A Little White Lie: part 3
Title: A Little White Lie - part 3/?
Author: signcherie
Rating: T
Pairing: Anders/f!Hawke
Summary: Hawke is awkward with men. To get her to loosen up around Anders, Bethany and Isabela tell her that the apostate is only romantically interested...in other men.
Part one
Part two
The whole thing on the kink meme (I can't guarantee the rating will stay the same there. Actually, I can pretty much guarantee it's going to jump up to an M rating soon.)
crossposting to knickerweasels
Maker, please, thought Autumn, not tonight.
The Maker apparently did not hear her, because the hum of voices in the next room, which had been growing steadily in volume for the past ten minutes, now broke out into out-and-out yelling.
“...don’t know how you could gamble away everything we had! It’s not just about money. That estate was everything we had of our history! Our parents, our grandparents, our great-great-great-grandparents all lived in that house, raised their children there!”
“Don’t start pretending like that matters to you, Leandra! You left! Ran off to Fereldan with that bloody apostate to raise your brats. If family was so important, you wouldn’t have abandoned it!”
“You want to talk about family? You put my children into servitude! For a year! What do you know about family?”
Bethany’s voice, quieter than the others, drifted in, “Let it go, Mother. Please. It’s not worth fighting...”
“Better I left the lot of you to rot outside the city, then? That’s gratitude for you. I had to pull in favors just to get those opportunities for your useless kids!”
Just ignore them, Hawke thought, squeezing her eyes shut. Just go to sleep.
“Pull in favors? My children took care of your debts to those smugglers!”
“And now they take up space, eat me out of house and home! If that estate meant so much to you, you bloody well should have stayed to look after it!”
And suddenly Hawke knew she couldn’t do it. Not one more night spent curled up in bed pretending she didn’t hear them, or pleading uselessly for them to calm down. Not one more night of them shrieking at each other until they had no voices left to shout with. Not one more night.
“My children contribute more to this household than you do!”
Hawke didn’t bother with armor. A pair of trousers, a tunic, her boots, and her sword strapped to her back. That was all she needed. With a bang, she pushed open the door to her room, stormed past her astonished mother and uncle, and slammed the front door behind her.
She stood in the cool night air of Lowtown, face upturned to the sky, and wondered what in the Void she would do now.
She could go to the Hanged Man. She knew Varric and Isabela would still be up. But she wasn’t sure she could muster up enough cheer to deal with them tonight.
There was really only one place she could think of.
-----
It was later than usual when Anders closed his clinic that night. A gang fight in Lowtown had left a teenage boy near death, his body mutilated. He’d been carried in by his hysterical mother who pleaded through her tears for Anders to save her boy.
He was lucky the boy had been brought to him before he lost too much blood. Anders had been able to save his life...but the boy’s hand had been chopped off at the wrist, and Anders could not regrow limbs. He worried what would become of the boy now. It would be difficult to work, difficult to fight...would even his gang take him back if he could not be useful to them?
He wanted to berate the boy for joining a gang in the first place--and he had, half-heartedly--but he knew how things were. The gangs offered protection for poor Fereldan refugees with nowhere else to turn.
Anders sighed as he closed and locked the first of the two large doors to his clinic. First thing in the morning, he would go to see Lirene about the boy and his mother. See if there was anything she could do for them.
The mother had been exceptionally grateful. Anders remembered the adoring look in her eyes as she thanked him--and then the way her fingers shook as she reached for the buttons on her dress, offering to pay him with the only thing she had. He’d put his hand over hers, stopping her, telling her she owed him nothing. She’d grown even more worshipful after that, though that certainly had not been his intent.
He would leave the lanterns lit during the night, in case of emergency. Sometimes people would bang on the doors in the wee hours, needing help for some life-threatening injury. He always worried when he left to help Hawke, but he left the clinic in the hands of his trusted assistants, with a good supply of potions, injury kits, bandages--everything he could think of to help. So far, everything had been fine, and Maker willing, it would continue to be so.
As Anders started to shut the second door, a movement in the shadows caught his eye. Mentally preparing an offensive spell, he called out, “Who’s there? Show yourself!”
Hawke stepped uncertainly out of the shadow.
Anders exhaled and let the spell on the tips of his fingers dissipate. “Hawke,” he said in relief. “What are you doing here?”
She had a lost expression on her face that Anders couldn’t remember ever seeing before. It caused him a measure of alarm.
