i am flesh & I am bone

Date: November 5th 2020 Time: 12:15 pm Location: The Gilded Lily

Staring at strangers isn’t a common practice of his. No, really, it’s the sort of thing that tends to lead to an altercation, so Liam avoids that behavior – except this isn’t a stranger at all, is it? Liam’s head is practically on a tilt watching this man through the store window. A flower shop. And he’s holding a baby, no less, which draws a laugh from Liam and a simultaneous hand raking down his face. “You’ve got to be kidding.” This man had left an air of mystery and a bit of a bloodbath in his wake when they’d last crossed paths. Perhaps not the sort of closure he should be seeking, but Liam enters the shop all the same, raising a brow at the man behind the counter. At this point, it’s almost amusing. This man with babbling baby now in arms had certainly gotten one over on him. “Don’t think that was your name when you introduced yourself to me.” Liam nods towards the name tag on the other man’s chest by way of greeting, his expression as disbelieving as it is borderline entertained. “Not that you ever said much. Just got your work done and left in the middle of the night, didn’t you?” Not sure how much of a refresher this Arthur may need, Liam finally relinquishes the details of their last interaction. “I captained the Richmond. One of my men was found dead in his bed the same night you wandered off. Pretty mysterious, if I say so myself.” There’s no malice here, truly, and he indicates as much with the shrug of his shoulders. “Guy was a regular louse as it was. I could’ve done without that cleanup, though.”

@arthur-talbot

The laughter he hears is far too deep to belong to Ciaran, though he glances down at his son, momentarily bemused, until he hears the tinkle of the bell and a man walking in. A familiar one, though in the way faces and names were vaguely familiar when he was a Riverborn: he knows it, but he can’t place where. Arthur settles Ciaran back into an area penned off for him and Phoebe, the latter of which is curled up in her playpen, so asleep she doesn’t stir when Ciaran smacks the side of it. “Giving your name out to strangers is a risky move,” he supplies, still puzzled. “You never know which person might remember it, and if you are immortal, seems like it would be easy for a determined one to find you. Like you have.” Not a good first meeting then, but the man looks too amused by the situation to be a threat. It doesn’t settle Arthur, but he doesn’t shoot him a threatening look, and it fades almost altogether at the mention of the Richmond. Pain crosses his find, the memory clawing its way to the surface and elbowing its way into place. He grimaces, waiting, well used to the sensation of a spike through his head when it comes to memories and the pieces of them he doesn’t have still. “Ah, him. Not a very nice fellow either, his stories were horrid and his music even worse,” he says with a short laugh, rubbing his forehead briefly. “Job didn’t need to be done for another week, they wanted me to have him closer to the next port, but another night of that and I would have jumped overboard myself. I am Arthur though -- you are... Liam then?”

These are the sort of questions that have gnawed at her over the years, no matter how far back in her mind she tucks them, no matter what sort of lock and key she tries to keep them bound under. “You mean am I glad to be alive?” It’s almost disbelieving, but she knows Arthur well enough now, and respects his bluntness to boot. His own explanation makes her sigh softly. This isn’t about her at all, really, and so she leaves his initial inquiry unanswered. The second seems more pertinent. “If he feels the same doubt that I did…” That’s as much as she’s willing to reveal, and Aurélie simply shakes her head. “It is difficult to imagine that, considering the support he will be surrounded by. But if he does, I will support him then as I am supporting him now. Even if it hurts, he is my husband. I will help him however I can.” What a dismal future that would be, to willingly pass through the valley of death and emerge somehow on the same side only to find that he despises his destination. She cannot see that, but perhaps it’s just blatant refusal. They deserve something kinder. If he rises at all. Aurélie’s sigh then is as weary as she feels, her eyes closing momentarily, meeting Arthur’s when they eventually open. His concern is enough to take her off guard. And so his question is all the more startling. 

