we have the time we make.

Avery Chase

They did discuss Thanksgiving. Whether they should share it somehow, but they both have traditions, and Calden could sense in Avery some tremor of uncertainty about asking him to abandon his own family for the holiday to spend it with hers, resistance to the idea of doing so herself, and a hint -- a wisp -- of anxiety about how briefly they've been seeing each other, in the grand scheme of things. Officially or unofficially; to Avery, it is a candleflame of a courtship still, and holidays with the family aren't something she's prepared to share just yet.

So, perhaps lying together in her bed or his, Avery naked atop his chest, drowsing in his arms as his fingertips move slowly up and down her spine, they discuss Thanksgiving, and make plans for afterward.

--

And this is how, on a weekday no less, they have come to the Botanic Gardens. The entire space is awash with lights of every color. Some displays are muted and gentle, others a cascade of rainbow light. Sculptures and pathways and secretive kissing spots are all delicately lit like all the stars in the sky have come to rest upon the branches and leaves of everything here, providing color to flora that has gone silent for the winter. It is crowded, but not overwhelmingly so. There are families with children, couples, groups of friends. Many people -- Avery included -- wear pairs of paper glasses that turn every single point of light into a particular shape. Many children choose Santa or Elves or Snowmen; Avery chose stars.

Everywhere she looks, she sees stars, and the effect is so delightful and dizzying that she is laughing, laughing, long before they go inside to the cafe to get hot chocolate spiked with peppermint liqueur, sipping as they stroll.

Avery is a vision. Her knitted hat is green, her hair curled and spilling out around her jawbone. She is wearing grey slacks and boots with a low heel, a heavy white peacoat over it all and a scarf that gleams with silver and green mingled together. She could do without the coat, and the hat. She could do without the soft gloves that wait in her pockets, and does. But she likes to wear these things, even if she burns so hot, feels so warm even without the cup of cocoa in her hand.

The gardens are lively but serene, lovely but not overserious. People laugh and talk. Inside the cafe there was music, but nothing more than piano music, and not even solely carols. The themes are not strictly Christmas; there are no carolers marching through to interrupt anyone. Everyone is there to simply enjoy the gardens, enjoy the lights, and delight in these things. Avery may as well be walking on air every time she and Calden hold hands.

But that happens regardless of season.

She keeps looking at him, ridiculous in her paper glasses, beaming. "You have to try these," she says, of the $1 trinket. "I imagine it's what being high feels like. I feel so giddy."

Calden White

The other day, Calden thought of the night he met Avery. He didn't think of the way she looked when he first saw her in human shape. He didn't think of the way her eyes gleamed as she came around a shelf in his cellar. He didn't think of how she leaned over the back of his game room couch, or how she kissed him at the end of the night, both of them ragged from pleasure and exhaustion, waiting for her taxi in his truck.

No; he thought of her writing H2O in the dirt with her paws, and the thought was so endearing and so funny that he laughed aloud,

sitting in the saddle of his favorite quarter-horse,

a stone's throw from Ian who looked at him like he was crazy.

That's what love does to him, he supposes. Makes you a little bit crazy in the best sorts of ways. Makes you remember random things about your lover at random times under random circumstances, makes you smile, makes you laugh, makes something warm glow in your chest for no good reason at all.

A little like being high. A little bit giddy.

--

So now he's strolling the Denver Botanic Gardens. There's a chill in the air, but all those lights strung through all those trees casts a certain warmth all its own. The rest is provided by a hot drink, a moderate crowd, and of course: the woman holding his hand or winding her arm through his as they stroll. They look at the greenery. They look at the lights. He buys her those ridiculous glasses, and she buys him a mug of spiked hot chocolate.

They sit for a while. There are armchairs and couches by the window; they pick one made for three, though no third wheel is so socially blind as to join them. Calden sips his hot chocolate and Avery insists on peering through those glasses of hers. He slings his arm around her shoulders. She tells him he just has to try those, and he laughs at her. At her, mind you; though it's a gentle sort of teasing, without malign intent.

"I'm afraid I'm going to let you be the trendsetter," he says, smiling. "I don't think I could pull the starry-eyed look off. Too dignified."

Avery Chase

In her glasses, which look not unlike old-school 3D glasses, it's still not hard to make out her eyes. The plastic film between them is mottled with stars but he can still make out, just barely, the color of her eyes. She looks at him with a thoroughly dignified, very disappointed stare, a bit of a how dare you mingled with o rly.

Without a word, she reaches up, takes them off, turns them around, and puts them on his face.

And smiles at him. All around her, the lights on everything turn to stars in his view, swirling and twisting like a kaleidoscope, hazing his vision with something psychedelic. She is smirking.

Calden White

Calden is grinning when he gets that look, and grinning all the more when she pulls those glasses off and turns them around. There's no resistance on his end: he even bends a little to make it easier for her to slip them on, his eyes closing trustingly as she hooks the little paper earpieces behind his ears.

Then he opens his eyes again. The world is suddenly awash in stars, every point of light diffracted into a pattern. For a second he's just looking around, getting used to it, turning his head this way and that. When he looks back at her she's smirking.

He doesn't miss a beat. He bumps his brow against hers, returning that smirk. Murmurs into the quiet warmth between them:

"Well, now you've literally made me starry-eyed for you." And kisses her, soft and quick.

Avery Chase

Avery, surrounded by her aura of multicolored stars in Calden's eyes, just scoffs at him, rolling her eyes gently as she leans over to him, following that catlike forehead-bump with a soft kiss. It's a delicate thing, tender, but they are in public. People walk by every few seconds. Avery is not the sort to make out with her boyfriend in public; it means something that she holds his hand so freely, so happily, because she wouldn't always do that. It depends on the environment. Here, tonight, she is comfortable even giving him that soft kiss, smiling at him as she withdraws from it.

"You are a fool," she says, quiet and adoring.

Calden White

Avery is not the sort to make out with her boyfriend in public. Avery is the sort to pull her boyfriend into the back of a truck and make him see stars a wholly different way -- but that doesn't really count as being in public. So: these kisses are delicate and tender and subdued, the sort of thing you wouldn't be embarrassed for a friend or a family member to witness, that comes and goes without deepening.

"A man's entitled to be a bit of a fool for the lady he's sweet on," Calden replies, smiling. His hand squeezes hers, and then he lifts the glasses off his face and returns them carefully, gently to hers.

"How have you been?" A little more serious now. "Somehow I feel like every time I see you, it's always been too long since the last time."

Avery Chase

"Ah," Avery counters, "but you are not a bit of a fool. You are entirely one."

She smiles at him as he puts the glasses back on her face, but she actually reaches up to remove them after a moment. They may be hilarious, but it's hard to focus on his face while wearing them. She sips her cocoa, tipping her head a little as he tells her how long it feels.

All she can do is nod. "I know how that feels," she says quietly. "Though I think that may be because we do see each other somewhat seldom." She shakes her head at him. "Why can't you just raise your cattle in downtown Denver?"

Calden White

She is teasing, but Calden answers seriously. "You know," he says quietly, "I've actually thought a few times about turning the business over to my cousins. Taking more of a broad-strokes oversight role, moving south to the city to be closer to you. But I just can't really see myself doing it. I can't ... see myself doing this as a desk-and-phone job from a hundred miles away. That land is a part of me, and a part of my history.

"But god, sometimes it scares me to think, too, that maybe one day I'll look back on all this and wish I'd done something differently. While I had the chance."

Avery Chase

That... was not what Avery expected to hear.

Not the thought, even as a glimmer, of moving to Denver. Calden doesn't even pretend to mince his words, doesn't hide his reasons at all: to be closer to you. Nor was she expecting him to be so clear in his own heart that he couldn't leave that land, that it's a part of him.

Avery is very still as he speaks, caught off guard but not completely stunned. She breathes in after he finishes, exhaling slowly, and then sets her cocoa on the bench beside her. She leans over, wrapping her arm around him, burying her face in his neck for a few moments. Or his scarf, if he's wearing one, nuzzling either the heavy fabric or his warm skin.

She stays like that for a little while, feeling the strength and liveliness of his body against her own, her arms barely making it around him in this form. She nuzzles him one last time, then, drawing back to look him in the eye. Her brow is stitched, tight and a little sad.

"The land is part of you," she says quietly, in agreement and certainty. "But it means something to me that you would even consider leaving it just to have a little more time with me."

Her hand lifts, coming up to stroke his jaw, the backs of her fingers light and soft as they stroke down the bristle that comes in so quickly even after a good shave. "You are not losing anything by staying where you are. It's not a chance that will pass so quickly."

Calden White

He leans into that embrace as easily and uncomplicatedly as he's ever gone to her. Never, not even at the very beginning, was resistance for the sake of resistance a part of Calden's character. She buries her face against his neck -- it is his skin and not a scarf under that thickly-lined shearling jacket she will see him wear again and again this winter -- and he leans his cheek against the top of her head. They stay like that for a while, his thumb stroking along the side of her hand.

She looks a little sad. He feels a little sad. Somehow it makes him sadder still that she agrees with him. Doesn't argue. Reassures him. Thanks him, in a way.

"We don't really know that for certain," he says softly. "And even now I know that if it was land and cows on one hand and you on the other, I'd be a fool not to reach for you."

Avery Chase

"And you could upend your life and move to Denver and it will not make anything more certain," Avery tells him, with that soft, sad, but sort of amused little smile. She wrinkles her nose, going on touching his face the way she is, stroking him thoughtlessly, the way animals touch.

"If you are looking for someone to convince you to leave your land, it will not be me, Calden," she murmurs. "It is not your land and cows on one hand and me on the other, with a choice in between them. You have two hands," Avery adds, a bit teasingly. "You may hold both your land, and your cows, and your girlfriend."

She leans over to him, resting her forehead on his. "We have the time we make," she whispers. "But I would not be opposed if we made a little more."

Calden White

"Girlfriend," he replies, softly, as though amused and wondrous at the very word. The very notion of it.

No one could possibly fail to notice they are lovers right now. They've scarcely kissed, but: the way their hands keep linking. The way they keep leaning into each other, nuzzling and touching like animals -- it's unmistakable.

"I'm not looking for someone to convince me," he adds, "and on some level I'm grateful that you've never tried. But... I wouldn't mind if we made a little more time, either. I do miss you when you're not around." That's a bit of a confession, there. Strange, but for all their affection, all their potent chemistry, all the maturity and certainty of their relationship, they are sometimes almost fearful of the absoluteness and suddenness of their bond. "I miss you quite a lot."

Avery Chase

Well, that's just math, she could say. She's not around quite a lot, and he misses her when she's not around, ergo...

Avery does not tease him. She couldn't. He's so earnest, and this clearly pains him: to be so far, to feel like there must be something he could do, but not something he truly wants and not something she wants for him. She senses that, but she does not empathize so clearly with his fear, his trepidation of their bond. Not tonight. Sometimes she does, sometimes she is even more frightened by it than he is. But the truth is: she gave in. During summer, during that fancy birthday party for some acquaintance, she accepted it. He is her suitor. He is her lover. And her boyfriend, yes.

"All you have to do is tell me when you want to see me," she says, smiling gently, laying her head on his arm, "and if I am able, I will do my very best to come to you. And all you must do to see me is come to Denver. Whenever I can," and they both know that won't be all the time.

He has his business. His family. His cattle. Storms. Work. Palm-pressing and meetings. She has the war, and her family, and her pack, and sometimes, even when all their other stars align, she has to contend with a madness that drives her away from everything she loves most.

Calden White

"I know," Calden says quietly. He draws her hand to his mouth: the bristles of that ever-reappearing beard scratch and tickle as he kisses the backs of her fingers. "I know that, love.

"I'm sorry," he adds. "I don't know why this is on my mind tonight, but I don't mean to ruin the mood." He picks his cocoa up from where he set it, sipping, sipping, then draining down the last of it. "Come on," he says, summoning up a smile. "Let's go wander around and look at the lights. And if we see them selling those glasses again, I'll buy a pair too."

Avery Chase

"Oh, darling, you haven't," is, naturally, the first thing out of Avery's mouth, ardent in reassurance. "A mood that is ruined by honesty is not a mood worth maintaining," she insists, as he kisses her hand. She watches him sip, then turns to lift her own cup.

She sips, but she's watching him from the corner of her eye, and the truth is, she's troubled. By how distressed he seems, under the surface. She wonders what he isn't saying about that distress. What, really, is at the heart of how badly he misses her, how torn he seems to feel. Avery smiles as she lowers her cup again, trying to hide the little wrinkle between her eyebrows. "Maybe you can get some that look like snowflakes."

She rises with him, holding her hot cocoa in one hand, but holding his hand with the other, lacing their fingers together as they walk into the lights.

lola's fanmail.

Lola Hawkes

These days, since clocks were all switched back an hour, the sun was setting astoundingly earlier than it feels like it was doing three weeks ago. Lola had set out in the truck when the sun seemed still high and proud in the sky, but by the time her vehicle bumped and jarred its way along the gravel road that led up to the ranch that Calden White lived on the sun was already trying to make love with the western horizon. The sky to the east was going dusky purple, and though up above it was still blue, and to the west it was still blue, the clouds were starting to tinge orange and pink and it would only be another hour before dusk truly set in.

Because it isn't that dark yet, though, there are no headlights to bounce and bound over property and buildings when she comes upon the ranch. She's cautious about which bend to take in the gravel road-- she doesn't quite know where to park the truck. This is told by the slow crunch of gravel under her tires, and how she's crawling forward thoughtfully before cranking her wheel and parking half on gravel and half in the grass up against the flanking side of the barn. She wasn't an invited guest, so she didn't want to park in the driveway itself.

Lola didn't live on a farm or a ranch, but she did go to school with a bunch of kids in a rural community, so she understood some simple facts about making a living working off your land-- one basic simple fact was that if it wasn't well past dinner or time for your head to hit the pillow, chances were that you'd be out working instead of up in the house. This is why Lola checks the barn before the house proper.

She finds a door and creaks it open to peer inside at first, and then step inside completely when she's confident that she's found a working body (she can hear someone even if she may not immediately spot them inside of the large building). She's wearing a natural wool colored knit cap on top of her head and over her ears, with her hair in twin braids that originate from behind her ears and lay in front of her shoulders. She wears dark washed jeans tucked into hiking boots, and a mustard yellow sweater pulled on overtop of what appears to be a yellow-blue-plaid flannel shirt, judging by the cuffs and collar that appear from under the sweater itself.

"Hello?," is how she calls out, as most people would. Asking for an answer so she can identify the voice and see if she recognizes it, as well as get a better pin on where this person was within the dusty barn.

