Amelle had never been more acutely aware of the passage of time.

It seemed impossible that once, before, whole days—whole weeks—had passed in a blur of everyday activities, none more taxing than deciding what to wear, or what to eat; whether to accompany Kiara on one of her jaunts, or whether she wanted to spend the evening reading or playing Diamondback at The Hanged Man with the others. She felt panicky remembering all those wasted moments, all that time she'd allowed to slip away from her.

She'd have given just about anything to have some of that time back, now. A day. An hour. Even just a few minutes.

There weren't enough minutes in an hour. There weren't enough hours in the day. It had been nearly a week—six days and a handful of hours, Maker knew how many minutes—since the chantry's demise. Six days since she and Fenris found Sebastian in a pool of blood. Five days since Kiara returned from the Hightown marketplace with a bleeding scalp wound and something broken in her eyes. Four since Knight-Captain—no, acting Knight-Commander, now—Cullen had caught her healing the injured at The Blooming Rose and had once again allowed her to escape the Chantry's grasp.

Every single moment of every single day was spent trying to fix just some tiny portion of the damage Anders had done. The enormity of the task was too daunting; Amelle couldn't even attempt to grasp its entirety. Instead, she did what she could and wasted no time bemoaning what she couldn't change. She broke her days into manageable blocks, dealing only with whatever matter was before her and most required her attention. When Madam Lusine sent one of her girls running, Amelle went to The Blooming Rose and healed whomever required healing. Those trips were fewer now, as too much time passed for hope of survivors. Amelle ate when someone—Kiara, usually—thrust a plate of food under her nose. She slept in snatches, never more than an hour or two at a time. She splashed water on her face and even remembered to change her clothes, most days.

After that first horrible day, Orana had returned, having taken refuge with the neighbors. The elf cooked and cleaned from dawn until midnight, as though cooking and cleaning the Hawke estate might somehow undo some of the horror still contaminating the streets of Kirkwall. It meant Amelle always had leftovers—loaves of bread and pots of soup and as much baking as the Hawke estate pantries would permit—to bring with her to The Rose.

Amelle wasn't entirely certain what Kiara did. Worried, mostly. Fidgeted. Helped Orana. Paced. Waited for Aveline to bring news of the city, of the recovery efforts. The guard-captain stopped in at least once a day, and if the expression on Kiara's face afterward was any indication, once a day begged the elder Hawke to remain indoors.

Kiara felt useless, Amelle suspected. She'd have worried more if she had time. Uselessness wasn't something her sister handled at all well. Kiara's feelings of uselessness too often led to Kiara making grand gestures, and grand gestures were what had brought them to this in the first place.

But she didn't have time. The time she'd normally have spent worrying, she spent instead trying to help Sebastian, trying to remove that worry from her sister's burden.

Sometimes, when Amelle was in with Sebastian, she thought she heard footsteps outside the door, but Kiara never entered, and Amelle never called out.

She didn't want to make promises she couldn't keep, and Sebastian's condition was far too precarious for anything else.

Amelle wondered if Kiara came and sat with him when she wasn't there. Sometimes she thought her sister must—she would return to find the blankets shifted, or the bedside chair in a slightly different position. But it might only have been Orana arranging things in Amelle's absence, and she didn't want to press her sister into an answer it might make her uncomfortable to give.

Questioning Kiara might lead to Kiara questioning her in return.

And if Kiara asked, "Why isn't he getting better, Mely?" Amelle didn't know what she would say.

Sebastian wasn't waking.

Amelle had never seen anything remotely like it.

It didn't make sense.

She scowled as she pressed her hands against his chest, covering the wound. Closing her eyes, she focused, feeling the tell-tale rush of ice and heat as the healing power of the Fade funneled through her and into the injury. She peeked through her lashes to watch his face, his handsome features lit by the glow of the spell, but there was no response, not even the faintest flickering of his eyelids. His body was healing, of that she was sure, but it was doing so too slowly—as slowly as any wound might naturally heal, without the benefit of the endless waves of magic Amelle expended in an attempt to expedite the recovery—and he hadn't shown any signs of waking since she and Fenris had found him so near death.

