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!
When you were Ascended, there were immediate and obvious issues with the tradition of catching the sun; mostly because you could not allow the sun to catch you. Sam had abstained from the rituals the previous year for that very reason, had decided to stay very much not-burnt for the sake of missing some traditions, but...he had been trying to connect more with his land, his home. His history.
Besides, he'd made the basket (ok technically he hadn't yet, but timelines shimelines). There was no point in making it not to use it to capture the sun.
It had taken him a little while to work out how to do it, but he came up with a plan. Heading to the ruins at the time just before sunset, he wrapped himself up in clothes from head to foot, including a wide brimmed hat and a scarf to cover his mouth. Hot, for Longheat, but it would keep him protected, at least until he could reach the Ruins, where many buildings provided a shadow for him to rest in.
Finding a wall at about waist height he set the basket on it then stepped back, squinting his eyes - if he looked at it from the right angle, the sun would set directly into his basket, and he could watch it all from the safety of the shade. Sitting down on the stone ground he settled into thought, wishing Nate was here to spend the time with him.
The ruins told the story that Weaver had been chasing since she got here. What had been happening here? What had happened here, before the portals opened? She got pieces of it, whispered in corners, through tears from dark nights, from loose lips tainted with liquor. She understood that nothing good had happened here, not really. The world had gotten bigger, yes, but that wasn’t always a good thing. The gods had been silent in Halo, life had not been peaceful but it was routine (Halo was never peaceful), and the dangers were known. Now though? Now she walked through the ruins looking at the destruction, hand outstretched, fingers brushing against the cracked stone as if she could divine the specific through touch alone.
She was wearing clothes purchased in the market here, the fabric lighter than she was used to, but still she wore full sleeves and pants, tucked into new black boots that lacked the fur lining of her usual ones. The sun was not her friend, though it didn’t burn her like it burned an Ascended. No, it merely burned her as it burned all humans, particularly ones who had never been this far south in such brutal sun. Her scythe stretches across her back, the double-edged blade gleaming in the dying sunlight. It is a better time to be out, with the sun beginning to drop below the horizon, than in the middle of the day with the heat trying to roast you like a piece of meat.
Eventually she spots a lone basket sitting atop a small wall, and she almost laughs aloud at the sight. She’d learned the myth of catching the sun as Grounders knew it, and really just learned it because she’d only known a fairy version of it from her mother long ago and child’s memory is not the most reliable. She wonders if that’s what this basket is doing sitting there, waiting for the sun. It takes her only another heartbeat to find the man that must have placed it there. He is hiding behind a wall, covered from head to toe in clothing, and at this she does laugh a little. “You seem to hate the sun more than I do,” she says, holding her long-sleeve covered arms out. She assumes he's probably an ascended, but maybe he's just really damn pale. It's possible.
She was pretty sure he was a man, anyway. It was vaguely hard to tell with all that clothing but the shape of him seemed to suggest a man. Probably. He was lanky and short, but he lacked the curves she would have expected from a female. Though maybe they were just buried in the fabric that covered him, but he didn’t seem to necessarily be wearing layers. “Catching the sun?” she asks, pulling out her attempt at basket making from her pack and wiggling it around slightly. It’s a pathetic looking basket, really, but it does the job. “Would your basket care for company?”
weaver
-- ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies --
Sam had not expected to see anyone in the Ruins - really, that had been why he'd come there - and jumped at the sound of Weaver's voice, looking at her with wide eyes from under his hat. From the way she joked about his dislike of the sun, he couldn't tell if she knew he was Ascended or not; he decided to be cautious and not reveal himself. "Oh, well...it is overbearing sometimes in Longheat."
She correctly guessed he was trying to catch the sun and he nodded, but almost wanted to cringe when she asked to join. He was so bad at speaking to strangers, especially when they'd have to wait until the sun went down to be able to part. But he had no right to stop her and was awful at saying 'no' unless pushed, so he nodded. "Yes. I think it's a good angle for it, if you stand in the right place. I've...never done this before."
Hopefully that would cover him if he was doing it wrong. "I'm Samuel Wordsworth." He held out a hand in greeting.
