Prompt: Your protagonist is walking on the beach combined with Write about the person your protagonist thought they would be at twelve years old.

Notes: Evangeline Hawke. So, I sort of combined two prompts. The second one mostly just gave me a good idea, so I didn't really follow it very well. *shrugs*

And I'm still working on the Awakenings prompt. With school starting back up, I haven't had much time to play Awakenings, and I'm having trouble writing Velana correctly. It's such a fun prompt, though, and will have a longer story than the ones I've already posted. Hopefully the wait will be worth it. ^.^

As always, reviews are loved and welcomed! Prompts also loved! If they're anything but Awakenings, I'll probably be able to get to them in less than a week!

Full Circle

"Is that Kirkwall?"

"That, my dear, is Kirkwall." Evangeline Hawke let her daughter's hand slip from hers, allowing the young girl to race through the sand to the ocean's edge, where she stood on the tip of her toes and peered over the water to the city that held so many memories for Eva.

Never before had Eva been so close to the water. All those trips to the coast when she'd lived in the city, and never once had they left the rocky cliff-side for the thin strip of sandy beach. Smiling for her daughter's sake, Eva slipped off her boots and joined Cailee in the shallow water. Even at only seven years old, she had a somber sincerity in her eyes that could only match her father's.

The waves that skimmed over the top of the ocean were small, rolling into Eva's knees but splashing into Cailee's face, soaking her from head to toe. She waded further into the water, until it reached her waist and the waves threatened to overtake her. Eva almost called for her to come back, but she trusted her daughter's strength.

Cailee was the daughter of a Champion, after all.

One particularly ferocious wave rose clear above Cailee, knocking her backwards into a tumble of frantic arms and legs and red hair. Eva, struggling against the wave herself, rushed to reach her daughter. Before she had made it even halfway, Cailee popped up, her face alight with a wide grin that Eva missed seeing. It wasn't a grin of humor, or happiness, it was a grin that said I dare you—a blatant challenge to man and nature alike, taunting the world to try and steal any fragment of bliss from her young heart.

It was a grin that Eva hadn't seen in years. She hadn't ever seen it on her daughter, but she'd once known it to be the signature of the man she loved.

Of course, that had been before.

Before the revolution, before the war, before the running.

The war was over, their lives were safe, but to Eva, it didn't matter. She would trade everything—everything except Cailee, that is—to have those blissful times back.

"Momma?"

Eva looked up in surprise, not expecting her daughter to be so close. "Yes, dear?"

"Have you ever been adventuring?" Cailee's eyes were wide and inquisitive, and her small hand reached out to take one of Eva's.

Holding her daughter's hand tightly, Eva led the way back to shore. "A long time ago," she answered carefully, sticking by her decision that her daughter remain ignorant of the part her parents had played in beginning to war that had ravaged Thedas.

"What's it like?"

Eva remained silent, contemplating exactly how to answer the question. She stepped out of the water, ignoring Cailee's impatient tug on her hand. "It's very dangerous," she decided. "And expensive."

Cailee pulled away from Eva and plopped down in the sand next to her mother's boots, methodically attempting to brush the wet sand off of her feet. "I'm going to be an adventurer one day," she announced proudly, without looking up from her feet. "I'm going to be really famous. I'll have a great big house, and a sword!" Her head snapped up and she offered Eva a gleeful smile. "I'm going to have a sword, Momma!"

"That's great, dear," Eva smiled softly, holding back her insistent disapproval. With any luck, Cailee would grow up to be something other than an adventurer, and this was just a phase. At least her daughter hadn't inherited her parents' magical abilities; even with the revolution as successful as it had been, Eva knew from experience that it was still a terrible thing to be a mage.

That would change with time, she was sure, but Eva was still grateful that Cailee wasn't a mage.

Pausing from her attempt to clean herself of the stubborn sand, Cailee cocked her head to the side and stared inquisitively at her mother. "Was Father an adventurer?"

"Not exactly," Eva whispered, turning her gaze to the calm sea. It wasn't fair to her daughter, she knew, that she didn't like to talk about him. It had been years since his death, but Eva still couldn't bring herself to even say his name; the pain was still too close, too real. "He was a mage," she admitted, not looking back at Cailee.

"A mage?" Cailee ran her hands through the sand, her eyes going wide again as she the sand began clinging to her skin. "Could I be a mage, Momma?" As Eva was about to answer, Cailee pouted, "I don't want to be a mage. I want a sword, Momma!"

Breaking from her silence, Eva promised, "Yes, my dear, you can have a sword. Not now, though, you're not strong enough." Leaning over, she grabbed her daughter's tiny waist and pulled her into her lap, covering herself in sand. Cailee's giggles turned to a high-pitch squeal as Eva began tickling her, feeling a smile of her own beginning to form. "See what happens when you don't eat your vegetables?" she teased.

"Ok! Ok," Cailee laughed, trying to push Eva's hands away. "I'll eat my vegetables! I promise!"

Accepting her surrender, Eva wrapped her arms around Cailee and gave her a kiss on her wet hair. "If you eat your vegetables, I'll let you be an adventurer. Sound good?"

"Yes!"

Eva had no idea that her daughter would take those words to heart, relentlessly following her dream to become an adventurer, and, eventually, Kirkwall's next Champion.