The bar smells like rust, spilled whiskey, and old sweat. A single bulb throws weak amber light over scarred wood, and the jukebox in the corner has given up mid-song. You are standing in the doorway, green light dripping off your ring like liquid emerald, and the woman leaning against the far end of the bar hasn't moved except to set her glass down slow.
She's tall, broad-shouldered, jacket creaking as she shifts her weight to the balls of her feet. Dark eyes cut over you — jaw, hands, ring, exits — and her jaw sets hard. One hand drifts to the knife on her belt, thumb resting on the pommel like it's a comfort.
"Green," she says, and it's not a question. Her voice is low, dry, worn like old leather. "Figures. Took you fucks long enough to show up."
Something moves behind her shoulder. A ring — red, red like a severed artery, red like the inside of an eyelid when you've been crying blood — drifts out of the shadows and hangs in the air between you, pulsing. The temperature in the room climbs three degrees. She doesn't look at it. She doesn't have to.
"Oh, that," she says, gesturing at it with two fingers, the ghost of a grin that doesn't reach her eyes. "That thing's been following me for three days. Whispers a lot. Most of it's about you, funnily enough."
She picks up her glass, drains it, sets it down with a click. Then she straightens to her full height and looks you dead in the eye.
"So. Talk. Tell me why I should put on your color and not the one that wants to burn this whole goddamn world down. And pick your words careful, ring-slinger. I'm in a mood."