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!
He moves enough that she can join him against the rock, and with her closeness he can smell the scent of her again — not quite overwhelming, but enough of that tinge of snow, Halo, books, something medicinal perhaps. He pretends not to notice but it almost feels like a balm of sorts as the wind whips at the waves again and again.
But as she speaks, he does as he always has. Listens until the end without interjecting, letting her get it all out in the open. And he can understand where the whirlwind came from, why she didn’t quite understand when it had become second nature to him as time went on. And now? Now he was close to his twenty seventh birthday. Marking the tenth year of experience in regards to it. A decade of practice with sly grins and casual flirtations in comparison to a girl who’d only experienced it truly this year.
It’s really no wonder.
“Being an older brother does make you a bit prone to being protective.” He says softly, looking over and down to her as he tries to stretch his bruised fingers again. “You turned out alright, though.” He winks, a bit of a brighter smile crossing his face at the teasing. “But you’re right. I’ve only told… Three people here mostly everything? You and Hotaru know the most about me though.” He replies softly to that, smile faltering slightly.
“And even still, some people tend to use what little I’ve told about myself against me too. But it is what it is. You learn who your friends are quickly at least, or you try to prove them wrong.” He pulls his gaze from her to shift a small amount on the rock, reaching up to adjust the bandage again. “I do keep the whole prince thing mostly under wraps though. Don’t need to give people more fuel. Though court training has come in handy more than once.” Another hint of a tease, that falters near the end with how much Phoebe had mentioned it in arguments of the past.
if i let go, would you hold on?
would we fly?
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.
Her mouth quirked to the side when he said she was alright. "Thank you, I'm glad you think so," she quipped dryly. Meeting his grin with amusement glittering in her eyes. "I have to admit, I forget that you are most of the time. Maybe it's because blood doesn't mean much here? You are what you do. It's our actions that define how others treat us... and every drop of respect has to be earned.
"It's part of the reason why no one followed me when I tried to form a Council, before Zariah... I had nothing to show from the past that they cared to see." That... and Jigano had been peeved that she made a bid for power herself instead of waiting to follow him.
Scuffing her foot on the ground, building up mounds of sand around her foot, Maea let silence settle again. There were so many things she wanted to say, things they had to talk about... but she wasn't sure this was the time. Or the place, or the mood...
But then, would there ever be?
She drew a deep breath, nerves burning in her arms and fingers, heart racing a Mad beat in her chest. Not ready for this, she was not... "I... said I would try to find answers for you... for when we saw each other again. Didn't think... it would be this soon though." Maea maneuvered her tongue with difficulty, and it was so hard to swallow.
Lost in a world full of non-believers Searching for smoke in a still water pond
BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3
♦ Violence, magic, thievery is permitted with Maea at all times. DM me if you have any ideas ♦
“Oh good.” He rumbles at the comment of her forgetting that he is. Some habits die hard and he knows that he can come off a bit hard with the court trained arrogance, but he tries. Perhaps spending all that time with the rebellion had reinstated the fact he hadn’t wanted any of it, proven that despite how much he could be trained, it wasn’t him in the end.
Some things remain the same, however. Handwriting. Certain actions. The scar to his palm from his marriage with Phoebe. Regardless, he’s tried to keep them away.
The mention of her own bid for power has him shrugging lightly. “It’s overrated. You can’t make everyone happy. Just a life of stress.” His gaze slides back over to her with a small smile. Only to have it fade as her tension hits the air, almost taut enough to taste it, and he finds his gaze returning to the waters as he swallows a bit hard.
“Maea… I still need time. If for nothing else but to heal and still figure out what’s going on.” His head tilts somewhat thoughtfully. “But. Unlike earlier when I was pissed off, I still wouldn’t mind your company.” He offers somewhat before he leans back and finally looks down to her. “Like you mentioned in your letter, perhaps starting as friends again while I figure it out. Give time to it all. It really hasn’t been that long.” He says with a small smile. Despite how little it had been, the bruises from her had disappeared on his skin in favor for the more brutal of wounds.
if i let go, would you hold on?
would we fly?
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.
He shrugged at her failed attempts of the past, and Maea did the same to his words, knowing it was true... and also that there had been more to it than just trying to make people happy.
