[Rory] She doesn’t make waves, she doesn’t stride through the Caern with the power of an Ahroun that is confident and sure. No, not Rory. Rory keeps to herself, moves with a stealth of one used to not trying to draw attention to herself, one who’s used to being berated for being where she should not be – despite the fact that she’s every right to be here, just as everyone else born True.
She’s dressed in just about everything she owns, doubled up and tripled up under a coat that’s too light for the season. She’s not bred for living on the streets, though she learns quickly from her packmates and does her best. Her [wasted] breeding sings through her veins, though she oddly has no scent herself, aside from that of her clothing. In some ways, it’s impossible to miss her. In others, it’s hard notice her at all.
Whatever the case, she slips past the meeting of a group of Garou, hitching her pack higher on her shoulder.
[Marrick] She is impassive, because she wishes to be impassive. It is a visual lie that doesn’t matter.
As though hearing one’s faults does not, on some level, make a person uncomfortable, she endures because it is for her own betterment. The Fury glances at Lukas- a man she holds no love for, and Theron- a man she doesn’t even know, and back at Sinclair. She pretends this doesn’t bother her, and it is because she wants it to be.
If nothing, Marrick’s will urged her through a lot of things.
There is silence. Long, uncomfortable silence as it all sinks in.
“That’s fair,” she tells her, after long moments of musing over the words. These things don’t come easy to her, and she knows it. It’s been pointed out to her, and used time and time again. Enough that it leaves the Fury wondering, at times, if she’s nothing more than a meat shield. If she does little in her pack in regards to outside dealings if it is because she is so lacking or if it is a reason entirely.
“And that sounds like him.”
More silence. More thought. More choices of words that were alien to her, she looks back at Sinclair’s packmates and her stomach turns, and she pretends this doesn’t bother her because, yet again, she is in an instance where Sinclair is pointing out her faults and someone could very well be watching.
And she is unshaken, if for no other reason than her will.
“And that sounds like me, too,” she replies, “go on.”
[Wyrmbreaker] As Sinclair speaks to Marrick, Lukas turns away. He draws a little closer to his other packmate.
“Wolfhome, did I hear?”
[Theron Locke] Theron nods at Lukas “Yeah it was just an idea.. I don’t know how successful I’d be in getting us there. From what I’ve heard though I thought it would be a way to simplify things and gain some perspective. The other option was Pangea…but that may be just as unlikely. I don’t know, just interested in exploring some mysteries that doesn’t involve the normal horrors we see on a daily basis. Recharge the batteries, refocus and gain some clarity.”
[Rory] She finds a place to sit, and settles to the ground. She’s not far from Marrick – which is good as that’s who she’d like to speak with, but she wouldn’t dare interrupt. Instead, only occasionally glancing that way, she pulls her pack off and sets it on the ground between her thighs, digging inside for some project or another to keep her hands busy.
Soon enough, she’s got a pile of parts, and her tools, and she’s systematically taking it apart, putting it back together.
[Sinclair] Marrick accepts. She hides her discomfort, her issue with it, the way that a child learns as they grow older not to cry when they are scolded, the way they learn not to lash out when everyone in the class sees that they did the problem on the board wrong. Sinclair, for what it’s worth, doesn’t look that deeply, and probably wouldn’t notice if it bothered Marrick even if the Ahroun didn’t try to hide it. There’s no telling whether or not she’d care, though, if she could tell.
“Your other sin is insecurity,” Sinclair says simply, this time offering the label before the lesson, the conclusion before the explanation, a flip of her previous speech. “You used my punishment rite to stand before those gathered and make sure they all knew that you didn’t attack me because you didn’t get your way, you didn’t attack me because I wouldn’t let you challenge for a kinsman, oh no… you did it as well-thought-out and deliberate discipline for my disrespect, just like an honorable Ahroun.”
The Galliard’s sarcasm, lightly intoned as it was, drops completely. “I called you pathetic, Marrick. I said you had no self-respect and to this day you haven’t proven to me that you do. I did not disrespect you as an Ahroun, I did not ignore your word in battle. I was trying to teach you even then, and you hated hearing what you think about yourself flung at you from the mouth of another.”
Sinclair’s eyebrows tug together. Her tone becomes oddly… gentle. “‘Pathetic’,” she repeats, as though to see what the word does to Marrick now, if anything. Or rather: as though she is testing someone who has been cured of a phobia to see if exposure to the terrifying stimulus is something they can handle now. “Insecure,” she says again, more firmly, and then slowly shakes her head. “Because I never thought, and I never said to anyone else, that you nearly killed me over a guy. I knew the moment you came at me it was because I provoked you.
