heronyearwood

[heronyearwood]

HERON YEARWOOD — NOUVEAU GRAND OPENING

With a fellow hunter's name in the billing for display at the Nouveau Ribbon Cutting, Heron brings herself out of whatever Fellowship endeavor she currently labors under in the effort to attempt to woo him away from the Brotherhood, and maybe sniff out a few leads in the process - either for mortal bounties, or slips with a bit more bite.

[heronyearwood]

She doesn't trust him, not one lick. Maybe that will change, maybe it won't - the Brotherhood are a faithful lot except when they aren't, after all. All for the cause until they aren't. Politics, she thinks to herself, pft.

Reid at least seems to be the kind of crazy that means it, for whatever that's worth - she doubts she'd have the resolve he seems to be displaying to doggedly off himself for the betterment of the world were the scenario reversed. It's all violence to her, it's just that sometimes the teams change.

Cold fingers wrap around her own palm, warm and pulsing quietly with blood. "Well then, come inside, won't you." She says, with a smile, stepping aside and gesturing to her office; "Welcome to my little Sherlock office. Have a seat, tell me a bit more about the nature of the case."

Evidently, she'd spent her time wisely; coming up with an ultimatum. It's Halstead's second hunter-given one, at that. And he has this terrible feeling it won't be his last, either.

What does that mean, Yearwood? The question is in his gaze, flashing with the obvious dislike of being left in the dark (far too long). He's spent so long growing up, knowing the black and white of life; monster, kill. Mortal, help.

Then he died and his world became shades of grey.

Is it selfish that he doesn't at first care that Heron wants to bury a potential fix — if they miraculously manufacture one? Reid thinks so. But, grey applies to his morals too, sometimes. It's read in his hesitation; that traitorous narcissism. So brave and noble in his arrival, so childish and cowardly in hearing her bend to mediate his favour; bargain; exchange, morbid curiosity. Whatever gets a woman like her off at night. He won't allow himself to be hopeful, this arrangement is merely a hail mary of an attempt for a maybe. What is a little bit more pain to entertain them, when he's convinced he's already suffering the most in other ways.

"You're implying that you don't care if monsters continue to multiply..." It's a thought, spoken aloud. One of those too-loud ones that should stay hidden. He's got no right to be horrified or pissed that Yearwood might sooner see creatures spread like an infection just so she can keep her stake sharpened. They were once protectors. Halstead should have realised years ago, those odes are outdated; lost to the greed of destruction. "— Because you're afraid to be bored?"

It's psychotic. It makes him feel insane for warring with whatever twisted nature has taken root in his stomach and morphed him into a pale, shell of undeath. I'm a monster, and I still care for the world more than you do? What the fuck is a moral fight going to do for him here? Reid shakes his head, hands running through his hair like he's genuinely bargaining with a demon; that everything he's been enduring has simply been the opening act. He pauses to look back at her, disbelief smears his features, his arms lowering from their movements.

And the woman puts her own hand over the line dividing them like she dares it to get bitten off.

That hesitation stretches out in length, second by second; the steady beat of a heart, thump thump —

Reid licks his lips, debating what choices he has here when he's been the one pulling teeth with Heron on the doorstep; metaphorically on his knees, pleading for a partnership. He manages to verbalise the acceptable conditions: "We bury it, at the end of it all." He's careful, with making sure they share the same level of options, "Or you bury my ashes, Yearwood. That's it."

He meets her hand, and an icy palm connects with its warm counterpart.

[heronyearwood]

guess who came to dinner

who: @kannivalistic where: Two Sundays

Heron enjoys watching Valka work on the pig. She finds the dull thud of a cleaver on a block rhythmic and soothing in its own way, like a bassline. She's no stranger to butchery, her chosen nomme d'guerre of Carnifex chosen specifically for the imagery it might afford. "So the reason I'm bothering you, Valka..." She leans over the table, pressing her fingertips to the clean surface as she smiles wide. "the one Halstead son, Reid, really isn't dead after all - I'd heard rumors but I'd had doubts - he's a vampire, Hadley, and he's a suicidal one at that." Briefly, her lip tucks itself under teeth as her eyes scan the chopping of the pork on the block. "And he wanted my help." The entirety of the sentence is couched in incredulous giggling, as if she can't get it out with a straight face.