A laugh is something she can’t help, wrought with disbelief now. “Pas de vie privée ici…” She murmurs with a shake of her head. Her own arms wrap around her torso as she searches for words, gaze down now thanks to shame and something else. Fear, maybe. “His name is Daniel Bisset.” An introduction she hasn’t had to make in quite some time. It only gets more complicated from there. “We were married for the better part of a decade. Until – well–” she laughs again then, swallowing hard afterward, startled by the sudden tightness in her throat. “This is normally when I confess to killing him. But I suppose I did not. Not really.” Aurélie turns to her sire suddenly, her urgency pressing. “Gabriel does not know. He cannot know, it will only upset him, and anyway…” A shrug, then, nonchalance forced. “If he does not rise it will not matter. Daniel and I will never cross paths.” As close as she’s come to a confession of her intentions. No need to spell it out. Arthur will understand, she would like to think. Even if he granted her this life, he of all people seems to understand its shortcomings. Surely he won’t burden her with any sort of objection.

Her response settles something in him, a hint of unease he hasn’t acknowledged until this moment. It’s one thing to change someone on the brink of death, where the only other choice is letting them go to the great beyond, and being selfish enough to decide you can’t stand to witness a good sort go. Another to change someone, willing or not, and only one other of his people has been along those lines and they did not fare so well. They came out the other side, hating it, and he breathes a sigh of relief at knowing, if such is Gabriel’s fate, at least he has someone on his side. He hopes not, if only because Aurélie is one of his. “Good, somewhat,” he says, nodding his head, catching the look on her face and letting any other comments on Gabriel and what would soon come be taken by the wind. Better to address the rest, like her comment in one of the few languages he’s never bothered to fully learn. Just enough knowledge to pick up the gist of her comment and laugh, short-lived at the sort of vulnerability she isn’t known to show. He shifts on the step, eyes on her face and then away, only returning at the bitter laugh and the confession. But not confession? He frowns, confused, and the sighs heavily. “Is he a lich?” he asks bluntly, running through the scenario in his head, already dismissing the possibility of cold-blooded murder from his head. “You are not the sort to take a life lightly. You forget I have seen what you will die for, and the person who does that does not kill unless she has no choice or she is scared.” Either of which is unacceptable in his book. He doesn’t know Daniel Bisset, but he’s killed people for less, knowing not even their name, and so this is no big feat. “You don’t want to tell Gabriel? Is that wise?” he asks, a tinge of concern, watching her out of the corner of his eyes. “I will not tell you what to do, you know your husband best. I just fear it eating you up inside.”

She heard his questions, but the words wouldn’t come to answer them. Too much to think through now that the had stirred her thoughts into a maelstrom. There were many and more reasons a person would want to attack her mother. She was cruel, she was a social climber who chose blood and fire as her hands up the ladder, and she…oh. As Arthur sat her on the counter it came to her, sudden as thunder. “Morrigan, she steals children like the old fashioned Fae. I do not know what for, it is not like she wanted the ones she had.” Cora said hoarsely, watching Arthur clean her scraped wrists for a moment before seeking out his eyes with her own. This woman must be one of those, and little wonder she escaped the Otherlands with a deep seated fear of someone who looked like her shadow. It didn’t excuse what she did, not by any means, but Cora could feel the shock melting away little by little now, like wax. “That must be why she was yelling that I had stolen the children. I do not…well, I look enough like her to make it hard to tell apart at a distance. Her hair is darker, her eyes are greenish, but it is close.” She had refused to talk to the police past a bare minimum in her panic, the urge to leave and go home was too strong, but Arthur had. Arthur might have learned something more. “Ahuvati, who was she? Did they tell you anything? I am not going to pretend that I care too much about her hurts, but I want to know. Know your enemy, that is the saying in English, yes?” Cora realized belatedly she was grabbing onto the shoulder of his shirt in her fervor and she let it go at once. “I am sorry. Can we hold each other, after bandages? For a while?”

