20. Amber Hart
The space behind the altar is dark, so dark that even Amber's vampiric eyes have a difficult time adjusting. But the walls and floor are smoothly hewn stone, and she can feel the opening precisely where Dona Dominguez said it would be. There's a wooden door set into the wall and it opens onto a room lit by what looks like soft moonlight, enough for Amber to see every corner of the room. It's surprisingly mundane, something like a cloakroom or a ready room at a production studio, perhaps. The "moonlight" comes from a recessed few lamps and the room has four free-standing basins that contain what Amber's nose determines to be pure, cool water. The walls have several robes - not full-body garments like the Dominguez Family wore to their ritual, but bathrobes - hanging from hooks and they smell freshly laundered. The place looks more like a room for ritual cleansing than it does for bathing, as much as she'd dearly like to wash away the unclean - and enticing - blood that clings to her.
Amber stands with her back to one of the walls and waits, breathing evenly, working to smooth away the emotions the ceremony raised in her. She doesn't particularly need to breathe, but the action is calming, centering her in her human part. A weakness? Maybe. But it's her weakness to cherish and protect, if so.
The door opens and closes softly a minute or two later, and Dona Dominguez slides into the room in near silence. Even the padding of her bare feet on the stone is imperceptible. Blood decorates her hands and seeps halfway down her forearms, spatter marking the rest of her body in little drips and lines. And while she's still naked and gloriously so, the edge to it is gone. The mantle of the dark goddess of the ritual has faded somewhat, and Amber can look at her without that reflexive urge to continue staring and staring, drinking in everything she is and says. "Come. Wash away the blood of the guilty with me."
While she doesn't phrase it as a request, there isn't the sharp bark of an order to her words either. Amber rolls up the sleeves of her robe and splashes water across her face and and hands, as well as her neck, everywhere she got splattered. It would be a bit easier if she simply shucked the robe, and she's not usually self-conscious about being naked, but finds herself unwilling to do so at the moment. Only when she's done washing and ready to trade it out for a bathrobe does she undo the belt. "Not what I was expecting when I came here today," she offers an opening to the conversation, to be answered or dismissed as the Dona pleases.
Blood slicks from the Dona's hands and body as she washes herself slowly and thoroughly. At first it seems like she's not going to respond, but as the last droplets are cleansed from a softly glistening thigh, she looks at Amber, eyes dark and gaze heavy. "My people honor traditions much, much older than this upstart nation. Older even than the Christ brought here with Don Siveri's people. I wanted you to see one of them. The one closest to our kind."
"Not the sort of place you want to give up to some self-destructive upstarts with no sense of history." Amber gives her opinion of the cartel rather than comment on the ritual. She squares her shoulders and meets the heavy gaze. "I'm not here to judge, but to resolve the legal situation to your satisfaction," she further pushes away her own opinions with the mask of professionalism. She wishes she had a handful of papers to straighten for an added gesture.
"I see why he keeps you." The Dona comments idly, donning a bathrobe but not closing it, completely unbothered by her nakedness. Or perhaps it's just a power play. "Siveri had little time for such things, as well. Very well. Speak to me about what you've learned and done."
She'll take her complements where she can get them. "As you say. I spoke with Mr. Blakely to discuss why he was looking to divest Qualified Management of this place, and followed the trail through several layers of indirection. The Mendozas have been quite helpful," she drops in her little line for Teressa. "The source of the trouble seems to be a mortal named Hernan Salazar. He feels he has to send you a message or lose face, after your recent expansion."
The saint nods, once, her waterfall of black hair falling around her shoulders. "Then what is to be done about this... Salazar?" There's a silken danger in her husky voice, the promise of crimson altars and guttural prayers.
"That's what I wanted to speak with you about, to present various options and find a way to resolve things tidily." Her initial thought, to involve herself further, has gone by the wayside, thrown out with the first splatter of ritual blood against her face. "Simply killing him will only make the problem worse. A drug cartel is not to be trifled with - murdering someone so highly placed would deepen the conflict, and all-out war is a poor outcome for everyone involved." She neatly sums up 'lots of people on all sides will die' with a tidy euphemism. "You've intruded on their territory and their business, and they have to respond. Your choices are to continue to fight, learn to coexist, join together, or back down. I propose the second."
