Mayfair Manor

[XCandy and LunacyX]

Antha was all aglow with the ecstatic glint of drugged bliss as she grinned down at her husband, laid over the length of his body as if her slight form could pin him down. If she had been her usual self, she might have mused that it only made sense that something to eradicate narcotics from her system would make her act like this. Uppers negated downers, like coke and alcohol. But in her present state...well, Antha just didn't care for the specifics. "An 'experimental drug' of Tori's," the girl purred, her eyes gleaming as if she knew just how wickedly dangerous that idea was, "To counterbalance the narcotics he gave me first. They just can't decide what they want to do with me, can they?" She laughed at that, fully and without shame. "Oh, I might have talked Jack into slipping me some of his favorite little yellow pills between point A and point B."
She might have laughed again, and even looked as if she might, before a look of revelation crossed her face and she turned her gaze back on Cian, her eyes oddly serious and a slow, pleased smile creeping across her lips. "Did you just call me 'Evie'?"
Though she would admit her mental capacity was somewhat compromised, she couldn't recall a moment in the past where Cian had referred to her by her nickname. It hadn't really occurred to her before, the name was simply an invention of Courtland's when they were children to mark that he loved her the most, by his own logic. The other cousins had picked it up shortly afterwards, for more or less the same reasons, branding her as something that was theirs, and very few people outside of the family had ever been allowed to use it, or else dared to.
But Cian could use it. It made her oddly happy actually, which she expressed by closing the breath of space between their lips.

Five-thirty arrived sooner than any of the Mayfairs would have liked. The grandfather clock in the upper hallway gave a short chime for the half-hour mark, echoed by a smaller clock downstairs and another several rooms away, and Jack gulped beneath the constricting knot of his tie.
"Jacques Pierre, you quit your fidgeting!"
The boy tried not to flinch, instead tucking his chin and murmuring, "Yes, grandmother..."
"Don't worry," Courtland assured him in a little whisper, gently patting his hand, "You don't look anything like Lawrence in that suit." Certainly he himself did not, done up in a gray frock coat of his standard design---ornate and flared, perhaps too feminine for most men to even consider wearing---and a pressed oxford shirt, black slacks and shiny shoes. Suzette had deemed him unacceptably lax in dress several times, administering sharp pinches to his arm, but he had refused to budge.
Across the atrium, nearly sweeping a hand back through her carefully arranged curls, Antha bothered to sigh. She had been a bit irritable and lackluster when she and Cian had descended the stairs moments ago, likely the effect of the drugs fading from her system, but she was taking pains to compose herself for the business at hand. "I don't like leaving them alone up there with that...that..."
"Antha, please," Julien groaned, already massaging his temple, "Kirsten is a perfectly able babysitter. They shouldn't need you at all."
The cousins braced themselves for the way her eyes sharpened, lips pursing in indignation. "Of course they will," Courtland interrupted hastily, brimming with more good humor than was necessary, "You're their mother. But they'll survive. And so will you, for that matter."
The girl bit her tongue on whatever outburst had been poised upon it but looked no less irritated. Instead she quietly made do with pressing her cheek to Cian's shoulder, her arms tightening around his. She'd been oddly clingy around him lately, a number of them noted, and exceptionally so tonight. Suzette had hardly gotten a foot between them to inspect Cian's outfit before Antha had snatched him back without a word, latching herself physically onto him by seizing one of his arms in both of hers. But no one said a word about it...they didn't dare.
As promised, Suzette had scolded her for her outfit, declaring the neckline scandalously low and the hem dangerously high, even if she did appreciate that Antha looked the part of an adult for once in a gold and cream damask dress tight enough to limit her breathing and a few pieces of heirloom jewelry (off the top of his head, Lawrence calculated that she was wearing at least a million in premium diamonds and flawless south sea pearls), her wild curls all carefully pulled to one side and bound up with glittering pins.
Jack, snickering, had whispered into her ear, (his gaze trained pointedly at the aforementioned low neckline) "I nearly forgot how nicely you clean up," before the threat of Suzette's cane drove him off.
For his part, Alistair enjoyed the commotion immensely. He beamed around at his family, smiling happily when Pierce made his meticulous adjustments to his outfit. And despite her initial misgivings, Suzette was thrilled with the charming, precious boy. He was a 'jewel on their family tree' she said, pinching his cheeks and patting his scarlet curls, 'such a sweet thing'.
Not that Malakai was safe from her attentions, nitpicking over his tie and scarlet cheeks. "I don't want to sit by her..." he was murmuring to the old woman, trying ineffectually to brush her off, "She thinks it's wrong to eat anything the lower class can afford. And she's shrill."
The room was silenced by the first ring of the doorbell, the Mayfairs all going still. "Already?" Julien murmured, checking his watch, "It's bad manners to show up on the dot, don't they know---"
But Antha lit up, her bad mood dissipating at last with a wry little grin. "Ah...the cavalry."
"Cavalry?" Malakai murmured, before Jacob opened the door and a collective cry of mixed reactions rang out.
Standing stiffly in the door and fiddling with the cuffs of his blazer, eyes pointedly not looking at anyone, Nicolae cleared his throat. "I'm not putting on a tie."
"I won't ask you to," Antha cut in before anyone else could, and only then did Nicolae rake a hand back through his golden curls, eyes narrowing at his sister, and step into the house. Courtland and Jack were upon him in an instant, with squeals of delight and arms that bound him until Suzette brushed them aside, clapping his face in her hands.
"My little moonpie," she murmured lovingly, and for a moment he stopped fidgeting. "Goodness, you're cold as ice."
"I am not," he snapped quickly, pouting, "I just fed. A lot. I'm all mortal warm. Your hands are just old and cold."
"Oh, hush," the old woman reprimanded him, smacking her cane into the side of his leg.
"That'll be a hell of a distraction," Thorne mumbled from the safety of his corner, irritably petting his temporarily black-dyed locks.
Antha, adjusting her brother's cuffs when he couldn't seem to get them right, locking his cufflinks into place, spared him a single glance over her shoulder and the less than innocent purr of, "I don't know what you mean."
So instead he leaned towards Rynn's ear, whispering, "Nicolae always captured the attention of a room, and none of these people have physically seen him in two years. Who can possibly harass you or Cian with Nicolae around?" Though Antha pretended not to hear him, her brother noticed a slight twitch at the corner of her lips. Thorne always did have a way of seeing right through her.
Julien, meanwhile, cast his gaze sidelong from Nicolae to Antha, murmuring suspiciously, "That's one, so who are the other two?"

The next half-hour passed in a blur of faces, all of whom seemed to arrive within ten minutes. All fine figures, mostly older men with lavishly costumed women on their arms, some with their children in tow, some with a much older man or woman. Sophie and Gerard Astoria were two such tag-alongs, dressed in their finest, with their grandmother trailing behind. Sophie was hardly to be contained when she set eyes on Antha, whose smile turned sharp and forced, but her brother was quick to drag her off to the parlor, whining the entire way. ("But her legs are so long and she smells like violets~!")
They were followed by Antha's second surprise guest, a very uncomfortable looking David Talbot, who greeted the family hastily with, "I didn't want to come, she threatened me."
"'Threatened' is such a subjective word," Antha mused, eyes sparkling mischievously, "I'd rather call it motivation. Or a warning. But it's a party, dear David, you should really lighten up."
Scowling, the man turned and slipped away into the parlor, Antha's mood bright and amused for moments more before the next clump of guests appeared in the door and she was at once on edge. "Christian."
It was hard to imagine, but Thorne noted that Geoffrey seemed to be the most approachable of the Parker clan. He took after his mother it seemed, with her blonde hair and a face that had probably been beautiful in her heyday, her expression carefully managed. But as the rest of them knew, Christian favored his stern and severe father, who stood beside him now offering his hand politely to Julien.
"Monsieur Parker, so pleased you could come."
"We're glad to be invited," the man returned lowly, his voice deep and smooth. He cut an imposing figure, anyone would have to give him that, in a severely cut Armani suit with his inky black hair slicked back, a Rolex glittering on his wrist and sapphire tie pin against the fine fabric, nothing escaping his sharp gray eyes. "Particularly after we missed the last Mayfair family event. I mean of course your niece's wedding."
Antha stiffened, feeling the force of the accusation physically, and only then did she dare to meet Christian's eyes. He was smiling at her, sharp and cold, icy blue eyes baring into hers. "Christian," she greeted him slowly, eyes narrowing back, proffering her hand which he politely bowed over, laying a kiss upon her pale skin.
"Mademoiselle Mayfair," he greeted her in return, with all the finesse of a snake, "Or...is it madame now?"
"Whichever," she replied, in keeping with the passive-aggressive tone that the meeting had taken on.
"This must be your new husband, then," he began quickly, before Antha could brush him off, and turned his attention to the man at her side with frightfully sharp eyes and a chilling smile. "Cian Calais, was it?" He flipped his long silvery-white hair over his shoulder as if it were in the way before extending his hand in greeting. "Christian Parker. It's a pleasure to meet you, I'm sure."
But Antha stopped them before the men could shake hands, seizing Christian's wrist in her own fingers (he briefly grimaced as if he'd been caught) and smiling easily as she interjected. "Christian, you've forgotten your brother. We all know you, so you should introduce him first."
His hand fell away, a single strand of glimmering hair slipping away almost unnoticed as he did so, while his father gestured at the younger of the brothers. "Of course, no, that was my mistake. This is my younger son, Geoffrey. I believe some of your younger family members are classmates with him?"
It was Alistair who stepped up, with his frightfully disarming smile. "Geoff. Say, I hope you're feeling alright. That was quite a tumble you took at school today."
"I'm fine, thank you," was the curt response, shooting a flickering glance in Thorne's direction.
The Parkers were followed by Antha's third guest, which brought an exasperated groan from Julien. "Claire Leonelli. How...lovely to see you again."
The boy brought his unnerving gaze on Julien, briefly sneering, before turning to Antha and lighting up. "I didn't come for you, I came for Evie."
"Hey!" Courtland cut between them before Claire could come too close to Antha, all but hissing as he grabbed her up. "I've told you not to say that. That's our word, you can't use it."
"Oh?" The boy smirked, flicking a blue strand of hair from his eyes. "We could have each other arrested for treason, that's a bond you'll never have."
Antha grimaced expectantly, just as Julien hissed, "Antha Evelyn!"
"Speaking of which---" Claire's slashed grin broadened, that dangerous glimmer of insanity springing so easily to his eyes, "I thought of a new game. You'll play with me, won't you? The buy-in is cheap and the profits are---dare I say it? Insane." He laughed as if to illustrate the gravity of his last word and Jack all but shoved him into the parlor, away from Antha.
"What have I told you about traipsing around mafia strongholds?" Julien grumbled meanwhile, lowly enough not to be overheard from the parlor. "I loathe that boy, he's nothing but trouble."
"Ah, but he's so much fun," Antha responded simply, her smile bright and cutting.
"I don't want to imagine the possible felonies you've wracked up playing your 'games' with that boy."
"You were certainly pleased enough with the tens of millions of dollars it made..." Antha muttered, rolling her eyes, only to shriek at the strike of Suzette's cane against her leg.
"Enough, children. Sugarplum, drop all this talk of fraud and go keep the guests entertained."
"Fine," Antha hissed in defeat, taking Cian's hand and stalking off into the parlor.
"Ah, heaven almighty," the old woman sighed wearily when they were gone, shaking her head, "She's lucky she's pretty, that one. A girl with half her looks would never get away with as much as she does, even with all that devious intelligence." But she waved the subject away, taking Nicolae by one arm and Malakai by the other. "Come along, children, take me around the parlor."

Surprisingly, things had gone quite according to Antha's plan. With Nicolae present after so long---beautiful, golden Nicolae, with all of his easy charm and his dazzling smile, heir to a great amount of the Mayfair legacy and a key position in the family---the guests found themselves far less interested in the Calais brothers than before they'd arrived. David Talbot, who was a famously mysterious figure around the city, and Claire Leonelli with his pyrotechnic-based forms of parlor tricks took most of the rest of the attention. When someone's focus did shift towards them, Antha was more than enough to keep anyone from flat-out harassing Cian, and Courtland and Jack generally popped up with their wild chatter whenever anyone approached Rynn.
However, as the cousins soon learned, there was one point they hadn't thought to have covered and were not prepared for when it finally happened.
"Antha."
The girl stiffened and bristled like a cat faced with a bucket of water, clutching at Cian's arm when her name was spoken breathlessly, adoringly.
"Twenty feet, Sophie, those were the terms of the out-of-court settlement."
"Oh, that?" The girl beamed happily, her eyes soft and shining. "You know very well that was never enforceable, just a tacit agreement. It's alright, I know you didn't mean it."
"The hell I didn't," Antha hissed, darting behind Cian's back when the girl took a step closer and peeping over his shoulder in a poisonous green glare. Her options were severely, painfully limited in public, where she couldn't physically harm the girl. "What happened to your brother, wasn't he supposed to keep a rein on you?"
"Mother and daddy are introducing him to one of your cousins. I don't remember which---the slutty one, I think? They're so determined to have a Mayfair in the family."
She took another step forward, prompting Antha to call her name once in warning, and then another, which was enough to finally drive Antha away in a mad dash, slipping into the sea of bodies. Sophie pursued her in a flurry of swishing white skirts and pale hair, calling out after her.
"What fine messes Antha gets herself into," Ezekiel Mayfair sighed into his glass, rolling his eyes. Like most of the younger cousins, he had been lingering in the furthest corner of the room, trying not to draw attention to himself.
Blaine Rodgers, dressed to the nines, was also present, questioning Zeke no matter how the boy tried to change the topic. "So you're telling me you're a Mayfair, but you're not rich?"
"Not all Mayfairs are," James noted quietly, pressing his glasses up the bridge of his bandaged nose.
"I'm from a distant branch," Zeke muttered lowly, clearly fed up with the conversation, "We've barely even held onto the Mayfair name. We get some money for that, and it lets us live comfortably, but we're not rich."
"But you go to Sacred Heart with us, and I know you didn't get in on a scholarship."
"The main branch of the family pays for anyone with the Mayfair name in this city to go to school."
"This is boring," Thorne complained meanwhile, as listless as ever, "I just came for the food. When are we eating?"
"It's literally been fifteen minutes since the party started," Eleanor snapped, cutting a sharp gray gaze at her cousin, "You walking stomach."
"I live on hotel food, gimme' a break." But Eleanor merely scoffed, turning away, which prompted Thorne to turn to Rynn and Liesse and whisper irritably, "Be glad she moved out when you moved in. I don't know what a ten-year-old---"
"Eleven, you sloth!"
"Whatever. I don't know what an eleven-year-old has to be so angry about all the time."
Set on a new warpath, Eleanor turned back to Thorne with a scowl, her eyes flickering at Rynn. "Whatever. What are they even doing here? Isn't he, like, a mass murderer or something?"
As if on cue, Courtland appeared at her side like magic, stooping over to rest an elbow on her shoulder. "I wonder how many people here are?" he mused, sipping at his drink, "Big business is a dangerous game, dear Eleanor. Haven't you thought about it? Don't you wonder how many people in this very room have put nosy little girls like you down in the ground?"
The girl tensed, stepping hastily back with the hopes that he would fall once the support was ripped out from under him, but Courtland caught himself and laughed, shaking his head. "What's the matter? Not afraid, are you?"
"No!" she hissed, though Thorne thought he could see a trace of it in her eyes. "What would I be afraid of, you? You're just a stupid junkie. And lazy. And...and gay!"
Jack appeared then, forcing a mocking pout as Courtland muffled peels of laughter in his sleeve. "Eleanor, don't you approve of our relationship?"
"Ew, gross. I bet you two have all the STD's between you."
Gaining a grip on himself, Courtland grinned. "And some the doctors have never seen before. Which reminds me...you didn't hug your dear Uncle Courtland when you got here."
The girl shrieked as the boys advanced on her, turning and running as fast as she could. Courtland followed, demanding in amusement to know what was the matter. Jack, who was content to conclude their short game, remained behind with a little grin of satisfaction. "God, she's got such a smart mouth for such a little girl." His gaze swept back over to Rynn and Liesse, his smile softening. "I hope she wasn't too rude. Eleanor gets her sadistic jollies saying terrible things to people. If it turns out she never killed a small animal just to watch it bleed, I'll be shocked."
"She'll be getting better now though, won't she?" Thorne mused, first glancing after her and then turning his gaze on Jack, "Now that Vanessa is born and the chains that bind are forming? That's how it works, isn't it? I'm not close enough to Antha, I'm not entirely sure how it works."
"The designee influences any cousin bound to them by a certain degree, that's true," Jack conceded, glancing off as if he were thinking very seriously about it, "But there's a lot to consider in that equation. The depths of Eleanor's twisted nature, Vanessa's character, how powerful both of them are, how closely bonded they'll be...even with our generation, the most closely bonded in family history, look at Lawrence. He's in the closest circle, but he doesn't take after Antha at all. Or, if he does, he takes after some very small, meticulous part of her."
James, who had been watching quietly, made a great show of blinking, looking just a little shocked. "I think...I think that's the most intelligent thing I've ever heard you say."
"I'm not an idiot," he protested, roughly elbowing the boy, "I just don't see the point in being serious, usually. It's no fun."
"Everybody thinks you're a joke." He hadn't meant it meanly, though it was clear by the look on his face that he realized it sounded so and was sorry for that.
"So?" Jack smiled, a hint of a laugh on his lips. "Who am I trying to impress? Courtland knows me. What matters outside of that? It's useful that Antha knows me, and my other closest cousins to varying degrees, but the rest of the world? ******** 'em." He raised his glass slightly, tipping it in a toast, and then threw the contents back in one easy gulp before drifting away, chuckling to himself.
Thorne and James were silent for several very long moments, staring after him in blank shock, before finally the latter murmured uneasily, "Did we...did we just get some actually rather profound life advice from Jack?"
"I think we did." Thorne shook his head, trying to clear it. "He has even more of an actual brain under the drugs than I thought."
James likewise shook his head, glancing away thoughtfully, but instantly paled. "That doesn't look good..." He gestured surreptitiously with his glass to the corner by the windows where Antha and Christian Parker were deep in conversation, both stiff and speaking very quickly over one another. "It looks a bit...heated."
"Antha and Christian can't be in the same room without something leading to a fight. They're a thousand times worse than she ever was with you, Rynn."
"Should we get Courtland?" James inquired nervously, watching the argument from the corner of his eye, "Or, should we get Cian? Who do we get to stop these things now?"
"No, I think it would only make things worse." Thorne put his glass to his lips, glancing away as if it was none of his business. But like a spectator to some horrendous accident, he found it difficult not to look back. He was just in time to catch Antha's eye, which at the same time made him look away for good and stopped Antha, silencing Christian with a word and then turning abruptly on her heel. She had stalked partially across the room when Christian's subdued scowl turned determined and he started after her.
She was just several feet short of Thorne and James when he caught her by the arm, too roughly to be anything but a fight, her eyes going wide with incredulity and then abruptly rage as she was spun around to face him, hissing lowly at her, "Don't walk away from me." The boys both stirred as if they would intervene, but quickly settled again as if they'd thought the better of it.
Despite the necessary iron hold Antha had on herself, she could not quite contain the flare of scorching power that washed over the room for the smallest fraction of a second, a clear threat if there ever was one. Christian stood his ground, seething, as she ripped her arm from his grasp, reacting not as most girls would by recoiling from the abrupt violence but instead rounding on him, murder in her eyes and voice dangerously low, not drawing the attention of the other guests. "You must be out of your ******** mind."
Christian scowled, oblivious that they were now in possession of an audience, however small. "Oh, how superior you imagine yourself to be. Antha Evelyn goddamn Mayfair with all your power, your connections, and your ******** fortune. Do you think I'm scared of you?"
"I think you're a fool if you aren't," the girl hissed with grave severity. Christian sneered, rolling his eyes, which meant he did not see Antha's abrupt movement when she turned her back to the wall so that no one other than Thorne, James, Rynn, and Liesse would see it when she seized him by the tie, yanking it just short of choking him until they were hardly an inch apart. "Do I think you're afraid of me, Christian?" Her voice was the smallest, deadliest little whisper, dripping venom. "Do you think I ******** care the tiniest bit? You don't have to be afraid for me to chop you into little scraps of meat and dispose of you in the werewolves' den on a full moon. Do you think you'd be the first? Try me, Christian."
"You don't have to remind me that you're a psychopath, Mayfair. But who do you think you're dealing with? Do you think I'll go quietly? Do you think the entire city won't be looking for me in an hour?"
"Do you think I don't have the entire city wrapped around my finger?" Another smirk that turned James's blood to ice in his veins, her voice gone cruel and mocking. "I own this city, Parker. You're just a pest straying dangerously far out into the open. And do you really think that after I've had at you, your mommy and daddy and little brother will ever find a single strand of your hair? Don't equate me with your sort of amateur work."
She released her hold suddenly enough that he bobbed momentarily before regaining his composure. "You really think I can't touch you, don't you? We had contracts, Antha, and you're in forfeit of them. And your children?" The man sneered mercilessly. "God, how easy it'll be to ruin them. Born right after your marriage, right after your husband showed up in town, your son looking like his uncle...I can bury them in so much scandal they'll never survive it, and you won't be around to do a damn thing."
There was still the smallest sliver of space between them and Thorne noted, with his usual wandering observational sense, that despite Christian's considerably superior height and breadth, Antha's slight form was the more imposing one by leagues, even in her little gold and cream party dress. "I'll say this one last time, and then you're going to turn around and get the hell out of my sight: If you pull another stunt like in the entrance hall---if you have so much as a passing thought about causing my husband even the slightest inconvenience, you will wish with every fiber of your being that I had only killed you. And my children? Threaten them again and you can say goodbye to your entire line. Your mother, your father, your brat of a little brother...no one will ever find so much as a drop of their blood. I'll have your name taken off of everything in this city, it'll be like you never even existed."
The man gave an impatient tsk of indignation, turning angrily, but Antha halted him with the sharp call of his name. It earned her a brief glance over his shoulder, long enough for the chilling smile to spread across her lips as she said very seriously, "It's not a threat. It's a promise."
Though the recipient of the words vanished with moderate grace, James paled and gave a fine trembling. Casting her eyes briefly over the four of them, Antha idly removed a glass from a passing tray and then, very calmly, said, "And none of you saw or heard a thing, did you?"
James rapidly shook his head, staring at his feet with his tongue thoroughly tied, while Thorne replied in equal measured calmness, "I don't know what you're talking about, you were never even here."
"Good boy," Antha commended him in a low purr, with a satisfied smirk to match. Her eyes drifted after Christian meanwhile, likewise composed as if the altercation had never taken place. It took a few seconds, her eyes flickering thoughtfully, for the musing to pass errantly from her lips, "I think I'll be killing him soon."
"Antha!" James squeaked in immediate horror, his glasses slipping down his nose as the glass nearly slipped from his hand.
Thorne, a great deal more jaded than his cousin, only bothered to murmur in warning, "You're backsliding, Evie."
"Am I?" Antha smiled, as dazzlingly and dangerously as ever. "Gracious...you'd better sound the town alarm. But it's a party, darling. And besides---" She slid up to him as close as she and Christian had been, one pale finger pressed to her smirking lips for silence, "---I was never here, remember?"
"Should I even ask what he thought he was going to do to Cian that's got you so worked up?"
"No, cher. No you should not."
With an easy shrug, Thorne relented and Antha recomposed herself, glancing over the room as an amused smile played across her lips. "Not afraid of me..." she murmured, half into her glass, before downing the last of it to choke the trickle of laughter. "What a joke." It was only then that she seemed to take any notice of Rynn, those gleaming eyes locking briefly to his before gesturing after Christian. "What do you say Rynn, do your old habits die as hard as mine?"
It was Alistair who intervened before anyone could say anything else, inserting himself into the conversation as easily as if he'd been there all along. "Evie, don't go luring poor Rynn into your murderous rampages. He has a real shot of mending his reputation, don't go spoiling it."
Antha gave a 'hmm' of consideration, flashing Rynn a brief, conspiratory glance before turning back to observe the room. "Pity. I do love a good partner in crime, and I don't think Cian has a taste for blood."
"I don't think any of us could rest easy if we knew you two were off working together. Particularly Cian, but that's a different matter." The boy laid a hand on Rynn's shoulder as he spoke, as if to reassure him.
"Don't you think he trusts me at all, Airi?"
"I can only speak for myself, but I don't trust you one bit."
The girl grinned knowingly, casting him a sidelong glance. "How cruel. I do have some semblance of self-control. Well...for the time being." She grew abruptly serious then, without warning, handing her empty glass off to a waiter. "If you all will excuse me." She was gone before they could, stalking off into the crowd in fresh irritation.
While James was relieved to see her go, he noted that Thorne and Alistair were grinning in amusement to one another with the quirk of his brow. "What a godawful hypocrite she is," Alistair sighed, swirling the ice in his glass with a low clink.
"The worst," Thorne murmured in agreement, and then seeing that James had not pieced it together, nodded to where Cian was all but mobbed by pretty young girls across the room. "And everyone always accuses Nicolae of being such a violently jealous creature, but Antha is so much worse."
With one last gentle laugh at his sister, Alistair turned to Liesse, all dazzling smiles and easy grace. "But don't you look like the new princess tonight. It seems like an absolute waste to have you over here instead of on the dance floor." Grinning, he nodded pointedly at nearby where Malakai stood with flushed cheeks and clenched jaw, pulling politely and ineffectually at his arm to get it away from a shapely, bejeweled young woman who chattered rapidly at him without response, or seemingly any expectations for one. "They say anything that's worth having doesn't come easy. But in this case, I think you'll find your acquisition immensely grateful for the change in company."

