Brasenose College

As it becomes increasingly difficult to hold onto just what she wants to discuss with Andrei, her attention begins to divide  "I fell into the shadows in my room and was embraced by them, as strange as that sounds. They remade me and my Beast, and when it was over I found that I could enter and exit them at will. I couldn't find any writings on it in my books, so I'm not sure what's happened to me." Her mind again stalls and Rae realizes that the topic of discussion with Andrei will be lost forever if she doesn't go now. "Um...I need to go, Bri. I need to talk to my flatmate about something that feels very important. But I'll stay safe and talk to you tomorrow. Please be careful, I don't know if there are more of those things around. Goodnight, love." With a tap, she ends the call and beelines for Andrei's room. (Continued in Cowley)

Aubrey clicks her tongue at the sudden hang-up. All Rae had done was leave her with even more questions. Looking up after a moment to Hera, she half-expects to see the woman still scowling in scorn over whatever perceived mistake she mistakenly had believed the starlet to have made. "Right so she's like, odd as all hell, right? Like that's not just me she's totes out there, yeah?"

Hera nods in thought, giving Aubrey an appraising look up and down as she does so. Something about the expression on her face seems almost sad. "Stay on this. It runs deceptively deep... something is off. Perhaps you won't be a Maiden for all that long after all, Artemis."  

“Oh?”  The comment catches Aubrey off guard. She was under the impression Hera was utterly incapable of being all that pleased, and yet it almost sounded like she was suggesting a promotion. “What does that mean?”

"Call it smiling coyly and ignoring the question," Hera replies with a laugh, "but you'll understand when the time is right."

Aubrey's groans as her eyes roll hard enough to threaten to roll right out of the room. "No I doubt I will  if you keep doing that." Grabbing her phone and with an immediate reminder of exactly why  she'd left earlier, she moves swiftly out the door, pausing only momentarily while at the threshold. "Good night, ' mother' ." With a heightened pace she puts the professor's door behind her and makes for her own room, the evening's excitement finally dying down long enough for her to gather her thoughts. All of it had gone... far from as she'd hoped or expected. There had been some answers, at the least, but honestly — and especially with how Raziel spoke — more questions than anything else.  Sighing all the way down onto her bed, she nearly considers drifting off early, until she remembers finally that she hadn't even gotten to see the one person she'd truly meant to tonight.  Heyyy you, hope ur enjoying the first night ;))) had like a ton to deal with but im finally free, come over and lets get started <33 The text sent off to Nora, she lets the phone slip onto the soft comforter of her bed and allows herself a moment to unwind, reaching instead to stroke the softness of Amun's back. 

Amun purrs and stretches his legs out in front and behind him. A few minutes later, there's what sounds like a rush of air from outside Aubrey's door and a rapid knock.

Aubrey hops up off her bed and opens the door, a sultry smile slung across her face to greet her ghoul.

Aubrey opens the door and Nora bursts through into her regnant's arms, hanging her arms about the vampire's neck. "You didn't say that I would be so fast ."

"There's a lot I didn't tell you yet," Aubrey pulls the girl in close, locking lips for a teasingly short moment before staring into her eyes. "How was your first day? How did it feel? Tell me everything."

"They. Fucking. Love me!" Nora exclaims doing a little twirl in front of Aubrey that makes her light dress flare out. "It's like I'm the only person in the room. Like 'who's that girl' plays every time I walk through a door. How is it that you don't already rule the world with power like that?"

