When he pulled her back up with a mean glare, Hawke broke off the dance and bowed to him knightly, then stuck her tongue out. And once again, she was lost in the crowd.

Fenris went, as any sane person would, through the entire list of curse words in his mother tongue, and even borrowed some from the foreigners. But before he succumbed to what he could only describe as sheer, implacable rage, he steadied himself and breathed in. Out. In. Out. In. Out.

O… kay. Time to check on Varric. The door to the Gardens was still unlocked.

Outside came Varric's incredibly reckless laughter, accompanied by a few dogs howling in the street. He followed the sound and eventually found the stolen caravan, on top of which sat a very happy Varric. Next to him sat an Orlesian young man with a mask pulled up above his eyebrows, drinking from the same brandy.

"He-hey, elf, come up and join us!"

"Who is this person?"

"Olimpe. My co-conspirator, of course."

"I thought I was your co-conspirator."

"Okay, this is may be awkward… but I do see other people."

"Who's your friend, Vahhric?" Olimpe said happily.

"Unimportant," Fenris said. He felt the words dying to come out—'Hawke's back!'—but seeing him so jolly and content, he decided not to. Plus, she had had one opportunity too many to hide behind borrowed mansions, letters and fancy masks instead of facing them head on. Varric deserved a good tail-between-her-legs Hawke after this last stunt. "Shouldn't you… scatter? Like right now?"

"Yes, that would be the wisest way of doing things," Varric said with blank eyes.

"But we're having too much fun!" Olimpe added.

"I'm the king of the world!" the dwarf shouted, raising his Antivan brandy.

"Stop shouting. You'll alert the Guards!" Fenris said.

"Right, right. I'm the king of the world!" Varric whispered.

"I suggest you come down and we leave for your own safety, milord."

"Nonsense."

"Can you do something?" Fenris asked the Orlesian guy.

"Hey, Vahhricose Veins."

"Hey, O'limpy-dingly-ding."

"Monsieur Unimportant thinks we should act like real, self-respecting rogues and get off the merchandise."

Varric inhaled, and pointed at the boy. "King's nose-picker! I hereby appoint you nose-picker to the King!" He broke into laughter.

Fenris face-palmed himself. "I knew I shouldn't have left you unsupervised."

"I am supervising him just fine, monsieur Unimportant," Olimpe said.

"What's taking so long, royal nose-picker?!" Varric half-shouted.

"Sorry, sorry, my King, this queen had a bit of a booger," Olimpe apologised, smirking at Fenris.

Varric laid down on the roof laughing. This really wasn't the time for… news.

"I wonder who scares you more—the Viscount or Aveline," Fenris said, crossing his arms.

"There is no question there—Aveline," Varric said.

"You need to move the caravan," Fenris said.

"Alright, fine."

So Fenris helped two drunken rogues steal a caravan in the night. Take it all the way down to the Foundry District. It was a miracle it didn't run over Varric, who, like a broken clock was right twice a day, became strangely determined to lead from the front.

"Nous l'avons fait, mes amis!" Olimpe said gleefully as they pulled it in. "What do you say we go and celebrate?"

"Nova what?" Varric said, confused.

"We did it!" Olimpe translated energetically, taking Fenris by the shoulder.

Ser Unimportant introduced himself proper by his death glare, which made the guy's hand tremble.

"You did it? Did you know that's what you were doing when you were doing it?" Varric asked with concern.

Olimpe broke into laughter. "Oh, no, we haven't done that." The elf took away his hand like it was made out of syphilis. "And it seems we're never going to."

"There's a brain marinating in that brandy after all," Fenris said in patronising tones of tiredness. "I'm leaving now."

"No, elf! Stay! Come on, don't be a party pooper!" Varric said pleadingly.

The dwarf seemed miserable deep down and he needed this. This kind of silly adventure would have taken the cake with Hawke. She'd climb up on the carriage and jokingly express her concern. Varric would, through no deception of his own, mistakenly assure her he had this, while in reality, she would have taken care of it. And as much as Olimpe seemed like a buffoon, he was no Hawke. He was a rebound clown. But he could have this night.

