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Character of the Season
Once known as the Butcher of Whitebrim, he's now The Butcher of Dygra, stepping forward as the first created demigod of the Ancients. There is no question that Astaroth casts an intimidating silhouette. Tall, domineering and dangerous, if looks could kill you'd be dead already, but to get up close and personal with the Grounds' resident cannibal tells a much different story. Dripping with charm and clad in only the finest attire, Asta is a gentleman monster, as polite as they come and committed to his role as security for the Dusklight and those who have earned his loyalty. Be careful of that smile, though - those teeth are sharp.
Congratulations, Asta!
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!
Casimir has been touched gently tonight more than he had in literal years. He could count on one callused hand how many touches had been meant with love intended. Particularly, hands intended to make contact with his face oft had violent intent behind them, looking to shatter a cheekbone or bruise an eye. Perhaps that's why he always seems to melt whenever Thorn's hands grace his face with such gentleness he always feels like he's melting into the touch, his face curving into Thorn's fingers like a cat bumping its head against something it wants more of.
As Thorn's hands grace his curls, brushing his hair against his ears, it takes everything he has not to drop his head into Thorn's fingers and lean, asking for more. He holds that much dignity within himself, but his eyes do flutter shut just for a moment as Thorn's fingers grace his face.
He's a terrible liar, and a terrible speaker, which usually covers the terrible liar part, and as Thorn looks at him with that open, hopeful look, he doesn't have to ability to lie to him about how he slept. He keeps his face carefully blank, the act of keeping it so carefully neutral an admission in itself and then, realizing that, he tries to shift it into something more normally casual, which he knows makes it worse. Fortunately he knows Thorn doesn't anticipate anything, so he keeps quiet, shifting himself to begin the process of extricating himself from the bed.
He doesn't know what to do now, in this domestic moment, the blanket pooling in Thorn's still-naked lap, the sunlight soft on his shining face. It was easier in the dark of the night not to bolt, but now, the urge pulls at him, near-overwhelming. Casimir recalls, once again, that he does not know how to merely exist, to have a pleasant moment in bed with someone he truly wants to with, and the knife's edge between joy and fear begins to grow just a little thinner. Will Thorn still want him in the light of the day, with the exhaustion and alcohol out of his body?
Feet resting on the floor, he tries to force his breathing deep and even and regulated and not frantic bursts. "What now?" Rips from him abruptly, and he hates the way desperation laces in it.
He feels Casimir’s face tilt into the touch, gentle fingers stroking along the smooth skin, quietly content and overjoyed to see it happen before his very eyes. He brushes away the curls from his face, fingers tugging for a mere moment on one of them when he poses his question and as he scans the beautiful cheekbones and the slate eyes that look back at him and sees the neutral look, the courtesan already knows the answer.
Though it is a little amusing to watch as Casimir tries to make it even more neutral, watching as it fails spectacularly and the smile on his face twitches from trying to grow brighter. He shouldn’t be smiling at the fact Cas didn’t get any sleep, but the attempt of him choosing to try and mask his emotions from him even further is at least a little bit funny.
He doesn’t stop him from sitting up, though, just withdraws his hands to rest in his lap where the blanket had pooled, and when Casimir’s voice does come, it seems almost apprehensive. Like there’s desperation in the undertones that Thorn isn’t sure what to do with. “Yeah, what now.” He murmurs softly, slouched a little as he looks up at Casimir’s face, unashamed and unbidden, no masks to be found on the courtesan’s face.
“I didn’t think I’d get this far with ya, t’be honest.” Comes the quiet admission – not bolstered by the alcohol but for the sheer fact they’re currently in his room where it was private, quiet, just the two of them. Thorn thinks it’s easier now to share that heart on his sleeve, to let it bleed out a little where it might catch on Casimir with the close proximity. “I’m glad I did, though.” He tacks on, before Cas can worry about it. “You can catch some sleep here if ya want, but if it’s hard t’sleep in here, I won’t be offended if ya go to wherever it is ya sleep and get some actual rest.” This part is honest, not like the night before where it was more of a double edged blade, sinking into both of them. “Jus’ so long as I get to see ya again later.” He raises his brow and tilts his chin up a little, pinpointing Casimir with a look that seems to suggest he can’t get rid of him now.
