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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.
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11-03-2025, 11:54 AM (This post was last modified: 11-03-2025, 11:58 AM by Colt.)
COLT
He looks like a cool drink of water But he's candy-coated misery He's the devil in disguise A snake with blue eyes
She sets their sandwiches down on the coffee table, flopping back beside him on the couch and propping her toes against the table edge. Her lunch will end up mostly decorative, appetite not quite all there as of late, which she attributes to the stress this time of year always brings her without heaps of memory mud everywhere. Instead, she reclaims the tack she's been cleaning for the upcoming fair. Her hands need the busy work.
Absently oiling the bridle, a few beers deep by now, she's played hostess well enough when it comes to refilling his drink. She hasn't been fully present during their conversations though, as he might have noticed. She suddenly seems to as well, the echo of his voice, long since faded when she'd been in the kitchen still, seems to finally reach her. She turns her head towards him, a soft smile edging in. "Sorry sugar, what were you saying again about your plans this season?"
It's not the first time she's asked him to repeat himself. There's an edge to her she keeps sharpening on her thoughts. It pulls her in, and though she's here, she's miles away inside her mind.
He only comes out at night Gives you feelings that you don't wanna fight You better run for your life He's a good time cowboy Casanova
Received a Gilded Market wig from Remi that resembles her usual hair and is enchanted to stay on better than most wigs | has a reverse centaur tattoo on her left hand with the legs going down her pointer and middle fingers that looks like this.
He’s been sipping the coffee easily in between the rants he’s gone on about the bartender at the House of Midnight that (according to Thorn) playfully despises him, and the way he plans to take some matters into his own hands this Flowerbirth when she returns from the kitchen with the sandwiches.
He’s drawn silent, waiting to see if she picks up any portion of what he’s said as she picks up the tack she’d been working on in between. He remains just as quiet as he snags one of the sandwiches, his hummed thanks leaving him, muffled by the bite that he takes. She seems off and he can’t quite tell why, but something about it seems to suggest Vesper because that’s really the only difference he remembers her mentioning.
Colt’s question is met with a shake of his head as he swallows down the bite he’d taken. “Just some kinda revenge shtick. It’s no big deal, really. What’re your plans?” He changes the subject, leaning toward her a touch as he goes to nab the cup of coffee again, the courtesan’s seafoam gaze lingering on her face and squinting slightly as if he can read her mind – in which he most definitely can’t. “You got anythin’ goin’ with Vesper?” He asks bluntly – curiosity getting the better of him as he starts to knock down the biggest contenders of people and things she's been dealing with as of late.
He looks like a cool drink of water But he's candy-coated misery He's the devil in disguise A snake with blue eyes
One 'brow lifts up, mildly devious as her gaze cuts a sharp line sidelong to him. Her fingers continue to run the oiled cloth over the leather, dragging a shine to the dusty edges and darkening the hide of it all as the dry pieces drink in the care. "Revenge?" she repeats, her features canting into something small and sly. "Count me in. We can come up with something little, but super annoying to really mess with him."
When she's pulled back out from herself, everything's like normal; sunlight breaking back through the fog for a moment. "Like...poke a little hole in the middle of all the straws right before his shift starts, so every drink he passes everyone has problems with. Put a dab of honey all over the cabinets so whenever he touches them he gets gunked up. Pour some of that blue stuff (curaçao) in the bottom of his shakers so his drinks come out the wrong color..." She trails off with a shrug and a faint hum as she gets back to the bridle. Clearly she's had too much time in bars to consider what small problems really set them off.
As he asks about her plans though, her hands still for a moment, reaching out to grab her beer as she considers. "Mm," she starts to say, the sound sinking into the bottle as she tips back a sip. Thorn leans in and she glances at him in return, features furrowing with confusion at the look. The name that slips out of his mouth next feels like a punch to the chest, and she exhales sharply around the beer, tilting it down with a short cough that she buries in her elbow.
