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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!
The morning sun slipped behind the hollowed forest of trees, approaching the afternoon as news flickered back and forth amidst hunters and trackers. Were it any other time, Deimos might have permitted them all to take care of it on their own, but something restless bordered along the fringes of his pulse, and he was there amidst his fellow Halovians, seeking out the void luxere wreaking havoc through the latest paths and hunting grounds.
A certain apprehension centered behind his ribs at the notion – because for all the dark incantations flowing through his frame, and therefore causing general avoidance of any luxere - he still enjoyed the creatures. They’d represented life during many a LongNight, and he’d assisted in luring them to offer them respite and repose within the eternal darkness.
But these ones – with all the void and spite stored within – couldn’t remain.
A chorus of noises maneuvered through each of them, as trackers split apart amidst the folds and trunks of trees, waiting for the sound of cloven hooves moving through the snow. Deimos, for his part, remained in the line of sight of many; leaning against one gnarled piece of timber, Zuriel tucked by his side, and Belial flying overhead, keeping watch.
My fingers are numb, the tip of my nose stings, and the snow has officially made it past the waterproof promise of my boots. There’s no denying it anymore—I hate the cold. I always dreaded it most when mom and dad wanted to hide out in Halo a while.
But I didn’t leave for Torchline just to find family. I left to prove something. That I could help. That I could do more than hide from the things that scare me. And if I’m going to test myself on that, a void creature is probably my safest option—that can’t be done in Torchline, and I didn’t want to pay for a trip over the mountains. So here I am, on an impulsively brief trip to Halo with what funds I’d gathered.
I stay back, mostly hidden behind the frost-crusted trunk of a tree, breath curling from my mouth in soft, uneven clouds. I watch as a tall man leans against a gnarled old tree, unicorn at his side, calm in a way that makes me wonder if he ever gets cold at all.
He doesn’t look like someone who takes kindly to interruptions.
But he also doesn’t look afraid. Which makes me think he’s the one the others are following. If anyone here might have use for an extra pair of hands—or at least not kick me out for trying—it’s probably him.
I grit my teeth and stay where I am. Just another quiet shape in the trees. I don’t speak yet. Don’t want to give him a reason to send me back after I’d followed the group all the way out here.
The Sword’s attention and focus honed entirely on the breadth of the wilderness around them; listening for the shift of cloven feet through snow, to the wake of restless branches either peeled apart by the wind or monstrous, void-infested deer. The curls of breath flickering through the otherwise pale exterior of the earth. He knew the multitudes with him. They were experienced. They knew how to get the job accomplished.
Save for one.
Zuriel noticed her first, in the way all unicorns were uncanny and sharp. One glance towards the tree nearby was all it took for the mare’s eyes to narrow, for her head to tilt, then lift, taking in the unfamiliar scent, for the question flowing through her mind and ricocheting through his own.
His brow arched as his gaze broke away from the long, fleeting trail, and towards the timber where the stranger leaned and hid. A question flickered through and nearly disturbed the area, but then he recalled they were on a hunt, and the deep rumble of his tones would interrupt the process of waiting and watching.
Speculations were rampant, but fleeting still; no sooner had he turned away from the potential quarry did a series of whistles break out, and his sharpened stare segmented solely upon the clearing ahead, where long, dark legs broke through patches of rime.
Where luxere had always given them strength, these particular beasts only left ample amounts of dread and ferocity – enough to sting into hearts and heads nearby, as they small herd clustered closer and closer together. Deimos took a long, long inhale, before granting a nod to the nearest tracker, and they began to assemble the necessary means of action, quiet as possible. A movement of weapons, like bows and arrows, spears, or magic, sizzling on the pulse of others.
As they begin to move, I do too, as quietly as I can, my boots crunching only just barely underfoot. I’m not as graceful as the others in my life—not even close—but I watch where I step, press my weight into the balls of my feet like my mom taught me, and try to be smaller than I am.
Then I see them. A cluster of void-luxere. Just reindeer, technically, or they were. My breath sticks in my throat regardless—luxere aren’t huge, but they’re big enough, and there’s more at a time than I’d hoped.
And those antlers? Probably not something my short daggers are going to just politely move aside.
