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!
She makes him better, and he makes her better, but it's so unfortunate that she can't voice this either. Her mind wants to spew all of the negatives rather than the positives, because she just doesn't know how else to look at things. All of her life has been spent fighting, running, pulling herself together even when all she wants is to fall apart. With Milo, it's different. Nothing is the same. Nothing feels the same; it feels safer, warmer, lighter.. like she could let her guard down. But that's what she's most afraid of doing, even if it's also what she needs more than anything.
"How could you say that?" She demands with a cracking tremble in her voice, tears beginning to make their streaks across her face. She's not caring if it's hypocritcal, not caring if he's confused or what-have-you. She hates it, hates that anyone could bring her down to such a low place.
She backs further into the water, legs hiking up against the push of the waves, until it envelopes her waist. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do, Milo," her voice hinges with desperation, whimpering out the words through her tears. "I can't get through it, not without you... but I don't know how to fix myself! I'm fucked up, Milo, what if I never- what if I'm always gonna be afraid of that?" She raises her voice above the waves as she continues to back further and further into the water, until it takes her with it and she turns to accept it.
"I- I can't-" She can't handle the internal confliction; she feels her heart tearing right apart, feels her soul give way to the fresh loss, and she disappears into the water.
How could he say that? Because he doesn’t understand. He doesn’t know what she wants but it sounds an awful lot like ‘space’ to him. And so he’d try. But it hadn’t been taken well, and Milo feels like the one left pulling back, adrift and lost at sea with land legs. “’cause I don’t understand what y’want from me.” He tells her simply, lips quivering a bit as she steps further away from him and he takes a few stunted steps toward her.
“Then y’gotta figure out if ‘m worth more t’ya than yer fear.” He says, but then she’s gone. She stumbles over her words and disappears beneath the waves and Milo drops everything and anything he had in his hands, his stunted steps growing stronger and longer, careening across the sand and into the water to where he last saw her. “Don’ you fuckin’ do this t’me ‘Relia.” He hisses to the empty air, diving into the sea to find her. And gods, he manages to spy her just barely through the stinging of his eyes from the saltwater.
But he finds her, he latches onto her, and he pulls her up with him to the surface — his arms wrapped tight around her.
03-20-2021, 03:53 AM (This post was last modified: 03-20-2021, 03:59 AM by Aurelia.)
Aurelia
as if you were on fire from within
She tries, she tries so hard to bite it back, wishes she could take it all back. But it came out the wrong way, ending in an ultimatum and hurt feelings she brought on herself. He's hurt, too, she can see it in the way his lip quivers, in the small steps he takes towards her.
He doesn't understand. Neither does she. How could it all go so sideways? She shakes her head as she backs away, stifling a sob, telling him she can't, and the waves take her away.
The sunlight is lost to her here, so much light drowned out by suffocating darkness. That's what she is, isn't she? The darkness that swallows the light. She has every intention of dragging herself deep into the water, going wherever the current will pull her. Somewhere far away, she hopes. But her hands feel numb and she hardly makes any progress before she feels his arms wrap tightly around her.
A muffled, choked sound ripples through the water; a meager protest to being taken back. They breach the rolling waves above them and Aurelia splutters painfully. "Stop- Milo-" her words are hardly backed by any grit or anger, no choice made except him.
She goes for his arms with intent to push him away. Just let me go. But as she feels him there, holding onto her so tight it's hard to breathe, her hands find his and hold them there against her. Her back is to him and for the moment she's glad he can't see her face because she's such a mess.
"Milo..." his name trembles out, "I'm sorry-" a sob shakes through her, so much held back that she chokes on it.
She’s nearly lost to the water, but he finds her, grabs her, clings onto her like their lives depended on it. Even against her protests, against the bubbles of air that are suddenly strewn about them as he drags her to the surface with him. And when they do surface, he inhales a sharp breath, arms tight around her middle, her back pressed against his front.
And he’s panting, because he isn’t used to swimming – not like this when it came to trying to save someone. “Don’t you fuckin’ dare.” He mumbles against her as she tells him, essentially, to let him go. He wouldn’t and she has to know this. But at least she’s stopped freaking out and he can try to pull her out of the water, back to the edge of the beach where their feet can touch the surface.
