#marcellastarter

Showing up in the middle of the night, drunk off his ass and weeping was probably not a good look. But this was Marcella, somehow Ciro doubted that she expected anything better all things considered. Loss was... A monster of its own, when he’d finished drinking his way to the bottom of every bottle in Nice, he’d ended up on a plane and had hit up every bar along the way from the airport to Marcella’s place. He hadn’t appreciated it at the time, but it was nice. Macabre, it very much fit the spooky swamp thing energy that she had going for her. Truthfully, Rome was the last place that he thought Marcella would have come to take root, but he supposed her being here fed the whole marriage narrative that they had been headed towards. 

Ciro had missed the funerals, he’d missed the memorials, and now that he was here all this grief meant that the two of them didn’t really owe each other anything anymore. They were free. Free and heartbroken all at the same time, he wasn’t glad his mother was dead but he wasn’t not glad either. It was a conflicting place to live. 

After Ciro had pulled himself out of the bathtub he’d slept in, he wandered into the den still wearing last night’s clothes, his contacts so dry that his eyes were completely burning as he rubbed them with a silent spell to alleviate the ache. “You’re barely here for a year and the whole city is on fire.” Ciro said, playfully. Whatever he’d said the night before, he didn’t remember it now and he didn’t much feel like talking about it. He was more of the drink about it variety. 

This wasn't going to be like last time. Marcella wasn't going to show up at his door half dead like Remi did, prepared only when his life was on the line to take the plunge. Ezekiel was young, and maybe he'd someday come to regret siring vampires when he'd only been one for a year himself. But this wasn't so much about him as it was his friend, they were going to spend eternity together, one way or another. Ezekiel was ready for that if Marcella was.

There was blood, a few glasses for aesthetic, several bags at the ready to be practical. Synthetic to start, then there was bonafide universal donor human to take the last of the edge off. It helped having friends in the city, Ezekiel had grown up here, and he'd spent the last year trying to make the most out of those connects. He wondered if she knew their death day was the same, if that had been part of her plan all along, Ezekiel had gone first, and now she would follow. Not like him though, never quite like him. This was a choice that Marcella was making for herself.

Candles littered the graveyard, incense burned lavender and lilac as the fall breeze caused the flames to flicker. Their shadows cast across gravestones, big names he remembered, others that were inconsequential. Each of them were shooting stars. Two stood above the others, the first of which read:

Ezekiel Christopher Urquhart August 11th 1995 - September 30th 2022 Beloved Son, Brother, and Witch I am not there, I did not die

Beside it sat another now, newly commissioned:

Marcella Astrid Belanades November 17th 1995 - September 30th 2023 Beloved Daughter, Sister, Witch, and Friend Do not stand by my grave and weep

He'd agonized over the daughter part, he knew Marcella's relationship with her mother wasn't great, but her aunt had loved her in her own way. Neva too, no doubt, and there was something to be said about found family. Rose petals littered the area, a gentle bed had been made, Ezekiel's blood waiting in a goblet, his own hands prepared to snap her neck and end her life in an instant. Quick. Painless. Just like he'd done for Remi.

"I hope this is alright," Ezekiel admitted, in a platonic way he hoped it came across as romantic. He thought it was appropriate, something akin to what she'd be hoping for. The suit he'd chosen was classic and black through and through, something that wouldn't show the blood, fit for a funeral. "how are you feeling?"

“I suppose I should thank you.” Ciro said, uncharacteristically sober, as well-dressed as ever but he lacked the disheveled appearance of recent years. Neatly groomed, every edge sharp and refined. Neva would have been proud to see the Watcher now. In his palm he gathered air via a simple gesture of physical magic, muttered an Etruscan word for transformation as he gave it solid mass. Paper, light and thin. Delicately folded edges and twisted it’s shape. He had a lot of time to make up for, but Ciro felt more powerful than ever. Something he had never needed blood magic for. “Your friends though, they attacked my family, I hope you know what that will mean for them.” The paper rose ignited, ashes blew away on an unseen wind as he squeezed what remained into his fist. He'd come back to Rome to uncover what had happened to his family, only to unearth a plot that was more sinister than he'd feared. Ciro had ignored Neva's requests for aid, had ignored everything for so long. A drunken, blind fool. There was no way to make amends for the mistakes he'd made, there was no way to turn back the clock, but those that had conspired against his family would pay.

