[Kora] "The state of the city," returns the dark eyed Skald, with that same steadiness, the lingering twist of her mouth. "Where not to go, whom to look out for. What vaccinations you need before heading out there. Like - " a pause, narrow, curving mouth still around the words, her sharp features quiet, sober, softened only by the shape of her wide mouth and the subtle glow - of health, or fertility, something - that comes with pregnancy for creature half-human, half-animal.
She unlaces her long fingers from around the hand-worked mug and makes a supple gesture in the air, through the steam of the fresh hot chocolate. The pale shadow of her forearm laces across the polished wood surface of the table. " - one of the state department fact sheets, yeah? Before you head off the map into Absurdistan." There are a half-inch of bracelets on either one of her wrists. Leather, suade, knotted fisherman's line. They are part of her, change when she changes, weathered, shot through with memory, a hint more snug, now, as her body packs on new weight to support the child she carries. Between the layers, the hint of ink, dark against her pale skin.
Small tattoos, the sharp lines of old Norse runes.
"So we'll start there. This place," a glance up, at the ceiling, " - is run by kin. There's a dorm of sorts upstairs, like a youth hostel, yeah? Open to any who need it. The food's good, and the beer's better. They brew it themselves. I recommend the dunkel.
"The enemy holds land to the north of the city, in a suburb called Elk Grove. I brought a map so I can lay it out for you, but you should consider it strictly off limits unless I send you personally.
"And if I send you personally, you best make sure that my Godi's there so you know I've not lost my mind. Or Joey; someone, you ken?" Her voice rises there, pausing to ensure that he understands. "They're active in the city, too. We've lost kin and Garou. Most dead, but at least one kidnapped by the northerners. Joey's cousin, no less. I pray he's dead. For his own sake, if not ours. Now," a supple twist of her mouth. "I want to know more about you."
[Holden] His brow furrows, he fixes her with a strangely bemused and possibly confused expression. "You're strange for a Jarl." But he thinks about what she has said, she talks about sending him places personally like that is going to happen, or as if he would want to wander into enemy territory.
"If you give me a map, mark the no-go's in red and I'll stay clear as best I can." A pause. "I'm a fire-fighter with the Chicago Fire Department, I live in Lakeview." He pulls out a piece of paper from his jeans pocket that has his address written down on it. "Here you go. I'd prefer if you're going to send someone around to look at my place that they do it discretely."
His left hand lingers on the glass and he plucks it from the table for another swig.
"Do you need to know more? My favourite colour? Perhaps what types of chocolates I prefer?" A tilt of his head, he hadn't even batted an eyelash at her mention of dead Kin or Garou.
[Adara Mires] She blinked at Gina leave "Hmm ok, take care Gina" She wactched the kin go and concentrate on her steak. She wondered what she said or did to make Gina lose her good humor. Maybe it wasn't her per se. Maybe it was something general about her, her tribe or her nature as a Garou.
It was certainly the case with Carter. The man could barely stand her when they first bumped into each other. Ok, now thing were borderline neutral with between then, it was an improvement but there was tension still. She was afraid something similar was happening with Gina. She seemed like an easy going girl. She did have a really nice laugh and voice. It would suck that because of something out of her control, she couldn't be friendly with the young woman.
She let out a long breath and drank some more, eating her steak in silence.
[Kora] "You'll have to go North if you want beards and battle braids, Holden. This is a small Sept raised from nothing seven years ago by the scrappiest, most misfit bunch of fucking heroes you ever heard of. Like an indie superhero movie," she continues, still watching him steadily, her rage back, her attention sharp, alive. "I'd offer an example, but I haven't been to the movies in half-a-decade. But it's a Sept, raised from nothing, in the twilight of the world."
This is all offered quietly, backgrounded by a believer's fervor. " - in the second city. We'll be discrete. My pack claims territory in Cabrini, we're based in the abandoned cathedral two blocks from the river. If you need us, you can find us there. I claim the tribe's kin here. You're a man of Fenris, and I expect that you'll behave like one. Your honor is my honor. If you transgress, I will not hesitate to punish you. If someone transgresses against you, you will bring it to my door. I am not your chaperon, but I expect discretion. And if someone wants to claim you - or if you start getting close enough to another kin in the same way, I expect you to inform me.
