Andrés
Once Dr. Sepúlveda roused himself from whatever underground lair had been occluding his activities for the last month or so, he returned to life as if he had never stepped away to begin with. Jarring for those who had grown used to not seeing him around, perhaps, but the Etherite has never been over-concerned with the impact he has on other people's emotional states.
Kiara must have known this day was coming. After scientific debate and sex, his third favorite activity when the two of them are in each others' company is bitching about his students. The boy is apparently off learning the wonders of Wheel-turning from the counselor, which is fine by him, but the girl-child still has questions he could have sworn he'd answered already, so either he's been speaking Spanish this entire time or she could use a friend who shares her filthy pagan world view.
For Margot, though, the day in question comes as her mentor is rummaging through his unorganized mountain of books. His phone pings with a text message. He keeps on rummaging until he comes up with a slim soft-cover book, slips it free from the stack. It looks fairly old and lacks most of the markings of a manuscript published by a reputable source.
Forms and Forces: Intrinsic Characteristics of the Subconscious
As she examines the book, he reads the text message, then announces, "Wash your hands, we're going over to Kiara's."
They make a stop at a dumpy-looking liquor store and an equally dumpy-looking florist's shop - "Bee are bee, gotta support the local economy!" - and sometime in the evening on a Friday, there they are, at Kiara's apartment, Andrés offering not only a wide-eyed traditionless initiate but a bottle of mescal and a small bouquet of yellow tulips and purple irises.
And away we go.
Margot
The hotel room had to be at a point where it felt colder than the rest of them on that floor. Margot was used to the sense of chill that made her bones feel stiff when she was around her mentor, just as she was used to the mild panic of too-little oxygen that Ned induced (much that they had to be, in turn, accustomed to her her Resonance tried to turn stomachs with its gore-stick). People who passed by the door in the hallway shivered and hugged their arms, and Margot just watched them as they went, up until the Doc opened the door and ushered her inside. Once there he took just enough time to fish out a book and hand it to her. She'd flipped open the cover and gotten as far as skimming over the first page when he announced that they were visiting Kiara.
"Wash my hands...?," she asked, sounding confused by the reason why she would need to in the first place, but complied without friction all the same. She'd stayed in the passenger seat of the car while he made pit stops for things with which to woo a lady, feet up on the dashboard, knees tucked, nose buried in the book that she was just lent.
Upon arriving at the apartment complex Margot realized almost all at once that she wasn't at her most presentable (baseball tee, denim shorts, slightly scuffed white sneakers). While they ascended the staircase to the floor that Kiara's apartment was on Margot busied herself by taking her hair down from its ponytail and combing through the shoulder-length brown mass with her fingers a few times before pushing it back behind her ears. The hair elastic snapped about her wrist to join a set of unimpressive orange beads.
The door was knocked upon, or perhaps a doorbell was rang, but all the same it would open to reveal a face intimately familiar to Kiara and one a little less so a half a foot closer to the floor than the former. She'd smile, quick and polite and brief, and raise her hand up in a non-waving signal of greeting.
"Hi."
Kiara
It was a mystery what exactly Kiara Woolfe got up to during the periods when she wasn't making her presence known (and unsettling some fair few folks) in the city's magically inclined community.
It wasn't unusual for the witch to vanish without trace for rather impressive stretches of time - whether hidden away in a hotel suite like Andrés or spending time bonding with her twin soul's infant child or somewhere else entirely was anyone's guess - before reappearing as if by the casual aid of serendipity (ever gracious[ly fickle] mistress she was) to recline herself in the nook of a doorway at the Chantry or nestle onto a barstool with a flash of teeth and oh, all that abruptly liberated charisma, up for grabs to the nearest unsuspecting (and, often, unwanting) individual.
She lived in an apartment complex in the city proper Ms Woolfe, on the fourth floor of a rather impressive construction known as the Bank and Boston Lofts.
The view from the pagan's lounge overlooked a pretty little chink of intersection and city beyond; coupled with an unromantic aspect of a solid brick wall next door (some concession, one imagined, for the fact she was situated in a smallish corner block patched into existence to make use of spaces that needed, well, using). The ceiling had a modern bent with exposed ventilation piping but the Verbena had made in-roads with what space she had; hanging large, abstract pictures over white walls; figures in splashes of red, black and white dancing in frenzied demonstration (of life; of death; of the artist's whim, apparently).
