Chapter Text
He’s been wandering the Fade long enough that he’s really starting to wonder how many demons Merrill is going to have pissed off (or how many spirits Merrill was trying to talk to that Fenris or Anders subsequently pissed off into being demons) by the time he sees anyone again. And…damn, if it doesn’t ache in these quiet moments that he just assumes that his friends are coming. As if they could even hold it together long enough to keep one fucking city in a single piece let alone break into the Fade.
At least the Inquisitor sealing the rift at Adamant flung (the?) Nightmare (was the article part of its name? Varric would have known.) into a different far reaches of the Fade than he’d ended up.
Not that this one is totally lacking of demons or spirits - though he’s never seen the ones he’s nicknamed ‘Builders’ before, even in Kirkwall .
They…unnerve him.
Their tendency to stalk and cannibalize other residents of the Fade for parts is just…it reminds him way too much of home and all the things that make him feel completely okay with Kirkwall being on fire (inevitably, again ).
Still things have felt too quiet.
A sickly feeling in the air that tastes like those last days in Lothering haunts every dust-filled step through the Fade today, or since he gave up resting this time anyways - time is…weird. Sometimes he feels like Adamant was yesterday, other times he tries to count how many sleeps it's been and it adds to hundreds of years. It’s easier not to think about it and to ask Justice or Merrill about it once they’re all back safely ensconced playing Wicked Grace in Varric’s room at the Hanged Man.
Wait - no, the New Hanged Man doesn’t have that private room, because Varric took to living in the mansion with him after -
“SHRIEK-HISS ”
Garrett Hawke stops abruptly. Because he has never heard a noise like that. And that usually means he’s stumbled into the lair of some new and unique demon that he’d have been happier never knowing about and will definitely inflict the knowledge of on Varric as soon as he’s home.
His staff is battered - barely holding together under the weight of the repairs he’s had to make to it - but it’s easier to fight with it than without it still - at least if he doesn’t want to dip into skills that Merrill helped him pick up, the ones he’ll happily continue to pretend not to have around the Inquisition.
“ hssss ” That’s a Despair demon.
“SWRRRAK!”
He rounds one of the floating fade rocks, grimacing as his foot squelches in something that belongs in Darktown. (Or below it. Ugh.) The ick - for lack of a better word - stinks like an ogre’s armpit.
And - Maker’s Mother of Mercy - “That’s a griffon!”
It’s itty-bitty. The size of a small mabari, really, grey with brown stripes like a merlin with his ears pressed back and wings flared up to try and make himself look bigger as it tries to intimidate Despair into backing the fuck off.
The fire spell Hawke launches at the demon does a better job.
The griffon eyes him with open suspicion as he approaches, shifting to try and protect whatever that lump of brown and blue and red and silver behind it is. And then the lump groans -
“Oh, shit - hey, hey,” Hawke drops the staff and holds his hands up as he inches forward, wishing he still had the dog treats he usually carried. But he fed those to some wisps that had followed him around for a while and been kind enough to warn him against falling into a weird blackened valley that had smelled of death and ash and bone.
The griffon rumbles low in its chest like one of the strays Anders always insisted on stopping to help even though it usually ended up with the lot of them clawed to hell and back. (Except Fenris. The rangy, pissy, stray cats of Kirkwall always seemed inordinately fond of him.)
He really hopes the mabari comparison isn’t just about size because the griffon’s claws are much, much longer than a cat’s. Hopefully it’s smart enough to understand he’s not a threat.
“I can help, okay? I can heal,” he pitches his tone soothing as he can while he inches closer to the dying Warden.
(How long had they been here - are they even real or just spirits copying an echo? Then again, Carver’s letters had confirmed that Anders wasn’t bullshitting about how much some Wardens end up falling into the Fade - and maybe that curse is only particular to the sorts like the Hero of Ferelden but it’s not as if he hasn’t made semi-friends with a spirit before. He likes Justice well enough when he’s not being a dick to people - including Anders - who don’t actually have any ability to change how shit is -)
Slowly the griffon steps aside, letting him kneel next to the elf, pushing his head into the man’s still hand and whimpering softly. He’s Dalish - probably a Marcher clan since the designs aren’t ones Hawke recognizes right away from Sabrae - and in rough shape. Multiple stab wounds like someone ran him through with a dull branch.
