AN: I began this fic almost exactly a year ago, and from the very beginning I knew it was never going to take me anywhere I expected. Writing it was rewarding in itself; having the chance to share it with you all has been infinitely more wonderful, and I am so grateful y'all are still letting me talk about Hawke and Fenris after all these years. Thank you from the bottom of my heart to everyone who has read this, to the people who have consistently left such kind and wonderful comments, and to Jade, without whom this would be a great deal weaker (and shorter).

Thank you, and I hope you enjoy the conclusion.

Recommended listening: Tenuous Winners Returning Home, from the Hunger Games OST (watch?v=VHxYpnaaw3s).

The nightmare jolts him awake just after second bells. An old one, though still vivid after all this time: Danarius with Hawke at his side, collared and leashed, her eyes flat and strange as Fenris trades his freedom for hers. But this is an old fear, the horror gone with the familiarity, and the sharpest edges have already begun to fade as Fenris slowly forces each tensed muscle to ease again. The curtains block most of the night sky, though a narrow strip of stars finds enough gap he can see the outlines of the room without difficulty. No swinging berth, here, no rush of waves.

He is home.

There's a soft, sleepy breath beside him, and Hawke shifts on the pillow until she can press her nose to his shoulder. "All right?" she asks, still thick with sleep. His blue coverlet has twisted around her hips while she slept, baring her naked body from the waist up, and she lets out another quiet sigh as his arm comes around her in shield against the cool night air.

"Yes," Fenris murmurs. "I did not mean to wake you."

She hums tiredly and moves again, sliding one hand across his bare chest to toy with the finely polished jade and braided leather resting there. She still has not opened her eyes. "Want to talk about it?"

"No. An old dream."

"Mm. The old ones can linger." A lazy kiss to his collarbone. "Did you dream on the ship?"

"Yes," he says again, and closes his eyes. Most of it has already gone; all that remains is fear and the way the iron smelled. "But exhaustion kept them at bay, most nights. The others were silent enough they did not matter."

She snorts, soft and low. "Two rounds not enough for exhaustion. I'm losing my touch."

"Hawke," he sighs, but the reluctant laugh is already in his voice. "A different kind of exhaustion."

"Less pleasant."

"Less pleasant," he agrees, shaking his head at his own transparency. Hawke gives a long, languid stretch beside him, her naked body pressing full against his side; then she slings her leg over his and readjusts her head on his chest.

Her eyes open at last, sleepy and sated. Enough starlight he can see their shine, the glimmer of intent even through the fatigue. "Anything I can do to help?"

He laughs again, and she winks as he turns to look at her properly in the dark. The kiss is quiet, without refinement, and by the time Hawke draws back the last vestiges of the nightmare are gone, brushed away like spiderwebs by a delicate hand. Hawke takes a breath and lifts herself to her elbow, over him, and as she leans down to kiss him again her black hair spills across his shoulder. He tangles his fingers in it without hesitation, the smooth weight still a surprise to his imperfect memory even now.

"Hawke," he sighs between kisses, distracted by the touches drifting in purposeless strokes over his chest and stomach. "Surely you must be tired."

She pushes up, languorous affront. "Fenris. Surely you must understand the fact that you've been gone for a year."

"It's the middle of the night."

"And we're both awake. Do you want me to stop?"

For her own sake, he would say yes—but her lips drop to his throat before he can give it voice. Soft, open-mouthed kisses trace out the lyrium for the first time since he left, nothing of their earlier, frantic reunion to quicken their pace now, his own hands trailing along the curve of her back in traitorous encouragement. She moves lower, following one of the curls across his chest before teasing his nipple with her tongue; he groans at the flick of teeth and she grins, shifting her weight over him as she returns to his mouth.

No, he does not want her to stop. Too often he has dreamed of this in the last year to turn it away now; too often he has woken in a cold sweat, his fingers numb, the pale light of the lyrium still fading from the crossbeams above his hammock. The men had learned to ignore it even as he had learned to stifle the first impulse to kill when they woke him, bleary-eyed and staring, to stop the glow. He has learned how to live without her. Now that he knows he is capable, that he can stand alone and not be killed by longing—he has the freedom at last to choose here, with her, instead.

So. He chooses.