"My family give ground to these upstarts?" She muses, with a tone of outrage at the idea, but not directed at Amber. "Very well. I will instruct one of my children to arrange a meeting with this man, and we'll... work something out. But before I do, I must be in a position of strength." She focuses her attention fully on Amber again. "Destroy these paper swords they have levied at my domain, and I will handle the rest." She reaches out a hand, suddenly far too close, and caresses Amber's cheek, cold flesh against cold. "You've done very well to bring this to me." The Dona murmurs softly. This close she smells like a subtle aroma of woodsmoke and blood, the scent somehow intoxicating like a sweet perfume. "I will give you something for your service. A secret about the one you serve to carry close to your heart."
Amber's breath catches in her throat, cutting off entirely as she goes still under the touch. A secret about Siveri? She wants it, she wants to know more about him. For someone so important to her, she knows precious little that he hasn't chosen to share for some specific purpose. How lovely, to have a secret of her own to cradle, both to keep her warm when she feels alone and to cool her down when she feels stifled by his presence. "I'll... I'll establish two layers of holding companies. You can purchase the building through them, without anyone you don't trust in the loop," she manages to put together a proposal, even through the welter of emotions called up by the touch and the offer of a reward.
The Dona draws Amber's suddenly slack body into an embrace, her flesh soft and welcoming, if cold. That curtain of black hair draws around Amber, and there might be no one else in the world but Dona Dominguez and her, a shudderingly intimate illusion. "Once, Don Siveri was no Don at all, born to flesh as common as any other. He was a caballero, a man of what the Spaniards called chivalry and honor, though none recognized him as such but one." Her voice is hypnotic, just above a whisper and for Amber alone. Amber lays against the Dona's chest, captured completely by the spell.
"He served a queen without a throne. A woman called mad by those greedy for the gold on her brow." Fingers stroke Amber's cheek and jaw slowly, holding her against the Dona's breasts. Her whisper is so soft that Amber feels more than hears it. "Siveri failed her. He failed her so completely and utterly that he fled all the way across the world to escape his shame."
She can almost see it, visions of the past coming to life before her eyes, achingly real. It makes her... it makes her want to run to him, to take a knee and pledge herself to him more completely than she has, admit her weaknesses and become the knight he was unable to be. Creatures of the ancient world, this Dona and her Don, romantic and powerful in a way entirely lacking in the modern era. It's not real, she knows, but for a few moments she leans into the illusion, yearning after things that can never be. The truth is never so simple and romantic as that.
"I came to know him only after. Ah... how exquisite those days were..." The Dona responds to Amber's enrapture, reminiscing with a surge of seemingly genuine wistfulness. "How I hated him... and how worthy of my hate he was... the men of your age are so weak, Amber Hart." Her lips wrap their way around Amber's name in a way that seems almost lascivious. "If you learn nothing else from seeing our ways, servant of my hated foe, I wish you to learn that. See what strength is, learn what greatness tastes of." She leans closer, voice a whisper of promise. "Demand it. Settle for nothing less."
Salazar comes to mind - how weak he is, venal and blind. Not because he's mortal, but as a person. Amber might once have feared him, but never would she have respected him. He's not worthy of hate, the way this monster of the old world is. Did the Dona intend to bind her more closely to her regnant? Wrapped here in a woman's arms, she can only think of the one man she's never imagined as unworthy her emotions, love and hate alike.
"Good... I can see the truth written in your eyes." The Dona croons softly. "You will make for a fine enemy, in time." She tilts Amber's chin up imperiously, and leans down to kiss her, once and briefly. The touch of the Dona's lips is passionate but... not a passion Amber is familiar with. Not smirking and amused like Velo. Not eager and nervous like Carissa, and certainly not the excited devotion of Kev... it reminds her, in a way, of kissing Siveri. A passion not restrained, but understood, carefully cataloged and examined from all angles in the mind that spawned it. But less warm, less equal, regal and removed. Dona Dominguez does not kiss a lover. She only ever kisses supplicants.
Monster of the ancient world, the words stick in Amber's mind. Goddess on a throne, looking down on all of them and judging them strong enough to be interesting. Amber doesn't resist the kiss - how could she - but she has no passion of her own to match it. If the Dona wanted to remind her of her own smallness, and surely she did, it worked.
The bloody saint pulls away after a moment, licking her lips once, thoughtfully, as though tasting all of Amber's being. "Yes... in time. Such promise in this city..." She muses with evident pleasure at the thought. "Now go. Do as I have bid you and..." She takes Amber's measure with those dark, endless eyes. "I may have more use for you. And in return... you wish to know more of the one you bend the knee before." The Dona smiles broadly.
