Young Blood, Black Eyes & Broken Hearts [Florian/Stefan/Lyra]

[Florian]

FLORIAN

"Zaichaer did this." Florian repeated, almost as much to himself as Stefan. "They waited. They waited. They had my blood and waited for me to make a mistake. I left, and I'm sorry, and I came back a few days later because—" He didn't finish that sentence, but he continued the thought. "They arrested me for treason, but I didn't tell anyone anything about anything. I just took a train."

Florian hadn't moved from his spot, but what Stefan said registered a bit later than usual. "We can sit down." He said, one of the few things that didn't come out as a sob, though he didn't know how much of a question it was. He didn't reply to the suggestion of being dropped off elsewhere. Where else was there, that was not some ally of either Zaichaer or Kalzasi? Most of everyone he knew was on this very airship. Florian knew the layout of the Nachtherr, and once he confirmed the suggestion he took a deep breath and started walking in that direction, ignoring most anything else, Lyra and Brenner included. He didn't say anything else until they sat down.

"They didn't arrest me like normal. I didn't face a trial. I was offered death now or death later, and I made the mistake of choosing to live. I didn't even step off of the train." Florian frowned and stared at the table in front of him. "They said I was special. They'd been waiting to get their hands on me. Wanting to...to manufacture my betrayal, because I was too close to Eitan." He held his hand in his lap, nails digging into the very palm that had been marked by Killian. He had to speak his fears, know his fears, and he was terrified. He had to face his fears, but he was held down by panic. Florian looked up at Stefan, his eyes still white with only a thin black line around his iris to distinguish it from the sclera.

"I wasn't the only one there. There were a few others, different from me. But we were all special. It's... I have no safety in Kalzasi, and I go back home, they'll arrest me and take me back to the doctor. I have nowhere to go anymore." His hand moved from his lap to wipe the abundance of tears that still wet his face, and then he lowered his voice and leaned forward. "If you're going to arrest me, please shoot me first."

[Lyra]

She watched Brenner's back as he moved away from her, but her golden eyes slowly lowered to the pistol sitting on the table. There were things she could have said, things that in a flash of irritation she had to restrain herself from saying, but as quickly as the spark of emotions came they were snuffed out by age and experience. The gun wobbled as the engines of the ship came to life, the entire deck shaking though eerily quiet to Lyra's ears as she had expected the vessel to roar to life like a beast after its hibernation. As it began to slide sideways Lyra picked up the pistol, turning it over in her hands as she looked to where Brenner stood on the bridge.

Behind her she could still hear the sounds of Florian's chaotic melody, but she did not turn. While he was near her she would not allow anything to happen to him, but she could not fight his fights for him. Whats more that fear he felt... It was something he had to master on his own, just as she mastered her own. This was a test of sorts for him, to determine if he had what it took to enact his vengeance.

The pistol felt strange in her hand, awkward there where she held it at her side as she approached the Commander again. She could hear his frustration too, and something else. An odd mixture of emotions that warred with the resolute tones of his resolve to his cause. She had done that too him, she knew, but for whatever reason Lyrielle did not feel pleasure at seeing the seeds begin to sprout.

"You may bed anyone you wish." Lyra said as she came to stand beside him on the bridge, "Our relationship was never an exclusive one, and I do not begrudge you finding others who satisfy a need I cannot fulfill."

She toyed with the pistol as she spoke, but did not look at him and instead watched the ground steadily fall away as they were lifted into the air.

"The damages to me personally are minimal, for I care not for the wealth or prestige I have gathered. The true loss was the insight and reach I had obtained within Kalzasi. You see Brenner, you and those you conspire with have made an egregious error." Raising the pistol so it pointed out over the deck, toward Kalzasi, toward the palace gardens, Lyra smiled ruefully, "The prince was never the true danger. He was a weapon, and more importantly a symbol of the city and its people." Her arm dropped and the smile faded.

With a sigh she would lean against the railing or whatever structure was closest, "I was preparing as we discussed. I had started setting the foundations that would truly cripple the city, and its people. I had begun to gain the ear of key officials in both the Great Houses and the Circle of Spells. All of that effort, that time is now wasted for whether or not they directly link the nights events back to Zaichaer, our fleeing now all but cements in the mind of the Iron Queen who is to blame. Tonight will not stop Kalzasi, it will be the catalyst for much greater atrocities."

Stepping closer Lyra would slip the pistol into Brenner's hand and slowly bring it up so that it rested just beneath her chin, "If you are so worried about my commitment, then be a man and see your threat through to the end. Spare me the justifications for your ego. What happened tonight will not serve the realm. It will doom it."

