Anders contemplates neither closure nor renewal. From a young age, he's learned over and over: when you've got what you wanted, you savor it. Before it's too late. Before it's torn away from you, or you from it. Before the Templars show up again, before the darkspawn strike, before your lover's sent across the water, before the bastards make you give away your cat
( ... )
There are many things making the experience seem unreal to Hawke, the fact that it's happening at all not least. Twenty-four hours ago she didn't even know he was here, he was at the top of the long list of think around this subject or you won't be able to move at all that she doesn't acknowledge is in her head. The occasional flash of How can I let him do this, after everything? simultaneous with He owes me at least this much. The feeling of being herself (if problematically herself) instead of the half-Hawke half-automation she's been for months, all the arguing and digging at each other and scraping each other raw has certainly eradicated her protections. That will take some getting used to, and the chance to replace the resigned feeling of being exposed with a more literal and pleasing exposure is irresistable even if it will be temporary.
And the bright blankness of the room, bare of any possible distractions, bare of sound, since the soundproof blocks most noise from outside as well as keeping noise from inside drifting out.
( ... )
"If you breathe one more word about nightlights," Anders threatens, "I'll pretend yours don't exist." He's acutely aware they exist, in point of fact. His nose is practically between them as he says it. "And believe me, that will hurt me more than it hurts you," this said very low, positioned to aim the flow of breath just over one nipple, "please keep in mind." His hand is at the small of her back to feel the moment when she arches, her hardening flesh meeting his descending mouth, and he can't resist doing this thing with his tongue that he learned in the Circle at age fifteen. Refined it to an art form within months - that was a good winter, much shorter once you knew how to pass the time - it works best when applied simultaneously with other stimuli, so the subject doesn't get too comfortable, and Anders leans against Hawke to encourage her onto her back, his other hand ghosting a suggestive trajectory up her thigh.
"If it'd hurt you more than me, then I'm not sure you understand the concept of a threat." But she does arch, does gasp, does take his head in her hands, fingers digging into the scalp and tangling in his hair as much as they can while it's pulled into a ponytail. She resists being pushed backwards, instead curling over him, planting a kiss on the top of his head. One hand frees itself from his hair and instead toys with the the bare skin on the back of his neck, tracing circular patterns.
The almost tortured look of pleasure on his face is beyond heady, and Hawke takes a certain pride in it. It's good to know she can still do this to him. She kisses his cheek, then his ear, nibbling on the lobe while her hand keeps up a firm, steady rhythm. Every once in a while her thumb or index finger will slip over the tip of him, stimulating him further, and she begins gradually to increase the pace. "So tell me, Anders," she whispers, letting her breath tease his ear. "How long will it take before I drive you mad?"
It may or may not have been a bluff the first time she asked him that question; this time it's undeniably a dare.
He could have let her finish him, then - it would have been so easy, so sweet - what saves him is that, a second after she speaks, he registers the actual semantic content of the words. Up until this, Anders has been content to let Hawke have her way with him tonight, never mind how torturous or slow she cares to be. That discussion about nightlights has stuck in his mind as something more than a brief exchange of jokes about his poetry, and he feels (obscurely, unconsciously) that he owes her, that what she does to him now can count toward payback for months of neglect.
But then she says those words. It's not only a dare, though it is a dare, the best kind; it's an allusion, and an affirmation, and a question, too. He answers it the only way he can
( ... )
She could have finished him off. She could have rolled away. She could have a number of things. But she's proved the point she was trying to make to herself, and doesn't feel a need. Whereas pushing him to the brink tends to yield a good result, in this context.
So she smirks up at him, the dare still firmly in her eyes as she meets his own heated gaze without flinching. "Show me."
He guides her legs wider with a rough shove. He doesn't need to touch her there to know she's more than ready. Intentions half-formed earlier, to take his time, to lavish attention on her, to act less than selfishly for once, have all completely faded out of mind with that demand.
