Night's Omen

 Verity walked, arm linked through Niall's, down the long and dark hallway towards the newly renovated area of Midnight. The compound was so large that inside, you tended to forget you weren't in another dimension somewhere - especially with how towering the doors and ceilings tended to be. She turned to glance back at Iloquil and smiled.

"An old friend of yours has come into my... company. I informed her that you would be here tonight, and she agreed to stay so that she could visit you." She said this with a sly smile, one that was designed to make Darren curious in an unhealthy manner. "She said she may even participate in the... festivities."

Beside her, Niall snorted. "That would hardly be fair," he muttered.

Iloquil could not help but perk with interest. "Justin darling, do you have any idea who she could mean?" she asked. "We're not exactly known for keeping friends. Even the ones we have, we can't seem to keep an eye on," she added wistfully, speaking of Alexander.

 Well, now. If they knew what Alexander was getting himself into at that precise moment, they would not speak so casually - or perhaps they would have. That the ancient vampire who was stuck in the body of a human was currently speeding towards Midnight was something that escaped them all, as they were far more occupied by what was in front of them.

In the large circular pit there stood a man, and behind him a table full of weapons. There were several archways with large iron gates in front of them that one could see from any angle in the seating above, and at the edge of the railing looking down was a tall, slim woman in a blue sari. She had her head tilted to the left, brown hair cascading over one lightly sun-kissed shoulder as she observed the man observing the weapons.

"He seems to have a very basic understanding of what is required of him, but it feels as though he doesn't believe it," she said, turning around to look at Verity and Niall. She had never seen their arena before, but she was intrigued at how many feelings and thoughts the man within was putting out at the moment - they literally poured out of him, like water.

"Well, we can't keep him long," Verity said with a sigh. "He's only on loan." She gave Niall a sour look. When the man had found out that the blonde in the arena was a Diamond, he'd put his foot down. He'd harm him terribly, but he wasn't to be disfigured or outright killed. To Verity, that was all of the fun drained right out of her evening.

"Azhure darling!" Iloquil cried. For the second or third time that evening, she left Justin as though he were not there at all and rushed head-on to hug someone, this time finding the similar-heighted Elemental her target. She pulled back after the embrace, incredibly surprised. "It seems our hosts simply know no bounds for promising a wonderful night. How ever did they find you?"

"Oh, I'm always around," she said, a small shrug. "I heard they'd finally unleashed hell, and I just couldn't resist a look before I returned back to Fiji. It's amazing there. Can't say I don't miss it terribly."

Persephone fought the urge to take Darren somewhere else for the time being, but said nothing. She knew that he'd withstood a lot of horrible crap so far; the arena might actually break his brain. She didn't think he'd be too happy to watch people fight to the death for no really good reason.

Everything about this night was utterly ridiculous, but Aaron had to at last admit that he was grateful to have gotten the break to 'lick his wounds', since nobody he'd come into contact with all night had been anything resembling 'gentle' with him.  Those freaks who'd jumped him and dumped him here had come out of nowhere and beat the ever-loving shit out of him quickly enough that, while he got his shots in, they overpowered him before he could do any serious damage, and from that point on he'd been in this pit fighting off whatever was thrown at him.  He'd had REAL animals attack him, shifters that didn't seem to function like they were at all human except to use humanoid intelligence against him, a few hunters that looked panicked and desperate, and finally a decent-aged vampire who must have pissed someone off.  His body hurt like he'd been hit by a freight train, he still had wounds seeping blood even after trying to clean them up some during his 'break', and he was getting pretty fucking tired.  He had no idea that Niall had no intention of letting him die because of his guild, so he pretty much figured that he was going to fight until he dropped, and then Murphy was going to light into them as soon as Diamond heard what had happened.

It was nice to know that his guild would do something about it, but it was still horribly inconvenient for him to be dead when they did.  He'd contemplated some form of escape while he was resting, but considering he was being held captive in the area where they intended to hold dangerous fighters, he wasn't surprised to be unable to find a way out.  He was still working on his plan.

The table covered in weaponry -- all looking like they were from the middle ages and only truly good as melee weapons -- had been replenished before he returned, so there were spears, swords, shields, maces and pretty much every kind of old-time weapon he could ask for, except a crossbow or even a bow.  Apparently, nobody wanted to be shot up with arrows while trying to enjoy the show from the sidelines.  Who could blame them?

 The rest of them sat down, Persephone keeping Darren close by her in case anything should happen. The night had gone so well - she suspected this was Verity testing his resolve. They'd discussed shutting the war down, but nothing had been promised, and perhaps the dynamic duo was trying to see if he'd hold true to his word about "accepting" them for what they were and abiding by the simple ground rules of respect that they required.

She didn't know. What she did know was that the rather stunning woman was acquainted with the four of them, and so their reminiscence gave her all the more opportunity to keep Darren back.

Azhure, meanwhile, was still leaning against the railing. The drop down wasn't terribly far; not so much that a fall could hurt you, but just enough to prevent someone from climbing up. There were, of course, wards in place to prevent that as well, but really, with Niall standing right there, not many would be fool enough to try and of those that did, even fewer would reach the wall itself to try and overtake it before succumbing to the sound of madness.

"He's quite remarkable," she said, hand rested beneath her chin. "I've never seen someone last for so long. It's been nearly an hour, you know," she said, canting her head to the left as Verity sat down and stretched her legs out.

"Has it? I honestly forgot he was down here," she said. She was still obviously raw about having to give him back.

"I think his time may be coming to a close," Niall warned. "We do have to play catch-and-release with the Diamonds."

Azhure pursed her lips. She wasn't aligned with any sort of side; neutral almost to a true sense of the word; that didn't mean she didn't hold a certain reverence for some life - especially the capable kind. She'd only come because they'd asked it of her, and she'd only stayed because she was intrigued. If she believed for a second that he would die, she would act - but not a moment before then.

The next person came out, and it seemed as though the question of the presence of a crossbow had been answered. He didn't even allow Aaron time to react; just began firing. It was hardly a fair fight; although he managed to dart behind the table, it offered little in the way of cover, leaving him exposed enough to take two bolts - one to the arm, and one to the chest.

"Oh, my," Verity said, secretly thrilled. "It seems we're going to lose him after all."

Niall, not to be outdone by his own pride, refused to call the fight.

"Seriously, think of how much trouble this is going to cause!" Persephone finally shouted, standing up.

Niall looked back at her, setting his jaw. He held his hand up to the other hunter in a cease fire, but the man was either too crazy or too stupid to acknowledge the command. He felt like he'd given it an accurate amount of effort (which was to say, not very much). "So we will," he said. He could find a thousand ways to make it look like an accident. It bothered him that Diamond was even a concern. Verity's indignant nature knew no bounds.

Then there was Azhure, who had leaped over the railing and was supposing she'd thought too soon about her reverence. She landed on her feet in the soft sand, approaching them both with a quickness. She snatched the halberd off of the table, turning to look at Aaron. "Stay still," she hissed. A ripple rocked through her body with the force of the bolt that caught her in the back, pushing her off balance for a moment as she swayed forward, threatening to fall onto the hunter. Her face twisted from one of total shock to a smoldering fury, and she turned with the halberd in her hand.

With a hearty swing, she threw it at the man advancing with the crossbow, who was now out of bolts. It caught him in the face, and he made a disgusting and wet noise as he toppled over. She stood there for a moment, her back to everyone as she made a horribly animal face at the pain she felt pulsing from her back. With an angry snatch, she reached up and snapped the bolt at her back. It hadn't gone all the way through, but it had been far enough. She yanked the top part out with a roar, then cast it aside. Fucking humans, would they EVER learn?

She dropped to one knee, placing her hand on Aaron's chest. "I'm afraid I can't let you die," she told him, her voice still pained. "I need you to... relax," she stuttered, gritting down on her teeth hard as she pulled some of the muscles the bolt was still buried in. Tears pricked her eyes and ran out of the corners of them, tracing silvery lines down her tanned cheeks. It was only a natural reaction to the burning in her back. She could deal with the healing once it had been dug out, but at the moment, she could not let it concern her.

"This is going to hurt quite a bit." That was all of the warning she gave him - and then her hand went down at the first bolt, hitting it with enough force to send it straight through the fleshy part of his shoulder, tearing tendon, muscle, and whatever else on the way through. It could have been worse. It was terribly close to his heart, but far enough away that she could still remove it.

The sound he made was terrifying, and Azhure couldn't help but wince. She simply wasn't impartial or evil enough for this to work well. "You need to relax," she said again, placing her less-bloody hand on his cheek and leaning in so that he could see her face. "You need to relax, or you will not survive the next few moments." She fluttered her lashes rapidly as tears caught in them, blurring her vision. She could take his pain away, but at how close to the edge of death he was, she feared he'd just cross right over. Obviously she'd forgotten how much of a determined shit he was right then, but it may have been for the better.

She suddenly felt incredibly suffocated and nauseous, and she couldn't be sure if that had been the bolt grazing something necessary or the loss of blood after a few hundred years without suffering so much as a scratch.

From up in the stands, as though they were thousands of miles away or perhaps even under water, she thought she heard Iloquil say, "OH, FOR THE LOVE OF -- " But the words didn't make any sense to her then, not really; all that made sense to her was a sudden and sharp grip of her forearm where the blonde man had taken a hold of her. He said something that she also didn't understand, and then entire world flipped upside-down and then extinguished.

Aaron?

There were sometimes jokes made about Aaron's intelligence level, most unfounded, but they were still made.  He wasn't always the most observant and he certainly wasn't as smart as Nicolette and Eithne, but he was in Diamond for a reason; you didn't get there without having a hell of a brain to go with your other skills.  Besides knowing every weapon that had ever been used to fuck someone's day up inside and out, Aaron paid much more attention to his surroundings and learned much more from little things than he let on, and he'd definitely noticed the hot brunette in the bright blue sari watching him fight since he arrived.  That didn't exactly endear her to him, knowing that she was in the stands watching him bleed and make others (who probably hadn't done any more wrong than he had, most of them) bleed, but there was something odd about the way she was watching.  She didn't seem bloodthirsty at all, not like some of the spectators. 

This whole situation was JACKED.

That a whole dinner party seemed to suddenly join her somehow didn't even surprise him, though it was still weird and just distracting enough that he missed a very important second or so of reaction time when the next opponent was sent in.  He'd made a beeline for cover behind the table with a mad reach for the halberd at the same time the other man fired to fucking crossbow  (how was THAT fair?) at him, and it occurred to him as he aborted his attempt to grab it that he shouldn't have tried to begin with.  Probably because as he was changing his mind, he felt two sudden, unpleasant points of pressure; one was in his right bicep (he'd have never been able to throw that thing even if he got it, not after that) and the second struck him square in the chest (definitely couldn't have), so cover was a better idea.  Not that it would save him for long.

There were a few seconds of grim understanding in his mind as to what had just happened and what was going to happen (namely, his impending death) before the pain actually struck full-force, hard enough to take his breath away.  He'd rolled onto his back after hitting the ground, trying to decide if he was going to be able to function without removing the bolts, or if risking the added blood loss to prevent further tearing of the muscles was worth it.  He had NO TIME before the other hunter would be in his face, so he was trying to regulate his breathing and bring his left arm up to yank the bolt out of his arm when the figure appeared.

For a split second, he thought he was going to die. 

Realizing it was the pretty woman from the stands made him wonder if he had died, especially when she yanked the halberd he'd failed to get at off the table and chose NOT to impale him with it, but to throw it like she was born to do it.  He reached what he thought was the pinnacle of confusion when she said she couldn't let him die with tears (of what HAD to be pain from an injury he was vaguely aware that she'd endured) sliding down her face and onto his cheeks, but it was a very 'okay' sort of confusion; he was surprisingly okay with all of this, except that it hurt to breathe and he'd been trying to do something that he couldn't remember.  That wasn't really okay, but since he couldn't remember, it must not have been that important, right?  Not important, and neither was her warning him that something was going to hurt.  He already hurt, he'd been hurt before, and he'd already decided that he was okay with a very dim, distant sort of acceptance.  He just wished that the fire in his chest would stop raging for just a little while, and then everything came rushing back into technicolor clarity when she ninja'd the bolt straight THROUGH him and reminded him that hurt was NOT okay and he needed to get the fuck out of here.  'Screaming' did not quite cover that situation, and he wondered briefly if he didn't perhaps prefer being shot with BULLETS to crossbow bolts.  He could compare later, after he was done with that wordless expression of the shock and agony she'd just caused, and IF he survived.  He felt weak and tired as he focused on breathing afterwards, unaware of the way his eyes had teared up to stream liquid down his face because his cheeks were already wet from her tears.

Obviously, neither of them was having a good day today, and it was about to get worse.  Maybe.  Depending on your point of view?

All he remembered as his breathing became more labored, almost like the heat was going up and he was being dunked underwater at the same time, was hearing her surprisingly soothing voice telling him to relax, and he actually started to.  It sounded like the perfect plan, like relaxing and just letting the current take him was exactly what he needed to do, and he went with it for a brief moment before his own natural inability to follow instructions quietly kicked in and he sucked in a deep, harsh breath with suddenly widened eyes.  His left arm slammed back into the ground painfully to try to push him up while his right flailed pretty uselessly because the sudden spike of pain in it impaired its movement, and something was WRONG, but his whole world had shrunk down to include only the rush of water in his ears and the woman leaning over him.  His left hand shot up just as quickly as he'd nailed that elbow into the dirt, gripping the woman's arm almost like he thought so might be an anchor to keep him from being swept away, but that might have actually only made it worse because that sensation of water around him only increased.  There was another sound over the crashing waves, and it confused him just a little.

"Azhure?" he murmured, and then he was out.  The water could have him.

 Azhure felt as though her body was being slammed repeatedly against craggy remnants of an empire long past, sunken into the waves of an angry sea. She could hear the rushing water all around her, and kept trying to get far enough away from them to get a decent breath of air, but for some reason she lacked the grace to be able to do so. She felt entirely like she imagined a human might in the situation - helpless. She began to sink, swallowing mouthfuls of bitter, freezing salt water as she did so. She felt debris tangling around her and weighing her down as she sank further and further, the sapphire light at the surface of the water becoming more and more dim.

