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“Tethras is an unusual name, isn’t it?” Merrill asked one day over the rowdy chatter of the Hanged Man. There was a tankard the size of her head clutched delicately between her palms and a telling red flush had bloomed its way over her cheeks as she regarded Varric with her wide, curious eyes. Already, she was two pints in, funnelling in the strong stuff on Isabela’s tab. All things considered, she was taking it like a true Marcher.
Across the table, Varric smiled obligingly. “On the surface, sure,” he said easily, tipping his own mug towards her as if to illustrate a point. “But my family’s originally from Orzammar, Daisy. It isn’t as uncommon a name as you’d think it is.”
“Oh, I know, I know, it’s just… you don’t hear the name often, is all,” she replied with a punctuating nod. “Aside from you, of course. And your brother, Creators guide his soul. And whenever you mention your mother. And your entire house. Hm. I suppose it’s not so unusual after all.”
“Don’t worry yourself over all those other hacks,” Varric told her, shaking his head. “Fortunately for you, I’m the only Tethras you’ll ever need to have the pleasure of dealing with.”
“Does it mean anything in particular? Your name?”
“It’s the name of some prince who got the short end of the stick a long time ago,” he explained. “After the dwarves realised how badly they messed up, they started naming each and every heir after him. As if that’d make up for all the shit they made him go through. Eventually, the name carried on until one of them made it to Paragon, and here we are: House Tethras, at your service. Maybe I’ll tell you the story properly one day.”
“Oh, I’d like that.”
“What about you, Daisy?” he continued, happy that she was happy. “Anything interesting about your name?”
“My name isn’t nearly so important, it’s barely worth mentioning,” she admitted. “Nothing quite so exciting as being named for a prince!”
“Careful, Merrill,” Hawke warned as he swooped in from the bar with the next round. The tray balanced precariously between his hands, which he made no effort to steady as he fell heavily into his seat beside Aveline and Varric. “If you start reminding Varric of his princely ancestry, he’ll let it go straight to his head and there’ll be no living with him.”
“I’m sure you have nothing to worry about.”
Merrill giggled and accepted her fresh mug graciously. “Well, what about you then, Hawke?” she asked, eager to keep conversation flowing. “It’s only just occurred to me that I don’t actually know your family name. After all these years, too. Shameful of me, really.”
Hawke, who had passed the drinks around with a boisterous smile and was about to sip his own drink contentedly, blinked and looked at her with the beginnings of a confused chuckle. “I…whatever do you mean, Merrill?”
“Because Amell was your mother’s maiden name, wasn’t it?” she continued, nodding along with her own reasoning. “Isn’t that how it works with humans? Or are you somehow an Amell, too? Oh, well, I’m sure you must be. That’s what it says all over that lovely estate you have in Hightown.”
“Merrill,” Hawke said around his growing grin, far too amused to take any sort of offence. “You realise that Hawke is my family name, don’t you?”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I can see why you hide it. It’s quite unfortunate, really,” she said apologetically, reaching over Aveline to give him a gentle pat on the arm. “Hawke Hawke doesn’t really have much of a ring to it, does it? Did your parents not like you much, then? Or maybe they just really liked birds of prey.”
At the inexplicable notion, Hawke let his smile freeze awkwardly on his face as understood her confusion to be genuine. “Are you…are you being serious?” he asked incredulously. He looked at Varric, who seemed to be just as baffled. “Is she being serious?”
“I… Well, shit, I think she is.”
“Did I miss something?” Merrill said in a panic, wide-eyed and suddenly nervous. “I’ve said something wrong again, haven’t I? Oh, bother, I’ve offended you.”
“No, no, you haven’t offended me, Merrill. I just… Well, I just don’t know how to proceed from here, really,” Hawke admitted. He couldn’t help but let out a bemused chuckle. “I do feel that it’s my duty to tell you that Hawke isn’t actually my given name. It’s just my family name. That’s all. Maker forbid that my parents actually named me Hawke Hawke, that’s just ridiculous.”
