knightsoflegend | CHAPTER FOUR ♔ does it run in your blood to betray the ones you love

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CHAPTER FOUR ♔ does it run in your blood to betray the ones you love

WHO || Failboat, Rafael, Isabella, Nadia [Closed]
WHAT || After an exciting Grammy night, the Knights meet up with Nadia to hear what she has to say
WHERE || Staples Center, LA --> Warehouse
WHEN || Feb 8th, 2015 [back dated]
HOW || Actionspam

[ The Knights' mission to stop the signal and prevent Draken's cult from spreading whatever subliminal message was lurking beneath Keijen Blade's performance was a success. It didn't come without its bumps in the road, however: Alexander Anderson showed up, and the Knights ran afoul of the Mind Master. Buffy nearly died fighting Anderson, but in the end, he was defeated, beheaded, and hopefully put to death forever. Finnick, though, found himself thrust into a mental illusion that convinced him he might still be in the Hunger Games, and left him uncertain about whether any of his life here was real.

Another surprise came in the form of an announcement by Nadia Reichenov, an artist working with Crombe and company, that she was changing her band name and taking things in a 'new direction'. This direction was perhaps revealed when after her performance, she approached the Knights in Rafael's dressing room - and handed them the necklace that connects her to the Nightmare God Malaak'a, saying she was willing to tell them everything. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ ♬ song of imaginary beings - iamx ]

The pendants are from him. The necklace that her pendant was set into eventually was a gift, from her mother.

Blade went looking for Jade years ago, found her while she was living in Italy with him. [ she nods towards rafael without actually looking at him. rafael looks like he's gonna be sick again, clearly unprepared to hear about keijen and jade having an incest affair behind his back. weird. ] Her mother had kept her in the dark about her birth, and about who her father was. Blade knew that, and knew that she harbored resentment about it.

His approach to Jade was completely different than with... the rest of us. [ she can't stop herself from sounding just a little bitter ] Maybe because he knew that she was already madly in love with someone that she wouldn't willingly betray. Whatever the reason, he approached her and told her the truth - that he was her father, and that her mother had conspired to deny him access to her for her entire life.

If she was so angry with her mother for it- why use the necklace her mother gave her?

Wait.

Are you saying she was with him willingly after that? [ This might be even worse. ] It wasn't mind control?

[ Because her initial assumption in Venice was willing. But then incest. And now ? ?? Werwatey ?? ]

[ ♬ gods and monsters - lana del rey

she looks at buffy with a raised eyebrow, realizing what she's asking ] Not like that, no. She was never with him in... that way.

[ her eyes skate across the rest of them ] When Blade found her and told her the truth, he also gave her the offer he gave the rest of us. A pendant, in exchange for making her wildest dreams come true, the adoration she deserved, and the power to do whatever she wanted. It was a tempting offer, and she agreed to take the pendant, but she didn't use it - then.

It wasn't long after that, however, that she was put in a position where remaining in Italy was dangerous for her. [ rafael looks down at the floor, and isabella turns to watch his expression ] Apparently, Sehanine came to her in a dream, had learned that her father was looking for her, tried to tell her that he was dangerous without explaining why. She didn't know who to believe, since for all she knew, her mother had all but abandoned her as a child as well. Sehanine asked her to come stay on her plane, likely to keep Blade from reaching her, unaware that he already had.

Forced to choose between staying with Rafael and trusting her father, and retreating to safety with her mother, she decided to see what Rafael would say. If he asked her to remain, she would, according to what she told Blade. He took the opportunity to warn her that Rafael had never really loved her, and when he told her to go, it seemed to prove precisely that.

She went to live with her mother, but she kept the pendant hidden on her person. Apparently, she wasn't happy there though. She convinced her mother to return her to Earth where she wouldn't have to be alone. Her mother was worried that she would go looking for Rafael, and in the process, be found by Blade, so she gave her the necklace as a condition for her return. If she left the club, the magic of the necklace would drain her life slowly, encourage her to go back. Her other precaution was to wipe Jade's memories, to prevent her from even wanting to find Rafael. That backfired, however. Jade felt like something was missing, felt so incomplete that she turned to the pendant she still possessed, agreed to fully accept the deal. She set the pendant into the necklace, and the Nightmare Lord was able to corrupt the magic of the club, turning it into a decadent prison for her, one that would hopefully lead her to crave more of the power and adulation she received there.

They were hoping to lure her out to join them, find a way to break the connection between her and the club, and if not, use her for the cause until she burned out, and then use the necklace itself as the artifact for the ritual.

Can't say either of them is winning parent of the year, here. [A necklace that drains life is a terrible present for your child. And even if Jade was spared incest rape... well, a whole lot of other people weren't.]

No, but I think it's quite clear which one of them is entirely evil through all this. [ she looks uncertainly at nadia ] You really don't believe that any of the others would turn against him? Could be... could be helped?