Meanwhile, Antha had drawn new battle lines of her own. Slipping through the throng of eager, eyelash-batting girls, she pressed a kiss to Cian's cheek and took his arm, apologizing lowly for leaving him on his own. Taking into account her body language and the brief glare she shot the company around them, she only could have made a clearer point by brandishing a weapon and stringing a sign around Cian's neck that read 'Mine'. "Shall we dance?" she suggested as she surreptitiously ushered him away, smiling up at him as if to change the subject, "I suppose it's expected of us, and anyways I need something to turn my mood around." She parted the ring of spectators around the dance floor with the briefest tap of her finger against a shoulder, separating herself from Cian only long enough to turn around and offer him her hand. "What about it? I could stand to show these stuffed shirts a thing or two."  

[Okimiyage]

Cian could feel something inside of him clench down, like handcuffs, like one of the clamped beds they had once used to treat epileptics, like the warning ‘play it cool’ and all that entailed. An internal struggle ensued, and something in him—
snapped.
Or ripped.
Or maybe that was Antha’s dress.
All that Cian knew was that his body had a will of its own, and when he came out of the kiss his hands were tangled in Antha’s scarlet curls, clenching so hard that it had to hurt, and he had to remind himself to relax, relax before his body would respond. Her dress was on the floor, all tatters. He gave it a rueful glance—but no more than a glance. As pretty as the frock was, there were more distracting things around to rest his eyes upon.
She was underneath him, hair all spread upon the pillows like a puddle of blood, falling over an eye that glittered like a faceted emerald. He spread his smile, leaned in, put his mouth against her throat. He could feel the old scars beneath his lips, patterning her skin like braille.
Cian sometimes had to remind himself how lucky he was.
It was hard, in moments like this. With all of his luck right in front of him, all he could think about was how temporary it was. And he couldn’t help. He couldn’t save her.
If it was Rynn in his place—powerful, stubborn Rynn—Cian had to wonder if things might be different. Rynn had never been able to keep calm like Cian could, to acknowledge his own inability to change things, to let go. Hell, he would have rather killed Antha, a total stranger, than let Liesse die. Morality didn’t matter as long as those he loved were protected. Like a loyal guard dog.
Downstairs, the doorbell chimed; Cian’s eyes widened, and sharp panic came into his gaze. “Oh, s**t. They’re here already? s**t.”
The two tore apart from one another in a flurry of tangled sheets, scrambling for their discarded articles of dress. In his haste, Cian knotted his champagn-colored tie wrong twice, nearly choking himself in the process. Antha needed help zipping her skin-tight dress; he clasped the chain of her necklace while she finished coating her lashes in mascara. Even Cian understood, as lax as he usually was about his appearance, that tonight was a very politely conducted war. It was important to be appropriately armored.
Eventually, just in time, the two of them clattered out into the hall, caught their breath—and Cian caught his wife up in a very careful kiss, trying not to smudge her lipstick—and descended the stairs, stately as could be.

Downstairs, Rynn and Liesse found themselves swamped in a tide of guests. Liesse didn't mind--she was beaming at her own frilly dress half the time, and ogling the fancy dress of others half the rest--but Rynn wasn't used to being ignored. In his own house, he was master. Here, he was just another guest.
A penguin-patterned server gave them both glasses of champagne, and Rynn promptly downed his own while Liesse admired the bubbles.
They didn't have long to adorn the sidelines, though. Rynn found himself actually grateful to be snatched up into conversation by the approaching cousins. God, did Mayfairs never stop breeding? There were so many of them already.
When Eleanor approached, he found himself wishing that at least one pair in particular had remained celibate: the little brat's parents.
Liesse’s mouth parted in a perfect ‘O’ of offense and shock, but Rynn intervened before she could protest, grinning at Eleanor like a bobcat smiled at its prey. Now *this* was the sort of game that he was good at. “Oh, is that what they’re saying about me these days? I thought that the police had agreed to wipe my record once my brother married us into the Mayfair household. Although—I wouldn’t really be vain enough to call myself a mass murderer. It’s really more of a family sport, after all; I can’t take credit for the work of all those who came before me. I just count myself grateful that they never dug up the gardens…”
Eleanor wasn’t used to backchat from her victims, but the shock on the little girl’s face didn’t last for long. Courtland swooped in to rescue the twins, although Rynn was certain it was rather for Liesse’s benefit than his own. Diverting his own attention to chasing after a server carrying a tray full of champagne, he returned momentarily to find Eleanor fleeing the conversation.
Liesse accepted the tall, fluted glass, and took a grateful sip. “You needed something to relax,” Rynn murmured, nudging her. Then, glancing at Courtland, noting Eleanor’s retreating back: “You work fast. I should take lessons from you.”
Liesse, fininshing her glass of champagne: “This soda is delicious.”
“That’s not so—“
Cian came in-between the twins at that point, replacing the emptied glass in Liesse’s hands with his own. “That’s right, darling. Ginger soda. It’s refreshing, isn’t it?” Rynn glared, and his brother winked—then waltzed off before Rynn could grind an elbow in-between his ribs.
Liesse blinked owlishly at Jack, the only one amongst the Calais actually paying attention to the conversation. She didn’t really understand what they were talking about, but the champagne made her bold enough to join in. “Isn’t contention what forms the strongest bonds, though? Forces of chaos need a lawmaker to thwart. The most noble souls should be challenged, daily, by a devil’s advocate. To go without breeds complacency.”
Rynn crossed his arms and smiled fondly at his sister. This was why he loved her—she had such a simple and delightful way of looking at things. “It makes things more interesting, at the very least.”

They said that was a curse in eastern countries: “May you live in interesting times.”
By the look of things, Antha was planning to make life a whole lot more interesting for the Parkers in the near future. Rynn recognized that flash of heat. It was the same sort of fire that had razed the burning city, in Antha’s dream. He could very nearly smell the charring flesh.
Liesse traded her empty glass for one full of ginger soda from a coat-tailed server’s tray. None of them were bothering to hide their stares; most likely it would only serve to make Antha’s antagonist more uncomfortable. Liesse didn’t know who Christian Parker was, but she was savvy enough to recognize the resemblance between him and the white-blonde antagonist from this afternoon at the school. She reached out for Rynn, giving his hand a quick squeeze. “Look. Isn’t that—?” “Shhh.”
Say what you would, Liesse had to admire Antha’s posture. Even though the Parker male towered above her, it was easy to see—just from a glance—who was cowed. Liesse supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised; this was Mayfair territory, after all. No matter how dainty Antha looked in her golden frock, it was her throne room that Christian had, unwisely, chosen to challenge her in. She wasn’t surprised to see him turn tail first.
She was, however, surprised at Rynn’s approval. He didn’t go so far as to clap a hand on her shoulder—after Christian’s attempt, that would have been superbly stupid—but his voice held an air of camaraderie, almost warmth, as he complimented her: “Nice.”
“And no, I wouldn’t say that I’ve ‘given up’ my wayward activities. I’ve simply made an attempt to be more—circumspect.” His eyes skirted the crowd. He wouldn’t have put it past Cian to completely ignore the flinch of power that had rippled through the party, but no, there were his familiar tousled curls struggling through a dam of bodies. (Rynn noted that these were mostly young women, cinched into dresses within an inch of their lives, war-paint up to their hairlines. Say what you would, Cian had a gift with the opposite sex.)
Liesse batted her twin with the back of her hand, clutching empty champagne glass. “Rynn. Don’t you dare! You promised.”
“Oh, well—I don’t know about promises, I’m so forgetful these days… I think I said I would try. But there are some situations I simply can’t help myself in…”
With a sidewards glance towards Antha, as she bustled off into the crowd, heading towards his brother, he added: “Besides—family is family.”  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were warming up to us.” Eyes twinkling, Courtland shot Rynn a wink, a pleased grin stretching wide across his face. “It’s about goddamn time, too.”
With Antha’s departure, the boy cast his gaze back over the crowd, watching quietly, waiting for something. Something interesting was bound to happen sooner or later, he could always count on that in their family. The front door opened and he smirked, proven right again. Either they had a crasher or someone had shown up unforgivably late, neither of which would sit well with Julien.
“Is that…?” Jack stood on his tiptoes to see over the sea of heads, his eyebrows furrowed.
Likewise craning to look, eventually Courtland’s jaw dropped, exclaiming lowly in equal shock and pleasure, “Oh my god. ” He turned immediately upon Jack, grabbing his arm and shaking him back to his senses. “Go get Pierce, quick!” As his other half darted into the crowd, following orders, Courtland seized the Calais twins and dragged them through the chattering crowd, Alistair several steps ahead of them. He was just in time to see Antha yanked off of the dance floor, judging by the movement of the scarlet crown of her head, and judged his suspicions utterly confirmed when he heard her give a low shriek of delight.
He released Rynn and Liesse when they reached the open area before the front windows, rushing impulsively towards a slender girl in a chic, fitted black mini-dress and outrageous platform heels who had her arms locked in a deathgrip around Antha. “Lucy! LucyLucyLucy!” Both girls looked up in unison, just in time for his arms to snatch them both up and squeeze.
“Courtland, get off and wait your turn!” Antha hissed, shoving the boy off and protectively gathering the other girl back to herself, all but bouncing on her feet in excitement. “I missed her more.”
The newcomer laughed, all unrestrained pleasure and delight. “Of course you did.” Her pale, slender fingers briefly cupped Antha’s chin, her pink frosted lips laying a careful kiss on each of her cheeks. “And I missed you the most, but that goes without saying.”
The girls squeezed each other for another few moments before finally parting to arm's length. Antha paused then, looking her companion up and down, inspecting the fine black satin dress and finally pursing her lips. "Lucy, did you steal my dress?"
The other girl grinned guiltily but brushed the question aside. "You didn't even notice."
Courtland did bounce on his feet, the agony of restraining himself flashing across his face before the girl sighed and opened her arms out towards him. He outright grabbed her off her feet, spinning her around and squeezing until she could hardly breathe. “Down, Courtland.” He obeyed, but only after showering her face with a litany of kisses, which she laughed through.
Thorne, his curiosity sated, merely hummed and then mused aloud, “So you’re Lucy….” His eyes rapidly took her measure as her eyes---the lightest shade of brown, nearly honey-colored when the golden flecks caught the light, rimmed with black ink in the cat’s eye fashion---flickered in his direction. “I thought you’d be blonde.” It was a funny thing that he’d never learned that about her when he’d heard so much. Famous Lucy, the wanton heiress, nearly as pretty as Antha and determined to be just as interesting.
Her smooth brow briefly pinched, as if she hadn’t expected to hear that, and then just as suddenly she gave another of those easy, unrestrained laughs. “You must be Thorne. Funny, I thought you’d have purple hair.” But she shrugged her thin, rounded shoulders as if it was of no matter, flipping the thick waves of her dark, glossy hair. “I guess we’re both disappointments.” She turned then, bright-eyed and full of purpose, narrowing her gaze eagerly at Antha. “The most extraordinary thing happened---so wild that I just had to come home. Someone said you got married.”
Antha sighed, rolling her eyes and taking up Cian’s hand. “I wondered when you would find out. I swear I called three dozen hotels all across Europe looking for you. You were supposed to be my maid of honor. But alas, it was like chasing a phantom.” But she shook her head, tugging Cian closer. “Cian darling, this is my absolute dearest friend in the entirety of the universe, Lucy Balmont. Her father does some business with the family. Lulu, this is my husband, Cian Calais.”
The girl put her hand in Cian’s as the proper introductions were made, but her bewildered and fascinated gaze was boring into his eyes, continuing for several moments until she murmured finally in wonder, “It’s like meeting a unicorn.”
“And these are the other new additions to the family,” Antha continued, pinching Lucy’s arm to pull her out of her trance, “Cian’s brother Rynn, our cousin Liesse, and my little brother, Alistair.”
“Alistair?” The boy in question gave a broad, guilty grin. He knew Lucy was familiar enough with him to read between the lines, and he knew her well enough that he was not surprised when she began to laugh. “You’ve been up to all kinds of trouble while I was gone, haven’t you?”
While the girls began to chatter, Courtland took the proper steps of explaining Lucy to their new family members. “Lucy is something of a supernatural groupie. She’s human herself, but we let her play with us sometimes. Until about a year ago, when she ran off to see Nine Inch Nails in Germany and the next thing we knew she had drunkenly followed some rock band to Japan. She’s been promising to come home immediately every month since, but alas…that’s Lucy for you.”
The girls’ reunion was halted about that time by a few exclamations of shock, bodies parting hastily until Pierce all but skidded to a stop in their gathering, Jack chasing at his heels. “Lucy.” He was breathless, his eyes bright, and it took him longer than anyone could have imagined to notice that he had an entire lock of hair out of place, at which point he hastily smoothed it back.
“Pierce!” The girl beamed at him, throwing her arms around him as ecstatically as she had Antha, and he all but melted on the spot. “Surprised?”
“Yes,” he responded instantly, and then did not quite think about it long enough before he tried to amend his answer, “I mean, no. That is…” His gaze shot to Antha, who had bitten her lip on a laugh, no help at all, and finally he gave a nervous laugh. “I mean, I thought you were in Russia.”
“Russia? Oh no, that was a month ago. I was going to come home, but I ran into my favorite Italian actor in the airport in Madrid and the next thing I knew, I was in Rome.”
Lucy shrugged, prompting a grin from Courtland and the dismissive sigh, “That’s Lucy for you.”
Instantly Antha was all bright, eager eyes, clutching Lucy’s arm in a deathgrip of gleaming black nails, demanding very seriously, “What did you bring me?”
Lucy grinned as if she had expected no less, reaching fluidly into the small black bag slung over her shoulder and puling from it what appeared to be a simple rock, old but unremarkable, placing it in the palm of Antha’s hand. “I went on a tour of Augustus’s childhood home and my nail file may have accidentally wedged into a crack in the wall of his bedroom and knocked this piece off. Which then fell completely unnoticed into my purse. Accidents do happen.”
Staring down at the piece of stone in her hand, the devious smirk came unbidden to Antha’s lips, her eyes like a magpie’s. Simultaneously, Courtland shook his head, whining desperately, “Evie, no. No. Do you remember what you said last time? You said you wouldn’t have any more séances to summon Augustus. You promised me, Evie, you said you’d let Augustus stay dead.”
Briefly, her gaze swept sideways in a slitted glance at her cousin, smirking in a way that could have meant any number of dangerous ideas were running through her head. “I say a lot of things, Court.”
“Evie!”
While Courtland and Antha were distracting one another, Pierce hurried to snag Lucy’s attention any way that he could, exclaiming suddenly and loudly, “You should have come to see me in Paris. I could have shown you around.”
“I intended to, actually.” The girl gave a small, airy laugh at herself, making dismissive gestures of her hand, “I was going to surprise you, and I got all the way to Germany before I remembered that it was Oktoberfest and, well, I don’t entirely remember the next week, but when I came to I was in Estonia.”
Pierce’s jaw clenched, very subtly, trying with all his might not to look as horrifyingly disappointed as he felt. “But we’re both home now, that’s what’s important right?” And he laughed, awkwardly and just a bit off-pitched.
Lucy quirked an eyebrow but said nothing and, mercifully, did not seem to give his peculiar behavior much thought. Instead, her gaze caught on Julien as he crossed the room and she began towards him, calling breezily back, “I have to go give daddy’s excuses to Julien before he sees me. I’ll be back!”
“We’ll be here,” Pierce called even as she vanished entirely, the words again tumbling out as if he could not control them. When she was gone his face fell, all disappointment and acute agony, the helpless little murmur dragging desperately from his lips as if he absolutely had to say it, “For the love of god, marry me, pleeeeease…”
Behind him, the cousins had formed a half-circle with their sharp, judgmental eyes all trained on him. He could feel the gazes without even turning around, opting instead to slap a hand over his face to hide the vivid, creeping flush across his cheeks. Thorne was the first to speak, arms crossed and voice flat, brows furrowed as he stared at his older brother. “I am so goddamned ashamed of you.”
“Shut up.” They didn’t have to even say it, he already knew, and he wished desperately that the floor would open up and swallow him whole.
Courtland spoke next, in a low and pitying murmur. “That was physically painful to watch.”
And as usual, Antha had the last word, shaking her head and throwing back the last of her whiskey and coke. “Pierce, I’m not sitting through this again. Either tell her you’re desperately in love with her or else I’ll stick you on the next plane back to Paris myself. And god help you if you start hysterically sobbing again, I’ll punch you.”
The boy, utterly defeated, fell into the armchair set by the windows as if he were made of pudding, splayed face-first into the damask upholstery with limp arms and dragging legs. “Just leave me here, it’s as good a place as any to wither away and die.”
“Done,” Thorne said simply and mercilessly, turning and merely drifting away.
Courtland was sighing, half with pity and half with disgust, Antha still shaking her head, when Lucy popped up again in their midst, laying a hand on Antha’s shoulder as she asked with mingled concern and amusement, “Is he alright?”
Pierce jumped, clattering so clumsily to his feet that he knocked the nearby table over with his foot and then stood very, very still, utterly mortified. Antha said nothing, merely threw her hands up in surrender and took Cian’s arm, tugging him away with her. “For the love of god, let’s go dance.” Anything not to have to watch this terrible spectacle.
“But before I forget…” she had murmured as she pulled her husband back onto the dance floor, swaying to the slow, mournful melody, “I have a favor to ask of you, love. I have a job for Courtland and Jack that absolutely must be done tonight. Nothing dangerous, strictly recon, but I need someone to keep an eye on them. Would you mind terribly?” She moved surreptitiously, her cheek to his, her lips scant millimeters from his ear. “Who knows, it might be fun.” Her teeth nipped fleetingly at the lobe of his ear then while no one was looking, before pulling back with the mischievous glimmer in her eyes, her rouge lips curling into a puckish grin.