Merrill blinked at the admission before letting herself smile agreeably. “You’re joking with me, aren’t you?” she said confidently - a confidence that quickly fell into a worried grimace when Hawke didn’t immediately start pointing his finger at her expense. “Please say you're joking.”
“Do you really not know my name?”
“Oh. Oh my, oh Creators. By the Dread Wolf, I’m so sorry, Hawke. I thought- I mean…oh, I’m a terrible friend, I’m so sorry!”
“Come to think of it, I don't think I’ve ever heard your name either,” Anders pointed out from beside Merrill. The acknowledgement broke her out of her ensuing ramble and she looked gratefully towards him. “It’s one of those things you don’t realise until it’s made clear to you. You’ve always just been Hawke.”
“I’ve always just been… Well, yes, of course. It’s my name, after all,” Hawke announced in disbelief. “My family name. My mother was a Hawke, my father was a Hawke. My sister was too. Carver, of all people, is a Hawke! I didn’t just pop out of the womb naked and fully nameless, you know. My parents didn’t take me tenderly in their arms and decide that ‘infant’ was a good enough title. What did you all think? That I just had enough mystique to get away with having only one name?”
“Absolutely nobody believes you have mystique,” Isabela chimed in, her smile far too wide and her eyes too glassy to be entirely sober.
“I don’t think it’s our fault really,” Anders continued, barely able to keep his grin from stretching into his cup. “You’re the one who introduced yourself as Hawke and then failed to elaborate on that. We all just went with what we know. If you didn’t want to be known by your surname, then why is it the first thing you tell us about yourself?”
“Because…well, I actually don’t know,” Hawke admitted sheepishly. “Aveline started it.”
He looked to his right, where Aveline was staring wide-eyed at her pint as if it were about to grow legs and follow her. “Did I?” she asked. “I don’t seem to recall.”
“Oh yes,” Hawke nodded. “Nobody ever called me by my surname before you, you know. Why would they? I have a perfectly adequate first name, thank you very much. I always assumed it’s because you’re military.”
“Yes. Yes, that’s right,” she said, relieved. “Military. You don’t typically use first names in conversation in the army. Too personal.”
“And yet,” Isabela chimed in, more than happy to fan the flames, “Carver is still Carver, and he was the one Hawke that was actually in the military. How do you explain that one, big girl?”
“And don’t we all call you Aveline?” Merrill agreed thoughtfully. “Unless you’d like us to call you by your surname.”
“They’ve got a point, you know,” Hawke chuckled, tipping his mug towards Aveline. “Rather unfair for Carver.”
“Why are you all trying to gang up on me? If you must know the reason, it’s because I met you first, technically speaking,” Aveline said, packing her arms defensively against her chest. “I couldn’t exactly call you all by your surname, it would be far too confusing. There were four of you at the time. Besides, you’re the elder brother and you were the one who did most of the talking. I suppose it was only natural that I would start to call you by your surname rather than Carver.”
“I suppose,” he agreed slowly, narrowing his eyes, “but now that I really take a moment to think about it, I don’t believe you’ve ever called me by my given name. In fact, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say that you don’t know it at all!”
“Hm, is that so?” Aveline said robotically. She lifted her tankard and took a hearty, loud sip before gesturing it towards the group. “Well, that’s solved that mystery, let’s talk about something else.” She looked pleadingly across the table. “Isabela. You’ve, ah, certainly got knickers on today. Good for you. Making progress. Soon you’ll be an upstanding citizen of Kirkwall, I’d wager.”
Isabela, who was not, in fact, wearing knickers, grinned wickedly and leaned forward as if to insert herself fully into the unfolding chaos. “Oh, this should be fun,” she said.
