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!
That hadn’t been his intention – not with these series of statements otherwise – but he was half-tempted to let them remain there. Safrin’s words echoed and spun in his ear again, mountains and pebbles, and a vicious sort of sigh built in between his ribs and collided with the rest of the misty air, all while he stared out across the expanse. “It was your sense of entitlement, and disregard for Ru.” That was why he’d offered an alternative. That was why he’d hastened towards other directions, instead of acting as everyone’s personal item maker. Perhaps a majority of the world saw him in that light, and he was just now capable of focusing in on it, of seeing where he really fell in between the cracks and seams.
The rock crumbled in his hands, in force and incantations, spun back into dust and demolished quarters, and he brushed it off, back into the shoreline. For a moment, his piercing gaze flickered away from the bizarre horse making its way over, slowly, and straight to Nate and his hollowed laughter. “Why should I give one to you?” Deimos had to wonder if this was how Remi had felt, all those years and seasons and cycles ago, constantly asked to churn out elements and fragments for greedy, avaricious hands. Maybe the Sword had simply gone on too long in the same mannerisms, and the result was here – exuding a level of boundaries with those reaching, grasping, covetous and self-indulgent, offended they’d have to do something for themselves.
As for the Climb, that earned a distinct eye roll. “Have you not gone there before?” In all the hustle and bustle of sickness the past year? “Best use your jacket then.” A dangerous, hostile sneer rankled over his features – a warning perhaps.
Otherwise, there was this god damned equine to either deal with or ignore. Reaching inwards, plucking at Attuned factions and capabilities, the beast called out to its fellow cretin, a gesture of impatience and irritation. What do you want?
under the bludgeonings of chance my head is bloody, but unbowed
Why you don't got any questions? How you know that this is real?
"Disre- my disregard?" Nate can't help the way his voice rises, his head snapping to fix the other man with a fiery glare. Entitlement, sure, whatever. He'd just asked, hadn't expected, but if that's what the other considers entitled he could accept that. "I don't know what she said to you, but she left me behind. Without a fucking word." What was he supposed to have done differently? He'd already been trying to hold things together, at least until he figured out what he wanted to do, and she had made that decision for him. It was simple, at least. If she wanted to be gone without a word, he would respect that, would leave her alone. Wouldn't go begging for something he clearly wasn't worth.
"I don't fucking know. Because you can? Because it's easy for you to do?" Easier than a trek into a molten landscape at least, easier than cutting deal after deal trying to find another precious gem in the back alley markets of Torchline. "Fuck it, forget I even fucking asked." He'd figure it out alone, ever back into some feral and snarling beast, lashing out at any offered hand until they didn't reach out anymore. And then he'd bemoan his isolation, curse everyone for not bothering.
Forcing himself to his feet, Nate pulls the aforementioned jacket tighter around himself, recognizing and ignoring the threat. "How do you think I know it's an oven?" Of course he'd been here, had survived obviously, but it was out of necessity, chasing a cure, fulfilling quests and tasks for a goddess who was seeming more and more like the only thing he could put any faith into. "If I can avoid it, I'd like to."
Slow steps stop completely, those black eyes glinting with an easy-to-miss surprise.A... ride? For you? The beasts response is slow, as if it hadn't expected such a brusque question, as if it hadn't expected a question at all. The heavy head tips this way and that, the horse sizing up the attuned with a sharp curiosity, and then chancing another step closer.
I am feeling such oppression
You can't tell me how to feel
This was already a prime example of why the Sword rarely opened his mouth. It was easier to give dust and stones, instead of boulders. Easier to keep the status quo. Easier to breeze over and by. Easier to grant the world what it wanted and carry on, forging ahead. But he’d done it so many times, in so many ways, and at just the thought, the mere mention of not obliging someone, here they were. In some convoluted mess, in some tipping point of constant indulgences and rising tantrums. Storms that had been building and brewing on both sides, in both individuals, though not for these particular reasons – snapping over here and there, because everything was exhausting, fatiguing, and draining.
He dropped the Ru’s involvement – that was between them and he’d offered his support to her already – but this god forsaken scramble over a rock made his eyes roll and flicker over the horizon, back into the mist and fog, to the confused equine drifting on the surface. “Just because I can, does not mean I have to.” Whether that was a mantra for himself, for Nate, or anything else hardly mattered; it echoed and reverberated in his soul, against his ribs. “All I have done for the past few years is give endlessly.” Lifetimes, really. And where had it gotten him? Dead friends? Love that left? Ties like these, right here, right now, obviously held together by what he could do for others, and never the other way? “And I am running on empty.” So perhaps it had seemed miniscule, this gem he could’ve conjured in his palm out of nothing – but it had become a breaking, crumbling edge.
For what did he ever get in return? More people waiting with their hands out? Berated and condemned, by those like Wessex, who turned mere statements into molten misunderstandings?
Deimos sighed, and finally turned his head back towards the Ascended, the vaguest hints of danger lurking in the midst of his features. “And you stand there and whine, because I have not made your life easier in this one moment. Because you will have to do something you are capable of completing on your own.” The Sword would like to avoid all of these conversations too, but here they all were, lingering in the cuts and lacerations of others.
He shifted his cranium towards the water once more, but only when he heard a response – perplexing and bewildering, a shared motion over the expanse. It was such an abrupt, bizarre interlude and interim between all the other nuances, that he blinked multiple times, trying to absorb the information. “I talked to it,” he extended one open hand towards the water horse in a hapless, careless gesture, as if that explained anything. “It is offering rides, apparently.”
under the bludgeonings of chance my head is bloody, but unbowed
Why you don't got any questions? How you know that this is real?
