Chapter Text
Anders’ clinic is the next stop before Hawke can retreat to The Hanged Man. Much to Fenris’ disdain, he’d thoughtfully picked all the herbs they passed on their recent excursion to surprise his favourite apostate healer with and he wasn’t passing up on the tired eyed, bright smile he was sure to receive.
Hawke hides his frown at the alarmingly dark circles under Anders’ eyes when he saunters into the clinic, artfully dodging the hacking cough of a patient as he does so. It is not on his agenda to catch the plague for doing a good deed.
“Hawke.” Anders, as expected, perks up like Dog at the sight of Hawke.
Two bulging arms swing wide and envelope Anders, tall as he is, into an unwashed and grubby embrace. “I knew you missed me.”
Anders’ laugh is clear and unburdened, the lightness of it as much a relief as knowing he is still laughing at all. Hawke would have a few bones to pick with Justice if he could get the spirit alone for a stern talking to. “I’m just glad you’re back to see me and not bleeding all over my floor.” He pushes weakly at Hawke, not exactly one to rankle at a few bad smells considering where he lived.
“One time!” Anders raises an eyebrow. “Oh, shut up.” Framed with a grin, Hawke presses the herbs into Anders’ hands. “Uhm… okay, one more thing before I gotta go- got a business date with my favourite dwarf but don’t tell Sandal.” The joke falls flat between them.
Anders sets the bag of herbs down, the grateful smile becoming a little worn already at Hawke’s hesitance. “What did Fenris do?”
“How do you know it’s him?”
“You’ve only been around two people likely to cause trouble: Isabela and Fenris. If it was Isabela, you wouldn’t hesitate in asking.” He’s folding his arms and Hawke feels like his mother just caught him with his hand in the cookie jar, scuffing his boots in the darktown dirt as he fidgets. “So; what is it?”
Hawke rubs awkwardly at his neck, eyes darting to the ceiling as he parsed carefully over his words. “Okay, so he was being a bit… weird.”
“Wolf weird or ex-slave weird?” There’s no need to be delicate when Fenris isn’t there, and Anders is far too tired for delicate phrasing anyway.
“I think… wolf weird? But kind of… well, not really either, actually… more like… you weird.”
“I beg your pardon?!”
An emphatic wave of an arm the size and circumference of a tree trunk shakes off his outrage.
“You know, the whispering to yourself but you’re actually talking to Justice kind of thing. The tense ‘walking it off’ as you fight with yourself sometimes. Classic inner turmoil stuff.”
Anders pinches his brow but shakes his head, the niggle of concern already worming at him as Hawke fidgets. Weariness tugs at his limbs but he sighs, not even thinking long when he knows what will happen is inevitable. He can’t help himself. “I’ll check up on him.” Justice makes a murmur of discontent and Anders pushes it down, not in the mood to argue.
Hawke grins. “I knew you liked him. Thanks, Anders.”
“I’m a healer; he might be sick. No ‘like’ about, Hawke.”
“Sure, sure.” But Hawke is half out the door already, never one to keep his darling Varric waiting as Anders slumps over his desk and tries to rub some energy into his face.
He might be exhausted and more than a little starved but there isn’t a ‘good’ time to invade Fenris’ privacy. Putting it off just prolonged the same arguments and made Anders worry for longer.
He waves to Lirene, half leaning on his staff as he heads for the door. Anders had never put much stock in praying to the Maker but he always found himself doing it on the off chance that he might be heard one day, and today he pleaded that Fenris might be receptive to his help. Chance would be a fine thing but when praying to a deity one might as well ask for a miracle.
His feet drag across each step but he manages to stand upright by the time he reaches Hightown, his gnarled tree branch of a staff passing easily for a walking stick that his youthful pride no longer protests. There were plenty of crippled people barely into their thirty summers that Anders had treated at his clinic, and if it cast a few suspicious eyes away from him then so be it. Exhaustion works in his favour as he groans and hobbles his way to Fenris’ door and knocks.
It is no secret that Fenris had soured inexplicably towards him lately. Not that they were anything more than civil usually, but he had done nothing to warrant the avoidance and sharp comments this time. At least, he was fairly sure he hadn’t. Maybe Fenris’ wolf had lost it’s apparent affection for him and was now more in tune with Fenris’ ‘all mages are evil’ rule.