Calden White

Lola has been by the White ranch once. She can't quite be said to be familiar with the place, but at least she knows how to get there. She knows which roads to take, where to turn. She knows where the house -- the surprisingly large, well-constructed house -- sits atop its low bluff, large windows facing the sprawl of the land. She knows, too, where the accessory buildings are clustered near but not quite adjacent to the house: the barn and the chicken coop and the calving shed and standalone garage.

That's where she heads. Not up the low hill to the house, but to that cluster of working buildings. The road here is paved, and the drive up to the house is paved, but the path to the barn is gravel and dirt. Her tires crunch to a stop. The main doors of the barn open away from her, but she finds a back door and lets herself into a dim, high-ceiling interior that smells of straw and working animals.

She can hear voices -- two voices, men, conversing under the occasional scratch and jingle and creak of horses being unsaddled, rubbed down, put into their stalls. When she calls out, the voices pause for a surprised moment.

Then one of the voices -- Calden's, if she recognizes it -- calls back: "Hello! How can we help you?"

Lola Hawkes

One day Lola will actually recognize Calden's voice, if she has her way and this acquaintence knits into a stronger, sturdier alliance. At this time, though, all she can go off of is the age and health and gender that the voice has. It sounds strong and young and deep and male, so she figures it's probably Calden and heads toward it.

The two men will hear her boots crunching on the packed dirt and raw cement where each or either lie, as she walks through to find the stalls and the source of the voice. Her hands are tucked into the back pockets of her pants. When she does eventually come into sight her expression is a blank neutral slate, with eyebrows appearing a little heavy because they're so dark and usually hunkered down in a ghost of a frown. Her mouth doesn't look like it smiles much either.

"It's Lola Hawkes come calling for Calden White," she explains, her voice a gruff and no-nonsense thing that carries through to the men. When she does spy them she'll pause, make brief eye contact with both, then jerk her chin upward in an acknowledging sort of greeting before redirecting her course to approach.

"Had a question for ya," she'll follow up, her voice less calling and searching, more direct now.

Calden White

Well, it turns out the two men are walking toward her too, so they meet somewhere in the middle: around the corner of the big tractor lurking in the back of the barn, not quite out to the stalls yet where the working horses are stabled. It's Calden all right, looking tall and russet-haired and cowboy-Fianna-ish as he does: a shearling jacket keeping him warm, rough work gloves stuffed in the back pocket of his jeans. No hat. Yes bandanna around the neck, though, as though maybe he just wasn't quite stereotypical enough without it. Seeing Lola, he smiles.

"Miss Hawkes. Well, you're a little ways out of your home turf."

The other voice, it turns out, belongs to Calden's distant cousin and employee. Dark-haired, lean-faced, a few years younger than Calden, the other man swipes his battered stetson off his head in a thoughtless gesture and sticks his hand out.

"Miss," he says, offering her a gruff little nod, a firm pump of the hand. "Name's Ian White."

"Miss Hawkes is kin to the Uktena," Calden explains. "Her family's old and well-respected around these parts. Almost," this is a bit of gentle ribbing, "as old and well-respected as ours. Ian's my cousin, Lola. Our grandfathers were brothers. He works the cattle with me."

She has a question. Calden quirks an eyebrow. "Yeah, let's hear it."

Lola Hawkes

When Lola comes upon the two men, Calden is given only the first two seconds of her attention before it turns upon the younger, swarthier of the two men. Calden might expect that she'd be checking his cousin out, because he was of course a strong ranch hand and clearly a part of the Nation, and probably closer in age to Lola than Calden himself was. But there is no potential or consideration of that note in her eyes when she surveys the unfamiliar man. Instead it looks more like she's sizing him up as though they'd stepped into a ring with one another. She's gauging if she could knock him out with one hit or if it would take a few more.

Thankfully it doesn't come to that, though, because the man removes his hat and sticks out his hand and introduces himself as Ian. When near enough to meet and stop walking, Lola accepts the hand and shakes. Her grip is firm but not overcompensating-- just a little too tight, too hasty though. She shakes his hand roughly before dropping her hands to her sides and returning her attention to Calden. The ribbing as to whether the Hawkes or White family is older or more established is met with a wry smirk that only barely touched at her eyes and curved only one side of her lips.

"Güero, the Uktena have been here so much longer than your Tribe of Bards can even hope to claim." He can pick from the tone that she's only returning the gesture, although since this is Lola we're talking about some of that pride is probably rooted in truth.

But, to business:

"A couple of other Kinfolk from the area, myself included, received letters summoning us out under.... uncomfortable circumstances a couple days back. From a woman who knew personal shit about our lives and families-- in particular, the families that Change. I'm curious to know if you got one of these too, and if you were just smart enough to stay away from the summons if that's the case."

Calden White

"She's got you there," Ian comments, the corner of his mouth curling. The ranch hand tucks his hat back on, as though that was obviously where it belongs.

Then Lola brings up the letter. Calden looks mystified. He exchanges a glance with Ian, who shrugs, shakes his head. Turning back, he answers, "No. Neither of us got anything of the sort. I don't think my dad did either, or he would've probably griped about it to me. You haven't heard Jimmy or Paul talk about something like that, have you?"

"Nope," Ian replies. "Pretty sure if Jimmy got fanmail from a girl we'd all hear about it."

"Did you go out to meet this mystery woman?" Calden asks Lola.

Lola Hawkes

"Well of course I did,"

She'd just called him smart enough to stay behind, but then turned around and expressed that she did precisely that as though it was obvious that she would have. There's a certain fire to her eyes and coals in her throat when she talks about it. Already, from when she had first arrived and joked about whose tribe belonged here the longest to now when she was talking about mystery letters, the Kinswoman's shoulders had gone tight and her hands at her sides had started to curl into loose fists.

Calden will remember very much that Lola was a passionate and testy thing, unafraid to speak with force to her voice, unwilling to mask her thoughts or opinions for the comfort of those around her.

"The letter I got was talking about my personal life, and it showed up on my front porch. I keep a good eye on my property, and others do for me too. I don't like that this bitch knows as much about me and mine as she does, so I went to find her."

Something about the tone suggests that she wanted to lay more than just eyes and words upon this woman. Lola grinds her teeth for a second, rubbing molars against one another to release some of this tension, but at least she has the good decency not to leave the other Kinfolk hanging as to what happened when she went to meet this woman.

"There were three others there besides me-- This Shadow Lord Kinswoman, a Glass Walker Kinswoman, and some other Kinsman that I've never met before-- not sure what his tribe is, don't know his name even. But they all got letters strongly suggestive enough to lure them out into the city for a stranger, too. And this woman rolls up saying that she thinks her sister got bitten by a Werewolf and that she's turning and that she needs our help."

Her nose crinkles-- she looks disgusted, like she's ready to physically spit, but decides against it out of respect and decency. "Wants us to meet up with her next Friday to actually see her sister. The whole thing reeks to me."

Beat.

"....But, you say you didn't get a letter. Maybe you're livin' too far north for her?" Although that begs the question why she was willing to venture out so close to the Bawn to reach Lola, and run the danger of encountering so many other Werewolves along the way.

Calden White

"Of course you did," Calden echoes, wry.

While Lola relates the events, Calden returns to what he's doing, communicating his intentions to his cousin with quick glances, small gestures. The two men have obviously known each other a long time. Know each other, and their work, well. They work together with a sort of mindless synchronicity, putting their animals up for the night.

By the time Lola finishes, Calden is closing the door on the stall. He gives the gelding an affectionate rub on the nose, then steps away while his cousins sees to its feed. "Come on," he says to Lola, an invitation of sorts delivered in two syllables and a house-ward nod. "We'll talk inside.

"Maybe," he adds, regarding why he never got a letter. "Or maybe I didn't seem like the type to take the bait. I assume the Shadow Lord Kinswoman was Eva Illeshazy?"

Lola Hawkes

They worked while Lola talked, and if she wasn't so wrapped up and distracted by the tale that she was telling she probably would have shown just a bit more interest in what the men were doing. She had occasionally considered a horse, or a cow, or a goat, or a few chickens. Something to assist with self sufficiency. But every time the thought flickers across her mind it's stopped partway and smashed back like a tennis ball returned to the other side of the court.

She lived entirely too close to the Bawn, and during the Moots she could hear the howls with ease. She knew that the Revels could occasionally lead to couples or even packs of wolves continuing their run through the night. She knew that it would just be a waste of money to raise a cow for eight months only to have someone whose face she knew come and kill it in a fit of wild energy and passions.

She may ask about horses or livestock later. She might consider ways to lock them up when the Moot goes on so that the danger is less present. For now, though, she bids Ian farewell and moves to walk along at Calden's side, to his left, because he'd said that they would talk inside.

"She was. The Glass Walker was named Sam-- I don't know her last name, but I know her brother is named Reese." I know this because he's the 'not-so-secret' gay lover of a member of the pack that keeps me. I still don't know how I feel about that situation as a whole.

"Where I'm torn," she confesses to the older and more leveled out Kinfolk, "is how this cabrona managed to find this personal shit out about me and mine, and how that equals out with her utter, blatant ignorance as to what Werewolves actually are. It doesn't add up, and it's got me all tense and itching to put it to a simple end."

Calden can probably guess what she's getting at when she says 'simple end'.

Calden White

"I've met Sam," Calden says, "and her brother. And Lola," he stops -- they're halfway up the path to his house, and this is where he turns and faces her, serious-faced, "you can't just execute people because they annoy you. Morality aside, that'll get you thrown in jail."

He starts walking again. Dusk comes early these days. Already the shadows are long; the west-facing windows of that large house on the hill are glinting. Calden is leading Lola to the back of the house, which opens out to three stories; which boasts a broad hardwood deck and vast windows looking out over the land. The bottom floor is a basement on the front end of the house, but back here, Lola can see what looks like a guest suite and a game room through the glass doors. He takes her up the outdoors stairs to the deck, though, and enters the main floor through the back.

"Maybe she's a lost kin who's good at digging up information. What kind of personal shit are we talking about, anyway?"

Lola Hawkes

They pause long enough for Calden to level a very serious look at Lola and express that it's not okay to execute people. She scoffs openly, hardly afraid of being reprimanded. "Okay, first of all, it ain't because she annoys me. It's because she's an outright threat. And I lost count on the number of enemy lives I've claimed that ain't landed me in jail yet." Naturally she has to have the last word on the subject, but at least she didn't get all hackles up and defensive to the matter. Instead, she was dismissive. Yeah, whatever, you go on not taking up arms and I'll keep on keeping us safe at night thank you very much.

As they approach the house, Lola's eyes lift up to the architecture in front of her and stay upon in a way that happens when people who are unfamiliar with large structures do when presented with such things. Lola lives in a modest log house, two stories tall but only because the top story is a large loft/attic space with a couple of afterthought walls to make an extra room. Her hands exit her pockets to go for a railing when they head up the stairs of the back deck, to what would constitute the 'main' or 'middle' level.

He suggests that she could be a lost Kin, and Lola scrubbed at the back of her neck thoughtfully. When they entered the house her words were slower than before because she was preoccupied with taking in the surroundings that she had stepped into.

"Shit personal enough that I've told a single person about it, and that's all," and this is probably all the information he's going to get on the matter, because clearly it's not something that she's keen on talking about. "I doubt the Lost Kin theory-- she was adamant about the fact that her sister got bitten and then started developing what she calls 'other symptoms'. Hector thinks she could be from a family of wolf hunters, good at tracking but not sure of what she's actually tracking anymore-- information passed through generations gets muted and diluted after time, after all. I'm guessing her sister might've been infected by a Fomor or some such shit, if it's actually changes being caused by a bite wound.

"What the fuck is up with you opulent motherfuckers anyways? Jesus, do you actually entertain crowds of thirty in this goddamn room?" If it helps, she sounds impressed instead of mad at the display of wealth.

Calden White

And instead of being offended, Calden laughs under his breath. "Like I said," he says, "we've been here a long time, generation after generation building on the same foundation -- literally and figuratively. And the organic foods fad has been damn good business."

The sliding doors onto the deck aren't locked. Calden pulls it open, ushering Lola in ahead of him. The architecture of the house is simple, wide-open: a great room centering the entirety of the structure, with kitchen and dining to one side, bedrooms to the other. Staircases up and down.

"Can I get you a drink?" Calden asks, closing the door and sealing out the chill. Central heating's on inside, albeit turned low enough that there's room for a fire in that massive hearth dominating the great room. "And -- a family of hunters isn't exactly the best news for us. But if she's as confused as she sounds, there's a chance we can make an ally out of her. Dancers are wolves too, technically.

"I just don't think putting a gun to her head and pulling the trigger is necessarily the answer."

Lola Hawkes

Lola lets herself be ushered inside. It's a sliding door, but even if it wasn't and if it had hinges and if Calden had offered to hold that door for her she wouldn't refuse the gesture. She clearly considered herself strong and capable (and had a track record to support it), but that didn't make her the kind of woman who 'don't need no man to treat her differently from anyone else'. She knows manners when she sees them, and knows enough to at least act in accordance with them. When it suits her, anyways.

Inside she stares around at the great room, but doesn't make any motion to sit. She's delivered her message, and is engaged in the conversation she has at current, but she frankly isn't sure how long this particular thread of topic will last, and she doesn't know where the conversation could turn afterwards. She doubts they'd start talking about families, immediate or generational, or swapping recipes. She's uncomfortable in social settings unless she has a task at hand or a message to deliver. This is why she was so easy to approach and engage at first, but why she looks reluctant to settle in and make herself comfortable.

At the offer for a drink, she nods and looks around for what looks like it could be the kitchen, and upon spying a piece of room that houses stainless steel from around the corner she starts to approach, figuring Calden would start walking there anyways. If someone straight up served her a drink she'd have to start yelling about how Fianna aren't Silver Fangs and Silver Fangs shouldn't be served upon anyways.

"Milk, if that's alright," she asks, surprisingly politely enough in tacking on the 'if that's alright'. She doesn't bother to pull off the sweater over her head, though it's no doubt warmer inside the house than it is outside. Instead she pushes the sleeves up to her elbows and calls it good.

"Oh, I ain't gonna just do that much. I'm gonna find out what she and her sister are, what's going on with her sister, and how she found out the information she did. Then I'm gonna use that information to figure out whether they need to be gotten rid of completely. If not, I am gonna beat the shit out of that woman for tapping into my life, though."

Clearly that just plumb doesn't fly in the world that Lola Hawkes lives in.

