I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

-Translation of Sonnet XVII (from Cien Sonetos de Amor), Pablo Neruda

The morning sky was gray, tinged vaguely golden around the edges of the vaporous mist that rose up from the calm surface of the sea. Though it was spring at last, the air of early day was cool as it enveloped Hawke. She shivered slightly, staring down at the rippling waters that lapped against the wooden hull of the small vessel. Above her, the crimson sails fluttered in the light breeze that drove the ship southwards towards the shores of Ferelden. She could see the blush of red that reflected across the waves as she looked out across the sea. There was no chance, she knew, of catching sight of land so soon. She and Fenris had come aboard the ship little more than a week ago and, though the weather had been fair, they were still a number of days away from the small fishing town where Captain Devins had told them they would make port. Nevertheless, Hawke kept her eyes fixed on the horizon, eager for the journey to be over.

Returning to Ferelden, she knew, would be no homecoming. Home is not a place to which one can ever return once it has been left behind. Home is less of a physical place and more of an abstraction, created in the mind and in the heart and fed by emotion. The feeling of warmth and peace that she had felt during her childhood had not been the result of the land where she lived, but was rather the effect of being surrounded by family. The sensation of feeling at home was no more than a sense of belonging and of being loved. Ferelden was now no more than an expanse of land which lay somewhere across the Waking Sea. It was no more her home than Kirkwall had been.

Leaving Kirkwall had been no great loss to her. It had been a place, she knew, where she had had wealth and property and position, but it was no longer a place where she could feel safe. The devastation that Anders had incited had driven the city into chaos that had not been halted by Meredith's death. Mages ran rampant through the city while the Templars attempted to regain control and, in the midst of that turmoil, the citizens of Kirkwall began to loot and pillage and contribute further to the chaos that had gripped the city and now refused to release it. Her mansion, Hawke realized, had likely been torn over by now. It was well enough. She had never felt particularly attached to the majority of her possessions. Granted, there were things that she lamented leaving behind. Her sister's gilded toiletry set, for one thing, and her mother's many family portraits. These last vestiges of a time when she had had a family and a home. She would miss these things and it pained her to think that they had now fallen into the hands of the rioters that had swept through the city while she and her companions disappeared into the hills. It ached also to think of Fenris' diary, still amidst the sheets of her mother's bed. The idea that someone else may come across it and peruse its pages felt like such a tremendous violation that she felt slightly nauseated whenever she thought of it. It was nearly as unpleasant as trying to guess what had become of the fingers that she had left behind, curled and bloody in the courtyard of the Gallows.

She tried to think of these things as infrequently as was possible. After all, she had with her all that mattered. Her mabari had, during that first night she had passed beyond Kirkwall, found his way back to her. Now, aboard the ship, Brutus had made himself useful by hunting the rats that had made residence below deck. At night, he slept on the planks of the floor in the same room where she and Fenris rested. Above the sounds of the sea and the creaking of the ship, she could sometimes hear Brutus huffing in his sleep while Fenris snored intermittently. Hawke's own sleep was light and often disturbed. Any voyage into deeper, restorative sleep was typically broken off by the nightmares that came to her nightly. There were enough ghosts in her mind to ensure that she never truly slept again. She remembered all too well the expression on Anders' face as he had died in her arms. She remembered the feel of blood against her skin and the smell of his body as it had burned. These memories returned to her at night, revisiting her along with all the accompanying memories of when she and Anders had almost been happy. Times when she had laughed in his arms and times when he had told her that he loved her. The time when she had tied him up for the first time, nervously and fighting back fits of giggling as she did so. When she had felt the warmth of him inside of her. And then, in her dreams, she felt the warmth of his blood spilling over her skin. His expressions of ecstasy or joy becoming that look of surprised resignation that had overtaken his face while she cut his throat. And then it was not only Anders who was gone, but all of them. Her father, her mother, Bethany, Carver. And Fenris. There was nothing, just the expanses of emptiness left within her as she found herself wholly and completely alone.

