Raphael strolled casually, one arm around each of his female wolf counterparts. So lovely, the two of them. Narkisa, bathed in Raphael's darkness, as always, tainted by it so much that she seemed almost a part of him, and yet separate. Delia, on the other hand, was still clinging to her own sense of self, desperately failing as with each passing day she fell more and more under Raphael's mental fog of fear and loathing. He spoke softly to them, his voice deep and murmuring, while each female listened intently to what he had to say, regardless of what the topic pertained to.
It was Delia first, whose attention strayed. She faltered in her steps, and stopped abruptly, nose up, inhaling deeply. "I smell... something. Something... strange." She continued to sniff in between verbal thoughts, and began to wander away from the pair when Raphael reached out, hooking a finger under the jeweled choker she was wearing - her collar, as it were. She yelped as she was snatched back to his side, and cowered next to him, like a dog.
"Get back here," he snarled. "I'm not in the mood, Delia."
It was then that Narkisa nuzzled his cheek lightly. "She speaks the truth, Master. I smell it, too." Her eyes were a wild, bright gold, dancing with hunger as she, too, had scented out what she could only describe as dinner.
Brennan had no way of knowing just how bad for him it was that Delia's attention had strayed from her master. Even if Raphael would have reined her in and they'd have moved on, he'd have been alright. His luck just wasn't going that well lately, obviously. First, the bad hunt with Crimson's human, and the hunter's lack of ability to even attempt setting bones, despite how badly he'd managed to make it hurt. They'd both healed together too quickly, before help could arrive, and even Avalon's best doctor hadn't been able to fix them.
That could explain why he was roaming around alone right then, since he'd ditched the rest of the flight for some 'alone time'. They'd given it to him, considering what he'd gone through, and he was grateful for it. He had a lot of thinking to do, particularly when he took note of Avalon's situation. As it was, she was stuck with an absolutely useless alistair. He couldn't remain as the Head of the Royal Flight, since he couldn't actually FLY, and by all rights, he might as well have been some normal human. What he'd really valued about being an avian was gone.
All gone.
He almost thought he knew what Amaltheia had felt like, jumping off that building. He wasn't quite ready for that, but he was getting there just thinking about how much of his life meant nothing right then. His wife, his livelihood, his queen, and even his family. He was worthless to all of them. None of them would have any use for him, for what would they need a human? They only cared about avians, and he was no longer among them. His mother had cried, and his father wasn't speaking to him. Nobody had taken it well, though they all seemed to forget who was taking it the hardest.
He really should have been paying more attention to where he was going.
He should have.
Narkisa had walked ahead, and had bumped his shoulder with her own, taking in the scent of bird as she turned behind him. "Terribly sorry," she said, but the shine in her golden eyes was quite... unfriendly, despite the empty hollow of her voice. She didn't seem to focus on Brennan as she spoke, but rather, the impending darkness behind him.
"What've we here?" Raphael mused to himself, his low, gravelly voice something akin to Christopher Walkin as he rubbed his chin thoughtfully, Delia still practically cowering at his side. "Shouldn't you be, I don't know... higher?" he asked Brennan, his brows raising with his question.
"I told you that I smelled him, I told you," Delia whined incessantly, squirming around in place. She yelped again as Raphael jerked her collar again, and alternated looking down at the ground and up at Brennan, her own eyes as yellow as Narkisa's.
Brennan could have ignored Narkisa bumping into him, and actually intended to. He didn't care if some woman ran into him, but it was her eyes that drew his own immediately back. One didn't rise to the position of Commander of the Royal Flight by being completely stupid. He knew another shifter when he saw one, and he knew an attacker. He would have faced her entirely had Raphael not spoken up right then and drawn his gaze momentarily.
Great, two more people. He was outnumbered.
Even better was taking in the way the man was treating the woman by his side. It rather effectively informed him of exactly what he was dealing with in just a few instants. The second girl had the same golden eyes as the first, and she was talking about scent. That made him instantly think 'wolf', and that she'd even need to TELL the man that she'd smelled him, like he hadn't believed her, made it clear that the man wasn't. From the looks of it, he was in charge, and Brennan knew enough about the supernatural world to know what that meant.
"Perhaps," he answered stiffly, and that was all Raphael was getting for an answer. He stood straight, his expression guarded, and he was paying very close attention to Narkisa. She had too much of what he'd have considered a strategic position to make her anything less than a threat. They were limiting his movement, his escape routes, and since he couldn't go up anymore, that was a bad sign. He still had his guns, though.
Narkisa leaned against the brick of the building, looking at her nails lazily. She tossed her long, dark hair back and glanced at Brennan, brows raised. "Master, you shouldn't taunt him. He might fly away, and then we won't have anything to do," she said, her voice lowering an octave, emoting depression. It was funny how realistic it could sound, but if you knew Narkisa, you knew she was lying through her teeth. She didn't feel emotions, she just imitated the sounds and expressions of them to manipulate the things around her, precisely as Raphael had taught her to.
Raphael regarded Brennan with an amused expression, and the vampire continued his stride towards the raven, wondering precisely when he would take his turn to shift and fly away. Raphael did fancy himself a black bird now and again, but he didn't know if he liked one so bold. "Perhaps?" he asked. He took it upon himself to simply reach into the bird's mind and take the information as to why he spoke so boldly for himself, and almost chuckled as he came across Brennan's mental shields. They would have been much trouble for a younger or even inexperienced vampire, but after a few moments of working, and plainly making it obvious that he was doing it, he plucked out what he wanted.
"Feels like someone's picking you up and shaking you around, or so I've been told by the people who have tried to resist me," he offered glibly with a smile, sorting through the information he'd just acquired. "So, Brennan. Can't perform anymore, eh? Have you told the missus yet, or is she just to find out her husband has gone lame of her own accord?"
Raphael really went right for the throat.
