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!
01-15-2020, 05:21 AM (This post was last modified: 01-24-2020, 09:46 AM by Nephele.
Edit Reason: edited open prefix thing
)
NEPHELE
It is easier to avoid the debris of ruination and decay when her feet need not touch the earth. Nephele can't say what brings her here beyond curiosity. Though that is what drags her around most of the Hollowed Grounds, aimless and inquisitive. This time she has brought her journal, flicking through the pages midflight as she inscribes her experience at the Fiat Lux festival. She is certainly no historian and is not particularly passionate about being a story-keeper, but her scientific mind understands that records of the Grounders will be important now that the barrier has fallen.
Another page is devoted to today's exploration, to pondering the societal impact of the ruins and what the Naturals may have gone through within the barrier. She perches like a falcon atop a crumbling piece of building, heel knocking out a mindless rhythm against the stone as she writes. The Grounders are a curious lot, and though she does not exactly prefer their company, at least they are informative when interacting with them.
Her feet definitely touch the ground and though she does not walk silently, she walks with the skill one might expect of a hunter. Quiet, despite the substantial boots that cover her feet. She is so used to the boots she wears in Halo that she cannot give up something akin to them even as she spends time in the Grounds, though she had traded for ones that were not lined in fur here so her feet didn’t melt in the heat. Today she comes back with a purpose of exploring, having only visited the ruins once and using the time to catch the sun rather than actually explore.
Not that there is much left here, but there’s a story of a past in these ruins and she’s been trying to understand the story of the Hollowed Grounds. She knows the story of Halo, of course, because it is her story. But the little information she received in Halo of the Hollowed Grounds did not really tell her what had conspired here. A lot, it seems, in a relatively short time as of late.
Weaver trails fingers along the broken walls as if she could divine the past from them (wouldn’t that be a useful piece of magic, but Weaver has no useful magic right now). She cannot see the past, of course, but she can imagine it. In the distance someone beats a steady drumbeat, and it feels like the sound of war that heralded all this destruction. She follows the sound to find out what it actually is, having to look up to spot the woman on top of a wall, writing and drumming out the beat with her heel.
The woman is small though not tiny, beautiful with fire red hair and wings along her back. Fae, then, unless she happens to be Attuned but Weaver can’t think of an animal with wings like that. Two outsiders meeting in the Grounds - must be a popular place. “Nice seat. Can you see anything good from up there?” Weaver might consider climbing to join, but the building the other woman sits on is not in the greatest shape and Weaver decides falling isn’t really on her list of things to do today.
weaver
-- ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies --
Company is not precisely what she expects as she sketches out the basic appearance of the ruins below her. Grounders - and she knows this firsthand with quite a lot of amusement attached to the knowledge - are not generally the type to look up. Likely due to nothing of consequence usually coming from the sky. At least it gives Nephele the advantage she desires when avoiding their stares and whispers, preferring to interact with each individual on her own time and terms. No such luck in this case, as a voice calls out to her from below. Nephele startles slightly, wings correcting the slight slip as her hazel eyes cast downward towards the intrusive sound.
A woman stands on the debris-littered street, eyes cast skyward and summarily meeting Nephele's as they regard one another. After a moment of chewing over the newcomer's words, Nephele lifts to her feet on the precipice and slides her notebook back into the large pocket of her dress. "If you count, then I suppose so," she calls back boldly, wings fluttering in a distinctly pleased manner. She's not the type to be very flirtatious with non-winged folks, but she is certainly a sucker for a beautiful face. Stepping fearlessly from her perch she flies down leisurely towards the dark-haired lass, hovering a few feet from the ground to stretch out her coiled spinal muscles - and to make a quick getaway if the woman turns violent.
"My name is Nephele. I am documenting this place. It is quite abandoned - what brings you here?" The birdlike tilt of her head follows, glancing briefly about at their surroundings before refocusing. Does she perhaps live in one of the half-constructed abodes? Is she adventuring, looting? Far be it from Nephele to judge someone's past-times considering her own involves sticking her nose in the business of every land and human she passes.