Show me. Again, an allusion, and a memory that would be enough to fire his blood all on its own.
For his own sake, though, as much as hers, Anders enters slowly, inch by agonizing inch, aware that too quick a pace will end this sooner. That would let her off too easily, and he ought to live up to the memory she's invoked. To keep from focusing his entire awareness on that sweet slide in, at the same time he captures her mouth with his, giving the kiss all the force that he can't yet allow his other movements.
Her breath puffs out in a laugh. "And you dare claim your appetites are jaded?" They're still wrapped around each other, legs tangled and hands beginning to wander again. She wonders if he really does plan to keep at this all night. There's another throwback to the early days of their relationship, when they hadn't been able to resist each other or tried very hard. Anders hadn't been the only one to have spent three years lying awake at night and aching. There'd been a lot of time to make up for, it'd seemed, and the'd only just gotten started.
That stung. Now. Focus on now.
Fortunately, now offered a number of interesting things to focus on.
He loves that she'll still put up with his Grey Warden jokes. A more fragile flower would balk, after that little trip into the Vimmark Mountains for an unexpected tour of a Warden prison. It wasn't an especially healthy place for a former Warden like Anders to visit; consequently, a few facts came to light that no lover or friend would be pleased to learn, let alone one so protective as Hawke. The taint, the Calling, the delayed death sentence - not pretty, on the whole.
Which is precisely why he makes jokes about it.
"Let's not talk about my appetites. Far better to demonstrate them." She shouldn't argue with that, mistress don't tell me, show me. Without explanation, though not with exceptional speed, Anders extricates his limbs and turns away, rising to his knees, leaning toward something he has to work to reach
( ... )
"A tablecloth?" Hawke complies, crawling onto the coat and sitting on it so she's leaning on one hand with her knees bent to the side. Her eyes stay fixed on Anders, however, appreciating the view. It's a nice view. He's too thin, still, insatiable Warden stomach (that infamous stamina has a price, alas, and it is the grocery bill). Though the still shouldn't be a surprise, come to think of it. Ten days for him, five months for her. Easy to forget.
Anyway, it's a nice view. Lean, surprisingly muscular for a mage, all that staff-twirling (insert innuendo here) does require some muscle. To say nothing of keeping up with her. Hawke's never been easy on her companions, unfortunately. Though the reverse applies as well, so she always figured it evened out more or less.
It's a much nicer view when he's looking at her like that. "Why a tablecloth? If want to see if you can whisk it out from under me without me moving, I'm going to laugh at you. Fair warning."
Anders feigns hurt. "Now that you've called out my devious plan, there's hardly any point in continuing, is there." To confront her he has to crawl a bit as well, only when he does it, there's an almost feline grace to the movement.
Facing her, still on his knees, he leans in using one hand for support. The other hand is gliding up the side of her uppermost calf. "It's a tablecloth," he says, "because you are a feast. And I haven't been quite this hungry in a long time."
The only thing missing is a pillow for her hips. Anders has to make do, looping his free arm beneath the small of her back, then drawing it in his direction to lift her backside off the floor, to cant her upward, open her more fully to his attentions. He is reverent, and careful, and deliberately slow. Occasionally he can't help uttering a small muffled sound of appreciation, almost a hum, but he's mostly quiet, listening avidly for Hawke's entreaties. Also, for directions, if any coherent directions can be relayed. He knows she won't hesitate to tug at his hair or push him away if she needs to.
In the end, though, Anders is the one to pull away. With every gasp and whimper he wrings from her, he imagines what she must look like making that sound, the blood rushing to her cheeks, the way she must be turning her head to the side, arching her neck. Enough of this and imagination no longer suffices; he needs to sit back on his knees to take in the full view, all of her at once, his lovely Hawke. In Varric's scurrilous tales, the
( ... )
It takes Hawke a moment to find breath and composure enough to answer, and when she does her expression is somewhere between amused and incredulous. "You stopped to tell me that?" Not that the near-worship in his eyes isn't enormously gratifying in the circumstances, but still.
