He is not yet Present. He is still in the Future Tense, which is to say, he will have been here, had he made it early, but as he is still in the Future Tense, he will be here shortly. Nobody's pluperfect.

     Gillian's accent is still as precise as ever. She's calm, but the tension crackles for a moment, irritation flaring in the grey ice eyes. "Anyway, I'm not here to yell and scream at you. I'm here to talk about the future."

     Loki veers off in the direction of not-the-city, leaving a scrape of rubber on the pavement behind him from the sharp turn. "Off into the wild unknown! Except I don't think you have any of that left in this country. Off into the slightly less tame than usual moderately known?"

     "I am doing a little light reading on encampments and villages on the city's north and west side. Care to pull up a chair and share a sip or two of tea? Join me in a little rebellion, maybe?"

     He laughs at that, setting his menu aside. "Right," Pres grins, the smile sparkling. "Right on the fucking edge. Let's live to have regrets but save the regrets til we're eighty. We're in London, right? Cheers, mate."

     "I have an impending sense of doom myself at the moment. Maybe it's contagious. So... what's yours? Maybe we can trade..."

     My god... it's full of stars...

     "...You are on the Hero's Journey now, Loki. And I'm sure you realize that it's not exactly the easiest road to follow. The clues are obscure at best," Aeron drawls out, "...the gods occasionally fickle and prone to obfuscation..."

     "Run."

     He is a narcotic, an aphrodisiac, and a stimulant all in one rather delightful package. Balthazar kicks back on the sofa, sitting in the opposite corner to face you, allowing him to stretch out like a languorous sultan.

     Balthazar smirks as he sips. "I suppose it has to be good for something..."

     "Well, it's not about people telling you what to do, Loki. You cannot be a passive observer now. You've... made the deal."

     Gillian stops to take a sip of wine, and her fidgeting comes to a halt. She lifts her chin casually, giving you a steady scrutiny that anyone familiar with the West girls would recognize and probably want to run from. "I want you to marry me."

     If I could whisper in your ear and have you hear me, I would say but this: Believe, Gillian.

     Loki follows Gwilym without further question or complaint. Maybe one glance to Aeron, before he moves. The promise of coffee ahead helps, but more of it is that he only has so much energy to give to irritation at his own confusion when the world is busy being very strange around him.

     One hand comes off the door, held out to you for an American four-square handshake. Intelligent grey eyes meet yours over the rims of her glasses challengingly and thoughtfully. What do you say, Professor Davies? Do you want to play with me?

     Loki gives up on this episode of Life isn't as simple as it seems in high school. It's not like he ever listened when he got it from his dad back then either. "I'll spend time with Pres in Oahu, anyway. I like Balthazar just fine, but I have no idea what he prefers to do on vacation. Probably things involving sun."

     Every seat is filled in Shepherd's Bush Empire, apart from those taking a quick break between shows -- ten minutes -- to get refills on beer and visit the necessaries. The old BBC theater is packed and the murmur of the crowd, the babbling Babel of nearly three-thousand, puts on its own kind of show.

     I really just don't need this. The West Girls should come with warning labels affixed to them...

     "Well, that presumes you really are driving, and that changing stations isn't better done by the person who isn't supposed to be keeping his eyes on the road and his hands on the wheel," Gwilym answers promptly. "No man's an island, Loki, no man's son."

     When he exhales, it's like the wind has blown through and taken his breath away. He says nothing for a moment. He sits there.

     "...As for provenance and publishing," he exhales a touch at that, in consideration, "...ethics don't really enter into it. After all, if you find something that hasn't already been located, then no one's really missing it..."

     She rises, moving further forward, peering into the gloom. She gasps sharply. "Oh. My god. Is that what I think it is? Loki, tell me if that looks like marble to you!"

     "Oes, I'm alright. I'm in love... so there's no hope really, but... I'm not the only one suffering that. You... asked me to call you when it got serious so... here is your phone call..."

     He knows your street so well. He has walked it twenty times or more by now, leaving you gifts in your mailbox and the occasional drawing on the sidewalk. When he approaches it, Balthazar slows the Rover. His fingers lightly brush the palm of your hand as turn signals flash and he pulls over to the sidewalk.

     "I'm not anticipating this show selling out fast," Loki says, and out comes the phone again for another quick note. "It doesn't conflict with any scheduled shows for the band, either. Greek gods interacting with Celtic characters almost sounds interesting now. Not enough that I'd get between the two of you and some Shakespearean bonding."

     "Well, research - I'm your girl. Glad you're fine. Sorry Pres isn't." The corners of her mouth turn down, and her shoulders visibly drop. "Tell me about it?"

     "Then, by the power vested in me," Balthazar rolls out with a grin as he rises, "I pronounce us band and drummer..."

     Okay. So this isn't precisely what usually happens. But the principle is the same. Candy, strangers, see "Do not take" and go from there.

     "Naturally." Gillian smiles. "So you'll help me? I'd like for us to make a few experimental forays before I invite anyone else. I don't know Balthazar well enough. He might try to do something silly like stop me because it's dangerous."

     In the envelope is a simple note. The revolution begins at eight. Sharply.

     Another day, another dollar - or another ten or twelve books thoroughly researched and discarded as not having what she's looking for, anyway.

     "Caustic," he notes with something of appreciation to his tone. "I don't know who the Lakers are," he drags on. "But I do love a good decimation. That is why god invented rugby."

     "Hey, stranger! Glad to see another Yankee yet? My Georgian grandmother would roll in her grave, if she were dead. How've you been?"

     "So what's his story?" she says, jerking her head toward the recalcitrant yank. "And what are you doin' with a Yank. Are you his official tour guide to all the worst sorts of places?"

     "My father would kill me if he knew I were taking rides from strange men I met in clubs," Loki says, either oblivious to any potential innuendo in what he said or prepared to pretend he is. "Let's take your bike, save the cash for the good drinks."

     Loki says without any offense taken, "Old enough to drink in the benighted You-Ess-of-Ay, even. So over eighteen." He trails along in the same direction, doing up the buttons on his jacket awkwardly with one hand. "You want my number, or should I start moping around in here hoping to run into you again?"

     It was a fantastic night. When the set was done, the last encore given, Balthazar Davies returned to his table to find a boot left behind and a drawing. A glance at the clock confirmed the hour. It's midnight, cinderella.

     Balthazar and Reggie share a look as the woman at the nearby table -- she's not British, Australian perhaps? -- proceeds to unpack her bag at the table. Cell phone, notebook. Who does work in a pub...?

     She can get into the talk of art. It helps her to distract herself from how you look, sleepy or otherwise. Distract herself from her own imagination, the urges it inspires in her. The things she wants to do, such as plopping herself down in your lap, sleepy as you are. She is trying very hard not to think about that.

     A hand comes up, tugs lightly at your hair, and she sighs, going quiet. Love is a son of a bitch. Remind me, if I ever run into that fat diapered freak that's Cupid, to kick him in the balls...

     "...I can't go on pretending to be Saint Peter to make all of you love me, or forgive me, or need me. I'm collapsing under the strain of it..."

     She's suddenly shy, taking the paper back and setting it aside. "I have a lot of faith. I mean, it's not religious faith; I don't know how you'd explain it. It's not religion, though. I just, I do believe there's something more to the universe than atoms..."

     She bends her head to peer blankly at the papers, golden hair falling in a veil before her eyes. "Thank you," she says quietly. "I'll ... see you in the morning, then."

