in a moment of madness!

The forest outskirts of Rome— that seemed enough of a neutral ground as any and as close to the feeling of the swamplands as the two were going to get. Oak and poplar surrounded them instead of the usual cypresses, but fresh air was really what they desperately craved. A necessary reprieve from the destruction surrounding the wedding and looking out the window only to find bits of smoke hanging over gaps of the city. Should they even still be here? In the city, that is, or even the country? Not that Casper would ever sway Marcella away from a place she was finding unity, but everyone had to weigh their options and decide on their limitations. It came from a place of extreme worry and noticing gaps in his actions following his ravaging hunger, feeling his youth as his monster once more. But while the thoughts spun wildly in his own mind, only the sound of woodland creatures stirring and their own breathing hung between. If there was nothing good to say, then don’t say anything at all; half correct words his subconscious brought about that more than likely held attachments to his southern upbringing.

“There’s a spot just outside the city where we could rent a cabin for a couple days,” he could even have someone pack a quick bag for them, allowing Marcella whatever room she needed to process. He, in all honesty, could use the detachment and re-evaluate what a future in Italy meant for the both of them. “Go home when we are ready— go under the radar for a few days,” his emerald hues studied her expression, though the only thing he managed to capture was how shaken her amber-tinted hues looked back at him. Yet it was like beating around the bush and soon an empathetic sigh escaped to press lightly, “Do our own ceremony for her.”

@caspermhahn​ location: Hahn Residence notes: sad boi hours

The floor was a comfortable place to grieve, the last of his dwindling connection to Remi was leaving the faiman’s system and pretty soon Ezekiel wouldn’t be able to feel him at all. Every now and then he caught glimpses of euphoric bliss and pleasure, well aware that Remi let others feed off of him for income, it didn’t make it hurt any less. He’d ended up at Marcella and Casper’s place that afternoon and started working through the other’s liquor collection as he talked incessantly about the faiman. His eyes were on the ceiling above him as he managed to finally cross the vampiric threshold of eternally sober to at least a little buzzed. “How did you two make it work?” Ezekiel asked, he imagined it must have been hard for Casper and Marcella. She was a witch, her blood was potent - Ezekiel knew, he’d tasted it - but as far as he knew the other vampire had never lost control around her. Zeke couldn’t say the same, twice was too many times already. 

-

Dusk had just started to creep through the long tapestry shaded windows that Marcella had hung herself. The place they had now called home was one that had all been her own choosing, which was something Casper had preferred anyway, given this was a space that she would utilize the most. Years of film projects left him comfortable in hotel rooms and found that most spaces he owned or rented just ended up being a place to store his stuff. They had similar enough style that it never bothered him what became permanent fixtures inside the house anyway, often bringing in some of the most strange and macabre items from travels. The couch the fellow Pluto vampire found himself prawned across was another one of various purchases, just like the tapestries, and hugged Casper as his emerald eyes bounced back over to the vampire on his floor. ‘How did you two make it work?’ To him, that was the equivalent of asking a scientist to explain dark matter and for a moment— Casper only bore his irises into Zeke before looking back at his own drink.

“It’s a lot of things,” his eyebrows furrowed as his voice took a more serious tone, a rarity, but there was something different in their bond now. Swiftly he moved to pour more into their glasses and find comfort again in his former spot, letting out a snort as he tried to form coherent words, “I had to avoid being around her and my family for a bit. Hide out in the swamps, fed on thralls and accidentally drained a couple of them. Managed to find support from other vampires who curbed my hunger and taught me better control, but— ” Lips found the edge of his liquor glass, taking a large drink as he gave an all too relaxed shrug, “But I guess my will has always been stronger than my nerves. And I don’t know. Marcella and I have known each other since childhood, we don’t have secrets.”

