Road Trip!

[Robin Stanton]

Robin yawns and stretches in her train compartment as it rattled along the French country-side, past Amiens and further south. She'd planned to leave Maldon first thing in the morning but had gotten delayed by some last minute repacking (had to check her things for obvious signs of Dad-stowaways, naturally) and then ended up saying good-bye to a couple of friends. By the time she got to Dover she'd had to wait for the afternoon ferry and ended up taking a less-then-direct train out of Calais with a rough destination of Paris in mind. In the end this suits her just fine, she's in no rush and this is nicer for watching the landscape go by than a high-speed TGV anyway. She's from a place that is very streamlined by technology and she can't remember when she last just existed in a liminal space like this for any significant amount of time. By the time the train pulls into Clermont she's made up her mind about what to do next. Rather than continue on the train until Paris she gets off at the station and sets out on foot.

Soon enough she leaves the last outliers of the city behind and finds herself at the edge of a forest. She follows whatever roads and paths lead her roughly south, snaking through the hilly terrain until the sun begins to set. She finds a nice little clearing, high enough that through the trees she can see the landscape stretch out beneath her, with small towns along snaking roads and in the fading twilight the blurry sight of the lights of Paris far in the distance. She lets her backpack fall to the ground and rolls her shoulders. "Food, then tent." she decides and goes about clearing some space for her little gas-cooker and pot to dump a can of ravioli into. She finds a fallen log to drag over to sit and munch on luke-warm pasta-like food as she watches the landscape. Being all by herself is weird. Not bad, but definitely different. There's all kinds of sounds in the distance, mostly birds and the rustling of the woods. She cleans out her pot (note to self, find a place near a stream next time instead of wasting bottled water on this) and goes about setting up her tent.

She rolls out the little pop-up tent on the ground and lets herself fall forward, right on top of it. But instead of thudding into the ground she deforms into soft, pale-pink clay that absorbs into the fabric of the tent. She feels out the extent of it, wriggling the support-rods and flapping the canvas before beginning to assemble itself like a very strange stick-insect of fiber-glass sticks and sail-cloth, driving it's own stakes into the ground. And once she's done propping her tent-self up she relinquishes her grip on the tent, coalescing back into clay from the tent's 'ceiling' and dropping down to reform back into her human self with a satisfied grin. She was going to wander around the vicinity of her campsite some more, maybe find a cool walking stick or something, but walking through the woods, up and down hills is more tiring than she anticipated and soon enough she's tucked into her sleeping bag, snoring softly with the tent flap open to let in a nice breeze of fresh air.

[Clair de Lune]

These are the ways the world turns, the lodes of power that pin its surface. These are the ancient places, that cannot be moved or renamed. Clair lives in them all, moving from birds burrowing in the earth to the creatures dwelling in the trees, so small that they hide in cracks in the bark. She is in Paris, then Rouen, then Calais, and only then does the sun set. The world is abuzz, filled with rumour and pregnant with possibility, and she feels it. The buzzing in the brain, the possibility of a future that is not like the present. Something is coming across the sea, and for once Clair stays in one place for more than a day. She stays on a rooftop, barefoot and unnoticed by the world, for twelve days, descending only to steal what little food she must from a populace that simply does not have the sense of sight to know she has taken from them.

It is a stakeout, of a sort. Over the channel the stormcloud looms, the great source, a gigantic fluttering butterfly waiting to hurricane across the water and be in her presence. To change or be changed? She does not know, but somehow the currents of the world are shimmering and shuddering. The sun rises and sets, hours are spent motionless, without speaking to another human being, and at last she sees the needles converge, the sharp points touch, and a ship begins to cross the channel from Dover. The occupant, whoever she is, does not know she is being watched. Clair takes the form of an albatross - or perhaps she is simply gone, and the albatross happens to soar overhead in the direction she would have gone - and travels for half an hour to meet the ship, wheeling overhead and alighting on the roof. Tourists take pictures; she doesn't care. The seabird preens its wings, watching, waiting, and then it sees her.

It knows her immediately, marks her as the target, but does not follow it. It simply waits, occasionally taking wing to catch a fish, and when there is sight of land a lone pigeon flies away from it, and gradually all eyes turn from the albatross until it is gone. The pigeon follows Robin through the city until she boards a train, where Clair so happens to already be aboard, the conductor not noticing her. At one time they make eye contact - the distant, suggestive scent of rare, exotic spices will stay with Robin for days afterwards, especially when Clair is near, especially when Robin does not know she is near.

Clair just happens to be everywhere Robin is going, unnoticed, though she still does not know her name. After a full day of watching her progress, though, Clair knows - she knows the shifting ways of the soul enough to know that this thing is not a girl, any more than she is. She observes as Robin goes into the forest, observes as she wanders without a direction, travelling somewhat southward. This forest was grown to get lost in; she would need a guide. And so, as the world had been assuring her, Clair's moment came. She cocked her head, pursed her lips, and whistled a clear, bright birdcall, over head head and into the woods, and the birds heard; they caught Robin's attention, guided her ever southwards, clear and forward.

Eventually, though, like all the uninitiated, she has to sleep. Clair is sitting in a tree, watching her as the sun goes down, the forest turns to absolute darkness. It is rare that Clair meets someone so comfortable with being alone; but then, everyone akin to the Moth must be willing to be alone, such that not even they are a constant in their own lives. Clair's face has changed seven times since Robin touched her foot to French soil.

Clair watches as the reveal is revealed; the shapeshifter, the skinchanger, I knew I knew I knew she was special. Clair feels the Moth radiate from her, the thrumming power of change used simply to erect a tent, a use so lackadaisical it almost makes Clair cry, scream, not in anger or sadness or anything a human could put a word to but in feeling nonetheless. Instead she perches in her tree, Robin never thinking to look up, and waits for the future.

Clair drops soundlessly to the soil, even the twigs knowing not to snap, and pads on feet and fingertips soiled completely by loam to the tent, crawling inside without even checking the threshold, knowing that there was nothing to stop her here. The girl sleeps soundly, and is beautiful in her sleep. Clair's lips and the floating halo of her hair brush gently, so barely, over that soft, pink skin, and then she smiles ferally, and her teeth are sharp like knives. Something hits the side of the tent. When Robin jerks a little, not quite upright but aware nonetheless, she is gone.

Instead of being in the tent, the crow that hit the side of the tent is perched by the fire, and Clair happens to be sitting behind it - though she will not be noticed until the crow takes flight, when Robin has had time to examine it, but not to touch.

[Robin Stanton]

Robin bolts upright. As fine as she was, wandering the woods by herself, a sudden noise in a dark, unfamiliar place, the smell of soil and strangely spiced trees around her has her adrenaline pumping. She blinks once, twice, then her irises change to slits before blowing wide and taking in her surroundings. Right. A tent in the woods. The trees probably just dropped a pinecone or something that landed on the tent to make that half-remembered sound that startled her awake. She's about to lie back down, but something feels off. Like she's not alone. Her cat-eyes scan the darkness outside and notice the crow. Her eyes immediately narrow in suspicion and Clair might even think for a moment that she somehow did the impossible and noticed her, but no. She's simply looking at the crow as if there might be a mind lurking behind it's dark eyes.

Robin crawls out of the tent and stands up in nothing but a tank-top and her boy-cut briefs, fists on her hips as she stares down the bird as if it had somehow greatly offended her. "Okay this better not be you, Sam. Did Dad put you up to this? Were you leading me around?" For she has noticed the serendipitous birds she'd followed when she felt uncertain about the direction she was taking. "If it is then you can flap right back home, you hear me?" she informs the bird and makes shooing motions at it as she advances on it. Worst case scenario she sounds like a crazy person, talking to a bird all by herself in the woods.

[Clair de Lune]

The trees press in, obscuring the moon, moving silently like their shadows do, flickering like firelight. The dripping body of the squirrel that Clair killed to carry the flow of power is discarded behind her, silently, and she wipes her hands clean on the leafbed of the forest. She moves easily, unnoticed behind the shadows and the shifting wind though she crouches only feet away, watching Robin closely with eyes like an owl's. Perhaps it is only a trick of the light that makes her look like feathers are beginning to sprout from her face. She moves, and the crow takes flight, and Clair is moving forward, implacable, steady and stooped, on hands and feet like an ape. Human in appearance, but animals lurk beneath the skin; just like Robin. A kindred spirit.

