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 smiled at her gently as she mimicked the movements with the upgrade to her prosthetic, and he quirked a brow at her. No, the prosthetic wasn’t the surprise he was talking about. The much more movable prosthetic was merely a tool that she would find useful for the surprise he had in store.
Her thumb moved over his jaw, and he felt the slow touch of her lips over his own. Kalt swore he could live off of her touch alone. As she pulled away from him, still keeping the close proximity, he flashed her a crooked grin at what she said. ’I missed you.’ He had missed her too, desperately. She knew that, though; he hadn’t exactly kept that a secret from her!
“I know,” he said, kissing her again before she had the chance to hit him. Kalt pulled away from her, his hands resting over her thighs. “The finger wasn’t the surprise, though. Come here.” He kept his hearing absently on the sounds his daughter was making. As he had learned the hard way, a quiet toddler meant she was doing something she wasn’t supposed to be doing.
Kalt would lead Ashetta from the kitchen into the sitting room, where there was something large under a white sheet near the window. He flashed her a grin and walked over to it, pulling the sheet away to reveal a stunning – if he did say so himself – piano. It was a shining black with pristine black and white keys, and the body of it had hand-carved, golden accents. A black stool with a golden seat stood right in front of the peddles. On the wood over the center keys, there was a carved SW in black so it didn’t stand out. However, an artist always signs their work.
He smirked at the woman and raised his brow, running his finger over the black wood. ”Been working on it for a little while, but finished it this morning. Perfectly tuned and everything. One of my masterpieces.” He swept his hand toward it for her to take a look.
'I know.' Ashe wrinkled her nose and scoffed, but he quickly joined their lips again before she could react further. She sighed and smiled against his lips, and she tilted her head at his words when he pulled away. "What are you getting at silver?" She moved her hand again, and it was hard to believe she was even wearing a prosthetic for how effortlessly it moved. She smoothly followed after him on silent feet, out of the kitchen and into the sitting room. Pale gold spilled from the windows and to the floor, and the silence that blanketed everything felt easy between them - silence only punctuated by the soft chatter of a small voice from the other room. Ashe's feet were light, walking on the balls on her toes. She was reluctant to disturb the stillness of the room, unsure of where she belonged here. It was with a glance at Kalt as he moved towards something large and shrouded that she made herself take a slow breath. She furrowed her brow at his grin, and then with a sharp snap of that fabric and the billow of it into the air, Ashe beheld what lay beneath... and everything in her head went utterly silent.
The pianoforte gleamed where the sunlight hit it, sleek and black, and so out of place in the world of ruin and despair. Gold accents flared against the glossy dark of the wood, and ivory keys lay stark beneath the fall board. Ashe couldn't move at first, her chest tightening painfully. She had learned to play the piano as a part of her tutoring in the Guild, had mastered it in her time in the south. But...
The assassin moved warily towards the instrument as though it might swallow her whole, wide eyes flickering across it. She glanced up at Kalt as she reached it, brushing her hand over the smooth surface of the fallboard, drifting up to its frame. "You built this," she said quietly. It didn't seem to entirely register. When was the last time she'd even heard the notes of a pianoforte? Not since... not since she had last played. She looked back at the keys, and her fingers drifted towards them. And that had been -
Her hand froze before it touched the gleaming ivory. She hadn't played since Jasper's funeral. Ashe pulled her lower lip into her teeth, as she looked at the piano with something that might have been longing. Was this why Kalt had changed her finger? She had been afraid to try and play again without her pinky even if she had had access to one. "It's beautiful," she said roughly. Even the bench was elegant and lavish - a taste shared by the Assassin in Blur and Silver Wing. Her fingers curled back from where the hovered over the keys, and she looked up at Kalt and a smile ghosted over her lips. "I haven't even seen one in a year at least.."
The man remained where he stood, a small smile on his face as he watched her reaction to the instrument. Ashetta seemed almost frozen at first, but he didn’t make any motion to spur her on, allowing her to take the step on her own.
