fadewalk | RP: Fenris (broodyfadewalk)

Anders was...having a conversation with himself, and wandering through Skyhold aimlessly in the meantime. Which was not as crazy as it sounded because he did share his body with a Fade spirit, after all.

He was certainly not brooding.

...maybe a little.

He could have sworn Varric had shown up to take over watching over Hawke for a spell, but time was weird in this place, and to hear Varric tell it, he had been gone - to another realm entirely? For perhaps more days than Anders thought had actually passed. Not that there were days and nights in this place to tell time by, but still. It meant that he had in fact left Hawke alone for who knows how long, and thankfully apparently nothing had happened - she seemed well on the mend, actually, but Anders still felt oddly guilty about the whole thing.

He huffed and focused instead on this new Varric - Hawke reveal. Now, at the time, he'd expected Varric's overly stubborn grief over his Hawke to be just typical Varric - no matter what way you looked at it, Hawke and Varric had always been close. That much was unlikely to change even between different versions of history, right? In retrospect, however, Varric had seemed pretty...distraught.

Anders waited for the inevitable huff of disapproval from Justice's corner of his brain, but the spirit hummed in interest instead. SHE DESERVES HAPPINESS. IT IS ONLY JUST, Justice offered, and when Anders countered that Hawke had claimed to be happy already, Justice just sort of...snorted. NOT EVEN YOU BELIEVE THAT, ANDERS.

Anders conceded the point, and realized he wasn't entirely sure where in Skyhold they had wandered to. He still hadn't slept, and sudden exhaustion weighed down his limbs. Then there was a bluish glow from down some corridor ahead of him, and Anders found his feet moving towards it without really stopping to judge the wisdom of that action.

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Again with the endearment. He didn't bristle this time, though his eyes narrowed as Anders kept talking. More than that, his stomach was beginning to roil.

I can't let you do that.

"You will not," Fenris began hotly, instinctively responding to that above everything else. He could rarely stand being controlled in any way. But he swallowed the words, gaze flicking down, then away. "So you will keep me in the dark," he finished stiffly.

Anders let out a choked noise, gripping a handful of his own hair like he might tear it out.

"Don't - it's not - that's not what I-"

He swallowed a noise of frustration, and tried again, his voice gentler this time. "Not like that. Never like that. You...you really don't want to know. Please."

Edited Date: 2015-09-05 08:25 am (UTC)

"...you did something so horrible that you thought Hawke would kill you. Hawke. Sebastian, sworn to the Maker, wants you dead. And I would hate you. Kirkwall is in flames. But why would Sebastian be so furious if you tore down the Gallows?"

Fenris looked up again, frowning. "Justice would not allow demons."

Anders shook his head wildly and made an aborted gesture with his hands. "No, no demons, I swear."

He made a face. "Please don't suggest we're capable of that. You know how he feels about demons. And I'm not - this is so close to the Fade, I can't keep him quiet as much as usual."

"I do not like being kept in the dark," Fenris said--though he dropped mention of demons. He trusted Anders and Justice not to do that. He'd known that to be true even as he'd said the words. "You come from my future?"

It all seemed so improbable, but where magic was involved, there was no telling what horrors could follow.

Anders bit his lip, and nodded, trying to ignore the inexplicable guilt he suddenly felt at keeping this from Fenris. An urge to blurt it all out abruptly and face the inevitable heart-ripping seized him. Maybe Fenris wouldn't - he hadn't that day, had he? Fenris had stood by him.

"That...would seem likely. What year did you come from? Have we..." his voice died, and he gestured vaguely between Fenris and himself.

"...yes," Fenris said. Then, frowning, "No." He wasn't sure exactly what Anders meant, and it seemed better to hedge there.

But when he gave the date, the reality of his answer was clear enough.

"Ah," Anders said, and he was impressed with the steadiness of the word when really he felt a strange rushing sensation in his ears and a clutch of despair around his heart, because this was his Fenris, yes, but so many months of pain and desire and confusion behind where they were now. All hope of just sinking into Fenris's strong arms and hiding away from the idiocy of this place, gone, in the simple naming of a date.

He staggered backwards. "I need to - sit down, probably," he mumbled, reaching blindly for the wall behind him with one hand and sliding down it until he was sitting. He pulled his knees up to his chest.

"I'm from over three years after that," he said, staring up at Fenris with wide, bloodshot amber eyes.

Fenris crouched in front of him, reaching to rest his hands on Anders' knees after only a brief hesitation. Even as upset--hurt, even, and angry--as he was by Anders' refusal to tell him more, he was not mistrustful. This confusing, magnetic man who he had hated once upon a time would not act to hurt him, no matter what else he might do. Fenris could trust that.

So his hands rested on Anders' knees, thumbs lightly brushing back and forth.

"I see," he said.

Anders tilted his head, his eyes drawn to Fenris's hands on his knees and then back to Fenris's face. His brow furrowed.

"You're being very accommodating," he said with wonder. "We haven't even fucked yet from where you are and I've called you a name I don't call you for years and you're still touching me." He let out a soft laugh, leaning his head back against the wall behind him.

"I'd forgotten. How sweet you were, before, when it was just the two of us. Not that you're not now, but this was different. More unsure, but always you, taking steps you couldn't have even explained to yourself at the time." He hummed. "You have always been the bravest of us, Fenris."

He blinked. "I'm...babbling, aren't I? Hawke said I should have been sleeping. Just..." he gestured at his head. "Justice doesn't like it here, and he can't be quiet about it, ever, and you're not here, and Jicosa's not here, and it's all just...too much for sleep."

At the word Hawke, Fenris stood. He always felt a crashing wave of jealousy, though he could never say who--or what--he was jealous of.

