When Flood wears his best to go to Sabbat holy ground it is doubtless those who don't understand him sneer at this monster who would hide in sheep's clothing, sheep's finery, sheep's wool and silk ties and pressed white linens like some man of industry. Like he really believes himself to be a man.
They probably don't do it to his face, though. They probably don't do it in the shadows, either. Unless they are very stupid or very brave, and maybe they sneer most where those two characteristics overlap. He has wiped away their sneers by surviving. He has changed them to wide eyed awe and teeth gnashing in jealousy by felling Camarilla lapdogs and returning from the Cardinal with a mandate.
Flood has his reasons for dressing the way he does. It is that he enjoys it. It elevates his mood. It sets him apart more than a mohawk or war paint might, especially in the modern times he awoke te. And while so many of the Sabbat revel in stripping away their human nature, the fact that he remains as he wishes despite them... Isn't that a greater form of rebellion?
There are subtle nods to the old traditions of the Sabbat in his dress. No overturned ankh or crucifix to buck humanity's conventions, though, only the light purple windowpane pattern laid out in thin geometric lines on his grey wool suit. The flair of a pocket square, a similar shade a lavender, folded into a tumultuous sea of points on his breast like a soldier's medals. His tie?
Black and folded into a fat knot around his neck. No need to overdo it.
This is not his weekly esbat. This is not him seeking out his priest to drink from the cup Caine carved for his people, this is not him seeking out those who would call him ductus and be lured to do violent things and indulge in their predatory nature under his subtle direction, this is him seeking out a much older relationship. This is him seeking out one who shares the blood of his line, the line of his sire, Garo, and Garo's sire before him back to the Hittite of the so-called chosen tribe's legend. Another freed by that blood from the mastery of others.
And one he had last spoken to very harshly.
Flood does not ask for Paige. Flood moves through the shadows seeking her out quietly. To ask or demand her presence might only further sour their relationship. This is his penitence. This is his show of respect. This is Flood silent.
And her brother in the Blood continues to search until he finds her, returning night after night and wordlessly waiting, revolving his schedule upon these journeys of silent penance and contemplation, knowing word will get around.
“Flood's at temple more than an altar boy these days,” a chuckle.
“The Lasombra's lurking around more than usual,” a whisper.
“Mourners of Enoch? Look's like he's fuckin' despondent over it,” snide as can be.
“What the fuck is he waiting for? Someone to bite him open and see what he's made of?” That one might come with a bit of hesitation, but it comes eventually, along with the rest.
Flood[ Perception + Alertness ]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (8, 8, 9, 9, 10) ( success x 5 )
Paige HarrowThis is hallowed ground. This: pit of inhumanity - of monstrousness. This nest of tunnels - of metal: twisted. A snarl of man-made pipes and exhaust and stone. Hallowed, of course - because here darkness breeds. Here foulness breeds, too - some would say that. They'd say - this is a place where vampires are vampires are courageous are themselves are not snivelling cowards are reverent are reverenced. They'd say here is the truth. Here we are making the truth known. Here we will lick our wounds and prepare to inflict those wounds ten times over on those who'd take the Pit (this is a Pit - this temple to Caine to Caine's true childer to those who understand what blood is for [to be spilled] to be used) and make it a punishment. Here -
This is hallowed ground. Brent Orly. Gui Cavalcanti. Paige Harrow. They enforce this with an enthusiasm chilling even to those whose blood is already cold, don't they? And there are always shadows in the Temple. Shadows that are natural, fire-spun and dripping, but turn to something unnatural (oh, you poor darlings, more natural than you'd dream) at a moment's notice. Never any telling what is in the shadows. Probably a fucking Lasombra if not a fucking Nosferatu Antitribu or Malkavian Antitribu. Fuck the shadows, some of the Sabbat think. Fuck them, but they do not say it unless they are brave.
Just as they do not speak against Flood, unless they are brave. And foolish, and snide, and whispering, whispering. Angelo, ravenous, hungry, fanatical, he is one of the first to comment in a quiet aside on the prodigal childe's sudden devotion, but aren't there others? Aren't there?
