Chapter Text
Things get better after that. Maybe Fenris is less difficult or maybe Carver is just better at avoiding arguments, but they’re okay. At least he thinks they are; Fenris comes with him to the Hanged Man, they play cards with Varric, Carver loses but doesn’t really care. They eat dinner with Orana, and Carver teases her about the care she has begun to take with her hair because it looks really good, and he jokes to Fenris that she might have her eye on someone, might have someone she wants to impress. Fenris scoffs. Carver laughs. It’s all right.
And then, suddenly it isn’t.
It happens at the end of a long day. Carver has been taking as much time as he can to see Fenris, dropping in when he’s on his way back from the Chantry just for a kiss and a, ‘How was your day?’, and signing himself out of the Gallows any time he doesn’t have night patrols, even though it leaves him tired and dull the next morning. It’s wearing him out, but it’s worth it, because it’s important, and Fenris seems pleased with the attention.
But today Alisse had her baby, and Carver had to stand in the doorway while they took it away, had to watch them hand the little boy to a wet-nurse and see Alisse weep and weep, and then had to report to the Knight Commander to give his opinion on whether or not the mage would turn to blood magic in her grief. He didn’t think she would, and he said as much, but the Knight Commander looked so unconvinced that Carver couldn’t help but rage about it when he finally got back to the mansion.
“It’s not right! I don’t even … would it have been so bad to just let her hold him? And rutting name him, shit, I can’t believe we just--”
“She is a mage.” Fenris takes a deep draught of his wine, shrugs a shoulder, and doesn’t seem to care. “Her child would be a mage. And dangerous.”
“Might not be a mage,” Carver argues, and he’s pacing, but he can’t seem to stop. “And, even if, then … you know, what’s wrong with letting her keep it? It’s the rutting Circle, if mage babies should be anywhere then they should be there. Come on, Fenris, she’s his mother! And the father--” because Leothold had been locked in his room for all of it just in case he did something reckless, “--deserved to see his bloody son at least once before we took him away.” We. Because, Maker help him, Carver had been part of it, and it was horrible, the whole thing.
“Is it so important?” Fenris demands, and his glare is hot and awful and Carver can feel the argument swelling between them, ready to burst. But he can’t stop, because--
“Yes! Yes, it fucking is!” He wipes a hand over his face. How could Fenris be so heartless? Sure, they’re mages, but even so … My father... “That baby should be with his own kind.”
Fenris makes a sound, high and sharp and wounded, and Carver doesn’t know why. “And you?”
What? “What?”
“What of you?”
“I .. this isn’t about me.” It is so not about him that Carver has no idea what Fenris is getting at.
“Is it not?”
“How could it be?”
“You should be with your own kind,” Fenris growls, angry and bitter.
It makes no sense. “What do you mean?”
“What do you think I mean?” He makes a sharp, dismissive gesture, cutting the air with the points of his fingers. “I mean that you should find yourself a woman. A human. And breed with her. It is natural.”
Carver opens his mouth and closes it and opens it again. “Why would you say that? That’s not what I--”
“Because!” He’s bristling, all over, like a cat, and Carver can’t understand why this is happening. “This, between us. It isn’t real. It can’t last. Humans and elves can’t ... and you will want progeny and you should have it.” He shudders, hands curled into angry fists. “Go, find yourself a woman with round ears and round breasts and fill her belly with babies.”
Every word hits him like a blow, and he can’t … why are they arguing about this now? “I don’t want any of that!”
“You should!”
Carver throws out his hands, confused and trying desperately to understand. “Do you?”
Fenris goes completely still, except for his eyes that cut sharply away, and then flit back up full of something Carver has come to think of as horror. “Yes,” he says.
Carver thinks he might have just felt his heart break. “What?”
“Yes, I ... yes. That is what I want.”
“Since fucking when?”
“Since now! Since always!”
It’s like his throat is full, like he has to drag his breath past a lump that’s trying to smother him. “Then what was all of this?”
Fenris’ face twists, his eyebrows drawing in like thunderclouds. “Marking time,” he says, and he says it so clearly, so crisply that Carver can’t even tell himself it’s a lie because he sounds so sure.
“So, you’re planning on getting married and having elf babies, then?” Carver can’t stop himself. Words just come and they won’t stop. “Who’s the lucky girl? Merrill? Orana?”
“Yes! Orana.” He makes an expansive gesture. “See all that she does for me! And how convenient she is.”
It’s too close to something Carver might have said in anger, and the breath in his throat sounds like a sob. “Do you mean all this?”
Fenris sets his teeth in a snarl. “Do you doubt me?”
Yes! Except... “Right now I don’t even know who you are! You were never like this before--”
“Before? Before what?”
“Before Danarius tore you up in your fucking head!” And he has more to say but Fenris steps in, one hand held up between them in a fist and, Maker, Carver has never been so afraid of Fenris shoving a hand into his chest, even when Fenris did shove a hand into his chest.