Plus, Fenris was a little mad at him. He had basically abandoned them in their post for a petty personal thing and then fucked off drinking.

"I'm going to check on the others, and then I'm going home."

"They're fine. The most exciting thing at that ball was us stealing some booze."

He was wrong.

"Have fun."

He went back, no matter how many times Varric shouted after him. He relieved Anders and Merrill. She thanked him for his help that night, while the rebel mage remained begrudgingly polite. He found Isabela in the barracks with an oil bottle and no trousers on, going from one bedroom to another. She just put her finger to her lips and joined whoever was waiting for her. Then he debriefed with Aveline and let her know the latest gossip. He went around the ballroom one last time to check if Hawke was there, but she was gone.

Evening, Fenris's Mansion

Fenris went by the Hawke estate and, judging by the brief conversation he had with Bodahn, it didn't seem like she had come back yet. He told him not to let Leandra know he came by, who was entertaining away in the main hall. On the stairs up to his mansion, it started to dawn on him the night might not be over.

And there she was, on the ivy column bench, as if she was witnessing the ghost of their argument an eternity ago. When he took out his pathetic little heart shard and stabbed her again and again. He wondered if she knew his words came out of hurt, and shared no address with rationality. In fact, rationality was as homeless as he used to be. But this was not the time to feel guilty. It was time for her to feel guilty.

"If this is no dream, the Maker has a poor sense of humour," Fenris said, stopping near her bench.

"You need better dreams," Hawke said, pushing her mask above her forehead and letting her hair down. "But look at you—" She whistled. "I've had dreams like that."

"And in those dreams, do you get punched in the teeth?" he said calmly, crossing his arms.

"Whoa, what is it with you and this courtyard?" she said, grinning and braiding her hair. "So much negative energy here."

"Think back on the common denominator. I'll wait." His risen eyebrow could cut through glass.

Hawke worked on her second braid and thought about it. "There was a full moon!" she said childishly, pointing at the night sky. Her shoulders sank in mock pity as she crossed her legs and held onto the bench. "Oof, is that it? Feeling a little lunar?"

"I feel like I'm talking to a lunatic," Fenris said in an ill-humoured tone.

"A perfect match!" Hawke offered with a toothy smile. She messed up the top of her hair so that the shorter strands came out all over. She had finished transforming into her old self. They did match, in a way. They were both all kinds of black and red, some even more on the inside than others. "I mean why are we even doing this little dance? We should just start picking flower arrangements."

Fenris walked over to her and, bending over at the waist, shoved his death glare into her face. "Let's just skip to the end and pick out a coffin," he said. It was the quiet tone of a man nearing the end of his wits.

"Oh, please," Hawke said, gently slapping him away. "Just cremate me, bake me into a little pie and drop me off at Meredith's."

"Oh, Hawke…" Fenris said as he shook his head, his tone reserved for professional sadists. "Nothing would make me happier than to turn you into dust and make you into a pastry."

There was a silence as she casually fanned herself. "Ooh, say that again, but slower," she said.

"Is that all you have after six months? Childish jokes and seriously questionable fantasies?" he said angrily, judgementally. He straightened himself.

"Well, when you put it like that, it just sounds bad," she said as she looked up at him, resting her hands on her open knees.

"Goodnight, Hawke," he said, and went to his door.

"Now, now, I realise you want a story, and possibly an apology—"

"Oh! Oh, you realise." He couldn't unlock his door. His hand was trembling too much.

She came by his door, leaning on the wall. "I'm sorry. It's a long story. The kind that goes well with wine?"

He inhaled his violent outburst, his nostrils flaring as his head slowly turned to her.

"My wine," she said calmly, innocently, tapping on her bag.

He finally opened the door and let it fling back into her face.

"Whoa, so rude," she said, closing the door behind her.

"I'm rude?" he said, turning back and walking into her face.

