prodigal

Liam isn’t a surprise, and he half wishes his friend had been several days later when August can toss this ridiculous sling into the trash where it belongs and not explain a lick of how he got it. It’s too late for it now. “I was not actually on duty when this happened.” August shrugs, winces, and then gestures him inside with a wary glance over his shoulder. He hasn’t seen Daniel much, a worry itself, but he’s seen snippets of Mary and he prefers to avoid anymore sightings of them. The door closes behind him, and August leads him further inside. “You can have your room still. Delilah left a while ago, so we should not have any other surprise house guests unless something particularly unusual happens in the next few weeks,” he states with a nod, figuring Liam wants a moment to drop his stuff off somewhere, but they are set aside near the door. Ah, no time for it, it’s not like Liam came with much more than a bag and whatever his arms can hold. “Nonsense, you can stay as long as you want, what use do I have for those extra rooms? I did not open the door on yours for several months.” August directs them to the couch, plopping down onto the cushions and setting his feet on the wooden coffee table with a pained grunt. “You sure you want to know? You leave for a little, and you miss out on all the fun. Remind me, did I tell you that Daniel’s ex-wife lived in town?” he asks, brows furrowing. He doesn’t know where to start with this story, truthfully, even if Liam no doubt knows pieces of it. “I do not recall off the top of my head, but if I did not: her name is Aurélie, and she is… a friend of sorts, I suppose. She is not at all what Daniel tried to make her seem, but I did not realize how… intense he was about wanting to be rid of her.” Which is mostly why he tried to avoid mentioning her, but August can see how that failed.

August’s hesitation, his quick ushering inside – it’s enough to set Liam’s nerves on edge. He’s not the type for panic, though, simply shooting a glance over his own shoulder in the direction his friend had looked. “Thank you. Promise I won’t darken your door for too long. I’ll find something more permanent and less in your hair.” But there are more pertinent things to discuss than living arrangements, and so Liam wheels back toward his accommodating house with an inquisitive gaze. “Well, I’ll be sure to clean the dust off,” he replies, a simple jest before he gets to the heart of things. “Knew he’d been married, but not to someone, well. Like us.” Liam replies, crossing his arms and knowing they’re nowhere near what truly matters. His foot is tapping by the time August hints toward the problem. “Where did that leave you? In the crossfire?” Blue eyes dart over his friend’s face before Liam sighs, running a hand down his jaw. “So Daniel’s been causing trouble.” What’s new? His definition for trouble is beyond what most would consider, maybe, but there’s no better way to frame it. “Is he rid of her, then? Or is that where you come in?” From the expression on August’s face, he can guess as much, and Liam shakes his head. “So he’s probably livid. Fantastic. Guess I’ll be having a word with him about how to behave. He tends to forget when he’s not kept on a leash.” His jaw is working, brow furrowed. How quickly things seem to unravel when they’re on Daniel’s terms. And how quickly he’d forgotten. For now, though: “Are you alright, then? You and, uh... you and the ex-wife? Have you seen Daniel since?”

Date: January 30th 2021 Time: 12:02 AM Location: An alleyway near Lethe Hospital

@liamlockhart​

Orion had no illusions about the state of Lethe these days, but he hardly wanted to ask his wife to ferry him to and fro everywhere he went. Some clients had emergencies, sometimes things ran rather late, so it had seemed a fair thing to stay until midnight and walk home alone. Properly alone, Maggie was at the vet until tomorrow morning, but he didn’t mind. Until he heard footsteps behind, felt a hand as cold as his own but stronger, far stronger, whip him around and shove him into a wall. Orion had not thought his ears capable of ringing anymore, but ring they did, enough so that he couldn’t even begin to hear what the woman was saying. Did it really matter? Not as much as the blows she rained down on him, the attempts he made to protect himself as feeble as could be given he had no idea what direction that she was coming from. He couldn’t bleed, couldn’t die, but he could feel pain. That was the nasty part of being a lich. He felt when his shoulder was jammed out of place, when a finger was snapped back as he reached out to cover himself. Fear hadn’t been a huge part of his life, at least not for himself, but it was all he felt by the time someone, some stranger pulled the woman away from him. Orion’s hands were shaking by then. He counted off the seconds to see if maybe she was just feinting, but no. Dimly he heard her being told to leave, to get out of here, and footsteps moving closer to himself. “I hope you aren’t here to give me a second round. Just because I can’t die from it doesn’t mean it’s painless.” Orion said, backing against the wall. “Who are you? Who was that woman? Obviously I can’t see either of you.”