“Danarius did that to me long before we ever met, little Hawke.”
Little Hawke. He sounds … Carver can’t, and he sounds … “But--”
“This is who I have always been. More fool you that it took you so long to see it.”
Oh
fuck
Carver cannot
he can’t
He won’t. “So either you lied to me before or you’re lying to me now! So which is it, Leto?!”
The word comes out of him before he can think better of it and Fenris reels as though Carver has struck him, and no, no, no…
“Get out.”
Carver reaches out, reaches up because, surely this isn’t, it can’t be, after all they’ve…
“I told you to get out! Get out of my house!”
“Fenris, I--”
“Get out!”
The lyrium washes over him like fire, and Carver backs up, hands open before him like a shield. This isn’t happening. This can’t be. “Fenris, don’t--”
Fenris fucking glows at him. “Leave now. I have given you every reason to leave. Do not force me to make you.”
“But--”
“AS I HAVE SAID!”
He can’t. He can’t just go. Fenris can’t mean it. But (as Carver stares at him, and doesn’t want to believe it) Fenris opens his fist into a claw, glowing and insubstantial and Carver knows, very suddenly, that this is it. Fenris will kill him if he doesn’t go. And then, in a sad heavy wave of regret, Carver knows that Fenris means it. That whatever they were is done.
How could it just be done?
But then--
How could I not have seen this coming?
And everything, everything suddenly makes so much sense.
“Fenris,” and it sounds so empty, because he feels empty, and Fenris only glows brighter, and the tang of lyrium in Carver’s mouth tastes of home, but … this is a home that does not want him. Not home. There’s nothing for him here.
He backs up into the doorway, and Fenris is still glowing at him, and he tries to find words but he has none.
It’s over.
Maker, how did it come to this?
But he has no choice, so he turns and walks out, and the ache in his chest could only be worse if Fenris had ripped out his heart. Maybe not even then.
#
Orana stays very still, letting him storm past her and hoping he doesn’t see. He’s so big and loud, and he frightens her sometimes, but he has always been kind and he makes Master (for that is what he is in her mind; Master who does not want to be called Master but Master nonetheless) so very happy when nothing else seems to.
Light streams out of Master’s doorway, painting the marble and stone in buttery yellow. Then there is a noise, furious, and the breaking of glass, hard and violent and familiar.
He has smashed a bottle. Again. And now he will walk in it and cut his feet. And then, perhaps, he will be angry enough to beat her, for the first time. But, he is angry now, and if she disturbs him in his anger then perhaps he will beat her anyway.
And yet. The door is open. Master has instructed her not to enter if the door is closed, but if it is open she is permitted.
Ah, that sound. He has swept a bottle onto the floor, and it may not have broken but it is rolling about on the stone and there, that is another thing he may tread upon and curse her for.
Orana balances the fear of being beaten for neglecting her duties against the fear of being beaten for disturbing her Master, and decides that the open door makes all the difference. If he will beat her, he will beat her. Her duty is to protect him from injuring himself. (And he may not, he has never--)
She fetches the broom and the dustpan, and ventures upstairs.
He is slumped at the table, face in his hands, and he is shuddering. Orana carefully does not see it; slaves who see such things are punished. The bottle has been thrown against the wall, and Orana curtseys, though Master doesn’t look up, and then bends down to begin gathering the glass together. She does it carefully, because glass is always tricky and finds a way to hide itself under things or in between things, revealing itself days, weeks, months later. Better to work harder now and avoid later punishment.
“Orana.”
She pauses, and then continues her sweeping. “Yes, serrah.” Master.
“You … heard us.”
He puts her in a difficult position. On the one hand, to say ‘no’ would be a lie, and she mustn’t lie. On the other, slaves who hear such things are punished.
It is fortunate, then, that it was not really a question, and therefore she need not answer. She ducks her head, picks up a large piece of glass and lays it in the pan.
He sighs. She sneaks a look at him. He has his head tipped back, eyes closed, his face wet and scrunched up in pain and sadness, and she feels sad for him. Master’s sadness is her own. His happiness, too, when he has it, is something she can share in. This is why she has tried not to be so wary of Ser Carver, because she has seen how much he makes her Master happy.
“It had to be done,” Master says. He sounds weary, worn out, sorry. She knows he isn’t really talking to her, but she listens because this, at least, he does not care that she knows. “It can’t go on. I can’t go on like this.”
Orana gathers up all the glass and tips it into the ash-bucket by the fire, picks up the loose bottle spilling wine on the floor, and adds it to the bucket. She will take it all with her when she leaves. Now, she tidies up a little, mopping the mess, putting books away, and picking up Master’s clothes.
“I am not enough for him. I will never be enough for him. Better to end it now than to go on, in this lie.”
She has seen them together, has seen the way each of them watch the other when he is not looking, and the joy between them is enough to light up this cold, broken-down house. They fuss over one another like birds, fluffing up each other’s feathers and nestling together, soothing one another’s hurts and making light of each other’s frailties. They are, she thinks, enough for each other, surely. Surely.