In truth, though Amelle hadn't told her sister as much, Sebastian had been more than just near death. When they'd found him, there'd been no breath in his lungs, and his heart was quiet. But his spirit remained, and she'd sensed it, clinging to him, fighting. Amelle still wasn't entirely sure how she'd managed it, but after what had felt like hours kneeling in that alley, Sebastian's blood on her hands, soaking into her clothes, she... well, if not restored him entirely, she'd at least managed to convince his spirit not to depart. He breathed and his heart again beat, and that had been more than enough for her. He'd even woken, for a time—long enough, at least, to recognize them, and to ask about Kiara. Amelle found herself remembering those low, stuttered, broken sentences. At the time they'd seemed a hopeful sign, definitive proof of healing. Now, after days of watching him not recover, she half-wondered if she'd imagined his wakefulness. She almost wanted to ask Fenris if he'd heard the words, too, or if they'd been some strange hallucination borne of exhaustion and distress and overuse of magic and the desire to put at least one wrong thing right again.

Sebastian lay pale and still as wave after wave of healing magic soaked into the wound. Several hours each day were spent with him, checking his progress, such as it was, and attempting—and unfortunately failing, for the most part—to keep him nourished. Even after only a few days, she could see him growing thinner. His cheekbones were more prominent and the hollows of his cheeks deeper, even under the beard that was growing in. He looked… depleted. And there was so little she could do.

She straightened, the blue light fading from her hands, and set to work re-bandaging the injury, to let nature do what magic could not.

Once she was done, she examined her work. She had the unsettling feeling her magic was keeping him from dying, but only that. It wasn't healing him. Even the work his own body was doing, knitting skin and muscle and tissue, seemed forced. Sighing, she dragged her sleeve over her forehead and blinked back the ever-present exhaustion and grief and need for more time.

Amelle crouched down, her mouth by Sebastian's ear, and whispered sweetly, as she had done every day since she'd first started treating him, "So help me, if you die, I am coming into the Fade after you and kicking your arse, Sebastian Vael. You know I can, and you know I will, so heal, damn you. I am not telling her you gave up, so stop being so stubborn and heal."

He didn't so much as twitch. His skin remained too wan, his breathing too shallow. Not for the first time, she wondered if she hadn't done something wrong, something unnatural, attempting to bring him back at all. She shook her head. When she used her magic, she could feel the resistance in him, but it wasn't wrongness. Reaching down, she gently brushed his hair back from his brow. Just for a moment—a heartbeat—she thought that brow creased under her fingers. Then he was still again.

It was a sign of hope where there'd been none, and she wasn't going to turn away even a glimmer of optimism, if it was offered.

For now, it was enough. It was just enough.

#

Kiara hovered in the doorway, watching her sister work. Completely focused on her task, Amelle did not see her. Kiara knew very well she'd be shooed away otherwise. Amelle was so damned particular when she was stressed. And whatever else was happening, Kiara knew Sebastian's injury—to say nothing of all the other healing she knew Amelle was slipping out of the estate to do at The Blooming Rose—was weighing heavily.

Even from a distance, as Amelle pulled back the poultice, Kiara could see the wound was still refusing to heal. Amelle had been healing bumps and bruises and scrapes, sword-wounds and arrow-wounds and magic-wounds for more than fifteen years, and Kiara had never seen one so persistent about remaining red and swollen and infected.

Kiara had been stabbed more times than she could count, and had taken wounds as dreadful, but Amelle almost always had her fit and ready and healthy in no more time than it took to focus her mana and convince torn flesh it really wanted to knit and be whole again. Even the worst injuries Kiara had ever sustained had not been beyond her sister's power, though it had seemed a very near thing at the time. In all honesty, she'd always taken such healing for granted. Maker, Amelle had all but brought her back from the dead after the horrible duel with the Arishok, and though that healing had taken longer, Kiara had been awake, at least. Sebastian's long, unbroken sleep unsettled her; it didn't seem natural. The longer he slept, the more certain she became that all the healing in the world wouldn't be enough to fix him, to wake him.

Amelle set the bandage to the side, grimacing at what it revealed. She inhaled deeply, closed her eyes, and her hands began to glow the familiar silvery-blue of her healing power. Kiara was no stranger to this side of the process, either, and as an observer it… seemed impossible to see what she saw. The power left Amelle's hands, danced over Sebastian's ashen skin, and was absorbed. The skin remained pallid. The wound remained inflamed, accompanied by the stomach-turning stench of sepsis.