Aveline went an interesting shade of puce, the type of flush that began at her ears and flooded downwards until her entire neck was burning. She resolutely fixed her gaze on Isabela, half-pleading, half-resigned to whatever fate was in store for her. Beside her, Hawke looked on in growing, bemused disbelief.
“Aveline,” he said. “Sweet, dear Aveline. You do know my name, don’t you?”
“...”
“Aveline?”
“Well…”
“Aveline!”
“Okay, fine. I admit it,” she announced. She snapped her chin up high as if she were about to defy her former Guard-Captain all over again, proud and defiant in the face of hardship. With a resolute gaze, she installed direct eye-contact with Hawke, the way she always did whenever she had a point to prove and she knew he was going to put up a fight. “No, I don’t know your name, Hawke, but I refuse to take fault in that.”
“You what? But I’ve known you longer than anyone here!” Hawke exclaimed, sweeping his hand to gesture towards the rest of the table. Isabela choked on her own laughter and fell into Fenris’ side as he angled his wrist in their direction. “Seven whole years of friendship, Aveline! I introduced myself to you - my name in its entirety at that! Has our entire friendship been based on a lie?”
“Not a lie. More of a…misconception,” she urged. “We were fleeing the Darkspawn when we met! It all happened so quickly. Wesley was hurt, your brother was being, well, your brother, and then poor Bethany had her run in with the ogre. I was just trying to keep it all together. I admit that I didn’t quite catch your name, and I didn’t bother asking again because I thought that it was just going to be a temporary alliance between warrior and apostate against the Darkspawn. How was I supposed to know that we’d actually become lasting friends? By the time we got to the boat, it was far too late to ask!”
“You literally could have just said, ‘I’m sorry, in all the chaos I didn’t get your name. Please could you tell me again?’ Was that really such a difficult thing to say?”
Aveline groaned and palmed her face, the shame setting into her shoulders. “I was embarrassed. I always assumed that at some point someone would say your name and then I’d be in the clear, but nobody ever did! It was like they were all playing a cruel joke on me,” she asserted. “Carver always called you ‘brother’, Leandra only ever referred to you as ‘sweetheart’, and Gamlen continues to call you ‘boy’! Eventually, we got too far into our friendship for me to admit to such a thing and by then everyone else had started calling you Hawke too!”
“Oh Aveline. I’m disappointed in you,” Hawke said mournfully, holding a dramatic fist over his heart. “Shocked, appalled, heartbroken, betrayed.”
“Well, out with it then,” Isabela grinned, nearly biting her lip to stop herself from falling over her laughter again, “what is your name?”
This time, it was Anders who choked on his drink and Merrill ducked her head completely behind her tankard in a fit of giggles as Hawke whipped his head around to meet Isabela’s mirthful gaze. “You too, Isabela?”
“I just assumed you were an Amell,” she managed to get out, shaking Fenris’ shoulder as if his solid presence would stop her from breaking down there and then. “Isn’t that what everyone was always saying? That the Amells are finally back in their ancestral home, or whatever?”
“Oh, piss off.”
“I always thought that Hawke Amell sounded a bit sexy, don’t you think?”
“It still could be his name,” Anders pointed out. “Hawke is nothing if not mischievous at the best of times. This could all just be an elaborate lie that he’ll laugh about later.”
“Maker’s breath, you just can’t find good company these days,” Hawke muttered in disbelief. He flapped his hand over the table at Fenris, looking at him pleadingly. “Fenris. Fenris, love of my life, light of my day, stars in my eyes. You know my name, don’t you?”
Fenris, who had been keeping out of the conversation in favour of sipping his mug, shrugged. “It has never come up.”
“You dirty little traitor!” Hawke exclaimed as Isabela collapsed over her drink. “Oh, that hurts, Fenris. I’m hurt. You see me naked on a regular basis, how do you not know my name?” Fenris shrugged again and offered him a placating smile, but made no other comment to ease all the dramatics. Hawke threw his hands up with a groan. “Everything I’ve ever loved has been a lie. I’ve known you all for at least six years, I’ve been at your beck and call for whatever any of you may need, and this is how you repay me?”