Arthur could think a number of reasons someone would steal a child and none of them were very good ones. He had spent enough time around the fae, particularly some of the more old-fashioned ones, to know they didn’t do anything unless it was a benefit to them. No mention of this crossed his lips, content to listen to Cora muddle her way through the connections forming in her head and Arthur quietly cleaned the wounds on her wrist. It wasn’t so bad, though he hated to see it, even as he wrapped it with a bandage and brought the injury up to his lips, his lips a feather of a touch, more to ease the tightness in his own chest. “I do not imagine people who are stolen enjoy being face to face with someone who is similar to their captor. Let alone someone who is her daughter, and has more than a passing resemblance,” he admitted, lowering her wrist and taking inventory over the rest of her. With a cloth, Arthur gently cleaned off her face bit by bit and then brushed his fingers through her hair, more to soothe her than calm the mess of blonde hair. “She is a selkie, not long in town. From the familiarity of everyone there, this is not her first time talking with them, but I did not speak with her. Took her to the hospital to await the councilman,” he said, a proud smile on his lips, not at all appeased by the idea of the woman’s suffering. Maybe some pity, and a healthy dose of anger towards Morrigan for her hand in this, but that was all. He nodded his head, kissing her cheek once, before helping her down from the counter. Much as he wanted to carry her, he thought it best to let her walk, at least a little, as the numbness and shock faded away. He handed her clothes to sleep in, and changed himself into something more comfortable. “Always, Ahuvati. I will hold you as long as you want.” Arthur led her to the bed, pulling back the sheets for them to climb in and then holding his arms open to her. He did not need sleep, no, but resting beside her, waiting for her to fall asleep, was peaceful enough, though he knew it wouldn’t come easily that night.

The Briar thing was important, certainly. But it was also relatively dealt with, was it not? This newer discovery, that of how much he looked like Andreas’ foster parents, that was far more pressing at the moment. “No, I am thinking you just do not realize how long we live. I am over three hundred, considered young by selkie standards. Very young. My foster mother Esther? She is nine hundred years old or more.” Andreas explained, texting away on his phone to that same foster mother. Esther had stopped typing, which was concerning but not hugely surprising. There wasn’t an unobtrusive way to take a picture of Arthur without him realizing, but maybe if he was quick enough he could…and then Esther video called him, blowing the whole thing. “Bubaleh, you turn this thing at that man right now! No more with your typing.” Esther practically yelled through his speakers and Andreas sighed. You didn’t argue with his mama, you just listened and obeyed, so he turned the screen towards Arthur only to be met with narrowed eyes from Arthur and shock from Esther. Oh dear. “Mama, I think now is not…” He began, only to be cut off again. “Stom ta-peh sh-cha! Look with your eyes! You, who are you? Where were you born? I left my son in Vilnus, in the old town, by the convent. They had been hunting us for days, it was not safe and…” Andreas held up a hand to Esther. This was a little much for the poor man right now, especially after what Briar had done. “I am sorry, she is…I taught her the FaceTiming and now she just does it.” A derisive snort came from the speakers and Esther made a rude gesture at him in selkie that he ignored. “Meir and I named him Arturas, it was in the note in the blanket. I paid for someone to write it in their language, do you understand?”

The year he had spent in Lethe wasn’t long enough for him to get used to the people who looked at him the way this man was now. Arthur didn’t flinch under his eyes, scrutinizing as they were, half on Arthur and half on the phone in front of him. “I do not know much about you at all, no,” he said, sniffing the air. It wasn’t strictly true, selkies had such a distinct smell to them and he had spent enough time on the sea to recall a couple of them, but, no, not enough to carry him in this conversation about long lost parents. Parents that he thought, for a moment, were just as gone in this conversation as they were in his head until the woman was on the phone. Arthur narrowed his eyes, taking in the woman’s expression, and he had no sooner parted his lips than words were spilling from her own. His fingers in his lap, but he shifted, gripping the bench, as though struck by some unseen force. “Vilnius?” he murmured, frowning. His hometown wasn’t a place he mentioned often, or at all if he was honest, he didn’t have anything there worth remembering fondly except scars and the vague memories of Cora’s daughter. He only brought the memories up for the latter, and now, at Esther’s ungentle prodding. Worse still to have his birth name dropped into his lap with ease, though he didn’t remember all the other details. Arthur held up a hand for silence, staring off past Andreas’ shoulder vaguely. “Stop for a second, gimme... gimme a minute, because what you are saying does not make any damn sense. You trying to tell me you are my mother?” he asked, focusing on his face and then hers in turn, the sharpness returning to his eyes full force. It was a question, but Arthur didn’t want to know the answer and he stood up, shaking his head, as if he could so easily dislodge the doubts. His lips parted, and yet no words could come. Usually he tried not to make it a point to move any faster than a human, out of respect for the people in his life who couldn’t, but Arthur didn’t waste time with pleasantries. No, it was more important to get away, and fast, so he could do his own digging.

