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THE REAL GIFT

Garrett and Bethany had been traveling round Kirkwall and its outskirts for some time now. Sometimes with Aveline, sometimes with Merrill, often with Varric. Much more frequently with Anders than any of the rest combined. They’d come to know each other well. Strengths, weaknesses, specialties. For his part, Garrett had been delighted to discover that Anders’ field healing was just as good as his clinic healing and boy, had that fact saved him some coin. And given Anders extra, which he invariably put toward medical supplies despite the Hawke siblings’ frequent protests that he needed things, too. Like food.

The year spent living with their uncle had been long and trying for them all. Gamlen now wanted the Hawkes to contribute toward rent and food, which was somewhat nauseous-making given that the only reason they were there was because he’d lost Leandra’s entire inheritance.

For her part, Leandra hated Lowtown, dreamed of Hightown, alternately cursed and blessed her choice to elope with Malcolm and vocally regretted Carver’s death every single day. Admonished Garrett for taking Bethany into danger all the time given what’d happened to her twin, which Garrett knew deep down his mother blamed him for. Chided Bethany for wanting to put herself in that much danger despite Bethany’s protestations that she’d be damned to the Void if she let her only remaining sibling go it alone out there.

And so it was that one cool day, the siblings had had enough of Gamlen’s whining and sequestered themselves in the room they’d been using while staying there. Bored, the two decided to go through their legacy, the belongings that had both been left in Kirkwall so long ago, and that they had managed to have sent to them by one of their mother’s friends who was still in the Lothering area and had gone back to scavenge what she could for those of her acquaintances who’d fled the Blight.

To their delight, they had much of their father’s belongings, including his robes – which were now moth-destroyed – his grimoire, which Bethany coveted, and his staff, golden and beautiful, with what looked like a nude of Andraste adorning its crown.

Garrett had just assumed Bethany would take it, but she said she couldn’t. Her own staff, she told him, had been something she’d worked hard to align with her mana and she wasn’t about to try to re-align her father’s long-unused one to herself after all that.

But while Garrett couldn’t bring himself to let it go, he feared it might become a target if anyone discovered it, for it surely would fetch a good number of sovereigns as unique as it was. But then he got an idea. And when he posited it to Bethany, her face lit up like the sun – little wonder Varric called her Sunshine. She enthusiastically agreed that if he would have it, she could think of no better man to wield it. She had, after all, confided to her brother that Anders’ kindness and general demeanor reminded her very much of the father she’d spent so much time with learning how to wield her magic. She remembered the staff well and told Garrett she really did want to see it in action again.

The very next evening, everyone was supposed to gather at The Hanged Man to meet someone who’d just arrived in town that Varric had recently become acquainted with and wanted the rest of them to welcome. Everyone had accepted his invitation, but as Garrett and the others were getting to know the bawdy pirate who called herself Captain Isabela, he was keenly aware that his second favorite mage was nowhere to be seen.

At first, he assumed the Darktown clinic had gotten so busy that Anders was tied up there and hadn’t had time to send a messenger. As time passed, however, he grew less engaged with the drinking and game of Wicked Grace, and more concerned for his friend’s whereabouts. It fleetingly crossed his mind that templars could be involved. Or Justice. Or thugs. Bandits. Mercenaries. Maybe he’d been hurt and couldn’t heal himself. Maybe something bad had gone down at the clinic and he was lying there dead, all alone, with no one missing him.

Except Garrett did miss him, and as he gripped his father’s staff tightly, for he and Bethany had meant to make a gift of it to Anders there tonight, his sister caught his eye and he realized he wasn’t the only one concerned, though no one else seemed to be.

“If you’ll excuse me,” Garrett stated, standing suddenly and abandoning his hand and small pile of coin, “I need to see to Anders.”

“Blondie? Why?”

“He’s not here,” Bethany replied as she, too, rose to her feet. She’d not won any coin that night, so there wasn’t much to be lost in abandoning her currently also-non-winning hand. “He said he would be but he’s not.”

“We’ll just check on him. Drag him back with us,” Garrett grinned, refusing to allow himself to say – or show – the worst-case scenarios running through his head.

Several retorts and quips they paid little attention to later, Bethany and Garrett found themselves outside The Hanged Man, beating a hasty path to Darktown.

“I’m glad I wasn’t the only one worried,” Bethany stated, her voice tight in her throat.