But.
“Every man wants his immortality through children,” Master says. “Does he not?”
Is that something she should answer? It is a question. But not, she thinks, for her.
She approaches the table. She tries to move confidently. Master has not lashed out at her yet. He does not seem to be the type. But she remembers him from Minrathous, and she knows how quick and strong and dangerous he is, and how viciously he kills.
There is wine in a bottle; Orana lifts it, fills his glass. He sits up, looking at her, frowning, but she knows by now that a frown from him does not always indicate displeasure.
“I have no intention,” he says evenly, “of giving you a child.”
Her hand trembles on the bottle. “Master.”
“Do not call me that,” he snaps.
She does not flinch. A good slave does not do that. Instead she folds her hands, casts her eyes down, and waits.
“Do not fear that I want that from you.”
Fear? She has fears but this, from him, now? “If Master wishes,” she says, and remembers how she is not supposed to call him master, and she starts again. “I would be happy to do whatever Serrah Fenris wishes.”
He exhales, picks up his glass, drinks from it. “Happy. You do not mean that.”
His happiness is, after all, her own. “If it made Serrah Fenris happy,” she says again, and he smacks his hand on the table, hard and sharp but not as hard and sharp as a blow.
“No. You do not -- Orana. Look at me.”
There is a moment of hesitation, and then she looks up. Her handsome Master, looking at her with that ruined expression. She smooths her skirts and waits, because he has not yet told her what to do.
“Is that what you want?”
This is easy. “I want what you want, serrah.” Master.
“No.” He shakes his head. “You think you do, but you do not know any better.”
I do know, she thinks. And perhaps I would want-- But she waits again, hands still against her thighs. Master is thinking.
“I do not want that. It would not make me happy.”
Ah. Orana nods, picks up the plates, and holds them against her waist. “Then it would not make me happy,” she says. He leans his head in his hands and says nothing, and she collects the dustpan, the broom and the ash-bucket, and leaves him to himself.
He is, she thinks, so very unhappy. She doesn't know how to satisfy him; he is a strange creature, unlike any master she has ever known. She thinks on what her papa told her, that to serve is to know the master or mistress better than they know themselves, to anticipate and satisfy before they have had time to realise that the thing they wanted was a thing to be ordered. To care for them, to be useful, and she nods to herself.
She will take care of him. It is her duty. He is, when everything is said and done, her Master.
#
He is standing in the street outside Fenris’ house and he doesn’t know what to do. It’s hot. Carver remembers this later; it is hot, so hot, and he sweats inside his shirt.
What is he doing? Going home? There is no home. Where is he going?
Just ‘away’. Away from this. Maker, his chest--
He drags a hand over his face, drags in a breath, feels his lungs shudder and he tries to think.
He needs to go home. His sword is under Fenris’ table, and no (no, no,) he can’t go back there but without a sword there will be thugs and things, and he’ll turn up in the harbour just a bloated sodding corpse that nobody even cares about.
For a moment he thinks, Fuck it, but then … no. He needs a sword.
And he knows, for his sins, where to get one.
It isn’t far, and then suddenly Carver is knocking on the door.
Bodahn lets him in, does nothing to stop him. He asks Carver to sit and Carver sits, asks him to wait and Carver waits, on a bench in the foyer because...
Well. He can’t claim he doesn't know how much he's worn out his welcome here.
He waits, like a tradesman, and then--
"Carver?"
It is his mother, wrapping herself in a shawl that is clean and soft and fine. Maker, she’s …
"Mother." She hugs him, and she smells of lavender, so clean and sweet that it makes him feel dirty just to touch her.
"Are you hungry, darling? Come and have something to eat."
"I’m not," he tells her but, well, she is his mother and she tugs him gently in the direction of the kitchen and he follows, feeling too heavy and thick to resist.
She sits him down at the kitchen table and turns her back, fussing with covered dishes and utensils. The plate she sets in front of him is all cold meats, roasted tubers, and a mess of greens sprinkled with nuts. It’s … they eat well, then. That’s good. Though, there are children starving in bloody Darktown.
"There, darling. You like salt beef, don’t you?"
"I like beef." He hasn’t had beef in a while. The smell of it makes him suddenly homesick.
Mother settles the shawl around her shoulders, sinking onto the bench across from him. Her gown looks out of place in this kitchen, too fine, too elegant, the wrap around her shoulders too delicate. She’s fancy now, such a lady. Carver can’t quite look at her.
"Tell me what’s wrong," she says, touching his arm very gently.
He pulls away, picks up a chunk of beef and chews on it. It's really good. "Nothing. I just … I need to see Garrett, that’s all."
"Oh, sweetheart." She sighs, tapping her fingertips against the table. Her nails are neat and shiny and there are rings on her fingers that he doesn’t recognise. Father’s ring looks old and worn and cheap beside the others. But she’s still wearing it. "Did something happen?"
