Fenris considered again that simply cutting off the mage's hand would be the most expedient answer to this problem. He could live the rest of his life with the cuff and chain if he had to. It could be a "fashion statement," to borrow one of Isabela's phrases.

His musing was prompted by the fact that he and Anders were attempting to work out how the two of them could fight – someone other than each other – while still chained together.

"Don't jerk on the chain," Anders groused. "I can't finish my spell if you yank on my arm like that."

"And I cannot fend off a blade if I cannot move," Fenris snarled. "Or claws that might rip your tender mage flesh. Or teeth that might, for a blessing from the Maker, take off your nattering head!"

Their practice was, as might be expected, going poorly.

When they woke that morning, stiff and cramped and far too close to one another on Anders' narrow bed, they had silently shared the only easy agreement of the day – last night never happened.Anders had heated some tasteless paste he had the audacity to call porridge and shared his meager food with Fenris before insisting that he had more to do around the clinic.

This was a Gray Warden, a powerful mage, and an even more powerful abomination? Spending time in close quarters with the man, it was difficult for Fenris to reconcile his notions of mages and abominations with what he witnessed in Anders.

However, with the man bitching at him from the other end of two feet of chain, he was not finding his feelings about Anders softening much at all.

At Fenris' insistence, they had left the "healer is in" lantern unlit and moved to the open space outside the clinic doors to practice fighting together.

Fenris hated the light little toy sword that Aveline considered a suitable weapon. It lacked reach, allowing enemies too close. He toyed with the idea of using Anders the way she used a shield, but he would become a liability once he was dead and still attached to Fenris' wrist.

"If I hit a man with the pommel of my sword—" he demonstrated on a support beam, "—can you take advantage of it?"

Anders considered how he worked with Aveline and nodded. "Two options, depending upon what we're fighting, how many, and how close the quarters. Either an energy cage that tightens like a fist or lightning."

He moved his hands through the motions of the first spell for Fenris to feel how it would affect him through the chain, then demonstrated the movements of the second.

"Good." Fenris pushed aside a surge of conflicted emotions at the realization that he was working out dual fighting tactics with a mage. This was his choice, not some kind of slavery. Or if it was, he and Anders were slaves together. "Then we will practice that until it flows."

They practiced until they were both sweating and gasping for breath, but Fenris pushed himself even harder until Anders finally gave in.

"Enough!" Anders let his staff fall from his hand to the floor with a light clatter and leaned over his knees, gasping for breath. "Haven't you heard of moderation?"

"Haven't you heard of the best defense being a good offense?" Fenris retorted. He was sweating almost as hard as Anders, but he stood straight and strong out of pure bloody-mindedness to show the mage who was the stronger of the two.

Anders waved that away while he drew two more deep breaths before he picked up his staff and stood up again. "If you're going to be like that, let's try a few other things. Remember when we fought together last Summer?" He raised a hand that suddenly steamed as frost gathered around his fingers. "I freeze them, you break them."

Exploiting frozen enemies – even imaginary ones – was harder with a longsword. Fenris had to adjust his tactics, finally settling on a cleaving sweep that seemed most likely to break through ice and frozen flesh alike.

"Again," he demanded when Anders went through the motions of casting the spell and jerked too hard on the chain.

"Again," Anders snapped when Fenris moved too quickly and disrupted his spellcasting.

"Again," Hawke interjected when they moved through the motions of ice spell and cleaving sweep perfectly. "That was better than watching a Rivaini dance troupe."

Fenris and Anders snapped their heads around in unison, sword and staff raising together before they both subsided. Hawke was standing at the top of the stairs lounging insouciantly against the railing with his lips turned up in a smirk.

"I'm going to burn your hair off if you do that again," Anders snapped before remembering himself. "Do you have any news?"

Hawke raised an eyebrow. "I don't know if I should give it to you if you're just going to threaten me." He pulled a thick envelope out from behind his back and wiggled it teasingly.

"Hawke," Fenris growled and held out his hand.

Hawke made no move to hand over the envelope and looked pointedly at Anders.

Anders sighed heavily and said, "You know I didn't mean it Hawke. Now can we have the envelope, pretty please with a qunari on top?"

Hawke slapped the envelope into Fenris' outstretched hand and took out a smaller envelope of his own. He held it like something precious. "Padraic got me a note from Bethany too. I think Cullen knew it and looked the other way."

Fenris passed the envelope to Anders and ignored him while he tore open the top and drew out a sheaf of papers. "Is she well?"

"Well enough," Hawke said, turning the letter from his sister over in his hands before tucking it away under his jerkin. "She's used to more freedom, but she's making the best of things. She copied everything down for Padraic since he can't write."

Fenris noted when Hawke's smile slipped. "Her letter says you two aren't going to be happy with the news."

"Makers balls, I'm not," Anders agreed while he skimmed the pages Hawke had delivered.

Glancing over, Fenris saw occasional sketches and a page covered in runes similar to the ones on their cuffs, but his reading lessons were still too remedial for him to even begin to make head or tails of the content.

"What is it?"

"Time for the Hanged Man," Anders said, scowling at the pages. "I need mental lubrication." He leveled a finger at Hawke without looking away from what he was reading. "Not one word."

