"What are you doing here?" asked Cassandra. She'd meant it to sound accusing but it only came out dazed.

"When Knight-Commander Rutherford offered the chance to travel here, I took it. Always wanted to see this place. And, of course, keep my eye on you," said James. He flashed her a blinding smile. "You've done well for yourself. Maybe even better than your birth entitled you. But I've been watching, from a safe distance, and I'll thank you not to repay my long-ago challenge to you in the ring. I'm no match for you, and the results wouldn't be nearly so enjoyable for either of us."

Her face colored at the memory, and she realized with a start that he was flirting with her. The thought was so absurd that it shook her out of her stupor. She ran back over his answer with a frown, and she asked with more of her usual manner, "You were at Kirkwall? Why wait until now to speak with me?"

James looked down, then back up at her face with boyish shyness. "A lot of reasons, I guess. We didn't part on the best terms. I wasn't sure how you'd react," he said. She snorted, and the corner of his mouth twitched. "There never seemed to be the right moment. And I'm just a servant. Not much to speak of, for someone of your stature."

Cassandra heard the echo of Cullen's voice, recounting the tale of the man from Weisshaupt who'd wondered if she would have accepted a grander man, and against her will she felt herself unbending slightly. "Rank matters little to me. But these things are still true, so why now?"

His eyes darted to the edge of the yard, where Cullen still instructed the veteran Templars on the tactics of unit fighting. "I don't press another man's claim."

She bristled. "I am not a claim."

James's eyes widened. "Oh. No, of course. But he was the Commander. He might not have appreciated the competition," he said. He smiled again. "I'd have had no choice but to compete for you, Princess. And I'm not accustomed to losing."

"Seeker will be sufficient," said Cassandra icily. "And the Commander is not that sort of man."

"I'm just a Tevinter refugee. Seeker," he said, with insincere emphasis on her title. "I couldn't take the chance. But here I think the Chantry will protect me if he takes issue with my interest in his woman."

She thought about correcting him again, that she was not a possession and belonged wholly to herself, but this was not the place for an argument. And there were more important things to say. "The Commander and I are colleagues alone," she said, astonished at how difficult it was to force the words past her throat.

"Even better," said James. He winked, and she squinted at him suspiciously.

Cassandra felt more like her old self, but she still wasn't sure what to do with this ghost of a boy she'd hated for so long. The path was clear in front of her - her love had returned, exactly at the moment she needed him, and with his penitence and her maturity they would begin anew. Only she couldn't seem to bring herself to step onto it.

She frowned. And he hadn't actually apologized for anything. When she opened her mouth to point this out, he cut her off. "I'm sure you have questions. I'd like to hear about you, as well. Can I offer you a drink in the tavern? I know you've had water, but I think you can stand something stronger," he said, smiling.

The prickle of eyes on the back of her neck forestalled her answer, and she spun around, half-hoping it was Leliana to rescue her. No matter how unlikely it was. Instead, it was an even less likely Marian Hawke.

"Cassandra Pentaghast?" she asked, but it wasn't really a question. "For a woman who was so eager to pump my friends about me, you're astonishingly hard to talk to." The ice-blue eyes looked past her. "Hello. James, isn't it?"

"Yes, Champion," said James in the formal tones of a servant.

Hawke laughed suddenly, a sound of pure amusement, though Cassandra couldn't see what was funny. "Well, James, I need to interrupt your business with the Seeker. Unless it was urgent?"

He shook his head and glanced at Cassandra. "Just renewing an old friendship. Nothing that won't wait. Will I see you later?" he asked, and Cassandra took a long moment to realize he was addressing her.

"It is likely," she said, and he touched her hand once before walking away.

Hawke watched him go. "Was he really an old friend of yours? I apologize, if so."

"I knew him long ago. I don't know if we were ever friends," said Cassandra.

"Ah. That describes most of the people in my life, too," said Hawke. She looked after him with mild interest. "I got him out of Tevinter - where he'd sold himself on accident to a magister's family, the idiot - because no one deserves slavery, but I can't say I like him much. Still, it's hardly any of my business. Other things are, however, and I'm told you're the one to talk to about them. Can we take a walk?"

She held out her crooked arm for Cassandra, like a man at a formal ball, and after a moment of confusion she took it. Hawke seemed even more amused than ever, and Cassandra saw Cullen's eyes follow them warily as the pair headed out into the streets of Haven. She'd never wanted to know so badly what he was thinking. She'd never been so far from knowing.