”Then why don’t you go be a surly fuck at the people who drained you. It’s not like I’m fucking knocking on your door asking for nonsense.” The jacket had been offered freely, as far as he’s aware. And I’m the grand scheme of things, a single diamond doesn’t seem like a lot. Not for everything it opens back up to him. No, Nate knows when he’s the target for vitriol he doesn’t deserve, and he won’t take it lying down.
Even with the latent threat growing in Deimos’ demeanour, Nate can’t stop himself from poking, from snarling and snapping and throwing a fit. Might as well lean into the accusations, while they’re expected of him. ”Do you know what fire feels like to me? It’s the only fucking pain I can feel.” The only thing he can really feel at all. His hand lifts, rubbing over the scar that splits his face, the edges of it softer now that when it had first been burnt into him. ”But no, you’re right. Excuse me for asking you to just magic something up. I didn’t realize a rock would break you.”
”Fucking good for it.” Of course the spooky horse is offering rides. That only makes the most sense, doesn’t it? Nate glares at the thing, so he doesn’t have to look back over at Deimos, and works his jaw. ”I don’t even know how to ride a horse.” The words come out before he can stop them, sullen and low.
The horse, to its credit, does not seem to care for whatever petty squabbles they’re engaged in. It continues to approach until it is close enough to be touched, a cool mist huffing out of its nostrils as it breathes heavily.
I am feeling such oppression
You can't tell me how to feel
A rough, hollowed laugh escaped his throat, shaking his head; dangerous and loathsome and very near contemptuous. “They would not care either.” Because at the very core, they’d taken and taken and taken with smiles on their faces, and he’d let them. He’d run himself into the ground again and again and again – once until he perished, and now, where he was finally beginning to carve something out of nothing. And this selfish idiot before him, with his hands out, with his snarls, with his own vehemence, was not about to be granted anything but the Sword’s abhorrence.
He breathed and felt it quake within his chest, waiting. Idle. Ready. And it would’ve been such a delight to set the fool’s fears into fruition, to cater to the fire inside him, to unleash and unfurl and drench everything around them in flames. Then he wouldn’t have to listen to the whining, the egocentric wails, the little, trivial, insignificant snarls. Tempting, enticing. But he let it simmer there, right under the surface of his skin, willing and able, while Nate continued and carried on, about a decision he had made. “I gave you an alternative from my experiences, and the means to shield yourself from it.” His eyes went to the jacket – but the gaze was piercing, puncturing. “You chose to be offended.”
Then he lifted his jaw, seditious and defiant, every inch the heathen, the hellion, he’d been before – spreading irreverence with his existence, turning and twisting, staring out into the horizon, across the mist, at the approaching equine. “I am no longer catering to those who think I exist solely to give them what they want.” The Nates. The Wraiths. The grubby little palms reaching and plucking and waiting. “Perhaps that starts here.”
As for the pale, likely impending doomsday horse, at the very least it wasn’t asking for anything. He watched the mist pool around in plumes, sighing half-heartedly at the wake of all this ridiculousness. Reaching into his pockets, he found a carrot clearly reserved for Zuriel, but she wouldn’t know it had gone missing. Breaking it into pieces, he offered one portion to the animal, palm out and flat, a low rumble curling through Attuned aspects. No, thank you he gave in response – no need for a ride today. And he does not know how, tossing his head, indicating sullen Nate. If Deimos were in a better mood, if he hadn’t been reduced to these filaments, he might’ve given advice to the Ascended. Instead, it remained empty and gone.
under the bludgeonings of chance my head is bloody, but unbowed
Why you don't got any questions? How you know that this is real?
A brow rises, the sneer only cutting deeper across Nate's features. It was not the picture of a man who didn't care, though he'd never admit that. Deimos is one of the few people who infuriatingly towers over him, and as cutting as his words may be, Nate has never been the type to initiate a fight he doesn't think he can win. Getting dragged into something is different, obviously, but it would not be the case here, not unless he managed to truly offend the Sword.
If Nate knows the danger he is in, the inferno that rages behind the other's skin, it doesn't seem to affect him. Though, there's little that could truly affect him in this state, too riled up now, too dedicated to simple anger. It's just so easy, so immediate. It doesn't take a scrap of effort. "You could have just made things easier for me too. What's it take, a fucking second?"
The next words escape as a shout, echoing over the roar of the waterfall and startling birds out of the nearby trees. "Then what's the fucking point of having the powers?" Hands ball into fists at Nate's side, electricity crackling in his one good eye. He very nearly reaches out to shove at Deimos, though he thinks better of it in a split second it doesn't stop the second pair of arms from appearing, also clenched into fists before him. A buffer, for the next words he slings. "What's the fucking point of you, huh?" Was it to simply loom around, to judge and deny and make things more difficult?
The horse sniffs at the proferred carrot, nostrils flaring and its mouth opening. It's a touch too wide, the teeth there a touch too sharp, but it accepts the vegetable at first, chewing with a single noisy crunch - then opening its mouth and letting the carrot fall into the water, its head turning away from Deimos. Turning to look at Nate, who has shoved hands into his pockets and started walking away, deeper into the jungle, a dark mumble of "Fucking shithead" clearly audible. It's petty, maybe, but he sees no reason to stick around for nothing when he has things to do. Places to go. Diamonds to find.
Fin~
I am feeling such oppression
You can't tell me how to feel
