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Character of the Season
Frail in body but dangerously quick of mind, Nikandr is the sort of character who proves that curiosity can be just as perilous as any weapon. A necromancer, inventor, and problem-solver with more ambition than self-preservation, Niki approaches the world like a puzzle box begging to be opened, even when what’s inside has teeth. Blunt, dry-witted, fiercely independent, and carrying a history best left partially buried, he has a knack for making even failure feel fascinating. Whether he’s raising the dead, moving across Caido to King's End, or experiencing a hangover for the first time, Nikandr brings a wonderfully strange spark to Caido, and we can’t wait to see what trouble his brilliant mind wanders into next.
Congratulations, Niki!
Credits
Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
OG Skinning provided by Kaons, with functionality and many custom plugins made by Neowulf!
It was, admittedly, not the most fun place to begin their tour. But it was a potentially educational one, and the Needle was a famous - or infamous - landmark in Stormbreak. While he was learning about the city in the sky he wished to see its darker and more serious aspects as well as its brighter and more tourist-friendly faces. Indeed, he had already explored some of its less reputable areas - the search through the Grotto for Mr. Matas came to mind
Today with Lena, at least, they had no pressing tasks to complete and could take their time walking through the city. The Needle was impressive even from a distance, an easy guide to follow, and only became more so as they drew closer to the prisons around it and the structure appeared to grow taller with every step.
Pausing well outside the cells and those they contained, he studied the architecture of the place and its central feature. Tilting his head up, Hadama traced the line of mirrored steel that thrust towards the sky, his expression stoically neutral as he regarded it for long moments before shaking the crick from his neck and turning to Lena curiously.
"What purpose does it serve?" he asked at last, unable to determine the Needle's function in this place from looks alone.
She’d be the first to admit her love of her home, but entirely forthright in its rather cruel history. She figured no land or region had all innocence and irreproachability; there was always something lined in the mercurial edges. Stormbreak had always been overt in its scruples though; in the hatred of some, in the way they’d guarded and protected and ensured. When all those portions were dismantled, the legends remained amidst the stone cold complexions. It was a wonder why some hadn’t been taken down in Sohalia’s time; but then again, there’d been multitudes of other priorities. And maybe they served as reminders, rather than the fierce spectacles and warnings of yesteryear.
The Needle especially, and as they approached she yielded a long and low breath. “It used to be for punishment.” She trusted Hadama to understand its name alone. “If one was to be disciplined, usually by whip, they had to face the Needle, and see their own reflection as they repented for their sins.” She didn’t glance his way, but stared at the spire, wondering what sort of crimes they might have cemented in now. Sedition for her, and so many others, against their tyrannical ruler of the throne, for now.
His eyes never left the Needle as he listened to Lena's explanation, silently absorbing the words without judgment or dismay. Torchline had its Jailhouse, and the Greatwood had its pits where trespassers had once been held to feed its Tulhaimnar. He did not doubt that Halo had some similar measures. All regions had petty criminals of some stripe. Petty thieves, drunks who caused disturbances until they sobered up, young toughs who went looking for - and often found - trouble.
All regions, too, had criminals of a darker breed. Those who committed crimes that were not so easily atoned for. But the spectacle inherent in the Needle... was an interesting choice of Stormbreak's past rulers.
"Mmh. Is it still used?" he asked, turning his gaze from the silvery spire at last - not without noting the similarities between it and the starkly phallic monument in the Grounds - to examine the cells around it. They had stopped far enough away that it was difficult to make out figures within those cells, but occasionally he noted movement. "Have there been more arrests in recent seasons?" Softly spoken, but not entirely an innocent question. Neither did he glance to Lena as he asked it, trusting her own wit and circumspection to unravel the subtler implications of the new management and what was tolerated by it.
“No. Not since the Order.” At least, nothing she’d seen on display. But the Caretaker also never had the heart to venture here to be a spectator – couldn’t stomach the torment, the scene – and her sister had only ever told her bits and pieces before realizing it was doing far more harm than good.
The Dragoons kept most things in place though, and she hadn’t been any part of enforcing teams. Rather suited in the medic role, Lena simply sought out the injured, now in human and animal means. As for more arrests this season, she shook her head again. “Nothing increased.” Which baffled her somewhat – any tyrannical force would likely have tried to smother the seditious spread – but maybe Dahlia and the Family didn’t find they needed to. Their presence was enough. “The reputation alone probably does the job.”
He nodded to hear that it was no longer in use, a slight easing of the muscles in his neck and shoulders at the information, though his expression remained neutral. Whether it was truly a relic of the past or whether Lena was simply not aware of when it fulfilled its purpose, he preferred to believe the former. Sohalia, at least, would never have condoned such flagrant cruelty. Of that he was certain. What the current ruler might use it for... was a thought he would rather not contemplate too closely.
But want and need were two different tides. And so he asked his second question, withholding any conclusions of his own until Lena could answer from the experience of one who lived in the city.
No, she said, and Hadama tilted his head thoughtfully, turning to look at her at last. "Mmh. I would agree." That capital rather than corporeal punishment seemed more the new style. But at least not wielded against normal citizens, however unenthusiastic they were about current politics. There was a seed of concern rather than relief there, one that he did not fully understand yet. Perhaps the more he saw of Stormbreak, the more it would grow until he could make sense of it.
"Thank you. I do not think we need to linger. May we stop by your skyport on the way to the Silk Houses? I have never arrived the traditional way," he admitted, turning from the spectacle of the Needle and beginning to walk away from its silent, shining threat.
Her eyes went away from the Needle itself, down towards the prison cells with outlines of individuals, though not every boxed portion filled – swallowing down her own portions of bile. At Hadams’s suggestion though, she nodded, content with the idea of not lingering in this place, where she rarely frequented anyway. “Of course.” Hitching her basket further up her shoulder, and tending to the way Mittens hovered, she gave a strained smile, glad to be immediately turning away from the fixture. He likely knew of what skyports looked like – his own region had one – but she appreciated the offer nonetheless, and persisted with more easygoing conversation the moment the structure no longer loomed so large.