Weaver had a habit of showing up in places normal people didn’t. Maybe it was a byproduct of the death wish her brother insists she has (she has no such wish). Maybe it was just a product of living in Halo and used to surviving in the worst of conditions. Really, it was probably because curiosity drove her, recklessness clothed her, and a willingness to die (if needed) armored her. Someone had to do the hard stuff in life, the stupid stuff.
He seems startled by her presence, a trend that seems to keep going here in the Hallowed Grounds. Apparently she didn’t act like a local, which was fine because she wasn’t. She was a Halovian, and not pretending to be otherwise. He doesn’t confirm or deny her suspicion that he’s an ascended. Maybe she should care, but she doesn’t. She also doesn’t yet know all the details of the drama that’s been going on outside her Halovian bubble, so maybe she would care when she learned. Though Weaver isn’t usually the type to blame everyone for the actions of some.
He lets her stay though, admitted he’s never caught the sun. She grins conspiratorially, ”I haven’t either, so we can suck at it together. We don’t really do this in Halo.”. She plops her basket down next to his, a dinky little thing next to his nicer one. It’s sort of hilarious, actually, and it feels like the story of Weaver’s life somehow. Dinky little basket versus the rest of the world.
She comes to join him, settling cross-legged onto the ground. He gives her a name (first and last, fancy) and sticks out her hand. She takes it, giving a firm but polite shake. ”Weaver Hale.” Hey, she could use a last name too, why not?
weaver
-- ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies --
Weaver told him that this was not a tradition in Halo, which was hardly a surprise for Sam. "I think you would be waiting a very long time to catch the sun in Halo. I was there for almost three weeks and I think there might have been ten minutes of sunshine." A little smile rested on his face, though it was not reaching to his eyes; his time in Halo had been difficult for reasons far more troubling than the weather.
"Wait..." Realising just what it was Weaver had said, Sam sat up a little straighter and tilted his head, looking her over. "Are you from Halo? I didn't know anyone had come this way through the portal. Do you live in the Citadel? I...did not get to see it." By the time he had arrived in the mountains, the Citadel had already been well covered by his fellow Ascended for exploring - in fact, almost the entirety of the mountains had too. He had always been a little slow.
Sam glanced towards the baskets; it would still be a while until the sun 'touched' them. "Weaver. Are you usually an explorer? You've come quite a way."
The sun was a thing they rarely saw in Halo. Well, they did, but it was a cruel temptress or evil overlord when it arrived. Either it peaked out just enough to pretend it might show up or it blazed so brightly they couldn’t see. Life in Halo was about some semblance of darkness (though it was often not pitch black) and learning to keep a fire alive. LongNight was just a longer version of their everyday life, really. She laughs at his comment about barely seeing the sun though, not at him but rather just in amusement. ”Too true, depending on the time of year. Come now though and the sun will make sure it’s so bright you still can’t see it.”
He seems to brighten though at the realization that she literally lives in a frozen wasteland, which is not quite the reaction she expects. Halo is such a hell that most people don’t seem all that interested in it, but she’s happy to answer his questions. “I am and I do. Not really another habitable place in Halo.” she confirms. She supposes it would be possible to live outside of the Citadel if someone really wanted to, but she can’t quite figure out why anyone would want that. Life in Halo was hard enough, no reason to make it even harder.
“Hunter by trade, technically. Maybe that’s something of an explorer, though really, I’ve been trapped in Halo so long I’ve just never had the chance to explore much of anything. It is nice to get out, get a few green things while I’m here.” Because green was a novelty to her. Not that that didn’t have anything green, but it wasn’t the same. She’d never known what it was like to be properly hot either. She’d been warm in front of a fire, but there was always a chill in Halo you could not shake. “If you ever feel like coming back to Halo, I’d be happy to show you around the Citadel. I mean, it’s the best part. You missed the good stuff if we have anything worth calling good.”
weaver
-- ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies --
"Then I think I'll definitely refrain. The sun in the Hollowed Grounds is more than enough for me." Even with the grey damp of the Hollowed Grounds, the mildness of the weather most of the time, the sun still had the power to burn away at his skin if he stepped into it. He had noticed recently his tolerance for the light seemed to have increased, but he still would not brave it.