They were safe. She had that much going for her, though it felt like a hollow victory right now. They were safe, Arthur had put them to bed and she had Arthur, who was comfort incarnate to her in so many ways. She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding when he kissed her forehead, shaky and uneven. She didn’t have to be strong, yes. Not around him, that was the part he left unspoken, and she gave in to it by the time he pulled her up again, then into his arms. Lukewarm arms, but that wasn’t his fault. They would grow warm in time with the longer they touched. The tears still fell, they rolled down her cheeks in between the breaths she was trying to steady, but she had to find herself again, didn’t she? Arthur said she didn’t have to be strong, but she had to pull herself together enough to…exist, to function at the very least. “She said I took them. That I took them, like I took her. That she wasn’t going to let me hurt anyone else.” Cora said finally, her voice barely above a whisper as she nestled herself closer to him, as close as she could. There she would find the little strength she needed to explain. He deserved an explanation, did he not? “I stood in front of the stroller, asked her what she was talking about. Told her these were my children, that she was mad. And she…” Her voice cut out and she fell silent for a long moment, fiddling with the bracelet on her damaged wrist as if she needed the reminder of pain to make the outlines of her shock clearer. “She called me Morrigan. Called me a liar, a cruel bitch and…I blasted her when I fell.”

He tucked her into his arms, letting his chin rest on her head as she tried to find her strength again. If his presence was the only thing she needed, he would gladly give every bit of himself, but Arthur knew she needed to say it as much as he needed to hear it. He listened to her heartbeat for a moment, and then to her words as she found them, arms tightening around her the more she spoke. “You did well, Ahuvati, you protected them and you protected yourself,” he murmured against her hair, pressing a kissing there. One of his hands sought out one of hers, holding on gently, careful to avoid the damages done to it. He only stilled in his touches when the name popped up, one they only discussed in reference to Cora’s own past or a far distant threat. “Did she look familiar? Maybe someone you knew in the past?” Unlikely. How else would they know that name specifically? It wasn’t so common, and yet could it be a coincidence? He sighed quietly, trying to figure it out, and then just as quietly he let it go. The mysteries of it would wait until Cora was ready. “Good. Whoever this woman was, she doesn’t deserve mercy from you and if you had done worse, I would not be upset,” he promised, stroking her hair for a fleeting second before standing up with her still in his arms, walking them over to the bathroom. Arthur settled her on the counter carefully, taking off her bracelet and setting it on the counter beside her, grabbing a cloth to clean off her wrist gently. “Whoever this was, they thought you were someone else. It is not your fault, not a single part of it.”

If it hadn’t done so already, Aurélie is sure that her heart would have stopped at the sight of a man sitting on her back porch. Panic rises from her stomach and aches in her chest. A mere second stands in the way of her and hiding like a child when she realizes that this is not the ghost she’s been searching each dark corner for. No, this is a welcome face, even if he startled her so. Aurélie composes herself before walking outside, giving a curt nod at his explanation. “I appreciate it.” She murmurs, as if his silent arrival hadn’t just sent her into a tizzy. The younger vampire accepts the invitation silently, mirroring her sire’s far-off gaze. She would usually yearn for him to get to his point. But in a time like this, she is glad for the quiet, however momentary. His question raises her brows. Still, Aurélie gives a halfhearted smile before her head shakes. “I am not sure where I expected to end up. When I woke… well, I thought I was in purgatory.” She laughs, that fear seeming so ridiculous now, so far removed from it. Perhaps it hadn’t been that far off, though. Arthur’s explanation earns a quiet nod, but a shrug follows suit. “I have wondered about a greater plan. I thought maybe that was the case, for some time. Naive, maybe, but it was why I joined the military. Thought if I had all this life ahead, I should do something good. Something bigger than myself, as I had tried when I was alive.” Pleasantries thoroughly exchanged, Aurélie allows for a moment of quiet again before she tries to get to the point. “I imagine we would have received a call if you or Faolan had found anything by the river.” Gabriel’s father had been ardent in his immediate search near the Quinault. She would be out there herself if her ill husband wasn’t sleeping upstairs, if another husband didn’t wander the streets, a regular revenant. But this isn’t the time for that conversation. Instead, Aurélie finally levels her gaze with Arthur’s, even if it makes her stomach churn with dread. The offer he’d made to Gabriel looms like a fog. “You are here for something else. What is it?”