Maybe he just hated Anders and that is never going to change, no matter how nice Anders would be. And he had been trying, extra hard, to be nice about everything. Not like he couldn’t sympathise with Fenris’ forced dual nature, and done by a blood mage no less. He and Justice were in total agreement that Fenris deserved their help. He rubs tiredly at his eyes and tries the handle, frowning as it opens. He thought Aveline had had a word about this.
That is a problem for another day, he thinks, looking to the stairs and calling out. “Fenris? It’s Anders, I…” Maybe saying Hawke thought Fenris was acting like Anders was not the best plan. “I wanted to check up on you.”
Anders waits for a moment but no response comes, unease settling in his gut far more pressing than any selfish desire to sleep. That Hawke had come to him, knowing the tension between them, only proved that Fenris had to be seriously in need of help.
“Fenris?” Anders calls again, his feet kicking up dust as he crosses to the foot of the stairs.
Still, no wrathful elf appearing above him to snarl and spit at him.
The unease gnaws at him harder. Professional concern, he thinks to himself even as he felt Justice do the mental equivalent of an eyeroll.
His back protests but he takes the stairs two at a time until he is hovering nervously at the door of Fenris’ room. He knocks. Hard. “Fenris!” Loud, a demand now. It echoes in the grave of a house and Anders feels his neck prickle at the sound bouncing back at him. The silence persists, not even the whispers of movement that might mean Fenris is simply ignoring him as he carries on with whatever it is Fenris did in this mansion besides drink.
Images of him passed out drunk, choking on his own vomit, flash before Anders’ as his mouth sets in a stern line and he wrenches the door open, lunging into the room.
His first thought is kidnapping. Then he remembers Danarius is dead and there is no one fool enough to think they can collar Fenris again, so his second thought is ambush.
The room is in disarray with the furniture tipped haphazardly in every direction, shards of glass and crockery crunching underfoot as Anders steps cautiously further into the room. There is no blood on the floor but there is no Fenris either. Worry sinks it’s teeth into his gut, no longer the niggling gnawing of unease, as Justice murmurs unhappily that this is not professional concern.
Anders wants to lash out verbally but a whisper of a sound stalls him.
He waits, almost certain that it sounded like a sob, but it does not come again. Casting his gaze about the room Anders notices the conspicuously undisturbed bed tucked in the far corner.
There is nothing on it but struggling on creaking knees, Anders peers under it and his face splits into a wide, relieved smile. “Fenris!”
A tangled mop of white hair shifts, bleary rubbed-red eyes glaring at him, and it’s such a welcome sight to the things Anders had imagined. “Go away.”
“Nope.” Anders is still grinning and he knows it is doing him no favours with Fenris but he can’t care.
“Leave it, stop…”
“I’m not doing any-”
“Not you!” Fenris snarls, and Anders barely dodges the still clawed hand that makes a swipe for him. When Anders peers back Fenris has both his hands fisted in his hair, tugging and scratching like he’s… like he’s trying to rip himself apart.
“Hey, hey, don’t do that, just-” If Anders needed another reminder that Fenris wasn’t entirely, well, domesticated, then the teeth that graze the hand he outstretches are enough of a reminder. “Did you just- never mind. Fenris, will you come out of there?” Silence. “Please?” Still nothing. “If you don’t come out, I’m coming in.”
“Try it, mage.”
“You’re awfully uppity for someone hiding under a bed.” The low growl he gets in response isn’t good enough to dissuade him so Anders tugs off his boots and begins to wriggle and crawl his way under the bed. All the while Fenris makes a low growling sound much like a very pissed off cat and Anders pays it absolutely no attention.
“I could kill you.” Fenris points out petulantly.
“You could, but I imagine you’d do it for a far better reason than my hiding under a bed with you.” Anders props himself up on his elbows as much as he can, the low hang of the bed giving him very little room to accomplish this but it helps to be able to look at Fenris in the eye. “So… now can we talk?”
“You have done nothing but talk since you barged in here.”
“True. But! I am a healer and you aren’t looking too healthy so… let me help. Magic should serve man, right? So let me serve you.” At the way Fenris’ eyes darken with something very much not anger, Anders realises that he might have phrased that better. His mouth tingles in the memory of Fenris’ mouth, the firm grasp of his hands on Anders’ body… and that was a thought better stopped right there. “Uh… I meant… you know… healing stuff. I’m a healer.”
