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!
// do my worst, shoot the moon, stab the sun. got a curse, on the tip of my tongue you go first, and i swear that i'll jump. born to kill, tiny slice of the throat //
Hardly healed, Sunjata shivers with the bite of the cold against a warm body, his torso wrapped and bandaged, yet he can’t stay away. He’s arrived to stare at the shrine (to glare, more like it), settled among some new blossoms with an arm resting around his middle to try and keep his breaths from causing too much pain.
It’s a brighter day, the sun having broken through the clouds of spring, cascading the world around him in vibrant golds and pinks and blues with little dots of white and red flowers among the wildflower mix, leagues away from the Barrows where things are more barren and demons watch over the dead. And yet all Sunjata can do is sit in the grass and glower at the shrine, running through a multitude of words he wants to hiss at it but refrains.
Instead, offering up a quiet little, “Guess I’m supposed to see you soon, huh?” He grits out, working his jaw, shaking his head and lifting his gaze to the bright blue sky where pale fluffy clouds pass by without a care in the world.
(Set before the KQ <3)
a new pill, or the poison you know, let it spill && i swear that i'll go
SUNJATA
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
After the encounter with the bear, and the endeavors of the Sea of Glass, Noah knew it was time to visit Vi's shrine. He wanted to thank him for the gifts he had been given, but also seek some guidance in ideas he was concocting in his mind. Having prepared an offering for the god, whether he needed one or not, Noah made his way through King's End towards the Barrows. Noah traveled slowly, but with purpose. He did not let his mind or his eyes wander and catch upon distractions. Generally, any time the hunter thought he might be able to gather something, he would. But he made his way swiftly, deliberately, to the shrine.
But he wasn't alone.
The hunter stood far away for a few moments, watching the back of the man's curly haired head. He did not want to interrupt him in his prayers, even as his jaw feathered. The last encounter he had with Sunjata did not go well. Neither of the men had been particularly friendly to meet, and Noah held a grudge within him against the man for the company he kept. After enough time had passed that Noah did not think anyone was coming to talk to the Flood, he finally stepped forward to place his own offering at the shrine. He looked over to Sunjata tentatively, but chose to stay quiet for a moment. The man looked worse for wear, not only with the dark bags he had seen before, but with injuries and the obvious scent of blood. "What happened to you?" He finally chose to ask.
// do my worst, shoot the moon, stab the sun. got a curse, on the tip of my tongue you go first, and i swear that i'll jump. born to kill, tiny slice of the throat //
He’s lost much of his Attuned powers from before – unable to call out to the birds to help keep tabs on what’s going on around him – so when Noah arrives, the Flood is unaware. And perhaps it works out that way, given that it gives him all the time in the world to not feel like he’s on edge, to put on a face, to wait and see just who it is that arrives.
It sure as hell isn’t Safrin, which is a relief. Instead, it’s Noah, which… Is still one person that keeps him a bit more on edge. So when Vi’s demigod speaks, Sunjata stiffens, hissing a sound of pain as he does so, before he moves to pull himself to his knees, to brace himself to stand. “Got the shit kicked out of me. Why? You want a shot?” He asks, tilting his head up toward Noah now, a dark brow rising.
After all, the two of them hadn’t really gotten along – Sunjata’s always been a bit more of a black sheep when it came to all the old god followers.
a new pill, or the poison you know, let it spill && i swear that i'll go
SUNJATA
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
Even for having stood back as long as he did, Noah was not truly ready to interact with Sunjata. He wasn't sure what he wanted to say, really. Their last meeting had been prickly, at best. There were lots of reasons that Noah did not trust Sunjata, but it was primarily his relationship with Nate and the fact that the ascended who attacked his home were all wearing the Flood's dragon skin.
No, this is a place of honor, is what the demigod wanted to say, but instead he asked "Is there a reason I should?" It didn't look like whoever had given Sunjata his last beating really saved any room for anyone else, really. The scent of blood was strong, even if the man had bandaged his wounds. The bear within Noah could still smell it all.
Noah stayed near the shrine, facing Sunjata. He did not think the man would attack, nor had he thought that in their last encounter. Not wanting to provoke the fight -- though, given his state, Noah did believe he would walk out the victor -- he was intentional to keep his posture neutral.
// do my worst, shoot the moon, stab the sun. got a curse, on the tip of my tongue you go first, and i swear that i'll jump. born to kill, tiny slice of the throat //
It’s probably a good thing that Noah doesn’t say the initial thought that comes through his head. Because despite the broken ribs, Sunjata would have certainly laughed at that. Sure, it was a place of honor, when you weren’t the one that had just betrayed the goddess the shrine stood for. But Noah is unaware over the recent developments – otherwise he might have known why Sunjata had said such a thing.
So instead, his gaze turns from the Sentinel, to the rocky shrine covered in a tangle of roots and flowers and shrubbery that he’s supposed to help Ronin clean up before explaining himself to Safrin, and his gaze narrows at it as he works his jaw. He pushes himself up to his feet with a hiss of pain, trying to draw up to his usual height but falters a few inches to hunch slightly where his ribs are barking in pain. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe the fact I betrayed Safrin to align with Frey.” His steel gaze lifts from the shrine to Noah. “I’m pretty sure she sent Ronin to do this. Figured when another devout follower showed up it was for the same reason.” A shoulder rises and falls in a shrug and he turns away from the shrine to gain a fraction of distance away from its prying eyes and ears, but stops to look down the hill over the rest of the Barrows.
a new pill, or the poison you know, let it spill && i swear that i'll go
SUNJATA
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
"Vi has my allegiance. Though it was Frey first. I've yet to meet Safrin." He spoke the words plain and simple, but there was an underlying truth beneath them: as long as your allegiance doesn't turn to the Voice, I have no reason to hit you. While Noah didn't have the same depth of relationship with the herald of nature that Sunjata did with the starlit lady, he understood that certain offers could influence certain decisions. In the end, Sunjata still stood on the side of the old gods -- if only barely, somehow holding on the last inch of a thread -- and it needed to be enough for Noah.
