Hawke was about to die.

This wasn't one of those moments where you look back and think, "Maker! That was close!"

No, this was one of those moments where, in the middle of a fight you know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you are moments away from being killed. Not even a matter of it being a wrong move or a missed step. Nothing you could prevent or change. It was simply your time. It was something that Varric might write – some romanticized idea of what fighting and struggling was like so that those who never did it could wrap their head around the concept in one of his novels.

It didn't surprise her that she recognized the moment, only that it hadn't come sooner. If anyone had been begging for death over the last five or six years, it had been her. She thought that she'd fight it when the time came, was sure it would be a narrow thing, something she almost escaped. She hadn't expected the clear-headedness – the acceptance. She supposed that learning something new about yourself on the day you died wasn't so bad. At least you didn't have to deal with the soul searching.

And thinking about the fact that she was about to die at least distracted her from the pain. She wasn't quite sure how far above the floor she was just now, but it was at least a few feet. The air that encased her was thick with the red mist of her own blood, swirling around her like she was the calm, broken center of a hurricane. She knew a number of her bones were hopelessly shattered – that had happened early on when a simple blasting spell had taken her off guard and blown her back into the wall along with Merrill. Hawke had gotten back up, feeling the hitch in her side and the slow trickle of warmth from the back of her skull as one of her daggers fell away from her useless mangled hand.

Merrill was still there in a crumpled mass on the floor.

Now the pain of broken bones was joined by warring feelings of being heavily constricted, like she'd been swaddled in bands of iron that were slowly being cinched ever tighter, and the feeling of being pulled apart.

Dazed, she turned her eyes down – since her head wouldn't actually move – and watched as her blood came out of the pores of her skin, joining in rivulets down her arms and then leaping off and away to join the storm already around her. How much blood did she have left? It couldn't be much at this point.

Turning her eyes in the other direction, she saw Varric doing what he'd promised. He was dragging Fenris out of the Hanged Man, away from the fight. She'd made him swear before they went in that if things went the way they were going right now, that he would get Fenris away from Danarius. That even if the rest of them died, he would ensure that this bastard never got back his prized slave. Watching the heavily injured elf being dragged out of the place, painting a wide swath of blood with his body, Hawke felt… happy. Varric would take him to Anders. Anders would heal him. And Danarius would limp back to Minrathous empty handed yet again.

She'd never met the man before today but had already developed such a hatred for him that it sometimes made Fenris himself blink in surprise when she let fly waves of invective and promises about what she would do to significant and soft portions of Danarius' anatomy.

Rolling her eyes again, she spotted him there, casting whatever this was, this paralysis that held her. His look was both intense and self-satisfied – the look of a man utterly assured of his power. And Hawke had to hand it to him – he was indeed powerful. He was certainly the most accomplished blood mage she'd encountered. Improving his odds was the fact that he was willing to use any and all of the slavers he'd brought along with him as fuel. But fuel without talent was useless, and this man knew how to hurt. He was proving that now as she felt her heart constrict once again in her chest, as if it were convulsing – giving up.

She caught Danarius' eye, staring at him, wanting him to watch her as she died, defiant. That smug expression faltered only slightly, the flush of being absolutely glutted with the power of blood making him look drunk with it, ecstatic. She hoped what she saw in his gaze was a flicker of doubt. But it didn't matter.

He would leave without Fenris. And she would stop her long fight. She decided that the moment was a good one. She wished briefly that she could move her face enough to smile as the blackness rose up and then she didn't think anything at all anymore.