Time: Evening
Location: Velvet Bite, Midtown
The Velvet Bite. The atmosphere around him buzzed. Wolves, Fae, and Bloodsuckers were all welcome here. Lucian decided this to be a neutral enough site to invite and meet an ‘old friend’. The music droned on in the background, intermixed with boisterous conversation and the occasional shattering of drinkware. Knowing the circumstances, Lucian paid out of pocket to have a private-enough booth arranged for himself and whoever he was meeting. A bottle of decent-enough scotch sat on the table with a couple of glasses and ice that never seems to melt. Fae magic, of course.
Tapping the package of his Halcyon Spirit Additive Free Unfiltered cigarettes, Lucian expertly pulled one out with his lips, and with a quick flick of his windproof lighter, one end of the cigarette began glowing a faint cherry-red as Lucian took a long drag of the tobacco and exhaled. With the cigarette hanging loosely from his lips, Lucian took out his phone and checked for messages and the time. It was fast approaching the agreed-upon time for his guest to arrive.
“Fashionably late, as per usual with this one…”, Lucian mumbles as he takes another drag of his cigarette.
Lucian also took a brief moment to send a message to the Pack’s senior member-only chat:
“I’m at The Bite, shouldn’t be too long. If I don’t report back within 2 hours, raise hell.” He then set his phone down and waited as patiently as he could for the man to show his face… if he could call it that.
He’d know the exact moment he made his entrance. Most, if not all people who visited the Velvet Bite, whether for business or pleasure, at least put in the effort to fit its scene. Not Hollow. He was one of the few humans who could walk in here like he belonged, and he was the only human who could do it while throwing any inkling of a dress code through the window.
Reputation meant everything here if one desired to speak to the right people. Sometimes, all it took was waving the right flag, and other times, it was stories people whispered about you within the confines of the private booths.
It was no surprise when there was a sudden, yet slight shift in the lounge’s atmosphere. As if a vinyl briefly skipped due to the slightest bump against its frame.
Hollow moved through the crowd, his signature mask bearing the visage of a skull, steadily moving past the light crowd of patrons. The only difference in his usual attire was a black trench coat he had worn over it. He went full-fledged edge lord with it, too; the collar popped and unzipped to show he had easy access to whatever he concealed beneath it.
However, the trenchcoat wasn't the strangest addition–no, the strangest addition was the girl at his heels.
Elodie Ashbourne didn’t belong in a place like this.
Not really.
And yet… here she was.
She clung close behind Sean—no, Hollow. She had to remind herself he wasn't Sean tonight. Her wide hazel eyes soaked in the Velvet Bite’s chaos with a mix of awe and tightly-coiled nerves. Glamour clung to the air like perfume, brushing her skin with invisible fingers, and she felt the way eyes followed them. Some with curiosity. Some with confusion and wariness. Like she was a wrong note in a perfect chord. She didn’t blame them. Sometimes, she felt it, too.
Still, she kept her chin up and tried to match his pace in her velvet milkmaid dress, all flared skirt and black satin lacing. She’d chosen it carefully–sweet, but not prey. Her strawberry waves bounced with every step.
“I’m trying to look confident, but I feel like I'm giving scared baby deer energy right now.” She whispered with a smile, not quite steady.
Then came the voice.
“You smell… odd.” A Fae man leaned in, too close, his grin a sliver too wide. His nose hovered near her neck like he meant to breathe her in. She flinched, brushing against Hollow’s coat with a barely audible gasp.
Elodie straightened quickly, cheeks flushed. She gave the man a smile like spun sugar over steel.
“Mmm, if you can smell that, you’re too close.” She said, blinking up at them.
“Back up, please, before someone gets ideas.” He blinked, then chuckled and drifted off.
A barista saving lives with politeness…She exhaled and let her fingers linger on the edge of Hollow’s coat. Still smiling. Still shaking a little. Showtime.
