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!
02-16-2021, 10:26 PM (This post was last modified: 02-19-2021, 12:16 AM by Melita.)
you must burn brighter than ever
The everlasting twilight sprung itself along the air, and only the natural sleep cycles told her it was morning. Pressed between the gulfs of salt and sea, alive and whole and well, striving not to dwell on a thousand other things, the youth shifted across the embankments. She would have drifted silently, become some little ruffian on the tide, had it not been for the tarp behind her, scratching across the sand. Along its threshold was the ghost whale bone, still dirty and dune-laden, but with a few fine touches of the water, she figured it’d polish up quite nicely.
Purpose drove her onward, her gilded eyes catching the lantern light lining the wake, where some parties had long since dispersed. There’d be more garbage and junk to collect from the surf and surface once others upon the beach had awakened, clambered out of their drunken stupor. She could help, later, when her own mission was complete. For now, it was dragging, taking a break, a breath, upon the swell of the earth, and then moving onward, onward, onward, Fangorn quietly bounding behind her.
Finally, she reached the Miana Pool, and she dropped the tarp near the edge, motioning her arms back and forth, content to let the muscles have a rest. Her eyes rested on the idle water itself, and the days of stories, of tales, of luck and fortune, of the L’ma dipping down below, wishing foe wings when it could no longer fly. Eventually, the youth grabbed hold of the bone itself, leaning it into the surface, watching as its brown, tawny surface, with only the slightest white knob, began to alter – a polished surface underneath, just waiting to gleam.
Longnight had begun and Rigby was more comfortable than ever. The fuckers in the grounds could have their fill of the carnage, Rigby would lean back against a stucco wall and simply melt into the background. His dark ragged clothing blended in with his favored haunts, the ones devoid of torchlight or braziers. He could simply snatch a trinket or two and move on unseen.
But today the poltergeist did not shade the walls of Haulani, he was out scavenging by the Miana pool. Bogus legends about wishes coming true and all that happy little bullshit- Rigby didn't come here to toss in a pretty stone. He came to find those left by foolish hopefuls and see if they were worth anything. He toyed lightly with the gold ring at his ear as he sifted through the shore surrounding the elegant pool, searching for something that may or may not shimmer under the starless night sky.
A clanking dragging sound brought his attention just as he'd set his sights on a specific stone, and as his honey brown eyes were drawn away, the stone disappeared into the surf. "Fuck," he cursed, pushing his fingers through the sand but finding nothing. When he looked back up he wore a bored scowl, dark brows narrowed on the intruder.
With her legs dangling in the pool, a hum started under her breath, a semblance of calm compliance, some way to cease the unending apprehension curling in her gut. Hands went over the surface of the bone, bringing the water up to the sand and dirt laden bombardments, the curves and angles, and then dipping it down into the reflecting vestiges itself. Muck and mire began to leave, dissipate, flicker off into the surroundings, and she might’ve left it at that, content with the fortune that surrounded, bounded, and clustered to the filaments, had she and Fangorn not heard another.
Attention dissipated, fingers still clutching and resting over the bone, but head raised in a predacious fashion. Eyes narrowing under the pockets of lantern lights, her brow arched at the singular word snarling and scowling through the air. Uncertain what the issue, calamity, or cause was, the youth remained poised in her position, gaze only segmenting neatly on the series of weapons at her disposal, should she have need of them, before attention segmented back upon the stranger. “Problem?”
He'd seen the girl around before, her fiery red hair was hard to miss. She most likely didn't know him though, he made a point of not introducing himself whenever he could. Salty scruffy curls hung over his eyes as he glared at her, and when she spoke he rolled his eyes. Yeah. You, bitch, he wanted to say, but he had noticed the arsenal near her side.
However potential threat would not save her from his attitude, "Can't you do that somewhere else?" came his grumbling tone, he looked away and back to the edge of the pool.
Oh good grief, this youth really wasn’t worth her time.
Stifling a yawn, the girl arched her brow, and continued her work. The water did wonders for the bone, lifting the silt and grit from however long it’d been ensconced, smothered, swallowed, and consumed by the coast. Her hands roamed along, shifting the sand off, and the ripples in the pool curled and contorted over the fragment, churning more and more ivory beneath its cathartic traces.
