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*
Harlem was still being pieced back together after the incident that happened during the Peace Rally. Some hunks of road were still split down the middle, and different buildings were in pieces; but Harlem was still breathing. Fresh snow was floating down to the ground, coating areas in fresh powder, while the streets that were solid were collections of grey-black, dirty filled slush. The neighborhood itself is tucked in for the night, but the inviting lights of the Cigar Factory continue to blaze on.
A few regulars are already set up at their tables, drinking their worries away, and behind the bare is a young girl with dark skin and flooftastic hair. She's busy at work, her arms sunk deep into bubbly water as she washes glass after glass. Her hair is pulled back in a crimson, woven head wrap, and to those that give in to curiousity would notice that an odd, diamond like pattern of ruby scales runs down the nape of her neck and disappears under the cover of her shirt. She's also wearing a pair of sunglasses.
*
There was nothing particularly notable about the woman who slid through the door of the gloomily lit bar, save for the fact that every step in her boots was liquid. All sinews playing together in perfect harmony, a hat pulled off to loose dark curls as her yellow eyes slid over the other patrons with appraising consideration. As the low hum of music thrummed through the building from the jukebox, Skali let out a low groan of appreciation before approaching the bar.
As she unbuttoned her jacket and hooked it over the back of a stool, she settled along the long slab of pock marked wood and waited for the bartender to notice her. Instead of fussing for a cigarette, or pulling loose a book to busy herself in, the woman seemed quite content to drink in the warmth of anonymous company as her nose flared and the heady mix of sweat, alcohol and tobacco was savored.
*
Perhaps it was for the best that Victor hadn't been present for the Peace Rally. He'd already made his predictions about somethin going down, but he'd been absent from the event and that itself ment that the culprits were recovered mostly whole rather then in multiple organ coolers. Stepping through the doorway, the large man in the equally large fur coat does sort of stick out in a crowd here in Harlem, but at least he'd been here before. Maybe one day people might get comfortable with him being around…and maybe one day water would stop being wet.
Moving into the bar proper, he's a few steps behind the woman who'd entered before him, but he pays her little mind as his eyes instead come to rest on Lynette and her 'sunglasses indoors'. Sniffing the air lightly he's silent for a moment before the corner of his lips quirk into an off-smirk. "So…not as peaceful as you hoped?"
*
Lynette pulls her arms up from her duties and grabs for a towel. After padding herself dry, she offers the newest addition to the bar a warm smile. "Evenin', chere? What c'n I get f'y?" The Creole questions and folds up the tea towel before setting it aside. As she waits for the order, she glances toward the other arrival and offers him a knowing wiggle of her fingers. At the proding about the ralley, whatever smile she had for him twists into a perse.
Finger up, she points his way in the same manner a mother might to their unruly child. "Don' start." She snips.
*
Skali smiles easily as the keep notes her need for a drink, motioning to the closest thing they have to Scotch on the wall behind her. "That. No rocks."
Perhaps she would have been more verbose if not for the sudden sense of a much larger figure behind her, nose twitching inquisitively as she looked up at the man, a curious consideration of his person tilting her head as her eyes went down. Then back up again. She weighed him much as someone might a piece of meat, or a good horse, before accepting her drink and adding to their conversation without invitation.
"You can't expect peace. It's the holidays."
*
"'Bout what I expected Darlin'" Victor shrugs, carrying the motion into the removal of his coat and then letting the furred jacket fall onto the bar stool next to him. The woman's once-over earns a little raised eyebrow, but he's not entirely immune from giving her an assessment that's shades similar before he shrugs again and looks back at Lynette, signalling his desire to commence the evening's drinking. "Holidays don't mean much for people fightin' wars of their own making. Ain't no signing silent night in the trenches anymore."
