August + September Catchall

[hearthebell]

Who: L Lawliet and YOU
What: A somewhat late August catchall, focusing on event stuff but can include CR logs and slice of life! When September's event goes up I'll add prompts for the month in order to save a bit of space. Please feel free to hit me up on discord at ladylazarus#2235 or plurk at LexiL if you want to plot, wildcards are welcome!
When: Throughout August and September
Where: Various place throughout trench

Comments

[acidjail]

[Mercymorn can't quite tell if this is a further attempt at seduction, and if it is, how much sincerity might be wound up in it. It's been an extraordinarily long time since anyone tried to woo her in any manner sincerely. The Cohort had the fear of her instilled in them long ago, and her brothers and sisters were too used to her as the unscalable mount. Even the fools of Blood of Eden never attempted to fling some sop in her path. Perhaps they'd had enough of that already with their beloved commander.

She has to admit it's flattering to be enticed into conspiracy, rather than having to serve as the goad. He says I choose my allies with such unfettered confidence for one so young and disadvantaged, like saying such a thing will make it so.

She's always had a weakness for fanaticism. She smiles back at him like she has a mouthful of bright feathers hidden behind her lips, eyes half-lidded in thought.]

The last person willing to look me in the eyes and say anything of the sort threatened to shoot me between the eyes for my trouble, which was exactly the sort of horrid thing she was always doing...but you.

[She reaches up and touches his jaw, very lightly, at the place it tips upwards on its way to hinge to the rest of the skull. She tilts her head, and makes a soft, humming noise towards the back of her throat, then drops her hand away.]

Let it never be said I am not reasonable. [Says the bloody woman with a mouth still full of teeth who cornered him here.] Let it not be said I am not amenable to cooperation.

Keep my name to yourself, and I will consider the rest fairly won.

[hearthebell]

[L's passion is a strange thing, pure however it presents. One could be forgiven for thinking it's an attempt at seduction; maybe it's similar, maybe it's close to those to impulses and desires all roped together like a wreath.

All he knows is that it's so rare for people to smile at him like they know what he's thinking. He's too cautious to return it, but his gaze lingers.]

I wouldn't threaten to kill you... you're not on that list.

[As though, of everyone in Trench, he could easily kill whoever he chooses. He stands and stares, as she touches the sharp line of his jaw and her hand slides away from the angle.]

Tell another reasonable and cooperative soul, why he would share the name "Mercymorn" with John Gaius. I've just met you, and I care more about keeping your business discreet, than his.

[acidjail]

[There's a terrible blurring of distinctions between things that ought to be kept well apart from each other with sufficient time under the grindstone of the universe. Mercy harbours no illusions about herself in this. She is a more rotten revenant than any of them.

Thus, when Lazarus commits blasphemy twice over, holy names uttered in this dirty crevice of a filthy city, the Second Saint to serve the King Undying, founder of his most devout House, and most stringent, unrelentingly guardian of those sacred syllables - she really does laugh.

It's a softer, prettier laugh than should come out of her mouth, still half-masked in gore, chiming and high and wholly in disbelief.]

No. You don't strike me as the idly threatening type.

[She says it with a stress on idly that tings with satisfaction, like she's hit upon a puzzle slotting into place, and is pleased with its shape.]

But yes...why should you care for God's discretion, when he has so badly misplaced it? As for why - I can't imagine. We did not part on the best of terms. It wouldn't win you any favours...and I somehow doubt he's inclined to bestow them on you anyway.

[hearthebell]

[L stiffens, guarded. He's unaccustomed, after all, to earning laughter that isn't ridiculing or mean-spirited in nature. The jaunty, satisfied little win of a joke well-landed is a feat he's accomplished enough times to count on one hand... and this time, he's not entirely in on the joke, he thinks. Maybe the prettiness is just a veneer over what he is used to, the same familiar creature coming to him in a different guise.]

I prefer the truth, however it happens to look under sunlight. We're often at-odds because John's prefers his truths in the dark, packed in ice. Shame is like that for proud men.

[acidjail]

[So there is a nerve in Lazarus that may be plucked to his displeasure. The fierce underdogs tend to have one. She is not entirely dissatisfied to see it sing, stringing him up to a more personal sort of defensiveness.]

Oh, you have been digging.

[She approves. Her approval is as sharp as her disdain, but far rarer, the glint of a diamond dusted blade over the jagged rake of broken plex. Her teeth are almost pink to match her hair when she flashes them, flipping her hood up over her distinctive hair.]

All I ever wanted was the truth. [She tilts her head, lightly.] Whatever the cost. A demanding principle...one so seldom appreciated.

You may go. Clean yourself up. I will consider your proposal.

[As though he did not already have the audacity to declare their allyship.]

[hearthebell]

[L, only human and a mortal one at that, in fact does have no shortage of nerves. He'd love one to think otherwise, of course, because by the standards of a merely mortal human, hadn't he done his very best to close himself into an ivory tower while he quietly witnessed the world's corruption and pain?]

Perhaps I have.

[He doesn't outright deny it, likely because she seems even a sliver of pleased. Her beauty comes with a sort of violence parceled and packaged along with it, and he could look at it, he thinks, a little longer.

His fingers tighten on the edge of the book, and he hurries away before she can demand it back from him.]