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!
Aurelia's tracked these peculiar little lizards quite far into the Oerwoud. It's piqued her curiosity to enough of an extent to justify this venture. Especially given that she has nothing else planned for the day. Maybe it's also for the hell of it; for some peace of mind; for a break from the chaos of Torchline. Which isn't much. In the grand scheme of things, it's pretty tame and much of that chaos is self-inflincted in Aurelia's case. But a breath of fresh air, where she can focus on something other than her emotions or even herself, is well appreciated.
It allows the tension, that normally holds her rigid, to ease off. Her shoulders pull back, her tongue unclasps from the roof of her mouth, her forehead creases disappear, and she's enveloping herself in the one place where she truly feels at home...
The wild.
Her dark, deep-brown cloak veils her face as she seeks through colorful ferns and twisting vines. Her ear listens for the unique tunes and vocalizations of treeflits. Having never seen them before, she's quite interested in... at least observing them! They remind her of the cloud wyrms from the ship, and of some of the things she'd seen back in her world, but their air is much more innocent than these other creatures. They sing their thoughts to each other like birds and spread tiny wings to flit between trees.
It's as she's following a cluster of them, a smile on her lips, that her foot snares. "Huh?" She glances down to notice what would appear to be a normal vine as it yanks her off balance. Upside down she goes, cloak billowing out beneath her head. Even her hunter's knife falls to the ground beneath her, no help for her now.
surviving is never beautiful its blood on your hands and face
With Halo in order, with the Warden returned (and the burden no longer on his shoulders), the Sword was freed from the parallels, the cycles, of haunting discernments, and allowed to stretch. Permitted to wander. Free to partake in the liberation, the cycle, the very nature of his inquiring mind – to explore, to unfurl, to entangle long strides and curious notions into the backbone of the world.
And he couldn’t recall the last time such a deliverance had been marked, crossing over portals with due diligence, scaling parameters, searching, searching, searching, with Zuriel behind him and Belial overhead, with the earth beneath his feet, so different, so unknown, so enriched with potential, with sagacity, with pinions and waves of investigations and queries. No need for his furs, no need for the heavily-laden throng, for the cumbersome load on his shoulders any longer. Roaming, trekking, discovering, hair off his neck, a realm beckoning in his sights.
This world was a jungle – and he was very, very briefly reminded of the Hidden Falls, of babbling water tucked away, of covert, subversive schemes, of a war launched on the waves of vehemence. But then the memories ended, and the new ones began, his piercing eyes taking in the vines, the swathes of entangled, curling fronds, not uneasy, but calm. Careful. Composed. He watched where he placed his feet, and the unicorn did the same. Belial, for all his antics, blended in amongst the canopies and boughs, as though he belonged.
Ahead though, were other rustling noises, demeanors, a snarl, a growl, parting through the trees. Zuriel snorted, and Deimos narrowed his eyes, only to notice a stranger nearby, fallen, seemingly snatched at by the greenery. He tilted his head, but didn’t approach.
Instead, he arched a brow. “All right?” And then conformed his earth incantations, forcing the elements to disperse around her – whoever the woman was.
it's fear and feeling numb at the same time stories of a life you should've never been forced to fight
A voice snatches her attention much like the vine had snatched her foot, and she lets out a surprised yelp. "Ah!? Yes, fine!" She snapped instinctively, crossing her arms over her chest. Yes, even suspended upside down and stuck to a vine, she is being indignant. This guy looks real tall, even from this point of view. Kind of reminds her of Sunjata's mass of broad shoulders and impossible height, but his demeanor is a lot different. The features are even more rugged, appearing battle-weary even. And with him is an odd pair of creatures, none of whom look like Haai.
But then the vines latched to her foot suddenly recede, leaving her weight supported no longer. She has little time to react so she barely manages to curl her head beneath her arms before she thuds against a large root. Her body rolls out to catch itself, kneeling against the vines and squinting as she rubs a knot that forms along the edge of one of her elbows.