"Easy enough. We've got kin in the PD and coroner's office. I may ask you to work with them. And - if you ever find any unusual bodies, anything like that, I'll give you the doc's number. All that clear?"
[Holden] "Wait on, you've claimed me? Says who?"
He blinks, tilts his head. This is obviously new to him, though none of the rest of it seems to have been.
[Kora] "I have a mate," says Kora, with supple, even snort near the end. " - but as Jarl of the Fenrir, I am responsible for all kin of the tribe within the protectorate. If that's new to you, I'm not sure where you've been all your life. And if you don't like it, you're welcome to leave."
[Adara Mires] he finished her meal and took the plate and went to place it in a pile of dirty dishes. She walked back to her stoll, her steps light, silent, moving with a grace many dancers would envy, almost akin to a cat's. One she sat back, she look around, emerald eyes scanning the place.
She was wondering what to do tonight. The weater sucked, she had no real friends yet that she could call and go hang at their place or have them come over. She crossed her as she drank form her bottle. Being in a new city, no matter how friendly you were, was always hard the first few weeks. And yes, she was missing the feelling of being complete without a pack.
She'll have to work on resoving that problem soon.
[Holden] "Look, if you want to offer me protection or whatever it is that you feel is your responsibility then go right ahead, so long as I don't see it I won't care. As for getting me to do things for you? Well, you can ask. That is fair."
A pause and he tilts his head sucks in his cheeks slightly.
"As for discretion and all that jazz, would I still be alive if I didn't have any? And Punishment? I don't suspect you shall need to punish me, I don't suspect I'll have to come to you to punish anyone else either."
A sigh.
"I've lived my life Kora, fought my war, seen countless Jarls just like you sitting across from me and I've nodded and told them yessir bossir I will do my best, I'll help you win the fight because I'm Fenrir and it's in my blood. I have no skills beyond fixing things, cooking and a life-times worth of chopping things up with my axe, alive and dead. If there's a fire, I can help you out. If you desperately need anything else from me then I'll consider it. Other than that? I just want to be left alone, is that so much to ask?"
[Mila Davis] There are quiet footfalls on the stairs heading down from the rooms above as well as a quiet humming. It seemed a little dark in tone and.. perhaps a little celtic? A moment later, a dark haired young woman pushed open the door to the main room; guitar in hand.
Her clothing was simple, just a pair of jeans, black heeled boots and a form flattering black top. It seemed like a theme, the black - but what else was more appropriate for one of the Grandchildren of Thunder?
Hazel hued eyes spotted only a single known figure in the room - hrm, apparently she should stop by more often. Oh wait.. the other dark haired girl seemed familiar - ah yes, she'd met her, briefly at least.
A hand lifted in greeting as Mila set her guitar against the bar and slid herself into a seat.
[Kora] "Með lögum skal land byggja en með ólögum eyða - " There's a certain meditative focus there. She pronounces the Icelandic with an accent - not an American one. Closer, instead, to a native speaker's tones, through shirred through a curtain. It's like hearing a Catalan speak Provençal. Her dark eyes scour his face, that weariness that someone else might read as weakness, for recognition, that he's understood the language. And if he hasn't, she translates, "A land is shall be built by laws or destroyed without them."
"My name is she who offers sorrow, renders bone. I'm a fostern and Skald and daughter of Fenris. I fostered at the Sept of Vindur and Ringing in Hjaltland, the Sept Halfdan the Old ripped from the hands of the enemy in the darkest hour of this world until her own, and ran under Truth-in-Frenzy-rhya until he fell in battle." Her voice is even, but there's a resonance. She's older than she looks; the voice, the lore. Underneath the young woman, pregnant, she remembers more lifetimes than he has seen Jarls.
Which is to say: countless.
That brief, ancient echo passes. There's hot chocolate in her mug, though the steam has faded now. The surface is still, and she has not yet had a drink from it.
Long fingers unlace from about the mug. Last year at this time she might have had black polish on them, chipped. That's gone; she's shorn away the last vestiges of her human self. Her nails are bare and blunt. An old piece of worked iron - older than either of them; older, even, than Half-dan the old - dangles from an iron ring punched through the inner cartilage of her year. It does not have a mate in the other lobe.
Inside her wrists, inscribed over either pulse - two runs. Thought says one, visible as she turns her hand through the knots. Memory, says the other, hidden still.