A quick huff of a laugh escaped through his nose, as his arms folded over his chest. ”I did,” he said to the acknowledgement of his statement. He grinned, remaining beside his creation. Kalt’s eyes, however, remained on Ashe, her every movement, her every subtle expression which always was able to tell him more of what she was thinking than her words did. His gaze flicked to where she avoided touching the keys.
When she said how long it had been since she had played, he nodded his head slowly and approached her, his hand moving down her arm as he walked behind her, his arm pulling her into him for just a moment. ”I could get my guitar and make it like old times.” He grinned, pulling her hair behind her ear. ”You don’t have to play now. Just have the option now. And now,” he took her hand with the prosthetic, ”the ability.”
He stepped away then, watching back towards the kitchen. He stuck a thin skewer into the bread and it came out, telling Kalt that it wasn’t ready. Well, that would change. Patience when it came to menial tasks wasn’t exactly a strong suit for the assassin, which certainly made his magic handy. He made the bread finish cooking to perfection with the flick of his hand, then drew the dish off of the fire.
Kalt brought out a knife and stuck his head out of the kitchen. ”Theea!” He called, walking back into the kitchen. ”You can come too, Ashe. Food’s done.” He easily sliced through the bread in exact proportions.
12-31-2018, 03:28 AM (This post was last modified: 12-31-2018, 03:30 AM by Ashetta.)
Ashe let out a soft breath as Kalt's hand grazed down her arm and coaxed her back into him, and she let her head fall back against him. Just like old times. A smile flickered over her lips as his hand pulled her hair away from her face, and she gazed down at the gleaming ivory. Rare stars in the endless blackness that had been their lives, when niether of them could sleep late at night. She nodded softly to him, and she couldn't help the measure of relief that uncoiled in her chest. She wasn't sure she could make herself play yet, if the notes even lived in her anymore.
As Kalt moved away and back to the kitchen, Ashe moved the fingers of her left hand, flexing and stretchng and marvelling at the way the metal pinky moved. She thought back to the old apartment in Northaven, all the holes in the walls where she had thrown her daggers in frustration when she tried to use them with her left hand . She had gotten so used to that ridged and stiff digit of gears and metal bars and pulleys, she hardly had thought about it anymore. Now her hand felt light, her fingers free, and she smirked to herself. Time to start training with her left hand again. And... she glanced down at the piano again. Maybe...
Her eyes flashed up at the sound of Kalt calling for Theea from the kitchen, and her too. She followed after the sounds of little feet thumping into the other room, and she arrived just as the little dark haired girl ran and grabbed onto the pant leg of Silver Wing, pushing up to the tips of her toes to peer over the counter at the bread he was slicing. Ashe moved towards him and behind him, reaching her arm under his arm and around the front of him. With a blindingly quick movement, she plucked a slice from the bread pan. The heat of the bread didn't phase her as she danced away from him before he could stop her for it.
When Kalt turned to look, Ashe would be standing with a mouth full of pumpkin bread and half of the slice in the hands of a grinning Theea - the bread already cooled with a little magical purge of its heat. The little one was grinning with a barely contained giggle. "Totally could use more sugar," Ashe teased again with a nod as she swallowed the bread. She was already eyeing the loaf again, however.
He smiled at Theea and glanced at Ashetta when she joined them, but his eyes moved back to the bread with the knife moving seamlessly through it. Without warning, a slender hand snatched a piece from the pan and disappeared, and Kalt stopped for a moment, looking back at Ashe with tight lips. He almost scolded her playfully for her impatience, but taking some of the food before offered was much better than the countless extravagant midnight snacks she had ruined purposely for him in the Guild.
Silver Wing turned back to the pumpkin bread and took a piece for himself. He sat on the kitchen table, and as soon as he did so, Theea scurried over, pulling herself onto a chair, then climbing onto the table to sit with him. He always told her to eat over the table, so he couldn’t blame her for copying the way he did it. It was more fun than chairs anyway.
He flashed another grin at Ashe’s comment, masked by a glare. ”More sugar, my ass,” he huffed, rolling his eyes as he took a bite of the obnoxiously sweet bread.