There were plants, goodness, everywhere. Ferns and trays of herbs on windowsills in the kitchen and two spidery looking fellows by the front door (these, it ought to be noted, felt rather hair-raisingly, skin pricklingly alert [dare we say awakened] for plant-life). Kiara's apartment had a modest entry hall cluttered with things (a side-table, a coat rack overworked with scarves and hats, umbrellas leaning into the corner; those knowing ferns) but then - when one stepped inside proper - it opened up into that lounge and kitchen. A shared space with lovely wide windows gifting that view. There were two bedrooms forking off left and right; one had the door open and glimpses suggested this was the brunette's place of business. A large padded chair set inside beside a table; the curtains partially drawn with candles burning that gave a faintly inviting scent; a newly added bookshelf overflowing with titles (everything from Crystals and You: how to better care for your tools to A History of Reiki).
Oh, and a cat.
This, the feline, was one of the first things glimpsed after Kiara ushers them inside; smiling over the flowers and tucking the bottle under an arm; a tawny eyed observer perched on the arm of a sofa. "That's Mjolnir," the Disciple introduces as she pads into kitchen to find a vase for the flowers. "He's all talk but no bite. Just don't try to pick him up. He's funny about that." The grey and black creature's ear pricked at the use of his name.
-
Kiara, it should be noted (and perhaps to Margot's private relief) was not dressed up to receive them; her dark hair was tied back at her nape and her outfit consisted of bare feet, jeans that sat low on her hips with an artistic frayed knee on the right and an off the shoulder sweater in dark purple and black.
"I hope you guys are hungry," she re-appeared, bearing a vase of flowers, the healer who felt like a abrupt encounter with Spring; flushing the immediate area with that pulsing energy of hers. "I may have attempted to cook."
Andrés
The most Andrés did to doll himself up before coming over was throw a suit jacket on over the short-sleeved tri-color button-down he'd worn to meet Margot in the park. Given that he also wore tan Oxford shoes and jeans, he would almost look presentable if it weren't for the fact that his salt-and-pepper hair was starting to get shaggy and he needed to give his beard a trim.
At least his glasses are clean. Granted, they're new. He had to replace them after the incident in the hotel bar, the one that bunted him into Quiet. The kids missed out on that episode. Oh well.
Flowers go from hand to hand without any further displays of affection, and once he is relieved of the bottle the Mad Scientist pats his pockets as if to remind himself which one currently houses his keys. Like he needs them to start his Jeep. The man has devices for practically everything. It ought to concern more people than it does that he is starting to feel the lurking of a shadow over his shoulder more often, that beckoning uncertainty that always tempts him off in pursuit of further understanding.
That is a topic for another time. Right now he has the distracted air of a father dropping his daughter off at a friend's house, waiting the appropriate amount of time before swooping out of sight again.
"You what?" Green eyes go alarmed-wide behind his glasses, and he makes an attempt at crossing himself. He does it backwards. "No, no no, thank you, I'm good."
Aha. Keys!
Margot
Inside the apartment it felt alike, a little like walking through a greenhouse. She eyed the spidery plants protecting the entrance suspiciously-- some awareness (read: caution) of the spirits helped her to notice that those two plants in particular seemed to be just as aware of her in return. Further in she would find a cat, to whom she was formally introduced while Kiara welcomed them into her home. Margot's hands were folded politely behind her back (<i>don't touch anything, kids</i>), but she did roam to approach the cat and hold out her fingers, curled to offer knuckles, and let it sniff and greet or ignore her completely.
"I have a rabbit," she contributed. "His name's Yorick."
That's riveting, Margot.
Doc patted himself down for his keys and crossed himself at the notion of Kiara's cooking, and Margot frowned as thought to silently scold him for his poor manners. Irises and lilies didn't mean that you got to be rude for the rest of the day. Then her brow smoothed and she left Mjolnir to his own devices and drifted to stand nearer in the apartment space to where the Disciples were.
"Yeah, thank you," to Kiara. Then, after a quick glance about at some piece of art on the wall, or a clock, or another of many potted plants, she commented astutely: "So you're a healer? Like, as a magickal trade?"