Lucian absentmindedly flicked some cigarette ash onto the floor before taking one last drag from the now-spent cigarette and dabbed it into the ashtray on the table. Taking the bottle of scotch and twisting the cap off, then poured two glasses, each with about two fingers worth, and twisted the cap back on. Picking up one of the glasses, he swirled the amber liquor around and took in the scent of it. A little peat, a little spice. Lucian let the scent linger in his nostrils, in an attempt to mask the inherent floral rot that permeated the place. Fae magic. Lucian detested it most of all, out of all things ‘wrong’ with the city.
Just as the scent of peat dissipated, Lucian picked up another. A human and a vampire in very, very close proximity. This made him furrow his brows. As far as he knew, Hollow worked alone. What the hell is going on… Defensively, Lucian tucked a hand behind his back, wrapping his fingers on the grip of his pistol, loaded with bullets tipped with liquid mercury.
“Old friend. Welcome. Please. Sit. Take a load off…” Lucian said in a controlled, confident tone but just below normal conversation volumes. Subtly drawing a deeper breath than normal, Lucian turned slightly to address his other ‘guest’
“And you. What might your name be? Please, have a seat as well… Any guest of the Hollow is a guest of mine…” Lucian offered the young vampire a half smile, showing one canine tooth longer than it really ought to be.
A detail caught by the eyes behind orange-tinted lenses. Hollow could have gone about things his way, but instead, he took a half-step back, offering Elodie the lead.
She peeked out from behind Hollow, eyes wide as they swept over the man sitting before them. Apprehension flickered across her face, but only for a moment.
“Go on, introduce yourself,”Elodie took a quick breath as she straightened with a practiced grace, offered a sweet smile, and gave a little wave as she stepped forward.
“Cinnamon.” She said brightly, the name rolling off her tongue like candy on velvet. One could only imagine how much Sean’s face twisted behind his mask.
“Pleasure to meet you, sir.” She held out her hand in the offer of a handshake, doing her best to keep her trembling at bay, but she felt a firm hand grasp her wrist.
“No handshakes. Sit.”She startled slightly as Hollow grasped her wrist, the gentle command making her blush as she sat quickly, murmuring,
“Yes, sir…” before she could stop herself. Mortified, she stared straight ahead.
Again, Lucian took in the scent of his two guests. Hollow smelled familiar. Human. Albeit sweaty. But, the other one, the one that decided her name is a fucking pantry ingredient, she smelled foul. A tinge of floral mixed in with traces of metal. Lucian looked at the unfamiliar girl quizzically as he pushed the whisky glass towards Hollow.
“Who…what are you? You…smell strange…”Lucian’s words made her freeze. Her lips parted, breath caught, like she might have asked
What do you mean?, but Hollow cut in first.
“She’s sitting. That's what.” There was no sign of warmth in his tone.
Elodie blinked, composed herself, then offered a honey-slicked smile and replied softly,
“I guess I’m an acquired scent.”She folded her hands in her lap, posture perfect, voice pleasant. But her smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. In the meantime, Hollow slid into the booth, sitting right beside her and directly across from Lucian.
“Hmm… was all that Lucian let out before finishing the content of his glass.
“Well. Let’s get straight to it. Hollow. Within your networks, what have you heard in the supernatural world, specifically on the Lycan side of things? I know you keep tabs on all factions…“Specifically on the Lycan side of things? Something internal then… So the rumors do ring true.” He almost seems too happy to confirm a tragedy, but events such as the one concerning Lucian forced Halcyon to writhe with activity. Each faction would use the event of Logan Delaney’s death in some form or fashion, and Hollow would capitalize on it. It was ugly but it was business.
Hollow peered down at the two glasses of scotch, reflexively weighing the intention behind the beverage of choice. However, his curiosity was ever so brief. He reached for the closest glass and guided it across the table toward Elodie. The action hadn't gone unnoticed by Lucian, but he didn’t care. That wasn’t important. The offering of scotch was merely cordial anyway.
“If you're looking for a murderer. I don't have their name. Not yet… Mostly because your pack is keeping a tight lid on things. Now, I understand the sentiment…” Hollow leaned in ever so slightly.
