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!
The last season had been one of the most challenging times in Bastien's life. In his previous world, he thought he had experienced hardship, but now the death of his wife and newly-close daughter in law coming so close together...he felt a gap in his soul, as if he had not had it for the last months. It ached, gnawed at him even in the happiest of moments.
When he woke up on a late-Flowerbirth morning, feeling so low it was as if he had awoken beneath the ground, Bastien made himself determined to have a good day. He had spent the morning with Azrael, playing and teaching them how to dance (a rather futile effort at the moment, but fun anyway); when they went for a nap at the neighbours for the afternoon, he found himself staring at their discarded, half taken apart toys.
He had said he wanted Deimos to make some new ones for them, and the man could probably do with levity too. As much as Bastien wasn't sure he'd be appreciated for delivering it, he bundled up the toys in a blanket and walked to the barracks, cheerfully waving at those he passed in an effort to up his own mood.
Getting to the barracks, he dipped his head in the door, hoping to locate the General. "Deimos, are you here? I was hoping I could bother you for a small favour. A rather pleasant one, actually."
Each season seemed to bring about a re-established reign of suffering; a prolonged agony of death, damnation, and everything else gnarled and belligerent in between. There was no foreshadowed end in sight either – the once prevalent time of regrowth and rebirth deciding to leave the path behind, and churn it over into an abysmal rift. Sometimes numbing, sometimes clawing, sometimes ripping, sometimes tearing, sometimes a haunting, poignant multitude in the dead of night, when nothing escaped the inability to slumber without chasing down one of the terrible figments. Remembering. Recalling. Renaming sins and plights and scars and mistakes.
The constant flaws turned and churned into a bone-wearing fatigue that ground its way into his skull, and stayed there, drifting ominously. He’d already spent the latter part of the morning beating everything in the training yard into submission, then subsequently repairing the damaged targets and dummies. At some point he’d meandered into the armory, spending time cleaning, putting blades back in their designated areas, some mindless fathoms requiring none of his inward wounds or blatant lacerations, striving to understand how to move forward, become better, when everything slashed and undermined, when it hurt to merely exist.
He only raised his head from sharpening a sword, placing it back upon a rack, when the door opened. The General tilted his cranium and thought nothing of it – plenty came and went through the aperture to gain access; perhaps he’d be left to his own devices, to brood in back corners, in the threading darkness consuming –
And then he heard Bastien’s voice calling for him. For a favor.
A long, deep sigh contorted its way through his lungs, and he rested his head back against a wall. How easy would it be to hide? To pretend he wasn’t here? So the world couldn’t find him, grind him into a million pieces?
And would that make things any easier?
He shifted off the wall, wandering down the hallway, until he reached the parlor with the artist inside. For a moment, he didn’t bother to hide his exhausted, pained countenance, and then recalled, shifting it back to some token nonchalance; the mask very worn, very tired, very frayed. “Bastien,” a nod of greeting, wondering if the man even knew that another part of Rexanna was gone. “What can I do for you?”
Bastien thought he heard, if he strained his ears, a sigh; he stayed determinedly chipper, even as he recognised his own sorrow in the tone of Deimos' breath, could see the way his shoulders slumped and heart sank without looking because he felt the same. When the General entered, he gave him a smile, but it was not the bright grin he had been planning. More of a grim, close-lipped smile, the sort people gave each other when there was little comfort to be made with words.
Still, he hoped to make something cheerful out of this whole mess. Just for once. Just for an hour, he wanted to have a nice time.
"Well, Deimos. I don't know if you've seen Azrael lately, but they have grown - Demi God children seem to, awfully quickly." Bastien did allow himself to sigh a little bit at that, but less with sorrow and more with a kind of fond resigned nature; as a father it was both exciting to see his child progress so quickly and depressing to know he'd lose time with them. "They are a young child now, and have developed a proclivity for taking things apart...and putting them back together. Most of their toys, and rather a lot of my supplies."
With a fonder, happier smile, he looked past Deimos to the room he had come from, imagining it to be a wonderful workshop full of anything he could wish. "I was hoping you might help me design a toy for them. A nicer task, after the fortunes we've had of late, hm?" A small, necessary, acknowledgement - this was a balm, a desperate attempt to wrangle back some normality.
Grim for grim then, stifling down the suffering because everyone else was worn around the fringes too, waiting to retreat back to their boundaries, their shackles, their tethers. Deimos didn’t ask what kept Bastien afloat – the man had seemed chipper regardless of circumstances, and had a child to maintain, to raise, look after; a portion of Rexanna still left in the world. Perhaps responsibility made him remain tied more to the earth, than drowning under the weight of it, like the General was doing – gnarling his duties in knots over the back of his shoulders, down the length of his spine, and waiting for the noose to tighten just a hair more.