The cold had already soaked through to the bone, but this is different—it’s a frost that sinks into my ribs, coils in my stomach, a creeping what if I can’t do this sort of cold. My parents did a really good job keeping me far from things like this. Beasts. Magic fights. Fights at all—unless you count the occasional childhood brawl. They’d wanted to keep me safe.
I breathe slow. Push down the nerves. I won’t be the first person in my family to walk into a bad idea with a knife and a rigid spine of stubborn optimism.
I shift into view just enough so that the large man with the unicorn can see me just fine, in case it matters where I am. I don’t wave or speak. Just meet his eyes, then shift my weight like I know what I’m doing.
Knives in hand, I mimic the stance of one of the hunters nearby—crouched low, ready to move. I probably look like a weirdly focused chipmunk compared to them, but hey. If I can just find the right opening, I’ll be useful.
Deimos had just enough time to quirk his brow at the stranger, once again, before the motions unleashed upon the glade, and the luxere themselves. A conflagration of armaments, incantations, and thunderous noises from the monsters, erupted over the surface – tight and coiled with tension and alarm. The dread permeated and pervaded from the creatures as they rampaged in different directions, trying to find the source of their endangerment. The Sword burst through the woods with his own enchantments, rapidly contorting the massive amounts of Mastered Air, whiplash upon one beast who’d grown far too near to one of the fellow hunters.
It fell with a horrific bellow, but more still came.
So it was no surprise to the Sword at all when two more funneled their way – antlers pointed and fervent. Locking away any emotions was easy, precise, and typical; as he coldly and nonchalantly decimated the first with the same movements as before; the air twisting like a knife into the deer’s threshold. But then the other appeared, heading straight at the unfamiliar woman.
I watch in all but awe as the man cuts through the luxere with such ease, it’s staggering. But there’s a second one that’s peeled away from the group… toward me. The luxere charges, and instinct takes over.
My parents may have kept me sheltered, but they’d been training me since I could hold a weapon. I don’t think. I don’t plan. I just move—straight in, not away. The moment those void-dark antlers lower, I leap to meet them.
Both daggers flash in my grip as I hook them into the base of the rack, locking my arms around the curve like reins. The creature is fast, heavier than it looks, and I grit my teeth as its momentum nearly rips me clean off my feet. But I hold on and twist, pulling hard to the side, using its speed against it.
One blade bites deep into its neck. Blood sprays hot across the cold.
It doesn’t fall.
It screams, wild and raw, and jerks violently. My grip slips. I stumble, heels skidding in the snow—and then I’m down. Hard.
My daggers fly from my hands, one skittering into a drift, the other vanishing completely into the churned white.
I roll, scrambling to get upright, heart pounding in my throat. The luxere is still up, still moving—and I’m suddenly just a girl on her knees in the snow, unarmed and shaking, staring up at a wounded beast that’s not done yet.
The rifling of hooves barreled through, echoes of vague shouts and whistles to alert one another to moving parts and wholes. Another down. Another evaded. Some carefully orchestrated to maneuver down the line, to be confronted by a hunter or tracker leering from behind trees and timber.
But not the stranger – Deimos glanced her way once again as the careening creature broke away, as the unfamiliar woman fought and stabbed, as it did naught but herald more dread and apprehension into the sanction.
His eyes narrowed, and he delivered another blow – a manifestation of Air mustered to thrash against the beast as it lowered its head to charge, and inevitably fell.
There were more crashing sibilances through the trees, more heroic outcries, roars, and warnings coming from another direction. He could pretend none of that had occurred, leave her be and to whatever she was striving for, but the conscience in him weighed over the nonchalance, looking away in case she wanted to find her weapons amidst the broken and barbaric forms, but then glancing back a short while later, Zuriel snorting nearby. “You all right?”
I start to nod. "Yeah, I’m—" But the crunch of hooves cuts me off.
More.
I whip my head toward the sound, already scrambling through the snow. My heart kicks into overdrive. There’s no time to be scared, no time to answer. I lunge toward the glint of a dagger half-buried in slush, fingers closing around the hilt just as the void-luxere charges.
It’s faster than I expect.
