Title: Grey light
Fandom: Dragon Age
Rating: T
Length: 540 words
Content notes: No warnings apply.
Author notes: Written for the ‘light’ challenge in fan_flashworks.
Summary: Orana tends to her Mistress’s fire and reflects on the intimacy of Sara Hawke's relationship with Fenris and Anders.

***

Orana kept her eyes turned carefully away as she crossed the room to light the fire. The grey light of early morning slanted through the upper windows and, in her peripheral vision, was washing over the bodies entwined on the bed.

Orana knew what she would see if she turned her head. She had blundered into the discovery when bringing Mistress her breakfast a few months ago: Mistress, the healer mage, and Danarius’s former slave, Fenris. The three of them slept together most nights. At first, Fenris had come and gone. But at some point he had stayed the night, and hadn’t left since.

It wasn’t unusual for Mistresses to take servants to their bed, but neither was it always a privilege. Among Hadriana’s servants, fear had accompanied the command to attend her bedchamber. Luckily for Orana, Hadriana had favoured men. Unluckily for them, Hadriana found pleasure in others’ pain.

Fenris and the mage were both highly favoured by their Mistress, yet Orana perceived no fear. She had heard them pleasuring her and they were even rewarded by finding their own pleasure, too. There was no screaming, like in Hadriana’s house, and no blood to clean off the floor in the morning.

Orana knelt before the fireplace, moved aside the unburnt wood, and swept the ashes into a small bucket. Then she brought out the tinderbox, placed some dry moss in the centre of the hearth, and arranged some kindling over it from the basket next to the wall. When she struck the flint and steel, the spark landed on the kindling and fizzled out. She changed the angle and tried again, but the spark seemed to wilfully avoid the tinder, landing instead on the stone of the hearth. She sighed. Sometimes she wished that she had been born a mage, just to make her daily jobs a bit easier. She went to strike the flint and steel again, when a tiny flame appeared spontaneously in the centre of the tinder. Orana fell backwards with a squeak in surprise.

“Sorry,” said a voice with a warm chuckle. She turned and saw the healer mage leaning on his elbow in the bed. His long blonde hair was out of its usual tie, hanging limply around his face, and the sheet had fallen to his waist, showing that he was at least half naked. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

Orana collected herself and stood up, dusting her hands off on the apron she wore around her waist. “Thank you, messere,” she said, dropping into a small curtsey. She had remembered the correct form of address for once.

“Please, just Anders.” It wasn’t the first time he had asked. Orana just curtseyed again in response, and he rolled his eyes before turning to look at the other occupants of the bed. Mistress lay next to him, her long dark brown hair wild across the pillowcase. Curled around her was Fenris, a lyrium-encrusted arm spread almost possessively across her body. A small smile crept onto the mage’s face.

“Thank you, Orana,” he said, without looking at her.

Orana knew what a dismissal sounded like. She curtseyed again, picked up the bucket of ashes, and left the room, quietly closing the door behind her.