Affirmation
"I feel for the mages, I do. I would not wish to be locked in the Gallows - "
"What person would?" Hawke shrieked, temper rising over hushed and shocked whispers from the Sisters, voice echoing in the silted silence of the Chantry. It seemed that all her conversation with this woman only frustrated and infuriated her. "Do the mages even get to see the sun nowadays? What kind of life is that? No one would wish that!"
The Grand Cleric furrowed her brow, the first bit of steel Hawke's ever seen entering her tone. "As I've said before, I cannot take sides. If it comes to war, it is the people of this city that will lose." Hawke opened her mouth to protest further, but Elthina held up a hand, looking pained. "Another time, Champion, please. I have other matters to attend."
Elthina bowed out and took up conversation with one of the lay Sisters; Hawke, rooted to the spot by her anger, ran both hands desperately into her own hair. Uncertain what further distraction could she provide, other than screaming bloody murder or yanking her entire scalp off, and worried that her lover had been caught doing... whatever it was he was doing, she jumped visibly when the gentle hand on her arm was not the man she hoped and expected.
"Hawke."
"Not now, Sebastian. I don't need your platitudes." She hissed, dropping her hands from her hair, and cast her gaze briefly at the Chantry doors. By the Blight, where was he?
"Accept my concern, then." The Starkhaven Prince continued with his unruffled mien, glossing over her derision. "I know we do not always see eye to eye, but you must know that I nevertheless care for your welfare. You work yourself to exhaustion for these mages - do you think they do the same?"
"They're not the bloody Champion of Kirkwall. I am. And, but for the whim of chance, I could easily be in their place - my position comes with responsibility." She smiled thinly, head tilted, and deliberately made her words pointed. "We all can't stand back and hope the Maker solves our problems for us - be it justice for the mages here or retaking Starkhaven."
It was Sebastian's turn to sigh; this was an old, old battle between them, one that seemed never to be put to rest, and he had no wish to pursue it. "Be honest with me, Hawke. Have you ever tried to lay your burdens down at His feet? Confession is good for the soul."
"The Maker turned His back on us. Why should He care to hear what I have to say to Him - a mage of all people? It'd probably be nothing but swearing, anyway."
"Ah, but we are all the Maker's children, are we not? No matter how wayward." Hawke bristled slightly at his serenity, but said nothing, and Sebastian took her silence for acquiescence. He patted her arm kindly, and went to rejoin Elthina, "Perhaps it has been far too long since you and He spoke."
Feeling burdened Sebastian's parting words, and lingering so long in the Maker's house, Hawke descended down the stairs, wrapping her arms around herself as if to ward off His disapproving gaze. It was one of the reasons she avoided the Chantry in Lothering, besides the omnipresent danger of Templars; It was not that she did not have faith, just that her doubts were many. 'Mages are cursed by the Maker' was the common peasant's mantra, and piety did not come easy to one embittered by a religion that spouted insult at every turn for your mere existence.
No, she would not talk to the Maker.
Fretfully, she glanced back where Elthina was still in conversation with Sebastian - no doubt him urging her to leave Kirkwall again, and Hawke felt the distaste rise in her throat. With position came responsibility; time and again Elthina was guilty of the same fault she found in Sebastian. There were rumors that the Knight-Commander has sent for the Right of Annulment; the Divine was considering an indiscriminate March, and Elthina wouldn't ever pretend to listen. But then, she's never listened about anything. Not when zealots were provoking the Qunari at every turn, and a Lowtown city block got nuked by poisonous gas. Not when they warned her that Petrice was running loose, and Saemus paid for her inaction with his life. Did she care for any but her flock of Hightown nobles? Now that she thought about it, Hawke has never seen a Sister in the Alienage or in Darktown. They didn't care about Kirkwall's abandoned.
Not like Anders did.
At this, Hawke had to take a seat on one of the pews, heart clenching with the thought of her lover, what he asked of her raw and fresh in her mind. How she had fisted her hands in his coat, wanting to shake him; how tenderly those lean fingers pried hers away, his amber eyes stricken.
Heartsick, she looked up at the golden statue of Andraste in her battle regalia, a leader who gave hope to the hopeless, led her people to freedom. Her divinity could be doubted, but her achievements, as a remarkable woman, were worthy of respect nevertheless, and Hawke wondered if the rumors were true; during one of Anders' more melancholy fits, he removed a whole section from his manifesto, lacking enough proof for a subject already deemed heretical - that Andraste knew well the dangers and potential for the misuse of magic because the warrior-prophetess was a mage herself.
"I... I know we've never really talked before," Hawke confessed awkwardly, fighting the bitter desire to laugh at herself; she'd never thought she'd beseech divine aid beyond blasphemous swears, and unconscious pleas for self-preservation in the midst of battle. But she needed an excuse to remain in the Chantry, for Anders to find her, and perhaps the Maker's Bride had more sympathetic ears - regardless of whether or not she was a mage herself.
"Honestly, I'm not certain if you're even there. But... what's happening in the Circles here, it can't be what you meant. It can't be; they've... twisted your words. The mages here don't want to rule, they just want to live, and now they might not have that even. Some fine Champion I've turned out to be." She checked on the position of the Grand Cleric, as behind her another lay Sister chatted blithely with a noblewoman, planning a wedding when her beau hadn't even proposed the engagement. The conversation stung at her ears - Mages weren't allowed to marry each other. "Come to think of it, I'm a pretty ineffectual friend as well."
"Merrill cried for hours after she shattered the mirror. Danarius is dead, but that has brought Fenris no peace. And Anders, he - "And, what? The words swam in her throat. That your lover is splintering at the seams, and your presence is nothing but a palliative for this painful process? That you'd storm the Black City, step onto the pyre, if you thought it would ease his smile? That despite everything you've done to support him, support Justice, there's these things that he can't - won't - tell you?
"I don't know what he's molding me for," She blurted out, fighting back the sob. "I don't know what he needs me to be. Did you ever feel this way? Did you think He used you too?" Sacrilegious conjecture, she knew, but Andraste believed in the Maker, and Maker help her, Hawke believes in Anders, this man who loved her with all-consuming intensity; who wanted her to be his voice, and sought to change the world with his words.
How do you resist it, the love of a god, when he's chosen you and needs you? Do you follow him, even if it means killing yourself?
"I've been looking for you," He interrupts, louder than necessary with false joviality. Hawke whirls from the pew to look at Anders, and those expressive eyes hold more misery than she thought a man could possess. He might not have heard everything, but he has certainly heard enough, standing, waiting behind her as the gulf stretched between them, and the words jostled and strained her heart, pushed at her teeth, and she felt herself almost break apart.
Tell me - what are you doing with me?
But she always knew with what she was getting involved - the trials and tribulations that came with loving a man possessed, though he'd tried time and again to warn her away. He never pushed her, wouldn't push her even now.
It was always her choice.
So be it - To the Black City, to the pyre. Her life was never normal. Hawke swallowed her doubts, and follows her faith, breaching the gap. His hand wrapped around her waist, leading her out of the Chantry, back into the light, and the rays of sunshine dance like licking flames.