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!
05-05-2020, 01:44 PM (This post was last modified: 05-10-2020, 12:59 AM by Jigano.)
LongNight was only a few short months away, and with it the need for all most people to stay safe inside. It was a time for quiet activities, cautious pursuits, and silent hobbies. Fear was a constant undercurrent throughout the night, sleep interrupted by scratching and tapping at shutters and doors and the voices that sometimes hissed and threatened, sometimes sweetly coaxed and cajoled in familiar tones from just beyond the threshold.
Distraction was needed, diversions from thought of what lurked outside the door, and books were an excellent resource in the opinion of the Provost of the Loreseekers. Fantastical tales of heroic knights and dastardly villains, romances to make hearts (and other anatomical regions) throb, spine-tingling mysteries, and historical accounts of ancient drama from various worlds. Simpler tales, too, for those barely literate or using the time to learn, or for children needing something to keep them quiet.
Jigano had posted a notice requesting delvers to assist the Guild in pulling books from the shelves, and waited for the volunteers in the lecture area of the first floor.
This is a Loreseekers Guild-helping PQ for non-Loreseekers in order to fulfil the SE requirement! Loreseekers can join, but please wait 48 hours to give others a chance to fill the slots first :)
Rexanna had already hinted he had enough on his plate, enough burdens on his shoulders with forthcoming tasks and foreboding potentials.
So he ignored that entirely today.
A portion of his movements towards the Loreseekers was merely a trade-off in duties and responsibilities. Jigano had assisted in the Artisan’s contortions, so Deimos would do the same for the Sage. If he admitted any mild, scholarly curiosity towards the books in question, he didn’t mention it.
He wandered into the midst of the hall; not a frequent visitor despite Amalia’s association with it. The last event he’d participated in, besides any Fiat Lux pre-festivities (and trauma), had been when they’d gone into the caves along the Fangs, only to discover dead bodies. He presumed, perhaps foolishly, there wouldn’t be any ancient cadavers resurfacing here.
The Sword arrived with his brawn, his might, his strength, his fortitude, and any underhanded, dastardly cunning required – a nod towards the bard as he approached. “Ready to help,” followed in deep, rumbling tones, while his eyes scanned, while his mind pondered.
Even if Wessex isn’t going to stay the week in the Ground, she might as well help out a bit here and there as promised. Oh, they hadn’t requested any particular aid, so she assumes everything else is under control. And part of her wants to be a bit spiteful, but that would only serve to underscore certain opinions. Unless… unless there’s a way to do both.
Knowing full well she isn’t who Jigano is looking for, Wessex nevertheless shows up at the requested day and time, sidling casually up to Deimos with a nod. Her arms cross as she looks at the various books, wondering if any still existed from her teenage years. “Yep,” comes the agreement - in that she’s ready to help - before she spies a familiar title and heads to it with a chuckle to herself.
Why, yes. Wessex had once read fierce romance novels. Don’t look so surprised.
you see, i take the parts that i remember and stitch them back together
Really, Nate is only in the grounds to keep Sunjata company. He'd been planning on getting underfoothelping with the packing at the VlamVloed, and had decided, last minute, to wiggle out of the job and wander the grounds instead. There were a few tasks he wanted to take care of, short, easy things, and before long he was wandering aimlessly, looking for something to do to kill some time.
Wessex catches his eye, disappearing into the Atheneum, and if nothing else she should be good for a conversation, however short it might be. So he dips after her, stepping into the building and stumbling on... something. She isn't alone in the big building, had come to help, though with what he had no idea. Not one to be caught out though, Nate just smiles, and steps beside his fellow ascended (kind of), ready to help with whatever. What are we helping with? He asks Wessex mentally, wondering what he should be prepared for.
05-10-2020, 01:40 AM (This post was last modified: 05-12-2020, 04:55 PM by Jigano.)
Deimos was welcomed with a grateful - though not surprised - smile, and a rueful nod of recognition for favors traded and endeavors undertaken as a team more often than not. They were often found enmeshed in various helpful machinations together, and their history was rich in enmity as well as amity. Bridges burned and mended, torched and rebuilt from the ashes had given the bard a hard-won respect for the General, comfortable in the Sword's presence and glad of his assistance. "Thanks for coming," he offered, holding back further unnecessary words while he waited to see who else would arrive.
And with one blond pixie cut, Jigano found all the joy sucked out of what should have been a comfortingly familiar and simple task. Wessex sauntered in and his smile faded to carefully neutral lines as he arched a brow at her in silent question as to what she was doing answering a request from his Guild... but he had never denied the Atheneum as neutral territory, or made attempts to desecrate the Shrine within it, however much its presence galled him. If she wanted to gather books, he wouldn't stop her, but he didn't have to like it, blue eyes turned to frozen mirrors as he locked his temper down hard.