“And you let me.”
She huffs a mirthless little laugh. “Marrick,” she says, calling her by her human name for the first time in this discussion, “the worst part of that night was that when you ‘punished’ me for being ‘disrespectful’, you only made yourself look worse. I wasn’t the one who made it seem to anyone like you lost your shit over a kinsman. I told you the truth. I told you how your behavior reflected on you, and you hated it because it was true. Not because it was disrespectful.”
The Galliard has not once glanced at either Shadow Lord she’s with. She focuses on the Fury, the Ahroun Elder, the over-lectured Cliath. “I am very, very good at goading other Garou to action, Marrick. It isn’t much of a skill, to get a race of people already frothing at the mouth with rage to snap, and it’s not always wise, but if I was trying to do anything at the bonfire, I was trying to get you to stop and look at how insane you were acting, how ridiculous your request was, how blind you were making yourself. It sure as fuck wasn’t to get the ‘last word’ in. I’m a Galliard, Bones to Dust. For fuck’s sake, who knows better that there’s no such thing as the last word on any subject?”
She clears her throat. She’s been talking a lot. A lot. “I am not your enemy. I never was. But everything I’ve ever said against you has been based on what I knew of you. Not what I’d heard. Not what I suspected. What I’d seen myself.” She exhales. “Nothing you said at the Stone of Scorn had any meaning, Marrick, because you did not know what you were talking about. You called me out on sins I had not committed, motives I never held in my heart. And worse, you did it because of your own prejudices.
“You put on bright display your ignorance, you did it because of your insecurity.”
She ends there. She does not tell Marrick she’s a good Ahroun, or a good Elder. It’s because she really doesn’t know. It’s because she’s not, herself, a member of that auspice, nor a Fostern, nor in possession of all of Marrick’s history. She does not offer Marrick help, does not tell her what to do or how to fix it, what she should have done instead. She concludes the lesson about White Oak, Warcry, and Bones to Dust.
And waits.
[Wyrmbreaker] “Surface similarities aside, Pangaea and Wolfhome are pretty drastically different,” Lukas comments. “What are you trying to teach her, exactly? Because that might affect your choice of one over the other.”
[Marrick] [frenzy check, again! using WP to resist if necessary]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 2, 5, 5, 6, 8, 10 (Success x 2 at target 8)
[Theron Locke] “I guess I wanted to help her strengthen her spirit, her mind. Help her better defend herself from mental attack. I don’t not think it was because she was weak, it’s because she made such a viable target. I just want to help her balance that out…ensure that she never attacks one of us or another of our kind again. She is a fierce warrior, but we are more than that.”
[Marrick] This time, she doesn’t bother to hide it.
She does look wounded. Genuinely, in the way that only youth can. She looks at Sinclair in the way that was really hard to place, and in a way that was hard to really understand. She felt horribly small at that moment. It was written across fairly attractive features. I provoked you, Sinclair said. And you let me. She clenches her fists tightly in her pockets, tightly enough that it makes her knuckles pop, that if her nails were just a little longer, it might break the skin.
She is reminded, briefly, of something Wyrmbreaker said. About her being gullible. About her being easily manipulated by the right sources.
Something about that aches.
“It’s really that obvious, isn’t it? My strings are so easy to pull,” she says, “I’m just gullible enough to take whatever someone tells me as truth. Even if it doesn’t make sense.”
She tries, dear lord she tries not to let something bitter and pained creep into her speech. It doesn’t work, and her words hold passion and vitriol for that moment that didn’t belong to her moon. She is insecure, and she does not refute.
She looks at Sinclair.
She grits her teeth, and she looks at her with a look that it at once harsh and injured. It is not what she said, it is not that the words came, but because of the explanation Sinclair offers. She is seething, bright and furious if the need be. And it is not because of the fact that Sinclair is refuting what she has said at the Stone of Scorn, but rather, one simple point:
Marrick Fisher had been played. She’d been played for a long, long time, and she had no idea.
“If you ever toy with me like that again-” she snaps, her voice is rough and harsh, but mostly it’s just… there. Marrick would come down later.
“I’m not a fucking TOY Sinclair! I’m not here to be laughed at, I’m not here to be humiliated or USED!”
She yells it at her. She all but roars it, and she can’t put into words why or how this made her so angry, but every other point faded into the background, the points of Sinclair refuting whatever came from the Stone of Scorn were lost.
“I’m SICK of it!”
And she doesn’t care who hears.