*
Lynette doesn't reply about the broken 'peace', or the holidays. Once Creed opens his mouth, she shrugs gently and places both their drinks on the space before them. "Don' read de news much, miss?" The girl finally inquires toward Skali before moving back to her place behind her sink and the task at hand. "Ain't de holidays dat ruined dat peace. Was jus' hate. 'nyway, how y'all doin'? Keepin' warm?" A pause, and head tilt toward Victor. "N'outta trouble?"
*
As soon as he settled in the stool next to her, there's a wash of old magic that could be scented on her person, sensed in her pores, a sharp tang of Juniper, wet fur, blood on the back of the tongue and a pulse that wouldn't stop pounding in the skull. And then it was gone, subdued, the sip of scotch taken and her shoulders rolled back with a happy little noise of contentment.
"The news doesn't change. Same things, over and over again. Though the presentation has gotten better. I do like the television."
*
Out of trouble? Victor smirks lightly with a shrug. "About as much as usual," he answers truthfully. No comment is made about the glasses, or the scales for that matter. Maybe he'd smelt it before he'd seen it. Skali's scent however earned the slightest twitch of interest in his lips before the scruffy man just shrugged his shoulders and raised his drink to his lips, downing a good percentage of the beverage in one gulp and setting the glass down once more. "Quicker then the papers, but about the same crap on it. Still better then the old silent things I suppose…" Had Victor been a fan of the old Chaplin films? Odds are he'd never confess to it lightly.
*
"'Suppose so." Lynette shrugs once more, taking out a cup and setting it aside to drip dry for the time being. With smells moving around, and each having the ability to pick upon them, the girl behind the counter was an odd brand herself. Lilac, honeysuckle, and coppery-iron were her aroma, along with that kick of magic that others may pick up on were they so inclinded to. She's keen on keeping their drinks topped up, and now and then, she'll look over them and out toward the floor proper. She had other patrons, after all. "Sorry t'say I ain't had much time f'de TV. How de holidays treatin' y'?" She inquires of the pair across from her.
*
Skali languidly sprawls on the stool in a seemingly impossible fashion that actually managed to look comfortable instead of awkward. The small talk was sipped at with as much care as she enjoyed the Scotch, a nod here, a smile there, waiting for the conversation to angle back her way. The yellow iris' of her gaze twitched from one to the other, nose matching her gaze in a fashion that made no effort to disguise that she was sampling at the air.
"I don't celebrate them. Where you from?"
The question was tipped to the bar tender, the glass of Scotch somehow emptied. She tapped the rim in a request for a refill.
*
"Around," Victor answers, nice and vague but accurate in his own way. He'd been wandering for long enough that he rarely counted the place of his birth as where he was 'from'. If anything, his childhood was something he'd happily let vanish into history and never be spoken of again. "Here and there, y'know?" Draining the last of his drink he places it aside, pushing the empty cup towards the bartender again with a mimed 'keep 'em coming'. "Get the feelin' none of us are locals here."
*
"Eh, t'each dere own." Lyn murmurs easily, and the question of her origins causes her to glance up behind those shades. "Down south," she begins, as if her accent didn't make that painfully obvious. "M'fr'm Louisiana. Jus' out side'a Baton Rouge." The city's name draws from the girl a smooth transition to French. At the motions of both, each gets a new drink once the girl has dried her grip. Chuckling, she shakes her head at Victor. "Nah, Beau. Don' t'ink many I met c'm fr'm here. But, we all c'm fr'm s'mwhere, non?" To Skali, "What 'bout you, chere?"
*
Skali wavers for a long moment, as if actually considering honesty. Instead she smiled in the easy way only a descendent of the Trickster himself could manage, and shrugged. "Well he stole my line."
A finger jerked towards the man adjacent to the other patron at the bar and she sighed happily while amber liquid refilled the glass. Tapping the side of the glass, she pursed her lips and told a half truth.
"North. Far North."
*
"Plenty of people come from New York, but it's the sort of place where people come to. More trouble to get into, more to see, all that crap…" Victor says with a wave of his hand and immidately starts on his new drink, decreasing its volume quite rapidly as he had with the first and giving the woman who'd been equally vague a chuckle. "Right, North." she didn't exactly come across as Canadian.