@arthur-talbot​

“Think most people consider it a purgatory when you first wake up. The way you feel is so... different than from when you fell asleep -- or that is how I went, at least,” he says with a quiet laugh, the memories so far he didn’t think of them with fear any longer. His change had not been in battle, but a methodical thing done to ensure success, much like tomorrow would be with Gabe, though he hopes it to be much warmer. It isn’t the topic he wants to discuss, but then Arthur doesn’t really have a goal here, short of offering support for all the things he knows are happening. Its a lot for any one person to take in, and he lifts his head. “Do you regret fighting to come back?” he asks, shifting to face forward knowing the question is an uncomfortable one. “I did. I think of all the things I’ve done, and the things I’m going to do, and I wondered what was the point. I don’t anymore, but when you first change, when you first get rid of that happiness of living, the doubt seeps in. Are you going to be strong enough to help his, if it comes?” There’s the meat of it, though his concern lies more in her and all the other things weighing on her. He dismisses the question about Fiona with a heavy heart, shaking his head, but it is not the point of their discussion short of being another thing around her ankle. Gabe needs strength to get through this, and Aurélie needs some, too. Arthur turns fully, gaze on her face, taking in the pain and tiredness there, and his voice goes quieter, wary of adding another weight. “You are worried about Gabe, and you are worried about Fiona, as we all are, but there is something else, too. Who is the man who made you flinch on the street?”

“Why Europe?” she giggled. “Because I always hated America? Pish posh, I can’t stand foreign accents!” She pulled back and grinned widely at him. “Not purposely. Oh God I sired my partner and its such hard work. You had so many more years of experience than me, you made it look so easy. And he fucking KILLED our girlfriend!” She started laughing at the absurdity of the memory. “She came back as a lich, lucky as we are. So it seems we’re all destined to eternal love. But you found it, too, huh? And a florist? You? Oh my God get out.” She decided she would buy Lennox some flowers on, oh, a weekly basis from now on just to chat him up every now and then, check in on Arthur and see how he was doing. There couldn’t be many in a town that was only seven miles wide. “I’ll have to stalk your place of work, maybe buy you a meal every now and then. It’s so good to see you. By the way, my name may be ‘Riot’ but I do not ‘raise hell!’” Finally, her smile lessened. If she were human her cheeks would be hurting by now, but she didn’t feel such pain. “I was never much of a trouble maker. Just because my line of work was promiscuous, and I’ve stolen for most of my life, doesn’t mean squat. That ‘raising hell’ nonsense would be Harris and Lennox. I’m the cool, level-headed one. Obviously. The brain. I would say Harris is the heart and Lennox is the hands.”