If Casimir knew the extent to which Thorn was pricking his heart on his sleeve and letting the blood pool into Casimir's already-bloodied hands, he would have left with the rise of the sun for good to let the bleeding staunch. The goodness of this, the happiness shining across Thorn's face and the fingers against his cheek, have to be as fleeting as candles in the wind. Even if Casimir does not do the breaking by leaving, he knows something will break. If he leaves, even to sleep and shower and even if he vowed to see Thorn later, will this moment of perfection dissipate?
Thorn's gaze pins him, anchoring his heart in chest, and in that moment, Casimir thinks he has stepped into a bear trap and even if he gnawed off his leg to escape, that would not stop Thorn from wanting to know his heart. That question, that choked and desperate what now? still lingers in Casimir's throat, anchored and stiff, and what he cannot figure out is what happens after. Thorn had offered sleep and shower, but that did not answer the nebulous and terrifying concept of what happens after this night between them, and then night after, stretching all the way into the future Casimir has spent so long fleeing from. There has never been an 'in the moment' for Casimir; it's all been floating, ghostly avoidance and the ever-present threat of a future he did not know how he would fit into in his ruined state.
And now, there was a deviation, someone to take him by the hand and drag him back into the living, and Casimir wanted to know what the fuck that meant. What now? What now, after Thorn took his hand and made him live a life that wasn't nothing, even if it was just for a few days of restless anxiety and culminating in this? (And what did it mean for Casimir that he wanted to know? Wanted to think about the future, even to know if it would end in pain and bloodshed? Wanted to know so he could avoid that, though he thought it was inevitable?)
He needs to shower. His shirt sticks to his front and he feels blood under his fingernails.
"You don't know anything about me," He murmurs in that same desperate, reaching tone, slate eyes searching Thorn's seafoam ones for some sort of answer, some sort of clarity, some sort of reason.
There’s a part of Thorn that wants to stick his fingers into Casimir’s chest, to rip open every nook and cranny of the dark voids within him that scream of loneliness and worry and fear and shove his light into them. He wants to dust away the cobwebs of the man’s ribcage and plant fresh flowers, something to be cultivated and grown. And yet, throughout all of this, it’s never really occurred to Thorn whether or not it was something Casimir even wanted.
It’s almost a standoff – the way Thorn sits there and looks up at Casimir with an openness not many got to see from him. The way he offers out all those quick fixes because he also doesn’t know what it means. He’d been quietly pining after this man for years in all his dark stoicism and gruff answers and yet, to have him right within his grip leaves him like the cat that chased the toy forever and finally clamped his paw down on it.
Only, unlike the natural predators a feline often was, Thorn doesn’t know what to do with it now that he has it.
The murmur should be enough for him to ask about it, to maybe sit back and take in the events of the past few days. The realization that maybe he should ask what Casimir wants. Did he want to be held gently and kissed and loved? And if he didn’t, would it keep Thorn from continuing to try and show him that he deserved some semblance of happiness when he truly didn’t know what Casimir’s past was apart from the rumors the courtesans threw out willy nilly.
“S’not like you’re very vocal ‘bout it.” Thorn offers, though it isn’t a judgement. It’s said more like an observation – that Thorn wants to know anything about him he can, but he hadn’t had the option to learn. “You plannin’ on starting soon?” He asks, letting Casimir search his face, finding it open and warm and inviting. “We can start easy first. Like… What’s you're favorite color?”
Casimir doesn’t know what he wants. He doesn’t think he deserves to be held in Thorn’s gentle arms, much less knows if he wants it under all the fear panic. Perhaps the reason he asked Thorn what was next was because he was hoping the courtesan, in all his lovely confidence and that assurance he always wore like a cape would simply tell him, and Casimir would nod and tilt his head towards Thorn’s hand again in hopes he’d take his chin again. Perhaps Thorn would just merely tell him to stay, and Casimir would, in this limbo of holding and being held, and the world would stop turning just for them.