Just when she began to succumb to the numbness that she felt, something warm firmly clasped her arm, wrapping around it. A hand? She heard her name, and then she felt as though she were free - free of the waves, free of her own power, if not but for just a second.

She hit the ground so hard that, as a human, she could have easily shattered her wrists and knees. She had reeled back from him, stumbled, and fallen forward, barely catching herself before her face smashed into the ground. She began to vomit, and buckets of seawater spilled forth, something that had never happened before. It felt like rejection; like her body was angry with her. So many vampires had gone through the same things as they were changed, but as a solitary Lyr, she had never dreamed that she would be bonded. It was painful.

From behind, a soft voice said, "I think it's time you went."

She looked over her shoulder in between heaves and a rather saddened Iloquil stood there, her hand firmly around Justinian's arm in a manner that could have been described as anxious.

"What - BLURK - happened?" she heave-demanded, closing her eyes before they felt like they'd bug out of her head. She turned and threw up what came to be known as seaweed when it hit the ground in front of her, forced to reach up and pull the clump from her throat when she began to gag.

 Iloquil had been watching with a mild interest, chatting among her friends and simultaneously checking on Darren to ensure he wasn't going to run away screaming. The fortune was in the court of the man in the arena; if he were a Diamond as they said, he would not be allowed to die. However, Niall as usual saw fit to try and tip the precariously balanced scales out of his own personal indignation. That Verity encouraged the behaviour was unhealthy, but did explain why they complimented eachother even still. It did not, curiously enough, explain why they did not kill eachother, but Iloquil supposed it was either one extreme or the other.

She jumped up as her friend hurtled the railing and, rather swiftly, dealt with the problem at hand. "Azhure, get back up here!" she shouted. "We have someone who can tend to his wounds, but you need to tend to yo - OH, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD."

With that, Iloquil had hiked up her dress and went right over after her, but it was already too late. She had to back away, and not because she wanted to, as the pulse of energy came from the center of where the two were, and she did not fail to notice that it even rustled her fine strands of chocolate and crème brûlée coloured hair. She waited until the moment had passed, ignoring the magic bubble that they'd been plunged into, and went right through it to yank the Lyr off of him. It felt like she'd opened the door to a very, very cold walk-in freezer when she crossed the boundary, but just as she'd grabbed Azhure's arm, she felt someone grab her own and pulled her back with a hard jerk.

"You would be wise not to," Justinian warned her.

"But - " she began. He cut her off with a meaningful look, and then wrapped his arm around her, guiding her back a few more step.

"Watch."

Then it happened. The fusion. And then Azhure was up, then down, then - vomiting? Iloquil could barely watch. Her own transformation had been horrible; she'd literally been tortured for days before it had happened. She understood it on a fundamental level, but not like an actual Elemental would. She would probably relate more to the man's side when he awoke rather than Azhure's, and in truth, the only reason she related at all was because Azhure was a fine creature who very much liked to be alone. Now that she was suddenly...

"Oh, Azhure darling," she whispered softly. It would be one of the only instances in her several-thousand year reign in which she whispered with such sadness and not have it directed at Justinian or Alexander. "I think it's time you went."

The Lyr began pulling seaweed which had been lodged in her throat out, making awful gagging sounds as she did it. Iloquil shuddered, feeling more and more like the images were being burned into her collective recalling memory. She clutched Justinian's arm a little more tightly.

"Darling, you bonded him. I'm afraid this really ends the session, friends," she said, looking up.

 Niall was smoldering. Verity, however, slapped his chest lightly with her fan. "I know exactly how she feels," she said with a small grin on her round cheeks. She looked at him, trying to draw in his gaze, and raised her hand to trace her finger gently down his jawline until she had his full attention. "Don't pout, my love," she begged, leaning in to kiss him.

The kiss was returned, but barely. "You realize this means that a rather powerful creature now allies herself with Diamond, correct?" he spat. "That she is a friend is unfortunate, but I fail to see why I shouldn't be even the least bit concerned - especially since none of you are."

"Because," Verity said, hiding her frustration with his masculine approach, but only barely, "she's not suddenly going to change her entire personality simply because she's been bonded."

"You did," he reminded her.

"I did no such thing. My life made me, not Rikai." She stopped at the look he was giving her, and then tilted her head sheepishly. "Oh," she said, the noise high-pitched and full of understanding. "I see what you meant. But I still didn't stop because of you. I stopped because it got old after a while. And I didn't need any money; I'd amassed enough. And furthermore, you still had to work through your crazy so one could say that you changed for me."

From the ground, Iloquil made a frustrated noise. "Can we skip the history lesson? I love you both very dearly, but right now, Azhure is still my friend and I'd still like to see her safely somewhere else, at the very least."

Verity blinked rapidly. "I do tend to go off on tangents, don't I? Alright then, darling." She looked past Niall to Persephone. "Will you assist your friend in taking these two somewhere safe?"

Persephone stalled. "Back to Diamond?" she asked. That would be so... so bad for her. Even if Darren was there as a shieldbuffer.

Justinian was pulling his phone from his pocket. "I actually have a contact - yes, it's me. Listen, I think I've found one of yours. Where? Well, currently he's on the ground and heavily bleeding... No, of course I didn't do it." He paused. "Do you want him or not? Oh, one second." He lowered the phone and looked up at the rest of them still elevated, now all standing and drawn to the railing for the sake of the situation. "His name?" he asked.

"Aaron Thorson," Niall said, gradually finding his anger simmering as Verity kneeded on the small of his back with her knuckles.

"Did you hear that? I have no idea! I don't care where he's supposed to be, I - Last time, do you want him or not? Okay, where are you? Nn, can't transport him like that. Because he's plus one. Because they're both hurt. Because she has to. Because they can't be separated. BECAUSE I SAID SO!" he bellowed. Another pause. "Fine. One hour. Iloquil and I will meet you. Come alone, don't come alone. I don't care either way. What charges? Oh, right. No, Orion is having them dismissed. You don't need to go to court, it's just a meeting in chambers."

Verity perked her brows after he finished the call. "Well?" she asked, incredibly interested in what had just happened.

"I've got a contact within Diamond who's agreed to take them both. Iloquil and I will deal with them, since we've known Azhure for most of her natural life. I guess it's only... fair." He frowned. He was feeling the same thing Iloquil was, and he also didn't enjoy it. With a long life often came the tendency to forget how certain emotions felt, and when they came back, it could be a bit jarring. This was... not sadness, but the memory of it, at least.

"Of course," Verity purred. "For what it's worth, I am so sorry."

The situation with Aaron and Azhure was upsetting for most of those involved, that much was obvious, but it wasn't the end of the surprises for the evening.  It was somehow fitting, considering just how much the rest of the local supernatural population was going through, that those responsible should have some shockers of their own.  Darren had weathered the entire evening fairly well, all things considered, and hadn't pissed anyone else off or gotten himself into more trouble (that he knew of, since having these vampires fond of him could change his life), and he pretty much figured that the night was winding down after Iloquil and Justinian took Azhure and Aaron Thorson somewhere.  They returned a short time later, and Darren was proved to be wrong in his assumption.

By a great big bald guy pushing a slighter young man ahead of him.

Cerberus had been in and out of the Midnight Fortress all night, though he'd mostly been out of it.  This was the first time he'd spent any real amount of time there since the attacks began, and he was certainly glad he had.  This Onyx hunter had brazenly approached the complex asking for the Master, and he'd refused to give a reason.  The doberman had initially expected there to be a bomb or something equally extreme in the equation, but after he checked the man over and found no weapons, he'd been puzzled.

So, he'd gone ahead and beat the shit out of the guy, just to be safe.  In case you were wondering, the Onyx asshole didn't have any tricks up his sleeve.  Not that Cerberus could find, anyway, and he was pretty good at finding sneaky little advantages. 

Thus, when he dragged Mr. Alexander Darling in for his audience with Niall and Verity, the normally sharp hunter was bleeding, favoring one leg and disheveled, but he had a determined set to his jaw that somehow helped counter the bloody nose.  Cerberus was rather proud of his handiwork.

"Master, Mistress, this hunter is requesting an audience with you.  Figured that if he was still interested after I was done with him, it had to be important.  No weapons, no attempts to fight back," he explained to the vampires present.  He hadn't been wrong to try to get Darling to fight back, since any excuse could offer Midnight a reason to keep someone, but the man had been careful.  He hadn't broken any rules for Cerberus and the vampires to use against him, so if they didn't return him, the only thing they could claim was that he's human and therefore fair game.  Unless he was freeblood, but Cerberus didn't think so.  Someone would have to grant him that, and he thought he would have heard about it.

Alexander was not pleased with the plan, though he understood the necessity.  Samantha, as upset as she was with him, was babysitting the tiger in the car while he 'slept' in the passenger seat beside her.  She was supposed to wake him up if he started to display any serious bruising or if he went into 'nightmare mode', which would mean that he was being tortured.  Otherwise, he'd go in, do the negotiating, then handle the trade.  It seemed simple, but when dealing with these kinds of vampires, there were likely to be problems.

Cerberus was the first one, and a painful reminder that being human sucked.  Even so, Alexander took the abuse as quietly as he could, not making any attempt at fighting back, even though he could have.  He was unarmed because going into Midnight with a weapon was suicide, and his only real option was to continuously ask for the zealous guard's master.  Finally, he got what he asked for, though it was in the form of handcuffs (for the second time that night) and being shoved through a series of corridors to a chamber with a number of people in it that inspired the aggressive shapeshifter to be much more polite than he had been previously.

What a shocker. 

Actually, this was a surprise.  He already didn't seem incredibly happy for obvious reasons, starting with how badly this night sucked and how much worse it was getting every time he ran into someone new, but there was something strange about some of these people.  They seemed...like he'd seen them before.  Like they were familiar.  He chalked it up to having heard about them, since it was no secret that he could supply information to Dev about Niall and Verity, but he just wasn't sure how he knew that stuff.  He just knew it, just like he just knew how to handle weaponry.  He didn't question it, but right about then, he wanted to.

Both Persephone and Verity seemed as though they had about just enough with surprises for the evening, and Verity had opened her mouth to say something to that effect when Iloquil interrupted her - and so quietly that it was strange they even heard her. It was more than likely because Iloquil never spoke with genuine shock or softness to her voice; she had, once perhaps, but it had been a true thousand years or so since then.

"Alexander, darling?" was all she said. Her honey-brown eyes were absolutely saucer-sized while her mouth hung half-open in genuine shock.

She righted herself, angry at the sudden bewilderment of the situation, and crushed the champagne flute within her delicate hand, ignoring the glass that cut her. The wounds hadn't even time to bleed before healing thanks to her age - one of the many things being old benefited you with.

"Is this some sort of a joke?" she demanded. Her voice was dangerously low and quiet, but of course in a room full of supernatural beings it wouldn't much matter how softly one spoke. "Justin?" she said, snapping her head back to look at him before looking back at the "human" hunter in the body of her old friend who should have been just as old as she.

Once you're old enough, surprises tend to lack any real...surprise.  Justinian and Iloquil had seen some ridiculous, crazy things in their time, and they'd participated in most of those situations.  To have multiple legitimate surprises in one evening seemed impossible, but when Justinian turned to see who Cerberus had brought seeking audience with Niall and Verity, he stopped dead, eyes narrowing.

"It's impossible," he snapped, and he truly believed that.  He didn't know where the hell Alexander was, but that wasn't him.  The caution and confusion at Iloquil addressing him didn't escape Justin, but it was still impossible.  That wasn't Alexander; even shielding, Justin could sense the power in his movements.  This human, while injured, was obviously very used to being capable, but he was still human.  He was an imposter.

He glanced over the faces of his friends, reining in a temper that didn't often get the best of him for years now, and waved the doberman away from the hunter as he walked up to him.  His mind pressed on the human's more aggressively than his literal approach, but there was...nothing.  It was as though nothing was there, even though Justin could see him, smell the blood on the air, hear his breathing and his heartbeat.  It was...

"Fucking impossible," he breathed.  He knew Alexander's tricks, what he could do, and was that what was happening here?  How could this be?  With a sharp, quick movement, he had a handful of the other man's long-ish hair, just about the length and even the style he last remembered his friend wearing it, and he used that grip to yank the man's head back so that he could get a deep, close breath of him.  The blood didn't smell quite right, too human, but there was this old, nostalgic feeling to it.  He didn't immediately realize that he hadn't smelled this in literally thousands of years (not since Alexander was human), but it was familiar.  He let the man go like his touch burned, flinging him back and turning on Niall and Verity.

"What is this?  How is this even possible?"  Had they known?  No, that couldn't be.  They were both smarter than that. 

Okay, so these vampires were freaking him out just a little.  Yes, there was something weird about the way he thought he'd met them before, but he was used to not remembering things.  Then, one of the women, Iloquil, called him by name, and the man with her, Justin, approached him.  Alex was unaware of the attempt on his mind because his brain wasn't actually in the room with them, but being grabbed and having a rather dangerous set of teeth so close to his throat was still frightening, no matter how good at his job he was and how temporary death would be. 

A joke?  Impossible?  What the hell was going on?

Being grabbed and then suddenly shoved back was rough on his leg, so it was a good thing that Cerberus stepped up to steady him, or he'd have been on the hard floor from the force of the push.  He couldn't figure out why they were reacting the way they were, but he was damn sure that what guild he worked for had nothing to do with it, and he really didn't see how his reputation could have preceded him.  He was good, but he wasn't a guild leader or even ridiculously open about his kills.  This was too much for that, so what?  Did they know him from before?  Oh, God, what was going on?

"You know my name," he said, not really knowing anything else he could have said in response to their words.  "That gives you another advantage.  This isn't a joke; I'm here to speak with Niall and Verity Celestino about a trade on behalf of the Bruja guilds."

Stating his business seemed to be the only thing he could do right about then.  Maybe offering that would distract them?  Christ, he hoped Samantha was ready to pull him if things got crazy.

 "Please stop... talking," she commanded/stammered, the hand that was not full of glass raising to make a halting motion as she turned her head for a second to try and grasp the situation. She knew that the focal point of the room right then was on the three of them; Alexander, Justinian and her.