Aubrey watches the girl's jovial display with a growing feeling fluttering up from her stomach to her face. Is this... pride?  "Give it time luv, I'll get there,"  she smiles coyly. "But splendid, it is  intoxicating, isn't it? God it's all they're good for, isn't it? Doing whatever you desire. Ughh. But we're getting ahead of ourselves. I'd love to sit here getting off on that high, but there's so much to cover and the night is like, waning or whatever. So come, let's go over the basics." Pulling Nora by the wrist, she leads her to the large bed in the flat and gestures to get comfortable. She sits quietly opposite the girl for the first few moments, tapping her chin as she considers how to start this. How did Cammy do this for me again?  Truth be told she couldn't remember it as clearly as she'd like. She was still rather hazy and recovering back then. And Nora wasn't even a full kindred, which is probably a good place to start right? "Okay so like, you've seen like, that one movie where Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise get married and bicker a lot right? Well picture that but not as melodramatic. Better sex, too..."  she proceeds to spend the better part of the next hour and a half laying out everything she could think of that she felt Nora would need to know, at least at this juncture, to hopefully not get herself killed immediately. She outlines both of their natures as kindred and... pseudo-kindred, as she calls the ghoul; the abilities the girl could expect and those to be aware of that exist otherwise; the very concept of a kindred's requiem itself and most importantly, the reason why  they don't 'already rule the world' — or as Cammy had explained it to her, how they do , the mortals just don't realise it. She notes, on that note, the existence of powerful elders and beyond, and the supernatural beings outside themselves, as well as some basics on staying safe. And most importantly, she stresses the masquerade, and the absolute need to adhere to it, lest she wish herself — and much more importantly Aubrey  — killed. When finally the explanation winds down, she lets out a heavy sigh and smiles at her creation, running a hand down the girl's cheek. "Now, that's of course like, a cray amount of stuff to remember immediately so don't stress, you'll get there. For now, you must be so thirsty. Here," she says as she pulls a wrist up to her mouth and punctures the skin with one fang, "drink and let your mind start to process all that stuff."

The early night comes quickly following her ghoul's departure, as Aubrey lets the sweet comfort of death slip over her body once more, waking only to the shattering crack of life ringing back into her bones come evening. As she awakens from her slumber and starts to process the previous night once more, she groans at the memory of the professor's incomprehensible freak out. So close, she'd been, to finally putting the whole 'investigation' behind her so she could get on to studying Cruac in earnest.  Instead, she knew what she had to go about doing today. And even that took a backseat to a call she begrudgingly knew she ought to make real quickly... "Mikey? Hiiiii it's Aubrey from like, last night?"  She sets the phone down to her side on speaker as she talks, focusing mostly on the application of her makeup as she finished getting ready for the night ahead.  "So like remind me what you wanted to know about again? 'Cause like, I think I have some deets that might interest you..."

Hi Aubrey. Uh, sorry, I'm not feeling so great. It was the library. I mean... I wanted to know what happened that night in the library. “The library… righー shit,” Aubrey curses as she drops her mascara and dips to scoop it up. “Mhmm honestly I’m like kinda shocked you don’t know already? You’re like a hacker Sherlock Holmes or whatever aren’t you? Anyway this is a secure call right? That’s a thing you do? Well irregardless I’ll talk fast if you’re all sick and gross and also I have things to do but what do you know about the Masters?…” Over the next few minutes she rambles off a bunch of the facts of the case as she’d gleaned from talking to those involve the last several days: A group including Professor McCarthy and an elder named Silas went into the place, awoke the masters that had a big sign or something on them saying “Don’t bloody wake us” or whatever; that immediately went to shit; a methuselah may-or-may-not  be involved; some odd eldritch beastie definitely was involved; Silas went crazy;  Liam and another put him in torpor… ”Oh! And   also cats were there and it was all kinds of messed up.” She smiles as she puts the finishing touches on both her story and face, then practically sings into the phone, “Kay that’s like everythiiiing that means we’re ~ eeveeeennn as fuuuucckkk~  alright?”

With her 'debt', as it were, taken care of, Aubrey finishes her preparations and heads for the door. She wasn't sure how to do it — no doubt her majesty had worn off and the girl wouldn't be so keen to speak with her — but she had to find Rae. Perhaps heading to her home was best? Michael had  gotten her the address, after all.  But a strix was apparently lurking near there, possibly. That seemed less than ideal. And it wasn't as if, despite Aubrey's own rather genuine at times assurances of safety, the girl would be dumb enough to just stroll back over to Brasenose, right? She needed to think. A quick bite to eat, perhaps, and surely something would come to her...

Shadows rise unbidden to coil around Rae as she approaches Brasenose college. The darkness hangs in the air like smoke and moves with the vampire as though alive. Across the quad, Aubrey steps out from Screens Passage and can't help but notice the oppressive gloom that looms beyond the college gate. It's somehow uncharacteristic of the well-lit streets of Oxford that she has grown used to over the last week.