"About how you need lubrication?" Hawke asked innocently. "I wouldn't dream of it, but maybe you could ask Fenris to glow at you."

"I hate you."

• • •

Ensconced in Varric's suite with a pitcher of the tavern's best swill, Fenris watched Anders scribble on a sheet of paper he had cadged from their host. Hawke sat at the far end of the table with his feet propped up, reading the letter from his sister with a faint wistful expression on his usually cheerful features.

Varric held court with business associates as though he often had a mad mage working in his suite, which was perhaps not too far from the truth. Fenris knew that Varric got along with all of Hawke's friends as well as Hawke himself did, sometimes better. He was willing to admit to that it really was difficult to dislike the dwarf.

"What's the news, sweet thing?" Isabela asked, strolling into the room to drape herself over the back of Hawke's chair.

"Letter from Bethany," Hawke said, tipping his head back to smile up at her. "She's doing well. She asks if you've put on pants yet."

"Never." Isabela slid into his lap and plucked the letter out of his hand only to have Hawke snatch it back.

"Family business," he told her before tucking it out of her sight.

"Fine. And what about them?" she asked before waving to Anders and Fenris. "Did you boys sleep well last night? Did you share a bed? Did Anders show you that delightful electricity thing?"

Fenris glowered, Anders lifted his hand in a two-fingered salute without looking up from the page.

"I'll take that as a no," she said, unabashed. "If the answer had been yes, you would both be in better moods today. I still think it would be brilliant – Anders with his sparklefingers, and Fenris with his glowing orgasm on demand."

Now Anders looked up, giving Hawke a venomous glare. "You told her!"

"You thought I wouldn't?" Hawke asked while he did something below the table that made Isabela squirm and laugh.

"I should have set your hair on fire earlier."

Fenris had to agree that it wasn't funny. The last thing he wanted was the power to reduce Anders to a sodden heap at the drop of a hat. There was nothing the magic he bore in his skin did not find a way to twist.

Hawke ignored Anders' threat, speaking instead to Isabela, "I had almost a small book for him from Padraic, but I don't think he's reading anything good."

"Worse," Anders said, pushing the papers away and running his fingers through his hair, adding streaks of ink from his fingertips to the pale gold strands. "This is beyond me and Padraic says he already knows no one else in Kirkwall's Circle knows more about it than he does, which is next to nothing."

Even with Isabela still in his lap, Fenris saw Hawke's expression slip into all business. "Does he suggest anyone who might know?"

Anders shook his head. "Outside of Tevinter—"

Fenris cut him off. "No!"No, he would not go to Tevinter, no he would not solicit help from a Tevinter mage. There was no discussion or argument. "It is not open to discussion."

Anders sighed heavily. "I knew you would say that, so let me finish what I was going to say. Outside of Tevinter, I know one mage who could help, but I'm not much more eager to see him than Fenris is to think of going to the Imperium."

"Spit it out, Blondie," Varric said, having just escorted another stone-faced dwarf out after wrapping up negotiations for fish oil of all things. "Who is it?"

Anders set the quill aside, straightened the pages that Padraic had sent, capped the ink pot, poured himself another tankard of watered-down ale, and generally dithered rather than answering the question.

"Mage," Fenris growled, "answer the question. If you know who might help, tell me."

"Widald Amell," Anders finally said, before tipping his head back to drain his tankard in one long pull.

Varric let out a long, low whistle. "The Hero of Ferelden? You want to just go ask him for help with this?"

"I know you said you knew him," Hawke said, "but do you know him well enough to ask that kind of favor?"

"I'd say so," Anders said dryly, although he slumped down more in seat. "He's the reason I became a Gray Warden. I went into the Fade with him, fought demons, darkspawn, and dragons with him."

Fenris knew his expression was skeptical, and Anders caught it as well. "Don't worry Fenris, he might just cut my hand off for you."

Fenris was surprised to see Anders refill his tankard and drain it a second time. "He's probably still pissed off at me, but I think he would do it for Justice even if he claps me in the nonmagical kind of manacles once he gets us free."

"Why?" Isabela asked, leaning forward. "Dal didn't strike me as that kind of man when I… met him in Denerim. He knew his way around belowdecks if you know what I'm saying."

"It doesn't matter," Anders said. "It will be my problem. He isn't the kind of man to punish other people for one man's mistakes."

Fenris watched Anders scrub his face with his hands again, looking suddenly ten years older than he had before the conversation took this turn. "It means we'll have to leave Kirkwall. He'll either be in Amaranthine or Vigil's Keep unless he's off being a big damn hero again."

"And if he is?" Fenris asked.

"Oh, my old friends will probably spend a lot of time arguing about whether it's fair to put me in a prison cell until he returns when I'm already chained to the biggest stick in the mud in Thedas. Then Oghren will suggest we get drunk, Velanna will insult me, Sigrun will ask a thousand questions, and Nathaniel will try to have a brood-off with Fenris. It will be brilliant."

If it was going to be so brilliant, Fenris thought, why did Anders' recitation sound more like a dirge? There was more to this story than the mage wanted to tell.