     "...I was High King there for a while, but all things must pass, yeah? Besides, the real work's back in the Other-Other-World."

     Hope you allow yourself the odd bit of happiness, even though it's scary. That's all I want for anybody. I just want everyone to be happy. I must be the biggest masochist of all.

     "Now, I am an engineer. I have built many buildings, castles, cathedrals. But I do not know how to reconstruct this friendship. This family. It's broken. So... he has made a new one." Frowning, he shakes his head. "Maybe that is all we can do. Make new families, and leave the rubble where it lies."

     You made me order it, watch it, regret it. You made me kill you. And I can't forgive you.

     In the quiet space of one's soul, there is no place for hammering. Though the London nightscape glitters past the windows and walls of a small apartment, and an Indian kitchen cooks up delights whose flavors permeate even concrete, in this small bedroom, in this quiet space of his soul, Davydd lingers with only one.

     The earth is in a constant state of reincarnation. Everything but me is changing. The bud becomes the flower becomes the leaf. I am the same width, the same weight, the same density as I was eight-hundred and twenty-eight years ago. Even an English Oak would have grown, would have changed in all that time.

     ...But I will be your escape when you need it. That's what Black Jacks do best...

     "My phone rang all night. Fairies, vampires, wolves, shivering nuns -- you name it, they rang me."

     "It's a good deal more goddamned interesting than cricket..."

     The sun rises, the sun sets. Rhodri is with you during your days; Davydd, your nights. With the trading off, it is beginning to seem as if each husband were simply different aspects of the same Man. Never existing at the same place, at the same time.

     "Would I be happier in knowledge or ignorance? Let's ask Adam, shall we? I believe that is the quintessential question of the universe, my brother. For now, give me the illusion of ignorance. If you are still seeing him in a year, then... come confess, my door will be open for you as always."

     Amice, my heart is like a fig left to dry in the sun. It is shriveled and small. You could serve it like pesto on a cracker, it is nothing. Flavorful but then gone in an instant. And yet, in it is pumping new blood, humming with the power that is in your blood. I feel something. I do not know what it is. But I feel it like pleasure and I feel it like pain. It is a confusion, a puzzle. What is it, what is it -- it beats with that question.

     "In these heels? The bull'd catch up with me and then where'd I be?" Fiona angles her face up to kiss you emphatically, a hand going up to your cheek.

     A guitar pick rolls and flips, finger to finger, leaping, effortlessly leaping, faster. And faster. It is a blur of motion, faster and faster until it becomes a streak of red and blue hovering above his hand like an aura. The pick, a guitar. Are you playing me, shadow-lord?

     There is something on the air that runs from him to you. Without calling you by name, it invites you. Charisma backed with something else, indefinable.

     "Hmm? Oh... no... we're not just about sex." Course not, baby. I love you for your mind. "I like watching telly with you as well as shagging." He says it so seriously, it must be true!

     Will the taste of your blood spring to mind? The immediate kiss might be recalled, but what of the piercing shock of the suckled lip as it was taken, tasted? A match to oil, will what started the fire be remembered?

     "The last time, I ended up tied to the bed with my own necktie, you six months pregnant and ... wait a minute," he chuckles, "...that was a fan-fucking-tastic night. Alright, you drive a hard bargain. I'll sleep with you...but I want to be respected in the morning..."

     "I want an old fashioned car, a cerise Cadillac, long enough to put a bowling alley in the back. I want an old fashioned house, with an old fashioned fence and an old fashioned millionaire..."

     It's in the heart of London; the irony appealed to him, inasmuch as anything has been appealing to him of late. Where does the man who's lost his heart go but to the city whose heart is stone cold uncaring?

     Taking his pack off the table and shoving cigarettes back into his jacket, Davydd narrows his eyes. "Llew, good on ya lad. I'll see you. Ah... and if you see the boys..." a pointed look, that, "... tell them..." Davydd pauses a moment. "...they should come up for air."

     After the call, brief as it was, came to an end, your captain showed himself again. Lift that pillow, tote that blanket! What had been efficient tidying before, following several hours of complete and utterly decadent dismantling, now had to be the very spic of the span.

     "It's not about being nice," he grumbles, "...it's about honesty...and about discretion. And knowingly allowing a potential corruption. That'll look nice, right next to all of my other wise decisions in the last few hundred years."

     "You are important to me, Io," he says quietly. "Y' are, oes? But ... I need to learn this, this thing. You - are going to go off in other directions. I've been ... using you for balance, all my life. And now ..." You have gone off in another direction. And my equilibrium is suffering.

     "... And he's cloaked himself in shadows. Shadows take a toll on him. Maybe," she sighs again, "maybe we were wrong to raise you two so much over there. It would have been different, here. But - I was selfish."

     The metallic steel crash of strings rattles through the amplifier in the flat above Black Jack Davy's. It's an hour past noon and Iowerth and his ... companion ... are out for the day. Gwilym Gwyn Garu is taking advantage of the opportunity to break the silence in a noisy fucker sort of way.

     "The realtor told me the previous occupant was ...quite artistic. He said the whole ship's painted rather fantastical, with blinking Christmas lights strung up year round." His mouth cuts a wry slant. "I'm not sure about that."

     I am the sea and the dreams that move them. I am the storm and the center of the storm. I need someone to stand with me, against the waves. To swim to me out in the middle of the ocean. When I stretch out my hand in my father's raging challenges, will yours be there to clasp it?

     He crosses to one of the other tables, sitting on the edge of it, letting his legs swing. "I'm scouting for an apartment over one of the little clubs. Music in the evening, cheap vodka, easy women - all the things mother'd warn me against. I don't plan on avoiding you, Io, I just ... I don't know. I have - things to figure out."

     You are leaving me...

     The perpetual gargoyle, Edward sits upon a ledge, smoking the last of his current case of cigarettes. Soon it will be time for another, and he'll have to leave his perch to find the nearest corner store for a top up. The other option is simply to go home, and he's not really sure he's up for it at this instant.

     "My father was a canon, so I'm a son of a gun." Justyn receives a wicked smile, and Ramses lets his feet drop as he leans forward. "Solidly middle class and I ran with crowds above my station in life. I killed my father with disappointment by being so dissipated as to become a poet. Or maybe I'm lying through my teeth. You'll never know, and what does it matter? I'm who I am now."

     That's the look on his face as you come at him with a sword. He can disarm you -- he's not worried about that -- but he doesn't want you to hurt yourself. "Now, sweetheart... put the sword away and let's talk about this rationally..."

     I'm lost, and I don't know how to find myself again...

     If this is the seduction, if this is the information you wish, my spy... you will have it. More than you need.

     "Ah," Edward says, not really responsive. "So 'whatever it was,'" Edward says, "...was complete and utter bullshit, then? Fuck if you're not as bad as any woman, Valan."

     "Why can't you just take something, for once in your life, at face fucking value?" Davydd remarks, amused and exasperated all at once. "I mean, how often do I," he's grinning now, "...apologize for anything?"

     "I'm telling you," Edward laments, plucking his bottom lip with two fingers, "...there's too many in London." Undead, that is. He sighs, shaking his head at the state and shape of things.

     He never knows where you are going to be when he calls. Maybe you will be in a gun battle. Maybe you will be in a club with women on your lap...or face down in your lap. Maybe you will be at the gym. On the same side of town, other side of town...

