dissolving the Circles."

"Maybe for the best," Carver said, seeing understanding in Cullen's eyes as they both recalled Kirkwall's suffering under Meredith's ever-tightening reign. "I wouldn't go back now, anyway. I'm needed here."

"Skyhold?"

"Well, not here specifically. Just...wherever the clan is. I guess you've seen them? Everyone's calling them the Daisy Patch, because of Merrill."

"The elven mage?" Cullen asked, eyes narrowing as he noted how Carver seemed to light up when he mentioned the refugee elves, and especially their leader.

"My, ah, girlfriend," Carver said with a proud smile made somewhat sheepish by the way he then blushed and rubbed at his jawline. "And you know how the Order is supposed to - was supposed to - protect mages? From their own power, and people who fear it? Well, that's what I'm here for. Merril's like a whole Circle all on her own, some days. I mean, she's amazing. But she can get carried away sometimes, so she needs me."

"I see." Cullen looked dubious.

"And I'm, er, trying to find her at the moment. I was supposed to meet her at the infirmary to check on Emmen - one of the clan. The Inquisitor brought him back here for the mages to heal."

"Well, then, we'd best reunite you with her before she burns something down, hadn't we?" Cullen said with a wry smile, beckoning Carver to follow him back the way he had come.

The white halls of the Grand Cathedral rang with voices and the slap of feet upon the marble as couriers and clergy hastened about their errands. Barely a week since her coronation, Divine Victoria smiled at the signs of life around her as she strode toward the tower. The reforms she had in mind would take time, but already the promise of change was reinvigorating the Chantry with life. She would not fail to use the momentum that her ascension had granted, to cast out what was broken and start anew to make the world worthy of its Maker.

Up the spiraling steps, and then the familiarity of the tower rookery overwhelmed her for just a moment. Certainly there were couriers to carry to her chambers the messages conveyed by the birds, but the Divine found it reassuring to stop by and see the feathered messengers herself from time to time.

"Your Perfection," gasped the lay sister minding the rookery today, bowing low.

"Sister Oriane," the Divine greeted her. "Anything to report?"

"Why, there's a message that just came," said the flustered sister. "Here - I mean, that is - shall I read it to you?"

"That won't be necessary," the Divine said. "But thank you. I'll have a look myself."

"The light is best by the north window," the sister needlessly suggested. Divine Victoria was a regular presence in this tower; she knew its windows almost as well as those of the rookery she had so recently departed. She was already stepping to the north as the sister spoke.

And in that pleasant light she felt a darkness passing over her eyes as she took in the short message:

"Divine" Nightingale:

Don't think this is a victory.

The Sunburst Throne is no place for the Left Hand. You would undo everything we worked for. If you will not yield to a true Divine, we'll see how well "Victoria" can protect one she loves.

Divine Victoria frowned in thought, the tiny note crumpling in her fist, as she stood in the northern window for several long minutes, thinking. Plotting. Guessing.

Finally, without the answers she desperately sought, she made her way back down the spiraling steps, back to the Sunburst Throne in the light of the dimming afternoon sun.

Hawke had never considered herself a fidgeter.

A woman of action, certainly. Decisive. Quick-thinking. They seemed like good traits, until time came to a standstill on the day she almost lost the baby.

Granted, no one had said she had almost lost the baby. But she knew. The pains had begun, the midwife had come - but too soon. It was too soon for him to be born, and the midwife had given her something to keep him safely in her womb for just a little longer.

It seemed like very much longer, only one day into this business of bed rest.

Fenris was as near bursting with worry as she was with restlessness, she could see. It didn't help that her restlessness was only making him worry more, and he had never been particularly patient. So she sent him on errands for her, her eyes longingly following him out the door, her heart wishing to travel with him, if only to get out of this room. And till he returned, she fidgeted.

Friends came to visit her. Varric, every day, telling her his impossible stories: whether he talked of miracles the Inquisitor had wrought or of what Sera had said to Iron Bull in the tavern, it was all marvelously impossible. She craved more of his lies, but the dwarf had his own duties as a member of the Inquisition so his visits were shorter than Hawke would have liked.

The Inquisitor himself managed to drop by most days too, in between Inquisiting and wedding planning (according to him, the latter was by far the most demanding). Sometimes Josephine, when she was not herself occupied with wedding planning, came with him. Sometimes Josie alone came to engage Hawke in "girl talk" that Hawke had not realized how much she had missed, having seen little of her female friends in recent months, besides Merrill, whose talk tended to leave Hawke bewildered. Talking with Josephine - it was like having her baby sister back, sometimes, though Josie was worlds more practical than sweet Bethany had ever been, and knew none of the Hawke girls' inside jokes, or - well, nevertheless, the lady ambassador was sweet and empathetic, smart and kind, a welcome distraction, and becoming a fast friend. As was her fiance; Hawke could not help but like his cheerful interest in every person whose path crossed his, his boundless energy, his wit and charm mixed with the practicality of a born leader. Hawke realized, almost as an afterthought, that she was not just building a friendship with Thayer, but finding in him a leader she would not hesitate to follow. Even if he had once led her through the Fade.

Merrill came often, babbling in her good-natured curiosity, asking Hawke endless questions about her pregnancy, about being married, about magic, about the Inquisition, about human culture, about anything and everything that crossed the Dalish mage's mind. Hawke smiled and let her talk till Merrill would start apologizing for rambling, at which point Hawke would say, "Don't you even think of shutting up, Merrill. By the way, how's Carver?" and that never failed to make the elf brighten up and gush about her newfound love, which was a little creepy to his big sister but also excellent little-brother-blackmail material, so Hawke drank it all in patiently.

