2

It had been a few hours. Varric had made the mistake of eating the peanuts at the bar, so had retired to his room with a sore belly, leaving Isabela to drink alone. She was drunk, but aware of her surroundings, and as she felt someone approach her from behind, she spun quickly, pulling out a blade from her waist.

'What do you want?!" she demanded, before locking eyes with a surprised looking young woman.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to frighten you. Are you Isabela?" the girl asked in the smooth, distinctive accent of a Fereldan.

Isabela sized the girl up. She was a little bit shorter than Isabela, and with a smaller frame. But she had a delightful little body, with a small waist, reasonably large breasts and a set of hips that a man - or woman - could rest their pint on. Just the way Isabela liked it. Shoulder length black hair framed her striking face, which had plump pink lips and the brightest blue eyes that Isabela had ever seen.

"That's okay, sweet thing, you didn't frighten me. Nothing frightens me! Yes, I am Isabela. Captain Isabela, although that title rings somewhat hollow with my ship broken into a thousand splinters off the Wounded Coast. But, enough about me. Let me buy you a drink, and you can sit on my lap and tell me about yourself."

She let her eyes travel up and down the girl at liberty, watching the girl squirm slightly under her attentions.

"Ugh!" an unimpressed voice came from behind the girl, and Isabela noticed a large, heavily armoured, woman, with flaming red hair.

Isabela's lips curled in mockery. "What's wrong, big girl? Are you jealous? It's okay, it can be your turn next…"

"No thanks!" the redhead spat out, obviously another Fereldan.

"Interesting, you throw yourself at two women, and ignore the man standing before you?" a deep voice came from beside the redhead.

For the first time, Isabela noticed the large man, well; boy was a more appropriate word, standing with the two women. Normally she would not have missed a big lad like him walking in, but her eyes had been too busy devouring the tasty morsel in front of her.

The girl rolled her eyes. "Carver, stop being so competitive…" she shot in the direction of the boy.

"Oh, don't worry, there needn't be any competition. I can handle you both" Isabela assured the tall boy.

His face contorted into a look of horror, an unusual sight for a man that was just offered two women. "You, and my sister?! I think not!" he said storming off.

Isabela let a little giggle escape her lips. She hadn't been overly interested in the boy anyway, not with this pretty girl, who was apparently his sister, standing before her. "So, what about that drink, sweet thing?"

"Umm… thank you for the offer, Captain Isabela, but I'm afraid I'll have to decline. I was actually looking for you. Varric told me that you might be in need of my assistance?"

Isabela let that information tick over in her mind. Assistance? Had Varric hired her a prostitute?! No, this girl was too attractive to be sold for 50 pieces of silver.

"I'm Hawke. I'm not sure if he mentioned me?" the girl added helpfully.

"You're Hawke?!" Isabela nearly spat out her drink. How was this pretty girl, in her little green dress, the warrior with an affinity for destruction that Varric had described?

The girl nodded. "Yes, I'm Hawke. This is my friend Aveline," she said, gesturing towards the grumpy redhead to her left, "and the man-child you just met is my younger brother, Carver."

"I'm sorry sweet thing, I'm not trying to be rude, but I have some extremely skilled killers after me. I'm going to need more than a pair of children and their nursemaid to help me out with this problem. But if you ever change your mind about the drink, you know where I am." Isabela turned her back on the girl, and went back to her drink.

"I'm sorry to have disturbed you, Captain" the girl, Hawke, said graciously, before making her way to leave.

"Wait, wait, wait, Hawke!" It was Varric, running down the stairs from his room. "Isabela, what are you doing sending her away? This is the girl I mentioned."

Isabela turned around to make eye contact with her dwarven companion. "Yes, I know it's the girl that you mentioned, although I will point out that you not only failed to mention her gender, but also the fact that she's just left her swaddling clothes."

Hawke cleared her throat, "Actually, I'm 20…"

"Isabela, you of all people should know not to judge a book by its cover. I think that we could help each other. You need help getting rid of your assassins, and we need help raising coin" Varric reasoned.

"I've already told you, Varric, I don't have much coin" Isabela said impatiently.

He shook his head. "No, that's not what I meant. I've seen you, Isabela, you're like lightning with those blades. Come and work for us. We raise coin for our needs, you raise coin for your ship. Everybody wins. Come on, you're not doing anything better with your time, are you?"

Isabela paused, and looked around the tavern. Regular coin coming in would be handy. And getting to chase around after this pretty girl looked like it could be fun.

"It sounds like we could be useful to each other, Isabela. We can watch each other's backs" Hawke added reassuringly.

Isabela smirked. "Oh, I'll certainly be watching your back, sweet thing."

Hawke nodded with a smile, apparently missing the intent of the comment. "Excellent. So, what can I help you with?