Night's Omen

prompt list

"What the bloody fuck is going on?" Narkisa breathed.  

"That's precisely what I'd like to know," Gareth snapped. There had been a lot of people showing up at their door lately, and most of them had been for Jill, in reference to things that he either didn't know about or was only beginning to put together. He didn't like not knowing, but he admired the fuck out of her ability to so neatly handle such a big threat, and he'd been surprisingly touched by her reasons for not asking for his help with it. It had been a very brief, but heated discussion while decorating the Christmas tree in which she'd made clear that he wasn't a tool that she used to deal with her problems, and Gareth…wasn't actually used to that from people who knew who he really was. It was such a part of who he was that he was so often responsible for stopping these powerful evils that it was rare for someone to value him over what he could do for their purposes. It shouldn't have been like that, and he mulled it over for nearly a day afterwards, looking over at her where she read curled in a blanket on the couch or hunched over some artifact lifetimes older than she was. They'd settled that little argument abruptly with him acknowledging that she was right and offering her a lift to reach a spot on the tree, her accepting, and their evening proceeding without any further talk of it, but her statement had lingered. 

Now, he was less pleased that the visits were apparently for him, and his eyes were narrowed on the man who was near his size who had obliterated their mailbox with an SUV that looked as though it had already hit something big and was currently trying to disentangle another from his seatbelt before it hung the fool. In the middle of the night, no less. Perfect. 

Worse, Nicolas wandered barefoot and shirtless out of the guest bedroom at the commotion, tattoos from over the centuries on full display and the shorts he slept in slung a bit too low on his hips to be considered polite, and Gareth rolled his eyes. Gareth had at least grabbed a robe, and he was pretty sure that nobody missed the way that Narkisa's eyes travelled up and down Nicolas' form, least of all Nicolas himself, who looked far too smug despite just waking up. 

"Better watch out, your daddy doesn't like competition," Cerberus told her, smirking despite the fact that he'd also looked, though not quite the same way. That dude looked older, but he also looked strangely ageless, like he was still utterly solid, and Cerberus had long ago learned to trust his instincts on people. He didn't know who the guy was, but he wasn't inclined to tangle with either of the two men they'd woken up, even if only one of them looked like he was considering homicide. 

"No way. After this, he said I'm home free. No backsies," she shot back, breaking her eyes away from Nicolas and his raised eyebrow to look at Cerberus, then back at Gareth, Jill and Nicolas. Cerberus just grunted his disbelief. 

"So why is there a crowd outside your door so late, Gareth?" Nicolas prompted, his gaze landing on Max and his expression only getting more amused. "Least of which is a wild mage. This should be good." 

Apparently that was the magic words for some reaction out of their wildling. Max had, until this point, been so frazzled with the entire evening that he hadn't said anything at all - nobody had heard a peep from him since Cerberus had untangled him from that cursed seatbelt, in fact. So when the large slightly undressed man called him out, Max looked up from his apparent mental disassociation over the evening, greyish eyes wide and thick brows up. 

"Me?" he asked, slapping his hand to his chest. "I didn't ask for any of this," he sputtered. 

"Calm down," Narkisa said, rolling her eyes. "I heard about your 'magic'," she said, wiggling her hands at Max. "We don't need you accidentally turning any of us into shrubs, so watch where you point your mitts," she warned gruffly, jabbing him in the shoulder with her finger. 

With every jab, Max jerked a little. That hurt! "It's not my fault," he protested, but still, he thrust his hands behind his back, head tilted toward the heavens as he let out a long sigh. 

"I just want to see Layla," he whined. 

"Layla?" Gareth and Jill demanded, practically in unison, but it accomplished what Narkisa and Cerberus appearing hadn't - Gareth told them to wait a moment, snapped at Nicolas to get dressed, and disappeared into the house to do the same himself. When he returned, it was with a strange mix of ancient and modern pieces, but the kevlar was undeniably modern and very high-quality. He'd apparently gotten tired of getting shot somewhere along the lines and Nicolas wasn't far behind him, though they both hesitated in loading up with weapons, almost like they were listening for something, and when Gareth looked to Nicolas, the other man's general air of amusement was gone.

"You know what that is, don't you?" Nicolas prompted, though he didn't need to. They'd both felt it before, and he knew it.

"And I know who it is, I'm certain."

"Is the Matriarch still in this city?"

"She is, and she'll have felt it, too."

"Then there's nothing more to do about it right now. One tragedy at a time," Nicolas said, shaking his head. "She'll be relentless, not to worry."

"It can't be a coincidence, Nicolas," Gareth warned, and the older man shook his head.

"Probably isn't, but one at a time. She'll take care of that one, but we're needed here."

It was easier said than done to just ignore the magical flares going up that signalled the death of a phoenix nearby, but Gareth clenched his jaw and made the trip to Midnight instead, trying to keep his mind from wandering to what could have happened to Evan to bring him down, and if it was indeed connected, as he thought it was. Midnight imploding, a unicorn in captivity and a phoenix dying all in the same night? No coincidences.

They'd chosen to drive separately from the Midnight caravan, and Gareth had tried to insist that Max stay behind with Jill where he'd be safe, but Max had be adamant about going back rather than waiting for Layla to be brought to him. Gareth could appreciate the sentiment, but watching him climb up into the SUV and the memory of him dangling in the seatbelt didn't really inspire confidence.

He was at the car, telling Nicolas to be careful with that damn axe on the backseat when Jill ran out the door after him into the cold, and for a moment, Nicolas thought she was rushing to stop them from leaving. It wouldn't have worked, but Gareth had talked her up to be much more aggressive than that would suggest.

"Stop! Gareth, for the love of Christ, stop!" she shouted. She finally met him in the driveway, and she was out of breath, like she'd run the length of her entire home - which, she had.

"I'm going, Jill," he said, his voice firm. She made a face. " Of course you're going, don't be ridiculous, did you think I was trying to stop you?" she asked, her voice shrill with disgust. She thrust something at him, and he couldn't believe he hadn't noticed her carrying it sooner.

"You forgot your sword, is all," she said.  She met his eyes, and that small, devious smirk flickered on her mouth for the briefest of moments.  It was hard to love her more than moments like this, however often he truly did. 

"Woman," he muttered fondly, leaning in to give her a kiss. He'd take the sword, too. After all, she'd gone through the trouble of retrieving it.

Cars were faster and carried more than horses, but he couldn't deny that he missed being able to dismount and be ready to walk into a fight, considering getting out of the car outside Midnight still meant grabbing their gear. They were quick and efficient from many years of practice, but he still couldn't help feeling like a much younger version of himself would be judging him for essentially driving around in a carriage in this much more luxurious future. Strange the things that had changed, and as he walked up to join Narkisa and Cerberus to storm the fortress, how many things hadn't.

"Follow me, I can show you a back way in through the dungeons. It's around the building this way," Narkisa explained, but Gareth hmm'd with an intent look on the building, then shook his head.

"No. This is a front door job," he said, and Nicolas laughed out loud, shouldering his axe as Gareth drew his sword. He was pretty sure he heard Cerberus mutter something about 'Ren Fest motherfuckers', but they were already headed for the door.

They'd been expecting trouble, but the chaos inside was a little extreme even for their usual. The Raven Guard posted by the doors seemed to be a little light for a place of that size, and they would have made quick work of them even without the aid of Narkisa and Cerberus, but it was barely an obstacle with the four of them there. It was as they pushed deeper into the building that they realized that the door had been deceptively calm, as they came upon Raven Guard fighting each other, bloody messes throughout the halls to show where fights had recently been settled, and there was a frankly ominous trail that looked as though a body had been dragged. They followed that on Narkisa's suggestion, but before they entered the large hall, the group of them paused.

"The two of you should go with Max and find Layla. Get her and anyone else out," Gareth instructed, not aware that Raphael and Stefan were already in the process of doing this, or that Layla wasn't going to be so easy to escort out.

"You didn't trust that they wouldn't betray us when we went inside," Nicolas said, no accusation to his voice.

"We don't know what's in this room or where the lines were drawn. I'd rather have fewer distractions."

"We've also never been invited to topple a fortress before," Nicolas offered with a big smile, nudging Gareth's elbow and making him grunt agreement. It was off-putting, but he remembered Justinian's visit and how concerned he'd been by Gareth's presence. Nicolas arriving would have spooked him further. Was that part of this?

Without taking anymore time to worry about it, Gareth pushed the huge doors open, stepping into the bubble that Justinian had created to keep Niall's nightmares contained, and the view that awaited them made them both stop right there in the doorway.

Justinian and Corinne were off by a wall, joined by Iloquil and Deja, who were fussing over Justinian. He seemed to have been stabbed with some spikes, and while Corinne didn't seem particulary injured, she was covered in blood. Near the door where Gareth and Nicolas stood was a body that he had a sneaking suspicion had once been Verity Celestino, though her face was a gory mess and less recognizable for it. The entire room was crawling with creatures, and as someone who considered himself very well acquainted with the monsters of the world, Gareth was fairly confident in thinking that they werne't anything real, or of this world. The walls seethed with bodies that seemed to move over their surfaces like water, if water had the viscosity of oil instead, and the air above them was a sea of twisting, unbelievable shapes, some of which seemed barely capable of maintaining flight.

All of that would have been enough to be startling, except that the center of the room was Alexander, bloodied and singed, staring down a massive black dragon from where he seemed to have darted away for a breath and to regroup. Gareth noticed that he must have collected up a fire iron for a weapon much earlier in the fighting, considering the gore attached to it. It was an impressive figure that he cut, but the dragon did not look as though it cared.

"When was the last time you saw a black dragon?" Nicolas asked conversationally.

"This isn't a real black dragon, it doesn't look right, look at the face. It's Niall."

"Well, I hope it fights like a black dragon. I haven't had one in centuries." Nicolas grinned at him, hefted his enormous battle axe, and charged in with exactly the amount of gusto that one could imagine. Gareth sighed, following him and cutting around to the flank as the dragon roared in Nicolas' face and Alexander dodged out of the way of its swinging, sharp tail.

One benefit to fighting with Nicolas was the fact that the man was incredibly good at keeping an opponent's attention. There was something about that laughing, smug face that made enemies want to punch him in it, and while it didn't mean that Alexander and Gareth got away with jumping in and killing the dragon, it offered them breathing room whenever the Niall dragon was too occupied with the axe trying to get at him. His scales were tougher than Gareth was used to, which was probably why Alexander had been having such trouble with the fire iron; considering his sword glanced off of them the first few times he'd swung it, he could see how being the only target of the dragon's attention and being unable to get a good hit in might have been frustrating.

Apparently, even with two other targets, Alexander was starting to lose patience with the whole process. Nicolas was denting and even taking bits of scale away from the dragon's hide just by sheer force with that supernaturally sharp axe, but trying to hit the same place twice was increasingly difficult because Niall did not play by any rules that any dragon ever had to.  One sharp, pointed tail split into multple lashing, almost tentacle-like appendages with a sharp, bladed edge to each.  Gareth dodged one nearly taking his head off and came away with a bit of blood dripping down from his (fortunately still attached) ear and Alexander took one very wrong while blocking Justinian and the group struggling there. 

Gareth hadn't been paying much attention to them, but as Alexander went down in a brutal, bloody mess, he caught enough of the shouting from the group to understand that Justinian was still holding the mental blockage around the space they were in, Deja and Corinne had been fighting off the creatures that were peeling away from the walls to strike at them, and the spikes that had been shot at Justinian were spreading barbed roots within in, winding out from the spike in his chest and leg and dropping him to his knees.  Gareth could see at a glance that the roots from the one in his leg had broken the skin on the other side of his thigh, wrapped tightly around his pant leg with thorny bits drawing blood through the fabric and then plunged back into the muscle of his calf.  Iloquil was trying to tear at the ones she could reach, burning them with her touch whenever they broke skin, but she couldn't exactly burn them out completely without setting her mate alight.  Justinian was old and powerful, but he was still susceptible to being burned alive. 

Alexander appeared again a moment later, looking worse for wear despite being in a fresh projection, and he didn't bother jumping back into the mess with the dragon.  Instead, he collected up the sword that Niall had dropped near the group earlier and cut into the creatures that were coming from the walls, three of which had apparently joined forces to try pulling Corinne into the wall with them.  Her hand passed impossibly beneath the surface and she screamed, yanking backwards and freeing herself from the sucking force of the wall in time for Alexander to cut the creatures in half.  He pulled her further from the wall immediately, glancing her over and then cutting into more of them.  With Gareth and Nicolas on the dragon, he could spare the attention here.

"Can you hold Niall's power in this space, Corinne?" he asked, flicking a glance over his shoulder as he took a diving creature out of midair with a quick slash. 

"I don't know, I--"

"You can.  You have the best control I've seen on a vampire, and his power is entirely about lost control.  You can rein it in.  Justinian has to get out of here, or Niall's nightmares are going to tear him apart from the inside," he told her firmly.  She swallowed, but nodded.  She'd killed Verity, and she could damn well hold this crazy bastard in check.  "I'll guard you, just ease in and take the burden from Justinian."

It was obvious in the set of Justinian's body when Corinne had taken on the force of the enormous shielding bubble, because he didn't necessarily collapse, but the rigidity had entirely fallen out of him.  He clutched at the spike in his chest, perhaps trying to pull at it or dislodge any of the roots within, but he screamed and found nothing more than bloodied hands where he'd tried. 

"Iloquil, get him out of here!" Alexander shouted, and that was the last word on the subject.  There was no reality anywhere, Niall's or otherwise, where she would stay and risk her mate's life for anyone else.  As soon as Justinian was free of the space that Corinne was now maintaining, the spikes and roots would be gone and he could heal.  The attention that Niall's insanity had spared for Justinian and the others turned to Corinne next, but with Alexander and Deja both guarding her, nothing would touch her.  It left the monster hunters to do what they did best, but Alexander had seen enough of them to have faith, even if they were looking a little worse for wear. 

Nicolas was blood-streaked and there was a suspicious smear in the same general size on the stone about fifteen feet away that suggested that might be why he was currently screaming back at the dragon, his axe lodging itself into the shoulder of the great beast and making Niall scream even more deafeningly.  So they'd gotten through the scales, excellent.  Gareth was covered in dust and blood of his own, with a pile of rubble nearby and multiple twitching lengths of tail-tentacle on the floor behind him; he looked furious as he stalked back in towards the dragon's head, swinging his blade up to slice through a new tail that darted toward him.  It went the way of the others, landing in a writhing mess of blood that was making the floor slick there.

"This is getting fucking ridiculous," he muttered, ducking under the head in an attempt to help Nicolas dislodge his axe, which came free with a sickening wet sound and no blood, but a sticky black goop. 

"That doesn't look good," Nicolas offered at the sight of it, the black mess actually squirming across the blade of his axe.  "A new gharl?"

"What now?" Gareth snapped, but he didn't get a chance to worry about the back gunk before the dragon's head came around at them.  He swung his sword around in time to plunge it into the dragon's mouth, but it was in the same movement that Niall's jaws clamped down around him, drawing a furious scream from his throat and lifting him off of his feet as Nicolas went back to swinging at the scales that were already damaged at the dragon's shoulder and throat.  Gareth's movement was limited, what with his arm and a large chunk of his upper body being stuck in the dragon's maw, but he jerked the blade around as much as he could.

The smell of the goop coming from the dragon's wounds was only slightly worse than the breath that escaped its throat when it shrieked around him as those steak knife teeth shook him around.  He pulled a dagger from the sheath at his boot and wasted no time in stabbing that bastard in the eye as many times as he could hit it, the gore adding to the scent profile choking Gareth as surely as the teeth tearing at him, but the truly frustrating part was that the dragon's head should have been a certain way of killing it.  Gareth had to have plunged his sword or his knife into its brain, and it was writhing and screaming like it had been a terrible blow, but it wasn't stopping.  He was fairly certain that the only reason he hadn't been bitten in half was that the sword was lodged in such a way that biting down any further would plunge it deeper than he could currently reach, but this wasn't going to last.

As though having heard his thoughts on the matter, the great doors to the hall opened, and a glance in that direction revealed Layla, who strode across the room leaving peace in her wake, the floors and air around her seeming to return to normal.

"Look!" Nicolas shouted up at Gareth, who was busy, but still looking.  "Even the gharls won't go near her!"

Gareth did not comment, but he was right; the creatures that Niall had created to terrorize all of them were keeping a wide berth from Layla, who was headed right for their master.  She stopped directly in front of him and he dropped Gareth so suddenly that he nearly lost his grip on his sword as he struck the stone flooring, the scream choked in his throat as he felt the air go out of him, but he was free, blood pouring down his side as he dragged himself to his feet.  She stared the dragon down as it roared in her face, her hair rustling, but that was the only movement she granted him.  With a hard look, she swiped at the air in front of her with the same sort of energy that Gareth would have expected out of someone throwing everything off of a table - if that table were upright like a chalkboard. 

There was no denying the effectiveness, however one decided to describe it (Nicolas later said that she'd swatted him like a fly), as the dragon roared its last and the illusions collapsed in darkness and stench that faded as quickly as if an unseen wind tore them from the room.  Niall was bloodied and wild-eyed on the floor, and honestly, Gareth wasn't sure how he was still functioning except that he was absolutely out of his mind.  Rather than give him even a second longer to collect himself, Gareth plunged his sword into the vampire's heart, and he felt Alexander come up behind him as he yanked the blade back.  A swift strike took Alexander's blade through Niall's throat, which should have taken his head off, and seemed to until a sudden geyser of liquid darkness flooded up from the floor beneath him.  It enveloped him, sticking to him and filling in his injuries as his mouth screamed wordlessly because it was no longer connected to his lungs to produce air.  They all backed up, staring as he was swallowed up by the shadows that collapsed back into the floor like they'd never been there at all.

Gareth stared intensely att he place he'd been, blood-smeared, wide-eyed and angry.  "Was that him dying as dramatically as he fought, or should we be concerned?" he asked, his voice more gravelly even than usual with the pain he was in and the struggle they'd just survived.

"I'm worried, personally," Nicolas offered, and the look they shared said they both knew exactly what that was.

"It's not a worry we'll be dealing with right this minute, at any rate," Alexander cut in, leaning in to support Corinne.  He hadn't yet dropped the sword he'd picked up, and Gareth couldn't blame him. 

"My dear, thank you for your timely entrance," Nicolas went on, turning to give Layla a bow that somehow managed to still be charming despite the blood, sweat and gore on him.  Gareth grunted his agreement and nodded, sheathing his knife and switching his sword to his other hand because the left side felt like giving out.  This was going to take a little time to clear up. 

Justinian and Iloquil returned a few moments later, both on their own two feet, which was better than when Justinian had left.  He looked worn, but the spikes and the roots coming from them were gone, leaving exhaustion and anger in their wake.  Alexander and Corinne joined them, and it was only in the wake of everything that Gareth even noticed Max hovering behind Layla, staying out of the way but close.  He shook his head and started for the door, unwilling to linger longer than they had to.  Nicolas also seemed to sense that this was the end of it, and stepped up beside him. 

"Do you think we'll be back here in a few years for Justinian?" Nicolas asked, seemingly idly, but Gareth snorted.

"Did you see the look on Alexander's face when we walked in?  I think he'd beat some sense into him if Justinian even considered trying this whole mess again," he pointed out, which Gareth didn't honestly think would be an issue, anyway.  Justinian had to have spear-headed this whole takeover, or he didn't see how it would have gotten this far.

"Good, let's get back to your beautiful woman, then.  She'll be eager for the story, and I brought good booze.  You're going to need it tonight," he said, flicking his eyes to the bloody mess that was Gareth's left side, and again, he grunted his agreement.  At least he'd gotten the leather seating, or the car would be ruined, too.  Another point in favor of horses.

"What is a 'gharl'?  You've both said it multiple times, and I don't think in regards to the same creature," Jill pointed out, looking between the two men.  Gareth's mouth widened into one of his generous but sharp smiles, regarding Nicolas shrewdly past the drink he'd nearly raised as far as his lips. 

He was still a bloody mess, but it was mostly dried and he'd ditched his boots in the kitchen after Jill had taken one look at them both and insisted that they come in through the garage.  Anything that dusted off of them could be wiped or vacuumed up, but disgusting shoes on the carpet was a step too far.  Part of Gareth thought that she might insist on cleaning up first, given the fact that both he and Nicolas (especially him, if he was honest) were coming back in rough shape, but she'd taken her cue from him and offered wine right off the bat.  She'd also been delightful conversation and a spectacular hostess, without comment as to his ruined shoulder and whatever damage his clothes and armor was keeping pressure on.  He appreciated it, and was going to appreciate her helping him peel off everything he was wearing later even more.

"Yes, Nicolas, please tell our lovely historian what a gharl is, and the extremely scientific method you used to name them," he said.  Based upon the instant indignance that Nicolas drummed up, which was immediately after covered up with a tilt of his head up and a haughty tone for show, it was safe to assume that it had been a time.

"A gharl is a catch-all term for critter monsters, the kind that are scavengers and show up to the roadkill after carnage or the ones that hang around a bigger monster to do its bidding or in the hopes that there will be scraps.  Some of the smaller types of goblins fall into it, gremlins, more fae than I can count, lots of things," Nicolas said, tone turning dismissive by the end.  Gareth hummed, smile appearing again.

"And why do we call them that?" he prompted.