Even so she laughs a bit and reaches for him, tugging him up towards her for a feverish kiss, tasting herself on his mouth. One hand slides down his arm, guiding it, with the clear expectation that fingers should take up where lips and tongue left off.
While Anders needs no encouragement, he does like it when Hawke shows him what she wants. He lets her draw him up to recline beside her, facing her, his arm between their bodies. She's slick and eager, and he sees no point in teasing. His thumb finds her pearl as he slides first and second fingers to curve within her, angling for that rough soft spot he knows will make her weep. Her kisses, though, keep him from detachment; even as he works at her with clever and conscious purpose, his body presses against hers, his excitement all too evident.
Hawke, however, is letting herself be selfish for a while, and although the hardness against her hip is suggestive bordering on demanding, her attention is most definitely elsewhere. He works at her adroitly, finding every sensitive spot she has and stimulating them, until she stops kissing him and instead clutches at him. She repeats his name under her breath as he takes her to the point of no return, Anders, over and over, until finally she buries her soft cries in his neck along with a few tears of release, as her body pulses and waves of pleasure wash through her, and she surrenders to them entirely.
Hawke first relinquished her first name when her father died, partly as a way of mourning him and partly because his death changed her so much. There was a loss of innocence; Marian had honestly believed her father could do anything, overcome anything, keep the family together no matter what the odds. And then he'd contracted Blight sickness and was gone in a day, before they'd had time to believe it. It took her months to accept, and by the time she had, she was different. And since someone had to protect the family, keep Bethany from the Templars, keep Carver from his own headstrong foolishness, she did. There wasn't time for Marian anymore, just the family. It wasn't a sacrifice, to her mind; it was all she wanted to do, all that mattered. Her mother and the twins had kept calling her by name, of course, and that was tolerable, but they respected her desire to not be introduced as Marian to anyone else
( ... )
"Don't say you're sorry for doing what you need to do." If there's pain in his voice, there's also something obdurate, something that refuses to break. "Not to me. Not ever."
It's not a self-denying gesture, it's the truth. Anders is the one who never believed in compromise.
"You owe me nothing, least of all the truth, but if I'm to have anything of you, the truth is what I'd like most. I'm ... glad you told me, really."
Keep me from acting a blighted fool around you, he thinks but does not say. He'll be a fool in some other way, some time or other, he's sure. She has some kind of a corrosive effect against his willpower. He might even attribute that to some accessory she wears, except that it works when she's wearing nothing at all.
"Glad of a lot of things. Though I will swear to you on anything you choose that I did not intend to lure you into bed tonight. Into ... carpet. Into a coat, then."
This laugh sounds more like her usual one, though it's still a bit choked. "No, I believe that. We just have a knack for it." Her hand shifts so their fingers are threaded, still splayed on his skin. "Truth, then. I love you. Despite everything. Perhaps I always will. But I don't know how to forgive you, not just for what you did, but for what you did to me in the process. No matter how necessary it may or may not have been." Her fingers squeeze his. "Thank you for the poem. I would have loved it."
One thing that hasn't changed: Anders is still capable of stunning feats of doublethink. Ask him and he'll tell you what he wants for Hawke, more than anything, is happiness, no matter what's required for her to be happy. She deserves peace. She deserves to heal, to put Kirkwall and its fall behind her. Forgiveness, or some measure thereof, might be a part of that process. Perhaps he can never fully atone for what he's done, but it wouldn't kill him to try.
Yet, at the same time, Anders does not want to be forgiven. Losing Hawke balances the scales, somehow. To explain the mathematics of justice would tax any human's reason, even if Anders were unwise enough to try. At the core of it is this: He was supposed to die for what he did. Hawke denied him death. Now she's generously affording him an opportunity to suffer, and he finds an ineffable relief in embracing it.