"Seriously, what's with all this close eye contact? Am I missing some sort of signal?"

"The signal is me, and the message is start fucking talking."

"What don't you understand, dear boy?" She dropped her bag, bottles clinking, and pointed with both fingers at her face. "I need alcohol. In. My. Mouth."

"Fine," he said, grabbing the bag.

"Why were you at the ball anyway? Did Varric steal your demon eyeball and held it up for ransom?"

"None of your business."

"Oh, come on."

"Fine… Aveline hired us to help the Guard. And we kept an eye out for your mother."

Her face changed, warmed up in a dumb expression. "You were looking after my mother?"

"Well, what do you think I've been doing all this time?"

"No, I—" She paused and smiled. "Thank you so much."

"Don't thank me. Thank your godless universe that she has kept her sanity in that giant house all alone. And that she kept believing you would come back."

She frowned. "Of course I was coming back."

"You stopped sending letters."

"Again. Crushed fermented grapes. In my oral cavity. Floods of it!" she said, pointing at her mouth as they were coming to the top of the stairs. "And, you know, I understand Aveline or Varric to be this angry, but why are you acting like I killed your puppy?"

"Oh, piss off," he said angrily, walking faster to his bedroom door with her bag.

"So, you're just going to leave me wineless?" she shouted after him.

"I learned from the best!" he said, holding the door. "Here's a demonstration!"

A counterforce kept the door from shutting. "Oh, no you won't! You will hear me out and I will have my wine!"

"No!" he said, pushing himself into the door.

"You're acting… ungh… like a child!" she said, counter-pushing.

High-pitched Tevinter laughter echoed through the empty mansion.

"Fine, punish me! We have all night!"

Fenris's eyebrows came up, and then down in an evil grin. What an excellent idea. He removed himself from the door's way, and in a split second, Hawke came in flying to the floor.

"Well, I guess I deserved that," her grumpy voice came muffled as she face-kissed the floor.

"Indeed," he said, crossing his arms.

"Ow, ow, ouch, ow—" Hawke half-picked herself up and remained there awkwardly on one knee, looking up at him. "Wow, I don't know what to say. I've been dreaming about this day since I was a little girl."

"Aww, poor little girl. So desperate and alone she'd tie down the whacky Tevinter fugitive next door," Fenris said mockingly.

"Well, now that you mention it—" she said, her face becoming playfully preoccupied with a certain image.

"The only rope in this house goes into my harpoons, thank you very much."

"Maker, do you even have a personality?"

Fenris couldn't remember his life and he had just escaped slavery. He didn't have a personality, per se; he just had a carefully annotated list of things he hated. But that didn't stop him.

"Hold on…" he said nonchalantly, searching his breast pocket. He took out the rose from before, and put it in her hands as she kneeled.

"Funny," she said grumpily. He was a funny guy.

Then he opened one of her wine bottles for himself. "Start talking."

"But I need that to—"

"Talk," he said meanly.

Hawke sighed and tried to get up, but no, that was wrong too.

"Sit," he said sharply. "And talk."

Sadistic was his second personality trait. Hawke wondered if he was playing dumb. But no, he didn't seem to register, didn't seem to have one kinky bone in his body. Not one he was aware of, anyway.

As for Fenris, he may have not understood what he was doing, but he was definitely enjoying it. Watching her stuck and finally compliant was a divine image as her resentful rosy lips unveiled her teeth. He wanted to break her suddenly, smash her into little pieces. Like a tough magic vase that could pull itself back together with an even finer glaze.

"Alright," she said defeatedly, feeling like she walked into the weirdest scene. "So, I went to look for Carver, and after a long, long time, I found him. Well, I found the fortress. Stroud and Carver were away. So, I spent a delightful couple of weeks in the Wardens' prison. They came down for me… eventually. Stroud was not happy."

She looked up at him as if to ask if that was enough, but Warden Fenris dangled the bottle impatiently. She almost broke the neck of the rose.