“Wait, wait,” Isabela gasped out through her tears. She pressed herself bodily up against Fenris’ shoulder, looking up at him with brimming eyes and a quivering lip. “You call him by his surname in bed?”
“As opposed to what?” Fenris responded, but received no reply from her as she was too busy sinking down her seat to cry with undeserved laughter.
“My actual name would be nice once in a while,” Hawke grumbled in her place, “but that’s apparently too much to ask for.”
“There’s no point in getting all high and mighty when you’re just as bad as us, Hawke,” Aveline tried. “I bet you don’t know Fenris’ family name.”
“That’s hardly fair. Fenris doesn’t even know his family name.”
“Ah. Well. Bad example, that.”
“What about mine, then?” asked Anders. “If all of this is so important to you, then you will of course know my family name. Isn’t that right?”
“Of course I know it,” Hawke snapped. Then, he faltered. “It’s…it’s Anders…Ander…man.”
“Anders Anderman. Wow. You didn’t even try there, did you?”
“You have no room to judge me, Anderman, you don’t even know my first name, which is far more important for a group of lifelong friends that have known each other for at least six entire years. You all know as well as I do that a surname is not the same as a given name, and frankly, I am aghast that not one of you seems to know who I am.”
“I know who you are,” Varric said, dutifully raising his palm.
“Ah, good. At least I have one true friend in this cesspool of treachery.”
“Oh, pish,” Isabela chided, her voice still overflowing as she righted herself in her seat. “You call him Hawke like we all do.”
“Yes, and it’s because you all call him Hawke that I do too,” Varric responded safely, raising one of his empty mugs when he spotted the barmaid making her rounds nearby. “Just following the lead of the majority. Keeping it all consistent. If I called him by his first name, then that’ll just cause undue confusion with the group dynamic, and we can’t have that, now can we?”
Merrill cocked her head, looking aptly apologetic for starting the whole ordeal, but was equally unable to remove the giggle from her voice or the amusement playing in her eyes. “How come you know his name when nobody else does?” she asked over Hawke’s petulant groan.
“It’s this rare dwarven custom, not many people know of it,” Varric grinned. He leaned forward conspiratorially, prompting Merrill to do the same, before continuing in a loud, stage whisper, “You see, when Hawke and I met all those years ago, I went up to him, looked him dead in the eye, and I simply asked him. It’s a difficult concept to grasp, I know.”
“Must have craned your neck to look up that high,” Merrill mused. “My people just tell you their names when there are to be introductions. Less faff that way, I think.”
“I bet the Seneschal knows my name,” Hawke muttered as Norah swept by them to clear away all their empties. “I bet Meredith knows my name. I bet Knight-Captain Cullen knows my name.”
Aveline rolled her eyes and graciously gathered up a tray of empty mugs to slide over to Norah, who was struggling to work around Hawke’s dramatics. “You’re taking this far too seriously,” she said.
“The Arishok, you know, the fellow I valiantly duelled to the death? The large Qunari I fought and killed all by myself to become the Champion of Kirkwall? The one who named me basalit-an before all of his people because he respected me that much? I bet he knew my name,” he continued unconcernedly. He turned towards Norah as she gave his area a cursory wipe with a rag and he batted his eyes at her. “Norah, you know my name, don’t you?”
“Everyone around here knows your name, Hawke,” she nodded agreeably, offering him a friendly smile as she retrieved her tray and took off with the last of their empties.
He watched her leave with a dejected sigh, looking all too like a child waiting for his father to return from the war. “She called me Hawke,” he said achingly, dropping his forehead down to the table.
“Everyone calls you Hawke.”
“Yes, but was it an ‘everyone calls you Hawke’ Hawke, or an ‘I don’t know your name’ Hawke?” he pouted, rolling his head to the side. “Because I seem to get those two mixed up quite a lot.”