     "I do need you," Alire admits with a smile and some coloration. Though, it occurs to him that the globe is only one-way. You cannot see him. He begins to roll out of the shirt. "I feel the separation of our worlds when I go where you may not..."

     Those'll stick with him for a while. Every imagined contortion, every fantastical arrangement of bodies he could have imagined were on display, made just by two. Hanging from a special silk sling, a cocoon from the ceiling on hooks. All that was missing in that... fucking circus was a trained dog, a clown and a couple of musically inclined monkeys!

     "What makes you think I am wild? Those who know me would laugh to hear you say that." His lips make a twist as he holds still -- all but his mouth and eyebrows. You'll have to forgive him that much expression at least. "Edward Drago," Iowerth adds, anglicizing his name. "Or Captain Drago if you prefer."

     He is honorable, and capable, and so what need have he to blush?...Perhaps the arrival of his mentor, a man of great faith, great will, who really isn't supposed to see him flirt.

     The electric flamenco stops and Rhodri unjacks, slides the guitar around the back and comes over. "No one pays attention to the ramblings of the lead singer," the lilt and drag of the un-English displays itself. Not Irish. Not Scottish. Something Other.

     There's a nod from the Primogen, his hand adjusting the lapel of his dark suit. A kindness to the decorum of the court. "Saarbrucken," he says softly. That was the place. Lips purse and a slight noise escapes as attention's given back to Greydon. "Your problem, Trevelyan," Edmund says by way of acknowledgement. He doesn't want to hear anything about it.

     Eyes flicker down towards the note, so carefully laid. All this blushing, all these statements, they make his curiosity unbearable. The frown starts as he gazes down the first paragraph, and it only settles more firmly in place by the end.
     "William."

     "It was an ... interesting image. He burned as a dark sun. I ... would not trust him with my soul, I do not think, if I had one. But it made me wish to paint. Not him, perhaps. But to paint."

     There are eddies in the dancing throng of The Odeon, noticeable only to those who can feel as well as they can see. The charge on the air is tight, electric, openly sexual. And at the center of it is a golden Caligula.

     "I have known for some time that only a man would move me. You, Greydon, have moved me; to you, I respond. Your words hold me spellbound, and your touch enslaves me. As an individual, removed from my sense of self, I wish to study under you; with you, as the object of my study and as my instructor. I wish to work with you. As a man..."

     Relax...
     Relax, hell, you don't know...

     "I do not have to brag to tell someone to fuck off," Valan chuckles. "I simply say... fuck off. It is less work." A cigarette is in his mouth and it is lit. His lighter and the pack are stowed away along with his gear. He zips up the red and white bag -- Francais Nationale -- and hoists it on his shoulder, puffing out a bit of scented smoke.

     Al'alim taps away the brown and grey ash, "I do not think you sound foolish. Young," he grins at your call on that. "Not yet lacking hope in self or in others. If you can hold onto such feelings, then... who knows," another shrug, "...you may be the better philosopher..."

     Lost. He is so very lost. In a maze not of his own creation, not even of his own recognition; this is nowhere that he has been before. Not even with Johannes Arnaul, Saint-Protector of Saarbrucken; not anywhere. Perhaps he is nowhere at all.

And when it comes to all night living
I know what I'm giving
I've got it all down to a tee
and it's free...

     The rare few plan to be a harpy or become The Harpy because they know the true path - poise first, influence second, power follows. Only then will the crowd point and say - That is the one you need to talk to. That is the one you should impress.

     Now, the corgi is rigged to the contraption just like a horse would be, and he trots as proudly as if he were the queen's own prized arabian, decked out in Christmas (alright, Yule bells) and grinning madly.

     In an inherited ap Owain motion, Rhodri saves the beer from the sudden motion of you on his lap, his one arm cradling you as his other spreads out to hold the Guinness at a safe distance. He chuckles, "Well, I guess it was a bit foolish to think he'd be right back."

     It'll be a long journey, ap Owain, but you've made those before. You can't protest your feelings and expect things to change. Well, they'll change sure enough but in time. In time.

     And you are in a low time now, yes? So how could I ever think to leave you for something as trivial as swordplay and politics...

     "Veuillez attendre son excellence, Prince de Paris. Trente secondes," the male voice says evenly, professionally, and with an expectation of compliance.

     "I'm going to kill Davydd ap Llewelyn. Fucking bastard."

     "If by boring and predictable you mean to say magnanimous and charming, then... yes," he grins at you, his hands unlacing from where they lay upon his stomach to take out his cigarettes again.

     Davydd both chuckles and sobs to hear that. Turning his head to his friend, he gives a vipered grin, his eyes creasing in the corners. "Now that's the William I know and love," comes the croak of his voice. "On my ass to the end of time."

      "You are...the best thing to happen to me. The only thing good that has happened..." he looks slightly sadder, "...to me. I am...at your debt, Samantha. Eternally."

     There's a giggle for the simile, and she cradles the phone to her as if cuddling you by proxy. "I am so to be found! Bloody man. I am right here. It isn't my fault that you aren't." Ah, the games that lovers play.

     There is a new story in the images that sail at you. A man with a face of terrible beauty when angered pours himself a drink in the back of a limousine. The bulletproof glass installed as a modification to the old limousine holds up to the throwing of a glass as his temper erupts. His scotch-stained hands go to his head as he sits forward.

     "Ah, sensibility," Davydd croons. "Such language," comes the mock scold. As you look him up and down, your gaze raking over him much as he'd imagine you'd rake your fingers though the devil's own coals, he stands there, open to your look, unabashedly himself, drinking his scotch.

     "Mind my delicate skin," William drawls, preparing to step out after you. "I bruise easily."

     "Venetian. From Venice. Your parents ... met there." One eyebrow raises quizzically. "And, of course, your parents met by some startling, astounding series of coincidences that made for a hell of a story in the retelling, didn't they."

     "They can teach the apes of India to type Shakespeare," William waxes on as he smiles, his head tilting back to see you, "and I can pour a scotch. The wonders of modern science." He winks and he waits for the other evening salutation -- a kiss. "For ill or fair," he says quietly.

     "You are really improving. Perhaps we should take a trip to Tokyo some time. You can study the masters of Eastern Art, and I can have tea waiting for you." William smiles to think of it. "I can be your samurai, waiting. You? The emperor, of course."

     "What the fuck did you do to your hair, boyo?" Davydd rattles out, standing and heading for the stew. He shakes his head at his son. "What was wrong with the color I gave you, by virtue of my stunning genes..."

     "Part of me wants to beat the shite out of him and anything that had anything of anything to do with any of it," Edward waves. He knows he's not making sense. "Part of me wants him to..." he exhales, "...just be my enemy so I can kill him.

     Blood rolls from his eyes, in his tears that come, the grunting sobs of a man in desperate pain, the grief pulled from his soul through his eyes and his throat.

     "Lookie cos, I just spent a shaky time with Davy. I just called t' say - and you'll never hear it again - that maybe you were right. When we were up there with you and Dunross. Maybe you were right about everything."

     "You're talkin',' Edward notes, his voice lacking humor, "...cos I'm not. And I'm not cos..." and Edward looks sadly to you, "...cos I've got nothing to say to you, Davy. I've known you through a million lifetimes and we've done a million things. And I got nothing to say," Edward laments, shaking his head.

     Are you on crack?
     Davydd peers at you, saying nothing amid your... cascade of words, as many as there are raindrops and about as random.