And a whisper is a shadow's greatest lover, don't you know. They go together, more than silence and shadows, because shadows are already silence. They can't muffle it any further: can't control it.
Here is Flood, seeking his sister-by-blood, seeking one who has in her veins what he has in his, close-knit, connected, he is in her, and she is in him, what is in him is in her, what is in her is in him, and perhaps there is something of sympathy there (no), perhaps it is magnetism, blood calling to blood. He has not always been alone when he comes to Temple, not to take of the cup, not to lead. Once Katherine cleaved to his side, Madonna-still face and gravity, eyes as cold as the rind of frost on a glacier. Once it was Alain, more full of fire (hatred [spite]), less deliberate in his ways. Though they asked him what he was about they left Lasombra business to Lasombra. They are not filled with the Abyss as he is. They do not know it in the same way.
Here is Flood, seeking Paige as he has sought her, and sought her, and the last time they spoke it did not end well.
Here is Flood.
He is near an entrance Veins of Caine, where they hold games of instinct, when he hears it. First: the distant sounds of something, clawed and scrabbling, desperate - a break of bones, an echo, stifled, short-lived, broke - games going well (or poorly) for some one or some thing, and then a sob. A breathless, soft-as-feather sound, drift-to-ash, and gone, and gone, and it is a prayer, a last-prayer, drifts up to Flood's ear like candle-incense in an Italian Church drifts up to stain medieval frescos, change their colour, and in the wake of that sound something closer -
A woman's heel hitting the ground, staccato sharp but muted. Whisper, too. Shadow's greatest love: whisper - whisper of a woman's coat against hard tunnel wall. A quiet step, and then another.
He has heard her before she says a word. Behind him.
Flood"My shadow knows yours," voice clear and strong enough to not just breaking his silence, but shatter it. It was never a vow. It was an offering. It was bait.
"Step into my shadow and let me step into yours, sister," and Flood does not know it's her, but he does. He is not certain, but in the moment he says these things Flood is certain.
It was bait, but it was never blood in the water.
"And this time, when we dance, I will try not to step upon your toes," and even if there is not sympathy, there is a hint of the genuine. His words are true in that he means every last one of them.
"If you promise not to try to lead," the caveat cast out to echo into Cain's veins and back. He gazes into the hollows cut in hallowed ground underneath Denver where too many Sabbat wonder if an unknown sleeps.
Or hope it only sleeps.
Once he has spoken Flood turns toward her. He gives her all the time in the world to move for vengeance if she will try to take it. Something in his voice says he trusts her not to.
Begs her to no break his trust.
[ Charisma + Leadership ]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 3, 3, 7, 10) ( success x 2 )
Paige HarrowFlood does not at this time find himself attacked by Paige's shadows. Flood does not at this time find himself besieged by Paige's strength. Flood speaks and he does not see whatever reaction his words tossed into Caine's Veins (echo [echo] swallowed gone) might stamp across his sister-by-blood's sharp-carved striking creatures. He cannot see if she is struck by them.
Until he turns to face her. The female Lasombra is a pair of baleful black eyes in a face that is pale as marble and as smooth. A striking sculpture of a woman. Black eyes that smoulder but there's no light there. Not even the suggestion. With this Lasombra, isn't it all smoulder. Crackle. Cackle. Look how sharp she is, how cutting. Paige. She'd be the razor-blade hidden in Halloween candy, the jagged edge on a safety railing that cuts, draws blood, poisons. Poisonous.
The corner of her mouth has carved upward; it would be a smile, were it not so malicious; were it not so gleefully cruel, not so mockingly lilted.
"Daniel, Daniel. What is this talk? Are we not bound to be one another's keepers? My sweet brother," that smirk, that smile, it curdles; so does the cadence of her voice, the dark glory web of it. Curdles even as it becomes caressing -- "I hear you've become quite faithful lately; quite diligent even!" -- then flattens.