Hastily she sets the beer down on the table, eyes watering around the feel of the drink being breathed in. "What?!" she croaks, the sound thin as she coughs again, shakily inhaling. It takes her a few moments of gulping down air to fully recover, leaning over her knees and eventually smearing her face into one of her hands as her mind works over the question all the while.
"I dunno," she finally says, and the weakness to it is not from the recovery of her lungs. "Vesper is, gone." She tries for casual, but it ends up softer than she means, and though it's echoed in her head countless times, saying it out loud makes it curl up, like it couldn't bear to exist out in the world. "He's got work in the Grounds now. For an unknown amount of time...a while, it seems." He hasn't been gone long, yet, but knowing it'll stretch on sits heavy in her.
The amber of her stare flicks from the opposite wall to him finally, and she hopes it doesn't look a thing like she feels. "I told him I could visit him, but I haven't decided yet." She puts that truth out tentatively, like it hurts to admit it. "This is always a busy time, with all the babies being born, moving the stock into the far pastures, all this damn mud now." She sighs through her nose. "Now we got this fair prep, and I gotta plan the rodeo for next season again." Her other hand jostles the bridle in her lap as if in proof, needing her tack to be pretty for all the horses that'll be pulling flower floats and letting kids sit on their backs.
He only comes out at night Gives you feelings that you don't wanna fight You better run for your life He's a good time cowboy Casanova
Received a Gilded Market wig from Remi that resembles her usual hair and is enchanted to stay on better than most wigs | has a reverse centaur tattoo on her left hand with the legs going down her pointer and middle fingers that looks like this.
Delight breaks across Thorn’s face in equal measure as the grinch’s might when it comes to destroying Christmas to hearing how she has plenty of bizarre but perfect minor irritations that would be amazing to utilize against his ‘enemy’. “See? I knew you’d know just what t’do.” He praises her, his laugh warm and bright as it slips from him with her return to their conversation. “Votin’ the holes in the straws, though. Sounds so fuckin’ shitty and hilarious.” He files the idea away for later as his focus grows more fully on her.
Completely focused and with the familiarity of reading people (thanks to his career path), the courtesan sees the way she shuts out of it — the way she curls in on herself mentally like a dandelion that no longer has the sun to look toward. “Oy, I didn’t say inhale your beer!” He says with a little gasp of surprise, a laugh leaving him that he tampers down as he jumps a little forward to make sure she’s okay.
And all the fire, amusement, playfulness fades immediately with the softness of how she says gone. For a while, but the way she says it makes it feel like forever, and suddenly Hawthorn realizes he might have overstepped. “Shit, Colt. I didn’t know..” He starts to say before he nibbles on the inside of his cheeks a little before he nods, curls bouncing around his head.
“Yeah this mud’s somethin’ else.” He sighs, slinking back into the seat of the couch, cradling his drink in his hands. “You got plans for the fair prep?” He asks, giving her the out to not talk about Vesper any longer than she has to if she doesn’t want to. But if she does, well, he’s all ears.
He looks like a cool drink of water But he's candy-coated misery He's the devil in disguise A snake with blue eyes
Other than her dogs, Thorn's the one person she doesn't much hesitate to speak to. Ever since the night she'd accidentally cracked in front of him. He held her like something that hadn't broken, just splintered a bit and could pass as whole still. That had been a feeling she waited some time to experience, and he'd given it, and in turn she trusted him in ways she thought she forgot how.
He does it now too; holds her in a way that lets her choose, no cage or judgement or anything but a presence that's ready. Her attention drops from him and she frowns suddenly at the tack in her lap. Though it gleams as if new by now, she seems to find some flaw in it still and presses the wet cloth back in with newfound energy. "I can't stop thinking about him," she follows up after Thorn's sworn sentiments trail off, clipping in over festival chatter. "It's annoying." She grinds the word through her teeth, just one corner of her lips parting to let it through as she bears down on the bridle, thumb shoving the fabric back and forth like she means to ignite it instead. "I'm annoyed right now that we're talking about him."