Oh, how he wished he could just fly away like the creepier of the two women said. He'd have preferred it, and probably done so already, if he could have. That didn't mean he had to let them know that he couldn't, though. She seemed upset enough about the idea of them not having anything to do, though he wasn't much of an expert on emotions and expressions. He kept his own to himself, so what would he know of others?
He made it a point not to back off as the man he believed to be a vampire approached him, aware that just about all he had right then was his nerve and a few weapons. Not much against two wolves and a maybe-vampire.
Nope, definitely a vampire.
There was no doubt in his mind as to what Raphael was the instant he busted into Brennan's mind, and that violent disorientation and almost-pain was what brought his hand to his forehead so suddenly. He glared the instant he had his wits about him again, mostly because of the comment, but the violent intrusion was up there for reasons. He'd officially met his least favorite person. "That's hardly any of your business, especially without even an attempt at a polite introduction. You know my name, so who are you?"
Maybe he just didn't care, but even so, his rudeness only went so far. Brennan, no matter what happened, just wasn't going to top the list of loud, nasty people in the city. Haughty and proud, though. Those were more like it.
Raphael paused. "Please allow me to introduce myself," he said. He bowed slightly, and then the smile that crept across his face was one that put the other discomforting looks to shame. Raphael was downright creepu that's what, that and the fact that his introduction was a prelude to 'Sympathy for the Devil' might've had something to do with his dark, unnerving aura. "Raphael Aristos. This charming git is Delia, and that vision of perfection is Narkisa."
Narkisa inclined her head only slightly, while Delia giggled maniacally. She truly was beginning to lose her marbles, turning into some sort of jackal moreso than a wolf.
"I admit, I've been looking to procure a shifter of the... avian persuasion for quite some time, but I believe I would prefer one whose wings weren't clipped just yet." He jeered at Brennan again, unwilling to match the alistair's cordial, reserved nature. Raphael personally had wanted for a long time to break an avian reserve, but the fact that this one was so well trained, well.. Lady Luck had smiled on him, after all.
"Tell me, Little Raven," he said, his voice starting to become... strange. He had picked the nickname effortlessly from Brennan's mind, though he didn't know who called him that or why, just that it was familiar. "What brings you out tonight?"
He was aiming to press on his mind, to see if he could ruffle his feathers, so to speak. He didn't want the man into a full blown panic attack, not yet.
This whole situation was surreal. Brennan, despite living in a sheltered life amongst the avians being raised specifically for the purpose he was completely useless for right then, knew enough about modern human society to recognize that line. It wasn't encouraging.
Neither was Delia's maniacal laughter. Between Raphael's attitude, Narkisa's coldness, and Delia's insanity, even Brennan was starting to get creeped out, and he was pretty good about not letting weird shit mess with him. "How unfortunate for you, then," he returned, rather...insulted just by the suggestion that if his wings were whole, Raphael would have done anything to 'procure' him. Hardly.
Of course, the 'Little Raven' thing threw him off, and that actually showed for a moment. He shouldn't have been surprised, considering Raphael had torn the other things from his brain, but that seemed...different. Theia was already such a strange part of his recent life that having her quoted here just made it all that much more surreal.
Cue Raphael's weird-ass power.
Brennan didn't know it, but his training was what was saving him. That and his stubbornness coupled with the outrage still swimming around his brain at having the facts regarding his situation torn from his mind. That didn't make him immune, but it meant he wasn't a quivering mess. He flinched, but he recovered quickly, still standing straight and proud. He wasn't going to just fall apart for some vampire's amusement.
"That's also none of your business, Mr. Aristos. I actually don't intend to waste anymore of your time, so if you'll excuse me," he said, and he meant to leave. It wasn't like he thought he'd just be allowed to, but he wasn't just going to stand there like an idiot.
Upon Brennan taking his leave, Narkisa stiffened, and moved to stand directly behind Brennan, so that when he did turn, he'd be turning into her. Delia, in the meantime, was alternating between a fixed gaze on Raphael and one on Brennan, something she was having a hard time keeping up with. She twitched a little as Raphael used some of his power. She'd learned well that tone of voice, and it sent fear through every ounce of her being, even if it wasn't her he was directing it at. Narkisa didn't flinch, only watched.
"I think it is," Raphael said. He stepped forward, invading, literally, Brennan's personal space. He'd walk him backwards directly into Narkisa if Brennan didn't sidestep, which he wasn't sure if he would do or not. "Tell me, alistair, what is it that keeps you up at night? What tugs at the back of your mind when you're alone? What scares you?"
Brennan almost FELT the movement behind him, being both a bird and a warrior, and made it a point NOT to back into the wolf who'd stepped up behind him. Not a good idea, as far as he was concerned. Of course, none of this was a good idea. Delia's twitching was starting to be rather easily explained.
They were trapping him. He made it a point not to let his eyes flick about too much, nothing to let them know that he was nervous at the fact that he couldn't just shift and fly away. He wanted to, and he wasn't used to not being able to, and it was making him feel more panicky than anything they were even attempting to do. He wanted to FLY. This wasn't a fight he wanted!
Staying still wasn't an option, and backing up wasn't, so he did all he could. He shot to the side, quicker than he'd have liked if he were trying to make it obvious that he wasn't afraid (which he was starting to be), but that didn't matter. He needed distance, so the vampire and the wolves couldn't rush him before he could use a gun. He didn't answer, and merely because nothing he could have said would have sounded convincing, he wasn't going to name something incorrect, and he wasn't going to tell the truth. Hell, the fact that part of his nightmare had already come true didn't help. He didn't need all of it.
Narkisa, even with all of the desire to rip his face off, stood still as he darted past her - simply because she had not been ordered to do otherwise. Delia was rabid, however, and furry claws dug at the wall she was closest to, while her jaw re-fixed itself from lupine to human to lupine to human again. Truly, she was mad, and it only took the release of the collar for her to drop to the disgusting, wet ground and completely shift. She ran in feverish circles, sniffing and starting, making strange, guttural noises as she begged to be let after the prey.