Fenris breathes her name, again when she pins his hips between her knees, the first pressure enough to catch his breath in his throat. The heat only grows as he smoothes his hands over her body, following the slope of her chest to linger at her breasts, splaying a palm over the rise of her ribs and her stomach, sliding lower to squeeze her hips as she leans down to kiss him. She has always been an encouraging lover; even now she gasps and sighs as he touches her, responsive to every press of his fingers, and when he strokes gently between her legs she drops her head back with a groan, gooseflesh pebbling down her arms.

There are certain things he knows about her body, now. He knows the way she will arch and cry if he closes his teeth at a certain spot beneath her ear; he knows the high, breathless sounds she will make as he drops his head between her thighs and tastes her, her fingers in his hair, his arm barred across her stomach to stop her rising. He knows the way she laughs when she pushes him past his own endurance with her mouth or her hands, when he cannot even find breath for warning and he can only clutch uselessly at her shoulders instead. He knows he would do more than this to keep her unbearable, rising warmth in his arms alone.

He should fear that, this willingness to yield in every way when it comes to Hawke. And perhaps he would in another world, if he did not know the same held true for her as well.

He cups her jaw as she sinks down on him at last, her feet tucked along his thighs, her palms braced against his chest. The lyrium glitters as it always does, bursts of light rippling outward from her fingers, from his hips where they're joined; she kisses him again and again, fearless and unshakable, and he wraps one arm around her waist as they begin to move.

Even here, there is no hurry. She rolls against him with every long, slow slide, her thighs trembling as he passes one palm up and down the pale skin. One of her hands serves as brace beside his shoulder; the other tangles in his shortened hair, cupping his head as she kisses him, smoothing the hair from his eyes as he holds her gaze.

His hips buck once, the rhythm faltering when she strokes deliberately along the length of his ear. An easy thing to return the favor, to find one of the faint marks from last evening on her neck, to return his teeth to it with careful pressure until she's torn between a curse and a sob. The lyrium flickers again and again, throwing light along the edges of the blue coverlet and the curve of Hawke's smile, and the leather cord around her neck with the stone from Nirena still knotted at the hollow of her throat.

Eventually she quickens, even this slow pace driving her at last to the edge. Her fingers dig into his shoulders, his own hand when he catches hers; he grips her hip with the other, pulling her harder against him with every thrust, until at last she drops her head into the crook of his neck to muffle her shout, every muscle in her body tensing against him. Heat washes through his skin in a wave, Hawke's magic loosed again—and then her thighs clench around him and he's coming as well, helpless, the pleasant knot in his gut snapped to flood the rest of him with inarticulate warmth.

He recovers first, a lifetime later, to find Hawke still half-dazed and boneless against his chest. He strokes through her hair once, twice, amazed even now that he can hold the depths of these emotions and not be broken by them. At last, as she begins to stir again, sighing, he wraps an arm around her bare back and reaches for the cloth-wrapped package on his nightstand. He had meant to give this to her later, in the light of day.

It seems to fit better here.

"Hawke," he murmurs as she slips away, eyes closed, to curl into his side. "Are you awake?"

"And exceedingly comfortable. You are forbidden to move."

"Hm. You do not want this, then."

She laughs, a soundless burst of breath against his sweating chest. "Cheat. I thought you'd forgotten."

"As if you would allow such a thing. Take it, Hawke."

She does, though she doesn't pull away as she unwraps it. The cloth drops to his bare stomach along with the twine holding it closed; in their place Hawke is left with a small book, its cover made of soft, buttery leather dyed a rich red, a short tie fastening them over the empty pages within. She loosens the ties, lets them fall away to bare the bird delicately tooled into the leather face, its wings spread in the wild breath before some dive into the sea.

She traces her fingers over the feathers, each one etched down to the stem, and the rough, beautifully thorned vines that wind along the edges. "Fenris. This is lovely."

He licks his lips, unaccountably nervous. "Isabela saw it first. I thought of you."

"It's beautiful," she says again, her voice very soft, then opens its blank pages and presses her nose to the seam. "It even smells right. Maker, I love the smell of a new journal."

The words press at his tongue, more excuses, more explanations, but Hawke's fingers still touch the bird's wings with something like reverence, and they die in his throat unvoiced. He kisses her temple instead, graceless and sober, and eventually she tucks the book against her heart and leans back against him.

"The last entry…" she starts, then closes her eyes. "In the old one. It was Papa's death. I haven't been able to write in it since."

"Hawke."

"I think it's time for a new start."

He says her name again. She kisses him once more, quietly, and tucks her head under his chin.

They lie together a long time in the comfortable dark without speaking, and when at last they sleep again, there are no nightmares.

