multiversallogs | On matters of style, swim with the current, on matters of principle, stand like a rock.

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On matters of style, swim with the current, on matters of principle, stand like a rock.

Who: Réjean & Ilde
What: A swap meet gone wrong, leading to swimming lessons.
Where: The Gross Tar
When: Newdi evening
Warnings: Réjean. Eye gore.

Among those he deals with it's common knowledge that Réjean can do things that aren't typical for a vanilla human, but the actual extent of his abilities are a closely guarded secret. Some men say that he's just a man with a few flashbang bits of magic that he's stolen, while others are convinced he's just a step below the great and powerful Oz. In part, it's for occasions like this that Réjean cultivates this ambiguity.

Within moments of stepping onboard the boat and heading out into the Gross Tar's current, Réjean knew that this meeting was unlikely to end well. The blinkmoth dealers of Head and Verso regions were too gregarious, too willing to meet on the river, and underneath it all, he could smell that they, and the heavies hidden below decks, were gut-churningly nervous.

Both practically and mystically, running water has a great many uses: it weakens many types of spells, bars some fae and undead from crossing, and in this particular instance, can provide a convenient, if undignified, escape. Once the first shots were fired, Réjean turned and with a hideous wail, clutching at crossbolt bolt protruding from what was once his eye, tipped over the railing and dropped into the river. With hardly a ripple to mar the surface of the water, Réjean sank below the range of the dealer's guns and crossbows.

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The boat drew Ilde's interest earlier in the evening - not for any special reason, really, just the sort of idle curiosity that she never sees any good reason not to indulge. It's why she's there when Réjean hits the water, darting sideways to avoid a collision, and curiosity is why she swims back toward him, dark-eyed and hard to see clearly with such little light down here. Just hints of blue pearl, and teeth.

She's harder to miss when she's close enough to start poking at his wounds and feeling for a pulse (which is hard under water and harder in general than it looks on tv) in his throat. If he needs air, she'll have to take him up (or let him drown - not out of the question, but she wants to know what happened), but if he doesn't... well, there's no pulse, and since it doesn't seem to be slowing him down overmuch, she makes a decision.

"Behave," she says, and in case he can't make it out under water or simply doesn't get the point the first time, she bares her teeth at him before wrapping an arm around his chest and dragging him with her, tail driving them through the water.

When she first takes hold of him, Réjean struggles more in shock than actually trying to escape. Did those bastards on the boat plan for this and hire someone to lurk under the boat? However, as he realizes that she's taking his pulse, Réjean relaxes and moves to tug the (actual) bolt out of his leg as the image of a bolt through his eye flickers and washes away in the current.

Behave, he mouths back and nods. Especially if she's going to help ferry him away from this little mess, he'll be on his very best, most charming behaviour.

Even with Réjean weighing her down (not an insignificant thing - she's small, even if her tail is longer and more powerful than her legs would be, and even if she's designed for this), Ilde moves far faster through the water than others would make on their own. She stays deep, out of sight and out of range, and doesn't begin to slow again until she's confident of having cleared the area.

The blood, even vampire's blood, draws attention deep in the river, but unlike the ocean, she's the bigger fish here and Réjean will go unmolested. More or less.

So long as it seems that she's taking him away from the boat and it's rather unhappy occupants, Réjean will relax and focus on being the easiest burden he can be. Of course, if she starts to get stroppy, too hungry, or look as if she's going to wrap him in sea-spider silk and stick him to the bottom of the river, he might get a bit less accommodating.

As she's neither stroppy nor hungry (Réjean doesn't really look like he'd taste very good, as a note), it's toward the riverbank for them. There are rocks ahead, where the water becomes shallower, and she's not especially gentle about shoving him up onto them.

Surfacing to her shoulders, she says, "That was clever. With your eye."

"Clever enough," he says fingering the hole in his pants before shaking all over like a wet dog. It's a good thing he's sturdy and despite being waterlogged and shot at least somewhat agile.

"Réjean Sept-Heure."

The introduction sparks a glimmer of interest, ripples in the water tracking the motion of her tail. "I've heard of you." She considers him a moment longer before giving her own name, "Ilde Decima. What were you doing up there?"

"Before I was getting shot at, I was meeting with some gentlemen that I used to work with. It seems that for some reason -- likely their own love of filthy lucre -- they decided to end our acquaintance," he says with a bit of an unpleasant smile. Other than his usually abrasive manner, Réjean tends to be all business and rarely does anything to upset that.

