Azura stood next to Oliver before the big carved oak door; the entrance to the town hall. It was beautiful and in normal circumstances she would’ve taken a closer look at it but now Azura kept her head down and simply stared at her feet waiting for the doors to open. Oliver watched her closely but as she made no attempt to even try to open the doors, he walked past her and pulled them open.

“What are you waiting for? Ben is inside, so let’s go.” When he grabbed her arm again, Azura couldn’t suppress a growl and yanked herself loose.

Surprised, Oliver jumped back. Azura couldn’t help but notice the slight hint of fear that momentarily appeared on his face before he composed himself again. After giving him a defiant stare for a moment she looked away and sighed.

“Don’t just touch me out of the blue again and there’s no need to fear me.” Those two things in one sentence even sounded strange to her but she dismissed the thought, knowing she couldn’t take back the words. “Ugh, what I mean is, I won’t hurt you. I’m not some kind of maniac.”

Cringing again at her own use of words, Azura resisted the temptation to facepalm herself. It had been much more comfortable when they had not spoken to each other. One thing she was glad for though; for the first time since her breakdown, her brain seemed to be doing ok and she didn’t have to force herself to keep focusing on the here and now.

She just waved at Oliver to take the lead so she could follow. She couldn’t help but catch the wary look he was giving her and decided it was better that she not look at him again for now. When she lowered her gaze once more he started to move and she followed. Except for the marble floors, Azura didn’t see much of the inside of the town hall. Judging by the marble and the door, it probably was a beautiful building, but she couldn’t care less as the nerves about meeting up with Ben started to take over.

They walked for what seemed ages, corner after corner until finally, Oliver came to a stop and knocked on a door. Soon after, Ben opened it, making Azura raise her eyes as he spoke up.

"Azura Thoreau. Finally, we get to properly introduce ourselves. My name is Benjamin Reed, mayor, and leader of Pleyvale city." Ben extended his hand and after a small hesitation, she shook it. He was dressed in a suit again, his gray hair slicked back and he was carrying the same golden chain she had seen once before when he showed up at Jeff's house. His glasses fit his circular face perfectly and he looked like quite a charming man... But she had seen and felt the way he could cast his power and for now, she was very careful with her words and actions. She didn’t know whether or not she could trust him. In her head, she said a little prayer that her mind would not abandon her during the meeting.

"Welcome again, Azura." He offered her a seat as he slowly said her name and nodded to Oliver to leave the room. He hesitated for a short moment before leaving them alone.

"Normally I would have wanted to see you straight away, but Lucas was dead set on postponing it so you could recover. I see that has happened and I'm glad you agreed to meet me today."

"Did I have any choice?" The sarcastic tone was not one she could hide and she immediately regretted saying it as his face flashed from friendly to a look she would rather not see again. It was only a brief moment before his face was all friendliness again though.

"No. And please reconsider your words first before outing them. The only reason you are still here is that I allow it. We don't have a good relationship with any blue-eyed snow leopards but considering you have been here for over a year, and that Nicolai has vouched for you, I have made an exception. I do want to know more about you and mostly about the fire part. That is something I have never seen before and I would like to know more about it."

"It's a Phoenix. I have a Phoenix inside of me, though currently, it seems to be on a hiatus." She did not like how he addressed her and she replied coldly and without any emotion.

"A Phoenix? The legendary bird that nobody has seen in over three centuries?" He raised an eyebrow and it was obvious he didn’t believe her.

"There was one in Greenwood three years ago. I killed it, it killed me, then revived us both with it inside me. Trust me, I was shocked just as much as you are." The sarcasm was again evident. The longer she spent in his presence the more her aversion towards him grew.

"Right... I heard the rumors but did not believe them to be true." Ben was either ignoring the way she spoke or genuinely had no clue she could care less. She suspected the first.

"Could you explain to me what happened and what your powers are? They could come in handy one day."

So the cat was out of the bag. He wanted to use her. Anger was building up inside her but she tried to push it down. It would not help and she did not want to piss him off, knowing all too well what the consequences could be.

She did what he wanted. She talked; about her past, about coming to Pleyvale, about the Phoenix, all in a factual way. She left out the emotional parts so he would not get any leverage on her. She also left out bits and pieces like the bond between her and Nora and she didn’t utter a single word about Charlie and the scar that adorned her body. It was none of his business and wouldn’t mean anything to him. Thankfully, her prayer had seemed to work and she felt more focused and clear than she had felt the entire week. Maybe it was the change of surroundings that kept her sharp.

When she finished Ben calmly continued as if they were in an interview.