*
Lynette smirks, causing a dimple to press into her cheek. "Fine. Keep y'secrets." She fusses at the pair. Even if she gave a round about location, it came with a solid name. While leaning forward, the girl pauses to rub any stray droplets from her face with the side of her arm. The shift causes her necklace to dangle free, showing that its middle is decorated by some hammer type charm, and a golden coin with Norse runes stamped into its face. "Y'all hungry? Don' got too much, but if y'wantin' s'mt'ing, I get de boys t'make it f'r y'."
*
Skali laughs despite herself at the comment from the man, the sound open and warm as the Scotch that her breath smelled of. It belonged in a much larger tavern, the sort crowded with copper mugs and pounding fists, old songs and over exaggerated tales. Yet here, it found a space between their idle conversations, and she switched to Russian with an artful tongue,
|R| "And East a bit."
The flicker of gold distracted her and she turned her attentions to the neck it was slung around. A finger nipped out to slip around the cord that coin dangled from, using the brief moment to consider it with a wry grin that threatened to split her features open in the seemingly over-enthused humor. And just like that, she let it go.
"Everyone is in New York. Who gave you that necklace, sweetheart?"
*
The Russian switch? That just earns another bark of a laugh from the man. Did he understand? Maybe, but who'd really take the scruffy looking beast of a man for someone who'd take the time learning to be multi-lingual? He'd noticed the necklace at the slip, but it doesn't catch his gaze with the same interest as it does Skali. He knew what Lynette could do, figured it was just another magic trinket or maybe some tourist bull. The sudden snatching at it from Skali however has him slowly lowering his glass, eyes narrowing just a little.
*
The girl, however, did not understand Russian, so whatever humor may have been there was lost on her. Even so, she smiles up at the pair, giving those behind them another brief glance before getting back to her labors. At the 'pull' of the cord that presses it into the scale like pattern on the back of her neck, she glances down at Skali's fingers and then up toward the woman's face.
At first, she doesn't say anything. Simply nodding in agreement with the pair that, yes, everyone was in New York, it seems. This was fitting, however, as it seems to be very, very true. "Thor." She answers, feeling the swing of the coin as it falls back down and 'pats' the flat of her chest.
*
Skali savors the honesty, and seemingly knows exactly how true the offering was. The mane of dark curls almost bristled as she rolled back her shoulders and settled both her elbows on the counter.
"Thought so. You met the other Odinson yet?"
Her head tilted in a curious fashion, pausing as she drew out a wad of cash from a back pocket and counted out three fives and five ones. Setting out her meager offerings she sighed and waved off the offer of food,
"Want to leave you enough for a tip and all that."
*
Victor, for all the exchange in front of him, merely raises his drink to his lips once more, a slow shake of the man's head refusing the offer for a meal in favor of the 'liquid supper' he'd been working with so far. Odinson's and Thor? It's anyone's guess if he has any idea what in the world they're on about.
*
"Ti Malice?" She inquires, and then gives a nod. "I have. Dough, I t'ink it was only once. S'been in de news lately, too. Guess y'don' stay outta trouble if y'de spirit of tricks." When both refuse, she makes sure their drinks are set and ready for a third go round. The pay from Skali, for the time being, isn't taken. After all, she hasn't left the bar.
Perking up, she turns her face toward Creed and offers him a bright smile. "Don' f'get t'r'mind me, beau. I got s'mt'ing f'y' in de back once m'shift's ova." Tis the season after all. Once that reminder is noted, Lynette moves her attentions back to Skali. "Y'know dem? De Asgardians? I be honest. Was…humblin' t'find out dey real."
*
Skali smiles as she listens to their conversation, savoring that last drink as she knows there will be no payment available for another. Reaching a hand up, she tousled her hair and leaned back in her stool, looking to the lazy fall of snowflakes outside with something akin to nostalgia in her expression. When she realized that the bar tender had asked her the question, she refocused her attentions and fixed that unsettlingly golden gaze on the woman.
