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!
now take what i offer, straight up the nose, down the throat
it's a bearable bruise on your conscious
He was an anchor, waiting to be pulled under and drowned, suffocating like he had within the mud monster – feeling the weight of the mud and rocks crushing down on windpipes and limbs. Only he had fought back then, fought back hard for that gasp of breath, only to now feel like he’s giving in, breathing in all the filth and letting the rocks bounce along his lungs. But he doesn’t utter it, doesn’t comment on it – imagining that Deimos can see the lie for what it is. He’s thankful with the Sword doesn’t ask.
He can keep it under wraps, until the day arrives at least. Then it’ll all break loose.
Instead he focuses on the task at hand, helping Deimos place and plant the pieces of wood for the ramp for him to nail them into place. And with it, he listens to Deimos as he mentions that he should probably meet Safrin’s Shield. It’s enough of a distraction from his own whirlwind of a life that he nods, the ghost of a smile dancing along his hardened jaw, the wind whipping a lock of hair around one of his horns as he nods. “I’ll have to.” He comments quietly, moving to help further.
The comment of the spar however, grants a nod from him as well. “I’m afraid you’ll have to take it easy on me. I’m sick and recovering.” A hint of the humor there, a glint of it in his eye, despite how much of an understatement it was. Had he not gone and seen Nate he likely would’ve left it to succumb until he eventually drowned himself. Perhaps Deimos can hear it in the rasps of his breath, the crackling of the fluid in his lungs. The humor fades quickly, however, as he focuses on Deimos. “I’m sorry that the memory mud made it to the Festival.” Feeling as though some of the blame has been placed on him.
but don't it feel good? don't you feel calmer?
i am the way and the life in the best looking truth
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
Why not fight? he nearly asked – except he understood exactly what it meant to simply want to succumb. To want to be dragged beneath the surface and drown, watch the world swarm, surround, and feel absolutely nothing. He’d been an onslaught, he’d been a terror, but sometimes in between those meticulous movements, those irreverent, driven motions, the ground could’ve opened up, swallowed him whole, and he would’ve taken his consignment to oblivion with gratitude and fervor. The Sword couldn’t now, not with so many tied and tethered around him, but the emotions, the sentiments compounded, remained, broken bits and pieces never quite fully healed returning from their recession. Reminders; bittersweet entanglements of the rancor scorching, biting, and tearing. Barreling on, on and on and on, on rapids and currents – until something sunk or dug into ramparts. Perhaps Sunjata was just too far gone now, and it didn’t matter. Cold and dark and listless, at the bottom of the sea, asking no one or nothing to pull him to shore.
“Later, I imagine,” Deimos advised while he settled several more nails into their corresponding factions, relishing in being able to nearly destroy something in the process. “When she is not cooped up,” cringing a little at the implications of the infirmary; not quite a joke, but he’d hovered just enough to stay out of the range of her glares and irritation. Maybe when Sunjata’s life wasn’t falling to pieces either.
“We can wait,” at the notion of sparring – not intending to take a sick man down, no sport or amusement in those regards. He eyed the smirk and would’ve naturally given one of his own, but his heart wasn’t in it, listening to the drone of the hammer instead, shifting a few more portions in place, allowing Sunjata to hold them down again. At the implications of the memory mud, the General’s brow arched, a sigh coming from his distinction too. “Were you involved?” The intentions of sorrows and apologies seemed too grand a gesture to be anything but; and he knew the notions of failing a mission, of doing something, of achieving, of trying, and it not being even close to enough.
now take what i offer, straight up the nose, down the throat
it's a bearable bruise on your conscious
Because it would become a losing battle, to fight back. And he’s slowly realized – perhaps because of the mud monster, perhaps not – that he’s tired of fighting, tired of it always becoming this. A battle, a losing one, always on the bottom of the sea, drifting further away from the surface with every pull, every ebb and flow of the current. He’s thankful Deimos doesn’t ask, instead he focuses on helping put the boards down and hold them there while the Sword nails it in place for his Shield – both likely far worse mentally than he is, Amalia for sure far more physically.
He gives Deimos a small nod and a small smile to that. “Sounds good.” He offers quietly, contemplatively – wondering what he’d even do with meeting the Shield, what he had in common with her if anything. Except now, perhaps that they’re both sick, her far more worse off than he. But both their lives seemed fracturing, fragile things. He finds himself somewhat jealous that Deimos is there for Amalia for the crumbling, to tape up the pieces to keep her together – while he had to lick wounds and glue them himself.