Rae stops mid-stride as she notices the dark collecting around her with every movement. She lifts a hand up to her side, bathed in the soft white glow of a nearby streetlamp, and watches as shadow draws in close to her and shades her from the light, clinging to her as if she were sanctuary from the illumination that is its end. " Perhaps something lingers from the trip to the land of Dark and Death with Mr. Grimm. Or maybe this is just how things will be now." Looking about the campus, she tries to discern a Kindred who may be of assistance to her, when she spots an unfortunately familiar face. With a bone-rattling sigh of exhaustion in anticipation of the upcoming exchange, Rae does her best to dislodge herself from her darkness as she raises her hand and calls out. "Ms. Knight! Ms. Knight! Can you help me?"

Aubrey’s hungry gaze turns from a lone fresher wandering like a lost puppy up the street to the exasperatingly more-lost-looking face of the girl she was looking for, calling out to her no less. She clicks her tongue but quickly glances about. What was she doing here? ”Oh my god  Rae-Rae!”  Her usual affectation rising with the forcing of a smile, her eyes are much less elated under the brim of the floppy straw hat she wore as she scans the surroundings for some kind of ambush. “What the actual eff are you like, doing here…”  She feigns a gasp. “Is this about your, you know…” ”…visitor from last night?”

Rae smiles in a tired way that doesn't show her teeth as Aubrey speaks in her usual, congenial tone.  "In part, yes. I'm here to turn myself over to the Master of Brasenose, I'm done hiding and putting others at risk. I will plead my case, and with a new bit of evidence, hopefully the Circle will at least end me quickly." As the river of shadows begins to collect around her once more to darken her space, Rae takes a deep breath. The presence of the gloom that affectionately hugs her instills a sense of relief, of amniotic safety that she is both confused by and thankful for. "And I will warn all I can of the Strix. In return, maybe they can tell me what's happened to me."

Aubrey blinks. "You're just... trying to die?"  This was certainly not what she'd expected. To be honest, after Hera's idiotic blunder last night she'd assumed they'd lost Raziel for good — surely she'd have snapped out of the majesty-induced haze, called her sire and concord together, gone to ground, and vanished. But here she was... turning herself in. "Yeahhh so like, I dunno anyone here cares that  much about you but, sure? Hold that thought..." Pulling out her phone, she sighs as the professor's name comes up, but she types out the message anyway. Heyy this is gonna sound fake af after last night but uhh, our fave sloppy friend just legit walked into the quad begging to 'plead her case' or whatever??? Maybe I did hit her harder than I realised...  With a cordial smile she glances back at Rae as she awaits a response. "So like, this isn't some dumb attempt at revenge right?"

Rae squints at Aubrey in confusion, "No, I am not trying to 'just die'. Things have only continued to spiral since the inciting evening, and this is the only straight line to putting an end to it. And I was under the impression that the Master was coming out of her skin with anger and had multiple parties out searching for me? If that isn't the case, then that's encouraging."  Rae opens her mouth to continue but stops short when Aubrey pulls out her phone and begins typing. Crossing her arms, she waits until she has the Daeva's attention again. "Trust me, Aubrey. If I wanted revenge , you'd never see me coming. That isn't to say that I'm not angry about last night, but I'm willing to move past it. I will agree not to read you if you agree not to Majesty me."

Multiple parties out searchinー Aubrey barely tries to stifle a laugh. “Rae-Rae you’re adorable but the Circle isn’t that  into you. I told you that last night didn’t I?l She tilts her head with a mockingly concerning look. “Anyway like, I don’t know what you’re so upset about. You “read” me, called me a bunch of, frankly? Super mean things? Like, we’d barely met and you called me a snake? The absolute fuck? Anyway I soldiered through cause I’m like, a trooper and all that but turning majesty on was just a reacting to how petty you were being, yeah?” ”Besides, it’s not like you can get upset I learned anything after that. Like I hardly even really asked you anything, you just started yelling a bunch of personal TMI stuff at me unprompted…?”

Rae's mild indignation at Aubrey's assertions quickly dissolve into quite another feeling altogether. Her lips curl into a sincere smile as she represses the urge to reach out and pat the top of Aubrey's head. " Oh, now who's being adorable. I was rough with you, I will admit, but 'snake' is just one of the little names used to address your clan, as there are several unflattering ways to refer to mine. Regardless, I do apologize for being so acerbic with you, I can see now that it has hurt you. Though, in all fairness, you weren't exactly being polite either, regardless of how hard you smiled or twirled your hair." Shifting her weight between her feet, she rests her hands on her hips.  "In equal fairness, I've never been particularly wealthy when it comes to friends, and I've been under alot of stress and clearly needed to do some venting. So, what do you say? Friends? Or at least not enemies?"