The trees are suddenly not so close, but the moon is, a great silver eye that blasts away uncertainty and stills the wind, stops time and freezes the mind. Not Sam; not even close. Clair does not know who Sam is, but their leading of the birds was worth noting; Clair herself, in perfect English, simply says "Good evening," as she sits on the camp stool that was left in the clearing, flowing over it like water to pour herself into human form. "You don't mind if I help myself to a seat, do you?" The feral creature-thing that blew over the back of the cloth-and-metal chair like a leaf in the wind suddenly seems far away, a trick of the light, and a tanned, beautiful woman looks Robin over in moonlight so bright it may as well be sunlight. One leg is folded over the other elegantly, her clothes clean, her features immaculate, the very picture of poise and beauty.

The crow, however, is nowhere to be seen. Perhaps it flew off. "It's impressive that you made it this far south on foot. Even with help. This wood is old, and likes to lose people in itself; the locals don't go into it. Even in the dark days when people kept it, the undergrowth was thick." Clair, of course, is not a local; she has walked the roads of power through the trees, and the wild knows her by it.

[Robin Stanton]

Robin half expects a human shape, but she looks for it in the bird, not behind it in the shadows. She startles and her feet slide into a stance, hands flattening and elongating into blades along with her forearms. The hairs on her neck stand on end as if something about this person screams danger to a sense she can't quite nail down. Especially once this strange person pours herself into her seat and stops looking so languidly feral. "What the hell?" she blinks and her stance relaxes a little, bladed-arms lowering. "You scared the crap out of me!" she laughs with nervous energy. "Yeah, sure, have a seat, you want some of my food?" she asks jokingly, immediately thinking she probably shouldn't. She's heard enough stories about the Fey that she should know better than to offer anything to strange people swimming out of the shadows of a crow.

Her eyes flick up to the moon. Did it look closer? Or did her cat-eyes simply make it seem much brighter? If she didn't know any better she'd think she's high right now. Everything feels just a little More. The woods are darker, the shadows thicker even with the large moon looming over the clearing like the eye of some unknowable thing that has taken an inexplicable interest in her. And at that thought her eyes snap back to the woman making herself at home in her campsite. "Yeah, well, I got dragged out camping a couple times with some very eccentric people so I know my way around trees." she says in an uncharacteristic move to inject some normalcy into the situation. She's met some strange people but only one who comes even close to carrying a mantle such as the one that seems to now hang over her. And that one she knows so well it barely registers anymore. This is different.

"I'm Robin, by the way." she says and gives the strange woman a small wave, making her realize she's still armed and shakes out her hands as if she's trying to dry them, making the blades melt into pink protoplasm before they snap back into fingers and thumbs.

[Clair de Lune]

Clair does not react, knowing that here, now, if Robin attacked her the lights would simply go out. This was a neutral ground, a place where nobody was allowed to hurt anyone else - occasional woodland creatures aside. The involuntary grunt of surprise was cute, though, a thought that was more human than most that Clair had, that helped her set aside the wild urges of the forest and bring together the more focused urges of the hairless ape. Robin was a strange one; clearly a shapeshifter, but not wild like shapeshifters should be, she had taken her place in the domain of the Moth and formed it into a human, constant place for herself in the world. Clair does not stand up.

"Don't mind if I do," Clair says, right back, and licks the corner of a lip. To make herself human is to abandon the wilds, and the human side of her has hungers, things she must eat - mostly food, but there are things about Robin she could eat right up. She holds herself still; all in time. "But, I thought I should tell you. You don't know your way around these trees. There will be visions tonight, but you must always keep sight of your tent. This clearing is pinned in place by the knowing of it; turn the corner behind a tree and on the other side will not be your campsite." She feels for that being, the animal ape that has seen a little into the abyss beneath the skin of the world, and the barest hint of the horde of chittering things that stares back, and wishes to remain human. But some warnings must be delivered.

"But if you know that, we need not speak more of it. When the sun rises, all will be well. Tell me about yourself, Robin. I have been interested in you for... some time now." That tongue appears again, too red like her lips. The red of squirrel blood. Briefly, the smell of cinnamon and malt wafts through the camp even more strongly. At Robin's transformation back to a real human, with hands, Clair lets out an actual laugh, if only a short one.

[Robin Stanton]

Robin purses her lips to one side as she listens to this strange woman who hasn't even told her her name yet but casually admits she's been stalking her. Apparently. It's magic, she decides. She's seen the occasional glimpse of it, but she's never been thrust through the veil like this, into a place where things feel like they're more and can seem to take up her whole field of view like a too-bright moon or someone's red tongue darting over their lips. She doesn't question Clair's warning for a second, just like it feels the woman could slip away the moment she leaves her sight like morning dew in the sun. No... more like a fox in the underbrush she decides at the thought of that too-red tongue.

"Well, I'm a shapeshifter for starters, but if you've been stalking me then you probably know that already, Miss-Dark-and-Mysterious." she chuckles. She probably should be upset about being followed but Robin is mostly just curious. Back home she stepped on enough toes that she might assume malicious intent from someone keeping an eye on her but here, where nobody knows her as Robin, daughter of heroes it feels weirdly flattering. She feels awkward just standing there and Clair is sitting in the only chair, so she takes a couple steps away from her and past her tent, making sure not to let her leave her sight. She finds a suitably large boulder half-buried in the ground and she twists her upper body into a corded rope of protoplasm that reaches out to touch the stone. She feels herself fraying at the edges as all that is 'her' is absorbed into the rock and soon that's what she is. Old and heavy. She heaves herself up from the boulder's nest of soil and roots and in an uneven tumble rolls herself into the campsite. Once she's come to a rest with a thud she gathers herself back together and her human shape regrows on top of the stone, leaning back with her arms behind her propping her up, face lit up with a grin.

"But if I'm going to tell you about me then I want to know who you are as well. Isn't that how these things work? Tit for tat? Or I'll just have to keep calling you by increasingly obnoxious nick-names, Cinnamon-Crow." For someone thrust into what she assumes to be some kind of otherworldly parley Robin is taking things very much in stride. She's very much used to riding the crest of nervous excitement, regardless of whether it's taking her towards something familiar or an alluring face in the dark.

[Clair de Lune]

Clair quirked an eyebrow, and it remained quirked the entire time Robin was demonstrating herself. At the transformation, her eyes shine and blacken, taking on a look like a dragonfly's wing, the moon shining off of it bright enough to glint off of the ground. For a moment, one could swear wings raise from her skin, the backs of her hands, her face, her back, little wings flexing and fluttering with a noise like a horde of locusts waking up. Then, just like that, it is past, and the boulder turns over, and the ancient earth is exposed. Insects pour out from under it, writhing into the camp, not touching anything but coating the leaf carpet of the campsite. By the time Robin sits atop the boulder, Clair is there too, propping herself up on the heels of her hands, looking up at the moon. The night, previously frozen still like the surface of a lake, erupts with hairline cracks of cricketsong and the crunching of centipedes preying on their neighbours.

"Cinnamon-Crow," she says, thoughtfully. "I like that. Cinnamon-Crow I shall be." She looks to Robin, and opening her jaw wide caws directly in her face, then giggles. "Nuts and malt, cinnamon and orange-blossom. I am the speech of the wind in the branches, I am the words that make sacrifice sweet. Under my feet lies a road paved with white stone and fringed with black grass. I know the dead, and am loved by the centipedes and the locusts," she said, by way of introduction. "I felt you, when you disturbed the waters at Dover. That is a place of power, too. It shines with Lantern-light, the sun and the moon alike glare off of the cliffs. I know you are a shapeshifter. What I mean is, why are you in France, Robin? Why are you in this place, on this night? And what do you want?" She leans over, kisses Robin on the cheek, and for a moment there is the taste of new, fresh blood in both of their mouths.

[Robin Stanton]

Robin can't help but grin like an idiot at the approval of what she thought was a joke but suddenly seems to have been turned into something else. The caw draws an actual laugh from her. She's never put too much stock into what's been said about her hometown; sure she's seen some crazy things but she sees crazy shit every day. But hearing it from a stranger, put into different yet familiar words... There's a lighthouse they say stands in every world from which life pours into existence and arguably it is what was leveraged when she came to this world. How in the hell could 'Cinnamon-Crow' possibly know about any of that?

