December 26th, 1919 - Morning

Elisa and Jamie got back to the bookstore just when Quinton hung up the phone.

Looking up at them, the Pajari bookkeeper sighed and rubbed his temple, shaking his head. "There's no one fitting Mackenzie's description at the hospital."

"Where the hell is he?" Elisa muttered darkly, hugging herself tighter. Jamie ( Read more... )

December 25th, 1919.

The ring was loud, dimly lit, and warm. Despite the frost in the air outside and the woolen jackets the spectators came in, sweat was dripping down his brow and plastering reddish brown curls to his forehead. People were catcalling from the sidelines, egging on one opponent or the other.

Mackenzie grinned, basking in the ( Read more... )

Mendel had been walking around the streets of Brooklyn looking for a story when he first met him.

He'd been standing on a street corner, looking as inconspicuous as you please, with a fedora tipped low over a prominent brown and green eyes sunk so far back in his skull that they looked black in the shadows. A long overcoat hid the nice suit that ( Read more... )

"Don't ferget yer scarf, Menny!"

Mendel Aschner stopped by the door, turning with a smile when his cousin came over with the familiar burgundy scarf. It was finally crisp and nippy outside, biting at noses with promises that Jack Frost was coming and was just held up. The front foyer, decorated for Halloween, was a dull explosion of browns, ( Read more... )

The music rocked the walls, and Mackenzie Moore slide through the crowd of bodies with as much finesse as a man his size could managed.

Waving at Jamie and Elisa tucked into a corner of the joint, the boxer grinned when Elisa reached out and grabbed onto his sleeve, dragging him over to their gossip table and sat him down.

"Where do y'think ( Read more... )

Stepping lightly out of the carriage, the woman looked up at the mansion that was soon to be her home - and, in effect, her tomb.

It was a rather plain-looking structure, with shuttered windows and heavy curtains to block out the light of the sun when the sun bothered to peek out from behind his veil of clouds. The front gate was perhaps the ( Read more... )

Eiel had sisters once upon a time, when the world was unknown and the winds were cold.

They were two pretty girls, blonde like their mother with their father's grey eyes. Astrid was born first, stubborn like her father with her mother's nose and the airs of Frejya herself; Kaia, when she was born, looked the most like her father and used to hang ( Read more... )

Slipping out of the shop on quiet feet, Byron slowly shut the door. When the door creaked and clicked uncomfortably loud, the small 'wolf froze, face twisted in an exaggerated wince while waiting for some inevitable disruption to his plans.

All was quiet, Kiba and Kezia sleeping peacefully in their rooms and not minding the sounds of the door, and ( Read more... )

After the meeting of the well, Larei had not thought she'd see Eiel from Far Away again. He had retrieved her bucket, they had exchanged more playful quips, and then he had been on his way to the bathhouse to clean a month's worth of grim from his skin and perhaps pay in the flesh they had skirted around in conversation.

Larei would admit openly ( Read more... )

He'd gotten used to being bought and sold the past few years.

After all, when one was bound as a slave and bartered like an object instead of treated like a person, one learned how to shut down and just pretend that nothing was happening around them. They allowed the terrible things to happen, because it eventually had to end so long as they kept ( Read more... )