It had become an occupation of sorts before he’d fled back to the sea: cleaning up after the tumultuous Bisset siblings. Edmund, at least, knew how to clean up after himself. Dangerous, maybe, considering how that talent coincided with so many secrets kept. But it led to less back alley fights, less blood for Liam to remove from the scene. No blood at all this time around, actually – that’s one of the first things he notes after realizing the initial contact. “Mary!” The shouting isn’t enough, but of course it isn’t. He’s getting rusty, unaccustomed from so many years away. No, he must rip her away like a persistent child, all clenched fists and bared fangs. “I don’t know if you realize, but this is the closest thing you’ve had to a real home in quite some time. If you or Daniel ruin it, you’re without anything. Edmund’s not here anymore. So don’t create a goddamn mess you can’t clean up.” Looking thoroughly chided, Mary opens her mouth for rebuttal but Liam doesn’t allow it, giving a sharp shake of his head. He knows better. “Go. Get the hell out of here before I report you to the police myself.” Easy, really, considering his current roommate. Bringing about actual consequence, however, is likely easier said than done. No secret that August has always held a torch for the younger Bisset sibling – but that’s a problem for another day, as Mary turns tail and heads out with some scalding remark he hardly pays attention to. Instead, he turns back to this blind doctor fellow with a weary sigh. His mother’s new husband, if he remembers right, and he knows he does. “Not on the agenda, no, unless that’s what you were looking for.” There’s no way in hell this man had started the fight, but the joke extracts some tension, if nothing else. At least on his own behalf. The trembling man doesn’t look so convinced. “Ah, Liam. It’s Liam... Lockhart.” Odette’s son, those had been the words bidding him. But that’s a moniker he can’t remember ever using. Not so easy to start. “And that was Mary. My, uh, unfortunate sister, of sorts. Apologies for her. Grief has made her lash out, but that’s no excuse.” And how sick he is of making those sorts of excuses. “I’m... not sure how to help. You’re as dead as I am, it seems, but not a vampire, right? So blood won’t be of much use. Should I escort you back to the hospital, then?”

@august-ulrich​

It’s not as if he didn’t call in advance. He did – a couple of days ago, in fact, when his feet were on solid ground and the ship he’d tended to for so long was but a speck on the horizon. He’s not sure he’ll ever truly be able to put into words what made him loose his ties to the Richmond, but in his heart of hearts, he knows it was the right thing, letting go. The thing he was bound to by duty, maybe. But he won’t search so much into it. No, really, if he is to return to Lethe, the most pressing matter is where he’ll live. August had accused him of loitering when he’d tried to hunker down by the river on his first venture into town, so it’s August he calls now, seeking shelter. August whose door Liam knocks upon, his scant belongings in his arms or tucked into the bag slung onto his back. Some of which he sets down in order to greet his friend properly, but he doesn’t get the chance, instead taken aback by his appearance. “Well then. Police work taking its toll?” His brow furrows as he observes the sling the other man sports. “You alright?” And then, with a sigh, he hefts his belongings up again. “Besides that, ah, thank you for letting me stay here. I shouldn’t be long. Sure I’ll find a place that doesn’t infringe upon you.” Once he’s crossed the threshold, once bags and boxes are sat down, Liam turns to his host with a question in his eyes. One he’s, frankly, not so keen on asking. “Now... what exactly have I missed?”