Calden White

Calden is, in fact, moving toward that gleaming stainless-steel kitchen of his. The affluence of the White family is unmistakable here. The bulk of their wealth is tied up in land and property and beef, but there's enough spare that they've built themselves this sprawling alpine-influenced manor. They've outfitted it with sturdy, quality things; never quite flashy, but solid and expensive and built to last.

"Of course it's all right," Calden tosses over his shoulder, opening the fridge, laughing a little. "Why wouldn't it be?"

Milk, then. A glass bottle, unmarked. If Lola suspects it comes from a local cow -- perhaps Calden keeps some milk cows in the barn, or perhaps one of his neighbors runs a dairy -- she would be right. When he gets a glass down from the cupboard and pours, the liquid is thick, nearly cream. No non-fat here, to be sure.

He holds the glass out to her. Replaces the bottle; pours himself a glass of apple cider. "Well," he answers, "let me know how it turns out. And if you need help. I'm not as well-connected as Miss Illeshazy, but I do know some people.

"You're not in a hurry to go back south, are you? We're going to have dinner here in a while. You should stay the night in the guest room and head back in the morning."

Lola Hawkes

Lola may enter the kitchen first, but Calden's close behind and he actually knows where he's going. He chuckles at how she'd presented the request for milk and asked her why she'd think it wouldn't be alright, and though the question might be a tiny bit rhetorical she answers anyways with an honest shrug. "Dunno, I just know milk tends to be more expensive, but I should've figured that wouldn't really be an issue here."

She doesn't look to him while she's talking, but instead is continuing her path of scoping out each new room that she enters. While Calden's at the fridge she's studying a flat steel surface on one of the counters, trying to decide it if it's supposed to be a cutting board (because that's a wonderful way to fuck up your knives) or if it's actually a grill top built into the counter. She'll assume it's the latter even before locating knobs to operate the thing, because in a house of a rancher she could imagine that they served steaks and other slabs of beef quite a lot.

The glass of milk is extended to her, and Lola's attention is pulled back to the taller, broader, older man and what he offers. She'll wander back through the lines of counters to meet him at the fridge and accepts the glass from his hand. The milk is lifted in an imitation of a cheers gesture, really intended to be a thank you instead, and she takes two big gulps.

There isn't milk at her house anymore, and if there ever is it's a small container of soy more often than not. This stuff is a treat instead of a staple as far as she's concerned.

She swipes the milk from her upper lip with a quick lick, then casts a surprised look back up at Calden when he invites her to stay. She has to take pause, and glances out a window to see night casting its early way over the land. She's still looking out that way when she gives a distracted answer: "Ahhh... Well, yeah, it is a lengthy damn drive. Alright, sure." She blinks, remembers her manners, and looks back to Calden. It's almost humorous how serious she appears to be when she follows up with: "Thank you," and how it sounds almost like a footnote that she nearly forgot to add.

"But, uh, yeah. I'll let you know what happens. Eva--" she's probably not pronouncing it the same way that the owner of that name does, but Lola doesn't seem the type to care. Hector's lucky that he walked away from his family history with such an easy last name, otherwise he'd have to fight to get Lola to ever learn how to say 'Prabhup
da'. "--suggested we bring a Crescent Moon with us, but this broad-- calls herself 'Nina'-- insisted we not bring any of Them with us."

She sighs now, and seems worn out by the situation instead of enraged with it. This is how this cycle tends to go-- she gets all worked up, full of indignance and fire, but then realizes after talking or working through the situation that she has nothing to go off of and can't do much about it right now, and she gets resigned and bothered and uncomfortable instead. "Just makes it seem all the more like a trap to me."

Calden White

Amusement crosses Calden's face. "Most people asking a Fianna for a drink expect scotch or the like," he says. "Compared to that, I don't think you need to worry about milk being pricier than water.

"And," he adds, "it does seem a little suspicious when someone you don't know -- who knows a lot about you -- specifically asks you to accompany her somewhere without backup. If you think she's worth the benefit of the doubt, explain your misgivings to her. Demand to meet somewhere neutral. Or, hell. Ask her what exactly she expects you to be able to do for her.

"Eva's got a good head on her shoulders. Whatever she suggests, I'd take seriously."

Lola Hawkes

Lola's attentively listening to Calden while he talks, even if she doesn't seem like it immediately. She's taken up post leaning back against one of the kitchen counters, weight balanced between feet, rump, and the free palm that lays flat on the counter top behind her. The other hand is holding the milk glass up so that she can take another drink, and she's wiping her lip with the side of the same hand holding the glass this time around instead of licking her lips clear.

It's clear she was paying mind when she answers, though.

"She didn't exactly leave us a number. Just an address and a time and date to meet again. I went and scoped the address out, and it's just some damn strip mall with nothing going on. She's clever enough-- though I know that that Sam gal went slinking after her when she left-- she might've caught a vehicle or something, I don't know." Lola's bad at communcation, that's quite clear. After all, she did make a hell of a drive out to have this conversation with a Kinsman she wanted to impress enough to be a friend and ally (even though she kept picking debates that edged up against being fights with him) when she could have just dropped him a phone call instead.

"She ain't really much for negotiations I'm not thinking-- my letter ended with a note that said: 'Don't make me come to you.' Whatever heaven she believes in best help her if she tries, 'cause I'll tell you now I'd lay her out without batting an eyelash if she did, and that's if Celduin didn't get to her first."

To the point that he has about Eva....

"She does, I respect her. She's seen plenty, she's got good resources and strings for pulling, and she's a smart lady. But I wanna pull as much information out of her before I potentially cast her off to another place--" she says this with a waving motion of the hand and glass together, off toward the window she'd been glancing out before. Again, her meaning is clear. "--and if she catches wind that we're not abiding by her conditions then my chance to find out how she knows what she does goes out the window.

"But....," and the tone is full of compromise and consideration, or as full of such things as Lola's voice is probably capable of being, "if she can find a Crescent Moon good enough to mask herself and hang back and let us do the actual work, then it couldn't hurt."

She'd leave the task of finding a Theurge to the others-- Lola was surronded by a pack of Galliards.

Calden White

Don't make me come to you. The sound Calden makes is midway between laugh and snort. "Charming," he comments. Takes a sip of his apple cider while Lola continues.

"Charlotte does good work, no question," he says, regarding Crescent Moons. "There's also an entire pack of nothing but Theurges, I think. I'm sure one of them could help you out. Though you do make a good point: if you're trying to suss this Nina out, and if she really does have some supernatural ability to tell wolf from man, then you run the risk of driving her underground.

"I don't know." That's how he sums it up, shrugging. "It's a tough situation and in the end you're going to have to make the call you think is right. You and everyone else stuck in it. But like I said, if I can help, don't hesitate to ask."

The cattleman sets his half-drunk cider on the kitchen island, then, straightening up from where he too leans against the counter. "Come on," he says. "I'll show you the guest room downstairs. You can settle in a bit, wash up if you want.

"My cousins usually have dinner with us on the weekends. You can meet the other two, Jimmy and Paul. After dinner maybe we'll play a game or two of poker if you want. Share some tall tales, drink some scotch." The corners of his eyes crinkle; he grins. "Typical Stagsmen behavior, you know the drill."

Lola Hawkes

The pack of Theurges is pointed out, along with a name that Lola has to struggle to place a face and identity to-- some Silver Fang (she thinks, she's been told or it's been overheard) that she hasn't ever seen outside of a Moot. But then Calden agrees with her point-- she could sabatoge herself if she actively brings a Theurge to the party. He says it's her call at the end, and Lola nods, contemplating her glass of milk while providing her thoughts on the matter, perhaps the final ones for the moment given how Calden was setting his cup down and changing his posture from rested to ready for movement.

"Way I see it is if we do bring anyone along they need to be good at shadowing us, not letting her know that they're there along with us. And maybe that person isn't actually a Theurge, but just someone who can Sense like they do, y'know...?"

But that's all business, and now Calden's ready to transition into friendlier, more casual turf. He offers to show her to the guest room, and she nods and carries her glass of milk along with her because she's not finished with it, but is apparently both unwilling to abandon it in the kitchen and unaware that other people might not like food outside of the kitching and dining space. As they go, he explains that she'll meet other cousins and they'll play poker and drink. She just grins at him, and though the expression seems a little tight at the edges at least it's genuine. She'll loosen up, just give her some time to settle in.

"I hope to high hell that dinner is some kind of beef," she adds as he shows her to her room.

She'll send a text message to Hector while given a moment to 'settle in', explaining that she'll be back to The Homestead tomorrow. She'll then shake hands all around to anyone she's introduced to, and each time she meets a new person she's throwing up a bit of a brash front and trying to impress, but that loosens up each time it happens, especially if a familiar party (Calden) remains nearby.

She'll play poker and maybe even win a round or two, but she won't drink, and if she's pressed the humor will leak out of her face and voice and she'll state again, slower and more clearly that she doesn't want any and leaves it plain and simple as that. If that hiccup does occur it's smoothed over quickly and easily and she's back to enjoying the game.

She'll sleep soundly, and that night she'll extend an offer to lend a hand to help with morning chores before she goes. If the offer is accepted she'll flash for a moment with excitement but manage not to make a fuss about it. If declined, she accepts that without a fight.

Either way she's gone the next morning, and she parts on much friendlier terms (smiles, waves, farewells and jibes) than what Calden probably would have expected given his previous experience with observing how the Uktena Kinfolk operates.

no one's exempt.

Calden White

It's a very long way to the Whites' ranch from Golden, and once Calden came to in the truck

(the very, very battered truck, we might mention, which will surely need either a major repair or a junkyard very soon)

he made a fairly valiant effort to convince Baklava Republik that they really didn't need to drive him all the way there. He was feeling fine, thanks to them. Really. And in the spirit of full disclosure, it must be said that a few times Erich looked like he was just about ready to pull over, let Calden into the driver's seat, flag Charlotte down, and go back home. With Melantha. Who was also almost dead, ffs.

She won't hear of it, though. She refuses to let Erich pull over, and she refuses to let Calden drive, and so in the end the tinypack takes Calden all the way to his door. Where he tries to thank them, tries to invite them in, tries to ask them to stay the night, but --

-- by then Erich is almost howling with impatience to be home, to go home, to curl up warm and safe with his packmates, his preciousprecious packmates, curl up near Melantha and reassure himself with the sound of her breathing. The beat of her pulse.

So that's where they part. That's where Calden stands, framed by his front door and the strong timbers of his house; waving to the tinypack as they drove away.

--

When the door closes, the quiet that settles around Calden feels surreal. His father is asleep. His cousins are somewhere out on the ranch. The hearth in the great room is cold. The kitchen is dark.

His cattledog-turned-pet unfolds herself from her doggiebed at the foot of his bed and comes trotting down the stairs. She bounds up to him, worry-wagging her tail as she sniffs him over very carefully. Calden gives her ears an absent rub. He's hardly even injured anymore. Bruised at best. The same can't be said for his clothes. Those: those are a horrific mess, torn and ragged, blood-drenched. He should probably change, he thinks. That's a good starting point.

And so he strips. He starts with his jacket, but once he starts he suddenly can't bear the clammy chill of coagulated blood on his skin. There goes his sweater, his shirt, his jeans, his socks. His underwear. All of it, stripped off, stuffed into black trash bag and sashed tight, dropped by the front door to throw out in the morning. His watch is still banded around his wrist. He pulls that off, too, stands naked in his kitchen washing blood and dirt from between the bands,

realizes he left his wallet and his phone and his keys in his pants,

abandons the watch under the stream of water to dig the rest of his personals out of the trash bag. Comes back and washes his credit cards, the coins and the bills, his proof-of-insurance for his wrecked truck, the wallet itself. The keys. The phone, too, the best he can without destroying it.

Goosebumps are standing up on his arms when he finally shuts the tap off. He is, he realizes, behaving like a madman. Standing in the dark, in his kitchen, bare as the day he was born, washing blood off his personal effects. He grips the edge of the counter a moment, bracing his hands, lowering his head, taking a breath.

Then, swiftly and methodically, he gathers his things up. Goes up the stairs, Patches running at his heels, to drop phone and keys and wallet on his nightstand. He turns the shower on, sets the water as hot as he can tolerate, steps into the spray and washes

himself

clean.

--

Better, after. Steadier. Brushing his teeth over his sink, turning on a light at last to inspect the damage. What remains of it, anyway. Ugly bruises; no lacerations, no gross trauma. Aches and pains, but nothing catastrophic, nothing that takes his breath away. He still looks pale to himself, though. Drawn and taut and exhausted. He flicks the light off and he leaves the en-suite bathroom, goes to his bed, throws back the covers.

There is a moment when Calden considers not telling Avery at all. He wouldn't want her to worry. There's nothing left to be done. He doesn't know if he has it in him to talk to her right now, either. To try and explain what happened. To calm her, if she was frantic; to reassure her, if she was angry or terrified or --

he's being selfish, he realizes. And if tables were turned, if she brushed the brink of death and was brought back from it, he would want to know. Even if he worried. Even if he was frantic or angry or terrified. Even if there was absolutely nothing he could do: he would want to know.

And one more thing:

he does want to see her. He wants to see her very badly indeed.

--

It is quite late at night, closer to dawn than to dusk, when Avery's phone chimes. A text message from her lover:

Had a close call tonight. Ran into some sort of wyrmhound(?) in Golden, got roughed up. Was with Melantha & her friends patched us up. Would like to see you soon but it doesn't have to be now. Don't worry, I'm okay.

Avery Chase

There is a moment when Calden considers completely disrupting the trust he has with Avery, for the sake of just not having to Deal With It. That moment passes quickly, because he is not some idiot in his twenties. He is not an inherently selfish man. He is not a liar, and he remembers that Avery is not some shrieking, fluttering bird of panic. He remembers: of course she may be worried, frantic, angry, terrified. But she is permitted to be. He nearly died tonight.

Avery is asleep when her phone chimes. It actually chimes a few times, because Calden's text is very long and breaks up across multiple messages. She would not have woken to the first one, but she wakes to the second, wakes fully to the third, pawing at her nightstand for her phone, drawing it over without lifting her head, squinting painfully at the screen. She smiles, though, drowsily, to see that the chimes are coming from Calden. She imagines teasing him that booty calls are best placed earlier in the night, not so soon before dawn.

The smile dies on her face. Close call. Wyrmhound. 'Roughed up', which she knows is a euphemism because if he ran into something he thinks was a wyrmhound he would be more than 'roughed up'. She knows who Melantha is only through her assocation with the little Baklava Republik pack's other members, knows now that Charlotte and Erich deserve even more of her undying loyalty, affection, and gratitude, and she is sitting up in bed with the blankets falling away from her satin pajamas without even realizing she's moved. Her heart is slamming in her chest, her mind racing to tell her that he's texting, for goodness sake, his mind and hands work, he is okay, he is okay, he's okay, he's okay,

while she shudders to take a breath, wanting to cry when he says he wants to see her but it doesn't have to be now.