"You heard my terms, Holden." The creature tells him, her steadiness spiked by the spark of heat somewhere deep in her blue eyes. The center of a flame; a certain measured sharpness there. A crispness to her presence, like peeling back the edge of a mask to find a wolf looking back at you. Her voice is quiet, modulated, but her mouth curls at the edges, like paper caught to flame.
She's older than most Garou. Mid-twenties. Either she changed late or she's survived a good long time. The softness of youth, of the teenage years, of adolescence has been winnowed from her face. Left behind, the healthy glow of a young, pregnant wolf. Who smiles easily. Whose smiles sharpen just as easily. "They're pretty fucking reasonable. If you can't abide them, you can leave. I won't stop you. If you're everything you say you are, I think we'll be fine. But in the end, that's up to you."
[Adara Mires] She was finishing her beer when Mila stepped in the room. Her attention was on the beautiful woman who stepped closer to her, at the bar. Her pink lips curled into a friendly smile and when Mila was close enough she spoke
"Good evening Mila, how have you been?" Her voice was soft, warm, clear, hinting at what it could accomplish in a song.
Tonight the young Gallaird was dressed in grey sweats with black socks and tank top. Her dark brown hair were in a ponytail with strands left free to fall over her right eye. "I didn't know you lived here"
[Kora] OH EM GEE WITHOUT TYPOS THIS TIME: PMed so as not to crush other posts.
"Með lögum skal land byggja en með ólögum eyða - " There's a certain meditative focus there. She pronounces the Icelandic with an accent - not an American one. Closer, instead, to a native speaker's tones, through shirred through a curtain. It's like hearing a Catalan speak Provençal. Her dark eyes scour his face, that weariness that someone else might read as weakness, for recognition, that he's understood the language. And if he hasn't, she translates, "A land is shall be built by laws or destroyed without them."
"My name is she who offers sorrow, renders bone. I'm a fostern and Skald and daughter of Fenris. I fostered at the Sept of Vindur and Ringing in Hjaltland, the Sept Halfdan the Old ripped from the hands of the enemy in the darkest hour of this world until our own, and ran under Truth-in-Frenzy-rhya until he fell in battle." Her voice is even, but there's a resonance. She's older than she looks; the voice, the lore. Underneath the young woman, pregnant, she remembers more lifetimes than he has seen Jarls.
Which is to say: countless.
That brief, ancient echo passes. There's hot chocolate in her mug, though the steam has faded now. The surface is still, and she has not yet had a drink from it.
Long fingers unlace from about the mug. Last year at this time she might have had black polish on them, chipped. That's gone; she's shorn away the last vestiges of her human self. Her nails are bare and blunt. An old piece of worked iron - older than either of them; older, even, than Halfdan the old - dangles from an iron ring punched through the inner cartilage of her ear. It does not have a mate in the other lobe.
Inside her wrists, inscribed over either pulse - two runes. Thought says one, visible as she turns her hand through the knots. Memory, says the other, hidden still.
"You heard my terms, Holden." The creature tells him, her steadiness spiked by the spark of heat somewhere deep in her blue eyes. The center of a flame; a certain measured sharpness there. A crispness to her presence, like peeling back the edge of a mask to find a wolf looking back at you. Her voice is quiet, modulated, but her mouth curls at the edges, like paper caught to flame.
She's older than most Garou. Mid-twenties. Either she changed late or she's survived a good long time. The softness of youth, of the teenage years, of adolescence has been winnowed from her face. Left behind, the healthy glow of a young, pregnant wolf. Who smiles easily. Whose smiles sharpen just as easily. "They're pretty fucking reasonable. If you can't abide them, you can leave. I won't stop you. If you're everything you say you are, I think we'll be fine. But in the end, that's up to you."
to Holden
[Mila Davis] "Adara.. is it?" As if she was trying to recall. And luckily for her, she got it right.
The Fury was offered a light smile, even as she motioned to the bartender to bring her her usual.
"Na, I don't live here. I just crashed on the couch upstairs for a bit after patrol today. Was easier to take a nap here than to go all the way home. Plus, I don't have a bartender at home, there.. I have to get my own.. unless Simon's around that is." She grinned a bit mischieviously. "I've been.. alright, otherwise. Had a fine plan shot down this week.. but, life sucks sometimes. How about you?"