[heronyearwood]

"If I do this - see if we can find a way to slash that little prefix off of your death, you serve a purpose beyond just filling a phial with whats left of you." She turns her head. "We find this vampire panacea you're looking for, we use it on you, and then we bury it. We don't show it to anybody else, Reid. You got that? Because I do this job because it excites me, and I'm getting too old to be bored - I don't have any intentions to spend my days knitting because I killed off a third of my job security." Heron's neck stays turned, like she's daring him to bite - to taste the acidic citric vervain and tart boysenberry brandy filtering into her blood; there's a thin, deliciously sharp white-oak athame in the loop of her belt, behind her back and beneath her untucked blouse that wants him to, because he's insane, and desperate, and pitiful. It's almost adorable.

Her hand crosses the threshold, offering an accord.

He might have preferred if she continued to laugh or jibe at him. Because standing in the pitiful silence of Heron Yearwood pouring herself another drink is just salt in an already open wound. Reid's beginning to understand the frustration of being barred entry to houses — he doesn't want to cause harm, but it's increasingly more degrading to be stood outside, on the porch like a child or a dog being told to sit and roll over just to get a whiff of a bone.

The most monstrous thing he might admit he's done tonight is glare at her like he's allowing the detrimental thoughts to win, for a second or two. Then, he shakes it off and takes another step away from the porch, to kick back against the wooden post that holds up the veranda. Distance, helps.

So when she's finished painfully dragging this out, he's certainly past bitter. But, he's already played how desperate his hand is to be here to begin with.

Reid didn't come with a tangible offering, besides himself. He has little to give in the way of valuables, or resources. Barely out of the woodwork of his hidden existence as it is. He's got a job, that pays his rent. It's not like he's admitting how powerless to Heron he is, with the neglectfulness of his new abilities. She's probably smart enough to tell, just by looking.

So he's plain with it. Catching her indifference to the question; he can lie about it, but it's not going to get him anywhere. Jerking his head up, once he steps forward — driven there by the powerful force of intrigue.

She's so close, that he can scent the undertones beneath her liquor and its woody, caramel notes. Her skin vibrates beneath the pulse at her throat and the one at her wrist. He swallows. "What do you want?"

[heronyearwood]

Heron breathes out a heavy sigh. In all her years in this trade, she has never been subject to a vampire practically begging to be tortured. She isn't so obtuse or stupid to suspect that such is exactly what Reid Halstead is stood outside her door asking about, but its close enough. She pours herself another drink, face scrunched up in the imperious work of weighing the options here. The Fellowship threw off the yoke of old tradition where the craft of Hunting Monsters were concerned; every Hunter, at end of day, had their reason for being in the work. Some had their revenge, some had genuine noble cause, others were simply there to kill that which they deemed inhuman - trained from a young age to accept her parents' zealotry and nobility, but she had long since realized something, and that - leading to her being a founding member of this fledgling coterie of monster killers - was that she did this shit for the love of the game. Pour. Clink. Tip. Sip. Book might kill her for this. But she's dealt with an angry Book before. Valka too, might have her misgivings, but at the end of the day, what did she really care.

"I'm assuming you have something to offer towards this endeavor?" She asks, tone like an annoyed schoolmistress. She's wandered close to the doorframe now, close enough that Reid could, if he so wanted, simply reach in and tear her out of the shaky safety of her officefront. Tip. Sip.

It's not laughter that greets him as he watches Heron's dramatisation of his shocking statement. Every ounce of self-control is redirected for half a second to stop his eyes from rolling at another person prepared to batter down the walls of his agonies.

For a moment, he steps forward and nearly hits the threshold — an instinct to help, in case she had been choking. His hands brace on the doorframe of the door. Suddenly, it's bothersome. Reid leans against it; his palms press on the painted wood, asking: "Are you o—?"

Reid.

Her recovery cuts him off.

Eyes break away from her speech, and divert to the side, to stare at a side table, with a wilting flower in an ornately crafted vase. "I was a hunter too, Yearwood. I know perfectly well how to turn to ash."

Halstead shoves back off the frame. It cracks once, but he creates the distance between himself and the invisible barrier that protects the Fellowship hunter.