Iloquil flicked pieces of broken glass that were stuck to her palm away absently, but the look on her face was still there. She was getting exceptionally mad, and the more he spoke, the more her anger rose. So much so that her power began oozing off of her in waves. Alexander would no doubt feel a slow burn in his feet, rising up through his legs as though he'd stepped in hot coals and was too dense to move off of them.

It was more than just Alexander, too. It wasn't targeted; sure, his presence was what set her off, but she hadn't felt this much raw emotion in ages. Persephone was who cried out first, grabbing onto Darren's shoulder and clamping down as the sensation of being burned alive caught her. For the sake of everyone in the room, Justinian took a step in the right direction by grabbing his mate's hand and squeezing it, trying to stop her from lashing out any further and doing damage at the expense of her friends' hospitality. It was well enough; just as he had, Verity rather loudly said, "You're hurting. My. Cat."

She stopped abruptly, but she wasn't done. She started digging, reaching into the mind of the hunter to try and find out what the hell it was he'd been doing, and why he was playing at human after all these years. She was stunned to find that what she found was nothing. Nothing at all. A pit of hollow memories that only started recently - seconds to her, perhaps years to him, but there were no childhood memories, and they all felt detached and disjointed. That was when she got really mad.

"Sorry, Persephone," she said, inclining her head just enough to make a brief eye contact with the girl. She was sincere in that apology, because Iloquil did not just lose focus so easily. No, she had to be pushed to accomplish such a childish mistake. But now? Now her eyes were all black, and they were completely fixated on the imposter before her.

"I don't know what it is you think you're doing, but if you really are Alexander, then I do know that you can't be terribly far away, so if you want to talk to Verity, you'll have to do it in person."

And with that, she reached out and grabbed for his neck, intending to break it.

 This was all just a little more than she had planned. Honestly, things were getting out of hand. First, Azhure had to take that hunter away - of course, Diamond was Diamond and they just tried to play nice all around with them. She understood that, of course, and had no problems with the decisions as they'd been called, but still, it hadn't turned out as she'd liked for it to. The dinner itself was good - Persephone seemed to enjoy Darren's company, the cat himself had appeared to have a good time, and he was especially relieved when his parents had been cleared and deemed "hands off" - and then they'd even stayed for coffee and biscuits, which was interesting. Rajz has flirted with his mother, which had been exceptionally funny given that his father had in turn flirted with Darren's date, which had both confused and entertained Darren.

And now? Now, Niall's guard dog was escorting a hunter into their domain under the pretense that he wanted to trade. What did he want to trade? She hadn't gotten that far, because suddenly her two friends were just... beside themselves. Verity grabbed Niall's hand out of a long-forgotten need of protection, despite how little she actually needed it. She didn't know what direction this was headed, but she didn't like it, and she was fairly certain that it was out of her control.

Then, the pain started. She was somewhat surprised that it was Iloquil instead of Justinian, given Niall's temperament it was only fair to assume his sire would be every bit as - well, hostile was the word that came to mind. But when Persephone fell to her knees in agony, that was enough.

"You're hurting. My. Cat." It wasn't simply a statement of fact, it was a warning to Iloquil to reel it the fuck back in before Verity had to do it for her.

"Darren, take her out of here," she said over her shoulder, and then turned her silver gaze back to the situation - but by then, of course, Iloquil had gone to the next level. "ILOQUIL!" she shouted, but of course, it was too late. Verity was a literal fraction of Iloquil's age, and despite being a Triste, she really just hadn't seen that coming. Instead of lashing out as the vampire had, she realized that her abilities would probably do more harm than good.

She didn't even have to say anything, she just let go of Niall's hand, hoping he'd handle it. She had been way too blindsided to act appropriately in that she'd just do more harm than good. Of course, it would be tantamount to Iloquil's outburst, and still even Justinian had yet to act, so that was another storm a'comin'.

Wow, so this night was completely Twilight Zone for him.  He'd had dinner, an actual dinner with a bunch of badass vampires who made small talk, bickered and joked with each other like a family would at Thanksgiving, his parents had been brought in and scared the hell out of him, then been welcomed into the group like honored guests after just a few minutes of what felt like impending doom (there had even been flirting!) and now he'd seen what had been explained as two beings accidentally being bonded and a hunter being brought in looking like he'd gotten hit by a truck.  Darren had been hit by a car before, so he knew the kind of damage it could inflict when it was going at higher speeds; this could have been a lower speed wreck.  He gathered from what the big bald guy said that it wasn't a truck that had caused the damage, and that made him definitely rethink the bald man's strength and appearance.

That wasn't the important part, though.  He'd been guessing that the hunter's purpose would end up being the point of discussion here, but once he'd stated his business, they were still all upset and seemed to ignore it.  Darren recognized him because he'd seen him with Connor before, but he didn't understand what was so special.  As far as Connor had said, Alex was 'lost'; he couldn't remember where he came from and he was a damn good hunter.  Dev, who was a scary bastard when he wanted to be anyway, had taken him under his wing. 

It wasn't like he had the chance to explain that, though he didn't even know if it would help.  This felt like a massive conflict of interests to him; conflicting between his own survival and Alex's, really.  He wasn't sure if telling them what Alex's deal was would help or hurt the other man, and he really didn't want to hurt him, but this was getting out of hand.

He could feel the burning from Iloquil's rage building up uncomfortably, but obviously not to the extent that Persephone did.  She collapsed beside him from the effects when he was only sweating a little and shifting, trying not to bitch about it as it got worse.  He ducked suddenly beside his 'date' when she even started to fall, his intent to avoid her impacting the floor like a sack of rocks, and he at least succeeded there.  He lowered her gently, glancing to Verity as she addressed Iloquil on the issue, then him.

Get them both out of there?  Abso-fucking-lutely.  He nodded quickly, whispering 'of course' and swept Persephone up into his arms as though he didn't feel the burning or the growing danger of this situation.  He had an open invitation to get both of them clear of this, and that was exactly what he was doing; he just hoped Alex could take care of himself, and he really didn't want to see the results if the hunter couldn't.  He didn't stop his movements until they were outside of Iloquil's rather large overflow radius, and then he set Persphone down on one of the surprisingly classy fainting couches that had been set up around the 'castle' so that he could get a good look at her.  It was odd for him to be the one getting her out of danger.

Justinian truly didn't know how to react.  This was his oldest friend, the same man who had risked his mortal and immortal life for him time and time again, the man that he'd given immortality to.  This man was also a human, somehow, and a human who didn't seem to know what was happening.  Justin didn't miss the surprise on the man's face when Iloquil called him out on being close and needing to talk to Verity 'in person'.  He seemed shocked that they knew of his ability, but then he covered it up quickly, eyes narrowing as he grasped more of the situation.

This was a puzzle, and Justin was far too upset by it to be any good at it; Alexander had always been the one who excelled at puzzles.  The ache that came from seeing his closest friend reduced to this...this bleeding mess of a human, it was more than he'd experienced in hundreds of years, if not more.  It was enough that when Iloquil surged forward for the human's throat, Justin reacted without thought or a real plan to put himself between the two of them and take hold of her wrist.  He didn't damage her, though if she really pushed, this was going to get ugly and he didn't even really know why except that he didn't want her to force the situation like that.

He understood in the brief instant that he moved what her intentions were: wake Alexander up or kill the imposter, then have him enter in his true flesh and blood form so that they could get to the bottom of this, but he had his own intentions.  If they killed him here and now, they lost him.  He'd wake up wherever he was, and if this was Alexander, he wouldn't risk his living, mortal form coming into Midnight.  His ability was his safety net, his escape clause, and it had been since he'd developed it.  Justinian had seen him die in glorious, horrific ways countless times over the ages, ways that would, and sometimes had, upset him to witness even when they weren't permanent.  Alexander would not come to them in his true body. 

They would have to hunt for him.

Justinian and Iloquil hadn't needed verbal conversation since they'd begun their immortal lives, but the exchange of information that occurred in those seconds was still pretty impressive.  They didn't have to explain themselves, it just happened, and it was clear that he didn't want to risk losing Alexander again so quickly.  If it suited his goal of finding out what had happened, then he'd crush the human life before them just as completely as Iloquil would have, but not until he knew. 

If this wasn't Alex, so help him and whoever had helped him do this.

This was getting ridiculous.  Niall knew Alexander and understood the problem at hand as well as anyone else in the room, but from a different perspective.  To him, Alexander was dangerous and respectable, accepted as something of an extension of his sire, but this human man was an entirely different creature.

He also seemed to have a purpose, one that didn't immediately require killing him, and Niall didn't honestly give a fuck if they hanged him by his entrails when his job was finished, so long as it waited until then.

"Justinian, Iloquil, my friends," he started, squeezing Verity's hand before taking a step forward.  He didn't need to put himself any closer, just make that one move to make his presence clearer.  "Why don't we let the human talk before we decide to kill him?"

Niall was as intensely interested in this 'trade' as Justin and Iloquil were in why this human looked and sounded like their old friend.  His own desire to ease the situation was out of care for his friends, but also a much more personal concern for Verity.  It was her cat that had been dropped by Iloquil's backwash (he'd felt it himself, and it was uncomfortable), and the way she took his hand in hers spoke far too much of how much she needed him to fix this.  He would.

"I want to know what this trade he is proposing to us is," he told the group at large, and there was a damn good reason for his curiosity.  If the guilds thought they had someone important enough to offer in a trade, then he wanted to know about it.  "And I'm sure that gathering some information from the poor fool before you break his neck would be beneficial to your cause, but I may be wrong."

It was as diplomatic as Niall ever got, and a rather impressive attempt if you knew him.  He could be manipulative and extremely cunning, but he was never this openly accommodating.  He was trying to be gentle, given their situation, and still be the rational voice here. 

There was something scary about Niall being the voice of reason.

 Voice of reason? Yeah, something like that. The problem was that Iloquil was already... already... EMOTIONAL. She hadn't had raw anger surging through her veins in at least a few hundred years. It was a hard thing to make happen, even when Justinian pushed her buttons for the sake of pushing them. It was hard to not just drop them all (well, Justin would have been difficult, but she could have done it if she tried). Between Justin stopping her from her goal of attempted "murder" and then Niall trying to assert dominance over the situation (whatever, she made Justin and Justin made him)... snap.

"AUUUGGGGHH!"

That was what she responded with. She flung her arm to get Justinian's hand off of it, and the light in the room began to dim as she drew in for what was about to be an unreasonable amount of pain. Then, of course, she felt her arms being forcibly pushed down at her sides as Justin had to resort to grabbing her in a bear hug from behind. Her beautiful face, a thing men had waged wars over, was contorted into a ferocious roar as she bared teeth and yelled again, Ancient Latin the tongue she chose. Sure, words here and there were understandable, but for the most part, the dead language was so much so that even Verity with her polyglot ways couldn't keep up.

Justinian wasn't even phased, and he yelled right back as he, LITERALLY, carried her out of the room, the shouting match going out into the hallway and then beyond. He knew if he didn't, she'd have tried to kill everyone and just drop the whole building on top of all of them (herself included, like she cared). She had a tendency to overreact when she emoted, which was why he had been glad to know she'd aged out of it.

A little-known fact about Iloquil was that even in her golden age of being a goddess, she was still incredibly insecure - that was where her jealous streak came from (wasn't that where it usually came from?). It was hard to tell who was capable of being more irrationally jealous of the duo, but right now it was clearly Iloquil's moment to shine. Even to Justinian, whose native language was the frothing bedlam she was screaming, her speech was hard to discern through the pained tones and elevated shrieking on things she meant to punctuate. All he could really pick out was "Why did he leave us," and "Where did he go," and "Why now," mostly, along with rather derogatory remarks about his family and what she would do to their graves if she could find them again.

Back in the other room, Verity rapidly blinked and straightened her dress.

"Well, now that that little... hurricane is done and over with," she said, folding her arms and stepping up to Niall's side. "I'm Verity," she said, looping her arm through Niall's and tilting her head. She raised her brows expectantly, and when nothing happened, she prompted with a, "Speak," and a pleasant, bored smile. Good recovery after that little episode Iloquil had.

Niall wasn't the only person present who thought this was getting ridiculous, but for entirely different reasons.  Alexander was feeling just a little...overwhelmed by these vampires and the havoc they were playing on his mind and memories, and it wasn't just because of the burning that had been getting pretty painful before Verity had gotten Iloquil to stop.  He didn't remember them, though he knew them, and how could that be?  Justinian jerked his head back, leaning in close to his throat, and the sensation was both distantly familiar and a little frightening, as though it had happened before and the effects had been extreme.  Being released only to have Iloquil coming at him was not an improvement, but he stayed put rather than make some useless attempt at scrambling away from her, especially when they all something seemed to know about his little 'trick'.  How they knew, he couldn't understand, but they did. 

Justinian stopped Iloquil in her reach for him, though he was only just in time and Alexander still felt her nails brush his skin in the seconds before her meltdown.  He most definitely approved of Justinian carrying her out, but as with everything since he appeared in their presence, it was a little surreal.  She was screaming and ranting in another language, but he understood it as well as if it were English, which he spoke every damn day.  Well, he actually understood it as well as Justinian probably did, since Iloquil wasn't entirely making it a point to be understood, but he knew most of what she was saying.

None of it was comforting, or really made sense to him.

Why did he leave them, where did he go, why now?  What?!  They couldn't possibly be talking about him, but he knew that they must be.  Why couldn't they just explain?  No, instead, they left him with Niall and Verity, which didn't feel like the absolute worst thing, since he had that same strange familiarity going on, but not to the same extent and it wasn't quite as...fond of a feeling seeping out of that black hole in his mind.  He felt like he knew them, but perhaps didn't trust them quite as much.

That was funny, since why would he trust the other two?  Whatever, he'd figure it out after he finished doing what he came there to do.  It was an effort, drawing his attention away from the distant Latin that he somehow understood, but Verity wasn't unkind in her prompting and he really did have a job to do.  Preferably quickly, since most of his body hurt from Cerberus' attempt to get him to make a mistake (which he really just thought was an excuse to beat his ass because the dog enjoyed it) and he wanted to get back to Samantha ASAP.

"It has been brought to the attention of the Bruja guilds that your people have taken someone of interest to us.  They would like to propose a peaceful trade, one for the other, on neutral ground.  Derek Walsh, a snow leopard, for Xavier Rush," he offered, and then he shut the fuck up and braced himself.  Iloquil and Justinian were both freaking out, and now he was just a little worried he was going to set Niall and definitely Verity off with this news.  The concern that they would 'shoot the messenger' was why Dev had wanted him to go in.  At least if they killed him, he wasn't dead.