     "But our future is out there," Edward's head rolls to the sky again, "...somewhere. Sometime." It's not here yet. He doesn't know what it is, but it does not lie with London.

     "...I have unfinished business with Rosamund. And... I am going to see her to close the book on it. I want you to hear that from me, not her. I won't be fucking her."

     There is no greater rejuvenating power than that of blood. And yours, so magical, moves though him as powerfully as the act of taking it affects you.

     The white fringe lowers as she looks down to begin picking loose the plastic seal on the bottle. "Open it and find out. Or maybe Miss White," her, "will kill Captain Crimson," you, "with a bottle in the living room..."

     "What we enter into, no man may put asunder," Davydd whispers. His mouth finds yours again. Another mouth brushes against the side of your neck. "You will have us both," he speaks in a hush. "Tonight, and to the end of Time."

     "I think my one husband can wait to have his turn right now," Fiona murmurs, "while I'm with my other husband. And right now, you're the husband that's with me..."

     I still love you. Fiona brings things round to what she suspects might be the best thing to say first, to get it out of the way. We're still getting married. And I don't think Davydd is going to try to kill you.

     You seem to have something to say and he's waiting to hear it, the sound of the other shoe dropping. "I don't want you to wait a hundred years in solitude," Davydd shakes his head slightly, tapping away the ash again.

     "Oh, and one other thing," Fiona adds, leaning back so that she can see your face, read all the expressions written there, see your eyes and the worlds that lie behind them. "Yes..."

     "So, I think we're agreed. You get your own place, we love and all that entails," his voice lowers to a teasing growl, "...we find out what Davydd's up to and eventually tell him of our involvement, but not yet as there's no point in upsetting the apple cart..."

     Fiona scowls at you. She's just aware enough, dim though the light over the porch is right now, that you're cutting her off. "If you don't appreciate my custom," she says majestically, "I can go drink somewhere else. I'm not drunk!"

     "Hello, Dot? It's Fiona. Look, I'm going to be at Betty's Boobs tonight. I need you to meet me there. I - look, I know I don't ask this usually, but I need you to keep me from doing anything too stupid. I'll be there at eight."

     "How could Davydd trust me - even if he wants me still? How could I trust myself?"

     "...It is time for Avalon to return to those who need it most. This body is theirs, I give it to them. With it my soul. With it, my being. For this land and I are indivisible. I am Avalon..."

     "Eat of the fruit of the tree and I will learn something..."

     She is aware of you, with the nervous skittishness of a wild thing, but despite it, she accepts your hand with one of hers - it's as regal as if she were deigning to dance with you at a formal gala, right down to the uplifted chin.

     There's a smirk for your callousness and a roll of his eyes. "Don't hold your breath counting on it, dearie. I'm as like to steal what I want as to wait for it..." And he likely means that. And has likely done just that in his day.

     "Hindsight is clear-sighted," Davydd exhales, cigarette crushed and the fire is out. "And all the things I have done, there's not a single one I'd repeat but one, and that was lodging the king's sword in Mithras' chest."

     Davydd ap Owain moves within the white void. What has he to fear? If the floor falls away, he will become a bird. If it rains water, he'll become a fish. If it turns to fire. Well, if it turns to fire he's fucked, but at least it will be quick.

     You give him license to ask and he goes quiet. He seems to mull over his question as he looks at his biscuit. He takes a bite of it and washes it down with cooler (though still very warm) cocoa. "Are you happy, Fiona?"

     There's more than one Black Jack Davy, but there's only one woman between them...

     It is a plate of crow, son, that's what's on the plate, the fork's in your hands, and you're the one eating it, Llywelyn.

     Edward grins, this time to himself. He extends his neck slightly, the invitation there, his gaze moving to the ceiling again. He blinks and smiles wider, whatever his thoughts are kept to himself.

     We have been together for a few years now. It is time, I think, that we have Our places and Our things and Our hopes and wants and needs. I am not going to be afraid anymore.

     Ian nods, then looks in the mirror again. Hand lifts to adjust his collar, but then he sighs, lowering his hands. It'd be the fifth time he's made corrections.

It's not What you thought When you first began it

      "We embrace him," William murmurs. "We solve a multitude of wrongs, of problems, we halt a multitude of suffering. For everyone..."

     This is a William you haven't seen in a while. Not since he retired in fact. It has been a brutal two nights. For everyone. "Well... I'm not angry," he murmurs. "I don't know what I am..." he says suddenly. "...Afraid, I guess. Worried."

     Davydd pauses in the public sitting room downstairs. A glance in reveals no one. Frown yet in place, he heads to the sofa and table, looking for something to write on perhaps. He checks his pants pockets for anything handy, finding only a tenner.

     "Tell him," Edward chimes, mostly together, "...I hope it works out like he wants." Have a nice life.

     "I don't talk about it all that often. People," Audi explains, "are afraid of death - they don't like talking about it. I don't think they need to be afraid of me. But you're not afraid of me. So why not talk about it?"

     William exhales, leaning to put the glass aside on the nightstand. Gathered there are Edward's things. The Browning. Cell phone. Silver case of gak. There is a glass, brandy snifter, quarter-filled with blood (his own). A bit of fresh...

     "Shite," A large hand hits the steering wheel and the phone is tossed into the empty passenger's side seat. "Why am I the only one making sense," and now I am talking to myself? Hockley. South? South... somewhere...

     William looks from the sky to his friend again, this time his gaze remains there. "If you cannot remain in Our World, and we ... cannot go to yours... shall there be a middle country? Will Earth do, Davydd?"

     "If Heaven is near Southwark," Soldekai smiles, still hovering near the bed. He smiles as he watches, taking delight in the scene.

     "I'm not a vampire, Edward... Mithras cursed me, for certes, but he never killed me..."

     He smiles softly, "Well, that's magic for you. ten impossible things before breakfast, and a hundred more once midnights come and gone."

     "This mean anything to you?" It's a simple enough question, but the image held on the page is far from simple... there is a figure of a man amid a myriad of threads or strings.. perhaps even within a web. Some strands are cut. Some are not.

     "No," Edward says emphatically, "...it wasn't fucking worth it." Not whatsoever. "He," Edward twists again, looking for his cigarettes and not spotting them, "...says," he shrugs and mumbles, "...I got some commendation from the Torries."

     The Oak King doesn't so much as blush. The look is more bland. Hey, once you find out Edward Meurelle, Vicomte of Blois and all around man's man is taking it up the back nine, nothing is shocking.

     He smiles, but you don't have to miss it. It presses at you, making itself known beneath the surface of your skin, felt in the five senses as the picture of it comes into view behind your eyes. I'm looking a little Oxford Professorish tonight...

     "It did take me longer than it should to realize that though I have been consigned to darkness I do not need to remain in it. In the end, the curse is only as good as the belief one puts in it. Same as faith..."

     That voice is rich as it is earthy is capped off with a grin, and the fingers that finished the song on the twelve-string start another in the in between. For those who can See, he's a wonder in gold. A loitering fairy king on a chair of oak. Everyone is mesmerized, like the legends of old Tam Lin...

     "Who is he? Or was he?" Her eyes go wide. "That Hugh fellow? Or the blonde? Or that bloke, the rich one... the one with the castle," she snaps her finger, "Mr. Big...."

     Mentioning Valdemort is rather like screaming Macbeth! in a theater. Some names are curses of their own.

