Eric

[borgiafatale]

Lucrezia did not take Eric's advice and leave her silver at home. But she did have the silver knife inside her purse with absolutely no intention of bringing it out unless it was a matter of life and death. After talking to Michael (and then, inevitably, Cesare, because Michael simply couldn't keep anything from her brother), she was even more wary of the idea of vampires than she'd been before. Her brother had also very intentionally not warned her away from them, and she was smart enough to know that he probably saw how she might be useful. And that didn't bother her. She was a Borgia, after all. And she had a lot of anger and unrest at the moment. Best to distract herself. And finding out more about vampires seemed like an awfully good distraction. As did finding out more about her brother's connection to vampires, which he hadn't exactly been forthcoming about.

So she went back to the Blood Diamond one night. Alone, this time. It was a warm night, one of the first in a while, and so she was wearing a white fluttery dress spotted with red cherry blossoms, and red heels. She wondered if there was something she should or should not wear to look more or less like a snack. She had no idea. Would a tight black leather dress have been better or worse?

She garnered a few looks as she walked in, going to the bar. She ordered an old fashioned, and looked up to the balcony, wondering if she would see Eric. She supposed she could ask for him, though she wanted to look around a bit first.

Comments

[thenorthman]

"So he was once a beast?" Eric asked, interest in the topic undisguised in his eyes.

[borgiafatale]

Lucrezia laughed, though there was not a great deal of mirth in it. "No, not really. He was just a man. But less dull and mewling then."

[thenorthman]

"He sounds awful," Eric pointed out, reclining in the couch and resting his arm on its back. He could have easily touched Lucrezia's hair, if he had wanted to.

[borgiafatale]

"I'm not sure that my marriage troubles constitute small talk," Lucrezia pointed out.

[thenorthman]

"I never said I wanted to limit myself to small talk," Eric shot back, his slight smile growing more pronounced. And so, perhaps more dangerous-looking.

[borgiafatale]

"Ah," said Lucrezia, not sounding surprised at all. Nor intimidated by his smile. She simply smiled serenely back at him. "Well, then if I answer questions about my husband will you answer questions about vampires?"

[thenorthman]

A note of approval crept into his smile, and he inclined his head slightly in assent. Of course, she'd already answered his questions, but he could get even more personal, that way.

[borgiafatale]

"Well," said Lucrezia, recognizing that Eric had already gotten a question in to her, "Based on what happened with - Serena, was it? - and her devoted follower, I'm guessing you have some kind of mind control abilities. I'd like to know what that does and how it works."

[thenorthman]

She was asking him a question she already knew the answer to; Eric did not believe for a moment that Borgia would not have told her sister all about it. So she was likely checking that he would not lie to her; of course, he did not. "We call them glamours, others call them compulsions. They require eye contact, and allow us to impose our will over that of a human."

[borgiafatale]

He was correct. She was checking to see if he told her the truth, and also whether he would tell her more or less than what Cesare had told her.

"How strong is it?" she asked. "I assume you could make someone bark like a dog. Make them let you bite them." She tried to think of an extreme. "Could you make them kill themselves?"

[thenorthman]

"Could I, or could any vampire?" Eric asked, amused and unsurprised at the turn of her questions.

[borgiafatale]

Lucrezia looked intrigued by that clarification. "Could an average vampire... which I assume you are not."

[thenorthman]

She was free to assume whatever she wanted. "Depends on the type of vampire," Eric replied, sounding slightly bored now. She already knew there were several kinds; Borgia would not have left that out either. They were all the more dangerous for it, since you could never be sure what would hurt any random vampire.

[borgiafatale]

She noted the boredom in his voice. "Okay then," she said, "the last on this, I promise. First, can you do it, and second, is there any way to protect oneself from it?"

[thenorthman]

"I can do it, and no," Eric replied, tilting his head towards her curiously. And paying attention to her heartbeat, of course; she might not let her reaction show. "But your brother's already told you all this."

Of course, there were some vampires you could stop from compelling you, but Eric's sort, thankfully, was not one of them.

[borgiafatale]

She was not completely surprised by the response, so she had no particular reaction.

"Yes," she confirmed. "But I couldn't say for certain how much he would have told me - or how much he might know in the first place. After all, maybe you like me better. I'm blonde, after all." A little smirk pulled at her lips. "Also, if you can summon one of your employees I could use another drink." At least, if she was going to be forced to talk about Allan.

[thenorthman]

Eric didn't summon his employees; he looked over at them, and they knew enough to come over. This time, it was a strapping young man with dark skin and piercing blue eyes. "Ms Borgia requires a drink," Eric told him.

"Whan can I get you, Ms?" the waiter asked with a helpful smile.

[borgiafatale]

Dear god were they all so attractive? Though perhaps Eric just liked to surround himself with particularly beautiful people.

"Old fashioned, please," she said with a smile back at him.

[thenorthman]

The waiters in the VIP area also doubled as willing meals if any of the vampires up here asked, so they were, of course, all particularly attractive. "Right away," this one assured her, picked up her empty glass, and turned to go.

Eric watched her watch him, and only spoke when she turned her gaze back to him. "Why don't you leave him? Your dull, mewling husband."

[borgiafatale]

Lucrezia looked at him for a moment. She hadn't even said this to Cesare yet.

"I am waiting for the moment that will be most beneficial to me," she said.

[thenorthman]

"That might be a long wait," Eric remarked. It might be more beneficial not to simply wait, really.

[borgiafatale]

"Then I may create a beneficial moment," Lucrezia said evenly, just as the man returned with her drink. She took it from him with a smile of thanks.

[thenorthman]

It was obvious that the human waiter wanted to linger, taken in with Lucrezia, but Eric dismissed him with a simple look. He turned back to Lucrezia. "And how do you expect to benefit from it, exactly? What is it you're after, Lucrezia?" He asked the question as he started playing with a lock of her hair, his arm lined on the back of the couch again.

[borgiafatale]

Lucrezia's gaze lingered briefly on the waiter as well, before looking back to Eric.

Her pulse may have sped up just slightly when he touched her. Just slightly.

"I want to have the upper hand," she said, and then rolled her eyes. "He has a mistress. Which is hardly even a scandal anymore - he'll probably marry her right after, talking about true love, and no one will fault him for it. Meanwhile, I am the woman who inexplicably cannot keep her husbands happy, a twice-divorced spinster not yet thirty. And I suppose there's money, too, but that's secondary beyond what losing it will do to his pride." She lifted her chin a bit, realizing that she'd begun to look down at her hands. "And this isn't about being a jilted wife. If he'd been honest with me I would have told him he could fuck who he liked so long as he was discreet. If I found out, I can't imagine who else has."

[thenorthman]

"It's a well-known secret," Eric confirmed. Of course he kept up to date with what was happening to the politicians, especially the ones residing and wielding power in London. "But anyone who hasn't remained stuck in century-old morality won't find fault with you."