"Carver was a little happier to see me, and genuinely surprised. The arse. Anyway, they gave me a light Warden armour and made me pinky-swear to keep their secrets. Then as I was going back, I started feeling followed. Funny thing—when you're bounty hunting, you run into a lot of other bounty hunters. Tevinter bounty hunters."

Fenris's sexual enlightenment had to wait. He frowned and gave her the wine bottle. "Is that why you stopped sending letters?"

"Yep," she said, drinking.

He looked down. "Why did they follow you?"

"They were at a market in Starkhaven, holding out a drawing of you. I was nearby. I guess they saw something on my face and decided to follow me."

"So, you led them on a wild goose chase."

"Oh, and how."

He felt bad now. His anger misplaced, his guilt resurfacing. She was whining on the floor.

"Can I stand up now? My leg is asleep."

"Go ahead," he said. He sat on the foot of the bed, full of thoughts.

"May I sit?" she said meanly.

He offered her a seat next to him.

"Oh, nice bed," she said childishly, making waves in the mattress with her bottom.

"Hawke," he said firmly, wobbling.

"Right, so I went in the other direction, spread rumours you were in Tantervale. They caught me before I could flee, but as luck would have it, a separate squad came. They ambushed us, they killed each other, and I died on the floor laughing."

"You are such a lunatic," Fenris said, chuckling and shaking his head. For all her instability, Hawke was such a spit in a slaver's face. He seriously wondered if she would just set fire to Minrathous if he took her there as a last offensive.

She went to her bag and fished out one long black metal feather. "This yours?" she said.

"Yes," he said, frowning. She gave it to him and he studied it pensively. They belonged to the calves of his trousers once, and they were very useful for kicking. But they became more of a liability when running, so as soon as one cracked, he cracked them all away. "Thank you," he said, putting it on a shelf next to his demon eyeball.

"Ah, I should have started with that. Could have saved myself the carpet burn."

Fenris laughed. "And rob me of the joy to see you make an arse out of yourself?"

"Pleasure in the small things. Of course…" she said, nodding. "I guess I deserved it."

"You had some noble reasons, I suppose," he said, sitting back down.

"Well, it wasn't like I was gonna let them follow me to Kirkwall, right? After all the trouble I went through to tolerate you," she said, bumping her elbow into his. "Ah, shit, I forgot again. It's been a while. Sorry."

"It's… fine. I have layers."

"Ah, lucky me." She looked down, looked sad. "I just couldn't let it be. I couldn't stand and wait for a letter that may never come. Mum didn't even have the strength to be mad at me this time. She just went… catatonic. It scared me. I couldn't sleep, couldn't eat, couldn't think. I had to do something."

He watched her face and became enveloped by the sudden realisation that Hawke's heart was completely and ineradicably tied to her family no matter what sour knives were stuck inside their veins. He couldn't conceive of family, love or duty, but he could see it now in her face.

Then his brooding got interrupted as he felt Hawke in his peripheral vision going at him, wrapping her arms around him.

"Thank you for taking care of her, Fenris," she said, her head on his shoulder.

This was not a dream. He was almost certain. He thought he would look crazy to hit himself right now and check. And it didn't help that he could smell that pink shampoo of hers in her hair right under him. Venhedis.

"I—" he stuttered. "It was—" He swallowed heavily, feeling the tension building up inside him, his heart throbbing in his chest. "Don't mention it."

Hawke took out the rose from her pocket and looked for a book. She pressed it inside and put the book on his memorabilia shelf. "To remember… whatever that was."

Fenris chuckled approvingly.

"So, I guess I should leave now," she said, putting her hands in her pockets. "Break away slowly while I'm still alive and well."

"As if I'd actually hurt you," Fenris said, crossing his arms.

"Oh, you might," Hawke said, imagining things beyond the veil of her blank face.

"I wouldn't suggest going to your mother now. She has guests."

"Great."

"You can't go to Varric either. He is… not inside this dimension at the moment."

"Right…" She danced a little thinking dance. "I could go haunt Merrill's house, pretend I'm a ghost and scare her."