Weaver stated there was not another habitable place in Halo, which Sam did not want to question...after all, she was a native and surely knew better. Still though, he distinctly recalled Amun telling him about an attack in a village up in the mountains. "Is there not the village? Ah...Whitebrim? Too?" He asked, unaware of any tensions that might have existed between this place and the Citadel.
As she spoke Sam picked up a stone and began to scratch little marks in the cobbles beneath him, his hands aching for something to do - an old nervous habit. "I imagine it must be. What a shame we have all been separated for so long. It is a good thing we have the portals now, hm?" Weaver would likely not realised how much of a loaded question Sam had asked; he wanted confirmation from someone that had used them that the portals had been good. It was further proof for his arguments in favour of The Voice.
Her offer brought from him a bright smile. "Oh! When it is less bright, I would love to. Could I bring my partner? He came with me last time, too. His name is Nate."
She laughs slightly as he says he’ll pass on checking at Halo and it’s blinding sun. Of course, she doesn’t blame him. After all she’s currently here, isn’t she, sweltering to death rather than having her corneas burned out? Though she’s pretty sure her initial assumption was correct and he is probably an ascended. Not that normal humans ran into blinding sun, but it just seems the most likely explanation for his avoidance of it, for the comment that the sun here is enough. She still doesn’t care. The conversation has been enjoyable, and she needed something to do if she was going to sit here and wait to ‘catch’ the sun.
“Yes, okay fine technically there is another habitable place. It is a dumpy little village that mostly houses exiles from the Citadel. I don’t count it.” She says it in the way you might say that a first kiss doesn’t count if it was only a peck. “It is a vaguely useful place if you need shelter out there but they are possibly as likely to kill you as an Ursur. Use caution if you plan to visit.”
Her eyes drop briefly as he scratches at the cobbles with a stone. It isn’t a judging look, just a curious one, seeing is there’s a shape in the scratches. Her eyes don’t linger though, not trying to make him uncomfortable. She understands fidgeting, after all, as she’s often fidgeting with one of her many knives, a habit she tries to avoid when in company that doesn’t know her well. It could be seen as a threat, even though she doesn’t intend it that way.
His next question seems innocent enough. She has no way of knowing the meaning behind it, but even if she did, she’d probably still answered him honestly. There is no reason to hide the truth. “I’m not sure. I suppose it has the potential to be both. I am thankful for the opportunity to leave Halo, certainly, but at the same time before at least I knew the dangers that lurked there. There are many more now, unknown ones. I suppose though that such things would have found their way to us eventually.” Maybe by then she would have lived and died and not had to deal with it, or maybe not. She will never know, and it’s not as if the answer to such speculation matters.
He brightens at her offer to come to Halo, and she smiles in return, finding herself rather pleased that someone actually wants to come visit. “It should be less bright soon, I hope. And sure, he’s more than welcome to come.” Weaver wasn’t particular so long as neither of them tried to murder her, and Samuel didn’t seem like the type to hang out with serial killers anyway.
weaver
-- ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies --
Weaver's description of the village matched up with what Sam had previously heard about it, that was for sure. He did not intend to visit ever, if he could avoid it. "My...friend-" Was Amun a friend? He wasn't really sure; The Voice would say he was his brother, but he felt uncomfortable applying that label to someone he didn't know very well. "-went there. Said they wanted to eat him."
There was not a specific pattern he was scratching out - just lines, one after another on a row. More something to do than anything else...grimly, Sam thought it reminded him of a prisoner counting days on the wall, which only lead him to wonder about Remi, if he was trapped somewhere dark and horrible; his heart hurt as he thought after his lost friend. This was not the time, he reminded himself, and blinked away the worry and tears that threatened to take over.
Her answer for the portals was a mixed response, but he felt her problems were more to do with the issues of coming to any new place, rather than an objection to the new technology entirely. "With the new dangers, there will be good things too, though. New things to see." He tried to encourage her to see it more positively, so that she might tell people she was grateful for The Voice's invention.
"Wonderful. It'd be great to walk around with a native. Last time we were there on business, so we didn't get a lot of time to see things." It had still been breathtaking, to witness a land so different from his own, though. "Have you seen anything you've liked in the Hollowed Grounds?"