Her mind would snap back into consciousness then and she would wake, shaking slightly and almost believing that the dreams had been real. Panting, she would bite her forearm to hold back the whimpering sounds that might awaken Fenris. Their first night aboard the ship, sharing that confined space below deck, she had cried out upon waking and he had woken with her. Hearing his voice then was, admittedly, one of the greatest reliefs of her entire existence. Still, she had felt a surge of guilt for having weighted him with her own distress and she had been too afraid to bring up the subject of Anders. She was entirely uncertain as to how Fenris would react to the mention of her former lover and she had little urge to further test his commitment to her.

Hawke sighed, looking down at the silvery surface of the water that caught the pink light of the rising sun. She could see nothing below the surface of the water and marveled at the apparent emptiness of the sea. There was life, she knew, beneath those waves, but all that was within its waters was hidden, distant and far beyond anything that she would ever know. So much of her life was filled with the same uncertainty. It was obvious enough that Fenris felt something for her, but it was unclear as to what that was. She hadn't the faintest notion of what it was that he expected from her or why it was that he had chosen to accompany her as she made her journey south. When he had made it clear to her that he intended to stay with her, while they had sat together not far from the warmth of the campfire, he had held her for a moment. He had kissed her wrist and he had touched her hair and, for the briefest and most fleeting of heartbeats, he had pressed his lips to hers. During the subsequent days and nights, he had not touched her at all. Not once. Not even for a moment.

It was enough for her. She was despicable enough of a person that it was enough simply to know that he was beside her. Hawke knew that she ought to drive him off and allow him the chance to find someone better, but the prospect of losing him again was almost too horrible to contemplate. The thought of going back to the hollowness that had filled her after he had left Kirkwall was unbearable. And it would be worse now that her friends had left her, heading north while she and Fenris made their way south. Having Fenris beside her was, she knew, more than she had any right to deserve. If he chose not to touch her, then she could hardly complain. Still, it left her confused as to what her role was meant to be. When he looked at her sometimes, gazing at her across the table, she suspected that he may be harboring some latent feelings of desire for her. There was, however, only the slimmest of chances that he would ever act on whatever lingering desire he might possess. Fenris was not the sort of person, it seemed, to engage in carnal acts without affection. He had, she supposed, experienced enough of the act when it was devoid of sentiment to have wearied of its basest incarnations. For a decade, at least, since he had escaped Danarius, he had never sought anyone out with whom to share a night of fevered, empty exertions. It was only when Fenris had believed himself to be in love with her that he had given way to his urges. Hawke doubted very much that that experience had done anything but to sour him still further with regards to sex. Certainly it would hardly compel him to seek her out for a reprieve of the act which had restored his memory of her betrayal. Though it was entirely true and undeniable that Hawke would have been amenable to such joining given the impossible impossibility that he chose to make such overtures, she was more than willing to forego such things if it meant keeping him beside her. However, she doubted whether he would remain with her much longer if she could not even offer herself as an outlet for his more primal instincts. Without either love or desire for her, she knew that it was only a matter of time before he saw reason and finally freed himself from the delusion that she was a worthy companion. The prospect of this was terrifying, though she knew that it was what she should want for him.

Finding herself shivering, Hawke decided that she might as well return to the cabin where she had left Fenris sleeping. It was her general practice to wake as early as possible and leave prior to his waking. If she was honest with herself, the primary reason for this was to avoid the various humiliating intimacies that came of sharing close quarters with another person. The ship that they had boarded, paying their fare through the use of Hawke's reputation rather than with the meager gold she had in her possession, was not the sort that afforded a terrific amount of space for its passengers. It was only a small cutter used by a rather unsuccessful merchant who never found that his trade carried him beyond the Waking Sea. Having arranged for passage on such a boat, Hawke and Fenris found themselves confined to one rather small, dank room which smelt heavily of brining fluids and salted meats. Being kept in such close proximity made the uncertainty of their situation all the more uncomfortable. Though they slept separately in two hammocks, Hawke felt herself becoming increasingly awkward with each passing day. The worst of it was that Fenris did not seem to the find the closeness to be the least bit off-putting. He seemed, as much as one could reasonably be expected to be under such circumstances, to be at ease.