For such a tall man, he seemed so small, tossed aside like a broken doll. A part of her wanted to hunt down the careless children who'd left him like this. Another, larger part couldn't bear the thought of more bloodshed. Kirkwall was still so unstable, and for once she could not see a way to fight or talk or charm her way out of the problems she'd helped create. The altercation in the marketplace had taught her that much, at least. Even if she'd wanted to take her chances, even if she wanted to go against the request she stay out of sight made so pleadingly by Aveline—and Cullen, of all people—she wasn't willing to take the risk others might be hurt in any dispute her presence on the streets might arouse.

Better to stay indoors. Better to remain unheard, unseen. Kiara shook her head. She'd never particularly wanted the notoriety, and she certainly hadn't asked to be Champion, but she did wish she could help more. Amelle was helping, and Fenris—thank the Maker—was keeping an eye on her (at Kiara's behest, and, of course, unbeknownst to her sister, lest she protest, and she would have). Cullen was helping. Aveline was doing her best.

Kiara hadn't seen them, but she imagined Merrill was tidying the alienage with the same devotion she'd once lavished on that blighted mirror; Isabela was likely collecting orphan children and finding them safe spaces to hide, all while pretending at indifference; Varric would be pulling strings and telling tales—sometimes both at the same time.

And Kiara could do nothing.

Nothing outside the house, in any case. And inside, she wandered from room to room, wishing she could do more. Sometimes, when Amelle was out, she sat at Sebastian's side, even though that was where she felt most useless of all.

Even wrestling with her feelings of ineffectuality, however, Kiara was grateful for the small mercies her companions had been granted. She was grateful there were people for Amelle to heal. She was grateful her friends hadn't all fled (or been run out of) Kirkwall as she feared they might.

She was grateful Sebastian wasn't dead.

And she was especially grateful that Aveline, at least, seemed in no danger of losing her position. Kiara had dreaded the repercussions the guard-captain might face for her willingness to stand at her side at… against Meredith. But people desperate for order and stability wanted the security Aveline stood for. They needed someone. They no longer had a chantry to look to, after all. And oh, oh, how that wound still stung. The white heat of it burned Kiara to the core, filling her with equal parts rage and horror and sorrow.

Much as Kiara wanted to help, wanted to rebuild, wanted… to be useful in some way, to make amends, to apologize, the marketplace had taught her Kirkwall no longer wanted her. There were those in the city who would see the Champion of Kirkwall dead, and Cullen and Aveline couldn't be responsible for her safety until they had their own people returned to some semblance of routine and order. Aveline's words, delivered calmly, but with pain in her green eyes.

Kiara understood. Much as she wished she didn't, she did. She couldn't argue, and Aveline knew it.

Shaking her head in evident disappointment, Amelle began to rebind the wound using more traditional, less magic-dependent methods of healing. Though the wound must have been horrifically painful, Sebastian neither moved nor made a sound as Amelle laid a new poultice down and began winding her bandages about his breast.

Kiara wasn't noticed until Amelle turned away from the grim task in order to wash her hands.

"Oh," Amelle said, the syllable hanging between them like an odd sort of apology.

"Give me something to do," Kiara said.

"He's… he's still just the same. There is nothing—I've done everything—Kiara, I'm sorry. I'm trying."

"Give me something to do," Kiara pleaded, desperation making her voice waver. "Please, Mely. Give me something to do or I will run mad."

Amelle's expression somehow managed to combine fondness and concern and dismay all at once. It was a look Kiara knew all too well, and one she wished she did not evoke from her sister quite so often. "He needs sustenance. Magic can only do so much, especially since he seems so…" Amelle drifted into silence and shook her head. "Do you think you could try giving him some of the broth? It's tedious work. A few drops at a time, and then you massage his throat to make him swallow."

Kiara gave a sharp nod and crossed the room. The broth had long-since gone tepid, but of course Sebastian wasn't to care. At first she stood beside the bed and tried to maneuver the broth and the force necessary to keep Sebastian's jaw open, but she failed miserably. The liquid splashed on his face, and she felt tears burning hot behind her eyes.

"Kiara…"

"No," she said. "No, I can do this."

"Of course you can," Amelle soothed. "But it will be easier if you sit with his head in your lap. The angle of his throat. Here, I'll help you."

Kiara clambered onto the bed. From here, even the medicinal tang of the poultice and its composite herbs couldn't quite mask the lingering scent of disease. With Amelle's help, they soon had Sebastian's head carefully resting in Kiara's lap. His skin was dry, pulled too taut against high cheekbones, and so very, very hot. Kiara ran tender fingers along his burning cheek, startled at the stubbly feel of beard, and then snatched her hand back, embarrassed. Amelle said nothing.