It is when Thorn asks him that easy question, a simple lobby just to try and get the words dislodged from Casimir’s throat that the bartender realizes perhaps he doesn’t know what he wants because he doesn’t know who he is. He knows what he is: quiet and grumpy and taciturn and stoic and broken and bleeding and hurting and running, but after those words, the definition that makes up Casimir begins to peter away. He knows who he used to be, and what he became, but he doesn’t know what Casimir present is. And he doesn’t know, by extension, what Thorn wants to hold in him.
Thorn’s careful observation, spoken neutrally, still sends some sort of unreadable flicker in Casimir’s eyes, and he has to push through the gum built up in his throat.
”Yellow,” He lies, because it’s better than telling Thorn he has no idea, and he’s always liked the way the yellow of the sun refracts from the glasses on the bar, and he could be the kind of person who likes yellow, maybe.
Perhaps there’s a part of Thorn that’s worried if he tells him to do too many things that the end result would be out of sheer obligation rather than want. So it’s this steady push and pull he’s trying, knowing that if he told him to stay that the bartender would. But was it fair? Thorn had always been a king of consent, and while he thinks he can read Casimir’s face well enough – let alone the other man having enough brawn to physically do whatever he wants compared to the willowy frame of the shorter, thinner man.
He doesn’t know Casimir well enough to know that he’s lying about the color yellow. And unfortunately (or fortunately) for the bartender, that just means he’ll have to put up with all the yellow things Thorn will inevitably get for him until he might think he’s drowning in a sea of gold. It’s face value, and Thorn’s smile brightens with it as he nods. “Mine’s pink ‘n purple.” Because of course he has to have two. He likes the vibrant pink hues of flowers and the purple of the sunset when the sun’s finally dipped below the horizon.
He reaches out now to take Casimir’s hand back into his, tangling his fingers with his and squeezing them lightly. His gaze flicks up to scan the bartender’s face, feeling the flush before it comes. His cheeks are bright red by the time his voice paints the air. “Maybe I need t’be more direct.” He starts off, swallowing down the essential word salad he wants to give the other man. “I’m gonna get to know you. I like you. I like this. I want this. So if it ain’t somethin’ you want, you’re gonna have to tell me.”
The double-pronged answer, the cheating at the question that Thorn literally asked, brings a quirk of a fond smile to Casimir’s harsh slash of a mouth and he nods slightly as if he’s processing the information. The color combination makes sense for the man somehow, and Casimir can imagine himself bringing the courtesan pink and purple flowers at the end of a long day just to see him smile.
When Thorn’s squeezes his hand in his, Casimir sends a light pulse back, reaching out with the other hand to trace Thorn’s knuckles where they lock with his. The directness is, as always, a relief, though the question itself is a surprise. Had the answer not been obvious? Had it not shone through as he lay all night with Thorn’s head on his chest, holding himself stone-still for the mere fear of rousing him? Had it not been clear when he asked Thorn to tell him to stay? Had it not been clear when he ran to protect the other man? (He would concede that that last example was in fact not clear).
Casimir nods his head once, firmly and decisively, his hair rustling a little from the force of it. And then, because Thorn had asked, and he deserves that much, Casimir says, ”I do. I want this. I just… don’t know how.” His voice is low and firm and decisive, and he squeezes Thorn’s hand to accompany the words.
It’s a relief – the way the smile slants along Casimir’s face, the way that he squeezes his hand back in a light pulse and he can feel the calloused fingers of the other man’s hand stroke along the courtesan’s knuckles. His face stays that dark shade of pink, one of his favorite hues as Casimir would now know, and when his directness is received well, he lets the smile grow a little easier on his face, loosening a breath that he’d held for a little too long.
“If I’m bein’ honest, I dunno how either.” He admits, head tilting as his shoulders start to relax again, keeping Casimir’s hand in his own like he could inject more heat into the cooling temperature of the other man. “My last relationship, uh…” Thorn pauses, hesitating, a crack in the easy façade as his gaze drops from Casimir’s face to look anywhere else. “Didn’t go well. Mostly ‘cause of work. He was.. jealous?” The courtesan chews on his lip for a moment. “Which I get. But.. work’s work. Nothin’ more ‘n nothin’ less. And maybe.. if I do go to the desert, I can do other things than be a courtesan.” In case that was a deal breaker, but at elast he’d gotten out enough to allow himself to look back up at Casimir.