"Oh yes ," she feigns a pained sigh and raises a hand to her forehead, "I was at a complete loss for how to go on after such insult."  The last few words can barely get out before a laugh escapes alongside them. "I simply can't imagine why someone who speaks like they're constantly auditioning for a Jane Austen play has struggled to, like, make friends. But as I said, I don't care about, you know, any of this? So yeah sure? Totes BFFs, kay?" Aubrey glances down at her phone once more as she awaited a response, then raises a brow as the shadows about Rae swirl up and around her more and more through her peripheral vision.  "Okay so like I didn't wanna say anything cause I figured after how you rambled about it last night you were just trying to like, prove a point now? But are you gonna keep doing — that  — the whole time or...? I mean far be it from me to judge wanting attention but..."  she gestures about to the rest of the quad as mortals continue to walk to and fro.

Rae laughs aloud, shaking her head in exasperation at Aubrey's manner. "I speak like this because I've always spent more time with books than people." Rae feels her own phone buzz in her pocket and retrieves it to see a surprising message from Mehdi about information. She types a quick reply. Tonight may be spoken for, unfortunately. I'll let you know when I'm available. It's good to hear from you, hope you're well. Putting her phone away, she looks to the clinging darkness to briefly breathe it in before looking to Aubrey with a faint smile. "...I'm not consciously doing this. The shadows follow me, cling to me. They're a part of me." There's a moment where she can almost feel herself begin to slip into the darkness, before snapping out of it. "Like I said, I don't know what this is and I couldn't find any writings on it. I'm hoping that the Circle could tell me something. Now that you're seeing it, does anything come to mind?"

"Step aside, Artemis,"  interrupts a low voice from behind Aubrey. The words are softly spoken and the tone intimately familiar. Just a few paces from the two girls stands Odin, vitae dripping from his wrists to coat both palms. The look in his eyes is cold and hard.

Startled by the sudden arrival of the ominous stranger, Rae takes a step back as her Auspex is instinctively triggered. Her nose fills with the scent of ash, and the bloodied hands of the man change as his intentions are revealed to her; palms lighting the dark with searing fire. Holding up her hands in surrender, Rae speaks as quickly as she can. "Sir, I mean no harm. Please allow me to speak, then pass your judgement as you see fit."

The shadows swirling around Rae coalesce and manifest into a tall, attractive man with dirty-blonde curls and pearl-white skin. He's dressed in a shirt and jeans - both black - with a scabbard at his hip. Odin raises his bloody hands, as though to enact an incantation and the blade flashes faster than the eye can follow. "Good evening, Edward,"  the man remarks as Odin's  hands tumble to the dusty ground of the path around the quad. "You're faster than you used to be. Still not fast enough though." Snarling in fury, Odin slams his bloody stump into the earth and his eyes glaze over black as he begins to chant in a foreign language. "You should leave," the man tells Rae, turning to look at her for the first time.

It all happens almost too fast for Rae to register. As she looks to the new stranger at her side, her features scrunch in confusion, but there is no time to hesitate. She turns to run and looks over her shoulder at Aubrey. "Follow if you can." With this, she takes off towards her home at a speed imperceptible to the human eye. 

The arrival of Odin and the even more sudden arrival of the man who was quite obviously Francis de la Fontaine leaves Aubrey blinking between strikes of what apparently was a sword and the falling of Odin's hands to the ground. "The fuck?"   Aubrey starts for a moment towards Fontaine, acting entirely off some innate instinct to tell him off, only to hesitate as a rare moment of rational clarity slips through and fills her with a sense of self-preservation. Rae calls out and starts to run and Aubrey watches, in shock at the incredulous violence before her. It was... not something she'd seen much of, even in the handful of years since her requiem began, and at once the fearless facade falls as she considers if Hera was right and this man would truly overreact so hard as to kill her. A piece of her mind says to stay — that was her  mentor being attacked, and this was her  clan — but in that moment, all she wanted was to curl up in Cammie's arms... the arms of her sire who wasn't here right now. So she bolts. Fear matches pace with her feet and her foe-turned-maybe-friend as she flits out of view of mortals in her pursuit of Raziel. "Rae what the actual hell!"