The bell rang for dinner not long after that, signaling a slow, loud procession of chattering guests into the dining room. The table had been extended to its full length, leaving barely enough room around the edges for the rotation of servers with their elaborate platters of food, so many chairs crammed around it that it required a certain amount of finesse not to bump elbows when the guests all sat down. The finest china the Mayfairs owned had been laid out, breathtaking pieces with hand-painted cream and pink roses and a circle of fleurs-de-lis, edged in gold, relics of the days of the French royal court. The glasses were all immaculate crystal, the complex array of utensils all ornate pure silver, polished to a mirror shine, with the Mayfair family crest etched into the handles. The antique vases lined up and down the table were filled with masterful arrangements of fresh roses, lilies, carnations, violets, and baby’s breath, for Antha, Julien, Michael, Courtland, and Malakai respectively. In short, not the slightest expense had been spared, not-so-subtly reminding the other elites of the city that despite their comparatively humble lifestyle, the Mayfairs ranked amongst the richest families in the entire world.
On the way in, the cousins rushed to offer the Calais clan helpful advice, with all the gravity of preparing soldiers for battle.
“Always be eating. If you can’t be expected to respond immediately, most people won’t bother you. Most.”
“And if anyone tries to bait you, loudly commend Jacob on the excellence of the food. Then everyone else is rude if they don’t follow suit.”
“And never try to save Antha. If you think anyone’s here for the company and the free food, you’re wrong, they’re literally all here to either bait her into an argument, try to negotiate business with her, or just to sit back and watch her tear some poor devil apart. Antha’s always the main event, there’s absolutely no help for her.”
“Thank you, Courtland. Now may I suggest you shut your goddamned mouth before that poor devil is you?”
It began innocently enough, everyone taking their assigned seats around the table with Julien on one end and Antha at the other as always. The cousins and the Calais siblings were all grouped around Antha’s end of the table, the aunts and uncles on Julien’s end, and everyone else carefully contained in the middle. The sole exception was Lucy, taking up her father’s assigned spot which had been neatly in the middle but had in fact been covertly switched for Lawrence’s place by Pierce some minutes earlier, putting her directly next to him. But the perils of a Mayfair dinner party became apparent by the time all the dishes had made their rounds, the low thrum of chatter broken by a raised, purposeful voice. He identified himself as the new curator of the history museum, of which the Mayfair family were the founders and principle benefactors, eagerly seeking Antha’s advice concerning their newest exhibit. He was a mere three sentences in when she silently deemed him a complete, absolute, irredeemable idiot.
“My predecessor assured me that you would be a most invaluable asset in these things. They say you’re a prodigy with history, Miss Mayfair, and quite a study on Emperor Augustus.”
Julien interrupted before Antha could cut him with any backhanded remarks---he could read the intent in her eyes as clearly as if she had called the man an idiot to his face. “It’s something of a running joke in the family that Augustus was darling Antha’s soulmate, you see.”
When the man’s blubbering was finally cut short, it was by a member of the city council asking her opinion on the recently proposed and hastily shut down bill to legalize Russian roulette, which most present recognized as a slight against Claire, as it had been his scheme. She had diplomatically managed to keep herself out of it for several minutes, until Claire casually let it slip that Antha had in fact been a frequent and wildly popular competitor at his illegal underground sessions of the game in the past. (Courtland let out the deepest sigh of relief when his name was not brought up, as he was the one who had brought her to see him play it in the first place.) Taking her own advice, the girl had hurriedly thrown a tart into her mouth and sat chewing as slowly as physically possible, glancing wildly around the upper parts of the room as if she hadn’t heard a thing.
There were comments about the wedding made all around, most of those in attendance having been present for it, seemingly innocent questions directed at the Calais siblings about themselves (but the cousins were all very proud of themselves for managing to deflect the trickier of the inquiries), some discussions of business matters that bored all of them but Lawrence and Vittorio terribly, and then finally some passing chatter on literature that had made the room go still and silent with terror when someone had denounced Allen Ginsberg as a talentless hack.
“Oh god, no, not Ginsberg,” Courtland had moaned helplessly, slumping down in his seat and keeping his gaze on his plate, “Augustus and Ginsberg---you never insult Augustus and Ginsberg, it’s not rocket science.” For her part, Antha was wide-eyed with outrage, sitting very still in her seat but for the hand that slammed her fork down on the table, and the following rabid, unrelenting rant on Ginsberg’s exquisite, haunting genius continued uninterrupted for five minutes before Alistair was able to soothe her again. After that, not even the rich, towering cakes, massive bowls of colorful, whimsically decorated ice-cream, and massive, elaborate fruit tarts could fully recover her temper. She was the first to trudge out of the room when dinner was over and the servers swooped in to take away the dishes, vanishing before any of the roving guests could track her down. Not that they didn’t try---they poked around every corner of the house, trekking up and down the halls, mingling around rooms, and drifting through the garden, admiring the fine Mayfair treasures, but no one could seem to find her. In minutes Cian had also mysteriously vanished, without witnesses to the event, and likewise could not be found.
Unconcerned with his sister’s spoiled mood, knowing full well how easily it could be turned around, Malakai had taken mere minutes after the party had dispersed to sneak up to Liesse, catching her gently by the arm. He was trying very hard to be utterly calm and casual, but could not quite disguise the hint of nervousness that plagued his eyes and shoulders. “I want to show you something.”
Very quietly, he led her through the bustling kitchen and out into the backyard, dimly lit from incandescent orbs on metal rods scattered through the garden, off of the porch and up to the glowing blue oblong figure of the pool. “You’re Cinderella tonight, right?” The boy smiled, in his usual soft way, taking both of her hands and stepping onto the plate glass fitted over the pool, one arm sliding carefully around her waist. He had cracked the parlor windows earlier, letting out a trickle of music from inside that he began to move to, with those slow, graceful movements that came so innately to Mayfairs.
Upstairs in the library, which had been locked fast against prying eyes, Antha gave a laugh beneath her breath, watching through the crystal clear windows. “Ah, tres lisse…how very smooth of you, big brother.” She turned away, giving them their privacy and Cian her attention, with the added bonus of her smoldering gaze and most impish grin.
Thorne was right, she was backsliding.
God, it felt good.
“But never mind them.” She slid up onto the desk with all the lanky grace of a cat, irreverently casting all the papers and knick-knacks onto the floor and hooking her legs around Cian’s waist, pulling him close enough to slide her arms around his shoulders. “I promised you a reward for putting up with this entire debacle, non?” A low purr thrummed in her throat, her lips pressing tauntingly to his neck and her fingers trailing down the front of his shirt, effortlessly popping open buttons. “And anyways, it’s your job to fix my mood when it’s spoiled. The family utterly depends on you for that, lest I raze the city in a fit.”
They were tangled by the time a thump sounded at the window, threatening to shatter the glass. Antha was briefly irate all over again, casting a murderous sidelong gaze out the window and into the dim gardens below where Courtland was grinning, staring up at them and weighing a few pebbles in his hand, considering whether or not to throw another. Antha separated her lips from her husband’s only begrudgingly, tossing her head and taking the edge of the curtains in hand. She paused then, just long enough to childishly stick her tongue out at Courtland---he grinned wider at that, blowing her a kiss---before yanking the curtains closed over the window.
“I told you she stole him.” The boy laughed, passing a bottle of whiskey to Rynn but looking at Jack, glowing with triumph because he had been proven right. “Never doubt me, love, I know our Evie like the back of my hand.”
“You know, I don’t think I even blame her,” Lucy was musing meanwhile, just a little drunk and endlessly giddy to be back home with all her old, otherworldly friends, “I mean she’s a traitor to everything we stood for and I feel totally abandoned, but damn her husband is hot.” She seized the whiskey bottle eagerly when it was handed to her, hastily exhaling her smoke and downing several shots worth of alcohol. “No, I can’t blame her. You’ve gotta’ lock that down.”
“Oh Lucy, how I’ve missed you.”
“But she’s still, like, fun, right?”
Courtland seemed to consider that, glancing up at the covered library windows. “She’s getting there again,” he said slowly, delicately, choosing each word with care, “You know how her psychosis works---the manic, euphoric highs and serious, deadly lows. She’s been in a low spell for a while now. We can’t blame her for that, she’s been under such pressure, so much to do. But I can see her coming back around. Mark my words, she’ll pull the jacket out of the back of her closet any time now.”
“Thank ******** god. Don’t get me wrong, the rest of you are great, but you’re boys. Antha and I are besties, I need her.”
Upstairs in the library, something shattered loudly and the small band outside all glanced up towards it, smirking knowingly. “But really, how much does Antha ever change?” To Courtland’s mind she was eternally that fourteen-year-old girl, thin as a rake with the shine of drugs in her eyes, spouting wild things that he was still years from understanding. She was still that beautiful nymph child that was all his, petting his hair with infinite, ardent love, conspiring to destroy other people for his happiness. He doubted he’d ever see her as anything else for as long as he lived.
He kept hearing her voice in his head, distant and ominous as a prophecy. Some things, once you’ve loved them, become yours forever. Maybe she hadn’t been talking about Nicolae. Maybe she’d been talking about herself, even all that time ago. And if you try to let them go, they only circle back and return to you. They become part of who you are. Or they destroy you. Maybe she was warning them that no matter what happened to her, they would never be rid of her for so long as they lived. She would have been right.
That was the moment it hit Courtland that Antha was about to die.
“Court…?” Jack was staring at him with such concerned eyes, one gentle finger reaching out to tentatively wipe a wet drop from beneath his eye.
“I’m fine, love.” He hastily rubbed his eyes and gave his best smile, which would have been quite convincing if everyone present hadn’t already surmised that something was the matter. His eyes flickered back to the window and he pretended they hadn't, instead laying a kiss on Jack’s forehead. “We should get back inside before Julien notices we snuck out and murders us all.”  

[Okimiyage]

Rynn’s eyes flicked to the side, catching the light as he erased his own satisfied smirk. He wasn’t the sort of person who ought to take pleasure in taunting a child, but he couldn’t help but feel a faint sense of pride at Courtland’s praise. He didn’t have a chance to respond, however, before a certain someone’s grand entrance diverted the attention of all present to the door.
Liesse was just as curious as Jack, stretching up onto the tip-toes of her sparkling shoes. She nearly lost her balance—Rynn had to grab her arm before she toppled into the crowd. Although, Rynn mused, it would have been quite amusing to see the domino effect take place in this sort of environment.
He didn’t have the time to imagine the situation for long before he felt another’s arm lock tight around his own, and with an ungainly yelp was dragged bodily into the swarming audience. They left a train of stubbed toes and dirty looks behind them—at least one woman in stiletto heels was forced to totter into a total stranger in order to keep balance. But they weren’t the only spectacle in the room— and most of the guests were still too busy staring at the newcomer (not to mention spreading hushed gossip) to pay attention to another one of the Calais family’s social faux pas.
They found themselves abruptly abandoned as soon as Courtland was within arm’s reach of the new guest. Introductions didn’t seem to be necessary, as Courtland made it very apparent what the girl’s name was.
She was as milk-pale as Antha, but dark-eyed where Antha’s were green, and hair that matched the shade and shine of her dress. Rich black curls tumbled across shoulders as slender as a knife-blade—no jewelry, it would have just been a gaudy distraction. But then again, when you looked like that, who needed it?
Cian, at Antha’s side like an unruly-haired bodyguard, gave Rynn a rakish grin, noting his appreciative eye. It was rare that Rynn displayed any interest in girls, so the long once-over that he was giving Lucy couldn’t possibly go without comment. He’d have to remember to give his little brother s**t about it later. Liesse blinked at her brother, then tugged hard on his arm. “Don’t stare, Rynn.” she protested. It was one of the few times that Liesse had actually demonstrated any sort of possessive behavior, so with a guilty glance away, Rynn complied.
Cian, for his part, put on his most charming smile and gave Lucy’s hand a firm shake. It was unbecoming for a married man to kiss a woman’s hand, no matter how pretty she was—read too much like flirting.
“The infamous Lucy Balmont,” he murmured, appreciatively. “I’ve heard so much about you. It’s a genuine pleasure. I’d return the compliment, although I’m not sure you could compare either of us with such a symbol of purity as a unicorn. A satyr, perhaps?” He softened the verbal blow with a wink. Then, glancing towards his wife, he released her hand and raised an inquisitive eyebrow as he turned to join Antha. Didn’t realize that you knew her, but I suppose I should’ve guessed, ha?
Lucy was legendary amongst the bar-crawlers of Osiris. Not simply because she was beautiful—although that was usually enough to build a reputation for oneself—but because her exploits were the sort of adventures that one usually only saw in Harlequin Romance novels. Dangerous, gorgeous, insatiable & powerful. The Balmont family was not to be compared to the Mayfairs, but money was a sort of power—or influence, perhaps, was a better word—and that, they had in spades. If she’d wanted, she might have been a political ally, or a business magnate. But if the tales were anything to be taken seriously, all Lucy was interested in was a good time.
Then again, she was friends with Antha.

But Cian didn’t have long to ponder. Rynn gave a short nod & “Charmed,” by way of introduction, while Liesse sprung forward all smiles. “So glad you came! Bit late for dinner, but we’ve still plenty of ginger soda. Don’t worry about missing the wedding, either, the newspaper took lots of pictures. I think there’s a film, too—it was quite the event, even if a bit rushed. You know how that is—they call ‘em shotgun weddings, don’t they? Not that Cian would’ve needed a shotgun to go through with it.” Rynn, at this point, realized that Liesse might need assistance in shutting up, and helpfully looped an arm around her waist and clapped the other hand to her mouth. Dragging her back, he gave an apologetic smile. “First time drinking ‘ginger soda’. Sorry.”
Liesse licked his palm, and he dropped it from her mouth with an eurrgh. Laughing, she spun away into the crowd. (Rynn, going pink, hastily wiped his hand upon his pants-leg—he did not seem to be able to think of anything to say, and instead chased after his sister with an expression of fierce indignance.)
Cian tried to hold back his own chuckle out of respect for Rynn’s pride, but hastily accepted the offer of a dance when it was given. When they were out of earshot, he broke out into peals of laughter. “The poor boy. He’s never dealt with her like this before.” In the throes of possession, yes. Submissive and worshipful, yes. It was nice to see Liesse grow a spine of her own, as odd and drunkenly maligned as it was.
Wrapping his hands around Antha’s waist, he pulled her in to lean against his chest.
He couldn’t help but sense that this was a rare opportunity, to dance with her like this. Possibly one of the last—but where did that thought come from?
No, no. Cian would have plenty more opportunities after this. He had to console himself with such thoughts.
A jazz standard wafted through the room, the scratch of the old Victrola evident in the singer’s deep and smoky voice.
Kiss the day goodbye
the sweetness and the sorrow
We did what we had to do--
And I can't regret
And I won't forget...

“‘Course,” he answered her, and he gave her a wink that came across as only somewhat devious. “Never fear, I’m an expert on mischief. I’ll keep them from getting up to too much of it.”
It had been a long time since Cian danced like this—he supposed he must have learned the steps at some point, because they came without effort, but he could not remember from where. it was funny how much he’d forgotten. There were years of his life that consisted of nothing more than a sort of grey fog, wisps of memories that dissipated like smoke once he attempted to consciously recall them. He remembered standing on someone’s feet as the steps to a waltz were demonstrated, without any idea of who his partner was or where the dance had occurred—but the tile beneath his gleaming black shoes was an intricate parquet, in contrasting shades of golden maple wood.

Antha and Cian drifted in stride around the dance floor, looking like nothing so much as the figurines atop a music box. Even Liesse, tipsy as she was, stopped fleeing from Rynn to gaze appreciatively out at the two of them. For some reason, the sight of them made her heart ache—an quite unexpectedly, she found tears stuck to her eyes. When Rynn caught up to her—with a triumphant mental growl of gotcha!—her expression of longing threw him off entirely.
His brow softening, he stood at her side. “Well.” he said, in the same tone as most people would have said ‘s**t.’
“I was going to punish you for that, but you’re already in tears. Not much I can do to make things worse. Really, I didn't think the quickest way to make you cry would be to put on a Jack Jones album--”
Rynn received a swat on the arm. “It’s not that.”
Liess had been trying not to sniffle, but it was either that or let her nose become all runny. She leaned against her brother with a great, damp sigh—Rynn pulled the decorative silk handkerchief from his breast pocket and held it out wordlessly. “Who’d have thunk it,” she murmured dreamily. “Rotten, run-away Cian, out of all of us, the first to get hitched. He did it, Rynn. The fairy-tale romance. And a father. I never thought I’d see the day.”
The tears had stopped sticking, and now were running down her cheeks freely.
Rynn couldn’t help but chuckle. It was either that, or cry with her. Tipping up her chin, he wiped her eyes and put an arm around her shoulder. “Come on, now. You’re making a spectacle of yourself. Don’t be sad.”
“I’m not,” she protested, smiling through her tears, and she joined him in a choked little laugh. “I’m happy. I’m just really, really happy.”
Rynn pulled gently at her shoulder, and she allowed herself to be led away. “Oh, hush. Let’s find Malakai, later. At our age, you shouldn’t just be watching everyone else dance.”

Unfortunately, they didn’t have the time to seek out Liesse’s fairy-tale romance just then, as the bell for dinner was rung and the meal stiffly announced by a tall waiter in tails. The tide of people turned and began to slowly trickle into the dining room; scooped up by one of the aunts, Rynn and Liesse followed suit.

Cian and Antha were at the head of the table, of course, all the better to be toasted to. Cian tended to sit back, eating just enough to be polite, but mostly having his glass of wine refilled and grinning at the debates in a way that was distinctly reminescent of a tame tiger. Rynn was watching his sister very carefully to make sure she received water in accompaniment to her ‘ginger soda’, although it wouldn’t be entirely out of keeping with Mayfair tradition if she went to school with a hangover the next day. The cousins were good enough to deflect most of the more probing questions for the twins, which was kind, seeing as how Rynn didn’t know whether Liesse could be trusted, in her current state, to remember all the nuances of her cover story.

But after dinner, no matter how carefully he watched her, it was not carefully enough to prevent her from stealing away into the crowd.
Rynn, briefly, felt a surge of panic. Twisting in every direction, he scanned the crowd for any glimpse of her periwinkle frock. He wasn’t sure whether he was relieved or not when he finally spotted her—slipping out the door into the garden with her beau.
It was what he wanted, wasn’t it? It had been his own suggestion, to cheer her up. But at the same time, he couldn’t help but feel as though he was losing something precious. He didn’t know what to call the feeling; Rynn had never experienced jealousy where his relationships were concerned. Liesse and he had always been together. He had never needed anyone else—and the fact that she did stung unexpectedly.
But, Rynn reminded himself, perhaps that was part of growing up. He couldn’t intervene—she had to have some experiences on her own. And Malakai wasn’t a bad sort, as Mayfairs went.