“It...I...” She let out breath. “My mother and Gamlen were fighting. Screaming at each other. I just...I couldn’t take it anymore. I thought maybe...you wouldn’t mind if I came here.”
Anders was touched and honored that he was the first person she came to when she had nowhere to go. “Of course you can come here. You can always come to me.”
He held open the door, but Hawke just shifted uncomfortably. “I shouldn’t intrude on you. I don’t know what I was thinking. It’s so late...”
Anders was exhausted, but the only thing he wanted right now was to be with Hawke. He hadn’t even realized how badly he wanted it until she turned up on his doorstep. “I’m still awake,” he said. “Please. Sit and talk with me awhile.”
Hawke lingered a moment, glancing back the way she’d come from, then came inside.
Anders locked the second door. “I’m really glad you’re here,” he said quietly.
“I just left Bethany there to deal with them all by herself. Maker, what kind of sister am I?”
“An absolutely devoted one.”
“A coward who can’t even deal with her own family.”
“You’re human. We all need a break sometimes.”
Anders gestured to a cot, and they both sat. A part of Anders wished he had nicer accomodations to offer her--his clinic wasn’t exactly the most impressive bachelor pad--but he knew that was foolish. Hawke knew what he was and what he did. “Your mother and uncle fight often, then?”
“Every so often,” Hawke said, looking away. “Mother--well, she’s not really angry at Gamlen. I think--it’s Carver. She misses him so much. She just gets overwhelmed and she needs some way to let it all out. And Gamlen--well, he makes himself a convenient target.”
Anders noticed the break in her voice when she said her brother’s name. “You miss Carver, too, don’t you,” he said, and then felt like an idiot. Of course she missed her brother.
Hawke laughed mirthlessly. “Every day. He was such a tit, Carver. He blamed me for everything. I swear, if he were here, he’d be telling me how Ostagar was all my fault. And Maker’s blood, I’d give anything to hear him say it.”
“I wish I could have known him.”
“You only say that because you didn’t know him. Trust me on this. He would have given you hell.”
Tears hovered on her lashes, but her face was hard, as if she knew they were there but refused to let them fall.
Without thinking, Anders reached out and brushed one of the tears aside. Autumn’s chin jerked up, her eyes meeting his.
“I’m sorry you lost him,” Anders murmured. “I know how much you love your family. I know how deeply you must feel his loss.”
They were lucky to be so adored by her. In his most selfish moments, Anders would give anything to have Hawke feel the same devotion to him.
“Ah, balls,” Hawke said, and Anders wondered how many other phrases Hawke had picked up from Isabela. “What about you, Anders? Have you ever lost anyone?”
Anders hesitated. “You mean besides Karl?”
Hawke winced and looked at Anders with wide eyes. “Karl. I’m so sorry, Anders, I wasn’t even thinking.”
“It’s all right. Karl is the only one I’ve lost...that way.”
Hawke took a breath. “Did...you love him?”
She sounded a little nervous. Was that because she had feelings for him and was jealous of his first lover? Or was he just imagining what he wanted to hear?
“You mean, was I in love with him? I don’t know. We didn’t talk about it. Talking would have made it...too real, somehow. When we were together, we could forget that out in the world, we were nothing but templar slaves. He was there for me when I needed him, and I...I tried to be there for him.”
Anders stopped talking, because he hadn’t been there for him, not when it counted. He’d promised to help him, but in the end, he hadn’t stopped the bloody templars from ripping his mind away. The templars didn’t give a fig for the person that Karl had been. His warmth, his laughter, his brilliant wit--they meant nothing to those who imprisoned him. He was just a mage, just another receptacle for evil, just another troublesome problem to be disposed of.
They certainly didn’t care that he could kiss with the ferocity of a tiger, that his eyes crinkled whenever he cast a healing spell, that he was as gentle and patient a teacher as he was a lover....
Hawke’s voice cut off his train of thought. “I’m so sorry,” she said softly. “I should have been able to save him for you.”
Anders would always live with his own guilt, but he hadn’t expected it from Hawke. “What could you have done?” he said. “You can’t possibly think this was your fault. He was already Tranquil by the time I asked for your help.”
“I don’t know,” Autumn replied. “Something.”
Anders sighed. For a moment, they both sat in silence.
“Who else did you lose?” she asked softly.
Anders blinked.