It is only when she is fully out of sight of and a good distance away from the Brasenose courtyard that she begins to slow down, turning to Aubrey as she slows down beside her.  Having come to a stop beside a tall brick wall, Rae begins pacing back and forth before leaning heavily against it. "I'm cursed. I'm bloody cursed. I can't even plan my own end without things going pear-shaped. I have no idea who that was, Aubrey. Apparently those shadows were  him, though I don't want to linger on that thought."  She stops to think, before looking at Aubrey accusatorily. "Who the hell was the creepy guy with Vitae all over his hands? He called you Artemis? And he started something like that right in front of the Kine?"

Out of sight for the time being m, Aubrey’s nerve comes back as soon as it’d left, and she gawks at the girl. “Girl what?  Did you not recognise your own fucking Grandsire?”   She scoffs, but the absurdity of him actually showing up just doubles if she doesn’t even know him. For a moment she considers that Raziel was just pretending not to know ー that it really had been a trap all along ー but the girl’s genuine frustration made that seem unlikely.  “Is he really that much of a sketchy creep you’ve never even met but he stalked you all night just twenty minutes after getting charmed for a hours? Jesus.” ”And that was a professor of Brasenose, duh?”  Her mind flashes to her snd Odin’s lessons just a day earlier, as she’d covered her own hands in vitae to study her rites. His would reattach right? Like, kindred healing and all that? Assuming Francis doesn’t just kill him…   “And he’s not creepy? He was clearly just like, trying to do something about the psycho-killer you slept with last night? You know, that you delivered to our front-fucking-door?”

"He's not...."  Rae considers both the description of Francis de la Fontaine given to her by Eve, as well as Eve's recent absence. "He wasn't with me since last night, as far as I can tell. I don't even think he was with me at all until I got to Brasenose, that was when the shadows started emanating off of me." She then remembers just what Eve had told her about how Francis had treated her, how he'd turned her and kept her isolated.  "And no, I'd never met him or even spoken to him before tonight. From what Eve's told me, I'd say he's a prick and I'd hoped to never have to interact with him. They haven't seen each other in years." "And that guy was definitely creepy, Bri. A simple 'look out, there's a shadow stalker.' would have gotten the message across. Though it's clear that Francis wouldn't have needed me to get to them if he really wanted to. He..." Understanding dawns on Rae's face. "What I can do is connected to my bloodline. Earlier tonight I did exactly what he just did."

Aubrey rolls her eyes, "Yes I know , you described it all last night. You'll note, by the way, that for all your nosily snooping around my mind, no blood of mine is on their way to, like, stake you because like, we're not crazy."  The thought of Cammy gives her an idea that lasts all of a moment. Perhaps it'd be good if her sire   were  to intervene here somehow? But she'd promised not to bother her too much, especially after calling in the favor for that Michael guy. No, she wouldn't reach out just yet.  "Even the professor back there wasn't gonna do anything to you. Like I said last night, it's not like you were in any danger at Brasenose anyway? Like, all the stupid mortal shite means nothing compared to whatever the fuck went down in the library last week. Of course now ..."   With a pinch of the bridge of her nose, she sighs.  "I have no idea why he needed to hide with you. Why do creeps like that do anything ? Why did you run immediately? Why did you ask me to follow? And why the eff did I?"  She leans up against the wall besides Rae and holds her head in her hands. " Ugh...  Question is like, what now?"

Rae's head tilts to the right as she looks to Aubrey with concern. "...you're more paranoid than I thought you'd be, I appreciate that. Why would Francis be here for you? If anything, I'd guess that he's somehow aware of the Strix, or here because of my access to our bloodline abilities. Eve has never talked about any of this before. He could even have decided that he just wants to reconnect, albeit in the creepiest way possible."  Crossing her arms, she glances at the road they just came down. "If what happened with the mortal man really doesn't matter, then I say we go back. As you've pointed out, anything else will just bring more questions and suspicion. Momentarily running so that you don't get caught in the crossfire of two elders feels rational enough for me." Rae then chuckles to herself. "Do you think it'll earn any favor if I offer the mortal's soul to the Circle?"