In the garden, Liesse could hear piano music trickling faintly out from the house.
Night had already fallen, but the gentle glow of the city was visible over the treeline, and lightning-bugs flickered among the dark branches like christmas lights.
She wasn’t sure what to say.
Less than an hour ago, she had been ogling Cian and Antha and wishing she could join them. It was as though Malakai had decided to play fairy godmother and prince in the same gesture.
She glanced down at the glass beneath their feet, nervously. Wasn’t glass…fragile? It was hard not to imagine how it might shatter under their weight. It must have been fear that was making her heart pound right now, and the giddy feeling she got from the champagne. (Rynn was so stupid to think she didn’t know what it was, but he never would have let her drink more than a glass if he thought she was doing it to get drunk)
But then she focused on Malakai’s hands, hers in his, their warmth, the weight of his musician’s fingers around her own, and raised her eyes with a shy half-smile. “I don’t think I could play Cinderella right now. I can’t imagine running away from all of this at midnight.”

Rynn had followed the gang of cousins out into the garden—been dragged out by his sleeve, more like—and now stood amongst them, watching the dark shapes move upstairs in the library window. It was alarmingly reminiscent of certain evenings in the Calais household, watching his brother’s silhouette in the observatory from the labyrinthine hedges. He’d never had the nerve to chuck pebbles at them, though; it would have just encouraged Cian. If the silhouettes were any indication, it was doing exactly that now.
Then, the curtains were yanked closed, and Rynn smiled crookedly at Courtland. “Told you they weren’t going to come down, but good try.”
The whiskey passed into his hands then, and he glanced around the circle with some small apprehension. He’d been closely watching to see how the others took their shots, but when he went to take a swig, he still wasn’t expecting the burning sensation in his throat. With a single hard cough, Rynn passed it off to the left and tried to resist the urge to stick out his tongue. They said you’d get used to it.
The heat travelled down his throat and into his chest in only a moment, though, and then he could understand why the Mayfairs drank so much. It was like the feeling when one came out of a cold night and there was already a fire stoked in the hearth, the chill sloughing away from Rynn’s shoulders. He stood up a little straighter and wiped whiskey from his lips. If Liesse was going to have a good time tonight, so could he. Anyways, she’d made it clear that she didn’t want him around, playing babysitter.
“You’re right,” he agreed with Court, distracting himself from that though. “If Antha’s up there, and we’re all out here, they’re going to notice the absence of ruckus a lot quicker.”
Rynn didn’t realize at the time, but it was the first time that he’d used ‘we’ to include himself amongst the cousins.  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

Quietly, a laugh spilled from Malakai’s lips, watching Liesse’s eyes nervously ogle the glass beneath them. “It’s not normal glass. Antha ordered it from some overseas laboratory, it could hold an elephant. They say it’s stronger than steel.” Another chuckle, shaking his head. “Evie loves her scientific marvels.”
And then, abruptly, he willed himself to stop talking about his sister. It wasn’t an easy thing for Malakai, who was so used to his world revolving around her, to gushing adoringly about her, but he persevered. Instead he drew Liesse a little closer, leaning in to whisper near her ear, “You forget the difference, though.” He nodded fleetingly towards the large, ornate house, lit up from every window. “You already live in the castle, you can only run home to the revelry at midnight.”
Though, revelry was a very loose interpretation for what was going on in the Mayfair house. Julien’s party was more like a viper pit beneath a glossy façade, and he could already sense something building with his cousins. He didn’t know what exactly, but he knew it was going to be a very long and eventful night.

Half an hour and many, many bottles of alcohol later, the cousins were looking for Lucy, who had disappeared in the waning crowd that had pervaded the halls. It was Courtland who found her upstairs, scratching at the door to the library like any desperate cat and calling for Antha in a low whine.
“Come on, Luce,” he sighed, pulling an arm around her waist and trying to coax her back downstairs, “They’ll be down soon.”
“But she’s been in there foreeeeverrrrrr!” the girl whined, leaning her full weight against the door.
“Half an hour,” Courtland corrected her, just as the other cousins came upon them with mixed sighs of relief and amusement.
Moments later, while Courtland and Jack were trying to extricate the drunk girl from the doorway, it opened very suddenly to produce Antha, her skirt slightly wrinkled and an eyebrow quirked. “Antha!” Lucy exclaimed happily when she saw her, launching herself forward until she was draped around the other girl’s shoulders. “They keep trying to tell me I’m drunk.”
“Lulu, when Courtland is telling you that you’re drunk, you’re already too drunk.”
Lucy thought about that for a moment, casting her hazy, heavy lidded gaze at the boy in question, and then very suddenly began to laugh. “********, you must be right.”
Antha only patted her head, smiling and sighing at the same time. “Ah, you haven’t changed a bit.” Her gaze became serious and inquiring then, turning on Courtland. “Court, I was never this bad, was I?”
“You?” The boy laughed, shaking his head. “God, no. By the time you got this drunk you were already popping speed like candy and rattling off quotes and philosophy that I was years from being able to comprehend.” Another laugh as he stepped closer, laying a hand on her shoulder and pulling her closer, staring mockingly serious into her eyes. “And then you’d get deadly serious and look me straight in the eye and proposition me. Or Dorian, or Pierce, or whoever you were talking to. Or all of us at once, sometimes. It was charming, really.”
Lucy laughed for another few seconds at the memories, before abruptly standing straight and putting a hand to her mouth. “I’ll be back,” she muttered, already turning and running down the hall.
Antha tilted her head, exasperated, before an idea seemed to hit her. “Damn it,” she sighed, before turning and running after Lucy, calling, “Lucy, wait, your hair!” She paused only briefly in the bathroom doorway, calling back to her cousins, “For the love of god, will you get these people out of my house? We’ve humored Julien enough. But don’t go near the pool, I’ll murder you if you interrupt.”
The cousins obliged, scouring the halls and politely ushering the guests out the front door. They gave the pool a very wide berth, far enough that Malakai and Liesse wouldn’t be able to see or hear them through the trees, pulling people from the gardens and herding them back towards the house to collect their things.

It was 10:30 when the Mayfairs finally settled around the parlor in exhaustion, having reclaimed their house from Julien’s various guests. Some of them were drinking, others picking at plates of leftovers because they hadn’t dared to pay attention to the food at dinner, while Jacob and a handful of servers with hastily unknotted ties and shirked jackets picked up the discarded glasses and set the house back the way it had been, moving furniture and unrolling the carpets, straightening the knick-knacks on shelves that had been jostled and knocked over.
“What’s taking them so long?” Pierce was fretting meanwhile, glancing at the stairs and waiting for Antha and Lucy, “I hope she’s alright.”
“Evie’s a pro at fixing this sort of thing,” Jack dismissed it errantly, happily clearing his second plate of lukewarm delicacies, “And Lucy’s liver is legendary when it comes to processing alcohol.”
Courtland, meanwhile, had gotten up and gone to the victrola in the corner, carefully lifting the needle and plunging the room in relative silence. Distantly, from up the stairs and the back of the house, there were faint vibrations of music that could only have been coming from Antha and Cian’s room. “There they are,” the boy murmured triumphantly, replacing the needle on the record and turning to head into the hallway.
He knocked but didn’t wait for permission to enter, half hoping he would catch the girls in a compromising position. He did find them on the bed, positioned as familiarly and intimately as lovers, and even Alistair posted languidly at the foot of the bed, but to his disappointment he couldn’t mistake it for anything but innocent. “What are we doing up here?” he questioned eagerly, plopping down on his stomach beside Alistair atop the plush coverlet. There were plates of leftover dessert on the bedside tables, a bottle of champagne they passed between them, and the stereo in the corner crooning some ethereal, haunting melody.
Antha grinned vaguely, laying perpendicular to Lucy with her head resting against the girl’s stomach, her legs curled up and shoes discarded on the floor. “Convalescing?” Lucy gave a dazed trickled of laughter, reaching out for the bottle of champagne before Courtland claimed it for himself.
Several moments passed without words, only the thrum of music, and it was comfortable for the exhausted group. At least until Lucy, famously without tact, began to speak. “Antha, somebody told me you were about to die.” The Mayfairs all retained their silence, though it was no longer comfortable, Antha staring down at the threads of her coverlet while Courtland and Alistair shared a complicated look. Lucy took all she needed from that, her eyes going dark as she stared hard up at the ceiling. Another few moments later, she continued speaking. “Do you remember the first time we met?”
Antha hummed in thought, murmuring, “Vaguely. You showed up at our house asking if we were really witches.” She mostly remembered being astonished, first because no one ever dared to simply walk up to Mayfair Manor, there were too many strange and horrifying stories tied to it, and second because who the hell just asked a total stranger that kind of question?
“I remember you answered the door.” Lucy smiled, speaking in wispy amusement. “You were like a little doll at first, fourteen and so tiny. But really I remember your eyes. They were so expressive, they darkened and lightened and shifted, but I never had any hope of knowing what any of it meant. I just know that you looked at me like you could see straight through my soul. And I remember that for one moment---just one---I was suddenly terrified of you because I looked in those eyes and I could see this entire world in your head. Some vast, wild, fast moving world, just behind your eyes. Just one look at those eyes and you went from a little doll to this unreal creature that seemed like too much for this world.”
Lucy paused, trying to collect any further thoughts. Instead, Antha took advantage of the moment to turn her head and peer very seriously up at her. “Lucy, if this is your grand confession of love, your timing is just awful.”
The girl was shocked for a split second, before she broke into peels of laughter, followed by Courtland and Alistair as Antha cracked a wry grin. “But mostly I remember you were looking at me like you didn’t know if you wanted to ******** me or murder me.”
Antha did laugh at that, the bottle of champagne poised just at her lips. “I still haven’t made up my mind about that.”
As they were laughing, another knock sounded at the door and Pierce and Jack entered with Cian and Rynn in tow (they didn’t trust the other remnants of the cousins with the Calais boys), suspiciously eying the group. That only made them all laugh more, Courtland beckoning for Jack until the boy shrugged and draped himself over the latter’s back with all the liquid bonelessness of a cat. Pierce plopped down on the other end of the bed, positioning himself amongst the pillows and making grabby fingers for the champagne.
“So what about this one?” Lucy questioned as if to change the subject, motioning lazily at Rynn.
“Rynn?” Courtland scrunched his eyes at the boy, reaching out to grab him by the wrist and yank him down onto the bed between himself and Antha. “He likes to pretend he’s not part of the family, but it’s not his choice. He’s stuck with us for life, no matter how far he runs screaming. He’s also Evie’s protégé.”
“One of these days,” Antha sighed, with the purr of a teasing edge, “I’ll get around to teaching him how to be a teenager.” While the boys chuckled at that idea, a third knock sounded at the door, this one surprisingly polite enough for Antha to call out, “Come in!”
“If you dare,” Lucy giggled.
Vittorio entered hesitantly, clutching a sheaf of papers. “We need to talk.”
Antha groaned, rolling over onto her stomach and kicking her feet. “I absolutely hate it when you say that, it’s never good.”
“Are you breaking up with her, Tori?” Courtland questioned in mock seriousness, grinning from ear to ear.
In response, Vittorio tsk’d and thrust the papers into Antha’s hands, quietly waiting as she looked over them. To the rest of the group, all craning to look at the files, it was all gibberish, scientific words and graphs and diagrams of DNA. But Antha sat up and studied it very seriously, quietly flipping through the pages and then lowering them to rest in her lap, staring up at Vittorio with sharp eyes. “Are you telling me something drugged Dorian with goddamn magic?”
The doctor diverted his eyes, painfully aware of how ridiculous it sounded. “The results are all there, the hard facts. All of those top researchers you bought out from around the world, they couldn’t make any sense of it. It was only me and the other witches working at the hospital who recognized what it might be.”
“So let me get the facts straight,” Antha said, putting a hand to her temple and the other up for silence, “Dorian went off into the woods for a party that he swears was one night. In reality, no one saw or heard from him for weeks. The place he saw and the place he actually was are two vastly different versions of the same place. And now…now he has ******** magic---tangible, visible magic---laced in his blood. Is that what’s happening?”
She seemed to be getting at something very specific, but Lucy, Jack, and Pierce weren’t sure what it was. Vittorio was looking at her with dread, Courtland and Alistair looking at one another wide-eyed with shock and concern and then back at Antha, waiting. “There are possibilities,” Vittorio murmured eventually, in an ill attempt to soothe her, “We could consult with the Talamasca, it’s just…this is the most likely one.”
Antha made another hasty gesture for silence, sliding off the bed to pace a few times back and forth across the room. Only Alistair dared to speak while she was deep in thought, his voice carefully controlled, “At least that would mean nothing slipped into the city without you noticing.”
“It’s probably something else,” Courtland said in contradiction, still trying to soothe Antha, “Lord knows what he could have gotten into. There’s probably not even---“
“Let’s assume it is,” Antha cut in abruptly, stopping and staring out of the window, making gestures as she spoke, “To be safe, let’s go with a working assumption that we’ve been invaded by goddamn fairies.”
“So…” Courtland’s eyes flickered as the rest of the group tried to process that idea. “If that is the case, what do we do? I mean, like, what’s the worst possible scenario here?”
“Traditionally, fairies only have three possible agendas when they get involved with a human. The first is abduction, which I doubt considering Dorian left of his own free will, presumably without resistance. The second is breeding.”
“We have to assume that deed was done,” Courtland purred, trying his best and failing miserably not to grin, “I won’t lie, I’m going to laugh if a litter of half-breed babies get left on our doorstep in a few months.”
Ignoring the banter, Vittorio pressed Antha to continue. “And the third?”
The girl paused, running a hand back through her hair and blowing a heavy sigh through her lips. “Consumption.”
“Consumption?” The cousins were all immediately sobered by the word, staring at her with wide, terrified eyes. “You mean like…like eating him?”
“According to the lore, humans are a delicacy to fairies. They gain power from eating us. Not surprisingly, witches are the favored choice.”
Moments passed in silence, long enough for panic to begin settling over Jack before he burst out with the scream, “Evie, we can’t let fairies eat Dorian! ” Courtland hastily clamped a hand over his mouth, shushing him. The last thing they needed was a panic.
“This is all hypothetical, of course,” Antha mused at long last, turning and going to her closet, pulling articles of clothing from the back, “The important thing is to keep a close eye on Dorian. No matter what the truth of it is, he’s wrapped up in something sinister. We just have to figure out what it is, exactly.”
“I’ll take guard duty,” Jack volunteered helpfully as Antha stepped behind her French changing screen, slipping off her dress and slinging it over the panels.
“No, I have a job for you and Courtland tonight.”
The latter of the pairing gave an abrupt, despairing whine. “But I already did something today!”
“You’re about to be doing a lot more.” The screen moved aside and the room fell instantly into silence. No longer the Mayfair princess in her expensive party dress, Antha looked more like one of the punk kids downtown, scantily clad in ripped, worn, and bleached-splattered short-shorts and a white tank top printed with the zodiac, thin enough for the band of black lace beneath to show through. For the Mayfairs, it was a much more familiar figure, and a more welcome one at the moment. This was the Antha that got s**t done. “I worked long and hard to take over this city. I’m not letting it slip out of control now.”
“Speaking of which…” With a sigh of effort, Alistair slipped out from beneath Jack’s legs and went to stand, stretching his back out. “I’d better get going.”
“You have an assignment, too?”
The boy smiled at his cousin in that disarming way he had about him, all mystery and charm. “More like a score to settle.” He laid a quick kiss on his sister’s cheek while she eyed him uncertainly. She knew of course---she, Alistair, and Nicolae had planned it all out---but she wasn’t entirely happy with the arrangement. She was too protective of Alistair for any of this, even if he did have nearly her same power.
When he was gone, she glanced briefly around the room, sizing her cousins up. “Jack,” she said finally, judging him to be of the closest stature to Rynn, “Get something for Rynn to wear. He’s too conspicuous as he is.”
“Is Rynn going to cosplay a ne’er-do-well tonight?” the boy laughed, rolling off of Courtland and trudging off towards their room to look through his clothes.
When he returned, dumping an armful of ripped and worn clothing in Rynn’s lap that Antha motioned for him to go change into, she launched immediately into the plan. “Do you remember Ah Sing’s?”
“The opium den downtown?” Courtland grinned as dangerously as any wolf with devious plans, “Fondly, if a little hazily. Is it still in business?”
“Flourishing,” Antha assured him, sitting down beside him on the bed and pulling on a pair of heavily ripped stockings. “And I need you to infiltrate it.”
“Infiltrate? Antha, we’ve been there dozens of times, remember? There was that one time you---“
“There’s a creature that frequents it nowadays. His name is Wu Fang.” The girl paused only long enough to put a cigarette to her lips, the tip sparking into life like a parlor trick. “He’s an enmortal.”
“Oh christ, Evie, what are you getting us mixed up in?”
“You, my dear, are strictly recon. You’re going to go to Ah Sing’s like normal and carefully---very, very carefully---find out what you can about Wu Fang. When I go looking for him tomorrow, I expect you to point the way, understand?” The boys both nodded seriously. “Oh, and Cian is going to keep an eye on you two. You tend to get…distracted, on assignments like these.”
Courtland pouted, offended. “How dare you, Evie. We are adults. Mature, responsible adults.”
But Antha merely rolled her eyes, stepping into an old pair of leather boots and returning to her feet. “Pierce, take care of this one.” She gestured at Lucy, who laughed dazedly. “Vittorio, you and Malakai and the rest of them need to keep an eye on Dorian. Don’t let him out of the house, whatever you do. Because I swear to god, if anything snatches him while I’m gone, I will run each and every one of you through with Jack’s katana.”
“Evie no, the blood will rust the blade!”
“What do I tell him?” Vittorio inquired meanwhile, paying her threat little heed.
The girl took up the sheaf of papers he had given her and pressed them against his chest. “He’s an adult, give him the facts. And the fact is, we’re not entirely sure what’s going on." The last step of dressing that Antha took was reaching into the back of the closet and pulling out a distressed leather jacket, an expensive and surprisingly trendy thing with a mandarin collar and zippers running slightly up the sleeves, fit perfectly to her slight form. Courtland and Jack both grinned knowingly, the former elbowing Lucy as if to make a point. "But that’s business for tomorrow, Rynn and I have other things to attend to tonight.”
“That’s a frightening thought,” Courtland purred thoughtfully, “What ever could you need Rynn for?”
“It concerns him,” Antha answered simply, and then paused long enough to flash her eyes at her cousin, “Besides, you know what’s going to happen when I’m gone. It’s time Rynn learned how to protect the family.”
Laughing briefly to himself, Courtland finally leaned over to press a loud kiss to Rynn’s forehead, purring, “We’re counting on you, mon porc-épic.”
With everyone clear on their tasks for the night, the Mayfairs all spilled out into the hall, trudging down the stairs. Alistair and Nicolae were already gone, Vittorio already deep in conversation with Dorian, the medical information on the table between them, Pierce helping Lucy to the kitchen to get some coffee in her. Antha took a moment to kiss Cian goodbye while Courtland and Jack went to change into more casual clothes, quietly reminding him that it was only recon (the warning was clear between the lines, don’t go looking for the creature, just find out where she could start looking for him) before she took Rynn by the arm and ushered him into her car.
“If you have questions, I suggest you ask them now,” she sighed, glancing briefly at him from the corner of her eye as the car lurched out of the driveway and jolted down the street, “But really, I’m not sure how much I can explain. When you put Nero down, we need someone to lock him up tight, where no one will ever find him. We can’t use anyone in the family, or the Talamasca---too nosy, there are too many secrets involved in this business---and I drove the rest of the witches out of the city. That only leaves the two enmortals that have since slipped in. So while the boys are looking for one---” She made a sharp turn onto the highway, weaving through the few cars on the road headed downtown, “---we’re going to solicit the other. Or, if she refuses, dispose of her. It won’t do to leave enmortals hanging around the city after I’m dead, they’re too dangerous.”

Meanwhile, across the city in a small, dark cemetery that hadn’t been used in decades, Alistair and Nicolae were taking what for all the world looked to be a stroll through the tombstones.
“What if it doesn’t show up?”
“We’ll deal with that when, and if, it happens.” Alistair was whistling lowly as they walked, which only served to further unnerve his older brother. He was too easygoing about all of this, seeking out a vampire possessed by some dark, ancient beast of a spirit. Granted, he was Antha’s twin, he’d seen the world through her eyes, but the new coven master was braced for something terrible.
“I just want to get this over with.”
“Patience, Nikki, patience. There’s no telling what’s going to happen, rushing it isn’t going to help us.”
With that, Nicolae fell uncertainly silent, watching the shadows as Alistair looked dead ahead, beckoning silently for the conglomerate that had once been Vikteren.