I don’t have time to think, only to move—dive, roll, twist. Its antlers scrape past me, one on either side of my head as I shove upward, driving the dagger deep into the side of its skull. The momentum knocks me flat on my back, pinned for a breathless moment beneath its twitching weight before I manage to squeeze my legs out from under it, soaked in snow, flecked with red, hair matted and sticking to my cheek.
I stagger up to my knees, breath puffing out in clouds, the dagger still clenched in one numb hand.
"I’m great," I say hoarsely, glancing toward the man and the unicorn like this is totally normal. My voice is dry as the dunes. "Really making a good impression, aren’t I?"
I swipe my arm across my face and give him a blood-smeared grin. "I’m Theea," I add, just in case I die in the next two minutes. "Nice to meet you."
Then I plant my boots in the snow and lift the dagger again, squinting toward the sound of more hooves cracking through the frost.
More indeed; an echo of smaller forms still storming through the midst and mist of the Hollowed Forest, scraping against silver trunks and granting barbaric bellows from the tidings of frenzied, violent anger. The aggression wasn’t a surprise, and he had to take his gaze off the other to focus on the incoming barrage. Some of his fellow citizens chased after several, but one barreled towards him, clearly unbothered by the amount of damage instilled within.
Unleashing another flowing form of Air, the deer bristled, screamed in its rage, but fell too, close to his feet. Rolling his eyes at the animal, he shifted back from its infested portions, and Zuriel skittered away in disgust. Only then could he see the stranger flailing about, staining the snow in red, scraping by the skin of her teeth or sheer fortune.
The response made him laugh – though it was a wild thing, not his usually tightly controlled demeanor. The hunting whistles and shouts were fading for those of fire and flame, trackers further ahead using their torches to lay waste to the fallen bodies – no point in harvesting the infested flesh. “You are surviving,” he shrugged. “That is impression enough.” He knew quite a few who would’ve fled – but also not accompanied any of them in the first place. She could work on her knife skills, but then again, so could many. “Deimos.”
Pausing to unleash his own flames upon the closest void beast to him, he lifted his head, listening for eager hoofbeats or Belial’s impending warnings, but nothing came. “What made you follow us out here?”
My chest still aches from where that last beast nearly pancaked me, but I roll my shoulders and try to pretend my heartbeat isn’t in my ears. Deimos speaks, calm as ever, like I didn’t just get up close and personal with a reindeer from hell. I glance over at him, breathing hard, brushing half-frozen blood off my arm.
"I guess I’m out here to prove something?" I say, trying not to sound too dramatic about it. "Mostly to myself. Maybe a little bit to my mom. Always acted like I was liable to faceplant into danger at any moment." I shrug, offering a crooked smile. "Which, okay, fair. I didn’t exactly land on my feet back there. But usually I do. I’ve got a whole average going."
A rough snort echoes from the trees, and I snap my head toward it just in time to see another void-luxere toss its antlers and lower its head, clearly having decided I’m next on the hit list.
"Asshole," I mutter, and before I can second-guess it, I throw my knife.
It spins once, twice, before it buries deep in the creature’s throat. It keeps running, blood spraying across the snow like black ink, but its momentum fails it. The void-luxere stumbles, collapses in a tangle of limbs just feet from me, and thrashes in a final spasm before going still.
I exhale, only just now realizing I’d been holding my breath. My legs are shaking, but I step forward, yank the dagger from its neck, and wipe the blade off against my already-ruined sleeve.
Then I look back at Deimos with a grin. "Much better."
Threads of others still rankled through, even if the final vestiges had felt just like that; enough that he snorted as another had intended to pierce the youth. He watched as the creature seemed to run on adrenaline and hatred, before even that sputtered out. With a sigh, he persisted in unleashing his flames upon that corpse as well, so that eventually it would unfurl into nothing more than ash and distant memories.
Though they were likely to send some sort of reminder through Theea, to which he arched his brow, maneuvering around the other fallen deer to another nearby, repeating the same process. He understood the notions of wanting to prove actions and decisions, especially to either others or oneself – but he’d also always been a calculating individual. He couldn’t measure every calculation or endeavor, but he also intended to snag where he’d understand the outcome. Running headlong into these frenzied efforts, in her state, had likely been far more than just those simplistic intentions.
“Agreed. There is something to be said for experience,” with a small smile, waving his hand in the unicorn’s direction. “If you are injured, she can heal you.”