Avery closes her eyes and tries to calm her swimming thoughts, setting the phone on her lap. She takes a few deep breaths, still shivering when she exhales, and then reaches for her glass of water, taking a few sips before she hits the Call button.

"Darling?" she says, as soon as it stops ringing, and she still sounds a little breathless and she still sounds a little raspy from sleep, but still: harmonious, lovely, as solid and cool as marble and gold.

Calden White

When the text is sent, Calden sits on the edge of his bed a moment, phone in his hands. Maybe he shouldn't have texted right now. Maybe he should have called in the morning. Called now. Something --

the phone vibrates in his hand. He blinks. Avery Chase says the caller ID. He swipes to answer and puts the phone to his ear.

Darling?

His eyes close. Relief and wanting and ache rushes through him, a flood. He thinks one of these days he'll have to tell her --

"I love that you call me that."

No; not one day. Right now. He'll tell her that right now because he almost died tonight, for god's sake, and when he was staring his own death in the eye he was full of regrets. That he never told his father that he's a mean, horrible human being but he loved him anyway because you're my dad. That he never sent Ellie a cowboy hat for her birthday or for christmas, whichever came first. That he never told Avery Chase

that he loves it when she calls him darling.

Calden drops back on his mattress, the droplets of water still on his back dampening his bedspread. He scrubs a palm over his face, closing his eyes.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you."

Avery Chase

Her heart breaks a little, sweetly and beautifully, and she can't help but smile. She wishes he could see the smile that puts on her face, because there's no words she can use to describe how that makes her feel. She just huffs a soft little sound, something like a laugh, and just says again:

"Oh, darling."

Which has the feeling, and the smile, all wrapped into three syllables.

"I'm glad you did," she murmurs, keeping her voice down even though the entire house is asleep, and even though her father's and brother's rooms are far from her own and even though she doesn't think they would hear her through the walls anyway.

Avery is quiet for a moment.

"I'd like to come see you now," she whispers to him. "But I don't want you to force yourself to stay awake if you're tired. Would you mind if I just... slipped in when I arrive?"

Calden White

Calden is a man who enjoys tradition, who sees value in old things and old ways, but -- god, the marvels of technology. To be able to reach out and connect like this across such distances. To be able to close his eyes and hear her voice in his ear like this, warm and near: there are arguments in favor of the Weaver after all.

"I don't think there's anything I'd love more than that right now," he says. "I'm going to leave a key under the doormat. I want you to keep it. I might be asleep when you get here. Just ... come upstairs and find me. Okay?"

Avery Chase

She is about to tell him that she didn't mean a key. She meant drifting through the walls of newer portions of the construction, pushing through them on one of many other sides of reality, and entering his bedroom that way, slipping into his bed, being there as soon and as tangibly as she could be.

But he tells her he wants her to keep it. And Avery blinks, and her heart flutters, and she is not ashamed of that but she is a bit startled that the man she's been seeing for only seven months would like her to have a key to his house. She doesn't know what to say, only:

"Okay," she whispers. "Go to sleep. I'll see you in a couple of hours."

Calden White

The truth is, Calden knew full well what she meant when she said she'd slip in. And it's not that he minds, or that he'd feel threatened or barged in upon or like his privacy had been violated. It was simply that he wanted her to have a key to his house. Like anything else he's offered her, he wants her to have this. He gives it to her freely, as though it was always her due.

--

They hang up. Calden plugs his phone in to charge. He scuffs his hair a little drier, and he takes a quick quiet detour downstairs to slip a key under the doormat. Wearing as little as he is, he's shivering even from those few seconds of exposure. He's grateful for the warmth and heaviness of his comforter by the time he climbs back into bed.

His head scarcely touches the pillow before he's out. Sleep, heavier and warmer still than his bedding, pulls him under.

Avery Chase

Calden sleeps. Down in Denver, in her palace of a home with its brick courtyard and gardens that were lush in summer and falling dormant now, Avery leaves her bed and puts her fingers to the buttons of her pajamas, swiftly, deftly undressing. She goes to her bathroom to wash up briefly, brushing her teeth and splashing water on her face, combing her hair, then gets dressed. She wears simple things, pulling on a pair of grey slacks, a camisole, and a v-necked sweater in deep sapphire blue. She slips her feet into a pair of flats and throws her still-warm satin pajamas and a few other items into a small overnight back, shouldering it and walking swiftly, quietly downstairs.

She writes a note in her curling, elegant script and puts it in the fruit bowl among the apples, oranges, pears and bananas that she knows her brother and father will both be plucking from when they wake up. It isn't necessary, but she tries. When she can, she likes to let them know.

Avery takes her Tesla from the garage, and when she gets on the freeway, she takes full advantage of the cover of darkness and the sheer speed that machine is capable of. When the sky begins to lighten she slows down, but it still takes her some time to get up to Calden's ranch. To drive through the gate and up to the house. To park alongside his truck.

Getting out, she sees the broken, bloodied windshield. She sees the dents on the hood and the roof, the damage done by something large and strange, no known animal, only a nightmare. Avery's throat moves as she swallows, the breeze bringing scent of her lover's blood, and the blood of an unknown but terribly pure kinswoman, and the blood of a monster all into her nostrils at once. She chuffs it out through her nostrils, a flash of rage coming with the breath.

Avery gets her bag and walks to the door, reaching for the key under the mat, turning it as silently as she can in the door and slipping inside. She looks around, pauses, listens as she quietly, quietly closes it behind her, putting the key in her bag. She knows where he is. She smells blood again: the bag of clothes, her eyes flicking to it in the dark. She passes by, going upstairs, coming to his door and -- despite herself -- giving it a gentle tap. It is probably too quiet to wake him, but all the same, she does it before she lets herself in.

Seems silly, to have dressed herself at all. Now that she's here, she just sets her bag down on the couch before his hearth, opening it up to pull out her pajamas. Avery undresses swiftly, changes back into those white satin things edged in sky blue, and comes to the side of the bed where there is more room for her. She pulls the comforter back only a little at the corner, enough to give her legs room to slide down, enough room for her to enter his bed, laying down beside him, covering him with her arm.

All these things are hard. She wants to turn on a light and find his wounds, care for him if she can, feed him if she can't. But at the same time, she feels unspeakable relief just to be here, to see him breathing, to smell him whole and intact, to feel him warm against her skin through that thin layer of satin.

Calden White

Dawn is washing across the wide-open spaces of northern Colorado when Avery parks in front of Calden's house. His truck is there as well, which is not where it usually is, but clearly whoever was behind the wheel couldn't be bothered with parking the truck in the garage. It's not even parked well: it sits at an angle in the small cement turnabout in front of the house, as battered and bloodied as its owner.

Totaled. Or close enough to it not to matter. In the growing light of day, the damage done to the truck seems surreal and obscene, not at all synchronous with the sturdy architecture of Calden's home; the unrefined, barren beauty of his land.

She finds the key under the doormat, right where he said it would be. The house is still quiet when she lets herself in. She doesn't run into Calden's father, and she doesn't have to explain herself or her presence. Her footsteps are light on the stairs, light in the upstairs hall. That little tap on the door doesn't even begin to stir her lover from his sleep.

Patches is looking at her when she opens the bedroom door, though. The small, pretty border collie is curled in her bed, ears pricked, head raised. Recognizing Avery and Avery's Gift, her tail begins to thump almost frantically, but she doesn't get up from where she lies. After a while, she puts her chin on her paws, watching with bright, dark eyes as Avery changes back into her pajamas

and comes to bed.

Calden does wake when his lady slips into bed beside him. Her legs brush his. He stirs, murmuring something incoherent. Her arm covers him, and he is as large and warm and solid and alive as can be. As though on instinct, his arm slides over her waist, pulls her near.

This time when he murmurs she can make out the words. "Beloved," he calls her, sleep-fuzzed; such a funny, archaic thing to say. He nuzzles her loosely, and then his eyes close again.

Avery Chase

The scent of the dog's presence made Avery pause outside the door. Just for a moment. Just long enough to feel the sudden, quivering tension of the animal and long enough for Avery to call on the gifts of her ancestors, all those born to the human skin, all those born in cultures that have domesticated animals as food and stock and companions for eons. She settles into the gift before she enters, and when she does, Patches does not whine or retreat but thumps her tail happily, and with relief.

Avery slides one satin-clad leg over Calden's shin, feeling him murmur and move, chest expanding with new breath as he pulls her closer. He mutters something, just recognition, and Avery smiles gently, achingly.

She rests her head on his chest then, in the crook of his arm, even as they hold each other. It does not take him long to slide back into sleep. It does not take her very long, either. She thought it would: that worry and anxiety would rule her, that she would want to stay up all night to watch over him, but she knows there is no safer place than this right now. He is far from everything that might threaten him. And he is with her. No depth of sleep could stop her from protecting him, if he faced harm again tonight.

So: she sleeps. She holds him, comforted simply to feel him breathing with her, and follows him a few minutes later.

Calden White

Calden sleeps for a long time. Long after he'd usually be up, long after he'd usually have his morning coffee, put on his working clothes, saddle up or get in the truck, go out on the ranch amongst his men and his animals --

long, long after the sun has risen and day has broken, Calden sleeps. In his bed. In the arms of his lover. His sleep is dreamless, which is a mercy. It is heavy, and deep, and restorative, and when finally -- sometime closer to noon than to dawn -- he stirs to wakefulness, he feels ... better, again. Like stable ground has reasserted itself beneath his feet. Like sanity has reasserted itself in his life.

Sometime in the night he has rolled on his back. He opens his eyes to his ceiling, and to the four posts of his familiar bed. The woman next to him is familiar too, though by modern standards they've only been seeing each other a short time. He spreads his arms and he stretches, yawns, folds his hands behind his head.

He smells clean. Perhaps Patches's sensitive nose can still pick up whiffs of blood and terror, but -- to Avery's human nose, at least, he smells like soap and warm water, and like himself. Like health and vigor and muscle and heat; and faintly, ever so faintly, like the wildness and savagery that demarcates a kinsman from a man.

He says nothing, even if she has awoken. One hand comes down; one arm wraps around her. He is quiet, feeling her against his side, her warmth suffusing him right through those sheer satin pajamas. One does not always equate a wolf in one's bed with safety, with contentment, with calm: but right now, she makes him feel all those things. He is quietly, uncomplicatedly grateful. Happy that she came to see him, even when he was too courteous to ask such an inconvenience of her.

Avery Chase

No one comes to wake Calden. No one comes pounding on his door after the sun rises, wanting to know where he is. Perhaps his phone buzzes. But anyone living in or coming by that house would see, clear as day, the truck that must have barely made it back to the ranch, the blood on the windshield and front seat. The midnight-colored luxury car nearby, which no one would recognize but anyone who has seen or heard of Calden's lady friend would easily assign to her, dripping with luxury and beauty as she is. Perhaps even, should someone come to his door, they feel the rage on the other side, coiled and protective, sleeping but never far from alertness, and think better of it.

Maybe no one sees anything. Maybe no one, this morning, is waiting for him.

Avery wakes shortly after dawn. She opens her eyes and looks over at him, how he has turned onto his back and how his chest moves as he breathes. She closes her eyes again, sleeps again, falling gently into that familiar rhythm. But some time later, she wakes again, and Calden is still heavy with unconsciousness. Avery eases away from him as gently as she can, padding over to the door as Patches drops softly off the bed to follow her. She opens the door up to let the pretty collie out to traipse downstairs and out into the open to relieve herself. Avery relieves herself, too, ducking into Calden's master bath for a few moments. She plucks a sleek little 7-inch tablet out of her bag as she returns to bed, tucking herself in with her back against Calden's side, playing a game of Plants vs. Zombies with the sound muted.

She dozes off after a while, though, the tablet on the nightstand, her head on his bicep, her butt nestled against his hip. Patches comes back, sniffing at the door, but she's too polite (trained) to whine or scratch or howl to be let back in. She flops down in front of the door instead, head on her forepaws, while Calden sleeps and Avery naps.

And it is a nap, and not a sleep: she wakes very easily, mildly, when Calden starts stirring, when he yawns and stretches, when he turns back to her after, wrapping his arm around her. She smiles, turning to look at him past her white-clad shoulder.

"Morning," she says fuzzily, tucking her feet in between his beneath the covers. "Darling," she adds, with a greater smile, gently teasing.

Calden White

She finds Calden looking at her, half-lidded, sleepy, lazy, quiet. His faint smile grows to her words. He leans over, lifts his head a little, bends to her and kisses the lee of her shoulder.

Settling again, he exhales. The truth is he's quite naked under the covers. She feels absolutely luxurious; the satin of her pajamas, the velvet of her skin. His arm unfurls for a moment, fingers reaching thoughtfully for nothing in particular; then returning, wrapping around her again.

"Careful, Miss Chase," he murmurs, his smile furring the edges of his words, "I could get used to this. I might want to wake up to my golden lady of the royal tribe every morning. And then where would you be, hm?"

The humor ebbs. He grows serious, his head shifting on his pillow, his eyes meeting hers over her shoulder.

"Thank you for coming here," he says softly. "I didn't want to be a nuisance. Or demanding. Or high-maintenance. But I really wanted -- maybe even needed -- to see you."

Avery Chase

"I should be wherever I like," she murmurs back to him, archly, decadently, the way he must have known she would. Even if he wants her every morning. Even if he is used to this. She wiggles against him a little, snuggles in fact, and even though she pretends that all she wants to do is curl up and sleep a bit more, she has had quite enough sleep. She has been in her pajamas, for the most part, for the better part of twelve hours. She is ready to get up, and eat, and see if her gift allows her to ride his horses, and she is ready to behave as normally as possible, to be as happy as she can be, to simply spend a day or so with him, to show him:

see? the world has not changed so much.

He peers over at her, and she rolls onto her back, looking up at him from his pillow, her hair in swirls all around her and above her on the linens.

"My darling," she says, not teasing this time, not even realizing she's used the word again until it has left her mouth, "you could never be a nuisance to me." Her dark brows have tugged together over those pristine eyes of hers, saying this. Her hand has lifted, still quite warm from sleep, to stroke the backs of her fingers over the bristly shadow across his jaw. "I think it would wound me a bit," she whispers, her voice falling as she looks into his eyes, "if you did not ask for me after such a night."

