Another missing scene. Sorry they are not in order now, but I'm sure you'll figure it out!

'After the Fade'

Fenris paces the floor, back and forth, back and forth, all the while muttering Tevinter curses under his breath. She will come, he knows and be like she always is, understanding and forgiving, she won't blame him. She will absolve him of all responsibility. All the guilt he felt for leaving her will come rushing back and there will be even more because he has hurt her again. He doesn't want that, he wants her to scream and shout at him, tell him how she can't trust him to help her out any more and that she will leave him to rot in this big empty luxurious hovel, how he can find someone else to teach him reading and he can forget about help when Danarius comes.

Damn the woman, she can ask anything of him and he will do it. He is more of a slave to her than he ever was to Danarius. How did he end up such a fool? He hears the door open and her footsteps as she comes through the entrance hall, the hesitation before she climbs up the stairs. Good, this is different, most of the time she marches straight up, confident in her stride, keen to talk with him and resolve whatever problem it is this time. She's not sure this time and so she should be.

Her steps are tentative as she approaches the door to the room. Enough of this procrastination! He marches to the door,

"Come to gloat, have you? Make fun of the elf who wants to be a mage after telling everyone how much he hates them? Don't beat about the bush Hawke, come here and tell me how it is. I can take it!"

He turns his back on her to march back into the room and then turns around to face her again, "Why did you take me into the fucking Fade? That abomination of a friend of yours will be lapping this up, ready to throw it in my face every time he sees me and as for the dwarf, he will tell tall tales to all and sundry of how Hawke once again saved the day by killing some other poor possessed devil. Why would you do it? Tell me why?"

He sees the flash in her eyes as the hesitation disappears and she almost runs at him, "Because you are the one bastard in the world I thought I could be sure would spit in the face of a demon and laugh at any temptations they thought they could offer you!" She pokes her finger at his chest, "Because I thought if I succumbed you would be the only one that could get me out of it! Because if that demon Justice played around too much with Anders, I knew you wouldn't hesitate to put a stop to any of his nonsense. Because in the Fade I know my magic might not be enough and I want a damned good sword at my back. Because I knew this time it wouldn't be pissy little demons trying to find a silly weak mage to possess, this was for Feynriel, a Dreamer, the first in two ages, the big guns would be out and I needed a friend at my back because I wasn't sure I could do what needed to be done if it all went wrong. If you need any more reasons I'm sure I can think of them, but I think all those are reasons enough! Before we went in you had given me no reason to think any of them were bad!" She steps back from him and folds her arms in front of her,

"So you tell me elf, at what point did you ever hint to me that being a mage would be all your dreams come true?"

Fenris gulps, never has he felt his anger drain out of him so quickly. How did she do it? Get straight to the nub of the thing and this time without all the quiet understanding that usually preceded it.

"I..I didn't know." He hangs his head, unable to look her in the eye,

"Wrong answer." He hears her give a large sigh, all her own anger leaving with the breath, "For Maker's sake Fenris, please don't do this, don't become the slave again, I'm not your master and I haven't come to punish you. I can't do this when you act like that. Get angry at me again if you need to but please don't back down." He winces as he realises what he has done, slipped into the old habits of behaviour when he knew Danarius was unhappy with him. This whole affair has done him no good at all. He feels that he is going backwards not forwards in his need for freedom.

"Argue with me, tell me why that demon was able to get to you. Tell me why I had enough doubt about you in my head that I listened to Marathari when she told me to make sure I removed all your enhancements before we went in."

"You did what?" The shock at what she has just said snaps him out of his passivity.

"She warned me, to be careful before going in. Demons are such sneaky bastards, they mess with your head and offer you things you didn't think you wanted. I knew if they got to you, I wouldn't be able to defend myself unless you were weakened. I did just enough to make sure I could. I just never thought I would need to."

Fenris gives a wry grin, "It's not only the demons who are sneaky bastards then. You cheated." He accuses.

"So what? I'm a mage, it's nothing less than you expect of me, right?"

"Better than using blood magic, I suppose." He admits grudgingly. "But that doesn't excuse me, I betrayed you. I tried to kill you! That a demon could persuade me so easily, disturbs me."

"As it should. Demons are disturbing."

