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It was past evening and into morning and the bulk of the group had dispersed, Varric to his suite and Anders to his clinic, Fenris and Merrill back to the Alienage due to Hawke's grinning insistence that he see her safely home (Isabela greatly respected Hawke's willingness to abuse his loyalty for the sake of that cute aggravated furrow in his brow). Thus, the sole remaining revelers at the Hanged Man were Isabela and Hawke, sitting side-by-side on the back wall, sipping philosophically at their ale, and playing a leisurely game of Snapback, the only game too simple for them to render pointless by compulsive cheating.
Isabela turned over a four and Hawke saw it a half-second before she did, a broad, scar-marked hand darting across the table with the speed of a striking snake. Isabela's hand, less than an eyeblink behind, clapped onto hers on the top of the pile, just a heartbeat too late, making a tangle of dark fingers on white cards. Isabela pouted and pulled her hand back, but Hawke paused for a moment, not taking the prize, cocking her head at Isabela.
"No lingering stroke?" she asked. "No teasing brush against my wrist? Do I smell funny tonight, or what? You haven't flirted with me once since we sat down. I think it actually cost me a couple of hands earlier, it's very distracting."
She didn't seem hurt or offended, just curious, but Isabela felt unaccountably like she'd been accused of something all the same. She crossed her arms and tried not to sound defensive.
"You remember a few days ago, that sort of Antivan-looking noble buying that fancy silk shirt at the hat shop? Well, I did look him up later. Not much of a talker, but a stallion between the sheets. Well, on the desk. We never made it to the sheets," she added flippantly.
Something flickered behind Hawke's eyes, a brief moment of stillness that Isabela couldn't quite read (Hawke got impossible to read at the most inconvenient times, it was frustrating and alluring in equal measure), and Isabela waited for the other woman to call her a whore. It was long overdue, frankly; it had been nearly two years since the day Hawke invited herself to Isabela's bar fight and got hit on for her trouble, a little over one and a half since they first had sex (not in a bed, or in fact anywhere remotely respectable), months and months of Hawke learning just how many things (well, people, specifically, and in what combination) Isabela had done in her life and how she spent her time and money. And in all that time, Hawke had never said it, in so many words or otherwise, and Isabela had no idea what she was waiting for.
Not that she cared what Hawke thought. Hawke was wrong about a lot of things (the value of money, the usefulness of idealism, the attractiveness of her favorite pea-green shirt). She was wrong about Isabela, if she really thought she could count on her. It didn't matter if she thought less of her for what she'd done (for what they'd done, for what she let Hawke do when she used that perfect commanding tone that made Isabela's spine melt). Her gaze only skittered away from Hawke's to keep an eye on the tavern. It was a bad idea to let your guard down in this place.
But strangely, Hawke's only response was a slightly puzzled, "So?"
Isabela looked back at her, and saw nothing but honest curiosity. Her own brow furrowed a bit in response, and she clarified, offhand, breezy as she knew how, "So I haven't had a chance to stop by Anders' clinic since then and frankly, I don't trust Mr Silk Shirt to have stopped by any clinic ever."
And Hawke still didn't call her a whore. Instead, improbably, inexplicably, unfathomably, she smiled, toothy and quirked and hungry, and suddenly she was sliding her hand along Isabela's shoulders, leaning into her personal space, purring into her ear.
"Why Bela, I'm touched," she said, breath hot and close against Isabela's skin. "You're actually turning down hours and hours of hot, dirty, acrobatic sex just on the off chance it would cost me a check-up? That's downright self-sacrificing of you, my dear pirate queen. You're going to ruin your reputation."
She shoved at Hawke's arm, pushing the warm tantalizing brush of the mercenary's breath away from her ear. "Cut that out, it's not nice to tease when I can't play."
"Oh, come now, Bela." Hawke leaned back in, her calloused fingertips slipping just under the edge of Isabela's collar, dancing a teasing line along the edge of skin turned suddenly flushed. "I know you're more creative than that."
Hawke could not possibly be serious.
Isabela glanced up from the fingers tracing a hot circle on her collarbone to see Hawke's eyes locked on hers, pupils wide and stormy with naked lust.
Hawke was serious.
"Hawke, we're in the middle of the Hanged Man," she tried, halfheartedly, her insubordinate body already welcoming the familiar tingle of Hawke's knowing touch.