"I said I was fine. I had that..." she grumbles, "thanks anyway." Blinking up at his rather thick set of expressive eyebrows, she lifts her own curiously. "Where did you even come from?"
surviving is never beautiful its blood on your hands and face
The arc of his brow remained as a range of disgruntlement flared from the stranger. Fine might not have encompassed the range of notions he expected, especially when one dangled from a vine, upside down. Zuriel took upon the motion of snorting, behind him, as if she couldn’t fathom what she was seeing, and Belial had already settled in a tree, blending into folds of darkness, watching.
So Deimos felt nothing when the woman fell. There’d only been a slight chance at softening the blow with his air incantations, and even then, he wasn’t certain it would have helped. “How did you get tangled?” He asked instead, the indifference nulling into a void of curiosity, eyes following the length of the vines. Were they sentient, and capable of grasping, like snakes? Or had she simply stepped wrong, foolish and ridiculous? The piercing slate of his gaze went to the ground too, noting any approaching fronds.
Zuriel snorted again, and he began to move, rounding along a place that could’ve been a path – and despite his mass and brawn, he tucked neatly into the folds of the forest. He could still hear her nearby as he continued his inquiry, maneuvering amongst leaflets and earth – composed of these same elements, somehow, someway, with the blend of enchantments, and the thoughts of the World’s Edge, the Hidden Falls, still pressed into his memories.
The question asked was a loaded one. He nodded towards her thanks, and lifted his shoulders in a composed shrug, but took his time with the inquiry. There were only so many places to begin. Isilme. Helovia. Moonlit Tides. Aurora Basin. Outlander tides. Hollowed Grounds. And then, when he’d lost everything, he’d crawled into the mountains once more. “Halo,” the Sword finally answered, stoic and impassive, sliding around a tall portion of timber.
it's fear and feeling numb at the same time stories of a life you should've never been forced to fight
Aurelia glances around at the messy swath of vines that sweep between each tree. Now that she looks at it, it's a little intimidating. "Dunno, normally I'm much more careful... I think they can move on their own," she states, a hint of suspicion edging her tones. She's no stranger to plants that have a mind of their own, after all. It's not too surprising to her.
She watches as he snakes his way along a pathway of sorts, unicorn close behind him. Their sheer size alone should have them standing out against the jungle but, somehow, they've managed to blend in and weave through with little hassle. It would appear, anyway.
Halo, he says. So that's where he's from, and that's why she's only seeing him know. She heard that they couldn't access their portal in Deepfrost. "I hear it's cold up there," she says, very conversationally. But it seems he has something on his mind and that he doesn't plan to sit still for long, "I'm an outlander, but I'm from Torchline I guess," she pipes up, retrieving her fallen knife and trailing after him. "Who are you?"
But then vine tendrils begin to slap around the path ahead of them, as if to tangle them in a floral web. If she'd never seen anything like these before, she might be stunned or in awe. But she has. In fact, there is a visible scar from magical vines on one of her arms. Being savvy to the dangers, Aurelia's hand swoops into her pocket and out comes a little matchbox. "Allow me," she steps forward.
A flame flickers to life and she uses her mixture of air and fire to build on it, until she can sweep it across the vines. The fire burns with just enough intensity to make them snap and retreat away from the path, less to make the whole jungle go up in flames.
"See, I could've gotten myself down," she offers a matter-of-fact smile at the man, "maybe now they'll stop trying to.. eat us, or something."
surviving is never beautiful its blood on your hands and face
While his suspicions weren’t confirmed, they added to his machinations, to the scrupulous calculations in the way he walked. As if he weren’t there – more covert, even with his towering structure, keeping, tending, to the shadows beneath the jungle canopy. Zuriel, with her nimble adornments, had no issue stepping over roots, plumes, and vines as they walked past, deeper and deeper into inquiry, wonder, and curiosity. He offered a nod in her direction, contorting understanding, before the topic seemed to change. The General only occasionally sneaked a glance from the corner of his eye, ensuring she hadn’t been taken or snatched away by another piece of the landscape.
