Rose raced into her mother's arms, then turned and stared up at Vorador. Vorador in turn stared down in bemusement at her. After a moment, her face expanded into a happy, pleased expression and ran toward him to climb into his arms. Seeing the little thing coming toward him, Vorador caught her by the back hem of her shirt, holding her by his thumb and foreclaw. He held her away from his body as if she were a disgusting bug and handed her back to Lara.

"Take this, if you would be so kind."

Raziel raised an eyebrow and suppressed a dark chuckle, saying instead, "Multiple wives, but no desire for children?"

"I did not become a vampire to be a father, Raziel. And fledglings often act enough like children to remind me why I do not wish to ever have living children."

Lara took a hold of Rose, then turned her toward the door. "Why don't you find out what Bryce is doing?"

"Pet nerd!" Rose ran out into the house as Lara turned back to Vorador and Raziel.

"That problem's solved. Now, I suppose we'll need to prepare for the coming battle, won't we?" Lara asked. Raziel nodded. During the conversation, Lara led them into the house and then into the reclining room, indicating the chairs for them to sit in.

"By this point Moebius has set himself up in a nice little fortress and has all sorts of nasty surprises waiting for us. He knows we need the blade and we'll jump over any hurdle he puts in our way."

"It's also very likely he will have Hylden acting as guards and scouts," Vorador added.

A sudden scream and a large crash sounded from further in the house. Raziel smirked and Vorador's head snapped up to angel itself toward the direction the sound came from, his eyebrows knitting together in concern. Lara made a soothing, negation gesture.

"Do not trouble yourself with it. It's only Rose destroying whatever Bryce was doing."

Vorador leaned forward, interested. "That sounded like a loss of life crash. Aren't you concerned?"

"No." She shook her head. "Rose would never hurt him. She just loves to antagonize him. She has much the same touch for technology that I do."

"Who, may I inquire, is this Bryce?"

"Bryce is my technological genius, though I would never refer to him as such when he's within hearing range. He's naïve and very sheltered, but he has one of the strongest grasps on technology and its workings I have ever seen. Once you know and are a bit more comfortable with the technical terms, I'd suggest asking him. He'll give you an earful of jumble, but once you sort it out, it usually contains the answer to your questions."

The door opened and Rose came in, looking sad. Lara looked down at her a moment before picking her up.

"Pet nerd kicked me ou', Mummy."

"What'd you break?"

"Dunno." She shrugged. "Something he called a 'vir'ual relty' 'quipment, or something."

Lara sighed, but hid a smile. Rose had destroyed Bryce's virtual reality toys? That was going to be expensive to replace, but it was worth it watching him bemoan his loss of his VR. Lara glanced down to rub Rose's head when she noticed Rose climbing off her lap and running over toward Vorador again. Expecting this, Vorador leaned slightly down, placed the palm of his clawed hand against her forehead, and held her there. She struggled against his hand to try and climb up into his lap a good ten, twenty minutes before finally tiring herself out and sullenly going and climbing into Raziel's lap where she fell asleep.

Raziel and Vorador began a discussion on how best to handle the coming fight, which after a few hours drifted into stories of old, and grievances they had with people on Nosgoth. The name of 'Malek' was mentioned many a time during it, but Lara managed only to scrap together the fact he was a man of some sort that Vorador hated with a fiery passion.

Lara watched them, left out of the conversation as a whole, but it was something she didn't mind. She watched the vampire and Soul Reaver talk, noted the changes in expression, the motions of the hands. Unlike Kain, Vorador and Raziel spoke much through their expressions, something Kain rarely did and something she had taught herself not to do. But her eyes stayed on Raziel and she found herself realizing that was part of what drew her to him. He was powerful, strong, and quite capable of taking care of himself in any situation. And yet he still showed what he thought like a beacon, and Lara felt that it had been thousands of years since she had met anyone who did that. She became aware of the fact that Nigel knew she didn't like to be touched, and respected it. He didn't try to, even if he wanted to. Raziel was capable of pulling her into his arms and not forcing her to be there, or making her want to be there. He just allowed her to realize she wanted to be there. She shook her head. She didn't need to do this to herself. He didn't need her, nor did he want her to be there. She could live with that. She just knew she was very much going to miss him when he left, possibly even for the rest of her life.

