[ Last eve, during the Honeybee Heist operation. ]
The moon had shone full and bright over the sleepy districts of the Goblet. The Holdings had been still and quiet as the sun's working hours had long since passed. The daytime employees had all either retired for the evening or gone out without any members to tend to or customers to ready themselves for. From the meeting room to the lounge there had been nothing but the steadfast ticking of chronometers and the occasional creaks and groans of the estate settling on its foundations.
Past the private chambers and farther down the halls was a room that most knew to be Lady Scythewood's private chambers. Though the Lady herself was never seen coming or going, the room was largely avoided all the same. On this night there had been a visitor in black leather who approached the door with silent steps and opened it without so much as a creak from its hinges.
Delilah glanced cautiously around the room. The room's interior was dark from the wallpaper to the flooring while the furnishing kept to a similar scheme. The fireplace was crackling with fresh logs and the writing desk near the door was unoccupied.
As she finished stepping inside and letting the door close behind her, the blonde expelled a soft sigh. It was one of obvious annoyance.
"It's not polite to sneak up on people," she murmured to the seemingly vacant room. The reply she got seemed to come from everywhere and no where all at once - a husky chuckle.
"Neither is it polite to break into someone's private room, but that's neither here or there," crooned Lady Scythewood's voice. "It is good to see you looking so well, daughter mine. Your little miqo'te had let slip that you had been feeling rather...under the weather. Such a pity. I do hope you've been managing."
Delilah's lips thinned but she remained silent.
The voice continued. "We've been so worried for you and Excen. Disappearing like that without a word or trace can't have weighed well on your consciousness. Ari has been so worried, as have some of the others here. Why even one of the ones who left approached Briar just the other evening wanting to know what they could do to locate you both -"
"Cut the shit and come out. I'm not talking to walls."
"Show your hand and I'll show you mine."
Delilah remained still for a long moment. A few moments later stepped forth a large xaela who calmly eased to her side from the sanctity of the shadows in a corner of the room. "Just as well," Excen mused, dressed in black same as Delilah. "I'd rather cut the head off the snake sooner rather than later."
After Excen appeared, the imposing viera known as Lady Scythewood stepped forth from an opposite corner. Her trademark mask wedged in place and the folds of her dress whispering against the carpet as she moved. As usual, it kept her expressions from being read, but the matriarch's voice remained as poised and warm as ever.
"Why not stop this game of yours?" asked Lady Scythewood. "It must be exhausting to be on the run. Unable to stay in one place for long, constantly fending off pursuers. Cut off from your friends and family with minimal resources and the clock working against you..."
"There's only one thing I want and that's my daughter," growled Delilah. The viera's eyes had narrowed and her lips had pulled back from her teeth in a snarl. "You're planning on moving her again. She needs to be with me -" But she was cut off as the Lady wagged her finger back and forth while tsk'ing.
"Such stress won't be good for you, daughter. It causes wrinkles. We all know why you and Excen are really here, and it's to find a way to halt the search for the Eye. We all know it's fruitless. I will get what I came here for. After all, I always get what I want." She took a few steps forward towards the pair.
Excen's katana had been drawn and lofted towards Lady Scythewood's mask before she took her third step. His smile was sardonic, his eyes cold. "One more step. I dare you." Delilah's hands had gone to her daggers though she hadn't otherwise moved. Lady Scythewood let out a long, exasperated sigh.
"You were such a good boy, Excen. The greatest present I ever gave Delilah. Such a pity to see how far she's pulled you down with her. But no matter -"
Lady Scythewood's long shadow stretched over the wall beside her. The silhouette shifted, morphed, distorting to seemingly impossible angles before the wall it stood against rippled. The sharpened points of two horns, then four broke through the surface, quickly followed by a Xaela taller even than Excen, with armor black as pitch and soulless eyes that seemed to suck the life from those they focused on. He regarded the situation with a neutral expression, the sight of Excen's blade so close to his mistress earning an icy glare.
"Pick your battles more carefully," said Leoric. His own hand moved to his blade along his back and drew it, the energies swirling around the blade seeming to suck out what little light was left in the room. "You don't have as many allies as you thought you did. Even less that aren't already being carefully watched."
"We already killed the five guardians you had waiting for us on that smuggling ship in the Ruby Sea," retorted Excen lightly, raising his blade. "What's one more?"
Delilah was staring down Lady Scythewood. Both women silent and the air in the room almost crackling with the building tension humming between the four. It was Delilah that finally broke the tension.
"What you want will never be achieved. Not like this. Not this way, and I'll be the one standing back and watching as your empire crumbles and your riches turn to ash."
Excen moved first, lifting his hand as the arcane, voidal energies swirled and burst from his palm, flying towards Lady Scythewood. Leoric intervened at just the last moment, his blade cutting through the air and blocking the dark magic, even as the detonation of the explosion rocked the Holdings. As the smoke cleared, the First Daughter and her guardian had already retreated, leaving Leoric and Lady Scythewood alone behind a dissolving barrier of blackened aether. Leoric snarled and lowered his sword, turning to Lady Scythewood. "You should have summoned me sooner."
She hummed. "My being here wasn't part of their plan. I had placed false rumors that I'd be in Thavnair this week checking on Aluna. But now that we know they're no longer willing to be on the defensive, it's time to put more of our own plans in motion." She paused, ear twitching as she seemed to be listening to something only she could hear.
"The others are returning from the heist via the aetheryte chamber. Inform the sisters that their guard was breached. Summon Briar here when the others finish getting settled."
Leoric inclined his head.
Lady Scythewood's smile was heard rather than seen. "I do so miss the beach."
In the early morning hours after the heist, an announcement went out over the pearl by Briar.
"In light of last night's success, Lady Scythewood feels now is the perfect time to go forward with an expansion and relocation of the Holdings and the Scythewood's Eorzean operations. Movers will be packing up things room by room and moving them to our new location in the Mists with the plan to have everything moved over before the end of the night tonight. I'm sorry it's so sudden, but the space we're moving into is bigger and much more scenic. I think you'll all like it. Feel free to utilize any of the movers to help you relocate your own personal effects."
No further explanation was given. It was official: the Scythewoods were moving.
As the last of the furniture was moved out and everyone was clear, the building that was once the Obsidian Holdings suddenly and without warning went up in flames.
As people turned to watch in confusion, Kaizen walked up next to Leoric, shoving his hands in his pockets as he passively watched the display."Was that really necessary?"
The armored Xaela gave Kaizen a chill glare, not turning his head. "We do not want even the slightest scrap of our business falling into the wrong hands. Nor do we want a certain pair of fugitives having run of the place, or finding any notes to signal where we've gone."
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