"Oh, come off it, you could tell her instead of playing this game, if you weren't such an awful storyteller.  Stingy on the details, I'm sure you've noticed," Nicolas said, looking to Jill for confirmation that he didn't need.  Gareth had always been very to the point, and when he gave information or told stories, it was the facts.  Nicolas loved a good story, and so he did the exact opposite.  "We call them 'gharls' because it's the sound most of them make at some point or other, it's always growling and hissing and strange sounds inbetween, gharling.  During a fight with a very nasty being that we won't name because he does listen for that, I swung the flat side of my axe to clear a path and swatted at least seven of the beasties--"

"Five at most," Gareth interjected, taking a long swig of his drink like this was usual.  They'd been large and had sharp teeth and claws, so even five was impressive, but he couldn't help himself.  He'd been correcting Nicolas' 'added details' since the storytelling had begun.

"It was ten, with more coming in to fill the space left by their brethren.  They were making all manner of awful noises, and I shouted, 'GHARL RIGHT BACK AT YOU, YOU LITTLE SHITTING GHARLS.'  It was not the most eloquent of speeches--"

Gareth snorted audibly.

"BUT I tend to let my axe do the talking, and Gareth was in a state at the time."

"In his defense, he was bleeding from every orifice in his skull and the gharls had tried cutting new holes for him," Gareth offered helpfully.  "I'd been stabbed."

"Stabbed?  He was pinned to the wall on a spike as big around as a baseball bat, and still stabbing gharls with his dagger," Nicolas pressed loudly.

"Okay, that isn't an embellishment," Gareth conceded with a slight tilt of his head, then finished his drink.

"How does your state then compare to tonight?" Jill asked as she sipped at her wine, and while she'd been drinking right along with them, Gareth had the sneaking suspicion that it wasn't as much, likely intentionally.  She was no nurse, but her travels had taught her enough to handle injuries, and he could bet she was holding back for that reason, especially after the question.

"I was not stabbed tonight."

"Nope, just caught in the jaws--"

"Nicolas --"

"--of a giant nightmare dragon.  Shook him around like a dog with a rabbit, his sword halfway down its throat the only thing keeping it from biting him in two," the man finished, definitely further into his cups than Jill or Gareth, and Gareth regarded him with some strange mixture of irritation and fondess.  Nicolas had been in a fantastic mood since the fight had started, even getting knocked around as they had, so drinking and telling stories was absolutely part of his after party.  Gareth was less inclined to share the gritty details, especially when Jill looked at him with her eyebrow cocked up like that, but he also wasn't inclined to silence Nicolas.  Details about big events was what Jill thrived on, and he understood that despite Bacchus being gone on her command, she was still very interested in the state of affairs in Midnight and its downfall. 

"I had it under control," he offered, to which Nicolas laughed, but not unkindly.

"That you did.  Stabbed that bastard in the eye half a dozen times, didn't you?  Only reason you didn't kill him then was because Niall was hiding himself somewhere else in the illusion is my only guess," Nicolas said, shaking his head.  Gareth snorted, but they had already established on the way home that neither of them understood the particulars of Niall's ability.

"He's dead, though, right?"

"Hopefully.  Gareth put his sword through his heart and Alexander took his head off, so that should be pretty dead," Nicolas said, but he hadn't said for certain, and Gareth's jaw clenched, thinking back to the shadows that had taken the vampire.  Jill seemed to catch on the lack of absolute certainty in the word 'hopefully', and Gareth sighed.

"Niall was very dramatic throughout the fight, summoning gharls and changing his shape.  The entire room was a nightmarescape from the walls to the ceilings, so it's possible that he was just very dramatic in his death throes.  It's also possible that something else happened, but that would be very bad and we're not humoring it tonight."

Namely because they were exhausted and drinking, and because talk of Taranis had to be very careful lest the entity himself take notice.  That was the last thing they needed, especially if the dark man was already poking his nose around the area.  Gareth also hadn't forgotten about the phoenix flares, and he knew that Nicolas hadn't, either.  A phoenix dying would only mean more trouble, and it meant Nicolas wasn't going to be leaving town anytime soon. 

"A different story, Nicolas," Gareth prompted, eager to move the conversation away from the night's events and the injuries that were currently hurting.  "Something that isn't sore right now.  You promised the lady."

"A promise is a promise!" Nicolas agreed, and then he was off.  Gareth was content to go back to just drinking, occasionally offering corrections.