Carver himself even came to visit on occasion, looking so awkward that Lisbet felt right at home, but inevitably she would say something to offend him and he'd leave in a huff. He came back, though. Perhaps that was the definition of family, after all.

There were new friends as well. Dorian visited surprisingly often. He seemed more discomfited by the very visible extent of her pregnancy than anything, but he enjoyed discussing magic with her. This was made more awkward by the fact that Fenris rarely left her side when Dorian visited, and would sit there glowering at the Tevinter mage as if certain that Hawke was about to become a blood sacrifice at any moment, or worse, be flirted with; but as Dorian proved benign day after day and Lisbet grew to enjoy her discussions with him, even Fenris relaxed and showed the Tevinter a greater respect.

Cassandra visited, or tried to, but she seemed almost tongue-tied around the Champion, on whom once she had pinned so many hopes, and fascinated to the point of awkwardness by Hawke's advanced pregnancy. After a couple of stilted conversations, the embarrassed Seeker did not return to Hawke's bedside.

Others came and went, but ever when she least expected it, Cole would be there. Sometimes he came in by the door like anyone else; more often she would look round and there he was, so intent upon helping that sometimes it made her anxious just to see him, wondering what he thought was wrong with her now. But his compassion won her heart before long, and Lisbet welcomed his visits gently and warmly. It was a little disconcerting, however, when he started trying to translate the inchoate thoughts of her child in the womb.

So many friends looking after her; Hawke should have been well occupied - and yet, the hours alone in bed far outweighed the times when company came to distract her, and Hawke fidgeted. It didn't help that she was very, very pregnant and there was no such thing as comfortable anymore. Lying down was not comfortable. Sitting up in bed was not comfortable. Turning to her side was not comfortable, and she suspected if she ever managed to roll onto her belly, she would be stuck there. Getting up to relieve herself, with the aid of Fenris or the serving girl who came to check on her, was exceptionally not comfortable. Lisbet was a patient woman, but some of that patience was contingent on being able to do something, to work toward the ends she desired, and the lack of ways to exert herself during these weeks was fraying her patience to the breaking point.

Hawke's was not the only patience threatened by her enforced bed rest. Fenris was torn between fear and - well, annoyance. She could die, carrying his child, and he would protect her from any harm, with his own life if it would help, but there was little he could do to protect her from this. They could only wait, try to follow the midwife's orders, and hope for the best. Now and then, when she sent him to fetch whatever food she was craving lately, or to carry a message to someone, or just to get him out of the room before they drove each other crazy (he was well aware that she was doing so), he would slip into the small chapel near Skyhold's garden. He had no words to pray - he had never really learned any of the Chant, neither Tevinter's version nor Sebastian's - but he would stand there for a minute, just looking at the statue of Andraste, and remember that he had heard that the Bride of the Maker had been a mother herself. And after a minute he would fix upon the statue a glare more eloquent than all the words of the Chant itself, speaking of hopes and fears and Maker help me, if she doesn't deliver this child soon… Then, certain that no deity could afford to overlook such an ultimatum, he would spin on his barefoot heel and march off to finish his errand, and back to Hawke's side.

Her side was becoming a more difficult place to be, despite his depths of devotion. Literally so: at night she tossed and turned so, trying to position herself so that she could sleep, that many a night, Fenris, startled out of sleep himself, would slip out onto the balcony and sit, perched on the railing, staring at the stars.

Cole found him there one night and brought his moody thoughts up short. "She wants you to say she's pretty," the spirit announced, without preamble and with that air of one pleased to be of service.

Fenris gaped at him, unable to form a coherent response.

"Growing, swelling, can't move, must move, Maker I'm huge, why won't he look at me, do I look as awful as I feel? Never be pretty again, can't - "

"Cole," Fenris snapped, "has it ever occurred to you that some thoughts are private?"

Cole just stared at him.

"Never mind," Fenris said finally, turning away from the odd visitor to stare out at the garden. "Go away."

By the time Fenris glanced around again, the spirit was gone. He gave it a moment more, then slipped down from the railing and back into his chambers.

Hawke had, miraculously, gone to sleep, her eyes darting in dreams behind eyelids dark from the wakeful hours. Fenris hesitated to disturb her. Perhaps it was of its own accord, then, that his hand reached to brush the dark hair back from her face, that his lips brushed the faint freckles over her nose with a kiss -

She woke; her eyes, of that green even deeper than his, almost olive, that always looked full of shadow and mystery to him, blinked blearily as she focused on his face. "Fenris?" she mumbled his name, and he had never heard anything sweeter.

He sat on the bed beside her, kissing her lips now, cupping her cheek with one hand. Perhaps her cheek was rounder now, filling out with the weight she had gained or the water retained in bearing their child, but her lips were as soft and sweet as ever; her round, small ears still enchanted him; her eyes still made him catch his breath. So he said simply, truly, "I needed to tell you you're pretty."

She leaned on an elbow, regarding him. "You woke me to tell me I'm pretty?" Her tone went beyond disbelief to a sort of resigned I'm dreaming and this is the Fade, right? as she tried to make sense of the conversation.

"No," he corrected himself as a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. "That you are beautiful. In every way. You grow lovelier every day."

"I do nothing but grow, these days," she scoffed, but a smile began to grow too.

"Exactly," he said. "Lovelier." And then he proceeded to enumerate for her the charms of her beauty - from her eyes to her freckles and on down - to finally, "Loveliest of all," and he kissed her swollen abdomen, making her giggle.

"Sweet talker," she sighed, and a tension seemed to have drained out of her as he talked. Weariness overcame her then, eyelids drooping till he could no longer see the mystery of her eyes. Fenris gathered her in his arms, resting his hand over hers on her belly, and they slept the rest of the night through without disruption.