"Aye. The Trickster is my grandsire. Great Grandsire actually."
And as if this was no more remarkable than the weather, she took another sip of her Scotch and introduced herself with a disaffected air,
"Skali, by the way."
*
A grunt from Victor, but it seems he's acknowledging Lynette's words, downing the last of his drink and listening to the exchange one might swear there was a ghost of a smile before the large man suddenly stands, placing the drink aside. "Victor…and I'm going for a smoke."
With that the man heads for the door, his errant coat once more left abandoned on the nearby barstool.
*
Lynette pauses in her work, looking up to Skali more directly now. "Huh." She smiles at least, and gives the woman another drink. "On de house." She explains with a smile, and a wink, before remembering that she's wearing glasses. When Victor offers a name, and an exit, she quirks a brow and watches as the man leaves. Then, she looks down at a near by ashtray, and toward the hanging clouds of smoke that fill the building.
"M'Lynette," she informs Skali, now that her curiousity about the departing beast of a man has passed her attention. "Y'doin' alright, chere? Wit all de t'ings happenin' wit y'gran'daddy?"
*
Skali considers the free drink appreciatively, pursing her lips together at the question before she leaned back.
"We're not close. It is his way to have such machinations to amuse himself with. I am nothing of import to a god like him."
The realization that she was a god herself settled slowly and with a momentary chuckle to admit the humor. All the same, she tipped back the glass of scotch and sighed happily as the heat burned down her throat.
"What did you do to earn the attention of the Thunder God? He does not offer his coinage freely."
*
"Honestly? I dunno." Lynette murmurs, leaving the ordeal with Loki on the side for the time being. Pulling away from work, she rubs at her arms and rests back on the rear counter, allowing herself somewhat of a break. Finally, tired of the glasses and how they press behind her ears, she slips them away and timidly showed that her eyes are of solid jade, with slitted pupils running down their centers.
She's waiting, trying to see if they would be accepted in Skali's company, or not. For now, though, she continues her story. "I jus' got t' New York at dat time. Was still on de run, on de streets. Met'm when he was havin' s'm dinner. He was havin' pizza, n'he invited me t'his table. Let me eat. Got me a drink, too. Den he gave me two coins n'told me t'call whenever I needed'm." A shrugs. "I gave one of de coins away t's'mone helpin' de homeless s'in Hell's Kitchen. Kept dis one; couldn't make m'self spend it."
*
Skali blinks at her story, seeming to take a long moment to absorb it before laughing once more with a shake of her head. If the peculiar visage of the other woman troubled the wolf, it wasn't evident, her preference for the reddest of meats and wide open spaces far stranger to the average person than verdantly green pupils.
"It's not the sort of coin you spend. Keep it. A god's protection is not something to be taken lightly."
With this proclamation, the woman stood and tapped the stack of bills on the counter with a wink even as she pulled back on her hat. Glancing to the door that the man had disappeared out of, she pursed her lips before nodding to her payment.
"Cover one of his for me as well. Take care-?" She waited for the name, applying no pet name as she watched the curious creature that had poured her scotch and told her some secrets and half truths.
*
"I don' plan to. S'his idea dat I spend it." She smirks gently and shrugs once more. Watching Skali stand and prepare to leave, she nods in agreement. "I know dat. M'lucky f'it. N'sure, I get'm anotha'." Reaching out, she slips the bills away and moves to place them in the register.
As she waits, the girl blinks, clearly confused by the secondary request for her name. "I told y'. S'Lynette. Nice meetin' y', Skali. Y'take care out dere now. B'careful."
*
"Oh. Indeed."
Did she forget? Maybe. But there was a glint of something more mischievous in the corner of the old wolf's eyes. She smiled, her jaws forming around the name as she practically purred it,
"Lynette…A pretty name. You take care as well."
Without another word, she gave a little dancing of fingers that approximated a wave, and slid out into the streets with an extra bounce in her step.
*