Date: January 27th 2021 Time: 7:05 pm Location: On the path toward August and Liam’s house

@johannakoning​

Not exactly the way he’d wanted to spend his night. But, really, who could temper Daniel Bisset if not him? No one, it would seem, considering the blood he now sports. Some his, some that of his pseudo brother. Thankful, isn’t he, for the lack of true connection. Hardly brothers. Especially now, after Daniel has wreaked so much havoc in such a short amount of time? Scandal in the newspaper, assaulting friends and, apparently, an ex spouse – this troublesome news was enough for Liam to seek a confrontation. An attempt at tempering. It’d turned into quite the opposite, though, when punches were thrown and an angry draw called. Those punches are what he sports the marks of, and though he can feel them healing with haste, he’ll still have to answer for them. To August and – “Ah, shit.” To Johanna. Whom he’d offered limited explanation for his departure and no real date of reference for his return. Had he wanted to return? Maybe. He’s here now, isn’t he? And worse for wear, which has led to worry written all over Jo’s face. “Johanna.” He clears his throat, then, wanting to apologize. Is it meant for her? No way to be sure. “Ah, it’s not entirely mine. Which maybe isn’t consolation, but... just a bit of a scuffle. No harm done, really.” A hand run down his jaw, a sigh, weary, regretful. “This isn’t really how I wanted to greet you. Planned to stop by the shop tomorrow, you know. But, well. Here we are.” It’s as much of an explanation as he can manage. His focus turns to her instead. “How are you, then? Alright?”

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?”

“Suppose I should’ve learned that by now.” Liam quips back easily, more amused than anything else, really. He should probably be more upset about the mistake he’d made in allowing this Arthur aboard, but this is a bygone he’s willing to let be a bygone. His brow lofts at the next comment, and Liam huffs. “I didn’t come here determined to find you, rest assured.” He shakes his head, wanting this conversation to stay lighthearted. He’s not about to pick a fight against a man with a baby on his hip. Done worst in the past, sure, but again: bygones. Liam instead squints at the man as he winces. Regret, then? He himself is not too sorry about the loss of that scoundrel, but Arthur’s reaction is making him think maybe he should be. A shame, really. Maybe he is too hardened at this point. Still, the joke gets something akin to a laugh out of him and Liam allows the confusing flash of pain go by without question. None of his business, as he sees it. “Not exactly a gentleman, no. But I was surprised someone wanted him dead. He was a nuisance, but I didn’t think him to be dangerous. People can surprise you, though, eh?” His fingers toy with one of the baubles on a bluebell and he shakes his head. “Imagine jumping overboard would’ve done as much damage to you as its done to me.” No heartbeat on this one, and it’s not shocking, not around here. Surprising that he hadn’t caught on aboard the ship, but those water-tossed years always did make him rusty. “Yes, that’s me. Had to leave the Richmond in other hands recently, sorry to say. Hope to be back aboard soon. Did you always live here, then? Didn’t discover this little nook of a town until recently, myself.”

Orion had a bone to pick with the universe as a whole, but specifically with Lethe and how ‘dead’ didn’t seem to be dead for the vast majority. Sure, he didn’t have much room to talk given what he was, but when precisely were relatives and friends going to stop popping out of the woodwork like undead daisies? That was the real question here. Liam Lockhart the man says, as if it’s a commonplace name, as if he hasn’t heard it from his wife’s lips in conjunction with tears. Matters to attend to indeed. So a vampire, like dear Riley. There was no other reason someone born human would live this long and be setting out for a blood pickup. He realized belatedly that he had lapsed into a semi-rude silence and he dragged himself mentally to the point. “Quite a fine name, Liam Lockhart. My wife’s prior name was Lockhart, my stepdaughter’s name is Lockhart.” Orion said, deciding to call a duck and duck and get it over with. Either the man would bolt or he was the right Liam, but it was a chance worth taking. “She had a son named Liam, once upon a time. So tell me, Mr. Lockhart, precisely how old are you? A tad over two hundred? I mean not to scare you off, sir, but the coincidences are past the pale. And if you are the Liam I suspect, I would dearly love to make your acquaintance.”

