Sabine
Cats choose, very carefully, where they live.
Sabine
is no exception. In the months since she met Ian she has been hunting
and preparing for a conversation she never meant to have. But then
there was a dancing partner she never meant to have. A dark and stormy
she never meant to have. A neon tangerine paper umbrella tucked into an
ornately carved wooden box, absorbing the scent of nearby herbs and
incense.
She has waited, Sabine, until now. There were things that she needed to do. There always are.
Tonight, she will do a thing because she wants to.
And so, Ian's phone rings.
Ian
When
he gave Sabine his number all those weeks ago, Ian half-expected not to
hear from her again. And so, as days passed and a call never came, he
inevitably put the thought of her out of his mind. Mysterious creatures
have their ways. He knows that all too well.
But apparently she has not forgotten him.
When
the phone lights up, vibrating quietly against the surface of his
kitchen counter, Ian is seated at the island with a plate of stir-fry
and a glass of wine in front of him, both of which are about half
consumed. He glances at the phone - notes that it's an unknown number,
and almost doesn't answer it.
But then it hums again, and, for whatever reason, he does.
"Hello?"
Sabine
Sabine's
voice is exactly as it was last they met: confidence, silk, and the low
thrum of distant thunder blended into something smokey and amber. "I
have a place for us to meet."
There is a pause, and then she
adds, amusement flooding over her imperiousness, "I would recommend
wearing something less fragile."
Ian
Even over
the phone, Sabine's voice is instantly recognizable. When she speaks,
there is a whisper of sense-memory - the scent of stone and water, of
rum and ginger... mostly of her. Ian goes still for a moment. It's a
surprise, but not an unwelcome one.
"What, no Prada this time? I suppose I'll have to scour my closet."
He's teasing, of course.
"Tell me the address. I'll meet you."
Sabine
Sabine gives Ian what turns out to be the address of a trail entrance in the mountains. Remote. Isolated.
Wild.
(She
does not respond to the teasing. She knows only that Ian is amused and
expects her to be amused. And that Prada sounds as though it should be
the name of an exquisitely delicious kind of rabbit.)
Sabine
is waiting there, carelessly lying along the top of a guardrail meant to
provide some measure of protection from the steep slope beyond to cars
and careless children. She is wearing battered brown cargo pants, a
white tank top, and a heavy jade pendant. Perhaps not exactly what one
would expect as night is falling and temperatures cooling.
She
moves like water, muscles shifting beneath her skin. The movement is
smooth. Her skin is smooth, save for where there is a glimpse of part
of a scar on her side in the few inches of bared skin, trailing downward
from the direction of her ribs and past the curve of one hip. Her bare
feet are steady and sure as she glides a few lazy steps along the
guardrail.
The smile that she grants Ian is equally confident and equally lazy.
Three
things are true in this moment, though Ian can only be certain of one.
She still has that paper umbrella. She is about to turn into a lion.
There is absolutely no sign that she has any fucking shoes.
Ian
It's
late to be going for a hike. Possibly park hours are nearing closed by
the time he arrives and parks his car in the lot - not that official
closing times have ever been of much concern to him. (Not that they are
likely to ever be of concern for someone like Sabine.) By the time Ian
ascends the slope to the trail's entrance, the light on the skyline is
dimming. He's dressed in a pair of dark green hiking pants,
trail-ready athletic shoes and a white tank top. Not at all dissimilar
to Sabine's own choice of attire - bare feet aside. There's a moment
when he reaches the trail, sees her and stops. He doesn't say hello,
just watches the way she moves along the guard-rail, eyes shifting down
to note the lack of shoes before coming back to meet her gaze.
"It's
a nice evening for a hike," he finally offers, a ghost of a smile
touching his lips. The air is cooling off, but still summery and dry. In
the distance, he can hear the sound of crickets making music in the
grass.
Sabine
Sabine regards him for a few
seconds. She has no plans to hike. She has plans to run. But she does
not correct him. Then he will ask the wrong questions.
"You
must know that people can sense the stripes beneath your skin. They can
smell the wildness in you." Sabine keeps walking along the edge of
guardrail. There is no sound and no hesitation as the balls of her feet
make contact with the cold metal, as her toes curl and grip.