She pauses long enough that it almost seems like she means for that to be the end of it. It isn't, though. It never is with Vesper. "I thought giving in would fix all this. I thought I'd get my fill, or he would. Instead, it made it worse." She huffs, and a piece of the polished rigging snaps beneath her excessive attention, jolting her forward over her lap, unaware she'd leaned her whole weight into it.
"Great!" she exclaims with all the tone that suggests the opposite. "Now I get to add fixing tack to my plans too!" She dismissively chucks the bridle and its broken rein over the side of the couch with a flop. Without missing a beat, she rolls back into it. "It's insane, Thorn." She sighs, oil-wet hands slipping through to pull at her hair and ruffle it over her shoulder, uncaring of the mess she adds to it. "The way I can't get enough of him. I feel insane."
He only comes out at night Gives you feelings that you don't wanna fight You better run for your life He's a good time cowboy Casanova
Received a Gilded Market wig from Remi that resembles her usual hair and is enchanted to stay on better than most wigs | has a reverse centaur tattoo on her left hand with the legs going down her pointer and middle fingers that looks like this.
It’s her terms, never pressuring and never too nosy to not be a decent friend, Thorn’s goal is to help her let off steam if she needs to. So he leaves the opening there – the dusty kitchen screen door on hinges that squeak, halfway between letting the sunlight through or closing fully to keep him out. He wouldn’t judge her either way.
She continues to clean and he half expects her to shift subjects and ask him what kind of product he was using in his hair this week that was new just to not talk about it, when she surprises him. “Yeah, I bet it is.” He hums his understanding, the courtesan sitting back a little but still in a way that allows him to get up should he need to. She double times on the leather with the cloth and he wonders silently how she doesn’t have a blister forming yet from the movement.
“Have y’all agreed to be anythin’? Or is it just kinda in the air?” He asks quietly, uncaring one way or another but figuring it would help him get a better idea of where her frustrations were tied to. Instead, he gets the snap of rigging, the way she jolts forward, the scent of leather and cleaner even more vibrant now as he shoots up to go and sit beside her. “Lemme help, Colt.” He murmurs, even if it wasn’t much of a help. Conjuring the telekinesis in his blood, he lifts the tack up and slips it over into the bucket of the rest that needed fixing (he’s been here often enough to know where she keeps things for her to-do list).
And rather than let her oil up her hair further, he reaches up to take it from her hands, running his jeweled fingers through it to start a little braid. “Tell me about what’s so special ‘bout him?” Maybe they could determine where the attachment came from, which portions she could try to guard against if she didn’t want to feel the sting so sharply. A bandage around the worst parts but not the whole so that she could still feel, it just wouldn’t be so gut wrenching.
He looks like a cool drink of water But he's candy-coated misery He's the devil in disguise A snake with blue eyes
Her head shakes simply at his question. It's something she's avoided dwelling on when she can help it, and it's an anchor she uses every time to remind herself that she's the one getting in too deep. "Friends with benefits, I guess?" She falters a little, 'brow pinching in as she considers. "I don't even know if he's my friend," she murmurs after a moment, pausing to glance up at Thorn like he might know some other word for it. "He's always been...something else." There's no unkindness to the term, just a blunt truth. She enjoys his company, and he seems to enjoy hers, but he's not someone she reaches out to just because, it's always more with him. She can't really imagine him sitting where Thorn is right now, and part of it is because she's never offered him the seat.
As leather yields to pressure and her patience with it for the time being, she permits Thorn's capable hands to do more than leave it in a tangled heap. "Thanks," she says gently, embarrassment keeping the smile she offers him small. Since she's already made a scene of it all, admitting to being crazy hardly seems so hard now, especially when he picks it up with the same quiet understanding he always manages.
What he asks feels too big to answer. She closes her eyes for a moment, slouching against him as his fingers work sense back into her hair. While he pulls golden thread together, she plucks at the little silver ones that Vesper's woven through her, tugging at memory and feeling like they could be solution enough. "There's something about him I'm drawn to," she starts, soft and simple. "He's handsome," she smirks, "but it's more than that. It's like...finding something good in the world finally, after all the shit, and you weren't even looking for it, but now that you know it's possible you wanna keep that good alive as much as you can." Her head shifts against him, lips parting over careful breath.
