From being an Abandoned who had rarely left the Hollowed Grounds, to embracing the call of adventure, to dying and being reborn first as an Ascended and then as an Ancient, Maea has gone through quite the amount of changes in her life. One thing remains common, though, in her attempts to find out just where she belongs; she’s always had a craving for knowledge which has brought her to so many places and to meet so many people here in Caido. We can’t wait to see what else is in store for her!
Congratulations, Maea!
Credits
Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
Skinning and hosting by the epically talented Kaons, and functionality fanciness by the coding magic of Neowulf. If you ever see either of them around, make sure to show them some love!
05-24-2019, 09:08 PM (This post was last modified: 05-24-2019, 09:09 PM by Remi.)
everything looks perfect from far away
"I think that this is likely going to be a very bad idea, which is why I wanted you with me." Remi explained as they walked towards the temple.
The alchemist had been formulating the idea in the back of his mind, but after his recent talk with Amalia, it had taken hold so concretely that he knew he'd have to act on it or he'd never be able to do anything else.
"If this does not go well..." Remi trailed off, shaking his head ever so slightly. "Well. I watched you die, so it seems a bit fitting."
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"You are not going to die." Ronin didn't think he had ever sounded so stern or so certain, and the voice that left his lips hardly seemed like his own, so full of conviction was it. His hand had found his friend's shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze, and Sugar chirped her agreement from her place around his neck. "We'll get through this Remi, together. You've done enough for me - it's an honour to start repaying the favour."
Letting Remi go, Ronin frowned up at the Temple - a place normally a source of great calm for the hunter. "What exactly are you planning to do, though?" he asked, conjuring a weak smile from somewhere. "Just in case I'm expected to play a part."
Remi didn't know if he felt amused or grateful. Glancing between the two sets of blue eyes, the alchemist could only shrug uncertainly.
"Well...I would really like to stop worrying that every time I turn my back Ludo will be waiting to smite me. Or..." Softening considerably as he too stopped to stare up into the stonework, Remi fidgeted with a feather suddenly in his hands. "...that I can never be close to anyone again for fear of having memories of them taken." Remi glanced sidelong at his friend, who was most certainly in that camp. Only..it was someone else for whom he wanted this now.
"I learned a bit about Ludo from a friend. I think perhaps...maybe I can make amends for losing its mask."
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Perhaps it was the fact that Ronin now walked so closely in the shadow of a goddess that he found it particularly irritating that a deity would seemingly smite on impulse, and the darkness that danced in his expression laid his feelings bare.
"Then even if we are to deal with Ludo tonight," he murmured. "Perhaps we can find a way to safeguard your memories in the future. I don't like the idea of you not being able to enjoy life because you're worried something might happen."
Sighing deeply, the hunter scritched Sugar under the chin and heard Remi out as he spoke of Ludo. He arched an eyebrow, equal parts wary and interested. "And what way might that be? Don't go making more deals, Remi... You already owe much to Ludo, after Isla."
05-27-2019, 01:42 AM (This post was last modified: 05-27-2019, 09:24 PM by Odd.)
everything looks perfect from far away
"Nor I." Remi agreed, and though he grinned over at the ex-captain, there wasn't much mirth in his voice. Instantly the smile fell away, feeling hollow, and the alchemist ran a hand up the side of his unshaven face as he sighed.
"....Mmm." Remi hummed, drawing in a breath and holding it as he twitched his lips to to the side. "Not...a deal exactly." He clarified. "More like...a way to make amends? I did lose its mask, I owe it something for that, even if it does not accept it. I thought that perhaps this coming LongNight we might try and...I don't know. Establish a sort of sanctuary. An open-door policy...perhaps a group that might make sure that no one ever has to suffer the cold and dark alone." The alchemist thought of what Amalia had said, that she and Jigano had been tasked with collecting vagrant souls of the god. Remi had seen enough death his first LongNight and he hadn't moved around all that much. He could only imagine what the actual death toll was.
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Ronin nibbled at the inside of his lip as they drew further into the Temple and towards a shrine he had gotten to know well, and the look he gave his friend was sceptical at best. "A not-deal, huh," he practically drawled, hiding his fear for Remi behind his sly tone. Before he could say more, though, his friend was explaining more about Ludo than Ronin thought he had any right to know, and he blinked a few times and let out a low whistle of a sigh.
"An open-door policy? That's foolish, Remi. And dangerous. So I have no doubt that they deity will be interested... I just hope you know what you're doing." He patted his shoulder gently.
05-27-2019, 04:59 PM (This post was last modified: 05-27-2019, 09:15 PM by Remi.)
everything looks perfect from far away
"It might be, and probably is." The alchemist agreed, his eyes scanning a face he had come to know so well for signs that he was going above and beyond his regular amounts of stupid. "But you would have died had we not opened the door. Aoife too. We lost many on LongNight because we were too afraid to answer .... how many more had not even bothered to knock?" Gently the alchemist shook his head. "There has to be a way better than fear and doors locked with a handful of bolts. There has to be a way where no one dies alone in the darkness."
Pausing at the shrine, Remi turned towards Ronin, his boyish face pale but his eyes determined. "If this goes ....ahh, poorly, I .." The cold prickle of nostalgia and deja-vu ran through the hawk making him shiver slightly. " I do love you. I just want you to know that." He said with a small smile, reaching across to gently grip the hunter's upper arm, offering a light squeeze.
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Ronin's frown was deep, his expression as stormy as the guard he had once been a part of. Nuzzling his cheek against Sugar, he nodded gently to Remi to show that he understood where he was coming from. That he even supported it, much as he didn't want to admit it. Ronin had not been in any sort of state the last LongNight to understand or appreciate what was happening. But it had been bad. He understood that much now.