But she saved her emotions for the subject of them, and Sunjata's response to her admission of not having any answers yet. He didn't either, that was plain enough. And he still wanted the distance, which made the skin of her underarms feel very tender and brittle, aching like ants set them on fire. He talked about returning to being only friends - was that even possible - and again the pain in her chest, the vehement jealousy and possessiveness when she wondered if that meant they would no longer be exclusive to each other. Did 'just friends' sleep with other people?
But that was the kind of thinking that landed them in this place to begin with, and Maea breathed deep to try and settle the feeling. In through her nose, out through the mouth. Over and over, in Loren's meditation trick to gain control - over herself, her thoughts, the conversation - and it helped her ground herself enough to still sound calm when she spoke.
"I don't have any answers either yet," she reiterated. "A mutual friend of ours told me it was okay to not know what to do... so I tried to focus on othet things. Like the kind of options I had to choose from. Either... an open relation with you, or none at all."
Because that's where they had been when they left off. All Sunjata's terms, and all ones she hated.
"I decided, that I don't want to choose either. But... what if there was a third option? What if... we could go back to where we were when we stepped over the threshold of that house? When we were still an us, and you take the time you need to figure things out, and we both take things more slowly to look for answers. Where you are still trying, and I will be too, and where maybe... possibly... I would not hate the idea of sharing you.. If I could just be there too? I think... that would only be scary. Not something to be broken by."
She spoke steadily, but would hold up a shaky hand in case he tried to interrupt, asking to finish before he spoke again. Maea wanted to just get this out there before she lost courage again.
"Because, the thing is? You have not actually fucked anything up. All you did was ask for time, which is a very reasonable thing, all things considered. I'm the one who panicked and tried to force answers before there were any to be had."
Maea didn't look at him, just stared out to sea. Wondered if this thinking made her a naive fool.
"That's the kind of middle ground I can imagine. Where we both work on things, and both sacrifice a little. And if it works, it works, and if it doesn't... then that will be another conversation.
"That's... about as far as I've come in my thinking. And you don't have to answer anything either yet, just... Can I ask you to consider it, at least? Along with everything else..."
She closed her shaking hands, clutching the fabric of her skirts between fingers that felt cold and numb. Wondering if he would reject her thoughts outright. If it really was too late to take that step back and pick up where they had left off.
Lost in a world full of non-believers Searching for smoke in a still water pond
BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3
♦ Violence, magic, thievery is permitted with Maea at all times. DM me if you have any ideas ♦
He swallows hard with the tension of his words hitting her ears, the rebounding feeling of that hidden frustration from before. But it’s far more reserved, far less intense without the alcohol to spark the flame, without her pushing him around to get that volatile response. And with it, his exhaustion included — the pain in his side, the bruising that covers his body.
So the least he can do is listen to the options she lists out, frowning a small amount when it sounds so selfish in comparison — but he wonders if that’s there the problem was as well. Was he asking too much? Was it not so much a sacrifice on both their ends and only hers to make him happy? He doesn’t have the answers for that either.
So he stares at the ocean until she finishes what she has to say, before his head tilts a small amount and he flexes his hand a bit. “The problem isn’t that, really, though. The problem was that I need to get past Lusea.” He explains, flexing his hand again as his muscle feathers with tension in his jaw against the pain. “It’s not like I’m actively out here searching for someone else. I’m just trying to get her out.” He looks to her then, reaching forward with his good hand to try and pull her in front of him, using that same hand to lift her chin to look into those pale eyes.
“I will consider the option you laid out.” He tells her softly, voice a low rumble. “Again, I just need to get her out of there to make room.” He tries to convey the emotions in his eyes but they’re shadowed still by the pain of his wounds and the emotional baggage he’s holding right now. “Please don’t think I didn’t mean it when I said I love you.” She should know how hard it was for him to say it in the first place. Perhaps that’s where this was doomed from the start.
Fear. Overprotectiveness.
if i let go, would you hold on?
would we fly?
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.
Maea was terribly afraid of what he would say. But once Sunjata began to speak, the awful tension in her began to ease almost right away. Because what he said was so simple and yet sounded nothing at all like it had before. Nothing about living arrangements or relationship rules, only a simple need to get over a girl that wouldn't come back.
