romdeau | a fishing date;

"As a matter of fact it is. If I haven't been struck by lightning, burned nearly to a crisp, frozen in my armor, or crushed like a bug, it's a very fine day." He chuffed a soft laugh for the tease.

"Good." He wasn't in a hurry to move. He liked the feel of her across his lap, her soft warmth resting against him. He was surprised at how easily the familiarity came. Touching others wasn't always something he could allow himself to do, not so stripped of external defenses.

He watched her, his breath catching and holding. He realized his mouth was open and shut it, swallowing once. If he wasn't so spent, he knew that alone would have been enough to have him going again. "You're something else," he said softly.

"I'm not entirely certain that's a low standard or if you're just the optimistic sort." She grinned. "But then, that's my typical Tuesday. Lightning, fire, potentially knocked over the head...so, I can relate to that much."

Hawke's gaze flitted to his and she smiled around his finger. She was sorely tempted to continue, just to see the surprise in his eyes, but she relented so she could sit back and look at him.

"You say that as if you hadn't done something similar." Her smile, though sly, was more than pleased. Cat that caught the proverbial canary, even.

"A Templar an optimist? Perish the thought!" He laughed easily. "I'm pretty sure there's a clause against that somewhere in the recruitment folder."

He felt heat come to his cheeks. Only by force of effort was he able to hold her gaze. He was much easier to fluster when he wasn't in the thick of arousal. "I, uh...you know, there is nothing in the world I could say right now that won't sound ridiculously awkward about that, so..." He was still grinning, finally having to look up and off to the side.

He cleared his throat. "If we were in an inn somewhere, I wouldn't be proposing this, but I think it might be a good idea to get dressed. I'm a little...worried...sitting out here in the open like this now that I have half a brain to think with again." The look he gave her was a little chagrined, a little admiring. "You're alarmingly good at distracting me."

"Breaking the rules? Why, Knight-Captain, I never would have thought." Never mind that there was no official rule about bedding the city's hired help. "Is that why they have you standing around in the Gallows all day in the sun?"

Hawke held his gaze and kept her smile in place, thoroughly enjoying how flustered he was for the moment. Just the same, she nodded in agreement. "Probably for the best. We've made it this far with surprising luck." Which only said they were due for something to ruin it.

With some measure of reluctance, she pulled herself out of his lap and stood, immediately regretting it when her legs locked up. Frowning, she stretched upwards on her toes to even out the muscles. "I'm taking that as a compliment, though," she said with an easy smile as she bent to retrieve her small clothes and the band for her chest.

"I hide my tendencies very well," he said. "Sadly, you've figured it out. I'm on permanent punishment for my sunny disposition." It was difficult to say all of that with a completely straight face. While he might give himself "amiable" on a good day, "sunny" was taking it way too far.

"You probably shouldn't have said that. That's as bad as, 'What a quiet day it has been,' or, 'What's the worst that could happen?'" He did his best to will away the heat in his cheeks, believing if he just kept talking, eventually the moment would pass.

He remained seated. It was better if only one of them was up at a time, bending and twisting around to get dressed. He couldn't figure out a way to watch her that didn't seem like outright rude staring, settling for glancing over at her now and then. "You should take it as a compliment. I'm not an easily distracted man."

"Poor, poor you," she shot his way as she slipped on her clothes, tying her band in the back. "Perhaps she'll cut you some slack if you grouse about me to the Knight-Commander."

Her trousers came next, which were a little more difficult. The leather was tight for a reason and she needed to balance herself on the edge of the bench so she could pull them on. "I usually don't fall into that trap. Usually." Merrill was rubbing off on her.

She grabbed his breeches and turned to hand them to him. "No, you aren't," she agreed. He was a Templar from Ferelden. If he was anything, it was dogged and steadfast in his duty. "I'll try not to be so distracting when we get back to Kirkwall, but no promises." And she wasn't going to promise anything while they were still out here, even if they needed to be a little more on guard.

"And ruin my reputation as the reasonable one? No, no. I'll suffer in stoic silence. It caught your attention, after all, didn't it?" He shot her a half smile.

He reached out a hand to help steady her, little more than pressure to lean against if she needed it. He wasn't feeling shy all of a sudden, but it was different touching someone during a moment of mutual intimacy and just shooting out a hand uninvited.

"Thank you." His small clothes were on top of them, caught up in the folds. He straightened them out first to pull them on, lifting just enough to get them over his hips and tied. The breeches followed. "I think you'll find me a little less distractable in Kirkwall." Realizing that could be taken as a challenge, he hastily added, "On duty, at least." She had already promised to behave herself in the Gallows. He wasn't too worried.