 It seemed that Alexander didn't fully grasp what Xavier meant to the Lady of Midnight, and Xavier had felt it best to leave that little nugget of information out - more than likely it was absolutely deliberate, too. Let them tell Verity to her face that they had him captive and see what that got them. Kimber had assured Xavier that he would not remain held for long in what little time they'd allowed her to have with him, but if Xavier had been in charge, he would have killed Kimber on grounds of treason, and strung the offending party (himself) up as a lesson to Midnight. But then again, that was how Midnight operated, not the guilds. And more importantly, the guilds, despite having taken a valuable prisoner, were otherwise NOT coming from a position of power.

Now it was Verity's turn to react, though to her credit, and mostly for the sake of her mate, she did not do so with such an absolute lack of grace as Iloquil had. Instead, her platinum-hued irises were suddenly vibrant and exposed as her pupils dilated to little slits. Her posture stiffened, while her arms crossed loosely in front of her. She looked at Niall, brows peaking, and then back to the bedraggled hunter.

"You propose to give me back my own cat?" she said, her tone both insulted and disbelieving (though not of the fact that they would give him back, but more that they dared to "offer" him to her as though they had any right to him in the first place). To Cerberus, who was thankfully still standing by, she said, "What Walsh individual is he referring to? I've been up here all night with the exception of the Arena." She didn't want to say that they'd had so many new additions in the last few hours that she'd lost track, but honestly, she hadn't deigned to bother with the new prisoners until the morrow, when she could catalog them properly and go over potential prices with the White Viper on hand who brokered most of their deals.

She also silently commended the Hound of Midnight for having the good sense to remain in the room, despite Iloquil's outbursts. Persephone was strong, but she didn't expect anyone who wasn't on par with the ancients to be able to withstand one of them loosing their abilities as the woman had; she would not have blamed Cerberus if he would have chosen to leave or even displayed outward pain at the event, but it may not have bode well for him in the future when she was feeling moody and reminiscent of past failures (as she often liked to point out). She would have to find it in her time to reward him for his hardy nature.

Oh, nothing about Xavier withholding information from him and the rest of the guilds would have surprised Alexander, but then again, that was just another reason for Dev to send him instead of another hunter; if there was vital information missing, Alexander might suffer, but he wouldn't be perma-banned from the planet.  Alexander, for whatever reason, had an idea as to just how much the tiger meant to Verity, which was actually why it was Verity that he seemed to mostly be addressing.  One couldn't forget Niall because that was suicide, but it was Verity's cat and Alexander knew it.  He might have guessed that Xavier mattered a little less than he actually did, the shifter being a failed operative, but he understood that there was more than just a business deal there, so he wasn't taken off-guard by Verity's unhappiness. 

That didn't protect him from her fury should she choose to get nasty about it, though.  That also didn't change the fact that Alexander would never have played this trade out if he'd been in charge, but there were few people he cared about enough for that to matter.  Of those that he did concern himself with, one was in his car with a tiger and the others had all already been attacked.  He was running out of fucks to give, and it was very likely that the dynamic duo and the wonder twins were going to use up the last fucks he had available to him. 

Verity looked to Niall for a moment and then spoke to Alexander, and yep, this looked promising.  Her incredulous and pissed off tone of voice wasn't encouraging, but other than the kind of Gallic shrug that was much older than Alexander thought he was as a response, he didn't have much.  Yes, he was proposing that they give her the cat that was already hers in return for something that was already theres; technically, both parties possessed each other's cat, so trading was logical enough, but there was nothing stopping both sides from just killing the shifters and moving on.  Hopefully for Christian, that's not how it was going down.

The big man that she addressed on the subject of Walsh was still in the room only through sheer force of will.  Yes, Iloquil's power had been painful and extremely unpleasant, and Cerberus had backed off a step or two for some breathing room, but he wouldn't risk leaving a hunter, even an unarmed and beaten hunter, in the room with his bosses.  He wasn't stupid, whether people thought he looked it, or not.  Fortunately, he'd also been keeping close tabs on the new arrivals and anything he might need to know for the following day, when he would likely be showing Verity around and pointing out anything he'd heard about the prisoners.  He knew who Walsh was, especially after hearing the hunter name his breed, and Cerberus smiled. 

"Snow leopard, like the hunter said.  Male, early to mid twenties, good shape, short blonde-ish hair and blue eyes.  You mentioned that you liked his eyes, mistress, just not as much as Persephone's friend's," he offered, hoping that some part of that would jog her memory on the cat being called for.  He'd go get Walsh if they wanted, no questions asked.

 Unhappy didn't begin to describe it. Niall didn't look like he was going to lift a finger here, when it was him that had started all of this. Well, a rogue hunter from one of the guilds had really started it, but they could have just dealt with her and accepted that it was someone who wasn't acting with the blessing of the guild behind them. No, he had been in the mood for a fight, and now they had one. She was incredibly irritated that he felt this was fair, because she sure didn't, but the way she poised herself left little room for one to read her thoughts. Instead, she just looked irritated about the general situation, rather than at Niall's hand in this particular incident.

"Mm. I recall, now," she said. To Alex, she only smiled, hands clasped together. "We have so many, you see," she explained. Yes, hunter. We have friends and family of many. I hope you are happy with your one, single pass. She turned, unwilling to see Cerberus out of the room just yet. "Get Persephone," she commanded, and a well-dressed servant did just that, hurrying out of the room.

For several moments, the room was utterly silent save for the loud ticking sound of the ornate clock located behind them on the mantle of the fireplace. She could see how worn out the hunter was, even if this wasn't his true corporeal form, and she watched his leg tremble as he tried not to shift his weight off of it in order to lessen any weakness he might potentially show them. He'd already gotten his ass beat, so he didn't need it to get any worse.

Persephone came into the room after a too-long and very uncomfortable silence where Verity just stared at him, her back effectively to Niall despite standing no less than two feet from him. "Fetch the Uncia called Derek Walsh at once for me, my dear. See that he doesn't find his way into any doorknobs on his way up," she instructed, which sounded more like she was urging the girl to harm him rather than asking her to keep him safe.

"While we wait, I'd love to know why it is you inspired my two friends to foam at the mouth," she said, and this did not sound like a question or a request.

Niall wasn't necessarily unwilling to lift a finger, but he was quite alright with observing for the time being.  Yes, this was technically started by a rogue hunter, but he knew that he'd had a choice about how far to take it and he'd chosen to go all the way.  He'd known that there would be casualties on both sides (though, as expected, most of the casualties were on the hunters' side, and if he went on long enough, he could have probably wiped them out completely), but there were certain individuals that he simply trusted not to get caught.  Naturally, there would be extenuating circumstances, such as Lucien Cobriana being overtaken or Xavier gunned down and captured, but for the most part, this was very much a culling of the weak.  This wasn't fair, and Niall was very interested in getting Verity's cat back, but he didn't think the guilds knew quite what the messenger they'd sent was capable of.

He waited, because there would be the time to step in and make this happen.

For Alexander, this was just a mess all around.  He understood what Verity's point was when she pretended not to remember who Walsh was and then declared how many they had, and yes, he knew that was true.  There was nothing he could do about it, and if nothing else right now, he could follow Dev's orders.  He wasn't sent in here to save everyone, just to trade the tiger for the snow leopard so that Christian Shane and his wife didn't have to face the fact that her brother was gone from them.  Alexander was positive that they were going to have to deal with a changed young man, but he didn't know the extent and once again, didn't care.  He had a job to do. 

Yes, the silence was uncomfortable, with Verity watching him and Niall watching both of them, but other than standing there and trying to keep from letting on just how badly Cerberus had wrecked his leg and how uncomfortable it was to stand there handcuffed and knowing that he could be about to take another beating at any time.  The only hopefully encouraging part of this situation was that Verity called for a woman whom she instructed to go get Walsh, which to him meant that there was at least a chance of success here.  That was for the best, because if he couldn't kill Xavier to eliminate the very large threat that he was capable of being, he didn't want to spend too much time hoping that he wouldn't flip shit on Samantha. 

Finally, Verity broke from her staring to ask him why her friends had flipped out about him (the raging in the distance had quieted some, but Alexander knew that they'd be back once Justinian deemed the situation under control, so it wasn't finished, yet), and he glanced to Niall, though why, he didn't know.  All he saw there was an intense interest in his answer, and that didn't help.  She wasn't asking so much as demanding an answer, and he knew this, but that didn't mean he could just give her the answer.  He didn't have it himself.

"I honestly don't know," he said, dipping his head both because he hated the fact that he didn't know, and because he was certain she wasn't going to believe him.  As long as she hesitated in attacking him, should that be her chosen route, he could offer her a few little things, but no real answers. 

"They seem familiar, he seems familiar," Alexander offered, looking up to Niall, who inclined his head ever so slightly, but said nothing.  "But I don't know why.  I know I haven't seen any of them in the past five years, and before that, I don't really remember."

Usually, this wasn't something he'd have told anyone, especially someone as dangerous as the master and mistress of Midnight, but let's be real; there were answers to be had here, just not from him.  The question was whether or not someone would speak up, which right now, could only be Niall.  The vampire gave him one of those blank looks that vampires (and Alexander) were so good at, obviously considering, but it wasn't Alex who got answers immediately.  It was Verity.

Alexander and I are the only ones Justinian sired in all of his years.  They were close like brothers when they were human.  I was told that there hadn't been any word from him in a few years, long enough that Justinian and Iloquil were starting to wonder where he was, but I don't know what to make of this human.

It was a quick, reader's digest version of the more complex thoughts surrounding the subject.  Alexander wasn't someone that Niall had known for long or incredibly well, but he remembered the man as being like a dark shadow behind or at Justinian's side, very much the logical part of the equation at all times.  There was no logic in this situation, and how this human could be Alexander, Niall didn't know.

 "Curious," she said, her silver eyes narrowed. She had been about to say something when Iloquil came back into the room, Justinian on her heels. Verity quickly looked up, as though searching for someone to catch her before she got to Alexander and tried to strangle him again, but she looked much more calm than she had before. Justinian must have been able to make her settle down (and Verity suspected that it may have involved violence).

She stopped short of Alexander, arms at her sides and hands clenched. It was obvious by her face she'd been crying, which was something Verity had seen maybe once or twice in a few hundred years. It didn't happen often. Iloquil held her arms up, as though beckoning him, and said something in an archaic Roman dialect, with a heavy accent on it. It was her specific way of speaking, having come from the Middle East and then to the Roman Empire; only Justin and Alex had ever really been able to understand her.

Verity felt herself holding her breath. That was one hell of a limb her friend had walked out onto. She instinctively stepped forward more, taking Niall's hand. There was a fair chance that if Iloquil was rejected, she'd be impossible to contain. She gave Justin a warning look from across the room. That he even tolerated her trying to call another man to her, a supposed friend or not... If Niall ever reacted like that to another woman, Verity would make his life very hard. Of course, she didn't know the situation like Niall did.

Verity wasn't the only one who gave their attention to the very old and very dangerous vampires walking back into the room, but Niall seemed to be the least affected by the fact that Iloquil had seemingly been crying; he knew more about the situation at hand than Verity or Alexander did, and he had the most ability to understand that Iloquil might care about Alexander (the vampire, since he was uncertain whether he believed that this human was him).  He also recognized the dark look on his sire's face, and that was what made him a bit uncomfortable.  If not for the trade that was apparently going to go on, he might have suggested that he and Verity give the other three some space, mostly because the last time Justinian had looked like that, Scarlet got an impromptu magical lobotomy.  Niall had already endured and eventually worked through one of Justinian's experiments in crazy, and he never planned on doing it again. 

Alexander was, surprisingly, more cautious and less afraid of the two very volatile ancients, and he couldn't have said exactly why.  All he knew was that he knew what they were capable of and knew that smaller, more petty violent acts were more likely.  Justinian could do terrible things to the mind, but he wouldn't to Alexander, and Iloquil was downright malicious when she wanted to be.  He would have expected her to strike out at him now, perhaps with nails instead of intending real harm (he didn't remember, but it just seemed to feel true that he'd worn nail marks of hers in the past), but she surprised everyone outside of Justin when she spoke to him in a language and accent that even Niall didn't understand.  He'd heard it from her and Justinian many times, had picked up a word or two from his sire, but couldn't ever understand Iloquil.  That Alexander looked at her almost suspiciously, like he didn't understand the situation and the laws of physics had changed, made Niall wonder.

Then, the hunter slowly, cautiously approached her, one pained step at a time.  Why, when he was an Onyx hunter and she was an ancient vampire friendly with Midnight? 

He understood her.  She'd told him that if there was any part of him that knew her, he should come to her, and yes, this was dangerous.  He knew that, thus the caution, but he understood, and that wasn't an accident.  Justinian watched, and it was he who broke the curious, slow approach and guarded distance.  All he did was make a comment, in that same ancient dialect and a shockingly casual tone of voice, about whether or not he should be jealous, and Alexander shot back his response in the same language.  "Jealousy is beneath you."  What he didn't know was that it was an old response, something he'd been trying to teach Justinian as a way to curb the rage that followed whenever Iloquil succeeded in making his friend jealous.  He was beyond caring, too overwhelmed by this entire situation, by the familiarity, the vague bits of memory that managed to flit in and out before he got a grip on them, the fear that came from having things within his mind triggered by these people. 

This was probably bad.

 At Alexander's utterance of the old back-and-forth that he and Justinian always had (where Alexander tried in vain to stop him from being jealous and Iloquil would only laugh and flirt harder with her prey) made her stop everything. She just sort of froze in place for a moment, and then her eyes got really big. Then, she jumped a little in her stupidly ridiculous high heels, screamed, and raced the rest of the distance to Alexander. She didn't take a flying leap at him to attack him, though. She jumped on him, wrapping her arms around him, and nearly took him over - that was the thing about vampires. They hit a lot harder than humans, even when they didn't mean to.

