Sebastian Steele

Sebastian's wealth was never immediately exposed to viewers. His appearance made him a shapeshifter, an amorphous being of class that belonged in neither the realm of the rich nor the poor and yet he freely crossed on either side, wrenching both dimensions into his grasp to play with. Nikolai was better equipped, better exposed, to witness a taste of what details shaded Sebastian's background. The private plane at the airport, secluded for only his use, was one. The trip to Romania was another.

The landing was seamless, car waiting, Sebastian taking the wheel with no debate. By the time they stopped, cigarette smoke had permanently embedded itself into the seats and the tires had lost a veneer of rubber that they would never be able to recover, lost to the unkempt road of the country. All sacrifices were traded for the looming cemetery, the one that was held in the dark by the night, perfect for the imagination to run wild with ideas of specters from the past.

Damn him, even Sebastian’s voice was enough to raise goosebumps of arousal across Tammy’s skin; it was the kind that reverberated in your bones, in your soul, that sounded commanding even in a whisper. That, mingled with the pain meant Tammy was almost dizzy, breath coming in short, desperate gasps. The heat of blood down his legs was nothing compared to the heat in his stomach; he didn’t notice what Sebastian was doing with the knife until it was too late, a burst of pain tearing a scream from him as he realised what had been excised. “Bastard -” he choked out, trying to close his legs for his clients’ sake, if not his. 

The skin beneath Sebastian’s fingers was slick with sweat, a testament to the exertion of holding back screams. Tammy didn’t want to answer; he knew there was an answer, that the hole his parents had left in his life was the very reason why he was there. He needed love, and he had to be beautiful in order to be loved as anything more than an object. “Neither.” It was more a strangled gasp than a word, even he didn’t know the answer – was it baking with his mother he missed most, or being allowed to stay up late with his father, watching TV? Or was it both?

Black walls absorbed the scream, as much as they absorbed the light. A black hole that could not be filled, even with the concept of excess, even when that excess was from the brutality of life being witnessed. It spared no mercy nor sympathy, a true reflection of their soulless creator. Sebastian was no bystander, though. His main ambition was not to watch and take note. He was the artist in the room, a muse by his side, stirring the creativity to his own path of destruction.

“no—it makes an ass out of you and me!” she laughed too loud at the cliché, poked the muse’s shoulder as if he was primed to agree with her, or respond at all. assuming granted nothing, but hey she’d been right. she didn’t need to call him on that, they both had to be aware of it. the same sentence said different ways. she watched the syringe with detached curiosity, the contents of it being revealed soon enough with the way the muse jolted back to life. she could see the sudden alertness in their face. it was epinephrine, or something similar, at least that’s what she would have used to keep someone awake. though she rarely preferred them that way.

“the problem’s always having to wake back up.” she gave the skinned chest a sympathetic pat. with the experiment completed, she went back to work, following along with his thoughts until they were redirected on to her. “i don’t know if succumbed is the word.” it didn’t phase her that they should have been brought up, there were plenty of articles that were easy to track down, whole family slaughtered—well nearly the whole family. they missed the little girl in the closet, hiding away from the whole thing. “they fought for a little bit.” the ending was still non-negotiable. blood stains on the carpet, all along the walls. “but not well enough!” she was no longer particularly moved by the thought, if he was looking for a reaction of some heart ache, he had the wrong person. she continued on working as though they were talking about the weather. “what’s got you interested in a cold case?”

By words or laugh, he wasn't fazed. No facial indicators involved, no internal response either, a flatlining sense on his side as he finished peeling back the layer of flesh from the neck. Focused always, even when he finally drew away, grabbing the gifted eye in her possession, hard enough for the cornea to be scraped off by the thumb, leaving it deflated like a low-pressured ball by the time he released it. The gelatinous substance inside would trickle out at first sign of a tear, held together only by the flexibility of anatomical design.

"You have another means to tell the time, now, Copeland," he continued conversationally, resuming the jawline. "It will take an hour to regain its shape. Consider it an incentive to fill the time with constructive meaning instead."

