He'd known to expect the daggers from her letters —the warden commander had insisted mages spend part of their day at weapons training with the rest of the recruits in preparation for the day when her magics might fail her— but he hadn't thought to expect the calluses. The way they bumped and dragged the most delicious friction down his skin, the slightest touch wringing shivering exhales from his mouth like prayers.
His hand had come up to grip her hips quite of their own volition, pulling her snug against the hard length of him. He had to bite back a groan when she twisted to press a kiss to his temple, a movement that rubbed her against him in a way he found very interesting, and very very frustrating. Bethany was still fully clothed, and it was driving him mad. That, and the sweet scrape of her nails against his scalp when she drew him in for another kiss, all teeth and tongue and hunger. The press of her arms twining about him, pulling him close, her lips, the taste of her, he couldn't get enough. He kept going back for more until he was sure he'd pulled all her air into his lungs, breathed it back, again and again until his head swam for her.
She was breathless when they finally pulled apart. Her cheeks were flushed all the way to her ears but she was smiling that smug little curl of a smile that could usually made him forget all about being mad at her but right now it was only making him harder, more desperate to crush her to him, to feel the sweet warmth of her against his fingers, his mouth, his cock. He groaned against her hair, open-mouthed. His erection was almost painful now, growing harder with every insistent roll of her hips.
He squeezed his eyes shut. Tried for words. Bethany ground down against him with a suddenness that made him swear, eyes shooting open, narrowing in mock anger when she just smiled and rolled her shoulders in that way she had when she knew she'd pulled something over on him. He bucked against her in retaliation. Her head lolled back on her neck he watched the long line of her throat bob when she whimpered, and it was just the prettiest damn thing he'd ever laid eyes on. He had to do it again. So he did, and seized the opportunity to talk while she was distracted. "Bethany," he tried again, mouthing it against the shadow of her throat where he knew a bite would make her squirm. It did, and he allowed himself that small moment of satisfaction before he made himself pull back.
"Bethany, I think," he said, nibbling a line across the sensitive skin beneath her chin, "you're wearing far too many clothes."
"Oh?" Her voice was a laugh caught in the back of her throat, thin and high and reedy. He dug his teeth in. She made the most delicious sound, so he did it again.
"Yes."
"Then I suppose you'd better do something about it," she said archly, giving that same slow roll of her hips that made his mouth go dry and his thoughts scatter until he could barely remember his own name, let alone what he'd been doing. Clothes. Right.
Piece by piece, he bared her before his gaze. The gloves first, finger by finger, kissing every inch of skin as it was exposed, paying particular attention to the pulse point in her wrist. He bit, lightly, smiling against her skin when she made the most delicious noise, legs tightening round his hips.
Then her breasts. He ran his hands over them lightly, then more firmly, weighing them, squeezing them, marveling again, as he had the first time, as he did every time, at his sister's beauty, at whatever incredible good deeds he must have done in another life that he was permitted to touch her, touch these.
They weren't perfect. One was slightly larger than the other, and they were both crisscrossed with pale scars and paler stripes where the skin had stretched as she'd grown, but they were all he'd ever desired.
He ran his thumb lightly over a nipple, rubbing circles that elicited small sighs. His heart leaped in his throat at every noise of pleasure that fell from Bethany's mouth, thudding in his ears until he was sure she could hear it, but she just leaned back within the circle of his arms, looking down at him through eyes gone half lidded with pleasure as he brought his mouth down to her left breast. He pressed a soft kiss to her nipple. It could almost be called chaste, if he hadn't then opened his lips and swirled his tongue around her nipple, drawing it into his mouth. He darted his tongue from side to side, again and again and again, until her hands had returned to pull at his hair, until her words of encouragement dropped off to soundless little cries. He paused occasionally to suckle and tease with his lips, hollowing out his cheeks, and then he bent back to work, reeling her back in when she made to pull away with a keening whine, only transferring his attentions to her other breast when she started to twitch.
It was done time before he finally let her breast pop out of his mouth, trailing a silver line from his mouth that he ached to lick up the line of her chest. He moved to do so. She put a hand in his chest, pushing him back. "Enough!" She laughed, a little breathlessly. Her eyes were bright.
"Fine, fine, your desires come first, of course." He ducked the swat she aimed at his head with a laugh, and bent to remove her boots. She lifted her hips to wriggle out of her pants, and then she was finally, gloriously naked. He took a moment to drink it in, until she started shifting restlessly under his gaze.
She quieted at the hand in her shoulder, pushing her gently back again the pillows. She went willingly enough, dragging him with her. "If you think you're getting off that easy, you've forgotten more than I thought," she whispered against the shell of his ear, making him shiver.
She spat in the palm of one slim, white hand, and then it was closing around the length of his cock, she was humming something positively filthy against his ear but he could hardly make it out because Bethany was good at this, Bethany was very good. Just the amount of pressure he liked, slow, building, with a twist at the end of the upstroke that made him see stars.
She was kissing him again, lips moving against his, and he realized she was singing one of the tavern song about him that Isabela had started, the one that took a few liberties with his duel with the Arishok. He laughed incredulously, and her teeth flashed in a grin when she saw he'd caught it.
His own hand dipped into the wiry thatch of curls between her legs, teasing, just touching her lips with the barest hint of pressure before dragging it back down again, then up, over and over and over, driving her nearly mad with desire. Bethany panted, she twisted, she huffed and growled his name and spread her legs wider, a clear hint that she wanted him to go faster, but he stayed where he was, up and down and up, until his sweet sister was wet and dripping, aching for him, until words started to fall from her lips that he knew she must have learned from the wardens, because she sure hadn't known them the last time they'd done this.