She went back to totally unintelligible speech, mostly about how happy she was, how long they'd been waiting, hoping, et cetera. And then she pulled back, a confused expression on her face, and in English said, "But why are you human?" She held his face in her hands, eyes narrowing as she scrutinized him. She turned to look over her shoulder, still having Alexander's skull in her hands, and spoke to Justinian.

"Why is he human?"

There was a... tone to her voice. The sharp, high-pitched sound at the end of her words that made the next thing that happened, if you knew her, predictable. It was probably why Alexander flinched, even though she still had him in a rather dangerous position.

"WHY. IS. HE. HUMAN?" she roared.

Verity decided to step in right then. She turned to Niall, a knowing look in her eyes. "She goes from a ten to a two and back up to an eleven," she said with a hand in the air. She stepped around him, her graceful form approaching the vampire who was now staring at anyone and anything that moved as though it would give her an answer.

"Sweetie, let go of his face," she cooed.

Iloquil turned back to Alexander, promptly letting go with an embarrassed "Oh." as she did so. She took a step back, then flashed that gorgeous, very sheepish smile, at him. "Sorry," she added, a little laugh. It was so amazing how she could switch back and forth between her moods, but thankfully NOBODY in the room was stranger to that. It would have been stupid to assume that just because she was a female she was temperamental - Justinian could be every bit as petty, and more, he just knew that right then, he was not playing the 'crazy' one. At least after a few thousand years, they had balanced out their good cop, bad cop routine.

"Come on, Sybil, give him some space," Verity said, pulling her equally tall, equally beautiful friend away by the arm.

Sorry my love, I know this isn't our fight, but I feared she might smash his head like a melon between her hands, and then we'd never here the end of it, she said to Niall. She flicked her gaze over to him, fluttering her lashes as she flashed him a smile that was laced with frustration. It's like having children, no? Aren't you so glad we dodged that bullet?

Having Iloquil react as she had immediately to what he'd said completely outdid Justinian's jaw pretty much dropping (it was the simplest phrase, but might be enough to convince him that this actually was his friend), and Alexander's eyes widened as she did that little jump in those heels, screamed and practically tackled him.  She didn't do him any intentional harm, but the initial impact felt like he'd just been thrown into a brick wall, and then came the embrace.  He was pretty sure he heard a rib or two crack, but other than gasping and enduring, he was silent.

She was talking enough in that moment for all of them.

He wasn't sure he understood all of this, but like before when she'd been screaming and Justinian carted her off, it was because of the speed with which she was speaking.  He didn't realize that it was his native language and that he and Justinian were probably the only two that really caught most of it, but none of it made much sense to him.  Why was she happy to see him?  Waiting and hoping?  How did that....oh.  Oh.  Why was he human.

If he hadn't been taken so off-guard by that question, the surprise evident on his face (which was saying a lot, since he could be incredibly expressive, but avoided it in situations such as this) as she held it in her hands, and he didn't like the way she repeated it.  Actually, he flinched at that tone, eyes squeezing shut as he tried to lean away.  Obviously, she wasn't letting go, so he couldn't, but he had a bad fee---yep.  There it was.

It was a good thing for Verity stepping up to make Iloquil let go of him, since Justinian was still staring at the two of them like he couldn't believe it.  The triste's involvement seemed to snap him out of it, and his eyes narrowed, flicking from the trio to his younger fledgling.  Tell me what he said when we were gone.

No questions for Justin, just instructions, and Niall didn't hesitate, not here and now.  He may have been the master of this establishment, but this wasn't the time to assert anything.  He used his impressive mental capabilities (which Justin took credit for, obviously) to simply play the whole scene almost like a video for the older vampire, and Justin nodded approval.  Necessary information.

Surprisingly, Alexander may have been the least concerned about Iloquil crushing his skull in the room, though that was because he'd just wake up and be free of this situation; nobody else wanted him to disappear, for fear that he might really take off.  Of course, he'd showed part of his hand in being here on Onyx business, but tonight was a night of extreme circumstances - if he disappeared from even Onyx, he would be labeled 'missing in action' because the guild didn't have a body.  His death would be assumed, but then, he'd still be in the dark about his past.  He wanted to believe that this was all bullshit, that they were messing with him, but there were too many things they couldn't be responsible for.  He almost wanted to ask questions of his own, but he got the feeling they would drop more accidentally than if he asked directly.  He wasn't wrong, but Justinian knew Alexander about as well as Alex knew him.  He was somewhat prepared for certain reactions, which only made it more disturbing to him.  This weak little human with his friend's face also had all of his mannerisms and patterns. 

"Tell me, Mr....?" he prompted, mostly out of sick curiosity.

"Darling."

"Excuse me?"

"Alexander Darling," the hunter repeated, and Justin almost choked, surprised and actually a little heartsick as he glanced at Iloquil.  This was cruel for a being who didn't feel these things and hadn't in centuries to experience them now.  Iloquil not only had this habit of calling others 'darling', but she'd made it a bit of an endearment for Alexander specifically.  'Alexander, darling' had been how she usually greeted him. 

"...Mr. Darling.  Tell me, how is it that Diamond put so very much into trying to recruit you, and here we find the perfect soldier on a mission from Onyx?" he asked, thoroughly displeased by that fact.  Diamond was bad enough, mostly because of the conflict of interest, but Alexander had refused.  Calling him 'the perfect soldier' was Justinian being petty, just as it usually was.  There was no denying that it was quite possibly true, what with Alexander's ability to cheat death and the devotion to weaponry, strategy and fighting styles that he'd pursued over the centuries; he was an artist, and war was his medium.  It was something that, unless Justinian was angry with him for some horrific death or no-win situation he was attempting to turn around (Alexander and Iloquil continued to be among the few that could truly upset him even in more modern times), wasn't mentioned.  Justinian was revealing some of his feels here, however well he was maintaining his composure.

Alexander deserved credit for his eyes narrowing, obviously picking up on at least some of it, but he was also gleaning more information.  Diamond.  If he couldn't get answers here, Diamond would have them, it seemed.  He ignored the 'perfect soldier' dig, but seemed to realize that Justinian was being petty.  He'd been right to expect pettiness rather than serious harm.  "I don't know anything about Diamond recruitment techniques.  An Onyx operative took me in," he explained carefully, and even saying it, he wasn't so sure if he was telling the truth.  He remembered...something.  It was just the slightest bit of an image, just some redhead with a hand to his bleeding head screaming in an Irish accent about who the fuck carried iron around nowadays, and he figured Diamond had tried, and failed.  It was scary that he was remembering more here and now than he had in five years.

"What Onyx operative?" Justin asked, carefully just a little curious and all too aware of everyone in the room watching.

"That's not information I'm at liberty to discuss," came the carefully textbook response, and that was what caused Justinian to shoot forward, grabbing Alexander up by the throat hard enough that the hunter made a choking sound and clutched at the vampire's wrists as Justin lifted him some. 

"You've forgotten much, my friend, but allow me to jog your memory on one thing in specific.  You are mine, and have been for over two thousand years.  I will not lose you so easily."

Niall glanced at Verity, cocking an eyebrow up.  Welp.  There went the 'good cop, bad cop'.  I'm not so sure we dodged it entirely, my dear.

 Iloquil was aptly stifled when Justin finally got tired of the back and forth, and she was strangely quiet as she snatched her wine glass up from the mantle and thrust it at a servant who instantly filled it to the brim. This repeated two or three (or six) times while Justin basically pissed on Alexander - or he may as well have, because he was pretty much establishing himself as the dominant one in the house. It wasn't even in any insult to Niall - it was more or less that Justin was fucking done letting this hunter not answer things.

And nobody in the room was surprised that Iloquil just drank repeatedly. They may have been ancient - Niall and Verity less so, but that didn't matter much - but despite the bronze goddess banking the eldest by even a thousand years more, they were still from a different time. She may be argumentative and petty and powerful, but she had chosen as a mate a man who had these same qualities, and it was just one of those things where, when he decided to take charge, she would follow along. Most people worried about pissing her off because she was the tempest of the duo, but it was only because she was more vocal. If Justin spent half of the energy that Iloquil did, things would probably be a lot more bleak for humans in general. They were only so lucky he enjoyed his time relaxing and not being bothered.

But this was beyond bothering - this was flat out pissing him off. Even if Alexander looked beyond him to the female, he would hopefully not be surprised when she only set her jaw and watched the scene play out. Hell, back then when Justin had been away, Alexander had been "in charge"; older or not, Iloquil was forever in their care, even if she didn't need it. When Justin reminded him that he owned him, it wasn't a joke; just like it wasn't a joke that Iloquil was officially out of this conversation for the moment.

Alexander would probably have better chances of reasoning with Justin, anyways. Iloquil was tipping back another glass of wine.

There was a moment there where Alexander didn't respond at all, just staring wide-eyed at Justin and fighting to breathe through the choke-hold the vampire had on him, but he seemed more upset at the 'two thousand years' thing (since that was when his eyes had bugged) than the rest.  His feet didn't fight to reach the floor, and though he was holding tightly to Justinian's wrist and forearm, he wasn't trying to fight him.  One, it would have been impossible unless Justin gave in, and two, dignity.  If there was one thing Alexander fought to maintain at all times, it was his dignity.  Even hanging there from the vampire's grip, his breathing cut down to a minimum, he looked about as calm as a person could.  Justinian didn't miss that, but it only increased the level of familiarity and made him somewhat angrier.  This was his friend, if only he could dig through the ugly layers of humanity that had been thrust upon him.

"The operative.  I'm not threatening him, if you're worried about protecting the fool," he ground out, irritated that this was necessary, but he did want his friend back, damn it.  "I'm trying to understand your mess.  What is the first thing you remember?"

Yep.  Alexander, because he'd been difficult, got to go through this questioning process with minimal breathing, at least until he started cooperating some.  His eyes flicked to Iloquil and the others briefly, but it was only enough to catch Niall squeezing Verity's hand, then going over to quietly take the wine glass from Iloquil's hand.  No help there.

"I woke up in an alley, killed a vampire that came upon me and Devraj Rashana was tracking it."  Did he feel guilty dropping the name?  Yes, but he got the impression Justinian wasn't lying, and he didn't know why.  Fuck this entire situation.

 Iloquil made a very loud noise of exasperation when Niall plucked her wine glass from her hand just as she had it tipped all the way back and was tonguing the thick ichor within. It hadn't totally hit her yet, so she bypassed him completely with a wry smile, and made her way to where her incredibly angry mate was throttling their former best friend.

She was approaching in such a way that made Verity take a step forward, and Niall raised his hand, but said nothing for the moment. Instead, he put his hand to his mouth, eyes wider than they should have been, and just... watched.

"Oh, dear," Verity murmured. "It's like those Arelis all over again," she said in a low voice. "Remember Cerise's birthday at the country house?

"HNN," Niall said into his hand. "Ramsey took two whole bottles to himself."

"This is worse," she said flatly.

"Yes," he agreed. Then, he stood a little more straight, turning his head to look at her incredulously. "Have you heard from them, recently? Those two were absolutely terrible. Such wonderful guests."

"You know, I don't think I have," she mused. "I thi -- OOH ILOQUIL, NO SWEETIE!"

And with that, she was across the room in a flash, prying Iloquil's (now marinated) form away from Justin as she tried to put herself into the middle of their conversation, which was intensely serious. She was rambling in her archaic gibberish again, though Verity recognized a few words here and there - carnival, masquerade, party - they were all roughly similar, anyways, though she clearly referenced different eras with the specific words she used.

"Just.. let me.. get you.. some fresh air," she strained, practically ripping her away from Justin's side. She huffed, giving him an apologetic glance, though they all knew this was nothing out of the ordinary, and managed to drag her back a few feet enough to get her to turn around. It was like trying to back up a Zamboni in a bird cage: Iloquil was acting like she was dead weight in her higher-than-hell stiletto shoes.

"You really need to lay off of that stuff," Verity said more loudly as she got her through the door; the words lay and off were punctuated by two sharp shoves each time to Iloquil's back. She was answered with more laughter, and she tossed a last glance over her shoulder and just waved her hand around in a circle as if to tell them to keep the interrogation going.

Once she'd gotten Iloquil into the room where Persephone, Darren, Kronos, Katya, and Raphael were, she just sort of cleared her throat. She looked directly at Darren and Persephone and said, "Watch her. No more wine, do you hear me?" She ducked back out of the room, and then flung the door open again. She only pointed a long-nailed finger at Katya, who was sitting in a chair looking incredibly uncomfortable, and said, "No funny business with my cats, do you hear me?"

She didn't wait for an answer, and slammed the door behind her. As soon as she'd done so, Verity pressed her back to it, posing primly at it, with a breathy laugh and a very broad, fake smile.

"Well, then!" she exclaimed.

 Persephone had been sitting in a chair next to Darren, alternating between staring at her nails and the clock on the wall. She glanced at Katya every so often, then to Raphael. If she was bored and uncomfortable, those two acted like they'd worn Halloween costumes to an intensely somber funeral. Raphael exhaled with puffed cheeks every so often and ran his hands through his hair, while sometimes stopping to pick lint off of his suit. Katya... she sat slumped to one side in her chair, her forehead on her fist. She had strands of her long, dark hair pinched between her fingers and was examining them for split ends.

Darren, in fact, was the only one who didn't seem to have a problem at all. He and Kronos had begun to play cards. Poker, to be exact. And Darren... was winning.

"Call," Darren said.

Kronos scratched his jaw with the cards in his hand.

"Hey!" Darren warned. "None of that mind reading bullshit!"

Kronos met him with a very, very dark gaze, but strangely, Darren didn't back down. Instead, he squared his shoulders a little, then hovered his hand over the stack of chips in front of him. "Care to make a side bet?" he asked.

Kronos threw his cards down on the table face down. "Fold," he said gruffly.

And then... and then Iloquil had happened. They'd been instructed not to give her any alcohol, so of course, as soon as Verity was gone, that was exactly what Iloquil tried to do. First, she went for the decanter, but Persephone effectively blocked her. She turned gracefully on her heel as though she had never been headed there in the first place, then dropped down into the comfortable chair that Persephone had been seated in.

"No seat backs," the vampire declared. She raised her and and snapped her fingers loudly. "Charlotte!" she called. "Wine, if you would."

"Charlotte," Persephone said, her voice tight. "The lady misorders. She will have sparking water, with a fresh lemon and an orange twist." When the servant froze, unsure of what to do, Persephone merely widened her eyes a little and jerked her head to the door as if to tell her to GET OUT.