"Off duty I don't mind so much."

"You're a credit to your order, Ser Cullen." She smiled right back and raised an eyebrow. "Only after three years, too." Which had more to do with the fact that she still had, for a time, wanted to beat him into the ground for taking her sister, as amiable as he had been otherwise.

With a nod of thanks, she finished pulling on her pants and tied them. She went for her shirt last, letting her jacket stay where it was. She was still warm enough that she didn't need it just yet.

She grabbed his tunic and passed it to him next, taking a seat on the bench and stretching again. "You shouldn't say that. I'll have to double my efforts to make up for lost time should we do this again."

"I'm old fashioned that way. It's good to take one's time getting to know someone." He glanced at her from the sides of his eyes, trying to determine how seriously she may have taken that.

He allowed his gaze to linger longer once she had her shirt back on. It seemed less like leering then. "Ah, thank you." He pulled the tunic over his head and tugged it down. He wasn't going to bother with his belt or boots. He could handle any surprises just as well without them as with. All he had really been after was not feeling exposed out in the open in a region known for piracy and banditry.

"If this is forward, then...so be it. I want to do this again. Ah, maybe not in a small boat, but..." He nodded. He enjoyed her company, and he enjoyed what they had done. He wasn't going to pretend otherwise now.

The admission earned him a lopsided smile. "And how much do we know of one another, besides that the both of us work too much and get caught up in the troubles of our dear city too often?" Her tone was far from flippant, despite how easy it could be to joke. She was curious now.

It struck her, as he was pulling on his tunic, how much she could see now with the moon out. She admired him for a moment, just long enough that it was intentional, before she looked back out at the water. She ran a hand through her hair briefly, fingers combing down the fringe at the front. The usual lock fell back into place over the bridge of her nose.

She shot him a look and another smile. "After what we've just done, I wouldn't say it's very formal," she said, equal parts jovial and reassuring. "And as fun as it was, we should...probably look into something more accommodating for the both of us."

He caught the change in tone, considering exactly how he wanted to answer that question. He decided for the time being to stick with the overall light hearted tone of the night up to this point. "It's Kirkwall. We've seen each other on a nearly weekly basis for years now. Neither of us to my knowledge has ever flipped out and joined a blood drinking cult, danced with demons in the moonlight, joined the Qun, or decided assassinations of annoying but harmless influential people would be a lucrative and satisfying side business. I know this because you never wear white lipstick, and you know because you've never seen me with my eyes painted black." His lips twitched slightly.

"Having said that, I am looking forward to knowing you better, and that's not a euphemism for more of what we did tonight, although that's nice, too." He was aware of being admired and realized he liked it, even if it was a little flustering.

"Agreed," he nodded then leaned to dig around for the brandy. "I'm really thirsty now. How about you?"

It was almost impossible to keep a straight face with that. "The red and white war paint just wouldn't work for me." It might be better if she didn't mention her time with the Red Iron, even if they didn't necessarily go after the the 'harmless influential people' often. Besides, Meeran was dead anyway, the Red Iron in danger of being rooted out... "And you've never had your eyes painted black? It must be stress, then; I recall seeing dark circles from time to time." Not that she was one to talk, when the Qunari invasion was going on.

He'd made their time together relaxing and enjoyable and she had already agreed to get to know him better. She hadn't regretted that decision. "Likewise. On both accounts," she added with a grin to ease the tension.

Her eyes scanned the floor by the bench for the bottle and spotted it beneath where he was sitting. "I'd love some. Especially now that we can see well enough not to go stumbling over the side of the boat in a drunken haze."

"Exactly, and it seems like a prerequisite for all of those groups. I have no idea why. I'd think if you were up to something nefarious, you'd want to look less conspicuous, not more so." His expression lost some of its humor, but he didn't lose his smile at her observation. He fell quiet while trying to decide if he wanted to address that.

"I don't sleep very soundly. I'm pretty sure I've mentioned the nightmares before. They're not as frequent as they used to be." He gave a one shouldered shrug. He had looked into it a little. No one seemed to know what to do about it short of some sort of magical intervention, something he wouldn't easily accept.

"I don't need darkness for that, you know." He chuckled, his hand settling on the bottle neck, and drew it up to offer it to her.

"Didn't you know? It's the only way they can tell each other apart, obviously. You wouldn't know if someone was from a blood cult unless they had the paint for it. Even they have trouble knowing who's who." She shrugged absently and the mirth remained in her gaze. "The Qunari simply don't care if someone knows who they are. They don't cower to anyone."