“You said Karl was the only one you lost ‘that way.’ Who did you lose...other ways? Do you mean your parents?”
She didn’t miss anything. It was almost unnerving how well she knew him sometimes.
“I lose people,” he said. “I used to lose them when I escaped the Circle. People don’t like to be left behind, abandoned.” That was how things had ended with Karl, the first time. He’d been dragged back to discover that Karl hadn’t been willing to wait for him, couldn’t forgive Anders for leaving him behind. “But I couldn’t stay. I couldn’t be locked up like that, always watched by the templars. It’s simply not in me. I...don’t know if you can understand.”
Hawke nodded. “I don’t think I could stand to be locked up, either.”
Of course she understood. She was right. She might not be a mage, but it wasn’t in her nature to stay imprisoned any more than it was in his. In their core, they were the same in that.
“I lost my friends in the Wardens. The Hero of Fereldan. Did you know that I was friends with her? She was...a remarkable woman. But duty took her away.”
Raven Surana. She’d been more than remarkable, and more than a little in love with her Antivan elf, much to Anders’s dismay. Anders thought about telling Hawke how very near he’d come to falling in love with Raven, but he thought it might make her jealous, and there was no comparison. He’d never felt about anyone the way he felt about Hawke.
Still, it had been harder than anyone knew for Anders to watch Raven walk away. With her there, the Wardens had been a sanctuary, a safe haven. When she was gone...it was just another prison.
Anders continued. “And of course, I lost my parents. Being dragged away from your family in chains isn’t something you get over. I could hear my mother’s sobs, but the templars wouldn’t let me look at her. My father...he was glad to be rid of me. I was a mage, punishment from the Maker for his sins. All the years spent loving and raising me...they meant nothing when the magic started. Who knows. Maybe he never did love me at all.”
Hawke’s mouth was agape. “Your father couldn’t really believe that.”
How could someone so worldly be so naive? “Oh, he could. You don’t realize how rare y--your family is.” He’d almost said “you are.” He didn’t need to give away how besotted he really was. “Most of the world is governed by fear. That makes it all too easy to believe the Chantry’s lies.”
“But how can anyone who knows you not see how good you are? How compassionate and sweet and--” She stopped abruptly and looked away.
Anders’s heart swelled. “Good” was not a word he would use to describe a half-insane almost-abomination. But...Hawke saw him that way. If she could believe in him, maybe there was something worthwhile in him after all. Something worth fighting for.
Anders was nearly overwhelmed with the urge to wrap his arms around her.
“Maybe he was just shocked,” Hawke said, still looking away. “Once you were gone, he must have realized how foolish he’d been. I bet he misses you.”
It took Anders a moment to realize Hawke was still talking about his father. “You don’t need to justify what he did,” he told her. “I stopped needing his forgiveness a long time ago.”
Hawke reached over and took his hand.
It was almost scary, letting her get this close. He’d lost so many people. It was becoming unbearable to even think about losing her. That was very bad, because he could never have her.
“I should go,” Hawke said quietly.
“You should stay here,” Anders said with alarm. “It’s not safe out there. The gangs have been active tonight, and you’re not even wearing armor.”
“I couldn’t impose...”
Anders gestured expansively. “I have cots. Lots of them. Please stay.”
Hawke sighed, but it was a sigh of acceptance. “Mother will be so worried.”
“She knows you can take care of yourself. You’ll be back first thing in the morning.”
He gave her a smile and started to stand, to get her some blankets, but Hawke held fast to his hand. Without a word, she leaned forward and kissed him softly on the cheek.
Anders held stock-still, his heart thundering in his chest, as her lips hovered over his cheek. It would take so little, just the slightest tilt of his head, to capture those lips with his own. One little tug on the arm to pull her tight against his chest as he devoured her mouth. They were all alone. He realized with a start that this was the first time they had really been alone together. Nobody would interrupt them. He could scoop her up in his arms and carry her to his room in back, peeling off each article of clothing to reveal the soft, warm flesh beneath. He would trace slow, languid patterns on her skin as his lips trailed down her long, exquisite neck, making her moan in anticipation...
But why bother going anywhere? Both clinic doors were locked. He could push her back on the cot, hands tangling roughly in her hair. She would gasp and pull him closer, not resisting as Anders tore the clothing from her body. She would return his kisses passionately, her hands on his body as urgent as his...