At first, Kiara poured the drops of broth and Amelle showed her how his throat needed to be massaged. After a while, and using a great deal of concentration, Kiara managed both tasks on her own. Her legs were falling asleep, but she considered it a small price to pay. Amelle looked exhausted, and Kiara felt abruptly horrible that she was only noticing the full extent of her sister's weariness now.

"Have you been doing this every day?"

"Of course," Amelle replied, a little taken aback. "As much time as I can spare. He's—he needs everything he can get at this point. Every drop helps."

With defiance that had nothing to do with feeding a dying man a little soup, Kiara declared, "I'll do it from now on. Tell me what to do, and I'll do it. You shouldn't—he's my—let me help. Just let me help."

Amelle's hand on the top of her hand was gentle. Kiara felt a rush of rejuvenating, cooling power sweep the length of her body and she glared at her sister.

"You're tired, Mely. Don't waste your power on me. I'm fine. I'm just bloody fine." Kiara glared at Sebastian's brow as though it could offer answers, as though she could foretell the future in its lines of care and pain. "Will he be fine for a while?"

"For a while, yes. Keep giving him the broth."

"I will. You go sleep."

Amelle began to protest, but Kiara was adamant. "Come on, Amelle. You're worn out. You and I both know you've been doing double duty. Get some rest. I can hold down the fort. I promise to scream my bloody lungs out if anything changes. They'll be able to hear me down at the docks. You know I'm capable of it. Mother always said I had no concept of inside voice."

The sympathetic hand slid from the top of Kiara's head to cup her cheek. Kiara didn't realize she was crying until Amelle brushed at the tears with her thumb.

"This isn't your fault, Kiara Hawke. Are you listening to me? This isn't your fault."

Kiara nodded, not believing a word of it, and Amelle sighed. "I can tell you don't believe me. Fine." Amelle crouched slightly, the better to meet Kiara's eyes — or, rather, force Kiara to meet her eyes. Which she did, reluctantly. "But I know—and everyone else knows—you are not to blame. For any of this. Even if you don't know it yourself, yet."

Kiara sniffled, pulling her face away and scrubbing her tear-stained cheek on her shoulder to banish the evidence.

Amelle paused in the doorway, looking back over her shoulder. "Thanks, Kiri. I-I do appreciate the help. Even though I know you're doing it as some kind of punishment or penance or something. It—I think it can only do him good, wherever he is, to know there are people who want him to come back. Talk to him, if you want. Maybe he'll hear you. Maker knows he needs to listen to someone, the stubborn blighter."

Kiara had nothing to say, at first. And it seemed a silly thing to talk to a person as deeply asleep as Sebastian appeared to be. Like talking to a wall or a chair or a bottle of Tevinter wine. Not that she hadn't been known to sometimes have those conversations, especially with the wine bottles. Instead, she silently emptied the broth into him drop by drop, and when she was finished, she laid the backs of her hands against his skin, hoping their coolness would soothe him.

"Where are you?" she asked him at last. "I… I never remember my dreams. Mely says dreams are our connection to the Fade. Are you in the Fade? I'm sorry if you are. I was never much of a fan. I-I wish you'd come with me, that time, when I had to go get Feynriel. You were so angry with me for going, do you remember? I'm sure you do. Sometimes you got—get—angry with me for the strangest things. I only wanted to help. Couldn't you see that? I only wanted to help." Kiara sighed. Her hands had grown hot, taking in his fever, so she turned them until her cool wrist rested against his forehead. He didn't move. He hardly breathed. "Even Fenris turned against me there, Sebastian. It was… horrible. I… I don't think you would have listened to the demons. Amelle didn't. Amelle wouldn't. But Fenris and Isabela... I-I didn't like the Fade, is all. I hope it's not like that for you, if that's where you are." Kiara's chest felt tight with emotion and her exhale brought no relief. "I… I never thought you'd turn against me, Sebastian. I never imagined it. Never once. I suppose that was naive of me, all things considered. I… I took your loyalty for granted. I did. If only you'd let me explain. Why didn't you let me explain?"

Of course Sebastian said nothing. His chest kept rising and falling. His eyelashes cast long shadows on his cheeks. His skin burned hot. Nothing changed. He kept on refusing to heal, slowly dying. Kiara swallowed hard and pushed a rogue lock of hair from his searing brow.