She laughs. Not at his hesitation at the word friend (that could be a tricky word, a tricky relationship to define), but rather at the rest of it about nearly being eaten. “Exactly. There is one properly habitable place in Halo.” she says, feeling vindicated that her statement was in fact correct. Or correct enough. Unless you liked running from cannibals in which case then there were totally two habitable places in Halo.
Her eyes don’t linger long on the scratches, which do indeed look like something a prisoner might scrawl. Perhaps he was marking the seconds ticking by while stuck in her company waiting for the sun to set, but Weaver didn’t think she was particularly bad company. There were definitely worse options, at any rate. Instead her eyes flick back up to the baskets, the sun inching closer toward the moment when they could “catch” the sun. Catch it only to release it again soon anyway. She understands the point of the festival, of course, but there is something still rather silly about it. Of course, given her general lack of love for the gods, she finds anything to do with them vaguely silly. It was either far too easy or far too hard to love someone that didn’t love you back.
He responding, pushing the positivity that she’d offered bundled in concerns. She doesn’t think much of it, really, other than that he probably really wanted the portals open. “Of course. There is better booze this side of the portal.” She says it with a playful grin, though it’s also true. In the end though, he’d be sorely disappointed if he hoped she’d speak fondly of any god, let alone one she didn’t know. The Voice was a rumor she heard, some god stuck in a tower who’d probably spent three hundred years plotting revenge. To the gods, Weaver was an abomination. Her smartest plan was to just stay off their radar as long that was possible, though she wasn’t entirely sure how long that would be possible. Granted, since they seemed to want nothing to do with her, maybe she’d just steer clear of them forever. Them, yes, but not necessarily their schemes.
“How boring. I will be certain to show you the exciting and fun things. ” she says, wondering if that business had been the influx of people that came to ‘explore’. Exploring for them, intruding for the Halovians. She’d be angry about it except that now she was clearly doing the same thing in reverse, and so she finds it rather hard to be annoyed at them. Besides, she’d just steered clear before and been left alone anyway. He asks about the Hallowed Grounds, and she nods. “The people, mostly. It is nice to see new faces, because that doesn’t really happen in Halo. It is so very small that you know everyone after a time, at least by face if not by name.” There were pretty areas of the Grounds too, of course, but she was a girl of snow and ice all her life and she would always love it the most.
weaver
-- ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies --
"You know, I've heard rumours..." Sam looked up to Weaver, thoughts of Halo and what he'd heard spoken of in the town coming to mind. "...That there's something called 'Mageglass' in the mountains, which is supposed to aid magic users somehow. Do you know anything about that? I can't use magic anyway, but..." He shrugged, lifted up a notebook from his satchel. "I like to record things about Caido."
Hardly knowing anything about booze (he'd barely been old enough to want it by the time he'd Ascended) Sam just nodded, imagining it was probably true. After all, they had more fruit and crops to make it from in the Hollowed Grounds and more people to experiment. "Is there any food from Halo you miss? I..don't eat much, but I'd love to try some." Not realising how odd of a statement 'I don't eat much' was without context, Sam just smiled.
"Yes, it is good to meet new people...when there are more portals, I wonder who we might find? I hope we could find somewhere with a good view...I'd like to have a place to write where I could look over a mountain, perhaps." Green rolling hills, blue skies...he'd dreamt of it for many years.
01-23-2020, 04:16 PM (This post was last modified: 01-23-2020, 04:16 PM by Weaver.
Edit Reason: forgot my table
)
Ah, Mageglass. She nods once as he speaks, confirming that the rumors are true. “It’s real. If you can survive the Fangs long enough to find it and then survive long enough to get it back, that is. It’s hard to find and harder still to make the journey, but potentially worth it.” She hadn’t tried to collect any in her own life, having never been close enough to anyone capable of getting in and out of that journey alive. She was skilled, but not skilled enough to be the sort anyone would seek on such a journey. It was this, along with many other things, that drove her now to be more interested in finally learning her magic. Maybe she’d avoided it for so long simply because it hurts, because it reminded her that her mother and brother hadn’t survived to teach her, but she could live with the hurt if it made her stronger.
