Mayfair Manor

[XCandy and LunacyX]

Antha only giggled at the boy, snatching back her wrist and cradling it lovingly against her chest. "It isn't the making of my skin and bones you need to wonder about. It's the things that hover around my flesh, in the air that I breathe." He had withdrawn, but she brought him back, grasping him by the collar of the shirt and drawing him close enough to see the dangerous glimmer in her eyes, "It's the poison in my blood, that thread of inhumanity that makes me dangerous." Over the gardens and through the walls of Mayfair Manor, she could feel Lawrence's thoughts like something tangible, scraps of silk, wondering what Stefan could have meant by his dying words, Khayman's name and some secret Louis had told him, something to do with Antha. He had all the pieces, scattered across the numerous pages of his memory, but he needed something to draw them together. It made Antha laugh, because she knew, and had in fact been the one to tell Louis. But she had never breathed a word of it since, and if Lawrence wanted to know the meaning behind those haunting words he would have to figure it out himself. "Then what are we to do with one another if you aren't going to kill me and I'm not going to let you die?" she questioned in mock innocence, smiling sharply at him, "It can only get worse from here. Hatred always does, you know---it grows unbidden, unprovoked, until it consumes you and it is all that matters."
She made no comment about his words concerning Liesse, did not point out that she was not alive and could not be angry with him or forgive him. There was no point in it, no sense, he would only grow angrier, or else sulk. Neither seemed an attractive idea at present.  

[Okimiyage]

"You only care whether something or someone is dangerous," Rynn said, drawing back into his corner with his witchlights all springing to steady green light again, "if you care whether you get hurt, or killed. I think we have established already that I do not."
The witch-boy was watching Antha with eyes that mirrored her own, bright and not quite all sane. "As to what we are expected to do with one another--well, like it or not, my brother seems determined to get involved with you on a permanent basis." Rynn's knees slid down from where they had made a defensive wall against his chest, and he arranged them cross-legged beneath himself. "We have two options. Or more accurately, we have a multitude of options, but the probably of you accepting most of them is highly unlikely. I don't think you would care for Alaska. Our first--" he held up one finger, leaning in conspiratorially, "is that we can both leave this tree-house tonight and turn away from each other, and never acknowledge the other's existence for the remainder of our lives. I will go out into the city and make my own way, under my own name, and any whisper of the Mayfair name, I will stay well out of earshot from. And you will let me live my damned life without interference."
Leaning back, Rynn held up a second finger, and said, "Or we can do what I understand most families do. Because I believe that is what is intended, yes? For Cian to be absorbed into the Mayfair ranks? And whether I like it or not, I am his brother, and he seems overjoyed about the idea." Disgustedly, Rynn muttered under his breath, "Traitor." Taking a deep breath, he went on. "We learn to--at least pretend to tolerate each other."
Rynn let out his breath in a whoosh. "There's a pack of cigarettes in the inside pocket of that coat. Hand me one."  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

Childishly, Antha removed the coat and flung the entire thing at him, sitting against the latticework wall with her arms crossed. She was going to be cold and drip rainwater from her curls and shiver and bear it in silence, diverting her gaze to focus on the wet tracks they had made across the floor. "If those are our only options," she hissed, "Then I think I should prefer that you go the hell away and drop off the face of the earth. Clearly you're never going to accept the olive branch, and I don't want to be tolerated, particularly not by you." Idly, she reached out to pluck a small white flower from the vine nearest her, spinning it in her fingers as her eyes followed the petals. "But it's really not up to me. You're Cian's brother, I'm sure he'd rather have you around." Again there came that brief laugh, carrying a hint of humor this time. "But as for me leaving you alone, letting you live your own life...that will never happen, not as long as you are within the range of my influence. I will always be there, hovering spitefully over your shoulder."
Outside, the lightning flashed blindingly bright, followed by the deafening crack of thunder, and Antha laughed to accompany it. Everything was so ********, so completely screwed up, nothing should have been happening this way--- "Go on, go. I would hate to keep you out here a moment longer, having to tolerate me."  

[Okimiyage]

Rynn's face paled, and twin spots of color appeared high and red in his cheeks. Without a word, he dug through the coat until he found the cigarettes he'd stolen off the dead truck driver. He'd been planning to give them to Cian, as a present.
He didn't speak until he'd lit up and inhaled his first breath of smoke in what--almost a year? Then, he said levelly, "Why? Because I want you to either leave me alone or leave me in peace? Don't be a child, Antha." The words came out sharper than he expected; for a glimmer of an instant, one could hear what Rynn would sound like as an adult, once he had fully matured, in his voice.
He wasn't going to get angry about this. He was going to control his temper, because it was either that or stub out his cigarette, leap forward and throttle Antha Mayfair 'til she choked to death. And Liesse would hate him for ever if he did that.
"Besides, I don't know what I'd do with your body," he murmured aloud. "I rather suspect you don't have any pig farms in the area, and I'm loath to eat you now that my brother's ******** you. Like Alice, after being introduced to her pudding."  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