Ilde's smile has teeth in it. Many teeth.

"Won't they be surprised."

"I've always felt that a good surprise is one of the little things that make life worth living," he remarks while untying his shoes and pulling off his socks. There's no point in wearing the damned soggy thing home. "Even if it's only living for a short while."

"Well. I get irritable when people start throwing trash into the water," she says, blithely, rising to sit on one of the rocks, her tail dragging through the shallows. "I can get behind bad things happening to those people."

"To say I'm wounded would be redundant." He faux-swoons and does his best to mimic the Danish statue of the Little Mermaid. "And it will happen, but I still don't know why they turned on me."

Which means he needs to wait a bit, see how things pan out, and play the long con.

"Are you the sort of lady who'll claim my firstborn if I thank you?"

Her head tilts to the side, and the curious blankness of her expression isn't unusual for her - that flat way she sometimes has is almost the norm. She's getting better, creeping out from behind the impassivity, but-

"Don't ever say that again."

Well.

Ah.

Réjean goes very still and, unusually, doesn't even bother with his usual constant fidgeting that makes him pass for human.

"Understood." This is what passes for an apology.

Good enough to serve its purpose - that's as much as Ilde really wants said on the subject, she can live without a stranger's pity or profuse apologies and certainly has no intention of explaining herself. It's enough, and after a silence she lets the moment pass as though it never happened.

"You can owe me a drink," she says, rolling her shoulders back. "I'm a pragmatic kind of fairy." There is no such thing.

"I'd be more than happy to pour," he says while wringing out his socks. Réjean could've navigated the river himself and has done so many times in the past, the assistance was welcome. "You have a favourite place? I'll be looking for somewhere new and a little less conspicuous. Or should I just pack a basket and come here to the riverside?"

"You're going to bring me a booze picnic, Réjean?" Her amusement melts the lingering chill, conjuring up a grin. "I like that."

"Complete with little umbrellas. I'll be back in three days, fair?" He wants a little time to stay hidden, heal, and then start to get a handle on this most recent mess.

"Here, three days from now," she agrees, glancing around to better commit the place to memory. She can find anywhere on the river, that won't be a problem. "I'll expect you."

Réjean stands, slings his shoes (knotted together at the laces) over his shoulder, bows with only a little flourish and then makes his way off into the night.

Exactly three days later, he can be found still without shoes, although this is more aesthetics than soggy feet, sitting on the rock she threw him out on. He's brought along a wicker basket, some general nibbly things, mimosa supplies, and a pair of tiny, paper umbrellas.

Ilde arrives about ten minutes later, looking not much as she had when they met - she's quite convincingly human to the untrained eye, clothed and carrying her own shoes, and walking along the riverbank towards him instead of swimming the distance. Pleased as she is to see he's keeping his word, she doesn't seem much surprised, sitting down by him.

Instead of a greeting, she peers into the basket, investigatory.

Inside the basket there's enough orange juice and champagne for a single mimosa and a random collection snacks from Earth, Baedal, and anywhere else that caught his eye.

"I forgot to ask what you liked, so I took a bit of this, a bit of that, and something that glowed lilac and smelled of Swedish meatballs."

Spared Réjean's wit by her gaze on the basket, she sits cross-legged on the bank as she straightens to pour herself the mimosa and tucks one of the umbrellas behind her ear; she considers the second one, and then (smiling) leans over on her knees, her weight forward on one hand as she uses the other one to tuck the second umbrella behind his.

"You see? I knew I should make sure I wore my good shirt today. I match," he says adjusting the umbrella until he's confident that it will stay in place.

"Is it to your liking?" Réjean never can tell what humans (or human-like) folk want to eat. So much of what's available these days is so far from his own dimly remembered frame of reference.

"I like the fruit." Her fingers are already getting wet with mandarin juice as she picks the flesh of one apart, daintily. "You're not too bad."

Edited 2011-06-24 00:21 (UTC)

"You're pretty when you lie," he says, seemingly entertained by letting his toes splash in the river water. "But I won't complain much. I'm a delicate man and I love having my ego stroked."

Being of the opinion that 'pretty when she lies' is not just amusing but also technically correct (she has a high opinion of her own reflection, and about 80% of the time it's an illusion), Ilde grins at him. "You don't look delicate to me, Réjean."