It would kill me to lose you, he told her once. He meant it. A slow death, by degrees, nothing dramatic. A silent and protracted process. Not a literal,
( ... )
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And the bright blankness of the room, bare of any possible distractions, bare of sound, since the soundproof blocks most noise from outside as well as keeping noise from inside drifting out. ( ... )
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It may or may not have been a bluff the first time she asked him that question; this time it's undeniably a dare.
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But then she says those words. It's not only a dare, though it is a dare, the best kind; it's an allusion, and an affirmation, and a question, too. He answers it the only way he can ( ... )
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So she smirks up at him, the dare still firmly in her eyes as she meets his own heated gaze without flinching. "Show me."
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Show me. Again, an allusion, and a memory that would be enough to fire his blood all on its own.
For his own sake, though, as much as hers, Anders enters slowly, inch by agonizing inch, aware that too quick a pace will end this sooner. That would let her off too easily, and he ought to live up to the memory she's invoked. To keep from focusing his entire awareness on that sweet slide in, at the same time he captures her mouth with his, giving the kiss all the force that he can't yet allow his other movements.
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That stung. Now. Focus on now.
Fortunately, now offered a number of interesting things to focus on.
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Which is precisely why he makes jokes about it.
"Let's not talk about my appetites. Far better to demonstrate them." She shouldn't argue with that, mistress don't tell me, show me. Without explanation, though not with exceptional speed, Anders extricates his limbs and turns away, rising to his knees, leaning toward something he has to work to reach ( ... )
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Anyway, it's a nice view. Lean, surprisingly muscular for a mage, all that staff-twirling (insert innuendo here) does require some muscle. To say nothing of keeping up with her. Hawke's never been easy on her companions, unfortunately. Though the reverse applies as well, so she always figured it evened out more or less.
It's a much nicer view when he's looking at her like that. "Why a tablecloth? If want to see if you can whisk it out from under me without me moving, I'm going to laugh at you. Fair warning."
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Facing her, still on his knees, he leans in using one hand for support. The other hand is gliding up the side of her uppermost calf. "It's a tablecloth," he says, "because you are a feast. And I haven't been quite this hungry in a long time."
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In the end, though, Anders is the one to pull away. With every gasp and whimper he wrings from her, he imagines what she must look like making that sound, the blood rushing to her cheeks, the way she must be turning her head to the side, arching her neck. Enough of this and imagination no longer suffices; he needs to sit back on his knees to take in the full view, all of her at once, his lovely Hawke. In Varric's scurrilous tales, the ( ... )
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Even so she laughs a bit and reaches for him, tugging him up towards her for a feverish kiss, tasting herself on his mouth. One hand slides down his arm, guiding it, with the clear expectation that fingers should take up where lips and tongue left off.
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Grey Warden stamina cannot be denied.
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"Don't say you're sorry for doing what you need to do." If there's pain in his voice, there's also something obdurate, something that refuses to break. "Not to me. Not ever."
It's not a self-denying gesture, it's the truth. Anders is the one who never believed in compromise.
"You owe me nothing, least of all the truth, but if I'm to have anything of you, the truth is what I'd like most. I'm ... glad you told me, really."
Keep me from acting a blighted fool around you, he thinks but does not say. He'll be a fool in some other way, some time or other, he's sure. She has some kind of a corrosive effect against his willpower. He might even attribute that to some accessory she wears, except that it works when she's wearing nothing at all.
"Glad of a lot of things. Though I will swear to you on anything you choose that I did not intend to lure you into bed tonight. Into ... carpet. Into a coat, then."
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Yet, at the same time, Anders does not want to be forgiven. Losing Hawke balances the scales, somehow. To explain the mathematics of justice would tax any human's reason, even if Anders were unwise enough to try. At the core of it is this: He was supposed to die for what he did. Hawke denied him death. Now she's generously affording him an opportunity to suffer, and he finds an ineffable relief in embracing it.
It would kill me to lose you, he told her once. He meant it. A slow death, by degrees, nothing dramatic. A silent and protracted process. Not a literal, ( ... )
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