"I don't know..." she starts, only to have her train of thought derailed by soft lips on her cheek. She startles but not unpleasantly so, her head turning to look at Clair. She's close, like the moon. Not looming but with the same kind of draw that makes wolves howl and the waves rise. "I, uhm..." she chuckles lightly. How is she this nervous? She's never nervous. "I guess I'm just wandering. Finding myself, you know? Got a little too comfortable, too stuck in routines and expectations so I just decided to leave. For a while anyway." She shifts a little on the rock, it's just big enough that two people can sit on it but not so large that it leaves much room between them. She turns and tucks her legs underneath herself to fully look at Clair. No one has eyes like that, not normally, and who would choose shimmering chitin. "You know, it's funny you talk of lanterns and places of power. It almost makes me think you've been to Maldon before. There's a lighthouse there that's supposed to cast it's light into other worlds."

[Clair de Lune]

Clair knows the shifts in her power, feels the winds carrying light and sound and smell from place to place, the spirits of all kinds muttering prayers as they proceed from grave to womb in a line, flickering candles in hand. In light there is to be found knowledge, but no mercy. The light here is the same, a great silver eye that watches and knows. There is no dismissing such a power idly, but Clair does not mind being seen by the great lens of the cosmos; dark things might watch them, but those dark things knew of them anyway. The skin of creation holds true. Clair smiles brilliantly, and her teeth, though perfect, seem somehow sharp, made for tearing throats like a hook.

Her power shifts from the Moth to the Cup, and the taste of blood intensifies, and with it the hunger. "To live without expectation is a great power," Clair agrees, nodding sagely, though the white grin does not leave her face. "This is a journey you cannot expect to complete. You certainly aren't prepared. But it is setting off without expectation that will take you to where you need to be, ultimately. I think my mother would like you." Certainly all of her coven would watch Robin with rapt attention, divining a great many things from the pseudo-shift of her skin and muscle. Nothing of her moves quite like a human does.

"I will be seeing you along the way. You are going south to Spain, yes? There to catch a boat to Italy. I have no one place to be, but I feel that you and I shall meet again, that it shall be important for both of us, not least so that I may go to Maldon myself. I would dearly love to read by the light of that beacon. Shall we make a pact on it?" She asks, starting to take off her jacket. Bound to her arm with twine is a barber's straight razor, keening with the light of the moon. She slips it out of its makeshift scabbard, and flicks it open, pricking her index finger just a little before passing it to Robin to do the same. Then, if Robin does the same, Clair presses their fingertips together, and a shift brings their fates to bear on a different horizon, as a flush spreads over both of their bodies. Far away, on the other side of France, the coven looks to the north, and without sharing a word begin their own march to the darkest place in France.

[Robin Stanton]

It's rare that somebody looks at Robin like this and it's not even something she's realized until just now. If she's just being herself people either try to see her as a human and have to push against the subtle signs she is not or they consider her something else entirely. Not even maliciously or with prejudice, where she's from mutants are accepted and even celebrated, but humans always seek to categorize. Nobody sees her joints move a bit too fluidly, her bones having just a little more give when she needs them to and admires it. Well, her parents do but that's different. Very different, she realizes with a flush.

"Maybe I am and maybe I will." Making blood-pacts with strange people in the moonlight is definitely something she's been warned about. Her aunts would probably be livid. The razor passes over her fingertip almost too easily, drawing a gash that doesn't bleed and reveals uniformly pink flesh. Only after a moment crimson wells up, once Robin wills her hand to be fully flesh and blood and presses the wound against Clair's. She's not sure what she feels, only that there's a sudden rush that's making her restless and giddy. "So you've been watching me, hmm? Are you going to keep doing that?" she asks and laces all but her index-finger between Clair's. She's as much holding her hand intimately as she is holding on to the evasive and cryptic woman lest she slip away instead of giving a straight answer. 'Not that there's anything straight about this moment' she muses and a sly smile tugs on her lips at her silent and stupid joke. "Because if so I might have to try and catch you in the act, dear Cinnamon Crow."

[Clair de Lune]

Clair's smile shrinks into a smaller, more secret thing, neatly hiding her hook-sharp teeth, though her lips are no less red. Less and less she is of the Moth, and the insects who were pouring out of the portal made by the stone are dispersing into the wood, by Clair's power leaving Robin's every possession untouched - even the few scraps of food that she foolishly left out by the remains of her gas fire. It didn't take a magician to know why one didn't do that. Clair places her head on Robin's shoulder, and it sinks in gently, the nearness of the changes coming for them both destabilising Robin's solid form just a little. "You don't seem very good at finding your followers," Clair noted, letting their bloody hands interlace, knowing that either of them could slip away if they wanted to - but it's not time.

"I have known of you for... perhaps two weeks. But I only knew you were you today. And I will keep on knowing you, more and more, as the time goes on, like you will know me. Intimately. Perhaps you will even catch me at it, someday." There was no other way to know Clair; either you knew nothing, or you knew everything and still knew nothing. Clair's strong, wiry arm comes around Robin's back and stays there a moment. She enjoyed times like these, the times before a pair of lovers were sure if they were going to kiss for the first time. It happened to her often, and was always her favourite time of night.

The magic worked, binding them in strips of silk, and Clair dropped the folded razor into her jacket pocket next to an equally fine pair of scissors. "It's the earliest possible days of spring, in the middle of the night, and the moonlight is cold. You stand it well." Truth be told it was not by accident that the cold was so mild, though certainly Clair was starting to shiver. She gave off the air of omnipotence mostly by not saying too much, and keeping her comings and goings secret, but eventually she cooled down like anyone else. "I don't suppose you have a blanket we could share, for an hour or two?"

[Robin Stanton]

Robin is, if nothing else, malleable and her shoulder a comfortable place to rest one's head. And on a brisk night such as this she's warm. "You'd be surprised, now that I know what to look for." She has no idea if she'd be able to spot Clair if she didn't want to be spotted, for all she knows she could watch her from around a the bend of a tree she wouldn't even begin to know how to step around without getting lost. Not that that would stop her. "And maybe all I need to lure you out is a nice cozy fire. You might be full of mystery but even the wind in the willows gets cold walking barefoot in the black grass, huh?" she smiles and Clair can feel a kind of undulating ripple go through Robin's shoulder. Bunching the back of her tank-top together two spindly arms grow from her shoulder blades, uncurling and spreading out membranes between elongated fingers. Normally she would have gone for feathery wings, those were always a big hit, but the mood feels enigmatic and what unfurls are two large bat-like wings that wrap around the two of them. And where feathers might insulate, the thick, soft skin of the wings radiates with Robin's body-heat.

"I think I can do better than a blanket." she laughs with bit of a cocky hitch in her voice. "You're not Fae or Spirit." she concludes as she rests her head against the top of Clair's. "I don't think they get cold in the night. Or ever." In this small little space of body-heat the wild and heady scent of Clair is even stronger and mingles with Robin's own earthy smell. Less like soil and more like the weak, almost alkaline smell of pristine mineral springs and moisture gathered on stone. The smell and closeness stirs blurry, sleep-addled thoughts and Robin suddenly comes to a realization. "You were in my tent, earlier, when I woke up."

[Clair de Lune]

"Perhaps I will," Clair agrees, "and perhaps I'll surprise you. I have a way of doing that, or so I'm told." She smiled, comfortably, closing her eyes and feeling the wind whisper to her - knowing what was coming, and knowing that it was nothing terrifying, for now. Opposite Robin, a hulking, dark shape passes between the trees, silently, two reflective things far too big to be eyes visible to them both as they sit atop their dolmen. Clair pays it no mind. "I knew a man who captured moths in a bell-jar. On nights like this, he would release them one by one to die in the candle." It sounds more like a recital, or a prayer, than an an actual, personal confession.

The wings extend with a slight disturbance of air, and Clair sighs in contentment. "You seem eager to classify fae, spirit or human," Clair noted. "I know of a coven on an island that floats from farthest to farthest place of the ocean, who eat their young and build monuments out of dreamstuff. Their places cannot be found by common navigators, only be word of mouth, and the story of how to find it changes every time. Is that the fae at work? Or people, or spirits, or Gods? Describe to me any of those without including the others. Besides, I have offered fae shelter from the cold many times before."