“Oh, you don’t want to know, darling.” Tammy’s voice was practically drenched in sarcasm, shifting uncomfortably on the hook. As hard as he tried to be beautiful, he’d always fall short, always fighting against his body. His fat, wrong body, a rough conglomeration of sinew and bone that his soul had been carelessly shoved into.

Tammy yelped at the kick, trying to close his legs in time – the surprise made his stomach twist, flashing back to when he was eighteen. When his clients genuinely terrified him, taking what they wanted and leaving him sobbing on the bed. Despite the arousal, he couldn’t help whining at the sudden pain, the slickness of blood down his thigh, dragging up some of that primordial terror. But he managed to bite it down, flashing Sebastian a knife-like grin. “Careful, that’s the moneymaker,” he choked out, straining against his bonds.

Then Sebastian just had to bring up his family. Physical pain he could take, insults he could brush aside – but taunting him with that, the acceptance he still desperately craved, was the cruellest thing Sebastian could’ve done. “I doubt it.” Tammy had to remind himself more than anything, snuff out the straggling flame of hope that still flickered after all these years. “They wanted a daughter, not a son. Not a son like me, anyway.”

"Wrong," he began to correct, a voice low enough to reverberate through the air until hitting Tammy's eardrums. "It’s you that would prefer ignorance over insight." Glass twisted against sensitive nerves, not in a sharp wrenching, but in a movement akin to stroking against the flesh. Pleasure was intertwined with pain, watching how it riddled the muse's eyes as the point of ecstasy was circled, hairline cut drawing blood to soak it in. "Unfortunately," his tone buoyed to the surface again before slicing, cutting, removing the same swollen flesh that didn't coincide with a male mentality, "there's nothing that you provide that isn’t easily read."

Somehow the tension of waiting for a response was worse than whatever Sebastian would inevitably say. With nothing for Nikolai to focus on, his mind began to drift, back through the years – four years, yet the wound was as raw as yesterday. The panic was still visceral, twisting his stomach with a vague, sloshing nausea.

It was all he could do to keep his voice steady, swallowing before he responded: “What about walking after you were told you wouldn’t be able to?” Another rough swallow, fighting the lump in his throat; he began to move towards the door, desperate for an escape. “What about living when, by all rights, you should have died?” What about killing your killer, the truth he clung onto to quell his doubts.

There was to be no escape, though; Nikolai yelped in pain, the twisting of his arm forcing him to turn, sending a bolt of agony dancing up his spine. He knew a knife at his throat when he felt it, heart jackknifing in his chest as he tried to stop panicking – but nothing was working, his breath wouldn’t slow down, the room was closing, collapsing – 

He wasn’t able to think of a lie, fingers fumbling to reach his own knife without alerting Sebastian. All Nikolai was able to choke out was both.

The blade was extension of Sebastian. Once flicked open, it activated its own nervous system, attaching itself to his own, feeling beneath itself how Nikolai's pulse quickened. It would take one slice into a singular pressure point to see how a broken artery revealed a spray of blood, coating his black walls, turning it to the canvas behind them for color. Sharp enough to make its mark on the slimmest hint of stubble on an otherwise clean shaven stretch of skin. He could bleed out on the floor in seconds, but that wasn't of value. There was more value in lengthening his mortal sentence than snuffing it out for one comment.

"What about living when, by all rights, you should have died?" he repeated verbatim, a mirror image of a newly implanted memory, only now highlighted with a serum of sarcasm, releasing him back to the wildness that was life. The knife stayed in his hand, even removed from the throat, could always find its way back to somewhere more useful like a wrist or an eye or a multitude of places that didn't end in eternal blackness.

Nikolai’s jaw clenched, wanting to tell Sebastian he was wrong, fear didn’t come from weakness. But the words wouldn’t come; he knew some part of him believed it, hated himself for the way the room felt like it was spinning, bearing down on him, closing in and closing in and closing in – 

Between breaths, between blinks, he could’ve sworn he heard Ljublic’s laughter in the blackness of his closed eyes. Then, back to reality. “Try me,” he said, almost regretting the words as soon as they left his mouth, but remembering the knife in his jacket, Remembering the adrenaline of Marrakesh, the person he used to be – yet that person was gone, leaving a hollow, pain-ridden shell behind. He blinked away the smoke, swallowing, trying to claw back some kind of control. “I’ve built my reputation on success, not difficulty.” The difficulty helped, he guessed, but Nikolai refused to give Sebastian any more ground. “I said I’ll do it.” Then tacked on more awkwardly, desperate for an escape: “I should be going.”

