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!
don't pull me, don't pull me down from the ceiling
Bastien had woken up feeling odd, but given his low mood at the moment, he had initially put it down to grief and ignored it; tiredness was unusual for an Ascended but it wasn't impossible he was merely emotionally exhausted, he found himself thirsty for blood, but he supposed it had been a while since he'd been at a shrine. For the morning he had been able to excuse it enough to get along, help Azrael up and begin painting in the studio, but as noon arrived he was beginning to find he had trouble standing.
Laying down on a couch by the window (he found that despite knowing he shouldn't, the light heat coming through the curtains was attractive to him) he tried to close his eyes, letting out a groaned breath as waves of something not unlike nausea came over him. For a while Bastien rode it out, laying there quietly with a frown on his face; every so often he heard Pittore's nails as the gremlin ran about, Azrael's giggles from somewhere in the house...then he could have sworn he heard a whisper.
Faint, but definitely there. Despite the way it made the world spin, he lifted himself up on the couch, staring at the door. Open, it was empty, but there it was again, the whisper that he couldn't make out. "Hello?" He asked, unable to get up to check it out. "Who's there? Speak louder."
Amun stumbled towards the Artist's Sanctuary. It was only a short distance between his studio and the Sanctuary, but it seemed to have taken forever. In fact, he felt like he'd taken several wrong turns.
Eventually, though, it came into view. Staggering towards it, he slumped against the wall closest to the door. Staring at the door for a while, he raised his hand to knock. It took him a few attempts to hit an actual rhythm as opposed to random knocks.
Then he realized the door was already open. Moving forward, he practically fell into the room, groaning and clutching his head. Zhanshi, who'd been trailing along behind him, entered into the room. Seeing Pittore, the landshark made a beeline for the other companion. "I didn't say anything," the potter rasped.
don't pull me, don't pull me down from the ceiling
Pittore noticed the actual people at the door sooner than Bastien did and immediately ran away from the advancing landshark, scuttering up shelves in an effort to make some distance, apparently not eager to make friends with Amun's companion.
At the louder, real voice and sound of his companions panicked, clicking nails on the shelf, Bastien sat up, holding his head and frowning as he leaned to look at the door. Seeing Amun he began to smile, but found it made him feel somehow worse. "Ah, Amun...I am sorry. I am having a...bad day, hm? I feel most odd." Rubbing his eyes and leaning back again into the couch, Bastien tried to centre himself, pressing his feet hard down into the ground.
"What can I do for you? If it involves a lot of travel I fear I may have to refuse."
Pittore would unfortunately discover that height and distance would not prove a deterrent to Zhanshi. Without any trouble, the landshark launched himself out of tunnel he'd chewed in the floor of the Artist's Sanctuary. Swimming through the air, he circled the gremlin. As the potter's companion flew, he bit down on the air.
Amun, though, didn't see any of this. Having collapsed onto his knees, he still held his hands. "Why would I need...what? What do I need..." Voice trailing off, he groaned.
Then he stilled, that unnatural still of the Ascended. Lifting just his head, he stared directly at Bastien. "There is something I need." The potter licked his lips. "Two things. But you can't give me either." He staggered to his feet and started moving towards the nearest easel.
don't pull me, don't pull me down from the ceiling
That the horrible shark that had invaded their home was able to fly clearly distressed Pittore, who let out a series of high pitched shrieks and clicks as he jumped off the shelves and ran, as quickly as his little legs would go, into Bastien's lap. Bastien, not quick enough to see what had happened, frowned but held his companion anyway, stroking his head comfortingly.
"I don't know - what do you need? Oh..." Watching Amun on the floor, Bastien was clearly concerned, but not in the state himself to do much about the situation. He forced himself to concentrate as Amun seemed to make the effort to do the same for him, but what was said only confused him further; Bastien frowned, tried to make his brain work, his fingers massaging his temples.
"What...are the things? Perhaps I can help. I don't know if you are in a state to be painting.." He mentioned, seeing Amun go towards the easel, but then shrugged and leaned back. "But maybe art would be good for the soul."
Zhanshi, not deterred by Pittore's reaction, followed the gremlin to Bastien. When the landshark reached the head of the Artist's Sanctuary, the potter's companion circled in the air around the man. Then Zhanshi dropped into Bastien's lap as well.
