Sundermount Shenanigans?

[avisionofhawke]

Things were going just fine right up until the revenant showed up.

Hawke had just been minding her own business, looking for reagents with Anders, Fenris and Sebastian (and wondering what had possessed her to bring that particular trio on this trip). It had been going quite well, she thought. They had found lots of elfroot, at least.

And then the revenant happened, and Hawke had pulled a rookie move. She had leapt without surreptitiously testing the ground she was going to land on first. The last she'd seen of her companions was their horrified expressions as she fell through that thrice-blighted hole.

Needless to say, she wasn't pleased with where she'd ended up.

Ten minutes out of that cavern and she already had no clue where she actually was, other than that she was still on Sundermount. She couldn't even find the cavern entrance again.

Damn it.

Damn it to the Void.

Comments

[cattymage]

From that strained throat noise (that he could merely BARELY hear) and the look on her face, Anders guessed pretty quickly what was up.

"You wrecked your throat with that, didn't you."

[avisionofhawke]

A meek, embarrassed nod. Never mind that that yell had been one for the record books (if there were any), it was ever so slightly humiliating to admit that she'd hurt herself while doing it.

[cattymage]

"Damned right it did. Bet they heard you from across the Waking Sea."

...should he...?

Sigh.

He will.

A familiar, comforting glow of blue, whirling up from his palms.

"If you promise not to do that again, I'll fix it."

[avisionofhawke]

Of course she wouldn't do that again. If that hadn't worked, nothing of the sort would. She bared her throat in answer, a silent promise to refrain from any attempts to alert dog lords of her existence.

[cattymage]

"Ah, there it is, the classic 'yes, Healer, pretty please, Healer,' face. My favorite."

This is the closest they've been, physically, for this entire debacle; he approaches close to Aisling and reaches out with his hands to hover them bare inches from her throat, and the energy curls out and wraps around her skin in little wispy trails like luminescent smoke.

His scent isn't right. Her Anders always smelled of Elfroot, lower-key notes of a few other herbs, some pitiable notes of Darktown, ink on his fingers; the things he worked with every long hour of every day. And always some other, unnameable note that felt like nothing else but Fade.

This one's is more of the scent of the road, of travel, only a hint of Elfroot he undoubtedly mixed potions of to keep himself going on his own. But not Fade. Not of the spirit that had entwined into her lover's soul.

And then, the healing was over, and he slowly drew his hands away.

[avisionofhawke]

Once again, it was Anders but not Anders. She submitted herself to the healing, feeling the now familiar sensations of a mabari head in her lap and her lover's fingers running through her hair as the pain faded away.

As whatever breeze had wafted his scent to her died out and the air moved back towards him just a bit, her own floated to him - a strangely heady mix of lightly scented soap, outdoors (a combination in and of itself that could only be described as a blend of woods, wind and sun) and that undertone of blood that a rogue carried no matter how much they washed.

She pushed him lightly with a chuckle. "You're really full of yourself, aren't you? The demon got a few things wrong, but at least that natural Anders charm is still there."

[cattymage]

"I'm perfect, thank you."

Step back, to establish personal bubbles that part of him didn't entirely want to enforce. The curves and lines of her neck, the hollow right above her collarbone... damn.

Fake-him sure was one lucky bastard.

[avisionofhawke]

"And so modest, too," she laughed. "I think I've come to a decision. This demon is obviously terrible at its job, and I'm not going to make it any easier. I believe I'll enjoy what I can of this blighted nightmare."

Now that that was settled, she stood up, feeling much better about the whole mess.

"What would you like to do, Nightmare Anders?"

[cattymage]

"As long as you're asking, there are quite a few things I'd like to do," and here we have the single most suggestive expression to ever cross a human face.

[avisionofhawke]

"Well, suggest away," Aisling said, giving him that smirk she knew made his heart leap - at least, real Anders reacted that way.

It was nice that this Anders wasn't so terribly afraid that he'd destroy her with his mere presence. It also helped to know that this was a dream, which meant that even if it wasn't her Anders, it wasn't being disloyal.

Rationalization was lovely when one was in the Fade.

keywords important tbh

[cattymage]

Her Anders would have taken that as that last bit of are-you-sure-are-you-sure needed to basically leap forth and utterly ravish her with his lips and tongue. As if the movement of their skin against one another was the embodiment of their love itself, as passionate an act as it was an emotion.

Just moments after he'd left it, he moved back into Aisling's space, turning into all languid movements. He ran a hand along her jaw, tipping up her face for easier access -- fucker was tall, after all -- the motion started at the back, near a lymph node, and slid softly to the underside of her chin. His hands were softer. Not soft, but softer.

"I've always been more of a fan of show than tell," he says, voice just that bit more husky, even with this version who couldn't go all THAT many sentences without making something sound coy and teasing.

Where hers was passion and fire, 'Nightmare' Anders was a lot more... she couldn't taste his heart in his lips. It was undeniable he was a good kisser, but he wasn't an all-encompassing one. It was a kiss to please, but not a kiss to worship.

In which Aisling tries to bring out her Anders from this one

[avisionofhawke]

Aisling took that as her cue to take charge, reaching up and wrapping her arms around 'Nightmare' Anders' neck and deepening the kiss. She poured her love for her Anders into each movement, each quick breath taken in the moments between the meeting of lips. It wasn't the same - nothing could quite match the real him - but she kept hoping it might evoke something close to what she wished for.

[cattymage]

-- the brush, then, the insistent press of leather-clad arms at the back of his neck, fingers bunching together the fabric over his back as they clasped at his shoulders as if for purchase to save a woman drowning --

The thought suddenly struck him, frightening and clear, this woman truly loves me, like a bolt of lightning striking down on a night where you couldn't see for the mists, I don't even know her, but she is genuinely in love with someone with my face and voice and name.

Oh, Maker, but this was one terrible dream. Her little swift gasps before she dove in on him, again and again, were what sealed it: and here he'd thought kisses were foreplay. This felt like an act in its entirety.

He was the one who broke first, pulling up and back (for what her life-or-death grip allowed him) and just breathing for a while, deep gasps that made his chest rise and fall against hers. He could his heart beating in the base of his throat. He could feel where his lips were getting puffy from all that... all that.

He looked into her eyes, and presently realized they weren't full of cold fire after all - it was hot, hot as could be, with so much heat in it that your nerves looped around to feeling cold as ice.

He was light headed. Dazed. Maker, he was starstruck. No one had ever kissed him like that.

[avisionofhawke]

Hawke held him captive with her gaze, staring into his warm eyes and seeing traces of the same awe her Anders - the real Anders, she reminded herself - always had after they kissed, though-

Was that a trace of fear?

Oh, right, Circles tended to leave that sort of problem...

The rogue slid her fingers gently into his hair, trying to catch her breath as she gave him a smile that managed to be both silly and sultry at once.

[cattymage]

"Think," he breathed. "Think I'm the one who got showed, there."

Oh. Hair pets. Oh right at the base of the scalp too that was -- nice _{and tauntingly familiar, dreamdreamdemonDAMNEDdemon} -- so nice it made his shoulders slump down and his eyes half-close like a lazy, happy cat.

Hey, he remembers something he wanted to do earlier. Remember that indepth description of what he was yearning to do with her hair, earlier? He gently reaches up, arm snaking up between their chests, and starts doing exactly that.

[avisionofhawke]

"I'd say you were," Aisling murmured in response.

Oh-

Anders was doing the thing now - the hair thing she always enjoyed when they had those rare moments that neither of them were busy and they could just sit together and enjoy each other's company and whisper sweet nothings in each other's ear...

Her fingers kept moving absently at the base of his scalp as she let out a soft sound and stood on her tiptoes to kiss him again lightly - quickly - before resuming that entrancing stare.

"Care to try again?"

[cattymage]

He picked a few bits of the detritus that had stuck in her hair out absently before he was subsumed, again, by those eyes. Every time he looked again, they captured him one bit worse.

His fingertips found purchase and stilled on her cheeks, pressing lightly to feel the bone underneath -- the way the body fit together as a whole had always enraptured him in a way that got him uncomfortable, sidelong glances when he dared talk about it. He shouldn't have done that. It made her seem alarmingly real.

He had to say something, remind himself of what this really was.

"Alright. Only because you're my very favorite nightmare."

The second kiss that Anders initiated still wasn't the sort Aisling had come to expect, but it was something far more intimate than the first. This wasn't the kiss of the confident, suave charmer who'd made a damn good attempt at kissing his way through the entirety of Ferelden's Circle of Magi. It was testing, it had an air of fragile trust - of handing someone something delicate and precious. Tender, with a tremulous caution that drove home exactly what Anders had meant, when he told her in the Circle, you don't fall in love. He sucked into softness the little rough patches of cracked skin on her lips, as his hands fell away from her face to rest against the crooks at either side of her neck. It did not deepen with ferocity, or even with teasing languor; it was as a question asked with lips but not voice.

[avisionofhawke]

Hawke's lips answered in kind, conveying a sort of gentleness and relief that words couldn't quite express. It was almost as though that kiss held a promise - I won't hurt you, I won't let anyone else hurt you either - with each sweet, lingering touch.

As they parted this time, Aisling caressed his cheek, the rough leather and comparatively smooth fingertips running across the skin, tracing across the stubble as they went.

[cattymage]

As much as the man loved cats, he could certainly look like an adorable but distraught lost little Mabari puppy sometimes, and that time was definitely now.

Last time he was stunned and breathless. This time is more... it's a distinctly Anders expression, there was no other way of putting it. His eyebrows were doing that little pull in the middle.

[avisionofhawke]

As she usually did when this expression appeared on Anders' face - the real Anders, she reminded herself again - she moved her hand to the top of his cheek, resting it there as her thumb smoothed the area between his eyebrows. It was distinctly meant to be relaxing, reassuring, caring - things Anders hadn't often had, she suspected.

"It's alright," she murmured as their eyes met again. What, exactly, 'it' referred to didn't matter. If it wasn't alright now, she would make it that way... Or wake up. This wasn't real, after all, just a painful, haunting dream.

[cattymage]

"Honestly," he said with a chuckle, and it was like a spell breaking, or the ripping of a delicate pall. He pulled away genuinely this time, the acute vulnerability in his eyes clouding over into a guarded amusement that was rapidly becoming evident to be as thick a shield as that which Aveline carried.

"..If...well, the Fade tends to function in terms of turf. A demon has to linger around to keep its dominion over an area. It should be around here. How do you feel about giving it a few new orifices for me to shove fireballs into?"

[avisionofhawke]

Once the spell was broken, that was that.

"Well, it was nice while it lasted. Alright, let's thoroughly check this place for demons. I intend to make it bleed for tormenting me like this."

Back to her normal smarmy smirk and devil-may-care attitude. And no, there wasn't just a trace of sadness in her expression at the loss of intimacy, because why mourn anything that happens in a dream?

[cattymage]

"Right." At some point in all that making out, he'd dropped his staff. He picked it up with a flourish and spin, and thus, the demon hunt was on.

And it went on.

And on.

And on.

[avisionofhawke]

After they'd finally thrashed their way to the top of the mountain (hours later), Aisling was more than a little frustrated.

"Andraste's nug-humping bastard nephew, that has to be the fifteenth revenant we've killed," she groused as she wiped off her blades. "Fifteen revenants, a few dozen shades, buckets of corpses, and was that a blasted Darkspawn Emissary back there?"

[cattymage]

"I hope it wasn't Andraste's own pet nug he did that to. That would really make those family reunions awkward."

His wrists were tired from all the staff twiddling, he had a growing mana-fatigue headache, and there was absolutely no sign of the stupid demon.

The big ol' jerk.

"Fairly sure it was," he confirmed to Hawke. "Ugh, which means Deep Roads. Maker, please don't let the demon be hiding underground. That's just not sporting."