He had no presumptions that she’d follow – he had his own mission after all – but sure enough, the conversation continued, in the habitual nature of introductions. “Yes.” The mountains were cold, and his soul bled with its chilling ramparts, with summits from yesteryears, with peaks and valleys from the present. That she was another Outlander piqued some intrigue and interest, and only because there hadn’t been many of them left from the initial run, from when the Voice had pulled and rendered them from their homes and lands and worlds. “Deimos. Outlander.” Arms and hands brushed aside a few draping vines, permitting them to dangle at a length away from potentially grasping at limbs or necks, and continued along his way.
Until other actions and devices seemed to spur her onward – and there were a few moments where he watched her foolishly gather a matchbox, and flick flames into the landscape. Were this a dried, summer haze, there might’ve been more risk, and were it not a humid, sultry climate, the same could be considered. But Deimos had enough wherewithal, experience, and haunting memories, to narrow his eyes, and unwind the mastered adornments of water, casting it along her potential conflagration. The cascade erupted and contorted, then doused, soaking the burning intensity, trapping cinders into escaping. “There are better ways than risking the wood catching fire.” Unimpressed, unamused, and still uncertain if she would’ve been able to get herself out of her prior predicament (not that it mattered – he half-wondered if he should’ve just left her there), he motioned around her. Zuriel sniffed, haughty and imperious, while Belial continued to glide above, virtually unseen.
it's fear and feeling numb at the same time stories of a life you should've never been forced to fight
Deimos. Weird name, she had to repeat it quietly to herself a few times to get it right, "Dae-mus? Daymohs. Deimos." But he continued onward without much else to say of himself other than that he's also an Outlander, which only does more to pique her interest.
So she continues after him, including a show of her own abilities. But as she glances up at him he seems even less impressed with her than before, when she'd been dangling by a troublesome vine. He makes a point to scold her for using fire to solve the problem. With a thoughtful frown, she supposes that he's right, but she was just trying to be helpful - and nothing had gone wrong after all. The flames simmered away beneath his water conjuration and she made to let them. Halo. Deimos. Outlander. And very Abandoned.
"Well... yeah, but I can control it well enough, I think... Trust me, I'm the last person to let this place go up in flames," she insists after him with a cautionary glance at his large equine companion. Where the other one went, she can't really tell thanks to the thick canopy above them.
She manifests beside him to watch as he slowly but surely maneuvers through the undergrowth. "I'm Aurelia, by the way," she states simply, and then with a furrow of her brows, she asks, "so what are you looking for out here, Deimos?"
surviving is never beautiful its blood on your hands and face
The Sword hid the briefest of snorts at the mild butchering of his name, furrowing his brows together in efforts to conceal some range of amusement or irritation – it wasn’t certain which was which, quelling along his chest. Unfortunately, his ability to parse few words and sentences didn’t seem to instigate or compel her to leave; a common place notion for Caido. He appreciated it in regards towards acceptance of his character, dominion, and entity, but some days it was a means to an end.
Well enough didn’t quite signify anything of worth. Control was a parallel – he’d had dominance, authority, and command over the fires within the Monster Hunter’s Guild, and it still burned. It still had to be destroyed. It still had to fall apart at the seams. A relative unease cast over his form, harbored and steeled through his shoulders. So much could go wrong in so little amount of time – he’d seen it. He’d witnessed it. He’d been a part of it.
And he didn’t know her enough to trust her.
Zuriel’s gaze segmented straight on the Torchliner, as if she could read into her soul. It was purposefully imperial and intimidating, for the unicorn’s haughty personality signified and dignified that others were quite beneath her. It was a visible show of judgement, before she turned her noble head in complete, utter silence, following after Deimos with a swish and flick of her tail.
Stuck with Aurelia for the time being, he speculated ahead, eyes peering forward, into the brush and thickets of wilderness. “Exploring.” He shrugged. “I did not get a chance to do so before the portal froze over.” Only thereafter did he glance over towards her, one brow arched again. “And you?”
it's fear and feeling numb at the same time stories of a life you should've never been forced to fight
Aurelia shrinks a bit under Zuriel's glare, glancing between Deimos and his companion with shifty eyes. For a long moment of tension, she wonders quietly if she's in some sort of danger, but then the beast swishes onward and she visibly relaxes.
She nods in understanding at his declaration of wanting to simply explore the wilds. Her answer will be the same, though it does surprise her when he returns the question.