*

“That’s me, I own this place and run it. You don’t get in that ring unless you come through me. Aelia Maia, nice to make your acquaintance.” She doesn’t drop her boots from the desk but instead reviews him with an scrutinizing gaze. He was lean and tall, there was muscle in his frame and more importantly the scent of blood that surrounded him which marked him clearly as a vampire. “I try to organize fights that will be of interest to the crowd. Is there a supernatural species that you’ve always wanted to fight against?” Aelia tended to encourage discord and disharmony among her fighters, she wasn’t keen on the ideals of a big adoptive family. Not everyone lasted through the week and the aggression from outside the ring only provided useful when the time for the fight came. “Have you ever fought before?”

-

There could be a lot said about a person by the first interaction with them, not that Casper was hooked on the idea of them being the most significant but Aelia managed to make hers stand out. Especially the order in which she decided to ask questions and it gave the vampire enough understanding that it mattered more to her that hostilities truly showed out in the ring. He flashed another cheshire grin towards her, feet still firmly planted in the same location as his emerald hues noticed no movement from the other. A casual shrug followed before he pursed his lips, “Can’t say I have ever had a preference.” The statement was quick as he thought back to the fights he had actually been in. Bar brawls, bloody noses, and mostly fists flying due to ego and a miscommunication. Or Casper just couldn’t find an excuse to back down, “Never fought like this— with a sign up sheet and a guaranteed crowd.” Those things existed back in his hometown and in pockets all over the states, but he had always found a reason to stay in the shadows instead of the limelight, “I’m Casper, by the way, it's a pleasure.” But as long as the two weren’t budging from their locations, a handshake wouldn’t find its moment between them.

“I’m here when I need tae be.” He says absently, too amused with the wrapping paper to delve deeper into it. It’s been nearly a year and the flat is nice, it’s not too spacious, it has a great view, but aside from the second bedroom that he’d converted into a darkroom and his closet, the place was too pristine to feel lived in. Briefly, he wonders what Casper and his lass’s place must look like, he’ll have to drop by for once instead of meeting out in public or at his flat. Something makes him think that the Halloween decor stayed up year round and just the thought has his the corner of his lips quirking up just a little. He steps aside to let Casper inside and he’s too curious to not carefully rip into the present as his foot slides the door shut behind them. It’s too sweet really, the gold bangle is beautifully crafted, the year stamped on the inside. He’s seen the dark haired lass at the market with all of her jewelry and it hits him as he slides the bracelet onto his wrist that he fits into Casper’s life somehow. “Thank ye, that’s very sweet.” And it’s just the slightest bit sheepish as he moves from the entryway to the bedroom and back all too quickly. “There used tae be a wee bit of a tradition.” He explains as he hands Casper the black velvet ring box he’d retrieved from his dresser drawer. “First gift Gav really gave anybody, whether he was their sire or nae, he always got them something.” And he’d had varying reactions to it throughout the years, he’d been too jealous for his own good. But if Gavyn would have still been there, he would have done something for Casper and the silver signet ring stamped with a thistle was a little piece of home. Jamie’s got that same thistle tattooed underneath the left side of his collarbone and Gavyn had it on things all over the estate. It was the gentlest and least awkward way to welcome the younger vampire to what was left of his little found family. “An’ there’s something else but it warrants a drink an’ a serious discussion.” 

-

It’s exciting to watch another receive and open a gift, even if you already know what is inside, emerald hues latching onto Jamie’s stormy blue’s as parts of his face bit back childlike eagerness. Casper understood the look well, often displaying that in his own features and found familiarity in it. Soon he was mimicking the behaviors and felt that jitter as the wrapping came apart, and noticed how delicately Jamie removed the gold bangle from its boxing. Marcella’s signature mark reflected in the slow light as the fellow vampire slipped the jewelry on, becoming almost a part of him as if the bangle had always been there. “Suits you,” he states in a way that shows his own surprise before eyebrows furrowed in confusion at the slinking way leaves and reenters the room, “-and what’s all this for?” Sure, Casper dished out gifts but there was never any expectations in return and it suddenly dawns on him that this black velvet box had been planned despite his own inclination.

