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!
i wish I could say I am a light that never goes out. but i flicker from time to time
"No, I know." Remi agrees as Ronin explains for the umpteenth time, why they can't just hang a sign on the newly built Skyport saying it was out of service. "I just like how quiet it has been." Because of Remi's policies on diplomacy and foreign aid. Because of the Greatwood. Because of the season. It set certain things within him to sleep while others woke and stirred, and though the alchemist hadn't been the most amicable to others, certainly this was probably one of the easier to handle iterations of the alchemist for Ronin.
'Wow.' Falling to a halt as the waterfall comes into view, Remi is stunned into a moment of silence as he beholds the way the rushing water crashes into an icy forth made bright crimson by the lichen still managing to grow despite the cold. It makes him smile, appreciating both the might and majesty of the water as much as the rather deadly colour of it. "So, what do you think Safrin thinks of you laying so many offerings at other shrines?" Remi wonders a touch mischievously, as he nods toward where the shrine to Rae and Frey pokes out of the snow.
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"So do I... but I don't think that's a good enough reason to close the skyport we just built. At least until Flowerbirth, it will continue to be quiet even if it's open." Ronin says with an air of apology, snuggled into his scarf and coat and meandering through the snow towards the Crimson Cataract. He hasn't long woken up, but the crisp air serves as a great substitute for caffeine, and when the waterfall and the red lichen come into view, he can only echo Remi's sentiment.
"I imagine she'll find it quite endearing on the outside, but be seething on the inside," he murmurs with a wince regarding Safrin. "I'd really rather not think about it, honestly." He does have his offering for Frey, though, producing a bouquet of snowdrops carefully uprooted from the frozen ground with roots still attached. He plans to plant them at the shrine, and hope that they grow.
i wish I could say I am a light that never goes out. but i flicker from time to time
Though Remi's glance is intended to be cross, the sight of blue eyes amidst rosy cheeks partially obscured by a scarf has him softening instantly. "No, you're right. And if there are rumours of strange predators roaming around the port?" The alchemist shrugs; that wouldn't be so bad, now would it.
"That's a good way of dealing with it." Remi murmurs with a chuckle, rolling his eyes slightly but letting Ronin deal with his cosmic tether the way he thought best. Glancing at the plants (and noting their roots with an admiring nod), Remi rolls his fingers across his palm, cracking all the joints before doing the other hand. Clearly his throat a touch uncomfortably, Remi kicks a bit of snow off the toe of his boot. "Do...you want help? Planting that?"
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"Well, you know how rumours tend to spread," Ronin remarks quietly, smiling to himself beneath his scarf. "If only someone were capable of creating ghostly looking manticores too, mm?" He draws up close to the shrine with his snowdrops, wrinkling his nose but otherwise not commenting on Remi's remark. The alchemist isn't the only one who needs a quiet season - especially a quiet Longnight - and the Huntsman will reap what he sows when the sun comes back out.
"Hmm...? Oh - sure." He smiles, already having dropped to his knee to clear the snow and try to find the earth beneath. "Did you not bring an offering...?" he asks, his curiosity no less for the muffled tone of his voice. Removing one of his gloves, Ronin shakes his hand out and lets claws replace his fingers so he can try to dig into the cold dirt.
i wish I could say I am a light that never goes out. but i flicker from time to time
Remi grins beneath his scarf and nods. 'All sorts of creatures come out in the Greatwood. Why, I wouldn't be surprised if there were monsters here that no one had discovered yet." He remarks suggestively.
Mirroring his husband, Remi too drops to a knee and begins to brush snow away. Clawing at the ground as well and finding himself pleasantly challenged by the frozen soil, the alchemist shakes his head. "No..I did." He says slowly, eyes focused on the marks his claws have left behind. "I suppose...Frey and Rae are the gods I understand least and..." Remi's voice has taken on an oddly contemplative quality as he speaks, and he finds himself pausing to bite at the inside of his cheek. "...I can't have things go wrong this time."
Raising the back of his hand to push his curls away from his forehead and leaving a smear of earth there in the process, Remi smiles without warmth at the hole in the ground. "The twins are going to come to this shrine, to...age up." He begins, knowing already he'd steered his and Ronin's nice afternoon off a cliff, but helpless to do anything other than tell his husband what was on his mind. "It is too dangerous with how things are for them to remain so small. And it isn't fair on Vai, or.." With a small and understanding smile for Ronin, he adds, "..you."
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"Like things out of nightmares, or illusions come to life," Ronin agrees heartily; once upon a time such things would have unnerved him, but now he's more reassured than anything. Mainly because those nightmarish things will most likely come from his husband, and there is very little to fear when it comes to Remi for the Huntsman.
He's still puzzled, though, as he glances across to the other man, their combined claws burrowing deep into the earth, though rather than becoming easier, it only gets more difficult as they go on. "Oh...? Oh. Well, yeah, I can understand that," he murmurs, even if he doesn't really understand what Remi says next.
The fire that flares out from beneath his hands does finally melt the earth enough to make it workable, but Ronin almost wishes it had remained frozen so as not to be such a tell about his spike in temper. "That's your gift to Rae and Frey...?" he asks softly, in the end.
i wish I could say I am a light that never goes out. but i flicker from time to time
There is little that makes Remi flinch these days, and though the tongues of fire that lick out from his husband's hands don't make him jump, the alchemist's fingers do twitch and then still in the earth. Though it's uncomfortable to say, Remi forces the clarification out with a slight shake of his head. "No." No Ronin, my offering is not my children; but those words are too hard to say. "I brought seeds, wrapped in a thin layer of bark to protect them from the elements and creatures that would eat them to stay fed during the cold." He mumbles, leaning back on his heels and pressing one knuckle against his eye. "But I am not sure it is good enough."