“I apologise, Hawke, I really do,” Aveline said gently, patting him on the shoulder, “but I can’t say that I’m not relieved that it’s finally all out in the open. After all these years of just calling you Hawke, I’ll finally be able to find out what your name actually is. It’s rather liberating, I must say.”
Varric chuckled, shaking his head at the ridiculousness of it all. “You’re all terrible people, really,” he said. “His name is G-”
“Oh no, absolutely not,” Hawke interrupted, obnoxiously leaning over him in an effort to shut him up. Varric floundered a little, mostly to save his pint from falling prey to the sudden shift, before rearranging himself to better support the bulk of Hawke’s weight. “You don’t deserve to know my name now, Aveline. None of you do.”
“Oh, Maker’s breath, Hawke, I apologised. Just tell me your name.”
“I shan’t,” he said. “Varric, as my closest friend, you are hereby sworn to secrecy.”
“My lips are sealed.”
“From here onwards, you will address me simply as Hawke the Betrayed, or, if you’d rather, Hawke the Friendless. You’re all sacked. Aside from Varric, who I am incidentally going to name the sole benefactor in my will.”
“Well, now you’re just being ridiculous,” Avenline exclaimed.
“Carver will, of course, receive a small stipend at Varric’s discretion. Let it not be said that I do not take care of my family,” Hawke continued. “He has, after all, known my name his whole life. Amazing what a little time can do between people who know each other. Families are found, bonds are forged, names are known. Amazing.”
“You’re doing this on purpose, aren’t you?”
“Of course I am. You know me, Aveline, I live to be a thorn in your side, especially when I have good reason to be,” he said with a haughty nod. “Oh, and notice how I used your name in conversation. Because I know it.”
“I will never hear the end of this.”
“No you will not,” he said. “And rightly so.”
Aveline shook her head in resignation and turned her sights elsewhere. “What about you, Fenris?” she asked, almost hopefully. “He’s going to hold this over your head, too. Can’t you convince him to be reasonable?”
“Hawke being reasonable? Surely you’re joking.”
“Oh please, it wouldn’t even take you five minutes to find out Hawke’s name and then you wouldn’t even bother to share it with the rest of us,” Isabela grinned, having mostly recovered from the giggles. She addressed everyone else knowingly, “Fenris will need only bat his pretty eyes at Hawke and the name will come stumbling out of him.”
“It’s true. I’m a weak man,” said Hawke. He looked at Fenris, his grin melting into a sappy smile. “Why don’t you bat your pretty eyes at me more often?”
“He does,” Merrill noted. “Usually when your back is turned, though. It’s very adorable.”
Fenris sneered at her, but his heart didn’t seem to be in it. “Keep your observations to yourself, witch.”
Merrill tittered, pleased, and Aveline let out a long-suffering sigh. “Alright, Hawke,” she said. “I’ll let you have your fun for now, but now that this is all out in the open, it’s only a matter of time before you finally let it slip. You know it’s a secret now and everyone knows that you can’t keep a secret for long.”
“I managed to spend my entire life hiding from the Templars,” Hawke argued. “I think I can keep my own name under wraps for a little while longer.”
“Yes, but you did a piss poor job at hiding from the Templars when you think about it,” Isabela pointed out. “You’re hardly subtle when it comes to your magic, you know. At this point, the Templars only tolerate you being an apostate because they know how much trouble you’ll be if they try to bring you in.”
“I at least fooled Cullen.”
“At first, perhaps,” Fenris noted. “Face it, Hawke, you are incapable of keeping a secret like this for long. I’d wager that everyone will know your name by the end of the week.” He thought for a moment before amending, “Maybe two weeks for Aveline.”