     Perspective... there's a splinter of it here, after all...

     "I was glad you could make it though. I wasn't sure if you'd want to or not." Again, honesty. What's gotten into Rose some might ask. Or, it could be that she's also at least a little curious to see if Davydd warned you off after the coffee encounter.

I'm a breather... a receiver and I don't know where I stand not since someone informed me that my house was built on sand... And its not the earth beneath me, just some concept of the land...

     "I...don't understand," Julian suddenly cries out, arms around the girl he's come to love. "I don't...understand...what happened?"

     He lifts a hand, he puts it gently to your face and he kisses you once, briefly. "I love you. Find me." And with the trailing touch, his hand falling away, Pharzuph turns to go. Follow me, he pleads. Even as his eyes plead such a case before, he pleas again. Follow me.

     "The past must be examined," Sabine remarks, and a gradual progression to lead to the present and future. Under the circumstances - only the Celtic Cross will do."

     Oh, god, god, god - if there even is a god. Why are human hearts so fragile? Why do they hurt - why must they break? Why do I long continually for that which I cannot have - or that which will not have me? Lift this cup from my lips, for I'm damned by the taste of it, and so tired...

     The world is topsy-turvy tonight. Lust out of whack, Love out of season, arrows off the mark, and faerie men rebuffed.
     What's the world coming to?

     It's like a fireplace throwing off sparks, in some ways, isn't it? The magic in the song is as real as the song itself, rolling through the room, even if most of the room can't sense it.

     Claridge's. Resort of the rich and famous. And apparently the great powers of the undead. Is there anyone actually Alive in this building? He has to wonder.

     But beneath the fashionable black layers, hats, and scarves, there must remain glamour. Can Caine's childer do without it? For when they stream darkly into the lowest levels beneath the Tate Modern, they reveal their True Selves.

     "I have missed having a woman on my lap. Long has this playboy," a wink flickers indigo, "...been without a bunny. I have had nothing but hare," men, "... for years now. I will say I do not miss the drama," eyes widen a touch as he grins, "...but I do miss the blushing, giggling, perfumerie of it all."

     "Something's going on, William. There are two here... who really aren't here."

     "Fear'll do that," Davydd smiles and the sun comes with it for those who can see it. For all others, it merely warms and brightens his face.

      And now there is no doubt in her mind that she is not safe with either group of men. "Shite," she curses on a breath, then spins on her heel to run, jabbing frantically at her cellphone's faceplate.

     "Alright news," Ian nods, smirking for the close interruption. "I am much like Midas," Ian observes, "...though saddled with the electrons of this age." He sets the PDA down near his leg. "How is young Montague?"

Guillaume: [Nods.] There is no fairytale in this, Montague. The only happy ending is the one walking here with you. I got to live, you see. Though, incidental to my own story, at times, my fate and destiny not my own, I am the only one with the happy ending...

     Enter VALAN MONTAGUE, the Hip, Young Man About Town. Waiting on the Tower Bridge is the Duke of Normandy, GUILLAUME d'ANGEVIN, clothed in a dark suit with an equally dark overcoat.

     "Never fucking mind." She pulls the money for the bar's trouble out of her pocket and tosses it on the table, apparently getting ready to go on her own now, "Who the hell do you think? Davy. Davy, Davy, Davy. It's always bloody well Davy."

     And there he is, an Old Man with Coffee. Her Old Flame. The man she couldn't live with or without for fifty years, or was it a century? Sommat like that. It's probably too late to leave. Setting his cup down, he gives his paper a snap and smoothes it out from the wind.
     Yeah, that's the reason...

     The Last Gunfighter. You stand in the street like a post modern John Wayne. The cigarette. The tough guy attitude. You are attitude in spades, oui? The cupping of the flame spills golden light on his golden face and golden hair. His suave Hipster's gear no match for the Cowboy.

     And only he will know me then as He knows me. As no other.
     Not even you, Maria. You will never know me like this. No one ever will.
     And he and I shall take this to our deaths, known only by and in the Divine...

     "A fortunate man indeed." Idly it draws a hand up, regarding it stark light of the street, turning rings and bracelets in the streetlamp's glare. "There are many who yearn for such a life. Many who dream of dreamless lives."

     Edward grins at the young man beside him, nodding his head. He gives a shrug and looks back to the Prince hovering over the dais. "He is no stranger, this one," Edward affirms. "He is Valan Montague. A Brujah," Edward says with some pride, "...of a rare line, and We all are honored by his very presence among you now."

     He'd successfully waved away this night for three years, and despite all his bravado and influence, he couldn't make the night disappear for his love's benefit. And it upsets him.

     Who's the fucking pretty boy, came the cockney crack behind him. Fucking tosser, came the laughter. And Valan turned. There was a little quirk of a smile. He even blew them a kiss.

     A celestial gift.
     "I do not do this so often," Sentinel, "...but I was glad for this task. It is..." she smiles, sitting down, "...the stuff of Dreams." Himself, literally.

     Aloud, again, she recites a cellphone number, and she sits seiza, closing her eyes. Emotion rushes forth to fill a void, and then, Fiona Arundel, known to some as Drancy of no other name, watches candles burn out to blackness.

     "In less than a year and a day, you will find him. You will find Answers, though they won't be the ones you are expecting." His words filling the space of those crawling moments, before the coin falls the scant foot to the table.

     In other words, Kit Marlowe aka Christopher Cherub of Dreams and Sentinel of Aspirations is on vacation. A stay at home sort of holiday, with an iced latte, overlooking Gabriel's Wharfside, his boat, and all of London's teaming tourist traffic.

     "I don't suppose you know a fellow called Dei, do you? I was told he might be here - otherwise, I admit, I wouldn't be, myself."

     It's been a while now since he stepped onto the scene here. When he first came in, his English was atrocious, his blood was new, but he was good, very good. Good with epee. Better with saber. Edward Meurelle's childe...

     Did I jump across for nothing? Are you tired of me already? Are you going to pull that 'I realized I'm not gay' line? This is what you get for sleeping with straight, dead boys, Valan.

     There is one more in the club, now, than there was a moment before. The vertigo and emptiness shifts to a momentary feeling of claustrophobia, then flees entirely.

     "I feel..."
      That was no tap, it was a punch...
     "...violated..."

     The white cotton suit. A suit tailored for warmer climes, its light colouring and weight making it almost entirely unsuitable for London. And yet this man seems comfortable in it, not noticing how out of place he seems.

     "When you talk like that, Davy," Edward murmurs, turning his eyes back to the punching bag, "...it happens like that. Is that what you want?"

     I was looking at a man at a bar one night and it was like I slipped beneath his skin. Further, beneath his blood. No, further, into his soul.

     "What th--" he starts, leaping from his seat to grab the duffle bag. "What the fuck?" he finally gets out, shaking the bag to and fro until the file comes out. The bag's tossed aside, and Edward stands, flipping through the folder.

     "Never..." and Soldekai's voice trembles, "...never ask me for anything again, when we are like this. Do you...understand, Christopher?"

     "I just thought I would pay you a visit... Many are concerned about your Patron." Another drag form his cigarette before adding, "Andrealphus." As if he needed that explained to him.

     It makes him smile. For the first time since being on this planet and in the material realm, he can honestly say that he is very, very happy.

     Julian closes his eyes. I am unprepared for this. Not this. Not you too.