[Adara Mires] Her brow raised with an apologetic expression "I'm sorry about your plan. Is there any way to salvage it. That is, if oyu want to talk about it?" She ask with some concern.
"As for me, I'm settling in. I paid my dues, trying ot get the others slowly. Been bumping into very interesting people, kin and true born" She say softly. She know most people around were either Kin or Garou, but there was a few humans in the place. "So all in all, I've been good.
And you're right, having a bar nearby is pretty nice, espcially when one's feeling down" She order herself another beer and look at Mila
[Holden] A sigh, deep and worn and tired. He looks down at the glass of single malt that Kora had gifted him, swirls it absently between his fingertips that seem to barely touch the glass and remains lost in thought for a good amount of time. There's cracks near his eyes, not crows feet but, not anywhere near that but lines of stress perhaps - worry. This man has seen things, done things, had things done to him - for him - and ultimately has most likely had more taken from him than given.
She speaks her tongue and he actually seems to understand what she is saying, she can probably guess from his accent and his looks that he isn't foreign - at least not so far as Iceland - this probably means he grew up amongst their kind, heard the stories spoken in languages their ancestors used - perhaps even told a few himself.
All that is by the by though, because he's still staring at his single malt and he's still thinking. He isn't speaking to a woman he's speaking to a Garou and she makes that perfectly clear. Should he expect any differently from their kind? After all these years? Has he learnt nothing? He looks up, firm lips set between the rough mesh of his beard and then he rumbles out a response.
"Sacrifices, we all have to make them."
Words spoken to him once upon a time perhaps, now falling from his lips as bitter and twisted as the cheap shit he had been drinking before she arrived.
"I'll abide by your terms if it makes your job easier." Isn't that what kin are for? "I meant what I said though, I don't expect to have need of you - no offence Kora."
He raises the delicious single malt that should be savoured, downs it in one huge gulp and places the glass back on the table without naught a sound but the swallowing in his throat. He stands, pushes himself out of the table.
"Guess I'll be seeing you around."
[Mila Davis] "Maybe." She shrugged. "But that involves traking down a certain Walker's family first. Gonna have to see how far he wants me to take the issue before I do anything rash. But trust me, I've had way worse weeks than this one." Her drink arrived - it was dark, probably a beer. A lithe hand wrapped around the chilled glass, she smiled a bit again. Apparently this wasn't going to be the thing to get her down.
"Well, that's good. You been trying to figure out where you belong yet? There are many packs here.."
[Adara Mires] She listened to Mila's words with a slight nod "Well good luck with that. If it'swt you really want" She say before drining her beer slowly. She smiled as she answered her question "I was thiking about that earlier. I'm settled no, I need to find myself a pack. Thing is, I met some of us but none a apack or none that would talk to me about their pack.
Imena I've met kora over there and bumped briefly into 2 of her packmates but I don't know anything about the way they fonction, what they do or even the name of the pack. I guess that I'll start asking around and see who mgiht be interested in little old me"
She grinned, taking another swallow.
[Kora] A soft snort then; the subtle gleam in her dark eyes. The steadiness - nearly unblinking - as he tosses back the single malt and his voice rumbles out is entirely animal. Her head moves in a predator's conjunction with her body, and thus she watches him until he has left the bar.
Then she herself stands; pulls out not a wallet but a passport with a fading United States crest on the dark blue cover. There's a picture in the middle pages of a girl, 18, with short dyed back hair, black nails hidden below, away from the prison-warden style passport photo. Staring, unsmiling at the camera. Home address: Missouri of all fucking places.
Her cash is tucked up in the pages, pulls out a ten and a couple of fives and lets them drift down to the table. Fans the pages closed. There are two dozen or more entry and exit stamps, temporary visas and the light recorded on the pages - entry points to the EU, northern Africa, Russia. Turkey. - without a re-entry stamp to the USA.
Her attention is briefly fast on the movement of light through the pages; but then the moment passes. Kora closes the passport, slips it into her back pocket, and walks out in the kinsman's wake. Pausing, briefly - to lift her chin in greeting to Adara and Mila, to confer with the bartender - before she disappears out the front door into the bright, cold winter's night.
[Mila Davis] "Well.." there was a pause as she took a swig of her beer. "I do happen to have a pack - kinda a little one. Mostly myself and Simon. We have two other members, but they are off jaunting about or being their crazy spirit type selves.."