“That is because your attempt at one is horrid,” he reminded her with an arch of his brows, the amusement of their reunion fading the more she spoke about her life since he last saw her. Of all the people he sired, Penny was the one he worried about the most, and the one he most suspected would stir up trouble enough that people came asking him for help. it hadn’t happened, but Arthur was a little surprised that it hadn’t. His tone darkened a little, tinged with a confusion over her calmness. “You say that with such amusement for someone you care about dying, Penny. Vampires who can’t control themselves even around people they care about are a risk to everyone.” He had only put down one of his own people, and he hadn’t done it with a smile on his face, but duty was duty, and what hell these people raised was on his head as much as theirs. Did she feel the same way about hers? Or had luck blinded her to the risks? “How long ago did this happen? I am happy your girlfriend came back, I don’t envy having that pain over your head for eternity.” He didn’t think Penny was a liability, she was a good sort even if she didn’t act it sometimes, but Arthur studied her, curious. “Stealing is sort of obvious around here, but I assume you’ll take it as a challenge like I did when I came here. I take it those two are here, too? Got the dynamic trio coming to visit? Try not to scare my wife or my kids, I’d hate to ban you from my shop.”

Date: October 27th, 2020 Time: 6PM Location: Orion and Odette’s home on Sycamore Ct

@arthur-talbot​

“You know what I find most interesting about you, Arthur?” Orion said, several minutes after being alerted to the visitor by his smart watch and two seconds after hearing him slip out into the back garden where Orion had been reading on his braille tablet. Many things of course, such as how he simply pulled up a patio chair and didn’t bother to answer right away, as if he knew Orion was an incurable lecturer at times. Well, he probably did. Riley seemed to have acquired two fathers, one talkative and one not, but that was alright. “You walk like a tiger, but one that knows where all the creaky floorboards are. It must have made you excellent at your work, but I assume you aren’t here for pleasantries.” He sat his tablet on the table and sighed, turning his face towards the noises that indicated just where the other man had taken his seat. “I heard what happened to your wife. What happened to Riley. Cora I believe has started seeing Odette again, which is very brave of her. But Riley…I worry about Riley. And I have a feeling there are things my wife doesn’t know that you do.” Orion paused, then tapped his fingers lightly on the glass tabletop. “So lets talk about them. About anything else you’d like too, of course, but I think she’s uniquely fragile right now. And I want to help you help her in any way that I can manage. Is that alright with you?”

Surprising the Faulkner’s wasn’t the easiest thing to do, and it was why he mostly gave up on trying. Knocking on their door seemed like a thing for visitors who would take a no for an answer, and slipping into the house altogether seemed like something for family, and he didn’t... quite know how he fit into their family tree. Riley was part of his, he wasn’t necessarily part of hers, and he settled onto one of the chairs, listening patiently to Orion’s chatter. “The speed and the strength helped, too, but if you look at the people in town, you know how far that will get them. All the strength and speed in the world does not make up for stupidity, or sloppiness,” he said, relieved for the moment to be still. Fidgeting was second nature to someone who lived among humans, and yet Arthur had spent so long as a shadow that he didn’t quite master it. His time in Lethe had made him try, but there was no point in feigning humanity to a blind man. “You ask like I could stop you or your wife when you’ve made up your minds, she is as much yours as she is mine,” he pointed out when Orion finished talking, knowing better than to cut him off. Let him get it off his chest, and then speak, and it was a tactic he knew Orion utilized as well. He wasn’t here to pick fights, and he sighed. “Riley is... not handling it well. If we were out there, I could figure out a way to help her, but that was when she had only me and mine.” Now she had more, and Arthur wasn’t sure how to help her navigate those waters. Outside threats he could handle, but this was an internal battle with herself - and a battle with family. People he could not send into the river as a solution. He settled his hands on the table. “She doesn’t feel safe,” he offered, a peace offering for some unspoken tension. Perhaps the realization that neither would be leaving from Riley’s life anytime soon.