There’s a slight pinch in his brows, a fine line that blooms between them as he searches his face to kind of read whether he’s jumped too far ahead – after all, for all he knew, he was the only one that had been pining after all these years. Perhaps, maybe, jumping into a relationship right away wasn’t the right call. Perhaps, maybe, it should have been an attempt to be friends first. But Thorn was the type to kiss first and ask questions later.
Yesterday, 03:08 PM (This post was last modified: Yesterday, 03:08 PM by Casimir.)
i'm a thinker, not a talker
Casimir listens intently at Thorn’s story in that quiet, intense way he has, neither judging nor condemning, just absorbing. It’s a new aspect to the man he’s never heard before, not from Thorn’s constant chatter at the bar or from any of the gossiping courtesans, so it must stay quiet and hidden in a little crevice of Thorn only few can reach. He nods even as Thorn looks away and he doesn’t chase the man’s gaze. He doesn’t reassure him that he won’t be jealous, or reaffirm the utter injustice of the previous partner’s behavior — Thorn doesn’t need that. He just meets Thorn’s eyes when he looks back up and keeps his hand in Thorn’s, steady and solid and present.
There’s question burning at Casimir’s throat, and he knows Thorn is telling him this to place them in the same unsteady boat, two lost people not knowing what they want and how to get there, but the desert looms here now, and Casimir remembers with a start that that question of Thorn going is what started this whole trip-and-fall into each other’s embrace. His jaw works up the words, deliberating carefully.
”What would you do?” He asks, rubbing a thumb over Thorn’s knuckle. ”In the desert. If you could do anything. Architecture?” It seems more important than Casimir, than conversations about loving and wanting. There is something in Thorn that burns too bright for this place, for all of King’s End, for Casimir, and the burn of his potential almost hurts Casimir’s eyes.
He’s like a sponge, Thorn realizes slowly. That Casimir’s taking everything he says without a single ounce of judgement or feeling like he’d overstepped anything. Or, even, that it wasn’t a deal breaker. Instead, he’s met with just quiet understanding when he finally looks up to those beautiful slate eyes.
Casimir’s hand remains in his, solid and real and while there might be blood on the bartender’s hands, they don’t feel like the ones his ex had. Especially when he feels the gentle and tender stroke of his fingers along his knuckles all while he studies the bartender’s face like it might have the answer he seeks in it.
What would he do? Gods, if only Thorn knew. “Maybe.” He says, offering a quiet laugh, his head tilting to the side where his hair starts to flop onto his shoulder. “I don’t wanna give my father the satisfaction that I returned to it, even though I like it.” Spite was one thing Thorn could thrive on – and often had. “Maybe I can help design shit ‘n be a host or somethin’. Or.. I dunno, not do anything for a while.” That almost sounds nice, too, in a desert paradise.
“What would you do, if you could do anything?” He asks, turning his attention back to focus on Casimir, his head straightening out as his hand squeezes the bartender’s again in a gentle soothing touch that almost seems to say keep talking to me.
Casimir should have anticipated the question turning back on him, but he had been too busy enraptured by the wistfulness of Thorn's thoughtful answers, feeling his thumb rub against the soft back of the other's hand. When he does ask the question, Casimir stiffens under his touch before, the motion of his thumb pausing, before slowly returning back to its movement. The metronome of his thumb moves in time with his heart, faster than it had been before, and he inhales a deep breath, trying to bring the racing of his heart back under his control.
Much like Thorn, Casimir doesn't know. Unlike Thorn, Casimir doesn't even have an inkling of answer, doesn't even have a concept of an island paradise to do nothing in. All in a single crashing moment, he realizes how little of an answer he has, how he does not even have anything as simple as a dream job or personal fantasy to keep himself sane while he pours endless drinks at the same bar night after night. If this is life after death, there's no future to rely on or run towards, not even a guaranteed tomorrow.