"No," he says, and she frowns at him, and he doesn’t want to talk about it because his heart feels like … "I just need Garrett, all right? I … left my sword somewhere and … I just … can I see him?"
"And there’s nothing wrong?"
"I don’t want to talk about it," he snaps, and Maker, that was … he sounds like Fenris and that’s just--
"Mother, I don’t think it’s a terribly good idea to leave Flora alone with the port," and Carver’s head jerks up because, thank fuck, it’s Garrett, leaning against the doorframe with his arms folded. He’s so lanky, so bloody lean, and why should that make Carver feel so clumsy? "Hullo, little brother. Come for a spar?"
That one strikes home, and Carver can hardly argue but his hackles are up already and, Maker, this place, how does it always do this to him?
"No. Just. You got any spare swords? I know you hoard them. Even though you don’t need them."
"I sell them, Carver."
"As though you need the money."
"Mmm, well. We can’t all get our lyrium for free."
Carver’s hand tightens into a fist, and he remembers how it felt to punch Garrett in the face. And that wasn’t me, it wasn’t, I’m not like that, except for how much he thinks maybe he really is. "Have you got a sword or not?"
"I might do. Where’s yours?"
Carver opens his mouth, closes it, and he just can’t. "Left it. Does it matter?"
"Garrett," Mother says, chiding.
Garrett sighs, swaggers into the kitchen and opens up the cool-room door. "Flora might be missing you, Mother," he says, coming out with a stoneware crock and a couple of chilled mugs. "I’m afraid she and I don’t exactly get along."
"If you’d try, Garrett, I’m sure--"
Garrett cuts her off so smoothly it hardly seems rude until Carver processes what he says. "Sebastian and I killed her mother. I’m not sure it’s possible to make up for that, no matter how hard I try."
Mother covers her mouth with her fingertips, and Carver feels rotten for her. "Garrett! You ass!"
Garrett shrugs. "Her mother was a blood mage seduced by a demon. And, just so you know, had Sebastian’s family murdered. So it wasn’t as though we had much choice." Garrett fills a mug and sets it down next to Carver’s plate, and then fills his own.
"Well." Mother takes a breath. "Perhaps you might let me know something like that, dear, before I invite someone for dinner."
"I’ll try to remember," and his smirk is so insufferably smug that Carver wants to bust it open.
But.
He doesn’t do that.
"I had best see to our guest." Their mother gets up, comes around, and leans down to take Carver’s head between her hands, kissing his hair and then stroking it. "Be good to your brother," she says, as though Carver is the one who needs reminding. "And take care of yourself, darling."
"I do," he tells her, and then, "you too."
Garrett waits until she’s gone before setting his mug down on the table and taking a seat. "So, little brother. Why don’t we make a deal?" He settles his chin in his palm, watching Carver with dark, thoughtful eyes. "You tell me why you look like someone pissed in your porridge, and I’ll give you a sword to replace the one you ‘left’."
Carver takes a swig from his mug as a sort of distraction. It's not ale, more like tea but with a kick, and it's actually pretty good. "I’m fine, I just …"
"You’re not, don’t lie. You’re floating about in a worse cloud of brood than usual. You’re practically miasmic."
"Please," Carver says -- begs, if he’s honest. "Please just … I don’t want to …" tell you.
"Is it money?"
"No, it’s not bloody money!"
"And you don’t … Carver if you need lyrium, you come to me, all right?"
He sounds so sincere and Carver can’t bear it. "I don’t need lyrium! Maker! I just need a sword so I can go home without getting jumped by sodding Coterie!"
Garrett lifts his eyebrows. "By ‘home’ you mean the Gallows, I suppose?" Carver gives him a look that he hopes expresses ‘yes of course I mean the bloody Gallows you twit’ and Garrett seems to get it because he frowns. "And you came here instead of going to Fenris because …?"
Carver can’t help it; he feels his face sort of collapse, as if he’s falling apart, and something in his chest just throbs like it’s trying to kill him.
"Ah." Garrett peers into his mug, swishes the contents around, and takes a sip. "Well. When did that happen?"
Speaking feels impossible past the whatever-it-is in his throat, but somehow Carver chokes out, "Just now."
There is a long pause, and Carver can hear his heart beat loud in his head, this heavy, sodden thud that hurts him. Why is he telling Garrett this? Why would he be so stupid? Maker, Garrett will hold this over him forever, and--
"Hmmm. Let’s get you a sword, then." Garrett gets up, but stops in the doorway. "Are you coming?"
There’s a chest in the hall and it’s full of things: daggers, a battered longbow, a shield, assorted staffs -- or ‘staves’, he supposes -- and pieces of chainmail and plate. Garrett hoards everything, Carver knows, so it isn’t much of a surprise.
After some rooting about, Garrett comes up with a dark scabbard of beautifully tooled leather. "Here. Try this."