It would just take one little turn of the head.
Anders would give everything he had to take that step, to finally feel her in his arms, completely and totally his. But if he did...he would destroy her, sooner or later.
Everything he had was a small price to pay, but he wouldn’t risk one iota of her happiness.
He pulled back.
-----
Hawke just meant to give him a friendly peck on the cheek. Just a small gesture of comfort for the hurt he’d suffered. But when her lips touched Anders’s skin, his breathing hitched, and his grip on her hand tightened.
Shivers ran down Hawke’s spine. He does want me, Hawke thought as her pulse sped up. I was wrong. Oh, Maker, I was wrong.
She couldn’t move. Nothing existed in the world but Anders and her, and the closeness of their bodies. His head tilted infinitesimally closer. For a brief, glorious moment, she was sure he was going to kiss her.
Hawke trembled in anticipation.
And then he pulled away.
Anders rose from the cot and began to remove some blankets from a nearby cabinet. Hawke blinked rapidly, trying to figure out what had happened.
“These should keep you warm enough,” Anders said, not meeting her eyes. He set the blankets next to her. “I’m sorry I don’t have anything more comfortable to sleep on than these cots. I would offer you my bed, but it’s just the same as these.”
“This is what you sleep on?” Hawke asked, making a mental note to buy him a mattress.
“I don’t mind it, but I wish I had something better for you. I’ll...let you have some privacy. Let me know if you need anything. I’ll be just through that door.”
He hesitated, just for a moment, then leaned down and kissed the top of her head. “Thank you for coming to me, Autumn,” he murmured, and fled to his room.
She must be the biggest idiot in Thedas.
What in Andraste’s name was she thinking? She knew Anders didn’t fancy women. He’d already told her as much. And there she was, making a fool of herself. Letting her imagination run away with her.
Had he noticed her reaction? Did it make him uncomfortable? Was that why he’d just rushed off like that?
Hawke lay back on her cot and pulled the covers over her head. She didn’t think she’d ruined anything. He probably didn’t even notice. She was just comforting a friend. Nothing unusual about that. And even if Anders had picked up on her feelings, she felt pretty sure that their friendship was strong enough by now to survive a stupid mistake on her part.
But she would have to be more careful in the future.
Author: signcherie
Rating: T
Pairing: Anders/f!Hawke
Summary: Hawke is awkward with men. To get her to loosen up around Anders, Bethany and Isabela tell her that the apostate is only romantically interested...in other men.
Part one
Part two
The whole thing on the kink meme (I can't guarantee the rating will stay the same there. Actually, I can pretty much guarantee it's going to jump up to an M rating soon.)
crossposting to knickerweasels
Maker, please, thought Autumn, not tonight.
The Maker apparently did not hear her, because the hum of voices in the next room, which had been growing steadily in volume for the past ten minutes, now broke out into out-and-out yelling.
“...don’t know how you could gamble away everything we had! It’s not just about money. That estate was everything we had of our history! Our parents, our grandparents, our great-great-great-grandparents all lived in that house, raised their children there!”
“Don’t start pretending like that matters to you, Leandra! You left! Ran off to Fereldan with that bloody apostate to raise your brats. If family was so important, you wouldn’t have abandoned it!”
“You want to talk about family? You put my children into servitude! For a year! What do you know about family?”
Bethany’s voice, quieter than the others, drifted in, “Let it go, Mother. Please. It’s not worth fighting...”
“Better I left the lot of you to rot outside the city, then? That’s gratitude for you. I had to pull in favors just to get those opportunities for your useless kids!”
Just ignore them, Hawke thought, squeezing her eyes shut. Just go to sleep.
“Pull in favors? My children took care of your debts to those smugglers!”
“And now they take up space, eat me out of house and home! If that estate meant so much to you, you bloody well should have stayed to look after it!”
And suddenly Hawke knew she couldn’t do it. Not one more night spent curled up in bed pretending she didn’t hear them, or pleading uselessly for them to calm down. Not one more night of them shrieking at each other until they had no voices left to shout with. Not one more night.
“My children contribute more to this household than you do!”
Hawke didn’t bother with armor. A pair of trousers, a tunic, her boots, and her sword strapped to her back. That was all she needed. With a bang, she pushed open the door to her room, stormed past her astonished mother and uncle, and slammed the front door behind her.