"You don't want to do that. She's had enough upset for one night."

"Oh, what happened?" she said, sitting back down next to him.

Fenris cracked his neck. "Racism happened."

"Oh, right, of course…" Hawke looked at him. "And you?"

"Oh, I'm fine. I got to hurt a lot of feelings today."

"Humans' feelings or Merrill's feelings?"

"Humans' feelings," he said, all titillated. He thought about it. "I actually had a civil conversation with her today. And with Anders."

"Wow, I should skip town more often."

"A lot has happened since you've been gone."

"Tell me!"

"Well…" he said, leaning back on his hands. "Varric imprisoned himself in his office. Aveline did the same. I had to drag both of them out. They were becoming pastier and paler than you did out of the Deep Roads."

"Aww, look at you making friends."

"Varric put me in the tank position—"

Hawke snorted a battalion of little snorts and couldn't stop.

He smirked at her meanly and went on, "And I was stuck with Anders and Merrill on the job for ages."

"Where did Isabela go?"

"Oh, she preferred to sit back and hit on me after hours."

"Oh," she said, some sort of thought forming on her expressionless face. He wasn't sure what the thought was, but it looked cold, and possibly violent. "What'd you do about it?"

"I filed a sexual harassment complaint with Varric," he said, smirking arrogantly.

Hawke broke into laughter. "You did not!"

"I absolutely did. Ask Aveline. She gave me the idea."

"What a dynamic duo." She looked down, thinking and smiling. "You're making yourself a little home here, aren't you?"

"I'm trying," he said, smiling a little.

She mirrored it with a kind of warmth. "So… since I can't go anywhere right now… can I stay here?"

"How poetic," he said, thinking. "Yes, you can stay."

"Good," she said, all sprightly. "'Cause I already left my pack in the other bedroom hours ago."

Fenris chuckled, shaking his head. "Why am I not surprised?"

"Juuust thinking ahead."

Night time, Fenris's Mansion

After they put on something more comfortable, they followed their insomnia trail and stayed up talking. Hawke went on about her adventures as he listened with entertainment. Her face got back that genuine radiance and the steady vitality of her smile.

Then he went on about the things he did while she was gone—about his misadventures with socialising, his partnership with Aveline and Varric, his locking horns with Hubert and virtually every other person he met, Varric's failed and foolish attempts to set him up with someone, his conversations with the Arishok, and his recent self-appointed mission to seek enlightenment.

She, in turn, studied him as he spoke. Ever the impassive face, but on occasion, the composure cracked into a smile or a laugh. His face made adorable laugh wrinkles. The fireplace shone on them, but he didn't need it to flatter him.

She suspected he had felt like the shell in him was broken countless times since she left. Yet he looked tense and rigid no matter what he wore. She remembered how he'd told her before she left that he couldn't feel the Sun. She wondered if that was the same for clothes and other material things (his mansion looked as decrepit as she'd left it). That he could feel no warmth from anything, no lasting warmth, and that his loneliness was worse than her guilt, that he felt damned. She thought how utterly difficult it must have been for him to live in a strange land, away from the only world he'd known, with nothing that bothered to love or damn him.

"I really hope Carver finds his new fate meaningful," Hawke said quietly. "He still blames me, you know. And I'm fine with that. Add it to the never-ending list. But I hope he finds purpose there. He always wanted to find one away from my shadow."

Fenris wondered if, through some twisted logic, she was jealous that it wasn't her who got the taint. "Do you wish it had been you?" he asked bluntly.

She grimaced hard and shook her head as she sat in an inexplicable position on the armchair. "Fighting darkspawn? Too easy."

"Too easy? We barely made it out of the Deep Roads!"

"That's not what I meant." She tried to find the right words. "I mean, as an enemy, they're too easy to identify. There's no need for recognition, for thinking. You just know they're bad. They're the curse of the evil magisters. But they came from those people, their other crimes forgotten. I don't want to forget their other crimes. I don't want to forget about the ordinary person and the seemingly innocent person and their deceptive ways of hurting others. I don't want to be apolitical. I don't know… if the Maker really exists, he's a fucking idiot for sending those darkspawn!"