He seems pretty quiet. Rough around the edges and.. probably on the inside, too. He doesn't strike her as having a softer side. Makes her curious to wonder what kind of shit he must have been through, or seen. Maybe sometime he can tell her about it, but she doubts it will be today. If anything, she can get a sense that she's slightly getting on his nerves. Or at least, his companion's.
So, in an attempt to mend that, she quells her enthusiasm. "I'm exploring too..." she eyes his arched brow and then strives to take the lead. This time, she pulls out her hunter's knife to cut at only the vines that will be a hindrance to their path. "My home had jungles like these, so I like it here. Almost feels like I'm back there, you know?" She glances back at him with an easier smile, "Except this place doesn't try to kill you. At least, not as fast. No reason to let our guard down, though." With a rise of her own brows, she returns to setting their course.
surviving is never beautiful its blood on your hands and face
Deimos didn’t quite understand why she seemed so determined to maul the jungle as she went through. Their marks into this world should’ve been insubstantial at best. He didn’t mind the dangling vines and swathes of roots, for this was where they’d been embedded, grown, and taken root. His eyes narrowed briefly, contemplating, before unfurling the earthen incantations again, compelling the briefest of movements towards the fronds, the greenery, just enough for them to pass along, and then return to normal. Nothing damaged. Nothing outdone.
Perhaps with a home of such warren hazes, she thought nothing of it. Habitual, to slide her knife across the verdant apertures. The Sword did manage a snort at the following statement. “Give it enough time.” He’d been in and amongst too many eaves here, too many broken, barbed wakes, to believe anything innocent was sequestered within. There were always monsters. There were always threats. There were always omens. Whether or not they stumbled upon something might be a matter of fortune, luck, and lack thereof. The monolith had the latter, more often than the former.
He could briefly hear Belial’s wings flutter above, and his piercing eyes slid briefly to a darkening plumage, tucked amongst the canopy ahead, before shaking his head, and broadening more of the elemental wares. So they lifted and anointed, so they consecrated and maneuvered, out of the range of her hunter’s scalpel.
The inquiry about his magic made him pause, but only momentarily, and then he was wandering deeper into the thickets and groves once more. What the Hidden Falls might’ve been, had they not been there solely to set it into pieces and pockets of war.
“Yes. I was born with it.” Nearly everyone had been; lingering in his blood from generations and generations of fire and water and demolition.
it's fear and feeling numb at the same time stories of a life you should've never been forced to fight
Aurelia's fully aware that danger lies in every crevice, every facet of each root they uncover. Perhaps that's why she's so determined in taking her knife to the vines, perhaps it is a small act of rebellion against the forces at which twine for her lifeblood. Two sides of the same coin. She offers a wry grin at Deimos' words, "That's exactly what I plan on not doing." If you work faster, smarter, better, then you'll triumph. It is a fact.
The swish of feathers above does little to draw her attention, but it is when that earthen magic cleaves its way through toiling vines that Aurelia draws back. With a slightly frustrated huff, she places her knife back into its sheath and allows the abandoned to show off, for all intents and purposes. She even steps aside to let him lead the way through since he is so intent on handling it.
Born with it. Okay, and...?
"You aren't much of a talker, are you?" Aurelia pipes up, stalking after him. But her voice takes on a more humble air, as she poses the question, "Maybe sometime you could teach me how to better use mine?" Her brows raise in question towards him.
surviving is never beautiful its blood on your hands and face
Another shrug undulated through brawny shoulders and an otherwise rigid, unyielding expanse, tall and towering, monolithic and enduring. She could plan all she wanted; he often did, given to calculating machinations and a Machiavellian mind, but rarely did it encompass or unfold the way he’d craved. An unpredictable world, nothing to underestimate. Then he continued maneuvering onward, long, meticulous, scrupulous strides, silence taking hold, the earthen elements partaking in his request with a surge of reliance, content to motion along their newly-carved pathways.
She could huff all she wanted; he didn’t really care.