The mention of waiting for the spar garners a nod, a slight thankful understanding – and he only pauses when Deimos asks if he was involved. His steel eyes shuddering slightly as he focuses on the board in his hand that he places down to follow suit with the General. “I tried to stop it with a few others when we noticed it. By the time it broke the ice wall… I was inside it.” A frown. “I got sucked up into it early on so I tried to do as much damage as I could to split it apart or something. I… Well, it obviously didn’t work.” He puffs out a crackling sigh, a slight shake to his head.
but don't it feel good? don't you feel calmer?
i am the way and the life in the best looking truth
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
Sometimes one could see there was no point. No hope. No promise. No future. Raw and real in its stark, cold abyss, in its harsh, unrelenting void. Deimos only remained here now after everything else because of those surrounding him, because he pushed and crawled and bit into the bindings, because he knew exactly what it was like to descend on one’s own, scraping their way into portals and pieces of darkness. He was there for Amalia because she’d always been there for him – patterns and complexities, routines and devotion, promises and convictions from his mouth, from his heart, that hadn’t bent, hadn’t broken, hadn’t fallen. The heathen could’ve lanced and brutalized himself amongst seclusion and indifference, apathy and nonchalance, like lifetimes ago, the Reaper re-possessed in his stoic, reticence haze; but that wasn’t who he was any longer. And he wasn’t sure what Sunjata was bound to do either – if this was just one more legion and league of onslaughts, of terrors, he was meant to overcome, or one more interval where the waves never quite let up.
The boards fell into place, and so did the story, the tale, of the mud monster – Sunjata inside (the whale?), ice walls breaking, piercing, penetrating, bodies clustered together and then demolished, all the excitement, all the merriment, extinguished on screams, wails, and massacres. His brow furrowed, hesitant to say anything for the moment; for blame would’ve been easy, anger would’ve been raw, ferocity would’ve been in his heart, lashing out at split hairs and intangible, murky things. He could’ve traced the fault lines and fissures just like everyone else: had the fiend been stopped, then the festival wouldn’t have been destroyed, then Aoife wouldn’t have perished, then Ronin wouldn’t have gone to destroy the Temple – a cycle, a current, a rivulet of fragments and misfortune. Should all of that been laden across their shoulders? Or were they just occurrences, fleeting, bounding things, compounded into a series of sagas and events that no one could’ve foreseen? “But you tried,” came first, hammering another nail in, a pulse for frustration, for vexation, for things that could’ve gone so many other ways. “When the blight started to grow worse, a group of us went into the Spire, to destroy the poisonous plants. We believed they were the cause for the sickness.” A pause for the memory scraping over his senses, for the venom choking over his lungs, for the spread of death and damnation, and for nothing at all. “We did – but it had no effect on anyone. The blight continued to spread.” And then the siege of all the broken, despondent individuals had begun. “Sometimes it will not work. But does that mean we cease altogether?” His brow arched; perhaps an armor-piercing question for both of them.
now take what i offer, straight up the nose, down the throat
it's a bearable bruise on your conscious
Had Deimos asked about the whale, he would have said yes. He’d known what he was, had seen them before – rarely, but occasionally there would be a pod off the coast of the ocean, playful and dancing along the surf. It was the biggest form that could deal the biggest damage, that couldn’t be slowed easily by the mud when there were little to latch onto. And gods how he tried and tried, drowned and drowned, fought and suffocated and survived in the end when others hadn’t.
It was a burden to bear, and one he was all too familiar with, it hit too close to home, and it withdraws him further into his sickened mind of confusion and frustration, headaches and fevers that impair a small amount of judgement in certain regards. All in all, he’s being too hard on himself at this present moment, and he tries to take a step back as Deimos’ voice rumbles up. A slight nod is given toward him in acknowledgement. That he had tried.
When he speaks of the blight next, Sunjata can’t help but to let his gaze lift toward the Sword. He can understand the thought pattern, what might have started it all springing from the place it had all began, in the end. “I had the blight.” Sunjata murmurs softly, a quiet rasp before he shakes his head ever so slightly.
The question, however, almost like a double edged sword. They could give up and let others suffer. Or they could trudge on and take the wins when they came, deal with the losses when they came. “No… No it does not.” Perhaps it’s a good metaphor for his soon to be wedding, too, hitting a bit closer to home than he expects. He swallows hard and goes to help hold another piece of wood wherever Deimos might need it.
“We try harder the next time and learn from our mistakes.” His gaze lifts to glance at Deimos, a dark brow raised in a silent question.
but don't it feel good? don't you feel calmer?
i am the way and the life in the best looking truth
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
Another with the blight – a sort of shrug signifying an apology in the shift of his shoulders, in the weight of other things they saw themselves fit to bear. The harsh reality of it was that they hadn’t been the ones to create the disease or the monster, but were readily available to mull and pull themselves into the sanctioned calamity without a moment’s hesitation. His previous inquiry though seemed to haunt both – because sometimes he’d rather sink, and sometimes he’d rather shoot to the surface, and sometimes there was a murky in between, a rough, twilight zone haze snapping at his senses. Perhaps that was where he reigned now, tied right along anchors, roots, and lines, driven to the glassy veneer, desperate for a ragging breath, to stretch and reach for something not attainable at the moment. There were too many wounds, too many decrees, too many nuances, and so they’d merely drown when the aches, when the pains, when their lungs gave in, when their souls hit the bottom. So when was that? When was it all too much? When did they overcome, only to find themselves locked back in the same channel and fissures, the current the same, established pounding of surf, shoal, waves collapsing? “We do,” he answered instead, his hands on the hammer still, grip tightening. He paused in his movements, in the motions, tilting his head as if to examine their current labor. “What did we learn from this one?”
