Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
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Deimos pulled out his hunting knife before launching, snagging, or doing anything else further. With one slide of the serrated edges, an ursur claw, massive and brutal, settled into his gloved palm. The fellow beast tucked it into the deeper threads of his pockets, and then slid the dagger away too. The notions of this predator, turned prey, needing to be back at the Citadel soon, to be properly taken care of, wasn’t lost on him; pondering if this wake was taken apart and rendered similar to that of deer.
But then it was time to lift, pull, with human convictions, strength, and hands, crouching down and only smirking lightly at Aisha as she readied herself too, as ropes were utilized, as muscles were honed, as a bear was hoisted down a ridge and upon a sled. Then they’d be free to hasten off, back to civilization. He took hold of the knotted, gnarled figments as well, applying the strength, the assurances, the multitudes of might into the motions and movements, crossing over the Glass’s terrain. He was only slightly distracted by the landscape again, peering out towards the sea as if the monolith down below would make a reappearance; before swinging his attention back to Aisha (Zuriel trailing behind, clearly still annoyed). “What will you do with your share?” A tease of course, the hulking mass was likely enough to feed several families, but they could always have first dibs, given the situation and the means they’d gone through to acquire it.
Aisha smirked right on back, warmth settling across what features were visible beyond her furs. They'd done well, gathered the instrument they'd set out for, and returned to Halo with many more assets. The ursur was huge, it's meat would be well put to use, it's fur to insulate them on the coldest days, and it's tusks, well they could find a use for them surely. Aisha began to pull alongside Deimos, dragging the beast down the hill and to the sled, now on more open and even grounds.
Aisha snorted at his question, staring forwards at the frigid expanse of ice and white, "I think white might be my new color," she chided in response, planning to take some of the fur for her own. "And out of the kindness of my heart I will donate the rest of my share to charity, so the poor people of Halo can eat this harsh Deepfrost."
He laughed at her response while they pulled and hastened, taking the massive beast downwards, then upwards, over the snow. He’d expected it, really; given the amount of fur and pelts they’d have available. The stark ivory would be formidable and useful for blending into the landscape, for returning for another hunt, a reckoning camouflage in the midst of constant ice and rime. “Good of you.”
As the land evened out, as the slopes turned into endless expanses and abyss, his strides elongated, muscles bunched, honed, and undulating beneath layers upon layers; content to utilize his brawn, as if this was naught more than a stroll. The monolith’s eyes went to her briefly, a nod forthcoming, away from the jokes and diatribes for an instant – sincerity in his plain speech. “Thank you for helping.” And Deimos meant it; considering what had occurred. The possibility of him being able to do this successfully, alone, would’ve likely been disastrous on its own forefront. Power was power, and strategy was strategy, but there were too many other factors within a world not known for its fortune. They’d been triumphant and victorious, and he wouldn’t dwell further on what could’ve been – his gaze sweeping back to the ongoing landscape before them.
01-11-2021, 05:59 PM (This post was last modified: 01-11-2021, 05:59 PM by Aisha.)
AISHA
the night and the dark appreciate
There was laughter and overall joyful energy following their success. Aisha's humor was met well, a smile present below the furs she'd covered her nose and lips with. She was happy to have succeeded, but mostly gracious that they'd survived. Certain factors had to align to make this such a victory; the unicorn to heal wounds, the shifting winds that'd kept her hidden, everything was luck when it came down to it.
And this time it was the warriors who were favored by that kind lady, to return unscathed bringing gifts and adornments, meals to come.
She pulled on, dragging the sled behind across fields of snow. Deimos offered a moment of sincerity, recognition for her actions. He'd only need ask, there'd be no protesting from her. She trusted him, believed in him. "Don't mention it, we stand for the same things you know," she replied with a slight quirk of her brow.
They pressed on, leaving the sea behind, and with it he took one last look over his shoulder, at the press of ice that seemed like glass, at the veneer, at the surface that reminded him eerily of so many damned things. Then he swung his head forward, dragging, hauling, forging onward, feeling the walls drawing themselves back up; inexplicably, trying to move ahead when there were so many other murky onslaughts, so many other factors and factions lining his edges.
As always though, Aisha had an ability to keep him out of the heaviest and headiest of doldrums, arching a brow, permitting another snort to follow through on puffs of air, on streamlined curls and contortions. Zuriel roamed alongside, clearly waiting for something, but he ignored her for the time being, angling his features in her direction. A smirk, a snicker, dared to rest in the corner of his mouth. “Do we? What do you stand for?” And he meant it to be humorous, light, airy, mercurial, naught entangling but the wide open range as they manifested their way home, pressing over the snow.
It was rare that he would be the one to initiate cheshire grins and playful banter. But his reply was humorous, and forced a smile to Aisha's face. He would not play that game alone, "Oh you know, 'protecting the people' and 'stabbing shit', that kind of thing." In a way, that was it. It could be worded more carefully, specifically. She could explain how she meant that they both wanted to help, to provide for, to be compassionate. And how they both needed the thrill of risking it all for those principles.
