What If the Storm Ends? [30% Complete]

[Natasha Radcliffe]

Prompt List

• Glitter
• Emerald
• Sick
• Price
• Fall
• Dreams
• Innocence
• Lullaby
• Smile
• Monster

[Natasha Radcliffe]

E M E R A L D

Oh, to run, to be free. It was one of the things Natasha loved the most about being a wolf - that she could forget all of the training and fighting and injuries and problems of her life, even if for a few hours, and just run. Unfortunately, there were other things that being a wolf brought along, and in her human form, immersed in guild life, those were more easily forgotten, while out here in the forest they loomed over her like a dark cloud.

Family, home, pack. She had friends, and people who were as close to her as they could be (Emile was like a father to her, Natalia, a sister), but they weren't enough. It was a pack she longed for, that connection that the wolf inside of her craved; even with the guild relationships she'd formed, they weren't enough to satisfy that void that she instinctively craved. She was lonely in a way that most people would never feel, and in a way that most wolves should never feel. She'd been all over Europe and the United States, and none of the packs had really opened up to her fully - they would allow her to temporarily reside with them, of course (those that were hospitable), but they never truly accepted her.

She slowed her running to a trot as the depression crept up on her, seeking out the cool water of a small lake to sate the thirst she'd grown from giving a lengthy chase to a deer. In the end, the doe had escaped, though if Natasha had been in better spirits, she would have eaten like a queen. She was the fastest wolf she knew, even faster than some of the others employed by the area of guilds she worked within. As she lapped up the water greedily, even going so far as to dunk her muzzle into the lake (which she regretted when she quickly emerged in an explosion of snorting as she inhaled it), she caught a noise across the small body of water, and it caused her to tense.

She narrowed her eyes, lowering herself to the ground in case it was another deer. She was still hungry, and didn't necessarily want to give up her position if she hadn't already been spotted. What she saw, though, was cause for her thick black tail to stiffen with a sudden sense of alarm. Another wolf, larger than she was by at least two, and with a thick, dusty brownish blonde coat, was staring at her from some thirty feet off. She felt a surge of territorial anger rush through her, followed quickly by fear as she realized that her new guest had no scent she recognized. It was lupine, yes, and male - musky and woodsy, a smell that was a near-aphrodisiac to her senses - but also something else. Something darker, heavier, and dangerous.

She was aware that all of the noises around her had ceased, and she turned her attention up to the night sky as the clearing dimmed immensely. The moon had vanished, tucked between thick clouds. When she looked back to the other wolf, she found that he was gone.

Oh, shit, she thought to herself. The rush of fear and urgency flooded her as she considered briefly that she may not be in good company, and she turned on her heels and began to gallop back the way she came. Her footfalls were swift and quiet as she tore back up the path that she'd taken out into the woods, counting the minutes until she could emerge on the other side of the tall pines and take her human form again. Something hit her from the side and startled her, causing her to yelp aloud in an undignified burst of shock. She felt herself rolling, and her dark brown and black fur gave way to long hair, grass-stained jeans, a simple gray t-shirt, and most of all, the gun in the holster at the rear edge of her pants.

She realized she was unable to grab it, however, when the world finally stopped twisting and turning. She was flat on her back, the Glock pressed firmly against her spine, utterly useless and out of reach, with her arms pinned down at her sides. There was something heavy and warm on top of her, and the stench of ash and pain was almost suffocating for a split-second before giving way to one that was more familiar and pleasant - wolf. She struggled to fight off her attacker, eyes squeezed shut as she contorted her body in an attempt to kick him off of her. She felt the weight of him change and become more evenly distributed across her form until, finally, a voice that sounded like how whiskey tasted (warm, burning, pleasant), caught her attention.

"Stop squirming, love. I haven't decided if I'm going to punish you for coming into my forest, yet, but you're not making your case any."

She opened her eyes finally, and found that she stared into the face of a man who was ruggedly handsome in such a way that, if she'd seen him without any knowledge of the supernatural world, she still would have said he reminded her of a wolf.

"There's a good girl," he said softly. He was quiet for a moment, taking in her appearance, and finally he reached a hand up to clear a few strands of her long, dark hair away from her face. "Let me see those beautiful emerald eyes."

"Who are you?" she breathed, unable to deny that he almost took her breath away (without the whole, sitting on her thing, that was).