"You met Simon yet?" That was a big thing.. if one couldn't tolerate Simon, her beta - then, it just wouldn't work out and there was no point in continuing the conversation further.
[Kora] (night folks!)
She unlaces her long fingers from around the hand-worked mug and makes a supple gesture in the air, through the steam of the fresh hot chocolate. The pale shadow of her forearm laces across the polished wood surface of the table. " - one of the state department fact sheets, yeah? Before you head off the map into Absurdistan." There are a half-inch of bracelets on either one of her wrists. Leather, suade, knotted fisherman's line. They are part of her, change when she changes, weathered, shot through with memory, a hint more snug, now, as her body packs on new weight to support the child she carries. Between the layers, the hint of ink, dark against her pale skin.
Small tattoos, the sharp lines of old Norse runes.
"So we'll start there. This place," a glance up, at the ceiling, " - is run by kin. There's a dorm of sorts upstairs, like a youth hostel, yeah? Open to any who need it. The food's good, and the beer's better. They brew it themselves. I recommend the dunkel.
"The enemy holds land to the north of the city, in a suburb called Elk Grove. I brought a map so I can lay it out for you, but you should consider it strictly off limits unless I send you personally.
"And if I send you personally, you best make sure that my Godi's there so you know I've not lost my mind. Or Joey; someone, you ken?" Her voice rises there, pausing to ensure that he understands. "They're active in the city, too. We've lost kin and Garou. Most dead, but at least one kidnapped by the northerners. Joey's cousin, no less. I pray he's dead. For his own sake, if not ours. Now," a supple twist of her mouth. "I want to know more about you."
[Holden] His brow furrows, he fixes her with a strangely bemused and possibly confused expression. "You're strange for a Jarl." But he thinks about what she has said, she talks about sending him places personally like that is going to happen, or as if he would want to wander into enemy territory.
"If you give me a map, mark the no-go's in red and I'll stay clear as best I can." A pause. "I'm a fire-fighter with the Chicago Fire Department, I live in Lakeview." He pulls out a piece of paper from his jeans pocket that has his address written down on it. "Here you go. I'd prefer if you're going to send someone around to look at my place that they do it discretely."
His left hand lingers on the glass and he plucks it from the table for another swig.
"Do you need to know more? My favourite colour? Perhaps what types of chocolates I prefer?" A tilt of his head, he hadn't even batted an eyelash at her mention of dead Kin or Garou.
[Adara Mires] She blinked at Gina leave "Hmm ok, take care Gina" She wactched the kin go and concentrate on her steak. She wondered what she said or did to make Gina lose her good humor. Maybe it wasn't her per se. Maybe it was something general about her, her tribe or her nature as a Garou.
It was certainly the case with Carter. The man could barely stand her when they first bumped into each other. Ok, now thing were borderline neutral with between then, it was an improvement but there was tension still. She was afraid something similar was happening with Gina. She seemed like an easy going girl. She did have a really nice laugh and voice. It would suck that because of something out of her control, she couldn't be friendly with the young woman.
She let out a long breath and drank some more, eating her steak in silence.
[Kora] "You'll have to go North if you want beards and battle braids, Holden. This is a small Sept raised from nothing seven years ago by the scrappiest, most misfit bunch of fucking heroes you ever heard of. Like an indie superhero movie," she continues, still watching him steadily, her rage back, her attention sharp, alive. "I'd offer an example, but I haven't been to the movies in half-a-decade. But it's a Sept, raised from nothing, in the twilight of the world."
This is all offered quietly, backgrounded by a believer's fervor. " - in the second city. We'll be discrete. My pack claims territory in Cabrini, we're based in the abandoned cathedral two blocks from the river. If you need us, you can find us there. I claim the tribe's kin here. You're a man of Fenris, and I expect that you'll behave like one. Your honor is my honor. If you transgress, I will not hesitate to punish you. If someone transgresses against you, you will bring it to my door. I am not your chaperon, but I expect discretion. And if someone wants to claim you - or if you start getting close enough to another kin in the same way, I expect you to inform me.
"Easy enough. We've got kin in the PD and coroner's office. I may ask you to work with them. And - if you ever find any unusual bodies, anything like that, I'll give you the doc's number. All that clear?"
[Holden] "Wait on, you've claimed me? Says who?"