"And they want to reach out and touch you, because that wildness call to them. But it haunts them too."
Sabine's
feet still and she regards Ian with eyes that seem to intensify the
fading light they reflect. Twin gold suns in the growing dark. Burning. Always burning.
Her chin lifts a little. "Do you want to know why?" It is more a challenge than an offer.
Ian
It
isn't what he expects her to lead with, and that gives him pause. Makes
him look at her with this sharpened focus and give this fractional tilt
of his head. There is a long moment where he considers his response.
Weighing, perhaps, how much he should trust her. The last time they met,
they spoke of things without really speaking of them. Perhaps he
expected more of that. He is very curious about her, but she has not come here to tell him stories about herself.
It does take him off-guard, a little.
"Some
people show their nature more strongly than others." It's slightly
cryptic, the way he says it. Like he could just as easily be talking
about her. "I'm not ignorant to my own."
(Ah, Ian. In one way at least, you are.)
"But if you have some insight... I'm curious to hear it."
Sabine
[Dex+Athletics | D=6 (8-2) | WP (because she knows Ian is athletic as hell)]
Dice: 9 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 2, 4, 4, 6, 8, 8) ( success x 4 ) [Doubling Tens] [WP]
Sabine
Sabine smiles, teeth flashing white against the shadows around her.
"Good," she says. "I had not expected you to be a coward." Again her chin lifts. "After all. I like you."
Her
smile broadens into a grin and then she is running lightly over the
curving rail. "Catch me," she calls to him, and leaps off ot the rail
to the ground below. As though the eight foot drop is nothing.
[And
Ian can jump after her (at the same 8-2 difficulty because they have
that same merit), or he can take an extra ten feet of running. Or he
can go grab a cosmo. Whatevs. The world is his oyster.]
Ian
[Naturally he is going to jump after her. This is Ian we're talking about. Dex+Ath Diff 8-2]
Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 5, 7, 7, 7, 9, 9) ( success x 5 )
Ian
She
hadn't expected him to be a coward. Something about the way she says it
makes Ian lift his chin in this subtle slip of amused defiance.
Ignorance or no, he is very much a tiger's son. And perhaps that is why
he cannot help but follow after Sabine when she offers him her
challenge. It isn't safe, leaping that kind of distance. But then,
creatures such as they have an entirely different definition of
dangerous.
Sabine is beautiful when she jumps. The muscles in
her body move with this fluid ripple of grace and athleticism, and she
lands with perfect balance on her feet. Ian takes about a half second to
consider his options before ignoring the official trail and following
Sabine over the edge. It's a long way down, but he lands safely -
elegantly, even. Like he was built for it. And he doesn't waste a moment
before chasing after her, running over the earth with these long, rapid
strides.
It's a rush: the way his heartbeat jumps, the way his body responds. She isn't wrong about him. There is wildness in his blood.
Sabine
Sabine
leaps off of the rail and Ian leaps over the rail and then they are
running through the trees and the dusk. Sabine is laughing as she runs,
joy as pure and untarnished as when she was dancing.
As when they were dancing.
Just ahead of him, she crests a rise. Just ahead of him and he is so close, so very close, to catching her.
Sabine
crouches a second on the lip of that hill, fingers and toes curling
into the earth. She springs laterally out into space, more as if she is
springing out into water than over rocky earth. Muscle ripples and fur
the pale gold of dawn spills over her skin. The nails that once bit so
carefully into his skin are claws before they strike the earth.
She does not look back.
She has never looked back.
Easy
and joyful as the forest around her seems to hold its breath and still
in terror and wonder, Sabine runs. Her joy and her wildness and her
eyes heavy with secrets and mystery, those things are all undeniably
Sabine. They are no less hers when she is a lion. They are no less
hers when she is a girl.
Ian
[Awareness, because mages try to figure everything out with awareness]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (4, 5, 7, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 4 )
Ian
[And then Life 1 / Prime 1 / Spirit 1 (yaaaay I finally have spirit!)]
Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (3, 7, 8) ( success x 2 )
Sabine
There
is that same sense of energy radiating from Sabine, blazing and
intoxicating and dangerous. It is not Resonance in the way that a Mage
has Resonance but id does flare bright and hot when her form blurs and
melts into the shape of a lion. She is, in the shape of a lion, a lion.