Apparently she thinks that it would be reasonable for a magickal economy and profession system to exist-- why not, wasn't that a part of being a community?
Kiara
Truth: it doesn't smell unpleasant, whatever it is Kiara has been concocting in the kitchen.
There's the low hum of an oven in use and the vague aromas of spices. Andrés looks startled by the idea of the Verbena's culinary prowess being tested (that, or he assumes the menu might entail eye of newt and tongue of bat) and he receives, for this response as Kiara carefully sets the vase of flowers down on the low coffee-table (that's apparently to serve as a dinner table judging from the settings the witch has laid out on it), a twitch of the brunette's red lips and a neat little eye-roll.
"Oh, calm down." She rebukes without any heat behind her words, crossing near enough to the Mad Scientist to brush her hip against him as she passes back into the kitchen for a moment; returning bearing a plate of bruschetta and a trio of glasses. "I burned something once around him and I'm forever besmirched." This, apparently, for Margot's benefit as Kiara gestures for her to make herself at home where she sees fit. There were two couches, pillows on the floor around the low table and an armchair; one of which was currently occupied by the pagan's cat, who had deemed the new come visitor (at least, as far as Margot went) to be acceptable company and worthy of time spent rubbing his face against.
Margot's query seems to be one Kiara considers as she opens the wine.
There was in one corner of the living area, tucked in below the largest window a small altar; it was nothing so grand but did house items Margot would likely identify with. A ceremonial knife; a mixing bowl; bundles of herbs and crystals. It felt as if it harmonized with the brunette settling down cross-legged on the sofa; one of her bare ankles decorated with a small silver chain. Clearly, Kiara spent no small amount of time working here (in both senses of the word). "Professionally, people know me as a Reiki practitioner and certified Massage Therapist but -" she gestures, pouring out the wine, "my trade does cross the line a little. I consider myself a healer, in both the mundane and magickal sense.
My background was medicine, before I awoke, afterwards, after I met the Verbanae - my approach just changed." Kiara's dark eyes ticked between Andrés and his charge. "But I've been a part of the pagan community for many years."
Andrés
Flirtation comes as easy to the Verbena as breathing, but the Etherite does not buy floral arrangements for just anyone.
In the language of flowers, the bouquet expresses wisdom and joy, passion and fondness. He doesn't seem the sort of man to give two shits about what genus or color he picks out, but as scatterbrained as he is, he's highly intelligent and highly educated. When he swooped through the florist's picking out what appeared to be the first things to jump out at him, he knew what he was doing. He's fond of her. He respects her.
Which of course no one would be able to tell from the way he reacts to her pronouncement of having cooked. Unless she's looking at them, Margot won't notice the way his eyes drop to the place where their hips brush and then lift to watch her return to the kitchen.
He hadn't been planning on staying, but Kiara produces three wine glasses. The way to Dr. Sepúlveda's heart is through his liver.
Rather than hovering between the kitchen and the exit like a socially inept asshole, Andrés runs his hand down his beard and traipses over to the armchair. Margot will have to sit on the loveseat next to the other Disciple, but at least this arrangement seems like less of an inquisition. Maybe.
With a glass of wine in his hand and an ankle hooked over the opposite knee, her mentor looks more like a sloppy academic than a cold-hearted scientist. Blame it on the environment. It's warm in here, earthy. The opposite of his resonance.
He does not interject. Ten points to Ravenclaw.
Margot
The exchanges between Kiara and the Doc were noticed but certainly not observed. She treated their affection the same way that a young relative would treat the idea of an older relative being romantic: with tolerance and strong attempts to ignore. Because gross.
Margot's hands folded together in front of her and she glanced briefly to the Doc and after Kiara's back when she left them to make her way into the kitchen, and by the time she had returned Margot had followed the Doc's lead and found a place to sit-- on the loveseat, at the arm that was further away from the Doc so that way Kiara would end up someplace between them. More to the point, Margot would be positioned in a way that she could see the both of them from one angle. She had a feeling this conversation would have her looking between the two Disciples quite a bit and she didn't want to feel like she was following a tennis match at any point throughout.