Finally, he couldn't stand it anymore and slipped a finger between her slick folds. Bethany's whispered oath to the Maker turned into a curse. After more minutes a second finger joined the first, then a third. The muscles in her legs trembled, twitching with every gasp, every pull of his fingers. He twisted his hand. Keeping his thumb moving across her clit, he arched his first two fingers experimentally, and she gave a scream, clenching down around his fingers in a way that made his cock throb beneath her fingers.
He was too close. Not yet.
He lifted her hand away, moved it to her own breast. She started to tease herself with a ragged whimper. Bethany's hips moved restlessly, fucking herself against his hand.
"Come on, precious," he murmured, staring, unable to look away, entranced by the tremble of her lips, the bounce of her breasts when her back bowed back against the pillows. She was so ducking beautiful. Again, he found himself questioning his luck, his great fortune in having having a sister, a lover, who returned his affections, who didn't avert her gaze in disgust at his touch, but welcomed it, reveled in it. Sometimes he wondered if he truly deserved it, but he had only to look into her eyes to know that it didn't matter what he thought, it mattered what Bethany thought. And she thought he was worth trekking across a blasted city for, worth dropping her guard, her weapons, her arms for. Her heart. "Come for me."
"I'm trying," Bethany whined, hands scrabbling at the sheets. Her skin shine with sweat. Fine droplets dusted the space between her breasts. He bent his head and licked them up, wringing another helpless, frustrated noise out of her.
"If you say so." Her eyes, which had slipped close in her throes, slid open to show a thin gleaming of copper, and he completely forgot what he'd been going to say. Even now, irritated and breathless, she had the power to take his breath away. He swallowed, thickly, recovering. "We'll have to make this a team effort, then, Bethany," he said, tapping the hand in her breast, which had fallen still.
She glared again, but resumed pinching and teasing her nipple until it rounded to a peak. Hawke made not the slightest attempt to hide the naked want in his eyes. He let it burn, setting the center of him aflame.
He quickened the motion of his fingers, bringing up his other hand to cup the back of her neck and squeeze, just there, and then she was coming, jerking up off the bed with a harsh scream.
Only when he'd wrung the last trembling aftershocks from her did he settle himself between her legs. Her arms came up around his shoulders at once, crushing her chest against his, rubbing herself against him with another one of those moans that made him go near lightheaded with his need for her.
His hand shook as he lined himself up. She was shaking too, he could feel it as he started to push in with agonizing slowness, inch by inch, until she was tossing her head from side to side and begging him to go faster, please, until he was gritting his teeth so hard they ached in an effort to maintain control, and pulled out, gripping her hips to keep her in place. His breath was loud in his ears, his whole world narrowed down to the woman between his arms. Her hips arched up off the bed in little jerks, and her lips were moving soundlessly now, beyond words, but he only had to look at her eyes to know the same hunger he knew lay in his. He thrust in again, in one smooth movement that had her breathe out his name in a rush.
"Fuck," he panted, and, "fuck. Fuck. Bethany." It was all he could say at first, until he found his tongue again, until she did. Latched onto it with her lips and teeth and kissed him breathless, and then he had too many words. They came spilling out of him, a flood he couldn't stop if he'd tried, and he didn't want to. Not if it meant he had to stop kissing her, had to stop moving, stop spreading her legs wider so he could watch himself glide in and out of her, caught by the droplets of her slick that spattered the sheets with every thrust. If he stopped now he'd die. "Oh, fuck, Bethany, you feel so good," half a growl half a song, and other things, inane things, that he wanted it to be his face she thought of when she fucked those wardens back at the keep, that he wanted her to come again, needed her to, needed her to scream for him.
Her breath came a series of short, sharp sighs, ripped out of her until they sounded high, sounded a gasp, a helpless rising moan. Her eyes fluttered, rolling up into her head. Small lines of electricity began to arc off her fingers, bringing with them some small amount of pain but he muscled past it, because it was Bethany. Because he knew she didn't mean to hurt him, that she couldn't always control these spontaneous bursts of magic when she let her control slip, and because he knew that, in a moment, the pain would turn to pleasure when she realized, and put more of a mind behind it.
And she did. It did. It started to feel good. Really good. Her right hand dropped from its white-knuckled grip in his hair to where they were joined. He bucked at the sudden wave of pleasure, driving himself against her, into her, mouth falling open in a low groan that came straight up from his belly. He matched him, met him, and they melded together. He lost himself in her, in her eyes, her mouth, the hot, sweet clench of her.
Bethany was beyond words. Every thrust ground her hand against her clit. She was shuddering again, nearing another climax, and he wasn't far behind.
His strokes went erratic, and he knew he was close, could feel it in the hot build behind his eyes, her sweet cries bringing him closer to the brink with every passing second. "B-Bethany." He said something else, then, something more, but he couldn't hear anything over his own panted breaths, the wet slap of skin on skin. He thrust inside her once, twice more, burying himself in her to the hilt, and then he was shaking, gasping with the electric thrill that lanced up from the warm coil at the base of his spine. The world went white.
When he came back to himself he was slumped over her shoulder, face buried in her sweat dampened hair. Bethany's head was tucked beneath his chin. She fit against him perfectly, flush against his chest. He wasn't sure if she was awake or not, and he felt strangely unwilling to break the stillness that had fallen over them to look.
In a moment, he would open his eyes and it would be time for her to go back to her armor and her oaths and the lovers she was sure she had, there across the sea. That clench behind his ribs had become an icy fist.
In a moment he would have to stop pretending that this was his life, that she was, that he would fall asleep between her arms every night wake between her legs, or any combination thereof, that she was his and he was hers, the way it'd used to be.
But not yet.