“I should have let it slide,” Aveline said to herself, swirling her ale grudgingly. “I should have just pretended I knew it, but no, I had to admit that I didn’t. Now look where that’s got me.” She shook her head again as if to berate herself. “Alright, to make it up to you, I’ll pay off your tab this month. I won’t ask you to tell me your name, because I know you’re going to hold this over me for as long as possible, but when I find out - and I will find out - you have to congratulate me accordingly and behave yourself for at least a week.”
“That’s assuming I ever let you find out.”
“Oh, I have my ways, Hawke.”
“She says, having not known his name for seven full years,” Varric said.
“And on that note, I’m going home,” she said, deliberately ignoring Varric entirely. “I suggest you all do the same. It’s far too late to stay up any longer and I know for a fact that you all have things to do tomorrow. Especially you, Hawke. You’ve got that meeting with the Grand Enchanter in the Gallows tomorrow morning. Do try not to be late. It sets a bad precedent and somehow I’m the one who gets it in the neck.”
“Yes, mother,” Hawke drawled, raising his mug in farewell. “Have a safe journey back, etcetera, etcetera. Don’t get up to too much mischief without us.”
Aveline offered a grudgingly fond wave as she headed out, but her voice carried through the dwindling patrons of the pub as she brazenly asked Corff for the name Hawke was listed under for his tab. Her curse carried too when it turned out he had gotten into the habit of only using his surname for everything.
“Serves her right,” Hawke muttered and he downed the rest of his pint.
As was their collective custom, the moment one of them called it a night, the evening began to taper out. With Aveline’s departure beaconing the end of their weekly get together, the tap of ale quickly ran dry and along with it went any sort of coherent conversation from the remaining ladies. Merrill, as eager as she was to keep pace with the others, had never been any good at holding her liquor, while Isabela took it as a personal challenge to try and best her own record with each passing week.
With Merrill swaying in her chair and Isabela face down on the table, Anders at least had the foresight to pace himself. That, and he was the only one with the good sense to keep a steady basket of bread rolls on the table, stale though they were. Hawke suspected that Justice had a hand at keeping him on the pleasantly tipsy side of things, rather than the blackout drunk that everyone else tended to veer towards, but he had no proof on the matter and Anders would always deny it.
Varric, as always, looked perfectly sober after last orders were called. If Hawke didn’t know any better, he would have believed that he had been drinking water all night, but that certainly wasn’t the case. Varric was a dwarf who was three sheets to the wind but did so well at disguising it that it was impossible to tell unless you were his very best friend. Sure, he smiled the same smile and talked the same talk, but Varric had a rather particular tell when he was drunk, and that was the way he would blink rapidly at the oddest times as if to reorient his vision.
Which left Fenris, who in the recent months had taken to matching Hawke’s drinks to keep them on relatively the same page throughout the night. He could hold his liquor better than all of them, but made up for it by insisting on suffering through the hard stuff that felt like raw acid going down your throat. A step up from the standard piss the Hanged Man was famous for, he always claimed, but Hawke wasn’t inclined to trust him on that one.
Hawke himself was annoyingly not as drunk as he wanted to be. Though nicely buzzed, the whole debacle about his name had given him the perfect opportunity to be dramatic and get under Aveline’s skin, at the cost of forgetting to drink what was in front of him. Fortunately, it seemed that Isabela, ever the opportunist, had managed to commandeer what remained of his drinks before they were cleared away.
“Come along, Isabela, it’s time for bed,” he said, walking around the table to rouse her. She was face down in a spillage of beer, her lips pushed up at an awkward angle and one of her hands still curled around her tankard.
“Only if you join me,” she mumbled into the table.
“Perhaps next time,” Fenris said, unwrapping her fingers from her mug. He peered into it and, after a moment’s debate, finished off whatever was left.
“She’s going to have fun tomorrow morning,” Anders noted with an easy smile. He offered his arm to Merrill, who beamed brightly and took it without making the effort to actually stand. It had become commonplace for him to walk her back to the Alienage on their nights out. Not out of the goodness of his heart, of course, but rather out of fear for what a drunken blood mage may accidentally inflict upon the city. It was a headache nobody wanted to deal with, and so Anders had offered himself up as chaperone.