Ian can sense tendon and muscle and bone. But this time, with Spirit
magic, he can sense what he did not before - can see how in reflection
of the world Sabine is running through the memory of trees and she
blazes there the same way that she blazes to his mystical senses here.
She is not a girl in the Umbra, but the same lion he sees running
through the trees in the physical world.
Ian
There's
something he missed when he tried to get a sense of her before. He knew
it then - knew at the time that he was sensing something he didn't have
full capacity to explain. Strangely it's Alexander's words that come
back to him now as he watches her run - watches her leap into the air
and become something golden and wild. Werewolves, he'd said.
And Ian had thought - not wolves.
He
can feel the burning pulse of raw power that lives in her body. And
when she jumps like that, he knows instinctively that something is about
to happen. He's running to the limits of his ability, pushing muscles
and tendons at a breakneck pace to catch this beautiful, wild, primal
creature. And there is a moment there, just before she shifts before
him, that he thinks he is about to win.
But he doesn't know what he's in for. And then Sabine is no longer a woman, but a lion.
(She was always a lion. It's only now that he's seeing it.)
The
shock of it makes his pace slow. It makes him hesitate, his heart
pumping rapidly with fear and excitement. He's already so alive in that
moment, it takes very little effort for him to push beyond the
boundaries of his mundane senses and see... something more. Something
that is both living and spirit.
For a moment, it honestly takes his breath away.
He
could be in danger. He knows this - is not so overwhelmed as to be
rendered foolish. But he doesn't stop there and watch Sabine disappear
into the mountain wilderness. He hesitates, yes. But it is only for a
moment. Then he picks up his pace again and runs.
Sabine
Before him the lion slows. Marginally.
Sabine
still does not look back. She stays ahead of him, still running.
Lions are not built for running long distances but Sabine is more than a
lion. More than a girl.
She runs through the trees, gold and
radiant like the first hint of sunlight. These shadows she does not
chase away. But other kinds of darkness? Those shadows shrink back
from her. Fall beneath her claws and her fangs and those burning eyes.
More
than shadows fall prey to her. More than gazelles. But she does not
turn and pounce upon Ian - does not show him bared fangs and rage.
Instead she lets him run with her. She matches her pace to one he can keep and she keeps running.
And
so, Ian's introduction to the Bastet is not violent. It is not terror.
It is not doubt. It is wonder and gold fur and grace.
Just
as they come closer to their destination, Sabine slows from full running
strides to a brisk trot. He could catch her now if he wanted. Could
leap upon her. Could reach out and touch her flank as her breaths come
hard and fast after so much running. Could dare to see if the fur just
behind her ears is soft as the fur behind the ears of a kitten.
Ahead, through the trees, he can just make out the outline of a small cabin.
Ian
He
sees the cabin through the trees in the dim twilight shadows. Sees
Sabine slow her pace to a brisk trot. Her feet are softer than his own
tonight. Unnerving, how something so large and so brutal could be so
silent when it runs. He is quiet too, but not that quiet. His shoes hit
the ground with muted thumps and his breath is audible in the evening
air.
He doesn't try to leap onto her. Perhaps if they knew
each other better. But it feels wrong - disrespectful, even. And more
than possibly dangerous. He doesn't let her go, either. She did
challenge him to catch her, after all. So his feet continue running, and
when he catches up to her side he reaches out to trail his fingers
through the fur at the nape of her neck. There's an electric sensation
that ghosts over his skin, this combination of primal fear and
exhilaration.
It's the first time he's ever touched a lion.
Sabine
Sabine had slowed so that he might touch her. She understands that there are things best experienced.
She
turns back to face him. She does not rub against him, does not nudge
her head under his hand like some housecat. There might be times she
can be that playful. Tonight, instead, she melts back into the form of a
barefoot girl. The eyes that regard Ian are the eyes of the girl and
the lion both.
"You have our blood," she says to Ian. And
then her chin lifts a little and she laughs. "Not lions though. You
are not quite so fortunate as that. Your blood is of the tigers.