“Me, too. I hope he’s okay.” Garrett gripped the staff tightly and ground his teeth together. “I…” He glanced at his sister as they half-ran toward the makeshift lift that would take them down to the Undercity. “I like him, sister.”

“I do, too.”

As the lift came into sight, Garrett shook his head. “I mean…I like him.”

Bethany glanced at him, then they reached the lift and stepped aboard. Garrett quickly manipulated the lever that would see the lift lower itself slowly enough that he knew he’d be subjected to a few words from his sibling before they reached their destination.

“There’s nothing wrong with liking him,” Bethany said softly with a smile on her face. “He’s very handsome, I think.”

Garrett puffed out a laugh. “I can’t believe I’m talking to you about this.”

She shrugged one shoulder. “With whom if not me? Do you think Varric would approve of you courting him?”

“Courting him? I’m not courting him, Bethany!”

“You could be. In fact, presenting him with Father’s staff as a gift may be the very first courting gift you offer.”

“It’s from us both, not just me.”

The lift clanged and clacked and whirred and creaked and groaned ominously as usual, as it lowered them deeper and deeper and deeper still beneath Kirkwall.

“Well, then, perhaps we shall both court him,” she said brazenly as her cheekbones became tinged with red.

“Wait…are you serious? You don’t…you like him, too?”

“I suppose not exactly in that way, no. He’s a bit too scruffy for me, really, and…well, I did tell him he reminded me of our father. I think it would be a bit odd to court him given that, don’t you?”

“Please don’t remind me. Thankfully, he doesn’t look like Father.”

“No, but you do. You’re the only one of us who ever did. Carver and I got Mother’s looks with our black hair and blue eyes.”

“And beautiful it makes you,” Garrett smiled, making his sister blush even more. “Carver, not so much, may he rest at the Maker’s side.”

Bethany burst out laughing, but it was a sound that died in her throat when the lift finally landed at the bottom of its shaft. For there, lying bloodied and so bruised and swollen that his features were unrecognizable, was the very man they’d come to Darktown to seek. The lift had almost crushed his fingers, as he lay face down in the disgusting bug-infested hay covering the ground.

With a cry of dismay, Bethany reached out for Malcolm’s staff. “Give it,” she ordered, and Garrett did. With two long swipes over Anders head to toe, a whitish light began to emanate from the staff. It enveloped Anders’ entire body and then after a few more seconds the man coughed, hacked, spit, threw up blood and mucous and who knew what all else, and become aware enough to whisper both of their names in a voice that sounded as though it was just as battered as the rest of him.

“All right, that was the extent of what Father taught me to do with his embedded magic before we lost him,” Bethany stated. “Can we get Anders back to his clinic?”

“Hey, what’s going on?” came a voice from their right. “Is that our healer?”

“Walter?” Hawke asked when he got eyes on the shadowed form approaching. “Cricket?”

“Yes, it’s us,” Cricket replied. “Is he..?”

“He’ll be okay, but we need to get him to his clinic,” Bethany stated.

“I’ll help,” Walter offered.

“Thank you,” Bethany nodded. “Cricket, will you carry Anders’ pouches and pack? I’ll take his staff and make a light for us to see better.”

“Of course.”

Garrett and young Walter, whom the Hawkes knew from seeing them and their caretaker Evelina begging around Darktown time to time and giving them as much coin as they could spare whenever they did, carefully carried Anders to his clinic. Cricket, who sometimes helped his fellow children clean for the healer to earn a few coppers here and there, knew how to unlock the door and did so. Bethany lit the internal lamps with her magic while Cricket closed the door behind them.

When Garrett and Walter laid Anders on one of the wooden medical tables, the injured man groaned.

“I wish I knew what to do,” Bethany winced at the sound of her friend’s pain.

“I’ll fetch a pail of water,” Cricket offered.

Walter nodded. “I’ll get some clean rags and a potion. He always starts the injured off with an elfroot potion.”

“Those boys are wonderful,” Bethany beamed.

Garrett was unable to speak. He’d managed to undo the front of Anders’ overcoat and slide it off him. He then pulled off his filthy boots as well, returning to his head as Cricket brought the water. Walter handed him several rags, and Garrett began carefully wiping down Anders’ face while Bethany pulled the man’s hair out of its ponytail and felt along his scalp beneath for lacerations. Finding none, she used another rag to wash the blood from his hair.