It draws so easily, and the balance is perfect. The hilt fits into his hand as though made for him and … is it humming? It smells of forest fire, a dark, charcoal sort of smell, and he examines it for … yes, there are several runes laid into the crosspiece, the lyrium glittering when he breathes on them. Maybe Sandal’s work, maybe not, he can’t be sure.
It’s a bit special, all told, and Carver can’t help but wonder, "You could get a lot of money for this. Buy you a lot of lyrium."
Garrett shrugs, stuffing his hands into his pockets in a way that makes his trousers bunch messily. "I know. I saved it for you anyway."
Or maybe for Fenris. Don’t think about that. Carver tightens his grip on the scabbard; he wants this sword, really wants it. "It’s a good sword."
"All yours." Garrett’s voice is low, and Carver doesn’t know what to make of it.
"Thanks."
"For a price," Garrett says and Carver gives him a withering look because, of fucking course. But Garrett grins into it and slings an arm around Carver’s shoulders. "Isabela’s taken Merrill to the Blooming Rose. Come have a drink with us."
"I don’t--"
"One drink, and you can keep the sword." Garrett holds up his hand, thumb and forefinger an inch apart. "Just a tiny, tiny drink." As if either of them don’t know that 'one drink' is never just one.
But. "Urgh, if it’ll shut you up," Carver grumbles, and Garrett laughs, pressing a dry kiss to the side of Carver’s head before he can squirm away.
"Excellent! You won't regret it. Well," and Garrett grins, "you might."
"Why," Carver asks when Garrett has swapped his ridiculous shirt for a less ridiculous and slightly worn set of robes, "did you let Isabela take Merrill to the Rose?"
"Why would I try to stop either of them? Isabela’s a hurricane, and Merrill’s all grown up. She can go to the Rose if she likes."
"But," and Carver holds the door open for Garrett who doesn’t even acknowledge it, the ass, "why would she want to?"
Garrett flashes him a grin, twirling his staff in his hands like a child. Maker, he’s so obvious. How did they ever avoid Templars at all? "Carver, Carver, Carver. You know why people go to the Rose, don’t you? Tell me we don’t have to have that conversation."
"Oh, sod off, you know what I mean."
Garrett settles into an easy saunter, matching his stride to Carver’s in a way that is so familiar, so comfortable that it makes him feel a little ill with how much he’s missed it. And Garrett. Maybe. It’s hard to tell. "Merrill doesn’t much like it when Mother brings home potential daughters-in-law."
"Is that what she’s doing?" Carver frowns. "Hang on, what about Anders?"
Garrett’s smile is bright but brittle. "Anders locks himself in his room and writes things."
"Yeah, okay. But I mean, what about Anders?" He doesn’t know how to say it. "Isn’t he sort of … in the way of, uh, all that?"
"I happen to think so. Mother doesn’t seem to care what I think, though. She just keeps trying."
Carver stops, and tries to puzzle this out. "Why doesn’t Merrill like it?"
Garrett looks at him as though he’s dense. "Why do you think?"
Carver thinks. "But Anders … and … what’s going on?"
Garrett sighs. "Carver, what do you think?"
"I don’t know, that’s why I’m asking!"
"Andraste’s pants! Do you really want to get into this now?" He sounds so exasperated that Carver drops it, because no, actually, he doesn’t. Not right now.
When they walk into the Rose, Isabela spots them immediately; she whistles very loudly. "Get drinks! Merrill needs another and I need three!"
Garrett snorts. "Go over there," and he shoves Carver ungently. "I think I’m going to have to open my tab."
"You have a tab?" But no, Carver doesn’t want to know, actually.
Merrill looks a bit pink. Maybe she’s drunk. That would be something, Carver thinks.
"Hu-ullo! I’m not being awkward," she says, awkwardly, and Isabela chuckles.
"Hey." Carver sits across from them, and … he hasn’t seen Merrill since the night he … the night he stormed in and … yeah, all of that. She doesn’t seem to be mad at him, though.
Isabela slides her boot up the inside of his calf; he starts to push her away but what’s the point? "So, how was your brother’s dinner date?" she asks, smirking.
"Did he really kill that woman’s mother?" Carver asks and Isabela beams at him.
"Oh, did that come up in conversation? I hope that came up. Just imagine Leandra’s face."
"That’s my mother’s face," Carver says hotly, and Isabela runs her boot up to rest it on the chair between his thighs.
"Mmmm, I know. Explains so very much."
He tries to argue, but then Garrett comes over, and a pretty young man with pointed ears presents them with a tray of brightly coloured drinks which Garrett and Isabela insist Merrill try all of and then--
It all dissolves into a blur. At first it’s all right; he feels better, much better, and the ache in his chest dies down, and Isabela is being so nice to him. There’s more drinks, and Isabela beats them all at cards, and then Merrill beats them all at cards, which is pretty much absolute proof that Isabela is cheating. After that he beats Garrett at darts, and Isabela pouts beautifully because neither of them will let her play.
