Chapter Four
"Save your breath, mage. We have caught you, at last. They should have hung you or made you tranquil long ago, but the mistake will soon be rectified."
Anders stiffened at his words, but squared his shoulders. "Do what you will with me, just as your kind always has," he spat. "Only let this woman go free. I would not see her kindness punished when she had no idea I was a mage."
The mans eyes flickered coldly over Hawke and he sneered. "This one has the feel of apostate as well. She'll be coming along with us too."
"No!" Anders snarled, and blasted fire from his hands at the same time Hawke yelled, "Like hell!" and released Fist of the Maker, slamming their burning bodies into the ground. Several men who were out of range of the fire spell, staggered to their feet and drew their swords.
Before they could hit either mage with a holy smite or drain away their mana, Hawke pulled her dagger and sliced her arm, chanting as the red swirl encompassed all the templars. They were lifted from the ground and blood poured from their bodies until the final groans of death faded and she released the spell.
The bodies hit the ground with a heavy thud, and she pulled a cloth from her belt and pressed it against her still bleeding arm. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply, wondering what this Anders reaction would be to the hemorrhaging blood magic spell- her most powerful one, and the only spell that allowed her to kill so many at a time.
Anders took her arm gently and removed the cloth, attempting to heal her and frowning when the bleeding stopped but the wound didn't close. She shrugged.
"It won't heal fully until the last of the effects of the spell fade. That one required a lot of power," she said tiredly. He maneuvered her toward a large tree root, and she sat gratefully, already working on the next course of action in her mind.
"Anders, you remember that I said I needed something from you to get the templars off your back forever?" He nodded and she continued. "Well, now is the time, and what I need is your blood." She hurried to explain. "I only need just a small amount…"
He took her hand and pressed his lips to her palm, and she shifted nervously, wondering at his continued silence, when he pinned her with a look so intense it took her breath.
"Mari, you just risked your life for me. You helped save us both. If you're sure you know what you're doing, then, for now, I won't question your methods."
She swallowed the sudden lump in her throat at his trusting words and nodded, then pulled the blood pendant from her neck, feeling the warm glow of the other Anders' blood against her hand for a final time.
"I've carried this with me for so long in readiness for this day," she mused. "It will be strange to finally let it go."
He absorbed her words, letting the full weight of what she was implying sink in. "You planned for this? But why do that?"
Her eyes begged him not to press her on this. "Ask me another time when we are far from this place. Now we have much to do."
She shook off her strange mix of confusing emotions and walked to the bodies of the slain templars. Hawke selected the least marred of the corpses, and the one a similar size and build to Anders. She drug it to one side and motioned him over.
A fleeting regret flashed through her as she looked at the handsome young templar, but when she remembered who they all were and what they stood for, her long nurtured hatred washed away any guilt or sorrow.
Anders watched the play of emotions across her expressive face, and felt an even deeper kinship to her than he had before. They had much in common, it seemed, right down to their conflicted feelings over the chantry lackeys.
"Give me your arm," she said, pulling the dagger from her belt again. He lifted his sleeve, and extended a muscular forearm to her. She gave him an apologetic look, then slit a four inch cut into his pale skin. He flinched slightly, but allowed her to angle his arm to bleed across the corpse at their feet.
When she deemed it enough, she released his arm and nodded to him. With a green glow, he sealed the cut instantly and lowered his sleeve back into place, watching her to see what she would do next.
Hawke placed the pendant on the body, then began chanting, her eyes closed and her head thrown back. The glass vial shattered and a silvery mist covered the corpse, obscuring it from sight. She fell silent and opened her eyes, looking down as the mist cleared.
Anders sucked in a breath as he looked down at a mirror image of himself, but older somehow, and more weathered and worn. The body was enveloped in black mages robes that looked to be in the Tevinter style. He glanced at Hawke and was surprised to see indescribable sorrow on her face and tears in her eyes before she turned away.
"Burn them all with your strongest fire spell, and it is done," she said quietly. "Your phylactery will lead only to this body. They will think you dead, and pursue you no longer." She walked away slowly, her shoulders slumped with fatigue.
He spent a silent moment examining the face of his doppelganger, then called large fireballs from the sky, draining a large portion of his mana with the single spell.