"Mn," purred Hawke in her ear in amused agreement, her hand sliding a little lower, every faint scar and ridge of her fingers perfectly distinct against the suddenly sensitive top of Isabela's breast. "You're right, I don't really like doing this sort of thing in public. I'm not a big fan of falling apart in front of witnesses under an expert hand, my lover stroking along the most private corners of my body, drawing desperate shudders out of my aching, clenching muscles as I bite madly against my wanton moans and cries, sweating and exposed, writhing and vulnerable for any passing stranger to see if they look over at just the wrong moment, if I let just one little cry slip --"
"Hawke," hissed Isabela, right hand digging into Hawke's thigh under the table, her gaze darting around the tavern. They were in a dark corner, near the back stair, Hawke wasn't even doing anything but purring in her ear, her hand wasn't even more than half under her shirt, but she could feel them, suddenly, the piercing curious eyes of the crowd, prickling the hairs on her skin, pooling a rising tension in her belly.
"Better brace yourself for humiliation, Bela. I'm going to make you scream and thrash like an Orlesian virgin in front of this whole tavern without even touching you."
The pulse of wild heat that rocked down her spine at the words pulled her breath from her lungs, sent her cunt clenching, and Isabela was absurdly proud of how level her voice was when she shot back flippantly, "You're touching me right now."
"Why, so I am," said Hawke, affecting surprise. "I'd better fix that, hadn't I?"
She slowly pulled back her arm, dragging along Isabela's skin as she went, the soft-rough pads of her fingers just barely brushing the surface of Isabela's body, stroking up her sternum and against the soft skin of her neck, two points of taunting fire running a trail along her jugular vein, across the bump of her vertebrae, and her hair swished back against hypersensitive skin in Hawke's wake. Isabela had had a mage spark lightning through every vein in her body and it hadn't felt as electric as this, and she shuddered, just a little, as Hawke's touch left her, her smalls already clingingly damp.
"It's a shame I'm not an apostate," said Hawke, idly, swirling her ale in its tankard, her mind apparently on a similar track. "I slept with this runaway in Willowberth once, and the things she could do with magic... You know that sort of soothing feel of a healing spell, like it's warm and cool at the same time? She could concentrate that. Turn it into a little pulsing ball of sensation, and drag it over my skin from across the room. Imagine that, Bela. Like the hottest, wettest mouth closing around your nipple, rolling it to a perfect point, soft tongue and steady suction and just the slightest scrape of teeth, but it's coming from inside the skin, both tits at once, and spreading out, dancing along the line of your corset. Sending out tendrils, tickling at your neck like a trickle of cool water in a hot tub, sliding down your belly like a lover's breath. Dipping into your navel on the way. If I could do that this whole touching challenge would be no issue at all."
"Yes... a shame," managed Isabela, and she was pretty damn sure she was leaving finger-shaped bruises on Hawke's thigh.
If Hawke even noticed, it wasn't apparent in her voice, still a casual, thoughtful drawl (and how did she manage to do that and purr at the same time, it was utterly obscene in every sense of the word). "And she did this trick with ice. Just froze herself a phallic little tube of it around two fingers, and I bet you can guess the rest. Do you have any idea how that feels, Bela? That cool, hard, ridged little toy, sliding in and out of your overheated cunt, stretching you open and then melting against your flesh, slow rivulets of cold water dripping down your pussy and mingling with your slick, sending icy little shocks to your clit as they slide past?"
Isabela took a long, heavy swallow of her ale, and Hawke very deliberately put her hand around Isabela's on the handle and pulled it back down to the table. "Bela," she said, leaning close again, hot breath caressing the shell of Isabela's ear, and she wasn't casual now, Maker no, she was hard, her voice as forceful and demanding and incontrovertible as the rock-steady grip holding Isabela to her mug. "Take that hand off my thigh, put it between your legs, push aside that sopping wet excuse for clothing you call your smalls, and bury two fingers to the knuckle in your gorgeous little cunt."
Isabela was pretty sure she'd never followed an order so fast in her life.
And oh. Oh. It had been so long since she'd done this from this angle, since she'd done this to herself, and she'd forgotten the control, forgotten what it was to want a little more pressure, a little higher, a little wider, and just do, immediate and instinctive, and she was hot and tight around her own fingers, trembling and jerking her hips a little against the clever intrusion of her hand, the knowing push as she worked herself deeper.
"Careful now," said Hawke, letting go of her other hand and picking her own mug back up. "Don't make a scene, Bela. Don't you dare make a sound."
Hawke's voice crawled across her shoulders like a living thing, and she bit her lip against a whimper as her whole body shuddered in response. Hawke noticed, and her eyes narrowed as they slid sideways.