05-04-2025, 04:14 PM (This post was last modified: 05-04-2025, 04:16 PM by Theea.)
the darkness falls around me at night
I glance his way just in time to see magic erupt from him, clean and brutal as it devours another corpse. My mouth parts slightly—not in fear, but sheer, sharp awe. That kind of magic isn’t subtle. It’s the kind you feel in your teeth. I’ve never seen anything like it up close.
”Noted,” I murmur, when he gestures to the unicorn. I take a second to check myself over, patting at my arms and sides. ”I’m alright. Nothing major, but thanks.”
I don’t get the last word out before another void-luxere bursts out of the trees.
There’s barely time to think. I lunge for my second dagger, managing to wrench it free from the snow just as the beast barrels toward me. Its head lowers. I duck, slice across its nose, feel the spray of dark blood, but I’m not fast enough to avoid the antler.
It slashes my upper arm—a deep, burning line that tears straight flesh. I stumble back with a strangled sound, blinking fast, shocked by how much it fucking hurts. My ears ring, my eyes even humiliatingly well. I’ve never been hurt like this before. Not really.
Still, I grit my teeth and twist, dragging the blade across its throat as it surges past me. It collapses with a groan of snow and blood and weight, legs kicking once—twice—before it goes still.
I clutch my arm, breath shallow, adrenaline starting to wobble in my knees. "Right," I grit out. "I’ve reconsidered. Healing sounds fantastic."
The elements were easy possessions for him; fire and water instilled in his blood, air and earth contorted rapidly through Caido mechanisms and means, as familiar as breathing. To unleash the flames was nothing, one rapid strike from another, warming the area while the bodies were desecrated, fallen to ash and bone in the snow. The first denial of healing went with a nod, absorbed in his task –
The thereafter though, had it not been so grim and barbaric, might have invoked another laugh out of him. Instead he snorted, watching the bestial display as this Theea seemed to gain confidence, intrepidness, and then daring all in one fell swoop – though, clearly, not without some kind of mishap. Which seemed to be the way the majority of the time around here.
“Let me know if it is not effective.” Then they’d have to come up with something else. No stranger to scars and their tales, he nodded once more, sending Zuriel over. The unicorn was a proud, haughty thing, a demeanor borne from well before they’d ever bonded, and her steel grey form slid over the snow with elegance, precision, and intended might. But despite the queenly exterior, she didn’t roll her eyes at the youth, and instead lowered her head, so the point of her horn might touch upon the wounded arm.
The unicorn moves like royalty—like something out of a dream. Her coat is silver-smoke and moonlight, all impossible grace, and I forget, for a moment, that I’m bleeding through my sleeve. Her eyes are intelligent in a way that makes me feel like she could carry a conversation if she wanted.
“Hello, gorgeous,” I murmur to her, voice quiet and sincere. I stay still, letting her assess me, like I’m a guest in her palace instead of a frozen interloper bleeding on her snow.
The moment her horn touches my arm, it’s like a cool bloom of pressure under my skin. The pain numbs, dulls, then vanishes entirely—just a faint sting where the gash used to burn. I flex my fingers, eyes wide. “Thank you,” I say to the both of them.
I shift back a step, eyes scanning the snow-churned clearing. In the distance, I can still hear the sharp clash of steel and the rumble of hooves, others doing what we just did—somewhere further off, someone shouts a warning. I reach for my sleeve, now stained and torn where the antler caught me, and sigh. “Guess I’ll be mending this again,” I mutter. My favorite jacket.
My eyes flick up—back to Deimos—and something clicks.
Wait. Wait.
The calm power. The unicorn. The air of command. That’s got to be a pertyton flying up there.
“That’s—” I start, brows lifting. “You’re the Deimos, aren’t you? The Resurrected Sword, the Warden—"
A sound to my right cuts me off. The crunch of hooves, close. Too close.
I spin a bit gracelessly, slicing out with my blade, the tip catching the flank of a void-luxere barreling past. It makes a high sound as it pivots, snorting, rushing back for them. I exhale, heartbeat in my ears. “Okay, right,” I huff. “Less gawking, more stabbing. We’ll circle back to the celebrity moment.”
