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!
It has been an age since Isla set foot in the Atheneum. The place both has and hasn't changed, and although her sense of smell is only a fraction of what it used to be, she swears she can scent the old parchment, the deep wells of stone, the hidden passages. Her footsteps are soft and near silent as she meanders through the place, wondering who takes care of it now. Since the Loreseekers are no more, and there has never really been a librarian... what will happen to all of this knowledge?
Losing herself in the shelves, Isla runs her fingers along volumes that she still only half understands, her eyes flickering over the titles as if she might find something that could offer further insight to the clinic. It's all well and good to be a medic, but if she were to go again, she'd hate to see the clinic fall into disrepair for a second time.
The Atheneum was still in many ways a sanctuary for Sam, long having been a place he could go to hide from the rest of the world and seek comfort in words of old, but in recent years he'd begun to notice the threads of anxiety still sneaking in even to the aisles of books. The years of mistakes and choices followed him even into the place he'd once treated as home and after his most recent errors in Torchline, the thoughts were louder than ever.
He'd brought some work to do, a book he was copying over, but for the last half hour he'd just been doodling on his scrap sheet of paper, squares he was filling in with black ink; thinking over conversations he'd had, fantasising different things he could have said or done. It was only a slight noise from elsewhere in the hall that drew him from spiralling down. Sam got up to check who it was for no real reason, habit he supposed; the last years had made him wary.
"Hello?" He called out, walking around the corner and through the shelves; his eyes finally fell on the other person there and seeing it was Isla, suddenly all thoughts of fear were gone. "Isla!!" Sam cried, running towards her with a huge smile on his face - he'd heard she was back, but seeing her was something else entirely, his old friend very much missed. If she'd permit it he'd hug her as soon as he was close enough, glad to be seeing a friend return instead of leave for once.
no value in the strength of walls that I have grown
"Sam?" Isla straightens up at the glint of copper that signals his arrival, turning in time to see him rushing towards her. And of course she receives him with open arms and a bright, fanged grin, hugging him tightly. "I didn't realise you were still here in the Grounds! I know a lot of people left when the world opened up more." Stepping back to get a good look at him, it's the strange sort of scrutiny that seems unique to the Ascended.
Because of course they don't really change, not so much physically unless it's scars. Inside, though? That's another story. "How are you? Are you the new librarian for the Atheneum?" She can't think of anyone more suited, honestly.
Unable to stop the wide grin as Isla accepted his embrace, Sam squeezed her once before moving back, perhaps staring at her face a little too much as he took it in again. After that night on the beach where he had helped Remi to push the unicorn's body into the sea, he had imagined he'd never see her, until the distant far-off possibilities of the Voice's afterlife.
"Oh, well...I did go to Torchline for a while, but..." Gods, that was too much to get into during a casual reunion conversation, so he shrugged, trying to make it look as carefree as he could. "I came back. Couldn't leave the book store and so on." While that had not been the reason, it had been nice to get back to work on his store and bookmaking, the routine of it calming in it's own way.
Sam glanced about the Atheneum at her question, raising his eyebrows as he considered it. "I mean...not officially, but I'm the only one that still looks after it here as far as I know...so...I suppose?" There wasn't really anyone to make it official anyway; he couldn't see Wessex caring enough to give any kind of royal librarian decree. "Are you going to work in the infirmary again?"
no value in the strength of walls that I have grown
They're both staring, it seems, but where some might consider it an act of social awkwardness, Isla has always been comfortable with scrutiny (call it a surgeon thing) and it's with a bit of reluctance that she steps back from him, still smiling brightly. "Torchline? I just returned from there," she admits, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear and sighing in remembrance of the tropical breeze, the clear, starry skies.
Much different to the snow and ice of the Grounds. "I'm glad you are back, though. Both because I got to see you, and because you seem to be the only one taking care of this place!" She gestures to the Atheneum around them, before nodding in confirmation about the infirmary. "I just got done cleaning it up, in fact! I was here to see if there are any medical textbooks among the shelves. Or anything I might be able to copy from. All my knowledge is in my head, and if anything were to happen again..."
"Oh, are things alright there? I saw you th--oh well. Not quite, I suppose." Sam paused, inwardly cringing at himself, having brought up the last moments of Isla's existence as a Unicorn completely instinctively, the thought of her and the beach inevitably leading there. "Sorry. I did hear that the people who came back did so on the beach. I wasn't there to see it, but I'm sure it was amazing."