Their first morning aboard the merchant's vessel, Fenris had arisen before Hawke. He had been scarcely dressed when he lifted the blankets from himself and then had only exacerbated the situation by proceeding to change his clothing as if it were nothing. Hawke, lying in her hammock, had felt a sudden thrill of surprise as he stripped bare. Though his back was turned to her, the sight was nonetheless arresting. Overtaken by embarrassment and the rather voyeuristic urge to continue staring, Hawke rolled quickly towards the wall and covered her eyes with both hands. After a moment, she began to feel that she was not looking at him in such an aggressive way that she was certainly betraying how desperately she had wanted to watch. She was, at the very least, failing to be casual. When she rolled over, turning back towards him, she saw that he was now mostly clothed and already in the process of cleaning his teeth. As he did so, he was watching her with one of his eyebrows raised quizzically. Hawke had found herself blushing. So he had noticed her entirely conspicuous awkwardness then. "You're awake, then?" he had asked flatly, surveying the increasing redness of her face that was now well beyond her control.

Clearing her throat and beginning the awkward process of clamoring out of her hammock, Hawke had stammered out something to the affirmative. He had made a small, noncommittal grunt in response and continued cleaning his teeth. Hawke had been left there, standing in the center of the small room and utterly without any idea as to how she was supposed to proceed from that point. She was aware that she ought to go about her morning routine and change from the shift she had slept in into something more conducive to moving about the ship during the day. It seemed impossible, however, that she would be able to find the nerve to strip down to her skin while he was in the room. He would think her disgusting, however, if she didn't even change her underclothes. In a passing, panicked moment, Hawke wished that they hadn't bothered to buy new clothing so that there would be no need to face this dilemma. Fenris had watched her for a moment as she stood, paralyzed with uncertainty, before he nonchalantly turned and faced towards the small, dusty porthole that looked out over the water.

Taking advantage of that moment, Hawke had quickly lifted her shift over her head and begun clamoring into fresh clothing as quickly as she could manage. As she did so, she was fully aware of the utter ridiculousness of her own modesty. After all, Fenris had seen every inch of her naked skin before. He had been inside of her, for Andraste's sake. That thought, and the memory of his hands running over the exposed flesh that she was now so reticent to reveal to him, caused her to flush so intensely that she had actually felt rather light-headed. When she had, at last, managed to clumsily clothe herself, Hawke had turned back and realized, in a horrifying moment, that Fenris had been watching her over his shoulder. After that morning, Hawke had made every effort to wake earlier than him and to leave the room before he rose so that she could avoid the awkwardness of his nakedness and the humiliation of her own.

Mercifully, when she returned to their cabin, Hawke saw that Fenris had already risen and dressed himself and was seated in one of the secured chairs with a large book about sea-faring and navigation set on the table in front of him. It was, admittedly, not the most intriguing material, but they hadn't had the time to purchase anything to read as of yet and had been forced to make do with what limited literature there was aboard. When Hawke entered the room, Fenris looked up from the pages and met her eye. Smiling slightly, Hawke moved forward and seated herself in the chair that was across the table from him. "Good morning," she said as casually as she could manage, wondering if he was beginning to find it unusual that she was always out of the room when he awoke. If he did find it odd, however, he made no mention of it.

"I gathered together some breakfast," he replied, gesturing unnecessarily at the food he had laid out on the table.

Hawke tugged uncomfortably at the right sleeve of the tunic she wore. "Thank you," she said, another smile quivering on her lips while he stared at her expectantly.

"I've already eaten," he told her, extending his hand to gently push a plate of slightly stale bread towards her.

"I'm not really very hungry."

"Eat," he ordered flatly, narrowing his eyes as he issued the command and then, after she took her first bite, turning his gaze back to his book while she chewed slowly.