"Yes ma'am," Amber takes a deep breath and nods, straightening her robe and attempting to regain some of her composure and emotional distance. "I'll have the paperwork delivered early next week." She hesitates, tempted to ask for a boon she can deliver to the Mendozas, but shakes her head and thinks better of it it. With a little half bow, she backs out of the room and into the darkness and very relative safety of the hallway. Probably not anyone reading her soul out here, just guns and knives. Far less dangerous.
Amber finds Carissa easily - the path between library and the building Amber will soon own is short, and she's heading home from said library, dressed in the same warm, fuzzy pink sweater as before, but different jeans. In some detached, idle part of her brain, she wonders if they're tighter than the last pair. Amber's honestly not entirely sure why she's here - she ought to be at home recovering some balance, thinking through what happened, but instead her feet have led her to Carissa. She's still wearing the same tank top and jeans as she was for the Dominiguez compound, though she has made a concession to the weather and pulled on a hoodie. Or maybe she just wants to feel a bit more covered up. "Hi," she makes her presence known, hands in her pockets. Her shoulders don't hunch. That's not a thing Amber Hart does. She cracks her neck and straightens up. No monsters around at the moment, just her.
"Hi!" Carissa says, noticing her, excited in a way that strikes Amber as achingly mundane. After the sterile passions of a being that could truthfully be called a god, Carissa's genuine excitement at seeing Amber feels like leaping into a cold pool on a hot day - or perhaps a hot tub on a stark winter morning. Carissa fumbles with her books for a bit and hugs Amber with one arm a little awkwardly.
Amber returns the hug fiercely, holding the lively little bundle of humanity and warmth against her with palpable relief. Tension rushes out of her like a dam breaking, and she feels a stinging in her eyes that would certainly be tears if she were capable of crying. "Hi," she repeats again, not yet ready to release the hug.
"Are you alright, Amber?" Carissa asks in her ear, shifting in all the uncountable little human ways that you don't realize are there at all until you no longer have to do them. She smells like... soap, a cheap-but-not-terrible floral perfume, a dollop of coconut moisturizer spread across the neck, shoulders, the upper curve of her breasts, and her fingers. And under that... the rushing fire of blood pounding through her veins. No. Absolutely not. That's not what she's here for.
"I... uh, I'm not sure. Can we go to your place?" She lets go, holding Carissa at arm's length, enjoying the mishmash of smells that comes from living, lacking the purity and timelessness of the dead. She knows her own scent is far simpler.
"Sure! Um... I should call Neela and let her know..." Carissa chats merrily with her roommate on the way back to the building, despite occasional worried glances in Amber's direction, and Amber manages to force the delicious roar of Carissa's heartbeat to the back of her mind.
When they arrive, Neela isn't home. Apparently she was out tonight doing late-night wind sprints, which Carissa describes with the subdued horror of one talking about some grand atrocity in the distant past. Carissa sets down her books on the narrow kitchen's small dining table, groaning and placing both hands on the small of her back while she tries to straighten out properly. "Ohhhhhhhhh why did I take six classes this semester?" She groans.
"Because you're dedicated and smart and you can handle it," Amber answers the rhetorical question, coming up behind Carissa and gently pushing her towards the wall, so she can use her weight and both fists to work out the kinks in Carissa's back. She's managed to put away some of her confusion during the walk over, more her usual self than she was a few minutes ago and less likely to burst into tears if she dares put blood in her veins. It's all still there of course, but just... less important, at the moment.
Carissa groans in pleasure at the unexpected massage, bracing herself against the wall and letting Amber work. "You're an angel..." She moans. Amber can see the broken window where Liam lunged at her hasn't been repaired yet. They've covered it with a firmly fastened and taped-down tarp. Even still, it'd probably be cold in here if Amber noticed such things, especially with her minimal clothing.
"Hardly," she snorts. "Landlord hasn't fixed the window yet?" Amber inquires as she works, pressing out first the stress in the lower back before starting to move upwards with firm pressure.
"Not yet... hopefully next week..." Carissa stretches like a cat under Amber's hands. "Neela and I sleep in the same bed for now... and in sweaters."
"Now see, if I were an angel I wouldn't be imagining that quite so vividly," Amber comments, moving up to the neck. "On the plus side, I can promise your shitty landlord problems won't last much longer."
"Ohhhhhhh- don't give Neela ideas unless you're ready to follow through," Carissa teases gently. Amber can feel warmth pulsing out from Carissa's soft skin with each beat of her heart. "And - ah - how do you mean?"