The boys worried as they watched, but Garrett couldn’t stop his heart pounding. Couldn’t stop his continued worry as Anders’ one good eye looked glassily at him while the other was swollen shut. His nose appeared broken, his upper and lower lips were split and still bleeding and a cut that split his left eyebrow in half was practically gushing blood.

“Anders,” Garrett finally breathed when the healer’s lips moved, and that attempt made the mage cry out softly in pain. “Anders, Anders.” His hand lay flat against the mage’s cheek and to Garrett’s surprise, he seemed to briefly draw comfort from it with a slow inhale, a closing of the one good eye and a slight curvature of his lips.

“Here,” Walter offered, handing Bethany the potion, uncorked. “I’ll help him sit up enough to drink it.”

Walter and Garrett slowly propped Anders up while Bethany got the entire bottle emptied into his mouth in just a handful of seconds. Slowly they could see the tension lines in Anders’ face begin to recede as the pain lessened enough to allow him proper thought.

“Can…heal…’yself,” Anders whispered, that one good eye still not leaving Garrett. “But mana…”

“Oh, he needs a lyrium potion,” Bethany acknowledged, pulling a bottle from her belt and uncorking it. “Prop him up again, if you please.”

They did, and the contents of the second bottle were emptied into the healer’s mouth. Color started coming back into his face, then, and over the next hour on and off, Anders went about the job of stopping the bleeding, healing the cuts, fixing his nose, reducing the swelling, mending three broken ribs and six broken fingers, and generally making himself look like himself again while the rest of them tended to cleaning the blood from his skin as he went.

Walter and Cricket told him they were happy he was going to be all right, and Anders replied, “I’m sorry I don’t have any coin for you. You deserve a reward for what you did. My thanks just doesn’t seem enough.”

“We didn’t do it for a reward,” Cricket protested.

“No. We did it to pay you back for all you do for us,” Walter confirmed. “But we do need to go find food for the others before it gets any later.”

“Here,” Garrett said, reaching into his coin purse and pulling out all the silver he had on him. Then he realized it would just make the boys a target to carry that much in their flimsy trouser pockets, so he divided them into two piles of ten silvers each before emptying his own coin purse into his hand.

Seeing where he was going with things, Bethany used a clean rag to wrap ten of the silvers together. She then placed them into Garrett’s pouch, drew the strings and handed it to a speechless Walter. Then took her own coin purse, an embroidered gift from her mother some years before, emptied it and folded another ten rag-quieted silvers into it, then drew the strings closed and gave it to Cricket.

The siblings took the rest of the coin they’d had on them and put it into Anders’ empty coin purse, which Cricket had placed on the table next to him during the worst of the evening, and drew its strings.

“Thank you,” Walter breathed.

“Conceal those well. When I was a lad, I used to tie the pouch to my smalls to keep it safe.”

Bethany giggled. “That’s not why you did that.”

“Hush, you,” Garrett groused, face flushing, as Anders barked out a short, delighted laugh.

Walter and Cricket did as instructed, and once they were certain the clanking of the coins could not be heard, and the outline of the pouches was not visible beneath their trousers, they rushed from the clinic to see about food for the rest of their cobbled-together family, closing the door behind them.

“I…” Anders faltered as he came to a sitting position and noted with disdain all the blood on his undershirt and on his overcoat, which was also on the table next to him. “I don’t know what would have become of me if you hadn’t come along when you did. Thank you.”

“It was a group effort,” Bethany said with a smile. “I’m just glad you’re all right. What happened?”

“I was headed to The Hanged Man as promised,” Anders stated, rising to his feet and moving shakily to a room divider near the rear of the clinic. Behind it was a trunk, and the siblings knew it contained everything Anders owned…which wasn’t much.

“You didn’t make it out of Darktown, then,” Bethany encouraged him to continue.

“Actually, I sort of did. I was on the lift by myself. When it reached Lowtown, a gang of ten thugs hopped on and started the lift churning back down again. They beat me pretty good, got all the coin out of my coin purse, took my potions, kicked me a few times for good measure.”

Garrett’s hands balled into fists. He was going to hunt those bastards down and kill them. Slowly and painfully.

“When the lift reached the bottom, they used their feet to roll me off into Darktown, then went back up. They’re probably long gone now.” Anders stepped out from behind the privacy screen now wearing breeches and an old tunic that had seen better days. “I apologize for my attire. It will be hell getting all that blood out of my trousers, overcoat and undershirt.” He sighed with annoyance.