Of late, Hawke had become conscious of the fact that Fenris had been forcing food on her several times a day with an unrelenting insistence. He was utterly unwilling to negotiate about the amount that she should consume and, when she resisted, he would typically become so impatient with her that she could never find the will to offer much protest. She obliged him, though she did find it a shade difficult to eat, especially in such great quantities. She had gotten rather out of the practice of doing so. It had been ages since she had had much of an appetite. As they had been fleeing from Minrathous back towards Kirkwall, Hawke had often found herself too anxious to swallow more than a few mouthfuls of food, which was scarcely enough to sustain her while they were engaged in such strenuous travel. Still, the stress of awaiting the return of his memory had rendered her appetite virtually nonexistent. When they had arrived in Kirkwall, the tension had hardly been alleviated. And after that, when he had remembered what she had done, Hawke had been unable to consider something so trivial as her eating habits. It was a process of actively keeping oneself alive and doing so had seemed pointless to her at that time, almost as if she were trying to prolong her own life past its natural end. Now, the lack of habit made the consumption of such large amounts of food seem quite odd. Still, Fenris continually drew her back to the table, urging her to eat. That morning, she might have merely picked at the bread and preserves that he had laid before her, but he kept looking up from what he was reading and would clear his throat pointedly if ever he discovered that she was not actively engaged in chewing or swallowing. The whole process, Hawke found, was extraordinarily uncomfortable for a myriad of reasons.

Fenris wished that she would oblige him with a trifle more enthusiasm. In the pale morning light that filtered through the grime-laden porthole, it was clear that she was still decidedly gaunt. A week of his effort was beginning to take effect, with her cheeks only just beginning to become less alarmingly concave, but there was still something decidedly sickly about her appearance. At times, it was difficult simply to look at her, and not only for the usual reasons. He turned the page of the book so that she wouldn't notice how intensely he was staring at her. She had been beautiful once, full of life and strength. Initially, it had been that beauty and strength that had drawn him to her. He remembered being fixated on her, at once intrigued and infuriated by how alluring she was. It was odd to remember the shallowness of his attraction then. He much preferred her now, when he took her as a whole. Her demeanor had altered drastically—she had softened in her severity and she had developed a thoughtfulness and tenderness that he observed with wonder. He found himself continually mesmerized by the subtle turns of her expressions and the dance of emotion in her eyes. It was such an alteration from the person she had been prior to her betrayal and it seemed almost impossible to him that he could have ever been infatuated with a creature that was so unlike the woman who was with him now. On quiet afternoons, they sat together as he read aloud from this atrocious book and she attempted to write out the words as he spoke them, using her untrained left hand while the right remained tucked away and hidden beneath the table that divided them. During those times, he found himself marveling at how very close he was to feeling content. He found himself amazed by how transformed she had become and how very nearly happy he was with her.

Still, it was difficult to see the physical transformation she had undergone. The first morning they had been aboard the ship together, before she had begun her little habit of sneaking off while she believed him to be sleeping, Fenris had surveyed her while she was undressing. In looking on her bare skin, he felt a familiar swelling of warmth within himself. He had possessed enough clarity, however, to notice how truly cadaverous she had become. She looked nearly like the bodies of disobedient slaves that were chained and left to starve after defying their masters. Looking at her while she was fully clothed had been alarming enough, but it was almost painful to see her while she was bare. The barrel of her ribcage was covered only by tight skin which left each rib and each vertebra of her spine fully visible. Her hipbones jutted out, looking as though they were trying to force their way through the skin that stretched over them. It was not only her emaciation that troubled him. Across her thighs, he caught sight of thin, pink scars that had only just begun to heal over. He knew well enough that such precise, methodical markings had not been made accidentally. He had watched her as she dressed, turning away only when she had looked back at him. It was unfortunate. The guilt she felt had transformed her into the woman that he knew very well he could not live without, and yet it seemed that it was simultaneously wearing her away to the extent that she would not be able to sustain herself for much longer. Seeing the manifestations of her guilt, written all over her wasted form, almost made him wish, for an insane moment, that she did not feel it at all.

Fenris had begun, at that juncture, to make his small effort towards mitigating the physical signs of her distress, since he hadn't really any notion as to what he was meant to do in order to correct the emotional source of the problem. He could have told her, perhaps, that he forgave her, but that would have been a lie. The anger he felt towards her was still very much within him. It was not only the sickliness of her body which made it difficult to look at her. The thought of her body and her nakedness called forth the memory of when they had lain together. With that memory, he invariably recalled all she had done to betray him and the deception that she had maintained until he had held her. That betrayal was bound to her touch within his mind, which further complicated the fact that he still found himself drawn to her and undeniably aroused by her very presence. It was a baffling conflation of emotion within him that made each day and night rather irritating.

