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+--- Thread: Loose Connections [Almaz] (/thread-1607.html)
Loose Connections [Almaz] - Natalie Grey - 04-12-2024
Natalie wasn’t naive, but the poverty was still uncomfortable to behold in the heart of the Custody’s greatest Dominance. The church was rammed with people and bright sleeping bags, its echoey halls currently alight with industrious daytime activity. Hanging fabric partitions offered privacy, but much of the space was communal. Some way off, a man was playing guitar to the delight of those around him.
She sat with Ezekiel on floor cushions, conversing quietly. It was the first time she had met the self-styled Angel of the Undercity, and he’d been openly curious but not much surprised by her unexpected presence among them. For someone who’d chosen such an overtly pretentious title for himself, and he did seem to relish it, there was little in the way of ceremony or formality. Smoke ribboned from the joint in between his tattooed fingers, and he lounged, watching her without self-consciousness. In the lulls where Natalie’s attention naturally drifted to the cadence of guitar strings, she sometimes caught the quirk of his lips in some private amusement, the origins of which he did not share. Ezekiel was perfectly amiable; maybe a little strange. But he was also very clearly well-loved here.
Rumours had brought her; of skull-strewn skies the night the undercity had burned, when many of these people had fled their underground homes and never returned. The offer she made was tactful, presuming to find proud resistance even though she wasn’t offering charity. Beyond her bearing and accent, little distinguished her; she wore the sorts of clothes she’d always favoured in Africa, and still felt truer than the glittering face she wore for the city’s elite. But nonetheless she felt distinctly on the outside; among the forces that turned a societal blind eye to ugliness they would rather not see. Born to wealth that had never been earned.
But Ezekiel’s reception had been welcoming.
By now building renovations for the school were well underway, the fruits of that very same familial wealth. She’d told Adrian the city’s rich would pay any price to protect their daughters from the Sickness, which was true, but she’d also warned him she’d no inclination towards profit. No one who sought help would be turned away, and that necessitated an understanding of welcome among those who would never seek it out. But neither was philanthropy anything but the mask she chose for the endeavour, and amidst the steady foundations Natalie was building for herself in Moscow, it was allies that mattered to her: the skulls that had lit up the storm-filled sky, and especially the night they had happened, hinted at a story she was curious to hear.
The conversation gave her much to think about. Despite his lazy theatrics, several times she caught hints that Ezekiel was more than he seemed, and that those breadcrumbs were being tossed with purpose and not due to carelessness. Some time later, when she stood to take her leave, he flicked up an object that she caught in reflex. It was a coin, but not one that had any monetary value. In the nestle of her palm, an engraved demon grinned up at her. It matched the smirk Ezekiel himself flashed up at her when she asked what it was, but he only shrugged and called it a gift.
She was on a side of the city she still did not know well, so was not familiar with the cafe she picked for lunch. But it was busy enough, which she took for a recommendation. A coffee later and she was ensconced in work at a table on her own. Ezekiel had given her a name, not outright exactly, though she expected he had known her curiosity would spark on the notion of an Asquith exiled in Moscow. It was as close as they had come to broaching Natalie’s own dubious history, and perhaps he had read from her flat look that it was better to skirt around questions about her own father. Probably that connection had been the reason for her open welcome, though.
Asquith was a family known to her, of course; they were the haughty sort of blue-bloods Natalie had always avoided back home. As it turned out, after a cursory online search, she discovered Helena’s background was black widow dark, though she had also been acquitted of the murder. In the news articles her face was blank and distant, with no remorse or conscious effort to hide herself away from the cameras. It reminded her uncomfortably of Alistair.
Despite reservations, it was perhaps for that same reason Natalie sent across a message requesting a meet. She was not sure she would even receive a form response back, but by the time she was packing her things to leave, an invitation had been extended. It was to a club in the city she had never heard of: Almaz.
Later that evening, Toma directed the car with no need for instruction once she’d heard the name of the place. Her brows arched, that by now familiar amusement glancing back in the rearview mirror. She offered no caution, which struck Natalie as odd considering what her mother paid her for, but since that permissive interest also made Toma tolerable she didn’t question it either.
Aside from the ample amount of security to get in, the upstairs bar was indistinguishable from any number of city venues; all leather and gold like a gentleman’s club of old, it was only missing the seedy stench of cigar smoke. She took a seat at the bar and gave her name to the woman behind it. Natalie was dressed to fit in, but not to stand out, though she realised almost immediately that she was one of the only women in here, and the only one alone. The collar of her dress hugged up around her neck, and it plunged low but narrowed down the bust, not flaunting much flesh for all that the slit was scandalously deep. A tumble of blonde hair spilled over one shoulder, and while the earrings in her lobes were diamond and sapphire, she gave every impression of the sort of wealth that was at no great pains to announce itself.
Natalie was early on purpose, mostly from curiosity. As her drink was poured, she glanced up at one of the screens scrolling stats, odds, and fighter profiles. She was not sure she had any intention of going below, not out of any delicate sensibility, but because something about the red-lit staircase reminded her of the Devil’s Lair and memories she’d rather bury.
RE: Loose Connections [Almaz] - Helena - 08-12-2024
Helena watched the woman on screens for a while before she made any move to act. She sat in her office, studiously cleaning the last of the blood from her nails and adding the final addendums to today’s copious notes. As the file saved and she set the recorder aside, her analytical mind moved seamlessly from one puzzle to the next. Natalie sat alone at the bar, her posture all the lazy arrogance of one who invited no company – but dared to the challenge. Almaz was not the sort of place the glittering socialites usually favoured. Which was exactly the way Helena preferred it. The underworld was a far simpler arena to navigate: one did not have to bother with being liked, one just had to brandish enough money to get what one wanted. Back home it had been uncouth to do one without the social niceties of the other. An entirely inefficient way to operate.
When she was good and ready, Helena sent word to lead her visitor up. Baphomet’s ears perked when the door opened, and stayed alert when the stranger was let in. At a discrete gesture from his mistress, the doberman stretched to his feet and padded closer for a better look. To her credit, Natalie only shifted her palm to let him sniff, though his giant head came almost to her waist. Usually people were more demonstrably afraid, or at least surprised. And perhaps she was, but nothing permeated the smooth mask of her expression.
“Miss Grey, I presume.” A brow slithered up, but Helena did not bother to soften it with a smile. Frankly she didn’t care what sordid history sullied the name, but she knew she wanted no trouble at her own door, and Grey could certainly be that. The whole court fiasco had been quite enough of that kind of inconvenience. Likewise, since she was not looking to replace her very dead husband, she had no interest in the sorts of networking that might bring her into the hideous Moscovite social scene. Almaz might be the kind of crass that curled Helena’s lip, but it was an excellent deterrent to all the accoutrements of her old world legacy name. When you were an Asquith, people always wanted something.