There was very little movement to Sebastian in response to the dare. Perfectly in place like a polaroid photo, a single frame of time with only the smoke slithering through the air from his held cigarette. No one could blame Nikolai if he thought that they were simply not heard, except for one.

"Success means nothing if it can be accomplished by anyone, Ciora. After all, anyone can breathe, but to manage it after being assumed dead is mildly more impressive.--In your experience, wouldn't you agree?"

Eyes of a hawk, watchful and commanding, lying into the other as he gave in, agreeing to terms that were not up for negotiation. There was no nod, no smile, not even a blink to indicate that there was found common ground, just silence given back with another drag from the cigarette. It was only when he attempted to part from the scene, a turn to leave eventually taken in, that the viper appeared.

Sebastian's hand to the wrist, pinning it to the base of the spine. Free arm swinging around, mid-motion flicking open his switchblade to have the metal gleaming at Nikolai's throat, all from behind. Trained, knowing exactly where the jugular was, practically stroking it.

she looked at her hand, stretching her fingers out as though she were contemplating what her life would be like without it. she liked her hands, the fine motor work they could do; microscopic incisions, sewing perfectly straight lines, mimicking any handwriting she so desired. she couldn’t get that from a prosthetic. and so her hands returned to the task at hand.

“all work and no play!” she joked, continuing on her own path of peeling back the skin. there were plenty of options on how to work. given silence or music, she would choose music. given music or talking, she would always chatter away. she thought it did little to bother sebastian, so long as the work was getting done. and she’d nearly matched his own pace, her charade aside. one even layer, no tearing, no wrinkling, everything kept as though it were about to be reattached to the next unwilling participant. “they don’t mention that on wikipedia.” she sighed, looking at the singing red that was left across the chest, how vibrant it was when trying to protect, reacting with oxygen to produce a pigment an artist would die for. the one thing the living had going for them. “if the face is what you want.” she shrugged, willing to go exactly as far as sebastian wanted. she never rested for her vision, she found it hard to believe that he would stop short either.

she watched as he popped the eye out of its socket with a tilted head, some note at the speed with which he did it. she was no stranger to the sight, pulling the eyes from her variety of victims was an easy choice. it always sent people into a fuss, putting so much emphasis on a single organ. what could it have seen! what secrets did it hold! mostly, she found the eyes to be the first thing to decay, and nothing more memorable. she reached over, lifting the eye that had been removed, and severing the ocular nerve without a second thought. she held it up for inspection, before showing it to the muse it had been so thoughtfully taken from, with their still in tact field of vision. “look at this! it’s going to be a snowman!” she smiled, before setting it down on her own tray.

“i’m assuming the ink only comes out after i’ve finished this part.” it wasn’t a complaint, merely a statement. she wasn’t bartering so much as feeling for the edges of her reach, the moment where she might get another nail removed. “which—i was going to continue with the arm! if that’s okay!”

The orbital socket laid bare, a gaping chasm in a face frozen in excruciating pain as it watched its own eye being held up to be viewed. It must have been an unusual feeling to see the organ that provided sight with the one that was made to remain attached, much less to be told a snowman would be etched into it.

"Does assuming grant you what you want?" he asked while the leather-bound fingers pressed to the side of the neck, no movement from the carotid artery beneath his touch, and yet there was no concern. "When the muse is done, you can begin," he rectified as his hand reached over to a syringe, filling it half-way from a vial in such casual order that it might as well have been routinely scheduled.

The exposed chest, where nerves were still left intact, vibrant red glistening under the lights above, the needle plunged through, piercing into the heart. Adrenaline drained into the body, its effect immediate, seen only in the rapid blink of the solitary eye.