His name spills from her lips in a tremble, the apology that has him sighing and squeezing her gently, pausing in his endeavor to get them back to shore so he can press his face against the back of her shoulder. “I know ya are.” He mumbles, muffled by the ocean and the water strewn from their bodies, from his dive in. “I know.” What else can he say?
“We’re goin’ back t’the shore.” He rumbles against her, a demand within it that trembles and shakes as it comes out. And Milo slowly begins to try and drag her back to the beach’s comfort and support.
03-20-2021, 03:44 PM (This post was last modified: 03-20-2021, 03:53 PM by Aurelia.)
Aurelia
as if you were on fire from within
She's got to be stronger than this. Got to be. This is ridiculous, she tells herself, as she sniffles and shakes from her flow of tears. Her breaths are horrendously labored and inconsistent, and there's no more fight left in her. Just the shattered shards of her life, which she's tried to put together again and again and again. And here, now, one vital piece has been haphazardly risked. He's the vein that leads directly to her heart. And she's so sorry that this is happening to them at all, that she's doing this to him too.
He knows, he knows, and he rests his head on her shoulder for a moment. Even if it's such a small gesture, such small words, it reaches through. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so bad at this, Milo!" She blubbers out hysterically, and he can pull her along wherever he wants to go because she's right there with him, turning, reaching, stumbling. "I don't want to lose you just because I'm an idiot and I don't know how to say what I really mean or what I really want," her words come out fast, panicked, heavy, "I don't wanna lose you, ever, for anything. Milo I'm sofuckingtired of losing everyone, everyone, that's why I'm doing this. I asked Safrin for something to protect people with, because I can't- I can't be the reason they're gone anymore." The murdering, the death, all of it that shrouds around her life like a cloak. It fits her far too well, and once she'd actually been okay with it. Could live with herself with it. Now...
She pulls back, halting and sinking her feet into the wet sand below. The world spins ever on and for a moment, just one fucking moment, she wants it all to stop. "I'm sorry," the words shrink and crumble against the wave of the sea, against the crash of her emotions.
“I know.” He repeats, pulling her along with him until his feet can get under him and he can collapse into the hot, sunlit sand where the waves don’t reach. He pulls her with him, down and down until he can hold her against his chest, panting as he tries to catch his breath from the swim and the water that’s dripping from both their bodies.
He takes a sharp breath, eyes heavy and red from the saltwater and emotions that course through him as he holds her close. “So ‘ts somethin’ we work on.” He manages. Something they can both try to become better at — her and her words and him and his understanding of what she means. For now, though, he hears what she says of Safrin — surprised she’s even gone and met a god, Abandoned as she was. But his heart blossoms with pride for her.
“You’d be great at it.” At protecting people. Isn’t that similar to what she’d done before? But he doesn’t stop there, he can ask about Safrin later, but for now? For now he loosens his tight grip a fraction so that he can reach up and pull her chin up to face him, to make sure they’re eye to eye. “Jus… Don’ you ever fucking do that again. Don’ disappear like that. Please.” His voice cracks and he tries to focus on her with all his exhausted bronze intensity. “I love ya, ‘Relia. Please don’ do that t’me.”
She sinks into the sand, going with him easily. It's warm against the cold that's washed over her, bright against the overwhelming darkness she feels. Her hands keep their hold on him, wherever they can, as he reigns her into his chest and they both shudder with breath lost to the turbulence.
Her eyes remain downcast, even when he tells her she'd be good at protecting others. The vote of confidence makes her brows lift hopefully, at least, even if she can't really bring herself to look at him right now. It's beautiful to know that he genuinely believes in her, that she can become that better person and it drives her onward. But, as always, she doesn't quite know how to put it into words.
So her fingers relax and she strokes his skin absently. It's meant to be a comfort both to herself and to him, to be gentle and soothing. Droplets of water fall between and around them and, as they fall, she wonders if she's still crying and they're actually just tears. She can't tell, her eyes hurt too.
Milo lessens his grip and pulls up her chin, bringing her gaze up instinctively to match his. His intensity is almost too much for her now, feeling the bronze of his eyes burn straight through to her core but, she doesn't flinch. Not even when his voice cracks, not when he tells her he loves her. There's a pulse of release that's invoked by that, though. Her eyelids flutter as she brings up one hand to wipe her face. There's a small pause, letting the silence wrap around them. She notices how everything doesn't feel so heavy here, in his arms, with the way he looks at her now. Like he needs her, too.