Raphael finally conceded after he'd slowly counted to five, and Delia took off after the bird. Narkisa turned to Raphael, a brow raised. "So it's true what they say about avians," she said. Her tone was bored, but cordial.
"Maybe," Raphael acknowledged, extending an arm for his dark wolf to take hold of. "Maybe, but it won't matter when our rabid counterpart finds him in a few moments. Do you think it was wrong of me to starve her?" he asked, a hint of humour in his voice. Even without the power of fear laced within, the sound itself of his bassy tone was still nerve-wracking.
Narkisa shrugged. "She did not obey," she said simply.
She could smell him, oh, but he smelled like fear and sweat and bothersome feathers, so many feathers, clogging her nose, but they were useless now. She was on his scent, on the trail, on the prowl, tongue hanging out of her mouth as she practically foamed, snout buried to the pavement before she stopped, giving way to her hearing.
One ear fell down while the other perked up, and then they both perked, facing forward, as the red wolf tried to listen to her prey. She hadn't eaten in so long, so very long, she had almost forgotten what it was like, that first taste of flesh. She picked up an unfamiliar noise to her right, and broke into a run again, making menacing, mangy growing noises in her throat as she moved.
Brennan didn't think any of this was funny. Not one SECOND of it, and he actually hadn't intended to run until the crazy woman shifted and started freaking out. The instant she was after him was the instant he bolted. He wasn't stupid. He might not have shrieked in terror or anything like a human might have, but he wasn't sticking around for that, and he was definitely scared of having those teeth sinking into him. Teeth were not good.
Neither was the fact that he couldn't outrun a rabid wolf, to be honest. Even as he ran, he was drawing a gun to protect himself with, and it was only when he could put a dumpster to his back that he twisted around to fire at her. He didn't miss often, especially when it mattered and he had an ounce of concentration, and he actually twisted away from the dumpster he'd landed with his back against, slipping around the side of it in case she decided to impact it. He wasn't getting crushed and caught that way.
Keep moving...
Moving would keep him alive, so long as he could manage it. Stay away from the teeth, and move. Keep shooting.
Good plan. Too bad it'd never work flawlessly.
Delia leaped, and was immediately knocked out of the air, by a loud sound. It nearly made her go deaf, and she lay on the ground for a second, before the burning sensation started around her side. She couldn't process what it was, like a bee sting, only much more intense, and from.. the inside! It hurt, and she howled angrily, making the most god-awful racket as she spun around, trying to nose at the wound, which was profusely bleeding already.
From behind the dumpster, noise, and she forgot her purpose for a moment. She laid her ears back against her head and curled her lips back in a snarl. As she came across the side of the dumpster, she saw Brennan's gun facing her, and without a second thought, jumped again, this time not for his body, but rather, his arm. Another round was fired off, but Delia managed to bring too much movement, and the bullet whizzed past her, singing some of the fur on her back as it buried itself into a crack of the pavement.
Teeth sank down into warm flesh, spilling blood outward, across her jaws. Yellow eyes danced with fire as she clamped down, delivering 1500 pounds of pressure per square inch. She shook her head furiously, trying her hardest to get him to release the gun. The blood was metallic and red, and it tasted like happiness to Delia, like familiarity, like life. Like survival. Like obedience. She yanked on Brennan hard, throwing her weight opposite his own. She'd either rip his arm off or throw him down on the ground, but either way, she wasn't going to let go without taking the arm with her.
Her fur had begun to mat profusely against her side as dark, viscous blood seeped from her own wound. The bullet had grazed something vital, at least. If Brennan could manage to stave her off, he might survive.
When Raphael heard the gunshots, he paused. "Methinks our little Delia has bitten off more than she can chew," he said slowly. At Narkisa's motion to shift, he stayed her, taking her by the shoulder harshly. "No. She either will or she will not, but interfere now and I'll never know if my training has paid off."
He had a few instants to consider just how bad being bitten by those snarling jaws would be before she was on him, and he hadn't done the feeling any justice. It HURT like nothing he'd ever felt before, but even worse was that it didn't for the first few seconds. At first, it was just a huge pressure, and then the pain came with the blood, and he actually screamed. It was a pained, but seriously pissed off, cry and something which had been accompanied by the second gunshot. There would have been a third if she hadn't been trying to diligently to tear his arm off, and he certainly wasn't interested in obliging her. Holding onto the weapon with his muscles being torn into wasn't working out for him, though. He tried, but she finally jerked just right, and the weapon dropped even as his body started to fall.
He had another gun and another hand, and even after impacting the ground to avoid having his arm ripped out of its socket wasn't going to stop him from getting to the second firearm. Better than she chew on his arm than his throat, anyway.
Other than that scream, he didn't make a single sound more than a few sharp breaths.
There was something to be said about the sound of a scream being music to Delia's ears, and that probably spoke volumes of the amount of time in close quarters she had spent with Raphael and Narkisa as of late. When Brennan dropped to the ground, she released his arm intending to bite him square in the face, but another gunshot caused her to yelp. He'd gotten her square in the chest that time.
She was bleeding on him as much as he was bleeding on the concrete they were both atop, but still, she couldn't cease until she had won. She lunged at his throat, though her strength was severely diminished. She missed, and took a huge bite down onto his collar bone, jaws easily crushing more of the delicate avian structure. She worried at it furiously, growling and making strange, disgusting sounds as she dug at him with her massive clawed paws.
She began to feel light, though, like she were lifting off of the ground. The blood loss was getting to her, even as a shifter, so many injuries at close quarters could not be so easily healed. The biting grew less and less, and her breathing more laboured, before finally, she just sort of gave up, and rolled off of him, burying her nose and whining as she found it increasingly harder to sustain consciousness.
That was, of course, when Raphael and Narkisa rounded the corner. "Hm," the vampire said to himself. "It seems you've injured my pet." He knelt down, wrapping an arm around Delia. He couldn't push her back into her human form, but he could still move between locations with her like this. Narkisa came to his side again, wrapping her hand around one of his.