What were a few seeds to a herald as fickle as Frey and a god as distant as Rae? That the children he wanted protected were also twins was hardly a similarity that would keep them safe should Frey choose to continue his streak of bad luck and poor choices.
"Should I not have said anything?"
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
With the hole dug and the earth soft from his hands, Ronin does his best not to crush the snowdrops as he plants them, carefully burying them among the rest of the offerings among the shrine. His eyebrows are drawn together in a frown, and he rakes a dirty hand back through his hair without realising it's covered in mud.
"I just... It came a little out of nowhere," he admits. "And I'm not sure what you..." What you want from me in this conversation. "What your twins have to do with your shrine offering." Rubbing the heels of his hands against his eyes, Ronin leans back on his heels.
"I'm sorry," he mumbles. "I just wasn't expecting to talk about this. I always disappoint myself by reacting badly."
i wish I could say I am a light that never goes out. but i flicker from time to time
They're both going to end up wearing most of the hole they've excavated, but that's the farthest thing from the alchemist's mind just now even as his eyes register the mud in Ronin's hair. "I..can see that." Remi admits slowly, exhaling. "It has been on my mind all morning, I just..." didn't say anything. "Only that...if we bring them to the shrine to have Frey age them up so that they might be slightly safer, what if things go wrong? What if this offering angers Frey, and they decide to age the twins into their eighties?"
Wanting very much to shove his face into the hole alongside the seedlings that Ronin might bury him as well as his offering, Remi instead bites the inside of his cheek to keep the sigh that has built in his lungs encased there. "I understand. And I'm sorry. This seems the one topic that our policy of talking through things never quite seems to help."
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Closing his eyes and taking a long breath of Deepfrost air, Ronin tenses all the muscles in his body and releases them again, forcing himself to slump somewhat beside the hole they've dug. When he blinks his eyes open again, he's at least managing a small, tired smile, reaching out to take Remi's muddy hand in his own. "Well," he murmurs. "What do you think would be a better offering?"
He knows very little about Frey, having barely come to any of these sorts of shrines, but he knows enough about all the gods to guess. "Maybe fruit, or luxere pelts, or something else that shows the Greatwood's abundance of nature...? Or is the other Frey you'll be trying to pray to?"
As for their talking things through? Ronin can only nod, squeezing Remi's hand. "Maybe we should talk about it more," he mumbles, even though it makes his insides squirm. "Make it more ordinary between us."
i wish I could say I am a light that never goes out. but i flicker from time to time
Puffing out a breath that sounds vaguely amused, the alchemist shakes his head. "Every time I think about those things I always think of how it could be twisted. A pelt implies a creature killed, fruit means something plucked and left here that could have been eaten by something.." He shakes his head, and then shrugs his shoulders. "I don't know. I'm not sure how it works at all, actually." Remi admits, exhaling in such a way that his cheeks balloon out for a moment. "I had thought about giving a piece of myself...or perhaps...clearing the Woods or something."
Lacing his fingers through his husband's, Remi lets himself sag to the side that he might sit closer to the Huntsman. "Hotaru is planning on staying in the Woods." He says in a low voice. "You should know that."
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"Mm... Frey is strange like that. I think they appreciate the whole circle of life thing, so..." Ronin shakes his head and wrinkles his nose. "Maybe clearing the woods, maybe helping nature to flourish...? It would be a good time to have earth magic again. Or that weird one that let you bring the plants to life." Squeezing Remi's hand, he shifts closer as well and watches the little snowdrops freshly planted in the ground.
Feathers shiver across the back of his neck to hear that Hotaru will be lurking in the woods (that's how Ronin sees it anyway), but he gives a gentle nod. "I will do my best to keep out of her way, and I'd appreciate it if she showed me the same courtesy." Then, as if at complete odds to the dryness of his words, he leans across to kiss Remi suddenly. "I don't want to feel awkward talking about this," he mumbles about it. "And I'm sorry that I'm making it that way."
i wish I could say I am a light that never goes out. but i flicker from time to time
It would be a good time to have earth magic again, but sadly what Remi has is mostly violence and murder and just now, it shows. 'Mmmmm.' He agrees without much conviction. Sex would also be a good offering, but surprising though it might be, he was about as far from being in the mood as it was possible for a man like Remi to be.
Unable to see the feathers or feel their heat, Remi nonetheless can feel the surge of fiery emotions from the Huntsman in a way that simultaneously makes him smile and clog his throat with emotion. "I'll let her know. And I am so—" Ronin's lips on his steal his breath and the thoughts he'd been meaning to stay. Flooded with warmth and persistent love for the man at his side, Remi hums a soft moan against the Huntsman's lips.
'Don't be sorry.' He whispers. "It is awkward. Why don't you kiss me again, and see if that helps?"
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"That's such a good idea," Ronin says with a lopsided smile; whether or not it makes it less awkward, he still wants to kiss Remi again, and as his lips press against the other man's he feels something inside him start to thaw out. The snow beneath them is starting to melt but Ronin doesn't care, his free arm slipping around the Lullaby as he deepens the kiss. "Mm... reckon this would be a good enough offering for Frey?" he wonders, as if accidentally reading his thoughts about the matter.
"I love you. And I trust you, and I know that you didn't mean for any of this to happen. It's easier, now that the twins haven't just got here, and it's not Leafchange any more." Brushing his nose against Remi's, he smiles and draws back a bit. "I'm going to do my best to start moving forward. It's not like anyone is going anywhere, is it?"