The last to enter, the mysterious Nate , was relatively unknown to him. A face he might have seen around a few times, but without a name to put with it, and he tilted his head curiously... until the lanky man went to join Wessex's side, making his allegiances clear enough.
Well, soonest begun, soonest gotten over with. Taking a breath to soothe the internally ruffled feathers, he gave the gathered trio a sharp nod. "Thank you for coming. I know we're all busy right now, and I hoped many hands would make this go faster. I'd like to pull a selection of books from the shelves to entertain people during LongNight. Something quiet to do to give them reason to stay inside and far from the doors." A bare tilt of the head to Wessex, who had tried to keep the Temple crew safe last year. Give or take some folks in the Rathskeller and a stray Sparkbird feather that even Jigano had to admit wasn't her fault. "The plan is to each pick a section and find a good selection of books from it. Between six to a dozen should do. Try to get a variety of reading levels if you can, some for children or those who are still learning as well as lengthier fare." Not everyone who struggled to read in the Grounds was a child, but LongNight might be a good time to work on that skill, or so the Provost hoped.
The Romance section was nearby, as luck would have it. It was large, with many shelves associated with it, though the further back ones didn't get quite as much light. The books were arranged haphazardly, as if often pulled down for perusal or borrowing and returned without care to title, author, or even language, and there were quite a number of other tomes mixed in so that books would need to be checked carefully for both genre and readibility in the common tongue.
The Mystery section was the farthest away, cloaked in deep shadows near the back of the building. The books were sparser there, and even from a distance many seemed to be in poor shape. A few moths fluttered about in stray beams of light filtering down between the floorboards of the partial floor above, adding an air of forgotten, genteel ruin to the section.
The Non-fiction section was closest to the previously collapsed wall, and some damage still lingered among the shelves and books there, dust piled high and mildew a real concern on some of the leather-bound journals and diaries. Still, there were many newer books as well, deposited there presumably by Outlander hands (or some other agency?) and only closer examination would show how much was salvageable, much less of interest.
The Fiction section sprawled, stretching tendrils and offshoots into most of the other sections as it bled together with Mystery and Romance in particular. Any attempt to catalogue those books into more cohesive sub-genres other than romance and mystery had long since fallen by the wayside. It had the most diversity, but also the most ground to cover, the shelves often stacked tightly enough that retrieving a book without damaging it or its neighbors would be difficult.
There are four sections to choose from since I overextended myself last time and no posting order! Please pick your genre, but don't collect your books just yet; more details will be revealed as you get closer to your sections. Jigano will take the one that's left over.
Deimos maintained his perfected semblance and oeuvre of absolute reticence as more assistance arrived. If he was surprised, bewildered, or distracted by Wessex’s appearance, he indicated nothing, proffering a nod of respect that was always indicated and extended between warriors. There was no side-glance to Jigano, understanding only a slight version of their fraught, treacherous history, and only the lightest breath held, watching, waiting, for something to dissolve, to erupt, to pool across in venues of chaos.
Then there was another, and he granted a nod too – a stranger, but seemingly in proximity with Wessex. In the end, it’d be nothing more than a shrug, not delving or crawling into any particular landmines.
Rather than stoking, instigating, or casting fires, the Sword listened to the instructions: the tasks seemingly simple enough, renderings of entertainment for LongNight (capable of comprehending why; when he often wanted to climb up the walls or pace the floors in utter restlessness). The beast committed the notions to his mind, gaze already running over the sections, pondering over reading levels, and once Jigano gave them the go-ahead, he headed towards the designated Mystery area – fixated and fixtured to shadowy ruins.
you see, i take the parts that i remember and stitch them back together
Thankfully, there's no need to wait for Wessex to answer him, the silver haired man speaking up as soon as he'd arrived, describing the task Nate had walked into the middle of. At least picking books out sounded easy, a low effort way to help out with Longnight, since he was no longer doing anything else in the Grounds. An easy nod followed the instructions, Nate wandering off as the instructions were finished.
Nate had personally never been one for fiction, romantic or otherwise, so it only made sense that he drifted towards the non fiction section. It looked a mess, the books somehow swollen with damp and caked with dust all at once, and the faint scent of mildew reaching Nate, making him wrinkle his nose. Bright eyes roamed over the shelves, scanning to see what looked appropriate, so he had an idea of what to grab before he touched anything.
No, Jigano hadn’t made any attempt to try and claim the Atheneum, perhaps because he knew the shitstorm that would erupt should he try to do so. It was the Grounder’s (the Natural’s, if you want to get down to semantics) long before he decided to put his Guild there. And they can both imagine the kind of reaction he might elicit should he try and do anything to The Voice’s shrine. He’d had one warning, after all. The second likely wouldn’t be a warning.