"When Lucas joined us he did not want you to fight, claiming you would kill Nathan. Does he think you're not in control?" He coolly asked while writing something in a notebook he had grabbed minutes earlier.

Azura followed his intonation, starting to treat it as an interview, watching and weighing her words carefully while closely listening to his. She shut down her emotional feelings as best she could so it would affect her as little as possible.

"He knows I get angry easily and he knows I've had my troubles in the past trying to hold myself back."

"You're a blue-eye; it's a normal trait. They are feral at times, angry, and dangerous. And yet...even as the flaming version of you, you managed to show restraint and that showed you are in control."

"Get to the point already." She crossed her arms. Azura was trying to act tough and confident, unphased by this torturous talk, but deep inside conflict started to rise.

Why was she talking to Ben and acting as if she wanted to stay when maybe she didn't want to? It had gotten harder every day being in the same house as Lucas, Ben just wanted to use her, and she had accepted her past and was much more stable than when she came to the city. Nothing was holding her here, she could go back to Greenwood anytime.

"I'm just trying to determine if you are dangerous or not." He gave her a polite smile. "Sparing Nathan goes against everything we know of blue-eyes like you. Like I said before, we see them as feral and uncivilized. They are wild, almost like their wild relatives. How did you learn self-restraint? We always deemed it impossible."

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The way he was smiling at her while he casually implied she was uncivilized left her with her mouth wide open. The words had to sink in a little bit then she averted her gaze from him. She wanted to be angry, shout, and spit in his face but she couldn't find the energy to do so. Azura licked her lips after taking her time to overthink his words several times. She could answer so many things but why bother, it was not like he would change his mind because she said so. Instead, she replied with a sneer.

"Maybe you should update and rewrite your history books about us then."

"Maybe I should, but you're just one blue-eye and was not even raised amongst them. You're actually a bad example to use as a subject for a new book about behavior." He wrote some more things while blatantly ignoring the obviously annoyed woman.

He was driving her up the wall and it became harder and harder to keep her emotions down. Part of her just wanted to curse the heck out of him and leave. The more she thought about it, the more appealing the idea became. Azura bit her lip shortly to keep her from doing just that and looked around the room to keep her mind occupied with other things.

It was just a boring, standard office like any other with just one door. There weren’t even any personal items as far as she could see. Either Ben had hidden them all away, or this was not his actual office she concluded. She could still just get up and leave, they probably wouldn’t try too hard to stop her.

Ben was still scribbling in his notebook. Azura grabbed the handles of her chair and wanted to get up when right then Ben looked up at her with a cocked eyebrow.

"You wouldn't leave right now would you?" He placed the notebook back on his desk and examined her closely.

"Actually, I was about to, yes. Give me one good reason why I should stay." She proceeded to stand up and crossed her arms.

"Fine. How serious are you with Lucas because he seems pretty infatuated with you."

"What?!" Azura dropped her arms, her eyes spewing fire. "That's none of your business!" Gone was the cool demeanor. She let it go, not wanting to play the nice girl any longer. He was infuriating her with his weird talk, strange topics, and unreadable attitude. They had been here for over an hour and she still had no idea what he wanted or where he was going with this talk. Only that he wanted facts, random facts. As she burst out, he started smiling widely and that's when it hit her.

"You are purposely trying to infuriate me. You hop from one topic to the other, try to hit a few nerves, and see what I'll do when I get angry. If you want a reason to dispose of me just ask. I can give you one right now!" She was fuming but stayed in the same spot. There were sparks, it was small but she felt it and embraced it.

"And it's working. Tell me Azura, Do you want to kill me? Do you feel the need to open me up, see my blood, watch me die? Are you losing control? Because this time there is nobody around to stop you. You can actually do what you want to do."

Benjamin grabbed a knife from a drawer in the desk and slowly approached her. She eyed him warily but it didn’t seem as if he wanted to hurt her. He grabbed her arm and placed the knife in her hand. The cold metal hilt felt like home. It was the same knife that always appeared in her dreams and nightmares. The one she had used to kill people with. She slowly rotated the hilt in her hand feeling the weight of the knife. Ben leaned in, the tip of the knife touching him but his green eyes never left her cold blue ones.

"Tell me Azura. How does it feel to be one of Lucas's victories? To be used and discarded just like that."

She grabbed his arm tight and moved the knife to his throat. He was not scared, she could feel his heartbeat, hear it even. He literally put his life in her hands willingly and kept antagonizing her. She knew, but one side of her didn't want to know. That side just wanted to see if she was able to kill him with one slide of the knife. She was starting to sweat, her hands started to tremble. Slowly she licked her lips as a wicked grin started to form on her face.

"Tell me, Benjamin. How does it feel to have a knife on your throat? To be a puppet, waiting for me to make up my mind. How does it feel knowing I'm thinking of several ways to kill you? Maybe I'll just slide the knife past your throat, maybe I'll stick it in your gut instead. I could also give you so many small cuts you eventually bleed to death."

His heartbeat was going up and he tried to pull back. Azura didn't let it happen and grabbed him even tighter as she moved the knife around stopping at his heart.

"Don't you ever play this game with me again, Ben." She hissed at him. She let him go and tossed the knife to the side. He took a deep breath, composed himself, and made a gesture in the air to which the door opened and Oliver walked back in looking a bit paler than he normally did. As Azura looked up she noticed the camera in the room, concealed in the ceiling, almost invisible. Ben followed her gaze and smiled as he looked at the camera as well.

"Beating Nathan was just one test. I had to know what you would do if provoked by someone alone. You made the right choice. I can see you’re in control, but you won't let others walk with you. That's a good trait to keep. I do have to apologize about what I asked and said to you just now though. Please understand I was trying to provoke you and had to find the right subject to do that, which means that most things I said hold no truth to them. I am glad you told me the truth as to what is going on with you though. You're honest and know how to deal with situations in a proper manner. So I say; welcome to Pleyvale city."

On the outside and the way he spoke, Ben seemed a completely different person. Calm and almost strangely kind but something was off about him. She had slipped back into the chair during his talk, trying to fit all the information together. Something inside her was resisting the man before her yet she couldn’t put her finger on it. When she noticed Oliver standing in the corner, she raised an eyebrow at his stance. His head faced down, but his body seemed on edge, every muscle tense.

Ben was trying to have her submit. The concept was not new as it often happened in werewolf packs. Andreas had used it more than once on Floyd to get him to back off but Azura had never been affected by it. Now that she realized what was going on, she tried to feel his power but found that once again, she was not one bit affected. Instead, the urge to counter it welled up inside of her. Of all things, that probably was the worst option out there. He was being subtle about it, she could tell and he probably was under the impression it worked as she had gone from standing to sitting down again.

Carefully weighing her options, she gathered it was probably for the best if she just went with it. Pretending to be compliant, while every nerve in her body screamed otherwise. Even if she wanted, she was in no state to counter him, and despite not agreeing with his methods, she had no reason to fight him over a power dispute. Azura lowered her head, clenching her teeth tight and as she did so, she felt his power waver. When it was all gone she raised her head again and pretended none of it all had happened.

"I want to see Nathan.” She made sure to sound timid as the demand rolled off her lips.

The two men exchanged glances after her request before Ben nodded to Oliver and gestured for her to follow them. They left the room and entered a long marble hallway where their footsteps resonated throughout. It was the only sound that surrounded them. Eventually, they came at a stop in front of a simple door with a small blurred window embedded into it. Ben entered first and Azura followed as Oliver remained outside and closed the door behind them.

They were in a small room that looked very similar to a hospital room. On a high raised bed was Nathan, tubes going down his mouth and IV's into his arm. He was in human form and his eyes were closed as if peacefully sleeping. The only sound was the beeping of diverse monitors around him. No cards or flowers in the room, only the bed, the medical equipment, and one chair. The whole atmosphere gave her chills and not the good kind. To Azura’s surprise, Nathan was not wearing a hospital gown. His bare chest was partly exposed, his skin bare to them. Her eyes moved to his legs, one was still in a cast from foot to his hip and was kept elevated but for the rest, there were no visible signs of a fight. No burns, no marks, nothing.

Benjamin startled her a bit as he spoke up. "We are keeping him in an artificial coma for now until he has recovered enough. He's healing quite well, although you did bring him to the brink of death. You broke a lot of his bones and caused quite a bit of internal damage, but even though you were covered in flames and heavily burned him, those were the first to heal. He will, however, carry a few scars with him including a bad working leg. He will probably be limping for the rest of his life. Don't feel guilty though. It was his own wish to fight you and knew darn well what the consequences could be."

Azura walked closer to the bed as Ben was talking. She looked down at the big man in the bed and frowned as she gazed at all the machinery attached to him. He did not look so big and strong now. He was just a normal man, beaten and down. The urge to touch him was growing. Her breathing became a tad shallower as she let her fingers glide over the cold steel of the bed frame. Like the urge to kill she got sometimes, the urge to move her hand down was becoming overwhelming. There was no harm in touching him, right? Slowly she moved her hand down and as her hand touched his a jolt of electricity flowed through her and everything went to black.