“So you have said.” The drawl of that mocking tone should not be arousing. It really shouldn’t.
“You know… Hawke mentioned you had been acting a bit like me lately.” Anders shrugs at the confused look. “Oh, not the handsome, witty human with authority issues parts-” Fenris scoffs and Anders ignores him. “-the muttering and the warring with yourself stuff, you know, my… Justice-y parts.”
Fenris snaps like a mousetrap and Anders lets the elf get a breath out before cutting off the familiar tirade. “You think to compare your demon to my… my…”
“Ye~es? Your what?”
“You know very well what, mage, or did you forget what sank it’s teeth into your neck?”
Anders’ hand shifts to rub at his neck, a habitual action when the scar is mentioned as it calls back the aching memory and makes Anders flush. “ You bit me, Fenris.”
Fenris’ lips peeled back in a growl. “No I did not. My… the… the wolf did.”
“Hm, I thought you said it was just a part of your nature, but still you.”
“Of course it is not me! I do not want to do these things, it can not be me!” This close, Anders can hear the elf’s teeth grinding. “I would never want to do any of these things! I would never be so base or impulsive or want yo-”
It shouldn’t hurt. It doesn’t, actually, Anders realises. Not like woe and heartbreak and loss. It stings, because it’s an insult, but mostly it’s just… affirming. It isn’t anything Anders doesn’t already know, and he’d been right to keep Fenris at a distance when he couldn’t control that side of himself. Now, it appears, he’s got that bit at least under wraps.
“… I know.” Anders nods slowly, the dust under the bed tickling his nose as he looks away from Fenris. “I know you wouldn’t. Any of the things that have happened lately. And perhaps you would prefer to have gone back to denying that part of yourself until it was locked away again, but who’s to say it might still have caught you off guard? At least this way, you are getting a handle on it.”
Fenris presses his forehead to his folded hands, looking much less the fearsome wolf he was named for and more… a lost, scared elf. “I do not… think that I am.” It takes everything in Anders to still his tongue from chipping in, just patiently waiting as Fenris chews through words like fishing in tar for the right ones. As eloquent as he is, he is not rushed. Not like Anders. “I feel like… I am losing control.” Comes the soft whisper, slipped through gritted teeth as if it takes everything in Fenris to confess it. It probably does.
“Well… you didn’t attack me, and you probably wanted to.” Anders points out gently. He leaves it open as to what definition of ‘attack’ it could be that Fenris might want, or rather that his ‘wolf’ might want. “And look at us; being civil and you letting me help you.”
“We are just talking, mage.”
“Talking is helping. Don’t tell me you don’t feel better when you have your manly evenings drinking wine with Hawke or Donnic, chatting away and easing each other- talking helps.” Anders thinks that’s a rather inspired bit of comfort but the grunt he gets for his trouble is, while not unexpected, not reassuring.
Patience, Anders has learned, is key with Fenris. He does not like to be pushed or goaded- two things Anders is very good at- and while it isn’t normally on Anders’ agenda to cater to Fenris’ grumpiness, it is easy to nestle under the bed and just wait the testy elf out.
It takes a lot less time than Anders would have guessed.
“Why are you helping me, mage?”
“It’s what I do. I am a healer.”
“So you keep saying.”
“Is it so hard to accept that I don’t want you to suffer if I can help you?”
“Yes.”
No pause, no hesitancy. It isn’t that Fenris hasn’t got his reasons to feel like that but Anders’ head jerks up and he knocks his head off the bed frame above him. Cursing and rubbing at his scalp he looks away from Fenris. “Oh.”
“I do not… hate you.”
“You hate what I am.”
“I… I suppose so. I hate mages, and yet… I trust you to a certain capacity.”
Anders nods. “That’s… fair. I don’t think you’d be in the rescue party if the Templars finally got me. Assuming they let me live. Either way, I understand what you mean. I trust you to have my back in a fight, like I’ll have yours. Doesn’t mean we agree or like each other.”
Bizarrely, Anders feels Fenris relax beside him. He’s still twitching and his eyes darting aside from time to time, but he’s calmed by Anders’ assurance of their acquaintance and it is kind of amusing.”Agreed, mage.”
“Ah-ah, we can’t agree. What did I just say?”
To add to the strangeness, Fenris laughs. More of a snort, really, but it is amusement nonetheless. Not derision or mocking, just… shared humour. Shared ground. For all they’re agreeing they do not get along, they seem to be getting along.