Downtown, clear across the skyscrapers and bars and important buildings from where Antha and Rynn were headed, Courtland and Jack were leading Cian surreptitiously into a back alley. The lights were all busted, the darkness further on dense and foreboding, but the boys were markedly fearless as they tromped up to the nondescript metal door set into the back of one of the buildings. The slat at eye level hastily creaked open, a pair of bloodshot eyes glaring hard out at the boys. Courtland, unperturbed, gave his cheeriest grin, pressing the palm of his hand where he’d drawn a complicated symbol with a blue pen to the opening. The man on the other side muttered lowly in Chinese, closing the slat and swinging the door open with an ominous creak just long enough to all but drag the three boys inside before slamming it shut again, moving the various locks and bolts back into place.
“I missed this place,” Courtland sighed dreamily when they stood in the dim, gas-lit cavern of assorted seating and shabby partitions, swathed in threadbare oriental silk. He navigated the place as easily as a regular, even if he hadn’t been one in some time, claiming a small gathering of low chairs and plump cushions arranged around a flimsy table. He had barely flopped down onto the chaise lounge, sliding an old pair of mod sunglasses over his eyes, before the proprietor had arrived with a complex set-up on a silver tray, smiling broadly and chattering at the boys in a thick accent. He spoke familiarly, commenting that he hadn’t seen the Mayfair boys in some time, but then hastily assuring them that he remembered what they liked, gesturing at the tray as he did so. Courtland just smirked, slipping a thick sheaf of bills in the man’s hand and set upon the tray eagerly enough that the owner tactfully slipped away.
“So how are we going to do this?” Jack murmured beneath his breath, watching as Courtland set to work preparing the drug for consumption.
“First, we have to blend in,” the boy said just as surreptitiously, taking up several orbs to throw into the burner. Only Jack and Cian were close enough to notice the expert way all but one of them slipped into his sleeve, replaced with benign look-alikes he had pulled from his pocket with the money. “You never know who’s watching, and Antha’s counting on us to be discreet. Besides…” With the pipe stocked, the boy leaned casually back on the silken cushions, breathing thick, pungent smoke, “It could be dangerous for us if we mess up. You know what those creatures are like.”
Jack, taking the pipe when it was handed over, had gone a few shades paler. “They eat souls, I know. I’d rather not remember that just now.”
“Calm down, love. If he was here, we’d know it. We just have to act the part, find out what we can, and get the hell out before somebody realizes we’re investigating.”  

[Okimiyage]

Liesse stepped close to Malakai, emboldened by the liquid courage warming in her breast. Now how did it go, again?
When she was younger, she had found ghosts in her garden like this. It was one of the reasons she had so lovingly cultivated those resplendent blooms, seeking to return them to their former glory. She thought of them as her ghosts, then—she hadn’t even told Rynn about them, knowing instinctively that she could not expect any of her brothers to share the same romantic aspirations as she did.
Privately, she liked to think that they were the ghosts of her parents, although she had only the most tenuous idea of what they might have looked like in their youth. There had been a painting in the library, before it burned--but that had been when Liesse was very, very small. For years, just before dusk, the ghosts appeared and followed the same pattern—now, Liesse plagiarized it for her own use.
She placed her hand, open palm down, upon Malakai’s shoulder, leaned into his broad chest. Around them, cicadas did their best to contribute to the melodies wafting from the house. Then, picking up her skirts, she stepped back, pulling him into the first of the movements of a waltz.
Around and around, they spun. The refractions of the pool beneath spangled the glass under their feet with light. Liesse’s steps were halting and clumsy, as one who had learned the dance by watching others for years instead of ever practicing with a partner of her own, but Malakai was a good teacher, and his leadership more than made up for her mistakes.
When they stopped—as the last notes ebbed away into the night—Liesse found that she had nearly forgotten to breathe. Laughter came with the first gasp of air; collapsing against him in relief, she flung her arms around his waist. She’d been so worried that she’d make a fool of herself in front of him—it was hard to believe how well things were going tonight, instead. Her head came up with an insistent question in those limpid green eyes, and perhaps she would have tried to phrase it better if it had not been for the champagne. “Why are you being so nice to me?” Liesse asked, her demanding tone softened by the smile that followed it. “I mean—I know it’s rude, but—what do you want?”
She bit her lip, suddenly abashed, and a glow rose to her cheeks. Glancing away, she murmured, “You’ve been so kind. You all have been so kind to us. And I know… it’s ridiculous to think I could ever repay you, but…” Raising her eyes, she met his resolutely, studying the gentle expression within them. “I’ll never forget this, do you know that? Even until my—my hair turns gray, and my eyes cloud over, I think I’ll always keep tonight with me. And I think—” another breathless laugh, knowing how silly it sounded but being unable to stop herself, it was better to say these silly things now, when she could. “—I think I’ll compare every man I meet, for the rest of my life, to you. You might have ruined me for the rest of them, and yet—I can’t help but be happy for it.”

Upstairs, Cian brought up the end of the line alongside Rynn, joining the rest of the family with: “Ah, so this is where you’ve all been? I knew you all would eventually succumb— the most comfortable bed in the house is a hard lure to resist.” Immediately falling into bed, he wrapped his arms around his wife’s waist and buried his face against her hip, kissing the fabric of her flowing skirt. Rynn, passing into the room behind him, gave his older brother a hard look. “Never thought of you as a cuddler. All the previous girls you tossed out on their ear would be so wounded to see you like this.” Cian gave a great, theatrical sigh. “Look, just because you’ve never had the opportunity to cuddle with a magnificent creature like my wife doesn’t mean the rest of us are going to pass up on it.”
Patting the bed, he raised an eyebrow at Rynn. “Opportunity only knocks once, little brother.”
With a sigh, Rynn attempted to turn away, only to have his wrist seized by Courtland & be forced onto the coverlet along with the rest of them. “It’s a good thing this bed is so ludicrously large,” he muttered, resigning himself to his fate.
“Don’t make such a sour expression,” Cian grinned. “Just give it a go. Think of it as practice, for when you find a magnificent creature of your own.”
“I already have a magnificent creature,” Rynn snapped. “I have a cat.”
“See? Perfect reason to practice.”

Rynn scowled in response, then turned away in a brief attempt to feign dignity. It didn’t work—he appeared to be having difficulty ignoring the fact that he was sitting scant inches away from a very inebriated Lucy, who, as she shifted around on the bed, was giving him a wonderful view of her own generous cleavage. The Mayfairs were going to absolutely ruin him for high school girls, with company like this around all the time. Liesse would have found it funny to know that, at the exact moment that her cheeks were all aglow and her mind filled with rosy thoughts, Rynn’s cheeks were the precise ruddy shade of her own. The contents of his mind, however, were not fit to be shared with anyone.
Shame that he was in a room full of very competent mind-readers. But they had other things to worry about—Dorian’s disappearance, for one.
Cian was pretending to be totally absorbed in cuddling, but the way he kept glancing over to his brother belied his relaxed appearance. Fairies, huh?
Erin would have been best to ask about the subject, but Cian remembered a little bit about the still folk, too. Enough that he knew there weren’t any in the area—or if there were, they’d kept to themselves for centuries, long enough that even the Ancestors had forgotten their existence. And enough to know that if they were showing their hand now—or if worse, if they’d moved in to satisfy some secretive motive of their own—that it was a bad sign.
Fairies weren’t nice. They could be pretty, but it was hard to know how much of that was glamour. The fact that they’d kidnapped one of the Mayfair boys for a night did not bode well—that they’d given him back at all was even more suspicious.
Cian’s jaw tightened imperceptibly, but he made a very gallant attempt to keep his tone lighthearted. “Perhaps they just didn’t care for Dorian’s poetry. The Fair Folk can be very picky about the arts, and their patronage is notoriously fickle.”
Rynn glanced suspiciously at Cian. “A member of the family was kidnapped, and you’re making jokes at a time like this?”
Yawning, the young husband sat up. “Oh, I was being perfectly serious. Didn’t you listen to anything Aedan tried to tell you? There was a whole year when he talked of nothing except for the Good Neighbors—that, and their ‘geological thaumaturgic constructs’. Seemed to think it was similar to what was going on in the hedge-maze.”
Rynn frowned. To be absolutely honest, he hadn’t. Aedan had always been going on about new fragments of information he’d pieced together from the scraps of their former library. Unless he had a pertinent question to discuss, Rynn had simply tolerated the intellectual’s ceaseless prattle—and mostly tuned it out.
He was sort of starting to regret it.
When Antha got up to change, Cian scooted over to sit on the edge next to him and clapped an arm around his shoulder. “You’re oblivious, little brother. And lucky, my god. I shudder to think what would have happened if Erin had ever been successful in any of his assassination attempts. Or if he’d had Aedan’s help, phew. You would have died in one of the most creative ways since iron maidens were still in use.”
Without any sort of warning, the boy abruptly noticed that he was being volunteered for a late-night chore. A pile of clothes was unceremoniously dumped in his lap. “Hey!” he protested. Dreamily, Cian shushed him. His eyes were glued to Antha’s a** in those shorts. Addressing her in the privacy of her own thoughts; You know, after all this is through, you and I really ought to have a night out on the town.

Glancing ruefully at Rynn, he added, “You do not appreciate your luck enough, kid. You know how many men in this city would kill to be in your shoes tonight?” Rynn glowered, and pushed his hair back out of his face. Cian was just trying to get a rise out of him. When it didn’t work, the older man grinned, ruffled his hair—“Looks better this way, don’t be too polished.”—and rose to his feet, leaving Rynn to pull out his outfit for the night.
He ended up settling on an old black sweater, full of holes and loose threads, with the ratty sleeves stretched out far beyond his fingertips. In parts, the weave resembled a fishnet more than it did any kind of fabric. A pair of artfully deconstructed black jeans, worn to cotton-soft comfort, followed. Truth be told, Rynn just picked out what he could detangle from the pile fastest, but it had Cian’s nod of approval, so it couldn’t be too bad. After he emerged from the master bathroom, fully changed, his brother gave him some pointers. “Alright, now—slouch a bit more. Bit more—that’s hunching, not slouching—and, mm, try to avoid eye contact. You’re a bit too pretty for that area of town, they’ll think you’re a rent boy—” “A what?” “—so don’t take anything from anyone, not a drink, not so much as a business card, ok? Except s**t. If anyone heckles you, swallow your pride. Basically, just don’t make a scene. And, most importantly, keep your eyes off my wife’s a**—I know it’s hard.”
Rynn looked outraged. He started to protest—Cian placed a finger against his lips. “Shh. Swallow your pride, remember? You can start practicing right now. Oh, and—” he glanced down at Rynn’s shiny leather shoes, and gave the boy a half-pitying glance. He was not prepared for downtown, but there really wasn’t anything more Cian could do about that at this point. “You should borrow my boots. The ones with the iron-capped toes.”
With that, Cian bounded out of the room, loosening and flinging his fancy tie away with a whoop. It wasn’t a bad idea to look a little pricy at Ah Sing’s, they liked a customer with money, but the tie was altogether too much. The idea was to look a little rumpled and desperate, so none of the other customers tried to roll you for your wallet.

By the time finally clattered downstairs to the car, Rynn was in a foul mood, fuming under his breath about patronizing little twats. When they climbed into the car, and Antha’s clarification came, he wanted to explode with Why did you marry that a*****e?
But instead, he turned his face to the window listlessly and buried his anger. He’d get back at Cian. When these shoes were returned in the morning, they were going to be glistening with polish.
“Well, now you’re finally volunteering information, you can start with—ay, where are we going? And, bee, who the ******** are you talking about? I mean, enmortals? I’ve heard of immortals, but…”
Just then he noticed how fast they were going. He knew where the term ‘pedal to the metal’ came from, but had never actually seen anyone take it seriously. With a groan, he buried his head in his hands. He just wasn’t going to watch. Happy place. Happy place.  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

For a moment, Malakai was silent, thoughtfully so. He moved in the old, familiar dance patterns, thinking about what she’d said. And then, a little more resolutely than usual, he stopped her. His eyes were unusually serious, dark and focused. “I hope I have,” he said softly but surely to her comment, as if there were worlds of things he meant by it. And then he shook his head, his expression easing as he motioned towards the house. “You don’t realize it yet, do you? I know Rynn doesn’t, but…you guys are family, you know? Even with blood aside---your new Mayfair body and Antha’s half-Calais children---you guys are part of us now. It’s like…one of those things no one really says, we just know it.” He imagined, quite rightly, that Courtland or Antha or Michael or the rest of them would be perplexed if anyone ever said anything to the contrary. It was natural, like adding pieces to a jigsaw puzzle that was eternally expanding. They showed up, they fit, and no one needed to ask questions.
“I told you before, about your light,” he continued after a few moments, softly, his head tilted slightly and eyes closed like he was working very hard to put his thoughts into words, “That it was bright and beautiful, not like anything I’d ever seen. And when you’re happy…” He paused for a split second, making rolling gestures of his hand as he grasped for the right words. “It’s like sunlight. It’s not just bright, it’s warm and dazzling, comforting. So making you happy makes me happy.” He opened his eyes then, with a momentary look of realization before the sheepish, embarrassed smile flitted to his lips. “Ah…I’m not sure if I came off creepy or ridiculous there…” A distinction he found himself having a harder and harder time making lately.
Across a short expanse of the yard, seated comfortably in one of the wrought iron lawn chairs on the patio and hidden by the shadows, Armand announced himself abruptly by calling out, “That’s called love, you poor, hopeless clod.” Malakai froze, going scarlet to the tips of his ears. His cousin, grinning and taking a moment to devour another piece of candy, made a hasty gesture for them to continue. “No, go on, I’m getting great material here. You can’t make up this kind of romance.”
If Malakai had ever been one for violence, this would have been the night that Armand died. It showed in the boy’s eyes, which only served to amuse Armand for several moments before the sliding door to the kitchen flew open to produce Lucy, drawn by the sound of voices nearby. Her make-up was smeared and worn, her hair artlessly pulled back, and her (Antha’s) fashionable dress almost totally covered by a baggy sweater she had borrowed from Pierce. And yet, like Antha, she still had a marked charm in her state of disarray, her similarly doll-like features offset by it. Glancing first at Malakai and Liesse, then to Armand, and then doing it over again, she narrowed her eyes viciously at the latter and said flatly, “What are you doing?”
“Shush,” he told her gently enough, gesturing that she should go back, “I’m helping. He got off to a great start and now he’s botching everything.”
“Armand---” Malakai began, half in warning and half in utter exasperation, before without warning Lucy had flung herself at the man, knocking him and his chair over with a small yelp of shock.
By the time Pierce arrived in the door moments later, wide-eyed with concern, the girl was sitting on his back, violently shaking his shoulders and berating him for interrupting. She spoke in shrill roars as she tried to get her hands around his throat, jerking him up and back down against the pavement, not always entirely coherent. “---bothering my pet---complete and total b*****d---have any idea how long girls wait for fairytale moments like this?!---probably the only one in history---this is why we can’t have nice things!---”
Though she might not have technically been a Mayfair, Lucy was as protective of Malakai as most of the other cousins, and nearly as much as Antha was of him. Pierce, flashing Malakai and Liesse a brief apologetic look and simultaneous grin of amusement, simply took his cousin’s leg and set to work trying to drag him inside, Lucy and all. “Antha’s seriously going to murder you for this…” he murmured as he strained to move them. Thorne arrived moments later, curious as to the commotion, and with one glance at Malakai and Liesse was only too willing to take Armand’s other leg and help drag him and Lucy safely into the kitchen, out of sight.
Malakai, sighing until there was no air left in his lungs, had thrown a hand to his temple in exasperation. “Of course, on the reverse side, that makes this your life. The cousins…well, they like to insert themselves into everything. Everything. Whatever you do, for better or worse, they’ll always be right there, peering over your shoulder, meddling. For the rest of your life.”
But, as much as he hated to admit it, Armand had been right. He already knew that, even if he hadn’t said it out loud. Of course that was something he didn’t feel ready to say out loud, no matter how well he knew it. He’d only ever uttered the words once (outside of family, which was a different thing entirely), and they were immediately followed by the girl he’d said it to having sex with Dorian in the garage and consequently, Antha throwing her out of town on pain of death. He was willing to admit he’d been slightly scarred by the event. Instead he did the next best thing he could: he gathered up all of those feelings, those ideas, the things he couldn’t say, and he kissed her. Madly, feverishly, with more passion than he knew he was capable of, he kissed her until he was breathless and the words came tumbling out. “I hope I do ruin you for every other guy in the world. Because then that means you chose me.”