You know what’s funny? Wessex has never thought to try and desecrate an Old God’s shrine. Never wanted to. But maybe that’s the difference between the Wraith and the Guildmaster - hell, between the followers of each group of Gods themselves; existence versus destruction. Ah, but more musings on that later.
She’s about to answer Nate when Jigano steps up to explain what they’re doing, and she finds it amusing that the man who can do so much and seems to be everywhere at once needs help collecting books. Recalling her teenage predilections towards Romance (and nighttime excursions, the secret, furtive grindings of horny kids and clumsy fingers), Wessex chuckles to herself and takes the Romance section, wondering which titles still exist. As she heads towards the small ‘area’ designated for said books, she shoots a thought to Nate. Surprised to see you in the Ground. But kinda love that two Ascended here must bug the shit out of Jigano.
A quiet bunch, everyone moved off to their chosen section with a minimum of conversation, which suited the bard just fine. If he was surprised by anyone’s choices he didn’t show it, focused on his own broad section and the challenge to come, of picking out books that others would be interested in reading at LongNight.
Of course, when is a PQ ever so simple? It was Deimos, heading back towards the shadows of the mystery section who would disturb the first bat. What was a bat doing in the Atheneum, you ask? A ginger Ascended who shall go unnamed had the well-intentioned but perhaps poorly-thought-out idea to bring one in to eat the moths and insects that were drawn to the books. But bats are social creatures, and one bat finds a way to lead her friends and siblings to the new hunting ground, and then they lead others and before you know it there’s a proper colony of Hummingbats living in the shadowed corners and shelves which rarely get disturbed.
At least, until today.
As Deimos slipped beneath the overhanging walkway above his chosen section, that bat woke humming alarm to her fellows, and as they began to drop and flutter about others were disturbed as well, some swirling around the General while others split off in confused groups, darting towards Jigano, Wessex, and Nate, not intentionally trying to impede the humans but panicked and sweeping through the rows of shelves in small clouds of frightened, flapping bodies, with all the problems that come from flying beasties.
Perhaps because he was closest to the first cry of alarm, Deimos would find himself the unintended target of the most guano dropped in the bats’s flight. Fewer of the bats veered into the romance section, and Wessex was nimble enough to avoid the resulting mess, but Nate was not so lucky literally in the non-fiction area. Jigano was mostly missed in the fiction section, only a few stragglers finding him amidst the many stacks.
Still, it left something of a conundrum – and a mess - not to mention a distraction for anyone else trying to use the Atheneum. ”Try and get them outside,” the Provost raised his voice to call, using his Beastmaster ability to try and shoo his nearest handful towards the doors.
Oh no! A colony of hummingbats is loose within the Atheneum and making a ruckus! Please help clear them out before they guano up the books too badly!
He likely should’ve known better this would be more than gathering books. The flurry of wings amidst the shadows was the only alert he’d receive, before a swarm and swirl of them rapaciously hung around his head. He shook his cranium, hands and arms nearly rising to fend off their approach, before he realized there were far easier solutions. The guano landing on his shoulders didn’t necessarily bother him; clothes could be washed, mended, and he’d had probably had far worse things clinging to fabric from war days.
So he breathed, tucking away the incessant rise to other incantations brewing, brooding, and brimming just below the skin, and attempted to utilize the foundation of Attuned pragmatics. The Beastmaster configurations pulsing and pervading through his clutches, his frame, his figure, was sent towards the winged creatures, intending to force them out the doors.
you see, i take the parts that i remember and stitch them back together
Of course it was bats, again. Nate recognizes the squeaking, the flap of leathery wings before the creatures even come into view, and despite his best attempts, it seems like he hadn't learned anything from his last encounter. One arm flails, trying to keep them away, while the other one is dedicated to keeping his head, his hair shielded. Maybe it helps against the wings, but that's as far as his protection goes.
The call to shoo the creatures outside was met with a rough sneer, though it was only obvious to Nate. If only it were as easy as that. In a huff, he shrugged out of his jacket, holding it aloft in a kind of makeshift wall, and tried to corral the bats towards the door, where someone more effective at this than him could take over for the last stretch outside. This was going to be the end of his helping for a while. Nate was utterly sick of bats already.
Perusing the well-worn covers of the books sucks her in until Jigano raises the alarm that something is wrong; she’s able to easily dodge the bats and whatever guano may come splashing down in the area, but when she’s asked to help get them out - there’s really nothing she can do. No Beastmaster ability, and they’d surely frown (and get caught up in) a biopulse. So instead, the Wraith jogs over to the doors to make sure they’re open. They’re not (and why would they be, in the middle of Deepfrost? Wind, snow, cold - none of it should be in the Atheneum) So to make sure the bats can actually exit when compelled, she flings them open and remains in the doorway, watching the rest of them try to shoo the pests out. The books can wait.