Aubrey blinks at her dumbfoundedly. "Do you... do you actually think your never-before-met Grandsire showed up disguised as your own shadow just as you arrived to turn yourself in to the Circle for nearly breaking masquerade after I used majesty on you last night to get you to fess up to a murder and told you to flee as he immediately chopped my professor's hands off because he... 'wants to reconnect'? Rubbing her temples to the point of nearly pushing right through them, she groans. "Anyway, you want to go back, like, okay? But if that creep comes at me you better step in front of his sword because no thank you, 'kay?"  Taking a preliminary step forward from the wall, she quickly stops. "...wait what the fuck are you talking about, "mortal's soul"...?

Rae smiles as she sucks her teeth in a tut tut sound. "Everything's about you huh, gorgeous? I think that he was fucked in the head before he was a centuries-old Kindred. I have been attacked by a creature that would make Lovecraft blush, almost eaten by an Elder, and nearly incapacitated by a Strix. All without so much as a word from him. And now I'm demonstrating abilities that I've never heard of, but he also has. So yes, I think he's trying to reconnect out of his own self-interest." Standing up off the wall, she begins to walk back to Brasenose, looking to Aubrey to follow. "But yes, I will do my best to stop him if he attacks you. Though you'll have to be nice if you want to sell the idea that we are actually friends." Rae then taps the side of her bag. "A gift from a new friend. Got Matthew's soul right in here, in an empty Dasani bottle. Thing points to me like a compass because of the magic binding it."

"Why yes,"  Aubrey smiles, "I am  gorgeous and everything is  about me. The sooner you get that the better our 'friendship' will be." Strutting up to walk beside Rae, she nods to the bottle with a hint of incredulity. "That bottle has Marty or whatever's soul in it? Really?"  She watches the bottle carefully, trying to discern anything unnatural about it. "...Did Khalid do that?"

Rae laughs quietly as she briefly wraps her arms around Aubrey's shoulders. " Oh love, I truly can't help but enjoy you sometimes. Such disdain for the world. It moves my cold little heart."  Releasing Bri, she reaches into her bag. "So it's a good thing that you are gorgeous. Otherwise I don't think you'd get much done. Anyway.."  Producing the bottle, it is f illed with a hazy white-gray substance and has strange black etchings on the cap. As Rae makes contact with it, it begins to shake like an angry cicada. "Yep. Poor bastard is right here. Won't be feeling up girls at fresher parties in this state." Just as quickly, she returns the bottle to her bag. "Not Khalid, another mage. A death mage. I had a taste of him and saw visions that almost defy description."

Again Rae offers up info she had hardly been asked for, and again Aubrey feels confused by the girl's apparent depth of intelligence but utter lack of a filter.  "Do mages taste different from other humans?"  That was a curious thought. She'd wondered whether biting Khalid would've been good. As far as she could tell he was as mortal as any other, just with an ability to do magic. Did that affect his blood though?   "Also it continues to like, blow my mind it took more than a day to find you when I could've, I don't know, walked into Oxford with a megaphone screaming "Confess shit for 5 quid" and you likely would've paid me  just to let you tell me." She eyes the swirling essence within the otherwise normal-looking bottle with a slight scepticism, but knows if Rae was claiming it to be a soul it probably was. "Dunno how this would help though? Sounds like even more of a confession?"

"What I've experienced is that the heart of their magic is tied to their blood. The blood tastes fine, but it connects you to the source of their abilities for a few moments. It's a dizzying experience, but it has allowed me to understand the nature of their power." Rae shrugs. "Maybe it's a Mekhet thing."   Rae then genuinely laughs. "I do my best to make my actions and thoughts a straight line, unlife has a way of complicating things all on its own. Maybe its just easy to tell you things because it seems that you don't care enough to lie. As for how this will help, maybe a complete confession will garner favor, putting everything on the table, so to speak. 

"Brilliant, I'll be sure to take a taste next time Khal and I do evening brunch." Aubrey chuckles as she adjusts the brim of her wide hat, "Absolutely precious. Well whatever makes you feel better. Can't say it won't hurt your chances either, but let's just get back and hope your grandsire isn't, like, a complete psycho." The two continue along on their slightly-slower-than-leaving trip back to the Brasenose quad proper.