Her eyes lifted to him and she smiled, her mouth full of bread. Fenris realized then that he had, indeed, been staring at her for an extended period of time. He looked down once more and heard her swallow loudly. "Fenris?" she ventured, speaking quietly enough that he was barely able to hear her. Glancing back towards her face, he saw that she was blushing brilliantly.

"What is it?" he murmured, wishing that he hadn't been caught staring.

Clearing her throat, she looked down at a roll of bread she held in her hand, digging her fingernails into the tough crust. "Do you regret staying with me?" she said at last, turning her eyes back towards him but continuing to pick away at the bread with restless fingers.

He sighed, watching as she began to play with the bread in an increasingly agitated and nervous manner. "No," he replied at last. Hawke sighed and dropped the bread she'd been toying with onto her plate. Deprived of that outlet for her fidgeting, she placed her palms on the table and tried to keep her hands steady. Fenris looked briefly at the asymmetry of her hands and then back towards her face. "You have made it abundantly clear, Hawke, that I am free to leave you whenever I choose to do so and I am fully aware that I am under no obligation to remain at your side beyond the point of my convenience. There's no need to continue harping on about the matter." He turned the page of the book without looking down at it.

Hawke nodded, reaching for a piece of the torn bread and lifting it to her mouth. While she chewed, her eyes wandered from him to the plate in front of her. He knew her mannerisms well enough to know that she intended to continue speaking and, quietly, Fenris waited for her to form the words. As he did so, he kept turning pages without reading them. He was rather too occupied with attempting to read her expressions and guess why it was that she had brought up this well-worn topic once more. "I'm just not sure what you expect from me," she said at last.

His lips turned down slightly at the corners into something that was nearly a frown. "Does that bother you?" Fenris said softly, studying the play of her features as she considered his answer. He was no more certain of what he expected from her than she was, but it had not occurred to him that the nebulousness of their situation might be as frustrating to her as it was to him.

"It worries me sometimes," she answered, meeting his gaze and speaking with a measured composure. "I know it's selfish… but I'm glad that you're here. I don't say it often, but I am. As much as I tell you that you should leave, I'm always relieved when you tell me that you don't intend to go." A smile flickered on her lips. "Which you know, of course, without my saying so. Still… I thought I should say it. I thought I should tell you that I am grateful that you came with me. I know it can't have been easy for you."

Fenris closed the book, watching Hawke and wondering how it was that her eyes were able to betray so much of what she felt. "Do you love me?" he asked quietly. He already knew the answer, of course, and yet he had felt compelled to ask it. It was vaguely humiliating how deeply he enjoyed hearing her speak the words.

"Yes," she replied, her smile conveying to him that she had guessed accurately the reason for his inquiry. "I love you. More than anything."

For a moment, he only looked at her, studying her eyes as she allowed him to stare wordlessly at her. Finally, he cleared his throat, looking down and reopening the book to a page that he had not been reading. "Fine," he murmured, his eyes scanning the page. He could hear the smile in her voice as she asked him if he wouldn't mind reading aloud. He obliged her, beginning once she had retrieved a quill and parchment so that she would be able to continue her own practice.

That night, as he lay in his hammock and felt the sway of the sea as it rocked them, Fenris looked up towards her. Their hammocks, due to the cramped nature of the room, were hung with one above the other. Each night, through the netting from which the hammocks had been crudely constructed, he watched her as she tossed and turned in her sleep. He watched, wondering at the array of troubled thoughts that must torment her through the nights. He could only guess, unable to ask and almost not wanting to hear the answers she would give. That night, she was almost still, laying on her side with her arms wrapped around herself. When she shifted her body slightly, lifting one of her arms to pillow her head, Fenris saw a strand of her hair hanging down through the weave of her hammock. That lock of hair was pendulously suspended above him, catching the dim light of cabin as the ship moved rhythmically from side to side. It was mesmerizing to watch the glint of her hair as it hung above him, swaying along with the sea. After a moment, Fenris found himself reaching upwards, gently catching the strand and rubbing it lightly between his thumb and forefinger.

Above him, not wanting to break the spell, Hawke remained perfectly still. Even so, she felt the slight tug of the contact and was aware of his touch. The first touch since they had left Kirkwall. Smiling and still, she closed her eyes.