Although Amun watched, he said nothing. He only spoke when the other man did. "I need things that you can't give me. Let me show you." Stopping for a moment he turned to look at the head of the Artist's Sanctuary. Meeting the other man's gaze, the potter smiled.
Then he resumed his forward march. Eventually he reached an easel. However, he had no paints. Frowning, he pushed past it, knocking it down in the process. Grabbing reds, oranges, yellows, every warm color he could find he returned to the fallen canvas. Pulling the lid off the red, he slipped his hand inside. Then he started slapping it onto the canvas, seemingly at random.
"Do we even have souls?" The words came out in such a quiet whisper that even Amun didn't know if he'd actually said them.
don't pull me, don't pull me down from the ceiling
At the addition of another companion in his lap, Bastien jumped, but didn't seem to mind too much, idly moving to pet Zhanshi too. In his right mind he would likely have more questions about the small flying shark, but in the odd fog he currently resided in, he didn't have the energy to worry too much about it. Pittore pulled faces, but as long as the shark didn't hurt him, let it share his master's lap.
"Again, you may be surprised..." He mumbled, but watched Amun to let himself be 'shown' what it was his guest needed. Bastien opened his mouth to object to his wasteful use of the paint but then shut it without saying anything, remembering how often he had expressed praise for unconventional use of materials: hopefully Amun would do something worthwhile of the mess.
He leaned forward to see more of the painting so far, when Amun's question came. "Of course we do, Amun. The Voice takes them and places them in her own new world, when we die here. How could she do that if we did not have them?"
As Bastien started to pet Zhanshi, the landshark would twist in the artist's lap. Then the potter's companion would try to nibble on the other man's fingers. It wouldn't be hard enough to break the skin, not yet at least.
Amun ignored the companions and Bastien for now. When the artist spoke, though, the potter looked up from his canvas. "You have it? He glanced around. "Where?" When nothing caught his eye, he sighed and went bent back to his painting.
Shifting from the red to a yellow, he slipped his hand into that as well, heedless of mixing the pigments. Again, he slapped against the canvas, seemingly at random. He swept his hands along the painting, mixing and sliding and rapidly filling the white with the colors.
Pausing in his work, he met the other man's eyes. "I am a copy of a fallen star. What if I don't have a soul? What if it's split between too many worlds, too many gods?" Amun looked at the ground. "Could she make me one if I didn't have one?" With that, he resumed with the art, moving on to the orange now.
don't pull me, don't pull me down from the ceiling
Bastien simply looked down at Zhanshi as the landshark bit his fingers, expression far too apathetic for the situation (though the lack of pain was helping with that). Making sure that the shark wasn't hurting Pittore, who was still squirming to get away, he was content for the moment.
"You haven't yet told me what it is you want. ...Right?" Bastien began to doubt himself before he'd finished speaking, his short term memory currently just as foggy as his recollection of events from years ago. Try as he might, he couldn't remember what it was Amun had come into the Sanctuary looking for, nor if he'd ever been told. He spent the next minute staring intensely at his visitor in the hope it might restore his memory, but it did not.
The mixing of paint really did make him want to yell, having spent hours the week prior making up the pristine pots, but Bastien bit his tongue again, not wanting to interrupt the potential making of a masterpiece (and in his fever-addled state, Amun's painting looked like it might be one). "Amun...you must have a soul. It's what gives you personality..what allows you to make your um...statues?" His voice was tired, as if they'd been having this debate for hours. "Don't...don't bother the Voice with it. You clearly have one. I can even see it, in some lights."
That was true enough: he could. When Amun leaned forward and into the glow of the nearby candle, Bastien could see a fuzzy but definitely there golden sheen in the air around him.
Zhanshi wriggled Bastien's fingers for a few moments before releasing them. Then the landshark turned to Pittore. The potter's companion lifted from the artist's lap and circled around the gremlin's head a few times. Inspection complete, Zhanshi dove into the ground again, chewing another hole and tunnel in the floor of the Sanctuary.
Ignoring this whole exchange, Amun shrugged. Hands and body streaked with paint, he continued with his work. "What you can't give me," he croaked out, absorbed in his painting.