He asks about food and she grins, grabbing her pack from her shoulder, a worn and well-loved light brown leather bag that’s clearly seen better days. Sticking it in her lap, she spends a minute digging through it before pulling out a small bag full of dried beef. “Halo isn’t really known for its food, but you’ll find some old, and I suppose new, family recipes and the like around. Me? Well I make some pretty great dried beef, if I do say so myself, and I just bring it with me.” She actually does make some great dried beef, a combination of simple patience and understanding the concept of spices and flavors. She’d grabbed all sorts of new herbs to try while she’s been in the Grounds, even. She opens the bag, offering him a piece. “You don’t even have to go to Halo for it.’
She doesn’t miss how he says he doesn’t eat much, and she waits for a moment before finally just asking. “Are you Ascended? You don’t have to answer but then I’ll just keep on assuming.” The way she asks it is without any judgment, but simply curiosity. She doesn’t personally know any Ascended in Halo, not to say they weren’t there but rather that she’s just never gotten to ask annoying questions of anyone about it. Not that she’s likely to pummel him with questions, but like...can he actually enjoy things like dried beef? Curiosity killed the cat, and all that.
He speaks more of the portals, and it’s starting to make sense if he is, in fact, Ascended. “You know, seeing something other than snow and ice already blows my mind. I’m not sure I can imagine what else might be out there.” Then again, to learn and find out is a tantalizing thing, and if the portals are going to be open at all they might as well keep going and hope they don’t open one to eternal fire. At least not before she’s mastered that particular magic.
weaver
-- ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies --
"Oh, really?" Sam leaned forward, interested to hear about it indeed. So often rumours turned out to be nothing more than that, especially things he'd found written in old Atheneum texts, which could be more than a little embellished. "Have you ever found any of it? It...probably would not be much use to me, I'm not Abandoned--" The truth, even if not all of it. "--but I'd still love to study it."
Weaver pulled out some dried meat, not too different from things you could get in the grounds. It made Sam smile, actually, to see they had something so similar. Though he turned down the offer, shaking his head. "No thank you. I don't eat." For the moment he didn't realise how much of an odd statement that was without context.
Though as it turned out, there wasn't much point in keeping it secret, as Weaver guessed a moment later. Looking a little surprised Sam nodded, nervous to see how she would react. "Yes...I am. Are you alright with that? I apologise for asking, but...tensions have been high, recently." He thought if he really had to he'd be able to take her in a fight, but he didn't want to.
"A lot of people wish for an ocean." Sam informed her with a far off smile, imagining it himself - it seemed fantastical.
“I haven’t,” she admits, though she certainly wishes she had what it took to survive the Fangs long enough to get some. She’s been to the Fangs to hunt, but they never spent long there, and without Erebor and her mother she knows that her and Korbin don’t stand a chance alone. There are a lot of things she probably would have done if they’d survived, and she’d probably be at least something of a different girl than the one she’d turned into. Those what if’s don’t matter though, because they did die, and she couldn’t bring them back or change the past. “I’ve seen traders with it. They would have taken my entire home in exchange for it, though. Didn’t seem worth the cost.”
He seems concerned that she’s figured out what he is, but she just shrugs at the idea of tensions. “You have not burned down my house or tried to kill me, so I don’t really care.” She knows what it’s like to be disliked, though for her it is not by other humans but rather by the Gods. She wonders what it is like to be a child of one, to be that close. She doesn’t ask though, instead picking a more generic question. “Do you like it? Being Ascended, that is.” All she knows is they can’t get drunk or feel pleasure from sex and that sounds less than appealing. Though being basically superhuman might make the tradeoff almost worth it. Almost.
He mentions an ocean and she finds herself looking toward the sun, creeping closer and closer to the baskets, wondering if there was an ocean out there somewhere. What would that look like? She cannot really imagine the idea of it, the vastness of a horizon made of water and sky instead of snow and clouds. “Do you think there will be one? I would love to see an ocean.” How amazing to stand with her feet in the surf if it was warm enough, to see the horizon as it stretched outside of Caido.
weaver
-- ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies --
