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!
Okay, so originally Ronin was going to take his husband to the Pacifist Plaza, for a sweet and wonderful date night. Blah blah, everyone's in love, how wonderful. And all of that is still true, and it will still come to fruition, but the Dark Star has a feeling that his husband might like to see the noble underbelly of the very noble Stormbreak instead. Besides, the Greatwood might have cutesy marketplaces galore, but it doesn't have anywhere like the Silk Houses.
"So," Ronin begins breezily, a thick coat protecting him from the Deepfrost chill, his arm laced feather-light around his husband's waist. "The goal of our little trip is to find a ball to hang on the weird little sapling that has appeared in the plaza. Before you ask, no - I'm not hanging my own bollocks up there, so think of something else."
oh but that's the irony: broken people are not fragile
It's convenient that Remi's memory-magic is what it is. He's almost never without the things he might need, especially with Ronin around. Of course, the Star thinks of the most absurd coat he can think of from his time as a Stormgaurd, and so Remi is left wearing a ridiculously pompous looking double-breasted jacket.
Remi frowns at his husband instantly. "As if I would ever suggest something so predictable." He scoffs, insulted. (He'd absolutely been about to suggest that). "We had one of these appear in the Greatwood too." The alchemist adds conversationally, though he's clearly distracted by the flourishes of colours and smells that waft through the Silk Houses.
"So just...any ball?" Remi wants to know, pulling his eyes off of a cart that appears to just have meat rotating on a spit.
The Lullaby
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
It's not ridiculous, it's classy, and Ronin happens to think that his husband looks dashing as all fuck in it. So he will continue to conveniently not remember any plain or ordinary clothing when Remi asks for it, thank you very much. "Oh, do forgive me. I had imagined that the Greatwood had turned to crude and brutish." As if Remi wasn't already that way to begin with.
The Lullaby gets distracted by meat on a spit (read: crude and brutish above) and his counterpart, meanwhile, is gazing up at some rich violet silks fluttering overhead. "Oh? And yet you came to hang a bauble on my tree." Nudging Remi with his hip, Ronin's attention finally drops to the cart. "Well, I'm not sure it has to be ball shaped. It just has to decorate the tree. Maybe I'll pluck some of your feathers at night and make a little charm to hang up there."
01-27-2021, 09:27 PM (This post was last modified: 01-27-2021, 09:30 PM by Remi.)
oh but that's the irony: broken people are not fragile
"Alright." The Lullaby hisses. "Not everything just turns rough and rugged because I'm around." Then he grins wickedly, nudging his hip into Ronin's. "Case in point."
The only reason Ronin isn't distracted by the meat on a spit, is because he's already seen it. Remi, who has had to live off of what he's caught himself for dinner, is absolutely entranced. His thoughts tugged away by the sound of Ronin's voice, the alchemist glanced back and shoots his husband a filthy smile. "Who wouldn't want to hang a bauble on your tree?" He wonders, regardless of what a poor innuendo that would turn out to be in practice.
'Well that's horrifying. "Here, I've plucked my husband while he was asleep, and am trying to pass off his feathers as an ornament." Remi grins brightly. "Now who sounds like they should be in the Greatwood."
The Lullaby
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Ronin gasps as if he's offended (he absolutely isn't); in fact, since Remi has been around properly again, the Star actually looks put together. His stubble is more fashionable than bedraggled, his hair has as much style as I rubbed some water on it and slept usually gets, and there's a brightness to his eyes that has never been seen by Stormbreak before. Tightening his grip around Remi, he steers them towards the meat cart - he can practically see the Lullaby salivating.
"That can be a game for later," Ronin says of 'hanging baubles on his tree', not that he has the foggiest idea what it might mean. They'll find out. He nods to the vendor, ordering two of whatever it is he's selling, before grinning and leaning in to playfully snap his teeth next to Remi's ear.
"I am rough and rugged on the inside," he all but purrs to him, blue eyes flicking up to see if he can find any other shops about that might sell balls. The hanging kind.
oh but that's the irony: broken people are not fragile
Well of course he can see the Lullaby salivating because he quite clearly is. As Ronin directs them toward the merchant and his spit of meat, Remi growls low in the back of his throat and stiffens for just a moment, as if he's consciously reminding himself that he can't just upend the cart and steal the entire hock for himself.