"I love you, too," she brings her other hand up from tracing lines in his skin, to rest along one side of his neck. Her thumb grazes over the bottom of his jawline and she breathes out a sigh, "I don't wanna leave you," her eyes flicker over the contours of his face, her own expression softening as they return to meet his gaze again, "I'm here to stay for as long as you want me to. Milo, I need you, not.. not space," she shakes her head and frowns up at him, "but I want you to be happy. To be okay. The last thing I want to do is push you away... or hurt you..." and her voice starts to shake again, her throat tightening, because she's failed him miserably in that. I'm sorry threatens to uselessly come out once more, but instead her lips quiver and she shakes her head again.
Her fingers stroking along his skin give him some amount of hope that she’ll be okay through this, and when he finally speaks, finally gives his ultimatum to her – the admission that he loves her, his hand on her chin, holding her close to him. Silence wraps around them but he isn’t worried – he doesn’t think she doesn’t love him too. No, if anything, it cements the fact that they’re both working on themselves. She’s working on how to piece her words together and he’s learning to wait until it’s understood.
Her hand rises to his neck and she says it back, and he releases the breath he didn’t know he had been holding, lips parting so that he can wet his lips after he’s managed to catch his breath. Sand lingers to every bit and piece of them, but he doesn’t move away – instead, he simply watches her, studies her face just as she studies his, and Milo nods when her eyes meet his again. “I am happy, ‘Relia.” He assures her. “’n I don’ care who y’wanna spend time with ‘r sleep with s’long as yer always happy with me.” Perhaps it’s naïve of him to think, but if others could provide her with what she needs when he can’t, well, he doesn’t mind.
All he wants is for her to be happy with him. And he’ll be happy too. “Y’can’t hurt me more than I hurt m’self.” He assures, her, his hand drifting from her chin to tangle in the wet hair there, leaning down so that he can press his forehead to her own, to breathe her in, to close his eyes and let his rabbiting heart calm down. “I’m smart ‘nough t’know when I’m in danger.” He’s a runner, after all. “’n I’m not in danger with ya.” He murmurs, opening his eyes and pulling his head away a fraction to press his lips to her forehead.
The sand, the water, the tears, the beach, it all fades into the distance as she gives him every bit of her attention. Her thumb continues to rub through his dark stubble. Now that she's looking at him, hears the truth of his words and chooses to believe them, she doesn't dare pull away.
Comparing him to anyone would be unfair. No one could compete with the way he makes her feel, makes her burn and freeze, fastens her heartbeat. She smiles softly at him, "You have no idea. You don't just make me happy, you make me better, you give me that much more reason..." she pauses and laughs softly, "and the way you make me feel terrifies me. I don't think there's anything I wouldn't do for you," so if he ever did have a problem.. all he had to do was say it. If there's anything she's learned here today, it's that she'd leave it all behind for him.
His hand is warm against her skin as it passes into her hair. She leans into it with closed eyes, touches her forehead against his, and she has all the resistance of putty. Her own hands glide over his skin to embrace him, joining around his neck.
He pulls back and she blinks up at him, that is, until he presses his lips against her forehead. Which is perhaps her favorite kind of kiss. The kind that takes away all of her stress, pulls it out of her churning mind with gentle understanding, that silently tells her he's there for her.
"Well, I wouldn't go that far," she peers up at him with a bit of a spark back in her gaze, before she smiles and suddenly her hands are going for his ribs to tickle him again.
Her words even out, without the emotions tearing at her and fear to spur all the wrong ones out, and Milo is so eternally grateful that it works. Her words reflect within him, in the gentle smile that begins to form around the corners of his lips as he holds her close, as he doesn’t dare to think about letting her go. “I’d do anythin’ fer y’too ‘Relia.” He murmurs gently, agreement and the final bit of understanding that they’re most certainly on the same page.
He pulls away a fraction, however, his hand sinking into her ocean tangled locks, his lips pressed to her forehead, before he’s pulling away from there again to meet her pale verdant gaze. There’s a soft smile on his face with the admissions, relief finally swelling through him, and he’s half torn between trying to sit up and hold her in his lap, or to simply fall back in the sand and take a warm powernap under the sun – likely burning to a crisp in the meantime.
Her words have him raising a brow her w ay, however, the spark back in her eye that has his lips parting before she dives for him, tickling him in response and he’s shivering, barking a laugh, writhing and wiggling under her to try and get her to stop – hands moving to try and trap her wrists. “Oy, that ain’t fair y’know!” He manages, fighting against her ticklish hands.
