3. The Name
In which Dragon Age lives up to its name, or in which Skrybble makes a big deal of the fact that her Hawke is called Ariadne. Read nothing—this means you, mythology buffs—into the name. I just thought it sounded cool.
Disclaimer: Don't own DA2.
She's not human.
So really, Anders isn't in a position to judge the measure of a human—that pesky abomination thing and all—but she's. Not. Human. Humans don't like the Deep Roads. Nobody likes the Deep Roads. Even the Wardens don't like the Deep Roads; they just tolerate them because they're the only ones who can. Every moment down here is making Anders more and more paranoid, and even though he'd never say it, he can't breath right anymore. Between the gray-brown, flickering light, careening tunnels and stagnant air, he feels like he's suffocating.
Of course she's fine.
"That was incredible!" she crows as she jerks her staff out of the creature's eye, her movement stiff from various bruises but her smile dazzling. She's steadying herself on her staff, but so casually that Anders hardly sees it. She's good at making those little things seem unimportant. "Aveline, did you see that? We killed a dragon!" She points to the creature slumped across the ground, a hundred times larger than any of them, as if they're not already looking. "Varric!"
"Hawke!" He snaps to attention.
"This needs a sonnet," she announces, gesturing at the body. "You up for it?"
"Already on it." He grins. They're best friends, he and Hawke, if only because they're the only people in the world who could be this cheerful after that kind of fight.
"Excellent," replies Hawke, and then, as though she still can't believe it, "Anders! Aveline! A dragon!"
"I see it." The guard captain is less than exuberant as she gives the corpse an obligatory once-over. "Next time we're finding a different route around the monsters, Ariadne. You took a nasty hit to the head there."
"I'm fine." He doesn't look but can hear, without being able to explain how, that she's rolling her eyes. If he had been watching her, he might have seen how she was gripping her staff tighter, knuckles stark and white. "Just a little dizzy. I'm a big girl, Aveline."
"But still not intelligent enough to get behind my shield when a dragon charges."
"You're no fun," Hawke sulks, rubbing at a streak of blood on her cheek, and Aveline shakes her head. Besides Hawke, only Varric seems remotely pleased about this fight; the dwarf's already frowning at the dragon as if figuring out the best way to depict it in verse.
How about 'vicious bastard'? Justice supplies bitterly, and in one of those rare coincidences, he and Anders are in perfect agreement. Anders is not a fan of dragons that can breathe fire at him while he's concentrating on healing, and Justice, who feels what Anders feels, wasn't a fan of the burns from a couple minutes ago.
Maker. He turns away from the dragon, too tired even to look at it. The sooner they're out of here, the—
"Hawke!"
It's not a 'Hawke-I've-got-the-perfect-rhyme', but 'oh-shit-Hawke-no', and Anders jerks around in time to see Varric slinging Bianca over his shoulder, Aveline spinning frantically on her heel, Ariadne lurching sideways with a hand to her head. She draws it away and the fingertips are dark and wet. "The hell…?" she mumbles, staring at the dribbling red on her fingers, and another drop of blood skitters down the side of her face. He sees her swipe at it, eying the streak of red on her hand, connecting it dazedly to the smell of copper in the air. He's seen that face before, the way her eyes widen and go slightly unfocused.
"Hawke?"
"Anders," she croaks back, and he starts forward. "I think I might be… bleeding…"
"Stop," he interrupts, and she lets out a breath in a whoosh, and then it's as if all the energy hisses out of her too, because she staggers sideways, falling heavily into him. Her staff clatters to the ground. He grunts and reaches an arm to pull her upright. Blood is slicking down her face, carving red around her eye socket like war paint.
"I've got you," he tells her, which is a stupid thing to say, because a moment later he blurts, "Varric," and the dwarf darts forward. He's got an arm around Hawke's waist, lowering her to the ground, and she blinks foggily, rubbing at her face with a hand.
"When I got knocked over," she manages, and then, "I didn't think… it was bad?"
"It's not," Anders reassures her instantly, and Justice groans. Yes it is. She's got blood pouring out of her; do you honestly think it's just a scratch?
"Shut up," he hisses, and then, "No, not you, Hawke," when she scowls in confusion. Her eyes, already hazy, are beginning to fog over, the focus in them dimming. "Hawke," he repeats, firmly but not calmly. "Please. Don't close your eyes. You need to keep them open for me."
