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!
With Deepfrost coming closer and closer, Delphine... well, her choices of where to go felt limited to Halo. There was one person who had been nice to her, and a variety of Launceleyns that she could try to convince to work with her and her magic. She really wanted to learn; she'd had so many magics back home, such power... And now, she had the bare minimum. Like a young child, who needed to learn control.
She was not dressed for the cold. Even more ill-dressed than last time. Her cheeks were flushed pink from the cold, her fingers turning a grey-blue color. Absolutely underdressed, and crying, even as she clutched a bag that looked as if it held an assortment of items; everything she held dear, she moved to knock on the door, tripping.
The assortment of items dispersed from the bag, all over the porch, and the young woman sat on the ground, sobbing.
He sprinkled me in pixie dust and told me to believe,
Believe in him and believe in me,
Together we will fly away in a cloud of green,
To your beautiful destiny.
Noah's home was warm and full of deep, earthy, delicious smells of dinner preparation. The fire roared in the hearth, and the tall man stood carving away at a luxere back strap. It was fresh from what he had helped Weaver kill for her small quest. He had harvested the straps and hung the rest to age before he carved it for storage.
Outside, the loud noise made Noah jump. Startled, he instinctively held up the knife he had been slicing away the luxere's silver skin with. Eyes narrowed as he waited for another crash, another boom, and of figures breaking down his door. While it was rare, breaking and entering and thievery was not unheard of as Deepfrost drew closer. When none of that came, Noah closed the distance to his front door. His body tensed and ready to right, he stopped and listened. Outside, faint sobbing echoed. He opened the door, and looked down at a lump of a woman.
"Delphine!" He realized, and without further thought, dropped his knife and scooped her up. He did not grab any of her possessions, but he swarmed her. His strong arms cradled her and brought her inside, using his foot to close the door tightly behind them. "Delphine, what happened?" He asked, setting her down before the fire. He hurried to his room and grabbed a blanket. He wrapped her up in and knelt before her, his large rough hands running over her arms in an attempt to warm her up.
Delphine curled into the man, as he carried her out of the cold. The fire was in front of her, a blanket around her, and she gasped at the warmth, shuddering. Her gaze was low, and softly she whispered, "I dropped my bag..." she sniffled, rubbing her hands against the blanket, pins, and needles shooting up her arms. Her words made out like this was the worst thing in the world that had happened to her, and another sob forces her to stop speaking.
It is likely, that because he is so near to her, Noah may notice the smell of smoke wafting from her person, see a redness to her eyes. Another futile attempt to forget. Ludo had told her to learn to love her memories, but all her memories brought her was sadness and guilt. She curled her arms around her knees, and stared at Noah, though she certainly was not seeing him.
If her belongings were retrieved, Noah would find a little pouch of rolled herbs, a variety of herbs to get the high she thought would help her. "I'm not... good at anything," she murmurs, her voice withering into a silence.
He sprinkled me in pixie dust and told me to believe,
Believe in him and believe in me,
Together we will fly away in a cloud of green,
To your beautiful destiny.
He held her, his large hands continuing to run up and down her arms in an attempt to warm her. The coming Deepfrost brought colder and colder nights, and Delphine was not dressed in a way that protected her body from the cold. He needed to get her warm. He tucked the blanket tighter around her, his face contorted with worry and concern. "Delphine, what happened?" He pressed again, voice stern.
As she spoke he looked back to the door. Getting up from before her he went to retrieve her bag and belongings. He stepped into the cold without pulling on a coat, knowing he would be out there for but a moment. He gathered everything, even his own knife he had dropped upon realizing who was on his doorstep. Returning to the shelter of his house, with a shudder, Noah placed all of Delphine's things on the table without inspecting them. He did not care about them--at least, not yet.
His mind raced with what had happened to the woman, blood coursing through his veins with fire and a readiness to act. "Delphine," He said, softer. He knelt down again, putting his hands on both of her shoulders and looking into her eyes. "Did someone hurt you? Delphine, tell me who it was and I--I'll--just tell me." He didn't know what he would do, but it sure as hell would not be lawful. His stomach twisted, waiting for her answer.
Delphine shivered, whimpering quietly as he disappeared, and then reappeared. He repeated his question, and she shook her head. "I... My babies... we were at... and now they're... and it took a second... and..." She stammered, leaning to bury her face against his shoulder, sobbing.
"And I can't forget," she whispered, the most coherant part of everything she'd just tried to say. "I can't... nothing helps me. Noah, nothing helps." She sniffled softly, voice muffled by the fact her face was buried in his shoulder.