Tammy allowed Sebastian to take his wrists, painfully aware of the pressure of the thumb, his racing heartbeat straining against it. Pulsing with a dizzying cocktail of curiosity, fear, arousal, so intertwined he could barely tell which was which. He dragged in a shaky breath, swallowing, preparing himself for what was to come.

He was good at being boneless, pliant, allowing Sebastian to hang his hands from the hook; Tammy’s resistance came from his words, a biting, sarcastic smile. “No want for it, either.” Shifting uncomfortably, he tried to find a position where his feet could easily touch the floor, but found none. Bondage was almost boring to him now, the ache in his shoulders already beginning to sink in – vaguely, he remembered a Sunday School nun telling him how Jesus hadn’t died from a spear to the side, or from the nails through his hands, or exposure. He died because every joint in his arms dislocated, and he couldn’t hold his chest up to avoid drowning in his own bodily fluids.

Sebastian’s words made Tammy glance up, then down, at his exposed stomach. Pale, dotted with faint freckles – and damningly wrong. He knew what was below the fragile covering of skin, and he hated it, meeting Sebastian’s eyes again with wary interest. “You’re –” The surgery table. The tools laid out. It all began to fall into place in Tammy’s mind. “You’re going to take it out.”

"How observant," Sebastian spoke, the congratulatory tone lacking to give rise to any sincerity. To him, it should have been obvious before his arrival, alluded to in their past conversation. "Tell me, when I said you were broken, how many defects did you count within yourself for this to come as a surprise?"

An answer was expected, but it didn't stop him from making it any easier to voice as his foot kicked apart the legs, wide enough, even if for just a moment's window to be available, for the shard of glass to sink its teeth between his folds. As if there wasn't enough of a reminder as to what sex he was born to, cursed with, ruby beads falling and slicking over the transparent piece.

“Is that an order, or just a suggestion?” Tammy raised an eyebrow, eyeing the broken glass on the floor. Men like Sebastian, they wanted pliancy, terrified obedience, but what they needed was someone with a bit of bite, enough courage to talk back. To give them permission to inflict a little more punishment.

Biting into him, the pain from the glass was sharp, tearing a ragged gasp from Tammy. He could feel the blood trickling down the inside of his legs, a feeling he’d almost forgotten, slick, warm – dizzying, tying his stomach in knots. He licked his lips, slowly, refusing to break eye contact. Refusing to allow Sebastian to scare him.

“My clients –” another gasp as the broken bottle moved; Tammy’s throat was dry, constricted by desire and – something else, something he didn’t dare name. “My clients always say I’m good with what lies ahead.” A shiver danced up his spine, making the glass nip just a little more. He allowed Sebastian to tie his wrists, the zip-ties tight enough to be painful; for the first time, he felt a rush of apprehension. Not anticipation, not excitement – fear, plain and simple. Fear, mixed with heady curiosity. “Noted,” he murmured, feeling painfully flimsy. “I’m not familiar with mercy, you know.”

"Considering you're not choking on glass at the moment, that should be enough of an indicator for you." If it had been an order, there would be no doubt that it would be fulfilled whether Tammy was complacent in the movements or not. For now, there was no need for it, an unwanted distraction with the only benefit to its existence was already within Sebastian's grasp, slicing into the pale flesh.

Behind his back, the bound wrists were held with his free hand, thumb to the bulging vein to feel the pressure of the blood that coursed through it. Words were cheap, anything spoken to pretend that there was no trouble, but the mechanics of the body didn't lie.

"You're not familiar with it because there was no need for it in comparison," he replied before the shoulders strained against their blades, a sharp lift upward to have the zip tie rest on the hook dangling from above--a sight unseen in its blackness, blending well within its surroundings like a camouflaged viper. In its height, it left the redhead to balance on the toes, feet arched by command.

“Just managing my expectations.” Tammy watches Sebastian, his cold, clipped way of speaking, the hollowness behind his eyes. There’s no question of the kind of man he is: perhaps not even a man, but a monster wearing human skin. Too clever to be an animal, too detached to truly be called a human being. 

