Valkurius smooths his hand over the front of his coat, humming a thoughtful noise in his throat.  “Miss Stormsong is too complex a woman to be described in passing conversation.  Animal and amiable, sharp and stronger than perhaps even she realizes.  Survivors carry with them a particular sort of viciousness, and she most certainly has displayed this to me before.  She bears a burden she does not seem willing to share with anyone.”

"There are times I wonder how much more of her I know than her lovers do, than her friends do.  There is a candidness in conversation with those you do not wholly trust, and I am under no delusion that she trusts me.  Those who hold no friendship, no true link to you are disposable; for some it makes it easier to lower guard, even unconsciously."  The Cassian purses his lips slightly, tilting his head to one side with a rustle of swept back hair.  "We are, in a way, more similar than she would like to admit."

"Who among us does not have blood on their hands?  But she is not wracked with overwhelming guilt like many survivors are.  She is not merely one who survived, she is one of the few clawing at the world around them to stay above the flood water, one of the ones who knows deep down that there is reason to stay alive.  She has known despair—I have seen it in her—but she does not break beneath the tide."

The dim coloration of the steely wall behind her was stark against her pale hair and skin, even as in the darkness he could see the flush of cheeks and dilation of her scarlet eyes.  Her breath echoed shallowly, sharp and harsh in the coolness of the air.  Avrea lifted her hands, claws digging into his broad shoulders, heel tucked against the wall as if to push herself up further, arching against him.

Cut for length!

She had reminded him of snow, a soft blanket of pearly white within a city of ruin.  Her brashness, her bold approach was as sharp as the winter wind, a reminder that not all of the Exiles were warm and welcoming.  Avrea Stormsong was a welcome thing, a challenge to convert where so many others embraced him into the fold regardless of his history.

The process had taken time, a careful manipulation to reveal the truths in pieces, a smidge of the puzzle every so often given to keep her biting, to keep her interested.  It worked eventually; she was a treasure to have convinced, a loyal woman bent and broken and reformed by hardship, jaded but willing to trust, to live, to love those who were worthy.

The beep of his datachron alerted him to the arrival of a message, and Valkurius carefully pushed himself up from the worn mattress, careful not to disturb the sleeping Aurin’s rest. 

There it was.  The settlement he was looking for. 

No secrets had been shared, that had been confirmed.  The explanation of his escape had been tracked and tested.  For a long moment, Valkurius scanned over the letter with silent resolve.  Twice, thrice he read over its contents, picking apart every sentence, every word for a hint it was a lie.  A trick. False false, it had to be false…

Welcome home, Mr. Salonius.

She smelled like cigarettes and cheap liquor, like a bad dream in a dirty alley.  She smelled like a place he’d never go, a place so distant from home that it seemed an insult to indulge.  Through the smoke she watched him, brilliant eyes narrowed in suspicion mixed with a certain sort of draw to danger.  She didn’t trust him, and rightly so.  Avrea lingered for a reason he did not know, but there she was, a brilliant palette of monochrome against the darkness of the dingy wall behind her.

Valkurius stood out as much as he ever did in Thayd with his clean suit and crisp beard, and in the dim light of the bar, his golden eyes were nearly luminous with mechanical augmentations.  Like a predator he watched, but she was no prey, not with her straight-backed pose and languid drape of crossed legs, not with the casual way she gestured with the long cigarette between her fingertips.  Not the way she stared at him unwavering as he played his little game, as he wove twists within their conversations like a man all too willing to keep secrets to himself.

The little Aurin narrowed her eyes and lifted her chin, testing the tip of a fang with her tongue.  “Some might think you’re a man running.”

"Aren’t we all?"  The Cassian rocked back with a tilt of his head, molten gaze narrowed on her seeming.  For all the cool detachment, there was something burning, something bonfire hot in the way he watched her.  She wasn’t a predator, but she did not bow beneath his focus.

Interesting.

The brush of fingertips—flesh on leather—was a strange thing, a tingle of warmth sweeping through nerves.  They paused, watching, unafraid and thinly veiled in their observation.  Around them, the music clanged a racket distant from the drum of pulse, Exiles wandered with trays and drinks.  Far in a corner, a woman laughed.

They stared, tense and taut.

Pretense was a thing only because he could feel the tension in her as he strode his calmest toward the door, but as it swung open to the darkness of the alley, his fire stoked its heat higher, higher until sturdy fingers found the front of her shirt, until a sturdy grasp tucked beneath her arms to lift her from the ground.  The brick and steel was cold against her back through the thin fabric of her attire, but she didn’t notice, not for the wave of flame surging through her.

He was on her like a beast, his superior weight and height pinning her, but she did not relent, did not mewl like an innocent.  Long thighs squeezed astride his waist, ankles hooked, and her clawed fingers found snowy hair and buried in pale locks.  The grip left prickles along his scalp, and the Cassian growled low in his chest against her throat, teeth finding skin, tongue pressing against the throb of blood just beneath the surface.  The sound was not in warning but encouragement, and one hand slipped from its brace against the wall to grapple, to squeeze with nigh bruising force at the curve of her hip.

She smelled like cigarettes and cheap liquor, but she tasted like sin, a sweet nectar, a feast laid out before a man who might as well have been starving for all the way he devoured bare skin.  When his mouth found hers, she flashed a fangy grin and bit the soft skin of his bottom lip hard enough that they could both taste the tang of copper.  Her hand dove under the collar of his coat and shirt beneath, dragging talons across bronzed skin hard enough to leave the sting of welts in her wake.

Unrelenting, he pressed her back, throwing her thighs askew with greater bulk.  She could feel his heat, feverish and searing, and she arched against him with a breathless, purred laugh.  Another yank to snowy hair, another scrape hard enough to bubble crimson, and he growled again, turning his head to snap his jaw about her shoulder, to squeeze with intent to pierce, to press tongue to the softness of her skin.

She tasted like sin, a spicy sweetness so unlike the call for home that she summoned up the siren’s song, a clarion call to beckon him forth.

Avrekurius

Would I have a secret romance with you?[x] yes (Oh my god she’s sharp and blunt, he appreciates it)[] no

Would I keep your secrets?[] yes, no matter what[x] yes, unless someone was in danger[] no way[] hope you like getting blackmailed 

Would I help you trick someone?[x] yes[] only if it’s harmless[] no

Would I tell you my secrets?[] yes, I’d trust you with anything[] maybe[x] only if they were harmless[] not if you were the last person on the planet

(NSFW) Would I tell you one of my kinks?[] yes, but I’d tell anyone that[x] yes, and ask to try it (He’s pretty lax about sexuality)[] yes, but just to get it off my chest[] maybe a small one[] ew, no way!

Would I use something I knew about you against you?[] no way![x] maybe[] in a heartbeat

Reveal any (unrelated) secret: He suffered a pretty serious case of Space Madness after his escape from Cassus, and the paranoia from that experience still lingers; it’s one reason why he has a hard time [not getting violent] around geists.Admit a secret thought I’ve had about you but never before shared: Your confidence is intoxicating, your wit sharp, your brazen willingness to push for hard questions others do not ask is undeniably attractive.