It’s been quiet for a moment since his introduction, and really, that tends to be enough to make him start to fret. Running with Edmund will lead to such things, people recalling your name with bitterness or outright loathing. So Liam is braced for... something. Some sort of confrontation or questioning about misdeeds done and, more than likely, a life ended. And so the commentary about names, the coincidence of it all, well. That’s disarming to say the least. Hard to swallow, too. It’s not as if he doesn’t know about his mother. Alive, or resembling it, in the same way he is. Having left their family behind and gotten this new husband, to boot. Centuries have passed, so perhaps it should be expected. Doesn’t help the sting of it, though. Time heals all wounds, they claim. Seems like bullshit. “Ah, yes. Something thereabouts. Can’t say I’ve, ah, kept up with tracking it, exactly.” Staggering, isn’t it? This crossing of paths. To be rediscovering his family through this... liaison of sorts. What can he say to this man, who clearly knows about him already? “Certainly seems like once upon a time.” Oh, the bitterness. There it is, like seawater in a wound. Stinging, still. “Well, then. That’s certainly, ah... it’s something. Coincidence, sure.” A beat as he exhales, trying to steady himself against the tumultuous tide of it all. “Have you and your wife been in this town long?” Liam deserves to know, doesn’t he? The history of his mother, this Orion’s wife -- has this been her refuge for the entirety of her centuries spent away? It isn’t as if he’d spent years searching for her, but to know her whereabouts makes the situation all the more real. “I can’t say I was aware of where exactly her new life led her.”

“I don’t look bad enough to call upon your deity,” she scoffs, swiping hair off her forehead, a twist in her lips as her fingers over the bruise. The vampires who come to the Otherlands are destroyed on sight, lest they start a blood bath of pretty faes, and she’s only faced one once in all her centuries. Not bad, really. “I was sloppy though, I will get her next time.” Its as much a promise as it is a threat. Briar stares at this man, with his hands held up and his attempt at soothing, and narrows her eyes. “My kind? How do you know what I am?” she asks, suspicious, swiping the blood off her face and smearing it across her cheek instead. “There is no secrecy or mystery in this town, everyone knows everyone and everyone knows everything.” She hates it more because she’s the one in the dark, always stuck questioning who is who and what is what. Her eyes flicker to his, and the blueness of them sends an annoying lurch in her chest for someone that is, after all, gone. Someone she didn’t know long enough to grieve, but knew enough to feel… like this. Briar shakes it off, and if he mistakes her bristling with annoyance for her own feelings to be something about the woman, then she lets him. “Who is she? I didn’t catch her name, she didn’t launch into pleasantries first, its a weakness people in this town have in spades.” She takes a step, frowning. Her vision falters a moment, black spots appearing in her vision, and she stumbles, wincing, her knees hitting the floor. Anger and embarrassment flood her in equal measure. “Fuck. I’m going to kill her.” 

“Agree to disagree,” Liam quips though he moves no closer, not wanting to push boundaries here. She looks like hell -- perhaps not worse case scenario, but not exactly ideal, either. Liam raises his brow as the selkie goes on. Her confidence could be ignorance, but still, it’s impressive. “Will you? She’s quite the foe, that one, as I’m sure you figured out already. But I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt. You seem like a fighter yourself.” He’s looking like a regular turncoat right now, hands raised in surrender to this brash selkie. But he’s not keen on a fight. Not today. So he stays like that, even as she pushes irate questions his way. “Can’t be sure, but there’s a certain smell to it. Every species has one. Blame the vampirism, if you will.” He laughs at her next comment, though it’s from of a bitter taste of irony more than anything else. “You’re right on that front. I’ve felt that way, too, anyhow. Seems like everyone else has a leg up, doesn’t it?” But that’s enough with the small talk when she’s still bleeding and Mary still stalks the streets. Quite the introduction she’s made. He’ll have to clean up the pieces. Some things truly never change. “Her name’s Mary. Bit of a hothead, though I imagine I don’t have to tell you that.” Liam leaves the comment about pleasantries alone, though this one doesn’t seem so keen on them either. Instead of pointing out that irony, he’s lurching forward when she falls, only to catch himself. Don’t want to seem like a regular predator, after all. “Afraid she’s already dead. And you may be, too, if you keep on losing blood the way you are. Can I help you get somewhere to get patched up? Or would that make you want to kill me as well?” He exhales, then, and tries something more cordial on for size: “I’m Liam, if that helps anything. Figure, you know, the pleasantries.”