He smiles again, finally, and she's missed seeing it the entire time. When her heart sank deep into her chest, threatening to fall apart with their relationship. But she managed, after putting up such an unnecessary struggle, to tell him the truth of the matter. It wasn't easy for her, none of this is. It doesn't just come to her, she doesn't have much experience, but with Milo things at least have always felt more natural. It feels right when she lets go around him, and wrong when she doesn't. Which makes it.. good, doesn't it? She wants to believe that it does.
She would do anything for him, especially to keep that smile on his face. So she attacks him again and, as her fingers crawl and jab over his ribs, her smile broadens with his laughter and struggle. Until she's giggling too, even as his hands capture her wrists easily.
That's not fair, he says, and she sits there, more up on his lap now, unfazed. Her gaze focuses on his smile. "Hey!" She pipes up, sounding as if she might argue. Instead, her laugh fades, replaced by a more loving expression, more needy. She leans back in toward him, hands in his, nudging his nose with hers, and her eyes hover back over those honey-brown depths.
"Kiss me. Please." She needs to feel it, the full extent of his feelings - and she needs to show him hers, too. She needs it to pull her away from everything else, even if just for a moment, to make the world stop spinning.
He’s nearly out of breath, gasping for it when he finally catches her wrists in his hands, moving them out and away from his body so she can’t tickle him any further. He pants to catch his breath, eternally thankful when she doesn’t fight against the grip he has – and it loosens, it loosens when he spies that loving look in her gaze, the way she sounds like she might be ramping up for an easily playful argument compared to what they’d just done.
But she leans in close, pressing her nose against his, leaning in against him, and her request? That’s easily answered. He doesn’t have to be asked twice to surge forward and press his lips against her own, entirely full of thankfulness and content, of need, because he needs her just as much as she needs him. He melts in her presence, with the taste of salt and sugar on her tongue.
He doesn’t release her wrists just yet, moving instead to shift them a bit so he can get his knees under him, to flip them so her back hits the sand, and he moves to press his forehead against hers again, bracing his arms against the sand and letting her hands go. “I love ya, ‘Relia.” He breathes against her skin, moving to dive in for another kiss.
Her lips tremble to meet his, apologetic and desperate and earnest, and her eyes close as he melts into her. This the best way she knows how to express all of the things she can't explain. She matches his heat with a flare of her own, relishing the feelings he invokes.
Breath pulls in through her nose and her lips part gently against his to let him taste her - and taste him back. A muffled sound comes out, short and sweet, packed with all of her affection for him. It's all she could ever want, could ever need; his closeness, his touch, his... everything. She leans into him, chest-to-chest, heart-to-heart.
Until she's suddenly in the sand, to which she groans in protest and looks up at him as if this is a cruel betrayal. Her body instinctively arches up to meet his, relieved when he sinks back into her. Her freed hands move steadily over him, tangling in his red locks and finding his skin warm in spite of the dive they'd both taken.
He says it again, that he loves her, but it's different somehow. More spurred on by emotion and impulse. "Milo-" his name is a soft, deprived cry on her lips but her words are cut off with another kiss. "Mmmh. I love you so much," she mumbles back, breathless, the fingers in his hair curling as she pulls him closer.
He can’t imagine anything else – that soreness of his heart when she’d started her rejection not that long ago in the sands, purely made out of confusion, slowly begin to leach out of him into the sand that he puts her against, hovering above her to pepper her and litter her with kisses, filling up that piece of his heart with warmth and life. Her protest is waved aside as he leans down to meet her, fitting himself against her and letting her hands go to roam as he braces his arms in the sunbleached sand.
He cuts her off with that warm, passionate kiss, pulling away as he catches his breath, huffing a small snort in response to her mumble, in the hand that tangles in his hair. He pulls back just enough to scan her with his bronze gaze, one hand moving to pull her dark hair from her face, before it rubs against her temple gently.
And perhaps it’s because it feels different this time, but Milo pulls back suddenly, sitting back on his heels as he pulls her up and flush against him, burying his face into her neck and pressing a kiss just below her ear. “Y’wanna grab the donuts ‘n come home with me t’night?” It’s a quiet, accented whisper in her ear, his nose brushing against her earlobe.