For several minutes, Antha said nothing. She turned the stereo up a few notches, blasting rock music, in what was clearly an excuse not to have to talk to him and continued to drive. Though it wasn’t terribly obvious, it didn’t take a genius to notice that she was angry with him over something, in a quiet and nagging sort of way that she clearly didn’t want to admit to.
They passed the main section of downtown, the neon lights and towering skyscrapers, and pulled off of the highway in the outlying rundown area, littered with abandoned old buildings and dive bars dotted with vast parking lots. It was to one of these bars that they went, the car skidding over the cracked pavement of the back lot and into a vacant space before she turned the key and killed the engine. Then, in the silence of the car with only the distant and muffled sound of chatter from inside the building and cars passing on the nearby highway, before she did anything else, Antha turned and roughly took Rynn’s chin in her hand, turning him to face the serious set of her eyes. “Let me be clear about something here. While the boys are safe with their recon, we are in very much danger right now, Rynn. If we don’t play this correctly, there’s going to be a fight and even for me it’ll be brutal. The only thing working in our favor here is that this is for everyone’s good, Nero isn’t someone people want running loose. I brought you because you’re the key element in putting him down and before anyone agrees to helping with any of this, they’re going to want to take your measure. Because if you can’t play your part, you’re going to get everyone else killed.” Her eyes sharpened in something like warning, her words coming out flatly. “No one has faith in a sulking brat, Rynn. You can act however you want the rest of the time but for tonight, for both of our sakes, I need you to be a goddamn adult about this. Forget about your brother, forget about the cousins, forget about your pride, and most of all---just for a little while---forget how much you despise me, because I need you right now.”
She released him abruptly, turning straightforward in her seat again and gathering up her phone and cigarettes as a silhouette lingered outside of her window. Her lecture had a certain impression to it, which she was not entirely aware of, an outpouring of that irritation at him that oddly had little to nothing to do with what she’d actually lectured him about. Serious matter as it was, it had been more of a convenient outlet for her peculiar frustration. Now when she spoke she was calm, if unusually distant, looking straightforward out the window instead of at him. “’Enmortal’ is an older form of the word. A more specific term. They used to be witches, just like us, mortal, until they found a ritual for immortality. The ones powerful enough to perform it sacrificed their own souls and began feeding off the life force of other people. They eat souls. They’re hollow shells, the only personality or emotion they have is based off of their memories of when they had them, but they have great power. They’re also nomadic and notoriously secretive, all of which makes them perfect for what we need.”
Fed up with waiting, the figure outside the car finally threw Antha’s door open, peering inside. He grinned briefly at the girl in greeting before peering curiously at Rynn, raking his unusual green and gold eyes over the boy’s figure. Whatever he saw, he was clearly disappointed in it. But he shook his head as if it was of no consequence, turning his gaze back on Antha. “Fenrir’s been waiting. You know he doesn’t like to wait.”
All at once Antha was her usual self, flashing the man a sharp-eyed smirk. “Tell him to keep his damn fur on, we’re coming.” She climbed out of the car with all of her usual lithe grace, putting a cigarette to her lips and starting towards the bar with only a passing gesture at Rynn to follow, pointedly not looking at him.
"You look like I remember," the man said as they rounded the building, glancing at her over his shoulder with a wide, wolfish grin. He had rather sharp teeth, once one looked closely enough, his tousled golden hair as wild as if he'd never combed it in his life. "Don't get me wrong, I like the Mayfair princess in your fancy dresses---it makes me want to dirty you up---but this..." His eyes raked intently over her figure, taking in her curves and all the pale, bare skin, his implacably peculiar eyes going dark, "Reminds me of when you used to beat the hell out of me."
"Sounds like you're eager to repeat the past," Antha purred teasingly, or in warning. It was hard to tell which. "But I'm fairly confident we had an entire phone conversation where I explained to you how I'm married now."
When she reached for the door, he rushed in front of her, putting inches between them as he oh-so-slowly cracked the door, grinning like he was going to devour her and promising she'd like it. "And I'm pretty sure I reminded you that we---" He gestured at the bar behind him, indicating the 'we'. "---have no concept of 'marriage'. That's why you liked our life, remember? The freedom."
Antha paused for a moment as he spoke, cocking her head and staring at him like he must be crazy, but at least it was amusing. When he finished she breathed a small sigh, shaking her head, and in the next second had punched him squarely in the stomach. He flinched, wincing and leaning slightly over, but just as quickly was grinning again. "Take me to Fenrir, Wyatt."
He cackled, ecstatic, and threw open the door behind him. "Aww, you remembered the rules."
The establishment was unusually dim within, even for a bar, hazy with smoke and strangely musky for someone who didn’t know what the place really was. There were notably few women within, scattered amongst some couple dozen men between the ages of twenty and forty, all of them powerfully built. Antha navigated the place as if she walked the halls every day of her life, confident amongst the towering figures, responding to passing greetings and meeting appraising glances sharply. And though she was more or less ignoring Rynn, she had blindly reached out and taken his hand firmly in her own, like she was claiming him in the midst of all the people who were eying him suspiciously.
“Fenrir.” The room fell silent beneath the low hum of the jukebox as Antha arrived at the back of the bar, kicking out a seat at one of the shabby wooden tables and shirking off her jacket before seating herself. The man seated opposite merely cocked his head, his one remarkably peculiar eye that was not covered with an eyepatch sharpening as he looked her over. He was as strongly built and leanly muscled as the rest of them, with their same aloof mannerisms, but a certain air of authority poured out of him and flooded the room, nearly tangible. He glanced at Rynn then, taking his measure as surely as Wyatt had, and then turned back to Antha without much of a reaction, merely pushing a bottle of whiskey and a shot glass over towards her. The girl grinned, fully aware that it was a test, and poured herself a shot, tapping it on the table and throwing it back. Though his stalwart expression never altered, the man seemed satisfied by this act.
“You lot never change,” Antha purred, with all the familiarity of an old friend, “Untrusting, wary, always taking everyone’s measure…”
Though it took a moment, the man finally spoke to that, in a low, deep voice to match his lack of expression. “Our nature rules us.”
Pleased to have gotten a response, Antha’s sharp grin turned a degree more teasing. “Can’t teach an old dog new tricks.” Nearby, Wyatt gave a brief bark of laughter. “So can I take it I have your cooperation?”
Again he hesitated before he spoke, his one amber eye locked very seriously onto her own. “Why?”
“You’re a man of quick, firm decisions. You made up your mind as soon as you’d heard my proposal and stuck with your instincts. If you weren’t going to help, you wouldn’t have agreed to meet me tonight.”
His face moved the very slightest bit, almost a switch, but it worked with the vague flicker of his eye to convey something like amusement. “You were always too sharp for a child of your ilk.” Antha smirked dually with satisfaction and a little bit of a challenge, leaning back in her seat and crossing her long, maddeningly bare legs. She got a few glances out of that, not quite like normal men might look at her scantily clad figure but rather submissive in their appreciation. Fenrir likewise appraised her concedingly and then sobered, his eyes flickering back at Rynn. “But this one…are you sure about him? This spell of yours is nothing to be taken lightly.”
In the split second before she responded, Antha’s eyes sharpened viciously, the twist of her lips just a bit more threatening. None of it particularly malicious, no…more like she was protecting Rynn. “When have I ever been one to take chances?” The man nodded slightly as if that were true, crossing his arms over his broad, half-bare chest, and just as soon as he had Antha was all business, straight-faced and serious. “Rynn is the person I chose. He may not be there yet, but he has the power for it. Surely even you can see that.” Rynn was spared another look, this one longer and more intent, like he was trying to stare deep down in the depths of his soul. “I have faith in him. I wouldn’t risk everything on him if I didn’t. Besides---” Though the seriousness of her expression had relaxed, her eyes went sharper than ever, flickering with accusation. “---you know how I hate it when people question the competency of my family members.”
The next few minutes passed in silence, Fenrir taking a long drink from the whiskey bottle and staring at Antha like this was the most important decision he’d ever made. She didn’t rush him, sitting back with her elbows across the back of her chair, waiting. Finally, when the consideration in his eyes settled into certainty, he rose to his full six-foot-four height and leaned over the table, staring intently down at Antha. “This time…we can’t protect our city. So we’ll help you where we can, if you swear that you will.”
Antha only smirked anew, her eyes gone dark as she stared evenly back up at him. “When have I not?”
The deal was struck as easily as that, cemented by their hands closing around each other in an almost archaic form of a handshake. The rest of the bar seemed to simultaneous relax and electrify at that, returning to motion and the low thrum of excited chatter. “Do you have the scent?”
Antha produced from her pockets two items at his urging: first, some folded brown wrapping paper. Second, a faded, frayed scarf that Rynn had no way of recognizing, though Cian might have. “The target is female,” Antha told him simply as he took them up, carefully inspecting both of them. Meanwhile, the rest of the keyed-up group had set rapidly into motion around them, stripping off their few articles of clothing. It was Wyatt, poised just behind Antha’s chair, who first stood utterly naked and grinning, eagerly cracking his neck as the lean, firm muscles up and down his body began to quiver and then shift. The change happened in nearly the blink of an eye, his body wildly contorting and then dropping until, very suddenly, there was only a massive gray wolf left, poking its nose over the back of Antha’s chair. He buried his nose in her hair, sniffing down to her shoulder before ecstatically nuzzling her neck. She grinned, reaching up absently to stroke his muzzle as she murmured, “Easy, Wyatt.”
The rest of the room was not far behind, so that in minutes the bar crammed full of people was suddenly overrun with immense wolves of varying color, barking fleetingly and pawing at the ground. The one designated as Wyatt rounded the table quietly, reaching his snout over to pick the very edge of the scarf up in his teeth and taking it off into the crowd as another wolf came for the folded paper. In the following minutes the items were passed around, skidded across the floor beneath powerful paws, and thoroughly sniffed by each of the wolves. Then, in one mass as if they were all of the same mind, they all turned and rushed past the table, filing out of the back door and into the city.
When they were gone, leaving Antha, Rynn, and Fenrir in the sudden quiet broken only by the low, mournful whine of the jukebox, Antha simply pulled her phone from her pocket, pressing a few buttons and putting it to her ear. “Courtland.” The boy’s voice leaked out of the phone, only loudly enough that Antha and Fenrir, with his extrasensory ears, could make sense of it. “The werewolves are with us. (…) Fenrir’s pack. So do what you can to get ahold of something with Wu Fang’s scent---a cushion, a pipe, whatever---and drop it off at the Full Moon Bar. (…) Great. Keep it up.” The conversation was over like that, Antha falling back into silence.
"You'll have to forgive my son," Fenrir began suddenly, as if he'd only thought of it, "The dominans is approaching."
Antha grinned in self-satisfaction, like she'd been proven right. "I told you he'd be an alpha. And young, too."
"His mother pushes him. She would have him overtake his brothers."
Antha was shaking her head even as he was still speaking, reaching across the table for the whiskey bottle. "Don't discredit him like that. Wyatt is powerful on his own." She had downed a shot before she remembered what else was in the whiskey, the liquid choking briefly in her throat. "Ugh, get this wolf stuff away from me," she groaned, hastily pushing the bottle away until Fenrir took it, amusement glimmering distantly in his eye.
"You used to drink it often, as I recall."
"Wyatt and Trajan used to hound me about it. No pun intended." She grinned slightly regardless.
While she sat quietly, staring down at the table lost in thought, Fenrir was looking at her, sitting back a little more casually than he had before, arms crossed, studying her. “Your emotions are all muddled tonight.” The girl glanced up as if she were startled, narrowing her eyes at him. But the werewolf, showing his first real hint of expression, smirked as if he found it amusing. “If I didn’t know any better, I would say it smells like jealousy. Not a scent I ever remember finding on you before.”
That did startle Antha, for a fleeting moment before she got ahold of herself again, clearly agitated. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she muttered irritably, and nearly sounded as if she didn’t, before abruptly rising and stalking over to the bar, jumping up to stretch her full body across it and rummaging around for a bottle of the good stuff.
Fenrir watched her go, his eye glimmering faintly with amusement, before all the traces of emotion vanished and he turned his serious expression on Rynn, looking him over yet again. After a moment he began to mutter his findings aloud. “Young, but lines in your face---stress, and in a perpetually bad mood. Quick, hard eyes---you’re innately suspicious. Clothes don’t quite fit, and you don’t move naturally in them, too stiff, refined---the scent’s been washed off, but you must have borrowed them as a disguise. And the texture of your skin is peculiar…you’ve only just started getting sun, fresh air---either you were confined somewhere or in the employ of vampires.” His nose wrinkled just slightly and lips curled with disdain at the last word. “You make for a strange figure,” he pronounced at last, his deep voice low and calm, “Even for Antha. But…” His eye hardened, boring intently into Rynn’s. “She says she has faith in you, and she doesn’t lie. She’s also less trusting than anyone I’ve ever met in my remarkably long life.”
“I take offense to that,” Antha hissed from the other side of the bar, pausing to glare at him before turning back to the bottles cluttered beneath the bar, inching forward until she was all but hanging off the edge of it.
“And yet it’s the truth,” Fenrir continued without so much as a glance in her direction, no hesitation, before continuing to Rynn. “If she says you can stop the Rökkr again before he can destroy us, then I’ll put my trust in you as well.”
Antha, having retrieved an expensive bottle of whiskey and torn it open, was sitting on the bar top, muttering beneath her breath, “Dramatist.” Though she was taking pains not to admit it, even to herself, his comment had clearly struck a chord that rang true.
Fenrir appeared to ignore her, but there was a dark glimmer to his eye as if something was responding to her behavior. Likewise beneath his breath, where she could not hear, he murmured to Rynn, “She is remarkably strange around you. She doesn’t move naturally, and she glances at you far more frequently than she should. I wonder what that is…” He had his inklings of course, but even to him, Antha was ultimately a mystery. But he did bother to take another hard look at Rynn, eventually murmuring in something like revelation, “Ah…you must have been around another girl tonight.” Not that that was an answer in and of itself, but the pack master was beginning to paint himself a picture. There were few things he liked more than unearthing Antha’s elusive little secrets, and there were very few people who were better at it.
It was roughly fifteen minutes before the backdoor slammed open again, one of the massive wolves skidding into the bar and eagerly up to Antha, the muscles beneath his fur already beginning to quiver and shift before, just as suddenly as there had been a room full of wolves, there was a naked man kneeling by her feet, grinning eagerly up at her even as his eyes were still making the transition between wolf and human. “I found her. She lives in a hoodoo shop at the far end of Ferdinand Street, near the river.”
Antha shot the boy a pleased grin, pausing long enough to press a kiss to his forehead that made him all but melt on the spot. “Good boy,” she purred, bolting out of her chair, “Fenrir, you can call your pack home. If Courtland finds anything, he’ll deliver it tonight.”
“Understood,” the pack master said simply.
“Rynn, let’s go.” She reached for her jacket on the back of her chair, hastily throwing it back on as she strode across the bar and out the door, eagerly climbing back into her car. “A hoodoo ******** figures,” she was muttering to herself when Rynn was securely into the car, bolting out of the parking spot and gunning it back onto the street. Back at the bar, a wolf was howling lowly outside, summoning the other werewolves home. As she drove, the girl reached over towards the glovebox and fumbled inside, never taking her eyes off the road. “Here,” she said shortly, shutting the compartment again and pressing a sheathed knife into Rynn’s hand, “Hide that somewhere you can get to it easily. This creature may be powerful, but she’s more physically fragile than either of us.” She almost glanced at him, but stopped herself last minute. “But that’s worst-case scenario.”

Back on the opposite side of downtown, in the other shady outlying area, Courtland hung up his phone after precisely four words---“What’s up?” “Which?” and “Roger.”---and slipped it back into his pocket, grinning. “Evie called in the wolves,” he purred ecstatically beneath his breath, eyes flickering at Jack for his reaction. “Of course that makes our job easier. Instead of relying on information, we’re golden if we can get his scent.”
Jack, though thrilled at the idea of the werewolves’ involvement, seemed a little less pleased with the new task. “So we need…what, exactly?”
“We need to find out if he’s left anything here, or if he has a regular spot he’s been in the last few days. Anything he might have had extended contact with.” His eyes flickered behind his dark glasses, following the lanky movement of a woman across the room. “The real question is, can we trust anyone who works here to be loyal to us over this guy?”
“With the fortune we’ve blown in this place? Not to mention all the times Antha’s warned them of impending raids.”
“We’ve been MIA a while, Jackie.”
“We’re Mayfairs . We’re literally the best friends you could ever make in this city.”
“And Wu Fang is an enmortal,” Courtland reminded him very seriously, with a flicker of his eyes to stress the gravity of the situation, “Some of these guys are bound to know that, and they’re clever enough to never cross him.” The boys both fell silent, Jack going a shade paler as Courtland pondered the predicament. Finally, resolute, he announced, “We need the girls.”
‘The girls’ were, more or less, hostesses that worked at the establishment, dressed in slinky silk, and ones familiar enough with Courtland that four of them came running when he motioned for them. He paused only to grin suggestively at Cian, whispering, “Antha will forgive you, so just act the part.” When the girls arrived in the corner niche, one settled by Jack, another by Cian, and the other two swarmed Courtland with intimate familiarity. “Did you miss me, ma petite?” The boy asked the nearer one, lightly pinching her cheek.
“I missed that,” she replied, nearly swooning, “You and your French.”
“Oh? Don’t you have anyone else to whisper sweet, foreign nothings in your ear?”
“Only Chinese, but it’s not the same. French is so much more lovely.”
Courtland laughed, as natural as could be. “Chinese? I didn’t know there were any actual Chinese customers here. Unless…don’t tell me the owner…?”
“No, no.” The girl giggled at the idea as if it were ridiculous, covertly glancing around to see that the owner wasn’t lurking nearby. “He’s a new guest. He showed up…I guess a month ago? He’s so strange, it’s charming.” The other girl had climbed into his lap meanwhile, fluttering beneath the soft stroke of his fingers in her hair. Nearby, the girl by Jack was teaching him how to play Cat’s Cradle, chattering quietly as she did so.
“But you still love me the most, don’t you?” Courtland pressed in a low, sultry purr, gently tapping her chin.
Again that little giggle, infinitely pleased with herself, while the girl in his lap rolled her eyes. “Oh, Fang isn’t nearly as charming as you. Nobody is.”
Courtland cocked an eyebrow, as if he was only curious. “Fang?”
“That’s his name. Wu Fang. It’s Chinese, I guess.”
Before Courtland could press any further, the girl in his lap interrupted in clear irritation. “Oh don’t listen to her, he doesn’t even talk to her. Silia’s the only one he actually likes. He’s not that friendly, if you ask me.”
Again that quirk of his eyebrow, glancing at the girl beside Jack, Silia. For his part, the tips of Jack’s ears had gone scarlet, realizing suddenly that the torch had been passed to him and he was too high to be dealing with this on his own. Several minutes passed, in which a very nervous Courtland was forced to chat with the two girls who were already upon him and Jack sat silent, thinking furiously of what to do. Finally, gathering his courage, he asked as casually as he could, “Do you always teach your guests how to play Cat’s Cradle?”
The girl glanced briefly up from his hands, busy winding a long string through his fingers. “No, but the man they were talking about, Fang, he was teaching me a new pattern today.”
Jack stared down at his fingers, and nearly could have cried for relief. He literally had exactly what they needed in his hands. Though, getting it was another matter. For half an hour, he could feel the murderous vibes radiating off of Courtland as he pretended to still have any interest in the girls while Jack tried not to be too suspicious, asking her to make more and more figures.
Eventually, when she announced she was out of patterns, the boy paled and tried frantically to think of something while she unwound the string from his fingers. He was thinking snatching it out of her hands and making a run for it would be stupid, so…
Courtland interrupted, leaning forward and putting a hand on her wrist, flashing his charming smile. “Can I try?” The girl briefly furrowed her brows but nodded, handing the string over. The boy failed miserably, tangling his fingers up and ultimately only making a square, but laughed it off. “Can I keep this?” he asked at length, holding up the length of string and focusing the full force of his charm on the girl, "I want to practice." Silia still looked perplexed but finally shrugged and assented, citing that it was only some string, and anyways it wasn’t hers, Fang had left it.
The tension melted out of Jack, though he struggled not to show it, while Courtland carefully pocketed the string and begun the delicate process of trying to get them the hell out of there. The girls weren’t easy to shake, and the owner was determined to squeeze a little more money out of them, but after a while they finally returned to the alley, Jack sighing with the entirety of his lungs while Courtland lit a cigarette, cutting his eyes at him. “That was just embarrassing.”
“Enmortals terrify me, goddamn it.”
But Courtland smiled, planting an affectionate kiss on his lips to make him feel better. “Don’t worry love, it’s over. And now we get to go to the Full Moon Bar and get drunk with our favorite half-dressed, chiseled furries.”He thought for another moment as they ambled towards the car, turning and flinging an arm around Cian’s shoulders. “And you didn’t even have to keep us from making a massive, horrible mistake!”
“Not yet,” Jack murmured with a little impish grin, slowly returning to himself.
Courtland ignored him, turning his cheek pointedly to Cian. “I think I deserve a reward. Kisses are acceptable.”  

[Okimiyage]

There was a breeze that sprang up in the garden, suddenly, it seemed, gusting through the rose-bushes, tossing up Liesse’s long hair, leaves and petals catching in her curls. There it was again, that light—peeking through the wind-tangled locks as they blew across her face, all but obscuring the slow and radiant smile that spread from her lips. She opened her mouth to respond, when all of a sudden a familiar voice interjected.
Whipping around in alarm, Liesse gave a faint squeak, tripped over the toes of her shoes in mid-step, and fell hard against Malakai’s chest. Her eyes went wide, and then narrowed into the closest approximation of anger that she’d ever managed to cultivate. She wanted to chuck these stupid shoes into his face. (It might have alarmed Malakai if he’d seen it—despite the difference in their coloring, the Mayfair bloodlines were strong enough that the cousin’s body bore more than a passing resemblance to Antha, especially with her brows knit in fury.)
Luckily, an avenging angel bolted out of the house at precisely the moment Liesse was trying to decide whether it was worth struggling out of her heels in order to blind Armand with one of them. Apparently Armand was not the only member of their audience, although the only one with the audacity to seek out a jar of candy & a front-row seat at a moment like this.
For the time, though, their roles were reversed; Liesse and Malakai stared in shock as Armand was swiftly dragged away (exit stage right) with the girlish Lucy still beating the s**t out of the man as they went. The door swung shut with a final blow and a resounding moan of pain from Armand. Curtain close. Liesse was almost inclined to feel pity for him. Almost.
But when she looked back at Malakai, the anger drained out of her. She couldn’t be annoyed after such a scene, not tonight. It seemed funny that Malakai found it anything to apologize for, even. Then again, for him, this was just part of daily life. For her, the malaise of Llyr’s Court still fresh, the cousin’s display of concern still had novel charm.
Liesse was prepared to explain this to him, but now that they had a moment alone, Malakai seemed intent that it should not be wasted.
It felt as though fireworks should have shot off when he kissed her—his lips seemed electrified, and for a brief moment, overcome with excitement but also heart-stopping nerves, Liesse went stiff as a doll in his arms.
She shut her eyes—hesitantly reached up to link her hands around his neck—kissed him back, her chest flooding with relief, sudden warmth melting away all trace of her fearful posture. Liesse clung to him.
When they resurfaced, both breathless, she had a hard time stopping herself from kissing him again, and again, and again. Very distantly, through one of the open windows, they could hear the cousins arguing, their voices raised in debate.
“—clearly I won the bet, it’s after midnight and they’re still going at it—“
“—they started before the clock struck twelve, you imbecile—“
“—it’s an antique, the chimes are slow! It was precisely after, I was watching the second hand—“
“—if you were watching the clock, how could you know when they started kissing, huh?—“
Liesse bit into her bottom lip, and tried to resist the urge to laugh. Succeeding, despite the expression of despair on Malakai’s face, was an Olympian feat. Time for a distraction: she took his hand, with a swift little smile, and stepped back, pulling him towards the gardens. “D’you want to maybe find somewhere a little more private?”
As they made their way onto the cobbled stone paths, Liesse linked her arm with his. The moon was so bright tonight that they hardly needed the garden-lights that lined their path; blades of grass cast sharp shadows across the lawn, and the shining fabric of Liesse’s dress seemed to twinkle as they walked, both illuminated by and a reflection of the stars that glimmered overhead. She took the opportunity to lean into his arm gently, stopping herself just before his stride became impaired.
“You know, even if my brother doesn’t understand why, I think he recognizes the generosity that your family has shown all of us. I think he’s grateful for it, even.” The girl sighed deeply, with a weariness that seemed beyond her years. “But for a long time, he’s been the family’s protector. He thought he was doing the right thing, the only thing he could, to preserve the integrity of our name. When his plan failed, he had not simply let down his family, he had destroyed the legacy of the Ancestors.” Liesse paused in their stroll, looking at a little bronze fountain in the Rococo style—a woman, her robes opened at the breast, contorted in passion and flanked by swans. It was difficult to tell whether she was in mid-escape or mid-ecstasy.
“I could see the shape of his mind, read a few of his thoughts, while I was incorporeal.” She shuddered a little, recalling it, unable to stop herself. “It was like looking at a storm, a tornado, and trying to see its eye through the winds. He was full of guilt, self-loathing, no explanation, nowhere to channel it…”
“I thought perhaps he’d gone mad. It runs in the family, same as yours; the most powerful witches are always the most unstable. And Rynn put us all to shame.”
She put the tips of her fingers in the basin, swirling the clear water counter-clockwise so that the rose-petals floating in the fountain danced in their wake. Then she looked up, met Malakai’s eyes with uncanny clarity in her own. “I’m glad that we came here. It feels overwhelming, sometimes. Your family is so large compared to our own, and this is…this home is nothing like where I was raised. Even though it was just the five of us for years and years and years, we were never this close. We never had parties, we never…played jokes on one another. We lived like ghosts— catching glimpses of one another, here and there, but for the most part…even when we did cross paths, we passed through one another as though we didn’t exist. I think my brothers would have forgotten to eat if I hadn’t brought them food, I think they might have forgotten how to speak at times—maybe that’s why Erin and Rynn hated one another so much, they didn’t know what to say to one another when they weren’t fighting—“
Liesse gave another one of those great, heart-wrenching sighs and settled onto a nearby bench. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t talk about this now. Tonight’s supposed to be—enjoyable. But I hate that everyone thinks of Rynn like…like that. He’s not ungrateful, but…he has his pride. His stupid, strangling, enormous pride. And being here, being in a house that is not his own for the first time in his life—he doesn’t know how to live like this.”
The family name had been a burden to Rynn for most of his life. It was his responsibility, but in that satisfying that responsibility there was a wonderful, fierce sense of fulfillment. Rynn had thought he knew his role in this world. He had never entertained the idea that he'd have to adapt to different circumstances.