Still it’s easier than having to heal his own guts and fight the Arishok at the same time, so Hawke dumps the last of his Life Ward potions down the guy’s throat and gets to work.
He sits back to inspect his work, weary and hoping that the healing Anders taught him is enough, it looks like it is, but internal shit was never -
The griffon tackling him out of the way is the only warning he gets to the explosion of purple energy crackling across the Fadescape. And then all three of them hit the ground hard . Harder than he’s landed in a while.
Gravity functioning like it’s supposed to, he notes dimly as he blinks the spots from his vision while glaring at the sky…
The sky . A sky without that fucking creepy ass city hanging in it.
The griffon is on his feet first shoving his head under Hawke’s shoulder and forcing him to move before hurrying to the elf who seems to have stayed mercifully unconscious for their expulsion from the Fade.
Hawke sits up to see the crumbling corpses of Darkspawn and Qunari - that’s antaam armor, but why are the Qunari dressed for war ? - but there doesn’t seem to be an immediate danger right now so he limps back over to the elf and makes sure his healing stuck after that fall.
With that done he takes a better stock of their surroundings.
Mostly destroyed elven ruins, the hum of magic (“Maker, Hawke, how do you always find the weird shit?”), black-scorched glass that probably used to be sand before whatever knocked them head over arse from the Fade happened.
“Any idea where we are, darling?” he asks the griffon who squawks conversationally at him.
Hawke grins despite himself and hauls his battered body back to his feet. “Okay, let’s get your Daddy into some shelter. Think you can find me somewhere without any Darkspawn?”
The griffon perks up at that and - well, apparently he understands because it’s not long before he’s swooping and chattering at Hawke and leading him to a cave-like overhang in the scorched rocks that will provide shelter from the elements without being deep enough for any Spawn to sneak up on them.
“Good job, darling,” he praises, scratching behind feathery ears like he would the family dog. (The one that he left with Donnic to help watch over baby Wesley before leaving Kirkwall to stash Anders with his former Commander in Amaranthine - because if anyone would fist-fight the Divine to protect Anders and Justice it was going to be the Warden that told Weisshaupt to go fuck themselves after their orders had led the pair to go on the run and help Alistair run down leads on the Red Lyrium while Varric and Aveline held the fort down in Kirkwall.)
He pauses, studying their surroundings, “Did the sky always used to be that color?”
The griffon seems to chirp in the negative so Hawke files that into the part of his mind that conveniently sounds like Varric when he’s bitching about being in the Deep Roads (again).
He can smell salt water nearby so they won’t be hurting for food. The level of magic that had happened is the sort that stuns fish and turns around all sorts of sea life. He’ll be able to find something edible on the beach, at least more edible than what he’s been eating - fresh water is going to be slightly more pressing…
Still, he doesn’t want to leave the Warden to wake alone.
He’ll wait until morning - with luck the elf will be awake enough for him to explain things and then he can go find some supplies to keep them alive long enough to figure out where (“And when, Hawke.”) they are.
The griffon - and it has to be a baby, it’s too small to be anything else - settles down next to its Warden and seems to fall asleep with its head resting on the slow rise and fall of his chest.
Hawke sighs and settles back against the rock to watch over them - he’s still not sure how real any of this is, it could just be another Fade illusion, but he’s talked it over enough times with Anders and Merrill. There’s no reason to ignore suffering just because it’s spirits instead, if they try to harm him or others he’ll be worried then, hardly be the first ambush he’s fought his way out of. (Hey, even the Inquisitor agrees if that Cole kid is anything to go by.)
There are lots of things he’ll need to think about - but…not until he gets this Warden safe. Not until the griffon is home and snuggled by whatever hearth is there. (He’s definitely not goig to think about how Varric is going to kill him - he was supposed to be right behind. He was supposed to always be there when his charming dwarf turned and - well, he sent Alistair back to his lady, sent the Inquisitor back to save the world from the nightmare he accidentally released while scrambling to protect his family again .)
“Ugh - I feel like Taash hit me again,” the elf groans, starting to stir. “Boy, you’re gonna have to let me up.”