For a split second, Antha smiled at him, coldly. There was something feral about her in that moment, dark and dangerous and altogether terrible. And then, without warning, she tackled Rynn, pinning him down against the creaking boards, her nails biting into his flesh hard enough to bruise and draw blood all at once. "I loathe you," she whispered, frighteningly sweet, "I rather want to grab your shoulders and bash your head against these boards until your blood begins to drip down to the ground. You're frustrating, stubborn, and contemptible in every possible way. You don't want to get along with me then fine, I get to play your worst nightmare. I can creep into your dreams and spawn every horror I can possibly think up into your head, send monsters to follow you in dark alleys, turn the plainest, most ordinary faces in this city into bitter enemies." She laughed against his ear, and one couldn't possibly deny the dark, malicious insanity that rang in her tone. "You can call me childish if you want, I won't deny it. I am childish, and capable of all a child's cruelty." She released him then, seeming to ease back into herself as she leaned over him, smirking, the water from her hair dripping down onto him. "I'm quite tired of your hateful little quips, all the things that run through your mind or fall from your lips against me. From now on, they shall meet with aggression."  

[Okimiyage]

Rynn went backwards, onto the wet coat, and between that and Antha's hair dripping all over him--he wasn't going to play her games, he wasn't going to give her the satisfaction. "Get off me," he snarled, bucking underneath her. He was still holding his lit cigarette, he realized, and he spun it in his fingers and pressed the cherry against Antha's grip. If it loosened even a little bit, then Antha had an elbow to the face comi--
No. He couldn't do that. Besides the fact that Antha was a girl and that tussling at a funeral was quite unforgivable, it would only be giving her what she wanted. "Can't have that," he muttered, and he cast his eyes aside and went quite still under her and waited for her to lose interest, like a mouse playing dead to escape the cat's gaze. Still, lit cigarettes against one's skin had a tendency to incite interest.  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

"Go on," she said, laughing, "It wouldn't be the first time someone decided to burn me. You'll find my threshold for pain has grown to alarming heights." That grin spread to her lips as she spoke, wide and dangerous, promising terrible things to come. She did, however, release him. Inflicting physical pain had never really been her strength. "Do you even realize how useless you are in the real world?" she questioned errantly, going back to the flowers that hung around them, "It seems you have nothing to offer but temper tantrums."
Across the lawn there came Lawrence's distant call of her name, beckoning to her, but she made no effort to respond, to let him know where she had gone. She didn't want to listen to his frustrated pleas for an explanation, to tease him with that elusive secret he just couldn't figure out. Instead she stared at the cluster of flowers in the palm of her hand, the thin red veins that ran through the waxy white petals. "Do you know why so many plants in this garden still flower at this time of year?" she whispered, tossing several blooms at him so that he could see the tiny red veins. There had been more than one vampire who had gone to inhale the scent of the blooms and withdrawn hastily, staring at them in incredulity because they couldn't believe what they had just smelled. Vampires knew the scent of blood, even when it came from a flower.  

[Okimiyage]

"As if you're any better than me," he snapped back, rising to his feet. "You think you'd have survived this long without your knights errant, your protectors? I don't think you can hardly go anywhere without your entourage." He stood up, and hit his head on the roof of the little covered platform, and dropped back down promptly with a <******** his head, he went to climb out of the tree-house. "I do know," he said, "and I don't care. You think that with a garden like ours, thick with the dead, our own roses didn't drip blood?" He had reached the door-way, and he turned around and began to climb down the ladder, swiftly. "You know, I'm inclined to feel pity for you, though. You're the most wretched, unhappy little creature that I know of, despite all your family and friends and lovers who'd die for you."
His witchlights went out suddenly as candle-flames, and the little room was plunged into darkness.  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

"I'm quite better than you," Antha said simply, with a great amount of confidence, as she poked her head over the side of the gazebo to look down at him, "That is why I have my 'entourage'. That is why I control this city." It was an easy assumption to make that Antha only held her place of power because she was the Mayfair Designee to the Legacy, but in fact such a concept was quite unheard of. Mayfairs had always dealt with Mayfairs first, keeping out of the politics of the city that didn't concern them. Taking power outside of the family had been Antha's idea, and on the merit of her own ability. Even her power within the family was not quite usual, as no other Designee had ever bonded their generation to closely together as Antha had.
In the end, whether she needed protectors or not, Antha had made herself a force to be reckoned with through her own ability, a fact she was quite pleased with, and despite the dark moments---and this was most certainly a dark moment---there was no one else Antha would rather be.
Lawrence was still calling for her, and as much as Antha didn't want to leave the pitch-black sanctuary of her childhood safe haven, she crawled out and down the ladder, ambling across the flooded flagstones to meet him beneath the broad black umbrella he held. "You shouldn't be out in this rain," he chided her, offering her his arm like a good gentleman before they began back towards the house, "Not in your condition."
"It's only rain," she sighed, trying with all her might not to shiver as they stepped back into the kitchen, Antha dripping rainwater onto the tiled floor.  

[Okimiyage]

Rynn watched her go to the safe haven of the house and the warm yellow lights and the comforting figure of an umbrella awaiting her in rain. The entire scene was--embittering. Rynn licked his lips, tasting the rain on his tongue, before he turned up his collar and began walking down the street. She'd forget about him as soon as he was out of eye-shot, probably. And even if she didn't, what would she do? Send one of her obedient pets to sniff him out like a criminal on the run?
Rynn yawned. His head ached; a man of lesser pride might have gone back to the Mayfair house and made his peace long enough to at least sleep on the couch, but Rynn was a Calais, and would have never forgiven himself.
He would have liked to say goodbye to Cian, he thought. Poor Cian; did he know what he was getting involved with? Had anyone warned him? He had seen something within Antha Mayfair's eyes, something inhuman and ugly that made him think of a wild animal. But oddly enough, he hadn't been scared by it. He had felt--oddly giddy, euphoric, as though he had seen yet another side of Antha Mayfair that few people could associate with the pretty girl in the party dress.  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

When they were safely inside the house, Malakai rushing in with towels to dry her off like the loving brother he was, Antha turned to Lawrence, her eyes sharp, and said, "Two days." The boy looked at her, confused, as Malakai wrapped her up all warm and dry. "I give him two days to come to his senses. If he doesn't, we'll be taking him to the airship."
Beside her, Malakai paled. "But he'll---"
"Suffer," she interrupted, "He will suffer, and beyond that I don't care. Let us see how well his pride serves him when he's strung from the ceiling, beaten black and blue." All of this was said in privacy of course, shielded from any prying minds. Particular care was taken to keep it from Cian and Julien, still upstairs with the other cousins.
"Are you about ready to go the hell away?" Courtland asked of Julien, groaning. Beside him, Jack smirked. Whatever Julien would have said in retort was interrupted though as Courtland looked to Cian, saying very loudly, "Do you know that's not how Julien really looks? He's been claiming to be thirty-something since we were kids. That's where all his power goes---to hiding his real age."
As the boy spoke his spiteful words, the color rose subtly in Julien's cheeks until, finally, he turned on his heel and stormed from the room, at which point the Mayfair children all gave a sigh of relief. "If you're going to be one of us," Jack said, looking at Cian, "You're going to have to learn to hate Julien enormously. The good news is that he makes it easy."
Meanwhile, Antha had gone to the front porch, seeking out the dark little corner where Nicolae stood smoking his cigarette, trying to keep out of the gaze of the family. "Did you see which way he went?" the girl asked, and she didn't need to explain which of the men she meant.
Nicolae made a vague gesture of his hand in the general direction of Vikteren's departure, watching the rain that had concealed his path. "It was hard to see. Should we start looking?"
"I don't know," Antha whispered anxiously, seating herself in the whitewashed wicker chair nearest him, "Something happening and I have the most terrible feeling about it. But I don't think he'd appreciate our interference."
"Then we wait?" he asked, hopping up to sit on the railing facing her, "See what it is and if he needs our help?"
Quietly, she whispered the only thing she knew to say, "I don't know."  

[Okimiyage]

Cian hurried to catch up with the cousins. A pride of Vanity, then, he said, wonderingly. But that cannot be all. What has he done that makes you all despise him so? It was going to be difficult to keep up with the Mayfair family's politicking, he could already tell. The general gist of it seemed to be that everyone had loved Stefan, everyone was beholden to Antha and most could be twisted around her little finger with a modicum of effort, and now, it seemed, everyone hated Julien. He had a feeling it had something to do with being Antha and Nicolae's father. He didn't know the details, but from what he'd seen of Antha's unhappy childhood in Satis House, the transition from original father to foster father had not been smooth.  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