Merrill tries several times to apologise for something and Carver just tugs one of her braids and says, "It’s fine. You’re fine. You know I … you’re fine."
At some point he collects a cuddly woman with masses of fluffy blond hair who sits squarely in his lap and refuses to budge. Isabela won’t stop laughing, but Garrett seems concerned for some reason.
And then, suddenly it’s too much.
“--don’t know what I’m doing," he moans. Everything is hot and it spins so. "I messed everything up … everything, forever, I don’t--"
"Oh, Carver." Garrett is crouching down. They are outside, in the alley behind the Rose, and Carver is sitting on a stone ledge with his head in his hands and he is not crying, he completely isn’t. "You’re doing all right. You’re just … I suppose you’re heartbroken."
"I’m not," Carver protests, but then, "I don’t know, maybe? I just don’t even…" It’s not a sob, it’s a hiccup, it has to be. "I thought … only he said, and I can’t … fucking hell, Garrett, I can’t, you don’t even know… it was shit."
"I can tell." Garrett scrubs a hand through his hair, and he looks … less annoyed than he should, really. "I’m sorry."
"S’not your fault."
Garrett laughs, quiet and low. "Now, there’s a first. Normally it is absolutely my fault."
"Normally it is," Carver argues, and then he takes a deep breath, only there’s too much alcohol in him now and the breath doesn’t make him any less dizzy. "Fuck. Fuck, Garrett. I thought ... I thought it was good. I thought we'd be okay and then... then it was all a stupid lie." Everything, lies. "He never ... it was just," and he makes a gesture that is supposed to indicate sex, "the whole time."
Garrett makes a face halfway between a grin and a wince. "Andraste protect me from that mental image. But, really, you were shacked up for a good two years, Carver. I don't know how amazing you think you are in bed -- and I'd rather not think about it, honestly -- but I sincerely doubt you're that amazing."
Carver isn't really listening, booze whumming around in his head like one of those ... tube on a stick things. On a string. Things.
It's not fair. Two years. Of his life, and what does he have to show for it? His promotion? That he only got because of Garrett, anyway.
"Maker, I should have gone with you. I should have ... I was meant to go with you. I should have gone.”
Garrett is quiet for a moment and then he sits, propping his stupidly lanky body up on Carver's ledge and looping an arm around Carver's shoulders. “I'm glad you didn't.”
Carver's glad that Garrett knows what he means so he doesn't have to explain. “You were angry, I bet.”
“I was. At first. But then--” Garrett sighs, tightening his grip on Carver and pulling him in. “It wasn't … what I was expecting. I should have listened to Anders. And I should have listened to you, when you said--”
“But look at us.” Carver can't quite find the words, so the words that come out of him aren't exactly what he means. “You with your … stupid crest. And the mansion. And those stupid clothes ... Maker.”
“You don't like my clothes?”
“No, you look like a twat.”
Garrett snorts, and then he sniggers, pressing his face into Carver's shoulder. “And you look so good in your skirts.”
From a man wearing robes. “Sod off, magey.” Garrett is still laughing, probably mocking him. Urgh, he's such a jerk. “But there, you know?”
“No, I don't know.” Garrett grins, gesturing with his free hand. “Go on and tell me.”
“Everything works out for you.” In the midst of all of this, the thought is clear. Yes. He knows what he means and tries to put it into words. “Everything … you went underground and I … I couldn't do it, when you were gone. I tried, but I won't ... I won't ever be you. I can't. I'm not,” good enough, “I'm just not.”
“You don't have to be.” Garrett shifts, warm and close against Carver's side, and Carver leans into him because he's there. That's all it is. “It's not all roses for me, you know.”
“Oh, yeah, being Champion of Kirkwall is balls, right?”
“It is a bit.” Garrett pulls up a bottle from somewhere and takes a swig of it. “Everybody wants something. I don't get what I want, not all the time. Not even most of the time.”
“You got the house.” Carver takes a breath, twists to look Garrett in the eye. “Mother's so proud of you.”
“Except for when she is so terribly disappointed.” Garrett makes a face. “I can't give her what she wants. I won't. She ought to know, though, because our grandparents asked the same of her and she ran away with Father. She ought to understand.”
Carver doesn't really get what that means, and maybe it's all the colourful drinks Isabela poured into him, and maybe not. Still, he says, “You're not a disappointment.”
Garrett blinks. Then he smiles. “Thank-you.”
“I'm a disappointment.”
“No you're not.”
“No, I am, because listen.” Carver takes a breath, loses his thread, and then gropes around for it again. “Listen. You came home and made everything good. Like always. All that bloody money. And Mother's happy now. She's … she looks really happy, and she never did when you were gone, she was all … unhappy. And I tried, but I could never,” do it, “make her … happy. But you did. You do. Fuck, I'm such a rutt-end.” He takes a breath, breathes it out, tries to focus on his hands but they're knotted in his hair. “You did everything, like always, and what did I get? Fenris and a uniform. And,” Stop, but he can't, “I don't even have Fenris any more.”