"You are talking nonsense," he said. "If this place is safe enough, then you will sleep. Come." Then, leaning down, he grasped Anders' hands, pulling him to his feet with surprising gentleness.

(OOC: Bedtime for me!)

Aand now he had done it. If Fenris was from that part of their past, bringing up Hawke was...unwise at best, quite possibly cruel at worst. He gave Fenris a worried look and bit down on the apologies that threatened to bubble out of his mouth. Maker, someone shut him up, please.

"Yes. Sleep. I need that," he agreed, letting Fenris pull him to his feet and then attempting unsuccessfully to convince himself to let Fenris's hands go.

"Um. Safe enough? I mean," he coughed a laugh. "Meredith is...wandering around nearly murdering people, and I'm keeping my distance because they think my murdering her back would be bad, not to say I'm not tempted, because I am, but." He shook his head to clear his thoughts. "Sleep. The guest wing where a lot of us have been sleeping has been safe so far? That's this way." He gestured. "I have a room. Not that you have to stay there. With me. There are more empty ones, of course. Um."

Anders looked down at their hands awkwardly.

(OOC: Yepp, me too, I totally crashed.)

He bared his teeth in a snarl at Meredith's name, protective instincts riling. "Find me a sword," Fenris said, "and I will share your room for the night. That madwoman will have a difficult time cutting her way through me."

Anders looked up, suprise widening his eyes for a fraction of a second, and then something else entered his gaze entirely. He was hard-pressed to name the emotion himself, especially with his brain feeling fogged and dull from lack of sleep, but there was an old, dull ache behind his breastbone even as he felt some of the tension in his body from the stress of constant wakefulness and wariness eke away. He swallowed.

"Right. Sword first, then," he said, squeezing Fenris's fingers briefly and reluctantly pulling away. He headed in the opposite direction from the one he'd gestured at. "Cullen's got a stash of all the weapons in this place; we can find you something there," he called back over his shoulder, pausing after only a few steps to be sure Fenris was following.

"Cullen?" He couldn't hide the surprise in his voice even as he followed--gaze swinging around the unfamiliar halls warily. A place this nice usually translated into the home of a magister for him.

Anders led the way towards the war room. He nodded.

"Yeah, Cullen. Or Commander Cullen, I guess, technically." He wrinkles his nose and then admits begrudgingly, "Not as much of an ass as he used to be. He comes from several years after I do, where he's left the templars and is now leading the forces of an organization called the Inquisition." He waved a hand at the walls around them. "This is their keep."

"Explain."

The word was hard, a demand, but Fenris brushed his fingertips along the small of Anders' back at the same time, softening that harshness.

"What?" Anders turned to look over his shoulder at Fenris, a little startled by the touch but more than anything craving more of it. He arched a brow. "Which part? The Cullen finally growing a pair and standing up to Meredith even in my time, or the fact that there's apparently some immensely powerful military group rising up in the near future and making lots of decisions about things?"

He ran his fingers through the strands of his hair in a distracted motion, setting it awry.

"I don't know much about this Inquisition, lo-...Fenris. Their leader, the Inquisitor, she said a few promising things about reforming the Circles and the Hawke I talked to, Marian, she said the Inquisitor's a good sort. There was some kind of crazy Fade-splitting-open stuff that happened, involving someone named Corypheus, who I think was a talking darkspawn like the Architect. Did I tell you about the Architect yet? Anyways. I don't know. I think the Inquisition formed to fight him off, or...something. It all sounds very complicated and I'm not sure how to feel about it, actually."

Reforming the Circles?

A powerful military group? An Inquisitor?

The Fade splitting open?

It was a lot to take in--almost too much--but living with Hawke's crazy band of misfits had made Fenris remarkably adaptable. He simply gripped a handful of Anders' robe and gave a short jerk of his chin, trying to sort through the waterfall of information and grasp to the points that were the most important.

(And why, why was he determined to think of that easy endearment as the most important part?)

"I...see," he said.

Anders squinted at him.

"No, you don't," he said, with an amused huff. "But I don't really either, so we're even."

He looked down at Fenris's hand gripping the black fabric of the robe he'd chosen specifically to suit the mystique of a man who would do what it took to bring justice to the mages, to change a world, and felt vaguely ill. He really needed to stop wearing this coat.

Fenris caught the look Anders shot that connection as well as his expression...and, naturally, misread Anders' thoughts.

He immediately let go and moved away, putting distance between them.

"Sword," he said, more to himself than Anders. He needed to focus.

Anders frowned as Fenris moved away so quickly, his head bobbing slightly as he followed Fenris's movement with his eyes. He was fairly certain he'd done something stupid just then, but couldn't for the life of him figure out what.

Bah. His brain was mush.

"Sleep?" he mumbled hopefully, feet moving after Fenris and then on again automatically.

"Yes." He selected an appropriate sword, testing its weight and balance before sheathing it. He was already in full armor, so the greatsword was all he needed. "I will follow you."

I enjoy following you.

"Hang on, let me just..." Anders scribbled a quick note in the ledger for Cullen about the removal of the greatsword. "Cullen's particular about inventory, and things," he said vaguely, blotting the quill and setting it aside.

He straightened, glancing over to be certain Fenris had what he needed. His eyes swept down Fenris's frame and he very nearly sighed. Maker, even just the sight of him was so welcome it was absurd. He had thought he'd mostly gotten over this debilitating loneliness in the past few years. Obviously not. He was taken from Hawke and Fenris for a handful of days, or so, and immediately he started feeling like he would crawl out of his skin, and stopped sleeping, and generally became not much better off than he had been before either of them.

He turned. "All right, this way."

Fenris followed close at Anders' heels, gaze sweeping the halls as they walked. He kept expecting something to happen--some attack, some threat. This was too much like the time he followed Hawke into the Fade after that dreamer.