to be always longing {Gwyn}

[Costin Dracula]

Little sister, eh? Costin could tell that Gwyn wasn't overly excited by something her brother had said, and he imagined that was probably it. After all, she was hardly a child.

Eddie he did not like, but he really had decided not to be too openly hostile to the other boy. He didn't want this to turn into a shouting match. So when Gwyn held out her hand, Costin took the opportunity to take just the slightest jab at the older brother without doing anything anyone could really peg as questionable. Instead of shaking her hand, Costin took it, pressed it to his lips courteously, and bowed.

"It is my pleasure to make your acquaintance, Gwyn...and Eddie," he said, politely. Remarkably politely. He couldn't remember the last time he'd been that polite to anyone, and it made him feel a little uneasy inside, like he'd done something he was going to regret later. He quickly withdrew his hand and shoved it back into his pocket. He couldn't even remember what they'd been talking about before they'd been interrupted, and he scowled slightly.

"Eddie," he said, thoughtfully. "If you were going to ceremonially get rid of a piece of paper, would you think that throwing it into the wind would be a good way to do it?"

[eddie]

Technically, Eddie should have no problem with someone kissing his sister's hand, given that where they came from it would be quite a common greeting to a young lady, particularly one as eligible as Gwyn.
However, this was Eddie and he wasn't very good at doing what he was supposed to, so he folded his arms and scowled very obviously at Costin, despite his politeness.

Until the question threw his concentration, which was remarkably easy to do, and instead of continuing to glare at Costin he just frowned thoughtfully.
"I suppose, but somebody could find it... I'd burn it." he decided - his tone wasn't exactly friendly, but it wasn't overly hostile either.

[Gwyn Locksley]

Gwyn was a little surprised when Costin kissed the back of her hand instead of shaking it as she had, so she thought, obviously offered, but then he did carry himself as a noble, and perhaps his homeworld was not to far removed from her own. Even more surprising was his sudden politeness. Just a few moments ago he had been grumbling at her and calling her ideas stupid, and now he was acting the perfect gentleman.

She just really couldn’t figure him out, and it was highly annoying. He was rude yet polite, mysterious yet open, intriguing yet annoying. Was he always like this, or had she just caught him on a bad day? Or, more likely, she had just picked at all the wrong bowstrings and he was only like this with her. It seemed to be common, she had a habit of doing that to people. Another reason she was far from popular, not that that was something she gave much thought to, let alone strived for.

Of course, the polite exterior was quickly tarnished, at least in Gwyn’s eyes. He still spoke properly, and addressed her brother with respectful curiosity, but the words were like a needle poking into that ball of irritation that had started to form the moment that wad of paper had struck her in the head. Her eyes narrowing, she propped her hands on her hips and glared at Costin, ready to fire off a further explanation about how he had disposed of his rubbish before Eddie answered the question... and the words happily died on her lips.

She really could have kissed her brother right then.

Her glare instantly melting, Gwyn turned a smug smile to Costin, an obvious ‘I told you so’ glint in her eyes. “I agree, Eddie. Burning is much more symbolic.”

[Costin Dracula]

He ought to have known not to appeal to that boy's sense of logic. Most people around here didn't even have much of a sense of logic. He was made vastly uncomfortable by the fact that in his mind, they both seemed to be smirking at him victoriously (when in reality, Gwyn was probably the only one who even knew there had been a victory).

"Yes, well, suppose you'd been raised to fear fire like death itself, and you weren't really trying to destroy the paper so much as you just wanted it away from your person. Casting it to the wind is perfectly good for that." It was clear by his tone that Costin thought that was the end of it; he wished he hadn't even brought it back up. What had made him do that?

"Anyway, you two must have all sorts of sibling business to discuss." Costin began toying with his cufflink, a bit of a nervous habit he'd acquired over the years (well, over the years that he'd been wearing cufflinks, anyway). "I would so hate to interrupt." For a moment, Costin entertained the thought of what it might be like to have a sibling. What if he hadn't been the only child "rescued" by Dracula and Tulio, what if there had been some other little orphan they'd dragged along with them? The thought, he found, was so distasteful to him that he almost visibly shuddered. Imagine if he'd had another person following him around all the time, interfering with his business, bothering him when he was having heated discussions with other people and calling him "little brother" or some such thing.

He almost felt sorry for Gwyn, then he remembered how irritating she'd been about the whole burning-the-paper thing, and thought better of it.

[eddie]

Eddie tried to follow what Costin was saying, he really did, but it didn't make much sense to him, and while he could follow the strangest trains of thought imaginable, for some reason perfectly regular logic occasionally lost him.
He didn't see why Costin was saying all that anyway, it had just been a question right? And Eddie had answered it, why was Costin going on about fearing fire and not destroying things when they'd already given him a perfectly good answer, he just couldn't figure it out, so all he did in response was to stare blankly at him. It was a good response, he'd learnt that, for some reason, it always made people stop talking.

Then he started talking about sibling business, which was just silly because what sort of business would he be talking about with Gwen? He didn't have any business at all, that was serious stuff, for adults, he'd just wanted to say hello.

"....I thought I was the one that interrupted..." he said eventually, completely mystified.

[Gwyn Locksley]

Gwyn was, indeed, smirking victoriously, and probably obviously enough that she was making up for Eddie’s complete ignorance as well. Oh, but Costin just couldn’t let it go! He just had to go on and on about fearing fire and not actually wanting to destroy the letter he had been tearing bits off of not long ago and he just wouldn’t shut up about it! She should have kept the stupid letter so she could shove it down his throat; that would probably shut him up.

“You can’t cast a balled up piece of paper to the wind, it just falls!” she pointed out in an exasperated tone, but apparently he was finally ready to move on, having convinced himself that everyone else was wrong and that his method of disposal was appropriate and symbolic or whatever he was going for instead of just stupid and lazy. Then again he was quick to make up an excuse to leave directly after, so maybe he also realised how flawed his logic was and was trying to slink away. He certainly didn’t look at that confident suddenly.

That wasn’t the best part, though. The best part was when Eddie, Eddie, proceeded to point out how flimsy his excuse to leave was. It had to be thin for that to happen. Sometimes she just really loved her brother without question or hesitation; this was one of those times. He had certainly made up for calling her ‘little’ with only a few words.

Another victorious smirk followed.

“My brother makes a good point,” she replied. “Not that our discussion was anything important. I can’t even remember what we were talking about.”

Alright, so that wasn’t entirely true. She had thought that maybe she was on the verge of figuring out the mystery about Costin’s past when Eddie had interrupted, and she was certainly hoping to continue that discussion eventually, but she didn’t want the boy to develop any misplaced sense of importance, or to misconstrue her interest and use it to stroke his ego. It was better to pretend not to care and take a dig at him in the process.

[Costin Dracula]

Costin was very quickly headed down the slope towards discomfort and misery here. When it had just been Gwyn, he had been managing all right, he thought. He could debate her. She was intelligent, and even if she was irritating the hell out of him, he had to at least concede that she did have a firm grasp of logic. But so did he. He could counter her logic with his own, and he could manage a civil conversation because she intrigued him to a certain degree.

Now there were two of them, and Eddie wasn't like Gwyn. To be honest, Costin just found him annoying. He wasn't about to say so in front of Gwyn, though, not because he cared what she thought, but because taking jabs at her brother would probably be seen as a rather childish insult, and not at all at the intellectual level he hoped people would consider him.

Of course, it seemed she hadn't thought much of him to begin with. Nothing important that they'd been discussing, eh? He realised with chagrin that he was highly indignant at that easy dismissal. He had told her things he didn't talk to people about, because...well, he'd thought she was intelligent and could handle it or...respect it or something. How rude. His jaw jutted out slightly in hardened resolve, and he decided he didn't like her.

Not that he'd been inclined to like her before. But now he disliked her.

"Nothing important at all," he said coolly. "I'll just be going, then. Good day."

[eddie]

It really didn't take much to confuse Eddie, and while he at least recognised that there was far more going on here than appearance suggested, he hadn't the faintest clue what it was that was going on, or what he was supposed to do.

The problem was, he didn't want Gwyn to be angry that he'd driven her friend away, even if Eddie wanted to do the brotherly thing and protect her from...well, any and all male attention, and some female in the case of that scary Dominique chick, but at the same time she didn't seem all that bothered that he was leaving.

"uh...bye?" He tried, wondering if that was the appropriate thing to say, he supposed it didn't matter if it wasn't, nobody really minded when he said the wrong thing anymore, they were used to it.

[Gwyn Locksley]

Well, that hadn’t exactly gone how she had intended, but that was hardly surprising. Gwyn never had been good at reading people, and people didn’t often think like her. So when she said something expecting a certain reaction, more often than not it never turned out how she planned. Case in point: she had been intending to get under Costin’s skin a bit with that comment, to make sure he didn’t develop any misplaced sense of importance when it came to how she viewed him, and maybe get him to argue the point, or even joke about it. Instead he got all uppity and tried to leave. Again.

And this time Eddie was no help at all.

This was quite a predicament. Gwyn did not like feeling guilty. It wasn’t that she was particularly worried that she had hurt Costin’s feelings, he seemed to brood and dwell on everything as it was so she doubted anything she said could have a lasting affect, but she had actually been... well, not exactly enjoying their conversation, but it had been interesting and now he thought she had found it dull and forgettable and would probably not talk to her ever again.

Suddenly her reasoning for saying what she had just seemed foolish and poorly planned. No, it wasn’t guilt she was feeling, it was regret. She did not like feeling regretful either, so she said the first thing that came to mind just to keep him from leaving.

“Ever played paintball?” she blurted out. She gave Eddie a look that was supposed to communicate that he played along, but she knew he wasn’t good at subtlety or picking up on hints or... anything, really. Except paintball... and his nerdy games and making friends and that sort of thing, but paintball was the important thing right now. Maybe he would be excited enough about the prospect that he wouldn’t question her. “Eddie and I are going to play this weekend, and you are welcome to join us. You can bring a friend so we have even numbers.”

Thinking about it, she had the distinct feeling that Costin likely didn’t have many friends. Or any. “Or Eddie can.”