It hurts so much. Carver pulls his hands down, plasters them over his face because this is the worst, the absolute worst. What is he doing with his life? Drunk in an alleyway with his stupid brother, just such a fucking mess. And Fenris doesn't even--
Just.
Don't.
“Carver.” Someone is touching his cheek. He tries to shake it off but it keeps happening. “Carver. Don't … I don't know. It's not your fault.”
“Yes it is,” Carver says, not really sure what they're talking about, but he feels so wretched.
“It isn't. Maker, you're going to hate me in the morning.” Carver has no idea what he means by that, but then Garrett is on the ground, between Carver's knees, and his hand is up under Carver's jaw and his face … Maker, his face. “I'm glad you didn't come with me. I'm glad you … well, maybe I'd have preferred you to join the sodding Coterie, or something, but … Carver.” His smile is cut through with something else, something painful, and Carver doesn't want to see it. “You're all right. For a Templar.”
“I'm sorry,” Carver tells him, and Garrett shakes his head.
“Don't. We both know.” And they do.
Garrett sighs, loops his arms around Carver's chest and pulls him in until Carver's face is smushed against Garrett's collar. Which he hates, but he doesn't pull away just yet because...
“Little brother.”
It ought to sting, but it doesn't. Carver can't help himself; his arm is already up behind Garrett, wrapped around his core and just holding on. My brother. And then-- “I miss Bethany,” he says, because suddenly he misses her so hard it's like a punch to the gut.
“I know. Me too.” And then Garrett pulls away far enough to look him in the eye. “I miss you, you know.”
“I'm right here.”
“Yes, but--” Garrett closes his eyes, sits back on his heels, his hands on Carver's shoulders gripping hard enough that it would hurt anyone else, Carver's sure. “You can come home, if you want. Come home with me.”
“You gave the room to Anders,” Carver says, because Garrett did, and--
Garrett laughs, ducking his head. “I did. I did do that. So I suppose you'll just have to share with me.”
“Urgh, never again,” and Carver leans away, back up against the rough stone wall of the Blooming Rose. “Done that enough, already.”
“It's not so bad.”
Carver snorts. “Yeah it is. Can't even have a proper wank with you in the room,” and wow, he said that, to his brother, and (amazingly) it makes Garrett laugh so hard he has to wipe his eyes.
“Important, that.”
“Yup.” Carver holds up his hand. “Hey, gimme a go of your bottle.”
“Ah, yeah. But no.” Garrett grins at him. “This is mine.”
“Fuck, Garrett, don't be a dick.”
Garrett snorts, takes a pull from the bottle, and then holds it up, out of Carver's reach. “If you want it ...”
“Brother!”
He snatches for the bottle and nearly topples off his ledge, and Garrett, laughing like a monster, catches him, holds him up, and then offers the bottle like a truce. “All right! You fucking … here you go.”
“About sodding time.” Carver takes it, drinks out of it, and it's rum, and it hits his stomach hard. “Wurgh.”
“Yeah, you've had enough.”
“I bloody haven't,” Carver argues, though maybe, maybe he has had far too much.
“Ri-ight.” Garrett sighs, smiling like the smarmy fucker that he is and … it's okay. Garrett's okay, and frankly, Carver has missed him like this, stupid, stupid Garrett.
“I sodding,” love you, “you twat. I can't.”
Garrett just laughs, scuffing Carver's hair up.
It’s … nice.
“Hey,” and Garrett has his thumb up under Carver’s ear, fingers curling behind Carver’s neck and rubbing through the short ends of his hair. “Let me walk you home.”
“I’m not going home with you,” Carver tells him, but Garrett shakes his head.
“I know, I know. Let me walk you down to the docks.”
“I can go on my own,” he says, but Garrett makes a disparaging sound, deep in his throat, and it reminds him of Fenris so hard that Carver can barely breathe.
“Let me. Just this once?”
It’s hard to say no when Garrett looks up at him like this, and those are Bethany’s eyes, that’s Bethany’s head-tilt, and her smile, like a sunrise, and Maker, this is his brother, what the fuck has he been doing all this time?
“Okay,” he says. How could he refuse?
Garrett hauls him to his feet, shoves him down the alleyway, and they bicker (of course) but it’s all right. They should bicker. It’s what they do.
They part ways at the ferry, and Garrett lets him have the rest of the horrible rum, which Carver starts to regret about halfway through the crossing. By the time he lands on the Gallows side he regrets pretty much everything. Maker, why did he even go to Garrett? Didn't need the bloody sword in the end and now Garrett knows, well, not everything but too bloody much, anyway.
Carver leans up against a wall, feeling ill and miserable, and he still has to get up the sodding stairs, urgh. Fucking rum...
And past the night guard. Fortunately, or unfortunately, one of them is Keran. “Knight Corporal?” Maker, he sounds so squeaky. “Are you … ser, are you all right?”