Really, he was quite annoyed he'd missed it. One of the nicest, most beneficial things the Voice had done, and he'd been in bed early with a book.
"Yes, it's good I'm here to look after it. Jigano...hasn't been around in a long time, and Amalia is...also somewhere..." Sam frowned, not knowing where exactly she was. He supposed that was an upside of his failed stay in Torchline, though, that it had meant he was here now to take care of the Atheneum, which deserved better than to rot into nothing. "There's a lot of medical works here, but there's also a few scrolls in the basement. I can find them for you, if you'd like. I hope that nothing else does happen, though. I've missed you, Isla - friends are hard to come by nowadays."
no value in the strength of walls that I have grown
"Yes, as far as I can tell things are very well there," Isla says of Torchline with a warm smile that doesn't falter, even as Sam almost brings up the last time he had 'seen' her. As for the return of the Ascended in the Citadel? She brightens further, nodding to him. "It really was. A testament to the Voice that so many chose to ascend and return." She wishes he could have been there - but at least they are both here now to celebrate.
Her smile falters just a bit to hear that Jigano is nowhere to be found - she had been hoping to run into the scholar on her return to the Hollowed Grounds. Honestly, though? There's no time to get caught up in it, not with so much continuing to change and to happen. Isla glances back at the shelves, nodding gratefully to Sam and gesturing for him to lead on, if he knows where any immediate texts can be found.
"That would be very helpful," she tells him. "...And they are, aren't they? I'm glad you're here, Sam - I've missed you, as well. How are things in the Grounds? Perhaps you and I should start a book club. An excuse to meet regularly if nothing else."
"Yes. I'm excited to meet everyone." Sam agreed with a nod and a wide smile, gladly remembering just how easy to talk to Isla was, how she didn't take offense at all of his awkward habits and stumbling conversation. He needed more actual friends in his life, people that he could talk to without having to look out for hidden traps to fall into.
He began to walk to the stairs, to where he remembered the medical texts being. Of course, he didn't have much use for them usually and having been away for so long, Sam couldn't guarantee they'd still be there...but the place seemed like it had hardly been touched since he left, with Jigano being gone (he didn't say anything more on that either - what was there to say? They were both used to friends disappearing, he was sure).
"Things are......mmm." For a moment he considered lying, but she'd find out eventually. "You know at Longnight we're going to be...fighting, right? I think everyone is just nervous about that right now. That, and these...Order people." Sam pulled a face, his opinion of them very clearly poor. "I think it's a frightening time to be Ascended, and a lot of the people here are. "
He cleared his throat. "But yes, a book club sounds great!"
no value in the strength of walls that I have grown
"Me too. I had an opportunity to meet a few already. Edrei Launceleyn is among us now, which as you can imagine has been exciting." Isla grins, letting out a tinkling laugh as they move towards the stairs, her steps sure and easy even in the dim light. "I was also able to meet the man responsible for leading us back - Aamu is his name. He seems to be a very gentle man. I think you would like him," she continues.
Sam's update is not as uplifting as Isla's news, but then with what is going to happen at LongNight, there's no way for it to be cheerful. Her smile grows a touch sad, and she nods to him. "Yes, I was told. I don't know how much help I will be in a fight, but I'll be there to provide aid to those who need it if they are hurt in the process," she says slowly, only to smirk at Sam's attempt to bring the conversation back up. "Do you still make books, or copies of them?" she asks. "I may end up needing your help to get my own medical knowledge on paper, if I can't find what I'm looking for in these texts."
"Oh, wow. Yes. I met Edrei once, before she passed." Sam laughed quietly and rubbed the back of his neck, remembering that night. He'd certainly had a test of his self confidence then, with Edy discovering him nude in the Oasis, but it hadn't been all bad. In fact, the memory made him smile now, even if it had been mortifying at the time. "I wonder how she's handling being Ascended. She seemed like someone that liked....well, things we can't do."
A gentle Ascended that raised souls from the dead sounded interesting, and if he really was nice, Sam would love to meet him. More Ascended that actually liked him was always a good thing. "Is he...a Demi God? How did he lead you back?"
That Isla had such an easy place to fit in during the fights made him a little jealous, Sam having resigned himself to being absolutely useless...unless... "Do you need any help? I'm not at all good at fighting, and maybe I could...I mean, I don't know anything about it, but I could hold things or fetch things." He'd probably just take up space, but he had to try and get out of the nightmares that would be on the streets.
