Heed The Morning Star

“Your mind is your greatest strength, love, and your most vulnerable weakness,”  Malcolm Hawke had once said, as he taught his daughter about the Fade and its dangers, “You  can converse with spirits and demons, even bind them, yes. But if they  take hold of your mind, you will be forever changed. No creatures of the  Fade are made to survive in our world, nor are we made to contain their  drive. A possession would bring death to both you and the being you  carry.”   

. 

The  first time Anders glowed blue in front of her eyes and half a dozen  Templars, the Fade pouring out of the cracks on his skin, Cirilla  remembered her father’s words with a shiver of dread crawling up her  spine. Void take her, this is what Father warned her and Beth against. Run. Run. Get the hell away from here. Move your legs.

But  Karl was a silent, gazeless shell of a man behind them – a standing  nightmare, and the pain in Anders’ roar and the hatred in his eyes  matched her white-hot anger. Next to her Varric cursed, Bianca snapping  into motion with a smooth click. Carver didn’t waste any time standing  between her and the Templars, even if he looked so conflicted and scared  he might burst.

“Haul ass, Cirilla!” Carver growled.

As the Templars rounded in on them, she switched off her fear. Her blade and magic took care of the rest. Fuck running. Look where running got them all.

She  didn’t need to be possessed to hunger for bloodshed that night. She  thought she should be terrified, ashamed of herself. She was not.

.

“You seem wary of me and Justice, Hawke.”

She  acknowledged his remark with a dip of her head, but otherwise focused  on washing the bundle of linens and bandages he had set out for them  both to clean. There were just the two of them now, laboring silently  under the forever-dim light of Darktown, barely sufficient with the  lanterns Anders had put on around his clinic. Only the occasional  rumbles of machinery resonated through the walls, doubtless coming from  the industrial area above them and the dock nearby, and Cirilla almost  got lost in the turbulent space of her own head.

His gaze would not leave her.

He  continued. “I can see you are keeping an eye on me, even if I’m  thankful for all your help around here. Don’t trust me to keep my  control and not burst out into demons?”

“I want  to,” she snapped a little too quickly, and thought at the last moment to  direct her temper into her current task. The piece of linen twisted and  stretched under her tight squeeze. “You joke about it like that. I’ve  only been taught to fear possession. I don’t even know how it’s possible  that you still managed to be… you.”

“You saw me at the Chantry, Hawke.”

“I  lost it and killed those Templars too, and I didn’t even know Karl like  you did. I’m hardly in any moral high ground to judge.” She pursed her  lips. “Your spirit probably saved our collective ass, as it was.”

“… You’re welcome?”

She  hesitated for a moment, then looked up and held his eyes. “I mean it  though. This?” she gestured at the made-up clinic around them, “It’s  impressive work. Brave. I’d be blind to not see the good things you do.  To not admire it. And if it—he, Justice, helped you to do all this,  then… I don’t know. I’m willing to know more, I suppose.”

He blinked. “You would ‘fuck the Circle, fuck the Chantry, fuck the Maker himself’, but you’re willing to believe Justice?”

“Yeah. Seems more real anyway.”

He  regarded her then, long look but not hard nor scrutinizing, only  contemplative, maybe a little fond, and she felt an odd familiarity with  the lessons she had with her father all those years ago. She wondered  what Malcolm would think of her now. His runaway daughter, who had only  come back home to watch him die, then proceeded to let her younger  sister fall to an ogre. Joined a gang – another gang. Killed Templars.  Made friend – were they friends? - with a mage housing a spirit of  Justice in his head, who insisted that he and his spirit were not an abomination. Came a long way, indeed.

Father was gone though. He didn’t get to reprimand her now.

“Few  people are willing to take that step,” Anders finally said with a  smile. “I’m starting to have more faith in your Expedition, Hawke, if  you’re still planning to have my aid in the Deep Roads.” He smiled. “A  Healer who likes you will keep you alive longer.” 

. 