Just as Rae is about to respond, she sways violently to the right and catches herself against the brick wall to their side as she is overcome by all-encompassing emotion. She is razed by unyielding intensity as she is crushed beneath the depths of a great conflagration that takes her a few seconds to even make sense of. These feelings are not hers. They are those of her maker. And what her maker feels is utter infatuation. A love that rends ego from the spirit, redemptive in the eternal hope that springs forth from it. But the emotions continue to blossom and spiral outward, rising higher and higher. It is the blissful surrender to a force that bends and binds all things. The destruction and reincarnation of the self, a moment etched in time, where who you were before and who you are after are forever divided by a single breath. It is love unlike anything that Rae has ever felt in her brief life and unlife. For a fraction of a second, there is a direct bridge between her spirit and Eve’s, and she relays a simple message: Francis found me. She shivers and whimpers as she covers her eyes, tears of blood beginning to stream down her face. But she wipes them away and turns to face Aubrey to throw herself into the arms of the Daeva. She longs to feel this for herself, with someone of her choosing. “She loves him beyond knowing and expression. How can she love him like this?” 

Aubrey is hardly paying attention to Rae when she's suddenly tackled by the girl, reacting almost on instinct with a backstep and a shove in shock. "Ew Rae-rae the fuck are you doing!" She snaps back, a look of mild disgust trudging its way across her face. "What the hell are you talking about, who loves who?"

Rae catches herself after being shoved, and holds out a hand as she looks to the ground and slowly comes back to herself. "Sorry. Blood sympathy. I just got a huge hit of what my sire is feeling." Looking up at Aubrey, she becomes enormously embarrassed of what just happened, immediately averting her eyes and taking up a walking pace again. "I don't know if you're aware, but my sire is the wife of my grandsire. Messy business that I think he only got away with because he kept her like a caged bird for many years. But like I said, they haven't seen each other in decades, and it seems like the reunion was... passionate . Part of me thought she'd let him go, but she still loves him furiously. So, FYI, I guess."  Wanting to put the awkward moment behind them as quickly as possible, Rae walks more briskly as they return to the Brasenose quad.

Aubrey raises a brow and watches her closely for a second, unceasingly confused by every odd thing that randomly seemed to happen to Raziel on a minute-by-minute basis. With her usual sardonic tone returning, she nods along.  " Riiiiight  well pretty sure that's called like, 'Stockholm Syndrome' but you know, go her, I guess? Anyway..." They continue on, the quad up ahead once more.

Clouds of thick black smoke rise in the sky beyond the towering spire of University Church. The wailing of approaching sirens blares down the high street, cutting like a knife through the distant keen of students screaming.

As Rae and Aubrey take in the scene, Rae closes her eyes and pinches her nose bridge as she sighs deeply before looking over to Aubrey. "So. Things clearly got worse. Should we continue on to find the Master of Brasenose? Or just call the night a loss, find someone to eat, and try again tomorrow?" 

Aubrey’s eyes widen with the rising smoke as her feet come to a stop, gawking up at the apparent carnage. For once, she’s at a loss for words in the face of whatever pointless carnage this man had wrought and a terrifying thought bursts forth from the deep recesses and confines of her mind, over the clouds of ash and ruin. One that rattles her to her very core as a reality she’d as of yet never really faced rears its ugly head… “Oh god my stuff…”   Her mind flashes to her room ー her designer clothes and other floppy hats and macbook and makeup and polaroids and plushies were all in Brasenose. If there was a fire spreading out of control right now… Well, they were insured, of course, but just the idea of losing them… “Is he like a complete fucking whacko what the actual eff! Like, why get all up in arms about a little murder risking the masquerade when you can apparently just like, show up and burn it to the ground instead! God !”  It’s a moment before she even registers Rae had said anything, and the girl’s lax attitude stuns her. “What? Rae-rae, luv, your absolute walnut of a grandsire is burning my flat down and making this like a thousand times worse looking for you . As much as that idea sounds splendid… not sure now’s a good time, hm?”

Rae throws her hands in the air in frustration as she gestures at the fire and distant screaming. "Well this has spiraled so far out of control that I'm not sure what we could do that wouldn't end with either one of us meeting the end of a blade or a horrible bit of Cruac?! And Francis, that fucking bell end...why would he escalate things like this!?" Realizing that she's been waving her hands around in anger, she closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. "So we rush to Brasenose to see what's going on, then?"