"If you die… don't die, Sebastian. Please. Don't die. We can't—things can't end the way they ended. You can't die with those words being the last spoken between us. I won't let you. Do you hear me? Do you understand? I won't let you."

She was crying again, but without Amelle to catch them, the tears just fell.

#

The Hawke estate was quiet when the elf girl opened the door to him. "Mistress Amelle is sleeping," Orana said, her own voice hardly louder than a whisper—she always seemed particularly nervous around him. "Mistress Kiara has been in with… with the patient for some time." On Fenris' crooked eyebrow she explained, "No, he sleeps still. Mistress Kiara feeds him."

"It's Hawke—Kiara—I'd like to speak with," he returned. "I'll await her in the library, but it is not urgent. I would not wish to disturb her. Or her patient."

Orana nodded. It was a simple enough request, and one he knew he was free to make. In truth, Hawke had often told him he was free to come and go as he pleased, especially as he so often made use of the Hawke library. His education was coming along slowly—frustratingly slowly, to his mind—but he could read now. It took effort. He found it easier to read than to write.

It was to the library he went now. He was working his way, very slowly, through a book of children's stories. Tales of great soldiers and beautiful damsels, for the most part—he suspected Hawke had recommended it for the scarcity of magic within its pages. Still, her recommendation was a good one; he could not deny he enjoyed the book.

He was just finishing another story when he heard the door slide open. Hawke looked wretched. Hair in dire need of a wash was twisted away from a pale face marked with the heavy shadows of too many sleepless nights. She found a brief, weary smile for him as she sank down next to him on the divan. He set the book aside and she hesitated a moment before leaning ever so slightly against him.

It had taken him some time to grow accustomed to… Hawke's tendency toward physical contact. At first her casual touches had startled and even displeased him—the first time she'd thrown her arm around him unexpectedly he'd very nearly killed her before he knew what was happening—but now he saw them for what they were: the Champion of Kirkwall's desperate attempts to remember she, too, was only mortal. To connect in some tangible way with the world around her, separate from the various titles she'd been given. Things were so often expected of her, and those things too often kept her apart from others. He… understood that. Touch was an anchor. He thought she used it to prove those she cared for were still with her, still breathing, still whole.

And though he still found himself occasionally startled when she stood close or touched his arm or braved the spines of his armor for a brief embrace, he no longer begrudged her the contact.

"You are weary, Hawke."

"You're observant," she quipped back, though her usual spirit was somewhat lacking.

"Not too weary to jest."

She nudged him lightly. "Is that good or bad?"

"It is you," he replied.

She sighed. "I suppose you may be right about that. You'll know to worry when I can't find anything to joke about. Orana said you wanted to speak with me?"

"If you are tired—"

"Plenty of life in me yet. Can I get you anything? Wine?"

"No," he said.

She was sitting so close he felt her sudden stillness. "A serious conversation, then," she remarked. "I've never known you to turn down a glass." With another heavy sigh, she pushed herself upright, leaning forward to rest her elbows on her knees. "Ahh, Fenris. Are you to be the first then?"

He frowned at this, and mirrored her pose. She chuckled mirthlessly, glancing at him from the corner of her eye. At length, he said, "I confess your meaning escapes me."

"Then you haven't come to tell me you're leaving?"

He stiffened, his armor creaking. "This is what you expect of me, Hawke?"

She had the grace to look chagrined. "I know my actions… and the actions of…"

He could not bear the plaintiveness of her voice; it smacked too strongly of weakness, and Hawke was not weak. The mage had destroyed too much already; Fenris refused to let him damage this, too. "You think I will abandon you because Anders betrayed you?"

She flinched when he spoke the name, and he would have regretted giving voice to it save for the lingering anger. At the mage, certainly, but also that Hawke might think him too weak to stand at her side. "You cannot forget I sided with you when you chose to support the mages. This… this is not you, Hawke. If you have cause to doubt my loyalty, speak it, but otherwise—"

She interrupted him, and though she spoke quietly, her honesty was enough to silence him. "Forgive me. Please, Fenris. I did not intend to cause offense. It is only… I would have none of you suffer if it can be spared. If I can help spare you."

He could not quite erase the anger from his voice—nor did he wish to—when he replied, "You dishonor us, Hawke, if you would believe any of us so easily swayed. I cannot speak for the others, but I will only go if you push me."

"I don't want you to go. You misunderstand me."

"I understand better than you know. You fear further betrayal. You think to push us away first, before we may hurt you. You seek to protect yourself. Poorly."