"Let's hope you bleed to death," he said, with a bright, cheerful sort of smile. And with that, the vampire and both of the female shifters had vanished.
He couldn't breathe.
That was the first thought that really stuck, even though he was thrilled at the realization that the last shot he took actually hit its mark, and horrified when she kept on attacking. It was the sudden lack of air that really hit him, though. It was like the pain and the location, the way his collarbone was just being destroyed, that really stole the breath right from his lungs. He couldn't even scream, not if he tried, and focusing enough to shoot the wolf was suddenly out of the question. He struck at her head and body with his left hand, which coincidentally ended with him pistol-whipping her a few times, but it wasn't like he was hitting all that hard by that point. His eyes were wide and he was obviously in agony, so the fact that he just laid there and tried to suck in as much air as he could when she fell away from him shouldn't have been a surprise.
That he didn't have a response for Raphael's 'cheery' smile and parting comment shouldn't have, either. Raphael looked as though he was going to get his way, though the former commander of the Royal Flight had to at least make an attempt at helping himself, even if the first one was a rather useless moving of his arms. He managed to pull them both up, even though the right one wasn't cooperating, and nearly lost consciousness when he attempted to push his own collarbone into something resembling its proper place. He wasn't going to fix it himself, but he was going to try to put pressure on it. It was bleeding far too much, and he didn't WANT to bleed to death. Or at least, he didn't want to right then.
In another moment or so, he wouldn't care.
"Father, I firmly do believe -- I know -- for Death who comes for me," Theia quietly whispered the Edgar Allen Poe piece to herself, fingers rolling the black feather back and forth, index and thumb, back and forth, like a good luck charm. It was true, she had felt badly at first about chasing off Brennan, her Little Raven, but he would never understand the way that her Falcon mind worked, even if it was trapped in such a disgusting, mortal shell. Her heartstrings had been tugged, but not in a traditional sense - more of, nobody had ever, in thousands of years, even noticed her - and then her Little Raven had saved her life. Well, what was left of it.
She whispered her poem softly to herself, shrugging the soft white fabric of her jacket close to her skin. She didn't find the weather particularly warm these nights, not as warm as the White City. She had almost completely passed the alley where Brennan lay by, but the scent of blood, thick even to her human nose, reeked in the air, hanging like a curse, an infection, polluting the stagnant air around it. It smelled of bile and garbage and copper, and it was a scent that Aleya knew as much as Amaltheia.
Trembling now, because Theia had nothing to defend herself with, she slunk into the mouth of the alley. "Hello?" she called softly. "Is anyone down here?" she whispered. She felt the pressing sensation of Death lingering close by, and felt it as His robes brushed by her, so softly, so familiar.
"I c-can call for help," she peeped, louder now, but still not enough.
Something dark caught her mismatched eyes, and she moved slowly, behind Death, but just by a pace. Her eyes began to focus, fully encompass the scene before her. Crushed bones, blood, flesh. Ligament was torn and strewn, and an arm once sleeved was bare, hanging uselessly at an awkward angle against a shoulder long-since crushed. It looked like the body had been attacked by wild dogs.
Death crossed her path, but not before Theia realized.
"Little Raven?" she said softly. She held a hand up, uselessly, reaching for Death - but He did not stop for her, just as she, trapped in her shell, did not stop for him in all this time.
Finally, she broke the silence, fully understanding the vision before her. "BRENNAN, NO!" Her voice was shrill and alien against even her human vocal cords - the split, ear-piercing shriek that was laced with dead magics ripped through the alley, nearly taking her own sanity with it. The feather floated silently to the ground, landing in a pool of blood, as Theia screamed hysterically, each cry more violent than the next.
Perhaps it was luck, or maybe destiny, that Brennan had been attacked close enough to the Mojo Lounge that Papa Aristide himself could feel the magical reverberations of Amaltheia's shrieking. Normally, he didn't bother to venture out of the Lounge itself for trivial matters, but when his curiosity was piqued, that was an entirely different story, and happened to explain why he was to be found stepping out the back door and into the alley beyond. A man that had spent the day tending bar for him, a rather new employee actually, knew enough of his habits to spare him a glance as he left the building from his place on the opposite end of the kitchen, but didn't comment. Why should he? He'd have to be very foolish indeed to question this boss' actions.
Besides, if he was going to question something such as this, he'd NEVER get involved in the activities in the back rooms, and he was there because he thought he wanted to.
Some new mortal's reasons for entering his realm aside, he turned his attention to the alley. He could practically feel the strangeness of the shrieker's magic, and the elemental bound to him felt much like it was stretching and practically purring just at the thought of it. This was something new, something interesting. He followed it, and was neither surprised nor bored to find the Death's shadow swooping in upon a prone figure, and it took mere seconds for the body's racing heart to slow and stop, and the labored breaths to falter. The bloodied man was gone, that much was obvious, and no amount of screaming would help him. Really, nothing should have been able to help him, but one thing in this equation might change that.
This was Papa Aristide they were dealing with.
"He's gone, child," he told her, his rumbling bass somehow sounding far gentler than should have been possible, but there was still an edge to his presence that would never be entirely gentle.
Amaltheia was still shrouded over Brennan's body, her throat aching, bleeding, as she tried and tried to raise him. "Come back! Come back, do you hear me? Empress, please, bring him back!" she cried, burying her face into her hands. Amaltheia in the many centuries she'd been bound to this form had never allowed her emotions to swallow her alive like this. She could almost feel the Betrayal all over again, the sentencing, the stripping of her power - it felt like Death. Like this.
When Aristide spoke behind her, as gentle as his voice may have been, it gave Theia no comfort, no solace. She turned to him sharply, one blue eye and one brown eye wild and wide, full of fear and loathing. "I can't fix this," she wailed. She could have, before. As a Falcon, she danced in the stars, and weaved songs of life and death, saying who lives, who dies, all for Her Favour. No more, though. She was tongue-tied and twisted, just an earth-bound misfit.
