Fenris/f!Hawke hurt/comfort: Nightmares

In which Fenris and Hawke help each other cope with disturbing dreams. 

Featuring lyrics from Sons and Daughters by the Decemberists, and (of all weird things) a bit of stolen dialogue from Futurama, if anyone can spot it.

Read on AO3 instead at the link below:

tinyurl.com/fenhawke7

************

Blood.

It was everywhere. Pools of it, rivulets of it cracking the soil, dried black clots of it sprinkled across the bodies he’d left broken on the ground, clouds of it roiling from the mist and filling his lungs.

He relished in it. He reviled it. It was his salvation and his curse, pouring from his glowing palms in anger and revenge and absolute, total, crushing despair.

A bloody grin lit that hated face with those hated pale eyes. Fenris snarled as he twisted his fist in Danarius’s chest, but the magister just grinned and grinned with pale eyes and bloodied teeth, those bloodied and pointed teeth that grew and expanded and took up his entire face as it swelled and stretched grotesquely…

An abomination. Fenris had known it was too good to be true. Of course he wasn’t dead. Of course he’d used his blasted fucking blood magic to become an abomination, and now he’d have to be killed again and again and again –

“Fenris.”

The abomination’s grasping claw grabbed him, and he wrenched his arm away. “Don’t touch me!” he yelled.

The hand jerked away. Fenris gasped and forced his eyes open, but it was too dark to see a thing. He blindly rolled onto his back and shoved himself upright. Where was he, where the fuck was this?

A voice in the darkness called his name. “Fenris, wake up,” she said.

That voice – her voice –

Relief smashed over him as his half-sleeping mind finally clicked into place. “Hawke?” he said hoarsely.

“It’s just me,” she murmured. “Are you all right?” The mattress shifted as she moved closer, and her fingers brushed against his side.

He flinched away from her touch. “Don’t,” he blurted. The dream was fading already, leaving only fractured images of bodies and blood, but the lingering revulsion and rage continued to rub at his skin like sandpaper.  

She pulled her hand away. “Okay,” she said hastily. “Hands off, I promise.” She was quiet for a moment, and Fenris forced himself to breathe evenly into the silence.

A moment later, she spoke again. “Do you want to be alone? I can go downstairs and lounge with Toby for a bit…”

“No,” he said immediately. “No. I…” He trailed off, then rubbed the heels of his hands into his eyes before dragging his fingers through his hair. “Don’t go,” he said. “I want you here.”

“All right,” she whispered. “I’m here.” The mattress shifted again as she settled down beside him.

The room was silent but for the pounding of his heart. He rested his elbows on his knees and focused on his breathing, inhaling and exhaling carefully until the blood stopped pulsing behind his eyes with every beat.

Hawke chuckled weakly. “I feel a bit useless. Should I, er… Mother would sing lullabies when we had nightmares. But that’s for babies. Never mind. Um…”

“You can talk,” he said. “I… I would like it if you talked.”

“Oh good! That’s something I am very good at,” she said. “You sure you don’t want me to sing?”

Her voice was quiet but teasing, and Fenris could feel his neck muscles loosening at her jocular tone. “That won’t be necessary,” he drawled softly.

She chuckled. “As you like,” she said, then rolled toward him, careful not to touch him as she settled on her side. “What should I talk about?” she mused. “I know. I’ll tell you what I did today in terribly exhaustive detail. That will put you right back to sleep. First I got up and had a piece of toast. Then I brushed my teeth. Then I went to the market to buy some fish…”  

He smirked at her, then lay back on the pillows as she continued to talk. “… then I had to give Toby a bath because he rolled around in the fish guts at the market. It was completely vile. Did you know that there’s no good spell for purging a dog’s fur of evil odours? Purging poisons and curses, yes. Purging disgusting smells, no.”

Fenris settled himself on his side and studied her beloved face in the dark. “I was not aware,” he murmured. “But I suppose that’s good to know. One thing that magic cannot do.”

“I thought you’d like that,” Hawke said. “Now, what else did I do today? Ah, yes. There was a new troupe at the Hanged Man. I poked my head in for just a minute, but we should go back and see them perform tomorrow. They did an amazing version of this one song that I used to love when I first moved here, and it was just – oh, but you don’t want me to sing…”

Fenris blinked slowly. Her quiet voice was as vibrant and bright as always, but it was soothing him nonetheless. “Fine,” he mumbled. “Sing if you must.”