In response to Cian's question, Courtland scoffed and said, "Everyone here who was spawned of Julien raise your hand." Of the three Mayfair boys left behind in the room, all of them raised their hands. "He goes around breeding like an animal. He never took responsibility for us, never admitted the hand he had in our creation, but he tries to boss us around as if he did. So many problems in life start with our paternity, especially Antha. Nicolae and Malakai were the only children of Julien lucky enough to have a father figure who loved them enough to overlook the fact that they didn't share the same DNA. Me---" Courtland scoffed bitterly, "---I got tossed in an orphanage until I was seven. And Julien claims credit for 'finding' me, but it was uncle Louis who found out about me and saved me from that hellhole."
"Julien's the most selfish person we know," Jack added, clapping a hand over Courtland's mouth to stop his seething words, "Everything he does is for himself in the end. And he's bossy and controlling and---"
"He always wants to be the one to pull the strings," Vittorio finished for Jack, the anger glimmering in his eyes, "I don't think he ever got over being the Designee's younger brother. When he fathered another one, he seemed to think he could use her to control the family."
"But he left her there, in Leon's destructive embrace, even though he knew she existed, that Leon was a filthy liar, because he threatened Julien's reputation." Courtland shook his head, running his hands through his hair. "Our childhoods were spent trying to avoid him. You'll want to watch your kid whenever it's born---if we're lucky enough that it's a girl, he'll try to use her, too."  

[Okimiyage]

XCandy and LunacyX

In response to Cian's question, Courtland scoffed and said, "Everyone here who was spawned of Julien raise your hand." Of the three Mayfair boys left behind in the room, all of them raised their hands. "He goes around breeding like an animal. He never took responsibility for us, never admitted the hand he had in our creation, but he tries to boss us around as if he did. So many problems in life start with our paternity, especially Antha. Nicolae and Malakai were the only children of Julien lucky enough to have a father figure who loved them enough to overlook the fact that they didn't share the same DNA. Me---" Courtland scoffed bitterly, "---I got tossed in an orphanage until I was seven. And Julien claims credit for 'finding' me, but it was uncle Louis who found out about me and saved me from that hellhole."
"Julien's the most selfish person we know," Jack added, clapping a hand over Courtland's mouth to stop his seething words, "Everything he does is for himself in the end. And he's bossy and controlling and---"
"He always wants to be the one to pull the strings," Vittorio finished for Jack, the anger glimmering in his eyes, "I don't think he ever got over being the Designee's younger brother. When he fathered another one, he seemed to think he could use her to control the family."
"But he left her there, in Leon's destructive embrace, even though he knew she existed, that Leon was a filthy liar, because he threatened Julien's reputation." Courtland shook his head, running his hands through his hair. "Our childhoods were spent trying to avoid him. You'll want to watch your kid whenever it's born---if we're lucky enough that it's a girl, he'll try to use her, too."

Cian set his jaw, hard. He won't have her. he said, simply. He didn't address the question of whether or not the child would be a girl; there had been enough anxiety about that for the evening. Does he actually have any power, or is he simply to be avoided for the sake of repulsive personality? Not that it mattered; Cian didn't want to get caught up in any of the power struggles that the Mayfairs seemed to be so clever at orchestrating. He'd had enough of that from his own family, and was ashamed to say that he'd been moderately talented at causing an uproar at one point, himself. How long ago? It seemed ages.
Cian shook his head, moving through the cousins again; he needed to find Antha. Descending the staircase, he caught sight of her outside, through the screen door--soaked to the bone, her hair all but black with wet. He clattered down the stairs in a rush, flying out the door and hurrying towards the Designee. Antha! Jesus, what happened to you? Come on--inside, out of the rain--you're going to kill yourself before the curse does it for you, if you keep up like this--  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

"You got that damn right," Courtland hissed, muttering angrily under his breath.
"Julien is moderately powerful in the witching sense. Within the Mayfair family, he wasn't powerful until now." This from Vittorio, sighing softly.
When Cian went outside to Antha, she laughed at his hectic thoughts, shaking off the solemnity of her thoughts concerning Vikteren. "I had a little chat with your brother," she explained, shrugging, "There's something about Rynn that trying to hold a conversation with him makes you want to kill yourself. But he's gone now, I'll be fine."
Across from her, Nicolae gave a short bark of laughter, dropping his half-smoked cigarette into the water-filled coffee can on the creaking boards. "Can I get the hell out of here yet?" he asked Antha, tousling his golden curls with a quick swipe of his hand, "Khayman's losing it waiting for me."
"Go on," she said, waving him away before she went to Cian, clinging to his arm, "We'll be quite fine without you."
"Wish I could say the same," he sighed, pressing his lips briefly to her cheek before vanishing into the rain.
When he was gone, Antha released Cian, pacing across the porch with her hands clasped behind her back. "Where were we?" she asked herself, glancing up towards the ceiling in thought, "Ah, yes...the Mayfair history." Again the knife was in her hands, being flipped between her spindly fingers. "We have two choices. One, we can go sit down and I can lay out some flowery tale about my ancestors over the course of the night. Or two, we can put Mayfair blood in your veins and you can see it for yourself. A crash course, if you will. What do you say, mon cheri?"