He reached for her, and she followed the gentle tug on her hand, let him guide her to stand in front of him, and raised her chin up, with gentle fingers that felt charged against her skin. He told Maea that he was not looking for someone else, and honestly? That's what she had been afraid of. That it really had been an issue of her not being enough, that he wanted to forget the same ways he had in the past. By diving into new beds, drinking himself half to death, beating himself black and blue... At least the two former didn't seem true this time.
And finally Loren's quiet suggestion that this wasn't about her made a little more sense.
She took the wrist of Sunjata's hand between her fingers, and gazed back at him, when he asked her not to doubt his love for her. Eyes shuddering at the shadows and pain in his eyes. The quiet surge of joy his reassurance brought her returned some light to her eyes, and her shoulders grew less stiff.
"I never doubted your love," she said softly. Only whether it was enough to keep him by her side. "Now I wonder how we got from 'getting over Lusea' to this 'take it or leave it' rearranging of everything...
"Can we please agree to never plan anything while drunk again?"
Her smile was weak and desperately amused, halfway between laughing and crying at this mess they made. Sunjata would consider her compromise... and he wasn't trying to replace her. That... oh Ludo, it was more hope than she had felt since they walked up the stairs to find the bedroom loft at the house.
Sighing softly, Maea let ger gaze drop, and found herself staring at his bandaged side. Frowned a little at how loose the bindings were.
"May I... retie those for you?" she asked, indicating the bandages he had tugged on.
Lost in a world full of non-believers Searching for smoke in a still water pond
BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3
♦ Violence, magic, thievery is permitted with Maea at all times. DM me if you have any ideas ♦
She takes his wrist and he watches as her eyes shudder with his quiet confession to her. And he sighs somewhat relieved when she tells him she’s never doubted it, having felt as though the past few days that she has — unsure of how to get around the feeling, at least until now.
Still, her question of not planning things while drunk does manage to quirk a small smirk along his face, reaching up with his bruised hand to rub against claw marks against his throat. “Yeah I think that’s a good idea.” He rumbles to her, offering a raised brow and some small amount of amusement to her.
Her offer of tying the bandages again has him lowering the bruised hand from his neck, considering her, wondering how she might feel when she sees the destruction beneath the shirt and the bandage. So he considers her for a moment, nodding eventually. “It’s pretty bad, they probably do need to be replaced.” He informs her at first, moving to remove his shirt in a way that won’t cause his wound to open again, though it proves to be difficult.
After a small amount of work, he manages to get the shirt off, left with a bandage that wraps around his torso. But he’s bruised along his throat and neck with a ring of claw markings, a large purple bruise to his shoulder, and beneath the bandage she’ll find the bruising continues, spread out from the wound that carves his side up, red and angry. Almost like the shark bites, but deeper, angrier, jagged rather than crescent shaped.
if i let go, would you hold on?
would we fly?
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.
His agreement, the quiet amusement, made her smile widen into a small grin. Squeezing his wrist gently before letting go, Maea waited while he removed the shirt. Quietly calling on Shii to help shed some light on the affair, she began to gently remove the bandage, frowning as she felt it crusted with dried blood, far from clean and fresh as it ought to have been. Soon enough, the little will-o-wisp came zipping, pulsing and bobbing in quiet exaltation at all the fun it'd had. It made a cocky loop around Sunjata's head, mock batting at the man's face in a half-threatening 'I know you, jerk' way, and then came to hover over Maea's shoulder.
She hissed at what she saw. The jagged, half-closed claw wounds in his side, the bruises littering Sunjata's neck, side, body... "This... have you cleaned this at all?" she asked him, not very good at concealing the grim worry in her voice. With tender fingers she touched the redness of the skin, searching for signs of heat, of pus, of infection setting in. "Do you feel warm, feverish? Any headaches, joint pain at all?" Maea was no expert on healing, but she knew enough to realize when something needed a healers touch, and this...
Taking the bandages, she summoned a ball of freshwater and stuffed the dirty bandages into it. Heating up the liquid until it was boiling, she set it spinning around itself and kept it up for a while, setting about to rinse Sunjata's wounds with gentle applications of more warm, clean water. It was all she could do, really, but better than nothing.
"You know... if you ever feel like talking about Lusea... I'd listen," she offered slowly, while working. "You have told me some things of your relation with her, but not really anything about her." She had always been rather intrigued by the woman, had asked herself whether they would have gotten along... anyone who could match Sunjata at his worst must be formidable indeed.