"So what did my friends tell you about me? Varric and Aveline must have made very different interrogation targets," said Hawke lightly.

"Varric, Aveline and Cullen told me many things," said Cassandra, emphasizing the final name. She couldn't help but notice that heads were turning to take second looks at her companion with every person they passed.

Hawke grinned. "Cullen and I were definitely never friends. A girl can't be friends with a body like that, can she?" She closed her eyes and tilted her head toward the sun, leaving Cassandra to steer them away from obstacles and gawkers while trying to control her rising blush. "It was such a shame he was a Templar."

Cassandra seized on the opening gratefully. "Yes. Varric told me that your sister was a mage, as well as your father. You were sympathetic to them throughout your time in Kirkwall. Why did you take up the Templar's cause in the final battle? Was the lunacy of Anders so affecting?"

"Anders wasn't a lunatic," said Hawke sharply, and Cassandra stopped, startled. They were at the opening of an alley, and Hawke pushed her into it roughly. "The mages were treated like animals, worse than animals, and the Templars were power-mad lunatics who wouldn't listen to reason. My sister ran her whole life from them, and even the decent ones would have locked her in a cage for no crime at all. The usual ones would have made her life torture. Bethany never would have survived in the Gallows. She was an opinionated pain, like all good sisters, and she would have been made Tranquil faster than I could snap my fingers. Women who looked liked she did usually were."

Cassandra narrowed her eyes, and Hawke laughed sardonically. "Don't tell me you don't know, Seeker. Anders did what he had to do to make people pay attention. It worked. The Divine is here. You're here, and so am I. There will finally be some justice in Thedas."

She stopped talking, and Cassandra watched her place a sunny smile back on her lips, like an Orlesian mask slipping on over a real face. "But a blood mage killed my mother. He was insane. They're not all good, so hey. I made a choice."

"You're lying," said Cassandra, a little more forcefully than she'd intended, but the knowledge of it was bright and clear inside of her. "You would have let them all go with blood still dripping from the arms. It's obvious you hate the Templars, more than anything. What was your real reason?"

Hawke's smile never left. "Varric told me you were good at reading people. You certainly figured him out. Or most of him. I guess you never figured out he could have led you to me." She picked a fleck of dirt off of her elbow studiously. "My reasons are mine. What does it matter to you?"

Cassandra knew, in the small, shameful part of her soul, that part of her easy acceptance of Varric's final lies was that she hadn't wanted this woman anywhere near Cullen again. But the dwarf had been convincing, she had to admit. An issue she would sort out later. "It matters because I can't let Justinia appoint you the leader if you're still full of hate."

"The leader of what?"

There was genuine curiosity on Hawke's face, and Cassandra crossed her arms. "Cullen didn't tell you?"

"He told me that if I came here, it would help my cause. That the Divine was open to reform if I talked to her Right Hand. You. That's all."

"You swore yourself to his personal service on something so insubstantial?"

Hawke laughed then, a belly laugh that had her steadying herself against the nearest wall. "Sweet Maker, did he say that? I said I'd come along and check it out. I'm not sure that counts as a personal service oath." She got herself under control and shrugged. "It was insubstantial, but I felt like I owed him. He's been helping me and my group funnel people through Kirkwall since I left, not that he knows I'm the one he was working with. Fenris was a good front. I didn't think Cullen was looking to betray me, and it seemed worth the risk, though I held out for a few days. He's sexy when he begs."

Cassandra's hands clenched before she could stop them, and Hawke's eyes sparkled. "Boy do you have it bad," she said. "Not that I blame you."

Understanding dawned. "You sided with the Templars because of Cullen. Because you loved him." And still did, most likely. "He did not believe that to be the case."

"Love had a lot to do with it," said Hawke, and for once she seemed sincere. "Does that satisfy you? I didn't come here to be a leader - Kirwkall was more than enough bureaucracy for a lifetime - but I'll do it if it will help the mages gain their freedom."

"I haven't yet decided."

"Let's keep walking then," said Hawke with a charming grin. She stepped back out into the street and instantly the town watched her once more. Something about her spun the world on a new axis, and it was easy to see why she'd never lacked for allies. "I'll convince you. And you can tell me what you really think about my old friends."