Tammy should be scared, but all he feels is his own version of detachment, a rush of fascination. His eyes tracked over to the bottle, Sebastian picking it up – it felt like watching a lion, pure dominance coiled into those movements. There was only a faint undercurrent of frustration, his position in this transaction clear: an empty vessel to be used as the client saw fit. To be toyed with, used, probably not satisfied. 

Perhaps he could get something from Sebastian, but it would be a long game. 

Flinching at the crash, Tammy gave in to one release of breath, licking his parted lips as Sebastian stepped closer. The predator circling, sending shivers dancing up his spine, anticipation pooling in his stomach. “I was going to drink that, you know.” Words falling more like sighs, standing taut and still as the lion approached. Closer, closer, – Tammy shudders as the first pain blossoms, a warm trickle of blood dribbling down his thigh.

Now he was as bare as he could tolerate, meeting Sebastian’s gaze. “I wasn’t aware this was a test. What’s next?”

"If you want to drink it badly enough," Sebastian countered, voice unchanged, even in contrast to the breathy release of the other, "get on your knees." The glass at the hip twisted slightly, a tell that if he did, the broken bottle would not be yielding to the movement, a shard that would dive mercilessly into the flesh as if it was a hot knife through butter.

Regardless, another slice mirrored the one at the opposite end, sending the thin garment slipping down the bare thighs, pooling by the feet in a tattered Hell. Stained by droplets of ruby red, they remained while Sebastian didn't throw a single glance to them, staying to the eyes that looked at him.

“The side that allows desperate people to do desperate things.” That smirk, a flicker of a smile etched into Nikolai’s memory, making his stomach drop. Sebastian could kill him right there, could trap him like Ljublic had, and no-one would know. He wondered if anyone would care. “I’ve had a knife at my throat enough times to know it.”

That, at least, was the truth – people did reckless things when they were scared, things they would never be able to do otherwise. There was a little of a threat there, even as Nikolai took a step back: he felt like a wounded animal, exhausted from the hunt, but he still had claws. There was still a knife in his pocket, and he’d bring his gun to Romania. “Alright, you’re coming.” A curt concession, trying to conceal how the thought sent a new burst of panic spiralling through his chest. “I know where the graveyard is. It’s quite hard to reach.” Another feeble excuse, one he realised too late only exposed another of his weaknesses.

"Fear breeds desperation," he informed, a fact that was not for debate by his standards as Sebastian kept a hold on his vision. "Weakness breeds fear." A calculating look given, as if sinking fangs of venom beyond the scalp, crashing through the skull, digging its way into the brain. "Are you weaker or stronger than you were, Ciora?--If a knife was held to your throat right now, would your desperation be triggered?"

“I’m more of a nihilist myself,” Ashton refused to let him get under his skin, or let the eye horrify him, there were a number of things that horrified him enough in his flashes of memories, that being numb was the only solution. “That doesn’t matter anymore,” it hasn’t in a very long time. Ashton’s identity was long lost, broken down and messily reshaped into whatever he is today. His bright blues were trained on Sebastian’s but in his peripheral he could see a hand raise to the statue, hearing the sickening bone crunching sound that brought along a micro wince, brought along the memory as he almost anticipated his own bones breaking once more for giving the wrong answer. “Cooperation requires a give and take. And I don’t think either of us is willing to give,” Ashton only broke their gaze to look back at the tortured statue, trying to salvage any features the cement hadn’t melted over. The easy breaking of a cemented finger only proves his point that it wasn’t all just cement. That’s fucking sick. “And what are we going to do about it?”

"If that was true," Sebastian began, seeing through the details of the statement with a hawk's vision and a vulture's appetite, "you're discrediting the philosophy by caring for the well-being of your kind. You should allow them the freedom to seek their end, considering it doesn't matter to nihilists. Don't be selfish in thinking it only applies to yourself when you use a label, muse." Sebastian began to gradually twist the pinkie still wrapped around his fingers, letting newborn sinews spin and loosen, thin threads that were barely constructed. A slight hum reverberated at the back of his throat at the question, not swayed in the slightest, but able to see something else in its utterance. "We," he repeated, lips savoring the word. "How quickly you decide that I'm interested in your problem enough to help you solve it. Is this a recruitment opportunity or desperation?”