"I failed you, turned against you so easily." He feels his anger rise again when he remembers what happened, " You hesitated! You waited before attacking me, Anders and Varric had no qualms about putting me out of action. Why didn't you? Did you think about leaving me to be possessed?"

"You bastard! You stand there and accuse me of being ready to leave you to your new found demon best buddy! You will not even grant me the time to pause for one moment because my friend chose to betray me! I have helped you every time Danarius has come close to taking you back, helped you keep that precious freedom that you don't even begin to understand, given you my word that should that monster ever come back again, I will be there to fight with you to my last breath! Yet you would throw that all away because some demon gave you a better offer! There was little of hesitation in you when you accepted his offer. I hesitated, yes, but not because I was ready to leave you, just that you were so willing to leave me!"

He bangs his fist on the table, there it is. Once again he has done something that should make her hate him, make her think twice about having him around and she still won't go, but he is not ready for that conversation now.

"But you didn't even flinch in slaying that sloth demon, you weren't even tempted to listen to what he had to say? Is there no part of you that isn't curious? What makes you so strong when the rest of us around you are all so weak? "

"My father always told me that no matter what demons offered, there was nothing they could offer that I couldn't get for myself if I wanted it badly enough. The only thing that monstrosity could have offered me would be to have my father, mother and sister back and even demons can't bring people back from the dead. Like I told that thing, I don't do deals with demons."

Determined to place the fault back at her he spits out, "It might have helped if you had told me that before we went in."

Fenris turns to stare into the fire. She doesn't know it, but she's shaking all his beliefs again. If all mages could be as strong willed as her there really would be no need for Circles. Her father had obviously taught her well, he should have been a first enchanter. And what of his own will power? Where had it gone to? All that Pride demon had to do was dangle the prospect of dealing with Magisters as an equal and he had crumbled. As soon as the idea had been voiced he had wanted it. Had wanted it so badly he was prepared to kill his friend to get it. If he was honest with himself, he still wanted it. Oh Maker, that was why Hawke was here. She wanted to make sure he wasn't to be tempted again and he couldn't promise that he wouldn't.

"Let's just hope we don't have to do it again." He says, trying to deflect and halt this conversation, he knows he should know better when talking with her,

"Not good enough Fenris. I want to know why someone so dead set against Magisters would want to become one of them."

Fenris barks back at her, "That's not what he offered! I do not want to be a Magister! He offered vengeance for all those slaves, I could have freed them all!"

"Is that what you really thought he said? He offered vengeance, Fenris, not freedom, for you and no one else. That is the trap he laid before you. Do you really think that alone you could do what Andraste could not with an army at her back? He would empower you with magic beyond your wildest dreams, let you kill a few magisters, then take over your body so he could experience the world and kill every slave, servant, elf, dwarf or human he could find until something stronger came along to stop him. You would be trapped inside, unable to do anything, a silent witness to the destruction you allowed to be unleashed in the world."

He glares at her. Damn this woman, it's like she picks out all his insides to have a good look and then puts them all back in the wrong place.

"Fine Hawke, you win. Demons are bastards and I'll wear ear plugs the next time you drag me into the Fade."

Hawke puts her head in her hands in exasperation and sits on a bench, "Fenris please, let go of this need for vengeance. While it stays, Danarius is still your Master and you are still his slave. Freedom is a way of thinking, it will not be found at the end of your sword."

"I am free Hawke, I have been since I ran from Seheron. Free to pay that bastard back for what he has done to me. He will find only death at the end of my sword."

She looks at him in quiet resignation, "It might seem so, but if you were truly free you would know you have the choice to put your hatred of him aside."

"Be careful Hawke, you are beginning to sound like Sebastian."

"Ha! Could you ever see me as a chantry priestess? The Maker himself would return just to chuck me out! Can't you see? The chantry, the mages, the templars, they are all enslaved every bit as much as you are by their hatred. Until they can let it go they will never resolve their problems, just as you won't."

Fenris' face softens as he looks back at her. Maker, she is beautiful and she tries so hard with him. She is right, he knows, but he can't do this, not even for her. Not yet. His hand touches her cheek, "You are asking me to forgive Danarius, but I can't do that. What I will do is think long on what your father taught you, maybe I will make things happen myself and demons will have nothing they can tempt me with. That is all I can promise for now."

"That is enough."