Khan." There is a slight baring of her teeth as she says Khan, but
beyond that one sign there is no hostility. "I cannot tell you much
about your blood.
"And that is what they smell in you, though
they cannot name it. You are not favored by Seline as I am and some of
your blood are, but your blood is still ours. You still closer to all
the mystery and wonder and power of spirits than they are. You more
than most.
"And so they are afraid."
Ian
Ian stops still when Sabine turns around, her
form shifting back to something more familiar to him. In the still of
the twilight, caught in the midst of this impossible moment, it occurs
to him briefly to wonder how it is she managed to keep her clothes. What
kind of magic she must possess that he does not. But he doesn't ask,
because what she says next catches his attention in a way that renders
all of his other thoughts silent.
He's still catching his
breath from the run, lips slightly parted to allow for more airflow. He
doesn't respond for a long moment after she speaks. In the interceding
time, there is the sound of the wilderness coming alive around them.
Trees, wind, insects, distant animals. There is the sound of him
breathing.
"You mean that literally," he says finally, a
crease of tension forming around his eyes. Because Ian has had years to
get used to the fact that some part of him was marked by primal forces.
He knows what his Avatar looks like; has seen her (run with her.) And he
understands that she is as much a part of him as he is of her. In a
spiritual sense. A metaphorical sense. That doesn't make it less real -
but it has never occurred to him to wonder if it could be more than
that.
"Are you..." the word feels wrong, somehow. Werecat.
It sounds like something humans would make up. Not a name a group of
people would choose for themselves. Ian's mouth tries to recoil
instinctively away from it. "...A shapeshifter?" He settles for
something slightly less vulgar. "You think I'm related to someone like
you?"
Sabine
Sabine regards him steadily.
Intently. "Bastet," she says, and it is more an offer than a
correction. "We cats, are Bastet. And I know you are related to us."
Those blazing eyes stay fixed on his. "How could I not?"
"You
already know, too. You have since you first saw me. You just don't
believe it yet." Sabine says this as though his surrender to the
knowledge of what he is is inevitable.
"Come."
And then she does turn away from him, taking the last distance back to the cabin at a more sedate pace.
Ian
Had
he been someone else - had his life been more... mundane. His reaction
to all of this likely would have been far more dramatic. Does Sabine
wonder about that? Perhaps she attributes it to instinct. That knowledge
she says he has but does not yet believe. And she isn't wrong, really.
There's just a hint too much recognition in his eyes for him not to know. (And what had he said earlier? He is not ignorant of his nature.)
Bastet, she says. It isn't a word he's heard before, but it feels familiar (right.) Khan,
she said a moment ago. That one felt familiar too. He can feel it
behind his eyes and in his chest. The way the words make the animal in
him stir.
Come, she says, and there's a fractional
pause of consideration before he does. The two of them walk the
remainder of the distance to the cabin, and when they arrive at the door
Ian offers, quietly, "It isn't exactly that I don't believe it. Partly,
yes. I knew my parents." There's a small catch in his voice when he
speaks of his family. "They were human." (Were.) "But I do know who I am
and what I'm capable of. And I don't think you have the full story."
She's shared with him this piece of herself, and although he doesn't
fully understand the significance of that (of her trust, her honesty,)
he does know that what she's given him is not offered lightly.
So he offers her the same truth.
"I can show you, if you want."
Sabine
Sabine
opens the unlocked door and steps into the house. Ian's offer to show
her something gets a curious glance, but then she steps inside. Inside
the cabin is...curious. There is a bookcase on the wall to the right,
and the books on it are all old. Someone gave them a cursory dusting,
but Ian can still smell, under the scent of herbs and wood smoke, years
of emptiness. Along the wall running the length of the cabin nearest
the door is a massive planter, filled with fresh earth and planted with
new plants.
"Sit," Sabine says as she walks into the
kitchen, though she does not look back to see if he obeys that...very
strongly worded suggestion? It is just short of a command, laced with
the faintest hint of concern. Sabine might be impatient and she might
be frustrated at having to tell one of the Khan's blood who they are,
but she does understand something of it means to have your world come
apart and reform in new ways.
"What do you want to show me?" There is the sound of running water as she fills two glasses.
