[ Master Post ]
Title: Rhapsody in Ass Major – Chapter 353
Co-Conspirator: 
MaverikLoki
Fandom: Dragon Age
Characters: Cormac Hawke ♂, Anton Hawke ♂, Carver Hawke ♂, Isabela ♀, Cullen ♂, Varric ♂, Anders ♂, Artemis Hawke ♂, Fenris ♂, Theron Mahariel ♂, Varania ♀, Paivel ♂
Rating: T (L2 N0 S0 V0 D1)
Warnings: Inappropriate sausage humour, codpieces, more appalling Page Six jokes
Notes: More fun with sausage jokes. Varania brings a date. Fenris is less than thrilled with any of these turns of events.
Cullen had finally regained his breath, if not his dignity, when a third Hawke made his appearance, sidling up behind Cormac and resting a chin on Cormac's shoulder.
"A barrier rune, hmm?" Artie asked, eyes crinkled in amusement. "Not to keep griffons out, I assume?"
"Just to deter wandering Orlesian fingers. You know the de Launcet girls are still interested in the piece in my cod, and the fortune and high living they assume goes along with it." Cormac tipped his head, rubbing his cheek against his brother's face. "But, no, definitely not to keep out griffons." He eyed the way Anders kept getting Cullen to blush and sputter, every few jokes. They seemed to be much easier with each other than he'd ever imagined, but that was probably for the best, if Cullen was going to end up in charge.
"And what about you, hmm? What outrageous design are you expecting me to decipher with my glorious ass, rather than showing me? And what are people going to think with you trying to get your own brother to recognise your codpiece by touch alone!"
Anders glanced at the Hawkes behind him and then grinned at Cullen. "Brothers, right?" He shrugged. "I had a brother, too. No idea what ever came of him. Older, of course. Gone before… Well, he moved to Ansburg, and there was my mum with no sons to help with the harvest. But, they're just like that, aren't they? You'd never believe the things he used to try to convince me of."
"Did he used to throw sausage parties too?" Cullen asked with a droll look. "I'm so glad my brother never did. And…" Artie finally stepped out from behind Cormac, and Cullen's stare dropped to his crotch. "…speaking of brothers. What is my brother-in-law wearing?"
Anders turned to look and guffawed. "Fran's work?" Artie nodded, grinning. "That is some marvellous craftsmanship, if a bit blunt."
"I thought so!" Artemis gestured at his piece, which formed a pair of cupped hands holding his velvet-clad crotch. "Fenris seemed to find it funny. Fenris… where did he wander off to?"
Artie looked about, rising to his tip-toes to look for his husband. The white hair and tattoos made him simple enough to find, balancing a pair of drinks and trying to extricate himself from Izzy. Spotting Artemis, Fenris ducked under her arm and came over, pressing one of the glasses into his hand. Cider, by the looks of it.
Fenris looked up at Cormac and then down at Cormac and snorted.
"All black?" Cormac asked, squinting down at Fenris's leather accoutrements. "A pity. I thought you might go for something a bit more exciting."
"Perhaps it's simply to keep you from looking too long," Fenris retorted, wrapping his free arm around Artemis.
"Then you don't know me very well, do you?" Cormac grinned. "I'll be here all night, trying to figure out what the trick is. Does it turn lyrium blue, if it gets warm? Will it open into red-lined slits, if you squat?"
"Then I suppose you'll be staring at my crotch all night." Fenris smirked at Cormac, across the top of his glass. "Don't let the Orlesians catch you. Even Anton might not be able to save you from those rumours."
"Worse than the rumours I've been stroking off my little brother in Lowtown alleys? I doubt that," Cormac shot back, reaching behind Anders to help himself to the chorizo, and to nick the sign from the table. "I'm sure the family's survived worse than the oldest son staring at some elven nobleman's crotch all night." He stuck the chunk of sausage in his mouth and adjusted the clip on the sign, before attaching it to Anders's belt. "Besides, you know my true lust is for the fine, thick sausage of the Anderfels."
Fenris squinted at the sign now dangling over Anders's crotch. "Is that what we're calling it now? Ch… hm." That wasn't a word he remembered reading anywhere before.