"I still make my books, yes. I got into maps, for a while, but..." That had been a part of the Torchline life that never really came to anything. "I can definitely make books of your knowledge. I'd be honoured."
no value in the strength of walls that I have grown
"She likes it more than anything else, I believe," Isla says airily, no less serious about it for her humour. "But I think she is taking advantage of a certain room I have heard that is available for the Ascended. I daresay she will find it, if she hasn't done already, and will be taking full advantage of it." Shrugging her shoulders, for Isla it's a mere inevitability.
Was Aamu a demigod, though? Her eyebrows knot together, the medic continuing to follow after Sam, and slowly she shakes her head. "I don't think so? He doesn't seem to be built differently to any other Ascended. And he seems confused to be here. As if he has been asleep for all this time." What did that make him, though? Her interest is very much piqued by him, and it shows.
Sam's offer drags her right back to the present, though, and she offers him a bright, fanged grin. "That would be lovely, if you don't mind," she says. "I could always use a hand, and I will teach you a few things, if you'd like to learn." As for the books, that just made it better. "Then it's a plan. LongNight should pass quite quickly, with any luck."
"...A...room?" Sam asked, turning to look at Isla and racking his brain to work out what she meant. She had barely been back a week, so it seemed unlikely she could know Ascended secrets he didn't....though he supposed he wasn't very popular. Feeling rather out of the loop, he meekly asked: "Can you...eat things and taste them in there and so on?"
Not a Demi God, but asleep for a long time - he supposed if he got to live for hundreds of years, he might spend some of it sleeping too. "Oh. I wonder what it's like to be that old. I guess...one day we might know...it kind of scares me." Sam glanced across at Isla to see what her thoughts were on the topic, not wanting to bring the mood down yet again with a mention of what his specific fears were (though they were predictable problems of the ageless; friends dying, times moving on).
"Great. Yes." He grinned, honestly glad to have an excuse to stay out of the frontlines for Longnight, but also for the project. "I'll help with anything. I...I've seen a lot. I'm not scared of too much anymore." that was a lie
Stepping off the final step and into the lower level, Sam went to a shelf not far from the door and began to look across the books, a finger gently brushing past each leather dustjacket as he read the titles, looking for the beginnings of what constituted the main medical collection. "It's mostly here...there are some books about praying to the Gods for health too, but...I assume that isn't what you're looking for, right?"
no value in the strength of walls that I have grown
"Yes, it's like... a room where the Ascended can feel again properly. It's more for... carnal desires, I suppose? But you could eat and drink and so on, if you wanted. I imagine." Honestly Isla doesn't really know, and she can only shrug to Sam, more than happy to let the thread of conversation go there. Besides, agelessness is a much more interesting topic, and Isla smiles across at him as they walk.
"I can understand you being scared. I'm quite excited, I think. Luckily we aren't alone - we'll have each other as time goes on. I am looking forward to having so much time to research and discover new treatments, new ways to practice medicine. And you will be able to mark the passing of the time in your books! Like a chronology."
It might be a lie but Isla still believes it, giving Sam an encouraging nod. "Until I am told otherwise, I plan to be at the infirmary. Drop by whenever you feel like it." She follows after him, smiling to see him so gentle with all of the books and peering at them as well. "Praying to the gods for health? Not exactly my thing, so." Grinning, Isla straightens up. "Do you mind if I stay here a bit? I'd just like to flick through some of these pages."
"Oh. Hm." Knowledge of that space was certainly interesting. Not that Sam really had anyone to go and share it with, but at least it gave him something to say to those new Ascended that missed their body's abilities. He couldn't help but wonder if it had been kept from him purposefully, though, his Ascended family not wanting him to enjoy the same things - that was too paranoid, right? His fingers went to trace the place on his stomach where Wessex's knife had hit.
To be excited about the prospect of agelessness was something he envied, though he couldn't quite summon it in himself. Maybe one day, when he'd finally found himself, knew who it was that would be growing older and yet staying the same. At least it was nice to see someone for whom that was a possibility.
"Of course. Stay as long as you like. I'd prefer if you didn't take them out of the building, but if you did just want to take one or two for a while...I mean, I'm not in charge or anything, but it would be nice if you could tell me." Since he was the only one checking that things were still there nowadays. With that said, he left her to her studies, knowing firsthand how irritating it could be to have someone over your shoulder when you were trying to read.
Fin
no value in the strength of walls that I have grown