—

The morning brings Hawke's laugh in his ears and her tongue on his throat, and after he is thoroughly awoken they come together again just as easy and deliberate as before. It's good. It's very good, more than Fenris knew he needed, and he can barely muster embarrassment when Hawke answers the door to Orana's knock while wearing only his shirt. She brings the breakfast tray back with a brilliant grin—set for two, and Fenris is painfully grateful for Orana's understanding—and sits cross-legged on the bed with him as they eat.

He had forgotten this comfort. Had forgotten, too, Hawke's tendency to surprise him with affection at unexpected moments, and the third time her lips to his ear nearly upset the coffee he abandons the tray to pull her fully against him. He knows he's foolish, knows she will hardly disappear—but he waited months in frozen waters to hear her voice, and even now he cannot shake the fear he will turn and she will have vanished.

She kisses him twice, then leans back enough to cup his face. "Fenris, I need to talk to you."

He hums agreement, pressing his nose to her throat. "Speak."

"It's about—Maker. It's about the family."

"I'm listening."

"You are not, you're provoking—shit! You're provoking me, and I'm already sore enough to embarrass myself at lunch."

He laughs, soft against her skin. "You have magic."

"There are some things I want to remember." That stops him enough to lean back, unexpected warmth spreading behind his ribs, and Hawke smoothes her fingers down his cheeks. "Fenris, Mother wants to leave Tevinter."

He blinks, and this time when Hawke pulls away he lets her. She resettles next to him, still in his shirt, and covers his hand with hers. Her eyes are very serious. "She wants to go south, back home."

"Ferelden."

"The Free Marches, actually. Kirkwall."

He blinks again, pulling memory back into the light. "She has family there. I remember."

"Her brother, my uncle." Hawke blows out a breath that stirs her hair, then runs her fingers through the strands falling across her eyes. "It's killing her, this house. Every corner she turns has the ghost of my father around it, and the magisterium isn't helping. Every chance they get they send letters to remind her of how much they grieve Malcolm's passing, and how much interest they have in ensuring his legacy is best managed for the good of the Imperium."

"His legacy."

"His seat on the Senate. And mine too, frankly. The only reason they ever tolerated me was him, and now that he's gone, they're more than ready to remove the last foreign stain from their ranks."

Fenris shakes his head, amazed and wholly unsurprised all at once. "I warned you of their inconstancy, once."

"And I believed you. Then and now." She touches his cheek; he catches her hand, pressing a kiss to her palm. "Come with us, Fenris."

"To Kirkwall."

"Yes. It's colder there, I know, but the Free Marches are practically magister-free. And Mother has friends in the city—well, sort-of friends, if friends are flip-flopping noblewomen who will only speak to you with the right number of rooms in your house. But they've been asking her to come for the season, and the estate still exists somewhere, I think, and Gamlen's there too. I've never met him, but he's my uncle so he can't be all bad, and—"

"Hawke," he says, and she falls silent. The smile is a dangerous thing, bubbling up from his chest somewhere between the exhilaration. "I will go with you."

She lets out a long, slow breath. "Are you sure?"

"There is nothing for me here but slavery, and the memory of slavery. Why would I stay in Tevinter?" He leans forward, kisses her, holds her gaze after. The crimson band on his wrist has caught the morning sun, brilliant in the corner of his eye. "You knew me as a slave. I wish you had not, so that you might better trust the free man you have made of me."

Her cheeks flush through the smile. "I've waited two years to be given leave to love you. Of course I trust you."

How easy the words come, after all this time. "Hawke, I came back because of you. Nothing could be worse than the thought of living without you, no matter the city."

She lifts her chin, a new, glad light in her face. Fenris does not know Kirkwall well, nor the world so far south aside from the coastal cities—and he finds he does not care. He has found a home despite everything, a compass stronger than a star which fades with daylight. He came to her once, cringing with fear, a collar around his neck and a small heart scarred from beatings; he is newer now, collarless, no ties but what he has chosen himself to keep around his wrist. Even his heart is stronger, the scars softened with the growth.

He'd thrown himself at her feet once, mercy in his mouth, every part of him sore and trembling. How long has it been since he was afraid?

Long enough. He kisses Hawke once more, strong enough to leave no doubt. "Hawke. I will go with you to Kirkwall."

She does not cry, though her eyes grow very bright. "I'm glad, Fenris."

After everything, so is he.

—

"So," Varania says, "the rumors are true. The Hawke family is to leave Minrathous."