There is also a realization that this would be their first holiday without him. And by their, he wouldn’t be including himself, but Dianna and all the other vampire’s that Gavyn had taken under his wing. At times, the whole experience of being adopted so late into the family was as if he was arriving at the final stages of a long party. ‘This was’ and ‘Would have’ are common phrases that gave Casper an ache deep in his belly, often leaving him to feel like a child asking an older sibling about their dead parent.

But instead of asking questions, the shine of the ring and the stamped thistle pull him back to the sounds of adopted children littering the floors of his parents home in New Orleans. The smell of the swamp mixed with all the holiday aroma’s of his mother’s baked goods— home. “This is really exceptional,” his emerald hues are soft as he looks to Jamie before slipping it onto his finger, securely next to the one Marcella had continued to adjust over the years. The other vampire might have been disguising the gift in all the traditions of Gavyn, Jamie hardly needed to keep with it and that detail was not lost on Casper. When he looked upon the ring in the future, it wouldn’t be Gavyn’s face he would see but the one who passed the velvet ring box in the first place. A cheshire grin molds from the soft one it held before as he listens to the fellow vampire, rhetorical question flooding from his lips, “Isn’t there usually something else?”

            As much as others might assume he’d find enjoyment in terrorizing civilians during Christmas, his perspective is the opposite. Yoshinori has always participated for social and spiritual reasons. The holiday season reminds him that there can be goodness among others, and although it doesn’t align religiously with him, the value of peace itself remained fine enough to partake in the festivities. He wouldn’t rob someone of their joy at this current moment. Consider this potentially the only period where Yoshinori thrives off of being unproblematic, parading his sensibility. “It’s gotten real fucking ridiculous over the years,” the male confessed, despising too much of the sentimental values in gifts. “At least the snacks being sold are great. It distracts me from warning others that they’re purposefully hiking the price of items since Christmas is in a few days.” The scrambling to purchase last minute items baffles him profusely, too, beguiled of his time.

-

A short snicker escaped the vampire, eyes still unable to look fully away from the holiday display and kept searching for a price tag to imply what the store sold. The scent of candied goodies or holiday breads hadn’t escaped him and the vampire would be lying if he said he didn’t miss them. While there had always been an unnatural way that Casper was able to switch from witch to vampire with ease, pieces of his mortal life were still too close to him not to give him some kind of pause. Gingerbread cookies, molasses bread— swampland cypress mixed with holiday pine and cinnamon. His mother would no doubt have started decorating the day after Thanksgiving, as per her tradition, and would have planned to leave the twinkling white lights on the house well past February. “What is that you're eating anyway?” the vampire stated after turning his attention fully to the man chowing down next to him.

-

“I had to sacrifice someone to join.” Her tone is desperately clinging to being casual. Because such things are casual for them, they have dead things in the house, Casper himself is technically dead. They’re not really shy about any of that, they haven’t been for the years they’ve known each other. Marcella has always thought it had a little bit to do with where they came from, death and decay were just things you dealt with in the swamp. “I picked one of the old crones that used to look down on me.” Not her mother, which is the constant elephant in the room, the person that she should have gone after. But she was an obvious choice, and someone she vowed that she would come back for one day. “August, the witch who owns Fates’, he was the first member. There’s a druid, that witch that owns the bookstore.” Because she can’t just sit right, her knees tuck up to her chest on the stool and she knows it makes her looks small, it’s how she feels when she thinks about all of the people. Killing someone she didn’t like was easy, trying to fit in with a group of witches though? It’d always been the two of them, sure they had mutual friends, they had people back home, but ultimately- “Zeke’s a vampire. Pluto, like you. It happened a few months ago.” That’s something he needs to know and she’s frowning, brow furrowed in concern. It’s funny how the former Amaranthus witch had gone from an annoyance to someone she truly cared about and trusted. “He doesn’t know about the coven, nobody does. It’s probably best that way.”

