Ingrid Hawke

Ingrid Hawke, born in 9:10 Dragon, was a cousin of the Champion of Kirkwall, Marian Hawke.

## Overview

### **Physical Appearance**

Ingrid is 5'11'', with a muscular frame and broad shoulders. A few people have disparagingly described her figure as "mannish", but she has learnt to brush these comments aside. After all, being tall, muscular and long limbed is all the better for fighting. She has short black hair, which she usually wears in braids, and piercing blue eyes.

### **Personality**

Most people who don't know her - and many who do - would describe Ingrid as rude, abrasive and violent - little better than a common thug. She certainly is all of these things, but there is a reason for it. Witnessing her mother's death at the age of four and her experiences during the Battle of Ostagar and her family's flight from Lothering have left her deeply traumatised, and much like her brother Leif she developed an unhealthy coping mechanism. But where Leif turned to humour, Ingrid turned to anger. She loves her family very much and she does have a softer, more caring side, but she keeps it well hidden.

### **Talents and Skills**

Ingrid is a very skilled fighter with sword and shield, having been trained by her father from a young age. She doesn't quite have the strength for two handed weapons, though, much to her disappointment.

Again, much like her brother Leif, Ingrid is an excellent Wicked Grace player, mainly beacuse it's almost impossible to tell when she's bluffing.

## **Biography**

### **Early Life**

Ingrid Hawke was born in a little house on the outskirts of Lothering in 9:10 Dragon, the second child of Magnus and Elodie Hawke. Her siblings were Leif (born in 9:07 Dragon) and Erik (born in 9:14 Dragon). The first four years of her life were very happy. Magnus and Elodie were loving parents who doted on their three young children. But then disaster struck.

One day in 9:14 Dragon, a few weeks after Elodie gave birth to Erik, Magnus decided to take Leif and Ingrid for a walk through the woods so Elodie could rest. They returned home to a scene of devastation. Four bandits had broken into the house while they were gone, and Elodie had fought them off wearing only a nightdress for protection. She killed all the bandits, but was fatally wounded herself in the process. Magnus, Leif and Ingrid said a tearful goodbye to their wife and mother, and then could do nothing but watch as she bled out over the floor. Ingrid was left traumatised by her mother's death and began to harbour a deep resentment towards her brother Erik. Subconsciously, she held him partially to blame. After all, if her mother hadn't been weakened from giving birth to him, maybe she would have survived.

In 9:20 Dragon, Magnus Hawke's twin brother Malcolm arrived in Lothering, along with his wife Leandra and their three children, Marian, Carver and Bethany. Ingrid took to her cousin Carver immediately. They were close in age, and he was surly and rebellious, just like her. The two of them spent many happy hours playing with their toy swords in their parents' gardens and, later on, sparring with real swords under Magnus's watchful eye. She eventually grew close to Marian as well. She was tough and stubborn, but with a softer side, similar to how Ingrid remembered her mother. She struggled to connect with Bethany, though, as she was irritated by her efforts to always be kind and cheerful. For her part, Bethany was always a little afraid of Ingrid.

Erik's magic manifested in 9:21 Dragon, which caused Ingrid to become even more resentful of him. It already seemed to her that the whole family were coddling him, since he was the youngest, but now everyone seemed to be even more desperate to protect him. On top of that, Erik being a mage could potentially put all of them in danger. She also resented Malcolm, Marian and Bethany for the same reason, but nowhere near to the same extent.

Ingrid was very upset when her Uncle Malcolm died in 9:27 Dragon. Despite her slight resentment of him, he was family and she loved him. She did what she could to help Marian, who now had to shoulder all of her father's responsibilities.

### **The Fifth Blight**

When news of the Blight reached Lothering, Ingrid immediately enlisted in the Ferelden army, dreaming of becoming a war hero just like her parents. Carver signed up too, and so did Leif who promised his father and aunt that he would do his best to keep them out of trouble. The three Hawkes travelled to Ostagar, where they faced darkspawn for the first time. The battle was a terrible defeat for the Ferelden forces. Loghain and his troops quit the field, leaving the King, the army and the Grey Wardens to their deaths. Ingrid and Carver refused to leave the battlefield when the army surrendered, and Leif had to practically drag them away. They fled home to Lothering and arrived just ahead of the darkspawn horde.

The two branches of the Hawke family left Lothering immediately. They had originally intended to travel to Kirkwall together, but became separated in the chaos. Leif and Erik both wanted to go back to look for their aunt and cousins, but Ingrid disagreed, arguing that they would be going back to their deaths and that at least they would have a chance of surviving if they continued running. Magnus sided with Ingrid, and the family travelled to Gwaren, where they were eventually able to secure passage to Kirkwall.