"I confess I was surprised."
Paige Harrowooc: ahem. Change to: "I confess I was surprised to hear it. So curious, considering our last conversation."
Flood“I have faith in few things, but you are one of them,” he begins. Empty flattery will not get him anywhere, but this is not an empty statement. It not only reveals why he has been so diligent in his visits, but that he seeks something he can only get from another power (higher or not). She is that power. It hints at these things without forcing him to speak them outright.
“Neither of us would benefit from a confessor, but perhaps both of us can benefit from curiosity: what it has reaped already, what is will sow,” an aperitif in the form of temptation. Something to whet her appetite for more. She has confessed her curiosity. She has shown its extent by coming here. Flood needs to capitalize upon that and seems to want to do so with some immediacy.
Who knows where dwelling in the past will lead?
Flood does not smile. He has no reason to. He takes no delight in any of this. His face lacks that malevolence, though. He is invested in the outcome of this, in where it will leave them, but it seems that in his mind what he has said of their last encounter is all that can be said without belaboring the point.
"This is a new conversation. Isn't it?" Again the question is genuine. She will dictate whether it is in the past (if only for a little while) or not.
Paige HarrowHe can see Paige looking closely at him. He cannot see a leap in her eyes as she takes the bait. He cannot see a flicker when she is suddenly moved, if she is suddenly moved, to abandon her ire. He can however see when she takes another step and then another, all swagger like mesmerism is a concept best described by a Lasombra swaggering nearer Flood only to rest her back against the tunnel's stone. Which looks less hard than she does, touch Paige's skin and find oneself surprised. He can also see her eyebrows loft.
"I'm waiting," she says, her eyes fixed (fixated) on his, and though there is no light in them, they burn with something like vivid, exultant.
He is after all coming to her.
FloodFlood's voice is all that comes toward her. He hopes it will be enough.
Flood has a story to tell. Flood has a tale worth telling. Flood is certain, in the moment he begins, that she will find it worth hearing. Worth truly listening to.
And that is why the male Lasombra is very careful about how he tells it. He crafts it out of voids, like the Abyss, and matter and light, which is what it hungers for. What he has shed light upon and what matters, at least by his reckoning. It wants to create nothing, so he gives it something to craft it out of.
Flood tells a tale and starts at the tail. He leaves out the head, because he hasn't seen it yet, and he leaves out the tick that sits on the beast, the one who had drawn his attention to it, the one who had made him itch for it. The metaphor doesn't work here because this is a black viper he tells a tale about. It's serpentine.
But he never mentions Jack. No, Flood crafts the tale, and with it he settles on some points: his known influence in industries that might've drawn his attention to these movements. Might've piqued his interest without a Nosferatu of the Camarilla whispering in his ear about it.
The construction site, quiet upon the Sabbat's coming, and the weed that had grown there. A lone delivery, but he leaves out the comings and going of a certain cab company. The legends behind that weed from their Iberian stronghold. The church(es) and the Father that seem to want or already have influence over that land. The man who developed it, Jonson of the Dry Denver Jonsons, and the man who manages it, Phil Lang. The bones of Caine and the word being stopped. Dammed up? He's not sure. Disturbed, in any case, and then on he goes on.
What starts out as a tale about a Gehenna cult, like what might be culled out of some vampiric newsletter or newspaper in another world, just the facts, ma'am, but then he moves on to a more visceral story.
And then Flood pauses. He leaves it there for now, because this story had gone on, become one he could tell first hand about a cab company and a cab driver, but before he does he is taking her in. He is trying to see if she had already had an inkling about some of these things, because there had been a woman with that man who was called Caravaggio.
And who knows who that woman was?
Flood[ Perception + Subterfuge. Dropping a WP. Flood is now at WP 7. ]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 2, 4, 4, 6) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Paige Harrow[Oh, my brother. Manipulation + Subterfuge.]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 5, 6, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 4 )
Paige Harrow[PAUSE.]