Clair breathes deep of that air, the scent of two people sharing it bringing a smile to her face again. "Yes, I was," Clair agrees, conversationally. "You left the tent open. In the wilds, that's an invitation; there's a reason tents close so tightly." She shifted her weight slightly, taking a deep breath of Robin's mineral scent. "You should not do that again. If I had not been following you, anything else could have taken you up on it. A feral animal, or a more intelligent thing." There was no sound of wildlife at all in the trees, or of wind; just the keening, silver sound of moonlight on the rock, and the faint sound of skin on skin as Clair brought a hand up to run the pads of her fingertips idly down the warm, fibrous drumskin of Robin's wing.

[Robin Stanton]

"Yeah, well, I wasn't expecting to have set up camp in... wherever it is we are right now." she laughs a bit nervously, eyeing the giant shadow passing them by. For all her bravado, Clair can feel Robin tense up. "Who am I in that story of yours? The moths or flame, man or jar?" she wonders out loud. She knows a lot but most of it is second-hand, passed down stories about the supernatural that now seem reductive at best. "And maybe Fae do get cold. Or seek the warm, but I think underneath it all at least part of you is human, just a strange and intriguing one. Who still hasn't really told me why she's been watching and waiting for me. I mean, I am pretty great but even I don't get people curling up in my arms like this. Much." she adds when she realizes how incredibly inexperienced that makes her sound.

The fingertips on her wings make her shiver. The skin is thick and soft, warm to the touch and quivers slightly in response to Clair, tightening into odd wrinkles almost instinctively. "Careful there..." Robin says quietly, her voice caught in her throat a little. "They're, uhm, pretty sensitive when I use them as space-heaters. Lotta bloodflow." she grins sheepishly She's not sure why she's embarrassed about this, Clair is just about clinging to her and all she'd have to do is tilt her head up a little and those red lips would be right there, inviting her in like they're just waiting... Before she knows it Robin is doing just that, pressing her lips into Clair's and partaking of the spicy-sweet taste of them as her own arms coil around the strange woman. One moment they're side by side, the next Robin's body fluidly twists itself until she's facing Clair, breaking the soft kiss for a moment to look into her eyes and the moonlight reflected in them.

[Clair de Lune]

Clair giggled. "Life without expectations," she said, like some kind of proclamation. The hair-prickling intensity of the moment increases, and Clair only gently strokes those wings, long, bare touches, as she remarks "I was just talking about how you could draw me in with fire. Perhaps that makes you the man, and me the moth. Humanity is always on the face of it, anyway; people always look human first, and reveal what kind of human they are second. You are the changeable kind of human. I felt the change in you across the water, like I said. So I followed you. Do I need a deeper or more profound reason? You interest me, I am a moth and you have a bell-jar." She giggles, a little. "Even if you don't know how to use it. Inexperienced as you are."

The entire time, she has been stirring her fingers gently across Robin's wings, listening to the desire rise in her new friend and lover-to-be. She is looking up at Robin's jaw, and suddenly Robin is looking down at her, and they kiss, deeply, taking bites of each other's presence and savouring them. Clair asked to be warm and Robin gave herself, and Clair takes that offer happily. The taste of spices and foreign foods changes again to blood and breathed air, and it's only shortly afterwards that Robin would realise that Clair has taken a small, razor-sharp nip of her lip, letting her blood mix in the kiss. She mutters something short, but vibrant, into Robin's panting throat, and a burst of red swims down into her lungs. "Don't worry," Clair said, patiently, "I'll teach you." She pulls Robin in, and the lessons begin - thorough, personal, and intimate.

[Robin Stanton]

Robin gasps at the churning, longing, urging red, drawing it deeper into her lungs where it blooms through all that is her. The effect is immediate, her wings tightening around Clair - Cinnamon Crow - even as she nips at her lips. It coils through her stomach and finds eager soil, spurred on by Clair's hand on her wings sending branching sparks of pleasure down her spine and she has to pull herself together a bit to keep her shape from sagging too much, literal putty in Clair's hands.....


The sun rises to find Robin in her tent, curled up tightly around her sleeping bag, her head swimming with half-remembered tatters of warm skin and nimble fingers, passing giants and a looming pale eye. She clings to them, worried they'll blow away in the morning breeze if she doesn't. The smell of cinnamon still lingers in her mind from the dream. Her eyes snap open. Was it a dream? She slowly gets up, torn between remaining in that soft twilight of dreams and the possibility that it wasn't. The boulder she moved rests solidly within the grasp of the earth again as if she never tore it free but her lack of clothes tells a different story. She finds them bunched on the sleeping bag, making her wonder if she simply melted out of them during the night. "What the hell..." she laughs, running a hand through her hair that immediately untangles it as she shifts in accordance with the intent.

She slips her clothes back on and goes about cleaning up her campsite, occasionally glancing around for any signs that the previous night actually happened as if that could make it real even if it hadn't. There's not a blade of grass out of place nor any scuffs or tracks in the dirt that aren't hers. Not that she could really tell, but she looks anyway. Finally she's done packing her things - folding up her tent the same way she put it up by taking it over and rolling herself up tightly - and all that's left is leaving the spot behind. Only as she climbs down the mountain, smiling to herself like an idiot about a particularly nice dream does she feel the slight tug on her lip and her fingers trace of the scar running across her lower lip and maybe the fraction of an inch further down. An image of soft lips and cinnamon laced with the tang of blood rises to the surface and the brief but sharp pain of teeth catching flesh. Robin normally doesn't scar but last night, dream or not, was hardly normal. And yet it's still no absolute proof, her body at times almost too susceptible to her own thoughts and dreams and she can't dismiss the possibility some part of her clings so hard to a dream it chose to make it real like this.

"I will be seeing you along the way. You are going south to Spain, yes? There to catch a boat to Italy." the dream echoes in her mind as she sets climbs down towards the sporadic signs of civilization to the south. Maybe that is what she'll do. It's not like she had a plan in mind anyway and there's worse things to do than following your dreams.

[Robin Stanton]

It doesn't take her too long to make her way to Paris, crashing in a cheap hostel in a room with 5 other people. She ends up striking up a conversation with two of them who speak enough English that her lack of French doesn't impede too much. She hadn't really thought about the language barrier. Back home she'd have a real-time translation algorithm running in her field of view and so would most other people. But they make do and Robin soon susses out that one of them is a mutant and the couple is here for a protest two days from now. Quick to regale them with stories of how things could - and in fact should - be she promises to be there, uncertain if she'll be able to actually meet up if the crowd is as large as seems to be the hope.

The next day she allows herself to be a bit touristy, hitting a bakery for clearly way too many baked sweets and wandering the streets; she follows a group of college students through the Louvre after having one of them unknowingly smuggle her in within their backpack and finally stops at the Eiffel Tower as the sun goes down. She allows herself one drink in a small bar that somehow still smells like stale smoke despite clearly having banished the actual smokers outside years ago and finally collapses into her bed. When she gets up her new-found friends seem to have already headed out so she shoots them a quick text and makes her way to the Place de la République. Before she even gets there she can tell something is brewing. People are hurrying and she can spot quite a few people wearing masks and obviously headed the same direction she is.

It's not a massive protest, at least not by Paris standards, but it's still a good couple hundred people, a good third of them obviously mutants. Robin produces a handkerchief from her pocket to tie into a make-shift mask, more to clearly signal her solidarity than for any real concerns of identification, and before too long somebody hands her a sign. It reads 'droits des mutants sont droits de l'homme' and even her French-challenged brain can put meaning to that. They make it about an hour or agitated but mostly peaceful protest before a serious police presence creeps into the plaza from the adjoining streets and it becomes clear that they do not want the crowd to march anywhere. Which has the effect that's to be expected and soon by sheer word of mouth and general crowd movement a new destination is picked and they move down towards one of the larger roads. Somebody up ahead is sitting on a overly-large mutant's shoulders with a megaphone and that's when things take a turn.