"There's been ways with magic that have dampened — lessened the affliction. I don't see why science or something alchemic can't work to try and resurrect the dead. Necromancers do it, why is everyone so afraid to try another way?"

A beat, to get to why he's at Yearwood's door. "I know the Fellowship has the resources — the kind of people unlike the Brothers do. They would never attempt such a sacrilegious thing." It's not bitterness for his former people, but despair. If he thought they would, he'd have gone there first, and not a dozen witches who were either making his state worse or too temporary to tolerate.

That, and witches seem to keep dying on him or joining undeath.

Reid sighs, waiting for the blow of Heron's impatience to be the death of him: "Don't tell me you wouldn't like to see how far you could push it, with a creature who was willing to sit and endure it?"

[heronyearwood]

She rolls her eyes at an even larger dose of his self pity, shaking her head. She could interject, explain, but why bother - Halstead has a purpose for being here, and he doesn't strike her as the type to opt a direct hit. The ghost of the past months looms large; the concert, the gala, the witches coming for their own. All of these have forced the Fellowships' meagre presence in this city to reassess. When he finally answers her question, Heron's eyes go wide like saucers and she sputters the sip of her drink, hastily putting it down to avoid further indignity, fanning her cheeks for a moment while she clears her throat.

"Reid." She shakes her head, standing. "You want a cure?" She shakes her head again, somehow more incredulous. "Rosewood, ash, poplar, even." She points a finger over her heart. "That's your cure, Reid. A morning walk if you're for something more dramatic." This is pitiful, seeing a hunter who bought it reduced to this sort of false, faint hope. "What makes you think it's even possible?" There are other questions, surely, but that one will quickly establish if this is all simply a huge desperate waste of both their times.

He doesn’t want to believe this is a mistake. But it’s beginning to look an awful lot like one. As if he’s poked a tiger too long, in their own den and it’s finally up from free lounging. It’s preparing to decide if the invader is a meal or a battle.

Reid prefers neither option. “I didn’t come to fight.”

There’s hesitation when she speaks like he might assume this is an ambush tactic; she might be distracting him; that she’s summoned hunters from the sideboard she leans comfortably on. They might be convening as she talks. But he doubts he gets the honour — Heron is enough hunter to do the damage all on her own, he’s sure of it.

“Funny,” What else can he say in her amusing speech of his torturous demise? “I don’t know what you find interesting in a man being struck from the roster, but consider me so glad for you,” The bite of his tone is laced with sarcasm. But he’s sure she’s smart enough to pick up on that.

He’s prepared to be laughed at, again. “A cure,” he states, like it’s the most obvious thing in the goddamn world. Before the hunters were enlightened, monsters were just shadows in stories. What is to stop them doing the next near-impossible revelation? “You cure them — you break their curses, whatever it is. You kill them, by fazing magic out of existence.” He’s not sure where to start — or how else to answer the question; hunting them, is effective to a degree.

But Reid won’t last, in his turmoil of being a foot in one world, to the next. So his options are equally as cold as death and ash — or playing guinea pig and an antidote.

[heronyearwood]

♖

People can change, surely. She's changed. Booker, probably the closest thing she has to a friend these days, has changed. People change. Monsters don't change. A Vampire is a perverted, twisted reflection of the person's life set to haunt the world and play on emotions to rob people of blood. A Werewolf is a wolf in sheep's clothing, no matter how kind and sweet they are in the day, they're always a hungry beast when the moon shines high. Witches play at protective and guarding sweetings, but for every spell there's a price, and if your magic doesn't stop at pickling herbs and grinding chicken bones into a poultice, it's probably too high of a price.

[heronyearwood]

♚ — Does your muse believe in objective right and wrong? Why do they hold this view?

Yes and no. Heron would describe herself as pragmatic even if that's not necessarily true.. Universal truths don't really exist to her in terms of right and wrong - there is only practicality informed by personal need and how useful a given choice's outcomes are. She doesn't even really believe monsters (in which she includes witches) to be evil, just dangerous and unpredictable - to her this unpredictable nature coupled with their infectious nature is what she finds abhorrent. She will work with them in the event it leads to something beneficial or useful to whatever she's attempting to do, but there's no thankfulness or love won just for the sake of it. The Vampire's Blood, the Wolf's Bite, and the Witches Tome are all free radicals that ought to be excised from the world.