Lost in a world full of non-believers Searching for smoke in a still water pond
BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3
♦ Violence, magic, thievery is permitted with Maea at all times. DM me if you have any ideas ♦
She removes the bandage all while Shii flits about his head, a feat of which Sunjata can only close his eyes to the brightness of the will o wisp before it settles and he rolls his eyes. A slight wince is granted as Maea removes the bandage, questions him as to whether he’s cleaned the wound or not.
“I have. Often, even if it doesn’t look it.” A quiet response as he tilts his head and watches the way she uses her magic to clean the bandages. “Amun helped recently too.” A softer admission, keeping his eyes on the magic and not the woman that tends to him. But she pokes and prods and questions him whether or not he feels feverish and he shakes his head to that. “I feel fine.” He offers, gaze flitting to her. He has been seeing healers recently, they just hadn’t been quite equipped to handle a wound of that size.
He has been trying, however.
Her question of speaking of Lusea draws a raise of his brow, uncertain if now is the right time. If it might spark some hidden flurry of frustration within her, at not being the flame. It wouldn’t be the first time, really, that jealousy beyond the grave had affected those he’d found himself around. “Now?” He asks quietly, watching her face. The initial comment made it seem as though any time would suffice, but the latter? The latter is what confuses him.
if i let go, would you hold on?
would we fly?
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.
Her examination was as careful as she could manage, and it revealed none of the symptoms she had been worried about. Only red and swollen, then, aggravated by movement no doubt. "That's good, I'm glad," she said, with some relief as Sunjata said he felt fine. That, she doubted very much, but as long as he wasn't feverish it meant nothing was acutely amiss.
That Amun had helped him made the girl look up, surprised. "He did? I mean, I'm not surprised he would help you, but... well, I haven't talked to him in a bit.." Meaning, she'd had no chance to tattle to her 'brother' about this recent mess. "You ran into each other?" Maea looked curiously at Sunjata. Knew the two men didn't have much history, from what they'd both said.
When she deemed the wound clean as she could make it, she reached for the bandages. They too were as good as fresh, and with a thought the water was pulled from the cloth, leaving it warm and dry. Maea used her telekinesis to roll it up into a tight wad, and only then began to wrap it around Sunjata, her arms just barely able to reach all the way around him.
"If you want to," came the serene reply, when he hesitated. "Or it can wait until some other day. It's up to you." Glancing up at him, she met his gaze. "You don't have to at all, either, if you prefer not to. I just think it might help, for both of us. You get to remember her, and I might feel less..."
She hesitated, chewing her lip. Considered how to phrase this. "It's not really jealousy, but more... impatience, I think? She doesn't feel real to me, as I never met her. Which makes it hard for me to relate to how you feel, and understand how important she is to you. And I really want to undersand." Maea looked at him, quite serious.
Lost in a world full of non-believers Searching for smoke in a still water pond
BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3
♦ Violence, magic, thievery is permitted with Maea at all times. DM me if you have any ideas ♦
His gaze finds her face when she lifts her head up on the subject of Amun. “He did. Found me on the beach.” He says with a small amount of amusement before shaking his head lightly. “He came back to the house with me and helped clean it up too.” He lets this information settle a small amount before he winces with movement as she begins to wrap it around him.
So he focuses on the explanation she gives him, the reasons why. And somehow, it seems like it might have an opposite effect, that the way he would talk about her would be both in part nostalgic, both in love as well. But he supposed he can try, at the very least. So he nods and looks back out to the water while he considers it. “Her name means Light.” He explains softly at first, chewing on the inside of his cheek. “She was the Korofi Flame. Always burning, fierce, strong, surprisingly reserved, always sticking up for the underdog. She’d be there to watch you learn a lesson and then give you her own after.” There's a hint of a smile at that.
“Her father coordinated the rebellion and she was basically a field medic. Boxing was illegal in Korofi and so they covered it up with a bar, so she was a barkeep as well.” Hence the whole reason he’d gotten involved in bars in the first place. “I got knocked out in one of my first fights in the boxing ring. And I woke up on the table of the bar with her stitching me up, here —” He shows her, pointing to the small scar above his hip. “The first thing she told me was ‘I don’t trust you, Sunjata Senzaok.’”
if i let go, would you hold on?
would we fly?
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.