Paige HarrowSiblings fight. Siblings fight for the affection of their Sire (is that not what Caine learnt to his cost?). Siblings fight for supremacy. Always a supplanter. Flood's sister-by-blood does not take her coal-black and snapping, like a trap, eyes from Flood's, though he will detect a faint narrowing of them as he goes on. Leaves out. Does she know? Do his words touching as they do upon a tangled web the spider nowhere yet to be seen call some part of his widow-maker black-hearted blood-sister out? He does not know. He cannot tell. Her eyes narrow faintly but that could be because whatever kindling keeps the darkness in them burning has just snapped, fallen, sent off up sparks. Her eyes narrow faintly but that could be in concentration, could be because, though he is coming now to her, she is envious of his diligence. Her eyes narrow faintly but that could be because she is absorbing his tale. Because she knows nothing, but sees that he is leaving something out. He cannot tell. But this:
That phrase which the Nosferatu (old partner [old crimes (now new ones)]) used that so snared him causes a reaction in Paige. The bones of Caine. The word being stopped. Dammed up. There's a pulse (venom) and her eyes widen and stay wide, and now her attention is riveted. She is no longer leaning against the wall so coolly, but leaning toward Flood to hear the rest of the story - if there is more. There is in her a bacchanal urge: to the hunt.
And as this happens, the shadows do shift for more dramatic effect. Cutting across the tunnel, pooling at Paige's feet and slipping back up against the wall, a density that peels itself from a flat dimension and makes itself a presence. A nightmare, certainly.
But not to these. They are the same.
Paige Harrowooc: hmm, jove. There should be a line between "to the hunt." and "And as this happens," and that line is: "This he can tell."
Flood[ Perception + Awareness ]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 6, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
FloodThe shadow comes and the display demonstrates that Paige had come prepared for something, had been dancing with the Abyss as her partner before Flood had come to cut in, and though he wonders if this is simply her modus operandi to have a host of such darkness attendant to her whims... Well, coincidences become dangerous if you discard them too casually.
Flood manages to hold Paige's now-wide eyes and as he winds down that first part of his story decides to hold his tongue. Whether he is or isn't a step ahead, he refuses to take a step back or give up more ground than he must to get what he came her for.
And those unspoken revelations? They could serve to further triangulate her place on the board he has laid out.
"You can understand my concern," because it must be worded as a statement, "and see why I thought you might be a good sounding board for this venture," again too firm to be a question.
As the font of information dries up he looks at her and finally his eyebrow raises. He expects her to continue participating in this conversation.
Paige HarrowThe font (the flood) of information dams up. Paige leans back into that darkness and it makes her more cutting a thing than usual. Look how it throws into relief her cheekbones. Look how it attends the curl of her mouth. Not a smile at all. Not pleasant - the beginning of a sneer, until whatever she is thinking about causes it to fade. Then deepen (vibrant [glorying]). Then fade again.
"Oh my Daniel, I believe I do," and sultry as her voice is, thick and clotted as her voice is, strokable and dark, there is a touch of gloating. Even that it is diminished - a little. Her eyes are still wide with interest. "As diligent as you have been in this Church for a handful of nights, it has been an age," a cackle, amused truly, "since you've heard the priests intone - has it not? Even decades."
Firm, suddenly. "Will you not offer me your arm while we walk further?"
Into the Temple's heart, envisioned by her mad pack-brother prophet.
FloodThe Temple's heart: The veins carry its darkness elsewhere so that it wells up from the very ground. Saturates the city. Gives them someplace to bathe in their baser natures. Here, though? It purifies it with flame and then pumps that crude-turned-refined elsewhere. Fills the cup of faith of those who come to it and allows them to carry it out into the world to toss like the contents of a fire bucket to stifle and consume this city.
That is the ideal.
This is the reality.
It is a place for transactions. For allegiance and alliances to be forged or melted down for scrap. Paige wants his arm. This is another demand tacked on to the trade he has yet to fully negotiate. He has a choice and he takes the dangerous one in offering it, crooking his elbow for her to hold in her grip and lead him off.