“She’ll be fine,” Merrill slurred, letting out a light whoop when Anders pulled her up. “She’s always fine. Isn’t she fine, Hawke?”
Hawke grinned at her. “That she is,” he agreed.
“You’re going to have fun, too,” Anders told Merrill, rolling his eyes a little. “Alright, we’re off. You three don’t look too bad, but don’t forget to drink plenty of water. Get some food down you, too.” His eyes found Fenris, who automatically sneered. “Hm. Actually, you can forgo the water. Maybe a hangover will make you more palatable.”
“Away with you, mage.”
“Yes, yes. See you all tomorrow. Come along, Merrill. Let’s get you to bed.”
Her response of ‘But I don’t want to go to bed’ followed them out of the tavern and Hawke watched them go with a fond smile. He turned to Varric and gestured at Isabela. “Do you want help with this, or shall we just leave her there to think about her life choices?”
“You think about your life choices,” Isabela muttered sleepily.
Varric, who was blinking up a storm because he was drunk, shook his head. “I’m sure I’ll manage to corral Rivaini back to her room one way or another,” he said. “Not like it’s the first time and it certainly won’t be the last.” He allowed himself a chuckle before eyeing Hawke. “We’ve all been joking about it, but are you alright? I can’t imagine it’s fun finding out that nobody actually knows your name.”
Hawke shrugged. “I suppose stranger things have happened,” he said. “Though I am going to track down Sebastian tomorrow and have him preach the importance of friendship and devotion in the eyes of the Maker.”
“Unless he also does not know your name,” Fenris said distractedly. Isabela had latched onto his belt without even deigning to lift her head off the table and he was carefully trying to pull her fingers out.
“I’m not terribly hurt by it. Just mark it down as another one of Kirkwall’s many, many abnormalities,” Hawke continued. “I’m sure everyone will find out eventually and we’ll have a good laugh about it. Until then, I think I’ll make a newsletter and pass it around the City Guard to hold it over Aveline’s head for a little while. That’ll teach the bugger for not knowing my name after seven years.”
“Well, alright, if you’re sure.”
“Honestly, Varric, I’m fine,” he smiled, regardless of Varric’s unimpressed stare. “If I’m being entirely truthful, I’d find it perfectly odd if people started calling me by my first name after all these years. I’ve been just Hawke for so long. Another thing to blame dear Aveline for. She’s ruined me for my own name.”
“Heh, I’m sure you’ll get over it,” Varric said. “You think you’ll be alright heading back to Hightown? You and the elf may not have drank as much as the others, but being tipsy doesn’t exactly put you in the best state to defend yourself against anyone stupid enough to try and rob you. You’re always welcome to stay here for the night.”
“A sleepover? How fun. Would you rather be the big spoon or the little spoon?”
“On second thoughts, have a safe trip home.”
“We’ll be fine, Varric,” Hawke chuckled, making a point to bump Fenris’ hip with his own. “Worry about yourself. I know a drunk dwarf when I see one.”
“Oh, so we’re resorting to slander now?” Varric said. He waved his hand dismissively and dragged himself over to Isabela. “Go home, get some rest and don’t wake me up for anything until after midday. Bianca needs her beauty sleep.”
“Go home, have some wild sex, wake you up at nine o’clock on the dot. Got it.”
Fenris had already snuck out by the time Hawke managed to wrangle out his goodbyes, as he always did when the evening drew to a close. He was waiting by a blockage of barrels, arms crossed and eyes narrowed as if the suspicious discolouration on the wall across from him had done him personal harm. He perked up a little at the sight of Hawke returning, but didn’t wait for him to join before he started heading back to Hightown.
Hawke caught up with him easily enough, grinning from ear to ear as he fell into step beside him. “You know that I’m going to hold this whole evening over your head for the rest of our lives, don’t you?” he pointed out.