[heronyearwood]

Heron's face is one of perplexed, if bemused, intrigue. "Wow, that's... uniquely pathetic - they sucked the fight out of you along with all the blood, huh?" She sips her drink; "Since your options are to stand there or go, allow me a moment to monologue, if only because they don't come along very often;"

Heron sips again. "I've always wondered what I would do if, in the course of fixing the world, what you've allowed to happen to you, happened to me. Back when I counted myself as a Brother I would have probably either asked for merciful death or done it myself - now though, I'm not so sure what I'd do. In that, you are more interesting to me alive than as an ash stain on my stoop."

The irony dawns on her, and she laughs into the rim of her glass. "Well, metaphorically alive." She finishes the brandy, pushes herself from her place, closes a few paces. "So. And how does Reid Halstead help The Fellowship more effectively kill all the monsters?"

There's the laughter. Just like he'd said.

Whilst Reid hasn't had the right to claim a role, or a part in the Brotherhood in seven years. It's still a natural instinct within him (among several other things he puts down to a sickness) to deny that he doesn't still want to defend them for all they stand for.

"They protect those who —" He's not a child, he won't just spit the mantra at her. "Whatever you believe, Yearwood. Don't you want to see the end of monsters, just as they do?"

Maybe, that's too broad a quest to voice so plainly. Monsters is a term he shouldn't be using when he understands the grey of that, more than he ever wanted to. Mortals can be that too.

Liquor slowly infects the air between them. Silently, he's grateful — it drowns the impossible-to-reach woman from his primal instincts.

And desperate, is accurate. But he doesn't verbalise it when it's written all over his actions; he's standing in the doorway of someone with a reputation preceding the average hunter.

"I heard you have resources the brothers won't touch." He reminds himself of the principles he's been prepared to go to war over. "You do things to the... creatures, that are unheard of. You try things..." Reid doesn't know how to go and say it when it has his stomach rolling. Not to others, but to himself. So he poses it as: "And I want to help."

[heronyearwood]

"The same principles?"

While his admission to seeking a favor had given rise to little more than an incredulous, scoffing smirk, his observations about the differences between the two cults is what provokes righteous laughter.

"The Brotherhood has boiled itself into a dogmatic little bureacracy, and watered down its mission to the point where it's less a cabal of hunters and more... monster cops; id est, nor principle that isn't somehow for sale." She unstops a decanter and pours herself a glass; Brandy, infused with beebrush; lemon verbena. She rounds her desk, makes space, weighing the outcomes of open invitation. They do always look so pathetic, unable to cross a threshold - she decides in the end that it's quaint, and she'll see where this goes before extending even so much as a chair.

"And what, pray tell, has you desperate enough to ask the Fellowship for a solid?"

The tips of black boots ghost against the invisible barricade that seals Yearwood from Halstead. It frames him like a phantom in the doorway and she's simply the humble and gracious host who'll never extend an invitation for dinner.

Reid hopes she never utters anything resembling a proposition to come inside, because he prefers the safety of not being able to get close. If she's anything like he's heard though — echoing the off-kilter confidence that talkative little birdies whisper about, he's not sure they'll stay so civil in this exchange.

He only wants to help, somehow. And ask for a little bit of hers, in exchange. Though, had it been him, standing there — it's a far cry to be ever considered equals.

"According to enough," he answers, so many so, that a hunter who fell from grace has heard plenty about her. The Fellowship, in fact.

But she apparently knows him too. And she certainly knows how to drive a stake deep. Even the metaphorical ones. Reid resists the flinch of being painfully called out for his misstep seven years ago. But how can he rebuke it? Yeah, I don't need this from you too.

"I would," he admits, shrugging his shoulders and tossing off the insult. Hooded eyes survey hers, "If I were in your shoes." And, how could he blame anyone for that; for doing what they were trained to do. She doesn't need to make it sound so poetic either. "And I would probably laugh aswell, if you knew I was here to ask for a favour." a beat, to make clear his intent as he brushes a thumb over the tattoo on the back of his hand; a phantom burn of what feels like betrayal lingers in the fading ink. "I know the Fellowship don't quite have the same principles as the Brothers do."