Paige had never promised she wouldn't try to lead.
"A long time, but never long enough," he answers like the echoes might haunt- no, not haunt. They irritate him. Like wasted time before he had heard a true sermon from their sire.
Paige HarrowHe goes for the more dangerous option. Paige takes his arm. Her grip can be as strong as his (or nearly), this he knows. But she does not clamp down on his cold flesh with her own as if a vise. They walk. Her heels do echo. They are Lasombra and Lasombra are elegant. Lasombra reign truly in the dark. And it is dark here, in the Temple's heart. Dark here, in their hearts. Black. And this time, when we dance...
He expects her to participate in this conversation. Paige expects him to make it worth her while. Caine's Bones. Piqued her interest: but too much? Enough to involve herself?
If she's not already involved.
She seems amused by his answer, but doesn't linger.
"So," with vigor, like a slap. His sister-by-blood is not languid. "Obviously you've stumbled onto a matter which concerns our Sect; perhaps our very bloodline." The snick of a smirk, there's that razor-blade poison-cut again. "Does the weed remain or is it what's causing your cattle to spit their weedy cud all over and foul up the construction's works? Are you wondering if this Father is ours?" A beat. She seems to want [Dominance] him to say it.
But she is too intrigued to wait. "I don't think so, and yet..."
"His name does remind me of something."
Paige Harrowooc: darn it! that should be 'Does any of the weed remain and is it what's causing your' etc.
Flood"The Cainite's bones, descendant. Or at least I think it was, perhaps the slip of my tongue was just me being hopeful," again, knowing what she does not know is just as important as what she does.
"Won't you tell me?" Flood does not slap back. The question comes softly, a request with ony whatever expectation she attaches to it now that she has said he has come across a matter of some significance to the whole of their Sect.
That meant this was also a matter of duty, something he could use to further pry these bits out of her, even if he is prying carefully.
"I wish to stop stumbling in the dark," and surely he doesn't mean this, would never admit to such a misstep, and see how straight he walks when he says it? How confidence despite chiding himself with it. He doesn't smirk. He doesn't sneer. He glides one step to the next and looks over at her down the unique construct that is his nose- if only thanks to his height.
She wants dominance. He shows her he's unconcerned with it.
"And I wish to take some ground instead," and hadn't she asked something about that weed? He ignores the question.
Flood[ Manipulation + Leadership. Specialty (Cult of Personality) applies. ]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 3, 6, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 4 )
Paige Harrow"But of course I will tell you," she says, and her voice will leave a dark stain; spilled wine or blood, something viscous. Caressing, again, "What would I be if I did not share with my family?" There might be (must be [probably is]) a goad there. The past is never really passed with vampires.
She asked a question about a weed. She Looks up at her brother; an adoring sister, in the tradition of the Clan of Night.
[Manip + Intimidation.]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 1, 3, 4, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )
Flood"Then you, dear Paige, would still and always be your brother's sister," a beat as he continues to look back. "Just without the talent for weighing the import of matters or knowing when to choose your battles- ones you can win," answering her rhetorical question with a hypothetical.
"But you are not that, are you, my darling Paige?" And he says it quickly. As if it will wipe the slate, the hypothetical, clean. But the claws what he says has? It has scored the backboard with its own sharpness. "No. Never you."
And he doesn't skip the next beat. Her earlier question?
She seems to want to hear back about it.
She presses back, insistent, and he returns with less than a trickle. But at least it is an honest one:
"I do not know. I suspect it may be what gummed up the works. Let us say that if I run into the Rocky Mountains you will know why and leave it at that, like a dead canary in a coal mine," as if it would be a burden he would gladly shoulder as a keeper.
[ Flood's turn. Manipulation + Intimidation. ]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 7, 7, 8, 9, 9, 10) ( success x 6 )
Paige Harrow[Manipulation + Subterfuge. +1 diff.]