05-20-2020, 01:34 AM (This post was last modified: 05-20-2020, 01:38 AM by Jigano.)
There were far worse creatures to run into than bats, though this particular colony was quite the nuisance! Luckily (literally) the assembled group had the right combination of rolls skills to tackle the problem.
Deimos 's and Jigano’s combined Beastmaster abilities were efficiently effective, gathering the stragglers around the edges of the flock and preventing any rebels from zipping off into another hiding place. The General’s command was fought by several of the little bats, but those that escaped his call were caught in Jigano’s compulsion, and there were others that fell prey to Deimos’s will. The teamwork of the two men was in full evidence in this task, as in so many before it.
Perhaps because of his previous experience with the little beasts, it was Nate who was the most successful, his bat-wrangling past coming through with shining colors. And what skill it was! The Ascended doctor would find that he had corralled several bats with his coat, leaders of the little colony perhaps, for whatever the reason many of the other bats followed in his wake, dipping and swirling close to his head and arms but never quite getting caught.
Wessex received the award for Best Assist, responding with swift common sense and decisive action to open the doors and given the rest a target to aim for with their various abilities and coats. The doors tried to stick for a moment, ice and cold resisting her initial push, but thanks to her impressive strength the snow that had blown against them gave way and Nate was able to lead the colony outside. With Deimos and Jigano holding firm about compelling the bats away, the colony was safely removed with a minimum of damage within.
The Provost leaned against a shelf as the doors were shut once more, smiling ruefully around at the little crew – yes, even Wessex, though it was a shade cooler – and gave Nate a deep nod of gratitude for the pivotal role he’d played. ”Well done, all of you, and my thanks. Hopefully the rest of this task will go more smoothly. Give a shout if you find anything else amiss.” It wasn’t like a little more noise would matter after the batnado, at this point.
With the bats out of the way the team could return to their respective sections. Some guano would need to be cleaned up at some point, but for the moment things seemed peaceful.
More so for some than others.
Back in the Mystery section, Deimos would find shelves that had few books to chose from. Upon closer inspection, many were missing pages or half-eaten from the back, leaving spines to sit deceptively on the shelf. It would seem the section had, at some point, suffered a bad infestation of paper wasps. Thankfully they were long since gone, but their ravages had left exceedingly few books to chose from. His roving eye might catch a solitary book on a shelf on the back wall, however, that looked oddly untouched compared to the sunken carcasses of its neighbors...
Ah, love! Or at least, erotica that spanned from well-written to purple prose (among other things). Wessex had chosen her section well, for she had no shortage of choices to pick from. There was an awful lot of cobwebs in the area though, since the last time she had browsed its shelves. Not between the stacks, but within the shelves themselves. An inordinate amount of cobwebs, in fact. The first book dislodged would reveal not simply webs, but a sticky nest spanning the fore edge...
And an angry passel of spiders the size of the demigod's thumb skittering out along the length of the shelf, stirred to motion and heading towards the woman at top speed to protest the disturbance.
Nate was finally free of bats, but now that he had a chance to search the Nonfiction section in peace he would find the books a struggle to decipher. Many were written by Outlanders in incomprehensible languages. Finding any that could be read in the common tongue would be a challenge of patience and Endurance...
Jigano's sprawling Fiction section was plagued with its own problems, as he found found a combination of Nate's dilemma and a rodent infestation in the center of his stacks that needed dealing with.
Congrats on getting rid of the bats! Unfortunately the Atheneum is a Deepfrost haven to even more critters that have been causing problems, and many of the books are written in strange, unreadable languages D:
you see, i take the parts that i remember and stitch them back together
These bats, in stark comparison to the ones back in Torchline, in the boxing ring, are blessedly easy to work with, after the initial shock. Maybe he'd picked up some skills, or something like that, maybe he'd just gotten lucky. Whatever the case though, the creatures are easily led to the outdoors, Wessex thankfully stepping in to open the doors, a crucial step that had somehow slipped his mind, Perhaps he'd gotten too used to open windows and doors, to not closing the inside off from a chill outside.
With the first crisis solved, Nate returns to his section. Haphazard and messy as it is, he doesn't feel the least bit bad pulling books out by the handful to be flicked through and sorted, new piles beginning to grow around him. One for books too damaged too bother with, one for rejects, and one for the books he'd present to the Provost. It seems for every book he stumbles upon that might be appropriate, he has to dig through twenty incomprehensible tomes, the piles of rejects nearly as tall as he is. He was not a patient person, and the longer he searched through pages of nonsense, the more frustrated he got, digging through the piles of books to try and find something.