I know what you are probably thinking. After we knew who he was to us, why would we stay when he ... did such things to us.

He is always quick to point out that our blood is the blood of the divine, and that the taboos that apply to mortals do not exist among our kind. Stories of gods are littered with examples - it is not as if he need look far to find them. For some, that was enough, because they wish to believe him. They crave all the power he has promised, and would do anything to achieve it.

I was... less convinced, but he has a way of turning the blame around on us, of pointing out that we desired him so much before we learned the truth, and making it sound like a shameful weakness of our character.

It took me a long time to see past that.

[ rafael looks down darkly again, conflicted ] It seems there is no end to how he will twist the truth as a weapon.

Do you... do you know what the others wished for, that the Nightmare Lord granted to them?

That I do not know. It's between each of us and the god himself.

And the Mind Master?

[ Not to derail all this Jade angst, but Buffy's still pretty concerned about the fact that (as someone presumably told her at some point) she just incapacitated Finnick, not to mention every other fucked up thing she's done. ]

Faking Draken and Dimitris out, I'm guessing. But then why pull Sarandis out of Andres? And where did she take him?

[ Because some people still have a bone to pick with that dickless wonder. ]

[ she shakes her head ] You probably know about as much as I do about her. She rarely talks to us, and when she does, she never reveals anything about herself. I think neither her nor Blade can read each other, but I am not certain what that means. She is... [ she folds her arms tightly around herself ] I do not know. There is something chilling about that woman. When she looks at you, it's like--- [ she all but shivers ] I do not know how to explain it. But I'm afraid I can tell you nothing about her for certain.

[With the mention of the Mind Master and Dimitris, Alainn's attention is brought sharply back into focus on the group and Nadia's next words. The fact that she had nothing more to contribute on that front than what they already knew disconcerted her beyond explanation. She says nothing still though, keeping herself out of the conversation.

/one more shit tag.]

Is she in on Keijen's little sideplan or is she Team Psycho-Church?

Like I said - I have no idea. If she was, I didn't know about it. But I wouldn't put that past Blade either.

Or she's out for her own completely separate agenda. [Now that they've discovered a secondary plan, Myri is starting to wonder if everyone on that side of things is out for themselves.]

Do you think we have any chance of bringing any of the others to break away from him? As you have?

Like I said, the rest of them have fully bought into his party line. None of them were all that interested in doing what was right before he came into their lives - they embrace their natures, as such. I don't believe there is such hope for any of them.

[ rafael takes a few steps away from them all, pausing there with his back to them. ] I-- [ isabella looks over at him, her every muscle tense. without looking back he says tightly: ] Buffy. May I have a word in private.

[ Buffy opens her mouth to unload another question on Nadia, not even noticing Rafael pace away, but his request interrupts her train of thought. She glances between them, briefly conflicted. Duty or … Well. She'd be lying if she said she didn't feel some sense of duty where Rafael was concerned as well, but that's not what has her pacing towards him now.

An apologetic look is offered to Myri, as if she knows this isn't the time, but given their conversation on the plane, Myri has to understand. Has to. Buried there is also the faith that Myri is better suited to getting information from Nadia anyway, and that this is better in her hands.

She moves to follow Rafael. ]

Yeah.

[ She agrees tacitly, dropping her gaze to deliberately avoid Isabella's eyes as she steps up shoulder-to-shoulder with Rafael.

In summary: Well, this has been fucking awkward. ]

Edited (s/v agreement) 2015-04-10 01:33 (UTC)

[Myri's eyes meet Buffy's and she gives the slightest nod of her head. They have plenty of people here. And while it isn't really the time to have a heart to heart, she could never deny Buffy the chance to speak to Rafael privately about... well, about anything. She can only hope that it will go better than she's sure Buffy is imagining it will.

As she watches them go, Myri turns back to Nadia.]

Is there anything else we should know?

The good news is that when you took the hourglass, it made it so that no other tieflings could take the deal. His resources are limited to the children he's already found - even if there are more of them out there, they can't help him without being able to travel to the Nightmare Lord's dimension.

Do you know how many have taken the deal? Cause I'm thinking it's not just Keijen we'll need to derail if we want your music heard over theirs.

They were looking to corner as many potential musical markets as posible, so there is myself and Keijen for the rock crowd, Rynn sings R&B, Devereaux for pop, Ted for country, and Natalia for latin music. Anything else they were hoping to establish was lost with the hourglass.

If they're listening to country willingly, it's too late to save 'em. [Spike, as always, has Opinions about music.] I mean, that's not even evil, that's just sad.

If we can't sway them to our side... can you at least give us any information on the best way to stop them?

[ she looks at them askance, frowning ] Well, the easiest way would be to kill them. That might be easier for some of them than others though.

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