He blinks, tilts his head. This is obviously new to him, though none of the rest of it seems to have been.
[Kora] "I have a mate," says Kora, with supple, even snort near the end. " - but as Jarl of the Fenrir, I am responsible for all kin of the tribe within the protectorate. If that's new to you, I'm not sure where you've been all your life. And if you don't like it, you're welcome to leave."
[Adara Mires] he finished her meal and took the plate and went to place it in a pile of dirty dishes. She walked back to her stoll, her steps light, silent, moving with a grace many dancers would envy, almost akin to a cat's. One she sat back, she look around, emerald eyes scanning the place.
She was wondering what to do tonight. The weater sucked, she had no real friends yet that she could call and go hang at their place or have them come over. She crossed her as she drank form her bottle. Being in a new city, no matter how friendly you were, was always hard the first few weeks. And yes, she was missing the feelling of being complete without a pack.
She'll have to work on resoving that problem soon.
[Holden] "Look, if you want to offer me protection or whatever it is that you feel is your responsibility then go right ahead, so long as I don't see it I won't care. As for getting me to do things for you? Well, you can ask. That is fair."
A pause and he tilts his head sucks in his cheeks slightly.
"As for discretion and all that jazz, would I still be alive if I didn't have any? And Punishment? I don't suspect you shall need to punish me, I don't suspect I'll have to come to you to punish anyone else either."
A sigh.
"I've lived my life Kora, fought my war, seen countless Jarls just like you sitting across from me and I've nodded and told them yessir bossir I will do my best, I'll help you win the fight because I'm Fenrir and it's in my blood. I have no skills beyond fixing things, cooking and a life-times worth of chopping things up with my axe, alive and dead. If there's a fire, I can help you out. If you desperately need anything else from me then I'll consider it. Other than that? I just want to be left alone, is that so much to ask?"
[Mila Davis] There are quiet footfalls on the stairs heading down from the rooms above as well as a quiet humming. It seemed a little dark in tone and.. perhaps a little celtic? A moment later, a dark haired young woman pushed open the door to the main room; guitar in hand.
Her clothing was simple, just a pair of jeans, black heeled boots and a form flattering black top. It seemed like a theme, the black - but what else was more appropriate for one of the Grandchildren of Thunder?
Hazel hued eyes spotted only a single known figure in the room - hrm, apparently she should stop by more often. Oh wait.. the other dark haired girl seemed familiar - ah yes, she'd met her, briefly at least.
A hand lifted in greeting as Mila set her guitar against the bar and slid herself into a seat.
[Kora] "Með lögum skal land byggja en með ólögum eyða - " There's a certain meditative focus there. She pronounces the Icelandic with an accent - not an American one. Closer, instead, to a native speaker's tones, through shirred through a curtain. It's like hearing a Catalan speak Provençal. Her dark eyes scour his face, that weariness that someone else might read as weakness, for recognition, that he's understood the language. And if he hasn't, she translates, "A land is shall be built by laws or destroyed without them."
"My name is she who offers sorrow, renders bone. I'm a fostern and Skald and daughter of Fenris. I fostered at the Sept of Vindur and Ringing in Hjaltland, the Sept Halfdan the Old ripped from the hands of the enemy in the darkest hour of this world until her own, and ran under Truth-in-Frenzy-rhya until he fell in battle." Her voice is even, but there's a resonance. She's older than she looks; the voice, the lore. Underneath the young woman, pregnant, she remembers more lifetimes than he has seen Jarls.
Which is to say: countless.
That brief, ancient echo passes. There's hot chocolate in her mug, though the steam has faded now. The surface is still, and she has not yet had a drink from it.
Long fingers unlace from about the mug. Last year at this time she might have had black polish on them, chipped. That's gone; she's shorn away the last vestiges of her human self. Her nails are bare and blunt. An old piece of worked iron - older than either of them; older, even, than Half-dan the old - dangles from an iron ring punched through the inner cartilage of her year. It does not have a mate in the other lobe.
Inside her wrists, inscribed over either pulse - two runs. Thought says one, visible as she turns her hand through the knots. Memory, says the other, hidden still.
"You heard my terms, Holden." The creature tells him, her steadiness spiked by the spark of heat somewhere deep in her blue eyes. The center of a flame; a certain measured sharpness there. A crispness to her presence, like peeling back the edge of a mask to find a wolf looking back at you. Her voice is quiet, modulated, but her mouth curls at the edges, like paper caught to flame.