As it turns out, it’s not a Grounder who looked up. Maybe Halovians are smarter, or maybe the girl just gave herself away with the rhythmic tapping of her heel against the stone (a sound a hunter like Weaver is not going to miss). Both seem highly possible, though she’s met Grounders that she suspected would look up and others she is very sure would not. The difference, so far in her experience, seems to have something to do with being a natural and an outlander. Her experience is minimal and definitely shouldn’t be taken as fact, though, but it does make some amount of sense. Naturals would know a whole lot more about Caido, would simply be used to the dangers of this place in a way outlanders were less likely to be. Live here long enough and you figure it out, but the outlanders she stumbled across haven’t really been here all that long.
The woman eyes her for a moment, and Weaver just waits, eye cast upward as if accepting whatever challenge is there. Then the woman responds, and Weaver lets out a pleased and amused laugh, because that is very much a response Weaver would give. Maybe they could be friends (or maybe they would rip each other apart, we’ll see). “Oh, I do like to think I count as something good,” she says with a grin and a bit of a sultry voice. Weaver’s type is generally male, but she can appreciate a pretty woman and a bit of flirting, certainly. On occasion a bit more, usually when there’s booze involved.
“Exploring, which I suppose is vaguely the same without the pen and paper.” she says, looking around the ruins of the Grounds. She cannot help but wonder what this place would have been like before the war, before the bubble. What might her life had been like if those things did not happen? It is a story she imagines sometimes, though little good it does her. Her life is what it is, and she does not mourn it, but sometimes she does like to dream. “I grew up knowing the stories of the Hallowed Grounds, the war and the bubble that trapped us all, but I never really imagined I would actually see it.”
weaver
-- ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies --
Perhaps in some form of parallel, Nephele has never met someone from Halo. Her one trip to the place she had met a fellow tourist from the Grounds. Weaver has no outward sign of not being from the Grounds unfortunately, or surely the Fae would be more than simply intrigued by her presence. The woman's laughter is clear and bright, wrapping around Nephele like a brisk spring wind. It makes it all the easier to float down to her when she is so lured by the sound, grinning to herself in a distinctly pleased manner at Weaver's positive response to her minor flirtation. Similar courting habits? Her mind instantly marks down in her mind for later contemplation.
"You are certainly beautiful, while goodness is a subjective measuring tool. I think you are well-suited to both, in my own biased way," she says as she finally allows her feet to grace the earth, smiling impishly at the woman as she tucks flame-touched strands behind her ear. She must look up to meet Weaver's gaze, but that is something she is becoming used to here. Though still disheartening considering she is one of the tallest of the Village back home.
Hazel gaze traverses the land around them as Weaver does the same, humming softly. "Yes, I suppose it is the same for me. We observed the barrier for decades before it fell. To finally see what is within it is informative." And quite a bit more sorrowful than Nephele had been expecting honestly. Feeling sympathy for the Grounders had not been on her agenda when exploring the land. "Are you not native to the Grounds, then?" At least her words seemed to imply such.
”To be fair, good, when it comes to me, probably depends on your definition. I am not good by its traditional sense.” It’s not as if Weaver kids herself into thinking she is good. Really, she believes herself far worse than she really is. She is not good in the straight laced kind of way, by any means. She enjoys booze, occasionally drugs, sex with too many partners, and flirts indiscriminantely and often means nothing by it. She is willing to fight, willing to kill, entirely able to curse like a sailor with the best of them. But at the same time, she is open minded and without many of the same prejudices the other naturals have. She cares fiercely, even if it doesn’t show, and will defend and protect those that cannot defend and protect themselves.
She would never call herself good in the kind, gentle, caring sort of way. She would never call herself good in the way she was good, either, but there was something wonderful buried beneath the layers of protective debauchery.
Nephele speaks like a researcher, and Weaver wonders what she does in the Greatwood. To be honest, she wonders what the Fae do in general. Do they live like the rest of them, except with wings and their smaller size? Or do they live like something else entirely? She knows little of the Fae outside of stories, some of which do not paint the greatest light, though Weaver knows that all stories should not be taken for truth.
”I’m from Halo,” she offers, only realizing now that she doesn’t look like she’s from Halo. She’s getting used to being here. She’d traded for some lighter clothes more suited to the climate, had stored away her heavy black cloak (she feels a little not like herself without it), and had spent enough time here to have some vague sense of the land. ”My name is Weaver, by the way.” she says, realizing she’d never actually bothered to give that bit of information. ”I assume you live in the Greatwood? Can I ask, what is it like there?” It was too hard to move in and out of Halo without the portals, and her world had been so small until recently.
weaver
-- ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies --
