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"Hurry up and deal, Big Girl," said Isabela, popping her neck and taking another swallow of her ale. "I know those man hands of yours can shuffle faster than that."
Aveline glared at her. "Shut up, whore." She flattened the cards between her fingers. "Why do you always say things like that? Why is it always me? You never pick on Hawke for being mannish, and she's the one with the sodding boy's name!"
"Aveline dear," said Hawke, putting her mug down. "I don't care that I'm mannish. Bela only pokes where it will make you squirm."
She shot Isabela a filthy smirk, and Isabela smirked back, sliding a hand up the Hawke's thigh just far enough to prove her point for her before the mercenary elbowed her away. "Why waste a good poke? But be fair, Hawke, you are awfully... magnetic."
Hawke laughed, and raised one hand, ticking off her fingers as she spoke. "My nose looked like someone lodged an axe blade in my face even before it got broken and healed wrong on that job for Athenril a few years back. I've got this scar on the corner of my lip that makes all my facial expressions permanently lopsided. My ears stick out and one's missing half its tip. My jaw could cut any glass my nose missed. My hair is actually pretty nice, but I'd have to actually do something besides carelessly yank it back behind my head for anyone to notice. And oh yeah," and her voice turned a shade of sincerely bothered, though she hid it well, "I'm a quarter Chasind and look it, from eye shape to skin tone to a too-wide mouth, which does not impress back in Ferelden, let me tell you." She sighed theatrically, the aforementioned lopsided grin ruining the effect. "Face it Bela, you just have bad taste."
"Nonsense," said Isabela. "The whole broad angular Chasind thing makes you look stern and regal, big sharp nose and all, and the scar adds some needed character, because honestly Hawke, 'stern' really isn't you. Your smile is gorgeous and if your mouth were any smaller it wouldn't be able to keep up. Your eyes could kill a man at a dozen paces, and you've got shoulders I could build a house on."
"You could build a house on Aveline's shoulders too," pointed out Fenris reasonably, though he was smirking behind his cards.
"Yes, but Aveline seems to think that's a bad thing," sighed Hawke, shaking her head and picking up her cards to examine her hand.
"Is it so awful to want to be beautiful?" demanded Aveline, aggravated. Isabela cocked her head curiously and started counting the mugs next to the guard captain. "Have you ever actually looked at a statue of Andraste? Most beautiful woman in the world, they say, and what does she look like? Fine features. Bright hair. Porcelain sodding skin. Slender, willowy arms," Aveline finished, sounding half wistful and half plainly disgusted.
Hawke laughed outright and nearly choked on her ale. "If Andraste had arms like you see on her statues, Aveline, they'd have snapped in half the first time she tried to heft a sword. I guarantee you the Prophet looked a hell of a lot more like you and me with her armor off than she did some elegant pampered lady."
"Oh? And what does that matter when the statue's what every man in Thedas sees?"
Hawke peered at her. "Wesley obviously thought you were a dish, and so does Donnic. I'm uglier than you by any normal standard and I get the best damn sex in the Free Marches on a regular--"
"Nightly," interrupted Isabela helpfully.
"-- nightly basis from the hottest woman I've ever met. I'm pretty sure that means more about what's 'beautiful' than any hokey statue."
"That's easy for you to say," argued Aveline. "You're... you! You can't walk out your door without people falling at your feet begging for approval. I can't be like that, I don't know how."
Isabela offered her best friendly smile. "Well, then, I'll just keep calling you Lady Man-Hands until you don't have a choice."
Hawke snickered and Aveline rolled her eyes with a heavy sigh.
"I don't even know why I put up with you two," she groused.
But behind her cards, Isabela could see her fighting a smile.