She's probably concussed. Dammit, why didn't he pay more attention during the fight? Oh, I don't know, Justice volunteers, it couldn't be that the massive bloody lizard was a little distracting? but Anders isn't listening. Varric props Hawke up, and Ander's fingers are working along her hairline, feeling for the source of the blood. "Ow," she protests feebly, and he cringes.
"Shut up," he mutters, hating how pathetic she sounds, and then clarifies, "Yes, you, Hawke," to her slight frown.
To his surprise, the expression doesn't leave her face. It's not a confused look, or if it was then it's ceased to be. "Hawke," she repeats, and it takes him a moment to realize she's not just parroting. "Hawke. That's all you ever call me."
What? "No it's not." He's found it. The smell of blood, thick and metallic, is in the air, and red oozes on his fingers as, gingerly, he inspects the wound. Breathing deep, he closes his eyes, reaching for any magic left. "I call you by your name. Hawke is just what everyone calls you."
"Boys call each other by their last names," she protests, blinking owlishly, her eyelids sliding lazily shut and open again. "Back in Lothering, everyone called Carver 'Hawke'. It's a name boys use for their friends." She tilts her head sideways. "I'm not a boy. Why do you always call me Hawke?"
"Did she hit her head hard?" demands Aveline, and Anders shrugs helplessly. He doesn't have the mental capacity to argue this point, to try and work out why he calls her Hawke anyway. He's trying to heal her, sending sparks of magic flickering along her temple, probing for any worse damage that he hasn't noticed; neither she nor Aveline is helping.
"Because everyone does," he shrugs. "Varric does. You don't mind that."
The dwarf snickers. "Moot point, Blondie. I have nicknames for everyone."
"But you don't," Hawke chimes in. "Anders, Ar-i-ad-ne." She enunciates carefully, syllables trickling off her tongue. "Say it. Go on."
He closes his eyes, lets out a long, slow breath. "Ariadne," he repeats softly, and the magic runs out from his fingers, needling into her veins, sealing skin over fresh and pale like new leaves. She's okay, he tells himself. She's okay.
She takes a slow breath in, lets another out. Her eyes rise to meet his, lucid and startling. "That wasn't so hard, was it?" she inquires, and then smiles before he has to reply. "You're... really good at that," she adds, surprising him. "Thanks, Anders."
"It's nothing." He lifts his hands away from her temples, because suddenly it seems oddly, uncomfortably intimate, the way he's yes, healing her, but also holding her gaze, her face in his hands. Suddenly Varric is eying Anders with this horrible look on his face, and the mage just knows that Varric's jotting mental notes about this scene, already seeing character development that neither Anders nor Hawke is ready for. Aveline, as Anders draws quickly back, just seems torn between gratitude and skepticism. She actually likes mages, that Aveline, and she's really quite a good person for a guard. But she and Anders are never going to be friends.
And Hawke…
Hawke is picking herself up and saying, "Varric, put a stanza about Anders in the sonnet," and then, purposely snagging his gaze before he can turn away, adds to Anders, "Call me Ariadne more often."
In their shared mind, it hits Anders and Justice at the same time, and it's impossible to say whose thought it is.
Oh no she needs to stop smiling like that this is so bad so very very bad—
You ass, Justice groans, you complete ass, now you've done it…
Why is he here? He's been asking himself this whole time, right? Why did he even come to the Deep Roads? And the problem is that he knows why—it's because of what just happened, because he hated the idea of her going down here without someone watching her back. Damn, he should know by now when he's over his head—
No, Justice interrupts, no. Over your head is a very different thing. You should know by now, Anders, when you are non-compos-effing-mentis.
She's already walking away, and he's following, but that smile is like a sunspot, stuck on the inside of his eyes when he blinks. But… she's so pretty, he thinks weakly, Justice, it's not my fault…
Just because people are pretty doesn't mean they're not ruthless sons of bitches, Anders. Remember the pirate? And the elf?
Fenris or Merrill?
The elf who wants to kill you, idiot.
Ariadne doesn't want to kill me.
For a moment, Justice is silent, and when at last he speaks his voice is soft but frigid. Hawke, he corrects. Call her Hawke.
Thanks for reading, guys! Reviews are always amazing ^_^