She lifted her head at his grumble and tone, snorting, the defiant edges of her existence beginning to unfurl themselves in the angle of her chin. “No.” A sweet smile followed, but it didn’t touch her eyes – those seemed far more dangerous, savage, and intrepid. “But you can.” And she made a little shooing gesture with one hand, before lowering her gaze back to the object of interest.
Her response was... irritating at best. But if she had to do her chores here, he'd find a way to cope. Honey brown eyes danced over the bone she'd dipped into the water, along the shimmering surface washed clean of it's soot. His thoughts wandered for a moment, wondering what the fuck she had killed for something that big. But eh, who cares, it would be too hard to steal anyways.
"No," he replied, shortly and with little emotion either way. Then back to the edge of the pool he went, searching for some valuable coin or glistening stone. There was quiet but the tide on the shore, until finally something that reflected below the water caught his eye. This time he would not wait, his hand shot into the water to retrieve the trinket. What he pulled from the pool was a tiny glass bottle necklace, except it was jagged and broken, just shards on a string.
He considered tossing it back, as it was essentially junk, but decided to stuff it in his pockets instead. He glanced back over the the red tinted silhouette, just to see what his unwelcome company was up to. Once again his eyes gravitated towards the bone, curiosity getting the best of him.
Melita snorted and sneered in response, an adequate fuck off delivered to one another. There was plenty of room for both of them, and many others, to occupy the space at hand, but the firecracker had staked her claim, and evidently, so had the stranger. As long as he didn’t interfere with her washing of the bone, of hopefully blending fortune into the enamel and lacquer, then she wouldn’t bother with him.
But while she tended to her task, placing the bone between her legs and locking them around the behemoth’s sanction, she kept her eyes on him. They slid, followed and traced his movements as she cupped water in her hands, then lifted it to the top of the surface, sliding it over the remnants, polishing over ivory. He’d apparently found something; his palms and fingers quick, dashing after something within the pool. It could’ve been an object, an artifact, long since left behind, once striving for some amount of luck. Following the same stories and myths she did now.
Maybe he was doing the same, just in a more acerbic manner.
When his eyes found hers again, she laughed, a wild round of danger and savagery mixed within; presuming he was guarding his suddenly valuable device. “Don’t worry, I don’t want it.”
The girl was cleaning the bone, from what he could tell, washing and rubbing soothing circles across the ivory. Why was his obvious question, but he wasn't sure if he cared enough to ask. When he realized that she too was looking his way, he paused, glared and settled back into the bored sneer. Her laugh was oddly unsettling in the dark, he almost didn't believe her comment.
"What is that thing," he drawled, ignoring her comment out of spite and allowing himself to engage. If she wanted to tease, then he didn't care to be polite and ignore. He'd angle towards mischief, two teenagers one upping each other on a the beach under the starless sky.
That thing could’ve encompassed any number of items around her. She’d received the same sort of question about Fangorn, who grumbled from her side, vines snaking in and out of the pool, and there’d be some sort of inquiry about her bow, staff, or any other weaponry she had tucked nearby. Ready. Willing. Able.
Though he didn’t seem encouraged by the taunts for a fight, so she shrugged her shoulders again, angling her features in an air of enigmatic quandaries, nymph spirits, and indulgent, mercurial pursuits. “A ghost whale bone,” came on a neutral tone, since it was the most obvious and strangest artifact in her hands. She continued to pour water over its contents, until all the silt seemed to have been freed, drifting back into the reflecting surface. “Have you ever seen one?” An arch in her brow, the slightest of teases – though she didn’t know who this fellow youth was, she’d never seen him out along the crew or across the sea.
02-24-2021, 01:56 PM (This post was last modified: 02-24-2021, 01:57 PM by Rigby.)
RIGBY
Admittedly Rigby hadn't noticed the vampire gourd, it's grumbling lost to the seething of the sea beyond and it's figure mistaken for debris in the darkness. But as it's vines began to reflect a little in the pale light, his attention was drawn there. From what he knew of them, they were nasty things, not the cute companion that most people coveted. She replied to his question, though his eyes remained on Fangorn, narrowed and suspicious.