### **Kirkwall**

On the family's arrival in Kirkwall, Magnus sent word to Aram, one of his former army comrades who had moved to Kirkwall several years earlier and who he thought would be willing to help them enter the city. Aram paid the fee to allow them to enter Kirkwall and helped them find a small house to rent in Lowtown. Magnus found a position with the city guard training new recruits, while Leif and Ingrid joined the Red Iron Mercenaries. Leif and Magnus had originally wanted to keep Erik away from the unsavory work the mercenaries were involved in, but were eventually persuaded otherwise. Ingrid argued that it was about time Erik started contributing to the family, Erik himself insisted on being allowed to contribute, and Meeran had implied that he would be willing to part with a good deal of coin in order to obtain the services of a mage. The combination of the three factors led to Leif and his father changing their minds and allowing Erik to join the company after all.

A few weeks after arriving in Kirkwall, Leif ran into his cousins Marian and Carver in Lowtown. Ingrid was very happy to hear that Marian, Carver and Leandra had made it to Kirkwall, but was saddened to learn of Bethany's death. That evening the two branches of the Hawke family met for dinner in Magnus's rented house and swapped stories of their respective journeys to Kirkwall. From then on, the five Hawke cousins saw each other regularly and sometimes helped each other out with various jobs in and around the city.

A year after their arrival in Kirkwall, Marian told her three cousins about a potential opportunity. A dwarf named Bartrand was leading an expedition into the Deep Roads, and his brother Varric had invited Marian to join as a business partner if she could raise 50 sovereigns. Marian was sure she could find places for her cousins on the expedition as well and assured them that they would be well paid for their efforts. It was too good an opportunity to pass up, and so Leif, Ingrid and Erik set about helping their cousins raise the necessary coin. Marian was as good as her word, and several months later Ingrid and her brothers set off into the Deep Roads alongside Marian and Carver.

The expedition was a success. Marian used the bulk of her earnings to buy back the Amell estate for her mother. She invited her uncle and cousins to move in with them, but they declined, feeling that they would be too out of place among the nobility. Marian still insisted on giving them a large amount of coin in addition to their expedition pay, and that combined with Magnus's guard wages and Leif, Ingrid and Erik's Red Iron earnings allowed them to buy a much larger house at the higher end of Lowtown (or the lower end of Hightown as Ingrid's father and brothers referred to it).

For the next six years, Ingrid and her brothers continued to work for the Red Iron and to carry out odd jobs in and around Kirkwall. They frequently crossed paths with Marian and her friends and would often team up with them to try to help solve Kirkwall's problems. They were a great source of support to Marian following her mother's death in 9:34 Dragon, and they also helped her fight back against the Qunari during the invasion. Three years later, they helped her defend the mages during the aftermath of the Chantry explosion.

Ingrid remained in Kirkwall for a few months after the Chantry explosion, working with her brothers to help those who had been injured or left homeless. Once the city was a little more stable, she and Isabela set sail on Isabela's new ship, fulfilling Ingrid's dreams of adventure and seeing the world.

## **Relationships**

Ingrid often found herself interacting with the friends Marian had made in Kirkwall, but her relationships with most of them were rather difficult. She despised Anders and Merrill for being respectively an abomination and a blood mage, and they in turn disliked her based on the fact that she was a lot more pro-Templar than the other members of the Hawke family. She and Aveline could respect each other as warriors, but as people they didn't get along at all well. Ingrid saw Aveline as an uptight do-gooder who was incapable of having fun, while Aveline thought Ingrid was rude, violent and a thoroughly unpleasant individual. Even Varric found it difficult to make friends with her because of her abrasive personality. She got on reasonably well with Fenris, though. She appreciated that he didn't seem to feel the need to talk all the time, and they would often sit together in companionable silence. She could also sympathise with his views on mages to some extent.

### **Isabela**

Ingrid first met Isabela in the Hanged Man and immedately thought she was gorgeous, with her curvaceous figure, sun bronzed skin and long black hair. They struck up a conversation during which Isabela invited Ingrid to join her for a game of Wicked Grace. Ingrid accepted and proceeded to lose all of her coin. Isabela proposed one final round, but this time, instead of coin the winner would receive either a favour or a forfeit from the loser. Ingrid lost again and admitted that she would have asked for a kiss from Isabela if she'd won. Isabela laughed and kissed her anyway - a long, sensual kiss that left Ingrid wanting a lot more. Isabela then revealed that as the winner she would request a forfeit from Ingrid - and the forfeit was that Ingrid had to come home with her that night. They went upstairs to Isabela's room and thoroughly enjoyed themselves.