"I can't fix this," she whispered again. She pulled the remnants of Brennan towards her, cradling his head into her lap, and sitting down in the muck next to him. "I can't fix this," she whispered again, closing her eyes. She couldn't even feel his warmth anymore. It was gone.
The whole show was intriguing to watch, particularly so much emotion swirling in that transparent ghost of power. It was strange, something he knew he'd never seen before, there and yet not. It made very little sense right up until she turned to face him, and her eye gave her away.
Yes, eye. Just the one.
It may have seemed callous, particularly when she was in so much pain, but the voodoo man couldn't help himself. He suddenly began to laugh, the whole situation suddenly falling into place so perfectly that he could do nothing more than laugh at the realization. She was a falcon, so the magic was hers, but it had to be bound. That would be why one eye was normal, and why her power seemed so transparent. It was there, still a part of her, but impossible for her to access.
For HER to access.
"You can't, petite blanc, but you don' need to. Ah can fix it, if you like me to, an' you will owe me," he told her, cutting right to the chase, for once. She didn't seem to have the ability to follow a long speech right then, and he was eager to play around in the real magic, if the ghost of it was so pleasant.
New toys were always fun, as were new favors.
She couldn't understand why he was laughing at her so madly, like a wolf howling at the moon, especially at a time like this. If she could still sing the dark magic she'd have woven a net around him to trap him in misery for eternity, but alas, Aleya was gone and this shell of her memory was here to stay - mortal, yet not, and powerless to Death as he stole away with her only friend, her Little Raven.
It was awkward that Theia even considered Brennan a friend, but he had been the only being to ever show her an ounce of emotion, oddly enough for his avian training, and that meant worlds to her.
It wasn't until Aristide boasted that he could fix Brennan than did Theia begin listening again. "Yes," she said without thinking. "Yes, fix him now," she demanded. It was after that when 'petite blanc' struck her as odd, and... she knew the meaning of the words, yes, but why did it bother her so? A chill went up her spine, but she couldn't concentrate on that now.
"If you can fix him, do it. I'll give you whatever you want," she said hurriedly. She didn't know that offering Aristide 'whatever he wanted' encompassed a whole hell of a lot.
Whatever he wanted? Amazing. Nobody ever understood just what that meant when it was time to pay up. Delightful for Aristide, who didn't care why she wanted this done, or what she thought she was getting, but would do it anyway. Eventually, someone might actually think to put restrictions on what they were purchasing with the promise of their favor, but not this time. He liked the freedom in it, and didn't stop to wonder if she would.
"Take off your coat," he told her, stepping forward to take it as soon as she obeyed, and he took a quick glance over the dead man laying before them. His elemental was telling him it had been a shifter, which was a shame, since that was likely to get a bit...addled. No matter, since Aristide would replace it with something better. He'd make the job he did worth the favor he'd later take. Well worth it.
This wasn't going to be easy, however. He didn't have any of his supplies with him, and he wasn't going to take the time to go get them when the body was already cooling. If the man was dead too long, it'd be too much work to be worth it. He'd just have to manage, and bent to dab his fingers in the still-warm blood caused by the man's wounds. He drew a circle around them in the blood, then laid the coat over the body and gestured Amaltheia to a kneeling position inside the circle.
"Dis won' feel good," he warned her, giving her a final chance to back out, even as his elemental began pacing about and his own power started to reach out.
Amaltheia dropped her coat to ground as he commanded, and hugged herself in the cold. She hated the cold sometimes, and right now was one of those times. She was ushered to her position in the circle, and placed her hands in her lap without knowing what she was supposed to be doing. She could feel the hum of power, and she knew that she had gotten in over her head when she realized that as a mortal she could sense the power, but there was nothing left to do about it, because Brennan's life was more important than whatever consequences she'd deal with later. Let's face it, she's pretty sure she's dealt with worse.
When Aristide warned her that it wouldn't feel good, she had already been preparing herself for something, though she wasn't sure what. She had never anticipated, however, that she would ever feel a pain like the one when she'd been bound - it had hurt worse than any physical pain they could have employed on her. No weapon a Falcon could wield was so great as the magic to strip the power of another.
Amaltheia clapped her hands to her mouth as she tried not to scream, not wanting to expose herself. Her scream was shrill against her sweaty palms, and sounded very different, almost... bird-like. Her muscles spasmed, and she felt herself begin to convulse, and tried desperately to regain control. She felt disconnected from her mortal body, though, somehow detached, like she was floating further and further away from it. She realized that she could see everything around her, even herself, as she looked back down below. Her body had rolled its eyes into the back of its head and had fallen limp, rocking to its side and rendered almost into the fetal position.
She couldn't seem to muster any conscious thoughts, but before she had time to even attempt to try, she felt herself being slammed downward at a rapid rate of speed. Everything went white, than red, and then finally black.
With the warmth of his own power and the elemental's magic sweeping around him, Aristide didn't even notice the cold. Why should he, when his own power was of life and the flesh? He dealt in death and cold things when necessary, but there was no escaping the facts of the situation. That was fine with him, especially now. It'd serve him well.
No falcon magic could fix this, not with their power lying in stillness and death, but that didn't change the fact that Amaltheia had a rather impressive build-up of power dammed inside of her. If he could free that, which he knew he could, then he could tap it and twist it to his own purposes. With his own power already raised and swirling around him, he thrust both of his hands straight into her back. There was a shudder and some smoke in the air between them, but no blood. This wasn't a typical motion, and the flesh and bone beneath him accepted his presence without resistance. It had to hurt, but he didn't care. He was speaking under his breath, though the words were lost on the strands of power spinning around them. He pulled from within Amaltheia rather suddenly and violently in a metaphysical manner, snapping the bindings within her and freeing the power that had waited so long for him to tug at it. It swept into and over him in a tidal wave, and he took all he possibly could before putting a stopper on the rest, leaving about half of it to Amaltheia herself even as her body dropped.