Kiara returned bearing bruschetta and wine, and the cat on the arm of the couch took to rubbing his head happily against Margot's knuckles when she'd offered them up to him again (they were sharing a sofa, after all). She smiled a little and took to scratching at the feline's ears absently and affectionately alike. Her attention had soon turned back to the Verbena, for the answer to her inquiry was being delivered. A healer of sorts to begin, and so the profession carried over. Margot had nodded to demonstrate understanding.
"Oh." There was a flat note there. She didn't really know what else to say following that, not at first (and if you were particularly perceptive you could hear just the faintest hint of disappointment). A moment passed, and the loss of words was replaced by a new question entirely.
"So.... the last time I met with a Verbena they said something about families...?" She glanced almost hesitantly toward Doc, but soon after set some kind of resolve or decision in her mind. The hesitation was bleached away and she looked more steadily to Kiara once more. "Or clans, maybe. My question is-- if I were to become a Verbena, would I need to join one of those?"
Kiara
Perhaps there was intent to that.
The witch’s provisions made ahead of their arrival in way of food and again now, as she brings out not two but three empty wines glasses. Perhaps in some unspoken language known only to lovers there’s a challenge implied in it. A will you stay punctuated through Kiara’s easy, open hostessing. She’s certainly no stranger to it, the idea of opening her apartment to others in their small, patchwork community of Mages.
Andrés knows that firsthand.
He’s more than likely heard scraps of detail and past sketches from the pagan about her other guests; other occasions a safe harbor had been needed and truthfully – there is an air of that to the space. With its overstuffed chairs and bold pictures and vibrant, vibrant houseplants spilling from every nook – it’s a home, this place. As much as any set of rooms could be; an extension of the brunette, then. With the same passion and delight for unfettered, liberated life; living; that Kiara brought forth. She sets her wine glass on her knee as Margot offers her response.
That quiet ‘oh’.
The flavor of letdown that the dark eyed woman sitting cross-legged does notice. Does elicit a tiny flex of generous lips in response to. Mjolnir settles down and begins a low purr; for a beat that’s the harmony to the room. The sound of traffic weaving floors below rises slowly a moment later, then:
Would I need to join one of those …?
There’s a moment when Kiara’s eyes shift toward the man parked in an armchair before she answers that speaks not so much of distrust as instinctual hesitation. She knows what his wife had been and knows Margot is a potential addition to her tradition. Still, somewhere in the Verbena’s bones comes that brief hitch.
Echoes of other lives, perhaps. The stirring of old, old hurts.
She looks thoughtfully at the younger woman, cradling her wine glass loosely between her thighs. “If you decide you want to join the Verbena, your faction,” a pause there to define the word for the Initiate with a brief, warm smile, “would be decided, at least at first, by your mentor. But that doesn’t mean you can’t forge your own way once you’re initiated into the tradition. I was brought into one that never quite fit who I am. Who I became after I woke up.
So I left. Searched on my own terms, until I met others that shared my perspectives.” Kiara leans back, her eyes steady on Margot’s face. “The factions are really just that. Perspectives on the same belief we all hold. Whether you stay in a coven or not doesn’t change that. For some Verbena, they find their purpose in their faction, with a select few.
But: we're all part of the same tree, we just own our own part of it. That's really what it comes down to. Four sides. Four elements." She takes a sip of wine, lets Margot digest that.
“Did this other Verbena tell you anything about the factions?”
Andrés
Shadows have a fondness for the Etherite. In the bright space of Kiara's apartment, natural light come in through the windows and the sounds of civilization trickling in behind it, it's easy to see how little sleep the man gets, how little care he takes of himself. The white in his beard stands out stark against his complexion and without his glasses, the fact that he's thinking about something else - probably several something elses - is evident in the lack of focus in his eyes.
Yet he snaps back to the present when he feels his student glance at him. Eyebrows lift and then furrow, acknowledgment and then bemusement. Did she tell him she'd met with another Verbena? He doesn't listen to half the things the kids say, but they don't tell him everything they get up to outside of their lessons, either.
Just because he can't remember her telling him doesn't mean it didn't happen.
By the time Kiara looks over at him, confusion has sublimated into encouragement. Amusement, of a sort. He rubs his brow with his free hand and shakes his head a bit, like would you get a load of these two.