Pausing, he lifted his hands and stared at them, flipping them forward and back. Then his gaze swept across the rest of his body. Finally he sighed and finished applying the orange paint to the canvas. "What if I'm just a really convincing fake?" Leaning back, he regarded his painting.
Shaking his head at it, he grabbed a brown can of paint and returned to the floor. Opening it, he dipped his fingers inside. He added just a touch of brown to the red parts of the artwork. Standing up, he gestured at it. "There. Fire and blood." And indeed, the painting was mostly a crimson, with flickers of orange and yellow interspersed with it.
don't pull me, don't pull me down from the ceiling
Bastien let his fingers be wiggled: it didn't hurt him after all, and he'd dealt with many a street puppy (and child) in Venice. He objected more to the tunnel in the floor, but beyond a shout, couldn't stop the landshark from making one: he'd have to fill it in later, he supposed, when he could stand up without wanting to fall over again.
It seemed Amun was just as confused as he was, at least, after something Bastien 'couldn't give him' - the artist presumed that it was likely Amun didn't know himself. "Is there someone here who can, though? I would say I was one of the more resourceful people in this place -- ughh..." He trailed off, leaning back against the arm of the couch and pressing a hand to his head, feeling overcome with an odd lethargy again. Concerned, Pittore shuffled up to sit on his shoulder and chirped as he poked at his master's face.
Letting the question of Amun being a fake pass by (far too complex for the moment), he looked up when the painting was presented, the first thing like a smile coming to him for the day. "Very nice. Will it stay here in the Sanctuary? It may be a good reminder of this time later...mmm." Massaging his temples, Bastien had a thought, one that felt wrong somehow but he couldn't quite put a finger on it: "Amun, could you go get Rexanna from upstairs for me? I feel unwell."
Zhanshi didn't react to Bastien's shout, but Amun did. Looking up, he frowned and placed a paint-smeared finger on his lips, leaving them coated with color. "Shhhhhhhhh!"
At the artist's question, the potter tilted his head to one side. Considering the other man, Amun shook his head. "No. I don't think so. There are only Ascended here and they don't have what I want." Sighing, he bowed his head.
Smiling at Bastien's question, the potter nodded. "I'd like that. That way, anyone who wants fire and blood will have access to it here." He turned to stare at his work. "But...it's trapped. I wish it were free." Sighing again, he slumped into a kneeling position.
Turning just his head, he frowned at the artist's request. "I'll try but I thought Rexanna was gone. Rexanna and Clem. I miss them. And I wish I'd been here for them. And you." Crawling across the floor, he tried to lever himself onto the couch the other man was lying on. When that failed (and he left smears of paint behind on it) Amun just settled on the ground. The landshark followed, leaving yet another small tunnel in the ground.
don't pull me, don't pull me down from the ceiling
The finger on his lips made Bastien frown and move his head back (giving him more double chins than he'd like to imagine), but he didn't push it off, not quite awake enough to work out that solution. At least as an Ascended his sense of taste was limited, so the paint on his lips wasn't too much of an issue, as it wasn't going to poison him either. It was just annoying, like Amun swiftly was becoming in his Sanctuary.
"There's...people other than Ascended. I'm rather sure..." For the moment though, none of them were coming to Bastien's mind. Outside he heard the whispers again, talking over each other in unclear tongues, and he pressed a hand over one ear, trying to block the sound. "Art is free." He said, a stock phrase in response to what he had heard, not really listening to Amun's worries.
Bastien only truly began to listen when Amun said Rex was gone. He tilted his head, something in his mind saying that the man was right, but not sure how. "Gone...can you find her? Clem..Clem is a free spirit. Young. He could be anywhere. But Rexanna should be close."
Still slumped on the ground by the couch Bastien was laying on, Amun tilted his head back so he was looking at the artist upside down. "Where?" His eyes darted around the interior of the Sanctuary. "Where are you keeping the non-Ascended?"
Frowning, he let his chin thump into his chest. "Then why does it cost us so much to make it." Sighing, he let his neck roll from one side to the other.
Moving so he could stare at the ceiling, the potter took a deep breath. "I don't think they're here. I'm not sure when or...or if they're coming back." He let out a whine from the back of his throat. "So many of us aren't coming back. Too many."