She stood in the cool night air of Lowtown, face upturned to the sky, and wondered what in the Void she would do now.
She could go to the Hanged Man. She knew Varric and Isabela would still be up. But she wasn’t sure she could muster up enough cheer to deal with them tonight.
There was really only one place she could think of.
-----
It was later than usual when Anders closed his clinic that night. A gang fight in Lowtown had left a teenage boy near death, his body mutilated. He’d been carried in by his hysterical mother who pleaded through her tears for Anders to save her boy.
He was lucky the boy had been brought to him before he lost too much blood. Anders had been able to save his life...but the boy’s hand had been chopped off at the wrist, and Anders could not regrow limbs. He worried what would become of the boy now. It would be difficult to work, difficult to fight...would even his gang take him back if he could not be useful to them?
He wanted to berate the boy for joining a gang in the first place--and he had, half-heartedly--but he knew how things were. The gangs offered protection for poor Fereldan refugees with nowhere else to turn.
Anders sighed as he closed and locked the first of the two large doors to his clinic. First thing in the morning, he would go to see Lirene about the boy and his mother. See if there was anything she could do for them.
The mother had been exceptionally grateful. Anders remembered the adoring look in her eyes as she thanked him--and then the way her fingers shook as she reached for the buttons on her dress, offering to pay him with the only thing she had. He’d put his hand over hers, stopping her, telling her she owed him nothing. She’d grown even more worshipful after that, though that certainly had not been his intent.
He would leave the lanterns lit during the night, in case of emergency. Sometimes people would bang on the doors in the wee hours, needing help for some life-threatening injury. He always worried when he left to help Hawke, but he left the clinic in the hands of his trusted assistants, with a good supply of potions, injury kits, bandages--everything he could think of to help. So far, everything had been fine, and Maker willing, it would continue to be so.
As Anders started to shut the second door, a movement in the shadows caught his eye. Mentally preparing an offensive spell, he called out, “Who’s there? Show yourself!”
Hawke stepped uncertainly out of the shadow.
Anders exhaled and let the spell on the tips of his fingers dissipate. “Hawke,” he said in relief. “What are you doing here?”
She had a lost expression on her face that Anders couldn’t remember ever seeing before. It caused him a measure of alarm.
“It...I...” She let out breath. “My mother and Gamlen were fighting. Screaming at each other. I just...I couldn’t take it anymore. I thought maybe...you wouldn’t mind if I came here.”
Anders was touched and honored that he was the first person she came to when she had nowhere to go. “Of course you can come here. You can always come to me.”
He held open the door, but Hawke just shifted uncomfortably. “I shouldn’t intrude on you. I don’t know what I was thinking. It’s so late...”
Anders was exhausted, but the only thing he wanted right now was to be with Hawke. He hadn’t even realized how badly he wanted it until she turned up on his doorstep. “I’m still awake,” he said. “Please. Sit and talk with me awhile.”
Hawke lingered a moment, glancing back the way she’d come from, then came inside.
Anders locked the second door. “I’m really glad you’re here,” he said quietly.
“I just left Bethany there to deal with them all by herself. Maker, what kind of sister am I?”
“An absolutely devoted one.”
“A coward who can’t even deal with her own family.”
“You’re human. We all need a break sometimes.”
Anders gestured to a cot, and they both sat. A part of Anders wished he had nicer accomodations to offer her--his clinic wasn’t exactly the most impressive bachelor pad--but he knew that was foolish. Hawke knew what he was and what he did. “Your mother and uncle fight often, then?”
“Every so often,” Hawke said, looking away. “Mother--well, she’s not really angry at Gamlen. I think--it’s Carver. She misses him so much. She just gets overwhelmed and she needs some way to let it all out. And Gamlen--well, he makes himself a convenient target.”
Anders noticed the break in her voice when she said her brother’s name. “You miss Carver, too, don’t you,” he said, and then felt like an idiot. Of course she missed her brother.
Hawke laughed mirthlessly. “Every day. He was such a tit, Carver. He blamed me for everything. I swear, if he were here, he’d be telling me how Ostagar was all my fault. And Maker’s blood, I’d give anything to hear him say it.”
“I wish I could have known him.”
“You only say that because you didn’t know him. Trust me on this. He would have given you hell.”
Tears hovered on her lashes, but her face was hard, as if she knew they were there but refused to let them fall.