The mention of Azrael made him tilt his head, not expecting the subject matter at all. Children hadn’t been something steadily in his gaze – appreciated, noticed, for the potential – but usually not sought. Kiada had been a welcome exception, a bold, audacious little thing in Helovia, something honed and ready and eager while the rest of the world lingered on wisps of listlessness. Was Azrael the same way, being of Rexanna’s blood and soul?
His heart hurt, and he looked around the room, before settling back upon Bastien, striving to pay attention to where the request was going. He blinked in surprise when the answer and explanation finally came around; since he mostly finessed weaponry, magical adornments, or some other necessity when it was required. Though he’d once made them secret gifts, blankets and a…rattle shaped like a dagger, he hadn’t ever gained the proclivity, wherewithal, or general knowledge of amusements honed. “I can try,” he mustered though, a firm nod, as he maneuvered near the table, and withdrew some parchment leftover from earlier defense designs and designations. “Can you draw what you had in mind?”
Deimos considered his suggestion, obviously surprised: it was clear from looking around the room (and at Deimos himself) that the man was not a toymaker, so when he accepted the challenge Bastien broke out into a large grin, clapping his hands together. "Wonderful! Thank you. I promise you Azrael will appreciate it greatly, as will I." Following to the workstation, he gladly picked up a pencil to sketch out an idea.
After a moment's thought, he drew three creatures: A Luxere, a Dragon and a Unicorn, each with removable legs and accessories, held on by screws, levers, catches, different ways to click and pull each around; something that would make a recognisable thing when together but could be easily taken apart. *
"Do you think this could be possible? If you have any better ideas, do tell me." He asked, pushing the parchment out towards Deimos. "I do not know how much experience you have with children."
---
* Like a wooden, old timey fantasy version of this.
He sat at the table and waited, between maps of surrounding areas, of defensive mechanisms, ornaments and adornments of design meant to protect or destroy – and eventually, nestled amongst them, were sketches and outlines of toys. Quiet, silent, hushed as he looked them over, tilting his head to study and discern, removable schisms and contortions, familiar shapes of animals and creatures they’d seen hundreds of times. Rendered likenesses, created to be taken apart, and put back together. To sharpen and hone the mind? Was this amusing for children?
The beast couldn’t recall if he’d ever done the same – much more apt to picking up a wooden blade and immediately hitting friends with it, coming home bruised and beaten and laughing.
“I should be able to,” went along with a brusque nod, a furrowing of his brows in concentration. He placed his hands upon the table, then lifted them slightly, allowing the building of the gilded contortions to come to life – figments of the first, a little luxere draped in a vibrant, elegant blue. But instead of creating it in whole, they were coordinated in parts, sliding together with handles, meant to be hastened away and back again.
And while he worked, he wondered, over the makings of dreams, over the pondering of seasons gone by. “Not much. Kiada was the exception.” The inklings of a smile began to curl over his mouth, before he remembered she was gone, and then it too vanished.
A subject change then, eyes not lifting from the toy. “Have you thought about a memorial for Rex?”
Deimos took his sketches and considered them seriously, as if he were looking at a schematic for a weapon or defensive contraption; it made Bastien smile, seeing him take on this task with the same militaristic precision he imagined Deimos might apply to anything else. He watched closely as from his fingers blocks of wood and parts of the sketch began to take form, impressively quickly.
"Ah...You knew Kiada when she was younger, then? I cannot say I had the honour of seeing her grow up." His voice was calm, but sombre, heavy with the knowledge of her death; if Deimos wished to speak of her, Bastien would listen. In some ways, he thought it might help to alleviate his own guilt about never having known her that well.
He wasn't expecting Rexanna's name to surface so quickly as well and thought over the question for a moment. "..I have, but...I do not think I could face making it yet. I was thinking, perhaps when Azrael is a little older and can understand what it is we're doing..." Bastien shrugged, well aware that was mostly an excuse to prolong the wait. "Do you want to be involved, when I do?"
The luxere continued to come to life in varying degrees, and eventually the slots formed and fit within together, designed to be taken away, piece by piece, segment by segment, until amusements had been wrought and then tethered to something else. He considered the little thing in his hands, before placing it off to the side, maneuvering it down the table for Bastien to inspect.
