Mages Flock to Books

Proclus
[Ah, look.  A bookstore...]
The thick bandage hardly helps, wadded and wrapped as it is about his foot.  It hardly helps him cut a dash as suave or elegant, though he remains cheerful as he enters the bookshop crutch first.
"Adam?"  He asks into the interior, making his way inward.  Past the science fiction, the posters, the slight change in stock that breeds a slight smile.  Good.  Commoners buying books.  Good for the coffers, good for the soul...
About his waist as he moves, so too does his satchel.  One bound foot and a crutch to match, but a smile of business and familiarity.  Of purpose.  Yes, the Jerbiton has purpose.

A. Gallowglass
Ah, behold, the bookstore.
And in that bookstore, one A. Gallowglass, or Dominic Adam Julian Gallowglass, no III, no II, no IV, he is the first of that name, and it is his name, his Craft name, the name valiancy belongs to, and relentlessness.
Where is Adam to be found? He is not at the desk. He is not in the shadowy alcove full of old and rare books. He is -
Leonhard can hear him up the stairs on the second level. There's one stair in particular which makes a noise when Adam comes down; it sings like wind through the bone of a mythical sea-creature, a story-carved bone, a hollow sound.
"What happened to you?" he says, reaching ground level, his dark eyebrows rising and see he even paused a step when coming down before completing the descent.

Proclus
He is to be found at the desk, though the proper side for a customer.  Yes, somebody selling something.  An idea in his eye, a something-to-show...  The satchel is atop the desk and he is pulling out a pad, a pen, an idea, throwing a practiced look over his shoulder to ensure the continued privacy of his timing...
"Frere!  Hm?  Oh, this old thing," he mentions with robust humour of his sprained ankle.  He is speaking in Latin, the accent Rhaetian.  A dead language kept very much alive, it fits well on his tongue.  "Just something I picked up on a hike with an Orphan.  Alexander Brandt.  You Have Awakened 101.  (I thought we had Hollowers for that 'here in Denver,' but I guess not.)  Anyway..."
He finally lets his eyes fully alight on his fellow Hermetic.  His fellow magus.  "What do you know of dead letter drops and brush-pasts and the like?  Did, ah, your Mater teach you about such things?  You see, I have seen... how to put this?  A potential gap in the market."

A. Gallowglass
Time to block the scene. Adam crosses the floor to reach Leonhard and his desk. He doesn't take a seat. There is only one chair today: no convenient near-by stool or stepping ladder. No convenient box to sit upon. The typewriter has been pushed somewhat to the side although it's ice cream parlor mint façade can just be seen between a rather large stack of books of natural philosophy. There is a journal which looks as if it is being written in: something hand-bound. Actual business-related paperwork is not to be seen. There is a little flier for some anarchist's collective swap meet thing, dated to happen in a week.
Adam's expressions are usually quite self-contained, but he is far from expressionless. See? He is poised when Proclus mentions Alexander, but the expression in his eyes shifts; acknowledges recognition, wavers into something sharp and smirksome when Proclus mentions Hollowers, and anyway, and anyway.
"I am listening," says he, and also, raising an eyebrow with a touch of humour. "With complete attention, once you sit."
He doesn't look pointedly at the desk chair; he just points to the damned chair, and his gaze grazes over the satchel, like somebody who likes to have his desk just so, and God help anybody who moves stuff around by plopping anything on it.

Proclus
"Sit?  Oh, you..."  He was about to tease the younger magus for his concern but stops dead.  He smiles, and it comes as a friend who might acknowledge the concern.  As a friend who might barge into one's shop and begin prattling, whether with purpose or not, and threaten to make a mess of the grand order of the desk.  Purpose.  The contents of the satchel draw him back, and there is another acknowledgement: his paraphenalia is shepherded into less of a sprawl.  Tidied, if hurriedly, though he continues with it.  "Really, Frere, I'm fine here and the light's the key.  Better to see, not hunched over my little...  Well... You'll see."
He undoes the pen, almost incidentally, explaining his query somewhat:
"I've heard talk of some (presumeably) Virtual Adept telephone hotline message... thing... which is all well and good (and, I suppose, it is) but I was thinking about what we spoke of.  Of the Order being prepared to support the Council hereabouts.  You know... should... well, perhaps when...  Well, let's say if things go wrong in the face of some crisis or other.  Now," he says, growing less rapid in his speech, "I've not got the patience to dredge up all the tricks of the trade we used to use in the War, but I do feel that we magi should have some form of secondary infrastructure to fall back on.  Prudence.  Would you agree?"

A. Gallowglass
Adam does not answer immediately, though he'd supplied, when Leonhard mentioned a Virtual Adept telephone hotline message thing ("Ginger, I believe"), and otherwise been quiet. Of course he was quiet, Adam; quiet and watchful in spite of the sleepless shadows around his eyes.
When he does answer, it is with a faux-start, and a -  "Hmm?" - followed my a scratch of his head. His hair - well. His hair is always in the state his hair is in - except it needs a good wash, too. In some places that's fashionable, that greasy needs-a-wash snarl of a look. "Oh, I'm sorry," he taps his temple, "The attention, still seems incomplete..."
Now the pointed look at the chair. At Leonhard.
"...I'm afraid." But there's a bare smile; that's as far as Adam is going to go, it seems, because how seriously he says, "You knew my mater, if not the man who succeeded her." Plantagenet: labyrinthine. "I would agree. Secondary, tertiary, and perhaps a feint of a fake infrastructure at the same time: that would be ideal."

Proclus
    "Ginger, yes," Proclus notes, listening, reminded, though more concerned for at least a moment about the exhaustion or over-work the Bonisagan would seem to have been pressing upon himself.  And it is a moment that returns.  And then stays.  "Oh, will you sit down before you fall down?  I've got three legs.  Take the chair.  Please."
"Quite right, though," the Jerbiton agrees of talk of feints and blinds and so forth.  Wholly unsurprised that Bonisagi would be so familiar with levels and degrees and Mystery.  "Feints, fake blinds, yes, and towards that end...  A new twist on Steganography.  Forget inks and one-time pads (though the latter will be of secondary use to us in what I propose), and nothing that can't be handled with eyes, a decent pen and a pad of paper," he begins to explain.  Upon the desk, he demonstrates, beginning to write - though with regular flicks of the eye towards Adam.  (Will you sit before you fall asleep where you stand?)  His penmanship is a little forced and his hand appears to be mildly contorting as he writes.
    "It's not in the text, in the words used.... but... in how... you angle the nib, and the... depth, by pressure on the nib... to...  There.  To embed a particular sigil or series of sigils, so as to form in Low Enochian, a message.  To the informed eye, at least."    The message written is simple enough, a copy of the information on the anarchists' swap meet flyer.  But he's surely not come showing off his ability to read and write, at least not quite...    "And to better secure the hidden message, we... can quite easily... add a few additional marks... thusly making the whole thing... a different message entirely.  So, even if the first layer of code is broken and by somebody who knows Enochian, they will read an entirely different message.  Of course, randomising the second layer of indenting strokes will require a uniformity of that same randomisation; lucky for us, that's where a version of a one-time sheet comes in handy.  As for what the one-time pad is..."
    He darts off for a moment...  well away from the chair... insomuch as one might dart on a crutch, but he is certainly animated.  Stopping by one shelf of books, he rapidly spiders his fingers across the tops of the books...  "Could it be here?  No."    Again, he darts, crossing to another shelf.  He glances to the Bonisagan, clicking his fingers as if in annoyance.  "Damn, not here, either, but..."    He makes his way to the window.  Across the road, the names of the other stores in the street, no, no, not quite...  Ah, yes.  His fingers trace the phrases in those other stores' promotional posters.    "Temporary, simple, readily available and nothing that could be thought to be in our control.  The perfect single-use code-sheet.  Of course, it would be foolish to use those shops.  To close to home.  But anybody could quite innocently walk past a McDonalds, and see the order of vowels in their latest poster."    He returns to the desk and his example of the code.  "See here?  (Well, I expect you do, but just to be sure.)  What originally looked to you to be The Enemy Has A Small Penis is actually, thanks to the latest McDonalds poster...  It Would Take A Master To Crack This Code From Scratch.  Throw in some dead letter drop locations and we have the makings... or at least the beginnings... of a back-up structure when needed.  Or we could just use it ourselves in emergencies.  Or both.  Either way, I feel that it's something that we should make known to the other magi, in case of emergency."