Ian
[Life 3 / Prime 2 (making a flower) vulgar diff 7 -1 (elegant resonance) -1 (focus: blood) -1 (taking his time)]
Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (5, 5, 8) ( success x 4 ) [WP]
Ian
[And Paradox]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 5, 10) ( success x 1 )
Ian
[Soak]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 3, 8) ( success x 1 )
Ian
Sabine
doesn't seem to grasp the weight of what he means to show her, but
then, Ian doesn't quite grasp the weight of what she's been telling him
all evening. They are, in that sense, two people from very different
worlds. She opens the door to the cabin and leads them inside. When she
tells Ian to sit, there's enough command in her voice that he pauses and
looks at her with this half-veiled, half-considering gaze.
There
is, perhaps, a hint of defiance in it. But he does sit, walking a slow
path to the living area before choosing a spot on the sofa.
It puts her at his back, and her presence behind him sends the hairs rising instinctively on his neck.
He
has to think for a moment about what he wants to do. Finally he pulls
the knife out of his pocket and flicks it open, using the tip to open a
small cut on the center of his palm. A drop of blood wells up and beads
along his skin. If Sabine looks over she'll see the way he's focused on
it. Even as he slips the knife away, his eyes and his concentration are
fixed on his palm. Perhaps she can smell the blood as acutely as he can.
It
is both living and quintessential, that blood. Offering of himself to
create something new. The magick materializes slowly - he isn't trying
to rush this (knows it would be foolish to hurry something this
intricate.) But gradually the blood lifts and reforms, spreading out
along his palm in a cool glow of moonlight (he may not know that he
belongs to Seline, but it shows in his magick - the way it shines all
soft and silver.) It creates the shape of a white rose, its petals
glimmering softly as the light dies out. It is only the head of the
flower, but it is soft and elegant and very much alive.
When he's done he looks up and stretches out his palm to offer it to Sabine.
Sabine
Sabine,
who is no longer behind him but standing beside the sofa, is staring at
the flower. She seems enthralled by the sight of the flower grown from
blood and magic. She sets one glass of water down on the table for Ian
and then carefully, delicately, lifts the rose off of his palm. It
practically glows, perfect and pure white against her skin.
She
seems to understand that the rose is alive. She walks the stemless
flower over to the planter and nestles it in the earth. Gives it some
of her water. Perhaps she expects it to grow roots from the sheer force
of her will. She crosses back to the sofa and perches up on the arm of
it.
"So you have your own secrets," Sabine says. She is
not afraid. "You should guard that secret, even with us. Not all of us
love witches." Her mouth softens, smiles; but even so there is an
increasing spark of anger in her eyes. "My brother is a witch. It is
not easy for him." Nor for Sabine, who has joined him in a life of
travelling adventures she would never have chosen for herself. But that
sacrifice she does not speak of.
Ian
Witch,
she calls him. And he could correct her, the way she did him. But the
truth is, he has little attachment to any particular title. The
Tradition mages, they might care more. 'Witch' is a Verbena term. An
Akashic would laugh at it. A Hermetic might recoil in disdain. Ian, for
all that he walks among them, does not claim any of these Traditions as
his own. And he doesn't much care what Sabine wishes to call him, so
long as it isn't intended as an insult (which it doesn't seem to be.)
So
he lets that be. It does surprise him, briefly, that she seems to have
more experience with his kind than he does hers (even though her kind is
also his.)
"I guard it as you guard yours," he offers
quietly. "But if your brother's one of us, I wouldn't mind meeting
him." There's a pause as he considers what she's just told him.
Something about it feels a little... unsettling. He had been fairly sure
that once she understood what he was, she would realize she'd made a
mistake. Instead, he discovers that he isn't even the only one of his
kind that she knows. And the other shares her blood (as she claims he
shares with the tigers.)
It isn't the reaction that he wanted.
Isn't something that he can easily fit into his established definition
of the truth. And whether he wants to admit it or not, it starts this
nagging doubt in his mind.
"If I really am what you say, then maybe we are
chosen. Just not in the same way." Typical mage hubris, to imagine
himself the equal of one of Gaia's children. (But he does not imagine
it. He knows it.) "I did become a tiger once. A long time ago. I still
do, when I sleep."