Avery's stroking fingers turn, her fingertips coming to rest over his lips. She quirks the smallest smile, out of the blue, murmuring: "Kiss," even though her clear eyes are shadowed still by her concern.

Calden White

There are shadows in their eyes. A solemn undercurrent to their lightness and their teasing. In a way, that lightness is a sort of mutual fiction. Or at least, an unspoken pact of normalcy; a purposeful attempt to do what they always do because they have to prove to themselves,

or he has to prove to himself,

that the world has not changed so much. That the world has not changed at all, really. He has been relatively lucky, Calden: sheltered up in his high plains, far away from the precious things that the Wyrm covets and attacks. He is not immune to the war, but he has come through his life mostly unscathed.

Unscarred too, though. Untoughened, in some ways. In ways that still leave him undeniably rattled when the safe constructs of his life bend a little. When the darkness outside comes in and touches him as it did last night.

There's a shadow in his eyes as she admits that it would have wounded her if he hadn't asked for her. And then she is touching his lips, her fingertips soft on the softness of his mouth. And his mouth is soft: his lips parting, his teeth gently scraping the pads of her fingers, even if his jaw is bristled; even if he is wholly unfit to worship her as he does. She doesn't ask for that, though, and neither does he. She asks for a kiss. His eyes soften. He raises up on an elbow and he complies; he indulges, his mouth soft and slow on hers, his hand touching her side just beneath her breast.

When it tapers to a close he rests his brow to hers a moment. Settles again on his side, facing her.

"There was a moment when I almost didn't call you," he confesses. "I didn't want to worry you. I'm ashamed to say I also didn't ... want to have to deal with it, either, if you were frantic and inconsolable. I was so tired. But I called you because ... because it was the right thing to do. And because if it had been you wounded in the night and me a hundred miles away, I would have wanted to know. I would have wanted to know it had happened, and that you were okay."

His hand cups behind her head. He drops his brow to hers again, sighing.

"I hate to think of you fighting creatures like that -- worse than than -- nearly every day of your life. I hate to think of you laying your life on the line. I know you, I know who you are, and I know I could never ask you to preserve yourself at the cost of all else. Not without destroying something in your or between us that I love.

"But Avery, if I could snap my fingers and magically exempt you from the war, I would. Even if it meant depriving our desperate cause of a brilliant warrior and leader -- I'd do it in a heartbeat."

Avery Chase

The things he gives her when he mistakes what she is asking for delight her. The Sunshine, on what could be called their 'first date'. This kiss on her mouth, when she intended only for his lips to press against her fingers. Avery just smiles, her eyes falling closed, her arms wrapping around his neck and shoulders in a rustle of satin, her breath lifting her chest when his hand caresses her so very close to that perfect curve. She melts slightly when the kiss parts, opening her eyes to him.

He confesses a few selfish thoughts, and then bends back to her, as close as he can be to her, til they're breathing the same air. Her forehead is furrowed; he sounds tired, still, and the way he is curled up with her like this, brow to brow, speaks to his vulnerability.

And why shouldn't he be vulnerable?

She feels a little bad, not telling him how close she came to death that night out with Erich. She feels a little bad that after she was healed, she didn't even think much of it. She did not need him. It wasn't even a conscious decision, only an assumption. Listening to him now, she realizes she understands that anticipatory weariness: she would not want, every time she came back from a battle, to have to console and comfort and reassure him. She would not want to deal with it.

Oh, she feels very guilty, and that informs how wrinkled her brow is even as he's telling her that if he could get her a pass from the war, somehow, he would. He wouldn't even think about it.

Avery smiles at him when he lifts his head, but the smile twists with ache. "If you had power like that," she admonishes him, "I would certainly hope you'd simply end the war instead." The smile fades, but gentles too. "Even if I were exempt," she whispers, "you know I would still fight."

Gradually, slowly, she sits up in his bed, the blankets gathered around her waist, her hair tousled, her warm skin welcoming the touch of cooler air. "We must all shoulder the burdens we are equipped to bear, in hope that we will deliver others from being crushed by them." Deeply, then, she breathes in, watching him anew, looking over him, finding the bruises that still discolor his skin, even though sleeping all night has healed a great deal of them already. Her eyes find his again.

"A couple of weeks ago I jumped in front of a friend of mine during a battle. If he had not laid a talen on me to renew my strength, and had I been struck again, it is very likely that I would have died." It is a blunt, simple confession. She watches his eyes as she says it, because watching his eyes is the last thing she wants to do as she tells him this.

"I did not call you, or go to you," Avery says quietly. "I did not even think of it. I was healing; I thought more about the edification I offered to my friend than I did of my wounding, or about calling you just to let you know. I was not afraid." She frowns, thoughtful, realizing the truth as she says it: "I was not shaken, because my faith was in him, that he would kill the beast or heal me if I fell, and he did not fail me. So when I returned home, it didn't even occur to me to feel concerned for my life. I rested, and I healed, and... I admit some degree of the same fear. I did not want to 'deal with it' if you were afraid for me. I didn't want to have to reassure you. I don't want to have to reassure you every time I take a wound. I do not want our time together to be spent in fear, or regret, or the stress of what might come of war."

She sighs, slowly and painfully, looking at him. "My love, I am truly sorry. I should have told you. It was selfish of me, and... aloof, and I want to be neither of those things with you." Her head shakes slightly. "I didn't know how you might react, and so I didn't even give you a chance to. I am so sorry. Will you forgive me?"

Calden White

There's ache in her smile, and ache in his, as she tells him the truth he already knows. He cannot keep her from the war. She would fight it, even if he could magically will her free from her obligations. She would fight and she would be brilliant, a true leader, a hero, a beacon of hope,

and she would jump in front of her friends protect them from death. Even if it meant she dies in their place.

Calden's hand follows Avery as she rises. His broad palm, his rough callouses: brushing from her side to her midriff, rubbing slowly and intoxicatedly up her other side. He touches her as though the very feel of her was addictive to him. As though his mind were not, in fact, tangled up in the what-ifs and the almosts; as though his heart were not twisting in his chest at the thought of her grievously wounded,

nearly dead,

nearly lost to him when he didn't even know.

"Don't apologize," he whispers. It is a sort of reflex. His wraps an arm around her waist, haphazardly: she is sitting up, after all, and he is still on his side, sprawled and lazy in his bed. His eyes are on her skin, on the rise and fall of those perfect breasts. Proof of life. He looks up at her then, meets those remarkable eyes of hers. "Of course I forgive you. There's nothing to forgive. I only just now told you that I would want to know if you had a brush with death. It's absurd and unfair for me to resent you for not telling me before."

There's a quiet. His eyes trailing down her body again; and then past her to the wall, the reflected light, the middle distance as he takes counsel with his own thoughts.

"I think," he says at length, quietly, "close calls are different for you and I." A painful twist of his mouth; a smile that doesn't quite make it, "For you, it's probably more commonplace than I'd like to think about. A fact of life. Nothing pleasant, but nothing to lose your mind over. And maybe ... maybe I think I would want to know every time I nearly lost you, but maybe if you did tell me every time, then that really would be all we'd ever talk about. Maybe we really would spend all our time together in fear, in regret, in worry over what might or might not happen."

Calden shifts, his lower body moving under the covers; the bedding shifting. Something oceanic about that: as though he were some sea creature, some benthic being stirring to her. Rising on an elbow, kissing her atop her thigh. Atop the crest of her hip. At the curve of her waist, rubbing his face -- scratchy scruff or not -- against her smooth skin.

"I love you," he says; nearly a sigh. "And maybe what I really want is just for you to tell me if and when I can help you share a burden. If and when something happens that isn't commonplace, isn't something you just shrug off, isn't something that you can or want to deal with by yourself. I just want to ... be there for you when you need me.

"As for the rest of it -- the close calls, the times you face death because you have to: I think I just need to deal with that myself. Come to terms with it myself, and accept that this is a small price to pay in return for the privilege of loving you. I don't think it'll be easy, but to make you talk it out with me every time you flirt with death -- I think that's just me trying selfishly to share an unfair burden with you."

Avery Chase

Through that satin, the feel of Avery is rather addictive. She is so smooth, so warm, the softness of her skin and the gentle give of certain parts only a sheath over the strong core muscles and the athletic limbs he noticed the first time she walked up from his guest room and he realized that the white wolf who had destroyed an elk right in front of him was also... this woman, who he looks at sometimes like he would happily fall down and worship her for the rest of his days.

He tells her not to apologize, and she aches, she starts to tell him no to that, but he tells her: he forgives her. She still wants to argue with him, but she doesn't. It would be a childish, plaintive argument anyway.

Close calls are different for the two of them. More commonplace for her, gauged differently. Had she been alone that night, she would have been deeply shaken upon her return. Had she not been distracted by socking Erich in the jaw and telling him to believe in himself, god dammit she might have been more vulnerable. He wonders if, were Avery to tell him every single time she nearly died, that would end up being their entire life.

She cannot tell him that isn't the case. At first when she came here, nothing seemed capable of touching her. Now it happens more regularly. Now she is also stronger. Now she cannot tell him that she doesn't think it won't happen with some frequency. She lifts her arms as he moves around, waiting for him to get comfortable again, even if that means he's sticking his face up under the hem of her pajama top and rubbing his face on her. Avery quirks, curious and fond and amused at his behavior, lowering her arms to settle them across his shoulders. She strokes his back with her fingertips, her fingernails occasionally, delicately running over him.

"I love you too, darling," she murmurs. "And I believe we've discussed it a bit before, in some way," she goes on, realizing it. "I am not very practiced, nor very good, at sharing things that burden me." For what it's worth, she looks a little apologetic about it, her eyes down on him, shining the way they do even in dim light. "But I will try. And I will try not to keep things from you out of some selfish purpose."

Her hand moves up his back and into his hair, sweeping it off his temple. "I love you, too," she murmurs again, wholeheartedly.

Calden White

Calden laughs, muffled -- muffled because he's nuzzled her until he's found skin; muffled because he's laughing against her skin. He draws back, then, raising his head to her as she combs his hair back from his temple. They are making pledges to each other, he realizes: unselfishness. Love. The sharing of burdens, which is in its own way a form of love and unselfishness.

"Well, you should practice, Miss Chase," he replies, his smile alight in his eye, "so you get better at it. After all, it's as you said. We should share our burdens when we can so we aren't crushed by them."

Which isn't exactly what she said. Which is actually the reciprocal of what she said, but -- oh, he's nuzzling her again, his nose stirring the satin over her skin, his eyes closing, his lips pressing to her body beneath it.

"I adore you," he murmurs. "It's like my world lights up a little more when you come around. But we should get up, because if you let me, I'll find a way to convince you to loll around in bed until lunchtime. And then we'll both be starving."

Avery Chase

Oh, the gifted, silvery tongues of the Fianna. She lights up his world. He turns her inspiring sayings around on her. He warns her -- oh dear, no! -- that he might just keep her in bed.

Avery smirks at his admonishment to practice, and she even tells him, albeit gently: "That is not what I said," because what she said matters deeply to her. It is not that he is wrong, simply that he is saying she said something she did not.

Her hand smooths his hair back again. "How do you know that I didn't get out of bed hours ago and have breakfast?"

Calden White

The corner of Calden's mouth curls up, slow, warm. "No, it's not," he admits. "But it's a very good corollary, I thought."

He rolls onto his back, then: broad chest opening, one arm folding behind his head against as the other hand catches hers. Pulls her fingertips to his mouth. Kisses her there, softly, finally and inadvertently paying her that kiss that she'd asked for.

"I suppose you might have," he allows. "But if you ate hours ago, then I'd imagine you'd very nearly be hungry again by now."

Avery Chase

He lolls in bed, and Avery watches him, head tilted. She allows him her hand, her fingertips soft on his lips, as he talks a big game about getting out of bed and getting food but does nothing but roll around in his covers. She lets her glance fall across his chest again, the remainders of bruises and the rainbow that partial healing has left on him. He probably catches her, looking at him, frowning, her brows tugged tight together before her gaze makes its way up to his eyes again.

"Please tell me what happened," she says quietly. It has nothing to do with lunch. Everything to do with sharing burdens. Or if not that: just knowing. Knowing, the light that casts out fear.

Calden White

Of course he sees her frown. Those vivid dark eyebrows tugging together; the downcurve of that mouth that he could wax poetic on. And seeing it, his hand rises; his thumb touches her lip, traces just beneath the edge of it.

He grows serious. Her expression mirrors onto him with her question; he's quiet a moment. Then his hand reaches for hers, though his eyes never leave her face. He finds her by touch, and then he pulls her down, closer, close to him. Pulls her to rest against his chest, head pillowed on his shoulder, if she'll let him.

"I was in Golden," he says quietly, "having a late dinner and drinks with some business partners I'd also call friends. We broke around eleven, maybe a little later. I ran into Melantha out on the streets and recognized her. We started talking, so I suggested that we go grab a cup of coffee. We had just started walking when the lights on the street started to black out.

"We were lucky to be near our cars. I had guns in mine, so we went for my truck. I thought if we were lucky we'd get away. If not, then at least we would be armed, and at least we'd be somewhere away from the town center. We started driving, but we could hear that ... thing following us. Its breathing. Almost like it was right there over our shoulders, closing in.

"And then the car went dead. I think it must have been able to ... disrupt technology. Or maybe its very presence disrupted technology. Anyway; we were stranded, so I gave Melantha my handgun and grabbed the rifle off the rack. And then it was on us.

"It broke the windshield. It clawed for us. It bit at us. It got me pretty good, and Melantha didn't exactly get off lightly either. I didn't get this being chivalrous and protecting her; we were both fighting with every ounce of our strength. Fighting for our lives. I don't know how many rounds we put in it, but in the end, finally, it went down.

"I remember Melantha holding pressure on me. Trying to stop the bleeding. I remember her telling me she was calling her friends, and I remember telling her it was going to be okay. I remember thinking her friends wouldn't make it on time, and maybe that thing had friends of its own, and maybe it wouldn't be okay at all but I didn't want her to lose hope. I didn't want her to die in terror and despair. So I lied to her, and then --

"The next thing I remember was waking up on the road. I don't know how she did it, but she called her friends and they came. They healed us up. The boy was driving and Melantha was with us. The girl -- your friend Charlotte, I think -- was following in their truck. They took me all the way home, safe and sound, and then they went back to Denver.

"And I called you.

"And you came."