Proclus
The curl of a C, it's lower half, ever so slightly indented by the nib.  The rise of an F, in the next word, similarly marked into the paper.  The C in one word, the F in another, and so on, in secretive collusion.  Composite sigillography.  The Enochian for Enemy.  But changed... made a mask for It Would Take, it would require, it may require, the demand would be, the demand shall be revealed...  The vagaries of Enochian made Low, conversational... but functionally communicative.

A. Gallowglass
He does not sit. Not Gallowglass. Never. No. Not now, not until Proclus plants his butt in a chair and stops hopping around like a broken-winged owl about to get hit by a truck (a simile which does not occur to Gallowglass but nonetheless has a certain poignancy - hm?). "You've got one leg doing the work of two, half a leg, and a stick."
But he looks with interest at the Jerbiton's hand as he writes. Is Proclus still speaking Latin? Perhaps Adam will switch to that tongue, too. A flick of black temper the next time Proclus looks at him and tells him to sit before he falls asleep, a side-eye like a bird might side-eye a worm, all subliminated by fascination. What are Adams for if not learning and observing, in the name of the quest? And he loves the language of angels. He loves it: and all its possibilities.
The a-slouched bookstore owner straightens when Leonhard darts suddenly, lurching from the desk to the bookshelf and then to the window and then: "Would it be much use to penny mystics without some familiarty with Enochian?"
"And what," asks he, interested, "put this bee in your bonnet? Simply inspired by Ginger?"

Proclus
"Penny-mystics.  I shouldn't like that, but it's been an age since I've heard that," the Jerbiton's snobby heart admits, enjoying the Latin phrase as it hits his ear.  Hits his ear so hard in fact that he stops flapping about like some sugar-fiend owl...  "In their case, a diluted version.  English.  Same principles."
Of bees, bonnets and he's not sitting down... The Jerbiton replies, making his way back towards the desk...a n d  t h e  c h a i r... and putting an arm towards THE CHAIR as he nears it... and leans on the desk, arranging his satchel to return its contents, "Not so much inspired as concerned, and wanting to have more than just drinks and Gustav to offer as hospitality at that get-together I was also proposing."
The bastard.  The leaning, sprained bastard.  He smiles.  He knows.

A. Gallowglass
"Hmm."
Adam; isn't he full of words? He hmms, and also continues to not sit down or lean on anything. He does not need to lean on anything because he is a man in possession of two legs. Neither of which needs must be propped up by a cane or is swaddled like an awkward baby-bundle in bandages.
"So what's this Alexander like? Kal was talking about him, not very lucidly. Said he might make for a Flambeau, however. I repeat again 'not very lucidly.'"

Proclus
"And not especially likely, I don't think," Proclus responds to the Flambeau's hopes, though with anything but satisfaction in delivering the words.  He may be enjoying the Latin but he's certainly not enjoying the realisation, in saying so, that he doubts the Orphan is headed for the Golden Path.  "I'd like to be surprised but... well, having spent some time with him, I'm not convinced Kalen may not be indulging in wishful thinking.  I would think him...  hm...  perhaps more likely to swing towards the Akashics.  Not so much for the Do, which I doubt is his 'thing,' but he's... well, I...  Orphans!  So confused as to be confusing, I suppose."

Grace
[Nightmares!]
Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (3, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

Grace
[Magedar!]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (4, 5, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 3 )

Serafíne
How far are Leonhard and Adam from the window with the best view of themostly-deserted street outside the cluttered glories of Night Owl (An Arch Key) Books? Because the sexiest goddamned car just pulled up outside.  A 1961 Jaguar XK-140, British racing green.  Top down because the sun was bright and the day was gorgeous and, as someone said, might as well take the convertible.  She's curled up on the creamy leather of passenger's seat giving Hawksley directions and not telling him where they're going and they've been driving in a few different sorts of circles that could almost be ritualistic if Sera worked like that,
but Sera does not work like that.  That is not how she is put together.  Night Owl (An Arch Key) is sliding by and she's in the middle of some animate story-or-other fueled by a handful of substances and that's why she misses the place,
until she catches the swinging placard in the rear-view mirror.
"Stop stop stop!"  She tells him, gleaming.  "Here here here!"
It's not the Biblioteca National.  But it is a whole store full of wizarding wizards and books books books books books.
Sera waits for Hawksley to put the Jag in park and cut off the engine and pocket the keys and circle that long, sleek, amazing snout-of-a-front-end and open her door and offer her a hand then she is: rising and rising and rising until she is tottering at very close to his own height because those thigh-high suede boots she is sporting have 2.5 inch platforms and 4.5 inch heels or maybe more.
"That's it - " she's telling him, with a nod of her blond head toward the storefront, "but you should let me cover your eyes before we go it.  So it'll be like a surprise."

Serafi­ne
(And just for funs.  Awareness.)
Dice: 7 d10 TN5 (2, 2, 5, 5, 6, 8, 8) ( success x 5 )
Grace
So, they have been talking about Virtual Adept hotline message things named Ginger, and perhaps it will be no surprise to anyone here that sometimes the universe simply summons the right person for the job, eh? Speak of the devil, etc. Truth be told, Grace has not been listening in to the bookstore, or performed any such technomagick in order to determine that people were talking about her (or her admin-level status with a certain dead drop setup).
Sometimes things just happen by coincidence.
So, she appears, the Virtual Adept (for real, no -ish anymore) at the door, wearing what must be her daily uniform of jeans, sneakers, grey turtleneck and laptop bag. The place feels like righteous knights in armor, the flash of steel (Adam has infused it so) but there, another hum to join the rest -- one she's not yet encountered. Perhaps Hawksley and Sera pulling up in their ridiculous car register as well -- the bright summer and in-betweenness.
"Huh," is all she says, not a 'hello' or a 'who's the new guy' or anything as she crosses the threshold. But she does smile. Gives a little wave. "'Sup?"

Proclus
[[Seems somehow suitable: Per+Awareness]]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7) ( success x 2 )

A. Gallowglass
Adam absorbs this new opinion of Alexander with an expression that can best be described as pensive. He does not make a case for Kalen's insightfulness, keen and unmarred by personal wants or desires. Nor does he make a case for Kalen's wishfulness. Adam: He is a collector of opinions and he puts this one on a bookshelf in his memory palace beside who knows what other opinions. Tongue curled behind his teeth, the dark-haired Hermetic (forget him [but how?]) taps his fingertip against his elbow (his arms are still folded across his chest, after all, stalwart and planted, rooted to the spot, go ahead and tilt at him).
"Why the Akashics, of all people? He must seem rather like a soldi..."
The door opens; ring-a-ling, a-ling, a-ling, and the bells herald a Grace! Adam is standing in front of his desk, on the side of the store which contains that recessed room of rarities and stairs leading upward; Proclus is also standing in front of his desk, if by standing we mean leaning like a fool. Adam looks to see who just came in, ready to be a helpful nonentity, when -
Huh.
Well, well, well. He smiles; the smile has something of cat-and-cream to it. "You have good timing, Grace. I was just about to ask my friend here whether or not he'd managed to meet you yet."
A glance behind Grace, reflexive, to the street; some flash car, flashing by, and then the door closes behind her, no more bells ringing.

Hawksley Rothschild
[For Leonhard:Coinciding with the warm slide of that British racing-green vintage Jaguar outside is the sense of wings, soaring wings, a predator in a dive, smoothing to the ground with surprising delicacy versus the sheer power in the flying form.  Something outside is flying, brushes its talons across the earth but never. quite. lands, never quite submits to gravity's clinging and grasping.  Could not submit to it if he wanted, really.  Regardless of the weather here, which is changeable, the feeling that one must shade their eyes if they turn to the window is powerful.  The sensation of crawling, drenching warmth from that sunlight is slowly making its way up the body, soaking into the mind.  There are gods of the sky and gods of the sun and gods who are both incarnate and that sort of god, that sort of entity, is right outside Night Owl books, the supernatural equivalent of the opposite of 'Night'.
For everyone else who has felt Hawksley before, his resonance is:http://youtu.be/8ip8OsExLJs ]

Hawksley Rothschild
Sera didn't tell him where they were going but she gave him directions.  If he wanted he could have guessed, but he doesn't; he doesn't care.  Lovely day, it was, good for driving and driving and driving under the sun in the goddamned Jaguar convertible.  Good day for his aviators and Sera's hair flowing behind her, good day for long roads but they're not going toward the mountains, he doesn't give a fuck about the last good skiing days of the season.
He slides the car to a stop, slower than Sera's stop stop stop, and looks in his rearview.  He quirks a brow, looking at her, and then there's the business of parallel parking this car somewhere he can see it and yes, there are people who are staring at this thing, how can you not stare, you don't see one of these every day.  You don't see people like Hawksley or Sera every day, either.  They're so special, so sparkly, so shameless, and he wears his wealth the way he wears the sun on his skin: like he was born to it.
Which he was.
Hawksley would not open the goddamned door for many people other than Sera, but he does gallantly circle the Jag and help her out, wearing artfully distressed jeans and a tailored white tee and clipping his aviators to the front of that v-necked shirt.  His watch cost thousands, his shoes are flat but no less extravagant than Sera's, just... not made to look it, as Sera's were.
"I've been here," he tells her, as they stroll towards the door.  "The clerk is a snob."
He looks down the sidewalk and sees Grace and grins though.  "'Sup with you," he counters, and the door rings, and there he is, there they are, strolling inward, with Grace going ahead and Sera on Hawksley's arm like he's a goddamned gentleman which he is not.