“Ja, but it would help, would it not? Unfortunately I do not think Bea knows how to apologize. She is my charge now that we know she is a selkie, I will keep her away from your wife. Your children.” Andreas said, leaning back on the bench as he warmed his hands on the tea he had bought this morning. It felt weak, this apology, but he didn’t have much room to apologize when he hadn’t done anything himself. “I do not know what I would have done if someone had done the same to my wife and child, but you are…perhaps kinder than I. What was done to her, I do not know the specifics yet, so thank you for that.” Who was she? That was a loaded question, one that he considered as he looked the other man full in the face, as if studying him as well. Esther had said…Esther, that was who this man looked like. Esther and her husband Meir, long dead but dearly missed. God, how tired was he that he missed that? Esther said Briar was a child that had been lost by the pod, but she had given a child away long ago for its own safety. A son. And this man, Arthur, he looked just like the people who had raised him once his parents had been killed. Andreas kept all of his family photos in duplicate. The physical put away in the safe at home and scans on his phone, as if to keep them with him always. So he whipped it out now, flicking through the pictures feverishly until he found a good one of Meir and Esther. “Listen, this is a strange thing to say to someone I know this, but you look just like these people. These members of my family.” He held the phone out for Arthur to see, tea suddenly forgotten beside the bench. “They had a son. Just the one. Had to give him to the humans for safety. You look just like them.”

His reassures didn’t help, but it was the best Arthur was going to get short of tossing the selkie woman into the river and letting it wash her to some other place. Somewhere that he wouldn’t have to consider how much easier it would be for Cora to sleep if she didn’t have to worry about the woman at all. “I would not consider myself kind, I have not decided if I should seek her out or not. If you say it is squashed, I won’t. If it isn’t, then I know who to find,” he said, pleasantly, the underlying threat unspoken but quite obvious. Maybe later he would regret it, but the councilman didn’t bother him anymore than the other ones did short of incompetence and he didn’t know this one enough to lump him with the rest. Arthur waited, bemused, at the strange twitch in the man as something seemed to occur to him, the answer to Arthur’s question lost to a mystery he had, at long lost, solved. He didn’t flinch or freeze at the question, a part of him sighing internally. “I am long past the stage where I’m looking for some mythical family that gave me up for some noble reason, and you are not the first to say someone looks like me,” he said dismissively. A short-lived motion when his eyes did focus on the pictures, taking in the sight of a man and woman standing beside each other, arms around each other. It was not just his face he saw in the man, but he saw Phoebe in the face of the woman with the dark hair. Arthur took the phone from him, eyeing it with a frown for several long seconds, finding small details of his own face, and his own eyes, and his ears. There was Ciaran, there was Phoebe, there was him, and yet... “Whatever son they lost, I doubt I am him. I was born almost eight hundred years ago.”

gabe-maddox‌:

Date: November 7th, 2020 Time: 3:02 am Location: Gabriel and Lielie’s house

 @aureliemarchand​ @arthur-talbot​

A point had been made to him a week prior that he shouldn’t wait out his illness until the last moment, that he had a better chance of rising if he wasn’t on death’s door at the time. By Arthur of course, who above all was a practical man who didn’t fuss around with sugar coating unless he was talking to his own children. Gabriel knew he was right, but he…well, he was afraid. It was fair to be afraid, he knew that well enough, but he also knew how short his time frame was to be messing about as well. By a week after that suggestion he was finding blood when he coughed, so finally he caved. His father was in the other room after a long, painful goodbye and his wife beside him on the sofa, with Arthur standing to the side. “I feel like one of those little old ladies in sitcoms who puts plastic on their sofa cushions.” Gabe said, prodding at the covers that he had bought the day before to avoid destroying their sofa. It had been pointed out to him that once he was drained he would collapse, so he was propped up on crinkly cushions across the chaise lounge portion of the sectional. They were all antsy, but he couldn’t put it off forever. So he sighed, then reached into his pocket for the rosary he had snagged when he was upstairs. “Lielie, ma vie, my entire soul. Your mother gave me this when I went to the funeral we held for you. So I want you to have it back. Even if I rise.” He said, grabbing her hand to fold it inside. A quick kiss, a smile he wasn’t really feeling, and he turned to Arthur. “Well, if I wait until I’m ready I’ll be waiting all my life. So I suppose now?”