Her expression sobered as she listened, nodding. "You did. I didn't realize you still had them." She shouldn't have been surprised. How often did she dream about losing Carver or her mother? Those sorts of things never went away. Not really. "I'm sorry."

She took the bottle gratefully, uncorking it. "Don't fall, if you do. I don't think I'd be able to catch you if I tried." She took a healthy drink from the bottle, the burn welcome.

"I suppose special belts or brooches are completely out of the question. Secret handshakes? Nonsensical passwords? As for the Qunari, I like to think they got that way because there's no way for them to be inconspicuous even if they tried." He smiled briefly. It was as plausible of an explanation as any as far as he was concerned.

The smile faded, and he shrugged again. It wasn't a topic he often discussed. "I probably always will. Sometimes I think maybe it's not such a terrible thing for a Templar to have a taste of what mages endure on a regular basis. At least for me, when I awaken I know it was just a dream. They don't have that luxury."

He stretched his back with a side to side twist and resettled. "It's nice to know you'd try."

"That would be far too easy and sensible, though." She smirked. "Could you imagine every mage stopping and needing to shake hands with one another just to tell whether they were in a specific group? It would be just as obvious as the skin paint."

She was careful to school her face into a careful mask of neutrality, though the smile faltered. "There are sometimes greater fears than those for a mage." Her father, for all that he understood the plight of mages, seemed far more afraid of what would happen to Bethany and their family should they ever be discovered. "But I don't think any of those other horrors would ever be as prevalent as demons themselves. Or temptation, I suppose." She and Carver had been lucky.

"And fail spectacularly and probably tumble after you. And where would that leave us?" She offered him the bottle when she had one last sip, a small slip of a grin on her features as she settled her chin in her hand.

"It would make Kirkwall seem so much friendlier." He snorted a soft laugh. "Until someone got the handshake wrong, and the streets filled with shades. This is why we can't have nice things."

He nodded, his look more thoughtful. "I know, many of them of this world and not beyond. I'm one of the things they fear, after all." It was never far from his awareness, always abundantly clear every time he was sent out to bring another in when they refused to go voluntarily.

His lips quirked a crooked smile. "In the water doing our best drowned rat imitations. I'm not sure I'd be able to climb back in if I fell out. I've never tried sober, much less drunk." He took the bottle for a deep swallow. Ale would probably be a better thirst quencher, but this was nice, particularly now that his sweat was drying.

"This is why Kirkwall can't have nice things." She shook her head. "So they rely on face paint instead and other small cues that are slightly more obvious."

For a time, the Templars had been one of her fears as well. She supposed that Bethany being taken to the Circle had freed her from that. Her gaze slipped to the side in thought for a moment but she eventually looked at him. "And you fear them. You're not alone in that."

She raised an eyebrow. "I could pull you out, possibly." Her gaze sharpened, scrutinizing. "...You can swim, can't you?"

"Yes, I do. I'd be lying if I said otherwise." Individually or as a group, he was wary of them. He had never been given a reason not to be and had been given more than ample reason for terror. Sometimes he still couldn't understand how he had managed to pull past that horrible time and see them as people again. It wasn't a moment of epiphany or anything quick. It was nothing he could point to directly.

His expression eased. "Yes, I can swim. You wouldn't catch me out in a boat this size if I couldn't." He offered her the bottle again.

"You should have said otherwise. I would have thought you were abnormally brave to be out here if you couldn't swim," she teased lightly, the joke half-hearted. She assumed he was able to, especially if he had once resided in a tower in the middle of a lake. Come to think of it, she doubted she knew anyone who couldn't swim.

She examined the bottle as she took it back, eying its contents a moment before taking a light sip. Thoughts were stewing, fueled by what he'd said about being afraid of mages because of what they'd done to him and the others in Kinloch Hold. She set the bottle down on the bench between them, her hand staying wrapped around the neck. "Is it better to hate or fear something that's hurt you?"

"Missed opportunity." He pressed his hand to his chest briefly in a parody of being dramatic.

"Better? No." He shook his head, looking out over the water. "But much harder not to." He shivered before he could suppress it. It didn't take much of anything to throw him back to that time. The waking flashbacks had stopped some time ago, his dreams a harder holdout. Still, the touch of magic over his skin unexpectedly could have his heart racing in his chest and his muscles quivering to act, direct threat or no. It was part of what made him so good at his job, his ability to go from zero to action at the slightest touch of mana across his senses.