She's older than most Garou. Mid-twenties. Either she changed late or she's survived a good long time. The softness of youth, of the teenage years, of adolescence has been winnowed from her face. Left behind, the healthy glow of a young, pregnant wolf. Who smiles easily. Whose smiles sharpen just as easily. "They're pretty fucking reasonable. If you can't abide them, you can leave. I won't stop you. If you're everything you say you are, I think we'll be fine. But in the end, that's up to you."
[Adara Mires] She was finishing her beer when Mila stepped in the room. Her attention was on the beautiful woman who stepped closer to her, at the bar. Her pink lips curled into a friendly smile and when Mila was close enough she spoke
"Good evening Mila, how have you been?" Her voice was soft, warm, clear, hinting at what it could accomplish in a song.
Tonight the young Gallaird was dressed in grey sweats with black socks and tank top. Her dark brown hair were in a ponytail with strands left free to fall over her right eye. "I didn't know you lived here"
[Kora] OH EM GEE WITHOUT TYPOS THIS TIME: PMed so as not to crush other posts.
"Með lögum skal land byggja en með ólögum eyða - " There's a certain meditative focus there. She pronounces the Icelandic with an accent - not an American one. Closer, instead, to a native speaker's tones, through shirred through a curtain. It's like hearing a Catalan speak Provençal. Her dark eyes scour his face, that weariness that someone else might read as weakness, for recognition, that he's understood the language. And if he hasn't, she translates, "A land is shall be built by laws or destroyed without them."
"My name is she who offers sorrow, renders bone. I'm a fostern and Skald and daughter of Fenris. I fostered at the Sept of Vindur and Ringing in Hjaltland, the Sept Halfdan the Old ripped from the hands of the enemy in the darkest hour of this world until our own, and ran under Truth-in-Frenzy-rhya until he fell in battle." Her voice is even, but there's a resonance. She's older than she looks; the voice, the lore. Underneath the young woman, pregnant, she remembers more lifetimes than he has seen Jarls.
Which is to say: countless.
That brief, ancient echo passes. There's hot chocolate in her mug, though the steam has faded now. The surface is still, and she has not yet had a drink from it.
Long fingers unlace from about the mug. Last year at this time she might have had black polish on them, chipped. That's gone; she's shorn away the last vestiges of her human self. Her nails are bare and blunt. An old piece of worked iron - older than either of them; older, even, than Halfdan the old - dangles from an iron ring punched through the inner cartilage of her ear. It does not have a mate in the other lobe.
Inside her wrists, inscribed over either pulse - two runes. Thought says one, visible as she turns her hand through the knots. Memory, says the other, hidden still.
"You heard my terms, Holden." The creature tells him, her steadiness spiked by the spark of heat somewhere deep in her blue eyes. The center of a flame; a certain measured sharpness there. A crispness to her presence, like peeling back the edge of a mask to find a wolf looking back at you. Her voice is quiet, modulated, but her mouth curls at the edges, like paper caught to flame.
She's older than most Garou. Mid-twenties. Either she changed late or she's survived a good long time. The softness of youth, of the teenage years, of adolescence has been winnowed from her face. Left behind, the healthy glow of a young, pregnant wolf. Who smiles easily. Whose smiles sharpen just as easily. "They're pretty fucking reasonable. If you can't abide them, you can leave. I won't stop you. If you're everything you say you are, I think we'll be fine. But in the end, that's up to you."
to Holden
[Mila Davis] "Adara.. is it?" As if she was trying to recall. And luckily for her, she got it right.
The Fury was offered a light smile, even as she motioned to the bartender to bring her her usual.
"Na, I don't live here. I just crashed on the couch upstairs for a bit after patrol today. Was easier to take a nap here than to go all the way home. Plus, I don't have a bartender at home, there.. I have to get my own.. unless Simon's around that is." She grinned a bit mischieviously. "I've been.. alright, otherwise. Had a fine plan shot down this week.. but, life sucks sometimes. How about you?"
[Adara Mires] Her brow raised with an apologetic expression "I'm sorry about your plan. Is there any way to salvage it. That is, if oyu want to talk about it?" She ask with some concern.