-

There is only the slight cracking in her voice that there was before, as the words flooded from her lips— a kind of confidence took her over and Casper could hear it as her explanation was allowed to take up the air between them. It made sense who she picked, though there was a part of him that questioned if the choice was simply a warm up to who Marcella really wished it to be. That’s how most of these things took root and flourished, by such a small seed. A small action. Eventually the time would be right for the face that the vampire knew still haunted the witch each night, “No one will miss her anyway.” Which was true, they both knew it and it didn’t take Casper much convincing that the sacrifice left them all better off. The real question was what deity might have been benefiting from Marcella’s deed, but now wasn’t the time to ask as he listened carefully to the members list. Most notable was August, someone which he wouldn’t say he knew on a deep level but at least it was a name the vampire recognized, and that they already managed to snag a druid on their roster.

“Pluto?” The subject was quickly changing to the one Casper once called his thrall, emerald irises snapping to Marcella’s only to capture her seriousness. His eyebrows soon furrowed to match hers as he let out an uncontainable sigh as he turned his attention back to the coffee that’s ready to serve. It’s a lot of information at once, but he’s accustomed to that and finds comfort there that keeps him holding that corner lip smirk. A laugh may have escaped, too, if he hadn’t already heard her say something similar in a different context. Casper was exempt from the word nobody. Nothing stays buried within, that was the very foundation of their relationship. “Nobody needs to know that doesn’t need to know,” his tone was reassuring, hands gripping lightly onto the saucer before pushing it across the breakfast bar, “hm, so- who’s the Sire?”

who: @senatusstarters​ where: dante’s

She’s having a drink and her feet are up, black combat boots are up on a filing cabinet as she sits in the main room of the fight club. It’s empty and its daytime, the clink of ice in the whiskey glass grounds her. Sunlight filters through the dusty blinds and time had just fractured once again. Moments before, it was midnight and she was standing in a graveyard, hunger had driven her to feast on a restless mourner and in her hands was a bloody heart – blood soaked down her dress, ran down her hands and stained her jaw and cheeks.

The sunlight in Dante’s feels wrong and she is still half feral as she hears the footsteps of another, an cool sense of collection comes upon her even as everything is distorted and nothing is right. “Have you come to sign up for a fight?”

-

He hadn’t originally. Planned to sign up for a fight, that is, but the thought mingles in his mind far too long which usually means he’s allowing it to take hold. There were several people that came to mind when it came to the promise of being on his best behavior, though this was more of an organized scene than the usual bar brawl he’d accidentally find himself in. Maybe this wouldn’t count and a devious smirk crossed his lips, “Maybe.” The words were quick as his emerald hues took in his surroundings and the relaxed nature of the one in front of him, dirty boots prompted on rusted metal, the familiar scent of whiskey brushing his nostrils. All the trademarked behaviors of someone who called this place their usual spot, “Is that something you handle?” Probably one of the workers, but with how desolate the place was currently— it might be a safe assumption that this was the owner itself.

“Are you ready to head out?” The question slipped from his tongue as the fellow vampire entered the threshold of Dianna’s home, taking in the little changes in decor that reflected the holiday season before gently kissing her cheeks in greeting, “It’s really no rush, I know I’m a bit early.” This was mostly due to eagerness to see her, seeing and treating her as if she was his second mother that deserved just as much as his own. Though it also allowed for more time chatting about any scandals Casper may have missed while he was busy working, knowing that not everything can easily be explained in a phone conversation or quick text. Emerald hues landed back on Dianna before presenting her with a neatly packed present, more traditional in its wrapping of gold and holly plants that only Marcella could wrap this neatly, “Happy Holiday’s from us.”

It had never been Casper’s favorite holiday or really favorite time of the year, but there was something about the blanket of snow and sound of wind chiming holiday bells that shook loose the holiday spirit. Halloween, since youth, was the one he and his family always went all out for. Mostly with the encouragement of his father, but the absence of himself in Rome and work taking over his mind— it seemed more than fitting to put more of his efforts into this one. A large tote hung on one side of his shoulder as he made his way down the market path, the smell of milled wine and cinnamon filling him as he sauntered. The start of the solstice hung in the air as his emerald hues bounced from sparkling jewelry to holiday gift baskets, excited for what the artisanal crafts might bring and who he might bump into during the bustle. “They’ve overdone themselves,” his lips muttered as he gazed on another storefront window display, triggering a snicker, “can’t even tell what they sell anymore.”