He sprinkled me in pixie dust and told me to believe,
Believe in him and believe in me,
Together we will fly away in a cloud of green,
To your beautiful destiny.
The anger that surged through Noah's body was only amplified by the fact that the woman could not get out a coherent sentence. He wrapped his arms around her as she curled in towards him, resting her head in the crevice of his muscled shoulder. He placed on hand on the back of her head, trying to listen as best as he could and decipher what she was trying to tell him. "Delphine...what happened to the girls? Who did this? Wha--" He stopped himself, feeling the anger bubble and boil in his gut and threaten to let loose.
His heart pounded against his chest as he held her, and he was sure she would be able to hear it. Whatever had happened to her -- to her children -- was horrible, that much he knew. While she may not be the most emotionally stable person in Caido, the crumpled woman on his floor before his fire's hearth was not the same woman who had sat here before, eating stew with her twins. Noah could feel the muscles tense in his back, and every fiber in him screamed at him and told him to go look for the girls, but he waited, giving Delphine the chance to speak, to explain what was going on.
Delphine exhaled quietly, trying to latch onto something to focus herself, his heartbeat, his breathing. Something. Eventually, she'd stopped crying, still pressed into his form as she tried to decipher her thoughts.
After a long while, she whispered, "I was asking the gods to take my memories, my... memories of my homeland. I couldn't... couldn't l-leave the girls, they're so..." Little was the word she was searching for, and as she pushed herself away from Noah, her voice numb, dull, her eyes matched.
I wasn't... I wasn't clear." She whispered, fingers twisting into her shirt, anxiously. "I wasn't... They weren't clear either..." She sniffled, shaking her head.
"I did it... I didn't... didn't mean... but..." She stammered.
He sprinkled me in pixie dust and told me to believe,
Believe in him and believe in me,
Together we will fly away in a cloud of green,
To your beautiful destiny.
He did not want to let go of her until she stopped crying. He needed her to calm down so he could understand the words that she said. Between the sobs and the high (or drunk) she was experiencing, Noah could not piece together why she was so upset. All he could think was that someone had hurt her, had hurt the girls, and that Noah needed to hunt them down and make them....pay.
"Delphine," He said her name softly as she pulled away from him. Instinctively, he lifted his hand and brushed some of her hair out of her face. Her eyes were so bloodshot it was unmistakable, but he did not really know if it was from the crying or from the intoxicants she had consumed. His face tightened and hardened as she spoke, his body instantly prickling at the thought of the gods being behind this. Noah could not fight them...or, he could, but he knew he would die.
Confusion wracked his brain as the rage and instant kill-bot feelings started to subside frrom him. "What...happened...to...the...girls?" He asked, slowly, carefully, his voice barely above a whisper, but still stern and ice cold with worry.
Delphine sniffled, murmuring quietly, "It told me... it said Mort would welcome them." She averted her gaze, staring at the floor, trembling. "I didn't deserve them," she whispered, her fingers slowly tangling into her hair. Ludo had told her that; she did not deserve them, and she was inclined to believe that statement.
"It told... me to love my memories, and it took them and..." She was pulling her hair now, "I can't forget, I can't. It won't... nothing helps. I want... I wanted to forget home. I just wanted to forget." She sniffled, staring at the man.
"I don't think I can love my memories. I don't... even love myself." She admits, and it's the clearest thing she's said yet.
He sprinkled me in pixie dust and told me to believe,
Believe in him and believe in me,
Together we will fly away in a cloud of green,
To your beautiful destiny.
He leaned back from her as she spoke, trying to give her some space to breathe and gather her thoughts. He rested his elbows on his knees, focusing on her. His gut twisted and his skin felt cold. He wasn't truly sure he wanted to hear what had happened, now that the gods were involved. Men, Noah could deal with. He was big and strong and had trained enough to pack a serious punch. But the gods? What could he do when it came to their involvement in their lives? Good, bad, or indifferent, Noah was powerless.
The woman mumbled on, her sobbing seeming to cease for now. When she said Mort, Noah felt his heart sink. For having only surface level knowledge of the gods, and not a lot of knowledge about their heralds, Noah still knew who Mort was. At the funerals of his parents the name was mentioned over and over again, people offering their condolences to the Olson boys by saying that their souls were in Mort's hands.
Noah moved away from Delphine. He stood and walked over to the table, resting on it. His skin felt prickly, and his insides felt like they were churning. It was a feeling similar to the feeling he felt after he killed the cannibal, only a few days prior. "You let them kill your children."