Avery Chase

It's best that she didn't shake him awake and demand to know what happened last night; the story is an unsettling one. The entire thing was short and brutal and unfair, and had the guns jammed or the thing had friends or had any number of factors been different, it would simply be another nightmarish story to tell kinfolk to keep them indoors and away from the possibilities of such danger. Avery's brow does not clear as Calden talks. In fact, there are moments when it only furrows deeper, when her mouth's corners are tighter and lower and her eyes -- and yes, they could be compared to blue skies and sapphires and the glint off of icicles -- look only more troubled.

She does go to him, easily enough, but not to lay her head on her shoulder. She lies on her side beside him, where she can see his face, which she is starting to think he is almost deliberately hiding from her, all these brow-to-brow touches and him nuzzling her waist and wanting her to lie down on him. But if it is deliberate, it would have to be unconsciously so. Still, this time she resists that, and watches him instead, where she can see the telling of the story on his features and he can see its impact.

What amuses her, bizarrely, is that he points out: he did not attempt chivalry for the young kinswoman whose blood is so pure it very nearly intoxicated Avery just to catch a whiff of it, even terrified and drying on Calden's truck. He didn't get hurt by throwing himself in front of a friend, which is only amusing because she just told him that she nearly got herself killed... throwing herself in front of Erich, the friend of the woman Calden was with. It's all a little funny, but she doesn't laugh even as the amusement at the thought flits through her mind. It isn't that funny.

Her hand rests gently on his side, away from one particularly mottled bruise, then smooths over his chest as she wraps her arm around him. She doesn't tell him the sheer debt she feels she owes Baklava Republik now, particularly Charlotte, or of the immense gratitude she has for them now that is somehow, stunningly, greater than it was already.

Avery's hand moves up from his chest and touches his face. If he is not looking at her, she gently turns his jaw towards herself so that he is. And she leans over him, her hair falling in loose, cool waves, as smooth and soft as the satin she's wearing, and she kisses him. For a long, long time.

Calden White

Her touch leaves a scintillating sense of awareness in its wake. A hyperacuity of his senses, until even the slightest shift of air feels crystal-clear. He turns his face as her hand turns it; closes his eyes and accepts that kiss, deepens it, returns it.

It's a long kiss. Warm and drenching and thorough. His hand rising to slide into her hair, smoothing down over her shoulder. That satin is soft and sheer; he can almost feel the texture of her skin through it. The warmth. The kiss could escalate, but it doesn't. He could escalate it, he could lean up to her or roll her under or move over her

(and some part of him wants to. always wants to.)

but he doesn't. When it draws to a close his hand is on her cheek, his thumb rubbing a smooth arc over her skin. He is smiling a little, achingly.

"I'm okay," he whispers. "Are you?"

Avery Chase

To this, she just smiles, looking down at him from so very close. There is a molten warmth in her to be this close to him, to have kissed him like that, to feel him and smell him in bed with her, to know he is naked under the sheets with her, to think of his hands on her body.

But she smiles, and she nods, her whisper equally soft. "I am."

a wyrmhound in golden.

Calden White

[...that wasn't ominous at all.]

Melantha Argyris

Today is another day off, and even though [i]important things[/i] happened last night and Erich looked particularly haunted after what they witnessed, Melantha left the tinyhouse alone. She told both of them that she just needed to get out. There are only so many books to read, so much to do, and Melantha itches sometimes with energy and wandering thoughts. So she left, taking Erich's truck and driving it out to Golden.

Not that she told them why she was going to Golden. It happens to be Parents & Family Weekend, which was a nice enough 'cover' for her to just walk around, not registered, not a parent or a family member, but look around. She went with tours that were full. There is, well after dark, still some mud on the ends of her jeans from the Edgar Mine Tour. She sat in a lecture about Chemistry and Geochemistry with Yongan Yang. She toured the Geology Museum and participated in a visual simultation of the reservoir. She walked the Geology Trail. She did more today than most people who are actually visiting their kids.

And now she is leaving the sweets shop on Washington Ave next to the Jimmy John's and across from the Blue Canyon, carrying a hand-packed quart of vanilla ice cream and a bag of mixed candies with shiny, crinkly wrappers because she thinks Charlotte will like the shiny, crinkly wrappers and the way you can see through the cellophane and the way you can't see through the foil and because Erich thinks he's boring and likes vanilla.

Outside, her coat all buttoned up, she starts trudging towards where she parked Erich's truck.

Calden White

Coming out of the Blue Canyon -- right about when Melantha is heading back to Erich's truck with her sugary loot, in fact -- is the purveyor of some of the finest beef in the state. Sadly, such a superlative doesn't confer much in the way of star status; but then, Calden is hardly the type to care for such things. He's a fairly reserved man in many ways. He isn't standoffish or cold by any stretch of the imagination, but he keeps to himself. He listens to audiobooks on his long drives up and down the state. He's slowly but surely spoiling one of his cattledogs into a pet. Given the choice between a night by a fireside with a few friends, or perhaps only one, and some sort of wild hundred-person party drenched in alcohol, he'd pick the former any day of the week.

And, in fact, when he spots Melantha -- recognizes her vaguely from some gathering or meeting or hoedown or other -- he almost doesn't call out to her. Waffles for a moment, wondering if a girl nearly twenty years his junior who hangs out with wolves just as young would really want to be seen talking to some thirty-something cattleman in boots.

Good manners win out in the end. He does call out: "Miss!" And if she turns, if she looks at him, Calden raises a gloved hand in a wave.

Melantha Argyris

Perhaps he has seen her, and if he has, he probably has not spoken to her, or had a drink with her, or become friends with her. But seeing her is enough, even once or twice, even peripherally. Walking through a restaurant was enough to make a Silver Fang suddenly go stiff and alert, watching her, suddenly and overwhelmingly protective of her. Extending one heeled foot out of a limousine was enough to make a Shadow Lord notice her and resent her a little for not -- in that moment, in her false self -- living up to the glory and wonder of her blood.

Calden will have no such reactions to her. He cannot look at her and know, instantly, what tribe she belongs to, but he could probably gues from that thick, dark hair, those luminous eyes, that olive skin that is somewhat golden even in the middle of autumn. There is just something about her that stands out, something that draws attention,

even if when he calls out to her, she jerks her head around, her kneejerk reaction one of defensiveness, one of looking a bit doe-in-the-headlights as a survival mechanism. She stares at Calden, then her shoulders relax a bit and she lifts her hand to give him a slight wave as well. She doesn't cross the street, though, since it's not her turn: the lights are against her, so she looks at him from the corner.

"I think I know you!" she calls back.

Calden White

"You do!"

They're calling at each other across a street. They draw some curious stares, but -- it's a Saturday night, it's a lively area of a lively town that's a lively blend of upscale and college funk. No one thinks much of it.

Calden, for his part, doesn't obey traffic signals quite so assiduously. After a glance both ways to ensure traffic is light, he jogs across the street, coming up on the curb a good six feet or so from Melantha. No closer than that. He saw the way her head came around, the way her shoulders moved when he called. Defensiveness. Wariness. It's not unusual, sadly, in the kin to wolves -- for any number of reasons.

"Well," he amends with a slightly crooked smile, "loosely speaking, you know me. Calden White. I'm affiliated with 1999 Broadway and Roxborough."

Melantha Argyris

When Calden jogs over, Melantha decides to just wait. She tips her head as she looks at him, something animalistic and primitive in the gesture, in the very air around her. It seems so odd to see her there with a bag from a sweets shop, a big long coat, thick mittens on her hands and a simple striped beanie on her head to keep it warm.

"Oh," she says, and that visible reaction grows a little more visible.

How. Does she act. Around men. Not trying to play stupid, not being cute, not making them want to protect her, not being Celia or Maria or any of them but just Melantha, who is not used to being around any men who are not Black Furies or one of her best friends. She blinks at him, and then holds the bag out to him.

"Do you want a piece of candy?"

Calden White

There is a faint awkwardness in the air around Melantha. It seems a little at-odds with her: her remarkable eyes, her air of timeless primality. She holds the bag out. Calden blinks at it, then at her, then laughs.

"I would love a piece of candy," he says, the laugh folding on itself: a smile now, warm. Crinkles at the corners of his eyes. No hat for him today; not even a Stetson. A shearling jacket, though, and jeans, and boots, lived in and well-worn. A sturdy buckskin gloves that he strips off to reach into Melantha's bag. He rummages past the cold ice cream, picks out one of the clear-wrapped candies.

"Thank you," he says, lifting the piece in a little salute. "I'm sorry, I don't recall your name."

Melantha Argyris

Her kneejerk response is to tell the tall, handsome, successful man some other name. Her kneejerk response is to wrap him around her finger one way or the other: if not with lust than protection. Even the married and attached ones, even the decent ones, don't mind sort of adopting young women who need help in the big, bad world. Her kneejerk response is to make sure the way is paved smoothly for the long game, the slow knife, laying a foundation for inevitable destruction... or at least usefulness from him.

She blinks again. "Uh. Melantha. Melantha Argyris." A beat. Let's swing pendulum-crazy to the other end of the spectrum: "I'm Greek. I'm in this pack called Baklava Republik with my friends Charlotte and Erich. Like really in their pack. With a rite."

Melantha tries to think of what comes next, even though she doesn't know. RIGHT. HIS NAME. DERP. "What about you?"

Melantha Argyris

[remove the caps part about DERPing!]

Calden White

Calden is, in fact, a decent one. A decent man. A decent human being. A kind person, with a generous heart. It would be so easy to wrap him around her finger. Maybe not with lust, but certainly: with her youth, her inexperience, her fragility, her need to be helped and guided and protected. The illusions thereof, anyway. Back in the day, Melantha -- Celia, Maria, Emma, Nadia, whatever her name might have been -- could have closed the trap by the end of the night. Done deal. Sealed fate.

That was then. This is now. She

doesn't know what to do now. How to interact. What to say. So she opens her mouth and absolute absurdity comes out: way too much info for a first meeting like this. She can tell: Calden is unwrapping that bit of candy, and he is looking at her with this puzzled sort of smile, trying to process what she's telling him.

Greek. Pack. Baklava Republik. Charlotte and Erich. REALLY in the pack. Rite!

What about him?

The silence stretches just a beat too long. Then: "I'm a rancher," he says, smoothly and amicably closing that gap in their conversation. "I live up north, near the state line. Charlotte, did you say? Wouldn't happen to be a Charlotte of the royal tribe, would it?"

Melantha Argyris

He is a rancher. She forgot: "I wait tables." Which is not the same thing as identifying as a waitress or a server. She is neither of those things. She does wait tables, though. She quiets down after that, because he's still saying things after that, and she doesn't want to interrupt him.

Charlotte of the royal tribe. Melantha quirks a bit at that. That may be true, and she can't really argue with it. She just doesn't think of Charlotte like that. Best friend EVARRR, a sparrow-dinosaur, talen genius.

So she says: "Yeah. Do you know Charlotte, too?"

Calden White

Calden shakes his head. "No. My -- " the term is new enough that there's still a little hitch, a delicious, tiny tingle in the soles of his feet and the axis of his spine when he says it, " -- girlfriend does, though. She's got a lot of good things to say about Charlotte.

"Anyway -- I didn't mean to keep you. Do you need to get somewhere before that ice cream melts?"

Melantha Argyris

Melantha just stares at him for a moment. Which she realizes may be rude, and she's not sure if she should stop just because of that or not. At least she doesn't speak slowly when she says: "It's freezing outside. It'll take a long time to melt. I am driving back to Evergreen, though. I was just going to put it in the bed of the truck, though, so it's not exposed to the heater."

She sticks her tongue into her cheek for a moment, something she would never have normally done, but it feels kinda funny and so she does it, childlike.

"Your girlfriend is lucky if Charlotte is her friend, too," she says, unabashedly. "Charlotte's pretty much a genius, and she's very kind and a total badass."

Calden White

That brings another smile. "Well. My girlfriend," oh, that word again. His smile widens, "is brilliant, kind, and a badass as well. So it seems our respective friends are in good company together.

"Her name is Avery," he adds. "Avery Chase. I'd show you a picture, but -- I don't actually have one." His brow furrows over a smile. "Thanks for reminding me. I'll have to ask for one.

"Now, since you're not in a hurry to go home with your ice cream -- how do you feel about grabbing a cup of coffee with me? Just so we can continue this conversation somewhere other than a sidewalk."

Melantha Argyris

She blinks at that. That part is still habit: blink a lot! It makes her look so lost at times, so much dumber or more nervous than she is, even when some of that nervousness and awkwardness is genuine. But she also has a keenness to her eyes, a sharpness, that she cannot entirely disguise.

Well she can. But she's not trying.

"I am okay without seeing a picture of her. I'm glad you like her and... stuff." Which makes her brow furrow. She actually doesn't care that much about what he thinks of his girlfriend, does she? Well, it's kind of adorable that he's so eee about her and it's nice that he says she's brilliant and a badass. And apparently she and Charlotte like each other. Okay. So actually she is kinda glad that he likes his girlfriend and stuff.

Melantha shakes her head a little to clear it when she's done processing that. Quickly, actually: her brain is rapid with calculations, even emotional ones.

"That'd be good. It's really cold. But can we walk to the truck first? I want to stash the bag in the back so it doesn't melt inside somewhere."

Calden White

Calden laughs a little under his breath. Had he been gushing? He supposes he has. The conversation is a little awkward, a little stilted. Not in a terrible way, though. And it's always nice, he thinks, to meet someone else like him.

"Yeah, of course." He steps back a little, falls into place beside her. "Oh," as he sees where she's heading, "you're actually parked right next to me."

And then,

as though someone hit a switch,

the street goes dark.

Melantha Argyris

She's heading to the giant truck that is bright yellow with black racing stripes. She called it 'the truck' but it certainly doesn't look like something she'd drive. She looks, from her slightly muddy-hemmed jeans and her sneakers and her shin-length down-filled coat and her beanie and mittens, like she should be driving something sort of squat and several years old and with the best gas mileage you can get on something that old. Or a truck that rattles and is perpetually dirty.

Nope: a bright yellow truck. With goddamn racing stripes.

"Oh, so are you the Volkswagen or the --"

the light goes dark. Melantha doesn't even seem bothered; she just keeps walking, shaking her head: Weaver bullshit, that's what that is.

Calden White

Well. Yes. That truck does not look like something Melantha would drive. It doesn't look like something anyone sane and adult would drive, but then it could be argued that a werewolf born to a full moon who lives in a tinyhouse is most decidedly neither sane nor fully adult. So: Erich drives that truck. And when Melantha or Charlotte need to go somewhere, they drive it too.

Calden's eyebrows may have hitched up a little on sight. But he's too well-mannered to say anything of it, so he answers her: "The Silverado, yes. I'm not really a Beetle type, I think -- "

and the lights go dark. Melantha just keeps walking. Calden is a little more bothered, turning to look down the street and up it to see where the darkness ends.