"He shows up, in ways people haven't for me, not without asking them to." She is not one prone to ask either. Her feet fold up beside her, tucking her bare toes into the cushions. "Mostly on his own, but whenever I'd ask him to, he'd be there." Countless times she'd turned and there he'd be, smug as a cat in a sunbeam. "And after he took me out to the Greatwood, he came here, too. First man I haven't kicked out at dawn in, gods, ages." She kicked herself out instead, but still her smile grows wider than it has yet at the memory. "And we had fun in town, and all the other times here and there we've been together." Maybe he hadn't given her anything much beside memories, but he'd given her good memories, damn good ones. If it'd just been fucking, he didn't have to put in that much work, certainly other men had always done less, and all their flowers and trinkets had never amounted to half as much as Vesper did in the end. "I think he's the most charming man I've ever met," she hums, the sound wistful with longing.
"And the sex Thorn!" Her hand grabs his knee as she leans into him more with a breathy laugh. "Gods, the sex is like nothing I've known." She trails off, distracted with memory briefly, her smile curving more sly and secretive. "It's a good thing he's not in your line of work, I think he could put the house of Midnight out of business, or at least take it over." A telepath with some extra 'hands' can have that effect, not that she knows that's half the reasoning. "You'd think he's Frey's son the way he feels. I almost wish you'd experience it once just so you know how serious I am." It's perhaps the one thing she doesn't feel crazy about, other than the fact it makes her crazier about him.
She sighs, lighter and almost content, as she leans further into Thorn. "So, should I go visit him or not?"
He only comes out at night Gives you feelings that you don't wanna fight You better run for your life He's a good time cowboy Casanova
Received a Gilded Market wig from Remi that resembles her usual hair and is enchanted to stay on better than most wigs | has a reverse centaur tattoo on her left hand with the legs going down her pointer and middle fingers that looks like this.
“There’s categories of friends, y’know.” Thorn points out in a way that might help her figure out that it doesn’t have to be the all or nothing that she might be feeling internally. In fact, he shoots her a bright grin and a smirk. “Like, obviously I’m your best friend. I’d fight him for the title if he even thought ‘bout steppin’ on it. Don’t care if he is a demigod.” He snickers a little because he knows for damn sure he’d get his sss handed to him if it did ever come down to it.
But he settles down to listen to her thoughts, fingers combing through her blonde strands as he starts to braid it back in smaller braids, having a feeling that they’ll be here for a while to let her parse through her thoughts. He doesn’t say anything to her gratitude, instead he just offers her a knowing smile as he continues to work, showcasing a softer smile for her rather than the practiced masks his work required of him. “Mmhm, yeah.” He hums along with her explanation — wondering if there’s some figurative checklist he should be marking off.
Handsome? check.
Refreshing — no, revitalizing? Check
Takes initiative? Check
Incredible sex? Also check.
Sounds too good to be true? Fucking check.
He can understand her apprehension and the draw, but he can’t help the way his fingers twitch against her scalp as he works wonders with her blonde strands with a scaldalized gasp. “Shh Colt, don’t let Safrin be hearin’ ya talk like that.” He says with a soft laugh, nose wrinkling with the smile that breaks across his face. “I mean, I bet she’d be more than ready to fuck with the Flood even more but damn. I’d like to keep workin’ thank you very much.” He finally gets a grip on his snickering, exhaling a little sigh before he continues to braid, using some more telekinesis magic to help braid more sections of her hair.
“Well, I guess it depends. How’d he react when ya said you’d come ‘n see him?” He pauses thoughtfully. “’Cause if it were more of a haha yeah that’d be greaaat, I’d leave him alone. If he didn’t, then what’s the harm?” There’s another brief and thoughtful pause, Thorn taking a moment to curse quietly under his breath as he gets the braids to slowly combine into one larger one. “Have ya asked him what he wants outta all this? Is he lookin’ for something serious?”
