@ladyevangelinenix A Potential Monster Mash? A Hypothetical Graveyard Smash?

Younger vampires were easy to spot, in Luka's estimation. There were a number of factors: baring, clothing, the state of their eyes, their nails, in they shied or demurred from conversations. It was not, he could admit, easy to guess just how young one might be but that was where his handicap played a role. A vampire from the Court of the Sun King was about as old to him as someone who had seen the Crystal Palace at the '53 World's Fair.

He guessed the young woman in front of him was closer to the Palace than Court. And, as was the case with many young vampires, closer to her humanity than he to his.
Watching her, he hummed and distracted himself and made noises at the work of Julius Victor Berger on the wall in front of him.

They were at an estate sale, part of the usual machinations of the city as the world turned slowly but surely into the new century. A townhouse on Hyde Park was being liquidated and there was a townhouse's worth of furniture and art and odds and ends to get rid of.

He hummed and indicated the painting, a portrait of a wine drunk woman in rosy pink satin playing a mandolin, to the young girl when he felt a cold spot brush close to him. He gestured with his homburg at the work, looking down at her from the corner of his eye.

"I'd love a glass of whatever she's had." He said lightly.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

ladyevangelinenix

Her arms full of books, she jumps as if apparently surprised to be perceived, looking like a small tortoiseshell cat in her momentary fright. She's as pale as the old papers in her arms, with with bright splotches in her cheeks like a person taken with a fever. She looks up at him from behind glasses she doesn't need (but people ask questions if you get so sick you nearly die and you somehow come back with better eyesight).

"Oh. Yes, I suppose. She does seem very happy to be drunk." Her voice has a peculiar hushed quality to it, like the rustling of pages. "I think the people managing the sale had some wine." It smelled like bottom shelf grocery store wine to her nose, however.

From:

forrestertailor

The same way Luka can tell a new vampire, Eva can likely tell that this man is a great deal older than her. How much older is a mystery but he has all the signs of lifelessness and a manner that dictates a respect only an elder vampire would demand. Despite that manner of weighty self importance, he seems very relaxed standing next to her.

"What have you found there?" He nods to her books. "Taking the best of the library for yourself?"

From:

ladyevangelinenix

Being without a formal sire and without any sort of companionship of her own kind, she's terrible about remembering the etiquette. It takes her a moment to realize she's talking to a vampire at all, never mind a very old and strange one. When she does, she nearly drops her books, unsure what to do with herself. She just tries to make herself look as small as possible, convey that she's not a threat or intrusion.

"The departed had an extensive library in my areas of interest. I would rather have acquired it more formally but the family didn't really want to deal with the paperwork. So here I am, trying to grab what I can."

From:

forrestertailor

Luka nods along while she dithers. He takes her in with a stare that measures her up and down. Behind the glasses that he very much does need to see, his eyes are round and yellow. His stare is expressionless and animal.

She’s holding herself up very tightly for someone know ostensibly knows what’s going on. He decides to do the right thing and give her a crash course in etiquette.

“Oh, forgive me I should have said,” and then instead of saying he straightens his back and makes eye contact and holds his fist over his heart. There is a stern formality to it, a gesture that is meant to be responded to in kind.

From:

ladyevangelinenix

"Oh!" She juggles the books around comically for a moment until she can get a free hand to return the gesture.

"Forgive me, I always forget my manners." She says, sheepishly. "I'm never expecting to run into any of our sort when I'm out and about. Or...at all really. You have been kinder than most about it. I am Doctor Evangeline Nix."

From:

forrestertailor

He gets the girl’s name but grimaces just the same, looking pained and slowly blinking his eyes. Luka fixes her with a concerned look and holds a finger up to his mouth.

“Ah-uhn.” He gives his head a small shake, then moves to the second form with a studied smoothness. Again inviting her to follow, he spreads his feet and brings the fist from his heart to her left side, opening his hand slowly to show off the nothing in his palm.

From:

ladyevangelinenix

She looks at him like he's showing her a dance step she's never seen. She shrinks further around her stack of books, like a cat trying to flatten itself with fear.

"I don't follow, I'm so sorry." She says, echoing the motion uncertainly, in a much more abbreviated fashion. "And are you sure it's wise, with humans around?"

From:

forrestertailor

Luka lets out a soft ‘shush’, leaning forward with a slow, liberate movement. He holds her eye, sinking to look directly into her face as she tries to match him.

“Young lady,” he says with all politeness. “What are you doing?”

He springs back up from the dance, cocking his head cutely and looking much more normal. He clutches his hat to his chest with both hands.

From:

ladyevangelinenix

"I have no idea." She says, her face turning to an unpleasant blotchiness as her bloodless body tries to blush. "Please, I don't know anything about how to do this. I never learned how. All I can do is beg your forgiveness." Her large, mercury gray eyes are wide with fear, as if her previous encounters with other vampires have been cause of great distress.

From:

forrestertailor

Luka’s brow knots and he lets out an indecipherable sound, maybe a word in a language she’s never heard.

“They did not teach you to joke either,” he says, looking ruffled. This time he puts a hand out to her like a normal person wanting a handshake. “Forgive me, I couldn’t help myself. Luka Forrester. It’s a pleasure, Dr. Nix.”

From:

ladyevangelinenix

She shakes his hand and then wraps her arms around her books again. She looks like she desperately wants to escape, even though he's piqued her curiosity.

"What are you doing at the estate sale? I don't usually encounter...our sort during daylight hours."

From:

forrestertailor

"You may as well ask why a shark swims," Luka gestures with his hat at the innumerable things up for sale. "I would be remiss to not take full advantage of such a sale. Paintings, books, furniture I didn't have to make myself. I could leave with everything here if I didn't have such restraint."

From:

ladyevangelinenix

"Well at least I've removed the temptation of a few silly books." She says. "So you'll have a bit less to worry about if you finally lose your sense of restraint."

From:

forrestertailor

"Thank goodness," Luka pinches the air. "It's a very fine little thread, holding that restraint together. Now, how can those books be silly if a doctor wants them, eh?"

From:

ladyevangelinenix

"Oh I'm not a medical doctor. Not... not anymore." She was one of the first women in London to get a medical degree but those credentials probably aren't worth much anymore. "I'm an...archivist, I suppose. At the
Society for the Study of the Paranatural, Occult and Crypto-Scientific. So these books are--" She gestures vaguely. "Relevant to those interests. So, silly to most."

From:

forrestertailor

"To most." Luka confirms, waving his hat around in a vague circle. Then he pointed it to himself, to her. "But quite serious to some. I'm surprised you would still insist they're silly, given our condition."

From:

ladyevangelinenix

And any number of other things I've seen, hurts I've suffered, people I've watched die in front of my eyes, she thinks. "Some of them are quite silly but are nevertheless important to the history of the field." She shrugs. "Mostly spiritualist and psychical research books, a quite a bit about British psychogeography."

From:

forrestertailor

"Will you need any help lugging them to your own library?" Luka asks, watching her demure again. She's a tough one, hanging onto being unassuming so tightly he has to worry for her. Whatever she's serving by being so timid, it must be drawn from a serious fright and pain. He nods towards the open door into the estate's library. "Or extra hands to go haul more of them out."

From:

ladyevangelinenix

It does. She has had very little dealings with her own kind, whom she's largely afraid of. Firstly because of her own violent turning by something unlike any other vampire she's encountered since and because most of London's urbane vampires disdain her.
She's trying to reconcile that fear with Luka, who hasn't been any worse to her than teasing her despite his imposing appearance.

"An extra pair of hands would probably be good." She says, frowning at the precarious stack. "I came here on my bike, so it would probably be difficult to get everything balanced on my own." Not that she isn't used to managing, since even this long in the world she still doesn't drive.

From:

forrestertailor

Luka, who can't move at 30mph without his stomach doing backflips, nods and scoops the books out of her hands. He puts them in the crook of his arm and moseys with her deeper through the house and the sale.

"And will you need any help getting home at this time of day?" He asks quietly, seeing the afternoon sun glowing through a birch tree outside. He eyes Eva. "I can get you a hansom, if you need it."

From:

ladyevangelinenix

"Oh, no. As long as I wear long sleeves and sunglasses, I'll be alright." The sun is getting less bearable as time goes on, but for now she's doesn't seem in danger of burning to ash under it, at least. "I won't go out in the daytime for a couple of days and I'll be perfectly fine." Granted, the sunburn isn't pretty but to most people it would look normal, at least.

From:

forrestertailor

"Very pragmatic." Luka hums at her, making pleasant conversation. "You're very new, aren't you? I don't mean to pry, but it's rare to meet someone who's still developing that sensitivity. I count myself very lucky it never stuck with me."

From:

ladyevangelinenix

"It went...differently for me, I'm coming to understand." She says, carefully. "Becoming this, I mean. Others seem to turn all at once. I seem to be sliding slowly into it, as into a long, lethal illness. As if afflicted by a bite from a sick animal. I still think, sometimes, that I can feel my heart beating."

From:

forrestertailor

“How awful.” There’s genuine surprise in his voice mixed with schadenfreude. He carries the books, knitting his brow and looking stern. Eva can tell he pities her condition at the same time that he finds her an oddity. It’s hard not to feel out of place next to him, especially when they should be two strangers with something in common. He speaks again with a simplicity that is devoid of emotion. “And is your sire around?”

From:

ladyevangelinenix

"The vampire who infected me? No. It is dead." She says, her impersonal tone backing up her description that she hadn't been made on purpose but rather attacked and turned as if attacked by a rabid animal. "I think it thought I was dead, seemed more like a carrion feeder, perhaps it was the transfer of saliva that did it."