Delphine shivered in his absence, curling her arms around herself as she watched him leave her. He spoke, and all she heard was disappointment.
Bellamy would have been just as disappointed if not more. "It wasn't what I wanted," she whispered, digging her fingers into her arms. Still stiff, sore, still cold. "I asked... I asked it to take my memories, not my babies. It's... my fau-fault." She murmured, staring at the floor in front of her.
"I just wanted to forget," she mumbled, sitting back hard, and rolling onto her side. "They... were all that I had." She realized, now, that her children had meant more to her than she'd thought. She might not have known them well, or been more than a cordial acquaitance to them, but she had loved them. She had... needed them.
After a moment, she pushed herself to her feet, stiffly moving towards her bag. She reached for one of the plushies, Bryony's plushie, curling her arm around the stuffed toy, before she reached for a little brown pouch. And she began to dump the herbs out, desperate for another high, desperate to try to forget.
Mostly she wanted to forget the disappointment she'd heard in his voice.
He sprinkled me in pixie dust and told me to believe,
Believe in him and believe in me,
Together we will fly away in a cloud of green,
To your beautiful destiny.
His stomach tightened and he felt like he was going to vomit. The sensation was so quick to come over him these days, since his incident with Korbin in Whitebrim. He pressed his palms into the table, swallowing down the saliva that pooled in his mouth. Ice prickled along his skin, the hair on the back of his neck standing up, as the fire within his breast threatened to burst forth. She let her children die. In her selfishness, she let the god of death take them away.
Noah had killed a man, an exile, a criminal.
Delphine had killed children, innocent, fragile.
He did not notice her moving until she was standing next to him. He watched her rummage through her bag out of the corner of his eye. He clenched his jaw, the muscles in his forearms tightening as he watched her nestle the stuffed animal into herself. When she lifted the brown bag, however, and a mass of dried herbs fell from it, Noah let the fire spill forth from his chest. With a guttural, rough grunt-like yell left his throat. "No!" He smacked the herbs off the table, sending them flying. With his other hand, he grabbed her bag and all it had within. "You don't get to forget!" His hand that had just swiped her drugs off the table curled, a thick, calloused finger pointing straight at her face. "you don't get to forget what you did, Delphine. You don't--you--no--we don't get to forget."
He understands. The desire to take away the memories of the murder he had committed sat deep in his heart. But it wasn't right. It wasn't the way. They couldn't forget what they had done--each of them, killers in their own right.
He threw the herbs on the floor, almost shouting at her, and the fact that he was angry was... it was comforting. Bellamy had never gotten angry, he was always calm, quiet, silent. He'd always waited for her to breakdown and come to him, when she'd punished herself, hurt herself in an attempt to appease her own anxiety. But Noah...
Noah was hurting too. Hazel eyes stared at his pointing finger, the accusation enough to make her shudder, and she whispered, "That's... That's what I was trying to tell you. I can't forget. There-there's never a day where I'm not thinking about them, about what happened, what I did... Never a moment where I don't see..."
But then, his words shift. 'We don't get to forget,' and she understands. He's hurt somebody too. "I couldn't bury them." The words are soft, and she shivered where she stood, staring at the scattered herbs on the ground. "I fled our home, and... everything in that bag is everything to my name. I'm not good at anything, I--I can't even practice medicine, or heal like I used too. I'm not worth anything. I don't know why it didn't just... take me instead."
He sprinkled me in pixie dust and told me to believe,
Believe in him and believe in me,
Together we will fly away in a cloud of green,
To your beautiful destiny.
Noah couldn't remember the last time he yelled. Truly yelled. He was no stranger to arguments, but the let the fiery rein of anger take hold of him was not something he did often, nor enjoyed. This, now, with his finger pointed in Delphine's face and his other hand clutching everything she owned, felt awful. He gripped the bag tighter, not worried at all about breaking anything inside. He did, too. He felt the small vials of whatever drug the blonde woman had chosen to bring her shatter in his hand. He gritted his teeth, narrowed eyes burning down on her. "Take some god damn responsibility." He nearly hissed, a muscle in his forehead twitching from the tensed, stone-like hardening of his face.
"They were your children, Delphine. Your children. Your job was to protect them. Teach them. Instead, you let them die. You brought them to the shrine of a god." Noah still did not know if all the gods were good or bad, but something in him screamed that she should have known better. "You don't get to forget. You don't get to waste yourself away. You don't get to sink into oblivion. You do as you were told, by that god, so that at the very least their lives--their deaths--weren't in vain."
Noah threw the bag on the table again. "You get every drug out of there and you destroy it. Right. Now."