The next days didn't settle into routine, as the very word rebelled against the ordered chaos coming to Haven, but they at least became more familiar. Cassandra greeted dignitaries, met bodyguards and sized them up, and used her tutored skill with languages to eavesdrop on the unnsuspecting visitors. The religious functions she usually performed fell away, except for the responsibility of the prayer sessions that she shared with the Divine and Leliana. They rotated as they always did when they were together, and Cassandra saw hundreds of faces in each congregation. Cullen was never one of them.

Leliana graciously extended forgiveness for Cassandra's callous words, but though it was honest it wasn't complete, and much of what had been strong between them was broken. Their conversations became functional and professional, and to Cassandra's surprise she found herself missing the interfering personal comments that the Left Hand had always had waiting for every occasion. But the chances to use them never arose. They didn't talk about the refugee aid in Kirkwall, or the reappearance of James, or why Cassandra still slept in her tent behind the Chantry. They didn't talk much at all, and Leliana took to having her meals with her scouts every night.

Even more distressingly, Leliana extended the same coolness to a dumbfounded Aedan, who took on the look of a kicked dog whenever the Orlesian woman greeted him with her most bard-like smile. Neither of them asked Cassandra to help them, which was just as well. Even if she'd been capable of it, their reconciliation would only lead to more pain.

Instead, Cassandra spent more time with Hawke and Varric in the execution of her task. The dwarf was unrepentant about his lies, and Cassandra quickly learned that her anger rolled off of him easily in front of the Champion. Whatever camaraderie had formed between them in the weeks at Kirkwall was gone once Hawke sat between them. But Cassandra was heartened that it didn't feel broken, only invisible, like a claw retracting into a cat's paw so cleanly that it couldn't be seen. One night he passed her two new chapters of Swords and Shields with a small wink, and she thanked him sincerely. At least there was one person's regard she hadn't entirely lost.

Hawke herself was harder to sketch in. Cassandra certainly felt her charm, and even beyond it she genuinely liked the woman. She was warm and kindly, despite the sarcastically irreverent streak that didn't so much run through her as consume her. Cassandra had to admit that it wouldn't be the worst thing for a less devout person to run the Inquisition, were it necessary. The Maker would bless them, but the practicalities of the world sometimes required a less exalted view. And Hawke was funny, one of the only people who could lift her spirits at all as the Conclave approached. Plus, Hawke's disdain of Templars faded in the face of so many personal examples, hand-picked by Justinia for their open-minded natures, and once the rogue even admitted that were they all like this, the Order might become tolerable.

That balance was what Cassandra had been hoping to see. A fervor to save the mages alone wasn't enough, and Cassandra was finding herself in the uncomfortable position of being the only person in the inner group with a suspicion of magic-wielders. She wanted them to be treated humanely, of course, but Leliana, Hawke and even Cullen seemed to forget the damage they could cause, on small and large scales, when given total autonomy. Justinia's card-playing youth made her impassive, but The Divine could not be seen to be biased, even in private, so close to a peace conference, and Cassandra was alone.

Still, Hawke was moderating, and she clearly had the qualities of inspiration and instinct for historical change that Cassandra had always imagined.

And yet.

There was something slippery about Hawke, that mask that Cassandra had seen her put on so many times. She'd stopped wearing it in front of only Cassandra, or so it seemed, but had she truly or was that another ploy? Varric had said Hawke was out of control, but that never seemed true no matter how Cassandra prodded her. Cassandra remembered what Cullen had told her, about how Hawke was so visible that Marian was never known. Was Hawke the shadow life, who only wore masks and had no true face?

But the feeling was hard to pin down, and part of her wondered if she was only searching for a reason to send Hawke away from this place. Despite her best efforts, she felt it like a physical blow every time Cullen spoke, laughed, or sat with Hawke in the public areas of Haven. She didn't want to know what they did in private, but she could picture it all too well.

James hovered around her whenever she left the Chantry, attentive and flattering, but unlike Hawke's absorbing foreground he was only distracting background. He apologized for his betrayal, telling a heartfelt story of his own desolation at his rejection and the loneliness that had led him to new comfort, and she forgave him easily. Too easily for comfort. She'd imagined she'd always be furious at this boy who'd taken the truth her mother had promised her and twisted it into pain, but now that he was here she had no more space for fury. It was only regret, and loss, and the indescribable void of her life that filled her now.