[Rory] Her fingers are nimble, and quick, and work to pry apart parts that the manufacturer likely didn’t intend to do so unless by a “certified technician” – which she certainly is not. She simply has a way with simple machines, seeing how they work, how they go together and come apart, how to replace it, fix it, make it better. It’s not always pretty, but it’s nearly always functional.
Today’s project? An old drill that had been tossed as useless. It freezes, and the cord is frayed, and she’s determined to make it work. They need it for the house, and that’s enough for her.
[dex+crafts – spec mech. tinkering]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 4, 4, 7, 7, 8, 8, 9, 10 (Success x 6 at target 6) Re-rolls: 1
[Rory] And Marrick yells – and her hands falls till, for just a moment, as her head snaps up and she watches, quickly gauging the distance, as if she expects such sudden anger to be turned on her, for no reason other than she’s there. She exists, and she’s there.
A few aching moments later… and she looks back to her project, taking solace in the familiar.
[Sinclair] Sinclair doesn’t rise. Her temper doesn’t go up, her packmates don’t feel her prepare to launch at the Fury. She looks at Marrick as the other girl screams, roars, yells, and the simple fact that she doesn’t seem phased by it could very well be as much of a point being made as anything she said aloud.
When Marrick’s shout has faded, Sinclair slowly says: “It’s interesting… that I said I was trying to teach you a lesson, and you’re the one saying you were toyed with, humiliated, and used.”
That hangs a moment. She watches Marrick, waiting to see if that’s going to cause the full moon to go for her throat again, then glances at Lukas and Theron if Marrick doesn’t. Her eyes go back after a second. “You’re gullible because you believe what you want to believe. So be more careful about deciding what you want to believe.”
[Marrick] “You have me enough rope to hang myself with,” she remarks, “lesson learned.”
She pursed her lips, and she looks at her, like she really is looking for an answer. Galliards are teachers. Galliards are more than this, and she’s looking at someone who is, essentially, a stranger, and she’s looking for something, “how the Hell am I supposed to know if you’re trying to teach me something or if you’re just fucking with me? How do I know that it ain’t your ego that’s telling me all of this because you’re hurt about something?”
She didn’t mean it, she didn’t mean to seem distraught, but at this moment, she was. The lesson was learned: trust no one.
After a long, long moment, she calms enough to carry on a decent conversation.
“This has been insightful. Thank you.”
[Wyrmbreaker] “You’re the Theurge,” Lukas replies, “and your understanding of the realms is better than mine will ever be. But I was always taught that Pangaea is a place of healing, of unity, of harmony. A reminder of what we’re fighting for. A place to replenish, not strengthen, the spirit. If Sinclair were languishing on the verge of Harano, then yeah. I’d take her to Pangaea. But she’s not.
“Wolfhome will probably push Sinclair harder. I think it might teach her something about the value of the pack — and maybe also something about herself, her own strength divorced from the Gifts and Rites and talens and power that comes with shapeshifting.” The Ahroun shrugs. “If it were up to me, that’s the one I’d choose. But,” and he smiles a little, lopsidedly, “it’s not up to me.”
And then there’s shouting. And Lukas looks around — doesn’t snap his head around, doesn’t startle. Sinclair can take care of herself. Here’s the irony: if Sinclair had bristled, he would’ve reacted far more swiftly.
“For fuck’s sake,” he says mildly.
[Sinclair] She cocks her head to the side. “Do you really think you ever got to know me well enough to assume I’d ever just be fucking with you, or that I’d risk inviting the wrath of a full moon because of my ego?”
Sinclair’s temper does, finally, show a little in a flash of lightning through those alien, opaq
[Sinclair] [WTF Jove.]
[Sinclair] She cocks her head to the side. “Do you really think you ever got to know me well enough to assume I’d just be fucking with you, or that I’d risk inviting the wrath of a full moon because of my ego?”
Sinclair’s temper does, finally, show a little in a flash of lightning through those alien, opaque eyes. “Ignorance,” she pronounces again, then takes a small breath.
“I’m done talking to you,” she says flatly. “You go from screaming at the top of your lungs to thanking me for my insight; I can’t fucking keep up. The lesson’s over, and I apparently have an umbral quest to Wolfhome to prepare for, and you’re harshing my wolfy vibe or some shit now.”
She throws up her partially-gloved hands slightly. “Later,” and turns to go, because — as Lukas and Theron and the rest of the Unbroken can likely tell — it is the way she is keeping herself from attacking.
[Theron Locke] He turns to Lukas and speaks “Well you’ve both given me some things to think about tonight. I think I need to depart and begin making preparations”
“Or perhaps it is time for the Unbroken to depart.” he doesn’t need to look at Sinclair to sense her desire to remove herself from this place. As he turns to leave, waiting for the rest of his pack to make the move before he follows.