Sitting still is hard for him. He switches which foot is planted on the floor, picks at lint on the armchair's cushion, swirls the wine around in his glass to watch the legs trail down. He perks at the last question. Almost asks one of his own, then decides it doesn't matter.
Margot
The wine glass offered up to Margot was accepted with a small nod of thanks. She sipped small and occasional, and sat up on the couch at the edge of the cushion so that her feet could remain sound on the floor. This resulted in her cradling the glass in one small hand, stem poking out between her fingers so its bottom could rest atop her knee. She was listening very intently to what insight Kiara had to share with her heavy brow flexed together in concentration and the ever-present trace of worry that seemed to ride perpetual in the shadow of her features. She wasn't looking at Kiara or the Doc, but down at the table between them.
"No, I don't remember factions coming up." She answered the question posed easily, it was the placeholder while she gathered her thoughts and structured them into questions.
"What if...," she started, then scowled when she realized what she was trying to ask. Like she'd finally hit the end of the maze and found a dud of a prize in lieu of cheese.
"I find myself in a position where I... share the same practices that the Verbena do, overall, it seems. Tied into the earth and dirt and things old and raw. The same respect of spirits and sense of... paganism, really, when it comes down to it. My Avatar feels like..." Her free hand fluttered expressively close by her chest and throat while she sought the word for the sensation that her hand was trying to describe as well. "Like chanting and drums around a bonfire before the battle of victory. Spears and knives and arrows and swords.
"But I don't particularly want a coven, or to join anyone's family. I want to make my own."
Kiara
Both Andrés and Kiara shared an essence of pure dynamism.
Being still was never an easy task to be asked of such creatures. They almost seemed to gleam and shift where they sat; as if their Avatars repelled the mere notion of such inherent, obvious stagnation. Still: to their credit, they manage themselves well enough to project the impression of thoughtfulness and consideration (a percentage of the time, anyway) of Margot’s quest for kinship amongst the Traditions.
The pagan, for her part, seems taken by Margot’s description of her Avatar.
“Mine is the wind. Or well – that’s how She speaks to me. Takes up what she will, uses fire and smoke.” There’s quiet solemnity in the Verbena’s voice as she says this, no small trace of affection, too. Then: “There are some of us, like me, who don’t really hold a place in any traditional coven. Even our faction allegiance is more of a comradery than any strict set of rules.” Kiara sits forward, sets her wineglass on the low table. It’s made of a dark oak, polished but left with its natural, rougher edges.
A touch of the wild, there are many of them in the apartment, in truth. The elements of nature; the colors of earth and blood and bone.
“You want to make your own way. Be free to decide who you are and what you become, who you offer trust to. I get that,” Kiara’s dark eyes search over the younger woman’s face. “Believe me, more than you know. You wouldn’t be the first to make her own way in the Tradition, there are those of us who prefer our own company.
You wouldn’t even be the first who decided she wanted her own faction. Her own rules. Nobody is going to stop you from believing in your own way, if that’s what you want. But,” she breathes out, brings her hands together. “Before you do decide, maybe I should tell you about the four main factions. At least,” a curl at the edge of the brunette’s mouth. “As much as I know of them. They aren’t all cloak and dagger.”
Kiara’s eyes skip to Andrés for a moment: “the dirty paganism and old ways are entirely optional for many, in fact.”
Andrés
One of the first personal things he told Margot had to do with his Avatar.
A shadow just outside his peripheral vision, beckoning to him, shifting soon as he turns his head to look at it. It doesn't boast the strength of others' Avatars but it came to him at the moment of his Enlightenment and it has driven him to greater understanding and it has always been in shadows that the Scientist has found truths others would be inclined to ignore.
It makes sense that Kiara's presents to her as the wind. It intrigues him that Margot's appears to her as Andraste. He and Kiara have more forgiving Avatars, a greater sense of freedom. He's never felt as if he had a personal relationship with his Avatar, that it wanted something from him he was not willing to give.
But then, he has always been curious. Bold in a way that sacrifices sanity for the sake of discovery.
As the two women continue talking, Andrés halves what's in his glass and sets it down. Settles both feet on the floor so he can joggle his left, elbows planting on the armrests, right hand supporting his scruffy jaw, pads of his index and middle fingers resting against the earpiece of his glasses.