"You first, little wolf," he replied smoothly.

She swallowed, hard, unable to take her focus off of him. And she thought her eyes were green? Natasha wasn't normally an eye person, and in fact she found it a little contrived when she heard people say that they liked a person's eyes as their best feature, but seriously, she couldn't find her voice, and the longer she stared at him, the more she forgot of herself. He prompted her with a raise of his eyebrow, and she blinked rapidly, unable to stop herself from smiling at her own stupidity.

"Natasha," she said, the laugh exhaled as she spoke.

The man got up, brushing himself off, and Natasha was fairly certain that she was okay to lay where he'd pressed her into the dirt a while longer and regain her senses, but he held a hand out and pulled her up - and it seemed almost effortless. "Well, Natasha," he purred (his voice sounded like a purr to her, anyways), "I'm Alexei - and I think I can forgive your invasion of territory just this once."

She looked away, feeling her cheeks grow hot with how aware she realized he was at her just staring at him. "Just this once?" she echoed, unable to not respond in her sarcastic tone of voice - though as she spoke, she was surprised to find she sounded almost playful.

"Tell me, are you hungry, love?" he asked. He still held her hand, which she noticed finally and withdrew, the movement a little too quick. He saw her open her mouth to question him, and continued speaking, cutting her off just as she drew breath. "I only ask because you let that little doe escape, and I can only assume that you didn't catch anything else."

She was flustered, now. "I - are you asking me to dinner?" she stammered.

He seemed to consider this for a moment, until she was sure that she'd made a fool of herself, and then grinned at her. "I believe I am."

[Natasha Radcliffe]

F A L L

  Natasha was beginning to feel like she was in the wrong place, on the wrong assignment. There were high-level hunters everywhere, and by high-level, what that really meant was god-tier. She'd somehow been called in to work a large case that, while based in Europe, the Bruja dealings of which she was very familiar, was being handled by Diamond. Natasha was a level 5 hunter with Frost, and arguably could have attained trainer status were she a little more committed to the job, but that didn't mean that she qualified for what Diamond expected out of their hunters - and it was obvious to her every day.

It was more than that, though. It was that people went out of their way to make her feel unwelcome. Not all of them, of course, but there was one in particular who had yet to warm up to her. She didn't understand why, because she couldn't fathom what she may have said or done, but Gunnar assured her in no uncertain terms that the problem wasn't with her at all. Still, when she'd been told that she would be going with a group that included Benjamin, she felt hesitation creep up inside of her. His wife had been a little cold to her at first, but she'd caught Natasha in the massive den in the early morning hours (her sleep schedule was so far out of whack) looking at a bridal magazine and they began talking. After that, things had been a little better. Irene failed to mention why it was her husband wasn't too friendly with Tasha, but the longer the young wolf was around, the more she saw that she wasn't unique in experiencing his unpleasant nature.

She was awakened late one evening by a sharp rapping at her door, and when she opened it, she found Murphy on the other side. Immediately, she shook off the foggy remnants of sleep and followed him to the meeting area, where a small team had been assembled to go and look into some Midnight activity in New York. It consisted of she, Benjamin, Irene, and a Changeling named Desmond that she knew by name already. Emile had assured her that while in the states with Diamond, if she came across Desmond, he would make sure she was taken care of. Thus far they hadn't crossed paths much, but he'd been nice to her when she did see him, and beyond that, Emile was like a father to her, so if he said someone was good, they were good.

"How do you get used to that?" Natasha asked, the chill from passing through a mirror still in her blood. She looked around, realizing that they were now in a high-rise in New York City, and felt a bump from behind her as Benjamin emerged through the large oval-shaped mirror on the stand.

"It's not a good idea to stand in front of our way in," he advised her.

"Have you ever been to the city?" Irene said briskly, cutting off her husband. She held her hand out, motioning for the wolf to come closer to see the skyline. "I know you've been all over Europe, but it's still quite a sight."

"It is," Natasha agreed. "So, why are we here?"

"Just to observe and report, darling," Desmond said. "Diamond likes to have firepower on even the most mundane of recon missions," he added with a wink. "This should be a boring night of staking out a hotel bar and waiting for our lead to prove incorrect."