Sabine
"Whatever
blessings you have," Sabine says, "You are still of their blood. We
are part spirit and part flesh. You-" And here she has to pause, has to
weigh her tone and find a word. "You are human. You are flesh. Some
of you are more spirit, but you are not what we are." She takes a drink
of her water.
"And, if you wish, you can meet Etienne. He is
out tonight." Her chin lifts a little. "I sent him away." And yes,
there is that same reflexive entitlement, but there is something else
too. There is an acknowledgement that Sabine had made this time for
him, made this time for them. It is, in its way, meant to pay Ian a
compliment. This tiger, this witch, she has invited into her home.
Ian
"No," he agrees. "I'm not what you are."
But they do
share something. That much, he always knew. Even if he didn't fully
understand why. It's less the immediate reality of the news than it is
the implications of it that he doesn't want to look at.
Sabine
has made this time for him. A bastet - a lioness - has willingly invited
him into her home. He doesn't know what it means for a lion to offer
that much of herself to a tiger (doesn't know that the Khan and the
Simba are not, and have never been, friends.) But he does know that he's
lucky to be in her good graces. The last time they met, he'd been all
seductive charm, and she'd kissed him the way he would imagine a lioness
to kiss. Then they'd left with that lingering promise.
Is
that why he's here? Why she sent her brother away? Or was it only to
tell him this news that he is not entirely what he believed himself to
be?
Either way, a ghost of a smile touches his mouth. It isn't
what it should be (he's still out of sorts,) but there's a hint of the
way he looked at her that day at the bar. "I think maybe I'm
disappointing you." He takes a drink of his own water and looks up to
where she sits on the arm of the sofa. "I'll try to be more enjoyable
company."
But he doesn't try to touch her. Doesn't try to kiss
her again. Instead he shifts to one side to make room, offering her a
space next to him. Of course, if she'd wanted it, she could have taken
it already. So perhaps it is less an offer and more of a request. (To
sit with him, instead of above him.)
"You're beautiful when you run. In both skins. I'd like to know more about you, if you're willing to tell me."
Sabine
Ian
makes space for her to join him and Sabine regards him for half a
minute. Long enough that it might seem she will not join him. But then
she slides off the arm of the couch and into the space beside him. She
is smaller than he is, capable of tucking herself against his side,
which she does. It is casual, sensual. But there is no sign that she
intends to do more.
He is still off balance and so Sabine is
waiting. She smiles when he tells her that she is beautiful and then
laughs when he asks for her to tell him about herself. There is nothing
cruel or mocking in that laugh.
"We are creatures that guard
our secrets. Well enough that there is not much I can tell you, not
about me and not about you. I will find one of your people though, if
you want me to. It may take some some time." And then she, so close
and with not a hint of bared fangs or claws, admits, "We are more
enemies than friends, your people and mine."
Ian
It
doesn't entirely surprise him to hear her say that. There are always
divisions; enmities. Among mortals. Among the Awakened. And, evidently,
among the Bastet. Still, she joins him on the couch and curls into his
side. Her presence is warmer than he expects. Whatever her size now, she
feels impossibly powerful. It's one of the reasons he was so
attracted to her before. Even now, the closeness of her body sends a
kind of electric current over his skin.
But it's different than before. He's
different. It isn't only because of the news she just gave him. The
difference is one of hunger (or the absence of it.) His want had been a
palpable thing then. Now? He seems happy enough to sit there with her.
To settle his arm around her as she tucks into his side. To breath her
in and mark the smell of her once more into his memory.
"And
yet here we are," he points out with a quiet smile. "Getting along just
fine." There's a beat before he continues. "I don't know if I should be
wary of meeting another Bastet. But... I would like that, I think. Thank
you."
"Should I be wary of wolves?" He asks because it seems a
logical question, and perhaps something Sabine might be willing to
share.
Sabine
"I spend most of my time away
from my family," Sabine says. She says it as though it explains
everything, though Ian may not have realized that he is one of the few
people she knows who can bear her presence. "We fight only Asura,
Etienne and I." And she sounds proud, though she does not lift her head
from where it rests against Ian.