“So…” Anders coughs to cover his uncertainty, “We were talking about your wolf, right? How it’s you but not you, and you’ve… what? Been arguing with it? Out loud if Hawke’s to be believed. Which is definitely what Justice and I do, by the way, just saying.”
Fenris growls. “I am possessed by no demon.”
“As you say, serah, but I have scars from whatever you want to call it.”
“That is a claim mark, I- it- claimed you.” Fenris’ cheeks flush for a scant second before he’s turned away from Anders and left Anders gaping at him.
He had sort of figured as much but to hear Fenris admit it? Maker, he had not been prepared for that. Curse his gravelling tone and the way it seemed to render Anders stupid in the worst ways. Stupid and not at all aroused. Nope.
“…riiiight.” Anders swallows. “So. Uh, yeah. Not exactly what you wanted, right?” Anders jokes and shakes his head, continuing on before Fenris can speak because he does not need another thorough telling of how unappealing the elf finds him. “Anyway… what have you been arguing about with… it? Yourself? Whatever.”
Fenris’ ears twitch.
It’s common with elves, little twitches or perks when sad or interested, Merrill did it all the time, Fenris less so. The most Anders has seen of it is when they are out on a mission and Fenris is primed for any hint of danger, a twig snapping making his ears prick, but this time Fenris’ ears are tweaked low like… like a scolded dog. Merrill’s ears droop a little when she is sad, but this was… not elf behaviour. Maybe Fenris was right and the wolf was becoming more present than Fenris could handle.
“I do not want to be this way.”
Without thinking, as Anders heart aches for the lost expression and sad voice, he reaches for Fenris and rubs the dropped ear nearest him.
Art by the amazing 1000saturdaymornings
Three little circles of his thumb over the skin as his knuckles rub Fenris’ head and Anders blinks, waiting for the impending lashing out but Fenris leans into the touch like he’d been desperate for it all along. His head butts Anders’ hand when he slows, and that is something Anders is well acquainted with from cats- more, now. So Anders does it again. Rubbing at the skin of his ear as he wriggles a little closer. it isn’t protective, it’s… convenient. It’s difficult to manoeuvre under the bed, it’s simply to stop cramping.
Justice pokes him for the lie but otherwise stays silent.
I know that feeling , Anders thinks. He does not say it for it will get him no sympathy and he’s come to at least be at peace with his magic, but he remembers a terrified little boy staring at a burning barn and remembers wishing with all his heart that he was not the way he was.
Fenris’ head falls lax, turned towards Anders so the mage can see the exhausted lines on his face, the rubbed red eyes and the bone deep weariness.
“I am sorry.” Anders says softly. For touching Fenris unpermitted, as welcome as it is, for the torment he suffered at the hands of mages, for the duality of his nature that he did not ask for, for… for everything. He might not be able to fix it but compassion might ease it, so he keeps his hand rubbing slow soothing circles as Fenris’ eyes slide shut and Anders watches over him.
I trust you.
Enough to sleep at his side with no concerns, it seems. Anders debates trying to wriggle them both out from under the bed to tuck Fenris to sleep but looking at the elf’s slowly relaxing face it seems cruel to move him.
Anders had expected Fenris’ acceptance of his wolf nature to have a backlash sooner or later, but it had taken so long it was still a surprise that as proud as Fenris walked now he was not unbreakable. If it could not be fixed by brute strength or tactical attack then Fenris needed help and the concept seemed so odd; Fenris needing help.
I am a healer, Anders thinks. I can help.
With Justice so silent, a blessing of Fenris’ company, Anders falls asleep without being run to exhaustion and the mantra he repeats to keep himself separate from Justice does not need saying but it is habit and it’s soothing to look at Fenris’ relaxed face and see the truth of it.
I am a healer, I am a mage, I can help, I am good.
He wakes a little while later, Fenris still blessedly asleep, and Anders takes his leave with a heavy heart. Let Fenris find some reprieve in sleep, there is no hurt his magic can heal here and he has offered what companionship he can. Anders is not keen to overstay his welcome.
He is not sure he can prove to Fenris that he cares and that he means no harm, but he will try. Fenris might not trust him fully, but he trusts him enough to give him the chance to prove himself and that is enough for Anders.
Art by the amazing Fadefox