“...but that is not how information sharing works. Right now, I’m working with leaks from unreliables, so you, Lucian, have a choice to make. Tell me everything you know about what happened now or keep it all tucked away until you get desperate enough to tell me when the trail runs cold.” He held an air of aloofness to what Lucian would decide but this was far from how he truly felt.
Elodie lifted the glass slowly, sipping just enough to hide her expression.
A murder in the pack? That’s not small news. She glanced between the two men, lips still on the rim.
Why does it feel like the real danger hasn’t even shown up yet?“Mmm. Well. You seem to have as much, if not more information than I do. Yes, I am looking for the bastards that did this to our brother. But that’s all. Surely your network of rats and spies have told you more than that? Such information is so surface level, and one such as you should find it insulting to even share something so inconsequential…” Yes, Lucian kicked the ball back towards Hollow, but his words are not without truth.
He didn’t know much more. Someone killed Logan Delaney, and he will work whichever angle he needs to find out who did it.
“Like, I said. Your pack has a tight lid on this…” Hollow made a mental note to be careful with how he went about this, knowing the temperament of the average lycan. Lucian was on a higher rung than most, but the death of one of his own had to be considered.
“...and I'm beginning to think that includes you. If you believe I have more inconsequential information than you do, allow me to prove you wrong. We'll start easy. Did you see the body?”Elodie quietly set her glass down, the clink of it soft against the table. Her hands folded delicately in her lap as she looked between the two men.
“I know trust is a rare currency here,” she said gently,
“but maybe we can spend just enough of it to get somewhere tonight.”Her gaze settled on Lucian with quiet sympathy, the corners of her mouth softening.
“It sounds like you lost someone who meant a great deal to you. That kind of grief…” she paused, her voice dropping just a little,
“...it hollows you out in ways words can’t fix. I’m so sorry you’re going through that.”Then, with a slightly wistful little smile, she added,
“But, my mama always said you accomplish more with kindness and pie than you ever will with claws and teeth.” A tiny shrug followed.
“I didn’t bring pie, but I’m real good at the kindness part.”She glanced between them again, voice light but sincere.
“So maybe… we can all take a small breath, and start over with just a little kindness and understanding?”Lucian’s eyes snapped to the girl that just…tried to perk up the conversation?
“How strong's that scotch?” Hollow said in reaction to Elodie. Her kindness was charming but it had no place here, especially if it was genuine.
“It’s just normal scotch… Not strong enough for all this kumbaya talk. But I do like that accent of yours.” Lucian said, letting off one small crooked smile before refocusing himself.
“Starting easy is fine with me. Yeah, I saw the body. I’m sure you got pictures of it before we had a chance to bury him. You and your spies made sure of that, right?.” Hollow didn't confirm or deny such a thing, not with words or body language. He kept his cards unbelievably close to his chest.
Lucian retrieved the now-emptied glass in front of Elodie and refilled it, slightly less than before this time, and lightly pushed it back while lighting another cigarette for himself. Hollow shot a glance toward the refilled glass but did nothing beyond that.
“Surely that’s not what you’re here for. What’ve you got for me, Hollow?”Elodie blinked at the glass, then at Sean, then back at Lucian. One brow arched slightly. Her fingers curled around the glass with slow grace as she muttered under her breath mostly to herself,
“Pours like a gentleman, talks like a warning label…” She sighed and took a sip of the drink and coding to glance at whatever else was around them.
“I have people that will look into it. The problem is that this…” He considered how he might describe it since he felt like a broken record player but perhaps he could give just a little.
“This crime against the Iron Fangs is still very new. No one's out there bragging about taking out your second in command, either. It hasn't gone up the Warden channels just yet, and I’ve even ruled out the infamous Butcher due to no mention of crescent-shaped scars on the body… I need to know more, so I know who to ask about this. So from what you could see, in what manner was he killed? And who discovered him?”Elodie slowly settled back into the booth, trying to make herself smaller–less of a presence in the crossfire of testosterone and tension.