Maybe there was a reason there were so many lines in the sand between what he was and who he’d become. Ezekiel didn’t have the level of control that made making friends with other species particularly easy. That much was made clear. The two of them had a relationship that had carried on over death but idly Ezekiel couldn’t help but wonder if he’d already fucked that up. At the reception he found her minding her own business somewhere near the refreshments dressed like a guilty widow at her husband’s funeral. “I’m sorry about the other night I don’t really know what came over me.”  

Engaged life was outstandingly different from single life, at least this time around it was nothing like what Ciro had remembered from before. Then again, Ciro was only a few amalgamated pieces of the man he'd been throughout their engagement. The grave prodigy who'd taken Neva's every word to heart had fallen away to a debaucherous hedonist who couldn't stand the sight of himself sober. Ciro retained the nobility of his family name, though he'd learned to loosen the reins in order to come into himself. Marcella was part of that, Ezekiel perhaps played the greatest part in it though.

"A lesser man would feel threatened that you plan on taking someone else to Wolfchella." Ciro would be working the entire time anyway, he and Salvador were unveiling a new wine that was tailored towards the lycans very distinct metabolisms and palettes. Strong alcohol and milkbones, it was a winning combination. Ciro finished with the last of his buttons on his attire as he straightened at his reflection in the mirror, from behind his glasses his eyes flicked towards Marcella's reflection behind him. Playfully, Ciro asked, "Should I be worried?"

Ezekiel had felt like he was in the air, floating, and then everything came crashing down. In life the vampire had been an athlete and in death his reflexes had only become that much sharper. Even as he'd come crashing back into Necromanteion while the tower fell, he burst into a murder of crows. Silken black wings, an omen of death, Ezekiel had to find those in his sire line that mattered most. Marcella, Remi, and Hakan.

Salvador had died right in front of him, blood had splattered Dis' burning streets as his whole head was bitten off. They were brothers in a way, Ezekiel was the younger and he'd loudly resented the fact that Salvador had a place at Hakan's side- but he hadn't hated him, not really. Even if that was true, nobody deserved to die like that. Emir was Rhiannon's precious, perfect little soldier and all that training hadn't been enough to keep his spine in his back. Rhia had- Magnus-

Free from the adrenaline, Ezekiel felt himself crashing as the crows reformed at Marcella's feet. "Everything's-" the vampire looked around, everything was gone, the city was burning, and he was losing everyone. "Everyone's-" Where was Hazal? Abel? Where was... Where was the city? Adrenaline receded to panic, if his heart could still beat then it would have been racing right then and there.

While most people never forgot a face, Kadir never forgot anything. This function was strange for him because he felt as though he was meant to be elsewhere, and no matter how much he ate there wasn't anything that could satiate his appetite. Fire burned at the back of his throat as he looked from person to person and quietly did the part of a people-watcher who loomed in the balcony. An old friend was enough to make him move towards the dance floor, a quiet specter that went unbothered by the debauchery that was slowly descending over the crowd. Marcella.

She was a vision in black lace, something about the attire invoked a memory from the past. A masquerade last year when they'd both been made to run for their lives, their conversation at a Gelato shop and then... Something. Kadir remembered how she had smiled at him the night of Halloween, he remembered following her out into the graveyard, and then everything went blurry after that.

"You look beautiful." Kadir remarked as he slid in to dance with her as bodies whirred about the ballroom, a hand at her hip as the other joined hers. The waltz felt exceedingly formal and while in life he'd always had two left feet, vampirism and death had brought a certain grace that he had previously lacked.

location: outside Marcella’s place

notes: you said we’re friends, right?

Without any idea where to go, Zeke could only think of one person who might be able to help him. Marcella. She said they were friends, in fact, she seemed almost desperate for it to be true. There was blood on his hands now, more than there had ever been in life, whatever soul was within him had departed for the other side - destined for some place that this version of him would never see. Daylight burned him, the sound of heartbeats made his throat go dry, and things he’d never been sensitive to before were an entirely new pain. 

“Marcella - ?” Zeke lingered in the shadows outside of her door, he kept his distance and even from here he could hear her heart as it beat warm, fresh blood through her veins. In his mind’s eye he would draw her neck to his lips and break skin with his fangs, drink deep and full as each draw coated his tongue and filled his mouth. Zeke swallowed the hard lump in his throat. Amaranthus wanted nothing to do with him now. Remi had sold him out to Kaan. He had nowhere to go and no one else to turn to. “I need help.”