True to his word, they literally were staking out the large, posh bar of an upscale hotel in the downtown city area, where rumours had been spreading about a Midnight trainer who had made it his personal hunting ground. They hadn't been told which one, but ever since the war with the guilds, Diamond was a lot more liberal about stepping in when Midnight was involved. Because they still had been told that Kiyoshi was out of commission, nobody thought twice about including Natasha. They needed to get her into working with them so that when they went back overseas there would be pre-established relationships, that, while not necessarily friendly, did help with levels of trust that were integral when hunting. By about nine or ten in the evening, the bar was just starting to really pick up.

Unfortunately, Natasha was beginning to grow tired, thanks to her being the only creature among the four that actually did require some amount of sleep. Desmond did, too, but he was rather accustomed to late nights, and hadn't been suffering from jet lag, either.  "I'm going to walk around, try to get my blood moving," she told them as she passed them all at the bar.

"It's probably a better idea if we all split up, anyways. No trainer will approach any of us if we're together. This guy's been picking people off who've been here alone," Irene said, signaling the bartender for another glass of wine. "I think it's time to put a rosy flush to my cheeks and look available, anyways. Hopefully he'll be young enough to think I'm human, or at the very least, too occupied with his goal to realize that I'm anything other than a child-aged vampire." She grinned. "Good hunting, gentlemen." With a last squeeze of her husband's hand, she slid away from them and went to sit at a high-top on her own, immediately putting out an aura of 'single and alone'.

  Benjamin resolved himself to be the one who kept an eye on things, and, scotch in hand, turned his chair slightly to keep the main room in his sight. Desmond did much the same thing, except while chatting up the high-class call-girls, quietly directing them to the old businessmen who would have the most money. It was endlessly amusing, which was why he did it.

Natasha had finally felt herself perked up enough to go back in and start on the observation, but as she crossed through the doorway, she heard someone whisper "Stop" into her ear, and found that stop she did. She chalked it up to being startled, but found that when she tried to continue walking, she couldn't. In fact, she couldn't move at all - not even blink. She was frozen, green eyes wide.

"What's a lovely little wolf like you doing in a place like this?" Kiyoshi asked, standing at her side as though materializing out of thin air. He reached up to brush a stray lock of her hair behind her ear, and Natasha would have flinched if she could - she would have hit him, actually, but there was no point in trying. She was rooted to the ground. He draped his arm around her, grinning. "Why don't you and I go up to my room and have a little one-on-one, hm?"

Kiyoshi, having no idea that she was there with other people, and escorted her to a suite on the fourth floor. Once inside, he commanded her to sit, which she did. He walked around in a circle, everything about him utterly erratic (he went from zero to sixty at the drop of a hat, then back down to zero again). He seemed - he seemed crazy, actually. He took off his tie, the entire time muttering to himself. Natasha could hear him, obviously, but what he was saying didn't make any sense. She'd been trained for situations like this, though like Antoine, she couldn't be prepared for variables (like the fact that he was controlling her - was he a Mesmer?) but she knew how to stay calm, and how to keep her mind focused away from things she didn't need him to know.

"So, little wolf," he sang, using Alexei's pet name for her, which made her nauseous, "what's your story? If I let you talk, you'd better not scream, now. I have been known to break my toys," he warned her. He sat down in a chair across from her, brows perked as he waited for her to speak.

"What do you want to know?" she asked, keeping her voice steady.

"Hmmm.... why you're not panicking, for one," he said, narrowing his eyes at her. "Tell me, little wolf - what do you do? And don't lie. I know when you're lying, and I'll punish you for it."

"I'm a hunter," she responded. What was taking them so long?

"A hunter," he squealed, clapping his hands together and leaning back in his chair. "It's my lucky day! What guild do you hunt for, pray tell? I've never seen you before, and I'd remember those pretty eyes of yours."

"Frost."

Suddenly, she was on the floor, a sharp pain spreading across the side of her face and into her head. What the hell had happened? She picked herself up quickly, still stunned and unable to hear from her right ear for a brief moment. Kiyoshi was standing over her, rolling up the sleeves of his shirt and clicking his tongue.

"I told you not to lie," he said sadly. "I'd hate to bruise that lovely face of yours, little wolf, but I did warn you. Get up," he then said, his tone of voice changing completely to a darker, more creepy tone. "Get up, or I'll hit you again."