"QM, the current owners, are going out of business. The company I work for is buying the building," Amber gives three quarters of the truth, leaving out the fact that she'll be the technical owner, even if up to her neck in debt to Siveri because of it. "I'll have a word about the window with the property manager," she grins, enjoying the little touch of purely mortal power. "But why shouldn't I give her that sort of idea?" Amber returns to the fascinating subject broached by the woman squirming under her hands. "Too shy to ask yourself, need me to break the ice?" she leans in, whispering the words into Carissa's ear from behind.
Carissa shivers, lips parting just a little as she sucks in a little breath. "W-well-" She groans, cutting herself off. "Remember- last time? You got me so worked up and then just left me here..." She's trying to be a little coy, but the effect is ruined by the little shivers Amber can feel. "And sometimes..." She flushes furiously, but seems emboldened by Amber's hands. "Sometimes I used to... listen to her and..."
"And what, my horny little Carissa? What did you do while listening to your roommate?" Amber pushes her up against the wall with her hips, pressing against her back so there's no escape. "What were you imagining?"
Carissa groans, pressed flat against the wall. "I used to... touch myself, listening to her. Thinking it was me with her - that I got to touch - all over her legs and..." She bites her lip, legs spreading a bit. "Her ass. We had thin walls, and she likes to be loud..."
Amber's energy lasts a few seconds longer, enough to nibble on Carissa's ear, before it collapses and she's left feeling just... empty. Drained. Her arms around Carissa's waist turn from dominating to simply hugging, and she stops pressing the other woman against the wall. "I... I'm not sure I can do it right now," she hates to admit any such weakness or lack of drive. She rests her chin on Carissa's shoulder from behind.
Carissa blinks and has to take a few moments to obviously shift gears. "Oh- oh. That's okay." She covers Amber's hands with her own. "I thought you wanted..."
"It's just... what you do, when a cute girl starts talking about things like that." Amber gives a shrug, still holding Carissa from behind. Amber's hands are cold, both from lack of blood and from the winter weather. "Force of habit. Sorry."
"No, that's not what I meant. I thought you wanted to... because you seemed like you had a rough day." She blushes at the admitting of her own presumption.
Amber bites her lip, hesitating at that. Admitting weakness is hard. Harder than she thought it would be. "I have had the roughest of days. Can we, I don't know, watch something?"
"Sure." Carissa frowns a little. "As soon as I get you something warm to drink and maybe a blanket. You're freezing." She turns in Amber's arms and smiles, still a little bashful at being intimate with her. "We can talk about it... if you want."
"I'm always cold," Amber agrees with the first half, avoiding the second. "First boyfriend said my feet are like blocks of ice. A blanket sounds nice."
Carissa kisses Amber's cheek and slips away to get said blanket. Amber hears a water faucet turn, and the splash of water against flesh, before Carissa returns and sits on the apartment's modest couch and pats the cushion next to her.
Amber doesn't want to lie any more. For one blissful moment she considers just... being honest. It's not something she can afford most of the time, not around Siveri and certainly not around the Dona. But it's not honesty she craves, after a moment of imagining it. The opposite, in fact. She doesn't want to be as she is, but as Carissa imagines she is. She wants the blanket to help warm her up, wants this to just be 'a bad day.' And so rather than the truth, she indulges in the fantasy. The blanket does warm her up. Carissa feels heat returning to her hands as they cuddle. There's not one heartbeat on the couch but two.
Carissa cuddles like a pro, soft in all the right places and warm. And while the thirst gnaws at the back of Amber's mind, reminding her of Carissa's beating heart pumping life through her veins, it's easier to ignore in the fantasy of being a living human with boring, small problems. "Need to talk, or need to not think about it?" Carissa asks softly after a few minutes of quiet companionship.
"I... not think about it, I think. Work stuff." Amber answers. Then, as always seems to happen, a moment later she can't avoid continuing the subject. "There's a client giving me problems. Can't really talk about it."
"Mmm. I bet they're very picky." She says with a hint of a tease in her voice. "Always wanting to micromanage. Or maybe they're not giving you any direction at all..." She guesses, overacting her thoughtful ruminating.
"More, ah... political differences." Despite the fact that she was the one who brought it up, Amber's not sure she actually wants to dance around the subject anymore. It does seem to be lightening her mood a bit though. "Bringing politics and religion in is always bad for business."
Carissa nods in a sort of long-suffering camaraderie. "Boomers." She says with great and solemn agreement.
Amber laughs. "Something like that anyway." She reaches around to scritch the back of Carissa's head, leaving the arm wrapped around her shoulder. "So what're you watching these days?"