Much like with Gabriel’s initial confession of his illness, Aurélie foresaw this before it was said. His declining health was evident even before the bloodied handkerchiefs began to appear, and the panic brought on by the sudden disappearance of his cousin helped nothing along, she knew that much. As much as she braced for his decision before it was made, Aurélie cannot stop her dread now. Perhaps she’d been hoping for a miracle. Should know better, really. Especially now. And yet, in the midst of this, her husband still manages to crack jokes. The smile on her face feels like the work of someone else, some sort of farce as she settles beside Gabriel, her gaze never wavering from his face. That is until he pushes something into her hand that elicits a small gasp. Her fingers curl reflexively around the beads in her hand and she exhales shakily. There are no words for this. And so she finds something else to talk about, something she’d laughed at then and still manages to laugh at now, even as her lip quivers. “Do you remember when Lucien called you that terrible name and I hit him in the mouth, in front of everyone? We had known each other only a few months. But I knew I loved you then. And now…” A moment she hasn’t contemplated in quite some time and a fact she’s certainly never spoken aloud. But they are steady until they break, her own words too hard to form. So she uses his instead. “Plus que les étoiles ci-dessus, Gabriel.” Both of her trembling hands wrap around one of his and she presses a kiss to his knuckles. Taking her time, while she still has it. Her nod is sure once she pulls away. No matter how frightening everything seems, of this she is certain. “Toujours.” 

@arthur-talbot​

He hadn’t sat by the death bed of anyone he cared about, and the emotion eating at his insides was not one he was familiar with these days. Grief, maybe, for the possibility of losing a member of his family so soon after finding it, or frustration for having an enemy he could not fight. Or sadness, for all the tender way Gabe said goodbye to each of the people he loved. Arthur stayed out of the way, arms crossed and back against the wall until Gabe summoned him over. “You can change your mind still,” he said, the last time that he would do so, the grim smile on his face all but saying he knew Gabe wouldn’t take it. He didn’t tell him it would be painful, he had already relayed his own death to Gabe in excruciating detail once before, and he would not remind him of it again, but for Cora, and for Faolan, and for Sabine in the other room, he crouched, hand on his forehead gently. “Whatever happens, I’ll take care of them. Try not to leave it in my hands, though, I think they’ll all be better off in yours.” It was a weak attempt at levity, but the smile was real. He did not do either of them the indignity of asking of her to leave, she was too stubborn and he deserved someone by his side, holding his hand. In all their talks of this event, in all the retellings they had from people who made the change, Arthur had always forgotten the initial discomfort, and then the spark of instinct, and the gluttony of draining someone to the point of death. Changing Aurélie, and changing Penny, and changing all the people he had come across hadn’t prepared him for helping Gabe who had one foot in his grave already. He drew back with a grimace, and drew a blade down his wrist mechanically, lost in the process, letting instincts and memory guide his steps. “We should give him some every fifteen minutes,” he murmured, to Aurélie, head lifting to hers with some dizziness, holding his wrist aloft. “Not you. We don’t want to mix blood yet, he’ll need mine. But when he wakes up, he’ll need some. Suppose we don’t have fresh handy.”

@aureliemarchand​

His list of people who matter in Lethe grows by the day, some added without his volition from the people who care enough about them to mention a name in his presence. And he loves his people, he’ll add an extra loop around another block to keep someone on their list safe. Aurélie is a mixture of both, important because of Gabe, who is Cora’s, and then important because she was his, in the sense that he owes her. When you save someone, their life becomes your responsibility and, well, he has plenty of reasons to worry about her. Gabe, for starters, and then something else that makes her face twist in public the last time he saw her. “I would have rang the door bell, but I have no idea of Gabe’s schedule,” he says in a low tone, sitting on the steps in her backyard rather than loitering in the front. Its peaceful outside for the first time since October ended, something they could use, and both can still hear the movements inside the house enough to justify enjoying it. He lifts his hand, gesturing outside, in a silent request for her to join him. Arthur doesn’t look at her, reclining back on his palms, eyes on something in the distance. “Did you ever think you’d end up here? After you woke up alive in that shallow grave of yours?” He didn’t show up for philosophical questions, but a part of him wonders nonetheless if he granted her a mercy or a prison when he chose to save her. “Speaking for myself, but I sure as hell didn’t. Personally, thought I’d have been put in the ground a couple decades ago, but guess there was some other plan for me. If you believe in that sorta thing.”