been thinking about various Dragon Age characters that I love and after Veilguard I had to draw Flemeth starting her transition from Witch of the Wilds to Mythal
I'll probably do a portrait of her in her sexy dragon look too~
i do think we should normalise being like. platonically enamoured with someone. perhaps i love and admire you dearly and there's nothing romantic about it
I kind of wanted to do a bunch of art for FenHawke Week (@fenhawke-week) like I did for Rookanis Week back in February. On the other hand, I also don't have as much fic stuff written for Aelinn Hawke and Fenris as I do for my other DA ladies. So, I decided that since FenHawke Week is eight days, I'd alternate art and fic. (Also, that way, I don't drive myself absolutely batty trying to jam out eight art pieces on limited time.)
So for today, I decided to go with the "Grief" prompt and write a ficlet for these two. Sorry, this is sad, but it's the saddest fic day for the week, if that helps?
This is set just after Leandra's death. Hawke is grieving. She and Fenris are already in their "Act II breakup" phase of the relationship.
Grief
(1,301 words)
Read on AO3
The oppressive silence in the Hawke Estate loomed over Fenris like an angry ghost, scratching at his nerves with ragged claws.
Hawke’s home should have been boisterous. Warm. Full of life and laughter. Visiting friends. Loving family. Respected staff. A place the people in her circle could call comfort, could call a second home.
Instead, the grand fireplace in the main hall stood dark and cold, ashes scattered across the floor like something had been raked out recently but no one had cleaned after. Letters piled up on the sideboard, beneath a bare spot on the wall where a portrait had once hung. Hawke and her family, when she was younger, Fenris thought, but couldn’t quite recall for certain. Faulty memory, perhaps.
Guilt at not paying more attention to his one-time lover’s home, more likely.
The soft pat of his bare feet on the floor seemed to thunder in the lonely space. Fenris’s lips thinned into a hard line. The others should have been there.
He should have been there sooner.
But no, Varric had to prod him out of his own self-pity to even convince him to come, and after all the pretty arguments of who was best suited and who might just make things worse and who Hawke really wanted to see, the only thing that had finally convinced Fenris was the promise—threat?—that if he didn’t step up, Anders would.
And, even though Hawke had thrown out Varric and even shouted at Merrill—and she never shouted at Merrill—and even though Fenris was probably the last person she wanted in her home, he now stood at the bottom of the stairs and hated himself for hesitating.
Orana appeared briefly in the hallway that led to the kitchens, holding a tray of food. Their eyes met. Hers were puffy from crying. Fenris felt his soften, and wondered if he looked as lost as he felt.
To his relief, Orana said nothing. She simply inclined her head and disappeared back into the shadows. Relinquishing the task of reaching out to Hawke to him.
The stairs felt cold underfoot as he climbed to the upper landing. The silence continued to lean in as though it could smother him too.
Hawke’s door mocked him in its steadiness. The last time he’d laid eyes on it, he’d left Hawke behind, her eyes dark and—he’d thought then—accusing. Only, he’d come to find after, he’d misunderstood. He’d broken whatever fragile, fledgling thing had grown between them, and she’d blamed herself for it, not him. Had continued to speak in his defense against Anders even though he didn’t need it. Had continued to treat him as a person even though he didn’t deserve it.
He’d driven in the knife, and twisted it, and she still called him friend in spite of it all.
He considered knocking, and instead tried the handle. The door creaked as it opened.
“I told you I didn’t want any,” Hawke’s broken voice quavered from the far side of the bed. It cut right to Fenris’s heart.
The room was a mess. Bed linens rumpled and tossed aside, clothes strewn about, Hawke’s glaive propped against the half-open wardrobe like a drunkard. A tray of uneaten and congealed food sat on the desk. The curtains were drawn as though to shut out the outside world. The fire in the fireplace guttered under a thick cloak of ash. Shadows coated everything as the lone lantern on the nightstand struggled to illuminate anything. The room smelled stale and musty.
Hawke huddled on the floor as far from the door as she could manage, hunched over her knees, head hanging between them, her hair a disheveled mess. She still wore the clothes Fenris had seen her in the day her—
Well, the day everything fell apart.
He rounded the bed, cautious. Hawke’s mabari, leaning against her like his weight alone could bear her up, lifted his head to whine plaintively at Fenris. And around Hawke’s feet, scraps of black spilled like wool leavings in the weaver’s quarter.
Oh.
Hair.
Hawke’s hair.
The knife she’d obviously used lay just out of her reach, strands still clinging to the blade. He could see now the rough hack-job she’d done of the cut, hear the shudder in her breaths of emotions long wrung out.
She turned her head slightly as he approached, one tear-swollen, red-rimmed eye watching him warily. If she was surprised to see him and not one of the others, she didn’t show it. Her breath hitched again as he settled next to her, a polite distance away. It might as well have been a chasm.
A half-choked sob that seemed to die in her chest, and she rubbed her arm across her face with an ungraceful sniffle that sputtered into fresh tears. “I take it Varric sent you,” she said, hiccuping on the words.
He couldn’t meet her eyes. “I know I....” He swallowed. Searched for the words. Found only helplessness that galled him. She needed more than he was. More than he could be. And yet he was the only one at her side at the moment, aside from her dog.
Because a certain dwarf thought he might succeed where the others had failed.
“I’m...not sure I’m the one you want to see right now,” he finally managed.
She shrugged listlessly. He swallowed down his knee-jerk irritation at the implied dismissal and took a deep breath. He opened his mouth to try again.
“You were right.”
The defeat in her voice, muffled against her knees, brought him up short.
“You...and the templars....” Her shoulders shook with her next breath, and she kept her face buried between her legs. “Mages ruin everything they touch.”
Ice lodged in his stomach as effectively as a blade, and he felt the prickle of the lyrium markings along his shoulders and spine flaring up in response.
What has magic touched that it does not ruin?
To hear Hawke, fiercely proud of her magic and yet kind and caring and protective of those she loved, who put up with him and his mess and his sharp tongue, say those words....
To agree with him....
His heart clenched around the damage he had done.
“Would it...help you? Thinking that?” he murmured.
She tried to laugh. The sound snagged in her throat and squeezed out as a sob. “I failed her, Fenris. I failed Carver. I failed Bethany.” Hawke hugged her legs closer to her. “What good is magic if all I do is fail the ones I love?”
He had no answers. He knew what he wanted to say, but shouldn’t. He thought he knew what he needed to say, but couldn’t. All he could manage was an awkward hand on her shoulder. Too light. Too heavy. It felt like both and an intrusion all at once.
“I don’t know,” he forced out. The closest to truth he could find to give her. “Maybe...it’s better not to fill these moments with unnecessary words.”
She did manage a laugh this time, bitter like stale beer. “Eloquent as always,” she sighed.
He bit back the harsh words that tried to spill loose.
“But thank you,” she added. “For being here.” She took another shaky breath. Fresh tears rolled down her cheeks. “I know it’s...it’s hard, and...I’m not the best right now....” She choked.
He pulled her to lean into his chest without thinking. She didn’t protest. Her fingers clutched at his armor leathers, holding on as though he was her only lifeline, and she buried her face against his chest and sobbed.
When she finally cried herself to sleep an hour later, he carefully moved her to the bed, stroking her raggedly shorn hair out of her eyes, and left her there with an inadequate apology and all his regrets.