Somebody in the line of police cowering behind riot shields thinks themselves a hero and fires on the woman who seems to be the ring-leader simply because she's trying to keep people organized. They're 'only' rubber bullets but one hits her temple hard enough to draw blood and the one that strikes her in the shoulder throws her off her perch. To most of the crowd it simply looks like she was gunned down and years of frustration and oppression simply boil over. The crowd surges, crackling with mutants funneling their righteous anger into use of their power. Water cannons are fired up only for one of their streams to simply evaporate into mist where it hits the crowd. Energy blasts slam over cops 2 or 3 at a time. Somewhere in the crowd a cloud of tear-gas blossoms and in response a bottle trailing flames arcs through the air. Robin is in the thick of it but soon grows to a good 10 feet tall, her normally soft frame condensing into muscles and she bats a tear-gas canister out of the air with her protest-sign, sending it behind enemy lines. Between that and her sheer size providing some safety from the erratic and panicked movements of the crowd she soon becomes a rallying point of sorts. People are shouting at her in French, somebody briefly appear on her shoulder to try and tell her something before giving up and simply pointing, drawing her attention to where the throng of people is frayed and cops are pulling individuals out to beat them into submission behind their own lines.

Robin simply nods and suddenly she and the teleporting mutant are in enemy territory. She shrinks down to a more manageable size and sprints for the nearest group of cops bearing down on a helpless mutant whose only protection are the iridescent scales covering their skin. Robin breaks into a sprint and leaps, slamming two cops to the ground when the amorphous blob that is Robin hits them with more weight than Robin had mere moments ago. And instead of remaining a shapeless blob she brings a number of pseudopods to bear, flinging one of the cops into the air to land on the hood of a car with a satisfying thud. Batons hit her, leaving bruises on a surface that hardens in response. Here and there rubber bullets puncture her and lose their velocity somewhere inside her. She'd have to peel those out later... One pseudopod latches on to a street-sign and she pulls herself out of this particular brawl to find the next person who needs help, using her power to animate the stop-sign to pull it free while other arms pulls a cop off their victim and wraps them up with the stop-sign like a metal rope.

And so she keeps going for what feels like ages but probably isn't more than a couple minutes at most. Still, her efforts inspire more of the crowd to bust through the police line and help their fellow protestors and break up the neat formation of riot-shields. Somewhere one of the protestors commandeers one of the water-throwers and Robin reforms into a human to let out a victory shout that never comes. Two little needle-bites sting her arm and she has just enough time to glance over at the young man in uniform, holding the taser at the other end of the two wires extending from the prongs in her skin to it. And then the whole world turns into garbled non-sense. Muscles contract and twitch and lose all cohesion, legs turn to literal jello and she collapses to the ground, protoplasm bubbling out erratically, collapsing back in on itself. She tries forming arms to pull herself away but her control over where and how they form is shot under the electrical current. Two, three, four five arms aimlessly grasp at the air, slap at the pavement, one of them getting entangled in the wires and damn near melting at direct contact with the current.

[Clair de Lune]

Clair doesn't know of the riot until its ripples begin to disturb the fabric of her awareness; the winds of fate, blowing through the world, flutter her like a leaf in all kinds of directions, and today they flutter her towards a cobble street in the middle of Paris. This morning she was on the edge of town, but by the afternoon she had made her way to where she needed to be, where fate whorled and vortexed; where Robin would need her again. She waits there, while the people slowly gather, all of them tense, on-edge, chattering like monkeys and socialising like them too. Paris was a different beast entirely to the wilds; more people meant different tacks were required not to be noticed. Still, there was enough street food that staying full wasn't hard. It was the knowing what direction to take in a place where so much chaos fermented that was challenging.

She knows Robin by her mark, shining from beneath her mask, that scar that stays on her lip as long as she has a lip at all - that scar she gave Clair permission to give her, nights and miles ago, in the forest. It's not just that, though; it's the way she's so obvious in the crowd, a ten-foot-tall tourist who doesn't understand a word spoken to her, surrounded by the teeming mutants. Clair just watches her; it isn't her place to intervene in something so loud, so violent, right now. Another time, perhaps, but now Clair is quiet, Clair is watching. It's Robin's time to shine and to have her bright light put out, suddenly, by a man with a taser. The result is gruesome; if Clair didn't have some measure of knowledge, she'd worry for Robin's safety. But in the end, they literally scoop the mutant off the pavement, a massive group effort while other police hold back the crowd just barely enough to escape with her. In the end, it falls to Clair to drop to the pavement, keeping low with her fingers and toes like a spider on the pavement.

She picks up a wriggling lump of protoplasm, the piece that the cops missed, and kisses it gently, shushing it before she is simply no longer on the street. Two streets away, she sits herself down at a café that casual diners have long vacated, as the less dedicated rioters filter past on their way to make an escape. She pulls the clay-like mass out of her pocket and places it on the table, cocking her head as she studies it. In the end, she knows what she has to do. A small note in a black book, and she turns back to the lump. "I know, I know. But we'll reunite you soon enough." She stands and rolls up her sleeves, hair cut short, features sharpening, suddenly writ masculine.

Clair starts running, first down the street, then over the rooftops, bare feet slapping on tile as she races to be in the place ordained by the universe. She pulls an elegant somersault, limbs splayed deliberately, passing through a clothesline as she lands on top of the hardened transport van containing Robin. By the time the guard in the passenger seat steps out onto the cobbles to check the roof, Clair is already in the passenger seat, drawing her straight razor over the tiny gap between the driver's sleeve and glove; a wound he will ultimately survive, but the blood he provides does enough for Clair in that moment. A shock of an unexplainable kind echoes outwards, carrying with it an old command in French; do not see. People a couple of streets over are dazzled; the occupants of the van, those unlucky enough to have eyes at that time, might never see again.

Clair is in the back of the van, cradling the prone Robin in her lap. "Shh, shhh," she says, gently placing that loose lump of clay under Robin's head, letting it gently reabsorb. "I'm here. Cinnamon-Crow is here." She likes the name. Considers it her name, even, enough to answer to it. For a moment, she lets Robin recover, but the time has come to move, all too soon. The struggle of weakness, lethargy, against necessity. A battle Clair knows well. She mutters a phrase, a gentle command to reignite the red seed planted in Robin's lungs, awaken her - carnally, as Clair knows how. Inappropriate for the moment, but they need to be moving, so anything that gets Robin upright will do.

In the next moment, the doors of the van slam open. Clair marvels at the strength of her new lover, before they are both belting down the street as hard as they can, ahead of any reinforcements that may be coming. Clair, still lean, masculine, and built for landing unassisted on the roofs of police vans, has an embarrassingly high-kneed sprint, but it carries her at the speed of Robin away from the scene of the crime. They are both two blocks away before they double over just inside an alleyway, laughing, supporting each other, holding each other, then kissing.

[Robin Stanton]

Robin's mind is scattered, reeling from trying to calm a body that cramped in ways that muscles can only dream of. Everything still prickles with pins and needles where she tries to push herself back up into the world beyond her body and reclaim some sense beyond the vague impression of being a loosely defined blob lieing on a hard surface. A ripple passes over her she can't explain save for that it seems to skitter through her very being, a razor-net that seeks to root out something it doesn't find in the sea of protoplasm and harmlessly moves past her. But it pulls her from her drifting in that sore but comfortable space and familiar shapes form within her. Protoplasm hardens into bones, tendons and connective tissue envelop them and string them together, nerves crackle to life and pull her mind into that knot of wrinkled fatty tissue encased in living calcium deposits. She's only vaguely aware of the details, certainly not directing any of this consciously but pulling on ideas and concepts of what a 'person' is. Bleary-eyed she blinks at the sudden stabs of light and the comforting shade that falls across her face as somebody leans over her and brings her a piece of herself she hasn't had the wherewithal to even know as lost.

Noises. No, a voice. Familiar words and tone, unfamiliar timber. Pieces slot together in her mind faster. She got knocked out. Is she dreaming again? "Cinnamon Crunch." she warbles. No, wait, that wasn't quite right. Gods, she's so hungry right now. And not just for food, she realizes. She fully comes too as adrenaline mixes with urgent longing in her stomach. There's a strange man gently cradling her head, but those eyes are familiar, as was the name that was uttered. Appearances have their use, certainly, but that's not what makes a person in Robin's eyes and she sees more than that when recognizing somebody. The way shoulders sit, the curl of lips, the ways eyes are wide in concern but firm and determined. Her dream has come to her aid. Or perhaps this is the person she dreamed about? No matter, she can feel the urgency in the beating of her heart and she wrenches her body into one last feat of strength to turn her arm into a spring-loaded hydrolic piston that slams open the back of the van.