Fenris laughed softly. "Not even a day back and you're already blaspheming all over the place. What if he exists and he hears you now?"

"I don't care for a Maker who hurts easily and demands worship. If he made me, he knew I'd question him. If he damns me for it, I go knowing I didn't construct a lie to make myself believe, when really it was out of fear that I believed. I don't think that's true faith."

"You have a point…" He looked down, thinking. "But have you ever tried to know him in your heart?"

"Is that what you're trying to do?" she said, smirking. "Maybe he'll respond. Maybe he'll heal your wounds."

"It can't hurt to try."

"I've tried to know him in my heart… but every time I do, I just know more about myself. I feel peace, and quiet, and compassion for myself, and it's coming from me. A part of me. Maybe my true self. I feel warmth coming from her." She let her head fall back past the chair arm and put her legs over the other. "I don't know. To try to know the Maker…" She put two fingers against her forehead. "I feel it's a sin of pride or a failure of imagination. But all of us know suffering. I know sickness, hunger, loss and death. I try to lessen these things. It's the bulwark of my faith. I don't do it for the Maker. I do it for me, for… just for people."

"Just any people?" he said flatly.

She raised her arms in the air as her braids fell back on the side of the armchair. "Hey, I don't need to know you from Andraste. Everyone's got a heart. Doesn't matter if you pee differently, or how much pigment's in your skin, or what shape your ears are, or how connected you are to the Fade. A heart's a heart!"

Maybe it was the wine, maybe it was a dream. But it was very pleasant merely to look at her, how she spoke. Her face was strong and expressive and quite pretty. He sensed a tender brooding sensuality in her when she put the jokes to bed. Pretty was a purely physical concept, but beauty was rooted in the soul, and soul she had in abundance.

The fire was dying and they were soon to be enveloped in total darkness. He felt the urge to find her in the dark, reach for her hand. He was drunk enough that he actually did it.

"We can do this the hard way, or we can do this the easy way," she said, extending her hand too so their fingers reached each other.

He felt a pounding drum in his chest, not at all the peace in the dark he had hoped for. What the hell? "The easy way?" he said.

"Boom!" she shouted, as the fireplace became alight with a roaring flame.

"Ah, of course," he said, cheek in hand. Perhaps too much time had passed, and she wasn't the hand-holding type anymore. "Explain this to me again," he said, intertwining his hands between his knees. "You said you had to re-train your powers so you wouldn't misuse them if you were forced to."

"So I did. What of it?" she said, putting herself upside down so that her legs were over the top of the armchair.

"Do you hate it?" he said softly.

She snickered to herself, but her tone became soft, fragile. It made him afraid.

"I used to think once that there was no place for people like me on this earth," she said. "Perhaps there was once, before Andraste, but that was a terrible world. The fact that Tevinter still exists is no justification." Her tone became bitter as she gestured in the firelight. "Hunters drove wolves from the world. One day, it will happen the same with mages."

Fenris raised an eyebrow, hearing how she said those words so unaffected. "You believe it is natural that one day you will all be annihilated?"

"Nothing about our world is natural, Fenris." Her upside-down eyes became sad as she looked into the fire. "Perhaps we won't even get to that day. Perhaps we will just die of despair." Her eyes became the empty eyes he knew so well. "We will just die of despair as the worldwide collective burden of our conscience will scream 'I've had enough!'. I mean, it's happening already… it's just a slow burn."

"What do you mean?"

"What do you think?" Hawke said. It was the world's most tired smile. "The Circle's highest death toll is not by Templars, it's not even by Tranquility…" She looked back into the fireplace. "It's by suicide."

He didn't have words for that. He had nothing.

"The truth is annihilation is coming, one way or another," she said pensively. "We will just vanish from the world very slowly, and without a sound."

