Guests milled to and fro with that high society ease held only by those born to such a world... Or those well trained enough to disappear amidst the crowd. She supposed herself as a child of both worlds. Born to it, but bred for it. With a family that held such ambition, the likes of which extended far beyond her own, it was inevitable that she would find herself in such a situation.
Strange... That people who barely knew her could so comfortably swear loyalty and devotion.
All she could think of was how pretty their blood would look against the white of her dress. A cruel contraption the girl had been stuffed into for the night. It was a monster of lace and tulle, the bust so tight that already ample swells very nearly touched her chin and something obscene in the way that a slit up one side flashed far too much of an already heavily inked and well toned leg. She wasn't sure when her body had stopped being the instrument of death and instead something for aspiring suitors to gawk at. What she would give to run... But to where she didn't know. With a newly founded campaign and people looking to her for answers, the twenty year old knew she had to stay. Life hadn't beaten her yet, and be damned if she would let it now.
Something did feel different tonight, however. An itch beneath her skin... That shiver born of fine hairs rising across tanned flesh. Someone was watching her. And it wasn't the nauseating leers of those hoping to woo her that night.
No... This was a far more dangerous stare. That of a predator. One she had used herself all too often. There was a wolf among her flock... Another one, anyway...
The man before her is placated with soft smiles, arm touches and cute giggles for awful jokes as he drones on about the heiress and her bid to be the Dark Lord, not one bit of her attention actually focused on the middle aged male. No... From behind a mask of pure, crystalized tanzanite, emeralds more startling than even the other jewelled masks adorned by her guests sweeped the room at five second intervals. For someone here, did not belong...
Eventually excusing herself with the age old excuse of powdering her nose, the slender figure weaves through the bustling masses with an ease befitting the predator she knew watched her every move. The first thrill of excitement settles within her for the first time that night as she steps from the main ballroom, leaving behind the dancing aristocrats and lavish decorations for the peace of the outdoors. The patio led right out onto the tree line of the dense forest that bordered the establishment rented for this event and her hand finds the railing just in time to jump over it and avoid the bullet that had been fired.
Heels are discarded mid air and she lands with barely enough time to swing a bare foot at the flash of deepest coal visible only thanks to illumination from the moon herself. Her kick, however, meets thin air and she completes the rotation; but not in time to stop the blow that lands just right of her left kidney.
But he hadn't seen the blade slide into his lung...
They stop and stare, eyes of a smoke filled sunset staring into fields of fresh green and what little breath remained in her body is exhaled slowly. He was beautiful... Even behind the mask... She could see the strong features, the glimpse of coal had been his hair and you would be hard put to decide who was more shocked in that moment.
After all, he had a gun to her head and she a second blade to his heart.
His lips curl, a sneer or a smirk she couldn't tell and the barest click is heard as he moves to pull the trigger. She reacts on instinct and drives the dagger in his lung upwards, unwilling to kill him just yet. He would have information she needed. Yet this doesn't stop him. Her eyes widen and she snarls, a beautifully dangerous sound and one not meant to come from a human throat. Not a second later sees him thrown from her with a strength not born of physicality alone, pure magic having done most of the work and her snarl is returned, her own smirk showing now as they begin to trade blows, neither willing to give it seemed. He matched her, blow for blow and every swing blocked or absorbed by a well built body. But she was not called untouchable as some gimmick...
By the time he's pinned the ground is littered with blood. Her hair has left the sleek updo it had been painstakingly pinned into and is now falling around them in loose curls of most delicate blue silk. Bruises are forming across one side of her face like a blossoming of dark petals and he had fired off a shot that hit home within her shoulder at some point... Adrenaline was a killers best friend all too often...
The once beautiful dress had been torn to shreds, leaving much of her legs bare as they rest either side of his hips, the mans own tailored suit doing nought to hide the small arsenal he seemed to be carrying. And she had to admire him for his audacity.
To show up at one of her events and attempt an assassination like this. Few would have the nerve. Fewer still the skill. And so there was only once person it could be...
"Death Dealer... Quite the honour. I must be shaking a few things up if I'm important enough to have you sent after me..." Her voice, while soft, is somewhat thick with a Welsh accent and yet still maintains an element of sweetness.
She watches him carefully, searching for something, any kind of reaction... But there was nothing. Even as she sat there straddling him, leering and boasting... He didn't at all react. His eyes were as dead as the whispers said... Devoid of anything but the most basic instinct. Survival.
It's her shock that allows him his chance and within seconds her back hits the floor, forcing all air from the womans lungs in a way which burnt terrifically. Her low growl is more playful than anything and she stares back, smirking with unashamed arousal. He was still yet to speak a word, and she sought to change that...
"You have me in a position many would die to see, love... The question is, what will you do with me?" There's little playfulness in her tone now for she realised how precarious her position was, despite the actual words and as he blinks down at her, she feels the cold metal of a barrel pressed flush to her head once more.
The survival instinct did not only exist within him. So she fights once more. Her body contorts drastically, both legs pulled from beneath him with a grunt and up to her chest so that she can launch him backwards with a heavy thud that leaves both crouched upon the rapidly softening ground and snarling at one another. He could have killed her... Twice now by her count. So why hadn't he?
Rain begins to fall in the softest of mists, the kind that soon soaks through and chills a person to the bone. But again, he didn't even notice. Not that she was exactly shivering but... His magic didn't even move. He strikes just as she does.
To watch blood mix with water is a truly strange thing. The way it disperses, even as droplets in the air and, as she looks down to the hole in her abdomen that a lucky twist had moved away from her heart, a spluttered cough spatters blood across the mans face just as she lowers her lips to his ear.
"Gotcha..."
For years to come, Cole would swear he had not replied, or made any sound at all. Branwen would tell you that the second she tore into his throat with her bare teeth was the moment that set them on a path neither would have ever thought to travel... And the first time he said her name so softly..