Natasha got up.

"What do you have to say for yourself?" he snapped.

"I work for Frost," she said again, hand raising to her cheek. Fuck. "I wasn't lying. I'm out of Frost in Europe."

"Well, you're a little far from home," Kiyoshi observed. "Tell me, what brings you to the Big Apple?"

"Visiting friends."

She was on the ground again, and this time, he'd hit her squarely in the mouth. She tasted copper and, had she been a human, probably would have lost a tooth over that. She restrained herself from making any noise, trying to concentrate on the epic beat-downs Emile had given her in sparring sessions, but this guy was seriously getting on her nerves.

"Listen, I'm not really into this slap and tickle thing, so if you could - NNH!" she cried. He held his hand out, silencing her while simultaneously pushing her back down on the ground (she'd been in the process of getting up again).

"You're lying is really hurting my feelings, little wolf, so I'm going to take away your talking privileges until you feel more honest," he snapped. "But, since you're not from around here and you probably don't know who I am, I'll go ahead and fill you in. My name is Kiyoshi," he began, making a lifting motion with his hand and forcing her to stand up. "And my special ability is to control shapeshifters. Of any kind. You should see the things I've seen, little wolf. Did you know that even if you don't have a half-form, I can give you one? Say, speaking of forms, let's see what you look like as a wolf. I'd like to know what I'm purchasing, after all - and that's a figure of speech, by the way, because I'm not buying you. I'll just be taking you."

All of Natasha's training began to slip from her when Kiyoshi informed her that he wanted to see her in wolf form. Gunnar had been very specific on the subject of shifting, and the verdict he'd come to after Eithne's careful research was that under no circumstances was Natasha allowed to shift during her pregnancy. Kiyoshi felt her mental block waver, too, and he smiled very broadly at her.

"What's the problem, little wolf? Are you shy?"

Natasha had to come up with a plan, fast. Anything would be better than shifting, including jumping out the window. Finding that she could speak again, Natasha took a deep, shaking breath. "I'll shift," she told him. "But you have to let me do it."

Kiyoshi arched his eyebrows. "Do I, now?" he asked, intrigued. "Okay, I will. Nobody's ever just volunteered. You'd think they'd just comply, but no..." he trailed off, then sighed. "I guess they just like abuse. Anyways!" he said, clasping his hands together excitedly. "Go ahead. Do your thing. Just know that if you try any funny business, I'll make you feel like your insides are being ripped apart," he informed her. He grinned. "This is so exciting!"

Natasha smiled as sweetly as she could manage, and then tipped her head back. She allowed herself to shift slightly - just enough for her eyes to brighten. It gave her the extra oomph that she needed to escape. Unfortunately, her chosen escape route wasn't the door - it was the window. With a startling burst of speed (Natasha was stupidly fast as a wolf, so she had to tap into that to ensure she could pull this off) Natasha turned while taking three big steps, throwing her arms over her face  to protect herself...as she smashed through the large picture window and free-fell to the sidewalk below.

The last thing she remembered was hitting the ground on her back, a sickening cracking sound accompanying her landing, followed immediately after by screaming, which got fainter and fainter before fading into a deafening silence.

[Natasha Radcliffe]

P R I C E

Irene was the one to hear Natasha's yelp of a scream as she jumped out of the window, and she snapped her head up immediately as she heard someone outside screaming, too. She signaled Benjamin and James, then used her celerity to put herself outside, thankfully before a crowd had gathered around the scattered bits of glass, and the large pool of blood, which was slowly growing larger. Both of those things surrounded Natasha, who was on her back, and dead.

"Oh, my god," Irene breathed. She looked up at James and Benjamin, her eyes watery. Instantly, she used her ability to wall them up, making it so that the crowd avoided the scene, and in fact were otherwise oblivious to it. "Is she dead? Please tell me she's not dead," she begged.

James and Benjamin had both knelt down next to her on either side. The Fae had his hand held over her, and a gentle golden-white light emitted around his hand for a moment. "She's alive," he barked. "But barely. The baby is worse off. I don't think we have time to get her to Gunnar," he said, his voice tightly controlled to filter out the emotion in it. Now wouldn't be the time to panic.

"I can heal her," Benjamin said, having no problem controlling his voice at all.