She sat very still next to him, but she did not raise her voice to argue.

"You are not my master, Hawke. I am not your slave."

This she tried to protest, her expression genuinely distressed, but he spoke over her, curt and immovable. "I follow you because you have earned my loyalty, not because you have forced me, or because you have bought me. A great harm was done you, and you are yet recovering from it. I know this. It is why I will permit this one offense. If you doubt me, say so. Do not cover your disapproval with platitudes. Do not attempt to protect yourself by hiding."

"Fenris…"

He settled a hand on one hunched shoulder, and felt her startle. "I do not say these things to injure you, Hawke. Surely you know this. As a friend, I would not see you suffer. Anders was a poison. I would not see you lost to it. Or irrevocably changed by it, even."

She leaned back, a faint smile pulling at one corner of her mouth. Reaching up to run her hand through her hair, she paused when she realized how filthy it was and grimaced. "So was there a group meeting? Were you the one designated to confront me about my wallowing?"

He offered a half-smile of his own. "You are missed at The Hanged Man."

"Isabela misses my coin, you mean."

"Our purses don't run quite as deep as yours, it's true."

She chuckled. "You lot could come here for a change. I daresay my wine cellar's better stocked than The Hanged Man's. And I never water down my booze. Or serve mystery-ingredient stew."

Instead of shrugging it off as a jest, Fenris nodded. "Perhaps there is merit to that suggestion. For the time being."

Kiara flushed slightly, and then he heard her swallow, hard. "So. What brings you, Fenris? You'd best tell me, since Maker knows I'll only guess wrong again."

Fenris clasped his hands and bowed his head. "There is to be a memorial service for those lost. I thought you mightn't know, as you've not left the estate in some time."

"Aveline and Cullen asked me not to."

"It was not an accusation, Hawke. Only an observation. I am observant. As you say."

She smiled at this. It was still a weak, pale thing compared to her usual grin, but it was better than outright sorrow. He had not realized how much he'd come to take her good humor for granted until now, when it was a much rarer commodity. But the smile faded as quickly as it formed, and she asked soberly, "When?"

"A fortnight hence. I believe to give the recovery effort—"

"Time," Kiara whispered. "Yes, they… would need time. Of course. Thank you for telling me."

"You don't think you'll be welcome."

Hawke cocked her head and raised an eyebrow. "You disagree?"

"You have always had enemies in Kirkwall. That has not changed. You have also always had friends. That has not changed, either. You have friends to mourn. Mourn them."

"Oh, Fenris. When did you get so good at perspective?"

"I had a good teacher," he replied evenly. "Now tell me, how fares Sebastian?"

She glanced toward the fire, her gaze steady and unblinking, but he did not miss the shine in her eyes. "Unchanged. Bearded. Thinner." The last she said as though she blamed herself for it. "Amelle is… concerned. More concerned than she'll say, but I can tell."

"She overextends herself," he said abruptly.

Hawke shot him a look that seemed to say please don't tell me you're just figuring this out now. "You think I don't know that?" She huffed a disconsolate laugh. "Moreover, you think I can get her to stop?"

Fenris' brow furrowed and he rose suddenly, pacing several steps. "A mage must not—"

"Please, Fenris," Hawke said wearily. "No tirades against mages tonight."

"It is no tirade. She must take better care."

Hawke raised her eyebrows. "Amelle knows her limitations. I daresay I'm more likely to end an abomination than she is, magic or not."

"You misunderstand me. I speak out of concern for her wellbeing, not because I fear she'll fall to a demon's lures."

"Really?" Hawke did not even attempt to keep the astonishment from her tone as she drew out the single word to twice its usual length. "I'll have to tell her you said so." Wryly, she added, "To think only a short time ago I was forever having to stop you tearing out her heart."

"I would not have done such a thing. She is your sister, Hawke. You trust her. That is enough."

She got to her feet, shaking her head ruefully. "It was a joke, Fenris. I must be getting rusty if you can't even recognize them anymore. Now, I know you said you didn't want one, but I've had an endless day and I do, so are you sure I can't tempt you with a glass of wine?"

He watched as she fetched a particularly fine vintage from a sideboard. "Oh, very well," he sighed. "I would not wish to be rude."

Her lips quirked again. "No, you wouldn't wish that," she said, pouring him a glass and clinking the edge of hers to his. "To not wallowing."

"To not wallowing," he agreed. "And to hope."

"Yes," she echoed, "to hope."