They were both tired from their exertions, but they hurried on their way, discussing which direction to go, as they were no longer safe in Amaranthine.
"Ella will understand what happened when she hears the gossip after the bodies are discovered, and we can send word when we are safely away." She struggled to lift a large rock and Anders pulled it aside easily. She smiled gratefully, giving way to teasing for the first time in hours.
"What would I do without a nice, strong mage around to look after me?"
He smiled back, acknowledging the compliment. "You won't have to find out the answer to that, dear lady. We're in this together, and I'm not letting you out of my sight anytime soon."
Hawke felt a warm glow spread through her chest at his words as she pulled her pack of stashed belongings out of the shallow hole. She gave him a questioning look.
"Do you want to retrieve your staff before we go?"
He pursed his lips thoughtfully and nodded. "I suppose we better, in case we run into any more big fights."
She nodded and whispered a spell against the side of a tree, then grabbed the strange staff that became visible. It was more than half blade and different than anything he had ever seen. He took it from her hands to examine and she watched him in silence.
"This is a very unusual staff." He glanced at her, but she had on her inscrutable face. He had figured out in the short time he had known her, that meant she was uncomfortable or hiding something. "Where did you get it?"
She shrugged, but didn't avoid his eyes. "From the Qunari. I returned some items they had lost, and they rewarded me with this."
"You did a service for Qunari?" He shook his head and handed her the staff. "Why am I not more surprised by that?"
She stowed it across her back, adjusting quickly to the familiar weight. "Shall we go and find yours now? I'll follow you."
Anders took her hand to guide her to where he had hidden the magical item. "Promise not to laugh when you see it, though. Yours is bigger than mine." He pouted out his bottom lip, and she shook her head with a smile.
"It's not the size of the staff that matters, Anders, but what you do with it that counts."
He chuckled. "Well now, if we're talking about my staff, and not my staff, I'm not worried about that one at all, now am I, Mari? What say you to my performance, lovely seeress?"
"I'll let you know if I ever experience the reality," she quipped, and he gave her a wounded look.
"If! If? Surely you know we are fated to be lovers. I knew it the first time I beheld you, and I can't even see the future. It would not be wise to defy the will of the Maker by resisting."
Hawke snickered, giving him a sidelong glance. "You don't really expect a line like that to work, do you?"
He waggled his eyebrows and smirked. "You might be surprised how many lines work for me."
She let her eyes run over him as they walked; the broad shoulders and muscular arms that even rough workman's clothes couldn't hide. His strong profile and warm amber eyes that could melt her with a look. She sighed appreciatively and smiled.
"No, I don't think I would."
They retrieved Anders staff, and Hawke even went so far as to creep close enough to the city gates to have a look, but the templars standing about chatting with the city guard had her running back through the brush to rejoin Anders without delay.
She had mulled over where to go, and had decided on Gwaren. It would be a long journey over land, but her family had lived there for a portion of her childhood. She was more comfortable remaining in Ferelden, in a somewhat familiar area. She also recalled the chantry there was quite small and had very few templars. Hopefully, that had not changed. If so, there was always the Brecilian Forest, or the Kocari Wilds if they were really desperate. They would succeed together, provided he continued to trust her.
Anders suggested they might consider Tevinter, but she couldn't shed her disquiet when she remembered all Fenris had told her of the Magisters. She argued for how much easier it would be to blend into their native land, than a foreign place where they neither spoke the language or knew the customs. He conceded the point and offered no further argument. Secretly, he was just pleased they were going together.
They found a likely spot to spend the night, amidst the shelter of several large trees, sharing the only blanket and their body heat between them. He inhaled deeply and wrapped his arms around her, smiling when she made no objection.
"Do you smell that, Mari?"
She sniffed and winced. "Yes, I need a bath. Sorry, Anders."
He pushed his nose into her hair and breathed deeply. "You always smell like lavender to me, but that wasn't what I was talking about. I was talking about the delicious smell of freedom. If whatever spell you did worked, this is my first night of true freedom." He kissed the side of her head happily. "I'll never be able to thank you enough."
She laid her head back against his shoulder, watching the stars winking through the leafy canopy and grey cloud cover.