Dice: 7 d10 TN7 (2, 2, 4, 5, 6, 10, 10) ( success x 2 )
Flood[ Perception + Subterfuge ]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 5, 5, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )
Paige Harrow[AGAIN]
Dice: 7 d10 TN7 (1, 1, 3, 5, 6, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )
Flood[ One more time. Hopefully. ]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (4, 4, 6, 8, 10, 10) ( success x 4 )
Paige HarrowThey are dead, these two. They are creatures of darkness. They do not flush, or ever seek to, squandering vitae on such sheep's clothing; and thus Paige's skin stays as pristine marble as ever it is at that claw-scrape sharpness. They do not need to breathe, to pretend longing (or to perhaps even do more than pretend) for days when lungs were anything more than bellows for the verbal shaping of their will. And thus Paige's breathing does not give her away, how effectively that scratch of his drew metaphorical blood.
No; she is given away by the shadows. They'd been following them, Paige's shadows, following them to dramatically obscure their way, slipping artfully across the tunnel ground as if some fire flickered where there is in fact none. Just a glorying of darkness, the dark glorying in their passage, providing bars against any other interested ears or followers: the shadows can be sharp. Her control is impeccable: but she ceases to control them for a moment. The lash (whip) of her eyelashes hammers down against her cheek and her eyes scrape away (it's so quick). For a moment.
"His name reminds me of a story I heard from Adrian." A sharpening, if he does not know the name. A faux-sharpening, as she has been subdued, pretends otherwise but he knows. He does however know the name: Adrian - another Lasombra who came to Denver for the siege. "He said he feasted on a man from a parish and the man's blood rang in him like church bells," sneer, not for Flood, "silvering away the night. Poor boy, he said he couldn't quite get it up after that for nights." Her fingers run across the walls - no, across the shadows. Back to those. They react like a cat stroked. "He hadn't killed the man. When he went to find him again, later on, the man did call on a Peter of the Town. Not," insinuate, her voice; see how it gets in? Like fever?, "Peter of the Rock. Did weep after him when he died," and now, a bark of a laugh. Viciously, maliciously amused: "He was making excuses for his poor showing below."
This is far more information, directly given, than would be Paige's wont. She is unsettled, truly. The laughter has whipped the black of her eyes back up into a smoulder-thing; thoughtfully, she looks (again) at Flood.
"I thought nothing of it and barely do now, but perhaps it is interesting. I'm also half-minded of a scandal..."
And at this, she frowns deeply and sincerely. "I will see if I can dredge it up for you."
FloodTo dwell upon what his words wrought would be to gloat and Flood does not gloat. He heeds what they've wrung from her, more information that she would give otherwise. Rare as blood from a stone and he takes it with thanks. Steadily metered nods. Respect.
"Dredge and if you get mired, know you can always call upon me for a hand, if not always a meal," and his hand finally reaches across him. Had it come before, when he was in the midst of veiling threats and sending them to dance like images of belly dancing assassins, it might have been too much. It might have prodded at her beast and summoned a snap instead of what he can only read as a whimper (or what passes for one where Paige is concerned).
Now it comes and reaches across his chest to go where Paige's hand is on his arm. It pats, yule marble on stone from the same quarry, and then gives a reassuring squeeze before saying:
"Peter denied Jesus. It seems this Peter left his ward adrift, a feast for the wolves, as well, if there is more to that scandal. Perhaps he didn't want to make a martyr of himself," the allusion spoken in the context of conjecture. "The living often disappoint." Maybe he believes this.
It attempts to get across a very subtle point. One that might only be read with the right (again) context.
We are not like them. How much do you think I know, sister? And yet here I am: walking with you, talking with you. Offering you my help and asking for yours-
Flood's hand releases. He takes back his arm if she will release it. He looks to be off and to leave her time to contemplate her next move, fleeing the heart like an invigorated cell off to do its work.
[ Manipulation + Empathy. Specialty might apply. ]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 5, 6, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )
Paige Harrow[credits!]
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