But it doesn't end. The entire town seems to have blacked out. The stars overhead are suddenly, dazzlingly bright. No moon tonight. There isn't a single light in a single window; not a speck of glow, not even a flashlight beam. You'd expect customers to come milling out of the coffeehouses, the bar-and-grills, the Jimmy John's -- but no.

It's just them. On the street. In the darkness.

And something else. Something in the shadows, breathing slow and even and deep. Closing in.

Calden sets his hand on Melantha's shoulder. He is a shadow in the dim starlight. He keeps his voice low: "Let's go to my truck. I keep a rifle on the rack and a handgun in the glove compartment. We're going to try to drive out of here, but I need to know: can you shoot if you have to?"

Melantha Argyris

[I'm just gonna do this one thing: dex + athletics]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 6, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )

Melantha Argyris

Hand on her shoulder. Melantha moves like you wouldn't expect someone of her size to move, someone of her doe-eyed blinking awkwardness. She ducks, turns, backs up, the motion a smooth spiral, ending with her just out of his arm's reach and facing him. There's a --

completely different young woman looking at him. Those eyes, the color of a summer day descending swiftly into a storm, no longer promise simply a gentle rainfall but possibly something much more devastating. There's a seriousness to her lips. No glower, no glare, no scowl or bared teeth, but a steadiness that only serves to look like a warning.

And the way her body is angled, slightly sideways. She gives him a narrower target, a her vital organs hidden, her jaw down to protect her throat, one arm up, and though it's clear she would have little to no chance of doing anything but annoying him a little if they were to engage in some kind of physical conflict, she looks like she would go down fighting. Fighting, kicking, elbowing, biting, relentless, unbreakable to the very end.

It barely even warrants noting that the bag with the ice cream and candy isn't in her hand anymore, because she might need both of those hands to deal with the somewhat stranger who just put his hand on her shoulder after the entire street went dark.

But: he sees the arm in front of her side slowly move as her hand rolls into a fist with his words. She breathes, exhaling slowly, then eases back a bit. "As long as you walk a head of me and I am not getting in your truck until I have the handgun and I know it's loaded."

Calden White

It hardly needs to be said, but: Calden was not expecting that. His hand freezes as Melantha slips out from under it. It stays there, forgotten, mid-air, as he looks at her. Even in the darkness he looks -- puzzled. Not at her reaction, per se. Not that.

"I'm on your side," he says. Softly, as though speaking to something skittish and wild and liable to bite. "I don't blame you if you don't want to believe that without proof, but you'll get that proof soon enough. I can't help but wonder what's made you so wary, though."

Maybe that's a stupid question. Just look at the world they live in. Still: he is still another moment. Then Calden begins to walk toward his truck. Quickly.

"Come on," he says. Ahead of them, the lights of his truck blink as the doors unlock. Even those lights seem

somehow

dimmed.

Melantha Argyris

Maybe that's a stupid question. Maybe Melantha, used to the sort of men she's used to, hears that and her jaw hardens a bit, her memories of so. very. many little manipulative comments about how women are supposed to be, the gaslighting, the heartfelt disappointment from men who are just so hurt and lost and bewildered whenever women don't smile at them, don't want them, are wary of them as though men aren't one of the leading causes of women's suffering worldwide, as though somehow she must just be silly or wrong or damaged or broken to be wary,

and maybe he sees that roar of anger in her eyes when he mentions that, the rising of something molten,

burning,

from deep within her core.

She swallows, and eases back, watching him go back, turning with him, but following him to the truck, which is much nicer than Erich's truck but she's not really thinking about that right now. She does remember to get the ice cream and candy though, dropping it in the bed of Erich's truck on her way to Calden's, which isn't far.

Also she takes off her mittens, glancing behind them both. "Do you hear that, by the way?"

Calden White

"Yes," Calden doesn't look back; he doesn't slow. And for once, he doesn't open the passenger-side door for a lady. He goes directly to his door, yanks it open --

(behind them. behind them, and slightly to the right: that deep, steady breathing, closer, ever closer, maybe a block away at most now.)

-- and climbs in. As Melantha gets in the other side, if she gets in, he pops open the glove compartment and takes out the handgun. Holds it butt-first to her.

"It's a semi-automatic," he tells her. Slams his door. Starts the engine. "Fifteen rounds in a clip. Spare clip in the glove compartment, but that's the only one. There's a rifle racked on the roof. It packs a hell of a lot bigger punch, but the recoil will break your collarbone if you're not braced right.

"I'll drive." He pulls away from the curb. Swings a sharp left. "If you have to -- you shoot."

Dark streets unfold ahead of them. No lights, no people. No explanation either. Just mile upon mile of blackness. No visible end to it. No border, past which the world is normal again, populated again, lit again.

And that breathing. Impossibly, it seems to follow them. Permeates the insulated shell of the truck cab. Haunts them, even as the engine guns and the tires churn and the truck lurches away from the Blue Canyon and its neighbors.

Calden White

[CORREKSHUN:

" -- and climbs in. Pops open the glove compartment and takes out the handgun. Holds it butt-first to Melantha."]

Melantha Argyris

A small part of Calden's soul must die every time he fails to open a door for a lady. Melantha, for what it's worth, doesn't notice. She follows him to the driver's side anyway, resolute: she was not kidding about refusing to get into that truck with him. The Wyrm has a lot of tricks, and she has heard horror stories of people lured by villains that they thought were allies, that wore the faces and spoke in the voices of friends. And this is not a friend or ally: she barely knows him.

So he gets to the car and he climbs in, reaching across to the glovebox to take out the handgun, passing it to her. She takes the grip with -- well, competence if not familiarity, and then keeps one eye on him and one eye on the gun (not literally) as she checks to make sure that it's loaded. When she's satisfied, Melantha points it downward, walking around the truck to the passenger seat and climbing in. She keeps her beanie on.

"Sometimes I blink when I fire," she admits to him, as blurted as anything else she's said tonight. "I know you're not supposed to but it's really hard not to."

Awesome. She shoots with her eyes closed sometimes. This will go swimmingly.

Melantha decides to buckle up as Calden drives, after that sharp left. She's tense: she doesn't want to leave. She knows they should leave. She feels a sickly cold wet feeling from that breathing, and she wants to kill it, and yet this guy is driving them away from it. Or trying.

"I don't think we're getting away she tells him, in case he can't hear it.

Calden White

Calden doesn't roll his eyes. He doesn't groan with disappointment and horror that she shoots with her eyes shut. He flicks her a glance, and then --

"It helps if you exhale, slow and even, before you squeeze the trigger. And always squeeze. Don't yank."

Another glance. Longer. Eye contact, brief but steady. He is earnest:

"You'll be fine."

And then he drives. And that noise, that deep, harsh breathing: it follows them, it haunts them, sometimes they think they're leaving it behind but always, always it comes back. Every time a little closer. Every time a little louder.

We're not getting away, Melantha says.

"I know," Calden replies, tight-voiced. "But we have to try. If nothing else, we can't have whatever that thing is hunting us down in the middle of town."

Melantha Argyris

Melantha is relatively implacable even when she does want comfort and reassurance. Everything in her rebels against someone patting her head or giving her a gentle squeeze and telling her she'll be fine and this is how she'll be fine. These days that instinct is stronger than ever, at least when she's not dealing with the two people she knows the best and trusts the most. It has caused some of her most tense moments at her job, her spine turning to iron as she tries not to bite people's heads off,

BACK OFF,

as she misses, once again, the steady reliance on one's-own-strength and the trust that everyone else is just-as-strong-as-they-need-to-be that she grew up with, went home to, lived in for most of her life. It is not easy to stop herself from yelling at Calden, who is reacting the only way that makes sense to him to this odd young woman. She feels a pang of self-rejection, a stab of fear that she's always going to go around acting a little bit socially hobbled because everything in her life was a lie and everything that wasn't a lie is gone and no one, nothing in the world is quite like those things she had that weren't lies.

She looks away from his long glance, and she wasn't meeting his eyes anyway.

"I know how to fire," is all she says, muttered, defensive, but so very quiet. Her mind, a running chorus: she knows squeeze, don't yank. She knows. Sometimes she just blinks. That doesn't mean she's dumb. She doesn't need him patting her hand or her head. She doesn't need his help at all she doesn't need his protection she doesn't want his reassurance or his strength, she just wants her own.

But how would he know anything about her? Girls like her in the world he knows are not really like her at all.

--

The breathing makes her want to scratch the back of her neck until it bleeds. She wants to shower. She wants to crawl out of her skin. She wants to kill it.

Instead she exhales. "I swear, if you're just some shapeshifting or surgically-altered fomor or something who is luring me away from other people so you can do whatever to me, I'm gonna fight you, and Erich and Charlotte are going to like. I don't know. Set you on fire and rip you apart at the same time." Her eyes skate over to him, wary but not cold, serious but not angry. "I'm not easy prey."

That, adamant. That,

whether he's her ally or not.

Calden White

God, she's implacable. She's wary, she's tense as a wire, she doesn't trust him a single bit and there's a part of Calden that wants to get angry. Wants to stop the car and turn around and shout at her that

HE IS TRYING TO HELP HER,

goddammit, so stop pointing the figurative gun at him when there's some monster out of myth hot on their heels.

He doesn't, though. They have bigger fish to fry than that. He doesn't dare stop the truck, even though he knows it's not doing any good, even though that noise, that sound, that breathing, it keeps following them. It dogs them, it permeates the truck, the insulation, their ears, their skulls, it bores right down the backs of their necks and it's always there, always there, always there,

closing in.

"I know you're not," Calden says. His teeth have clenched; he barely even realizes it. They're out of downtown Golden now. Heading out toward the uninhabited stretches, the golf courses and country clubs abandoned by night. The curving, scenic byways that wind down from the foothills into Denver: "Neither of us are."

--

And just like that

the engine cuts out. The car loses power. Loses its steering assist; becomes a dead whale in the water, heavy, lurching with momentum, almost impossible to steer. Melantha can see Calden's knuckles white on the wheel, can see him pumping the brakes, can see him pulling up on the emergency brake and hauling the wheel around and skidding off the edge of the road, missing a tree by a yard, shuddering, bumping, rocking to a stop on the shoulder, turned one-eighty from where they were going.

Silence. Stillness. And then: eyes glowing baleful red in the darkness,

eyes that belong to a body, a vaguely lupine thing of claws and teeth and ghostly-pale fur, alight with its own phantom, haloing light. It is breathing. It is grinning, baring row upon row of teeth.

Leaping. Pouncing onto the hood of the Chevrolet, crushing metal with its weight. The windshield cracks one side to the other. The creature draws a paw back, smashes it into the glass. Batters it to a spiderweb of cracks; will punch through it in another second.

Calden grabs for the rifle on the roof.

Melantha Argyris

That makes her eyes skip over to him. Not wary so much as curious, not intrigued as much as suddenly a bit more attentive.

The engine cuts and Melantha gasps a bit. She can't see but can hear him pumping the breaks. She is glad she buckled in when he veers off the road, spun around, and yet all the same when the car stops she scrambles to unbuckle, to make sure she's free to move. She sees the eyes and gasps again, almost yelps, turning the safety off the gun and then

not gasping, nor yelping, but letting out a shriek as the thing leaps, punching at the glass not nearly far enough away from her face.

Melantha has a gun in her hand. She hasn't forgotten. She braces her arm, aiming the muzzle at the thing. She really hopes nothing richochets and like. Kills one of them instaed of that thing.

Melantha Argyris

[+7!]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (3) ( fail )

Calden White

[Calden +5]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (6) ( success x 1 )

Calden White

[TING +8]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (9) ( success x 1 )

Calden White

Ting - Calden - Melanfa!

Melantha Argyris

[eep!

BLAM! just one shot.]

Calden White

[Calden: also BLAM. wun shot.

Ting: 1. Break window! 2. GRAB + THROW MELANFA OWT.]

Calden White

[er. 2 is effektivlee a rage akshun]

Calden White

Ting: BREAKS WINDOW.

Calden: BLAM, point blank range. Moving targets spec doesn't really apply in this case. WHY DID I PICK THAT SPEC IT IS STUPID.

Dice: 6 d10 TN4 (2, 4, 5, 7, 8, 10) ( success x 5 )

Calden White

[dam +4]

Dice: 12 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 6, 7, 7, 8, 9, 9) ( success x 7 )

Calden White

[ting: soak!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 5, 8, 9, 9) ( success x 3 )

Melantha Argyris

[1. Point blank!]

Dice: 4 d10 TN4 (3, 8, 8, 9) ( success x 4 ) [WP]

Melantha Argyris

[Damage! +5]

Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 9, 10) ( success x 5 )

Calden White

[soak!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 6, 6, 6) ( success x 3 )

Calden White

[2. GRAB AN TROW. str+ath resisted by ... dex+ath or str+ath, whichever higher.]

Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 2, 4, 5, 7, 7) ( success x 2 )

Melantha Argyris

[str + ath! HALP ME VOLCANO]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (4, 8, 9, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

Calden White

In the face of such strength, such supernatural might, there is no such thing as shatter-proof.

The glass shatters. Shards scatter every which way, glinting in what little light there is. Calden clawing for his weapon: yanking it down from the roof. The rifle in his hand, the grip, the trigger. He grabs for the release-catch on his seat. Drops back, drops flat, gives himself the room he needs to swing that barrel around,

thinks briefly, wildly, brilliantly of Avery Chase and how angry he was going to be if he never sees her again,

and fires.

The report is deafening. The recoil slams into his shoulder. He isn't well-braced. It leaves a bruise. It leaves a lot worse than that in the ghost-flamed creature clawing through his windshield, though: tears a blazing white hole in the thing. An instant later Melantha,

who was Celia de Luca not very long ago, a giggling pouting thing that teetered about on high heels and short skirts, tight sweaters, cute jackets,

levels her own gun. Her borrowed gun, anyway. Levels it, squeezes the trigger, slams a bullet home in the creature's shoulder.

It shrieks outrage. It makes a sound not wholly of this world, knife-piercing and thin, on the painful edge of audible. It reaches through the glass, its claws catch at Melantha, tear her coat, spill feather and down into the truck cabin, but: she grabs that paw, she shoves it back, she twists away from it. Her gun is still in her hand, but before she can point it

that thing lunges in again. This time it uses its teeth.

