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 has had a surprise brewing for Melita ever since he started packing up the Guild things and clearing out his personal items from the VlamVloed. Only he hadn’t quite managed to pick a time for it to reveal it, not with how shifting Melita’s moods seemed to be when it came to him. So today, he sends Haai out to scout for the youth, inviting her to the house to hunt and perhaps finally show off what he’s been working on.
He waits at the porch, a bow in his hand — the one Deimos had made him — with arrows strapped along his back, because he certainly needs the practice and if he plans on trying to salvage some of it for food, he needs to not maim all of the meat on the creature.
It’s a bright day and he finds himself squinting against the pale sun, a quiet and heavy sigh slipping from him as he makes sure the string of the bow is set with the right amount of tension, watching the horizon line from the lighthouse to see when she arrives.
we were young, dumb, taking our chance and making romance and breaking our promises trying to be and failing miserably, but am i too late or hearts to your spades?
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.
Like some child possessed, the beast howls in my veins
Haai found her scouting out the sand, digging her toes into the dunes, rapaciously clawing at the swells and surf, intending to bend and break shells or callously wait for something to sink her teeth into. A wolf’s ambitions, even in the ring of her laughter as the griffin discovered her and Fangorn along the tides, lighthearted with the touches of the wilderness burning into her existence, her presence. She shifted long, lengthy strides, nearly inviting Haai to chase instead of cajole them back to Sunjata’s insistence; a play amidst the runes, the ruins, the beckoning cluster of anything and everything. They could’ve courted fire and disaster in the melee, in the bewitching rounds of giggles and torrents, but all good things had to come to an end, and by the time Haai had manage to convince her and the gourd, all graceful presence had left her.
Instead, she was a little spark and fury on the winds, windtossed mane and tresses emboldened and audacious, matching her gilded gaze as she set her sights upon her uncle. Her bow was nowhere in sight, the quiver on her back notched in promise and predilection, a series of dominions, dominations, and supremacies to showcase – the convictions of a hunt biting into her mind. Perhaps that was all she needed; an opportunity for the irreverence to be snatched and utilized, instead of biding her time along embankments and shores, waiting for the next wave to engulf, or set her alight.
A savage march instead then, a snicker on her mouth as she maneuvered, waved, a constant barrage of movement and motion. “Arbiter,” she called out, a mocking bow extended. “Ready?”
Haai, being… Herself, was more than ready to fully incorporate herself into the games that Melita chooses to play. But before long, the griffin is panting in the duller heat of the sunlight, guiding the way for Melita and Fangorn to meet at the house. As they begin to arrive, Sunjata’s still working on ensuring the tension of the bow is set – though his gaze lifts to watch as Melita and the companions arrive, a wide grin shot the honeybee youth’s way.
He steps around the porch with his own quiver and bow, blade in his boot, and everything else they might need to take the Ramphire down, when she waves and bounds closer, extending a mock bow that has him rolling his eyes – perhaps a bit exasperated. “Ready when you are.” He chimes to her, nearing her and reaching out to rest a hand on her shoulder in his own quiet greeting. “I thought we could go hunt some Ramphires and get it cleaned up and stocked for LongNight.” He pauses, head cocking to the side slightly. “Assuming you’re game for that.”
There’s a light grin that settles on his face, a predator’s excitement lingering beneath his skin at the prospect of their soon to be hunt.
we were young, dumb, taking our chance and making romance and breaking our promises trying to be and failing miserably, but am i too late or hearts to your spades?
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.
Like some child possessed, the beast howls in my veins
“I’m always ready,” a lift to her chin, the defiant little smile flickering and bounding over her mouth, the decree more than precise. She was fervent for anything resounding and reverberating in violent, tempestuous storms, quick and swift, certain and sure, convictions of violence brewing below the surface, eager to be called upon. It was fire and flames, storms and seas, brimming, overflowing, gestures to the roll of her shoulders, and the audacious lilt to her gaze. “Of course,” she nodded, hitching the quiver up along her back further, pulling the bow from her bracelet. Second nature, loved and adored, a precious armament she’d never be able to replicate – home in her hands, across her calloused palms.
The implications there, she returned to being a restless contortion of feral, fierce nature, only cycling back through his words after a moment. “What’s a Ramphire?” Not an animal she was familiar with; already accustomed to the mantas, to the Hels, to other things drifting in and amongst the sea. This name was foreign, unknown, causing the slightest wrinkle to her nose.
She really always was ready, and he’s not sure if it’s due to the upbringing she had or the trials in the rift rife with chaos and enemies in every shadow, but he gives her a toothy grin in response anyway as he comes around the edge of the porch and toward her. As she mentions she’s willing to help with all of that, he nods his head, beginning to pave the way to where he’d seen the herd of them depart last night. “A ramphire is like… a feathered bird goat thing.” He explains, trying to recollect on what it was like.