He clenched his fingers together atop his lap. "I don't hate them anymore. I did at first. I'm not proud of that. It wasn't right, but...I couldn't do otherwise. At first I didn't want to try. Then I did and still couldn't. Finally...I don't know. I don't claim to be some bastion of morality. I got tired of being ruled by anger, and I turned out to have better stamina than the emotion when I set my mind to it. I guess I gradually wore all of that down."

He finally looked at her again, an honest, unapologetic look. "I was too complacent before what happened to me. I refused to see the nature of the threat. I didn't believe anything bad would happen because I knew those mages. I liked them, some of them a lot. It didn't matter. I wasn't spared. I was just..." He shrugged, this time a much tighter jerk of muscle than the ones before. "I don't know why I'm here. It wasn't mercy on their part." He fell quiet enough that it seemed he might not continue until he abruptly did.

"So...as someone who has sworn to protect them as well as others from them, I see the fear I still hold as valuable. It may allow me to see something I missed then. If it prevents another Kinloch Hold, I'd say it's worth what I paid for it, and as long as I don't use it as an excuse for abuse, it serves them, too."

She almost regretted asking, more because of his answer and the reaction he had than for the question itself. She couldn't fault him for the path he took or for what he felt. Had she been there, had she been subjected to the same, she wasn't entirely certain she'd be able to stay as objective as she tried to be in Kirkwall at present. Even with her sister and father as mages, watching good friends and comrades fall so quickly could easily change her mind about what role magic held in the world.

Her fingers lightly tapped the side of the bottle, a minor sign of her agitation. The sympathy in her gaze could be apparent, though she was concerned that he might mistake it for pity. Still, she held his gaze and nodded. Her hand went out to settle on his arm.

"It makes you a good Templar to be wary. Even people who want to believe the best in everyone have to be careful of whom they trust, whether they're mages or otherwise." Varric had the right idea in that respect.

She released him so she could take another idle drink from the bottle of brandy, handing it back to him so he could partake as well. "I don't think you were complacent. Who would want to believe that their friends and allies, people they'd known for years, would turn on them or succumb to the demons they'd kept away for so long? None of your fellows did."

He took the bottle and held it between his hands without drinking right away. "No, none of us. Not even the most paranoid. Not even the ones who actively despised our charges. Knight-Commander Gregoir was hardly what anyone would call lax or lenient. He was hard but fair. He emphasized vigilance. And that's the true horror of something like that. There's a very good chance that no one could have seen it coming, not even Uldred's and his conspirator's associates. Mages don't want to believe such things of each other, either."

He took a very long swig, wiping his lips afterward with the back of his hand. "Maybe it can't be prevented. Maybe the best we'll ever do is contain it. If we can." And die when they couldn't. "Ferelden was lucky that happened in a tower physically cut off from the rest of the countryside. If they had been able to leave, the Blight would have been just one concern. Redcliffe, Honnleath, no telling where it would have stopped.

"I told myself I wouldn't bog down in talking shop tonight. I'm sorry."

"Maybe it can't always be prevented but you can't be certain until it happens. No one actively wants to believe that someone they see day in and day out will succumb to temptation and attempt to kill you, but it happens. And it happens with everyone, not simply mages and Templars. The biggest difference, of course, is that one situation involves demons and the other doesn't." Ordinary men still fell to corruption on a daily basis. They'd murder old friends and enemies alike if it meant living another day. But there was an added layer of horror when the unknown and the beyond were mixed in.

She nodded her assent with a brief grimace. "Better to be ready and wary than to practically hand over the proverbial knife so you can be stabbed in the back, I suppose." It just seemed fruitless sometimes, to sit around and wait for the foundations to crumble. She was still trying to figure out a solution to the mage and Templar troubles in Kirkwall with little success.

"I'm the one who brought it up, not you. I'm sorry," she added with a faint smile. "The whole reason why we're here is to relax, not stir up old wounds."

"Yes. Demons make a huge difference." He rolled the bottle slowly between his hands, a gentle back and forth movement that sent it from palm to fingertips and back again, alternating the left and the right. He didn't seem aware of doing it.

"We have to be ready. There's no acceptable alternative." If anything, he believed the Tevinter Imperium was a stark example of that. In that respect, he was much like Fenris without the bitterness and hatred to twist the view to fanaticism. There but for the grace of the Maker...

"Then don't be. If you want to know me, that's...definitely relevant to why I think the way I think and do what I do. I don't like to get heavy handed with it, though." He didn't like to go into detail, and he might never. Not even Meredith had heard all of it from him, only enough to be able to put her trust in him.

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