“We were very worried when you didn’t show up at the tavern tonight,” Bethany offered, moving forward and giving him a hug. She loved getting hugs from Anders. They were always warm and…yes, well, she guessed she did see him as kind of fatherly in a way.

“I can’t say I’m glad to have worried you,” Anders smiled as he returned her hug and his eyes met Garrett’s. “But I’m awfully glad you were worried enough to come looking for me. I…appreciate that more than you know.”

“We…had…have…something for you,” Garrett said, motioning for Anders to come back out to the clinic proper. He went to where Malcom’s staff was leaning against a support column. When Anders reached him, Garrett showed the staff to him.

Anders’ jaw went slack. He raked his eyes over the staff from its very crown to the bottom as Garrett held it horizontally before him with both hands. “You can’t be serious. That staff is…it’s…”

“It was our father’s,” Bethany stated. “This was the staff he made when he was in Kirkwall’s Circle. It was also the one he carried when he trained me. Soothed me. Helped me learn and grow in my magic.”

“He called it Freedom’s Promise,” Garrett continued as Anders’ hand tentatively touched the solid grip in the middle of the stave itself. “I…think that’s appropriate for you.”

“We want you to have it so much,” Bethany added. “Even if you don’t use it because you can’t personalize it to your mana, we want it to become yours.”

“I think Father would be overjoyed if he were here,” Garrett said as Anders took the staff in both hands, awe etched into his features. “And I think he would’ve liked you very much.”

“I agree,” Bethany nodded. She gave Garrett a meaningful look, nodded toward Anders and then announced, “I’ll just start getting things cleaned up and soaking in the herbs while you get a feel for it.” With one more look at Garrett, Bethany gathered up the stained and bloody and dirty things left behind from Anders’ encounter and headed back to the room in the far rear right of his clinic where a large tub of water stood waiting.

Anders stepped away from the tables and twirled the staff experimentally. He then stood stock still, took a deep breath and tapped the butt of the staff onto the floor with his right hand. He closed his eyes while he extended his left arm outward from his body. In that moment, Garrett thought, Anders really did remind him of their father, though not in looks or form, but in gesture and self-possession. A great man who soaked in mana, became one with it, held it close, used it for good, used it with love and care and kindness. Respected it well indeed.

Anders’ eyelids fluttered open. “I feel it,” he whispered, eyes locking with Garrett’s. “I feel your father’s power, as though he was etched into the very folds of the staff itself.”

“You’re so beautiful,” Garrett blurted out, then realized what he’d said…but refused to act like he regretted saying it. There was no world in which the man with golden sunset hair cascading to his shoulders, and rich amber eyes filled with a gentleness long since absent from Garrett’s life could be considered anything but, and there was no reason Anders shouldn’t know it.

A small gasp of recognition from the mage, who moved forward slowly. “You and your sister…give me this gift freely.”

“Of…” Garrett’s voice broke. He cleared his throat. “Of course,” he replied. “We know your current staff was cracked in the fight with the templars the first…when we met at the chantry…”

Anders closed the distance between them, reached out and ran his index finger along Garrett’s strong, square jawline, which was so much more evident now that he’d begun shaving clean once a week.

“Did you mean it?” Anders whispered.

“About the staff?”

“No.”

“Yes. To both.”

“This is…probably the worst idea either of us has ever had.”

“The staff?”

“No.”

“I disagree. To both.”

Anders huffed out a laugh. “I was going to say that this was the best gift anyone has ever given me, but that’s not true.”

Garrett cocked his head at the man as Bethany returned from the back room, grinning impishly at the looks on her brother’s and Anders’ faces.

“There is more than one gift that was your father’s,” Anders continued. “The staff, clearly, but also the two of you. That I, of all people, have two friends who care enough about me to come looking for me when I don’t show up for a game of cards…” He reeled Bethany in and planted a soft kiss on the crown of her head. She smiled. “But the real gift?”

He closed his eyes, reopened them. Met Garrett’s as he loosed Bethany to go answer a soft knock at the clinic door.

“Real gift?” Garrett repeated.

“I think the real gift is still in the process of being given,” was the reply.

“Hey, everyone okay in here?” came Varric’s booming voice, making the men jump.

“Varric, just the dwarf I wanted to see,” Bethany stated, hurriedly grabbing her staff and racing back toward him.

“Oh? Blondie, there you are. These two got all worried about you. For nothing, I take it?”