So many sharp words and not a single bandage between them. Her gaze briefly lingered on Sean.
And Hollow’s not just tossing rumors for fun, sugar. He’s trying to help without handing you a shovel.A pause. Then, under her breath without realizing she was actually speaking,
“Lord help me, I should’ve brought cookies.”“I’d sincerely hope whoever did this, whoever committed this atrocity, would be smart enough to not start bragging about it… This is beyond the doing of common thugs. This was a message. Consider this, Hollow. You, or one of your own, discovers a dead warden, strung up on a cross, all bloodied and brutalized. How would you treat it? Logan Delaney, while he was old, he was still very capable. A low-level thug could have never gotten to him. The state of his body…” Lucian let out a long sigh and considered his next words.
“He was brutally murdered, likely from more than one assailant. There wasn’t anything specific about how and what they did. Think of a gory movie murder. You get the idea. A young one of our pack found him in the warehouse, and notified the higher ups…”Lucian then lazily addressed Elodie
“And yeah, that’s me. A gentleman with a few warning labels. One of the labels say ‘Yes, I can hear you. Perks of the race.’ So. If you got some’n to say, just go ahead. I chose this place because it’s neutral. I won’t bite ya, not here anyways. Though…if you brought cookies, I don’t know what I’d do…” Lucian said with a small smirk.
Elodie tilted her head, smile delicate as spun sugar.
“If I wanted you to know what I was thinking I promise I’d gift wrap it and whisper it straight to your ego.” And with that, she went back to sipping the drink and glancing around.
“A message…” Hollow suddenly pondered aloud.
“Doesn’t make sense. Not to me, anyway…” Despite the small details shared, the tidbits began to paint a different picture of the situation for Hollow than what Lucian described.
“I think we've hit a wall,” he lied but he didn't want to dig into this matter further with Lucian in tow. Looking at Elodie from the corner of his eye without turning to face her, he took note of her demeanor.
She probably needs a breather anyway, Hollow thought.
“Fuck sakes Hollow. Not only did you bring this Fresh one to this meeting, you’ve actually managed to give me nothing. I guess it’s too early to be tapping into my connections. My fault. I thought your network would have some threads I can pull, some scents I can sniff out…” Lucian said, quickly finishing off the contents of his glass and snuffing out whatever remained of his cigarette.
“And you, Cinnamon, what a ridiculous name by the way, welcome to the dirty, egotistical world of underworld dealings. You best start believing in ghost stories. You’re in one.” Lucian said, his signature smirk never leaving his face.
“The bottle is yours, consider it a thank you gift for actually showing up. Booth is also yours for the night. I’ve booked it. Courtesy of the Iron Fangs. You two have a good night.” Lucian said to his two guests before turning and heading out of the Velvet Bite. As he was leaving, he took out his phone and made a quick dial, holding an indistinct conversation.
Back at the table, Elodie blinked, watching Lucian retreat through the lounge haze, cigarette smoke curling in his wake. She leaned slightly toward Sean, brows furrowed in quiet disbelief.
“D-did he just quote Pirates of the Caribbean at me?” she asked, voice hushed with genuine confusion.
“Was that... supposed to be threatening or thematic?”Her gaze lingered on the empty spot Lucian left behind.
“And do all werewolves talk like Tumblr posts from 2011?”Sean let loose a sigh, yet there was a soft chuckle at the end of it. He faced Elodie, smirking beneath the mask that had no hint of warmth in its visage. His tone would be much lighter now that Lucian had departed.
“I am this,” He nearly pinched his index finger and thumb together,
“close to telling you that they all do but… I’d say it’s just a quarter of them or maybe a third.” He shrugged after stating the statistic so plainly.
“Anyway, you did well for yourself, Cinnamon... With most Lycans, there's a short range of about twenty-or-so moods. It's kind of like defusing a bomb.” He gave the surface of the table a light smack.
“And after all that tension and nothing to give, we got ourselves a little bit of info, free scotch, and a booth to ourselves.” He was feeling good about tonight yet…
The night’s still young. 
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