now take what i offer, straight up the nose, down the throat
it's a bearable bruise on your conscious
Focusing on the work that he’s helping Deimos with does help to quell some of his frustration, some of the heaving in his chest. He waits for Deimos’ acknowledgement to the initial question, gaze focusing on the grains of wood before him within the planks. And he sighs, somewhat deeply, a crackling sound when the question is pointed to him. What did he learn?
He learned he needed to be stronger than he was. He needed to not get swept up within it. He needed to learn to step back and reevaluate. He clenches his jaw then, gaze lifting then to look at the other man with a small frown that crosses his face, even if Deimos doesn’t look up. “To be better prepared?” Because it was his first Fiat Lux, and he had heard it had always been a time of light, a time of nice things to happen and occur after the terrible events that were LongNight. But they had all been wrong, in the end.
but don't it feel good? don't you feel calmer?
i am the way and the life in the best looking truth
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
Maybe they could all simmer in Sunjata’s proclamation. For a being so endeavored towards calculations, machinations, and projections of possibilities, he’d sorely missed the mark. Though he’d threaded his steadfast determination into LongNight’s accoutrements and potential devastation, the same couldn’t be said for the gleeful, exuberant notion of the spring’s diversions. Enamored and focused on ensuring the festival had been ignited, invoked, and instigated with kiosks, stalls, games, and any other amusements, he’d failed to delegate any defenses, any maneuvers, anything at all but the wide open field with its perimeters flanked for the taking. Stupid – it’d been tremendously damned and dim, and he was just as much to blame as the rest of them for not being ready or assembled when the time came for seditious strikes. Should they presume and register themselves for anything and everything from now on? Anticipate? Foreshadow? Or let it all simmer once more, think nothing of it?
The latter wouldn’t hold for long – not in his constantly maneuvering mind.
“Perhaps,” began on a sullen sigh, rising from the ramps now firmly in place, tapping on one of the wooden boards to test it, content when it held firm (unlike so many others things in these lives). “I spent time preparing for threats we understood, like for LongNight. I did not think Fiat Lux would embody tragedy or danger.” Experiences had instilled light and mirth, content to revel and spin, instead of staring over the horizon, expecting treachery and maelstroms. The fact that he’d fallen to such a level, to such a foolish, ignorant being, lanced and cut at him, and he didn’t spare a glance at Sunjata – irritated and annoyed at himself.
now take what i offer, straight up the nose, down the throat
it's a bearable bruise on your conscious
At least the boards were in place, the ramps looking as though they’re solid and strong enough to make room for a wheelchair to pass through, and Sunjata rises once more to his full height as Deimos responds to the half question/answer he’d poised to the General. And at the mention of preparing for LongNight – something everyone knew the dangers of by now – it hadn’t been expected, hadn’t been thought of for Fiat Lux.
Nobody had expected it, and perhaps that’s what made it hurt worse in the end.
A crackling sigh leaves him too, and he wipes the small bits of wood from his hands, gaze lifting from them to meet the blues of the Generals’. “I suppose maybe being better prepared during any big gathering might be beneficial now.” He offers with another sullen sigh – ’is nothing safe anymore?’ – before stepping back to the beginning of where he’d been, somewhere near Deimos as he inclines his head.
“Thank you. For the rings. Again, if you or Amalia need anything just let me know.” He offers by way of departing, though he pauses long enough should the General have anything to add, before he departs back to give into the midwife.
- fin for Jata!
but don't it feel good? don't you feel calmer?
i am the way and the life in the best looking truth
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
Any big gathering – and some amount of dread sealed over his soul at the notion of the next one, meant to signify the capturing of the sun, tributes, songs, and the like corresponding to Safrin. They’d all once sat beneath the stars, watched, and waited; and now what were they supposed to be doing to prepare for some upcoming melee? Something in him twisted, jaw clenching once more, another sullen sigh daring, threatening, to unravel from his throat, from his chest, from his void. “I will bring it up at the next council meeting.” Better to put all their heads together, to come up with some strategy, plan, or notion – biting down the rush of if it even mattered. If they had any control in this world (he craved it; a bewitching, enticing, tempting notion he’d always strived to uphold, even when everything seemed to be falling apart).
But Sunjata had departures and other things to attend to – his eyes falling to the ring boxes, and the bizarre, otherworldly connotations behind it all – nodding his head, grabbing hold of his tools to assemble more things elsewhere. “Thank you,” before he too disappeared and dissipated.