A. Gallowglass
[I'm going to put this on the table:
Screw posting order. I mean, within reason. I am multitasking pretty hard and bound to be pretty slow, and Adam's a quiet watchful sort, so you know.]

Hawksley Rothschild
[fuck yeah]

Proclus
"Only just this minute," the sprained Hermetic says in warm greeting to Grace.  He hitches himself upward a little at the desk.  Continuing, he seems very pleased by her presence, or so says the lilt at work in his accent, "Grace.  A pleasure.  Leonhard Frick.  You'll, ah, forgive me if I don't bow, won't you?"
He completes the refilling of his satchel, though not so much in haste to hurry the contents from others' sight as in some form of politesse, turning to...  feel... "Lammergeier," or so he mutters, thinking of that most vibrant of birds, thought of in Hermetic circles as the one perhaps most representative of the mystic... and...such a soaring motif for the Order.  Ah.  Serafine.
"Popular place, Adam," he quips, though clearly wondering who the hell...?

Grace
"Friend, oh that's good," she says, and means it. Didn't look like there was fighting going on in here, but you never can tell. She strides up to the leaning fool, leaving Hawksley and Sera a brimming grin over her shoulder as she leaves them in her wake.
"Hi, I'm Grace," she says, without an extended hand. Just a hello. "And I think if you bowed to me, I might ask you to forgive me for whatever the hell I did to cause that to be a thing."
"I think it's happened again," she says, eyes roving around the complicated details of the bookstore, all full of symbols it is. "We've converged."

Hawksley Rothschild
"Don't look at me," Hawksley quips to Grace, regarding convergence, "Sera tricked me."

Serafi­ne
"He has a fucking lot of books," Sera is telling Hawksley, turning her head to rest her mouth against his shoulder, smiling, smiling.  My friends, she is on drugs.  "And a ferret named Ruse."
- and Sera is a little bit careful on the stoop and the steps but with a hand to help her out an arm to wiggle her own through she can actually walk in those things.  The heels and platform are covered with suede too so that heights to which they (make her) tower are not immediately obvious and you might just assume from the rather long limbs and the glassine eyes and the little black dress, 85% of which is see through) that she really just might be that tall.  A model or some fucking thing. Surely Hawksley catches them up or gets her close enough to Grace that Sera can ruffle Grace's hair and maybe he does that because she's reaching, reaching -
"Leonhard.  Hihihi."  Both greeting him with a rather smearily drunk grin and telling Hawksley the stranger's name.  "He's got a lot of other fucking names too.  He's from Liechtenstein.
"I did not trick you."  Also, to Adam, "Where's Ruse?"

Proclus
"Well, Grace, I would try a curtsey instead but it doesn't suit me so well," he says, jocular perhaps, but warm, and it is a warmth which spills over to the Ecstatic's entrance, too.  Even less likely to dance with her than when they last (first) (sometime) met in the shop. "Sera."
Talk of Ruse, but signs of... try it...  Can't look less meritable than the crutch...  It's not a guess, not really...  "Ah, you wouldn't be Hawksley, by any chance?"

Hawksley Rothschild
"She tricked me," he repeats, whilst Sera is denying it, but he's talking to Grace and to the room in general.
But that doesn't mean he didn't hear her.  He's got a lot of other fucking names too.  Which explains the snobbery.  He hasn't stopped providing a place for Sera to lean when she needs to so she doesn't fall over.  How amicable of him, to be moved around at her whims, though he doesn't look worried that she might fall.  He's seen her in higher heels than that.  Drunker, higher than this.  He's more worried about her falling when her feet are flat, because what if she forgets how to balance that way?
He raises an eyebrow at Leonhard.  "I wouldn't be, by chance," he says, because if he's hanging out with the shopkeep who runs this place and has A Lot of Other Fucking Names, he's already suspect, tarred with the same brush.  Hawksley is ignoring the shopkeep.  "But by careful planning, I might."

Patience Mason
[Anyone mind another? Or is it a little to full.]

Hawksley Rothschild
[come on in! let's make it a party!]

A. Gallowglass
Popular place, Adam. "Most people are welcome."
The dark-haired Hermetic (scruff-haired, he should wash it; stop combing it wildly with his fingers when he's doing whatever it is he does [here's a hint: it involves books], then he'd look less like Dream of the Endless) shrugs his shoulders. He is not clearly wondering who the hell; ah, if only. He inhales; exhales. Lammergeier, Proclus says, and Adam's watching Grace and Proclus interact, then lifting his chin in a nod to Sera when she comes in on Hawksley's arm.
He makes a private bet with himself.
He begins to count seconds.
I think it's happened again. We've converged.
Don't look at me, Sera tricked me.
I did not trick you.
(He's almost lost the bet!)
Where's Ruse?
Adam grins. "He's upstairs, sleeping. Do you want to visit him?"
He is not ignoring Hawksley, but he is also not speaking to him or greeting him or otherwise making him welcome. He looked at him; he knows he's there. Fine; he's there. When Leonhard says Hawksley, though, and around Adam's reply to Sera, Hawksley answers, and did -- ?
No way.

Proclus
Oh, that gets a smile, and one of rather welcoming acknowledgement.  By careful planning; Names; yes.  "Then it's bloody good to meet you.  The, ah, other names would be Proclus Vaduz bani Jerbiton... Ex Miscellanea...  Hawksley."
He repeats the name to enjoy it.  If he was pleased to meet Grace, he does little to contain an extra dose of it bubbling in his eyes to meet the other Hermetic.  "Brilliant."  It may be a comment upon Hawksley's Resonance, or also just an unguarded reaction to the meeting.  Brilliant.
He looks to Adam to comment, "And Bethlehem settled for three magi.  Got nothing on Denver."

Grace
Grace lets Sera ruffle the hair, if she wants. And Sera's probably the only one in this room who could get away with that, truly. But Grace has more or less accepted the fact that being in Sera's presence involves hair ruffling and kisses to her forehead and other such intrusions (they are intrusions, but she ignores that, for Sera's sake).
She snorts at Leonhard, obviously imagining him curtsying. "Oh, if you curtsey I will bow." Grin. Happy. "Oh but don't, really, your foot..."
Then, she snorts at Hawksley in turn, at his careful planning. Yes, he does seem like he might be the type to carefully plan out who he is.
"Ruse?"

Grace
[Mageparty! YEAH!]

Serafi­ne
"I didn't trick him," Sera repeats, this time more or less to Grace and there's pleasure in the repetition, see.   The opposition of it, perhaps. The tug-and-pull of it. Look at the way she's smiling.  Bet you want some of whatever the hell she took.
Adam then she finds Adam again how come she always forgets about Adam and then finds him again when she comes back to him; this small circuit of surprise.  "Awww." YOU CAN SEE HER SADFACE.  D:  "I don't wanna - "
Wait.  Leonhard is introducing himself with lo his many names and Sera's inclining her head to Hawksley's right shoulder again.  "I told you about him."  Which is a lie, isn't it, unless she means those confused texts about gerbils some weeks ago; after her seeking; before Rio.  She can't mean those?  Probably Hawksley has forgotten them, anyway.
Back to Adam.  Who has slipped her mind and returned to it, if only by association with his ferret.  " - wake him." To Grace, who may need some program just to follow the slipside of Sera's conversation: "He's a ferret."
Then, waveringly back to Proclus.  "What happened to your foot?"

