08-19-2015, 08:15 AM
That smile of Eilas' was creepy as hell. Jaxen had his own slippery smile that he whipped out at opportune moments, but Elias's pearly whites were figuratively tinged red with the taste of blood. Other than that, and having zero clue about how to talk to women, if Elias really did what Sierra boasted, he was someone to stay on their good side. Jaxen recalled the sense of power that reared its ugly, yet sublime, head back at the river. Tarin said they would keep getting stronger until they simply stopped one day. Jaxen hoped Elias had reached that point, because if not, he shuddered to imagine how much more ominious their powers would grow.
By then their conversation had not gone unnoticed by Stanislav whose suspicion deepened the crevices of his wrinkles into craters. His voice rumbled a warning. "Best contain talk like that around people you don't know." His gaze flicked to Jaxen like the Marveet son was included, perhaps most especially. Jaxen's expression was a flat mirror, but he didn't argue.
The line of cars turned from the highway into an opulent area of Moscow. These were the former palaces of Russian nobility now private compounds for the rich and powerful. The gates in front of one parted and the car rounded a wide drive circling around a massive statue of a man on a rearing horse. Jaxen sighed as he looked at the front doors. He remembered lining up with his (half) siblings from oldest to youngest in front of those steps for pictures.
His gaze broke away and looked to his traveling companions as they began to file out of the vehicle. "I'm sure someone will take you anywhere you want to go."
Doubtful it would be their current driver, but there was always someone hanging about to taxi people around the city. Stanislav was apparently not impressed by the speed at which Jaxen was jumping from the car, and he whipped open the door from the outside even as Jaxen's hand rested on the handle. The towering entrance of the house looming behind his father's right-hand-man parted and Jaxen tilted, guessing who would be the one emerging. His breath caught, surprised, when the figure revealed was a dark-haired, curvacious beauty with a face of pale marble. His mother.
He slid around Stanislav, forgetting Sierra and Elias for the moment and waited by the car as his mother navigated the granite steps in painfully high stilettos. She pulled him to her shoulder and squeezed tight, but the tension in her arms prepared Jaxen for the slap to the head sure to come next.
By then their conversation had not gone unnoticed by Stanislav whose suspicion deepened the crevices of his wrinkles into craters. His voice rumbled a warning. "Best contain talk like that around people you don't know." His gaze flicked to Jaxen like the Marveet son was included, perhaps most especially. Jaxen's expression was a flat mirror, but he didn't argue.
The line of cars turned from the highway into an opulent area of Moscow. These were the former palaces of Russian nobility now private compounds for the rich and powerful. The gates in front of one parted and the car rounded a wide drive circling around a massive statue of a man on a rearing horse. Jaxen sighed as he looked at the front doors. He remembered lining up with his (half) siblings from oldest to youngest in front of those steps for pictures.
His gaze broke away and looked to his traveling companions as they began to file out of the vehicle. "I'm sure someone will take you anywhere you want to go."
Doubtful it would be their current driver, but there was always someone hanging about to taxi people around the city. Stanislav was apparently not impressed by the speed at which Jaxen was jumping from the car, and he whipped open the door from the outside even as Jaxen's hand rested on the handle. The towering entrance of the house looming behind his father's right-hand-man parted and Jaxen tilted, guessing who would be the one emerging. His breath caught, surprised, when the figure revealed was a dark-haired, curvacious beauty with a face of pale marble. His mother.
He slid around Stanislav, forgetting Sierra and Elias for the moment and waited by the car as his mother navigated the granite steps in painfully high stilettos. She pulled him to her shoulder and squeezed tight, but the tension in her arms prepared Jaxen for the slap to the head sure to come next.