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!
Zidane couldn't help but too in an understanding way sigh over what he heard Samuel state. In Zidanes lifetime things rarely had turned out in a good way after all and he was well accustomed to grief and sadness which probably had formed him into that gloomy mess that he was. "Things normally do.." He stated with a trace of sorrow in his voice that were faint but still easy to spot, especially for other ascendeds. His voice had gotten lower then what a normal person could hear but Ascendeds heard as easy as normal talk.
As the smile met him he tried to respond as best as he could, giving Sam a small smile with eyes that didn't really belong to it. It was not to be rude, he just had a hard time for happiness after all. As he got offered the book as a gift he nodded in a thanking manner before the eyes looked upon his new gift. "I thank you. Just this other one if you don't mind." He said turning the other book in his grasp over so the title was well seen. "What do i owe you for that one?"
"Mm. They do usually get better too, at least." Sam added, hoping that the optimism might spill over into actual events for his life if he spoke it enough; he had read in some books that a positive attitude made for a positive time in life...whether that was true remained to be seen.
If he noticed that Zidane's smile did not fully reach his eyes, he did not comment. Sam had put on many a fake smile in his life and would not dig into anyone elses. "Oh...ah..well, what do you have to offer me? If you have any books you think are unique, or a craft? You can owe me for later, if you'd like, too." Since he had no real need to trade for food and so on, he had always been quite lax on the payment for his books.
Zidane sadly didn't really believe the same as Sam did since (for him) things never tended to get better, only worse the more the time went on. Yes Zidane was not a person with a very positive attitude but then again his life had been one long nightmare to be fair. Which was maybe the reason he didn't reply to the positive statement given to him and simply just looked a bit like a kicked puppy instead. Depression was never really a nice sight to witness.
As the conversation moved on he fished up a pouch from one of his pockets to open it up and grab a pretty gemstone from within it, sparkling in the light of the shop in a bloodred coloration. He held it out towards Sam with a question filled look. "I have some valued stones of different colorations, anything that you might like?"
Sam did not comment further on optimism, seeing Zidane's face - a face he knew well from his own mirror, having often felt like statements about happiness or positive thinking were specially designed kicks for him while he was down. Besides, he had yet to see if it were even true in his own life, never mind anyone elses.
He had not actually expected Zidane to have anything on his person so as the pouch appeared Sam watched it carefully, eyebrows raising at the sight of the gemstone. "Very beautiful indeed...one of them would indeed pay for the book." He wasn't quite sure what he'd do with it yet, but Sam had always been a collector (the distinct between a hoarder and a collector, he thought, was that a collector curated) and thought the stone might make a good piece for his home. "Thank you."
Zidane did notice that Sam noticed how badly his mental state actually was which made him force out an apologetic attempt to a smile as to say that it was fine without using words. He kind of felt bad for making people realize how little Zidane had to exist for which mostly made others uncomfortable. He needed to work on that harder from now on.
Zidane was known to collect many different odds and ends. These stones he had found from sheer luck at one of his sulking night walks and had refined them at home. He had during his years run into a few locations of different colored gems stones that came into use quite often. A trip and he had four different colors and it didn't effect him badly to have something to refine either. He nodded, a bit more cheerful then before as he placed the cold stone in the palm of Sam's hand. "Thank you and i apologize that i can be a bit down, it was not my intent to make you feel bad. Especially not after giving me this nice book." He tapped his fingers on the gift he had received. "I hope to run in to you soon again. Thank you for the business and make sure to take good care." He gave Sam a smile and a nod before turning around and left the store. Ascendeds all seamed to be nice people, he really should mind hanging around them more was a thought he left with steering his steps back home.
