fadewalk | RP: Anders

Hawke's first day in Skyhold involved sleeping like the dead in Varric's bed. The second, mostly like the dead. She woke a few times to drink water until she thought she would burst, eat a few bites of something that was safe for her stomach, and curl back up.

The note to Anders had simply asked him to check in on her, and she was sleeping when he did, Varric stepping away while there was another familiar face to watch her.

She had her head buried under a pillow, arm pinning it tightly to hide her face, fingers twitching as she dreamed. Her thin wrist was about all that could be seen, scars lining the back of her hand, disappearing under the shirt up her arm.

Mostly she was just a bony lump under a heavy quilt, curled into a ball in the middle of the bed.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

(OOC: That's totally fine with me. Not sure when Anders will be around this evening though. :) )

(OOC: I'm here! Sorry, this week has been rather ridiculous.)

Anders frowned faintly at her, getting a little furrow between his brows. Finally he shook his head and tapped her on the nose with one finger.

"You great big-hearted idiot, you," he muttered, affectionate and reproachful all at once.

At the mention of his Hawke, however, he stilled.

"She...ah. Well. I - I suppose she would." He looked abruptly like he wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry.

The finger on her nose made her blue eyes cross briefly, and she looked both surprised and comically affronted. But the shift in Anders' face made Hawke flinch and she reached over to pull him down into another hug.

"Hey now, it's fine. We'll figure it out. You can get back to where you belong and raise hell when the Circles rebel, alright?" She smoothed a hand over his hair, gesture familiar and warm, and almost maternal. She'd always been better at their problems, their heartaches, her ridiculous nonsense friends, than her own.

(OOC: Let us know if you're around Neria and we'll work you into the posting order?)

(ooc: oh, I'm here ^^ call me whenever you feel like it)

(OOC: Okay, lets do Anders, Neria, Hawke! You go ahead after Anders next rep.)

(ooc: neat!)

Anders stiffened in surprise when she hugged him, and then let out a half-choked laugh at the normalcy of the gesture. It was so very Hawke, and he hadn't quite realized how off it had been, meeting these Hawkes who didn't act like Hawke at all.

He shrugged as he pulled back, his expression deliberately casual.

"Well, even if we don't...that might not be the end of the world. Fenris will take care of her. They might be better off, honestly." His voice cracked on that last statement, but he said it doggedly anyways.

Neria had been pacing in front of the door for some good time now, thinking and re-thinking her decision on talking to Hawke. But she had a decision made on her mind, after all, and not even her own embarrassment would stop her now.

She knocked, opening the door just enough for her to avoid shouting at the other side. "Lady Hawke, I understand you're slightly better. Can we talk?"

Hawke's eyes had gotten big and round when Anders mentioned Fenris, a smile that demanded details starting to form on her lips. She was close with Isabela and Varric for a reason.

The knock on the door made her start, and then the voice made her sigh. "I'm not talking to anyone who calls me Lady anything, faceless hallway voice." She threw a glance at Anders, an eyebrow quirking.

The very nosy expression on Hawke's face was enough to draw a laugh from Anders, and her response to Neria only made him laugh harder.

"Come in, Neria," he said, chortling. "Hawke, I think you might want to woman whose husband you threw your own life away to save." He waggled an eyebrow at her, a bit provocatively.

Neria entered, slightly sheepish, closing the door behind her.

"I hope I'm not interrupting anything." she smiled at the two "So, Hawke, I guess we never had the chance to meet in person, though I believe my husband presented you with a pendant I gave him during the Qunari Rebellion. You can call me Neria."

Hawke had turned quiet, paling slightly, when Anders indicated who it was. Maker, how awkward.

"I hope you don't want it back," was the first thing she blurted, and then she closed her eyes tightly. "Sorry, brain isn't all the way on-kilter yet." She rubbed the bridge of her nose and then said more steadily, "He mentioned you. A lot. Really, I had to start leaving cheese around to get him to shut up because he's just enough of a gentleman not to talk with his mouth full."

She winced. "Not that he's not a gentleman. I-- Hi. I'm Marian Hawke, I'm pretty sure I'm an idiot, and I'm sorry about that. It's nice-- nice? is that right? Need a better adjective-- anyway, it's superlative to finally meet you."

After she stopped talking she opened her eyes again, finally and blinked, looking for just a moment surprised to see other people there.

Anders started to rethink the invitation as soon as he saw Marian get pale at the sight of Neria. He frowned, healer's instincts kicking in, and settled more onto the bed, sitting cross-legged on the edge next to Hawke.

He reached over and pulled down her collar slightly, just enough to expose some bruises and cuts on her collarbone, and started muttering to himself, little "heavens, Hawke" thrown in with some scolding of himself and of his patient. Wrinkling his nose, he closed his eyes and started casting a whole body healing spell as Neria and Hawke talked.

"No, you definitely can keep it. The pendant, it is."

Neria sat next to Hawke, wrapping the woman's cold, bruised hands with her soft and warm ones. Her voice was soft and sweet when she spoke.

"I just wanted to thank you for sending my cheesy husband back to me. And please, don't apologize, you're still recovering. I should be the one apologizing for bothering you."

Hawke's remaining injuries are superficial, Aria having spent a great deal of magic to save her life when she'd first tumbled from the true Fade to this pocket. But the scars are deep and ubiquitous. As are the effects of spending months alone in the Fade. Time moved differently and occasionally she could find weird pockets of the world that might have water or table scraps to sustain herself, but by the end she was nearly dead of dehydration and starvation.

She shrugged a shoulder irritably at Anders tug at her collar, and frowned down at Neria's hands thoughtfully. "You're welcome," she finally murmured. "He's a good man, who deserves to be happy, and since he loves you so damn much, I assume it goes both ways. Always happy to help by nearly dying."

She raised her face at that, smile wry and sunny at the same time.

Anders, whose hands had been hovering sort of up and down Hawke's side and then just behind her neck as he casted, reached up and flicked Hawke's ear at that comment.

He gave her a disapproving look tinged with amusement.

"Well, I probably shouldn't trouble you anymore."

She squeezed her hand before standing.

"Anders, if she needs anything I can provide, don't hesitate to call me, yes?"

Hawke's hands being caught in Neria's still saved Anders from a really righteous rogue-quick wet-willy in that moment. She flinched and ducked her flicked ear against her shoulder, giving him a narrow eyed look before turning her gaze back to Neria.

"Did he make it back to you?" she asked softly. She hadn't been awake, coherent enough to read her journal yet, and while Varric had been talking while she slept, she was only sort of sure of what he and Aria had told her. "I'm starting a happy ending reuniting service, and it would be great to get your endorsement so that Anders here listens when I tell him it's going to be okay."

"Will do, Neria," Anders said with a nod.

He snorted at Hawke's happy ending comment and rolled his eyes, lips twitching.

"You'll have to watch it with the plotting, Hawke, or I'll be forced to consult Varric on how to return the favor and keep you from selfless suicide."

"Oh, he did." she stopped by the door, blushing a little "In fact, he is here now, such a mess this Skyhold." she shook her head a little "He told he'll be coming to see you, as soon as possible."

Then, she laughed at Hawke's comment.

"Now, now, listen to Anders. He's your healer and the healer is always right, specially the ones who saved my life more than once."

And with a small curtsy, she left.

(ooc: thanks for letting me pop in guys!! I'll let you to your scene now ^^)

"Heroic self-sacrifice isn't the same as suicide." Hawke's grousing faded when Neria mentioned Alistair was here, eyes widening slightly.

But she nodded when Neria left, and then reached over and gave Anders a light shove in the shoulder. "You're one to talk, by the way. 'If I pay for that with my life, so be it'," she parroted. "And Varric has his hands full of shit around here without worrying about me."

Anders opened his mouth to respond in kind, but the teasing expression faded quickly when she brought up that topic. It may have happened years ago for her, and most of the people in this place, from what he could tell, but for him? Hours - days - he couldn't be entirely sure how much time had passed here, but it had been nothing. Nothing at all. Would any length of time be enough to dull the memory of ash in the air and fire in the sky, blood in the streets and in the rubble and in the halls of the Gallows, and a woman who should have killed him right there pinning him against the wall of an alley and kissing him like she didn't care he'd just committed mass murder?

He looked down at his lap bleakly. "At least Justice would have been free," he muttered obstinately.

"Fine, fine, point taken."

He looked up again and arched an eyebrow. "And Varric is perfectly capable of dealing with all the shit this place throws at him and still worrying about you, because I can tell you he was doing that even before you arrived. So."

The way Anders' face shifted gripped Hawke's heart and she sucked in a sharp breath. "Sorry, that wasn't... I didn't mean to make it... well at least my foot still fits in my mouth! What a relief."

She rubbed a hand over her face at the mention of Varric, eyes darting toward his chair and then the door, looking pinched and worried and more than a little sad. "I've put him through more than enough. He shouldn't have to worry about me anymore. Wouldn't have to if I didn't keep coming back from increasingly absurd and improbable death traps."

Edited Date: 2015-08-24 07:23 am (UTC)

Anders gave her a crooked sort of tiny smile at that. Relief, indeed. This would all be so much more awkward if Hawke wasn't prone to...well, awkwardness. At least the bad jokes had a way of defusing the tension?

Yes, that was much preferred, he decided.

"No, he'll just wallow in grief and guilt and get these big shadows under his eyes and get all twitchy whenever anybody mentions your name, etc," he said, rolling his eyes. "Please. The two of you are ridiculous. Just...talk it out, already. Hug it out. I don't know."

Hawke's snort was not at all ladylike. Her mother would have been appalled.

"Oh please. We've hugged before! Usually when I'm covered in guts and he's trying to get away, but that totally counts." She shifted to lean against the wall, head at an awkward angle and chin resting on her chest. "Good thing too. Because feelings-talks? Not either of our strong suits." She made a wobbly so-so hand-gesture.