Kiara's eyes skip, and one corner of his mouth lifts in a smile. A rare expression for him, at least as far as the kids are concerned. He doesn't interrupt.
Margot
Even without the structured instruction of a formal Tradition, Margot found herself with a solid understanding of her Avatar-- something that even experienced Mages like Grace couldn't claim to grasp. Margot had understood from her discussions and from reading notes borrowed that everybody had different levels of ties to their Avatar, and that was somehow tied to their overall potential (but not necessarily their understanding or strength, which wasn't something she'd entirely wrapped her mind around yet). With her own Avatar she even had a name-- Andraste. The old Goddess was an echo imprinted in her bones, a shared strength that would grow as her skill did.
A shadow. The wind. A puzzle one could never fully solve.
Yet she, a scrawny girl with anxiety and an academic scholarship to her university, was chosen specifically by War. She supposed that the Gods needed to have the best senses of humor out there, long-lived as they were.
Margot glanced over to her mentor, who had consumed half a glass of wine and set to joggling half-resting and half-restless. From him she looked to Kiara, who explained that there was an option to walk the path alone. Margot's eyes went keen with interest and she sat up straight. Would she like to hear more about the other factions first, though, at least for the sake of knowing? Margot nodded firmly and took a slow sip from her glass of wine. Nothing to say, for the moment at least, she looked at Kiara with the expectant air of any good student. Preach on, teach.
Kiara
There’s a deep breath from the Verbena. She uncurls herself a little and picks up her wine glass again, taking a generous sip from it as if to fortify herself for what was to come – or perhaps the idea that she was solely responsible for correctly representing her Tradition sisters sat heavily on the pagan’s shoulders. Any and all theories could have been accurate - she swept apart her hands, shaping them into a rough approximation of a circle.
“So, the four factions. If you consider them the base elements of our craft. To call on the corners you must invoke air, fire, water, earth. There’s an old pagan invocation that begins:
‘From cave and desert, sea and hill,
By wand, blade, cup and pentacle,’
The elements are everywhere. In different cultures, across history. It’s not exactly uncommon to read about them these days, in one form or another. Your horoscope, for example.” A small smile from Kiara. “Some of that is our doing, some of it not so much. Even the Essence of what makes us what we are attune to one of the four.
Sometimes they even guide you.
There’s symmetry, to what I, we, consider the Great Wheel. What keeps us here. Why we are. The most traditional of us and who we call Earth, the North are the Gardeners of the Tree. They record the history of all the Verbenae and they have some of the oldest and purest bloodlines that run in families back generations. A lot of them work with Matter.”
A beat, some flicker of old pain. “My mentor was a member of that faction. It’s not unheard of these days for outsiders to join but – they’re very much into conserving the old ways. In my opinion, at the expense of the Tradition.” Kiara stops there to drain her wineglass and pours herself another wordlessly, her brows drawn. “Then, there’s Water, the West. The Twisters of Fate. My sister is one. They tend to favor the primal aspects of what it means to be human. What it means to be Verbena, too.
There are some among us that consider their methods too brutal, too … primordial.” It’s clear from the way the brunette’s voice adopts a certain tone she doesn’t, strictly, agree with that notion, but then, the healer was a self-confessed savage in her own manner. Blood was, after all, one of the female’s conjuring tools. “They tend to focus a lot of their working around Entropy. The discussion of reincarnation and past lives is a popular dinner table talking point for them.” Kiara sits back with her wine, her eyes finding a point on the wall, she seems lost in her own musings.
“The Moon-Seekers are the Air, the East. They like to dabble with various things, but a lot of the ones I’ve met seem drawn to Mind. They’re usually the Verbena you run into living in cities, working with the masses. Some of the more conservative types turn their noses up at the New Age vibe a lot of Moon-Seekers embrace.”