Hawksley Rothschild
Hawksley and Adam are adamant about ignoring each other, including Hawksley not caring about the ferret named Ruse.  God.  Snobbery + a fucking ferret named Ruse and he may as well have a giant neon arrow pointing at him saying HEY Y'ALL I'M A HERMETIC HOW YOU DOIN'.  So he ignores him, and Adam ignores right back, and this Leonhard guy goes into his other names and Hawksley wears a that's nice expression but doesn't return the favor.
"Leonhard," he says, and offers his hand, whichever one is not currently holding on to Sera if she hasn't wandered off.  "Bethlehem got a bunch of shepherds and choirs of angels, too," he mentions, but not with a huff, a sniff, a toss of his hair, which was cut in a fashion that cost way too much.  Just a reminder, because it's true.  Bethlehem got way more than its three kings.  They just came the farthest.
Well.  Not counting the angels.  Now that was a road trip.

Hawksley Rothschild
"She didn't tell me about you," he adds to Leonhard, since he and Sera are talking over each other.  She means the gerbils; he has no idea what she's talking about because sometimes Sera just texts things, you know?

Patience Mason
Patience came here more then most might surmise after finding this bookstore many months ago she had shown up every couple of weeks to peruse the findings both old and new. She strode through the door as she often did, like a woman out of time, a person so stuck in an age gone by that it was almost impossible not to mark her passage.
With the warmer weather came the return of her usual attire, riding leathers and that old aviator's jacket both so time worn one might wonder how they still held that air of regality despite their utilitarian nature. An old motorists skullcap with googles was pulled from her head, letting the her blonde locks fall about her features, such things impossible to control after riding.
She took stock of the bookstore, and with a straight back and alert eyes she moved towards the new arrivals section, eager for a new discovery, or an old friend.

Proclus
"I may just hold you to that, when the foot's not being so awkward," he warns the Virtual Adept, quite without thinking, just loosely, perhaps a little charmed by her snort.  But he's not sitting down.  It can't be that bad, can it, Adam the Sleepless?  "And it's being awkward, Sera, because I had an accident hiking with Alexander... the Orphan.  Cop, as it happens, so a dab hand with the first aid."
"Perhaps it's just as well, Hawksley," he offers up, adjusting himself on his crutch a moment, mock-flourishing his spare hand down after shaking Hawksley's.  "To let it be such a wonderful surprise to meet me at my best.  Or very much not.  But, my manners!  Which House are you?  Oh, sorry, girls...  Can't help myself asking, getting all Hermetic, aren't I?  (No escaping it, I guess.)  But, really, which House are you?  I'm thinking... not Quaesitor or Bonisagus.  Miscellanea?  Are you with the Miscellany?"

Patience Mason
[blahh my brain fails me, wrong bookstore, scrap the part about her being there regularly >_<]

Proclus
[[Magedarorama!]]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 6, 6, 8, 10, 10) ( success x 5 )

Grace
Alexander is a cop? That Alexander? Thursday Alexander? Grace frowns, but doesn't say anything, mentally filing that information away as a potential danger zone.
Well, he won't be getting an invite to Ginger any time soon, that's for damn sure. Likely to haul her away for computer crimes...
The others, well... "Hey, Patience! Long time no see!" There's another wave. Yep, they're converging, like a flock of birds to seed -- Mages to books, right?

Serafi­ne
Sera did tell him.  She knows she did and there's the argument in the sly flash of her eyes on his avian profile but she actually does not manage to continue the rather deliciously familiar bickering aloud because she has forgotten her part in the exchange and they're moving on.  Aren't they.  So she rests her temple against his bicep and turns her head on a lazy fulcrum to kiss Hawksley while they talk about shit she does not (care to) understand and the sensation of all that resonance - just swims around her and she thinks, thinks thinks thinks thinks thinks, knows that this is how the world was meant to be.
All potential.  A cauldron of creation.
Oh.  Sera lifts her head and glances behind and sees: Patience.  Who is lovely and surreal in ways that even Sera whose pupils are swallowing her irises can manage. Sera smiles over Hawksley's shoulder.  Hello, she says.  But she forgets to open her mouth, so there's just a slow blink and a half-hidden smile.
Her head swings back around.  Gaze grazing Hawksley's profile before settling - in that mildly startled way she has when she remembers that she has forgotten him because he is right in front of her - on Adam. 
"She talks like a fucking robot."  Sera non-sequitors to Adam.  She means Patience, of course.  "It's fucking amazing."

Hawksley Rothschild
[oh shit]

A. Gallowglass
Night Owl Books (An Arch Key) does indeed have a new arrivals section. It is very, very, very tiny, consisting of one woe begone little table near the front door, upon which absolutely nothing that is on the New York Times Bestseller list is to be found.
Gallowglass is reserved just now. He is reserved but that is not inexpressive. His eyebrows had winged up at the name Hawksley. He'd given that no way look. He'd confirmed Serafíne's identifying of Ruse as: he's a ferret. "He likes to sleep by the anarch sign upstairs. Don't feel bad about waking him. He wakes me up all the time." That's how he confirms it: by not denying it. By adding a detail. Insignificant unless one is looking for Ruse and an anarchy sign. He is a rumpled thing, Adam, dark shadows around his eyes from time spent burning the midnight oil until there is no oil and indeed midnight's a long forgotten dream, and when Serafíne looks waveringly at Proclus' foot the Bonisagus gives the older man a significant look. Sit down, old man. God damn it.
He had an accident hiking with Alexander the cop. Adam: he wonders what it was. Perhaps Leonhard tripped while talking? Adam would not trip while talking. He would just trip because he is clumsy. Doesn't stretch as much as he ought. All of that.
He is reserved. He is not too reserved to give Hawksley a flick of a: yeah, no, not Bonisagus, not THAT guy sort've look. Or maybe it's Proclus who gets that look -
"Ex Misc, hmm?"
- which slides away from the other Hermetic and the Bad Hermetic No Way to land on Patience. He looks pleased to see her; unfolds his arms. Sera's non-sequitor gets this reply, low-key:
"I know. It's fascinating. Hello, Patience. Come meet Leonhard; you two should talk." His attention slips from Patience to Grace, to see how she's taking the convergence: he seems to expect her to have something witty to say about it, judging from his faint smile.
He also has no manners today, for he is not jumping on the introduce himself properly bandwagon.

A. Gallowglass
ooc: That should be like,
"I know. It's fascinating. Hello, Patience."
In terms of loudness. *grin*

Proclus
Seattle Alexander is a cop, yeah, thinks the Jerbiton in noting the frown that happens across Grace's face upon hearing that little tidbit.  It's not that he doubts it was noted by the others, too, but the frown attracted some... sympathy?
Yet the mention of convergence has tugged at his own features a little.  He remembers the last time in the shop with a flock of Denver's Traditionalists forming... but Hawksley retains the lion's share of his attention.  Perhaps he's rude, not seeming to pay more attention to...  no, his impression of Sera has become a Mage not so lightly insulted in error.  Oh, no need to fret, Liechtenstein.  Sera's proximity, kissing Hawksley: it is met with a playfully faux-expression, of What's This?!  What's This Horrible Thing?!  And it is an expression which is as quickly flung from his face as dragged on in the first place, in receiving Adam's oh-so-valiant barb, doing little to hide his appreciation of the humour (even directed at his own flaws... for he's not so alone), but back to Hawksley.

Patience Mason
The store was a marvel, a place filled with knowledge crammed into every corner of every shelf, from the top of the shop likely to the very bottom one could find something to read, something to examine, something to learn. Of course such shops were becoming the exception rather then the rule, like the weight of the consensus upon awakened doings the weight of the big book stores was slowly crushing the life out of such places, leaving only the true gems to survive the immense pressures involved.
Patience pulled the old leather gloves from her long fingers as she moved slowly into the shop, the hobnailed ridding boots that encased her feet struck dully on the floor of the shop as she moved ever so slowly about the room. There were of course other people here, gathered to learn or to socialize or simply buy. But the etherite's eyes were for the written word, her reason for being here, and so the people were forgotten...at least until Grace spoke up.
At that point Patience drew herself from her wandering ways and strode to the gathering of people, her lips curling upward in a warm and pleasant curve as she spoke to Grace.
"Grace  Considerable  sociological, metaphysical, geographical and frotean formulae must have resolved and become affirmed to permit and actualize this highly improbably relativistic realignment of the concurrent dimensional plane." Her voice the tone of someone who was all to pleased to see a familiar face. Slowly she took in the presence of the others she knew, Sera, who drew a welcome wave, and Adam to whom the woman offered a raised and curious brow with a friendly nod before going on.
"I must reconsider the theoretical properties for this alignment it would seem that this is not simply a standard planar shift and realignment, but a proper metaphysical convergence. Appropriate and temporally accurate sociological salutations Adam, Sera, It is positively marked to visualize and actualize the concurrently nominal state of your biological carrier structures, I theorize that your encumbant noospheric and metaphysical states are equally nominal?" She inquires pleasantly before turning to Adam specifically and looking about.
"Subject Leonhard?" She inquired blinking for a moment in consideration. "I have not actualized and formally indexed and notarized an individualized personage with that precise identifier." She looked between Hawksley and Leonhard. "I currently possess insufficient markers and data forms with which to ascertain the individualized personage..." She pauses and tilts her head before extending her hand to both of them with a warm smile.
"My parentalogically assigned identifier is Patience Mason, it is a noted and indexed temporal framework in which to actualize your individualized personages."