"Slower."
Laughter rose up suddenly across the tavern, one of the other tables going momentarily rowdy, and Isabela drew back a little in her seat, trying to hug deeper into the shadows, feeling that pleasant liquid urgency pooling between her hips, and just for a second, considered ignoring Hawke.
"I won't say it twice."
Isabela slowed her hand.
Hawke grinned, smug and satisfied, and just... watched her, that familiar smoldering intensity in her stormy grey eyes (like her voice, practically a physical caress in and of itself, raising goosebumps where it landed). Isabela's left hand was white-knuckled on her mug as her right slid in and out, keeping Hawke's pace, just a maddening bit too slow, every brush against her clit with the heel of her palm or tickle of her fingertips against that high inner softness raising that first hot throbbing pulse of pleasure, but letting it recede just before her hand grazed past again, just before she could push it a little higher. She could hear her own needy whimpers rising in her throat before she swallowed them, the wet filthy sound of her slick squelching and sliding between her fingers, even the pounding of her own blood in her ears and it all seemed so loud, echoing through the tavern, but she didn't dare take her eyes off Hawke, didn't dare lose the searing heat of that gaze on her body.
Hawke took another slow, deliberate swallow of her ale, and broke eye contact, turning from Isabela to stare dissatisfied into her drink.
"Norah!" she bellowed, raising the mug, and as the waitress turned over to them, Isabela made a noise of protest and started to yank her hand clear of her smalls. She hadn't even moved a tenth of an inch when Hawke's hand clamped around her wrist like a vice.
"I don't remember telling you to stop," said Hawke, low and steel and dangerous, and she was insane, she couldn't possibly expect Isabela to sit there and rut on her own fingers in front of Norah, because yes, Isabela would cheerfully strip them both naked and bugger Hawke's brains out on the table if she thought Hawke would go for it, but this was different, this was her flushed and throbbing with her own hand down her smalls and Hawke smug and calm without a hair out of place --
-- and then Hawke's thumb dug into a pressure point just as Norah got within arm's reach and Isabela's hand spasmed against her will, fingers scissoring inside her cunt of their own accord, and she had every intention of glaring bloody murder at Hawke but Maker's balls that put her right on the edge and that final rolling tingle was sweeping through her core and now she couldn't stop, it was too close, too good, she didn't even see Norah, barely even heard Hawke's customary cheerful flirting or Norah's standard dismissive contempt, felt every eye in the room and couldn't give a damn if a single one was real, and she was biting her lip to keep from panting and thumbing wildly at her clit and not even caring if the desperate lewd roll of her hips gave her away as she ground and twisted against her hand and then she was coming, hard and dizzy, biting brutally into her free wrist to keep from moaning.
She opened her eyes just in time to see Hawke sweep in for a cheeky kiss against her temple. "Close call, there," the mercenary said, leaning back just enough for Isabela to see her face, no doubt the better to appreciate her smug smirk. "Ten seconds earlier and you'd have come apart in front of the help."
"Ass," accused Isabela, smacking her shoulder with her clean (if slightly bitten) hand, as the other was still locked in place by Hawke's disgustingly strong grip (a realization that sent a faint unfair aftershock of frission up Isabela's spine). The blow made a satisfying slapping sound against the lightly-embroidered Antivan linen, but Hawke was pretty much a walking pile of bricks and didn't even rock in place, much less lose her triumphant expression.
If anything, in fact, her grin turned wider. "I thought you liked asses, Bela. You certainly spend enough time going on about the Seneschal's."
"Yes yes, you're a laugh riot. Can I at least have my arm back?" Isabela said with a sigh. It was a very good sigh, she thought. It sounded tremendously put-upon, and utterly unimpressed, and bore no resemblance at all to what one might reasonably expect from a woman who had just had a mind-blowing orgasm.
Hawke clearly wasn't fooled, but she let go all the same, surrendering Isabela's wrist (and ghosting her fingers gently along the skin there in what Isabela would almost have called a caress, if she thought Hawke would ever do something so ridiculous on purpose). Gingerly, Isabela slid free of her ruined smalls and still-sensitive cunt.
"First you don't flirt with me, now you won't laugh at my jokes." Hawke sighed dramatically. "Bela, I'm starting to think you don't like me anymore."
Isabela didn't deign to answer that, beyond wiping her hand deliberately on the side of Hawke's shirt.
But she did resolve to visit Anders first thing in the morning.