"Asura is...anger and
destruction. Devouring." Sabine might, one day, explain more of the
world that they share to him. Tonight she offers him only little
glimpses.
"I have seen no wolves here, though they are dangerous." She pauses.
"We
are here because one of the Bastet, another kind, has fallen into the
sway of Asura. It commands shades to do its bidding and hoard objects
of power. Knowledge." Sabine tenses a little. "Forbidden knowledge.
Corrupt."
Ian
Sabine's response confirms Ian's suspicions in more ways than one, and he goes very quiet for a moment, his eyes cast down to take in the sight of her nestled against his side. Perhaps he ought to be more concerned about his proximity to such a lethal predator, but he isn't. If she wanted to hurt him, she'd already had any number of chances to do so.
She tells him they're hunting another Bastet - one who works with corrupted spirits.
"Someone I know found something in.. I think it was Reynold's Park. Animal carcasses, patched together and marked with symbols he couldn't read. He said they'd been animated somehow and used to attack a campsite."
Sabine
"They are his abominations." Abominations, Sabine says, and, despite the fact that she remains curled against Ian's side like some docile cat, there is such raw hate in that one word. "My brother has fought them. That one sends them out to hunt us.
"Etienne, more than me. They are too weak to kill me." No doubt. No fear. Only a little pride. It is only so glorious, being able to stave off such weak things. "Perhaps one of those women had the scent of magic on her. It may not have been that she could do true magic. She might have had something old. Something with power she did not know.
"Those abominations are not able to understand more than simple instructions."
Ian
Ian's response to that is a brooding sound, soft and resonant. "I think finding him would be easier if we worked together. If you think he's a threat, which it sounds like he is. I already know people who've been trying to track the source of those... abominations, as you call them. What does this Bastet want with your brother? To kill him, or something else?"
There are so many unknown variables. It's questionable whether Sabine will even be willing to share that information with him, but the look he affords her as he tips his head down to catch her eyes is dark and serious.
Sabine
Sabine nudges Ian in response to that sound, the pressure of her cheekbone a little too intense against his shoulder to read as nuzzling.
"He wants to kill us both." Sabine looks back into Ian's eyes, chin lofting a little. She does not seem at all moved by having to look up at him; for that she would have to question who had the most power here. "He would be glad to sway us to his side, we would be more valuable than his artifacts, but we are harder to bind and to corrupt."
There is, just for a second, the flash of bared teeth, as full of the promise of violence as laughter. So too, is the sound that catches in her throat, low and rough-edged. Not quite a laugh. Not quite a purr. Not quite a growl. "Do I strike you as easy to claim? No. He cannot have me. If he is very lucky he might kill me. But even if he skins my body for his macabre den of horrors, he will not have me."
She frowns, considering his offer. Weighs her pride and his blood and what that offer is worth. "Witches," she says finally, "Must be exceptionally careful around the Asura. Your power calls them to you and many of you answer.
" But if you want to hunt with us, you may." There is a second's hesitation and a very faint twitch of her lips. "Even your friends who are not of our blood."
Ian
Do I strike you as easy to claim?
There's a soft pull of the muscles around his jaw, a knowing lift of an eyebrow that speaks volumes for all its subtlety. He has known Sabine for precious few moments, but he does not need to guess to know the answer to that question. That he's able to remain still beneath the press of so much rage says more about him than it does about her. Some creatures were never meant to be claimed.
"I'll be careful," he offers, though there is a hint of that same quiet pride and defiance in his voice. "I'm not so easy to claim either."
(Or so he believes.)
He regards Sabine for a moment, then tips his head in acknowledgment. There is a certain weight and gravity to it, the way he agrees to this tentative alliance. Truthfully, he has no authority to speak for anyone by himself, but he makes the gamble that the others will see the same logic that he has. "I'll speak with them. We should arrange another meeting - with Etienne and the others. Perhaps we can come up with a way to track down your quarry."
Sabine
Ian says that he is not do easy to claim either and Sabine laughs. "Are you so very certain you want to meet other tigers?" Her eyes darken a little. "Because they will likely try."
"I cannot teach you about them. But they are not so important. I can teach you about the world that is mine and the world that is ours.