"I can't wait." Remi whispers back, though for all the playfulness of the banter, he has eyes only for the meat. As it's handed over, the merchant nearly loses a hand, so quick are the alchemist's fingers. Instantly it's in his mouth, juices dripping down his chin and into a bear that Ronin valiantly tried to comb that morning.
"Mmmm. So rough." The Lullaby agrees through bites of meat, all but inhaling his snack. "What about..." Remi tries to finish the sentence but comes up empty. His mind is firmly fixed on meat and sex in a quickly vacillating order. "..a hair ball?"
An on cue, he chokes slightly on his food, coughing.
The Lullaby
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Ronin loves this man, in his immaculate coat with a body that may as well be carved out of marble, dribbling into his beard. And he's grinning his apology to the merchant as he accepts his own snack, giving him a nod as if they've just settled some favour between them (they have) before he's gently directing Remi away, lest he end up chewing off the poor man's leg. "A hair ball?" he repeats with a bark of laughter, made all the more jovial for the Lullaby's accidental choking.
"It's not going anywhere!" He grins, gently patting at Remi's back and turning to pause outside a fabrics store (one just has to ignore the particular garments being advertised in the window is all). "How about we braid some ribbon together? It'll give your fingers something to do other than shred meat."
Speaking of which, Ronin must thoroughly love and have missed his husband, because he offers out his own snack for Remi as seconds. It's an offer painstakingly given, and it shows in his delighted smile.
oh but that's the irony: broken people are not fragile
Forcing in a strained breath through his nose before finally choking up the bit of meat his lungs had greedily tried to take, Remi clears his throat and raises a brow at his counterpart. "Braiding. That's what you want me to be doing with my fingers?" He asks skeptically but instantly shrugging as if now that Ronin has suggested it, there's no doing anything other than that.
As more food is offered, Remi instantly reaches out to accept, before sheepishly pausing. Part of him wants to sob his appreciation, while the other wants to ask what the catch is. "I thought I wasn't meant to be shredding meat." Taking a tentative bite, he holds the bit of wood stuck through the meal toward Ronin. Sharing is caring, after all.
"How sure are you this tree isn't going to come alive and use all the baubles attached to it as weapons?" Remi wants to know as he roughly shoulders open the door to the shop, making the merchant within gasp slightly at this rather crude entrance.
The Lullaby
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"Obviously not. You know what I want you to do with your fingers." And if there is any doubt about it, the suggestions that Ronin sends through their Attuned bond will hopefully fill in the blanks. But of course, braiding will do for now, if nothing more than because it gets a bauble on the tree, and he can spend time with Remi.
Honestly, Ronin has already given up his snack in his mind, so as the meat is offered back to him for sharing, he can't stop the boyish flush to his cheeks as he leans in to take a bite. "Not with your fingers you're not. You can shred meat with your teeth as much as you want," he mumbles around the morsel, before following his meat-juiced husband into the fabric shop.
"Don't mind him, he's just excited," he tells the merchant airily, already stepping forward to examine the fabrics and ribbon on display. "We could make you a very fetching cape, don't you think?"
oh but that's the irony: broken people are not fragile
Remi takes the imagery and runs with it. He imagines brightly braided bits of ribbon turning into leather. Leather which binds his husband's ankles and hands together in a bed far larger than the one they woke up on.
Leaning forward to kiss the Star, (and perhaps slurp off any juice that falls from Ronin's lips), Remi all but deep-throats the remaining bit of meat so that he can toss the stick into the street before entering the shop. It doesn't at all occur to Remi that being in an actual city this is now litering.
A beauty and the beast reference wouldn't quite work here, but had the boys known anything of the movie, Remi might have wondered if Ronin wasn't being a bit of a Belle. "Not very practical." Remi points out a touch skeptically, raising a brow toward Ronin as if wondering if this was a genuine request. Glancing, entirely innocently around, the alchemist catches sight of a bolt of light blue silk.