Next thing she knows they're running, fleeing angry voices that are too stunned or blinded to stop the two from beating a zig-zagging route through the city until the commotion falls away behind them and they're stumbling to a stop. She's out of breath more from exhilaration and laughter than true need for oxygen and before she knows it she's pushing Clair against a nearby wall and seeking her lips with her own. She has to know if her dream was just that or if what she remembers holds true, regardless of circumstance or shape. And oh does it ever. That slightly bitter but full, cinnamon tinged taste erases all doubt from her mind.

"Well hi there..." she laughs quietly.

[Clair de Lune]

Clair explores Robin's body hungrily, allowing them both to enjoy the moment as she shifts back to something a little more feminine - not quite the face Robin first knew, nor will it ever be again, but like most of her appearances close enough that it makes no difference. Robin's touch is close, familiar, quirking a little smile from Clair as they look into each other's eyes. "Hi there," Clair mirrors her, in a deep, intimate tone. "I see you're getting involved in the local traditions, hm? Maybe not a great plan for your first date with Paris, getting yourself deported." Clair knew all of this - she followed Robin to Paris, and followed her to the riot, distantly. She had other things to do in the meantime; on the outskirts of the city was a disused silver mine she had stopped by, to commune with some of the occupants. She laid hands on a book in a store that changed locations every week, did a little barber's work... Paris was a city to catch up on, when one visited.

"I should've known you would do this, though. You're one of those people, aren't you? Can't stay out of trouble for love or money." She quite enjoys being pushed up against this wall, here with this person. Gendarmes run past them, shouting something as a pair of mutants pursue them down the street. Clair doesn't care enough to pay attention, and nobody notices them until she wants them to, so they stay like that, Clair pleasantly pinned between the bricks and the young mutant and Robin slowly working Clair's command of urging out of herself, feeling that intense need for the breath of another slowly work out of her as they kiss. Clair allows it to pass - certainly it would be nice to have this woman again, but she simply doesn't need a thrall like that. She'd rather see what Robin does next.

Speaking of which. "What was your plan after this, anyway? Was this your quick way of getting home?"

[Robin Stanton]

"Oh everything was under control." she laughs breathlessly. "I doubt they got a holding cell I can't squeeze out of. Though I appreciate you saving me from potentially having to rinse myself down the drain." she adds a bit sheepishly. She feels like she should be more surprised by that night among the trees turning out to have been real but why second-guess a good thing. Hell, half the reason she settled on her rough southern trajectory is because she thought by following Clair's proclaimed itinerary she might increase the odds of it not just having been a dream. "Besides, I'm not just gonna stand around when someone's got a boot to their neck. It's actually real easy not to get their asses flung through the windshield of their swat-mobiles but until that happens I gotta work on my pitching arm." she grins as if she hadn't been turned into barely-sentient goo less than 20 minutes ago.

"And I dunno, southward, I guess. I was gonna see if anybody in the hostel is headed that way but if not I'll catch a train and ride it till I hit the ocean. You did say I'd be heading to Spain, did you not?" she smirks. She has no idea if that was a genuine prediction, gentle nudging or outright manipulation but she sees no reason to assume it's the later. "Was that your way of asking me to travel in the same direction as you? Because I think it might be working."

[Clair de Lune]

Clair quirked a little smile. Of course, when she bound herself to Robin, it wasn't a binding per se, but it made it much easier to keep track of her, and easier for her to find her way to Clair. Not in a way that Robin could easily read, but the current of omens that witches of the Moth were buffeted by was easy to follow. "You underestimate the Parisian police. The French hate mutants, and the French love to hate the gendarmes, and their stations are equipped to deal with mutants. Still, I'm sure you would have figured out something." She took Robin's arm, and they walked elbow to elbow down the street while the remains of the little riot they'd been at filtered away down the street. The smell of burning cars had filtered down to this part of the neighbourhood, and signs of police organisation were beginning to show. It was time to be in another part of Paris.

"Righteous anger is hot," Claire remarked, sagely. "But it isn't all there is. And a free spirit alone isn't the only reason you leave home and go somewhere to get into fights with the police. I asked you before what you wanted, here in France. And I guessed that you might be going a certain direction. Or perhaps I told you to, and you're being very good and following my instructions, hm?" Clair laughed delicately. "I don't really give instructions, though I will always tell what I understand as the truth. You could go anywhere in the world, and learn any number of new and strange things. How is your lip healing?"

[Robin Stanton]

Robins hand darts to the scar on her lip as Clair asks her about it, weirdly self-conscious about it. Clair is giving her a lot of feelings she's not accustomed to, she realizes and she's far from opposed to this, even if right now it means she's less self-assured than she normally would be. "It's... not? Not like it normally would at least. Usually that only happens when some part of me wants it that way. What do you think, does it give me a certain rogueish charm?" she asks, briefly unhooking her arm from Claire's to walk backwards in front of her and flash her a wide smirk.

"And I don't exactly follow instructions well, but I might make an exception for pretty French girls if it means I'll keep running into her. I still don't really know what I'm looking for, but it's already been kind of worth it. Think you might find your way down to the Mediterranean with me? We could go swimming together as fish, find some secluded beach?" She's not sure, but she gets the impression Clair might be more at home away from as many people as there are in Paris. And if she's wrong, well, rolling through the surf together is plenty enticing on it's own, in Robin's opinion. "Don't think I packed a bathing suit though..."

[Clair de Lune]

Clair laughs easily, but there's a deeper undercurrent to her laughter, dripping with a dark, fairytale venom as she looks over Robin's lips. "You certainly look like you want it," she said. "But as someone whose religion is rogueishness, you have a long way to go before you start looking like a hardened criminal. I suspect you never will; which is good, because you're almost pretty enough to make up for being British." She links elbows with Robin again, smiling contentedly to herself. She doesn't seem out of place at all, here in the city; even her clothes are more metropolitan, leather and denim instead of the woven cloth she was wearing in the forest.

"I suppose it's good that you specify you'd follow instructions for me, because I was about to say you take to them quite well. An ideal student, actually. Perhaps I could play hide-and-seek with you as some eel, see where else we can find space on you for more... markings. Hm? Or maybe I could just teach you how to really live as an animal." As they moved further from the raucous sounds of the riot, they stepped easily onto a tram, not making any motion to pay, and nobody stopped them at all.

"You know, I've spent months at sea as an albatross, sleeping on the water's surface, dining on the freshest seafood, only talking to the occasional shipful of fishermen. It's a way of life that would drive lesser people mad. But you... well, you probably couldn't do it for months. But I think you could do it at all, and still return to human form with your mind intact. We'll consider it at the Mediterranean, hm? I refuse to believe you didn't pack a swimsuit. But you likely won't need it, animal or no. I can take you to some very secluded spots."

[Robin Stanton]

"Oi, ya gotta problem wi' Bri'ish people?" she falls into a terrible accent before returning to her normal, almost weirdly mid-atlantic tone. "That's fair, most of the world does."

"And I've never fully lived as an animal, more like occasional stints. My Dad's all about disappearing into roles but I never fully got that, could never quite tune my mind to it and not be a human wrapped in an animal shape. You like leaving marks then you better make sure I like them or they'll be like footprints on the beach." she says, though she's wondering how much truth there is to that. She briefly sucks her lip into her mouth where Clair left a scar and runs her tongue over the taught indentation of skin thoughtfully. "I think I will though, if that night in the woods is any indication." Even though Clair might have worked most of the Working she put into Robin out of the shapeshifter, she still seems to be full of almost nervous energy and Clair has to practically hook her in with her arm. Even on the tram she finds room to generally be a ball of energy clinging to Clair. Finally she seems to surrender to it and swigs herself onto Clair's back in a bending and shifting of limbs until her arms are draped over Clair's shoulder and her legs hooked around her waist. She's made herself a little lighter so the surprise of it wouldn't pull Clair off-center but still heavy enough Cinnamon-Crow has to put some work into holding her up.