"You do not have to know them to know those things."
Sabine rubs her face against his shoulder again. More lightly this time. Almost gently. She is silent for a moment, and then, "Yes. It is better I send Etienne to meet them. And then, if they want to meet me, I suppose they may.
"Even witches struggle to bear my presence sometimes." There is just the faintest echo of regret as she says that.
Ian
It occurs to him to wonder about that - what life must be like for Sabine (and others like her.) He remembers the people at the fountain, how they stared but could not bring themselves to be near her. The thought lingers on his mind while he watches her; feels her face brush against his shoulder. After a while, he tips his head down and leans it against hers, breathing in the scent of her hair. His arm around her side tightens for a moment. When it relaxes, he lets his fingers trail gently up and down her side.
Her warning still hangs uncomfortably in his mind, and he frowns a little, softly.
"What do you mean, they'll try to claim me?"
Sabine
Ian cannot see Sabine's expression change as she registers that Ian is trying to offer some comfort to her. Perhaps it is because she has, for the first time in years, the chance to wonder if she is not the one controlling the moment she finds herself in that she really answers him. Perhaps it is because it is the truth, at least as she knows it, and she came here to tell Ian the truth.
"We are dying," Sabine says quietly. "The Asura are destroying the world. And humans, some because of the influence of corrupting spirits and others just because of habit or greed or indifference." Her eyes stray towards where she can feel his hand glide along her ribs.
"We are creatures of a dying world. It may be that science will save some of its children, but the world, the living world that sustains us, She is dying. Our cousins who are lions and tigers are dying too. Once they are gone and we are gone...I do not know what will become of our cousins like you who remain.
"For now though, our cousins like you are valuable to us. The children of two like me are...twisted and forbidden. They are broken in body or in spirit, or both. The children I might have with most people would likely not be like me. With one of our cousins, whether in a human form or a lion form, the chances of another werecat are higher.
"Not you," Sabine adds, a touch regretfully. "Only, for me, with other lions. Only for you with other tigers." She sighs. "To a dying people, that chance...sometimes they don't see much choice. Your cousins are known for their violence. I do not know how reasonable they will be.
"Especially if they find you are a witch."
Ian
We are dying, she says. And Ian does not tell her what he thinks about when she says this. He doesn't tell her that once he had a choice to walk down two paths and he chose the one that led him into the city. He doesn't tell her that he thinks the world isn't dying, but changing. He doesn't think she would find it very comforting.
And then she tells him that he is valuable for reasons that have nothing to do with his skills or accomplishments, but for some accident of luck (good or bad is up for debate.) And he hears this with a kind of slow-dawning clarity - what she really means when she says sometimes they don't see much choice. His hand goes still against Sabine's side, then slowly pulls away. She can feel the change in his body, the way the muscles coil and go tense. The way he draws into himself.
Almost, he wants to tell her never mind. To forget she ever saw him. They can take care of this threat and then she and her brother can leave and he will go about his life and forget everything she's just told him. Instead he flashes her a dark look, and when he speaks there is this lick of defiant anger curling at the back of his tongue. "If that's true, they'll be disappointed when they find me." There's a weighted pause before he adds, in a softer tone, "I'm sorry."
It isn't an apology for his anger, but an acknowledgment of the loss she speaks of.
"I think... maybe I should go." A beat before he remembers, "Can you give me your brother's number?"
Sabine
"As you wish," Sabine says quietly. There is no sense that she has any idea about any reference that that could be making, the statement stands on its own. And perhaps she mourns the loss of contact and the loss of her people and the loss of her world, but she regards him with eyes that echo with the eternity and steadiness of the sun.
They will burn out, she and the sun. One sooner than the other. It will be violent and dramatic and, at least in some sense, breathtaking.
Sabine rises and walks away from the place she had acquiesced to being. It was a thing she does not expect again, had not expected at all. How do you mourn a thing that you never dared to hope for? How do you grieve for what you have accepted is against your very nature?
She is not prone to grief, Sabine. Nor to introspection.
She does not offer anything else, only Etienne's number, written neatly on a scrap of paper. Her chin lifts as she offers it to him.
"I will find you another tiger," Sabine says. And that promise is also a dismissal.