A. Gallowglass
[INTELLIGENCE. What you say?]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )

Proclus
"Subject Patience, familial specificity: Mason.  Reference: Leonhard, familial specificity: Frick.  Both Frick and Leonhard not uncommon nomenclature in Liechtensteiner naming procedures.  (I'm not related to the old Prime Minister.)  I... ah... greet you with... well, a clear-hearted hope not to... ah... come across as a dick, is... this damaged biological unit believes is the, ah... vernacular.  You know what?  I should have curtseyed and have done with it, I think.  Hello, Patience."

Hawksley Rothschild
Hawksley has met Patience Mason all of one time.  It was also the first time he met Pan, the second time he met Serafine.  They were in a park, and he'd been kayaking.  If he gave it more than a moment's thought he'd recognize her, she doesn't exactly blend into the background, but he doesn't recognize her and just glances at her as she first enters.
All right.  Someone -- SERA -- told Leonhard about Hawksley, and that he's a Hermetic, and so instantly the guy is asking about his house and saying things like dab hand and Hawksley irrationally dislikes him for all of these non-reasons, right away, and that mock-flourish doesn't help and he's just staring at the guy all oh my god and Hawksley quirks a god-damn gold-colored brow at the oh, sorry, girls and presses the tip of his tongue against an incisor.
Sera leans against his arm and warmth floods through her temple into her brain, just as it floods from her temple into his arm.  Same with when she kisses him there.  'She' -- Sera means Patience -- talks like a robot, which is when he remembers her from the park, nearly a year ago now.  Adam's flicking eye and Leonhard's assumptions aren't out of line: hell no, he's not Bonisagus.  He isn't answering anybody anything, because he's pretty sure Leonhard and Patience should talk,
"That's a fabulous idea," he says, thankful for the number of people making his non-answering less obvious.  Well, he's hopeful.  Leonhard's attention seems hard to shake.  Hawksley has glanced down at Sera beside him, because even in her heels he's a mite taller than her, and there is
something
in the way he looks at her that is at once terribly obvious and also hard to discern.  It isn't simple fondness, it isn't evidence of ardent adoration, but there's an awareness in that glance that Hawksley isn't giving anyone else.  Ah, that's what it is: that is what Hawksley Giving A Fuck looks like.  And indecently, shamelessly, it's one more signal that he doesn't give much of a fuck about anyone else.  Well, maybe Grace, because have you seen her eyes lately?  She also told him he could flirt with Ginger if he felt like it and it wouldn't mess up the program (and also would not cause her to come to life and become obsessed with Hawksley, not that that's ever happened).
Patience speaks.  Hawksley looks at Patience, stares a moment, does not attempt to respond.
Leonhard says: not to... ah... come across as a dick.  His eyes bug.  He beams.  He grins.  He laughs.
He says: "Fuck," at the end of that laughter, to himself, and squeezes Sera's hand.  "Don't you dare abandon me here to run after a ferret," he tells her.

Grace
"Oh Patience," Grace laughs. "The universe, it relativistically converges us all the time. Improbability gets a bit stretched with how often, you know? More like, where there are two of us, five of us are already aligning, like clockwork."
She assumes, given the ease with which Leonhard speaks of things, with which Patience speaks of things (although if there were a Sleeper in the shop somewhere, would they be able to peel away any meaning from that robot speech? Perhaps not). So it's on to business.
"I'm actually here for a reason you know?" she addresses Adam. "I was going to offer you a piece of Ginger. But now, there's lots of people here now without it, I see... Anybody have no idea what I'm talking about?"

Serafine
Sera cannot understand a word Patience is saying.  Not a goddamned word.  First time they met Sera asked a certain priest to confirm whether or not Patience was simply a hallucination or actually present-in-the-shared-space.  Now again, months later, and Sera cannot answer these questions.  She closes her eyes and allows the strange, dulcet tones to wash over her without any attempt to decipher the message or the madness behind them.
So once again, Sera essentially withdraws from the actual conversation, allowing it to just swim over her consciousness, tasting the ebb and flow of magic in the air.  She is breathing so steadily.  She can hear Hawskley's heart beating.  She can feel his wings.  She can sense the shadowless brightness of Adam's unending pursuit.  Proclus the foundation beneath which Grace is slip-sliding and oh -
oh gods how it makes her smile.  Sera thinks about a knot stitched through the second knuckle of her thumb with a fine white thread and an iron needle.  She thinks about storms and sunlight and what it means to fly.  She thinks within and beyond the disordered boundaries of her own goddamned skin and some nights she can even feel the stars pierce her lungs and she's opening,
opening,
paying so goddamned much attention to the people and absolutely no attention to the conversation flying around her head, at least until Hawksley starts laughing, which she appears to find infectious although she has absolutely no idea what she's laughing about, and is still not paying any attention to the conversation at least until Hawksley tells her she better not abandon him to go running after a ferret.
"He's fucking adorable though.  Adam put him on my shoulder and he hid beneath my hair."
(And they can feel her magic, perhaps, back of the throat.  The tinge of it.  Sometimes Sera just texts things, you know?  Sometimes she just does things.  She can't help it.)

Proclus
[[Minor sprain, already well on the mend but still all swaddled up to (would be fairly assumed) avoid any backsliding.]]

Patience Mason
"A co-habitated theorem Leonhard, such duality of purpose in this temporal instance is pleasant."  Leonhard speaks in a manner not all that dissimilar to Patience, though to the educated the differences might seem astronomical. Regardless of such particulars the woman nods, seemingly pleased as Leonhard identifies him by his speech. Patience focuses on Hawksley then, and though the man did not speak it seemed to dawn on Patience that they had indeed met before, and she offered him another polite and friendly nod.
"Factual and intrinsically noospherical reparations sir, Your individualized personage is logged and notorized within my concurrent data storage, it is sociologically and personally positively noted to actualize your concurrent and ongoing existence in the realm of biologically actualized matter."
She then turned to Grace and stepped close a curious and conspiritorial smile on her lips as she said. "You theorize such intriguing formulae Grace, perhaps I need to realign and stress evaluate my own theorem given to my inherent nature and predilections towards individualized temporal allotment." She tapped her cheek as she considered that, her other arm folded beneath her chest as she thought before going on.
"We are dispersing and sharing the medicinal and caloric biological entity indexed as Zingiber officinale?" She inquired, seemly entirely perplexed. "I do not visually or olfactorally identify suitable nutrient substances be it solid or liquid concurrent with the use of Zingiber Officinale."
She briefly turned to look at Sera, her eyes searching the womans hair for signs of the afformentioned ferret, and then finding none simply blinked before looking amongst the others for answers.

Grace
"Ahh, Patience doesn't have any clue. I'm not talking about Zingiber officinale, I'm talking about a program named Ginger. It lets you leave messages for people -- for everybody really. It's as secure as I could make it, encrypted you know. And it's kind of stored on a phone sex line without their permission, so I'd really appreciate it if you guys make sure not to tell Alexander about it until we can be sure he's not going to run me in, thanks..."
She does frown at that last one. To be alone in Denver, freshly Awakened, freshly dealing with all the freaky shit and to be restricted from the 'water cooler' so to speak? But hey, it's not like she hasn't her reasons.