     "There's a French revue opening off West End, not the actual West End, but close. Anyway, an open audition for singer/dancers for an actual stage act, Julian. I've always wanted to do that, and well... I auditioned."

     "Always nice to see help in town," Salem says, her blondish hair piled on her head. She pushes up a pair of horn-rimmed glasses. "Have you gotten settled? I will admit...I'm a little surprised, but no less grateful."

     London. Is everyone going there? What is going on anyway? Well, you may know. A front of a battle only beginning to make itself known. Kit. Going to London.

     She kind of looks like a cross between the Mongolian Jennifer Lopez and a slightly shorter version of Tia Carrere smashed together. "Uh-huh," Yisun drags out. She points at him and peers. "Mare's milk with a beer back, right?"

     Huh. Phantasmagoria. Yisun quirks a look between the waitress and Jonathan. "I'm new to town. So... this place is hot?" Hot. Get it? I have become so droll...

     Yisun stands and smiles, her hand coming out. "Yisun Inkhe," she says, natural and native Mongolian accent on Mongolian syllables and then: "Pleasure to meet you," English accent having a war with something almost ...American.

     Dearest Emily. Herein is a goddess from the sands of dead Aegyptus. She spread her wings, in centuries past, to protect her King. Let her now wrap you in her aegis of feathers.

     Little poet, so sticking out among the fetished and freaky crowd, a brilliant beacon of purity in a most impure world, you are irresistible.

     Lord Andrealphus, I try. I promise. But, Lilim? Here?

     Annabelle Deschamps' arrival in town always makes for an interesting time, and always causes ripples.

     L'Enfant Terrible, the rebirth of the Sun King. Even his skin is golden, like it is brushed with gold leaf powder or saffron, a nice effect from the saffron silk robe he wears.

     "I guess we call a Toreador we trust." A pause. "The list is short. Girault..." He pauses again, corners of his mouth upturning. "It is a short list indeed when Il Gatto di Firenze floats to the top of it."

     "I know... what it is to lose. I understand this loss," he says. "I have been where you are now, three times..."

     He looks at you in the mirror for a moment, then says, "You alright?" He's going out in a while. A planned recon meeting to check out heroin dealers who may have supernatural backers. Edward smiles a little, continuing to tuck in his shirt.

     The Cymri's mouth purses in thought. Magic. "I believe it came from her... her trauma. The breakdown upon the sudden end of the Bond. What it must feel like with the Line suddenly goes... slack."

     The last hour or so was rather uneventful, as most of it she spent as a ruby, as red as the one she wears on her finger. Time passed and she was returned to her normal state, but she remained still and unconscious. Her small body instinctively curled into the fetal position and then stayed there.

     Here, she is known as Alexandra Salem, Planner for the City of Westminster and Greater London. An urban architect of the highest caliber...and one of David's oldest and most faithful servants. Rumors abound that she is the next Archangel, and her greatest calling card is the civilized human world as we know it.

          Creepy eyes. That can't be a good sign. Fuck. We may have to kill her. Like when Old Yeller came down with rabies.

     What should we do, my love. Next, I mean. Well, I know I must call William, but we can't keep her here. We're not a sanitarium...

No more will the Wolfe howl.
I am half of a whole.

     And he rises, arm slipping around her waist. "Maybe you can change my religion." And he grins at himself.

     If a raven can really look like a drowned rat, then this raven achieves it, royal girth or no. He's as big as a hawk, really. A true rook. As you speak, he tilts his head at you, rocks back and forth on his taloned -- quite formidable at that -- and then he hops down...

     "I don't mind being asked, but unless there is going to be some sort of action, I really must insist that you make up your mind. I was in the middle of a dinner party. Do you know how long it takes to have a white dragon actually answer an RSVP? No, I should think not.

     Shh. This way. Step. Foyer. Living room. Stairs. Dieu. You'll have to deal with the stairs. Okay, I can do this. I can do this. You can do this, Meurelle. Just one foot at a time. Dieu, you haven't been this fucked in ages. Sheer ages.

     Arms go wide, green eyes -- Cymru green -- go wide as well. And so too the smile. A triad reaction, how fitting. "Mad Peter!" he exclaims, the whiskey, brandy, scotch and mead -- yes, mead -- getting the best of him for a moment. "Boyos, look there... my old soothsayer, messenger of The Lady...go greet a friend..."

     "Holy shit," Davydd thinks to say, and his hand comes up and rubs his unbearded chin. "I see what you mean. Not saying you look bad, you're just very..... puckish. Huh."

     "Melodrama, at your age," he murmurs, shrugging his jacket into place, smirking. "As if anyone should pity you." As if you pity yourself. William gets the joke.

     "I did hear that you were asked to speak with me. Is there anything you ... would like to say, Edward?"

     "Have you," he grins, looking down between you, "...wondered of my own instruction and whether you...could take lessons from the Old Ones?"

     Sometimes I don't know if the music I'm hearing is actually playing softly in the background, or maybe in the neighbor's bedroom, or if it's something ringing in my ears. It starts when I speak your name around your tongue and it rolls like the sea. Right over me.

     Edward smiles again at the photographs. "It's good to be reminded sometimes..." he whispers softly. "Good on ya, lads," he grins at the trio again, giving the men a nod of confidence.

     Standing at the edge of the awning as the water billows around him and soaks his heavy cloak is a tall figure that seems to have stepped right out of European folk lore, or an American pulp serial.

     She's been crying, and her eyes have that slight hint of puffiness - but the most recent tears were enough ago that maybe it could just pass as exhaustion. Maybe.

     She's been considering it for days, now. Weeks. Something like that - some sort of human time scale which is meaningless, and logically, she knows to be meaningless, to him

     Somewhere not too far away, wandering about in the inclement season, is a well-dressed man, vestments suited for the weather, with a long overcoat of heavy wool, beneath this a white turtleneck of handwoven knit, wool taken from the backs of Welsh sheep and made specifically for him.

     The song, well - it grants insight, in part, perhaps, but there's hesitation paired with it. No jumping to hasty conclusions, here. When the song morphs, she smiles faintly, though a troubled expression still holds on her face. Maybe, maybe tonight, she'll tell him.

     William inclines his head again, his eyes drifting over you. "You wish to see. You fear what you may see. Tell me... is the price of seeing more costly than the price of being blind?"

     The paper's folded a few times, shoved into a pocket, and she climbs onto the ledge, poised there for a moment with a quick glance around. And then ...

     "M..maybe...maybe...I am not the type of person you need," she whispers, not sure what to say. Maybe I am not like others. Maybe I have failed. Maybe there is something wrong with me.

     And a glass that was sitting on the coffee table explodes. Green eyes lift to you. And with a whisper of something Welsh, something old, the glass is whole again. As if nothing had happened.

     Sandrine just frowns at you, shaking her head. "I have been patient, Davydd," she says, "...and have let you...go on with her about whatever..." hands wave, "...whatever you go on with her about. But, I will not have her thinking that I am...not normal."

     "And ... I'm in a lot of trouble, Dot. I'm just, I can't keep up this pace. It isn't working anymore, but I don't ... have anywhere else to go with it."

     He laughs. Rich, the sound and warm. And amused. And delighted. And Knowing. "You should not bait the hook, if you do not want to catch a fish, ne c'est pas?"

     "Mary," Davydd sings out, staring through the lights to his favorite waitress. "Mary had a little beer, it's head was white as snow..." The crowd roars and the band behind him, chuckling, begins plucking out the children's tune. "...and everywhere that Mary went, the Guinness was sure to go..."