Halfway across the city, the brother in question was in the midst of demonstrating such pride.
Rynn appeared not to listen to Antha, throughout their conversation. His eyes were focused out the window, golden city lights reflected in his irises as they passed through the darkened streets, through the city proper and beyond, into the strangling back-alley routes where hunched, predatory silhouettes lined the road and rooftops like the snuffed-out street lamps. Rynn’s lips were thin and bloodless with worry, pressed hard together, by the time they stopped. And then, worry turned to anger.
So this was what she thought of him. “Sulky brat”. As if she was one to talk—she, whose nickname was literally ‘the brat princess’.
Antha had cultivated her public image around her own nigh-legendary temper & reckless behavior, and she was the one who was telling him to behave, as though he was a child, as though she was some kind of patronizing Christian saint of good conduct, lecturing him? He had to resist the urge to laugh. It just would have pissed her off more—and now, she was his only ride back to the house. Well-played; Rynn would congratulate her on the ploy later, when he possessed the freedom to slam a door in her smug face.
Instead, he rolled his neck around to stare her down wordlessly through the final stretch of her spiel, then flashed a chilly smile. Rynn was not incapable of holding his tongue, no matter how immature she thought him. “Understood, capitan~” was his only response to her haranguing. He stuck around for the explanation, a vein twinging in his hard-set jaw, but when her door was jerked open, he exited the other side immediately with movements as quick and anger-stiff as a knife plunge.
Outside the car, though, his sure steps faltered.
He wasn’t fool enough to ignore her explanation. And this was not his turf. Cian might have been able to make a play at comfort here, but Rynn was less capable of feigning foolhardiness. The dim-lit room that they entered was lined with bodies, all but invisible against the blackened brick walls. It reminded Rynn of nothing so much as a gauntlet—or perhaps ranks of soldiers, guarding some alleyway palace. Although, on second glance, the bar was anything but palatial.
He understood why Antha had given him the lecture, then.
And he understood Cian’s warning, too: take all the s**t that was thrown at him without so much as a flinch.
He recognized something in the way that these people stood, their level stares, their appraisal, and it made his shoulders go stiff, the hair on the back of his neck stand up. It was the same look that a warren of foxes gave a rabbit, if the bunny should happen to come bounding merrily into their midst. And it was the same look that the ancestors had given him when he first summoned them, before he had even hit puberty, forming a ring of silent, eerily glowing, blank-faced figures around him in the lightless bowels of the family crypts. Rynn had faced his judges down without fear, although his heart had pounded in his throat while, in the old tongue, he had begged their forgiveness for his summoning, and humbly asked to receive their blessing and their power.
But this time was different. Although he readily returned those passive, unreadable looks, although he could feign an unperturbed countenance, he couldn’t help but get the feeling that they knew he was…unnerved. He saw a man’s nostrils flare as they approached, and the thought sprang forth without warning: They can smell it on me.
While Antha slid into the seat at the back of the bar, Rynn stood silently behind her chair, observing the man whom they had come to see. He could feel many, many eyes on his back. His spine ached with rigidity.
The man only looked at him twice, and Rynn was half-grateful that he was spared a longer interaction at the same time that he felt he ought to be insulted. The man’s eyes were liquid gold, like light through a glass of well-aged whiskey. And when he asked, do you have the scent—it all came together, snapping into place in Rynn’s head with a gently click. Of course, ‘Fenrir’. He almost laughed.
When the pack had fled out into the night, that was when Rynn finally sat down. His knees felt unsteady underneath him, and not just from the whiskey he had consumed at the house. Well, well, well. A pack of werewolves. He supposed he shouldn’t have been surprised; if fairies and vampires had found Osiris City a convenient place to settle, why not werewolves?
His shoulders were a little slumped, but he still watched Fenrir still with all the wariness of a wolf’s prey, throughout the man’s rather rude appraisal. “Very good.” he answered, his tone brittle. It was the first time he had spoken since stepping inside. “Although I would not have expected any less, what with the company that you command.” Rynn took care that his voice did not break, hoarse though it may have been from the liquor. But other than that, he listened carefully.
When Fenrir was done, he repeated one of the words with slow, clumsy inflection.
“Rökkr.”
“I am certain we have no time for explanations, at least not tonight. I do not know the definition of this word, but I believe I know the common foe that we share.”
Suspended within life and death, spinning slowly upon the thread of power between worlds, like a venomous spider inching closer and closer towards its prey
Fire behind them, fangs before them…
“If you would help us, know that I—“
He paused, shifted upon his stool with discomfort, and then corrected myself.
“The Mayfairs do not forget. And I will see to it that the debt you are owed is repaid.”
With a curt nod in the man’s direction, and at Antha’s departure, he slid off the seat and followed in her wake, being very careful to avoid the sight of her a** in those shorts. Being slapped would have completely ruined the effect of their retreat.
Outside, he had a hard time releasing his breath in a controlled way. He wanted to heave a sigh of relief, and then smooth the standing hairs on his arm into submission. Rynn didn’t know how to get rid of the goosebumps, though.
He climbed into the passenger seat beside Antha and slumped back against the sloping leather cushions in relief.
“Antha,” he said, quietly.
She didn’t hear him, or chose not to respond. And it wasn’t until she offered him the sheathed bowie knife that he looked at her.
It seemed funny to him, suddenly, that she would be the one to put a blade back in his hands. To offer him a weapon, when only a few months ago—had it been that recently?—he had invited her to his home in order to plunge a dagger into her heart.
All of that seemed so far away now.
He tried again, a little louder.
“Antha.”
Suddenly he didn’t want to meet her eyes, and he tried to pretend it was because he didn’t want to distract her from driving that he looked away, out the window, let his eyes drift up to the pale face of the moon overhead.
“You know that I don’t hate you, right?”

At the bar, beside Jack & Courtland, Cian swirled his tumblr full of jack&coke and watched the cold sweat off the glass. It was purely to blend in at the bar, of course.
Turning his back, still holding his cup (he would have been an idiot to take his eyes off it in this neighborhood) he listened to Courtland’s run-down and let his eyes drift over the fellow inhabitants of the bar.
‘Inhabitants’ might have been used literally, here. Some of these people looked like they hadn’t slept in days, much less left to go home for a shower and a change of clothes.

He took a deep sip from his cup, only halfway paying attention to the discussion around him. Distantly, he Distantly, he heard Courtland hiss, “Antha will forgive you, so just act the part…”
The girls descended in a flurry of tightly clinging, silk robes. ******** found a girl roughly half his weight nestling into his lap within half a second, winding dainty white fingers into his hair and tousling the loose, sandy blonde curls in fascination. Her hair was a sleek sheet of ink cascading down her shoulders, stark black eyelashes in vivid contrast against clear, moon-pale skin. The red sheath of silk that she wore left little to the imagination; it was clear by her practiced air that she was one of the club’s top earners. It was clear by the way she wriggled in his lap, as well, that she recognized the expensive brand of his shirt and trousers, and had picked him out as her tip for the evening.
She traced the lines of Cian’s jaw, his throat, into the ‘V’ of his collar, with graceful fingers that bore the scent of jasmine with their touch…

Something instinctively told Cian to protest.
It was an odd sensation.
He’d never had cause to feel guilt over the idea of a disloyal act before. Then again, he’d usually never gone as far as to seriously ‘date’ anyone before, at least not to the point of cultivating a sense of fidelity, much less alone get married.
But to throw a big fuss over something like this would most certainly draw unnecessary attention to the group. And Courtland had made the suggestion, after all…
He seized her hand with his own, his left, and brought it down in a surprisingly strong gesture, while simultaneously catching her ‘round the raise with his free arm—she felt light as a feather—
And saw the twinkling of his wedding band staring back from his left ring finger.
Of course, he’d never gone out with one before. He’d forgotten to take it off. And now he had the perfect excuse. Standing, so that for a moment the girl (because she could not be old enough to be called a woman, even if she had the body of one—Cian had heard the rumors of how Wu Fang liked his girls—) rode against his hip, with an excited squeak—Cian gave her a rousing smile before he let her drop, although she clung to his shoulder reluctantly. “Sorry. Just married.” He showed her the ring, and gave an apologetic shrug.
Her accent was almost too thick to understand, and Cian found himself no longer wondering why she had not spoken before now. “Plenty of men in here married,” she answered, the unfamiliar words jarring against her red-lacquered lips, but gesturing to the room around her with the bemused shrug of a professional, who’d seen many nights such as this and had already cast their roles in the evening. Two old hands at the game of the sexes, taking out a p***y-whipped newly-wed out on the town in order to show him the ropes of married life. Every man deserved to have nights just to himself, after all. And after her attentions, he’d be a profitable regular if the clothes he was wearing were the brand names she thought they were.
Cian spent an unsuccessful half hour fending off the young vulture’s ‘attentions’, by means of small talk and polite defusement of her mangled attempts at sexual innuendo (and sometimes by means of a swift dodge, as they drank together) while she attempted to wriggle back into his lap. It was, if nothing else, an amusing diversion for all members of the party. When they parted ways, Cian left her a hefty tip, she thought herself very superior, her peers privately (but not very quietly—she did not notice it) called her a drunken lout, and the surrounding patrons of the establishment quickly forgot about them.
Struggling back into the alley, taking a deep breath of the clean(ish) night air, Cian swallowed and turned around to stare at Courtland and Jack. He hadn’t been totally blind to their actions (and reactions) even if he had seemed to be totally involved in comically fending off the girl’s affection.
“Ugh. I’ll be reeking of sandalwood for weeks.”
He waited until they were in the car—the club had a guard outside of it, after all— and then popped the question.
“That was what we came here for? A game of cat's cradle? s**t, guys.”
He grinned—the joke was that he, that all of them, could feel the power radiating from that little piece of string like a red-hot ember radiated heat. “I could’ve just charmed a shoestring or something if that’s what you wanted—“
Cian leaned forward, inspecting their treasure without bothering to disguise his intense interest, and then laughed, jerking back with momentum, as they sped out into the street. “For that feat, hell—I’d kiss both your asses if you asked it right now.” Leaning forward, he gave Courtland the promised reward, although the car hit a pothole as he did, and the kiss landed just shy of the corner of Courtland's lips. The sky roof of the car pulled back, and Cian’s laughter spilled out from the car, into the night air, as the three fugitives sped away onto the freeway.  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

Quietly, Malakai sat down beside Liesse, his gold-green gaze cast up at the canopy of leaves and the splotches of moonlight between them. “It’s alright,” he said slowly, thoughtfully, “It’ll be okay like this, for now. Because no matter how the rest of the family thinks of him, they love Rynn. Eventually, weeks or months or years from now, he’ll open up more and they’ll get to know him. They will. It just takes time.” Malakai himself had no such difficulties. He saw the shape of Rynn’s soul as clearly as a stroke of paint on a canvas.
That was his trouble. Looking out through the garden, the towering oak trees that edged the property and the array of skinny fruit trees nearby, he remembered the night that Stefan had died, watching Antha and Rynn together in the same orchard. Their souls were like a painting that had been slashed in half, two separate, different pieces, standing alone, that made so much sense when you put them together. Aloud, he murmured, “Like dragons…”
Malakai was intensely worried for his little sister. The little pang deep in his chest didn’t help, that stab in his heart that he knew wasn’t actually his but had come from Antha.
“We should go back in,” he said at length, erasing the deep trace of worry from his face with his usual soft smile, “It’s getting chilly out here. And I don’t know about you, but I’m getting hungry. I couldn’t eat a thing at dinner---Rose actually picked the food off my plate because it was ‘too fattening’.” His attempt to scowl turned into more of a pout, which was typical of the sweet boy. He couldn’t stomach the negativity. “Come on.” Quietly, he pulled his sweater over his head, away from his wrinkled shirt, draping it over her mostly bare shoulders before taking her hand. “You can properly meet Lucy. You’ll like her, and she’ll love you.” The boy smiled, brushing aside a leafy branch as he escorted her down the flagstone path. “She’ll be family one day, you know. Legitimately, I mean. I know it seems like Pierce would never be able to say more than two words to her without having a panic attack but he’s getting better, and one day…” With his free hand---the one not laced with Liesse’s---he made vague gestures in the air, trying to express his wispy thoughts. It was difficult to explain to people who didn’t see things like he did, which was…everyone, really. “Their souls are like a picture,” he said finally, softly and seriously, “Cut in half. They’re separate, and they make enough sense alone---her face on the one side, his on the other---but then you put them together and all the jagged edges meet up and it’s perfect. They just match.” He laughed beneath his breath, as if he couldn’t believe the word was about to come out of his mouth. “Soulmates. I think that’s what it has to be. I see it every once in a while---very, very rarely. But I know it when I see it. Like Courtland and Jack.” Like Evie and Rynn. But he didn’t dare say that part out loud, not to anyone but his sister. What was the point?
Coming out of the trees, the lights of the house were almost blinding when he was confronted with them. And for a moment he paused, just watching the silhouettes moving in the windows and smiling fondly at them. Goddamn pain that they were, every last one of them, Malakai loved his family boundlessly. “But you can’t tell Pierce about it,” he began quickly, whispering, a finger pressed to his lips to mark it as a secret, “He’ll stop trying if he knows, and you can never stop trying. Just because you’re meant to be with someone…” His gaze flickered, briefly dark, before he pulled himself hastily back with a little rueful smile. “…it doesn’t mean things will always work out in the end. Life is more complicated than that. Sometimes you just…slip by each other.”
He was spared the further agony of his thoughts by a scuffle at the back door, Thorne and Lucy fighting tooth and nail over the handle. Lucy won in the end, throwing it open with a clatter that promised it had barely escaped intact. “Malakai, I found the cake~!” she called, in the ecstatic, not entirely stable cadence of someone still processing a great deal of alcohol.
Thorne, lurking behind her and rubbing his shoulder, murmured as they drew near the door, “I tried to stop her, I did. Tell Antha I tried to stop her.”
“Oh, don’t listen to him,” Lucy dismissed the boy easily, slapping him away---a little more violently than she meant to, bringing a small yelp from him---and taking Malakai and Liesse each by the arm to drag them inside. “What’s Antha going to do to me? She loves me. She adores me.” She said this after she had taken up a frosting-encrusted spoon, pausing to point it at Thorne for effect before putting it back to its intended use.
“Evie kills things she loves, when it’s necessary,” Armand reminded her, dropping into a seat at the table beside her and leaning forward, mouth open, until she shoved a very large bite of cake sloppily through his lips. “So, then…” he purred when he had finished chewing, licking frosting from his lips and wiping it off his chin with the tips of his fingers, which he then licked away, staring at Malakai the whole time with a puckish glitter in his eyes and grin to match, “M, have you shown her your work?” The boy went scarlet, instantly sputtering and trying to refute that there was anything to see. But his cousin just cackled, sitting contentedly back in his seat. “Not the poems, you poor, sensitive creature. Cian’s wedding present.”
“Oh…” Malakai’s relief was palpable, the tension draining out of him with the flush on his skin, “That.”
“You got Cian a wedding present?” Lucy questioned, licking the frosting from her fingers, utterly oblivious that Pierce was watching her as if he would explode at any moment. “It’s a little late, isn’t it?”
“It’s taken a while,” the boy murmured, suddenly nervous all over again, “I hadn’t planned it, exactly. But there was a moment, after the ceremony…Antha was in her dress, and she was letting down her hair and taking her jacket off, and it just kind of stuck in my mind. So I painted it.”
Before he could get another word out, Lucy had clattered out of her chair and was at the boy’s throat, her sugary fingers clutching his collar as she stared with deadly, wide-eyed severity into his own bewildered eyes. “I want to see.”
While Malakai stood blinking at her in mild alarm, Armand was laughing. “Calm down, Luce. I know you love your girlfriend, but we do have pictures, you know.”
She released her hold abruptly, eyes twinkling, returning to her seat to stare at Armand, her chin in her palm. “Fetch them, please.”
“What am I, your dog?”
“Well you are a dog.”
“Shut up. Malakai, will you go get her the damn painting?” The boy obeyed, sheepishly, his nerves all put on end. Armand, meanwhile, seemingly irritated at being ordered about, snapped, “Remind me, why are you Antha’s best friend while she has a restraining order against Sophie Astoria?”
Automatically, Thorne put his hands on Liesse’s shoulders and pulled her several feet backwards, while simultaneously Lucy had taken up her fork and brandished it at Armand, throwing her other hand down on the table so hard that half the room shook. “Do not compare me to that…that…that sappy, impossible pod person!”
Armand, realizing he had struck a chord, threw his hands up in surrender and Lucy very slowly withdrew her fork, eying him murderously all the while. “That’s why,” Pierce said with a little grin, gesturing at the makeshift weapon clutched in her fingers, “Lucy’s a boss.”
“Thank you,” the girl huffed, turning and pressing a grateful kiss to his cheek. When she turned back, he all but melted on the spot. “Armand, can you try being a ******** gentleman?” she said then, stretching her legs out to kick the chair out from under him as she did so. While he was sprawled on the ground, groaning about an injury or some other nonsense, Lucy picked the chair up and daintily set it upright again, brushing off the seat and tugging Liesse into it. “You come sit here by me, puddin’. Right here.” When she was settled, Lucy sat quietly staring at her for a few moments, leaning close with her chin on her fist, the most pleasant smile on her lips.
“Lucy…” Thorne said lowly in warning, shooting her a look.
The girl retaliated with her own sharp glare, hissing, “I’m not interfering!” And then she was immediately like honey again, happily patting Liesse on the head. “I like this one. She’s as pretty as a little doll. Even if someone---” She glared pointedly at Pierce, who paled. “---dressed her like Elsa. Next time---next time, Liesse---Antha and I will help. We’ll raid her closet---she has so many pretty things, she won’t even notice.” While Armand protested, pointing out that Antha had been able to identify a stolen dress at least a year after the fact, Lucy ignored him, happily pinching Liesse’s cheeks. “You’re like a little kitten, all fluffy and cute and full of sharp things. I love it.”
“Lucy!” Malakai protested in a sigh, returning with a large rectangle wrapped up in sheets, “She’s not a cat, don’t pull at her cheeks…”
“But she’s sooo cu~te!” Lucy argued, throwing her arms around the other girl in a powerful bear hug.
“No,” he continued, hastily prying Liesse out of her grip, “I changed my mind, no one should meet you drunk. Lucy, let go!” When he freed Liesse, he immediately pulled her into the safety of his arms, pouting slightly.
Lucy only giggled, clapping her hands together, before abruptly shifting gears. “Is that your painting? Let me see it!”
Knowing there was no use in denying her what she wanted he carefully took up the painting and set it up on a nearby table, leaning against the wall, and unwrapped it. (x)While the Mayfair boys regarded it admiringly, Lucy was outright shrieking, clamoring out of her seat to get a closer look. “It looks as real as a photo! M, I want one, too!”
Ignoring her, Armand had stepped closer and was inspecting it intently. “This frame,” he murmured, running his fingers over the ridges and sculpted roses, “It’s not ours.”
“I wasn’t sure how comfortable Cian is with all the heirlooms, so I bought this one from an antique store. I figured this way, it’s all his.”
“You’re such a sweet thing,” Lucy purred, leaning over to kiss the tip of his nose. Behind her back, Pierce was staring daggers like he thought he could make them real.  