So. Amun had seen the house. Had ducked under vines of purple flowers to step onto the porch and wandered over threadbare carpets and dusty floors. Perhaps to stand within the kitchen, where Sunjata and her had exchanged more truths than either of them could really handle. Maea wasn't sure how she felt about it. Happy, sad, a little envious - she wanted to go back there too - and plenty grateful, that two of the people she loved most in this wretched world was getting along. "I see. Hope he didn't tease you too much..." Though the odds of that weren't the best...
As Sunjata began to talk about Lusea, Maea fell quiet. She kept her eyes on the task of wrapping the bandage, making sure it was not too tight but not so loose as to slide around either. Once the wrapping ran out, she tied it off and held a hand out in quiet request for his shirt. To help him get it back on, with as little pain as possible.
Once done... she just settled in to listen. Hands hanging limp by her sides, eyes moving from his face to the sea. Shii began to drift off towards the waves lapping the shore, and she watched it too. Saving her thoughts, her feelings for later.
This was something she needed to hear. Needed to face, and accept, and come to terms with. Because Lusea's name would always be a whisper at the back of Sunjata's mind... and if Maea couldn't live with that, then she had no business being by his side. It wouldn't be fair, to either of them.
Her mouth quirked slightly, as he repeated the comment Lusea had made. Clearly the woman had been more intelligent about that than Maea, on her first encounter with the man.
Lost in a world full of non-believers Searching for smoke in a still water pond
BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3
♦ Violence, magic, thievery is permitted with Maea at all times. DM me if you have any ideas ♦
“Not much, no.” He replies easily before he calms enough to speak of Lusea and lets her work, the bandages tightening on his side and the shirt eventually replaced as he hands it to her to help him slide it back on. Then, with nothing else, he finds himself flexing his hand a small amount, glancing to her occasionally to see how she reacts to this. The quirks of her lip do spark some amount of relief within him.
“I told her not many do. And then she told me to get the fuck off her table and stop bleeding all over it.” Which sounds a bit ironic based off of this current encounter. “Which was fair. I couldn’t even light my smoke, she had to do it. And then she stole it from me.” He shrugs a small amount with some amusement.
“Then, of course, me being the idiot I am… Well, she avoided me for the most part. So I did what I could just to talk to her. I got my ass kicked a lot just to end up on that table.” His gaze finds the sea again as Haai curls around his legs, resting her head along the sand and watching Shii. “And things were fine for awhile. She was fiery, saw through my ruse quickly. But she’d grown up in the Slums so she knew all the street tricks whereas I was just the noble boy, the arbiters son.” Needless to say, his attempts had never gotten far.
“I didn’t know at the time that she was the daughter of the rebellion. And most people tried not to deal with him. He had a habit of intimidating people, and one day I got the task of delivering something to him. I showed up, was definitely intimidated. And she shows up with a question for him only to curse him out for having me in their doorway.” A quiet huff at that, a shake of his head. “Things between her and I didn’t change for a few months. She’d always avoid me. Until my mother died.”
if i let go, would you hold on?
would we fly?
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.
It was the tale of a slow romance building over time. A caustic meeting, a spark of interest never quite stamped out... and Maea thought she could read that same interest in Lusea, as Sunjata clearly had felt. Because... why else avoid him, unless he stirred something within the Flame? Something the woman hadn't wanted to acknowledge, not feel, not look at too closely...
But perhaps that was just Maea's imagination speaking.
Listening with unflagging attention, as was her way, she absently set her mind to playing with the magics at her disposal. Like so much plucking of fingers at cloth and hair, she tugged strings of power to make rocks defy gravity, bent the ocean into shapes. Played out the scenes Sunjata told her about, with faceless miniatures. Boxers dancing in a ring, watery smoke rising from a lit cigarette... and feathers fluttering down into the sea from a liquid bird taking flight, when he spoke of his mother's death.
Because she had encouraged her son to be free. Because of inked feathers on the back, and a reputation for running with the wrong crowd.
Gently, Maea reached out a hand for him, brushed pale fingers lightly against the digits of his uninjured hand. Left it for Sunjata to decide whether he wanted to take it or not; she wouldn't mind if he preferred not to. Not this evening.
Lost in a world full of non-believers Searching for smoke in a still water pond
BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3
♦ Violence, magic, thievery is permitted with Maea at all times. DM me if you have any ideas ♦
