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“Always resignation and acceptance. Always prudence and honour and duty. Elinor, where is your heart?”
Sense and Sensibility.
Fenris was now used to wake up in the middle of the night to his numb arm under Hawke’s head. He usually pulled her closer to his chest to free his arm without having to lose her touch, other times he moved his fingers to help the blood circulate and he slowly pulled out his arm from under her.
But this time his arm wasn’t numb, it was the cold that woke him up. While his eyes adjusted to the lack of light his ears caught the soft whimpers that came from a little ball on the other extreme of the bed.
“Hawke?” he whispered in the dark. Was she dreaming or was she awake and upset?
The whimpers turned to louder sobs.
“Hawke?” he called her again, his hand reached to touch her back. She was trembling and freezing. He called her again shaking her shoulder softly. “Hawke, wake up”
She just curled up more, now openly crying.
“Marian, love, wake up”
She opened her eyes and took a deep breath. The first thing she noticed was the dim blue light in the room.
Fenris.
She turned and he was right there, almost on top of her watching her with those puppy worried eyes.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her face in his chest without being able to control her tears. She whispered nonsense, something about being thankful and amazed, she sounded relieved.
“What happened?”
“You were gone. The last time, I left him because I had to go to Ostagar. It was going to be a few months, a year at most. It hadn’t passed a couple of weeks and he was gone.”He just let her talk, perhaps it would start making sense in a moment “I wasn’t even far away and I had promised him I would come back. I didn’t leave him because I wanted to, I had to leave, I had a duty, I had to protect Carver and—"
"— What?” Was she talking about her father?
“You just left, you finally realized that I am not good enough and you left. Like all the others have. They always leave because I am not enough. They give vows of love and faithfulness but it just never works out. It just hurts so much. You will leave eventually and I don’t think I’ll be able to bear it, not again”
“Hey, hey I won’t leave you”
She talked of a past lover who most likely was now dead; a fool, lucky enough to have caught her eye, a fool that left her as easily as he had a few years ago. No wonder she could see the resemblance.
“He said the same thing, he said he loved me and I was so certain of his words and I let myself go, if I had known he was lying”
“I am not lying, how could I leave you? It would only bring me torment” It was an experience he was not willing to go through again. Once had been enough. But her eyes looked frantic; they spoke of despair and begged for certainty.
“Promise me you won’t leave me”
“I promise”
“Say it, I want to hear you say it”
“I promise I will not leave you, I will never leave you” He spoke that last phrase with so much conviction that she believed him. But it didn’t feel right. She felt so sickened by her request. She felt worse now that he heard him say it so willingly, so easily. Did he really mean those words or was he only trying to comfort her? Now she was almost hoping he had lied to her.
He felt her sobs and the tears soaking through his shirt.
“Are you still crying?”
Her yes was almost inaudible.
He brushed her hair to the side to leave her ear exposed and with his lips brushing her temple he started to sing to her
“My funny valentine, sweet comic valentine—"
It was so rare to hear him sing. The first time he had sung to her it had been in a very similar situation. They had been in bed, in the middle of the night and too worn out to think coherently.
“Fenris?” she interrupted his song.
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry I made you promise that”
“Then I’m sorry I made you marry me”
“You didn’t make me”
He took her chin and made her look at him.
“And neither did you. Hawke when I tell you that I am yours, I don’t mean that I am your property and when I promise that I won’t leave, it is not because I can’t do it, it is because I don’t want to”
What was left of the night was spent between kisses and reassurances. No one was there against their will and past experiences were not the general rule and did not determinate the future.
Sadly the haven lasted just those couple of hours. The first rays of sun brought a letter from Varric that asked Hawke to repeat the past, follow duty and leave her love behind.