“Is that so?”
“Naturally. You want me to do the dishes? Well, you don’t know my name, so you can do the dishes. Oh dear, has the dog vomited on the carpet again? You continue not to know my name, you clean it up. My, my, you want to spend the night curled up comfortably in my arms because it’s cold and I happen to radiate heat like the fire pit I was always meant to be? Well, yes, of course we can do that, I’d be delighted to, but you don’t know my name, so you have to be the big spoon.”
“That last one seems a little mild.”
“We all know how much you like being the little spoon, Fenris. It’s perhaps the most cruel punishment I could ever inflict upon you, one lover to another. I’ll wear you like a backpack through the night.”
“Such a hardship,” Fenris said, not even gracing him with an amused glance, the little traitor. He began to scale the steps into Hightown, stopping only when Hawke hesitated mid-way up the stairs. “Hawke?”
“After all this time, do you truly not know my name?” he asked casually. Or rather, he had been aiming for casual. Nothing could phase Hawke, everyone and their mother’s knew that. It was as blatant as the magic he pretended was well hidden. And yet, something must have tipped Fenris off to his uncertainty. A catch in his voice, perhaps, or the way his smile didn’t crinkle his eyes all the way to the jovial crescents everyone was used to.
Fenris let out a soft huff and shook his head with the barest hint of a fond smile. “You think too little of me, Garrett,” he said.
Hawke paused. He blinked. He broke out into a grin far more befitting of the lighthearted Champion. “Oh, you cheeky little-” he exclaimed far too loudly in the silence of the evening. “Did Varric tell you?”
Crisis averted, Fenris shrugged one shoulder and resumed his walk upstairs. “Just because it hasn’t come up in conversation before does not mean I never knew it,” he pointed out. “After we met, I was hardly going to put my trust in the hands of a strange mage I knew nothing about, so I did my research. “
“That…makes a lot of sense, actually,” Hawke nodded, taking two steps at a time to fall back into place with him. “Then why did you make it sound like you didn’t know?”
“I was teasing you.”
“You vile, horrible, beautiful elf. You’re lucky I love you or I would be throwing you down these stairs.”
“I’d like to see you try.”
“I think I could get a good tackle in before you send me on my arse,” Hawke decided. He reached out to take his hand, offering a cheeky grin when Fenris shot him a look. But the gesture was not rejected. Fenris wasn’t usually the type to enjoy such displays in public, especially when it was an affection that removed his means of defence, but the liquor must have hit him harder than suspected, because he curled his fingers around Hawke’s with a contented grunt.
Happily, Hawke continued, “Surely you and I are beyond the point of family names by now, don’t you think? Why do you continue to call me Hawke if you’ve always known my name is Garrett?”
“For the same reason the dwarf does, I suppose. Everyone else does and it suits you,” Fenris admitted, locking their arms in place when Hawke tried to swing them. “If it makes you feel better, I believe Isabela was also teasing. She’s referred to you by name in conversation before. Conversation with you, no less. The others…I am unsure. You do always introduce yourself as Hawke, after all.”
“So the moral of the story is that I simply don’t give out enough information when I meet people. Duly noted.” He lolled his head lazily towards Fenris, the ale in his belly keeping him warm, but the company keeping him warmer. “Will you, at least, call me Garrett from now on?”
“Perhaps in private,” Fenris said.
“Marvellous,” Hawke grinned. “Though I hope you know that I do plan to tease Aveline relentlessly about this. I just need to decide on a name ridiculous enough for her to believe, then perhaps we can get another seven years of stupid out of her. I’m going to be insufferable about it all.”
His sincerity startled a short laugh from Fenris, who tightened his grip on Hawke’s hand and allowed him at least one swing of their arms beneath the shadow of Hightown’s entryway. “Hm,” he hummed, glancing at Hawke with a secret affection nobody else would ever be privy to, “I wouldn't have you any other way, Garrett.“