     His eyes are almond shaped, slightly slanted, and dark. A shade deeper than night. And he stands some seven feet tall one's eyes may think. In vestments made of shadows and earth, fur. Fox, both grey and red. Wolf at the edges of his cloak. There are talismans of fairy metal, and of claw and tooth and bone.

     "Oh, there always is. For every good, there is an ill. The universe depends upon balance. But what's the downside you see? My only being able to be with you for nine days after you call me? I have a week left, by the way."

     I want to be with you, Huw the Hunter... even if it's frightened me, even if your strength is more than mine, or perhaps because of it. I want to be greedy, and know you with all my senses. I don't know if this is because of Chinon and its master, or something Dei started but didn't finish - demon or no - or an offshoot of having met Davydd. Or perhaps, what you said to me, yourself... 'To not love because of him, just lets him win...'

     A thrumming in the back of the head, fluttering, follows the clocks. A ripple in the floorboards, imperceptible to most. The sound of something rushing forward at incredible speed.

     ...And then, holding out the package, the slender smile turns to an almost grin. "Ventrue Express..."

     "I'm no different than you," Davydd murmurs, chin lifting in the tipping of his head. An inclination of strength, and in those green eyes there is little mirth.

     My universe. My carefully crafted universe, the architecture of nearly a thousand years is crumbling at my feet. All I can seem to do is stare. Evenly. Blankly. I do not know what to do now. Maybe none of it matters at all. None of the secrets. The mysteries. I am unravelled.

     Will he still want to speak to me? Do I really want to speak to him, knowing it might not have been him? I don't know what I want...
     Worse than a child in a candy store, and with less reason, isn't she.

     "I love you," Sandrine murmurs, closing her eyes to enjoy your lips at her skin.

     Julian's face cracks its present placidity, a smile angling at his masculine features. "Needing. Wanting assistance." He nods in familarity with such terms. Lavender eyes look at you again, sorting out negotiable items. Julian begins at your head, with its curl, and works his way down, pausing occasionally.

     The threads illuminate one of the white washed walls, something like stucco only not, and the heretofore random peelings and cracks in the wall become a crackling smile. "Put a kettle on, Karoly, prop your feet. Tell me, how have you been. What have you been up to..."

     The spear gleams. It is not made of gold but seems gold. Not made of bronze but seems bronze. Not made of earth but is as easy to hold as one hewn from the wood of her trees. "When London is ours," Michael intones, "... embed this in the center of the city." And the lines of battle will move forward at your command. You are the standard bearer now.

     With the tuning note, in time with it, she slams her fist back, into the wall. If Huw needed another spike, well, he's got one in spades, now - that energy which had gone so deceptively quiescent rises, tearing out through her skin.

     It is settling into Almost dawn. Who the fuck could be calling me at this hour? Someone'd better be dead or dyin...
     There's an exhale, a clearing of his throat, a rough but soft, a warm and not-entirely-awake voice that greets you. "Mmm... no one I know would call at this hour," the earthy voice is edged by a thick and drawling accent, flicked with a lilting tongue.

     "It's alright," he says, "...it'll be alright..." Such words, such famous words. But he doesn't stop, and a hand reaches out, lightly moving against a reddened cheek. And he kisses you anyway.

     "As for home," another shrug and Dei takes another swallow. "Who knows. Maybe that's not it at all. I guess it's the connection to the people I left behind," he says. He looks into his drink. "The feeling of separation. I guess I'm not cut out for touring..." And he makes a wry smile.

     Mutter... damn it. I don't know what to ask him. I know weird shite is going on. I don't know what to do about it. People just... keep popping up out of nowhere. I want answers, but I don't even know what to ask... don't even know what good questions are to ask...

     "Alright, little missy," he mutters beneath his breath as he looks ahead, "... it's going to end tonight. You and me and the game makes three."

     There's no escape. In a thousand guises, I insinuate myself into a thousand copulations. Dawn into dusk, dusk into dawn. Bed to bed, nation to nation. I forget by not having time to remember. But what happens when the solace becomes so used that it's hollow. Even the solace becomes part of the act. The endless fucking act...

     "All the information's in that there card," she informs Erik, Jared, and Dei in a tone which for her, is amiable to the point of mellowness. "I'm a reporter, I can ask you set questions if you like, or I can make it up as we go, or you can tell me to go get stuffed." Her own accent is London punk, with a hint of something a bit better educated creeping through underneath. "I'm Drancy."

     "I will have what you are having. You look very good, doing very well. You are... beautiful and strong and in the fullness of your Word. I would be proud of you, Julian, except that we are both damned. It is hard to be proud of that..."

     Slender fingers light upon the napkin and draw it toward him, fingers that, curling, lift it. He reads it. He tucks it away. Safely, in a pocket. Andrealphus looks at you through his mortal shell. A mask that he does not move away, but do you know just how transparent it feels? O, what would it be like...
     What would it be like to Love again...

     I cannot escape it. I want to close my eyes. I want to not ... be this....

     "I...I don't understand what has happened to you, alright?" her brows arching. "You are...different. Everything about you is different. And it has only been a few months..." since we got together.

      The eyes reflected in the glass go down along with your hand. "Well... see... it's just not as easy as that, Julian Kane. Andrealphus is missing. He's gone. His temples are empty... no one's seen him in ... "

     "You're a doll," he whispers, "...my doll." Just so you know, Samantha. There is no other as close to my heart as you.
     But I have no heart. That has gone, since The War. Shattered, they say, on the floor of a now-empty citadel. I have no heart...that's what I am told.

     "So basically, wot you're saying is that you can't be bothered to commit, so you stick with people you can use and toss away without worrying they'll come after you with a shotgun." She turns to look over her shoulder, her smirk having more real warmth in it this time, even as her eyes are challenging. "Funny, that. I always thought that's what Kleenex got invented for..."

     For over an hour, he'd accepted greetings and congratulations, a crowd of beautiful women shielding him from the undesirables. Dressed in violet velvet hip-huggers and violet suede boots, Julian finally emerged from his perch, causing the world to open before him.

     Consistency is great, if you realize it's being consistent. In Drancy's case, she has no such assurance, and being tossed over a shoulder to make the world go topsy-turvy, well, her world's already gone topsy-turvy - this just makes her anger flare up again. "Put - me - DOWN!" She beats ineffectually on your shoulder, squirming and struggling.

     "Tybed, Davydd, ai ti gwneud a gorfoledd cystal fel tristwch er myn hon enaid." The voice is ancient, ageless, trickling out of her from years ago, and oh so familiar, and not just because it's a recognizable voice, of I've heard this before. The words are familiar, personal and informal. I wonder, Davydd, if you have to do with joy as well as sorrow for the sake of this soul.

     Pulling her hands away from her hair, Drancy speaks slowly, in a low tone, still leaning up out of her seat. "Way I see it, there's only one way to deal with things like this, and that's to push on through to the other side. Maybe I'm going mad, and maybe I'm not - you say it's magic. Right, then." Her hands shoot out, intent on grabbing your wrists, bare skin to bare skin. "Let's break on through."

     Davydd pauses, green eyes turned to darkness, a moment before crossing into Picadilly to head to parts southwest. Just a glance for traffic, but then it lingers. A rush of pricking skin, like a shiver up the spine. Something on the wind...