“Birdlike faces, ram horns, travel in herds. They like the garden that’s overgrown on the other side of the fence but they’re a bit wary of me and my panther form as of late.” He chuckles, giving her a relatively innocent smirk as if he can’t quite figure out why that is. “Lots of meat though, and the feathers are pretty. I think I heard some people use parts of it to make medicines or what not… So Nate might be able to benefit from it too.” Gods knew Nate didn’t need the creature for the food portion. He shrugs, turning his attention ahead along the path they take, winding through a few of the trees speckled here and there, the long grasses that come up to the back of his thigh. “Just treat it like a deer when you go to shoot at it.” He informs, grabbing an arrow to place idly on the string while they walk.
we were young, dumb, taking our chance and making romance and breaking our promises trying to be and failing miserably, but am i too late or hearts to your spades?
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.
Like some child possessed, the beast howls in my veins
“A feathered, bird, goat thing.” She repeated, her mind her brain, struggling to come up with the image. She certainly hadn’t seen anything like that before, even with all the sightings of bizarre flora and fauna – bird faces and ram horns aside. The fact that hunting it would prove some use, other than meat, extended a well-anointed nod, medicinal properties embedded somewhere between their weird configurations.
“Lead on then,” the youth exchanged, a smirk still there, forthright, half-menace, half-mischief, and a self-assured poise in her steps. Fangorn bounded behind her, a bit quieter due to the foretold necessities of felling these creatures, while Melita carefully chose an arrow from her quiver. No flames shot from this particular armament though; and she caught the briefest sizzle, the slightest crackle, a snapping, sparking sound on its flinty, gilded edges. The ruffian grin turned all the more daring, a promise, a conviction unraveling through her senses. “Sure.” She’d treat it like a deer. She’d treat it like anything else destined to and for oblivion.
He gives her an enthusiastic nod to that, a crooked grin crossing his face. He was just as surprised to see the creatures for the first time as he’s sure she will be based off of that description. But they’re wandering through the grasses and variety of trees now, bows at the ready with arrows prepared, the plan to shoot at it like it was a deer was an easy idea to go off of. He imagines it’ll make more sense when she sees one.
So the search continues, and Sunjata pushes away from the trail they take a bit to try and survey a bit wider of an area, seeing nothing in his current line of sight. Melita, however, will see the speckling of blue feathers, hidden among the shade of a tree as it grazes, only the one at the top of the hill that begins to descend toward the rest of the herd.
we were young, dumb, taking our chance and making romance and breaking our promises trying to be and failing miserably, but am i too late or hearts to your spades?
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.
Like some child possessed, the beast howls in my veins
Her feet, her strides, meandered quietly into the waving grass, the outstretch of trees. She knew better than to fling herself into the terrain now, to hone in the ebullience, the effervescence, the fervent twitches and pulsations in her blood, and merely to stalk, to savor, the glimpses of silence. The temptation in audacity still bolstered, still heightened, still rolled through her limbs, a surrounding storm, a pervading savagery – but she kept them contained, coiled, for the eventual rampage. Saved, placed aside, for the demonstration of ferocity.
The youth and her gourd meandered slightly away from her uncle, pausing every now and again to glimpse, peeking over stumps and fallen logs, around larger trunks of trees, over bounds of blades. It was her, instead of Fangorn, who saw and found them first, a speckling of blue, feathers and plumage, beneath boughs, rankling in shade, along a knoll. Crouching down lower, not intending to be caught, she sent the pumpkin towards Sunjata, where her companion could grumble and hiss quietly, inform him what she’d found. Then she tightened her bowstring.
It comes within Melita’s view, not running off when the young woman nears it and crouches lower – because it hasn’t quite noticed her approach yet. It’s feathered beaked head tears grass from the roots of the place it’s chosen to graze, ignorant of the quiet groan of Melita’s bowstring. Sunjata, meanwhile, sees nothing on his own trail though he remains prepared just in case. When Fangorn approaches and utters those quiet hisses, he nods, slinking through the grasses toward where Melita had embarked.
He finds her, easily enough, that shock of red hair among the normal beige of the dunes nearly impossible to miss. He crouches down as well, but not before getting a good look at it, tightening his bowstring as well as he settles beside Melita, keeping his height to an absolute minimum. “That’s one of them.” He tells her quietly as he can while the creature continues to graze.
“Wanna take the first shot?” A mischievous grin is shot her way, prepping his bow to take his shot after she does.
we were young, dumb, taking our chance and making romance and breaking our promises trying to be and failing miserably, but am i too late or hearts to your spades?
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.
Like some child possessed, the beast howls in my veins
She studied and perused, soft breaths floating from her lungs, a rendering of brows furrowed, gaze narrowed, blood pulsing in the wicked contortions of a hunt. Though she had no Attuned connections or abilities, the girl was only too alive and well to understand the notions of carnivore’s instinct; been turned over too many other times in her devilish, demolishing discord to not feel the rush of insurgency. Then Sunjata’s presence confirmed the animal before them was what they sought; and she remained quiet, muted, methodical (for once) in her approach.
Only a swift nod indicated her pursuits. And then, of course, everything else thereafter.