Then: “And lastly, there’s the Lifeweavers. That’s what I am. We’re Fire, South. Most of us feel a strong call to the wild. Live there, sometimes. We focus on Life. For me that’s healing, but – many of us use it to transform ourselves, too.” Kiara’s mouth curls in a smile and for a flash, there’s those sharp, white teeth of hers as she says: “With practice, a lot of us learn to shapeshift. Take the form of wild animals so we can run with them. If the Verbenae have black sheep, it’s us. We don’t easily conform or necessarily play well with others.” Kiara’s eyes return to study Margot’s face, searching it. “I could see you finding a place with my sister’s faction. Or my own.
The Twisters of Fate are few, but, they might be worth talking to.”
Andrés
Your horoscope, for example.
Thus far, the Etherite has done a fairly decent job of not heckling the women while they edge closer to discussion of the differences between the four Verbena factions. He hasn't said a word since his minor outburst concerning Kiara's cooking experiment and aside from the occasional fidgeting he has more or less sat still.
Then Kiara mentions astrological nonsense and Andrés slides out of the armchair. A noiseless effort but they can practically hear the groan in his posture. His footfalls are silent as he wanders into the bathroom and, with the door open, starts rummaging around for god knows what.
He's out of the room for her explanation of the Moon Seekers. That doesn't mean he doesn't catch it. This apartment has decent acoustics and he's still got one ear attuned to the conversation anyway. This would be the place for him to interject, tell Margot that his wife had been a Moon Seeker, but he can't remember if he told Margot anything about Hinata besides the fact that she died and became another failed experiment in the name of Science.
When he comes back out of the restroom, he's got his glasses tucked in the pocket of his suit jacket and has appropriated whatever lotion he found in the bathroom for painting dots and streaks on his face in the fashion of a drunk Celtic warrior. He says nothing as he flops back down into the armchair and drains his wine.
"They'll at least understand her, eh, her need to make a mess when she's Working, yeah?"
Says the guy whose last Quiet episode happened because he caused an explosion in a hotel bar.
Margot
As Kiara spoke, Margot listened carefully. She kept silent and watched with wide eyes. They flickered away only to follow Andrés on his way to the bathroom, then returned to Kiara. Eyes departed once more to follow his reappearance, with her brows only hopping upward in confused skepticism, then hunkering downward in vague disapproval when the lotion-dabs were discovered.
When Kiara had paused in her speaking, after explaining the different factions and their habits and trends, Margot shifted her posture forward. She sat with her feet planted soundly on the floor (though that meant sitting with her backside far away from the back of the couch), elbows propped on her thighs so she leaned forward over the space created before her. In that space she held the glass of wine in a weave of fingers from both hands. When the suggestion that she speak with the Twisters of Fate arose, Margot nodded vaguely, gaze still forward into space as she thought, and lifted her glass for a sip of red.
"Water would make sense. Divination is one of Andraste's namesakes, I can see how twisting fate would connect to her." She didn't speak to their primal habits, her very essence stamped her ways as bloody and savage.
Another small sip, another nod, and Margot looked back up to the Verbena woman diagonal from her seat. "I'd appreciate that, you putting me in touch with your sister, I think."
Kiara
The Etherite's commentary on the requirements of a Verbena's Working did draw a glance from the brunette on the sofa. Drew the slightest twitch of her mouth upward at the corner (not simply because he'd returned with streaks of warpaint on his face with her moisturizer). He already knew of the witch's altar space; of the fact her apartment more often than not resonated with the aftermath of the pagan's craft and that process itself was never any contained or neat affair.
Blood remained, after all, one of Kiara's oldest tools.
"I doubt there's much Margot makes use of they haven't seen before," came the reply, the Life Mage's dark gaze roving the other female's form for a beat before she nodded, set her wineglass down and uncurled herself from the sofa. "I'll find you Sadie's information." The brunette's fingers carded through the Doctor's hair as she passed. "Eat something," she instructed softly and her footsteps moved away into the small, cramped entryway where the sound of keys and papers being sifted through followed.
Mjölnir watching her progress before stretching, dropping down and padding in her wake to twine around the brunette's ankles; purring in open encouragement of attention being paid to his needs. "Sadie can be hard to pin down," Kiara returned with a slip of note paper on which she scribbled a number and email. "She wouldn't be my other half if she wasn't, but I'll give her a heads up about you calling." She sank back down on the sofa and slid the paper across the table toward the younger witch, tucking her foot beneath her.
"At the very least she can give you another perspective on everything."
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