"As for me, I'm settling in. I paid my dues, trying ot get the others slowly. Been bumping into very interesting people, kin and true born" She say softly. She know most people around were either Kin or Garou, but there was a few humans in the place. "So all in all, I've been good.
And you're right, having a bar nearby is pretty nice, espcially when one's feeling down" She order herself another beer and look at Mila
[Holden] A sigh, deep and worn and tired. He looks down at the glass of single malt that Kora had gifted him, swirls it absently between his fingertips that seem to barely touch the glass and remains lost in thought for a good amount of time. There's cracks near his eyes, not crows feet but, not anywhere near that but lines of stress perhaps - worry. This man has seen things, done things, had things done to him - for him - and ultimately has most likely had more taken from him than given.
She speaks her tongue and he actually seems to understand what she is saying, she can probably guess from his accent and his looks that he isn't foreign - at least not so far as Iceland - this probably means he grew up amongst their kind, heard the stories spoken in languages their ancestors used - perhaps even told a few himself.
All that is by the by though, because he's still staring at his single malt and he's still thinking. He isn't speaking to a woman he's speaking to a Garou and she makes that perfectly clear. Should he expect any differently from their kind? After all these years? Has he learnt nothing? He looks up, firm lips set between the rough mesh of his beard and then he rumbles out a response.
"Sacrifices, we all have to make them."
Words spoken to him once upon a time perhaps, now falling from his lips as bitter and twisted as the cheap shit he had been drinking before she arrived.
"I'll abide by your terms if it makes your job easier." Isn't that what kin are for? "I meant what I said though, I don't expect to have need of you - no offence Kora."
He raises the delicious single malt that should be savoured, downs it in one huge gulp and places the glass back on the table without naught a sound but the swallowing in his throat. He stands, pushes himself out of the table.
"Guess I'll be seeing you around."
[Mila Davis] "Maybe." She shrugged. "But that involves traking down a certain Walker's family first. Gonna have to see how far he wants me to take the issue before I do anything rash. But trust me, I've had way worse weeks than this one." Her drink arrived - it was dark, probably a beer. A lithe hand wrapped around the chilled glass, she smiled a bit again. Apparently this wasn't going to be the thing to get her down.
"Well, that's good. You been trying to figure out where you belong yet? There are many packs here.."
[Adara Mires] She listened to Mila's words with a slight nod "Well good luck with that. If it'swt you really want" She say before drining her beer slowly. She smiled as she answered her question "I was thiking about that earlier. I'm settled no, I need to find myself a pack. Thing is, I met some of us but none a apack or none that would talk to me about their pack.
Imena I've met kora over there and bumped briefly into 2 of her packmates but I don't know anything about the way they fonction, what they do or even the name of the pack. I guess that I'll start asking around and see who mgiht be interested in little old me"
She grinned, taking another swallow.
[Kora] A soft snort then; the subtle gleam in her dark eyes. The steadiness - nearly unblinking - as he tosses back the single malt and his voice rumbles out is entirely animal. Her head moves in a predator's conjunction with her body, and thus she watches him until he has left the bar.
Then she herself stands; pulls out not a wallet but a passport with a fading United States crest on the dark blue cover. There's a picture in the middle pages of a girl, 18, with short dyed back hair, black nails hidden below, away from the prison-warden style passport photo. Staring, unsmiling at the camera. Home address: Missouri of all fucking places.
Her cash is tucked up in the pages, pulls out a ten and a couple of fives and lets them drift down to the table. Fans the pages closed. There are two dozen or more entry and exit stamps, temporary visas and the light recorded on the pages - entry points to the EU, northern Africa, Russia. Turkey. - without a re-entry stamp to the USA.
Her attention is briefly fast on the movement of light through the pages; but then the moment passes. Kora closes the passport, slips it into her back pocket, and walks out in the kinsman's wake. Pausing, briefly - to lift her chin in greeting to Adara and Mila, to confer with the bartender - before she disappears out the front door into the bright, cold winter's night.
[Mila Davis] "Well.." there was a pause as she took a swig of her beer. "I do happen to have a pack - kinda a little one. Mostly myself and Simon. We have two other members, but they are off jaunting about or being their crazy spirit type selves.."
"You met Simon yet?" That was a big thing.. if one couldn't tolerate Simon, her beta - then, it just wouldn't work out and there was no point in continuing the conversation further.
[Kora] (night folks!)