But this simplification should do the trick. She dragged the carcass by his side, leaving behind the sea of glass, eventually seeing the glimmering precipice of the citadel on the horizon.
Simplistic answers for far more meaningful measures and weights, for the world they existed within. They shielded. They presided. They protected. They guarded. And despite no ominous beacons, save for the malicious quandaries of the Order, yet on the horizon, they were there, in the hush of footfalls and the paradigm of winter, to come rushing in. It was all he’d done throughout his life – easy to fall into, to brandish a sword and swing a blade, to demolish and carve in the wake of his magic, in the claws of his shifts, in the chaotic emblem of their entities. There were some noble principles tied and tethered to their presence; and some Machiavellian webs in the back of his mind, safekeeping for a day when furtive natures were necessary, required, for other means.
Never once thinking of themselves.
He nodded, the same smirk still chiseled along his foundations, dragging and pulling, listening to the sled slide across the ice and snow. Zuriel was a remaining figment off to his left, and the Citadel was on the horizon before them, outlined black against the stark white. “Mm. And sometimes vengeance.” An amusing form of justice; to plot, to scheme, to muse, to mull, to conspire, an enemy's downfall.
Aisha nodded her agreement to his addition. "Yes exactly," she replied, turning her attention back to the path ahead. She would admit that not all of her efforts were entirely generous nor genuine, but for the most part she tried. Vengeance would always creep into her reasoning, how she could settle some vendetta and mask it with purpose. Sometimes she didn't try to mask it at all, that was what real anger could do.
Generally she tried to stay clear of topics that might darken the general's brow, and by now she knew that his past was one such thing. But she was curious, "You've had your fair share of it haven't you?" Aisha grew up a princess, anyone with ill will towards her had no measures to act on it, and revenge had never been necessary. Aside from rivalries and general discontent, her only enemies were far beyond the border of her capital planning some scheme that might never reach her.
Here she'd come across more than a few calls for the crueler emotion, that longing for retribution when she felt she was wronged. But Deimos, he likely had many stories, of which she knew few.
He’d been generous in the past for far more bitter, belligerent reasons (damnation, a blade, breaking apart enemies one by one, never quite satisfied until they were limp and still at his feet); nowadays it was easier to meld and mold, to carve and create, extend those missing, broken parts of his repose back into the world. An unreachable figment of mountainsides and glaciers, where he’d craved for the realms to split beneath his wake, for everything to come traversing down, down, down into blighted, depraved, withered pathways, where vengeance had been sought in the press of a sword and the quick, volatile action of a King. A Reaper, who’d wanted nothing more than to settle into the void and be left alone in the dark. Hardly any compassion had been left in that creature, in that sculpted soldier, waiting for his next opportunity to carve his nefarious armaments.
But the Sword’s eyes remained on the horizon when Aisha spoke, clenching his jaw, regretting the lines of his amusement. For some reason he hadn’t fathomed they’d cut back on him, presumed agreements, laughter, some mild accord across the factions would reverberate, and nothing would end up hollowing him out. But his grin disappeared, and his brow furrowed, and he was lost somewhere in the midst of all those tethers, all those lines, all those acts. “Yes.” Some better than most. Some worse. Some for glory, where boundaries blurred and the Basin warlord had been chasing down the adversaries for his people. Some for avarice and greed, striving to right a wrong.
They could’ve been endless stories and myths and legends, and not many of them mattered except to a select few. Would she still judge him then, as others had done, when more of his past became unfurled? When they finally noticed exactly what he’d said he’d been all along?
A shrug hastened through his shoulders as he tugged and dragged their prey, pretending as if the semblances didn’t bother, didn’t tear, didn’t ripple through his lungs. “I have had many. You may hear one.” For the moment – and he glanced at her from the corner of his eye, trying to inveigle another smirk across his mouth. It didn’t quite reach his gaze, stopping short of their piercing junctures. Then he turned back, towards glaciers and rime, towards Citadels and the segment of so many god damned alterations. “From the sea or ice.”
Aisha did not miss the sudden steeling of his features, the tightness in brow increasing. She'd fathomed this, that a shift might bring out his darker anterior; but she was so curious. Perhaps she'd wanted to see it, some of the reaper elements she'd heard about from others but never experienced. To draw him out of hiding with the friendly bond they shared. To trust her with these memories.
The ursur was dragged behind as they continued on, the unicorn nearby, and he indulged her interest. A choice, a tale of the sea or a tale of ice. Aisha burrowed her nose into her furs as an icy wind cut past, thinking over the options he'd given. Ice was familiar by now, the tundra no longer posing much wonder in her mind. What more was there to imagine than a sheet of white and ripping cold? And though she'd grown fond of it, she longed for a different world right now.