"How are you doing this, by the way?" she asks, her chin resting on Clair's shoulder hanging a little bit looser from her shoulders and a little bit squirmier around her waist than a regular person. "Nobody is noticing us. Not really. Is this like when you were hiding behind the bird at the camp? Stepped around some corner people can't see? Just how invisible to the world are we right now?" Clair could swear the grip of Robin's legs around her tightens a little against her back.

[Clair de Lune]

Clair chuckled easily. "Not as such, no," Clair admitted, "but it seems to be what the French do - we hate the British, 'innit'? An ancient rivalry, native to a lot of histories. Not that I have a problem with it. It forms the core of others, though, some people who live closer to the Edge of things." She keeps Robin tight to her elbow for a while, but there's no holding onto an excited Skintwister, even one who is uninitiated and does what she does purely by instinct. In a way, there's no better way to be in the ways of Moth. This one could be a great student... or simply lead her to interesting places. Clair hasn't discussed taking on a student with her mother, but she doesn't particularly care; just like her mother didn't care about seeking permission to take on her own students.

She grunts a little in exertion, grabbing a bar to hold herself upright as Robin half-climbs, half-flows onto her back, letting out another little laugh. Perhaps, then again, Robin isn't subtle enough to be a Skintwister. There are other things to it besides just changing shape. It depends, entirely, on whether or not she can be taught to be still in the presence of the Buzzing in the Brain. "I have many works, which have many ways of changing the world and myself. In the clearing, I became a crow, and when I ceased to be the crow, you convinced yourself I was merely sitting behind the crow, and somehow you simply didn't notice me. But truly both were me; and I merely moved from one to the other. Coming onto the tram, well, I just walked aboard, and nobody stopped me. There are ways of walking that pass, briefly, through unseen holes in human sight. But if you get too crazy, it'll be easy for us to be discovered, and then we might be kicked off the tram. So don't scream or smash anything, okay?"

She reached back, craned around in a way few humans could, and gave Robin a small kiss on her cheek. "I like you, but if you get us kicked off of our transport, I'll be irritated at you."

[Robin Stanton]

"Huh. That's a very different way of taking on a shape. You'll have to show me how you do that some time. It's magic, right?" There she goes trying to classify things again, though in this case it's more out of reverence and a lack of vocabulary. Suddenly she wishes she'd paid just a little bit of attention to what her aunt is capable of so she could impress this mysterious stranger with even a scrap of actual knowledge. "I mean, sometimes people call what I do magic, but just in the sense that it's, you know, impressive, not like Magic magic."

In response to the kiss on the cheek Robin grins and reaches up to ever so slightly ruffle Clair's hair. "No worries, I have no intention of getting kicked off of either of my rides. Where are we going anyway?" she asks, nibbling on Clair's ear. "Because I think I want to thank you properly for saving my butt from the gendarmerie." Part of her has almost hoped Clair's spell - no, her Working - would be strong enough she could fool around with her right here, but now she's not so certain. Although she does let part of her spread into Clair's shirt, not to fully animate it right this moment but enough to feel the sensation of her body heat and bare skin. And, okay, maybe to make it move a little bit just to make her Cinnamon-Crow aware of what she's doing.

[Clair de Lune]

Clair's smile rests easy on her face as she feels the flush coming off of Robin. She clearly took to even the gentlest of touches of the Red far too well, letting hunger overtake her, which made her a bad person to learn that particular lore... though it suggested strength in other places. Her heart, mainly, insofar as she even had one - Clair knew that blood didn't flow in her as it did in normal people. "Magic, yes. My school comes from the old Celtic traditions, from where you'd know Germany to be, but perhaps three thousand years ago. Even then, it's new, and quite controversial among other covens; but change is in my nature, and the nature of my people." She shakes her head a little.

"Other traditions are old in other parts of the world, but people who had mastery of more than one lore were only heard of in the last few generations. I have dedicated myself to hungers, and urges... which is why you can't seem to keep your hands off me, I think. But if you play too easy, I may go looking for something with a little more thrill to the hunt." She was joking, and quite enjoying her own shirt kneading gently at her curves. "You can keep doing that, though. That won't get us noticed. Just don't get... too excited. I don't have a place in mind for us to go, yet. Haven't you ever escaped from a battle before? The first direction you go is away, followed by deciding where's next. Where is your hostel, by the way? We're going east, right now, generally speaking."

[Robin Stanton]

"Well, you're also a very pretty girl with a proven interest in hitting this." she grins. "But if you wanna catch me then I'll have you know I'm quite slippery." she adds, feeling pretty confident right now from having a fairly close and intimate grasp on Clair. A fact she only too happily abuses by moving, tightening and gently twisting the fabric in all the right places, letting it flow over soft and sensitive skin. "You do seem to enjoy me being a little clingy though..." she laughs.

"My stops further south, I think. Maybe south-west by now. Not too far I don't think? But the real question isn't how excited I get on the way, really. No one's going to notice me." she adds with an almost devious little smirk and then the weight of her on Clair's back suddenly lessens almost completely as the rest of her disappears into her clothes. For a moment there's a strange resistance to her movement as her clothes very briefly grow stiff but soon Robin's presence settles into the different fabrics more comfortably and invisible 'fingers' of animated fabric start running down Clair's back and start exploring.

[Clair de Lune]

"Interest?" Clair asks, incredulously. "I'd say I've moved beyond thought and theory and into the realms of the practical, wouldn't you?" Clair feels Robin's caresses coming, this close, being a master of change herself, able to see how things were changing. Others might have felt disconcerted; Clair feels at ease, knowing that if she has to she can simply abandon this form and the clothes she's wearing with it. It occurrs to her, actually, to wonder what would happen to Robin if she did that. She decides not to test it; intimacy, after all, takes trust, and Clair would not want to ruin Robin's trust in her by dismissing her to Nowhere this soon, if indeed that is where her clothes went. Perhaps they would fuse together, form some kind of two-headed changeling animal abomination. Clair puts the idea out of her mind as Robin fully becomes her new role, and enjoys the intensifying sensations.

With Robin out of the picture physically it's easier to occupy the space between others' perceptions, and Clair takes a seat, drawing in a deep breath as she feels Robin push over her body, down and through her clothes, until they are pressed together as intimately as any two people could be. Clair feels her outfit becoming more and more tight-fitting, until the entire thing is snug against herself, and she feels soft little things begin to explore her breasts, her hips, between her legs... Before she can say anything - not that Robin has ears at this point - she is entered, and she bites her lip to keep herself quiet. "We're getting off soon to find our way - gmph - back to your room, so make this quick. I need to be able to walk off of the tram without the conductor seeing me." A seeking tendril finds its way to a sensitive place inside her, and she shudders, and swallows a low moan. She thanks her lucky Hours that there are no children on this tram, or many people at all.

[Robin Stanton]

Robin's far from insensate, though most of her world is warm and soft right now, feeling Clair's voice and ragged breathing more through the vibrations of her body than actual ears. She'd meant to tease Clair more than anything, but once she's started and feeling the flush of her body it's hard to stop herself from grasping, probing, seeking what makes Clair shudder. And sooner rather than later she feels things come to a head. She's oh so tempted to keep going, ignore Clair's concerns about getting off (the tram that is) but she's already pushing it and disregarding her wishes directly is not something Robin cares for. And so she quiets herself, withdraws and just holds Clair in this strange embrace for a while until she feels the two of them move again.

Only as they reach her hostel does Robin fully leave Clair's clothes, reforming herself into her humanoid self, albeit barely a foot tall and sitting on Clair's shoulder with a very self-satisfied grin on her face. "I mean I was going to take my time but your wish is my command." she snickers, leaning against the side of Clair's head, hands between her knees to hold on to her shirt.

[Clair de Lune]

Robin doesn't have much restraint - Clair has to remind herself that it's at her own request. She grips a bar of the tram as it turns a corner, clenching her thighs and tilting her head back to stare sightlessly at the ceiling, holding her spell in mind loosely so as to not waste the blood she spilled to step aboard so casually - though it was only a beetle, crushed neatly underfoot as they stepped aboard. She's not sure how to treat the clothes she's wearing, but in the aftermath, she runs a gentle hand down the leg of her jeans, petting Robin, or so she thinks.