[Okimiyage]

Liesse smiled, but she couldn’t quite erase the crease of worry from her forehead. “I know. I just wish I could make it easier for him. I suppose when you grow up like we did, you have to practice at making friends.” She stood up from the bench, brushing her skirts to remove any trace of debris from the glamourous party gown, then stepped onto the path. She almost didn’t hear Malakai’s addendum: “Like dragons…”
Liesse glanced over her shoulder, but the boy was quick to change the subject. She frowned, but didn’t pry. If there was one thing Liesse thought she was good at, it was knowing when to keep quiet and give others their space.
Settling arm in arm again, a posture that felt all at once familiar but also new, they wandered back towards the house, matching one another’s stride with unpracticed ease. Liesse found that she was grateful for the sweater—it smelled like him, still warm from his body, and he had been right about the drop in temperature.
“I met her a little downstairs. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen Pierce at a loss for words—normally he’s so suave, it’s disarming. Everyone needs someone that throws them a little off-guard, though, I think. If all your interactions are utterly practiced, you run the risk of never letting anyone see you as you really are.” She laughed a little, leaning against his arm. “And that’s how people fall in love, isn’t it? When you let them get to know you, really know you, all the vulnerability, all the insecurity, guilt, foolishness, passion…and they still accept you, no matter what.” She glanced up at Malakai, and there was a flash of worry in the way her brows knit together, the way that she looked back down at her feet again so quickly. The toes of her shoes glinted against the dull cobblestones as she walked, peeking out from under the hem of her skirts.
“…Thank you for not making fun of my waltzing, by the way. I know I’m horrible at it. We’ll…have to practice again, someday soon—perhaps? Now that I have this dress, it’d be a shame to hang it up in a closet for ages and allow the poor thing to collect dust.”
She smiled, trying to pretend that the invitation hadn’t sounded as pathetic as she thought it did. Play it cool, Liesse. But she was grateful when the fight at the back door drew their attention away from her own inept attempt at asking Malakai out. Gods, I’m bad at this.
Lucy made a wonderful distraction, though, wielding the frosted spoon as though it were a magic wand and she was stealing the role of ‘fairy godmother’ away from the ‘prince’. Liesse nearly laughed at her own foolishness, when these thoughts passed through her head. Maybe Cian had been right—she had read too many fairy-tales as a child. They tended to resurface in her thoughts in most unexpected ways.
Luckily, she was forced to voice very little aloud, at least until Cian’s wedding present was mentioned. Then, she couldn’t hold back a squeak of delight. “Oh, that’s perfect.” She wanted to rush off after him, as Malakai left to fetch the portrait, but she would have to content herself with holding the door open so that he could crab-walk the enormously unwieldy frame through without too much worry of scratching the gift.
The ensuing theatrics almost made her forget, though. Not to self: do not compare Lucy to Sophie Astoria. Or probably even mention the name around her. Spreading out her skirts, she blinked at the close inspection that she received, and could only wait with bated breath as to whether she would be found lacking. The smile didn’t help. Knowing how the dinner party had gone, Liesse had learned that smiling strangers were not always friendly—there was no telling when they’d be concealing sharp teeth. When Lucy finally gave her assessment, wide-eyed Liesse noticed that she hadn’t taken a breath in close to a minute. The air all came out of her in a great whoosh, and her posture collapsed into a slump. “Phew. You had me worried.”
Luckily, she was not under inspection for much longer—Malakai returned, and she had a wonderful excuse to twist out of Lucy’s attempt at a strangling embrace and leap to her feet, presumably for a better look at the painting. “Oh, Malakai, it’s beautiful,” she breathed. “Cian will love it—you really captured her.” She tore her eyes away from the painting just long enough to give him an admiring glance. “I saw some of your work at the school, but you’ve only gotten better since then. That poor teacher, I think she might want to eat your heart for its talent.”  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

Tearing his eyes from the painting, Armand took a moment to look between Malakai and Liesse. The former was blushing at the compliment, a sweet little smile twisting his lips. Finally, his head falling to the side, Armand gave a great sigh. “Jesus, will you guys just do it already?” The boy turned wide, horrified eyes on him, trying and failing to make outraged words. They died as faint squeaks on his lips. Armand only grinned, taking the opportunity. “Have you seen his poetry yet, Liesse?”
Malakai did react then, clapping a frantic hand over his cousin’s mouth. Lucy, meanwhile, had smacked him squarely in the back of the head. “What’s the matter with you!” she demanded in a huff, giving him her most threatening eyes.
He grimaced, rubbing the point of impact and fending off further attacks. “I’m just saying what we’re all thinking…”
“Come on, Luce,” Pierce sighed, gently moving her back from Armand, “I think it’s time we got you to sleep.”
“I wanna’ see the babies again first,” the girl demanded after a moment of thought.
“Please god, Lucy, don’t wake them up. They’ll be crying all night if you do. Just let them sleep.”
The girl pouted for a moment, her mind working hard to think of something to convince him. When she came up with something, her eyes lit up mischievously and she stepped closer to Pierce, resting her chin on his shoulder. “Let me go say goodnight to them and I’ll sleep with you.”
The boy froze, as still as a statue, the color draining from his face. Armand and Thorne glanced at each other, taking an educated guess as to where all his blood had gone. Malakai was sighing, ruffling his hair as if he wasn’t sure what to do. But when several long minutes had passed and he had said nothing, Armand stepped in, pressing the two apart. “Malakai, will you go put her to bed?” he sighed, shooing her away from Pierce.
The boy hurried to obey, putting a hand on the small of her back and urging her out into the hallway. When they were gone, Pierce took a deep breath…and burst into tears. From the table, Thorne said flatly, “You’re so not cool, big brother.”
Armand was trying---and poorly failing---to stifle a laugh, patting Pierce on the shoulder. “She’s drunk. You don’t want it this way.”
“But…but…” He sniffled, shoulders shaking. “I was so close!”
“That’s alright,” Armand consoled him, smoothing down his hair, “Just wait for your moment. But for now...go to bed, Pierce. Just go to bed and don’t get any ideas.”
Dejectedly, he shuffled off, murmuring a wispy goodnight. When he was gone, his brother gave a small groan. “I am so disillusioned right now…”
Armand chuckled, shaking his head. “Love’s a terrible, inexplicable thing, Thorne. Now come on, I’ll give you a ride home.” He gathered his coat as Thorne lumbered out of his seat, pausing to lay a kiss on Liesse’s forehead. “He’s crazy in love with you, you know,” he murmured against her hair, his lips stretching into a grin, “So have a little confidence in yourself. It’s not like these chances come around often.”
As he passed out the door, Thorne trailed at his heels, turning and giving Liesse a little salute. “Good luck,” he murmured, a crooked grin twisting his lips.
Malakai passed them on the way out, exchanging goodnights as he returned to the kitchen. “Lucy’s passed out on the couch,” he sighed, going to rifle around in the cabinets as he spoke, “She conked out like a light. Not surprising, considering how much she drank. Tea?” He set her out a cup anyways, pouring out the floral brew, and brought both cups over to the kitchen table, setting one in front of Liesse. He sat silently for a few minutes at the table, gratefully sipping his tea as the tension leftover from the stressful night seeped from his shoulders. It had been rough on the poor boy, between fending off the girls Suzette had tried to match him with and trying to keep his cousins from making too much trouble. Trying to sneak a piece of bread during dinner without Rose noticing had taken nearly all of his energy by itself. "At least there's no cleaning up left to do," he sighed, since he was the only one in the family that could be made to do it, "Bless Evie for thinking to hire a crew, Jacob would be in tears if it had all fallen on him." He paused, glancing out the sliding glass doors, and gave a little laugh to himself. "But that's because he wouldn't have gotten to drive cousin Clara home. Don't tell the others, they'd pester him about it, but I think they're dating." The idea brought a sweet little smile of satisfaction to his lips. After all, it was perfect serendipity that Jacob would wind up in the family. He loved them like family, had taken care of them with all his might, and had jealously guarded their secrets. Jacob was much more of a Mayfair than a lot of their cousins, when he stopped to think about it.
And then, all at once, Malakai realized that they were alone. The realization came a little late, and proved quite a shock. He wasn't used to being in the house without half a dozen cousins running around, bursting in on everything. Even in his own room, hardly a day passed that Pierce didn't show up demanding cuddles or Antha didn't slink in to vent about something or another. At the very least, Armand liked to rush in and grab everything he could find that looked like a journal, pouring over it looking for material for his books.
His ears went red, his gaze dropping sheepishly to the table. “I’m not used to it being this quiet,” he murmured, grasping desperately for something to say, “There’s usually someone running around, making a fuss.” He cleared his throat, glancing briefly at the nearby clock. “But it’s still early, they’ll probably be out for a while.” Which was doing nothing for his poor nerves.
At least Aunt Suzette had left.  

[Okimiyage]

Liesse colored horribly; the pale skin that accompanied red hair so often was absolutely no use in hiding her embarrassment. It was difficult to discern words from the inaudible squeaks that she managed to produce, but amongst them were “…none of your business…” as she scooted back from Armand and crossed her arms in a portrayal of anger that was rather on the unconvincing side. The overall effect was rather pathetic—Liesse had very little practice with ‘intimidating’—somewhat like a small house-cat trying to puff itself up to lion-size.
Perhaps luckily, no one took her seriously. She didn’t know what she would have do in order to enforce her authority.
As soon as their attention was diverted from Malakai and herself, though, she seized his hand.
Pierce gave the immediate impression of a lovelorn swain, all but flinging to his knees and proposing, the entire time he was looking at Lucy. Poor boy. Even for all his charm, the girl he was courting was rather beyond his level.
Which was only to be expected. Boys like Pierce didn’t just ‘settle’ for ordinary girls, dull girls, safe girls. They likes challenges. Liesse supposed that after years of being playing the seducer, courted and coddled by the opposite sex in turn, it had to be difficult to resist a challenge. It was only Pierce’s poor luck that he’d staked his heart on one of the most elusive targets in Osiris.
And besides, if you wanted to roll with witches, you needed a particular sort of unusual social grace.
Malakai played the part of gentleman excellently, escorting Lucy out of the kitchen to save Pierce the trouble of exploding after holding in his emotions all evening. Liesse fidgeted with her skirts, suddenly alone after an evening spent at another’s side. Her nerves did not pass unnoticed; she was grateful for Thorne’s reassurance, even if his breath was more alcohol than air, and she waved him off with a crooked, worried little smile and set herself busy around the kitchen.
There wasn’t much to do. The silver was all sparkling, the dishwasher empty. Even the garbage had already been taken out. If Liesse didn’t know better, she’d have suspected that the Mayfair House had a brownie in residence rather than just a masterful service staff.
While Malakai was gone, she drifted through the kitchen, opening cupboards and letting her eyes take in rows of gleaming glass, monogrammed china, porcelain cups as thin as a finger-nail, gilded with the family crest…if nothing else, it was a good opportunity to familiarize herself with the kitchen’s layout. You never knew when you’d have the opportunity to bake for someone—
And Liesse thought of the look on Malakai’s face, imagined his reaction if she should offer him some home-made cookies, and blushed out of pleasure.
When he entered the kitchen again, sans Lucy, she whirled around, still hot in the cheeks, and let the cupboard she’d been peeking into bang shut quite loudly. If it had been possible to get any redder, Liesse would have managed it.
“S-sorry.” she said, locking her hands behind her back. “I was just looking around.”
Scooting back to the kitchen counter, she watched (a little enviously) as he moved through the kitchen with a practiced ease.
Finally, he presented her with a cup that smelled like chamomile, and…Liesse bent her head down over the tea, inhaling deeply. Roses.
Straightening back up, she took a deep sip, and lowered the cup to reveal a hesitant smile. “I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to get to sleep after all the excitement of tonight.
…but I’ve heard this kind of tea is supposed to be good for that, right?
Thank you.”
She linked her hands underneath her chin, and gave Malakai a sidelong glance, with only a hint of mischief in her eyes. “Then again, it’d be nice to stay up. While we wait for them.”  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

“You’ll get used to it,” he said with a little laugh, again sipping his tea, “If you have too hard of a time, there’s always lavender tea in the pantry---Antha keeps an entire crate of it---but for now, chamomile is good for soothing nerves. Especially this brew, it’s Dolly Jean’s recipe. She makes most of the tea we have in the house, actually. But rose tea is her specialty.” Not surprising really, considering the wealth of them she had to practice and experiment with. “She got the equipment from great grandmere Marguerite. Antha and Courtland found it years ago and tried making new batches of her weird drug tea, so Julien threw it all out and Dolly Jean rescued it.” And trying to take something from Dolly Jean was killing one’s soul, she had the most heartbroken, helpless eyes whenever anyone did it.
Then, with her last musing, he went nervously quiet. “That’ll probably be a long wait,” he said at length, softly, retrieving his phone and sliding it over to show her the text from ‘Evie <3’. Stop worrying, big brother, nobody died. But we are going to go get Rynn spectacularly drunk. “That lot doesn’t do nights out halfway. If they stumble in before dawn, something’s wrong.” A rueful little laugh spilled from his lips, his head shaking slightly. “If they have their way, Rynn’s going to be completely incapacitated for his second day of school.” A ploy, he thought, to begin turning him into them. Nothing would have made Courtland happier.
A small clatter sounded in the hallway, alarming Malakai, but before he could even fully get to his feet, Lucy stumbled in bleary-eyed and heavy-limbed, glancing vacantly between them. Malakai gave a heavy sigh to see her, moving as if he would go over to her. “Lucy, you shouldn’t be up---”
“Don’t like the couch,” she mumbled thickly, rubbing her eyes with the back of her hand, “I wanna’ sleep with Annie.”
“Antha’s not home,” he sighed, shaking his head, “And you can’t just crowd her and Cian.”
For a moment the girl just pouted, like a child, wavering slightly on her feet. “Where does Pierce sleep?”
The boy hesitated, seeing to weigh his options. And then, reluctantly, he pointed back the way she’d come. “Down the hall, the back door behind the stairs on the left.” She wavered for another half second and then turned and trudged off the way he’d directed her, a door opening and then closing at the end of the hall. Cocking his head uncertainly, Malakai gave a great, heaving sigh and dropped back into his chair. “That’s not going to wear well on him…but otherwise she’d crawl into bed with either Evie and Cian or Courtland and Jack.” Though, admittedly, he wasn’t sure a single one of them would mind. Antha certainly wouldn’t---they’d been having slumber parties for years, they were used to sharing a bed.
But finally he shook his head, as if there was no use fretting about it. “If we’re going to wait up for them, music is essential. I’m a veteran of waiting for my drunken cousins to turn up at dawn, trust me, I learned this the hard way.”  

[Okimiyage]

“Rose tea,” Liesse repeated softly, tapping her fingernails against the side of the cup slowly.
“That’s funny. I used to make it myself. All the roses in the old gardens must be dead by now, in this heat, but…”
She took a deep sip of the proffered tea. “I’m sure hers is very good. I’ll have to try it sometime. Dolly-Jean has surprising...talents, doesn't she?”
“At least Rynn’s in good hands. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him drunk, actually. But Antha will cope. She’ll watch over him.”
There was so much to ask, but she didn’t know how to say it. It was one of the few times in her life that she’d ever been alone with a man, free to speak her mind, and all of a sudden she was acutely aware of the her unique position.
“I figured,” she said, suddenly, desperate to break the silence. “Rynn needs a bit of time to explore the city, you know? He’s lived like a cloistered monk most of his life. Responsibility is all well and good, but there's such a thing as too much, too soon. Everyone need a break, now and then.”
She was talking too much about her brother, she knew, but it was something like a nervous habit. Liesse wasn't used to anyone displaying a genuine interest in her, without Rynn by her side.
The clock ticked on, as they drank their tea to the dregs.
Impulsively, Liesse made her decision. She was going to kiss him, again and again and again. He deserved it, after tonight, only the most recent in what must have been a long line of social obligations that he'd borne... She set her cup down with a clink of china, and put her hands on the counter, and leaned forth—
It was a good thing that Lucy interrupted them. She didn’t know what would have happened next. Her stool clattered as she suddenly sat back on it, leaning back and staring at the teacup in her hands with a fixed, studious gaze, as though she was mentally recording its pattern for later duplication.
After Lucy stumbled blearily off once more, her eyes shifted sideways to look at Malakai, without daring to move her head.
“What would you like to listen to? Er—if you don’t think we’ll wake anyone. I wouldn’t mind staying up, since I have company. I used to wait for Cian sometimes when he first started going out, before I realized that most nights he wasn’t coming back.” She gave a half-hearted laugh at this, more the imitation of humor than out of any real amusement. It had stung at the time, but joking about it was more comfortable than admitting the truth.  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

Malakai smiled, as gently as ever, nearly amused. “Rynn is like Evie---disturbingly like her, really---I don’t think he has it in him to take a break. Not for long, anyways. And when she divides up for kingdom for safekeeping after…well, after---” He still couldn’t say it, couldn’t even directly think it, because to his mind, his little sister was immortal. “---I have no doubt she’ll be entrusting some corner of it to Rynn. The Talamasca, probably. They’re deathly afraid of him, which gives him the leverage to keep them in line.” But then he shook his head, smiling as if to change the subject. He wasn’t particularly one for politics, he left all of that to his siblings and cousins. Instead, he was in charge of taking care of them while they took care of the family, which was far more agreeable to his gentle nature.
"Dolly Jean really will surprise you if you underestimate her," he said softly, swirling the remnants of tea leaves around in the bottom of his cup, "She has trouble with most things, which is to be expected I suppose, but she has incredible resolve. She tries everything she can, and if she can do it well, she does it vigorously." Certainly she had exceeded most people's expectations, not least of all Julien.
“I have an idea,” he said suddenly, putting his teacup aside and rising to his feet. He paused for a moment, just long enough for a thought to flicker through his eyes and then to lean across the counter and press a kiss fleetingly against Liesse’s lips. Chaste, for the most part, endlessly sweet, smiling as he pulled away as if to say he knew what she had been thinking. “Follow me.”
He led her into the parlor, closing the door behind them and taking a seat in front of the piano, gesturing for her to sit on the bench beside him. “This room is soundproof,” he informed her as he lifted the lid over the keys, “Angelique---my great-great-great grandmother, who built this house---wanted to be able to have music and dancing in here without interrupting the conversation in the sitting room.” His fingers struck a few keys, tinkering out the first stirrings of a melody, and then switched to something a little faster and more complicated to test it. When he was satisfied that nothing had damaged it during the party (which was always a real concern), he took up both of Liesse’s hands, covering them with his own, and set them on the keys. “This was always my favorite piece to play when I was learning,” he said softly, moving her fingers slowly to pluck out a tune, “Chopin, Nocturne Opus 9. I used to play it to Courtland as a lullaby when they first brought him from the orphanage. He would toss and turn and scream and claw at his chest in his sleep unless I played this for him. It’s a useful trick nowadays, though---play it for him and he drops like a ton of bricks.” A little guilty laugh fell through his lips. Honestly, he did it all the time.
Across the room, something thudded and shifted before erupting from beneath the couch, a little black blur streaking across the room. In the next moment, Amadeo was plunking uncertainly across the lid of the piano, swaying slightly with every reverberating note from within the case beneath him. When he'd valiantly made his way across, he hunkered down on the edge and stared intently down at the fingers moving on the keys beneath him, every so often reaching lazily down to bat at them. Oblivious to their audient, Malakai was murmuring beneath his breath, "Quick, quick, slow...quick...slow," to every shift in the music. Not one to be ignored, Amadeo rolled onto his side, stretching his body in an outward arch, and reached out to lay his paw gently but firmly on Malakai's head. The boy glanced up in surprise, wrinkling his nose as the proffered paw fell on it, but finally broke into a little smile. "Do you like the song, Amie?" The cat blinked slowly at him, shifting onto his back as his chest thrummed with a purr, demanding to be petted. Malakai obliged happily, softly stroking the thick mass of his fur and murmuring to Liesse, "I think he's missed it here. Antha kept him in that empty old house with her for too long."
There was something in the way he said that, something subtle and relieved. He had never liked having his little sister cloistered away in the swamps, going about all of her mysterious business. And, almost as bad, her less than mysterious business. He knew why she'd moved into that old house in the first place---because Julien had taken a stand and tried to separate her from Nicolae. From the moment she'd left, he'd hardly seen either of his siblings for months. Just Antha, Nicolae, and their cat, alone in their haunted house in the swamp.
He smiled even as his fingers stilled on the piano keys, watching Amadeo roll around in a bid for attention. He refused to remember it, all the loneliness and concern. Instead he focused on the piano, his fingers easily launching across the keys into one of Mozart's more lighthearted concertos.