"Ugh, whatever!" Iloquil said loudly. She threw her arms up, allowing her hands to slap down on the chair in a rude way; it caused Katya to jump, which in turn made all three cats shiver (yes, even Kronos).

Iloquil, not unaware, sat up slightly and looked around between them all, very pointedly. "What...was that?" she asked. And then she smiled in a horribly broad way, and that was about the time Persephone swore that she would bash Raphael's head in with a rock for ever inviting that fucking vampire along with him. She liked Katya - honestly, even without the power - but this was not a good time.

She tuned back into the room just as Iloquil physically dragged herself across the room in her chair until she was right in front of Katya. "And what is YOUR name?" she was asking sweetly.

"Don't answer her," Persephone commanded.

"Shut up, you buzzkill," Iloquil snarled.

You'd think, after Alexander answered his question and revealed himself to be somewhat cooperative, Justin would loosen his grip.  No such luck.  Either he didn't trust Alexander, even as a human, not to pull a fast one, or he was just that angry.  Maybe both.  "What alley?  Address."

Alexander stared at him, surprised still at the level of interest from these ancient vampires.  He wasn't stupid, just having trouble believing all of this, so the idea that he was somehow...two thousand years old?  It was a little hard to swallow.  Of course, it was also hard to breathe right about now, so he definitely had other problems.  The others around them just continued on, mostly as though nothing were happening despite watching it very closely.

As with most talk of the Arelis, Niall was....torn.  They were powerful and dangerous, but could also hit a level of petty malice that sometimes rivaled even Justinian and Iloquil.  Ramsey was less so, which Niall attributed to his being a warrior for centuries and making it a point not to care about stupid things, but they'd also spent so many of those years playing whatever 'court politics' an area had to their advantage.  That their game involved copious amounts of sex only made it that much more interesting and complicated.  Inviting them always made for such a wonderful party, as much as it made Niall groan to remember some of it.

While he'd initially stopped Verity from getting too involved in what Iloquil was doing (he'd taken her wine glass from her, which was more daring than they usually had to be, but Justin was busy), he didn't step in once Iloquil had started injecting herself into the conversation/interrogation going on.  Why?  Because if Verity didn't, it looked like Justinian might backhand his mate, and that was never a good sign.  Better to haul her off and let him finish what he was doing.

Alexander, for his part, stared at Iloquil as she did this, understanding, but still not entirely sure how, as she went on and on about the magnificent parties they attended in places like Venice and Paris.  She spoke of them as though they were recent, but he got the distinct impression that they weren't.  Also that Justinian was upset, which was why he suddenly spit out the alley's address amid her reminiscing.  It stopped the angry vampire holding him from either choking him out or hauling off and nailing his obviously intoxicated mate, so win, right?  The fact that it worked, and Justin stared at him like he'd said something important as Verity dragged Iloquil off, had to count for something.  Since Justin lowered him to the ground and released his throat a moment later, he figured he was right.  Verity returned to Justin cursing.

"That fucking voodoo king."

If someone asked him how exactly he was dealing with this whole evening the way he was, Darren never would have been able to explain it.  Here he was, sitting in the same room with a vampire he really liked, her date who'd tortured the hell out of him just a few hours ago, a jaguar/vampire who was scary as hell, and the friend that had totally mind-fucked him as to who she was for awhile there.  There was a hunter that Darren didn't know well, but knew of, in the other room probably getting his ass kicked, and here was the leopard in the middle of an awkwardly quiet room, playing poker.

Winning.

On some level, that might have been the crazy part, but Darren spent a lot of time with hunters, and in the bar.  On slow days and nights, they'd play at the Hollow, and it was definitely something to see someone as old and smart as Ash play the game.  Naturally, he had unfair advantages, but between Ash and Dave, Darren had picked up a few tricks.  Still, he hadn't entirely thought that he'd gotten as good as he had (Ash and Dave both still beat him often enough, though it was less than it used to be, by a lot; Connor didn't beat him often at all), and he sure as hell didn't think that he'd be crushing Kronos the way he was.  The vampire hadn't seemed to expect it, either.

Darren couldn't deny that he was enjoying it.

He was not, however, a fan of the way his temporary feeling of control and confidence got kicked in the nuts by Iloquil appearing (she was nice, but still powerful enough that he was just a little nervous, though dinner had helped make him somewhat more comfortable) and then startling Katya.  That was the problem.  Katya had kept her power so totally underwraps that evening that, even though she could never turn it off enough that Darren wouldn't be tempted to sit down next to her and get cozy, he'd been able to resist well enough - Raphael was also a good deterrent.  Having her surprised by the sudden sound and movement out of the ancient who seemed pretty sloshed (Darren was thrilled that Persephone had that whole, 'no more booze' thing under control, though being a bartender meant that he could have cut her off himself, if he had to) meant that all of the cats in the room got an awesome dose of cat-lady power.  Darren shuddered through it, his already chartreuse eyes going all cat for a second as he inhaled and tried to rein in.  He wouldn't have been surprised if Persephone had a similar level of difficulty, both of them far too into their feline side, and though he didn't complain, shift or otherwise lose control, he most certainly set his cards down while he got a good, deep breath and worked on that.  It was a matter of a few seconds, but those were some shitty seconds before he turned mostly-human eyes on Iloquil and Katya.  The former had dragged her chair up in front of the latter, and that line of questioning?

This wouldn't be good.

"Any good at poker, Miss Iloquil?" he asked suddenly, and instantly somewhat regretted it, but anything to distract her from Katya, or try to.  He'd purposely throw a few hands just to make sure she was happy if he had to, but damn it, none of this.

 If Justinian had slapped Iloquil, not an individual in that room would have stopped him. Verity and Niall had gone through their bouts at times, but for the most part, they respected eachother enough not to interfere. Neither of them would take their brawls to the level that Iloquil and Justinian would, but it was mostly because their time together was minutes compared to the eternity that the other two had been together. It wasn't domestic violence in the sense that humans considered it - Iloquil was far from helpless, or abused.

At Alexander's utterance of the address, which Verity had missed thanks to having to remove Iloquil's drunk ass from the situation, the situation had changed entirely. She returned to Alexander catching his breath and Justinian angry about an entirely new set of problems. When he said, "That fucking voodoo king," nobody had to ask to whom he referred, because they all already new.

"That meddlesome little shit!" she exclaimed in spite of her previous composure. She now stood with her hands defiantly on her hips, looking between her own mate and his maker. There was a moment of silence as the silver-eyed woman looked between the three people in the room, and then she just said, "Well, how are we going to handle this?"

She had never met Aristide personally, which was odd considering how he liked to acquaint himself with figures of power, but she'd heard enough about him to know that he wasn't precisely to be trifled with. If she had to guess upon meeting him, she may have incorrectly assumed he was a Triste - he just had a way about him that spoke of many years of power, and discipline to control said power. Aristide was so much more though, and because he operated under a completely different set of rules and gods, the vampires despite their age often left him to his devices for fear of ending up in his crosshairs. Alexander, it appeared, hadn't been so fortunate.

Of course, Verity didn't know that this all rooted back to her lovely friend who was currently intoxicated beyond belief in the next room. She did know that Alexander must have meant a great deal to her to drive her to the point of blind drunken behaviour, though, especially to interfere with Justinian and basically undermine his intensity in the middle of his interrogation. She almost flinched at the thought of what he would say to her later when she had sobered up. He may have been younger, but his power was every bit as great, and he had suffered enough at her hands for petty emotions to be willing to return the favour.

She approached the hunter, who was gaining his bearings as he tried to, with as much dignity as he could muster, breathe smoothly to replace the lost air and calm himself after his very near brush with Justinian's ire. This was still her house, as much as that little fact had been overlooked, and she would not prefer to splatter the hunter when he had her cat, even if that was what the rest of them were voting for. It was sudden, her change of heart, but she realized there were much bigger things to deal with.

"My dear, it seems you're caught up in a rather large net of trouble at the moment, the least of all what you initially came here for," she said softly, offering him her arm. He would do well to take it, even if he didn't want to. For the moment, it was a sign of a very tense peace.

"Have Cerberus fetch the creature he requested, and initiate the trade. Fear not, hunter, I will agree to this small favour, but make no mistake, you will reside here while I allow my friends a chance to figure out what's going on. You won't be harmed any more by the hand of my staff, but I cannot and will not speak for the two with whom you share a bond. That is another matter entirely, and if you have any sense at all, I'd advise that you attempt to delve further into whatever memories you can so that this mess can sort itself out."

She basically told him that he wasn't leaving anytime soon and that it would be in his best interests to try and tell Justinian and Iloquil as much as he could. She did it all with facial expressions that alternated between concern and irritation, but she didn't seem to threaten him outright. In fact, she all but said that he was safe within the walls of Midnight from everyone except for the two ancients - those two she had no control over and she wouldn't even pretend to try and order them around. She could only imagine if she and Niall had been separated for some reason. If this situation were reversed, she doubted she could maintain her calm long enough to get any information out of someone at all, let alone as much as Justinian had gotten.

"I think you should go check on Iloquil, Justinian, and let the hunter gather himself together for the moment."

 She wasn't likely to forget about Katya any time soon, but Darren's question distracted her enough that she let the other vampire go for the moment. She turned in her chair, studying him over her shoulder with her brown eyes, then answered. "Good enough to take all of your money," she said confidently. At that, Kronos backed his chair away and stood up, gesturing to it.

"You can have my spot, then, my lady," he said, his voice still holding the irritation of his defeat. He glanced back to Darren, then to his daughter, and they all seemed to share the knowledge that keeping Iloquil both distracted and amused would probably be for everyone's benefit. He was relieved when she stood, abandoning her chair in front of the duo who tried very hard to be quiet so they'd go unnoticed, and walked to the chair he'd offered her.

"Thank you, darling," she purred as Kronos seated her. As soon as her water came, he set it next to her, reminding himself that some days a glorified butler was better than being on the other end of her anger, and gave Darren a very dangerous look.

"She will cheat if you let her," he warned him.

Iloquil put a hand to her chest, her mouth falling open in surprise. "I will not!" she said, her voice offended. She took her water and had a few generous sips, then set it down and held her hand out for the cards. "I'll shuffle," she informed Darren, her fingers wriggling until the deck was placed in her palm. And shuffle she did; Iloquil may have been drunk, but she shuffled the cards like a Vegas dealer. "How do you want to play this?" she asked as she did so, referring to the amount of betting as well as which version they'd be playing. She herself preferred Blackjack, but she could go for five card stud or Hold 'Em - or anything, really. She was a little too intoxicated to cheat, despite what Kronos had said.

Behind them, Raphael gripped Katya's hand tightly. "This is the most uncomfortable I've been in a very long time," he confessed, leaning in to whisper the words into her ear. "Are you okay, or should we make an excuse and go?" Katya watched Darren as he glanced back to them, knowing that she'd have a lot of explaining to do later about why she seemed so friendly with the vampire they all knew to be the personification of fear itself, and sighed.

"Tell me about it," she said. She turned to look at him, realizing that he was still very close, and gave him a small, reassuring smile. "I'll be fine," she said gently. She appreciated the concern he showed, but if he showed too much of it, those questions she'd have to answer would multiply by a lot. "Why don't we move in closer to spectate?" she suggested.

Raphael didn't look like he wanted to do anything of the sort. Having Darren watch their interaction only told him that the cat had found a weakness in the terrifying vampire. That the weakness happened to be a friend of his meant nothing - if there was anything Raphael knew of people, it was that they would exploit said weaknesses if it meant saving their own asses. He was thankful that Katya could control Darren, but he knew that her power didn't extend to all hunters, and Darren was connected enough that he may accidentally say the wrong thing to the wrong person and Katya could end up in trouble at his own expense.

"Okay," he agreed. "If you think it's a good idea."

As they stood, Katya felt him release her hand. "I don't think it is a good idea, but it's probably the best option we have. If she's having a good time, she'll forget. By the time she remembers, we'll be gone." She noticed that Raphael only grimaced in response, showing his doubt, but didn't argue with her and instead pulled out a chair at the medium sized table for her to sit down. He seated himself next to her, and unfortunately next to Darren as a result.

This was so goddamned awkward.

No, Iloquil wasn't abused, just like Justin wasn't - they kept each other on their toes, you could say.  Whatever one did to the other could be returned just as bad or worse.  Fortunately, they stuck to petty shit rather than razing cities (they left that to Alexander, or used to).  One of the things that Alexander had forgotten was that, while he was the logical and most sane one, he was also the one who tended to leave more damage in his wake, just by nature of what he did.  There had been more than a few cities in the last two thousand years that had either been destroyed or had their leadership rearranged...violently.  Fortunately, while he went very 'soldier of fortune', he also had this habit of doing things just because he thought they were 'right'.  Hitler, as egotistical as he was?  He didn't think he was going to lose, and he did not kill himself.

Voodoo king?  Alex stared from Justin to Niall (who'd essentially facepalmed) to Verity, and he might have asked them what the hell they were talking about if that wouldn't proclaim his ignorance, and if he didn't have an idea already.  He wouldn't have had details for them, but he remembered a little of that ridiculous situation; he didn't want to remember anything more of that.  It...hadn't gone well, and it was all horror and pain. 

He didn't really have much to offer on the subject of what they were going to do about it, mostly because he was still trying to figure out exactly what they thought was wrong (all he could gather was that they were all insane, really, because what they suggested was impossible), when Verity approached him and offered her arm.  He was suspicious about it, but accepted the gesture -- what choice did he have in the matter?  It was a comfortable enough position on his part despite being such an old thing (modern people didn't hold onto each other in such a way often), almost as though he'd done it many times in the past.  Even injured, he held up fairly well in taking her arm and walking alongside her, and the fact that he didn't trust her really didn't hamper him in the slightest.  He didn't know it, but he'd walked with many women in such a way in the past, some of whom he'd known intended to try to poison or stab him.  It was a pleasantry, no more.