Ideas flash through his head, all bleaker and more panicked than the previous: he could return to fighting, let the strength of his body carry him through the nights and turn off the whisper of his conscience; he could keep tending bar for endless days and days; he could...?
He can't imagine anything else for himself.
"I don't know," He chokes out, pulling his hand free from Thorn's to bury his face in it.
He really shouldn’t be surprised with the way Casimir reacts. The stiffening, the quickened pace of the thumb tracing his knuckles — knuckles that have rarely been used for violence but had mended or built far more than anything else.
He draws quiet, letting Casimir decide how he should respond, if he even responds. He does try to remain just as open and quietly curious, scanning his face, but when Cas rips his hand from his touch and buries his face in it, that same desperation and brokenness seemingly coming out of nowhere, but still there the same.
Thorn wastes little time in closing that distance — not trying to take his hand again but instead wraps his arms around him to pull him in against his chest and the vine tattoos. “S’okay. You don’t have to figure it out now.” Or ever, really, but Thorn doesn’t let that fall from his lips.
Instead, he just aims to cradle him close. “We can figure it out together, yeah?”
Casimir barely notices the way Thorn's arms wrap around him and pull him close so wrapped up in his personal crisis. There's a spark of hope that flickers in him when Thorn says they'll figure it out together, which is quickly drowned out by a further wave of despair. He should be heartened by Thorn's offer of support, his use of together, but instead it just sends his head deeper into his hands. Thorn, who could do anything and could go to the desert to build his empire or just enjoy the leisures of life, committing to stitching up a broken bartender who’s last name he might not even know. The injustice of the situation rises parallel with his hopelessness.
He drags his hand across his eyes, dropping them back on his lap heavily and lets free a small sigh. How does he begin to explain to Thorn that he doesn’t have an obligation to fix him, or to let every broken man rest their sorrows upon his lanky shoulders?
”I like tending bar,” He says weakly, trying to salvage what the tender morning had succumbed to. He had liked fighting too, because things turned rotten and the consequences of his actions formed like cuts along his knuckles. Maybe he should run away to Halo and join the soldiers. Maybe then his capacity for blunt instrumentation could serve something greater than drunk patrons.
He wonders if Thorn would let him follow him to the desert like a lost puppy, or a guard dog, just letting him hold Thorn and resting the man’s head upon his chest. Why did the man want to get to know him and figure out if there was anything under his shell? (What is there wasn’t anything, just that hard suit of armor with nothing inside?)
”I don’t know if there’s anything to get to know,” He offers in his strangled baritone. ”Maybe it’s just this.” Not like Thorn, with his swirling, caring depths of kindness and personality and ambition.
Thorn realizes quickly that he’d be willing to hold Casimir through whatever crisis he has – or continues. The warmth that seeps from him whether the bartender feels it or not is a comforting boon, one that the courtesan is happy to inject back into him, to keep his arms wrapped around the stronger man, the bulk of muscle and smooth skin and curls, as if the thinner courtesan made for a pretty good pillar.
He’ll keep him there as long as Casimir allows – hearing the weak answer that he gives. And honestly? Thorn doesn’t think it’s that much of an issue. The desert would have a bar within the casino, and if Cas wanted to continue that choice there would be options. “You’re good at it.” Thorn hums, confidence leaking into the smooth hum of his voice, holding Casimir close against him.
To hear the strangled tone of his voice, Thorn can’t help but ache for him in a way that he isn’t sure how to help. He wants to fix it, but he knows that there’d be no way to help fix anything unless Casimir wanted to start it. So instead of answering all of the ways that Cas could start again, as though he were a ghost that’s just become physical again, he opts for something else. “S’okay if that’s all, too.” He answers confidently. “This is all that was there ‘fore I convinced ya to step out from behind the bar with me, an’ I still wanted to.” It wasn’t a deterrent for the courtesan, and it still isn’t one.
He presses his cheek in against the wild curls, as if the physical answer was just as important as the verbal one. “Hate to break it to ya Cas, but you’re stuck with me bein’ the Thorn in your side.”