To anyone who could read auras, Aristide would have practically been glowing there was so much power rushing around, and he stood over the fallen woman's body for a moment, eyes closed, without seeming to do a thing at all. Really, he was focused inward, sweeping the falcon magic through his own power, mixing and twisted them together to both strengthen his own and warm the falcon magic with the power of life and flesh. His own elemental had rushed him as well once the falcon magic had been freed, and that only helped. Ignoring the fallen woman, he knelt beside the dead raven and did something rather similar to start. He set one hand right over the man's heart, his fingers clenching and actually digging right into the body much like what he'd done with Amaltheia, and thrust downward with that magic to practically ignite the organ that was so very essential to life. The body arched up towards him and he continued feeding magic through it even as it became clear that the man's current form couldn't sustain what it was being given. The eyes shot open, their darkness being completely overtaken by the magic surging through the body, the mouth opened in what appeared to be a silent scream, and the voodoo man didn't let up. He was waiting for something in particular.
Ah, there they were. He had no intention of forcing a newly alive shifter into a different form, but wings were necessary. Only when they burst from the body's back was he satisfied with what he'd done. Just as suddenly as it had all begun, he withdrew, drawing the rest of the power that was swirling about back within himself, then forcing it downward, towards the ground to calm it all. Once he was certain that no harm was going to come of it, he stepped outside of the bloody circle, leaving Amaltheia and Brennan to recover on their own.
"Good luck. We'll speak again."
As Aristide pulled out, the ghostly skeletal structure of wings plumed from her back. They looked like hazy white sketches as she fell forward, screaming, angry and in pain, confused as to why she was not left to her dark shell that she had found only moments prior when she'd lost consciousness. As the power cascaded down on top of her, crushingly close, her screams were robbed by the utter silence the magic brought, causing her to choke in breath and cease her sound. No longer so occupied on attentions of Aristide, she folded a wing experimentally towards herself, reaching up as she bowed it over her head, almost sculpted in her pose.
Feathers the colours of snow and ice bent towards her, the ends dusted with an indigo hue, a shade so perfectly vivid it looked as though it had been snatched out of a rainbow just for her. She ran her fingers across the feathers slowly, shaking, afraid that the illusion might disappear, but she felt sensation on the tips of her digits, and suddenly knew that she wasn't dreaming.
She pushed herself to her feet with a grunt, and wavering, turned to Brennan's body, still unsure of what was happening. She could feel the strange song that death sang looming so closely, but getting fainter, and fainter still - it was replaced with a thunderous sound, a heartbeat. She dropped back down to her knees, still unable to walk fully, and crawled to Brennan's side, before she shrank back in surprise.
He.. but it couldn't be.. His wings were as black as pitch, the ends streaked with violet just as hers indigo. His skin was pallid, but living - his chest bloodied but rising and falling.
"Brennan," she stammered finally. She reached out slowly at his motionless figure, afraid he was in some sort of trance. "Brennan... your eyes," she whispered. Theia didn't realize her own were the same brilliant hues now, no longer one holding the mongrel trace of mortality to it - both of them as rich and blue as the edges of her feathers.
Brennan was...either extremely calm or so completely panicked that he couldn't even function, because he didn't even move as Aristide withdrew. His first waking moments had consisted of such overwhelming sensations that he'd thought he was going to die all over again (even if he wasn't really aware that he'd died to begin with), and now he was slowly coming down from the rush of it all. He didn't know what to do, other than just lay there, eyes wide, and catch his breath.
He hurt, he suddenly realized, all over the place. It was understandable where he'd been hurt, because wasn't he bleeding everywhere? That werewolf had torn him up, so he SHOULD hurt, but...it wasn't quite bad enough. He felt strangely well, and just plain strange all around.
His eyes flicked to Amaltheia when she said he name, locking on hers even as she mentioned his, and he didn't get it. He had NO IDEA what was going on, but he could see that her eyes were no longer two different colors, and how could he EVER miss the fact that she had her wings back?
How fitting, that he'd lose his, and she'd regain hers. Of course, he didn't yet know that they'd both benefited from the voodoo man's ritual. Even as he pulled himself off the ground with a groan, rubbing at his face with a bloodied up hand, he didn't know. He felt like his brain was in a fog, just returning from somewhere that he didn't know, and it'd take a few moments before he was altogether 'there'. He'd need that time to register what was going on. It still hadn't occurred to him what had happened.
"My...eyes? What...?" Even the words came out hoarse, which should have been expected. He'd been healed, but he HAD just suffered his collarbone and throat being torn up.
"Your eyes. Brennan, your eyes," she hissed, unable to believe what was in front of her. She had no mirror, nothing to show him with, nothing to try and explain what she could possibly be seeing. "Your wings," she said, reaching behind his head to brush them lightly. "Brennan... "
She trailed off. She didn't even know what to say. The buzz that she'd felt for what seemed like an eternity was suddenly gone - her mortality was gone. She could feel only the low, soft lullaby that her power brought - the song of silence, of stillness, a sensation like gravity, one that could pull you in if you listened too closely. She covered her face for a moment, breathing slowly, trying to pull herself out of the stream of the dead, that alluring symphony that could wash over your mind until nothing was left. She looked back up at him.
"Falcon," she said finally.
She was talking about his eyes again, and he had no idea what she meant. What was wrong with his eyes? He obviously couldn't see them, since there wasn't anything with a reflective surface present (and both of his guns were so bloodied up that there was no way of using them), but whatever was wrong with them, it sounded urgent. Until she mentioned his wings.
His wings were gone.
Weren't they? She reached behind him, brushed against them. Brushed against his wings.
His head jerked around to look behind him as well as he could, and it was well enough. He could see them, black and more glorious than he'd ever remembered, but they weren't his. They just weren't. The violet, that wasn't the way they were supposed to be. He swept one around him to touch it, see if it was really there, and it was. It wasn't right, though.