"That is a gracious offer, thank you," he told her, and to a point, he really meant it.  Being promised that he wouldn't be harmed by her people essentially eliminated most of the threats to his well-being in this place.  It only left Justinian and Iloquil, and somehow, he wasn't especially afraid of them hurting him badly.  It wasn't his safety was was too concerned about at this point, though.  Originally, he'd been expecting to be escorted out, probably with a gun to his head or the like, to bring Walsh to Samantha and Kimber, then have them hand Xavier off to Midnight's people.  It would have been a wonderfully simple thing, except Verity wasn't allowing him to leave until Justinian and Iloquil were satisfied.  That put a kink in the plans, and meant that he was worried all over again.  "If I'm being forced to stay, can I get some assurance that the two women who will be escorting your cat in are granted safe passage back out with Walsh?  They're freeblood, but that hasn't been much of a guarantee this evening."

It was actually Niall who snorted, Justinian merely watching and curious at who his friend could be concerned about, but the Master of Midnight himself stepped in on that one.  "As long as they conduct themselves appropriately, they can leave.  I understand the snow leopard isn't in any condition to leave on his own, anyway." 

Not a good sign, but Alexander wasn't surprised.  He'd take that, though, and nodded his thanks.  Justinian, frustrated that he didn't have a plan for fixing this whole situation when Verity had asked, made some impatient gesture and stalked out of the room to go collect Iloquil, who was...wrecking the young leopard, Darren, in poker.  That was...unexpected.  "She cheats, you know," he pointed out for the cat's benefit, but even as he walked in, Darren was winning that hand.  It looked like he hadn't won many, based on the number of chips in play and how few he had, but he was apparently winning a few.  Impressive.  Iloquil was a sharp player, even drunk.  If Niall and Verity didn't find a use for this cat, Justinian might.  After he was finished dealing with his mate, of course.

"Iloquil."

Darren knew he was going to lose.  Somehow, that knowledge was actually somewhat liberating instead of depressing, mostly because he wasn't sure if winning against Iloquil was safe.  Kronos gladly gave up his seat and Darren might have been irritated over that if not for the fact that he was volunteering to help keeping Iloquil both distracted and amused for a bit.  Taking one for the team, so to speak, and keeping her from getting too interested in Katya and doing anything about it.  That was acceptable.

Kronos' warning didn't go unheeded, and Darren sure as hell hadn't let the man cheat himself, so he wasn't surprised.  It was such a delicate situation, handling these vampires who were ridiculously old, but he'd found that not freaking out and being himself seemed to work.  They apparently appreciated that.  He chose five card stud, watched her carefully as she dealt, and then proceeded to lose.

Hard.

Make no mistake, he won a few hands and he actually got the impression that she was too drunk to cheat effectively, so he wasn't worried about that.  She was just an awesome poker player, more on the level with Ash than Darren (Ash still wrecked him regularly), but he didn't mind.  He picked up on tricks from people who were better than him.  Nobody seemed to realize it, but Darren paid a lot of attention to his surroundings, and he noticed shit.  He also learned quickly and was very adaptable, or he wouldn't be social and functioning right about now.  Considering he'd been in a cell being tortured by one of the vampires in the room just a few hours ago, he was doing pretty damn well.  Persephone should be proud, for sure.

He did not fail to notice Raphael and Katya scooting closer to watch, or how friendly the two looked, but he didn't let his attention linger on them; he didn't want Iloquil to notice them again, and he really did need to pay close attention to the game.  He also looked up as soon as Justinian entered and spoke, smirking at the warning that everyone seemed willing to give him, but actually more pleased with the fact that the ancient's entrance didn't come with the scent of blood.  Seemed like he had not actually splattered Alexander, which was a relief.  "So I hear," he offered easily, finishing out that hand successfully, then hesitating.  Justinian seemed to have a purpose for coming in here, and that meant not distracting Iloquil first.

 Verity nodded, apparently agreeing to Niall's terms, and summoned Cerberus from out of thin fucking air. "Be a love and escort the two no doubt receptive ladies along with Xavier in for me, won't you?" she asked. The way her pitch and tone altered when she spoke to Cerberus was almost comical - she took that soothing sound on when she spoke to all of her shifters. It was almost amusing to watch, especially since they'd heard her swearing and yelling earlier in frustration at both her drunk friend and the revelation that Aristide was behind the mess they were currently in.

Well, one of the many, anyways.

She allowed Alexander to be released from her grasp, if only so he could take the offered toiletries from a servant and tidy his appearance up quickly. In the meantime, she folded her arms and looked to Niall, brows raised. "What do we know of 'Samantha' and 'Kimber'?" she asked, the names purposely sounding foreign by her tongue.

"Well, Kimber is Xavier's little girlfriend while he's away," Niall reminded her, which caused Verity to nod with sudden recognition.

"Oh! The lovely little lupine lady!" she exclaimed. "How funny," she added, a mischievous smile on her mouth. "Fancy that I've been asking to meet her, and she's about to walk right in with him."

No sooner had she said that then did Cerberus appear in the doorway. "Your guests, Lady," he rumbled, stepping to the side. He revealed a rather beaten (but very firmly standing on his own) Maltese Tiger, who had an arm wrapped tightly around a slender brunette wolf who looked pale with anticipation. Next to them stood a tall (taller than Verity, even) woman of tan skin and blonde hair who looked like a model more than a hunter.

"Xavier!" Verity cried, rushing to him. He let go of Kimber to greet her, and Verity did not fail to notice that the wolf seemed to rock back to place her weight on one foot, allowing her arms to fall behind her at rest. She seemed obviously more relaxed than Samantha did, and Verity made note of it.

"What happened, darling? Are you well? What do you need?" she demanded, flooding him with questions.

"Verity, let him breathe," Niall muttered from the background.

 Iloquil had been having a dandy time playing (and winning), and she'd almost forgotten about the trouble in the next room - until her beloved came in to fetch her. She was actually in the process of taunting Darren with what he could have in his hand at that very moment - demonstrating her ability to count cards now that she was sobering up. The thing about Mojo was that it came on strong and left just the same; that Iloquil was over 3,000 years old just meant that on her it happened even more quickly. When she heard Justin's sharp voice, she sat rigid in her chair, her smile (as her back was to him) freezing on her face.

With a slow, deliberate sigh, she put her forearm on the table and shoved all of the chips back towards Darren. "Good game, Mittens," she said, her voice holding a tone of regret as she was pulled away. She stood, turning on one of her very high heels, and walked around the chair so that she could meet Justinian face to face.

"Yes, my darling?" she asked, her throat suddenly going dry. Damnit. She needed more water.

The rest of the room was suddenly a flurry of chairs as the others nearly ran over themselves to clear out into a further room, Kronos at the lead of the pack. He was promising them something about television and refreshments, and they all seemed eager to be there - or anywhere other than where the tension was suddenly building to the point of electricity.

Xavier...actually couldn't complain about his captors once he was in the car.  It was a nice car (Alexander's), and his 'captors' included his girlfriend and two other hunters who gave so little fucks that it was actually laughable.  By the time they arrived and parked where they'd wait for Alexander to go in, he figured this was going to be a pretty comfortable wait.  He wasn't wrong.  Technically, he was still a captive because his hands were bound, but neither of the women seemed worried about him being dangerous (hell, Kimber had no reason to think he'd be, and she was in the backseat with him), and the conversation had quickly turned to silly stories, Samantha bitching about her unconscious partner (which was curious enough that Xavier had asked about it), and the three of them generally just bullshitting around until Cerberus appeared.

"Relax, him being here means she's accepted the trade," he informed the girls, and Cerberus didn't hurt things by putting his hands up to show that he was unarmed, or at least, not holding a weapon.  He leaned down towards the window that Samantha cracked, glancing into the car.

"The mistress asked you ladies to come on in, she's got your cat coming upstairs as we speak," he informed them, glancing pointedly at Alexander's sleeping form.  "Bring him, too."

It was up to Samantha to carry Alexander, which Xavier got a small amount of amusement out of, and he casually shed the bindings from his wrists as they got to walking so that he could hold onto Kimber more comfortably.  Was his nervous?  Yeah, a little.  He'd been taken down by the guilds, which hadn't happened before, and now Verity got to meet Kimber for the first time in a decidedly unpleasant fashion.  He was hoping this would all go smoothly, but was still a little off-balance about it.

He shouldn't have been so worried.  As soon as they entered, Alexander looking up from where Verity had essentially deposited him (and looking like he'd been hit with a sledgehammer or something, which Xavier translated to mean that Cerberus had played with him), Samantha stood straighter and Xavier let go of Kimber for Verity to rush over and fuss.  "I'm fine, nothing that won't heal, milady.  I'm sorry I worried you."

If they had doubted that she gave a shit before, seeing her fuss like this over him sure was proving the original point, which was that she'd ruin lives if she didn't get him back. 

While Verity was fussing over Xavier and Niall spoke up to hopefully get her to calm down and let Xavier breathe, Alexander sighed and rolled his eyes (much like the Master himself had done just a moment before) and went over to where Samantha had laid his unconscious form on a fainting couch.  He wouldn't have been surprised if she'd just dropped him somewhere, so he appreciated that she hadn't, but the point was made.  He was obviously injured and worse for wear as he walked over, but he was quick about waking himself up and dropping the body double.  It wouldn't do him any good now, anyway, and it was a relief for those injuries that had been much worse before to be shed now.  The only problem was that the bruising on his throat from Scarlet was still present on his actual body, and that was unpleasant.  Whatever, he'd deal.

Actually, he seemed almost as comfortable as Kimber was in the room once he'd woken up, since he basically just sat up and watched the rest of the interactions, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees, but otherwise remaining seated.  Fuck all this formal bullshit.  Oh, and wonderful, that servant that Cerberus had left to bring Derek Walsh up did his bit, and the snow leopard?  He was being half-carried, one eye was completely swollen shut, and one was only cracked.  His face was caked with blood and it was very obvious that there were other injuries, though it was possible that part of the pained way that he moved was internal from being force-shifted so many times back and forth.  The cat didn't seem to be too present in the mental sense.  Wonderful.

Yep, Darren was right in thinking that the game was over when Justinian entered and said her name like that, and her words as she shoved the chips his way confirmed that.  He didn't even pull a face at being called 'mittens', figuring it was safer to be getting endearments out of someone like her than the alternative, and basically took Kronos bringing up television and refreshments to mean that leaving was a good idea.  Nobody questioned the wisdom of this decision, and with the barest backwards glance, Darren followed the others further into the fortress.  None of them wanted to be present for this.

Justinian, to his credit, started out pretty mildly.  There was some intensity to his words, but he wasn't accusatory just yet.  The problem for Iloquil was actually something that she usually viewed to be a favored quality about him - he wasn't stupid. 

"I got an address out of him, my dear.  The place that he woke up?  It's suspiciously close to that voodoo man's establishment, which makes sense considering what's happened to Alexander.  What I don't understand is the why of the situation," he pointed out, almost conversationally.

Nope, not stupid.  He knew she'd gotten that drunk and had herself removed quickly for a reason, and he sure as hell knew that Alexander wasn't the sort to piss someone off, then casually walk right into a trap laid by the same person, especially without sending in his body double.  Alexander couldn't have known what was coming, and Iloquil was behaving suspiciously.  "What did you do?"

Kimber couldn't deny that the last few hours where she'd been stuck in the car with her boyfriend and the Serpiente (and her unconscious partner, whose body they had moved several times at Samantha's varying states of rage) had been anything but torturous. Sure, the night had started off with a bang, but it was ending on a low point - or, it was until her retelling of the time that Remi had gone to Denny's with the wolf crew and threatened to fight an entire high school track team on his own. Thomas had been quiet up until that point, but he had been every bit as drunk as Remi had, and it was when one of them called Remi a faggot that the two wolves had stood up and shit got real. It had been pretty amazing until they called the cops - and then the fight had moved into the parking lot. It had ended up with Kimber stealing a cop car.

When Cerberus arrived, Kimber was snuggled up in the back with Xavier. They were bathed in a red light from the trunk, which was open and angled up, allowing snow to fall into the space within. Alexander would be pissed, no doubt, but it had been Samantha's doing to begin with. There were thick drag marks in the snow from where she'd moved his body from the passenger seat to the trunk and back again after Xavier pointed out that he would get hypothermia if he stayed in the trunk long enough - or suffocate.

Samantha had found a bag of Jelly Bellies in the trunk, no doubt from where Alexander had hidden them after catching her trying to smuggle them into the car at some point, and she sat in the driver's seat eating them by small handfulls as they all chatted. Eventually the hole in the bag turned out to be insufficient, and Samantha yanked it to make it wider - she ripped the bag in half and sent tiny rock-hard jelly beans everywhere, including all over Alexander's unconscious body. The car was totally silent for a second as the beans rolled around and fell, and then Kimber snorted like a horse from the back seat and buried her face into Xavier's jacket.

"I bet he's going to be pissed when he sees this," Xavier observed, knowing Samantha enough by now to know that she wasn't about to try and clean the mess up. He'd already heard her explain how disgusting she was two or three times, but that was enough for it to sink in - he wasn't surprised that she was single. At all.

"I'm sure he will," she said, leaning over far enough that it strained her voice. She grabbed a handful of the fallen candies and began lining the pockets of Alexander's expensive (and bloody) suit with them. Wouldn't he appreciate that?

"He's bound to be hungry," she said, defending her behaviour.

"Oh, I doubt that. Verity is a gracious host. She'll see your friend stuffed with food before his departure. He just might not realize that it isn't a threat," he added with a noise not unlike a laugh. "She's old country. Still has a fascination at playing house, which includes having people fed and appropriately seasoned with wine."

Cerberus had come shortly thereafter, and Samantha had rolled the window down just a hair while simultaneously eating another handful of candy. They all got out and followed the massive shifter to the manse, Alex slung over Samantha's shoulders like a sack of potatos. As soon as they'd gotten somewhere where she could dump him, she unceremoniously dropped him. He was lucky that they'd provided a fancy cushioned fainting couch - more or less because Verity loved the style of decor that came with it - and he slid off after a moment, hitting the ground in a heap.

"Whoops," she said, her voice thick with candy. She chewed noisily while leveling her gaze at the hologram of Alexander, all the while knowing that everyone in the room was looking at them. The attention finally broke when Verity and Xavier reunited - only to build back up as Verity confirmed he was well and then shifted her focus past him to the brunette.