The next evening, Marian introduced her three cousins to the new friends she had made in Kirkwall, including Isabela. Ingrid laughingly told Marian that she and Isabela already knew each other rather well, but was secretly pleased that she now had an excuse to see Isabela again. Over the next few months, they gradually fell into a friends with benefits type arrangement, although they were both free to sleep with other people whenever they wanted to. This continued for three years, by which point Isabela had come to mean a lot more to Ingrid than just a friend with benefits. She denied her feelings even to herself, believing that if Isabela ever found out it would mean the end of their relationship, such as it was.

In 9:34 Dragon, Isabela disappeared with the Tome of Koslun, only to suddenly reappear during the Qunari invasion to return the Tome to the Arishok. Ingrid and Marian both angrily refused to let the Arishok take Isabela. When the Arishok suggested that he and Marian fight a duel, Ingrid asked why he wouldn't duel her instead. The Arishok replied that she wasn't *basalit-an*. Enraged, Ingrid threw herself at the Arishok, only to be immediately run through by a Qunari spear. While Marian duelled the Arishok to save Isabela and Kirkwall, Erik and Anders fought desperately to save Ingrid's life.

Ingrid woke up two days later, still angry and in a lot of pain. She was deeply relieved to hear that Marian had survived the duel and that the Qunari hadn't taken Isabela, but also saddened and confused to learn that Isabela had disappeared yet again. At first she assumed that Isabela would return soon, but as weeks went by with no word, she began to give up hope. Once she'd recovered from her injuries she started spending more and more nights at taverns and at the Blooming Rose in an attempt to forget her heartbreak. Her father, brothers and cousin did their best to help her and to curb her self-destructive tendencies, but the first few months following Isabela's disappearance were very hard for everyone involved. After a while, Ingrid began to realise that what she was doing wasn't healthy and made an effort to cut down on her drinking. It seemed that she was finally making progress, much to her family's relief.

Then, in 9:37 Dragon, Isabela unexpectedly returned. Ingrid heard the news from Marian and immediately headed to the Hanged Man to demand an explanation from her former lover. But Isabela wasn't there, nor was she there the next three times Ingrid went to the Hanged Man, and in the end she could only conclude that Isabela was avoiding her. This sent Ingrid into a downward spiral, and she resumed drinking to excess, to the dismay of her family. One evening, several weeks after Isabela's return, she was drinking in one of her favourite seedy taverns when Isabela finally appeared. She brushed off Isabela's first attempts to apologise, but when Isabela explained that she had fallen for her and that she'd left because she was confused and afraid, she couldn't remain angry with her. It seemed to her that Isabela was being completely honest with her for the first time since they'd met, and this prompted her to finally confess her feelings. The two women spent a joyful evening making up for the three years they'd lost, and over the next few days they made no secret of the fact that they were together again - for good this time.

Ingrid and Isabela remained in Kirkwall for a few months after the Chantry explosion and did what they could to help those who had been injured or left homeless. Once some stability had returned to the city, Ingrid helped Isabela obtain a ship - through not entirely legal means - and they set off to travel the world.

## **Miscellaneous**

Ingrid never allowed Varric to give her a nickname. The only people who can call her anything other than Ingrid are Isabela, who occasionally calls her "sweet thing", and her father, who gave her the nickname "little lioness".

Ingrid has a mabari tattooed on her right shoulder, a nod to her Ferelden heritage, and an anchor tattooed on her left shoulder, a symbol of her love for Isabela.

## **Links**

### **Reddit Headcanon or Writing Prompt Threads:**

A Joining of Hands - Ingrid and Isabela share a tender moment (Prompt: Six Sentence Story: The first time your OC held hands with their LI or best friend)

Blood - Ingrid tries to take on the Arishok. Things... don't go to plan (Prompt: 100 Word Drabble: "That's a lot of blood")

Recovery - Ingrid regains consciousness following the Qunari invasion (Prompt: Recovery from a grievous wound - make it all about observations and gestures, no dialogue in this piece)

The Intervention - Ingrid's father and brother take action to stop her destroying herself (Prompt: "It's cute you assume I have feelings")

Broken Hearts and Honeyed Words - Ingrid is drowning her sorrows yet again, but is interrupted by Isabela's reappearance (Prompt: Sugar on the tongue, liquor on the lips, heart shattered into pieces, stolen with a kiss)

Moments of Joy - Ingrid's father gives her a very special set of weapons (Prompt: 100 Word Drabble: A time your OC couldn't stop smiling)

## **Gallery**

Ingrid and Isabela by ChevalierLogan (https://twitter.com/\_ChevalierLogan)Ingrid Hawke by Hes-Per-Ides (https://hes-per-ides.tumblr.com/)