Fenris lifts one shoulder in a shrug, and she leans back in the fine, embroidered armchair and raises her cup to her mouth. Bethany had brought in the small silver tea service earlier, the pot still gently steaming on the small table between them; Varania's cup is almost empty, though Fenris's remains mostly untouched, and when she sets it down again he refills it nearly to the brim.

A silence as she adds two lumps of sugar and stirs it with a small, glinting spoon. "When do you leave, then?"

"The beginning of Solace."

"A hot time to travel. You will be glad to be at sea."

"Exactly so," Fenris agrees, and curls his fingers around his knees. "Varania…"

"I will not go with you," she says fiercely. "Do not ask me."

Not quite a flinch, but the hurt surprises him. "As—you wish."

Her mouth twists, and the return of her cup to the tray is sharp enough to splash tea over the silver rim. "Misere, Leto. You have my letters. I have a life here. I have employment, and when your family—" she makes a gesture at the sunny sitting room around them, the fine carpet and heavy, expensive curtains, "wore the clothes of my design to the autumn fêtes, the magisters came to the shop afterwards with my name. Mine," she repeats, her eyes blazing. "I who was a slave, and they come asking for my favor."

He can't keep back the smile. He knows he has seen this look before, even if the precise circumstances escape him; every one of her letters has brought new memories before the veil in his mind, thin and shadowed but real. This is only one more. "Bethany told me of your assistance. She was impressed with your skill."

"She has done a great deal for me." Faint bitterness behind the gratitude, his sister conflicted even in this. "It took some time for my employer to allow me a free hand."

"But he has."

"Yes. And far better pay, and a room of my own designing, and no more errands of delivery."

"As deserved."

Now a flash of faint, embarrassed pride across her face, quickly shuttered into something more defensive. "So. I will not leave."

"Varania," Fenris says, and she lowers her teacup. "Know that if you need one, there will be a place for you in Kirkwall."

"With your family."

"You are my family, also."

Her mouth firms, and this time the gladness has no shadow to it. "As you say, Leto." Another pause as she takes a sip of tea, and her shoulders straighten. "It is better they go regardless. They would not have thrived in Minrathous much longer."

He knows. Still… "Kirkwall will be different. For all of them."

"And for you," Varania points out. "They have no slaves there."

Fenris inclines his head, assenting, and abruptly Varania pushes to her feet and moves to the window. She still wears pale green, his mother's favorite color, and her red hair is still tied high on her head, though not as severely as before. It is easier to picture her now replying to his ungainly letters, her notes no longer than his own brief reports and just as stilted, but…he has kept them even so, bound with Hawke's in a box beside his bed.

"Varania," he says again. "I will continue to write, if you wish."

"See that you do," she says severely. "The silence while you were icebound was…unpleasant, Leto. I did not enjoy the thought of you lost a second time."

"Kirkwall is not so far south. I will write."

She shakes her head, lines of tension down her spine and shoulders, stiffening further as Fenris rises from the chair to join her at the window. A sunny day, the lawns green and trimmed—and Bethany kneeling in the far gardens, a broad-brimmed hat shielding her from the heat, her gloved hands dirty to the wrists. She looks delicate regardless, as if one breeze might carry her away; Fenris had seen her like this the first day he'd come, when his collar had been cut from him and he had still been a slave.

They are both different from the people they were. A good thing, for him, but for Bethany, perhaps…

"It is good we go," Fenris murmurs at last, and Varania nods.

Another minute or two, and then Varania turns to face him squarely, her eyes level and strong. "Leto," she says, just as sure, "write to me. And I will write to you. And know that if you find yourself in need, I will have a home for you here, as well."

An iron band around his heart, squeezing tight enough to bruise. "Varania."

She shifts in discomfiture, waves a hand between them, and the moment is broken. "So. Go find them before you are missed."

Fenris laughs, but when he offers she does not hesitate to clasp his hand. "Be well, then."

"And you," she says, "brother," and for the first time, he thinks she means it.

—

Two months later, Fenris stands at a ship's rail on the edge of the Waking Sea. This journey southward has been far calmer, an expensive charter for the well-kept magister's family who travels with them. Leandra has spent most of her hours at the starboard rail, her eyes turned towards Tevinter and the second home she has abandoned in ten years; Bethany is the best of them at drawing her away, reminding her that there is family here for her too, and when the grief wanes even Carver and Hawke's casual bickering can make her laugh.