[Brenner Dornkirk]

"That was merely an analogy..." Brenner glanced sidelong to Lyra as she drew beside him on the bridge, and his expression lost its cool edge for a moment. If anything, this novel rift between them aroused greater desire. The thrill of the moment was potent enough and flush with the bestial energy that fear and excitement were wont to yield. Other animal impulses could easily tack themselves onto such potency.

"Well." He crossed his arms over his chest and regarded the cityscape before them as the Nachtherr began to rise. "I will freely concede that the survival of the queen was an unfortunate oversight on the part of my allies, but time, not you or I, will decide whether tonight's operation was a grave error or a salient victory." He glanced to his hand as she pressed the gun into it and relaxed his arm to let her move it as she would.

He stared at her face, frozen for a moment with his hand taut about the grip and his finger on the trigger. Slowly the tip of his tongue protruded to graze across his top lip.

"You look exquisite in this lighting." He whispered, as his eyes trailed toward the spot on her neck being indented by the muzzle of the revolver. "I like you, Lyra, I do... Interpersonally... socially, I feel like we get on like a house on fire, and I hope that house is Novalys, but..." Finally, he relaxed his grip on the gun and slowly pulled it away from her flesh. "I do not yet trust you completely. I could not bring you into this discussion. It would have been treason against my own Fatherland and a betrayal against an ally who, if I were to cross them, frightens me..." He smiled faintly, almost playfully, "...even more than you do, my bewitching Lyra." He paused for a beat,

"Now." He tucked the gun back into his belt, and turned to approach the captain's chair. "I am afraid the best laid plans of mice, men and, in your case, mages go oft astray." He opened a panel adjoining the seat. "But the grace, elegance and endurance of Humankind lies in our ability to adapt..." He reached into what seemed to be a storage compartment of some kind, "...to evolve. So..." He withdrew a bottle of brown liquor by the neck and closed the compartment.

"Why don't we drink? Whether you elect to join me in toasting our victory or drown the grief I caused with my impetuous blunder- It matters not. It is behind us, and the future will hold whatever the future will hold." He uncorked the bottle and offered it to Lyra, as an old quote from a favourite play of his came to mind. He took her hand and placed it around the bottle much as she'd done to him with the gun moments earlier.

"Whatever happens now for good or ill, 'I have set my life upon a cast, and I will stand the hazard of the die.'"

[Stefan Dornkirk]

The additions Florian was making to his story moved around in Stefan's head like puzzle pieces. The important thing to remember when taking a statement for scientific study was that the one giving the statement fully believing what they were saying did not always make their recollections true.

The Private returning to Zaichaer out of a sense of guilt after deserting was a point in his favor, a rather substantial one. It was possible that he had been arrested by members of the ZADC without the Order being aware, there were sometimes crossed wires between the branches of the government. It was also possible that the experimentation in question was so secret that protecting it was worth leaving Eitan, his superior, and who knew how many higher levels of authority in the dark. If it had led to the new technology employed at the party they had just fled...

Stefan would not say that the torturing of non-consenting innocents was worth the winning of a war. Hard choices had to be made sometimes, and he himself had done experiments on living creatures that had not been pleasant and often led to the deaths of those creatures but he had done all he could to render their suffering minor and brief. With modern medicine, not to mention the level of magical intervention that would be required to keep someone alive through what Albrecht was describing, there was no reason Stefan could see to keep the man awake, let alone able to feel.

The mention of a lack of trial didn't surprise him that much. The military dealt with traitors and deserters quickly and harshly, it was a necessary evil. Stefan might make inquiries when he returned home, but he also might not. Leaving such things to a trained operative like Eitan, who was well versed in the politics of which questions could be asked and which should not be, seemed the wiser course.

Pulling a pocket-handkerchief from the excessively formal suit he had worn to the wedding reception he handed it to Florian, not unkindly, but also not used to reacting to hysterics. Walking the few feet to the wet bar he looked through the bottles before selecting a mild spirit which, in his experience, helped calm him when he was anxious. Pouring two tumblers full he returned to the table and sat, placing one in from of the weeping Lysanrin.

"Here, this might help. I see you have been through a great deal of horror and confusion without anyone to help you." In a similar circumstance, Stefan would have likely fallen apart himself. "If you are able, try to drink that and calm yourself. If you can, we will discuss what is best to be done. Would you trust Commander Angevin with this? I can get word to him and have him come meet us before we reach Zaichaer if that is your wish."