[heronyearwood]

♖ — Do people, in your muse’s opinion, ever really change? Do they believe themselves to be capable of changing?

Heron believes people will, given enough time, tell you who they are - maybe not in any explosive manner, but in how they react and deal with different situations. As to whether they can change? Sure. Minds and bodies decay - mortality creeps up on people and as they become more concerned with legacy and love who knows what sort of shifts people will experience in their motivations. But one thing she's learned over her nearly thirty years in this career is thus; if you want to know somebody, intimately and at their core?? Hunt them.

[heronyearwood]

It's not often a vampire crosses her threshold. Well... almost crosses her threshold. Vampires, you know. Not that his being stuck at her door was a necessary giveaway; there are enough sigils etched into her shoulders that she can simply feel when one of these bloodsucking eyesores is nearby.

"Yes?" She asks with a smile and a tilt of her head one-side. He continues, and her brow creeps skyward. "Heading? Not according to a lot of people... but I do have my appeals and enough weight to throw around." She moves away from the door, without turning her back on him, and sets her behind on the edge of her receptionist's desk - he's long gone for the evening, however.

Heron's arm and ankle have reforged themselves quite well; thanks to stolen vampire blood, and the danger of death in that regard has passed, as has whatever poison the Phial witch Davenport had scratched her with in the early summer; though it's left a nasty run of black veining up one arm, normally hidden beneath a blazer but here on display with her short-sleeved blouse. "And what brings one of those who live in death to my doorstep? Surely you don't think the Halstead name carries so much wait that I'm above killing you for being shit at your job?"

For: @heronyearwood

There's a list of names he's got in his head, all waiting to be scratched off with a bloody red line. He plans to erase the letters and who they belong to from existence. The host of the masquerade has stolen his sire's top spot. She'd been there for seven years and her reign has finally fallen to second place.

He's sure she'll be thrilled to know that.

Promises are hanging in the air, a newfound, childish rage that steers him off his former path of righteousness. (What he at least believed to be, once)

Some names he's had echoed in his ears, but they're sitting on another kind of list. Reid's flown past bravery into stupidity — but he's still, trying to salvage what he can of his reason to survive this.

"Yearwood?" It's a question — much like he's approached Valka once, blindly at the butcher shop. He's got a pile of ash in a vial tucked away in his pocket from a night of disaster. It's a last-ditch resort, for if he has to. He'd planned to roll it at Book's feet, like the other had once done for a stake.

The stakes here, seem higher. "Heard in the grapevine, you're heading the other side." It's likely not smart to go right to the head of the snake, but he's done being in the shadows, when those he does care for, are in the sunlight.

[heronyearwood]

"Pain's what I needed gone." She says. The Vampire blood would take care of the bone inside an hour or two, she just needed to make sure she didn't die between now and tomorrow's dinner. "You did excellent, sweetie." She says, breathless and exhausted, but somehow feeling as if tonight is definitely not over. Witches, she thinks to herself, useful for so many things. Nevermind why she's here, where she's going after. Heron lifts herself to her feet, tries to move her arm, and winces - it's not quite numb, but not the incomparable ache of a broken humerus either - fingers flex and she gives a due nod. "Thank you." It's almost genuine.

No time to linger though; the trouble inside can very easily make its way out here, and she needs to get going before that happens; "Keep up the good work!" Heron chirps, awkwardly kicking the other heel from her foot to restore enough of her gait to make good the escape. "Be careful," she coos as she leaves, "It's dangerous here."

The other was in obvious pain and everything in Mavi screamed not to use her magic but she decided against it - looking around and hoping for the best as she hovered a hand over the others arm as a small ray of light began to shine. "I've never treated a broken arm so I don't know if it healed but the pain should mostly be gone," she said with a weak smile, her fear of using magic in front of the wrong person becoming more and more apparent. "Did it help?" she asked

[heronyearwood]

Great. Painkillers are fine but she was hoping for something a bit more thorough; beggars can't be choosers however, and she senses a helpful sort here. Heron limps over to where she's directed and sits, grateful for a resting moment but still tense to leave - no word from either Alejo or Booker or any other Fellowship hunter inside yet. "One of the Vampires in there... he tried to make me drink his blood." She says, working herself into tearfulness. Her marks would be obvious in their magical nature to any witch whose ever crossed paths with a hunter, in or out of friendship, but many of her designs are old Brotherhood sigils in nature; which she hopes will obscure any of her involvement with Siltshore.