A. Gallowglass
Grace is actually here for a reason; he raises both eyebrows, the slouching dark-haired thing, giving her most of his attention. Not all of it; Patience requires quite a deal. Leonhard responding to her made the young man smile; smile so it carved dimples out've his cheeks. "I thought perhaps you'd come by to see if the book you signed sold yet or not."
The smile naturally fades when Hawksley asks Serafíne not to abandon Hawksley; or maybe it is just because that sun-stroked young man has spoken? He is just about to say, hopefully:
You can wait outside. Or maybe, You can leave.
When Patience begins to talk again, and Patience, talking, that is difficult to talk around, or at least isn't something Adam is willing to talk around. Nobody else saying they don't know what Ginger is, so Adam (relentless [always]) drags himself back to the point. A point that has been presented. And after Grace answers her, he says, glancing once at Leonhard,
"Ah, thanks. That's nice of you. How does it work? And, Sera," gear-switch, "I think Ruse might be afraid of your friend's shadow, so perhaps you should just let him sleep. He'll be here again on Tuesday."
Or any day Adam feels guilty about leaving him alone, but there is no reason to say as much.

Hawksley Rothschild
Sera and Hawksley are of a mind, when it comes to Patience.  He just doesn't engage, and doesn't try too hard to understand what's coming out of her mouth.  Nor does he, as Leonhard does, try to match her syntax and vocabulary.  Despite the far more steady, gratitude-inducing resonance of the mage who wants to know more about him and despite the resonance of the Snobbish Shopkeep which touches on something well-hidden but deeply entrenched in Hawksley's own mind, it's Sera's and Grace's and -- hell -- even Patience's that are most attractive to him, the ones that set his teeth on edge and get his heart beating faster, make those wings that no one sees but everyone feels beat faster, aching for the sky.
And it is Sera he keeps looking at, as she rests her head on his body and meanders her eyes about the room, as she smiles, as she thinks of things he cannot see but sees the reflection of on her face and in her eyes.  She laughs.  Tells him the ferret is adorable.
"Well, I'll get a dog then.  Something fluffy and white," he says, and you can tell by the way he says it he damn well would.  He'd go out and get a dog just for Sera to chase and snuggle when she sees it, also dogs are way better than ferrets, Sera, obviously.
At least he's not outright rude to Patience.  She nods at him and he catches it, nods back.  Smiles a little, even if it's because he thinks she's thoroughly unhinged and deserves a little mercy.  There are precious few people Hawksley thinks about giving mercy to, and next time Patience sees him, he might not.  Capricious asshole, you might call him, and you might be right.
"Deal," he tells Grace, regarding not telling Alexander.  "I also promise, just because I'm that nice, not to make my first Welcome to Ginger message for him 'Fuck the Po-lees'."  That's a hell of a promise, Grace, you'd better appreciate it.
Adam speaks to Sera.  Says her name.  And for the first time since he walked in, Hawksley actually looks at the shopkeep.  He knows what's being said.  His shadow -- his resonance, his bearing, even his face, resemble the sort of bird of prey he's named for.  Adam is right to think that the poor animal -- even if it's a totally stupid animal who has ferrets is this the 90s Jesus Christ -- would be frightened.  It's happened before.  Hawksley has had friends with gerbils and mice and rats as pets and they aren't too fond of him either.
His eyes remain right there on Adam a moment.  Probably longer than it needs to.  Dammit, he is thinking.  Or feeling.  It can be a feeling, too.

Proclus
It is difficult to shake, that attention on Hawksley.  All the moreso following his laughter.  He thinks of a lot of dead magi.  And laughter.  "Well, you're no Janissary.  I'll give you that."
Adam, oh, Adam.  Frere.  He doesn't even glance to the Bonisagan, at least not with his eyes which - though not pointedly - remain in the vicinity of Hawksley for a long breath.  A stand-in Pater, a ferret, and more... and not a question asked.
"Ginger sounds a bother to keep, well...  It would be to me, being a bit limited with that sort of thing," he says, admits, turns to Grace.  "All the moreso if it were blabbed outside the Council so, no, no telling Alexander Brandt from my lips, Grace.  Would it be possible to be added to it myself?"
He glances to Patience.  Wonders what kind of messages are left from her.  Smiles.  Turns back to Grace.  "You know, if that might be okay."

Patience Mason
Patience nodded as Grace explains what Ginger actually was, and from the look on her features it seemed obvious that to the woman, that made alot more sense after all who just ate ginger straight? "Direct and ongoing access to your established and decentralized data and informational points accumulator would increase ongoing and concurrent efficiency of metaphysical activities by fifty three point two six four percentiles Grace, immediate actuality would be positively aligned." She said with a nod. "
Inquiry, has to this current temporal identifier any individualized personage accidently integrated a data module or aural vibration with the copulatory stimulation service?" She inquired like it was a matter of scientific interest, but something glimmered in her eye, like it might well be a joke.
 But then her gaze is drawn to Hawksley and Adam once more, and those sky blue eyes moved slowly from one to the other, gathering data perhaps, or at the very least observing an uncomfortable encounter.

Grace
"How it works? You call the phone-sex line. I'm not going to lie. It'll show up in your phone records like that, but if you have my Ginger installed, you'll get something else instead. A menu, for you to leave a message or listen to existing ones.
"It's not really so much a bother to keep. So long as I'm not completely restricted from accessing my own computer and phone," she gripes, grumbles at that one. Perhaps such has happened before, and she's not so happy about that.
Then Patience speaks up, and Grace laughs. "I sure hope not! I mean, people could call the number without having Ginger on their phones, but that would be fairly obvious -- it wouldn't be at all like Ginger."
She turns to Hawksley, all stone-faced and serious. "Hawksley, assuming we ever invite him to the thing, I encourage you to leave him such a message. Hell, I will too. We can fuck the po-lees together."

Serafi­ne
Sera has no notion that Patience is studing the weight of her blond curls or perhaps the quarter of her skull that is shaved down to a soft dark fringe from brow to the nape of her neck looking for a ferret.  Patience's  conversation style is just absolutely beyond Serafíne's ability to process, so she does not even make the attempt.  Just allows the strange, lilting music of all those Very Long Words to drift around her.  Breathes them in, sometimes.  There's a point where Sera just inhales and sort of lifts her chin to rest it on Hawksley's shoulder and blinks and glances back and watches Patience framed against a crowded set of bookshelves, and she is glowing, luminous, a throwback and thinks to herself that Dee might like her.   The style see.
Dee would love the style.
The trail back to front-and-center and her eyes snag on Hawksley's profile and she watches him with a keenness and a kind of sagacity that is not brilliance, but a skin-and-bones wisdom, of sorts.   Breathes him in, a half-dozen layers and her posture against him slides from nuzzling to nestling and back again.
Adam suggests that she visit Ruse another time and Sera smiles, wide but close-lipped.  Nods and probably opens her mouth wide enough to say K, which stands for Okay, and the remaining letters of the word are sort of swallowed in the tide because Hawksley is promising her a dog, something fluffy and white, if that's what she wants, and she didn't know that she might want that until just fucking now and we hope that Collins is an animal lover, because he might have a new houseguest in the near-to-mid-future.
She wouldn't abandon him for a ferret, would Sera.  And she smiles really rather tenderly against him, and that tenderness is strongest for him but extends in these opening rings around him and then there's the pressure of her mouth against tailored white V-neck t-shirt.  She's planting small, rather thoughtful kisses at the tendinous insertion of his trapezius and informing Grace and Hawksley that Seattle Alexander "told me he was in security."
The nuzzling continues.  Sera breathes, all-in.  Shoots Leonhard a glance, favors him with the curve of a rather distracted, distractable smile.