11-06-2025, 09:06 PM (This post was last modified: 11-06-2025, 09:42 PM by Colt.)
COLT
He looks like a cool drink of water But he's candy-coated misery He's the devil in disguise A snake with blue eyes
Delight streaks across her face as he valiantly stakes his claim as her best friend, a laugh that starts in her chest for a moment spilling free over her growing smile. "Honey you'd have to be blind on a foggy night to miss that you're my best friend." Her humor simmers into just a quiver along her lips. "I think you could take him if it came to it, for the title anyway." Only because Vesper would let him, she's sure, but the sentiment remains encouraging just the same, each of them happy to feign the delusion of success.
The comfort of her hair shifting beneath the calm and steadying pull of his hands and magic is more soothing than she'd admit to. Losing her mother early on, she'd been the one to comb her own hair, the task not quite up to her father's skillset. Other than an odd sleepover here or there growing up, this had been the first time in a while her hair had been gently cared for like this, and it sinks into her deeply. The rest of her worries dissolve for a bit, crumbling easily into the contagious sound of his laughter, the absurdity of her remarks drawing them into a fit. "I dunnoooo," she drawls out with a lilt, feeding into the conspiracy that Vesper's talents in bed are all part of a bigger plot of Safrin's. "He did say he was considering bartending at the House. Could be his attempt at making a move." She snorts that away, no truth to the threat. "That worried me...how close he'd be. If he's irresistible now, I'm done for if he's just, there." Which, now that he's nowhere close, doesn't seem as bad as it once had.
Her fingers tap thoughtfully on his knee, the mirth all drying up quickly now. "He came to tell me he was leaving during LongNight. He left right after it broke." Not an answer, not just yet, but she continues. "I was drunk, and sad." She shrugs, because she usually is during LongNight (many tend to be), she's just also usually alone. She drunk more than usual during the stretch of dark, aiming less for a buzz than a drowning. "Said some things I maybe shouldn't have, because I felt this...panic, or something, clawing up me over him being so far away for so long. It felt like, losing him, I guess." There's a quiet sort of shame to it. That she'd let it leak through that night. That she'd felt it at all. It's not rational.
She draws in another breath, because laying it all out like this, even to Thorn, is no simple matter. Her throat feels raw with each word as she yanks intent and feeling from the corners of her mind where she's mostly ignored them until they've become this tangled mess. "It didn't look like he felt that way, so I asked him why not. You know what I got?" She tilts her head, trying to find him for a minute. "He told me that he's not unbothered." She huffs, as unimpressed now as then. "That's it. That's how he feels, I guess. Not unbothered." She shrugs, her wrist flipping the word away and out into the breeze of her breath.
"I don't even think I know what I want us to be," she admits after a minute of quiet consideration. Her bottom lip folds under her teeth, working thoughts into pieces. "I can't ask him if I don't know, right?" Her gaze glances sidelong, searching for confirmation. This had all seemed far less complicated when she was younger, when she dove right in without any guards. "I just...miss him, when he's not around." she sighs, unsure if that's answer enough. "He said he'd miss me too though, before he left." She puts that out carefully, like it's heavier than it should be, because it carries more wrapped in it than she can explain. "And he seemed open to me visiting," she shrugs, gaze flickering with the memory. "Nodded when I offered and said he'd want something interesting to do or look at if I made the trip up."
He only comes out at night Gives you feelings that you don't wanna fight You better run for your life He's a good time cowboy Casanova
Received a Gilded Market wig from Remi that resembles her usual hair and is enchanted to stay on better than most wigs | has a reverse centaur tattoo on her left hand with the legs going down her pointer and middle fingers that looks like this.
He chuckles a warm sound, his smile bright and entirely Hawthorn as he beams it at her, uncaring how he’d claim the title (even if Vesper just gave it up so he wouldn’t feel so bad). A win was a win, regardless of why.
Still, he calms down to listen and braid her hair, attentive and focused as he offers little bits of commentary here and there to prove he’s listening and that he isn’t just a blank wall she’s yelling at. “Oy, he can’t just take my bartender’s spot.” The one he’s promised to enact revenge on with the undertones of some kind of enemies to lover’s vibe. At least that’s the fun that the courtesan has with it.