“You sure?” she asked.

He smiled sleepily at her playful tone. “Yes,” he whispered, then closed his eyes. “But no filthy limericks set to music. Do not make me regret this.”

She laughed softly. “All right, Fenris. Just for you, I’ll hold back on the dirty lyrics.” She cleared her throat, then began to sing.

When we arrive, sons and daughters

We’ll make our homes on the water

We’ll build our walls of aluminum

We’ll fill our mouths with cinnamon now

These currents pull us ‘cross the border

Steady your boats, arms to shoulder

‘Til tides all pull our hull aground

Making this calm harbour our home…

Hawke’s voice was soft and slightly cracked with sleep, and some of her notes were out of tune.

Fenris had never heard anything sweeter in his life.

*********************

The next morning, Hawke was as cheerful as always. She teased him about his bed-head while she bustled around making the bed, and she hummed to herself as she traced the fine kohl lines around her eyes, and she chatted happily with Orana when the elven girl brought them a tray of coffee and pastries in the study.

There was, however, one glaring difference: Hawke hadn’t touched him all morning.

This was very unusual. When Fenris and Hawke were in private, some part of her body was almost constantly in contact with some part of his: holding his hand, squeezing his arm, stroking his chin or his earlobe, pressing her knee against his own. Fenris couldn’t remember the last time he’d sat on a piece of furniture in her house or his without the warmth of her body pressed against him.

Hawke smiled at Orana as she left the room, then sat cross-legged on the carpet about a foot away from him. “We should probably go talk to Her Fancy Highness the Knight-Commander today. Let’s leave Anders behind this time, shall we? I’d rather not break up a brawl between the two of you today-”

“Hawke,” Fenris interrupted. “You can touch me if you want.”

She stopped short and gave him a careful look. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” he said. He held out his arm and beckoned her close.

“Oh thank fuck,” she exclaimed, then immediately slid over to him and slung her legs across his lap. “I thought I was going to explode.” She nestled her head cozily into the crook of his neck and sipped her coffee.

He draped his arm around her shoulders. “I apologize for last night,” he said quietly. “I had hoped this particular issue would not follow me into your house. It seems that I have no such luck.”

She tilted her chin up to look at him. “Do you often have bad dreams?” she asked.

He shrugged moodily. “On occasion. They become tenacious when I start sleeping in the same place for several nights in a row.” That was the cruelest irony of the nightmares. When he’d been on the run from Danarius, sleeping in abandoned hovels and muddy shelters in the woods, he’d almost never had a nightmare. It was only when he stopped moving for a few nights at a time that the nightmares would begin to plague his sleeping mind.

Hawke drew back and stared at him in dismay. “Wait. But how long do they last for, then? Surely you haven’t been having them for years…?”

He shook his head. “They stop eventually, for the most part.” He declined to tell her that it had taken almost two months of living in Kirkwall before the nightmares had started to wane.

He dearly hoped they would go away more quickly this time around. Hawke’s home was not that much of a change from his own mansion; he was still in Kirkwall, after all, and still in a house that was familiar to him. Most importantly, he was safe and free. There was no good reason for these dreams to keep needling him at night.

Hawke ran a comforting hand across his chest. “Is there anything I can do?”

“I… don’t know,” he said honestly. “I don’t know that there is anything to be done.” He had never had to worry about someone else’s reaction to his rude awakenings. He hadn’t shared sleeping quarters with another living person since he’d left Seheron, and when he travelled out of town with Hawke and the others, he hadn’t shared a tent with any of them.

Hawke was quiet for a moment. Her voice was hesitant when she finally spoke. “Maybe… maybe we jumped into sleepovers too soon,” she suggested. “Would it help if you spent some nights alone at your own house? Slept in your own bed, had your own routine a few nights a week?”

Her fingers were tight in the fabric of his tunic, and Fenris understood her reluctance. In all honesty, he was reluctant too. But her suggestion made a certain kind of sense.

He sighed. “The idea has merit,” he said grudgingly. “It is worth a try.”

She nodded, and they sat together in silence for a moment, his arm tight around her shoulders and her head pressed firmly to his neck.

Then she pulled away and smirked at him. “Maybe I’ll let Toby take your place when you’re not here. He’s almost as warm as you. But much more hairy, unfortunately. I much prefer hugging your gorgeous hairless chest.” Her fingers snuck under the hem of his tunic and across his abs.