"Falcon?" he repeated, and he stared at her with eyes that shouldn't have been his, stained with what had just happened, all disbelief. "No! Raven! I'm a raven! What happened, what's going on?" he demanded, releasing the stained black feathers as though they were undesirable, and trying to pull himself to his feet. He had to scramble closer to the wall in order to stand, but he managed it within a few tries and a head-rush. It made him dizzy for an instant, which really only seemed fitting. His whole world felt upside down.
Theia grew angry for an instant when he rejected what she was saying, and rose slowly, trembling, following after him. She was a natural Falcon by birth, and so she had a restricted control over her magic, even in the newness of it all. She was familiar with it, and glad to have it back, the silence twining 'round her fingertips like vines, the lullaby of the darkness swelling around her.
"Brennan, you need to calm down," she said, pressing forward with what little power she dared use. She meant only to try and stay his wandering mind while he tried to grasp all this, though she was still a little irritated that he would behave so... ridiculously about this.
"Not raven, Brennan. Falcon. I don't know how, or why, but you are a Falcon, just like I am a Falcon. Look, do you see?" she asked, approaching him, fanning her wings out. She looked almost angelic for but a brief moment, and it was apparent that the old, depressing Theia was gone for good. She looked back at him, eyes sparkling and so alive. Slowly, she rose a hand to his face, to catch his gaze.
"Don't you feel it?" she whispered, unwilling to accept that he didn't want this. He couldn't possibly not. Anyone, avian or otherwise, would be stark raving mad to reject this most precious magic.
Calm down? He felt like he was stark raving mad at this point, but somehow through it all, he could think again. Why? He once more turned his now violet eyes on her, and he understood. She was right, he could feel it, and she was using whatever 'it' was to calm him. She was allowing him the ability to actually think, and it was both blessing and curse.
She was right, no matter what he wanted, she was right. He could see her wings, and though he hadn't taken quite the look at his as he had hers, he knew they were different, but the same. They weren't raven wings, not anymore. They weren't his, but they were. He'd lost his, and been given new ones. Better ones, if he was to believe Amaltheia and her obvious happiness on the matter.
What had he lost in return, though?
The Avians didn't get along with the Falcons. His people didn't get along with falcons, and there was Avalon to consider. How could she rule her people with him by her side? Would she even consider it?
Had he really lost everything, only to be given a whole new chance and lose it all again? Could fate be that cruel to him? "Avalon, I have to speak to her," he said suddenly, not answering Amaltheia's questions or considering the fact that going to Avalon like he was would be a certain disaster. Drenched in both his own blood and the wolf's, violet-eyed and with wings that shouldn't have been him, he was a wreck just physically. The mental effects of the entire situation had barely had time to touch at him before Amaltheia calmed him.
"Are you sure you shouldn't get your bearings first, little Falcon?" she asked, considering how his Tuuli Thea may react to his new... everything. She took a step back from him, stretching her wings out, and oh it felt so nice, like she had retrieved lost time. Time was a strange thing to feel, but it was a most precious gift, much like her magic, and Theia wasn't interested in losing either one now, especially now that there were very little who could stop her, save that strange man from before.
"Oh," she said quietly. She had suddenly remembered telling Aristide she would do anything he wanted to save Brennan. "Oh...." she said again, and sat down suddenly. What would happen, now? She needed to find out, once she could clean up.
Little Falcon.
At least Amaltheia couldn't read his thoughts, since they plummeted again just at the change in her 'nickname' for him. She didn't want to know that he didn't really appreciate the change the way she did, that he would have preferred the familiar, what he loved, in place of this.
It seemed to occur to him at the same time as Amaltheia's promise of a favor had that he'd actually died. Or at least, he thought he had. He blinked suddenly, eyes shooting back up to her, and her suggestion that he get his bearings first made so much more sense. So did the blood, and as he looked down, the tears in the shirt he was wearing. He only had to tug it away from his body, feeling the way the fibers stuck to his skin, to see the darker blood surrounding the shreds that remained over one shoulder, towards his...
collar bone. He remembered that, and actually wavered some just thinking about it all. He remembered in perfect clarity. He hadn't been able to breathe, and so much cold had just descended upon him, even as he heard Amaltheia's voice ringing through the alley. He'd thought he was dying and just remembering random sounds, but now he understood that she'd been there in those last seconds. She'd been there just as much as the cold that had swept up over him, and now? Now, that man was still dead, and in his place was some new...thing. He wouldn't even consider himself a falcon, not yet, anyway.
"I died. She killed me," he murmured, completely in his own thoughts even as Amaltheia sank to the ground.
She ran shaky hands through her hair. Her calm demeanor began to slowly wash over her again, something she'd missed so much previously, but now relished. Aleya was back, alive and well, and this time, there was no Empress to take her away again - or at least, she'd live like that as long as she could, serving none but herself until the day came where she would be put on the stake again and burned.
"Where do we go from here?" she asked finally, looking back up at Brennan. He didn't seem to understand how beautiful he'd become. He was a Dark Falcon, something that never would have occurred in the natural order of things. Feathers black as pitch, eyes as dark as twilight - on the island he'd have been cast out, bound or confined, depending on the level of power he held. Falcons cherished children, true, but they would never have tolerated such a... an anomaly, or not that Theia could imagine. Still, he was, to her, more beautiful than even Alia and Aeson. At the thought of her brother, even the briefest, her heart stilled some, and she looked away.
"We shouldn't stay here too long, " she warned. "Our kind has long since been thought gone, and I wager anyone who can sense magics is going to know that something has happened."
She was asking him? He hadn't the foggiest notion where to go, considering the fact that he lived with Avalon. Amaltheia had told him pretty clearly that she didn't think he should go back there, and that left him without anywhere to go. Eventually, he was going to go looking for his wife, though. He didn't want to just leave, even if it might leave her with a neater ending to the situation. There was the chance, the slight one, that it wouldn't end.
Even if he was a fool for hoping, he had to give it a shot.
Oblivious of all that she was thinking about regarding his appearance, and simply assuming he was a complete freak on top of everything else, he just stared at her for a moment when she mentioned 'their kind'. He couldn't help it, but he didn't like it. He couldn't keep staring at her, though. That'd get old fast, and despite being unhappy and pretty dumbstruck by this whole thing, he was NOT an idiot. He would not behave as such.