Hawksley Rothschild
Let's be fair to everyone: it's hard not to stare at Hawksley.  He's attractive, sure, and he's sort of appealing the way that laying out on a beach in the sun for six hours at a time is appealing to just about everyone when winter is still trying to keep a hold on everyone.  The way his t-shirt is cut makes it clear that his upper-body is given a great deal of time and attention, and indicates that it would be unwise to get into a push-up contest with him.  His skin is tanned because he spent several days of February down in Rio and was mostly or entirely naked a great deal of the time, so his hair and his skin are golden and his eyes are that piercing, predatory blue.
Plus he's with Sera.  He is 'with' Sera in a very obvious way, at least in the sense that they showed up together and she's hanging off of him and he's looking at her a lot and so on.  And Sera captivates.  Everything about Sera welcomes worship.
How this fucker is of the Order of Hermes at all doesn't make much sense.  But no: he's not of Bonisagus.  Leonhard laughs that he's not Janissary and Hawksly swivels his eyes over, giving a faint smirk that may as well say but wouldn't it fuck with your head if I was?
This is about when he realizes that Leonhard kept giving him attention even when Hawksley didn't give it back.  And when he realizes that Patience has looked over at him and Adam even though he and Adam are decidedly not together.  And thank god for Grace right that moment, distracting him from taking all this in and frowning at people, because Grace makes him smile.  "You and me," he says, waggling a finger between their two chests, "are gonna get drunk one day and leave yelling messages on Ginger for every newb.  And it's going to be amazing."
Sera was nuzzling him.  His shoulders round down by a half-inch.  He doesn't notice.  He does notice her swiveling her head around and kissing him where she does.  Even though he's sober and she's Something Else he's not shushing her or trying to get her to stop, stop, like this should embarrass her.  He just brings his hand up, back of her neck, back of her head, her crown, the shaved fringe, fingertips pressing and rubbing slightly, mindlessly, all the better to horrify the others that this guy who doesn't even seem properly proud of his Hermetic-ness is also Involved somehow with one of the low, the carnal, the penny-mystics who don't understand how magic really works.
"I bet the priest would join in that," he says, still ostensibly to Grace.  "I bet if we could get him drunk enough he'd yell Fuck The Police with us.  In Spanish."

Serafi­ne
Hawksley mentions the priest and Sera smiles, and supplies "Pan!" all fondness and delight, quite pleased with herself that she was able to contribute to the conversation and it feels rather like she's surfacing right then; like she's waking up, waking again and by now she probably has wrapped both arms around Hawksley's rather remarkable torso and is both holding on to and hanging off of him, head tipped into the pressure of his hand against her neck, her skull, her temple.
"He means Pan."  Maybe that bit is directed to Adam and Proclus and Sera says it helpfully and a bit earnestly and there's a hint of adoration there.
Sera adores the priest.  Sera adores almost everyone.  In different ways.  For different reasons.
She really can't help herself.

A. Gallowglass
There are plenty of Hermetics who Adam does not like and who do not like Adam: plenty. Theirs is not a brotherhood of frolicksome House Gryffindor cosplayers. He does not usually arbitrarily decide (imperious [lofty]) not to regard them as Hermetic at all. Because that is silly: there is a code that one follows - there are practices one puts into use. Hawksley, though. Hawksley. Bah.
Grace explains that Ginger gets installed, and when she explains that, yes indeed, Ginger will show up on phone records as a phone sex line, there's a thoughts-swinging-elsewhere, far-far-far from this book shop sort of " - heh - " - or maybe it's more of a hah? Anyway, there it is.  "All right, thank you Grace, I'm happy to have her installed on my phone. Do you want to do it now or..."
Meanwhile, Serafíne and the making-out, casual-like, and - well. Adam must assume this is just something she does, after Pan. A Sera-thing.
THEN. Because there is another then. THEN, have a heart-attack, be prepared for it: a middle-aged man comes out've the backroom, shaved blue hair, piercings, but it's all faded, none of it is vibrant, old tattoos, and he says - "Kit, sorry I'm late, but - "
Then the tattooed blue-haired guy stops. Because: all these Willworkers, their resonances awash; he feels them.
" - but - " a waver, like: are these customers? " - uh, the guy with the thing. Aren't you supposed to be - ?"
And Adam: looks, briefly, blank. Blank, blank, blank, dreaming eyes like what his attention is a million miles away, followed by - how does Adam curse? Adam does not curse unless he means to curse. He says very specifically: "Yes." But it sounds a lot like:
Fuck. In tone. And cadence.

Proclus
"Oh, you shouldn't have worried, Sera," the Jerbiton gratefully, and immediately taking to his healed hoof.  He curtseys to Grace, "I warned you."
"There's just no stopping you sometimes, is there, girl?"  He directs this to Sera with a friendly lack of swagger but a clear gratitude for all the blatant-lie of his pretend-disappointment.  Ten years since the touch of Life Magicks on him.  Ten years of caution and solitude, and being so damnably careful to avoid the Awakened, Council and otherwise.  Ten years denied.  Ten year insisted.  Ten years!  "Ten years!  I haven't been healed by Will in ten years.  Of course, that was ten years avoiding the Order and Council because of a tribunal.  A punishment.  Kept from this."Elation.  The foot doesn't matter, but for the kindness of its healing - uneccesary but arguably all the more kind for that.
"Kept from this," he almost concludes, this elated outburst... or, at least, once elated outburst, turning back to Hawksley.  "But being kept from knowing if we share a House, Hawksley... if that is the case...  Well...  Why keep yourself from a House-brother if that's the case?  Really?  You're not shy and I know Interdiction, and it's not that.  So what is it?"

Proclus
[[Bugger my brain.  It's gone 5am for me so I've not got the Stats Leonhard would have!  Given the arrival of Mr Blue Rinse McTattoo, even Leonhard wouldn't have been so dim as to continue after "I warned you."  Please ignore the second and third parts of my last post.]]

A. Gallowglass
ooc: We can have that part happen after Leonhard's post, dude! :)

A. Gallowglass
ooc: My slow easing out of the scene need not interfere with Mageyness. *grin*

Proclus
[[Kind of you.  But I suspect I should work Leonhard out of the scene, too, before my brain entirely deflates.]]

A. Gallowglass
 ooc: No way man, Leonhard being all ELATION is too cute.

Proclus
[[I hate you]]

A. Gallowglass
ooc: :) <3

Hawksley Rothschild
Hawksley smiles.  It's such an endeared smile, as open and shameless as any other expression of his.  "Yes," he tells Sera.  "Pan."  Pan like the other god, the unchaste, the dangerous, the one who is as much of the earth as Hawksley is of the sky.  He doesn't think Pan thinks he's anything like the god-Pan.  But that doesn't mean he doesn't, in fact, share a bit in common with him.
Oh look.  A guy with blue hair.  Hawksley looks over, lifts his brows, looks around for who might be called 'Kit' here, finds Adam.  Grins, sort of savage and evil and delighted.  "Kit," he repeats, the way some people might lick their favorite treat on a hot summer day like Stranahan's Whiskey Brickle from Sweet Action over on Broadway in mid-July.
Delicious.
Then, Leonhard.  Hawksley exhales, rough, turns on him.  Not to him.  On him.  "She's not a 'girl'.  She's not sweetheart, she's not darling, she's not dollface, she's not 'girl'.  You sound like a slaveowner from the Deep South trying to remind the slaves that they're less than him, more worthless than he is.  Her name is Sera and whether you intend to or not, you're showing her disrespect she doesn't deserve and-or assuming a familiarity that you don't deserve.  If you think calling her by her name is too intimate or something, then call her Miss, call her Ma'am, call her something that shows a little decorum rather than revealing just how thick the stick up your ass is."
Anger.  Okay.  That's anger.  And whatever happened with him and Adam the first last and only other time he's been in this shop wasn't anger, Adam would clearly see that now.  This is anger.  This is dude I'm about to break you jaw if you call Sera or Grace or Patience 'girl' again so help me.
He's not done.  His voice lowers, levels.
"My name is Hawksley Rothschild, Crimson Guardian, Right Eye of the Sun," which is not even the whole of his shadow name, much less his true name, but is a step more than his craft name, "Initiate Exemptus bani Ex Miscellanea, former bani Shaea, on fucking probation, and I'll accept you as a 'brother' when you accept and treat my friends as your equals."
He takes a deep breath.
Sera's probably never seen him angry either.  He can't think if she has.
He exhales.
Hawksley lifts his hands, palms out.  "All right, that was a bit much, even for me.  I'm gonna go take a walk.  Maybe have a good cry.  Write a sad poem in my journal and move on."

A. Gallowglass
[Hey wait what are you daring to yell at someone I like in my frickin' bookshop PLEASE ROLL DO NOT FAIL I AM TIRED.]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 3, 9, 10) ( success x 2 )

A. Gallowglass
[*HUGSTHEDICE*]

Hawksley Rothschild
[crude. YOUR jaw, not you jaw. come on, Rs, work with me.]

Grace
"Pan, ah, doesn't have a phone. And apparently I can't entice him to get a phone, because the last time I tried to show him Ginger, I hit him in the face with mine, and--"
Long story, apparently.
Then, Hawksley loses it in defense of Sera (and my what a loss, what a righteous fervor, and what's more -- he's right). Looks like the shine has worn off of this particular gathering, huh? Like something broke.
Then, a man in tattoos and blue hair comes in and the heart, it stops. "Sure, Kit, we can do that some other time, if you like."
Silence. Shut up, everybody, shut up shut up... Or have a fight about the word 'girl' being thrown around, better than other topics.
Oh, Christ. Hermetics and their names. And how posturing, preening, ridiculous. Grace eyes Patience with a weary look, like 'See, see what we have to deal with?'