she didn’t understand how she ended up in this situation, how she could have made such a fundamental misjudgement in walking into what she hoped would be a peaceful gallery. she’d been trying to expand, and look what it proved. that the world was dark, and hopeless, and had moved on without her leaving her stumbling behind. she could feel the knife cool against her skin, waiting for her to move, and all it inspired was the tears. she could feel them tumbling down her cheeks, silent after so many years of being provoked at the will of strangers. she knew that no matter what she chose, how she moved, the knife would be plunged in and she would be spitting up blood in a matter of seconds. she could go another hundred years without the copper taste in the mouth, but it never in the plans. “it’s the wrong place. that’s—that’s all there is.”

Pitiful. There was not a single heartstring tugged by the sight of tears, nothing akin to a rippling sense of sympathy for her within the brain, and the stomach felt as calm as ever, digesting the scene with no taste for it. "If you believe that," he began with a languidly quirked brow, "why are you still here? Go and find a place that's rightfully yours." Looks were exchanged, a command more than an offer, a means to tell her to get out of his sight, to turn her back to him. It came shortly, how she moved, how the blade left her skin from it, how she was so very close to freedom from him. Only to be yanked back by the hair. It came quickly. Blonde strands were drawn up, back of the neck exposed, sharpest edge of the knife digging into the nape, severing the spinal cord in a forceful push in. How it acted like how a power cord getting cut, the flow of electricity of the nerves was done for. She was left dangling by his hand, only for the fingers to retract, letting her slump forward with her hair mopping up the wound. "Enjoy your reprieve from being expected to act on your own, muse," he spoke as he stepped around her. "Find me when you've decided not to waste your immortality, will you?"

“Who said anything about being a martyr?” Does it ironically count if he was killed for someone else’s beliefs? Tortured just because someone believed that muses existed and should be studied for a higher purpose? But Ashton wasn’t gonna give Sebastian the satisfaction of ticking him off and getting a kick of out it. He wasn’t ever sure how to go about handling Sebastian, told to just deal with him until they had solid proof for an attempt to take him in, or get a kill order. He just needed to prove it. However the way Sebastian toyed around him, carefully watching that hand smooth over the concrete, he wasn’t going to get his answer that easily. “The eye would seem to say so, don’t you think?” Ashton gestured towards the grotesque visual that makes what seemingly looks like any other statue, a terrifying sight. He narrowed his gaze, contemplating the question, “I have a feeling you already know, which muses are you hunting?”

The eyes did not follow the train of words, how Ash had made a move towards the statue's only exposed part of itself. That circle of a cornea beginning to form, even before any color could reach the iris, a reborn organ. "Hm. You should appreciate the touch of realism, muse, instead of condemning it," Sebastian mused, the type of tone that was the equivalent to how a cat toys with the body of a mortally wounded squirrel. "Be aware that identity is not a right that belongs to everything. It's earned. Tell me, have you created yours? Or was it forced on you by someone else?" His hand smoothed over the grit of the concrete-covered finger, eyes never once leaving the other as he refused to give a legitimate response to his question, only providing one of his own. In response, there was the faintest tug to the corner of the mouth before his wrist jerked in an instance. The crush of cement, the break of bone, a symphony that formed beneath his touch as the pinkie was now pointing upward, opposite to the way its knuckle had allowed it to function. "How impolite not to answer. It doesn't inspire cooperation."

The offhand way Sebastian spoke told Nikolai he was looking at someone who had killed before. Someone who had thought it sport. “Evidently you haven’t seen the same side to humanity that I have.” It was an effort to keep his voice steady, to keep himself rooted to the spot when everything in him was telling him to run, run before the walls got tight enough to crush him. “I don’t see myself hunting other people to fulfill some kind of ritual. He failed.”

Had he? If he had, Nikolai wouldn’t have been so afraid facing Sebastian, biting the inside of his cheek to suppress the way his breath began to quicken. If he had, Nikolai wouldn’t even be in America, wouldn’t feel the phantom pain in his back turn to real, jolting agony from just a small movement. “It’s not selflessness, Mr. Steele. It’s how I work. You haven’t minded before, so why take an interest now?” Of course, because it was the best way to rattle him. Because Sebastian knew full well, Nikolai’s pride wouldn’t allow him to turn it down.