Without thinking, Anders reached out and brushed one of the tears aside. Autumn’s chin jerked up, her eyes meeting his.
“I’m sorry you lost him,” Anders murmured. “I know how much you love your family. I know how deeply you must feel his loss.”
They were lucky to be so adored by her. In his most selfish moments, Anders would give anything to have Hawke feel the same devotion to him.
“Ah, balls,” Hawke said, and Anders wondered how many other phrases Hawke had picked up from Isabela. “What about you, Anders? Have you ever lost anyone?”
Anders hesitated. “You mean besides Karl?”
Hawke winced and looked at Anders with wide eyes. “Karl. I’m so sorry, Anders, I wasn’t even thinking.”
“It’s all right. Karl is the only one I’ve lost...that way.”
Hawke took a breath. “Did...you love him?”
She sounded a little nervous. Was that because she had feelings for him and was jealous of his first lover? Or was he just imagining what he wanted to hear?
“You mean, was I in love with him? I don’t know. We didn’t talk about it. Talking would have made it...too real, somehow. When we were together, we could forget that out in the world, we were nothing but templar slaves. He was there for me when I needed him, and I...I tried to be there for him.”
Anders stopped talking, because he hadn’t been there for him, not when it counted. He’d promised to help him, but in the end, he hadn’t stopped the bloody templars from ripping his mind away. The templars didn’t give a fig for the person that Karl had been. His warmth, his laughter, his brilliant wit--they meant nothing to those who imprisoned him. He was just a mage, just another receptacle for evil, just another troublesome problem to be disposed of.
They certainly didn’t care that he could kiss with the ferocity of a tiger, that his eyes crinkled whenever he cast a healing spell, that he was as gentle and patient a teacher as he was a lover....
Hawke’s voice cut off his train of thought. “I’m so sorry,” she said softly. “I should have been able to save him for you.”
Anders would always live with his own guilt, but he hadn’t expected it from Hawke. “What could you have done?” he said. “You can’t possibly think this was your fault. He was already Tranquil by the time I asked for your help.”
“I don’t know,” Autumn replied. “Something.”
Anders sighed. For a moment, they both sat in silence.
“Who else did you lose?” she asked softly.
Anders blinked.
“You said Karl was the only one you lost ‘that way.’ Who did you lose...other ways? Do you mean your parents?”
She didn’t miss anything. It was almost unnerving how well she knew him sometimes.
“I lose people,” he said. “I used to lose them when I escaped the Circle. People don’t like to be left behind, abandoned.” That was how things had ended with Karl, the first time. He’d been dragged back to discover that Karl hadn’t been willing to wait for him, couldn’t forgive Anders for leaving him behind. “But I couldn’t stay. I couldn’t be locked up like that, always watched by the templars. It’s simply not in me. I...don’t know if you can understand.”
Hawke nodded. “I don’t think I could stand to be locked up, either.”
Of course she understood. She was right. She might not be a mage, but it wasn’t in her nature to stay imprisoned any more than it was in his. In their core, they were the same in that.
“I lost my friends in the Wardens. The Hero of Fereldan. Did you know that I was friends with her? She was...a remarkable woman. But duty took her away.”
Raven Surana. She’d been more than remarkable, and more than a little in love with her Antivan elf, much to Anders’s dismay. Anders thought about telling Hawke how very near he’d come to falling in love with Raven, but he thought it might make her jealous, and there was no comparison. He’d never felt about anyone the way he felt about Hawke.
Still, it had been harder than anyone knew for Anders to watch Raven walk away. With her there, the Wardens had been a sanctuary, a safe haven. When she was gone...it was just another prison.
Anders continued. “And of course, I lost my parents. Being dragged away from your family in chains isn’t something you get over. I could hear my mother’s sobs, but the templars wouldn’t let me look at her. My father...he was glad to be rid of me. I was a mage, punishment from the Maker for his sins. All the years spent loving and raising me...they meant nothing when the magic started. Who knows. Maybe he never did love me at all.”
Hawke’s mouth was agape. “Your father couldn’t really believe that.”
How could someone so worldly be so naive? “Oh, he could. You don’t realize how rare y--your family is.” He’d almost said “you are.” He didn’t need to give away how besotted he really was. “Most of the world is governed by fear. That makes it all too easy to believe the Chantry’s lies.”
“But how can anyone who knows you not see how good you are? How compassionate and sweet and--” She stopped abruptly and looked away.