"And you must be Kimber," she cooed. She held her hands out for the wolf to approach, and Samantha watched with mild interest as she did so. It was an odd situation, to say the least - Kimber and Verity had a polite chat about their arrival, Kimber's evening, et cetera. Then, of course, Verity offered them leftovers, and Samantha snorted a jellybean out her nose and into her hand.

It was then that Alexander took his own body back, sitting on the couch for the moment until his world made sense again. He locked eyes with Samantha, then slowly reached into his pocket while he did so. He pulled out a jelly bean, drew his lower lip in over his teeth in a sneer, then threw it at her as hard as he could. From a bystander, it looked like Samantha jumped and blocked thin air with both arms, her head turning as her body contorted to shield itself from the assault. A few more came after it, each thrown with total rage, and they pinged off of her head and hands, stinging her with each strike.

"Stop it, faggot!" she exploded. She ran at him, fist raised to punch him, as though she had totally forgotten her environment. The entire room went totally silent then, and she straightened out, pulling the edges of her v-neck shirt down and ironing them with her hands. "Uh.. I'm Samantha," she said dumbly. "Just in case there was ever any doubt."

"There wasn't," Alexander hissed.

"There wasn't," Niall snapped simultaneously, looking up from managing Verity to stop her from micromanaging Kimber and Xavier. "Get your cat and go somewhere that isn't here," he commanded, waving her away like she was a fly.

"Niall!" Verity exclaimed.

"Alex!" Samantha exclaimed.

"Unnnh," Derek groaned. He slid against the wall he'd propped himself up against and came to rest on his backside on the floor.

"Janet!" Kimber called out, unable to resist the Rocky Horror Picture Show moment.

 Iloquil ran the tip of her finger down the bridge of her nose, looking up at Justinian through her lashes as he spoke. She was tall, but he was taller. Unfortunately, her big, beautiful brown doe eyes were absolutely no help to her at the moment, much like how in the next room, all of Samantha's charm didn't stop her from being both pelted by candy and making an ass of herself in front of rather important people. Iloquil was sorry she was missing it; she'd rather be anywhere then in her mate's crosshairs. This wasn't one of those little petty things that would blow over, either. This... this was a lie. A big one. It could even be the big one. The one that got her dumped. Like, permanently.

To her credit, she didn't fall apart, instead swallowing very slowly and pressing her lips together as he took a step in on her. Her skin tingled with his proximity, as it always had; Justinian would always have the same effect on her, and he'd always use it to his advantage when it came to tactics of battle. Because this was a battle, whether she liked it or not.

"Well," she said slowly. "I didn't do anything. Not really," she added. She pressed her lips together, unwilling to take a step back when he stepped in again, and put her hands up to his chest. "Now, Justinian," she said slowly. "Be reasonable." She tossed her hair to the side, exposing her lovely neck, and rolled up on her tiptoes to nuzzle against him, trying to get on his good side.

This couldn't have been more surreal if they tried, Alexander had decided as Samantha, Kimber and Xavier were lead in by Cerberus, but then he shivered, stopped to consider why he was cold and damp (she was a cold-blooded snake, so he knew she'd run the hell out of his heater the whole time she was out there), and finally reached into his pocket to find out what was there that hadn't been before.  Finding rock-hard, frozen jelly beans? 

Fucking straw that broke the camel's back.

The look he fixed Samantha with, obviously realizing that she was to blame not only for the jelly beans, but for his current disheveled state, he just about lost it.  Otherwise, he probably wouldn't be throwing the damn candy at her, but he just...couldn't stop himself.  This was supposed to be his day off, the one day a week where he didn't spend all day literally awake and all night projecting (technically, his body slept, but his mind didn't), and he'd spent the entirety of it dealing with Samantha's company, this Midnight mess, being tortured and killed, then rushing out to do it again.  Jeremiah and especially Scarlet had done a number on him, then Cerberus had beat the snot out of him when he came in here, which didn't even include the stress and insanity of Justinian and Iloquil's reactions.  He was so over this day, and it wasn't even finished.  When he started pelting Samantha with the jelly beans, she was just lucky he didn't have a gun or something, but he managed to weaponize the candy well enough.

He wasn't surprised when Niall essentially took his side when he lost it, having the vaguest idea from what had been going on that the people here knew him well enough to understand that it was unusual for him to lose his temper, even if he didn't feel confident in knowing them that well.  "What?" he demanded, not sure what she expected him to do about Niall telling her off, especially since he thought she deserved it.  On some level, he realized that she must be over being entirely mad at him if she was screwing with him again, but it meant to him that keeping her away from his body while he was projecting was a good thing.  Thank god she hadn't had a sharpie. 

Xavier sure as hell wouldn't have stopped her if she'd had one, and though he was paying attention to Kimber and Verity as they played nice, he couldn't help noticing the two hunters being asses to each other.  This only confirmed how pissed he'd guessed Alexander was going to be about his trunk when he saw it, not to mention the fact that, if someone didn't get out there soonish, the battery would die.  Not sure who would come out to give him a jump right outside of Midnight.

Xavier was glad to accept leftovers, the ridiculous amount of healing his body was trying to do making him starving, but he didn't miss Samantha's snorting a jelly bean out of her nose (was she seriously female?  He'd never seen a woman do shit like that), or Derek's arrival.  Seemed the cat they were trading for was definitely worse for wear; the hunters were getting damaged goods, and if they thought they were offering Verity the same, they were waaaay wrong.  Xavier's ability to bounce back was pretty awesome.  He was hurting still and definitely slow, but getting to relax in the car with Kimber had been nice, and the guild's infirmary had treated him well.  Leftovers sounded awesome, but he did glance to Kimber to gauge her comfort level.  He certainly hadn't been planning on introducing her this way, but it worked, he supposed.  Verity was being absolutely charming and even Niall was friendly, trying to keep his mate from completely suffocating both of them between monitoring the Alex/Samantha situation and telling her off.

Xavier smirked at that, not surprised, but Niall didn't seem to give too many fucks about what she did if she stopped behaving like a child; he figured it was a good thing the man wasn't around actual children often. 

Unless you counted Verity's cats, which Niall sometimes did.  She seemed to collect them even more completely than Katya did sometimes - Kronos, Persephone, Xavier, now that leopard Darren, and now they had a snow leopard in the room that Niall personally would have preferred to keep.  If he didn't think that Alexander would tell him straight out that it wasn't his division, Niall would have offered to change the trade from Walsh for Xavier to Darren for Xavier; Darren's family would no doubt want to be assured of his safe return (they didn't have to know that he was already going to be safely returned and had mostly been well-treated), and having a snow leopard would likely make Verity rather happy.  He remembered Alexander being very...no nonsense, and usually fairly cold and calculating in his decisions.  He seemed less so as a human, but Niall wouldn't have been surprised if he stuck to whatever deal he was sent to take care of.

Beloved, we have another feline present who's a bit...unwell.  I would send him and the disgusting snake away, but I know how you like to entertain.  What would you prefer?

He may have been the master of the house, but in some situations, the mistress ruled.  Entertaining was one of those.

The shit Iloquil was trying?  It wasn't working.

Justinian was far too old to fall for the same tricks that might have worked when he was young and new, and this wasn't about something stupid and trivial that he might be willing to be 'convinced' to let go with her ample talents.  No, this was his best friend, his blood brother, of two thousand years.  This was the man that he'd trusted his life to since he was a mortal boy, who was now human.  He wasn't stupid enough to believe that she had nothing to do with it, and frankly?  If she'd been innocent of what he was accusing, she would have gotten angry.  That she was trying to appeal to him the way she was meant that she was guilty and she knew they both were aware of it.  He didn't budge.

"Oh, I'm certain I'm being more than reasonable, yet you're still not explaining what the fuck happened," he pointed out, voice still dangerously quiet and casual.  For all of the yelling they'd both done earlier, this was scarier for how quiet it was, though he broke his refusal to touch her when his hand whipped up to grab the wrist attached to the hand she'd pressed against his chest.  "Why did the voodoo man target Alexander, Iloquil?"

He asked because, as much as he disliked the bastard, he knew that Aristide didn't do anything to anyone unless he stood to gain, or it was vengeance.  He surely didn't have any deals involving removing Alexander from the gameboard, so Justinian could only assume that the man had been slighted.  That a human was so powerful as to make his slights such a big deal infuriated Justin, but there was little he could do.  He needed to know more about this so that he could find a way to fix it, preferably that didn't involve approaching Aristide himself.  Too dangerous.

 Well, his night had gone from bad to worse. Between Persephone practically peeing on him to establish dominance over Darren (how the fuck was he supposed to know the cat was spoken for?) and Katya/Verity at the damn dinner table...  He honestly thought that Verity would have encountered Katya sometime before now, but evidently the two didn't care for eachother. Or, Verity didn't care for Katya. Katya was only there because Raphael had asked her to. He'd wanted her to meet Niall and Verity, he just didn't realize how chock full of felines Midnight REALLY WAS until her car had arrived and pretty much every pet or otherwise feline servant in the entire establishment rushed their rooms to try and see what that wonderful smell was.

Now they all sat tensely in the theatre room watching the only DVD anyone could find - The Vampire Diaries.

"Doesn't that guy kind of look like you?" Darren asked, finding the time to actually speak to him between avoiding his gaze and giving him the death glare.

"As much as that guy looks like you," he replied. Darren turned back to the TV to find what could have easily been a relative on the screen, and muttered something to himself about people needing to get their own look. Katya was next to him, white-knuckled in the chair, while Persephone and Kronos played a game of slaps, totally uninterested in what was on the TV as soon as they realized that they didn't bring in "anything good".

Finally, Raphael said aloud what they were all wondering. "What do you think they're doing in there?"

Katya winced. "I don't know, but Justinian sure looked mad when he came in to get Iloquil." She could only imagine how mad someone would have to be for the three-plus thousand year old vampire to want to avoid their company. She looked critically at Raphael, then. "Why?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. This is boring. And uncomfortable. And I want to know what's going on."

"Not it," Kronos and Persephone said at the same time. They both had turned to look at him, and Persephone yelped as she took her attention away from Kronos for just long enough; he'd slapped her hand so hard that the noise practically echoed in the room.

"Fuck!" she yelled.

"Okay," Raphael said. "Fine." He turned to Darren and held his hand out in a fist atop his other, palm facing up. "Darren. On three."

Katya scooted next to them and held her hand out. "ON three or after three?" she asked.

"ON three," he said flatly.

 Well, they could all go fuck themselves as far as Samantha was concerned. As soon as she realized that nobody was in her corner, she started walking over to Derek, fully intending to just hoist him up over her shoulders and steal Alex's car. That fucker could find his own way back.

"Wait," Verity called after her; Samantha could hear high heels clicking on the cold, hard surface of the marble floor. She turned around, walking backwards as she did it.

"No, he told me to go, and honestly, I think I probably should. Wouldn't want to get myself into more trouble than I already have tonight," she said sharply.

"No, dear, you misunderstand. I intend to attend to your little... friend before he leaves. It seems as though you've brought me my own cat back in marginally better condition than I had initially expected. It's the least I could do." She smiled, and something flickered across her face that the rest of them didn't see due to her proximity and angle towards Samantha - once again, Verity phrased demands like requests, and Samantha swallowed as she realized that telling Verity no could probably end in more trouble than it was worth.

"Okay," she said slowly. She was quiet for a half-second, then said, "what leftovers?"

Verity smiled, though it seemed a little too glib to be anything good. "Through that door. Why don't you take Alexander with you? I'll tend to your friend personally," she sang.

We'll see just how loyal he is to them before he leaves, darling. Maybe Katya's ability will come in handy, after all. I could ensure that I'm still on Derek's little brain long after he's gone home and gone back to his menial life. He might even miss me. She glanced over her shoulder at Niall with a knowing smile, then knelt down next to the snow leopard. People tended to think Verity herself was a vampire instead of a Triste, simply because of her alignment, but it was only due to the fact that the most well-known Triste in the area was practically begging for the wood to build a cross with. Just because Verity wasn't a "good guy" didn't mean she lacked the abilities of a Triste, and those did include healing, as well as mental manipulation. She just didn't need to use them often; she was very good with her words and actions alone. To add her own mystic touch to a project was usually overkill, but in this situation? She found it was just right.

"Oh my, it seems he's passed out," she said, feigning alarm. "Cerberus, would you be a love and have him brought to the infirmary? I'll be in with him in just a moment." And with that, she returned to Xavier and Kimber, offering them each an arm as she lead them into the dining area. Whether Alexander and Samantha followed was their own problem, although she was certain that the snake would go, regardless of her partner. She seemed like, had she the metabolism of a normal human, she would be easily obese at best.

Such a pity. I do love Brazilian women.

 She looked shocked when he pressed on, demanding for her to tell him what had really happened, doubly so when he grabbed her wrist. After thousands of years, Iloquil could still be hurt physically by very few, and one of those people was the man who currently had her in a vise-like grip. She didn't want to tell him what really happened. She didn't even know, fully, what had really happened, so how could she explain? He squeezed her, as if to prompt her into action, and she pressed her lips together.

"He didn't target Alexander, he targeted me," she confessed finally. She'd heard people say that it felt good to get lies off of their chest, but since Iloquil was more afraid than anything else, it didn't feel good at all. She yanked her hand away from her mate in the brief second he hesitated at her admission, stepping away from him to put some space between them. If he was going to be mad, she didn't want to be close enough to get hit.

"It was my fault," she said firmly. "He stepped in and took my punishment because of - his loyalty to you, I assume? I didn't really get a chance to talk it over with him. All I was able to say was a quick, "No, don't!" and then I was alone." She paused. "I just didn't want to say anything because I was afraid you'd blame me for it, like I could have stopped him." Physically, maybe, but would she really take that gamble? Probably not. "I thought you'd leave me. And anyways, I had no reason to assume he was still alive. Aristide didn't say anything, he just accepted the offer of sacrifice and they were gone. How was I supposed to know he was still alive - and human? If I had, I'd have probably said something a lot sooner."

She sounded defensive, mostly because she was worried about her own ass here, so it would make sense. She knew she was in trouble, but she didn't really feel like she should be abandoned because of someone else's actions. "So now, you know. And you can be mad at me if you want, but I didn't make him take my place. If he wouldn't have, I'd be the human one with no memories - or worse. Either way, it was going to be bad for you."