     According to various students of the topic, if one is to believe the legends and stories, there would be over six thousand varieties of faeries alone. As such, it should be no great surprise that one of the few trees, fenced in against the sidewalk as they are, left in London was both old enough and weakened enough to contain a lesser denizen of faerie.

     "Mmm... oui. You are a perfect specimen, are you not? A work of art, perhaps. I would love to meet your creator to thank them personally for gifting the world with one so... magnificent. But, alas, I have not introduced myself," the woman says with a cat-like grin. Her moves are also very feline in nature.

     Falling water. It chimes to the senses. He can hear the voices in the water. Soft and lilting, like the sound of his own singing. He can feel the water by the coolness of the air as he passes. He can taste it, as scent captures flavor and spills it upon his tongue.

     "The painter of the flower shop, a man of an Artistic Bent, owns a gallery here in the City. Since he did not get enough of paint with the flower shop, I thought you might help with his...artistic development. Some of his works need...touchups. Would you care to hear more?"

     "You think," Edward's brow furrows, "...this is all related?" Ah, yes. DeRancey. Palmer's.

     Fiery brows knit together and he looks like the old veteran now. Hardy. Welsh mountain with eyes. "When I knew I loved you," his expression softens as he looks to you, and this is how he's telling you, "... I couldn't get it out of my mind. The fear... "

     A pause and turn, though. Something else he wants to say. "Take care, Davydd," Sebastian says evently. "Two weeks is a long time. Two years, is an eternity. It is best, we all do those two years on the same page." Not a chastisement to you, but a reminder to you all. "Just watch yourself, because others are doing it for you."

     It is not long after the sun decides to slip out of the sky for its nightly rest that the one known to some as the Goth Diva slips out of her hotel room for a night on the town. Still staying at the hotel, as though she is still unsure as to whether or not she will make London her home once more. It has been so long.

     "Death and Taxes," the laughter's returned. He visiting you is now as certain... if not more certain... than those two fates...

     God, though I am a grievous sinner, spare me from that fate...

     This is the nature of art. Art, the sphinx. Art, the oracle. Inexplicable and full of meaning...

     "A poet voyeur," William chuckles, and he lifts the glass to his lips, another sip of Bordeaux. "Tell me, would you be sitting in the corner singing my praises as I sinned, or would you, like some poets, have to experience the ...inspiration as a participant?"

     "Can't a man wear a green shirt without being called a raving poofter or tree hugging bender?" The red brows fly up and Davydd grins. Fuck ya, Meurelle.

     I have to remember how to handle a dove. Slow hands, Llewelyn. Slow hands and slow movements. Soft voice and a soothing warmth. And then you'll have your bird in the hand, boyo. You used to catch them, remember... when you were young...

     She knows the name of every flower, every plant. She even knew what sort of gardner tends it, what he's attempting to do with the space. She was pruning a little, even..." Scandanavian women. Quiet, like glaciers. But what is it about them that just sets a fire in men's souls?

     Peer about the corner, and you shall see. A waft of perfume. One that you do not know. A topcoat of grey wool with a cream lining rests upon a chair. It was once a living being. Bending the corner will yield a foot tapping, grey shoe visible. Then legs, long and firm. And the rest. A young woman with shocking strawberry blonde hair. Certainly not red. It glows around her face, a veritable copper halo.

     A hint of humor. Sakir watches the interplay of the three as an outsider would, an interested outsider.

     Wrists turn down instinctively as Sakir notes Edward's gaze. A touch of alarm on his features. "I --" He faulters for a second with the language "-- would enjoy that yes." He then slowly begins to stand, at least to make introductions, while one hand remains on his glass. "Sakir Akalay." Left hand offered to shake. "And I thank you for your offer, though I already have a drink." Strange how fast he changes from faultering over a language to seeming perfect fluency. It must have been surprise.

     "It was a key," comes soft Latin, "... it had my name scratched into its surface... it had a note 'Those That Lead Us Forth'... it's like looking at death and greatness in the mirror, you look away, you close the box, you don't dare stare at Fate too long. Or it will freeze you..."

     "Well... I'm not sure what else to do, Edward," he murmurs. "She chucked my belongings out the window and onto the lawn and is fucking another man on my prized leather chair. It's not like we argued over finances. She wants something I can't give her..." his hands are animated again. "I mean obviously. Or she wouldn't have done it. She was a good confidante... I don't hate her..."

     "And you didn't upset me," he whispers, "I would just rather not think of you as...someone else's drizzled," fucking "...dessert." Not an image he likes. In fact, the notion pisses him right off, no matter who the Else is.

     Now the tall man is a handsome man, with a charming smile. He also has an Aura that exudes malevolent bad-ass as much as it does awe inspiring virility. To most people the initial response is going to be to cow away. To Guan Lao it is means only one thing: He must be a warrior. I will ask him.

     Girault pivots. An eyeful of Christian. The rest of the world should be so lucky. "We claim him in the name of Italy and..." Dark eyebrows sweep upward even as his eyes make their own exploration.

     "Holy --" Edward doesn't finish the rest. "Um," he suddenly stands, eyes wide open, "...no..." already, he's tumbling past your legs and the table, moving towards the foyer. "No, no, I got it...just..." he twists to see you, hands out, "...just stay there. No," he blinks, turning to look in the mirror above the table in the foyer, "...stand. That's better," he nods, running a hand over his hair.

     Show me...
     You who know so much, show me what this life is like...

     Hazel eyes lift, not to a sound but to an expectation. He is waiting for you...

     Is this the way that you like it?
     Is this what you had in mind,
     when you called above to the angels
     for the six hundred and sixty sixth time...

     The kiss begins softly, Edward's eyes closing. Upon the white linen, his fingers touch your hand, seeking them out among the remains of your meal. It is gentle, but pulling as the chair wills him back to its cushions. There. Edward's eyes open, wondering what shall you think of it. I am falling in love with you, it said. I want you beside me. Stay...a while. He breathes then, brow furrowing a little as his own thoughts resound in his brain. I hear it...can you?

     The king deserves love as much as the peasant... we are lucky, perhaps. But we have worked hard for this luck. No one else knows how much, how hard.

     He had other plans for Palmer's tonight, until he got your call. A fighter by the name of Yang Ping was to meet for a bit of martial arts. But plans change. Ping had been there regardless, but after finding another opponent and then watching others, he gave a wave and departed. Another time. Instead, Edward mustered himself together to face his cousin instead. While he was glad to see you, there was something else behind his expression.

     "Ah well... it could have been a worse ending. She could have done worse than William Plantagenet giving her Last Rites, Davydd Llewelyn staking her breast and Edward Meurelle of Blois landing the striking blow..."

     Her skin is so pale. She moves past you but her eyes are caught by something else. A feeling? Copper hair glistens and the bob flips with the turn of her head. Just as a yellow light passes by in a stream. She sees the back of a head familiar. A strong arm circles around her small waist, and she turns. Can you hear them, Edward?

     "Oh, great!" screams Edward, "That wasn't really even fuckin' necessary." Fucking Plantagenets.

     "She," the man seems hesitant to say, to explain why a broken-off flower would need be given to you, "...she...claims that it was as this...after she took the clothing from...the wash."

     I am a wicked man ... I am a wretched man...
When Jesus was upon the cross I never was this alone ...

     As people head into the ring, Edward turns to see you and gives you a smile. "Hey there, cos!" he yells, "Whatcha doin?" as if nothing's happened and you're walking towards him down the street.