"I researched the spell carefully. I assure you, it will work. It's just another example of the hypocrisy of the Chantry and their templar puppets- you know to make a phylactery you have to use blood magic, right?"
He sat in grim silence, having come to the same conclusion, long ago. "I have suspected for some time, but it's not something that would have been tolerated if I tried to speak my suspicions aloud. Anymore than my innocent observations that the Chantry intentionally turns templars into lyrium addicts in order to control them." He laughed, but it sounded strained. "I spent two months confined to a room alone, when Knight-Commander Greagoir heard about that little comment."
She turned in his arms to face him, but his twinkling eyes already covered what emotion she had heard in his voice. "Did they punish you the last time you escaped?" she asked, already knowing the answer, but wanting to give him the opportunity to exorcise some of his demons. The twinkle and slight smile faded, and his serious countenance made him look much more like the Anders she used to know.
"Oh, they punished me, all right. The bastards locked me in solitary confinement for a year." His breath hitched in remembered horror, and her brow furrowed in sympathy. She wondered for the thousandth time if it wouldn't have driven her mad.
"How did you stand it? What kept you from losing hope?"
He smiled unexpectedly, and caressed her cheek with gentle fingers. "I'm starting to think it was you. Can you shape-shift into a hawk, by any chance?"
She chuckled and shook her head. "I've never learned to take animal form. Why? Did you have a hawk for a friend?"
He nodded. "I did. I had a single, barred opening to let in fresh air. Soon after my sentence began, the bird landed there, and I started talking to it. He, or she, I don't really know which, came back the next day. I started saving small scraps to feed it, and we were fast friends from then on." His gaze became unfocused with memory. "I swear, there was intelligence and understanding in those gray eyes, even when my rants were half mad."
Hawke considered the possibilities. "It could have been a sympathetic apostate unwilling to leave you all alone…or it could have been a hungry hawk in search of a kind hand to feed it." She shrugged. "Or perhaps it was both."
Anders regarded her with the warm brown gaze that always set her insides to fluttering. "And what of you, Marian Hawke? Do you describe yourself as well?" He brushed her hair back, gently caressing the side of her neck. "Are you only a sympathetic apostate come to offer me the pleasure of your company, or do you hunger for something you can only receive at my hand? Tell me what you would have of me, Mari, and it is done."
Hawke shivered from his words as much as his touch. She wet her lips hesitantly. "I wish no more than you are willing to give, Anders. Never more than that," she whispered.
"And what are you willing to give me in return, my dear Lady Hawke? Is this to be an exchange between equals?" His hand threaded through her hair and he tilted her head to the side, baring her neck to the wandering lips he lowered to her throat as his voice wove a spell over her and stole her mind.
"I give you anything you want of me," she breathed. "Everything."
"I accept," he murmured against her lips, breathing his warm breath against her face and giving her time to stop him, should that be her wish. Brown eyes held blue for a small eternity, and she pressed forward with a sigh of surrender, merging their lips and sharing the air they breathed as they drank greedily from each other.
It was as though she had never lost him. Her grief just a distant nightmare that had no place in her current reality, and she moaned with all the joy and longing of a woman coming home to her beloved.
Anders was amazed as he kissed Marian. It was thrilling and new, yet so familiar, he found himself wondering if this was what it felt like to go beyond infatuation and attraction, and possibly into something deeper. Something he was almost afraid to contemplate.
The taste of her drove him mad with want. He stroked her tongue with his own, wordlessly asking for more of her, and she met him eagerly, kiss for kiss. When she finally pulled back, he stared at her heaving breasts and parted lips, still wet from their passionate embrace.
Unfamiliar emotions made him feel like someone had punched him in the gut, and he struggled to think of something to say. He wondered if he looked as stunned as he felt, reeling from the revelation a mere kiss could bring. Normally he would press for more while he had the advantage of her willingness, but he hesitated. This was not like the casual encounters he was used to, it felt- important.
Marian smiled at him with eyes shining, and lay her head against his chest, saving him from the effort of speaking. She fell asleep in the welcome warmth and comfort of his arms, listening to the steady beat of his heart.
Anders spent a long time in silent contemplation over all the conversations they had had, and the events of the day. Remembering Hawke's fierceness in battle, and how she fought for him, before he finally succumbed to the lure of the fade.
~o~