She could help with minor things but a broken arm? That was way above her pay grade. But luckily she had enough health training, along with using magic to practice on injured animals, to help stabilize the other's arm. "Alright, but all I can do is take away some of the pain," she said, not wanting to get the other's hopes up. "Come on, there's a stump right there if you want to sit on it"

[heronyearwood]

immediately following Heron's escape

When Heron emerges from the landscaping, she is a mess; mask broken, dress a shambles, blood smeared on her chin and throat; but she is alive, though her arm, already not in its best shape after the Phial Witch's thorny poison, has some sort of pain, a likely fracture from the ungentle landing. It'll heal overnight with the Vampire blood in her gut, but she has to be careful not to die in the next twenty-four. Still, she needs to set her arm if she wants to avoid unpleasantness later. When she finds somebody setting up a triage in the outer courtyard, she slumps against the wall of The Sentinel. Her seeking sigil burns on her skin; somebody ahead has witchblood, and she gnaws at her lip. "Could use help setting a broken arm," she calls.

open masquerade ball starter - part 2

She may not have been the most experienced at healing people but she sure as hell could try. So, having made a make-shift infirmary just outside of where the originally fun event had taken place, she wrapped a make-shift bandage around a small child's arm before standing up, dress now covered in blood. "I feel like there are way more qualified people to be doing this than me," she mused with a small chuckle, looking to see someone near her. "If you need help you should probably find a nurse, I've reached about my limit for the night"

[heronyearwood]

who: self-para where: Masquerade, Part II

She was in the restroom when she got the text from Booker. She was on her way out of the Bathroom when she heard the Vampire address the whole of the party; she stays behind the door, voyeuristic in her spying, watching things unfold.

It isn't all cowardice; she has a very good memory, not eidetic maybe, but close enough for a Hunter's work, and though Alejo will be missed, he is providing important field research as she watches just who among the party-goers lunge for him as he's flung to hungry masses. They may be wearing masks, but many of them are showing skin, many have unmasked. The Fellowship will remember. She isn't expecting the second part of Markus Villier's little incitement though, and that is when she decides it's pertinent to find the others and issue a retreat before any of the younger or more hot-headed among them do something incredibly stupid. She doesn't get that chance, though, because she realizes that, in the course of fixing her makeup, her glamour has been dispelled, and with her glamour gone, she's been made. A vampire kicks her to the floor of the restroom through the door and is on her with a blur of movement. The fight is fast and the fight is furious, and as the filthy thing tries to snap at her and suck her dry, she flips the script, going for his, sinking human teeth into vampiric flesh and taking a mouthful of blood before mustering all her strength and kicking him into an open stall, flinging a spike of ashood into his shoulder - it doesn't kill but it does enough to slow him as she dives for the ornate frosted window and smashes through with a flare of her Hunter's mark, weathering ribboned skin and a heavy impact to the ground twenty feet below.

[heronyearwood]

"They are crafty," Heron signals, as if he should be able to glean everything she means from those three words and her tone; You could always expect them to have something up their sleeve, some spell or rite, or, God forbid, a curse. It's why they're useful tools and annoying prey. And like any hunted animal, that unpredictability eventually becomes predictability.

And when Cam answers, she gives a little golf clap. "And he's right again." She smiles, a wide, toothy thing that seems to threaten to split her head in half.

"What if I could offer you a tool that could just... point you in the direction of night-stalkers. Surely you're not so doggedly attached to the frustration that comes with figuring out where to start."

"Are you absolutely sure? Witches are crafty." He's known a few, shared a bed with a few, and used even more. There's no shortage of knowing just how conniving they can be. But he doesn't hate them the way Heron seems to, judging by her expression which shifts once more back into a smile.

She moves, and his head turns with her for a moment. But the answer is an easy, simple one. "Knowing who is who and where they are. Obviously. What of it?"