"Your house?" he suggested, hating being so forward, even with Amaltheia, but it was somewhat necessary. "Or hotel rooms. I believe I still have my wallet."
He had to check, since he had no certainty regarding what happened between getting attacked and being revived. He hadn't THOUGHT his wallet vanished, and it hadn't. There was the fact that he couldn't exactly go rent a room as he was, though. That'd be a trick.
"Okay," she said, though it wasn't clear to which suggestion she'd agreed. She brushed herself off a little, and shifted into a falcon. It was brief, because before Brennan could react, she was back on two legs again. She felt woozy, and swayed a little bit, making fast footwork to stop herself from stumbling over into the nasty contents on the ground.
"We'll take a cab," she said. "I doubt anyone would come looking in Pyrige." At least she'd come back in full human form and not demi-form, despite how awful it felt to her. She looked at Brennan, and nodded to him. "Can you lose the wings, or do you need help?" She spoke somewhat less forcefully than she'd ever before, and it was a strange change. Brennan might not understand it, but Amaltheia was finally whole again, even if he wasn't.
It was true that she'd shifted to falcon and back to full human before he could react, since all he did was blink inbetween. Not that it mattered, since he'd seen Avalon shift before. Hawks and falcons weren't THAT different physically that it should be a shock for him to see. Why she seemed so unsteady was a different story, but he could almost understand. He still shot forward to attempt helping her steady herself, though.
Her question surprised him, honestly. Need help? Shifting? Should he?
No, he'd be fine. He knew how to do this, he'd lived as a shifter all his life. How could shifting from demi to human form be any different now?
HA! Wrong answer.
He tried, his mind feeling frazzled and a wreck already from the entire situation weighing on him, not to mention being physically tired due to having DIED, and he failed. The problem with failing this time was that he didn't just remain in his demi-form. Oh no, that'd be too easy, and nothing was easy for him lately. No, he threw the energy out to shift, but hadn't managed to focus enough to really force it to do what he wanted. Perhaps he was lazy from having gotten used to the way things were, but the added levels of power, even if he was tired and weakened, meant that everything was skewed. Having not actually DONE anything with that power, it essentially rebounded right back at him.
Painfully.
He was grabbing at the grimy wall with a sharp gasp, certain he was going to drop right there for an instant, and he realized almost a full minute later that he hadn't actually accomplished anything. Lovely.
"Oh, Brennan," she said softly. She let him fall, pulling what was left of her energy up to shield herself as the cold of his magic brushed against her, physically dropping the temperature in the alley a few degrees. She moved towards him as swiftly as her sore body could manage, and placed her arm on his shoulder. There was evident sadness in her eyes, because now she knew that he really did know, fully, how different he had become.
With her mind, she reached out, into the chaotic stream of energy she had felt around him, and tried to calm it down. She gently urged his wings down, no songs yet to be sung with wishes so simple, despite the level of difficulty this was for them at the current moment. Slowly, they seemed to comply, fading away.
"Come on," she said, nodding her head a little. She offered an arm for support, and she found that when she started to walk, she was limping a little. She needed to sleep, badly, to rest from all of this... madness.
Amazing that, with everything going on, it actually hurt his pride to need help with something as simple and reverting to full human form. It did, though. He couldn't help it. By the time he'd recovered somewhat from the unexpected backlash, she was helping to ease his wings down, and there was nothing he could do but take a few deep breaths and let her do it. She accomplished the job when he couldn't, and that was all that really should have mattered, but it wasn't.
Everything mattered, and it was so very, very much.
He didn't know what he was doing. She was offering support, trying to help him, and she was so different from the Theia he'd known before, but everything was different. He was different. They'd traded situations, it seemed, her regaining what was familiar and beloved, and him losing it all. He was in unfamiliar territory, and he didn't even know how to function alone yet. That backlash had been all that was necessary to prove it to him, and it was a sobering, unpleasant thought. He had to go with her, or he'd be lost.
Not that he was really in any situation to argue. Even his proud Avian Reserve wasn't objecting loudly enough to the idle thought of just passing out in the alley, and that was saying something for how wiped out he was feeling as the pain of the power surge faded. He felt wasted and spent, like he didn't have anything else to even offer himself for support. She'd even calmed the chaotic energy swirling around him, and he didn't have the strength or desire to draw it up again. Now that it had calmed, it was down for awhile. He was ready to rest, and regroup.
He accepted her help, not even considering the fact that he was covered in blood, his clothing ripped, as they headed off to wherever it was she decided to go. He didn't care. Suddenly, he didn't care about a whole lot.
Theia managed down to the end of the alley, and hailed the first cab she saw. Luckily for her, they weren't in the most spectacular location of New York, so when she got in and Brennan slid in the seat next to her, there was a questioning glance in the rear view mirror, but nothing more aside from a gruff, 'Where to, toots?' to her. She answered, voice devoid of emotion, and then settled back against the seat.
For a while as they drove, she stared out the window, watching the lights as they passed by in a blur - or was that her vision? She couldn't tell. She was at home with her old familiar powers and thoughts again, but she was worn so thin that to even attempt to use them would have proved disastrous for all parties involved. She opted, finally, to rest, leaning her head against Brennan's shoulder. The cab ride was at least twenty minutes long, and in total silence. When they arrived at her home, she paid the cabbie and shut the door, making heavy footfalls towards her front door.
Once inside, she directed Brennan to the guest bedroom. Before he could speak, she held up a hand. "There's a full bathroom in there, and I know an extra robe or two, plus towels and toiletries. Clean up, and then sleep. Sleep as long as you need, but please don't leave before at least waking me. I can assure you now that I will be out of commission for at least twenty four hours, and you will probably do the same, so don't be alarmed when you wake up and a day has passed."
She turned and left him in the doorway of the guest bedroom, presumably to clean up and fall into unconsciousness herself.