“I’m pissed, ob-vi-ous-ly.” The other knight sniggers inside his helmet, and Carver squints at him. “And just ‘cos I’m not in uniform doesn’t mean you don’t have to bloody salute me.”
The knight clears his throat. “Sorry, ser.” They both salute, and it makes Carver feel completely ridiculous. Also, the other knight is clearly not a ‘he’ but a ‘she’. “Can we get you anything, Knight Corporal?” she asks, sounding strikingly like Isabela. “Water, maybe?”
She’s sassing him. He can tell. “No, I … actually, yeah. Yeah, that would be good.”
She jerks her head at Keran and the recruit skitters away, coming back with a bucket and a ladle and Carver takes a couple of gulps from it, and maybe they help but, Maker, he feels so hot and wobbly.
Fuck. It. He ladles some water over his head. Ser Lady-Templar makes a noise that sounds deeply amused, but he ignores her. Partly because he has no idea who she is. He should recognise her voice. It’s dumb that he doesn’t, and he doesn’t want to ask.
“Thanks,” he says, for want of anything better. The stairs look really steep. But. He has to get up there. He slicks his dripping hair out of his eyes and blinks. “I … goodnight.”
“Do you need--” Keran starts but Carver cuts him off.
“No, I don’t, I’m fine,” and he’d take the steps two at a time but … yeah, fuck no. It’s hard enough taking them sort of half at a time. Whatever that … shit, his feet are bad at this.
He doesn’t look back, not even when he hears Keran mutter something that makes the woman laugh.
It’s so hard. He keeps staggering into things and, and he hopes he won’t bump into anyone he knows, but it’s well past curfew and no-one is around, the corridors empty and silent. Good, really, because the next set of steps has him bracing a hand against the wall for balance, and he doesn’t want anyone to see him like this. Except Keran and what’s-her-face already did, and they’ll talk about it, fuck, especially Keran, urgh, recruits.
He props himself against a window ledge. Why did I drink so much? Except, he knows why, and … and he doesn’t want to think about it but …
Even cushioned by booze, the weight of his unhappiness hits him hard, so suddenly. Fenris, you … It’s all so useless. He’s useless, if he hadn’t been then maybe none of this would have happened, maybe Fenris wouldn’t have … maybe it would have meant something, and he thinks, Why would it, though? Why would anyone, ever … Maker, I’m no fucking good for anything, I don’t even know why I--
The heels of his palms are hard up against his eyes, and he wallows in them for a little bit before remembering that he is in a fucking corridor and anyone could see. He takes a breath, smooths his palms over his cheeks, blinks blearily at the world, and tries to stand up.
It goes … okay. All right. He just needs to get back to his room and he can--
What? Cry himself to sleep? Well, what else is he gunna do?
Maybe he should have gone home with Garrett.
Except, no. No, that would have been terrible, drunk as a sailor and, to the void with it, he’s a rutting Templar, they are supposed to be models of sobriety and … shit, shit, shit, he’s no good at fucking anything, why does he even try...?
“Fuck,” he says, though it comes out slurred and messy. “Oh, fuck me.”
Tomorrow is going to be-- Don’t think about it, don’t, or you’ll break, you will fucking break and I can’t do that, I just. Can’t.
And yet. He wants.
Please, someone, will you please just listen to me.
No-one will. Urgh, so pathetic.
Except. Maybe, someone will. Maybe…
He realises his feet are in motion only when they stop, and he’s not really sure where he thought he was going but he finds himself here, outside a door, outside this door and he is here now, so should he knock?
What if he’s not wanted?
But. Here now, might as well, though it is a bad idea, he thinks, even as he raises his hand to knock, and when no-one answers he thinks he had best try again, just one more time before he--
The door opens. “Hawke?”
“Hi.” It’s a stupid thing to say. He’s so stupid, he should never have-- “I … sorry, maybe I should go …”
“No, don’t … Hawke, are you all right?”
There are firm fingers in his collar, a thumb running along his jaw, and--
“Why are you wet?”
“I did that,” Carver says, and it suddenly seems so stupid, and he leans against the doorframe, tucking his face into his shoulder. “Seemed like a good idea. At the time.” He takes a deep breath, tries to straighten up. “Kinda stupid, now.” And another breath. “Maybe it’s just me. Maybe … I’m just stupid.”
“No,” and those eyes are so kind, so concerned, Carver kind of wants to drown himself in them. “You are definitely not that, even if you are… ah. Please, do come in.”
“Is it okay?” This is a bad idea, can only end badly, but Carver can’t be bothered caring. “Ser? It’s late, and I …. but you said …”
The Knight Captain steps away, holds the door open for him, tugging his night-robe close around himself. “My door is always open.”
“For this?” It’s hard to explain, but Carver is sure that this is not what he meant when he said that.
The Knight Captain nods, though, and through the funk of booze and misery Carver is so glad that the man is smiling, even if it looks like an end-of-the-world sort of smile. “My door is always open for you.”