[Florian]

FLORIAN

After his few moments of hysterics, Florian managed to pull himself together. Part of it was spurred by danger — the threat of everything lurked in the back of his head. He was seen with Brenner and Stefan, even if he had only inadvertently joined them moments before the attack. Kalzasi wouldn't be safe for him, either, not after his horrendous choice in companions. Another part of it was spurred by the mark on his remaining palm, the large, inky black outline of a circle. The very mark that had drawn Lyra to him, and the safety that provided him. He looked down in his lap at the dark mark on his hand, and then reached that hand up to take the handkerchief from Stefan and dry his eyes.

The drink was just as easily accepted, and Florian drank it all before he spoke again. He wasn't sure what, exactly, Zaichaer wanted to do with him, dead or alive or stolen away back to the black site. But he had escaped once, and retrieval felt out of the cards, especially with the other Lysanrin experiment that was sent after him. The offer of contacting Eitan was enticing, regardless with how it could or may end. He took a deep breath, and spoke much more calmly than he had when they first started the conversation.

"The doctor — Dr. Constantine — had discovered unique properties of my blood. I don't know if you found them yourself, but he suspected it was related to my work with Commander Angevin. I worked a lot with his Negation wards. Since I was absorbing that aether into myself, it made me resistant to magic. The doctor told me as much that they could not do much with their tonics besides keep me alive as they..." He trailed off and looked to the side, a distinctly uncomfortable expression on his face for that brief pause. "I'm inherently anti-magical. My blood and tissues resist magic because of this." He sighed. "That was why I was special. Because they could use my blood and block a mage from their aether, or inoculate someone against the effects of magic."

"I wasn't the only one there. The doctor is still there, I imagine. The lab is still there. I know too much and I can only imagine they want me dead or dragged back for it." Florian drummed his fingers on the table and watched them, not looking at Stefan directly. "You're the scientist, that's why I'm telling you all this. Maybe you can make more sense of it than I can."

It seemed to finally sink in that whether he stayed in Kalzasi or went back to Zaichaer, he was not welcome in either. "And you can contact Commander Angevin. Oh, is there anything I can change into on this ship? I'm tired of this stupid Kalzasern outfit."

[Lyra]

Despite the press of metal against her skin Lyra could not help the smile that came with the Commander's quip. She had been called many things, but exquisite was certainly a first.

"Trust is not easily won." She conceded. The air had begun to change somehow. The buzz of excitement was fading, giving way to a wave melodic tones that were softer and more rhythmic. Fading adrenaline? Relief? Beneath it all though Lyra could hear the rumbling growl of desire, a plague of his kind that echoed in the look in his eyes as he holstered his gun and turned. Her smile turned sultry as she followed after, drawing closer than was strictly necessary as he opened the compartment.

When the bottle was offered to her Lyra stared at it with a blank expression, confusion showing a moment before she hesitantly accepted it, but did not immediately drink.

"You speak as one who has gained much and lost little." The smile was gone, but she did not frown or seem upset. She stared at the bottle, and then with a sigh that was heavy with regret she tilted it back and took a small sip. The taste immediately made her expression sour and she handled the bottle back with a shake of her head.

"For good or ill, what is done is done. Let us hope there will be time to repair mistakes before hammer falls." Setting hands on hips she looked over the city again, somber before she looked at Brenner, "All I had made and worked for is gone... I have nothing to my name. Will there be a place for me in your Fatherland, or will I be forced to flee as soon as we land?"

[Brenner Dornkirk]

"Indeed it is not... Least of all amongst bedfellows as strange as we." Brenner nodded in agreement. They had forged an unlikely alliance with some purposes seemingly in common, but others that were admittedly at sixes and sevens. She'd expressed a desire to see magic regulated, whereas Brenner thought that a half measure. He wanted to see sorcery abolished altogether, lest the cycle that afflicted their world and all its inhabitants continue ad infinitum.

"Perhaps, though I think the one resource I've just gained in greatest abundance is enemies." He noted, as he accepted the bottle Lyra returned and took a quick gulp. He didn't so much as wince at the caustic spirit. Claiming his rightful seat in the captain's chair, the commander considered her words.

"The work we discussed you beginning in Zaichaer is that much more pivotal now. I will uphold my end of that bargain to what extent I am able, if you remain willing to help us. I would understand, of course, if you loathe me now and wish me ill. If that be the case, then I have suffered a grave loss after all..." He softened, glancing up at her for a moment before turning his eyes ahead to watch the clouds and the treeline.