Anders’s heart swelled. “Good” was not a word he would use to describe a half-insane almost-abomination. But...Hawke saw him that way. If she could believe in him, maybe there was something worthwhile in him after all. Something worth fighting for.
Anders was nearly overwhelmed with the urge to wrap his arms around her.
“Maybe he was just shocked,” Hawke said, still looking away. “Once you were gone, he must have realized how foolish he’d been. I bet he misses you.”
It took Anders a moment to realize Hawke was still talking about his father. “You don’t need to justify what he did,” he told her. “I stopped needing his forgiveness a long time ago.”
Hawke reached over and took his hand.
It was almost scary, letting her get this close. He’d lost so many people. It was becoming unbearable to even think about losing her. That was very bad, because he could never have her.
“I should go,” Hawke said quietly.
“You should stay here,” Anders said with alarm. “It’s not safe out there. The gangs have been active tonight, and you’re not even wearing armor.”
“I couldn’t impose...”
Anders gestured expansively. “I have cots. Lots of them. Please stay.”
Hawke sighed, but it was a sigh of acceptance. “Mother will be so worried.”
“She knows you can take care of yourself. You’ll be back first thing in the morning.”
He gave her a smile and started to stand, to get her some blankets, but Hawke held fast to his hand. Without a word, she leaned forward and kissed him softly on the cheek.
Anders held stock-still, his heart thundering in his chest, as her lips hovered over his cheek. It would take so little, just the slightest tilt of his head, to capture those lips with his own. One little tug on the arm to pull her tight against his chest as he devoured her mouth. They were all alone. He realized with a start that this was the first time they had really been alone together. Nobody would interrupt them. He could scoop her up in his arms and carry her to his room in back, peeling off each article of clothing to reveal the soft, warm flesh beneath. He would trace slow, languid patterns on her skin as his lips trailed down her long, exquisite neck, making her moan in anticipation...
But why bother going anywhere? Both clinic doors were locked. He could push her back on the cot, hands tangling roughly in her hair. She would gasp and pull him closer, not resisting as Anders tore the clothing from her body. She would return his kisses passionately, her hands on his body as urgent as his...
It would just take one little turn of the head.
Anders would give everything he had to take that step, to finally feel her in his arms, completely and totally his. But if he did...he would destroy her, sooner or later.
Everything he had was a small price to pay, but he wouldn’t risk one iota of her happiness.
He pulled back.
-----
Hawke just meant to give him a friendly peck on the cheek. Just a small gesture of comfort for the hurt he’d suffered. But when her lips touched Anders’s skin, his breathing hitched, and his grip on her hand tightened.
Shivers ran down Hawke’s spine. He does want me, Hawke thought as her pulse sped up. I was wrong. Oh, Maker, I was wrong.
She couldn’t move. Nothing existed in the world but Anders and her, and the closeness of their bodies. His head tilted infinitesimally closer. For a brief, glorious moment, she was sure he was going to kiss her.
Hawke trembled in anticipation.
And then he pulled away.
Anders rose from the cot and began to remove some blankets from a nearby cabinet. Hawke blinked rapidly, trying to figure out what had happened.
“These should keep you warm enough,” Anders said, not meeting her eyes. He set the blankets next to her. “I’m sorry I don’t have anything more comfortable to sleep on than these cots. I would offer you my bed, but it’s just the same as these.”
“This is what you sleep on?” Hawke asked, making a mental note to buy him a mattress.
“I don’t mind it, but I wish I had something better for you. I’ll...let you have some privacy. Let me know if you need anything. I’ll be just through that door.”
He hesitated, just for a moment, then leaned down and kissed the top of her head. “Thank you for coming to me, Autumn,” he murmured, and fled to his room.
She must be the biggest idiot in Thedas.
What in Andraste’s name was she thinking? She knew Anders didn’t fancy women. He’d already told her as much. And there she was, making a fool of herself. Letting her imagination run away with her.
Had he noticed her reaction? Did it make him uncomfortable? Was that why he’d just rushed off like that?
Hawke lay back on her cot and pulled the covers over her head. She didn’t think she’d ruined anything. He probably didn’t even notice. She was just comforting a friend. Nothing unusual about that. And even if Anders had picked up on her feelings, she felt pretty sure that their friendship was strong enough by now to survive a stupid mistake on her part.
But she would have to be more careful in the future.