Cassandra did try, earnestly, to re-walk the path that was laid in front of her. The hand of the future beckoned, and she knew without Varric's help that this was how the stories worked. But no matter how James plied her and teased her, there was nothing in him to tempt her to move. He even went so far as to kiss her one night behind the tavern, ale bitter in his mouth as he pressed his tongue against her own. He called her princess in needful whispers, but it wasn't consuming or dangerous now, only sad.

She didn't fight him, almost hoping that a buried spark would catch and fill the hollow place where her heart had been, but nothing happened. His passionate kisses couldn't elicit even a tenth of what she felt simply meeting Cullen's eyes across the room, and she was cold under his touch. After a few minutes she pushed him away gently and walked back to the Chantry on shuffling feet.

The Maker was faithful, but He was also just. She released the last of her hope into the star-filled sky and rededicated herself to her divine calling.

She ran into someone as she mounted the steps towards sleep, and she looked up in horror when she realized it was Cullen. She hadn't been this close to him in days, and he still smelled like leather and metal, with a new hint of the woods around Haven that made him even more deliciously masculine. He'd cut himself shaving that morning, and the angry red line at his throat drew her eyes unerringly.

Cassandra shook herself and tried to remember his desire for distance. Cullen had avoided her nearly completely since she'd given him her room, a task both small and large. Small because of the increasing number of people, but large because they both met frequently with Justinia yet never seemed to meet in the halls. It occurred to Cassandra now that the Divine was doing it on purpose, and she didn't know whether to be grateful or irritated.

"I'm sorry," she mumbled as she looked down at her feet and tried to move around him.

"Are you okay?"

She nodded. "I did not hit you with any force."

"No," said Cullen, touching her arm. "I meant, well, are you okay? You look like maybe you aren't."

Cassandra sighed, and she heard her voice wobble. She stayed quiet until she felt mistress of herself. "It is nothing of import," she said. Only my missing heart. "It's kind of you to ask, but I do not expect you to indulge my moods." She looked up at his face and nearly wept at the furrowed line that bisected his brow. His concern was borrowed from the past, but she wanted it in the present so badly she could hardly breathe.

Another box of confusion and pain to shrink and add to her growing internal pile.

He coughed and looked away. "Hawke told me an old friend of yours was here. Was in Kirkwall, actually," he said. She didn't miss the slight hesitation on the word 'friend'. "Is he bothering you? Did he follow you here on ill-intentioned business?"

"No," she said. "He only made himself known to me here, not in the Gallows. And he was not… that kind of friend. I knew him in my childhood, in Nevarra."

Cullen's eyebrows raised. "Did he know your brother?"

"Slightly," she said. "We haven't spoken of him." Partly because she never spoke of Anthony, to anyone, and partly because James seemed to have no interest in conversation not about himself or her. But because Cullen was looking at her with that vast concern that pulled words out of her, she added, "He was more my friend than Anthony's. He was my first suitor, I suppose, though it all seems very awkward and innocent now. I haven't seen him since I joined the Seekers."

"I see," said Cullen. His face held a strange expression, and she wondered, secretly, if he was jealous. But, of course, he wasn't. His voice never wavered as he asked, "Is he looking to renew a young courtship?"

"Yes," she said simply. "But there is nothing to renew. He is not," she began, then broke off with a cough. "What I want."

She'd been so close to saying, He is not you, and nothing would have shamed her more. She had to get out of this conversation. "Hawke is in the tavern," she said abruptly.

Cullen seemed to come back from a distance and said, "Thank you. But I don't think the tavern is for me tonight. I thought I'd take a walk. The stars are beautiful in the mountains."

He paused, and she made herself very small inside of the silence. She wanted to go with him, so badly she was already mapping the path they would take. As the pause went on all of the hope she thought she'd released came flooding back into her. Maybe he would ask her to join him. Maybe he could learn to love the bad Cassandra, the cruel and selfish one that he'd never known except to hate. Maybe through that, somehow, she would be saved.

Instead he sighed and said, "Hopefully I don't get lost," and the moment passed.

She reassured him that the bell of the Chantry would help him find his way and cautioned him against bears before finishing her climb to the Chantry doors. She couldn't resist turning around at the top, just to watch him for a minute longer. She saw Hawke join him as he passed the tavern, laughing and draping herself over his broad shoulders with a whoop of excitement. Her long, dark hair was silvery in the streaming moonlight, and she tossed it like a mane at something Cullen said as they passed through the gates into the village proper.

Cassandra tucked away a final box of pain inside herself before she went to sleep.