“I didn’t know,” she breathes out after another set of anger words leave Liam, hoping that he’ll listen. “I know that is no excuse, Liam, I don’t mean for it to be but I- I just…I didn’t know.” How can they mend so much damage within one family? It would be so easily to blame Edmund, to think that he caused all of this and that none of them played roles in each other’s hurt. But the pain on Liam’s face, the abandonment and betrayal he feels, that is not on Edmund. No, that…that is all on her. Riley’s bottom lip quivers, “no.” I wish he hadn’t. I wish I could turn back time, change what had happened. I wish I had come back sooner, kept my promise to take care of you, I should have…she should have done a lot of things, but here they are now. The two Lockhart siblings, though they hardly feel as such. They are no longer close as they used to be. Time and Edmund did quite a good job of tearing them apart. Though Riley knows she had a hand in that as well, leaving like she did.

It stings worse when he pulls away. No words could hurt worse than that, or the distance he puts between them as if she’s got a deadly disease. Perhaps to him, she is the plague. She blinks back tears, letting them roll down her cheeks as she looks down, needing a moment away from her brother’s gaze. “Well that’s uh- I…I expected, as much. I didn’t forgive mother either, not at first.” With time, maybe, she hopes he’ll come to understand or at least he’ll forgive her. None of what she did had been to hurt him, surely he knew that. At first, keeping away from him had been about his safety. But then, over time, the hatred she had for herself as a vampire only grew. In Riley’s mind, if she went back to Liam, he would see her for what she thought herself to be all along; a monster. Of course Arthur convinced her otherwise, but too late. Edmund had already killed Liam, or so they thought. “Yes, I wanted something else,” she says after a moment, stepping forward only slightly this time. “Not your forgiveness, I know better than to ask for that. I want a chance to move on. Liam, Edmund’s…he’s dead. Our mother killed him,” she begins, trying to catch his gaze. “He’s gone. Our pain’s not, I know that, and…we can’t change what’s already happened. No matter how much I want to, God, I do,” Riley’s brow creases, and she steps forward again. “We can’t. But we can move forward without him. I mean haven’t you wondered what it would be like without him? Or what it would be like if mom or I were alive? I always wondered and wondered, and now…now we have that. Right in front of us, we’re all here except dad and it’s just…why can’t we just be happy for that? For a second?” She bites down on her lowe lip, head shaking. “Please, Liam. You don’t have to forgive me, but at least give me a chance to talk to you? Properly? If not now then another time, then? When you’re ready?”

“Glad to keep in line with your expectations.” It’s petty, maybe, and snappish to boot, but he’s angry. It simmers, not the violent rage seen in the people he frequently keeps company with, but it’s enough to grit his jaw and shake his head. She’s bold, though, this maybe sister of his, and forward with her demands. He levels his gaze with her then even if he keeps his distance, trying to keep his expression natural even if he feels anything but. “I’m aware--” he begins to retort at this piece of news she must feel so important in delivering. But the second bit is new. It’s enough to get another laugh from him, as disbelieving as the first, and his foot drums, his gaze avoiding his sister’s then no matter how much she searches. “Christ. This family knows no limit on its ironies, I’ll give it that. For God’s sake.” His mother, the fleer of their family, now the killer of the man he’d come to call father. The news delivered by a sister who had up and abandoned him as well. How bitter it all is. It only grows worse as Riley launches into the idyllic, and Liam turns to her, his disbelief past the point of humor, even the most ironic kind. “Do you hear yourself? You tell me that our mother killed the only family I’ve known for the past two centuries, then expect me to put that aside and see the joy? To pretend to be a family with you two, who left me behind? No, Riley. I didn’t have the chance to wonder because I took the family I got. The family that didn’t leave me. And now he’s gone. So forgive me if I can’t sit here and gaze upon your ideals.” Time separates them, and space, too. But not enough of it. He walks to the door, then. More space is needed. But he won’t be forced out of his own home -- a borrowed home, a seemingly temporary home, but still. His. “I don’t know that I’ll be ready. Give me another century or two of solitude. Maybe then I’ll be able to forget.” The door is pushed open and he turns back to her, meeting eyes so like his own. The only thing that makes them feel like family, really. “Leave me be, please. You had your chance to talk.”