The notions of a dragon might ordinarily make him snarl, for all the experiences immersed from the flying lizards. Instead of harking back to the ivory beast laden in Halo caves, he opted for a smaller cretin, much like companions, beginning on segments of the tail, and then wings, as Bastien spoke. “I did, for a little while.” Before Rexanna went away and took her children with her, before he died and perished, only to find her here, again, after so many years. “She was always very bold. Reminded me of fire.” The small smile returned as his eyes went away from the artist, and back to the dragonling proportions. “Was never going to let the world stop her from anything.” Save for now; when it’d all been a bit too much.
The inquiry over Rexanna’s memorial seemed to take a different track – Deimos had presumed Bastien would already have it in the works. The comprehension of why he waited made sense though; and perhaps it would always feel raw, choking, gnawing, fresh, stinging, all-consuming. There was the child to consider too. He didn’t sigh, but lodged it within his chest, a rugged nod following on the inquiry, gaze settling back on the Ascended. “Please.” Then his eyes fell again, back to the second toy, another note ending, quieter. “If you will allow it.”
Bastien took the little luxere model into his hands, turning it over and fiddling with the moving parts, a smile spreading across his face. "This is beautiful! Oh, Azrael will love these; you are talented, Deimos. Have you ever considered using your magical skill for sculpture?" If he could make things as intricate as the toys in mere moments, Bastien could hardly imagine what beauty the man could create with some time and creativity.
The small dragon was adorable; Bastien, who had never seen one of the companion dragon's larger counterparts, did wonder why Deimos didn't follow his sketch exactly this time, but didn't question it. Artistic licence was something he always encouraged. "Bold...that does not surprise me, given what I knew of her and certainly not with what her mother was like." His smile turned fond and sad. "The...second child that Rexanna had, along with Kiada. Did you ever meet him?"
There were few he wanted to allow into his bubble of grief, but Deimos, who had proven his devotion and love for Rexanna many times, was one of them. "Of course. Is there...do you have any ideas, for anything to include within it?"
He looked up from his machinations and work at the barrage of compliments, tempted to smother them down and refuse them. But at the Ascended’s smile, at the notion that this was something good that he hadn’t managed to ruin, the tiniest indent of a grin formed within the crook of his mouth. “I have not.” His renderings of artistic work had commonly been in blood and in battle, streaks of fallen ichor and canvases of skirmishes an oeuvre, an opus, to vehemence and violence. Here, where creation magic simply unfurled with whatever his mind concocted, it was far more simplistic. But no, he hadn’t meandered down into reaches of creative components. He sketched and etched in armor, dabbled in maps, or gave little tokens to friends.
The monolith handed over the dragonling next, before corresponding to the unicorn, using his own as a muse. The dark gray hues blended neatly into the obsidian mane, the glowing, unnaturally blue horn, and the proud, noble disposition along features, carving along hooves while Bastien spoke of Kiada. “Kianzo. He was part of our kingdom. Took after his father.” And the tones might have suggested this wasn’t anything to be impressed with; since the Reaper’s discussions with Tembovu had never gone smoothly.
He wasn’t sure if he expected the acceptance, or merely thought himself too much at fault, within the blame, to be permitted in the making of the memorial. The surprise might’ve settled itself along the widening of his eyes, and then he went back to the unicorn toy. “Some symbolic things.” Suns. Eclipses. Cloaks. Daggers. Representations of who and what she’d been. “Could we put a similar one for Kiada nearby?” As much as the Harpy might not have liked the notion; but she couldn’t be with her mother right now – so perhaps more in thought than in spirits and souls.
Bastien, taking Deimos' smile as a good sign, raised his eyebrows and leaned a little closer, jokingly but sincere asking: "Well, if you ever wanted to come along to my Sanctuary and try out those skills...?" He was sure that whatever the man made it would be a beautiful edition to the guild, and perhaps it would help him unwind, something it seemed that the General sorely needed.
With equal delight to the Luxere he took the Dragon, again turning it over and trying out the movements, shaking his head softly in disbelief that Deimos had been hiding these talents the entire time. Still, he could tell that his stoic friend was not used to compliments, so he did not pour any more upon him for the moment. "Ah. Yes, Rexanna told me of the father...I did not get the impression he was well liked."
Finding it a little odd that Deimos seemed so surprised (yes, he had been mad immediately after the death, but Bastien had never been one for grudges), he nodded. "Symbolic of what? You must tell me more; I would love to know your ideas." As for Kiada, he tilted his head side to side, considering it. "Of course we could, but I must admit to not knowing her too well - it might be best if you led on that particular project."