[Marrick] I’m done talking to you-
She is interrupted.
“We’re in agreement, then,” she says, “keep warm.”
The Fury is content to turn her back and walk away. Unafraid to do so, unashamed to do so. Either she had baited the female or Marrick simply was unafraid to walk away from the Galliard on her own terms instead of the ones that she set forth. Whatever else Sinclair said to her, whether she kept talking or not, fell on deaf ears as she walked away.
[Sinclair] [I have got to get to bed! Thank you for the RP, all! That was surprisingly intense. *L*]
[Rory] The group breaks up, and she glances up to see Marrick headed her way – she glances past her, to where Sinclair stalks off, Theron following – and likely Lukas as well. Then she looks back to the Ahroun Elder, and lifts a hand slightly to wave. She doesn’t scramble to stand – sometimes it’s the small things that show the gradual improvement of people skills in the small Fianna.
“Hi.” A beat, as she rubs the side of her nose with the hand that holds her screwdriver, leaving a smudge of grime across her skin. “Tan I calk to you a minute?”
Hesitant, as always.
[Wyrmbreaker] The Shadow Lords of the Unbroken wait for the Glass Walker to catch up. As she comes abreast of them, they turn, including her in their immediate space seamlessly. Three together, mismatched for height and build and just about everything except the storm-intensity of their presence and their pale, cutting eyes, they walk away.
Lukas can be heard asking, “What was that all about?” And then they’re past earshot.
[Wyrmbreaker] (thanks for the play, guys!)
[Marrick] “What’s up?” she asked Rory.
The Fury was starting to feel wound up, like she needed a purpose. Needed an outlet, needed something quick to get her mind off of growing ire and an unintended lesson. (Trust no one.) She regarded Rory, let the Unbroken pass for the time being.
[Rory] She ducks her head a moment, looking down at the dismantled tool in her hand that she’s started to put together again, and chews on her lower lip, slightly. It’s very much like she has to gather her courage, to bring this up.
Her Alpha had counciled her not to get involved, to step away, to stop now… and she knows, knows that it will end badly no matter what. She has honor, however, and knows all these things – and so brings them up now.
“Its.. about Gabe.” she furrows her brow slightly, as she glances up at Marrick, then back to her hands. “…ne’s hice, an… he wants to take py mictures. On…a date.” a beat, and then in a rush “an I know that fe’s Hury and that it’d never work or lever nast but he’s nice to me and I’ve never thad hat and I just.. I wust jant to.. you know…” and softly, barely voiced. “…ask. if it’s ok. I mean.”
She can’t possibly look up at her now. It took all her will to simply get that out…
[Marrick] “He’s Fury kin,” she says, “and… if he likes you, then he likes you. And if you guys care about each other… then you care about each other. You can go on dates, you can do what you want and you need because yer times are brief here… Take care of him, when you’re with him, and respect him like one of your own, and we won’t have a problem.”
She takes a moment, and for a second she inhales, it’s sharp, as though she was stabbed by something that didn’t feel like guilt.
“It ain’t a claim, but… it’s a date. Dates won’t hurt anything… if you two like each other, yer entitled to happiness. He ain’t an object, he’s a Fury.”
[Rory] She’s… openly confused. That’s not how she expected this to go at all. She snaps her gaze up to look at Marrick, to watch her, to make sure she heard her correctly, that it was ok if she have her picture taken, if she go play in the snow, if she perhaps gets a kiss, or maybe other things she’s never known too.
“I wouldn’t ever hurt him. Not ever.” It’s soft, but comes out clear as a bell – despite the fact that Rory wouldn’t know the difference if it hadn’t.
“I… I’m a mule. I know it lon’t wast. An’ that he’ll find womeone sorthy. I jus..” and here, she blushes bright red, and ducks to hide it behind the slide of those curls. “hike lim.” a pause. “I won’t ever hop stim from doing his duty, or what he wants to do by you, an’ Tis Hribe.”
[Marrick] “You ain’t a mule, Rory, yer metis. There’s a difference.”
She’s sharp with this point. Like there was shame in being considered a mule, but nothing in being a metis. That mule was a word she wouldn’t tolerate. Not about her fallen brother, not about her sisters, and not about the Fianna with her at that moment.
“I know y’wouldn’t hurt him. I mean… in the grand scheme, yer both entitled to be happy. An’ yer both entitled to good an’ wonderful things. You’d do right by him. Metis got no stock in treatin’ kin like meat like other garou might.”
