When Vesper Hawke barrelled through the door of Isabela's room after her, the pirate remained stiff and still in the center of the room, refusing to turn and face her. The tautness of her muscles was evident in the light of the fire on the hearth. It was clear in every line of her body how much she wanted to run, but Hawke was very intentionally blocking the only exit. She would not let Isabela get away this time. Not after three years without hearing so much as a whisper of her fate.
Isabela kept her back stubbornly to the door. "Usually when a girl walks away, it means the conversation is over," she drawled—or, she tried to, but Hawke still knew her well enough to pick up on the waver beneath her words.
It outraged her. Bela didn't get to be flippant now. She didn't get to push Hawke out now, when she'd left her in the dark for three years—after Hawke had risked her life for her. The mage squared her shoulders so she filled the doorway, balling her fists. Even if Isabela wouldn't look at her, she knew she could feel the intensity of her presence. "We're really not going to talk about this?" she demanded, voice cracking like a whip.
Isabela crossed her arms and seemed to fold in on herself. "What is there to talk about?"
"Really? Are you asking me that?" Hawke barely kept her voice beneath a shout. Once, she might have felt sympathy at the sight of the pirate so alone; so small, but that time felt long past. "How about how Kirkwall was attacked; innocent people killed, because you were too selfish to give up your precious relic in time? Or how I dueled the bloody Arishok—how I got this—" She wrenched up the edge of her tunic to bare the long sword scar down her sternum. "—for you, and you repaid me by disappearing for three years? Could we talk about that, maybe?"
Bela turned her head just enough to run her gaze over the scar and wince. "Hawke, please," she protested weakly, but Hawke doubted that even she knew what she was asking for.
"I thought we had something," she said like an accusation. "I thought I could trust you."
Isabela scoffed and it sounded awfully close to a sob. "Didn't everybody tell you that was a terrible idea?"
"Your decisions are your own, Isabela!" Hawke tried valiantly to rein in her rising emotions, but control was slipping through her fingers. Everything was hitting her too hard; happening too fast. She could feel her hands shaking as anger morphed suddenly and unexpectedly into sorrow. She felt like she was going through the stages of grief in reverse—she'd already gone through them the right way, and now her heart was all mixed up. "I had faith in you," she hardly more than whispered. "I let you have the bloody relic and I defended you because I—I…loved you."
Isabela flinched. "That was a terrible idea, too."
"I guess you're right," the mage admitted hollowly. Those words hung in the air; made it suffocating, for a long pause. Isabela said nothing, and that just made Hawke's despair deepen. What had she hoped to accomplish by confronting the pirate, again? Hadn't she known that it would end up this way? The way it always did?
The truth was, she'd hoped. She'd hoped that maybe Isabela had changed. Maybe she'd come to her senses. Maybe she'd realized how much destruction she'd left in her wake and decided to fix it.
It was a foolish hope.
"Don't you have anything to say for yourself?"
"What is there to say?" Isabela's facade finally broke completely, and she whirled to face Hawke with anguish in her eyes. "I'm sorry, all right? I returned the relic thinking that would fix everything, but it just made things worse. And then you—" She broke off, amber gaze flicking down to Hawke's torso, where the scar from the Arishok now hid beneath her tunic. "You…" Slow and painful as if her joints were made of stone, the pirate took a creaky step toward Hawke, then another. The mage could virtually feel the distance narrowing between them like a physical buzz in her skin. This was the closest they'd come in three years. Would it…feel the same? After everything?
She watched Isabela's lips part in anticipation—trepidation?—as she grew close enough to reach out for Hawke and feel the heat coming off her skin. A heavy pause was the last thing that stood between them before the pirate's unsteady fingers contacted Hawke's body and a shuddering sigh left both of them. Long copper fingers traced the length of the scar through her tunic. "You saved me," she finally said softly, roughly. She didn't meet Hawke's eyes. "I couldn't handle it. I couldn't face you after that. I didn't know what to do."
Hawke shook her head, at a loss. "So you just left? For three years?"
"Yes! Don't you get it? That's what I do. I run." Isabela took back her hand and dropped her gaze to the floor in the closest thing to shame Hawke had ever seen. "Everyone is right, Hawke, and they always have been. I'm not like you." She chuckled mirthlessly. "All I am is a lying, thieving snake."
"You don't have to be," Hawke protested. She almost reached for Bela's hand but restrained herself. "You're just afraid of being anything else."
The pirate sighed sharply and turned away in frustration. "I don't know how to be anything else!"
"That's not true." Hawke stepped after her as she retreated, voice softening, eyes intense. "You came back, didn't you?" She had to make the pirate see. Good or bad wasn't something you were, it was something you chose. And she so wanted Isabela to choose correctly, for once. She—she wanted Isabela, she realized. Even now. Even through the knot of pain and remorse and resentment that had been twisting itself tighter and tighter inside her for three years. She saw more in her than even Isabela did. They could—they could still fix things. Hawke could forgive her. If only she would forgive herself.
"For all the good that did," Isabela quipped regretfully.
"You have a good heart, Isabela. You just have to learn to trust it," Hawke pressed. Finally, tired of watching the pirate look everywhere but at her, she dared raise her hand to cup her chin. Three years without feeling her skin—and it felt just like she remembered. Except now, Isabela tried to pull away, halfheartedly. Hawke didn't let her. "Trust it more than your fears."
One of those graceful copper hands came up to clutch the mage's wrist, squeezing, torn between pushing her away and holding her close. "I can't, Hawke." The pirate looked more upset than Hawke had ever seen her, her usual smooth bravado burned to ash.
"Let me help you," Hawke breathed,
"Why?" Isabela demanded brokenly. "Why are you here? Why do you still care?" It sounded like a rebuke, but at the same time she leaned into Hawke's touch, as if she were fighting with herself as much as with the mage.
"I care about you, Bela. That won't change in three years or a hundred," Hawke said with certainty. She stepped closer and let her brow rest against Isabela's and it felt like her insides were imploding with all the emotion that crushed her at once. Of course she was still angry, but at the same time, now that she was this close to her old companion it felt like the past three years had been as insubstantial as a blink.
"Bleeding heart," Isabela accused her with an echo of her old teasing tone, even as she closed her eyes and melted into the contact. There was a beat of silence, and then she stiffened, eyes flying open again. "Oh. Sorry." She winced and laid one hand on Hawke's scar in apology.
"I'd do it again, you know," Hawke said instead of accepting the apology. She watched Isabela's amber gaze from inches away, holding it fast with her own. "Even if I knew it would turn out like this."
Isabela sighed in something like defeat. "You're too good for me, Hawke."
"No." Hawke smiled thinly, tilting her head slightly so their lips would align, if…if that was still on the table. Maker, she wanted this woman. Still. More than before. Different than before. "I'd say I'm just good enough."
The pirate's eyes flickered down uncertainly, for once. "You still want to…?"
"I want to try again," Hawke affirmed, her hands falling to Isabela's hips in preparation to pull her in, but she forced herself to be patient; considerate. "I mean, if you—"
"Yes." It was out of Isabela's mouth too fast, too eager, and followed by a hard, sudden kiss. Just as abruptly she broke away, clearing her throat. It didn't do anything to steady her voice when she said again in an attempt at composure, "Yes." She let her own smile flicker to life, almost hesitant. Like she couldn't be sure Hawke was serious. Like she couldn't be sure she deserved this. Like maybe…maybe she'd missed this too. "…my champion," she added at a whisper—teasing, but not really.
Hawke grinned and leaned in to kiss her again.
It was imperfect—just like everything they'd ever done, and everything they would ever do—but it was a start.
…