"...Um...my family or rather my clan doesn't have greatest track record with vampires but um....I still like to help you if I can miss."
Blood clung to her nails, thick as garnet polish, dripping slow down her otherwise manicured hands. She hadn’t bothered to clean herself— hadn’t the time for it either. Smudged make up and wild eyes, the mess only made her more beautiful, a saint written in ruinous ink.
The stranger’s offer registered, but it also planted a seed of doubt in the back of her mind. Help... Sanctuary? She tilted her head, long curls falling in a loose, blood-matted halo, and regarded him with that predator’s stillness, the kind that made men forget whether they were pack or prey.
Parting her blood red lips, Astaria let out an exhale first before speaking.
“And how do I know I can trust you?” Unlike her usual smooth, seductive tenor, Astaria now spoke in hushed notes—as if the walls had ears and a gallery of goons were still out to get her. “Men do have such a way of dressing up their appetites in pretty words...” And she did just seem to have slashed her way through what looked to be this man's opposing faction on claws alone. “Forgive me if I don’t seem particularly eager to fall for another trap.”