There was the gnarled knot of uncertainty clenching around his chest again. Used to military precision and might, of predicting exactly where an opponent would reach, would strive, orchestrations of movement, or even incantations, the beast believed himself wholly unfamiliar with the concept of artistry. Rendering something from his mind, with representations of those he cherished, was simplistic enough. Most of the time the beacons came to life out of protection, devotion, or love. Coming over to the Artist’s Sanctuary and actually attempting something of such calibers felt daunting, and completely out of his comfort zone.
But wasn’t that something he could be doing? Instead of solidifying into stone, waiting for the next onslaught, the next torment? Learning? Attempting to become better? Would it be a decent-enough distraction? “I can try.” If the words sounded hesitant, they were echoes of foreign attributes and endeavors.
While he worked on the makeshift Zuriel, incorporating figments of cloven hooves and long columns for legs, all to be taken apart and put back together again, the beast snorted, a distinct rumble of laughter beginning in his chest. “Not an impressive individual.” Beyond size wise – the man had even towered over Deimos, but he’d never found Tembovu as anything striking or awe-inspiring. Being a fool shouldn’t be a defining character trait. He paused in his ministrations, considering, presiding over a comment lurking behind his teeth, before shrugging and permitting it to clamber along the barracks. “You were very good for Rexanna. She needed someone like you.” To help her remember, realize, she was worthy, valued.
He swallowed down the discomfort, furrowing his brows into concentrated efforts as he continued along the rest of the unicorn’s body, creating a whimsical, leonine tail that could be clipped on and off. “What she was. Like suns, or eclipses, cloaks, daggers. Powerful. Crafty. Capable.” He could embed them into something, or make them stand out, glow, embellish, any features Bastien had already concocted.
Kiada’s inclusion made his expression soften, even if he didn’t dare glance upwards. “That would be fine.” He’d be happy to do it – even in the knowledge that she wouldn’t be physically present.
Hearing Deimos agree to try filled Bastien with glee; he had never imagined he might convince the soldier to come to his Artist's Sanctuary, to try out some self expression. "Oh, I excitedly await it, my friend. I am sure given some freedom, you will make beautiful work - perhaps even a gift for your wife, as a first project?" It was often a good way to motivate someone, to give them their first ideas, to frame it as a present for someone they loved.
Not an impressive individual was certainly a way to put it, the phrasing making Bastien smile. "I must admit I got a little mixed up...was this the one who was a prince with wings, or was that another unsavoury character?" He asked, eager to find out more about Rexanna's past and thinking that it might be nice for Deimos to chat about memories.
Not expecting a compliment and not from this environment especially, he nodded and let out a sadder laugh. "Thank you. I loved her...I still do love her, more than the stars and the moon and anything else. This world, my coming to it, has two benefits: firstly that I could meet her, and secondly that I can be sure I will see her again." No more of the uncertainty of his past life, where Heaven had been a tool for the clergy to manipulate it's people.
It was interesting how they all saw different sides to one person. "Cloaks and daggers...ha. We can certainly put all those things in it. Do you have a location in mind? I could host both in the Sanctuary, but I don't want it to seem as if I am trying to lay claim to those memorials; they will be for all who knew them."
Suddenly, the palpable excitement from the Ascended drained him of any notions, and he thought about backpedaling, skirting out of the issue, and never bringing it up again. The second statement physically hurt, and at the clenching of his hands, he broke off a portion of a hoof, and had to pulse more fabrications and parameters into it to repair before Bastien noticed. “I doubt she would enjoy it. Or want it,” mumbled quietly, sinking down into his fingers so they shook, before he took another breath. All the other things he’d ever done or made for her, all the love, all the shelter, all the sanctuaries, hadn’t kept her near.
Hadn’t kept anyone – they still disappeared, died, floated off into the ethers.
The General swallowed, tried to bring his thoughts back to something less melancholy, less rooted in self-loathing. He managed another snort as Bastien tried to recall which facets belonged to which character – an easy thing to mess up and distinguish when there’d been such a host of them. “No. This one was the elephant-like beast.”
The artist’s perspective on Rexanna, on the way regrets didn’t seem to hasten, didn’t seem to dawn, pierced over his mind, and he attempted concentration once more on the figure in his palms, adhering to one last coat of dark, dark gray, before offering it for examination. Is that what he should’ve been doing instead? Relishing all the good, instead of the gnarled pain breaking through his chest, his ribs, his bones? He didn’t know. He felt like he knew absolutely nothing.
As to where to place these memorials, these odes and opuses to lives well-lived, he hadn’t thought of it – piercing eyes flickering over to the barrack windows. “Did she have a favorite spot?”