She snorted mentally and shook her head to get rid of the thought. 'I'm beginning to sound like someone out of a soap opera,' she thought disgustedly. 'So he doesn't need you. So he's going to go. Life's like that. It's time to move on. After all, you do have Nigel . . .'

But a distaste so profound welled up in her, she felt she might almost be physically sick. And it finally dawned on her that she really did want Raziel and would only want him. There was really going to be no one else who she could ever be closed to. And she knew with that admission that she had signed the contract to a lonely, single life.

Raziel suddenly glanced at her, and she was captured by his gaze. Neither moved, studying the other's eyes and wondering why they felt this attraction for one another. A low cough drew their attention away from each other and made them aware of the fact that Vorador was still in the room.

There was a sudden knock at the door and Hillary stepped in.

"Miss Croft?" As she looked up, he brought in a little cup of tea and a kettle for her and set it down on the little foot table next to her. He glanced at the other two men in the room.

"I remembered that Lord Raziel did not require any tea, but I seemed to have neglected to inquire as to whether you would like any, Mr. . ."

"Vorador," the master vampire responded. "And, no thank you. I have about the same taste for tea that Raziel does."

"Very good, sir." Hillary nodded politely to them, then backed out of the room. Lara poured herself a cup of tea and sat back in her chair with a sigh, breathing in the warmth the rose to her. She took a small sip before a sudden tapping at the window drew her attention away from it. Vorador stood and flipped the window open easily and a shadow snaked in with the grace of a cat. It came to rest near his feet in a crouch and Lara identified it as the male vampire that had been holding Jials up earlier.

"My Lord, we have found him."

"Speak. Where as he hidden himself away?"

"To the west of here in a large mansion he has sheltered himself away. The place is crawling from top to bottom in Hylden and traps. A few of the others are keeping an eye on it. We couldn't even get in. Had we tried, we would have set off an alarm, so we do not know where in the house the Reaver is."

Vorador nodded acceptance. He looked to Raziel and Lara.

"If we're going to go, we have to do it now before he becomes aware to my presence here."

"Fine." Lara glanced at a clock. "Give me one hour to get together all the weapons all need."

The next hour burned past as vampires darted in and out of the house, preparing themselves to work as back up and Lara and Raziel threw the things they needed into duffel bags. Guns, extra ammunition, and a few higher-powered explosives were thrown into the bag. Unbeknownst to Raziel and Lara, when they were turned away doing something else, a small ball rolled into the bag. A second later, a little four-year-old girl climbed in after it. Raziel turned around and zipped up the bag, picked it up, and set it in the car they were going to be taking. Lara packed away her guns, then slipped her backpack on her back again. She glanced at Raziel and he nodded. It was time to get going.

The car rumbled into life and the driver eased it out of her driveway and down the way. The trip was extremely silent, and when they got closer to their goal, the car's headlights went out. Out of the mist rose a huge building that even Lara would hesitate to call a mansion. The windows were all sealed shut except for a few and the ones that were open had light pouring out of them. The car pulled over to the edge and was shut off, allowing the all-encompassing silence to sneak in. Then, with no word spoken among any of them, they all piled out of the car and made their way slowly toward the mansion. There were a few Hylden guards walking around, obviously on patrol, but the vampires traveling with them made short work of them. They made their way cautiously to the front door. A short way back from it, Vorador touched both Raziel's and Lara's shoulder.

"You two seem to be the 'front-door' type, so I'm going to let you handle that. Moebius has probably put more guards on the back and side doors, as that's usually the way anyone goes. I'll take my scouts around the back ways and meet up with you. We'll see who finds the Reaver, and coincidentally Moebius, first."

He teleported away, presumably toward the other side of the house, and the vampires vanished into the night as if mentally called. Raziel grabbed the duffel bags and set one down near the door, then slung the other one over his back. Raziel and Lara exchanged a single look and smiled. Then she moved forward and kissed him passionately. This was what she had missed; the lure of adventure and the thrill of desire. Both turned back to the house and moved to the door. Raziel touched her cheek gently once, then kicked the door in, causing it to fly back about ten yards, having ripped out its own hinges. Raziel stepped in, Reaver extended and ready, Lara next to him, pistols cocked.