A hollowed, muffled rumble left his chest at her statement – uncertain if it was meant as an insult. She was a stranger, unknown and foreign and unfamiliar. He rarely obliged those he cherished. “I say what is necessary.” And nothing more. Talking got one into trouble. Talking led to vulnerability. Talking led to mistakes. Talking led to letting down one’s guard. Talking led to more and more errors, holes in the armor. The monolith had done enough of the latter for the rest of his lifetime.
The question of tutelage, of teaching, of instructing, as he’d done so many times before, granted and gave him the slightest of pauses; before he continued onward much the same as before. “Maybe.” A minute smirk appeared. It could’ve been the angling of a tease, but he made it purposefully difficult to discern. “How long have you had yours?”
it's fear and feeling numb at the same time stories of a life you should've never been forced to fight
She eyes him with amusement at his rumble-grumble, brows arching. "Oh, forgive me if I overstepped? Just observing." She dares to poke the bear, grinning playfully. Well, he opened himself up for that, didn't he? Her brows press together with further amusement at his claim of saying what's necessary. "How do you know what's necessary or not?" She asks, light-hearted and genuinely curious. She tilts her head a little.
Not that she truly cares. If he's not much of a talker then more power to him but, it's food for thought. Can never go wrong questioning your own views every once and a while. Something she's learned quite the hard way.
Her gaze brightens up a little and her pace quickens at his 'maybe'. If he thinks that's not enough to get her hopes up, he's dead wrong. She'll take it and run with it, opening her mouth to say something more, but he asks her a question and her lips lower with whatever words she was going to say.
"I've always been able to use magic too, even before Caido. It worked a little differently in my world, though, and not everyone thought it was a good thing..." she trails off, not sure if she wants to really get into the nitty gritty parts of that story with Deimos just yet, "so I never used it before I came here. I just have fire and... air, but my fire is stronger. All I can do with the air magic is this," and she spreads her hands to make a big show, as if she's about to send everything into a hair-tossing whirlwind. Not so. All that happens is a tiny burst of what might be akin to someone breathing very heavily. Her shoulders slump down and she lets out her own, actual sigh. "Lame, right?"
surviving is never beautiful its blood on your hands and face
There was some facetious remark biding behind his teeth, but then the words struck a little harder than they were likely intended, and he grew more silent. The quiet pervaded every tangible outset of his form, while he pondered the angles. For what it was worth, his lack of conversation or the right stanzas had sometimes been misconstrued, and he’d tried to make it a point to herald more dignity, more conversation. But the Sword could also be stuck in those ruts of old, habitual, routine moments; where the wounds hurt and the scars scraped and the notions blended together into days of politics and diplomacy. Of harboring furtive grounds and secrets. Of a mind cultivated to machinate, and subsequently ruin. Of years where everything maimed and marred. And even now, since arriving to Caido, much had been the same – no matter how he’d strived to alter, to change. The lacerations still bore their weight.
So he shrugged, and moved on.
The earthen incantations continued to spread, and he strived to gain sense of any unfamiliar sound, any unfamiliar movement, through the beckoning haze of bright hues and illustrious jungles. Not to seek out danger, not to regard unnecessary risk, but to wonder, to discover, to ponder: what laid within, what lived and surrounded.
The companions hastened along at their own pace, and she answered his inquiry. Another Outlander tradition apparently, tweaks and turns of different parallels, but the magic instilled altered too.
He watched too, at her demonstration – as the puffs of air billowed, on a promise, on a beckon, but could only go so far.
“It takes time and practice,” the monolith noted, instead of calling anything “lame”. Because it wasn’t, just new and foreign. “The longer we are here,” meaning Caido – this world of strange and bizarre intricacies, “the more our powers seem to grow.” And he had no other way to explain it – save for endless training, rampaging through trial after trial, tribulation after tribulation. “My life drain was strongest. And then creation.” And then everything that fell thereafter.
In response, his own Air enchantments rose, a gale, a force, ricocheting between the canopies and boughs. Somewhere Belial made an affronted snort. He might’ve made it a grand whirlwind or crescendo, but permitted it to fade, arching one brow, before maneuvering on. “It will progress.”
it's fear and feeling numb at the same time stories of a life you should've never been forced to fight