"Chorizo," Artemis supplied, and that made sense, he supposed. For a certain value of sense. "Chorizo of the Anderfels. Cormac does like them spicy." He waggled his eyebrows at his brother. "And please do keep staring at Fenris's crotch. It's worth it, I promise."
Fenris quirked an eyebrow at his husband. "I'd much rather you were the Hawke staring at it. Then I would make sure it would be worth it."
"Oh, I'm always staring at it. Even if it seems like I'm looking at something else, I am devotedly focused on your crotch in my peripheral vision."
"How sweet."
Artie grinned and offered Fenris a sausage, waggling it in front of his face. Fenris caught it in his teeth with a teasing growl.
"You two are gross," Carver muttered, and only then did Artemis realise he was there, strategically standing behind the table.
"And I would like to thank my youngest brother for keeping his crotch out of my line of sight, this evening. Excellent use of a table, Carver," Cormac congratulated him, snatching up another bit of sausage and dipping it in one of the cups of sauce. Fig sauce, apparently, he realised as the flavour settled into his mouth. "Pretty sure I've found the best sausage at this party, already."
"And it's not the one you just put in your mouth," Anders joked, with a sly smile.
Cullen choked, again, and Carver reached across the table to slap him on the back a few times.
"Still trying to lower the number of templars in the world?" Carver asked Anders, snidely, helping himself to the conspicuously unlabelled sausage on the table between them.
"I had no idea you found Ander sausage so appealing." Cormac smiled over the table at Carver, who looked entirely disgusted and surreptitiously spit into his hand, before making his way toward the nearest potted plant.
"All of you are gross," Carver muttered.
"No, no. That's gross," Artemis protested, nose crinkling as he pointed at Carver's hand.
"And isn't it rude to spit?" Fenris asked innocently.
Cullen wheezed again. This time Anton appeared at his side, patting his back. "Could you all please stop trying to kill my husband with sausage? That's my job!"
"I hate this family," Carver muttered, scowling until he spotted Merrill across the room. With Theron. "And for the record, I also hate sausages." He caught the smirk Anders was determinedly not making. "Literal sausages. The food. Also the metaphorical sausages — oh shut up."
With a huff, Carver skirted the table and made for his girlfriend, still determinedly keeping the table between himself and his siblings.
"Scarring templars," Artie said to Cormac. "That is tonight's theme, apparently. Well. Tonight's other theme." He poked at one sausage plate, reorganising the sausage so that they filled the plate in a more symmetrical way.
"Artie?" Cormac took his brother's hands in his own. "Stop fondling the food. People who aren't related to you mean to eat that, and I think they might object."
"My hands are clean!" Artie whined, still aware of the lack of symmetry out of the corner of his eye. "Or do you mind me handling your sausage?"
"I'd trust you only to put clean, delicious, and symmetrical sausage in my mouth, because you are my sweetest and most delightful brother. I'm not sure if that says more about you or more about Carver and Anton." Cormac squinted over his shoulder at where Anton still stood, attempting to adjust Cullen's codpiece.
"I am your most delightful brother," Anton argued. "I am quiet and cunning, and I bring home ridiculous amounts of money."
"You're not as quiet as you think you are," Cormac pointed out, raising his eyebrows suggestively.
Cullen blushed furiously at the very idea.
"I thought maybe you should see what it was like." Anton smirked, then tucked a bit of sausage into his mouth.
"Carver's right," Artie sighed. "You are gross."
Fenris agreed, watching with disgusted fascination as Anders tried to shove as much sausage into his mouth as he could fit.
More guests arrived over the next few hours, filling the hall with all kinds of codpiece concoctions and sampling the sausages (in an unsymmetrical way, to Artie's distress). A crowd had gathered around Jethann to ooh and aah, gawking at what he was wearing, for a change of pace.
Theron stared pensively down at his own crotch. "I still think mine's better," he said. "What do you think?"
Natia took a step to consider Theron's codpiece from a different angle, squinting at it over her drink. "I don't know. The colours are nice, but the detail of his…"
"Mine has detail!" Theron protested. "It's a very detailed dragon head!"
Natia hummed. "Let me get a better look at his, and I'll report back to you."
Bethany swept across the room, her flowing silver shirt tucked into slim, ice-blue leggings, with what seemed to be some sort of jewelled animal skull at the front. She smiled and held her hands out to Varania. "You brought a date! Who is this handsome man, and does your brother know, or am I going to have to keep him distracted?"
Varania chuckled. "This is Paivel," she said, gesturing to the man to her side, "from the Sabrae clan of Sundermount."
"Oh! You're one of Theron's people!" Bethany's smile widened as she shook the thoroughly overwhelmed elf's hand. "My brother is terribly fond of Theron."
"I'm actually his teacher," Paivel noted, eyes caught on Bethany's codpiece. "Is that… a wolf?"
"It is! Merrill suggested it, actually. An empty codpiece, a trickster's mask, and my own studies in Nevarran funerary tradition…" Bethany shrugged. "But, how have you been?" she asked Varania. "We never have the time to talk, at Fran's. Are the children well? Are you enjoying Kirkwall?"
Varania smiled shyly, hooking an arm through Paivel's. "Kirkwall is… an interesting place," she answered neutrally. "I can't say I'm used to the food here yet. Or the cold. But it is nice to have a job, a community for the children to grow up in." Here, she found herself less afraid that her children would be taken from her and sold into slavery, and that alone was worth the change of address. "And Paivel tells the most marvellous stories." She looked at him like the moon shone out of his ass. Or his codpiece.
Theron saw the couple, and his ear twitched. He took the glass out of Artie's hand and took a long gulp. It was only after he'd almost drained the glass that he paused to consider the taste. He held the drink in front of him and sniffed. "What is this?"
Clearing his throat, Artemis took his glass back. "Cider. The not alcoholic kind. Sorry."
"Blasphemy."
Fenris offered Theron his drink instead, before finally turning to see what Theron had been staring at. "Is that…? Who is she with?" His brands lit for the barest moment.
"Ooh!" Theron said, distracted by the glow and by Fenris's codpiece.
"That's quite a sword," Merrill remarked, having also seen the flicker of Fenris's codpiece. "Though, the pommel looks a bit big. That seems like it might interfere with proper swording."
"The pommel of my sword is just the right size," Fenris purred, slyly, eyes still on his sister and that other elf.
"Oh, didn't you know? That's Hahren Paivel — my teacher. He's the head of the clan, now that Marethari's gone. A brilliant storyteller and historian, really," Theron gushed, helping himself to the rest of the Nevarran sucuk Merrill had just taken a bite of.
"If you keep going on like that, I'll think you're dating him, not my sister." Fenris eyed Theron. "Your teacher? For how long? Wouldn't that make him a bit old for her?"
"Since forever, really. Paivel's the best. And it doesn't matter how old he is, really, he'd be a bit old for her if he was seventeen, from what the rest of the clan says. He's just always been old." Theron paused. "Do you even know how old your sister is?"
"No, but it doesn't matter, does it? He's old enough to be our father." And that was something Fenris didn't need to have thought of — except that the idea of having a father who was an elf did appeal, to some greater degree, if only because that wouldn't be the father he had.
"Do you really care about that, darling?" Serendipity asked, leaning over Fenris's shoulder, holding her wine a bit out not to spill it on him. "Or is it just that there's some man sniffing about your sister? She is very pretty. I'd be more worried if he was human, no slight meant to your adorable husband or his brothers."
"Why more worried?" Fenris asked, squinting at Serendipity. "In my experience, elves are just as capable of being asses as any human is, particularly when they're around asses they find attractive." Which… no. He did not want to be talking about his sister's ass, no matter how obliquely. He'd blame the drink.
"My wife will tell you that I am an ass all of the time, whether I'm around attractive asses or not," Theron cheerfully replied. "But then, if I'm around her, I'm around an attractive ass, so how would she know?"
Fenris sighed, wishing he had something stronger. When he finished rubbing his eyes, he opened them to see Theron staring appreciatively at Serendipity's crotch, which was festooned with folds of fabric the shape of a flower. A familiar pink — and suggestive — flower. "A… blooming rose?" Fenris drawled, raising one eyebrow.
"Oh!" Theron exclaimed with a relieved laugh. "That is… not what I thought that — Erm. That's a lovely flower."