Orana comes with them too, and Bodahn and Sandal and a handful of the servants, with Cork and Lydas and Lydas's lover, a tall, broad-shouldered man with an easy smile, among them. The rest have chosen to stay in Minrathous, the estate there reduced to its barest minimum while the Hawkes remove themselves for the matrona's health. It is best this way, Hawke tells him, though he can read the grief still shadowed in her eyes. Tevinter had been her home, too.

Still, the shadow lightens with every league, and by the time the first glimpse of Kirkwall rises on the rocky tor above the bay, Fenris cannot deny the lifting of his heart. It is a start, even born as it is from mourning. It is a chance.

"I hear it's called the City of Chains," Hawke says behind him, and Fenris snorts.

"A promising beginning."

"Naturally." She comes to lean on the rail beside him as the ship glides effortlessly into the harbor. "It will be different, here."

"It can hardly be worse."

"Oh, I'm sure we can find a way."

She grins again at his rolled eyes, and before he can find his own retort she has leaned over to press her mouth against his. The quip dies on his tongue; he touches her shoulder once, carefully. A stone with his markings rests at the hollow of her throat; the jade pendant of the Fog Warriors is a heavy, comforting weight against his heart. "I stand with you, Hawke. That will not change."

Hawke meets his look, a steady, level thing, and then turns with him to the city. He has read enough about it by now; Varania has told him more, and his knowledge is sufficient to recognize the buildings of importance. The Gallows rises up before them, imposing and stark against the mountain behind; across the bay the city itself has resolved into detail at last, men shouting cheerfully on the docks, smaller boats roped alongside clippers and strange, foreign ships. The rest lifts in levels behind, white-painted clay and iron and houses with square roofs, the grander stone and glass higher still, distant behind carved walls. The Chantry spire marks the highest point, a gold sun calling home its worshippers; even the Viscount's tower is not so tall, and Fenris lets out a slow breath at the sight of it.

It will be different here, he knows. No slavery, true—and Hawke and her sister made apostates, protected only so far by their status and their mother's name. But—they have chosen this with their eyes open, and so has he. Besides, Carver stands with them, and Fenris himself, and they are together a formidable force. He will not fear.

As if he has summoned them, Bethany and Carver come to the rail beside Hawke, smiling. Bethany points to some house with flowers in the window, barely visible at this distance, and wonders at its roses; Carver has spied a rarer ship, and at Hawke's question begins to explain its intricacies in greater detail than any of them wishes.

The captain lets out a cry and the anchor drops, rusted iron, to the sea below. The green water froths at the weight of it before settling again, slow ripples glinting among the waves as the white spume settles once more; on the dock men heave planks into place, while other sailors wrap the ropes thrown from the rails around the pylons with expert practice. Seabirds wheel and cry above them, great dark circles with the occasional white flash of wing; the ship knocks once against the pier, a hollow boom, and settles at last.

"Mother," Hawke says suddenly, and Fenris turns to see Leandra approaching her family, pale but smiling. Toby trots just behind her, stumped tail wagging, ears perked at the wealth of new sights and smells awaiting him just across the water.

"My goodness," she says as Bethany tucks her arm into her mother's. "How many years has it been? And it still looks just the same."

"You'll have to give us the tour eventually."

"Eventually. It will be nice to settle, first." She blinks twice before the tears ebb safely, then tosses her head so like her daughter Fenris can't help but smile. "I'm so very ready to be home."

Bethany nods, and Carver falls in behind his sister as Leandra moves towards the captain at the rail. Toby follows to sit eagerly at their feet, barking at the birds that swing too close to the ship, the sounds carrying across the water like a signal of their arrival. Hawke lingers, though, her eyes turned to Fenris, and when he leans against her shoulder the smile that spreads across her face is slower, more true.

"Fenris," she says. "Whatever happens when we step foot off this boat, I think you ought to know that I love you."

He knows. He smiles regardless, and kisses her, and when he pulls away she rests her forehead briefly on his own, one last respite before the storm. Somewhere the estate lies ready to be reclaimed, its slavers ousted at the request of a formidable foreign magister; somewhere the dwarf Varric watches for their arrival, the business proposition of which he's written already drafted and ready for their perusal. Somewhere Hawke's uncle waits, even now, for this beginning.

Then she lifts her eyes, and Fenris with her, to the place where her family stands waiting for them at the rail, the path stretching out before their feet to solid ground. His family now, too, chosen freely.

"Onward, then," Hawke breathes, and he takes her hand, and they go together into Kirkwall, unafraid.

—

end.