Proclus
"If you're on probation, perhaps I can help," is the rather studied, if limited reply.  But not so limited is the attention.  Watchful.  Not notably judgemental, and perhaps a fair deal of sympathy there in the Jerbiton's creased eyes, but unimpressed, and quite able to let one exhibition of elation turn to one of a different stripe.
Of course, there is no apology in him.  Perhaps a little lack of timeliness is noted, but Girl clearly means something different to Leonhard.

Patience Mason
Patience has been remarkably quiet during much of this exchange, she had after all been quite divorced from the actions and goings on off the mage of Denver, her own research keeping her on that farm of her's well outside the city. She watches as a fight almost breaks out and when Grace looks to her with weariness in her eyes Patience offered her an agreeable smile before letting out a sigh and turning to the two hermetics with a shake of her head.
"Such socialogical friction and political placement disruption portrays and actualizes your socio-political-metaphysical amalgamation in a distressingly negative light stream gentlemen. Decorum and socially positive actuality is highly recommended in this juncture." She offers before turning to Grace and stepping up beside her, close enough to take her arm.
"Inquiry Grace, is it possible to actualize and implement the data accumulator on a static optical reciever? In a fixed geographically aligned structure? Or does it inherently require the utilization of a roaming access point?"

Serafi­ne
No, Sera has seen Hawksley in many places and in a remarkable number of states but she has never seen him angry and she can feel it tightening in his body, the ratcheting promise of it, the potential energy of it,  and she feels that like a premonition, like an aura, this halo all around him, and well, see, she's breathing that in too; feeling that anger and the way it beats in the heart and pulse, cracking it between her teeth, aware of so many things, including the way it makes her heart pound.  Heart in throat, heart on her tongue.  Sera is no longer hanging onto or off of Hawksley.  Her arms slid from their less-than-loose circle around his waist and she straightens a bit and regardless of the height of those heels, so does not really require his assistance to stand so, so, so -
- she stands up on her own, and still beside him but not all over him, frowning and a bit still and watching his profile more than anyone else's,  reaching to grab his right hand with his left, and to lace their fingers together.  This connection is thoughtless and necessary as any other.  There's nothing deliberate about it.  She just catches one of his hands as he drops them and Proclus and Adam this tight smile because her heart is pounding -
and a direct look for each.  Her pupils are huge and Proclus can see himself reflected therein.  Then, "you're welcome." Her voice is quiet, her hand tightens around Hawksley's and she's turning to go, "See you," offered to the room.  Grace, she reaches over to ruffle her hair because Sera cannot help herself and then Sera and Hawksley are headed out the door.
Together.
They will go for a walk or at least a drive.
He will not write any sad fucking poems in his journal.

A. Gallowglass
Kit. Hawksley repeats. Adam raises an eyebrow at him. But he says to the blue-haired man: "Go into the back. I'll be there shortly." Sure Kit, Grace is saying, we can do that some other time if you like. And the blue-haired man goes into the back with a lingering glance for the collection of people in the bookshop. This is not because they look like a motley assortment: Night Owl Books (An Arch Key) is full of motley assortments of customers when there are any assortments of customers to offer. It's because they are all Willful personalities. Because their resonance affects him - Grace, perhaps, less, with that Mystery that touches her, makes him forget a detail or two, or perhaps it's just the others are stronger. Regardless: a lingering glance, and then he is gone, and then Hawksley loses it, and Gallowglass
Has a terrible temper. Nobody here knows it yet. Today is not the day they find out. Still: for a moment it's like his heart stills, you know, the sound of it, and there's just this black rush pause the moment before black fury, and then he leashes it.
Of course that guy's on probation. Who'd want him? Of course he used to be ( - was probably kicked out of - ) House Shaea. Adam: teeth together. He's so focused on controlling himself that he doesn't say anything, and look, isn't he a reserved, sea-eyed, crazy-haired bookish thing? Adrift around so much emotion.
Hawksley lifts his hands, palms out. Maybe have a good cry. Write a sad --
"Don't talk about it. Go do it. Shoo."
If you're on probation, perhaps I can help, Leonhard says, and Adam does not scoff. He just raises his eyebrows again, and says, "I'll be in the back. Grace, erm, sorry, I'll - call you or - perhaps at the House? Or Kal will - well we'll be in touch. Patience, a pleasure. Sera," just her name, because well. She brought Hawksley, man.
There is another look for Leonhard, though. It's not a taking-care-of-you-look, but it is very aware; there might even be a question, like, come-with, or?
And then: he's gone. Nobody (except Hawksley?) is kicked out, per se. The blue-haired guy is on duty now, after all.

Hawksley Rothschild
There is so much energy in that body of his.  Not magically, but physically, he's the most powerful person in the room.  That's just... obvious.  Were he to let that anger get the better of him, well and truly define him in this moment, he could hurt someone.  He's not a monster, far from it, and there's plenty of people who could put him down and frankly, with a twist of reality in the palm of her hand Sera could drop him to the ground without doing a lick of damage to him, but she probably wouldn't.  He's dynamic, and he's forceful, and the person who knows him best right here has never seen him get mad like that.
Not that it matters.  Most people here have only met him once or twice, Grace excepted.  For all they know, this is who he is and what he does and what he's like.  This does define him, this sudden loss of temper, this blowup.
Including, of course, the way he hits some wall in himself and goes whoa, boy and backs off.  Decides to leave.  Is leaving, because if he weren't he'd just start yelling at Leonhard again and then probably Patience, too.  Sera is withdrawing physically, except for her hand, which he -- rather thoughtlessly, instinctively almost, lifts to his mouth and kisses but then lets go of, extricates himself from, walking to and out the door.  She doesn't have to leave with him.  She is anyway.  He's her ride.  But let's be honest: he would have come back to take her home, to take her wherever she wanted.  After his walk or his sad poem or whatever,
even though he doesn't even keep a journal.
This is what he leaves behind him in his wake, other than the memory of his blowup and his words about what it means to refer to someone as 'girl' when you know their damn name, regardless of what that word means to you:
- Adam, you're right.  He was kicked out.- You know his name now.  You could find out more about that without asking.- Or maybe he didn't get kicked out, just like he's not really getting kicked out of this bookshop.- He's the type that chooses to leave when he's fed up.- The bell over the door rings, and almost echoes.
A while later, Grace gets a text.
Sorry I didn't say goodbye.  Drinks sometime soon.
Sera is with him when he texts that.  She always seems to be with him.

Grace
Grace lowers her voice down a few notches, now that blue-haired guy has made his appearance and disappearance. "Yeah, Patience, I can put it on anything that has the ability to make phone calls and has a processor. So, if you have something like that, sure. I can write up an interface for it."
Hmm.. Fixed geographically aligned structure. "I do have to be there to run the install, though. Is that an invite to your house, then?" she grins.
Sera ruffles her hair. That's also okay. And soon as the Mages of Denver converge, they scatter to the winds too. Some pecking was involved, with these birds drawn to the bookstore's seeds of knowledge.
[OOC: By the way, anybody here can totally assume that Grace is going to live up to her promises and install Ginger if your character wants it. Update the Ginger Access thread on the forum if you like, or we can run further scenes where Grace installs stuff, I care not!]

Hawksley Rothschild
[that was my last post! you guys are awesome and this scene was great. :] thank you for the RP.]

Proclus
Leonhard catches the look.  Relentless.  Of course it is.  There are, after all, studies to be started.
"Please give my best to Dan," the Jerbiton says to Sera, her departure with Hawksley.  To Patience he... finds he can't must much more than a nod, though a warm creeps back into him as he does so.  For Grace, though...  "Glad there wasn't a cop around.  It was good to meet you, Grace."
And so the Jerbiton, too, leaves, intent on business with Adam.

Proclus
[[Much MUCH bigger scene than I was expecting.  Nicely played, everyone!]]

Patience Mason
[At that i think we can call it?]

A. Gallowglass
[ooc: Yes. Thank you everybody for coming in and playing. That went crazy places!]

Patience Mason
[Agreed, very fun. :) ]

Proclus
[[Right.  Me off.  See you later!]]