He jolted and grabbed her creeping fingers through his shirt. “Hawke,” he warned. “That tickles.”

She blinked innocently at him. “Well, I can’t see what I’m doing,” she replied. “If you take off your shirt, I’ll know not to touch the ticklish bits.”

He sighed. “You are a pain in my ass,” he told her affectionately.

“And what a fine ass it is,” she purred. Slowly and sinuously, she straddled his lap, then took hold of the hem of his shirt.

Fenris allowed her to pull the tunic over his head, then pulled her flush to his naked chest. I will miss you, he thought, but he didn’t say it; it was a foolish sentiment, even if it was true. He spent most of his days with Hawke, after all. He could bear to be apart from her for a few nights if it meant getting these pernicious dreams under control.

****************

Later that night, Fenris was lying on his familiar mattress in his familiar mansion, and he couldn’t sleep.

It was infuriating. He and Hawke had agreed on this plan, and it was supposed to help eradicate his blighted nightmares, but now that he was alone in his own bed, he couldn’t sleep.

After lying restless and bored in the dark for a few hours, Fenris got up and pulled on his armour. He slipped unobtrusively through Kirkwall’s streets until he arrived at Hawke’s mansion.

He used his key to get in and soothed a snarling Toby with a pat on the head, then made his way up the stairs to Hawke’s room.

He knocked softly on the door and listened, but there was no response. He knocked a bit more loudly. “Hawke?” he called.

A soft whimper floated through the door, and Fenris cautiously eased it open. As expected, Hawke was in bed. She rolled from her side onto her back as he opened the door, and for a moment Fenris thought she was awake until he saw that her eyes were closed.

Not simply closed, he realized, but shut tight. With a jolt of alarm, he noted that her whole face was a tight and twisted expression of distress. As he watched, she jerked her head to the side and whimpered again.

He slipped into the room and pulled off his gauntlets as he sat on the side of the bed. “Hawke,” he murmured.

She inhaled through her nose, then she sobbed, and Fenris reached out and squeezed her hand. “Rynne,” he said, a bit more loudly.

She gasped, her eyes popping open only to drift half-closed again as she exhaled heavily. “No,” she mewled. “I have to…”

He squeezed her hand again, and she woke properly this time. Her eyes widened as she recognized him in the dark, and she reached out and grabbed his wrist. “Fenris?”

Her grip was hard and her voice was plaintive and thin, not at all like her usual bold tone. He took both of her hands and squeezed them gently. “I’m sorry to intrude,” he said softly. “I was unable to sleep, and I thought…”

She clutched convulsively at his forearm. “Will you hold me? Please?”

Her fingers were painfully tight, squeezing as though to confirm he was truly there. He forced himself to breathe through the sudden burst of tenderness that filled his lungs.

“Of course,” he said. He pulled off his armour as quickly as he could, then crawled onto the bed.

Hawke wrapped her arms around his neck before he even had a chance to settle. When he finally lay on his side, she pressed her mostly-naked body against him, her arms tight around his neck as she kicked the sheets away from her legs and tucked one knee between his legs.

She was shaking. It was a subtle but constant tremor through her body and arms, and a lump swelled in his throat at her extremely unusual show of fear. What in the Void had she been dreaming of that had scared her so?

“Be easy, Hawke.” With difficulty, he rolled onto his back so he could hold her with both arms.

She curled her arms around his waist and tangled her legs with his, and Fenris breathed in the sleepy scent of her tousled hair. Despite her near-nakedness and the discarded blankets, her shivering was easing up, and Fenris kept his arms wrapped tight around her until her body became loose and calm.

He ran a soothing hand along her tattooed back. “It seems obvious now, but I was hoping to stay here tonight,” he said. “If that’s all right.”

“Of course, you handsome fool,” she mumbled. “You can stay here whenever you want.”

Her sleepy voice was round and full with the return of her humour. Fenris trailed his fingers lightly over her ear, then finally closed his eyes.

So much for a few nights apart, he thought, but he couldn’t bring himself to be displeased. His dreams might plague him later, but he didn’t care. He was right where he most wanted to be.

He and Hawke didn’t agree on everything, but it seemed that they were of the same mind on this matter at least: it was better to face nightmares together than alone.