"Yes, yes, you're very talented," Clair says, patting the tiny thing on her shoulder condescendingly. "You've learned things since that clearing in the forest. Been taking lessons with others, hm?" If she needed to, she could simply scale the building and let herself in by the window-latch - it was one of the simpler spells to move so simple a lock as they put on most upper-floor Parisian windows - but instead she simply holds out a hand, assuming Robin would be disturbed to see her slash a bird out of the sky. "Whatever you have to let us into the room... I hope it's not as small as you are. We may have issues if it is."

[Robin Stanton]

"Pfft, no! I'm just a quick learner. And it's..." Robin trails off for a moment, trying to find the right words. "You know how when you can't see, your other senses compensate? It's a little like that. A lot easier to know what works when every twitch and tremble is most of your world. And then you just... go with the flow." she smirks, wriggling her fingers. "Oh yeah, hang on." Plunging her hand into her own chest of rippling protoplasm she soon pulls out a room key and drops it into Clair's waiting palm. She doesn't mind the head-pats at all, if she did she probably wouldn't have chosen to be small enough to ride on Clair's shoulder to begin with. Besides, if the worst reaction somebody has to her shenanigans is mild annoyance in the form of patronizing pats she'll take it.

"Plus I guess it's easier not to be nervous when you don't have a heartbeat hammering in your ears and other excitable parts demanding attention. It's a very uncomplicated way to be." The key lets them into the shared room that's empty of people at the moment, with just the simple light-brown furniture that somehow seems to exist in every hostel around the world. With only the mild detritus of travelers present, hiking boots haphazardly shoved under a bed, a loose sock, a poorly-folded map (somebody apparently going full erudite without a smartphone) and so on. As they enter Robin hops down from Clair's shoulder, swelling back up to regular size, just an inch or two shorter than Clair, to catch her fall. "I could talk your ear off about my shifting though so please stop me if I'm boring you."

[Clair de Lune]

Clair smiles and nods. She knows exactly what Robin means. "I've been things that have no eyes or ears, way down at the bottom of the sea. Maybe I'll take you there someday... but that takes time, descending and ascending. Days, actually." They ascend to the higher rooms of the hostel and Clair knows what she'll be looking at before she gets there; smells the staleness and sourness of traveling teenagers, sweat and road dirt and hormones. It's the same kind of pull that comes from red light districts and sunlit marketplaces; the weight of humanity generating a mass of sensation, that one can experience just by being in it. So much of everything, so many influences to draw from...

"If you didn't interest me," Clair said, "you'd turn to look at where I used to be, and I would simply no longer be there." It was one of the most common tricks that Clair pulled, and one of the easiest. Instead, she presses a finger to Robin's collarbone, a short but sharp nail digging into her and nicking slightly, just to draw a little blood. From that small spill, she ignited a spark, sucking on her finger to draw it into herself, looking Robin dead in the eye before pulling her close. "Does it bother you, that I do this to you?" she asks, her eyes glinting dangerously as she pulls Robin into a kiss, breathing that spark into the red to ignite it, pull Robin once again into her thrall. She pulls away, lips curled, eyes smouldering. "Show me where your bed is," she commands. Gently, playfully, but it is still a command.

[Robin Stanton]

"Ow, hey..." she objects, though more in confusing and surprise than genuine discomfort. And then they're kissing again, hot breath shared between soft lips. And this time Robin is awake and aware of the simmering heat sinking into her, turning her breath ragged and limbs tingly. It ripples through her like wildfire and goosebumps. She could fight this. Or at least try to. Turn herself into something incapable of the physical sensations of it, but she suspects she would not hold out long like that before the need to feel would drive her mad. Should she be concerned about the fact that Clair can turn her on like a gosh-darn light-switch? Maybe, but she hardly needs magic to be attracted to her and it feels nice to stoke this flame.

"What's the harm? Or are you worried I wouldn't want you without it?" she asks, as she pulls Clair towards her bed, on the way kicking a chair towards the closed door where it seems to wedge itself under the door-handle all on it's own. "Cause you talk like you're halfway ready to disappear on me like you did in the woods, never to be seen again. And I think that would bother me more than this. This I like..." she says, letting herself fall back onto her bed and into a blob of protoplasm that bounces a little, shedding her clothes and reforming into a young woman, now sans clothing and grinning up at Clair.

[Clair de Lune]

Clair lets herself be pulled along, allowing Robin her gentle little jabs. She knew, of course, that her presence, intimacy with her, was addictive - dangerously so, to some people. She could shield people, but it took effort, and Robin looked so... delicious. She could always dispel the effects later, she supposed, though gathering the power and the pieces would take a while. "I don't think I'm going to disappear, just yet," said Clair, somewhat comfortingly, "Though I always do in the end." She kneels down by the bed, taking Robin's thigh worshipfully in one hand, kissing the outside, under to the sensitive skin on the inside, and further in... but just before she makes contact, she passes onward, nipping her way up Robin's sensitive stomach as she crawls, almost spiderlike, up the younger woman.

"The test is whether or not I come back... some have waited years. You said you wanted to thank me?" She carries up to her breasts, along the inside of them to the crook of her neck, and bites viscerally at the place where her throat meets her jaw, before returning suddenly with her hand to Robin's core, where the lessons begin again...

[Robin Stanton]

"You talk like you're much older than you look." Robin notes but any further thoughts are chased away by Clair's lips and teeth on her skin, pushing her further down into the blissful, hungering heat deep inside of her. She stays human throughout most of it, the urge and fire burning trails along her nerves keeping her rooted in soft flesh and heated blood. But here and there when the flame almost burns too much and she needs more contact than skin on skin can manage she melts against Clair, small pseudopod tendrils rising from her skin like grasping hairs and trembling in waves like delicate bundles of puffy nerves.

Eventually she's spend and she curls up against Clair, almost attached to her in how much she clings to the other woman on the shared bed. Still, Clair would probably have little trouble leaving unnoticed if she wants to, even if it does mean leaving the warm and soft embrace of the little ball of protoplasm playing at being a woman.

[Clair de Lune]

Clair looks down at Robin fondly, appreciating the way her body flexes and moves in the aftermath of their lovemaking. For a moment she just hangs over her, her hair tickling Robin's face, and then she settles down and folds herself into Robin's curled-up form, not going anywhere, just yet. "You might say I have shared a soul," she said, mysteriously, "but also, I learned my English in philosophy lessons with my coven. If I wanted to, I suppose I could be very modern... but this comes more naturally to me.

"It's not even night," she says. "I can stay for quite a while, yet. I have nowhere to be." She holds herself close to Robin, breathes in that bitter-musty, mineral scent. "You are quite something, you know," Clair remarks. "You could really be something, in time. But first, we can just be here." She manoeuvres herself, at length, to being on her back, bringing Robin to rest on her bare chest. "You're an excellent woman. Very responsive, you blush easily, and you take to deep and consuming hunger like a bird to the wind. You'd look beautiful in a collar, your form bent to my pleasure... But you could accomplish so much more without it." She sighs, wistfully, playing with Robin's hair. "Sometimes, we mustn't give into hunger. But maybe we can play at it, sometime... another time."

[Robin Stanton]

Robin is an exceptional snuggler, no awkward angles or weight or cut off circulation, just a soft body and warm embraces. Even with Robin's arm nestled on her chest and forearm tucked in to prop up her head she fits perfectly against Clair. "Yeah, I hear that a lot." she says almost a bit wistfully and chuckles softly. "Unlimited potential! No clue what I really wanna do with it but I sure could be anything at all. But this is nice, this is uncomplicated and I don't have to think too much about it, just let myself be what feels right." And while Robin might be a little inexperienced, she's not completely naive about what Clair means when she talks about collars. She can't quite decide if the thought is exciting or scary. Maybe it's just both.

"For fun." she nods, looking down at Clair and peering into her eyes, her own a faded pink. "But not for real. I'll play at many things, but I do so for me. I don't know if I could fight your magic if I wanted to and I hope I never have to find out, but I've stared down too many scary things and come out on top. Hell, I've been raised by scary things. I may have only fooled around with people before you, but your workings don't bother or frighten me. Unless you force them on me. And you don't want me as your enemy, I can promise you that." she says with a big smirk on her face. "Just be honest with me, that's all I ask." she adds and put her head back down, tucking it between Clair's chest and her jaw.