His stomach freezes and drops to his toes, and the food he'd just eaten threatens to make a reappearance. "Let's find something else." Remi says hurriedly, before reaching out for Ronin and tugging at one of his sleeves with a shocking amount of need.
The Lullaby
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Accepting the meaty kiss as though they aren't in a shop filled with lovely and clean fabrics, Ronin cares not one iota if he is being a bit of a Belle. His husband has always been a bit of a beast in turn - at least since they had moved to Torchline, anyway - and he's learned to roll with those punches. "Ew, pRaCtIcAL." He rolls his eyes, huffing to himself and sorting through a few bits of ribbon that he might be able to weave into a star shape (or a dick shape, he hasn't decided yet), when a strong hand is yanking his sleeve away.
Not one to deny Remi on a good day, let alone in this state, he lets his arm fold around the Lullaby to guide him back out of the fabric shop, letting his concern flood through their bond rather than allowing it to show to the (very puzzled) merchant. "What happened?" he asks only once they are clear of the place, keeping to the snowy cobbles and weaving pathways.
oh but that's the irony: broken people are not fragile
Suddenly quite pale, his skin threatening to become clammy with sweat, Remi uses Ronin to steady himself until he can properly brace against a nearby wall. With both hands in front of him and his head beneath his shoulders as if he was going to vomit, Remi squeezes his eyes closed and tries to breathe deeply.
I just realized where we are. He mumbles silently, the words all the more thickly accented for this sudden and surprising aversion to blue silk. The uhm...inside I saw... Remi's thoughts are garbled pulses of whorehouses, a stabbed man bleeding out. Finn as a child, and then Remi as one. They feed each other bread. All throughout is the flutter of blue silk and Finn's bare chest, and eventually it's all too much. The meat pushes through Remi's teeth for an encore, and is deposited only half-chewed on the cobblestones.
Breathing heavily, but feeling better for having vomited (itsn't that always the way), Remi wipes at his mouth with the sleeve of his too-grand jacket, and lets his back heavily fall against the side of the building. "Sorry." He mumbles, chest heaving beneath the shiny double-buttons on his jacket.
The Lullaby
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Ronin leads them down a slender side street, hidden from the more raucous noise and lights of the Silk Houses, letting Remi go that he might have time to gather himself - or in this case, empty the contents of his stomach onto the cold cobblestones. The Star's pang of concern is drowned out entirely by what the other man projects to him, and Ronin has to stop from wincing at the intensity of it. Especially since it might only get worse, should he choose to touch his husband.
And there's never any doubt of that, in this world or any other. "What could you possibly be sorry for?" he murmurs, his voice a warmth in the chilly evening air, and he steps forward to carefully unbutton the coat that Remi won't feel quite so restricted. Once the jacket is open, he slips gentle arms around his husband to draw him carefully away from the wall and into a careful embrace.
"Shall we go somewhere else?" he suggests. "I didn't realise... I didn't know this was part of his story." It's obvious who he means. Who else could it be?
oh but that's the irony: broken people are not fragile
'Well.' Remi turns a chin that trembles slightly toward the sound of Ronin's voice, trying on a smile that is shaky, but genuine. "I thought perhaps it might come up ball-shaped." He says, looking down at the steaming pile of sick and having to instantly turn away lest he add to it.
The fingers around his throat are warm, though the air they let in is brisk. Both are incredibly welcome, and Remi finds himself relaxing against Ronin with a sort of weariness that is more than skin-deep.
The mention of Finn makes Remi's cheeks burn hot and his toes grow cold. He feels as though he's broken the Spyglass's trust despite having said nothing at all. But actions speak quite loud, especially those of the alchemist. "Please." Remi agrees. Suddenly the noises and sights of the Silk Houses are tinged with violence and soft skin, and the alchemist's stomach begins once again to rise to the occasion.
"Suddenly using my feathers to make an ornament sounds like a grand idea." Remi chuckles, slipping an arm around Ronin's waist that the Star might lead them away from the busy sweetly-scented street.
The Lullaby
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