The whole process was starting to feel routine, though checking in with those he considered his found family was far from something that caused stagnation. Especially when Casper knew there could be news and stories attached. It’s the same reason he would invite Dianna to dinner, take a moment to speak with his former thrall, and hear what rippled like an earthquake while he had been absent from friends at local bars. There was always a part of him that would get a thrill out of the encounters, even when those he spoke to seemed to lack information, there was something new to be discovered by everyone. But Jamie, though their time together was limited when it came to vampire years, held a different place within Casper that he couldn’t quite describe. Feet scuffed the ground just in front of the fellow vampire’s door before buzzing to be let in, unable to recall fully the last time he had been here, yet his body moved instinctually. “I’m surprised you’re here, wasn’t sure yah even used the casa much anymore,” emerald irises scanning the entryway that held no evidence that swayed him in either direction, “Didn’t think it would be safe to just leave this outside.” Hands clasped a neatly wrapped package in holiday wrapping that sported a horror twist to those looking closely, “Here, it’s from Marcella and I.”

Maybe it was because Casper had always expected to be the one that a tinge of emotion bubbled deep within him— the sire to accidently slip from feeding to becoming a sire one night in the back alleyway of Rome when it came to the newly formed vampire in front of him. Pluto, just like himself, and without any kind of direction at the beginning but Zeke had friends. It felt as though he was almost looking into a mirror when it came right down to it and if Marcella hadn’t specified, the vampire would have thought she was describing pieces of himself. “Would you like another?” his eyebrows moving upward quickly as his emerald hues bounced to the drink on the table between them. In the past, places like Just A Bite or Il Cane Nero seemed fitting enough for a thrall encounter, though that no longer was the case. Before the other could answer, Casper was lifting himself from his comfortable position and made his way to his personal bartop. A gift from his father after the couple had settled into Italy and served more than just traditional cocktails, fingertips gripping a tall crystal decanter full of a certain rich burgundy liquid, “I picked up this grade in my travels, they always advertise that regional food or drink might alter the taste.” He let out a snort that triggered a shrug, “Probably just a crock of shit, but guess I like to think there is a difference between farm-to-table and fast food.”

-

She steps back and looks up at him and all of that anxiety, all of those nerves in her gut, they go right out the window as her eyes follow him as he moves from the doorway to the kitchen. It’s still a lot to talk about and Marcella has notes on all this, she’s prepared so much as she’s paced the metalworking studio and chewed the inside of her cheek. There is always the soft whisper at the back of her head wondering if one day she was indeed going to be too much, if someone else was going to just dump her somewhere. It’s the trauma, it’s her mother, she knows that much. She’d spent years holding her tongue after she’d started being locked out of the house, forced to wander the swamps if she’d displeased the woman. It wasn’t so much a possibility now, but metaphorically it was still an option. To be left out in the cold by the one person she really, truly cared about, it’d destroy her at this point. Barefoot, she pads towards the kitchen and seats herself at the marble island there only to rest her elbows upon it’s surface and lace her fingers together. “I joined a coven. Not the Narcissus or Amaranthus, but something else that’s better for me and what I can do.”

-

A coven. The words almost sounded like a bell as they fluttered through Casper’s ears, knowing that the witch could have whispered and he would have felt the same triggering response. Though his stoic features spoke differently, as he proceeded to start up the moka pot and listened. It seemed odd if he said it aloud, Casper knew as much, that it wasn’t that she was joining a coven that was weird but it was weird that she was joining a coven. But there was a history there in his reaction, knowing that his mother had offered a place amongst her own coven for Marcella that was politely declined. If your gut instinct isn’t in it, then there is no reason to force it and that was something all the Hahn’s understood. A snicker flooded his lips after a moment, emerald hues flashing towards her nervous silhouette at the island and gave her an assuring grin, “Must be noteworthy and peculiar if it piqued your interests.” Bubbling and crackling begins, coffee scent slowly filling the space between them, “Would I know any of them?”