Despite the distraction, he did register 'ghost whale' and the question that followed. He had seen one before, only once. At Aumakua, where his father had prayed countless times to the gods of life. He was eight or nine or something like that, chubby cheeks and grubby fingers. Waiting blasély for the pointless begging to cease, he'd stared between the railing bars at the ocean. He remembered so vividly the haunting sinuous figure ripping through the waves, it swallowed whole a hel that flew above the surface and then disappeared.
But Rigby didn't need to share that story, so he shook his head no.
"And what's that?" he drawled again, this time pointing to the gourd.
Unaware of the memories stored within, Melita took the silent response, the idle shaking of his head, as veracity, and poured the water along canals and ridges that had yet to feel the cascade. She wasn’t sure if she’d wish a sight or experience of the haunting, disastrous wakes upon anyone – save for her worst enemies (reserved for Kiada alone, at this point). Each time she’d witnessed, strived, and tried to overcome their massive beings, their harpooning vestiges, their tyrannical, cunning, crafty positions, she hadn’t even come close. Instead, she’d had to go towards an alternating route – asking the heralds, the divine, if there were pieces to this puzzle. If there was a way around the rapacious cretins.
Fangorn eventually earned attention, as per the norm and routine. In response, the pumpkin slithered his vines outward, allowed them to become eerie, eldritch looking things – what he might’ve been, if left out in the wild and not domesticated by a bond. “Fangorn,” Melita started, eyes ducking downwards to lift the bone, ponder it through illuminated lantern light, then continue the process from before. “My companion. A vampire gourd.” The aforementioned hissed in the enveloping of darkness, bemused.
He could see it clearly now, as it snaked it's tendrils to recreate some nightmarish horror. But once the girl confirmed that it was a companion he let his bristling cease, this thing was no wild beast, just a pet. He still watched it as it hissed, almost interested in how this girl had ended up bonded with a vicious vegetable. Back to the bone, he considered it just a bit longer, along with all of her other brutal toys, then with a sigh he turned back to his half of the pool.
Squatting over the edge he sifted through the mucky sand, searching for something more worth his time than a broken bottle necklace. He scrambled to a different part of the pool, opposite Melita and her gourd. Finally something other than sand reflected the light, something iridescent and rounded. Once again he plunged in after it, retrieving a shimmery skipping stone type stone. Quartzish, but more rainbow reflective, surely some superstitious dingo would trade for something like this. If not it would be nice to clock someone with and rob them of their well being.
So he stashed this too in his pockets, almost forgetting back the necklace he'd found.
She might’ve told him the story, had he asked. Instead, she took the silence for nothing in particular, settled with a rippling shrug through her shoulders and tended to her work. But she kept her eyes on him – not many in Torchline were to be fully trusted, and the youth had learned, long, long ago, survival meant more than just armaments and weaponry.
He seemed distracted by something else anyway, and while Fangorn toyed and played with his vines, the stranger dove down into the depths. Melita presumed he knew the tale of the L’ma, and heralded no warning, no call, no gasp, merely a witness to his movements and motions, diving, resurfacing, something in his grasp. Whatever he’d found, he kept it well hidden, covert, tucked away within a moment’s notice. Perhaps the practice of a thief.
Checking over the bone, the honeybee youth stood, the bone laden back along its tarp – cleaned, nearly bleached, in the abyss of luminary and lantern light. “Well, I’m done here,” she announced, a wave of farewell. “Good luck with whatever you snagged.” Maybe it’d fetch him a nice price at the market.
When next Rigby glanced the woman's way it was because she announced her goodbyes. She'd apparently finished with her bone, cleaning it for whatever reason. She wished him well despite his crudeness, the kind thing would be to do the same.
But instead Rigby stood, lanky body hunched as it usually was, and he huffed. Then he unceremoniously started off back in the direction of Haulani, his finds hidden deep within his pockets. It wasn't until he reached the area near the city by the firling that he stuck his hand into the pocket with the bottle necklace in it, and nicked his finger. He frowned, stared at the blood, then removed the trinket, plunking it on a branch next to someone's ornament.