"Alright," he conceded at last. "I'll wait for you nearby - and I'll be watching. If it goes awry, I suppose I'll have to have a god's wrath on my head too." The ghost of a smile crossed his face, and he snorted at Remi's touch to his arm. Batting it away, Ronin stepped forward to hug his friend tightly, holding him close enough to cause Sugar to trill her discomfort.
"I love you too, Remi," he murmured, stepping back reluctantly. "I didn't get to do that last time, so you can fuck off if you think I'm missing the opportunity. But you'll be alright. We'll make sure of it." Taking a long breath in and out, Ronin retreated to one of the Temple seats, murmuring quietly to the dragonling around his neck.
"One god's wrath, one god's blessing, maybe it will balance itself out." Remi said with a humourless smile, shrugging his shoulders but silently praying that he was right. Surely Safrin wouldn't let any harm befall Ronin after all she had done to bring him back?
At first Remi's smile faltered as his hand was swatted away. Though it would have been out of character for Ronin to rebuke him so, a chill sparked low in Remi's stomach and radiated icicles through his spine and legs. As he was pulled tight though, the alchemist melted against the hunter, humming a note of appreciation to Sugar as she grumbled. "I would not want anyone else here with me." Remi said, pulling back and giving Ronin a final squeeze on the arm before turning to face the shrine.
Taking a deep breath and bolstered by Remi's own unique brand of sunny optimism, he walked towards the foot of the shrine and knelt down. Likely Ludo cared little for this sort of pomp and circumstance, but the alchemist would rather not take the chance.
Looking down into his hands, Remi closed his eyes and imagined the door to the Rathskeller on LongNight. He let the echoes of knocks gone unanswered ring in his ears, his expression flinching at each remembered bang. "Ludo, I know I cannot make up for the loss of your mask, but I would like to try."
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
05-27-2019, 08:46 PM (This post was last modified: 05-27-2019, 09:24 PM by Ludo.)
ludo
The candles inevitably lit about the shrine began to flicker and dance, and whilst Remi would not see Ludo at first, he would feel its presence. And if and when he did open his eyes, it would be to find the shrine before him empty. Above and around though...
Ludo was everywhere, black tendrils of rags hanging down from the temple ceiling, a porcelain mask nestled among them. Like a great black spider, bearing down upon its prey.
Feel it he did. He remembered the weightless cloth wrapped once against his neck, snowballs tossed at his back. Though even in his memory the scarf went from a noose to a dark swath of cloth, and the snowballs were both ice-blades as much as playthings.
Opening his eyes he tried not to recoil at the nearly oppressive way Ludo filled his entire field of vision. Not even the shrine was a respite, for the alchemist forced himself to turn and look up into the expression-less white face looking down at him. Though the question asked of him made the alchemist tilt his head in that bird-like way he had as he peered up. "Your..." Trailing off, Remi shook his head softly. "I know nothing of your story." He continued, the thought of lying or trying to otherwise deceive the god not even occurring to him.
Narrowing his gaze speculatively, the creases on Remi's face smoothed into an expression of boyish concern. "—does it have something to do with LongNight?" He wondered out loud. It was the only thing that made sense, given the conversation Remi had just had with Ronin and the thoughts and memories flooding his mind.
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
A mask could not narrow its eyes, but Ludo made a very good job of it regardless. At the concern on Remi's face and the boyish nothingness in his thoughts and his questions, the deity hissed - a sound that seemed to fill the entire Temple, making it shudder. Wordlessly it dropped down, a bundle of black rags and a blank face... directly onto Remi.
"It matters not," Ludo grated, wrapped about Remi like a cloak, oppressive and heavy. "You are here because of LongNight, though. Such deals we made. Such gifts spurned." For Ludo had not forgotten when Remi had offered him anything in exchange for Isla Lockwood, an anything it had not yet cashed in.
"Do you come to add more debt to your already weighty soul?"
It was only instinct that caused the alchemist to flinch at the sound, as his faced remained as full of concern and wanton want to help as it ever had. Bracing himself as the darkness of the room seemed to pivot and descend, the alchemist expected to feel the weight of a mountain ontop of him, but found only Ludo, which was far harder to hold up.
"Yes." Remi agreed. Part of him wanted to defend himself, to plead that he should not be punished for someone else's sin, but ultimately as he had concluded before, it was his fault. "You can think of it as a debt of a kind, I suppose. A promise made from me to you." That Ludo had referred to his soul as weighty rang with a truth that Remi could not possibly describe. His soul was not heavy because of any vallour on his part, any goodness. But because of failure and misery and death. " I was thinking of LongNight...all this talk of the days getting longer made me think of it, for soon they will be short again, and then for that week they will be gone. During LongNight we were so unprepared, it being our first. We said we would do better, and I want to make good on that."
Gently his face crumpled, and though he held up the weight of a god around his shoulders, Remi turned and sat on the stairs leading up to the shrine. Looking down into his hands he conjured a feather and gently began to trace patterns on his palm. "So many doors locked. Screams that went unanswered. No one should have to die alone in the dark and the cold, only wanting to be let in." He added in a low tone, frowning down into his palm.
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Ludo remained, a dragging, suffocating weight around Remi's shoulders as he began to explain. The mention of the longest of nights, however, and of knocks at doors going unanswered, set the deity to quivering. Whether out of anger or fear or something else entirely, it wasn't clear. But as Ludo surged up to hover before Remi, there was something intense about its masked gaze.
"Those souls do not rest easily," it agreed in a voice both low and wary. "But what would you do, sweetling? Leave your door open for the world to step inside? A fool's errand."