Edited 2011-06-24 13:36 (UTC)

"You've never seen me get faint over this year's lace patterns," he says with all the seriousness it deserves. "Anything exciting, anything worth fainting over happen down here lately?"

"Besides you getting shot off a boat?" Besides that, Ilde.

Réjean nods and offers to peel another orange-like fruit for her. Unsurprisingly, he's not eating, but that doesn't mean he doesn't want to play with the food.

"I think I gave someone in Gidd a heartattack when I swam beneath their glass-bottomed boat," she says, reflectively, as she passes him over a fruit to peel. She'd rolled onto her back to peer back up at them, she remembers a man bending down to look and then getting startled when she tapped on the glass before leaving. "People keep mistaking me for a mermaid, you know."

The more of this mimosa she drinks, the less the things she says will have to do with anything relevant to anything besides 'the first passing thought in her head'.

Given proper incentive, Réjean can even make roses out of radishes.

"Ah, I wasn't sure myself. There've been mermaids that could come ashore before." No dinglehoppers for her! "All different manner, you know?"

"All I know about mermaids," as she lights a cigarette, setting her apart from probably not as many fairies as you might first think, "is that they go in the sea, and I don't."

Making it sort of quibbly to be so determined about the difference between her and a mermaid, due to the fact that she isn't completely clear on what that might be anyway, but it's one thing she does know and therefore it matters.

"Is it rude of me to ask what you are?" He breaks the not-orange into segments and offers them back to her. "What are you?"

"I'm a naiad," she supplies, taking the segments and picking them in halves again to eat. The convenient thing about being right beside the river is the ease of rinsing fruit juice from her fingers, among other things. "Which sort of means 'I don't really know'. Freshwater fairy. I'm making it up as I go along."

Scrutinizing him over her glass, "What are you?"

"Are your bones made of pearl?" Réjean doesn't seem to think so, but he's heard rumours and figures that it won't hurt to tease or ask.

"I am very useful man to know. I used to be a tinker, a tailor, a bonesetter, but these days I'm just the man who knows where to go to get whatever is needed," he says, smiling to show off his fangs. "I also go bump in the night."

With the genuine earnestness of the easily-inebriated, Ilde is briefly sidetracked by the idea of her bones being made of pearl. Her skin has a lot in common with mother of pearl when she isn't hiding it under a human seeming; perhaps this rumour stands to reason? It isn't as though she's ever looked at her own bones. She spends a moment studying her own hand as if it'll become transparent if she concentrates hard enough.

(For a moment it seems to be changing into glass, which has nothing to do with her bones and everything to do with her illusions sometimes being influenced by her train of thought.)

His fangs, mercifully, pull her back into the present and she beams at him. "Oh, another one."

Edited 2011-06-25 20:07 (UTC)

"You'd think there'd be fewer and, given a few years, there will be," he replies sounding very much like he's experience upswings in vampire population before and weathered them well. It's a self-regulating ecosystem. "You'd also think that having the extra time might give a man perspective, and yet..."

"The longer people have to be themselves, the more themselves they're going to be." Whether that's insight or the champagne talking is a matter of opinion.

"You also have to consider the type of person that appeals enough to share such a 'gift' with." It's pretty clear that Réjean has a low opinion of most vampires -- a great lot of stuffed shirts and (un)holy rollers more concerned with rules and slights than anything of value. Why life forever if you're not going to enjoy it and improve yourself?

"Arseholes of a feather?" she hazards, inquiringly. She's picking a piece of fruit apart as they speak, now - not eating it, just slowly peeling it into nothing.

"Can go fuck off together," he replies delicately. "But should anyone ask, you didn't hear it from me."

Réjean is sure that somewhere there are decent, reasonable vampires, but until he meets them, a cynic he will remain.

"You're a sweet man, Réjean," Ilde tells him, dryly, resting her feet on a rock in front of her and stretching her toes 'til they point towards the water. "I like the ones I know." More or less. She likes Katherine best, she thinks.

"Clearly I don't get out enough or I just attract the wrong calibre of person. You don't think it's my face, do you? I've been told I have a good, honest face."

...bullshit.

"I'm deaf and drunk, not gullible," Ilde says, kindly.

"It is my face then. I knew it. I should've traded when I had the chance." Either he's full of it or there's some suitably horrid take of face-stealing to come.

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On matters of style, swim with the current, on matters of principle, stand like a rock.

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It cannot be denied that Réjean is magically delicious.

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