"Sea," she replied, looking forward to watch the citadel grow before them.
The offer only seemed to encourage her, and for once the monolith would indulge. And likely only out of kinship and trust; otherwise it would’ve remained another furtive piece of his past, of his lives lived. The answer clipped across the ice, and he tilted his head, eyes still on the horizon, the foundations of another time, another world, crossing over his machinations. A nod was given, granted, short, and curt, while he mulled over how to best navigate one nuance of a lengthy journey. “I used to live in a kingdom called the World’s Edge.” One of many; fortuitous cycles of realms and revolutions, weeks into a newfound soldier for its ramparts. On wisps of incantations, on ethers of air, particles of the snow lifted, filtered, flickered into makeshift cliffs before her eyes – where the sea met a wall of rock, crashing and reeling, where the mist ebbed and flowed, where he could’ve imagined the Moonlit Tides down below, where he’d been reminded of childhood homes. “Not long after I made it my home, we were invaded.”
Thereafter, he curled the cascading powder into rivulets of soldiers, warriors once right after the other, marching, charging, demolition and disaster, a pummeling void of machinations and action. “Mostly due to God influences.” Mirage and her legions, her allies, moving forward with the intentions and backing of the Moon Goddess, favor falling to the draconic woman. “We fought, but were outnumbered.” And then the snow ceased, dropped back into its place, scattered into ice and rime. A shrug of his shoulders followed; she’d be able to surmise what came next. “We lost, and were forced out.”
The beginning of many failures – and his jaw clenched, waiting for a reaction, for a notion to continue onward, as they meandered closer and closer to the Citadel’s fortress.
Aisha was aware of the privilege she had to be able to hear some of his secrets. He knew how deeply he'd dug that hole for his heart, to hide it so it might not be found. But with time she could erode the soil, find the warmth that hid inside. And perhaps he might do the same for her.
This story was not one of joy, but it beat with that same lifeblood, with resounding urgency.
So delicate was the flurry that enacted his memories, Aisha smiled at the flakes though they played out a morose scene. As the warriors began to battle, as the snowmen marched and fell, her smile faded. This was a story of war as it had always been. Someone lost, and it had been her general. She looked back to him as he shrugged, narrowing her gaze just slightly at the stoic lines she saw there.
"And the revenge?" she prodded, because the story could not end there.
This story of vengeance wasn’t of blood for blood or eye for eye. They’d been willing, but the impact had been lessened, sent to lick their wounds, to reassemble amongst snowy crags and apertures, huddled in caves, clambering for ruses, for schemes, for a way to manifest their contempt all over again. “The revenge,” and he nodded, hastening another series of flurries and flakes as they walked – filtering them lightly against the sun, so they glistened despite the melancholy labored and lingering within the story. “We gathered what was left of us in caves, along the outskirts of some mountains.” And here she might recognize the beginning of his icy, glacial proclivities, where the harsh void scarcely mattered to him, not after they’d survived the Siberian cavalcade, thriving on their hate. “We sent out spies and thieves to harass them. Soldiers to attack them. To show we were still out there.” The snow churned into outlets of caverns, recollections of vast tundra, not unlike the world they crossed now.
His head lifted, out along the horizon, yielding a breath, indifferent towards the potential judgment. They’d done what they could – obstinate and proud, belligerent and contemptuous, yearning for a piece of what they’d tried to save, to salvage. “Our antics irritated, but we gained attention from another being too.” From the rime, his images shifted, changed, altered, into the rise of summits, into spectacular, dazzling hues over their heights, the shape, the contortion, of auroras bleeding their particular array along crowns and vestiges – a lake that never froze – a world he couldn’t, wouldn’t, have again. “The God of Time sought us out, and granted us a land called the Aurora Basin.” Only then did he incline his gaze towards her, a particular arch to his brow as he sighed.
And perhaps the best show of retribution and retaliation was that they had survived, long enough to rise again – frozen phoenixes in their wrathful cinders.
He continued, inciting another series of snowfolk players who would spin the tale before them. Aisha brought her gaze back to the flurries, lost in the magic of it all, reminded she were still on this earth and not in some mystic alternate plane only by the strain in her muscles from pulling the beast and the cold that nipped at the exposed skin around her eyes. She listened to his story and fell into it.
They'd left the sea and entered the ice, all part of the same story in the long run. They pulled the ursur past snow caverns that he assembled with his will, he spoke of excursions to spite their oppressors, retaliations that would not cease. She could imagine the fear, the anger, that might still echo those caverns even after they deserted them for this Aurora Basin.
This story of revenge was not a physical kind, rather than revenge it felt like recognition. Getting what was due despite the opposition. "It's beautiful," she said lightly, "we had colors like that in my home." Aurora over a different kind of mountain, the plateau of the eastern kingdom would be littered in rainbows from the waterfalls around. She missed it, and from the intricacy and detail he'd put into this icy recreation, he thought fondly of this memory too.