"I'll monitor her vital signs, then. You can't give her too much - she's too close to death. I have a feeling she'd rather die then wake up a vampire with a dead fetus stuck inside of her," he said. There was no point in sugar-coating anything, and in truth, he was correct. Natasha would have rather died; she was happy being a wolf, and that's all she wanted to be.

Benjamin nodded. "You'll tell me when to stop?" he asked. At James' own tense agreement, he looked back down at her. He bit into his wrist, then held it to her mouth, urging the blood to run out of the vein and down into her throat. Unfortunately for Natasha, Benjamin didn't simply see her as a fellow hunter who needed saving; he saw her as an opportunity, and Benjamin liked those more than almost anything else.

"Enough, Benjamin," James said suddenly.

The vampire said nothing, simply withdrawing his wrist from her mouth, then casually glided his tongue across his wrist as he looked up at his wife. There was enough blood on it from the puncture he'd made that it was easy to miss the fact that he'd gotten some of Natasha's on him, and it didn't matter how little it was, it was enough. He found that, if he thought about it, he was suddenly very, very aware of her and her unborn child. He didn't smile, though he wanted to - two for the price of one. He couldn't have planned it better himself. Truly, he wished the girl no ill will - she was simply a piece of a larger puzzle, one that involved a particular demon he couldn't wait to have a word with at his earliest convenience.

"Can we move her now?" Irene asked, crouching down by them. She reached out to cradle Natasha's head in her hands, smoothing back her dark hair and ignoring that it was matted down with blood. She noticed that her surface cuts were already healed, and the broken bones were mending themselves at a rapid pace. Benjamin had been the right choice - James could heal, sure, but her husband's blood was old, and had that light demonic flavouring that her unborn would probably respond better to than just a regular healing.

"I think that would be for the best. We should still let Gunnar look over her - and moreover, we need to find out what exactly happened to her," James said. He re-positioned himself to a crouch, then slid his arms gently beneath Natasha's limp body, and slowly lifted her up, holding her close to his body.

"I'm pretty interested to know that, myself," Benjamin muttered. "I think she found who we were here looking for, if I can make a wild guess," he added, straightening out the collar of his shirt. He held his hand out to James, wrapping his other arm around Irene's shoulders. "I don't think we'll be taking a mirror, this time, dear," he informed them, and in the blink of an eye, they were all gone and re-deposited directly into Diamond's spacious infirmary, where luckily, Gunnar was currently catching up on his notes.

"We ran into a bit of a problem, Gunnar," Benjamin said, stepping aside to reveal James and the fallen wolf.

Gunnar practically fell out of his chair when he realized what was going on. "What happened?" he demanded, taking Natasha from James and placing her gently on one of the beds. He was already giving her a once-over, then he straightened. "Was she already healed?" he asked. He looked at the trio.

"We didn't have a choice," Benjamin said gruffly.

"I made sure that he didn't turn her by mistake," James said quickly, knowing where Gunnar's mind had gone.

"I see," the healer said, turning his attention back to his patient. "I'll make sure that she's okay from here, then move her to her room." He paused. "I'm glad you acted so quickly. From the feel of it, you came just on the other side of turning her, but your blood is healing her completely. I'm going to put her to sleep for the time being, just to make sure she doesn't try to jump up and promptly hurt herself again, but I'd like a much more detailed explanation of what happened, if you don't mind."

"We're waiting for that ourselves," James told him, his voice sounding ragged. "I should have never let her go by herself. I can't believe Noelani approved her. She may be a good hunter, but she's got far too much at stake, all-powerful boyfriend or not."

Gunnar said nothing, mentally calling for Chad. He'd have to make sure that someone placed a call to Alexei and told him what had happened; feud with Benjamin and Irene or not, there was no way Gunnar could, in good faith, not tell the man that his wife-to-be and child had come within literal seconds of death - true death, not even vampirism, which, heh, that would be another matter entirely. "Thank you again, for saving her. You should go and brief Noelani on what you know; in the meantime, I'll get her settled. Chad's already on his way."

The three left, though James was more hesitant than the other two (Irene seemed to want to linger as well, but at Benjamin's beckoning, she left quickly). The Fae watched the couple go, and couldn't help but think that perhaps he should have been the one to heal the wolf. He couldn't explain it, but he had a very bad feeling about the entire situation, and part of it was walking away from him right then.