They  kept each other alive through the Deep Roads. She almost lost Carver to  the taint, but her little brother could still walk out of that place  thanks to Anders. Then they kept each other alive for a lot longer.  Months. Years. Their group of friends was rowdy and danger-prone,  annoying and confrontational more often than not, but she fitted right  in just so. Their fortune seemed to change with the winds, but she and  Anders did not fail each other once.

She still had  questions, but it was more a curiosity than anything these days.  Frankly, she was impressed that an embodiment of Justice would be able  to hold out for so long in this rotting corpse of a city. Surrounded by  the walls of the old Tevinter, amidst oppressions old and new, the long  war Anders and Justice set out to fight seemed as inspiring and real as  it seemed futile. She knew which version of the tale Varric had already  decided to tell.

Sometimes she walked her dreams  in the Fade, and she saw her mother sitting with her book next to the  fireplace and a content smile on her face, Brandy a slumbering, snoring  pile of warm fur at her feet. In her dreams she would read Carver’s  letters over and over, trace her hands over his uneven handwriting,  taking solace in knowing her little brother was now thriving as she knew  he deserved to be, even if the life he’d come to live was not easy. The  scenes played out just like her every waking day, but they somehow feel  less fragile here, no threats of the outside world disturbing their  peace. Safer in her imagination than anywhere else.

A familiar spirit sometimes visited her in those dreams, and it would remind her that this, her family, is her Purpose. You lost it once, it would recall, and you almost couldn’t carry on without it. If the Goal drives you now, then your life still has meaning. And  when she woke, it was with those words that she gritted her teeth and  carried on, washing her blade with blood and washing the blood away  before she got home. No matter the price to her soul. She believed in it  most days now.

Cirilla Hawke knew she sold her  own morals already, her growing reputation a mocking testament of her  marks on the world. Justice and Anders though, they glowed bright as two  souls and one. She selfishly basked herself in the intense warmth of  it, drawing closer and closer like a moth to a flame.

So  no, she didn’t doubt Justice, hadn’t been since a long time. But hers  and Anders’ friendship only grew along the years, and so did her  curiosity. She wondered about the kinds of character Justice and Anders  were before their merging, about the palpable and surreal determination  that drove their actions now, what fueled the burning sun in their  heart. She wondered if she could reach for that greatness too.          

. 

“Anders  thought many things about you, Hawke,” Justice called to her just  before they prepared to leave Feynriel’s fading dream. The boy’s mind  was no longer trapped inside the Fade, and without its Dreamer the place  slowly dematerialized and disintegrated, pulling her and Anders’ –  Justice’s – consciousness alongside them.

But they  were still in each other’s presence now, a rare moment of relief where  she could see and talk to Justice without any immediate danger plaguing  their minds. So she willed herself to stay a little longer.

“We  are very close friends.” She shrugged, then put a hand on her hip and  turned toward him, consciously keeping her chin high and her eyes hard.  As if preparing to brace any kind of judgement he would throw at her.  Mostly instinctual, but she was still annoyed at herself for that.

“He  admires your spirit and strength, and greatly values your support. I  will not disclose more than that, but I can see why he would look up to  you. You have a strong sense of Purpose. Even if I dislike your methods,  I can understand your drive. He— We believe that we can achieve great things with you by our side. I would like you to know that.”

She  was suddenly aware of how the thick fur wrap graze her neck with each  blow of the winds, and how the seams of her scarf crumbled away with the  currents swirling around them. Justice’s eyes were bright like two  burning stars, and she remembered how it was this… this magnificent being  that had brought Karl Thekla back from his Tranquility, something they  all thought impossible, however briefly that moment was. He stood tall  and proud in front of her, undaunted. A beacon.

It  had been a long time since she last felt self-conscious by a  compliment. Cirilla swallowed, a wave of emotions threatening to escape  her. She felt a little weak at the knees, and at the same time  invincible. She could get drunk on it. 

She stepped forward and put her hand on his shoulder. He squeezed his own hand on top of hers.

“Onward,  Justice,” she said, reveling in the course of the Fade beneath and  above her palm. It had a rhythm, a strange pulse, and it was as real as  the waking world. “Anyone who want to cut us, I will cut them first. I’m  by your side for as long as you need me.”