“Not for nothing,” Bethany said. “Will you walk me back to Gamlen’s? I’m starved and these two are going to be a while. I’ll tell you the whole story on the way!”

“Story? A new one?” Varric eyed her, then narrowed his eyes at Anders and Hawke. “Why do I think there’ll be yet another before dawn?”

Bethany giggled and the two exited the clinic as she began to weave her tale.

“Thank you for this,” Anders said with a small smile, gesturing with his staff-wielding hand. “Truly, it’s a gift I will always treasure and use with great reverence to the man who made it.”

“You’re welcome,” Garrett nodded, mindful of the fact that his sister was probably going to flirt Varric into staying with her as she’d been trying to do for a year and had very nearly succeeded at. Which meant that it was totally fine for Garrett to stay here so she could have some privacy in their shared room at Gamlen’s. He wouldn’t trust his sister to just anyone, after all.

“Oh, here, you and Bethany need to take your coin back.”

Garrett shook his head. “We’ve been saving up. Other than what we gave to Walter and Cricket for their help tonight, the rest is to start getting you some better things for this clinic.” Garrett looked around the room, hoping Anders bought the well-intentioned fib, for he wasn’t about to take those sovereigns back now. “These tables, for example. When we laid you on one tonight I thought, they’re so uncomfortable, can’t we have washable bedrolls or something, for the patients?”

Anders’ face lit up. “I know just the thing! Lirene came across this fantastic fabric woven by a vendor in Lowtown. She told me blood wipes right off it and it’s filled with sawdust for cushion, made cheaply from what’s left on the ground by loggers!”

Garrett grinned. “I knew there had to be something! Also, privacy screens. I know if my insides were on the outside, I wouldn’t want every other patient gawking while you tried to piece me back together.”

Anders chuckled. “I like that idea. The, uh, dividers, not your insides being outside.” He made a grossed-out face. “I really need to stock up on bandages, but that bastard I used to buy from left for Starkhaven. Says he can get more coin there for his wares.”

“Then you’re in luck,” Garrett practically crowed. “Merrill said a city elf from Denerim just arrived. He’s a merchant who makes bandages out of discarded cloth and clothes people can’t wear anymore. She mentioned your clinic and the man – I think his name’s Carlen – said he’d stop by here tomorrow to see if you could strike up a deal.”

“That’s fantastic!” Anders enthused, moving back to where his personal sleeping cot was set up near the tub of water and potion-brewing fire. He carefully propped his new staff against the wall and said, “I’ve been looking for someone to sew some decent linens, and one of the mages we helped…I mean, that I…anyway, there’s a woman here in Darktown now who sews beautifully. We just need to secure her a supply of linen and mmphf!”

Garrett had been unable to take it anymore. The sheer joy on Anders’ face, dreaming of all the things he could now buy for his clinic, to help the poor who would otherwise surely die. The sparkle in his eyes, the spring in his step…the way his not-inconsiderable muscles moved beneath the threadbare shirt he wore. The way his calves moved with every step, visible between the knees of his breeches and his ankles. Even his feet were pretty, and that was not something Garrett had ever thought to say about anyone’s feet but his sister’s, since he’d been painting her toenails for her from the time she could walk.

And so Garrett had kissed the mage.

And the mage was kissing back.

“I…want…”

“What do you want, love?” Anders asked.

Garrett melted. Love, he thought. He called me that.

“I…want…”

“You said that.”

Wrapping his arms around Anders’ neck, Garrett nuzzled him nose to nose and smiled. “I want…you.”

“In what way?” Anders asked, clearly on board with this idea if his body’s reaction was any indicator.

“I intend to court you properly,” Garrett stated, “as difficult as that may be at times. I…” Garrett shook his head, cupping Anders’ face and getting lost just looking at him. “You deserve no less from any man.”

Anders’ eyes shone in the flickering lamps of his clinic. “Was your father’s staff the first gift of this intent?”

“Bethany said it should be, but it was from both of us. She adores you, you know.”

“And I adore her, but…it’s her older brother who has that kind of interest from me.”

Garrett smiled. “Good,” he breathed, squeezing Anders tightly and feeling the man’s arms snake around his body to do the same.

“The staff is wonderful. It’s perfect. And you and Bethany caring for me is…a gift unlike any I have been given in recent years.” His arms tightened around Garrett and his lips nipped at the shell of the rogue’s ear. “But you? Here? Now? This is the real gift.”

“Yes,” Garrett whispered as his lips pressed gently into Anders’. “It is.”