• Closed • Sibling Showdown [Alistair]

[Zvezdana Venora]

15th of Saun, 716

Zvezdana had been having a lovely afternoon. She had been having tea with two cousins that had proved fruitful. At least, on the information front. Theodore “Baby Bear” Venora had let it slip that Alistair, her ‘beloved’ older brother, had sent him to Warrick to meet with Lazuli. Not only that, they had been plotting against her rise to the throne. To think, her own family was Anti-Rebel. Not only were the secretly Anti-Rebel with her on the premises, but they had been making moves against her with other families.

There was nothing like family.

Zvezdana had excused herself from tea shortly after that to retire to her room where she began to throw a giant tantrum. Old, empty perfume bottles from her youth crashed against the walls. She even went as far as to sweep her arm across the desk to break an oil lamp, something that was stylish in her mother’s eyes. The noise brought servants running towards her room only to be sent fleeing for their lives as more bottles were sent flying out the door at them. When she ran out of things to throw, she sat fuming on the chest at the end of her bed, staring at the door. Her eyes were wild, her cheeks were flushed, and her hair was in disarray. The red dress she had worn to tea was pulled in wonky ways where her body motions had been unfit for a real lady. The skirt was hooked up on one of the buttons of her tall knee high boots. Zvezdana’s chest rose and fell with deliberate effort, and an artist may have depicted her with smoke coming out of her nose, ears, and mouth. Anger could not quite describe the feeling she had.

She was filled with rage. Rage as red as lava that flowed from the Heart of the World and as dark as the deepest abyss in the ocean. She knew she and her family had their issues, but this was almost uncalled for. Wasn’t family supposed to support the endeavors of their children? Weren’t older brothers supposed to protect their younger sisters? Weren’t cousins supposed to be excited to have a queen as their cousin? None of this meshed well.

It was all his fault.

Had she been first born, this would not be an issue. Second born meant second place. She had always known that to be the rule of her parents. She had never thought it would extend to the point that it affected the rest of the world. Alistair. He was the one to blame for all her misfortunes: her father’s hatred, the rape she endured as a child, her constant inability to be the best. He was now the root of her family’s betrayal. He was even dragging Warrick into it. Someone she thought she trusted. Lazuli would be caught in the fray. Whatever innocence the Warrick Baroness had left would be destroyed by her malicious brother.

This had to stop. Now.

Zvezdana stood up, taking a moment to take a look in a broken mirror. She fixed her dress, hiding her knee high boots beneath the red tafetta. She pulled the stray hairs back behind her ears. The silver torque, previously skewed, was put back in place along her collarbones. Once she passed her own approval, she began to move towards the door. A CRACK beneath her eyes caused her to look down. The pieces of the shattered oil lamp stared back at her. For a split second, she thought about taking a shard of the broken glass with her. The thought of it entering her brother’s neck was enticing. The spray of red against the wall, carpet, and her dress seemed to fuel her fire. She left the shards where they lay. Bloodshed would be avoided tonight. Zvezdana did not need to add murder to her resume.

Servants steered clear of her as she stormed through the halls towards her brother’s room. It took a few minutes to get there, as the house was huge. She had forgotten how big it was. As a child, she could make it from the end of one wing to the other. She had been running. Even as a munchkin, running seemed to make everything shorter. Now, her heels told of her coming. The clicked on the wood in between the long carpet. Finally she arrived at his door. Her fist pounded on the door continuously.

“Alistair!” Zvezdana screamed, pounding on the door some more. “Open this door this instant or, Originals help me, I will break it down!”

[Alistair]

It had been far from a quiet evening. Ellasin was back in town, and two days prior she'd contacted him, came directly to his office. Being face-to-face with the most powerful mage in Idalos was always a dizzying thing, especially considering he had been opposed to her methods for a long time, and he was positive that she knew about his discontent to some degree. Earlier, she came again, and this time requiring his assistance. Alistair was now, in the evening, spending time with Father Damien in his room. They were discussing Coven matters quietly and ensuring that the Necromantress had not been plotting the demise of Venora or any such thing. They checked each others words for conflicting stories, and discovered that in fact they had both played their part well.

But there was another war ongoing in Alistair's life, not just one. There was a civil war embroiling the Kingdom, and he had known for some time that on the fifteenth of Saun, Zvezdana would arrive back home in Sabaissant. It was only a matter of time before she discovered Alistair's affiliation with the pro-loyalist group, and the violent knocking and yelling of his name was as good an indication as any that she'd determined his previous actions.

Break it down? he asked himself. Hm. The door was very sturdy, and Zvez was quite the petite little woman, at least last he'd saw her. No threat there. But his sister was volatile, and he didn't wish for her to go about breaking things and spreading misinformation about Alistair or whatever difficult thing she'd do in her anger. There were enough rumors circulating about both of them in the media, and it was best if they compressed their anger and put it to good and discreet use. So, with Damien standing in the background, Alistair opened the door and looked Zvezdana in the eye.

"Hello, sister," he said. His voice was quite the opposite of hers - calm, collected. He was always this way, and she would know that. He had the heart of a block of ice, both rigid and defined. His reactions had always been the same. Her volatility was a trait he experienced on the very opposite end; stability.

Before she said anything, he invited her inside to sit at his table where he'd played chess and ate his morning meals. Damien leaned against the wall in the corner of the room, wearing a silk vest with a golden sundial pin. He was a tall, muscular and handsome man, and Zvezdana would have seen him with Alistair plenty of times before. He had been inseparable from the Venora in the past several months, the two becoming closer and more dependent on one another each and every day. She might recognize based on his appearance that he was the one Alistair was rumored to be having an affair with in the Gazette.

"Would you like some dinner? I haven't quite eaten yet, so I was about to get some." He offered politely, as he wished to make it clear to her that he was here to have a calm and rational discussion, despite the fact that he knew she didn't want one. "Damien was merely sharing the latest gossip with me. It's amazing that the Fairharbour matriarch had slept with and been betrothed to eighteen different men before finding her first husband. You'd think she would have gotten tired after all of those dalliances." The Lich, off in his corner, rolled his eyes. Since when did we have this discussion? he thought.

The Venora was prepared for her to explode. If anything, his politeness would likely infuriate her. He knew. But by being as such he could craft the advantage for himself in this conversation - she would be seen as the angered one while he would be merely as an understanding host. And with his sister, it had always been about gaining the upperhand. They hadn't gotten along well since the very, very early years.

[Zvezdana Venora]

Alistair had a way of making her blood boil, and it was no different when he opened the door in his cool, collected, suave way. She immediately regretted not bringing the glass shard with her. Jabbing it into his smug face would have been quite pleasurable. It might have helped her work out some of this angst that she had balled up inside of her chest. Instead, she had to deal with his perfect face and her perfect personality. Perfect. The word infuriated her. He had always been the favorite in father’s eyes and probably in her mother’s eyes as well. Everything about him was everything she was not. It was everything she wished she could be. She wanted to be loved and adored like he was. Cared about and respected. Maybe that was another reason she was fighting alongside Veljorn. Maybe, just maybe, her family would see her as more worthy than they did now.

Zvezdana slipped in without a word, but the glare on her face and pursed lips told that she was about to have words with her brother. For a brief moment, her gaze fixated on the other man in the room. Was this his fabled boy toy? Was Alistair really having a relationship with a man? Maybe he wasn’t as perfect as she believed. Before Zvezdana turned her back on him, she gave him a once over. At least Alistair had a good taste in men. With that, she turned her back on the man, fixating her fury on Alistair.

“I do not care about what you two were discussing, nor am I inclined to share a meal with you Alistair. This is not a conversation that I wish for your boyfriend to hear, but so be it,” Zvezdana growled, curling her fingers into tight little fists against her side. “How dare you send our cousin to treat with Baroness Warrick?! I thought my family would have backed me up in my decision to marry Lord Burhan and to seek to raise our status to royalty. Instead, I find you having words with other parties behind my back to help King Cassander.”

The name rolled off her tongue like acid. Ever since she found out that Lazuli had been tortured, she had a particular hate for the boy-king. Not that she didn’t have a hate for him before, but that was in support of her husband. Now, she had a personal vendetta against the king. She would see him flayed, hung, and burned at the stake. Zvezdana had murdered him so many ways in her sleep that she could not decide on one single method. She would simply have to push him just before his last breath and then have the method cease. Then she would get to try a new one until his body could take no more. It hurt to know her brother was trying to tear her dreams apart, since they were so lovely and bloody.

The rage ebbed a bit, making her feel a bit tired. She decided to join him at the table. Zvezdana would play his games. It would probably get her further than yelling and throwing a fit. She had already put down her foot as to why she was here. Now he could explain himself and maybe they could get through this for the better.

“I understand we have never been close or even on good terms. Maybe now would be a good time to lay it all out there. You have made your moves, and I have made mine. I plan on taking the throne from Cassander, and I would rather that my family not be standing in my way when I do it. I have little to no intention of being beaten, and I would rather keep my family away from the bloodshed. That even includes you Alis.”

No matter what their relationship was, Alistair was still her brother. She had to respect that. Overall, she did not want to see him hurt. She actually wanted to cause her parents more harm than him. He was just their puppet after all. Although he was no longer innocent in the game of thrones, he was innocent during most of the crimes against her. She still blamed him for her rape and now she blamed him for aligning with the anti-rebellion/pro-Cassander groups. He could still redeem himself, and she would give him the chance to do so.