A pit opened up in his stomach. Her voice was the saddest sound in the world. He wouldn't get off this empathy carousel so easily.

"But I can't bear it!" Hawke said, coming up in her seat in a lotus position. "I can't bear to be quiet and be nothing, and-and wait for death! Can't bear to see the world go on without me, have love and families and meaningful moments, while I can't be part of it! Because I'm ultimately unnatural. Because this world is unnatural and people fear it. And why wouldn't they? The tainted writing is on the wall…"

She seemed full of sadness at the thought. As if the past would one day wipe the present away, like a tidal wave approaching. And he still couldn't speak. The stars just aligned him into a cosmic frown, and he was stuck in melancholy reflection of himself. His unnaturalness, his amnesia, his belonging to nothing, nowhere and no one. He felt the black hole in his stomach about to swallow him whole.

What she saw was different. She saw a shadow of a pain come over his face. There was something moving in him, trying to get out. There was tenderness in his face. Tenderness curled up into a terrible pain. Maybe worse. A love aborted and smothered. She caught his eyes and, in a fraction of a second, whatever turmoil was moving inside him, it washed away. Like the last rays of the evening sun leaving the world in darkness with no goodbye. Whatever was there, it was willed back into darkness unexplored, never meant to be shared, seen or confronted.

"But to answer your original question… I do hate it," Hawke said. "But I don't hate myself. You see the contradiction? I've never hated myself," she said, falling back over the chair arm.

"How come?" he said, contained.

She took some time to answer, as she stared into the fire. "In a way, you could say my greatest sin is that I have a wonderful time being myself. My guilt is always there, my moral abhorrence for myself is always there, but I have a good time. As long as I can get through the day without the red half-light terror of running out of mana, I feel normal. I've always insisted that I deserve the right to try and feel normal."

"But you always have that terror, that doubt. Your small mana pool doesn't go away."

"No, it doesn't… I've tried everything," she said pensively, putting an arm over her forehead. "You see, that's the core of the dilemma for me—how can I enjoy living in a body that can easily corrupt me? If it's not blood, it's demons. It's so easy to find the justification."

He remembered his speech to her in the courtyard when they met. She knew full well what he was talking about. She just didn't need the lecture from some ungrateful stranger.

"How can I enjoy being me, if I can become terrible and horrible in the blink of an eye? Ah, it's an old story," she said bitterly. "Soldiers work it out when they go to war. They tell themselves there is a cause. Then they experience the thrill of blood, of having that power, that the earth is under their command, like they are beasts. And beasts know it. The wolves know it." Fenris swallowed heavily as she said that. "They know the sheer thrill of tearing something alive into pieces. I knew it. And it horrified me."

"I know that feeling," he said. A fearful readiness, like an electrical charge, raising the hairs on the skin. A cold creeping up the spine, reaching its tentacles up the neck, toward the back of the head. Maybe that's why his soul was so sick, his chest felt so hollow. Maybe he did an awful thing and he couldn't even bring himself to acknowledge it. Or worse. He couldn't remember it.

"I know," she said, a ghost of a bitter smile. "Broken people are dangerous. Dangerous as any other, but what makes them more dangerous is that they know they can survive."

He was mystified by her honesty. But she was regretting it now. She came up from her chair and let herself fall back on his bed, covering her face. "Urghhh. I'm sorry. This is why I don't talk about this. I just… end up depressing everyone!"

"Nice try. You'll have to try harder than that," he said, smirking. It was hard to believe there was anything beyond the bedrock of suffering he had already reached long ago. But he knew it wasn't the whole truth. She got to him. She opened up that black hole. And it scared him.

"Come, lie down," she said. "Just lie beside me, at a distance. I'm not gonna try anything. Principles aside, I'm too tired."

Fenris came up from his armchair, smiling a little. "You mean everything you say, don't you?"

"Most of the time."

He laughed softly. "You realise you are like a child, don't you?"

"I have the great simplicity of one," she said confidently, dream-like. "So, bed?"

"I have a better idea."