"We will have to see about getting you registered once we reach port. Hopefully the work in Kalzasi will have afforded me good will in the eyes of the State, in which case we may be able to fast track the process. You were, after all, immensely helpful in my endeavour." There were no promises that his efforts would be regarded favourably. He might have been seen as a liability to be done away with, but such were the gambits that led to greatness and glory.

"And of course I would be remiss if I did not afford you a place to stay in Zaichaer as you offered me as much in Kalzasi." He took another swig of his schnapps. "So, then, Lyra... Where do things stand between us in your eyes?"

[Stefan Dornkirk]

The idea that a biologist might be able to retrieve useful properties in the Lysanrin's blood made perfect sense to Stefan. He had taken samples and investigated them with his limited ability without any real result. Had he the equipment and training he would have made more of an effort, but it was no more than a hobby for him, so he'd let the idea go.

As Albrecht began to calm down, and as the lights of Kalzasi grew fainted through the little windows of the galley, Stefan began to release a little of the tension that had been gripping his body in an iron fist since they had arrived at the party. He tucked the doctor's name away in his mind to investigate later. It sounded vaguely familiar but medicine was not his main, or even secondary field of study so it was unlikely he knew the man.

The implications of the study and findings were fascinating, but nothing in the ideas explained the sort of open body surgery Florian was recalling. Could it be possible that the drugs he'd been given had caused intense hallucinations? But, no, there was the scarring to account for. Hardening his resolve Stefan accepted that there was much to account for in association with Florian Albrecht. There were questions that needed asking, answers that needed to be exposed. He have to go with Brenner when he made the report to the First Minister. Stefan had not met the woman outside of social occasions, but the crumbs of what was happening looked like they might be about to catch fire. A fire that might catch Eitan in its embrace would not be tolerated.

Rather than addressing any of the information being given he reached out and took the Private's shoulder in one hand in an attempt to provide comfort.

"We shall take you to Dornkirk Manor. No one will stop us, we have full clearance. My rooms are quite secure, and no one will be looking for you in the city, let alone in a noble family's home. From there we can contact Commander Angevin and discuss what is best to be done."

At the request for clothing he nodded and stood,

"Of course."

After a few minutes of searching, he found I ZADC uniform that would be a little long on the Private but not so badly so as any of Stefan's own clothes. Returning he handed the clothing over and said,

"Here, it will cause even less likelihood that you will be noticed if you're in uniform. You may use the cabin Eitan used for the expedition if you like." There were two small private cabins in addition to the captain's. How sleeping arrangements would go they could sort as they went. It didn't feel likely that he would be sleeping at all in the hours that remained before they arrived back in Zaichaer, so there would be a private cabin for Lyra if she wanted one.

"Try and get some rest, you've had a terrible shock that sounds like it came at the end of an exhausting few months. I'll wake you before we reach the border if you wish."

[Florian]

"Thank you." He said before Stefan left to search for a change of clothes. Florian's eyes were red but the hysteria was drifting away, and now he was focused on his breathing to keep it from coming back. His fortune was in the hands of the brothers Dornkirk. Seeing that Stefan's reaction was an attempt at some semblance of comfort and understanding was a good sign, so he would have to see what Brenner would decide to do. It was the same choice he had made on the train. Death now, death later. He was resolute on buying himself more time at any cost, with any choice, even with his so frequent scrapes with death. He was resiliant. There had been harder things to survive than a sleep on the Nachtherr as he came to the city.

"Thank you again. I can only hope that things get better from here." Florian sighed, and then he stood up and took the clothing from Stefan. That they were going to essentially smuggle him in was a good sign. Maybe the Dornkirk took pity on him for his story, though Florian was past the need for pity and earnestly sought revenge, he was in no place to refuse the help. He needed to be stronger, he needed to be better, and he needed to rest. With the bundle of clothing tucked under his arm he made his way to the cabin to change and sleep.

[Rune]

R E V I E W

Lore:

Brenner:

Survival:

Planning ahead
Using tech to conceal himself
Knowing the equipment for the job
Assessing avenues of escape
Knowing when to run
Knowing when to stand his ground
Attacking gods and living to tell the tale
Surrounding himself with adept comrades
Turning obstacles into benefits

Tactics:

Absconding from the sum of his own sabotage



Lyra:
10

Florian:
10

Stefan:
10

Points: 10 each

Injuries/Ailments: None

Loot: The pride of a daring escape? One previously missing Lysanrin? A Creepy new Girlfriend?

Notes: All involved writers are mods so, you can add lores are you want or just send them to me and I'll pop them in =)