Instead, he nods at the mention of her being drunk and sad during LongNight – understandable, really – and he hums a soft sound. “That sucks.” Not only was she alone on LongNight, but she’d also had those thoughts to think about. “I could’ve come an’ hung out with you. My LongNight was exhausting.” He would’ve happily had a break from having essentially been a part of a week-long orgy. It’s no surprise he's more than excited to be able to do something else for a minute as his fingers continue to collect bits of gold strands of her hair, braiding it with ease to keep it out of the way.
“.. Unbothered?” His nose wrinkles – unsure what kind of answer that was. “The fuck.” He sighs, nose remaining wrinkled as he comes back into the conversation as she asks him a more clarifying question. “I mean, I think it’s worth asking. At least then you’d know whether to cut him off before it hurts worse, y’know?” Then, after a moment of consideration, his fingers dropping from her scalp and the braids he’s placed once he’s secured them. “I could go with ya? That way if it doesn’t work out you’re not gonna be alone. ‘Sides, if it does, worst thing that happens is I spend some time at the Dusklight.” He contemplates a little, head tilting this way and that. “It’d be nice to let someone else work for once.” He sighs a little wistfully.
He looks like a cool drink of water But he's candy-coated misery He's the devil in disguise A snake with blue eyes
She will absolutely be teasing him about this bartender again later, a smirk stretching out in current response to his protective stance over the devil he knows. "Not sure he's bartending any more," she reassures. "Or if he is, it ain't here. Was talk of a bar on the Ark too, y'know, his dad's ship that's in port now. The big one." She shrugs though, because that risk is neither here or there at the moment, and the conversation drifts away from such easy problems as what bar Vesper might be behind.
Everything slows a bit at his offer of spending LongNight with her. She eases up off him a touch, but only to wind her arms around his side in a crooked hug, head tilting against his shoulder with a grateful sigh. "Y'know, I just might next year," she murmurs gently, the words pressing into his shirt as she turns to glance up at him. "I normally always spend it alone, but...this year I had a few times I was with people and it was a lot nicer than I expected." Vesper's visit had been very bittersweet, but her escapade with Sohalia and her time with Sunjata had all eased a breath from her too, proof that there could be other paths to take than the same broken one year after year. "Sounds like you need just as much saving too," she grins with a scrunch to her features, knowing fully well what sort of exhausted he means with how busy the House had been when she'd gone in search of oil and the kind of wildness LongNight brings out of people. "Bring you some protein and electrolytes and guard you for a nap at the very least."
A sharp mmhmm responds to his repetition of the poetry Vesper had left her with. "There's also this Ancient girl I met, Thalassa." She waits to see if Thorn recognizes the name. "She seems to have some kind of past with Vesper. She called him a bastard, an asshole, said he turned his back on her when she needed him most." Colt's 'brows lift pointedly. "Not quite the same impression he's given me, but she didn't have much reason to lie." She doesn't think Vesper has either, so she shrugs. "People don't always get along though. And she's not exactly sweet." Not that Colt's saying she deserved it, doesn't even know what it is really, but she knows she's only working with one side of the story. Still, it lingers on her doubts like smoke.
"But that's just it Thorn," she murmurs as he suggests she just ask him and be rid of him if it's nothing good. She leans back a touch now, hands slipping from him to fidget in her lap, staring at him with a streak of worry. "If I ask him, what if it makes it worse? What if all I get is more unbothered?" Because, in a way, that had been her asking, and that had been the answer he gave. She bites the inside of her cheek. "I don't think I can cut him loose. He's in here now," and her palm presses on her chest, fingers splaying near her neck. "I don't get a say in whether he becomes a part of me or not," she whispers, fear keeping the words too tight to rise higher. "I don't want him in here forever. It was never supposed to be forever," it's a plead now, and though her eyes are still on Thorn, she's begging it of the world. Sense, freedom, something other than this clawing uncertainty and the risk that he'd break her.
After a moment she sighs deeply, her hand falling back to her lap. "I thought I outgrew this," she admits in a low, defeated voice before slumping sideways into the couch and drawing her knees up between them. There's a fragile smile though, at his offer. "If I do go, I'd definitely love if you're with me." He arms reaches out over her knee for his hand, a small, stifled laugh rising at the thought of him vacationing at a brothel.
"Part of me wonders," she says low, like a secret. "If I don't go, will I get an answer just the same? Maybe it'd just...die, with enough time and distance." She'd still break, but maybe it wouldn't be so bad, and he'd just turn into another ghost haunting her every LongNight hereafter. Nothing smooth or as simple as she feels Thorn is recommending in terms of cutting him loose, but maybe something she could learn to live with, the way a three legged dog still runs. She looks to Thorn for approval.
Immediately changing course from her last thought, her words tumble out with, "but I mean, he showed up, right? That's not nothing, right? He could have just left without saying anything." Sometimes that felt like the bare minimum, other times it felt like the world. Shouldn't that mean more than him saying something? Didn't him standing in her kitchen mean it mattered, even if nether of them would say it? Didn't I'll miss you too carry more weight than not unbothered? It'd been the way he looked at her too, the way he touched her...or had she read into things she wished had been there, the way she tried to remove an extra word that he did say? She groans at the impossibility of it all.
He only comes out at night Gives you feelings that you don't wanna fight You better run for your life He's a good time cowboy Casanova
Received a Gilded Market wig from Remi that resembles her usual hair and is enchanted to stay on better than most wigs | has a reverse centaur tattoo on her left hand with the legs going down her pointer and middle fingers that looks like this.
“Oh, yeah.” Thorn says a little distractedly – imagining the ships of the Boondocks even though he hasn’t been there in a little while. He does recall the big one, though, one that hadn’t left in between his trips there and back before LongNight, so it has to be the one that she’s talking about. So he nods, settling in as she winds her arms around his side, resting her head against his shoulder and the courtesan slumps into the couch more comfortably.
Tilting his head to let his seafoam gaze settle back on her, lips quirked in a small, nearly there smile. “I find lots’ve people do it to pass the time ‘til the sun comes back.” Thorn doesn’t have horrors to remember during that weeklong night, instead choosing it to be his end of year race to test his endurance. Like doing a marathon once a year under the guise of a holiday spree.
“Ugh, please do. My mouth’s waterin’ at the idea.” His hands come up in a gesture of exhaustion, slumping further and jostling her slightly as he chuckles softly, letting it fade to focus on her thoughts and emotions regarding a certain handsome shadowy demigod. As she mentions an Ancient with history, his head tilts, curls bouncing slightly with the motion as his brows pinch. “Huh. Wonder if they had a thing, maybe an’ she’s bitter? I don’t know ‘er though, so I couldn’t really say.” He scrunches his nose with the thought, focusing back on her again as she fidgets.
His smile is a touch somber, softer, more traditionally him and less of the courtesan as he hears her fears and worries. “You do get a say, though, babe. Either y’let him spin ya up like ya are now for someone who’s unbothered by you bein’ there or you get through the hurt ahead’ve time because ya know your answer.” The shoulder she isn’t leaning against rises and falls in a small shrug. “You’re festerin’ about him.” He says a little quieter, after a moment of searching for the right word.
Hearing her defeat and watching as she slumps onto the couch opposite and drags her knees up, he reaches out to pat at her leg – the vine shackles of tattoos gleaming dark in the light against his pale skin. “Maybe he’s feelin’ the same? Maybe… You’re both scared’ve what it means so y’all do this weird ass dancin’ around the point ‘cause neither of you are willin’ to talk about it in case it ruins whatever it is that ya do have?” All he really has is Colt’s side to go off of – but he knows her well enough to know it isn’t the first time she’s spun about this specific demigod. And frankly, if it were Thorn he’d be fucking exhausted..
He looks like a cool drink of water But he's candy-coated misery He's the devil in disguise A snake with blue eyes
The same thought about Thalassa has admittedly crossed her mind, and hearing Thorn echo it feels like confirmation, despite no recognition of the girl resting in him. Her fear is, will she be standing in Thalassa's shoes some day, as though the Ancient is truly just a version of her future self trying to offer a warning she's too stubborn to heed.
"Not unbothered," she corrects so quietly it's barely a whisper, because she knows it doesn't really make a lick of difference. Enough to say, just this once, at least. A sigh of recognition soon follows suit though, and anxiously she pulls her hair around her shoulder, the various braids he'd woven in making hte process cleaner than before, and it hangs wighted and collected away from the couch she presses into. "I know, I know. I'm sick." A weak smile plays out on her lips as she reagards him, the faintest laugh slipping out. "Sick and tired of myself at this rate. I dunno how you put up with me like this." She certainly can barely stand it. One of her legs uncurls from its defensive posture against her chest, nudging against his in unspoken gratitude.
He brings it back to talking. It's no simple thing to pull answers out of shadows and starlight though. Same as getting them from gunsmoke and horses. There's something you can find, but it ain't ever easy or straightforward, not if you're asking for something that won't hurt. "Yeah," she says, to all of it. To the maybes, to the dancing, to the fear and the ruin. Maybes have become her best partner on the dancefloor with Vesper, and fear and ruin are just the names of every song. Admitting it for the first time is something, but it's not rest, and she's out of breath at this point from going round and round about it.
Her hand reaches out and she swipes her beer back up, finishing the bottle in one tilt. A finality, of something, thank fuck there's an end to be found somewhere. "Alright," she declares, as much for herself as for him. "I'm done talking about midnight man. He's taken far too much of my time with you." She does feel a bit better, getting it all off her chest, letting him hold onto it all for this moment at least. She breathes in deep, like it's the first time in a while, and smiles genuinely. "Tell me, what're you doing at the fair? I gotta run the pony rides, but are you gonna be in the dunk tank, or are we going with Sunjata and calling it Flood the Flood?" Not that it's half as fun dunking him when he can just wick it all away in a flash and probably enjoys each dump, but she'd pay a lot to keep getting his ass wet.
He only comes out at night Gives you feelings that you don't wanna fight You better run for your life He's a good time cowboy Casanova
Received a Gilded Market wig from Remi that resembles her usual hair and is enchanted to stay on better than most wigs | has a reverse centaur tattoo on her left hand with the legs going down her pointer and middle fingers that looks like this.
“Right. Not unbothered.” Thorn murmurs, taking the correction despite the small smile that tries to bloom on his face of encouragement despite the roughness of his words. He isn’t trying to be mean, he’s just trying to offer alternatives for her to hopefully not get hurt again. He remembers that night at the House of Midnight when he’d learned how to line dance, remembers the reaction she had when a certain song came on.
But she presses into the couch and he peers down at her with a nod. “’Cause I’m your best friend. Duh.” He titters like it’s obvious and settles in to tell her that she should just ask him – and maybe it’s because in his line of work everything is understood at the door. They could pretend to do whatever within the room, but the understanding was explained and agreed upon before diving into it. There weren’t questions, and if there were, there were ways to stop it to ensure it wasn’t getting out of hand.
Something he should have probably figured out with his last relationship. But he’s blissfully single as he watches her spiral about the shadowy demigod until all of the wind has come out of her sails. And when she straightens, she snags the beer and finishes it, and Thorn settles back in the couch cushions for a minute before he stretches out like a cat – shirt rising and leaving more of those floral, vine tattoos on display curling around the sharp jut of his hips.
“Haha, we totally should.” He laughs a warm sound, sighing on the exhale before he stands and makes a show of it in the process. “Unfortunately, I’ve gotta be the face of the House when the Waterboy’s flauntin’ his region.” His hand comes up to wave it off, before he glances toward the door. “I wanna smoke, you comin’ with?” He asks, hooking his thumb toward the front door where her porch sits so he can have a smoke.