The girl continued in her crouch, raising the bow quietly, lining up her sights, her vision, listening to the crackle of the energy, the electricity, flowing through the arrow. Tension taught, calloused fingers pressed and arm at the ready, she released the munition, permitting the snapping, sparking armaments to sizzle and seethe through the air, attempting to land amidst the animal’s frame.
He informs her, pulling the string of his bow back and waiting for her to take the lead. And from the corner of his eye he can spot her prepare herself, the string pulling back, remaining in her crouch, the bow raising quietly as she lines up her sights. He can see the brief spark of electricity slipping from her arrow, and immediately Sunjata’s interested in that alone, knowing she’d had fire arrows but electric ones too? Regardless, he could ask her about them later.
She shoots, and the arrow arcs, and it captures the unsuspecting ramphire in the side – diving in deep as the creature staggers and attempts to run. And this is where Sunjata shoots, aiming his arrow for the creature’s neck to try and stagger it down some more. His arrow arcs through the air as well – not as fancy, no electricity (which had helped in the staggering of the creature as the electricity bore through it) but it hits just as intended as well – sinking in deep to the creature’s neck.
With both punctures, Sunjata’s already drawing another arrow as the ramphire begins to stagger once more, tripping over its own hooves, it’s horned head shaking as it tries to rid itself of the arrow in its neck, before it crumples to the ground.
we were young, dumb, taking our chance and making romance and breaking our promises trying to be and failing miserably, but am i too late or hearts to your spades?
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.
Like some child possessed, the beast howls in my veins
It scorched, it sparked, it seared; not like the burning conflagrations at her back too. It reminded her of so many things – the radiance of Ampere’s powers, undulating and piercing in the time of her prestige, and then when she was gone and returned again against her will. When the same puncturing depths rampaged down Melita’s back as she dove to protect Clem, as the world clambered and seethed because lives taken were suddenly reclaimed.
It felt like a resurgence, a claim to her own feral, wild, wickedness, to days where she’d lost her innocence, and now permitted it to be destroyed in her precision, in her wake, in her mercurial debauchery. Revenge, justice, taking away the Rift’s control over her life – no longer the scars from there, but here, and how she could stretch and snag and court the incantations, enchantments, and rapacious edges to her too.
It sliced into the creature, and so did Sunjata’s, and together they seemed to crackle and sneer, the hunted beast sinking into the earth. She rose without a second thought, marching forward, closing in the gap, thinking of some amount of mercy, taking one more electric arrow, notching it onto her bow, and immediately releasing the taut string – intentions for its skull, its cranium, to lodge and end its misery.
The creature staggers, falls in quiet pants as it struggles and tries to grip the ground from the pain of the arrows that puncture its sides. There’s labored breathing from its chest, where Melita’s arrow continues to electrify it within, legs jerking a small amount while Melita moves in for the final kill. The arrow, aimed directly at the creatures skull, does as is aimed, and ends up sinking in deep and putting the creature out of its pain once and for all.
Sunjata, however, begins to put away his bow and arrow now that they’ve gotten the creature they’d sought, and pulls some rope from the belt loop of his pants, taking it to tie its legs together and pull the arrows out – at least his own, unsure if grabbing onto Melita’s arrows might shock him with the electricity that sparkles and sizzles from the flesh.
Once he has the legs tied up, he attaches another piece to be hauled back – the creature’s relatively large, and it would take both of them to get back to the house. Or, perhaps, it might take attaching it to his nyala shift to tug along. “Nice job.” He offers, giving her a wide grin. “So, we can either both bring it back or you can tie it onto me in my bull shift and we can take it back. Whichever you choose.” Because he doesn’t really care either way – he just knows that if he stays shifted to lug the thing back, that he wouldn’t be able to talk with Melita while he did so.
we were young, dumb, taking our chance and making romance and breaking our promises trying to be and failing miserably, but am i too late or hearts to your spades?
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.
Like some child possessed, the beast howls in my veins
Downed, felled, and subsequently demolished, her gaze was absent of any feeling but satisfaction in the hunt. The animal would be utilized for all its properties, skin, flesh, bone, and meat, nothing wasted, nothing under-utilized. Perhaps she’d become numb to the transgressions of taking lives, when desperation in youth had led to unholy slaughter, sedition, and savagery; the need to protect overriding anything else. Now it was resources, refinement in her stalking, in her abilities, honing them in; gratified with the electric arrows’ capacity, listening as the crackle ceased, grabbing hold of the embedded munitions, and wiping them off.
Sunjata tied the legs together, easier to haul when the creature’s limbs wouldn’t be flailing around anywhere, but coincidentally, she hadn’t thought about transportation. She didn’t often snag animals too large to carry on her own, or usually brought a sled, something able to haul the carcasses home.
She grinned at his compliment while still deep in thought. “Thank you,” then her eyes went back and forth. “I can help you carry it,” she opted and decided, not wanting him to have to bring the ramphire back all on his own; wouldn’t mind applying her strength. The girl could regard his further directions, uncertain which would be the simpler method of bringing it out of the woods and grass.
