#past thread.

      "i won't fight you-" he says quietly, offering out his wrists to be cuffed. "but please, for elena, let's be discreet."

the vampire let out another sigh as he checked his watch for the nth time. it was day three of the carnival and seeing as he had spent most of his time with lillian, he had agreed to meet with oliver this time around --- even maybe spoil him a bit because of not seeing him for so long. but the longer he waited, the chances of that were slowly slipping away.

Sasha had known it was a bad idea the very second she entered the restaurant. The atmosphere was warmed by the dimmed illumination, dousing the room in hues of yellow and orange. In a strange way, she found herself reminded of a sweeter time. The sound of a piano played lowly and climbed up the walls, its melody turning into white noise below the hum of the chatter of all other guests, out to spend the night over a delicious italian dish. Being lead toward the table, she saw that the person her friend had set her up with was already seated and waiting. Sasha didn't bother to check the time, to see if she had managed to be late at all. Instead, she brought a smile to play around her lips as she tilted her head, feigning a sense of saccharine innocence. "You must be Spencer." She contemplated her blind date for a moment, her almost sweet smile sitting firmly in its place. "I'm Sasha. Nice to meet you. I hope I have not kept you waiting too long."

The engine clicked more quietly now as it cooled beneath the hood and it marked the only sound that filled the interior of the unmarked sedan. The irritating noise subsided and had soon given into the ubiquitous silence of an ordinary tuesday night. It was past nine and Sasha had grown tired of the surveillance of one General Neal Parker long ago. Hazel eyes peered through the windshield, across the dimly lit street toward the small house, where nothing stirred and it almost made her question, whether their lead suspect was even at home. Wyatt's presence beside her was a welcome one and she wondered when she had gotten soft enough to be thankful for another's company on the job. "Still nothing." Unusual, based on their previous records of him. "He hasn't even twitched the curtains." She sighed. "Twenty bucks that he clocked us the second we pulled up."

Biting wind whipped around his head, while not even his jacket's hood could offer any meager semblance of shelter, as Sam pushed his hands further into his pockets, quite as though it'd make an actual difference. The early hours of a gloomy noon rolled across the cityscape and his mind was colored a dark shade of eternal blue as he read the script, carved into the headstone, which served as his sole focal point. There was a lump in his throat and it bore the threat of asphyxiation, brought forth by the grief, sitting on his chest, heavy as a stone. Verity's presence was a ghost in his periphery, as his eyes read the name carved in stone, bearing once more. He remembered a tenderness, a happy family that had been lost. His life, all of a sudden, felt as though it had been overcome by a wrongness. As though things were supposed to have been different.

Sam lowered his gaze for a single moment and he felt sorry, for all the sorrow he had caused her. Bernadette Beauchamp. And when he turned, after what felt like a small eternity of silence, hesitation was what mirrored in the way he looked at his friend. He was sure she had envisioned something different for her Christmas, and yet--

Less than two weeks. No more than fourteen days and Harlow's days underneath California's sun would come to a tragic end. For now, at the very least. It was slipping - the certainty that things might fall into place after all. That in some strange, fateful stroke of sheer luck or happenstance, this might not turn out to be an enormous catastrophe after all. "You have to help me." The statement came immediate, as did her appearance in the wooden doorframe. Harlow's voice was resolute, her gaze unrelenting, as she observed Verity in their living room's space, comfortably designed to give a vague sense of homeliness. And yet, there was no doubt she'd ever settle with "No" for an answer. "It's urgent." @veritywagner

        “they didn’t teach you any kind of defensive magic ??” golden brows furrow, chin cupped in an upturned palm. the seelie was a peculiar girl, doe eyed and naive. not at all like anything the wolf knew of their kind; she was practically mundane in comparison. “just flowers ??” she wasn’t sure how they’d gotten on to the subject - cassie wasn’t exactly one for making small talk with strangers. but the girl had wandered in to the hunter’s moon and looked about as lost as a werewolf in a vegan restaurant. she couldn’t help herself. and then, without realizing it, an hour had gone by with them just talking. “you really should be able to defend yourself.”