A used couch and a pair of recliners are grouped around a coffee table in the living room, with a foursome of wooden chairs claiming the bump out for quieter conversation. The dining room boasts a white laminate table with four aluminum and vinyl-upholstered chairs - too new to be 'vintage', too old to be trendy. The appliances and cupboards in the kitchen are new - or at least refurbished to look like it - and a door leads out to the backyard from there.

Up the stairs are a number of empty rooms where anyone affiliated with the Sept can crash and an office for private meetings. The Glass Walkers have their own area accessible via a locked door off the foyer. The main doors themselves lead back out to the front porch of the house.

The porchlight to the large Victorian house is on, as are the lights on the first floor that shine through lacy curtains. Somewhere inside the house, through the heavy steel door, faint music plays. Natalie's surprise, when she opens the front door to reveal the Wendigo standing outside, is easy to read on her face, and subsequently ill-hidden behind an air of bland politeness. "--I'm surprised to see you here. Will you come in?"

Jacinta gives a small nod of her head. "Quyana," she answers and steps through the doorway. Her own countenance is fixed, controlled, unreadable. "Did Thomas tell you that I have been searching for you?" Her voice is flat, only a hint of rise in tone to announce the question.

Natalie cocks her head to the side, delaying her answer until the door is closed behind her visitor. "He did, yes. He didn't say what about, though." She glances to the living room, then opens a hand invitingly that way. "Would you like to sit? Can I get you anything?" She takes refuge in a host's duties even if she cannot match the Wendigo for utter blandness.

Jacinta follows the prompt with her gaze and with another small nod she heads into the living room to sit at one end of the couch. She rests at its very edge, uncomfortable and ill at ease. "No, thank you. I would rather speak." Despite her words, she doesn't seem immediately inclined to give voice to her thoughts.

She stands proudly, this young adult; sure in her movements and comfortable in her body. Calloused fingers adorn small hands at the ends of muscular arms. An Alaska Native, Jacinta is not the tallest warrior one could imagine. Her stout figure falls just shy of five feet. Her eyes are a brown so dark as to be almost black, and there is a steeliness about her gaze which belies her easy smile. Her dark hair, once long enough to reach mid-back while braided, now reaches just below her shoulders and hangs loosely, untethered.

Her clothes are casual, relatively new blue jeans, and a dark blue T-shirt that has seen very little wear. On colder days, she wears a black, fleece pullover, but when her arms are bare, a detailed tattoo of a long-knife is visible along the back of her left forearm.

Natalie follows more slowly after her, taking in the Ahroun's look silently. She chooses a comfortable-looking armchair, the upholstery shabby at the edges, and settles into it with an air of possession pricked through with her own uneasiness. "...I was under the impression," she offers after a few heartbeats have ticked past, "that Megan-rhya was going to be here as well."

Jacinta rests her palms on her knees, back straight and stiff. Her brows twitch downward at Natalie's words, confusion showing briefly in her eyes. "I did not invite her to come," she says, and the confusion that was in her face touches her voice as well. "I am here in furtherance of my Fostern Challenge." Though she looks as though she might go on, she doesn't immediately.

"Fos..." Nat echoes blankly, the proverbial shoe dropping. "Oh." The Galliard appears as much at a loss for words as Jacinta, retreating into polite fidgeting - folding her fingers together on her lap, drawing her feet farther beneath her, blinking expectantly at the other woman. "All right."

"Ii," Jacinta says and takes a deep breath before she goes on. When she does, she speaks at a brisk pace, not pausing until she is finished. "There are several tasks which I must accomplish. One of these is to work as your Fostern Ahroun until the next Moot; to perform such tasks as you would ask an Ahroun of your own Tribe to perform. I must also work for the Bone Gnawers, so my time must be divided, but where your interests coincide, there would be no contention."

Natalie looks as though she might interrupt once or twice, her mouth opening and closing again, but stays silent until Jacinta's finished. "And you... are still living on the bawn while this is going on?" Carefully asked, this, her surprise ebbing under a sharp interest that hints of further mental shuffling.

Jacinta's shake of her head could easily be missed, it's so small. "No. Stacey, Walks the Middle Road, is taking my place as Guardian while I reside in the city." She settles a little further onto the couch, now leaning forward slightly, watching Natalie's reaction carefully.

"...All right." The Walker settles back in her chair, eyebrows drawing together while she studies the Wendigo's face. "What else do I need to know? How long are your terms, what does Olga have you doing, that sort of thing." She seems, if no longer as flat-footed as before, keenly interested.

Jacinta once again sits more fully upright, her expression stony. "Olga has not yet given me a task, although she spoke of a problem and I have begun to scout it out." She pauses, her tongue running over her teeth before allowing them to clack together. "You have my use until the Moot before the Great Hunt."

It takes Natalie a second to process the terms; when she does it's with another nod. "...June, then. All right, I don't have anything now. Are you someplace with a phone? Some where I can get hold of you? And if you need a place to crash, the Safehouse here is open."

Jacinta is silent for nearly a full minute, sitting completely still except for the shifting of her gaze as she considers her words. Then she rises, and her hands fidget at her sides. "I am staying with my kin." Her jaw works, no words yet coming. She takes a half-step forward, and then back again. "I cannot give you her phone number... cannot allow you to contact her, until I can trust you." Her hands rise, defensive and placating. "It is important that we be able to trust one another. As Garou, as members of the same sept, as protectors of the Hidden Walk. We do Grandmother a disservice by working in opposition."

Natalie echoes, her nostrils flaring, lips pulling off her teeth, "...You can't trust me." Disdain. "--Then I guess we've got nothing more to say to each other." She pushes herself to her feet, manner gone utterly cold. "Let me see you to the door."

Jacinta's jaw drops with shock; anger brings color to her cheeks. She takes three steps toward the door and then turns to the taller Galliard. "I speak truth to you, and you do not want to hear it. Do you deny my words? Do you think this is the best way to help Grandmother?"

Natalie begins hotly, "You speak..." only to cut herself off with a sharp gesture. She stares at the Ahroun, making no pretense of politely avoiding dark eyes. "You said you were to act as a Fostern of my Tribe. What the hell am I supposed to think when you then flat out tell me you can't trust me?" Another short, dismissive gesture. "I can't talk to you about this tonight. I need time to think, time to talk to Alicia and see what she had in mind."

Jacinta's chin juts forward, eyes not turning aside. "You hear only what you want to hear, only half of what is said. Thomas Grey can reach me, if you need. I will leave you to think and speak with Alicia." Now she does turn, swiftly, back to the door. Only when she reaches it does she turn back to Natalie. "But think on this, while you are thinking. What I said was this: It is important that we be able to trust one another. I wish to trust you. That I cannot, yet, is a statement of how things are, not how I wish them to remain."

Natalie stalks after the shorter woman, though only to the end of the half-wall. "I thought I could trust you," she says quietly, with a touch of bitterness, her eyes never leaving Jacinta's. "Now I'm not sure." Mouth twisted as though she'd eaten a lemon, she drops the smallest of nods. "Goodnight."

Jacinta frustration reads clearly on the face of the Wendigo and she shakes her head. "I will always act with honor, Natalie," she says, hand on the doorknob. "You may choose to believe what you wish." That said, she turns back to the door and opens it.

Natalie's farewell is a cool, "Likewise, I'm sure." She doesn't bother repeating her goodnight, but waits, still as a statue, until the door is closed. The porch light doesn't flick off until Jacinta's on the sidewalk; the lights on the public side of the safehouse turn off a second later.

[End of log]