Some Lovers
A 100 prompts challenge on Fenris/LadyHawke by Marianne Bennet
003: Futile
He was running through the jungles of Seheron again, his head pounding, his feet bleeding, his hands swatting away insects, when her voice called him back: "So what happened when Danarius found you?"
He looked up from his bare feet, from the tropical undergrowth poking out between his toes, to have himself come back to a room in Kirkwall, a bottle in his hand, and Hawke sitting in front of him, her blonde head backlight by the crackling fire. There was no judgment in her gray eyes, not yet anyway. He was certain that that would change as his story continued and he regretted that change even as he spoke the words that would instigate it.
"What do you think happened?" he asked of her and saw that she was taken aback by the bitter anger in his tone. He began to feel the old vehemence rise in his throat as the memory of Danarius's face came to mind. "He ordered me to kill them. So I did."
He saw in Hawke's face that she had already guessed at the conclusion to this tale. That made him angrier. "What was I supposed to do?" Fenris demanded of her. "Tell me. What would you have done?"
"Ran," she told him flatly.
"I did that."
"Ran before I killed my friends."
"This was a stupid question," he growled. "You can't give me an answer. You've never been a slave."
"But I've been running," she replied coolly. "All of my life, I've been running. I'm an apostate. You act like that doesn't mean anything."
"You could have stopped running." He had not meant to accuse her but that was what it came out as. "Would the Circle truly have been so terrible?"
"You sound almost like Bethany." Hawke turned slightly away from him, resting her elbow against the splintering wooden table, pressing the base of her palm into her temple as though she could push the memory of her younger sister out of her head altogether. Fenris knew how that felt and yet he didn't; his memories were so few that even the worst of them was better than none at all. But he knew the pain well enough.
Her other hand rested limply against her knee. For one wild moment, he thought about reaching over and taking her hand in both of his. It was the sort of gesture that someone like Anders could have made easily. But then she lifted her face from her other hand, turned back toward him, and the moment was lost in the instant.
She fixed her steely gaze on him once more. "But, whatever Bethany may have wanted, she knew that it wasn't a decision for her alone. She had an apostate father and an apostate sister and neither wanted to be subjected to the templars. In my case, I have family to take care of. You were always alone. The only one you had to look out for was you."
He flinched from her unfeeling appraisal of his situation. "Maybe it felt inevitable," he snapped. "Maybe I didn't feel as though I could run."
"Then why did you? Why didn't you just go with Danarius then?"
The jungle floor had been stained crimson. Blood was everywhere, on his blade, on the hair hanging in his eyes, on Danarius's robes. "I looked at their bodies…" Saw the wounds gaping open and bleeding scarlet. "I felt…" Shame. "I couldn't…" Do anything. "I ran. And I didn't look back."
That wasn't true. What was the point of lying to Hawke? He didn't know. But he didn't correct himself. He suddenly felt self-conscious. Except for that one moment, she had not looked away from him, appraising him. He wondered if he was worth anything to her. That thought gave him pause; he wasn't a slave anymore so why was he trying to estimate his value?
She shivered; she saw him notice. "Why do you live here?" she asked. "It's so cold."
"It's winter. It's going to be cold wherever I am."
"It's more than that," she replied, getting up from her seat and walking toward the window. "It's like… this house is cold. There are too many bad memories. No one could be happy living here, least of all you."
"Then what would you have me do?" He did not budge from his seat though part of him wanted to join her at the window. "Go to the alienage with the rest of the elves?" He sighed heavily. "I don't know why I tell you these things."
"Then stop telling me and then saying that talking to me is pointless."
"I have no one else to tell." He looked down at the bottle in his hands. "You and I don't always agree…"
"Never agree–"
"That's not true."
She paused before speaking. "Isn't it?"
She was looking at him again. It was harder to be inscrutable when she stood there, scrutinizing him. "I'm a mage," she said flatly. "Can you see anything but magic in me?"
"Maybe not when we first met," he shrugged. "But I didn't see much of anything in anyone then. I didn't think that I needed anyone. Maybe I don't."
"But maybe you do."
She crossed the room again, came closer but not too close. He preferred it that way and it made him secure enough to admit, "It isn't as though I would know. I've… I've never allowed anyone too close. Who would I trust?"
"Do you trust me?"
"And what if I said that I did, despite everything?"
She hesitated; he saw her hesitate. "Well," she began slowly, diplomatically –she was always diplomatic, except when she was funny and except when she was angry. He had been afraid he would make her angry. "Maybe we could find out. For both of us."
Months later, years later, she would wonder if he had heard those last four words, realized that it had meant as much to her as it had to him. Or had that last plea been completely ignored?
…
A/N: Another update, three days in a row. What is this world coming to? If any of you lovely readers have suggestions or maybe something you'd like to see, feel free to mention it in a review. I aim to please. -MB