She gives her half a smile.
“Better show me those pictures, though.”
[Rory] She bites her lower lip, chewing on it contemplatively, and then lets it slide free into a soft smile. She picks up the pieces and parts in her lap, and sets them aside, only to stand in front of her Auspice elder, and then, after a moment, she surges forward and gives Marrick a hug that’s surprising in its swiftness, and perhaps more so in it’s heartfelt intensity. It’s brief, but much as a child who’s been given the biggest, best gift on Christmas morning, it conveys everything the shy little Fianna feels.
“Thank you.” And flush with a delighted embarrassment, she nods. “I will. He says I’m pretty. I bon’t delieve him, and so he’s paking tictures. I just want to see what de hoes.”
She settles back to the ground, and gathers the pieces and parts of her drill again, holding them close. These she understands. tools and mechanics and pieces and parts and how they fit together. People, Garou, kin? She doesn’t understand them at all.
[Marrick] She gives the girl a hug, and it’s quiet. Tension bleeds away and, for the time being, she starts to feel more at ease.
“You are pretty, an’ you don’t need a man to tell you that,” she informs her, “or a woman, for that matter. Have fun on your date… and have many, many more, hopefully.”
She smiles something content. Later, she might regret this, dashing a poor metis’ hopes, giving her something she can never keep, but for now… this was right.
They were both entitled to some sort of happiness.
[Rory] She smiles, that same shy little smile, as her fingers start to work again, expertly putting the pieces back together. It’s as if something inside guides her hands, her tools, and it all falls into place without much effort at all on her part.
And when she’s done, the pieces move smoothly, and there’s little doubt in the young Fianna’s mind that it will work when she plugs it in.
“I snike the low… I’ve never seen it before. We’re going to snuild a bowman if we can…” She’s excited, a little flutter of belief that it’ll be ok, at least for a little while.
[Marrick] She feeds on that, takes it as what it is. It is a friend enjoying the possibility of something good. In truth, Garou got so very little of this. It was so infrequent that it could hardly be enjoyed.
Marrick was getting used to this idea: live like it’s your last day. Live like you have something to live for, and for now, the Fury did have something to live for. She had brothers she loved, a sister she couldn’t live without, a sept that fascinated her, and the promise that there was something Wyld out there for her to protect.
“Y’get some good stuff out here from what I’ve heard.”
[Rory] She wrinkles her nose. “If only it wasn’t co sold…” silly, she knows, and that expression says so. She’s from the desert heat, and this cold is getting to her – which is clear by the layers on layers that she wears.
Then she looks up at Marrick. “Oh! We have a house. With a coom for all the rats!” She loves the alley cats she’s befriended, the ones that depend on them now for food and milk, for water and now they can provide shelter too. She’s pleased, and content. “Gabe adopted one.”
…and with the mention of his name, blushing again.
[Marrick] “Where’s the house? Did you guys expand or somethin’?”
Curiosity abounds in this one.
[Rory] She smiles. “Clonzeville, brose to our alleys. We’re expanding – Elliot is alpha, now, and Schala.. she’s trying to det the geed in our names. She’s in if she dan co it.”
Skinny shoulders shrug under the layers of clothing. “Is abandoned, and needs a wot of lork. But..” she pats the Drill and nods. “I’m good with hy mands, so’s Chloe and Elliot.”
[Marrick] The Fury was outwardly pleased for the pack. She looks at her friend, and there’s a rather content look on her face, “well, hey, me an’ Boy ran into the same issues when we got out plce, so if you ned any help renovating or anything, we can help. I ain’t bad with a drill.”
[Rory] She smiles brightly, lifting her pack to her shoulder as she stands, the now fixed drill in her hands. She pats it, once or twice. She likes to make things work. “I’d thike lat.”
Then, after a moment, she furrows her brow, slightly. “Is Boy alright?” She was at the Moot, she knows the punishment, and is concerned for her friend’s packmate.
[Marrick] “.. he’s holding up,” she told her friend, “he’s been better, but he’s been worse. Since kin ain’t allowed in the bawn anymore, it ain’t like I can bring Wendy over o nothin’… he’s held up pretty well though. I mean, pack’s gonna survive. We’ve lived through losin’ our totem twice, we can live through this.”
[Rory] She nods, slightly. “Good. If we han celp…” The rest goes unspoken. It doesn’t need to be, the offer is there. Whatever they need, she’ll do her best to help.
“I..i should go. Time por fatrol, an’ scrounge.” a beat, and that same shy smile appears again, hidden with the duck of her head, the slide of curls. “An’ thanks again.”