Melantha Argyris

Melantha is ready, and Melantha fires, and she doesn't blink. She isn't thinking of anything at all except breathing, because breathing is the first necessity of survival. She watches the thing jerk back at the arm with grim satisfaction, even as blood patters over her hands and cheek and jacket. When it comes for her, she takes her left hand and calls on strength she has only asked for when moving something heavy at work and not wanting help, or when working on the house and not wanting to get so tired. But she has called on it before, and calls on it now, letting it come up roaring and world-altering and explosive,

shoving that thing back with an audible, shouted "NO." before she pulls back to brace her right arm again.

[Shoot it again! 3RB this time!]

Calden White

[Calden: 1a. shoot it again! b. try to slam it back w/ butt of rifle!

Ting: 1. BITE CALDEN. 2. BITE MELANFA. NOMNOM.]

Calden White

[Ting 1.]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 5, 5, 6, 7, 7) ( success x 3 )

Calden White

[Dam 1!]

Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 2, 4, 5, 6, 6, 10) ( success x 3 )

Calden White

[soak! diff8]

Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 4, 4, 7) ( fail )

Calden White

[SONUVABITCH. 1a. SHOOT IT. -1 die after split.]

Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (1, 9, 10) ( success x 2 )

Calden White

[dam +1]

Dice: 9 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 2, 2, 3, 3, 5, 6, 7) ( success x 2 )

Calden White

[soak!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (5, 6, 7, 8, 10) ( success x 4 )

Calden White

[b. FUCKER. NO DICE LEFT.]

Melantha Argyris

[BLAM BLAM BLAM]

Dice: 7 d10 TN5 (1, 4, 5, 5, 6, 7, 9) ( success x 6 ) [WP]

Melantha Argyris

[SHOULD HAVE ROLLED THIS BEFORE.

WILLPOWER! before second shot, so at -1 WP instead of -2

+1 diff for distress!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN7 (1, 2, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 3 )

Melantha Argyris

[Damage! +5]

Dice: 10 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 4, 4, 5, 7, 8, 8, 8, 9) ( success x 5 )

Calden White

[soak!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )

Calden White

[2. Bite Melantha!]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 4, 10, 10) ( success x 2 )

Calden White

[damage +1!]

Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 3, 3, 4, 6, 8) ( success x 2 )

Melantha Argyris

[Soak! +1 armor]

Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 3, 6, 9) ( success x 1 )

Melantha Argyris

[Rolling WP again]

Dice: 4 d10 TN7 (4, 4, 7, 8) ( success x 2 )

Calden White

Snapping teeth. A crushing grip on the Stagsman: an audible crack of bone, a bitten-back shout of pain, his arm too mangled to attempt to batter the creature back. For Melantha, a lighter price -- a scratch through her thick winter clothing, no more.

And their guns: muzzle-flash flaring in their hands, punching one, two-three-four bullets into the thing. It slides back a precious few inches. Shakes its head once, hard.

Lunges again. Murder in its eyes.

Calden White

Calden: +4!

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (4) ( fail )

Melantha Argyris

[Init! + 7]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (1) ( fail )

Calden White

Ting! +7

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )

Calden White

[ting - melanfa - calden.

Calden:

1. GRIT TEETH, SHOOT THE DAMN THING. IN THE HED. +2 diff for targeted, +.... let's say +2 damage for critical shot, if successful.]

Melantha Argyris

She is pretty sure she's going to throw up or pass out. The burst of blood from the thing did not bother her; when it bit into Calden, savagely, Melantha felt the blood drain out of her face a half-second before she just started shooting, squeezing the trigger over and over for what felt like forever.

When it bites her, she feels woozy, and not from blood loss, but the sight of the blood, the pervasive smell of it that is so sudden and all-encompassing for her, the knowledge of it, the torn skin, the blood running out, the wrongness of that, and her head swims for a moment before she clears it. Forces it to clear, so she doesn't die or something.

"NO!" she yells again, a higher shriek this time, with greater rage but somehow less force, with a sort of mad defiance instead of steely resolve.

[3RB again! that worked good!]

Calden White

[Ting:

1. Bite Calden: targeted for other arm! +2 diff. Every dmg after soak decreases firearms dice pool by 1.

2. Chomp Melantha!]

Calden White

1. CHOMP.

Dice: 6 d10 TN8 (4, 6, 8, 8, 10, 10) ( success x 4 )

Calden White

[Dam +3!]

Dice: 9 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 4, 5, 6, 7, 7, 9, 9) ( success x 5 )

Calden White

[soak!]

Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 2, 4, 8) ( success x 1 )

Calden White

1. Oops. WIF -1 DMG MOD.

Dice: 5 d10 TN8 (1, 2, 7, 9, 9) ( success x 2 )

Calden White

[Dam +1]

Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 2, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

Melantha Argyris

[oh god not more blood -2]

Dice: 4 d10 TN7 (1, 2, 5, 8) ( success x 1 )

Melantha Argyris

[3RB!]

Dice: 7 d10 TN5 (1, 4, 4, 4, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 4 ) [WP]

Melantha Argyris

[Damage +5]

Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

Calden White

[soak!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 7, 10, 10) ( success x 3 )

Calden White

[Calden: SHOOT IT WIF MAI WUN REMAINING DIE. +WP. +2diff for called shot.]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (7) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

Calden White

[dam +2 +2]

Dice: 12 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 4, 5, 5, 5, 6, 8, 8, 9, 9, 9) ( success x 6 )

Calden White

[soak!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (4, 5, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 3 )

Calden White

[Ting 2. Bite Melanfa!]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 3, 10) ( success x 1 )

Calden White

[Dam!]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (5, 5, 9, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 4 )

Melantha Argyris

[ONOZ]

Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (6, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 1 )

Melantha Argyris

[yup, more blood. -3]

Dice: 3 d10 TN7 (2, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )

Melantha Argyris

[FOUR FOR YOU, MELANTHA. YOU GO, MELANTHA.]

Calden White

The next lunge,

the next bite,

mangles Calden's arm so badly he can barely hold his rifle. It's very nearly willpower alone that lets him raise it. Brace it on the steering wheel. Aim it.

Fire.

Blows a chunk off the thing's head. Blows an ear off, a wad of flesh; leaves it bleeding streaks and trails of blinding white. It retaliates: tears through Melantha's coat, her puffer jacket and her hoodie and god knows what else she's bundled on against the cold. Tears into her flesh, that pure pure blood of hers. Hisses: delight and hunger, both.

Calden White

[Ting! +6 now]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (10) ( success x 1 )

Calden White

[Calden: um. +0. LOL]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )

Melantha Argyris

[+5]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (1) ( fail )

Melantha Argyris

She is not thinking.

About Charlotte, about Erich. About school or the tinyhouse, never to be ascended to, never to be returned to. She is not thinking about her mother who she barely remembers or her father and brothers who stayed and died or her brothers who left her behind for another tribe. She is not thinking about love or longing, about peace or the future. She does not think about Damaris or the commune or the sisters or Duck or anything, anything, anything but

staying alive.

There is no pleasure in this, and no satisfaction left for her -- grim or otherwise. Everything is narrow to what helps her stay alive and what does not. That clarity is black and white but it is, for her needs, clarity. Her own weaknesses will not help her stay alive.

She refuses them.

[3

R

B

!!!]

Calden White

[Calden: 1. fuck it. SHOOT THE DAMN THING. IN THE GODDAMN HED. AGAIN.

Ting: 1. drag-and-throw Calden out of car! 2. SAME THING WITH MELANTHA.]

Calden White

1. Drag and throw! str+ath -2 (dmg)

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 4, 5, 9) ( success x 1 )

Calden White

[resist! using str+ath pool, -5 (dmg)]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )

Calden White

[SHOOT IT OMGBBQ]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (3) ( success x 1 ) [WP]

Calden White

[dam+2]

Dice: 10 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 3, 4, 4, 5, 5, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 3 )

Calden White

[ARE YOU SHITTING ME KAHSEENO. soak!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (4, 6, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 4 )

Melantha Argyris

[3RB!]

Dice: 7 d10 TN5 (1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 5 ) [WP]

Melantha Argyris

[+5]

Dice: 9 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 3, 3, 9, 10, 10, 10, 10) ( success x 5 )

Calden White

[fail this, you motherfucker]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 7, 8, 10, 10) ( success x 4 )

Calden White

Calden is thinking about them.

He's thinking about all of them: the people he would leave behind. His girlfriend -- his lover, his paramour, his lady, his Avery. He is thinking about the sunlight on her skin, the way she shakes back her hair; the laughter, how it wells up and spills out of her. He is thinking about his father, too, grouch that he is; and his brothers, and his cousins. He is thinking about Eva and Eva's little daughter who likes cowboy boots. He is thinking about that kin he met so recently,

who goes around looking for trouble like this,

who would probably consider it an honor to die just. like. this.

He is thinking that: he is thinking, I think I'm going to die here. He's thinking he should have saved a bullet for Melantha. He's thinking he has no time for that now, and he pulls the trigger again.

--

The bullet snaps the beast's head around. But it swings back. It leers, unscathed. It grabs for Calden,

who shoves its paw away with nerveless hands, grunting something that might have, in another life, been a NO. He's learning from Melantha, it seems.

--

Melantha.

Who raises that gun that isn't even hers. Who lines up her shot. Who steels her resolve -- what little remains of it.

Who pulls.

the.

trigger.

--

Luminous blood, shimmering white and auto-fluorescing, splatters across the hood of the truck. The beast's head snaps up and back. It arches, almost graceful. And then -- quite slowly -- it tumbles backward. Slides bonelessly off the hood. Hits the asphalt with a quiet thud.

Everything is quiet, then. Gradually, little by little, beat by beat of their racing hearts, light begins to fill the world around them. The streetlights. The pathlights of the golf course beside the road. The distant night-lights of the clubhouse, somewhere beyond the ninth hole.

Beside her, drenched in his own blood in the driver's seat, Calden breathes in pain-ragged pants. He is dazed, he is shivering, his somewhat less injured hand still gripping that rifle with what little strength he has left. His head lolls against the headrest. He stares glassily at Melantha. His eyes want to close, but he makes them

open again.

"Have to get out of here," he rasps. "Call someone."

Melantha Argyris

It dies. They live. And everything comes crashing back in, floodgates opened and waters surging, overwhelming, taking all that magma of hers and slowing, freezing it solid. She watches the thing slump backwards and slide off the hood and in a second she is scrambling for the door handle, shoving the door open even though everything hurts and there's blood everywhere and that cowboy with the rifle may very well be dying. She almost falls out of the truck, gun up, and she is shooting before she's in that thing's reach.

One shot. Then another. Then, stalking forward, she stands over it in her beanie and her frizzy hair and that long, now-scratched-open and blood-stained coat of hers, slamming three more bullets in rapid succession into that monster's head. Then there's a clicking as she pulls the trigger again, but the clip is empty. The thing flinched every time it is struck, but that's just physics. It is dead. It is limp. It doesn't get up again. Melantha's breath steams in the darkness. She stares at it. And she starts crying.

Hiccuping breaths that have no sound but a subtle gasp to them, she starts sobbing, tears in her eyes. Her respiration is ragged and uneven but it's at least there, and it's on the verge of panic, but she has just enough slivers of self-control left to come back around and climb back into the --

blood-soaked

truck.

This time she just shakes her head, letting out a whimper, taking a step back, shutting her eyes veryveryverytight because she can't stand this and yet there's Calden White, telling her that they have to get out of there, call someone, and he really looks like he's about to die or something, and she is standing there crying with her lips pressed together shaking her head like these things will make it all go away, and then she digs down, very far, and pulls up what's left. It isn't much. She can feel her reach scraping the bottom of the barrel of her resolve when she pulls up another draught, but there's enough.

Enough for her to open her eyes, in spite of the blood, and force herself to breathe again, and climb into her nightmare, pulling the door shut, letting the empty gun tumble recklessly to the floor of the truck. It's cold now, with the windshield broken. She kneels on the passenger seat, hunched over all of her own pains, looking down at Calden with that tear-stained but youthful, beautiful face, like she comes out of some other time, some lost mythology.

charlotte erich i'm not okay i'm in golden kinda outside of golden and i'm with someone named calden white he's kinfolk we got hunted by this thing and we're both really hurt well i'm really hurt but calden white is really really hurt and i am freaking out cuz i think he might die and i don't know how to stop it but please please please hurry please i'm freaking out

"I am," she tells him, whispered, even as her stream-of-consciousness panic is being offered up to Volcano.

oh also we killed it so we're not getting attacked anymore and i have another clip if something else comes but please just hurry okay

She does know enough that if there are bleeding wounds that are still bleeding, you have to apply pressure, so she looks for the biggest one on him and then presses her hands down on it, not mercifully or gently and she lets out this frightened, shaking little noise of near-panic when she feels fresh blood erupt beneath her palm but she is burning with the strength of her own nearly-depleted soul and she just holds, tight, keeping her eyes on Calden's.

"I'm calling my friends. I told you we're a pack. Like a real one with a rite and everything, and I can talk to them in my head. So I'm calling them and they're gonna come, I promise."

Melantha Argyris

[BTW it was -1 WP to get in the truck and apply pressure]

Calden White

She is calling.

He can't imagine how. He doesn't see a phone. He doesn't see a two-way radio. He doesn't even see a smoke signal, a Bat-signal... anything. But she says she's calling. And he believes her. He has nothing left but faith, after all.

She find a wound on him, the largest and bloodiest she can find. She presses on it. He

screams,

or he would if he could. As it is: he gives this strangled, airless sound. His hand grabs at her wrist, strength like a drowning man's, and for a moment she might think he'll tear her off, push her away, something, but:

no. His grip isn't so desperate after a moment. It is only firm. Strong, still, in spite of -- everything.

She hated it when he tried to offer her comfort earlier. She felt patronized, talked down to, lied to perhaps. He can't help it, though. This is in his nature, as much as bitter, unyielding survival seems to be in hers: he grips her forearm tight. He finds her eyes even as his vision threatens to grey out. He tells her with the last dregs of his strength:

"It'll be all right."

strong>Melantha Argyris

She looks at him with something between incredulity and white-hot anger.

"Yeah, because I'm going to stop you from bleeding to death and my friends are coming. Jesus." Melantha frowns at him, a little wrinkle between her brows, a tiny hint of strength returning to that tear-wet face of hers. "Just like... try to relax and rest and don't move too much," she says quietly, perhaps meaning his arm trying to grasp hers, which only spreads more blood around, and she thinks if he touches her skin with any more of his blood she's going to fly into a full-blown panic if she doesn't mercifully lose consciousness first. Even now, her brow feels strangely cold, her face a bit numb. And her hands are not working the way she wants them too. But they press anyway, holding tightly to that wound.

"Thank you for the gun," she whispers to him.