"Tell me, which side are you imagining?" he questioned, a glint of a smirk dancing across his lips. Sebastian had seen the full spectrum of humanity. There was no side that was left unexposed to him. "Or is there only one that's worthy of keeping you up at night, now?" Perhaps Nicholas wasn't consciously interested in the hunt, but hunting was interested in him.

Tammy’s eyes flitted across the room, taking in head, gun, table, the splatter of blood. All of it kindled something in his stomach, an electric, tingling thrill, at once intoxicating and slightly nauseating – this was the lion’s den, the mouth of the abyss; he was staring at a monster.

“Forward, aren’t you?” He remarked drily as he set the bottle of wine down, watching Sebastian with eager, dilated eyes. First heels, then jewellery, necklaces and earrings coiled into his shoes so they couldn’t get lost – not that there was much for them to get lost in, the jet black floor consuming more of his black suede heels than anything else. The jewellery was quickly followed by belt, trousers, turtleneck, til he was standing there in nothing but his binder and underwear.

He hadn’t realised how cold the room was until now, a shiver flickering over his skin. Was it the cold? Or was it anticipation, a morbid, willing curiosity to see what Sebastian had in store? Either way, there were goosebumps spreading over Tammy’s arms as he undid his plait, combing out his hair so it fell over his shoulders in a copper cascade. “What now?”

"Were you expecting a love letter, muse?" His tone was lacking in the humor that was wading in the undercurrent of sarcasm. An empty type of expression that was accentuated by the allegory of death splattered in the room. "Refrain from being tarnished by romantic notions, particularly during a transaction. It's unprofessional."

Fingertips plucked the bottle of wine by the sealed rim as the other began to shed the clothes that clung to him like a second skin. The original, pale and unveiled, could be seen rising by the hairs, speckled by bumps and decorated by scars that Sebastian noted without exception. Red strands coated over them, but the touch was not a focal point; what Tammy asked was soon answered in a different form.

CRASH

The hand had swung fluidly, calculating in its short trajectory like a pendulum, one that smashed the bottle within its hold against the edge of the table from underneath. Shards of glass mixed with wine, spilling and disappearing against the black floor, the glimmer of both substances its only cry out to the eyes. Left wrapped by his hand was the jagged bottleneck, the beginning of the blooming shape that was hold in memory only.

The crunching noise of steps came from beneath the soles of his boots, stopping just in front of Tammy. The contact of eyes was like an ironclad hold, even as the sharpness of glass drew its fangs across his hip as it slipped beneath the band of the underwear.

It’s just the room. It’s just the room,  Nikolai tried to tell himself, the damned room was an optical illusion, designed to unsettle its occupants. He’d stood in it before, only now did it seem to collapse, cloying, filling his mouth with the taste of stone, copper, clogging his throat with the need to scream. Haide, e doar o cameră, his mind slipped back into Romanian – but even that was little comfort, reminding him of what Sebastian was asking him to do.

Perhaps there was still a little anger there, that Ljublic had tainted Nikolai’s memory of his homeland.

His eyes snapped back to Sebastian the moment the other spoke, wary, knowing by now not to trust him. “It’s called desperation, I think. Or – knowing when to spot an opportunity.” Even if Nikolai didn’t remember it, he had that much to hold on to, the knowledge that he’d freed himself from one apostle of death. He could do so again. “You know that’s unnecessary, Mr. Steele.” The thought of Sebastian lurking over his shoulder sent a fresh rush of anxiety clawing its way up Nikolai’s spine. “I work best alone, and like you said, I don’t have anything to flaunt.” Not to Sebastian, anyway.

"Being desperate and opportunistic are not the same," he informed conversationally, "and neither are required to put an end to a life. Remarkably, they sound like excuses, or are you unwilling to admit that Ljublic was able to baptize you?"

He watched as though he was perched from a lofty height, looking down on him, a God that was presenting judgment with a glint in the eye as if Hell was the preferred destination. Why wait, though, for death to take over to meet such a place? What a waste of time that would be.