"Did you come here to apologize to her?" Noah asked as the Flood stood and turned away. The pain in each of his movements was obvious, and if Noah were someone here to seek vengeance he believed it would be easy to gain it. But he wasn't. He had come simply to pray to his own deity, to ask for guidance and assurance as to his next steps. The way the new demigod moved made the hairs on the back of Noah's neck stand up, the tension in the air and between the two men thickening with each breath.
// do my worst, shoot the moon, stab the sun. got a curse, on the tip of my tongue you go first, and i swear that i'll jump. born to kill, tiny slice of the throat //
Ah, that’s right. The Vi demigod.
Sunjata works his jaw, the new demigod taking a shallow breath to try and draw up a bit higher to his full height, though it certainly looks and feels painful when he does. He pauses to chew on the inside of his cheek, a small snort leaving his nose at the comment. “Frey was the first god I met.” He offers easily – the fact not being a secret in the slightest. “When I went to attune I thought I was going to them, but it was Safrin who showed and attuned me.” He shrugs a painful shoulder, before he’s turning away from the shrine and Noah asks a question that has him barking a laugh, then coughing right after.
His arm wraps around his ribs a bit tighter as he shakes his head, curls dancing, the earrings in his ears moving with the movement, the dangly ones hovering above his shoulders. “Gods no.” He says with a small amount of vehemence. “I’ll have to face it one day but today’s not the day.” He shakes his head, tilting his head back to glance at Noah. “Besides, I don’t regret what I did.” At least not right now. And that was perhaps the crux of the issue with him to begin with.
a new pill, or the poison you know, let it spill && i swear that i'll go
SUNJATA
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
When Sunjata laughed, Noah raised his eyebrow. The theme of "if Noah were a different man" permeated this encounter. This time, had he been a different man, he might have laughed at the way Sunjata laughed and then sputtered in pain. But the hunter found no amusement in this. He was many things, but he wasn't cruel.
Of all things Noah thought might happen on this day, for him to explain himself and his religious history to Sunjata was not one of them. But here they were. "I attuned when I was very, very young. I didn't have much memory of it until I looked into Vi's eyes the day he asked me to be his demigod. Then I remembered I had seen those eyes before." As Sunjata turned, as did Noah.
"The heralds weren't present in my childhood, because they were within the Hollowed Grounds. I grew up mostly without the influence of gods at all. I did seek out Frey, though, after learning about them from my friend Phoebe, and then seeing the good they were doing for Halo."
// do my worst, shoot the moon, stab the sun. got a curse, on the tip of my tongue you go first, and i swear that i'll jump. born to kill, tiny slice of the throat //
He also didn’t expect the day to turn into a history of Noah, but Sunjata can’t complain. It’s better than getting his ribs punched again. Better than tasting the copper on his tongue and the way his lungs feel like they’re crushing with each and every breath. So he stills, deciding that he doesn’t think that Noah is going to attack him, so he moves to sit on the grassy knoll again to get a bit more comfortable, to stretch out his legs, looking away from the shrine as he keeps his arm braced along his ribs.
Idly, he wonders what it might have been like to become an attuned from such a young age. “I imagine it must have been a surprise to get them all back so suddenly.” He comments idly, leaning back on an elbow until the mention of Phoebe has him snorting again. “Ah. She’s why I went to Frey in the first place, too.” He shrugs lightly, wincing a fraction at the movement but sucking in another shallow breath as he pushes past it, trying not to let how much pain he’s in show. “She’s another Frey demigod. I don’t… Think she’s found out about me yet. Probably won’t be too happy about it.” To this, he casts a slightly amused gaze back up at Noah with the raise of his wounded brow. “She’s my ex-wife. And Frey even officiated the wedding. Makes things a little awkward.”
a new pill, or the poison you know, let it spill && i swear that i'll go
SUNJATA
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
02-24-2022, 02:00 PM (This post was last modified: 03-01-2022, 08:33 PM by Noah.)
i will endure the night for the promise of light
“It happened slower than you’d think. Halo is full of people who grew up without the gods, so it took some outside influences to be able to welcome them back in our lives.” Noah and Weaver were some of the first ones. It was even Weaver’s quest from Ludo that gave Noah some of the confidence he needed to be able to pray out to Frey. Though he had several empty shrine visits, and some that left him with curses, eventually the herald had come to answer him.
“Phoebe does have quite the ability to influence,” Noah chuckled, remembering meeting the woman on the beach. He had been so concerned of the dragon with her, but she was able to talk him down, and to show him that not all outlanders were untrustworthy. “I didn’t know you two had a history.” Noah stated, brows drawing together some as he looked to Sunjata. The larger man had moved and Noah had chosen to follow, settling himself down just a few arm lengths away from the Flood. “I haven’t seen her in a while. I helped her retrieve ice from Halo, and that was a few seasons ago. I imagine that she’s on some kind of task for Frey.” The way his words came through were almost more questioning than stating, as if Noah were leaving space to fill in any blanks that Sunjata may know about her whereabouts.
Though the way Sunjata went on, he wasn’t sure there would be any information to fill in the blanks. “Well, for your sake let’s hope she takes Freys knowledge above her own. She’s small, but in your state…”
// do my worst, shoot the moon, stab the sun. got a curse, on the tip of my tongue you go first, and i swear that i'll jump. born to kill, tiny slice of the throat //
“Hm.” He rumbles, because it makes sense and it’s exactly what he imagined when he first stepped foot in Halo. Though, he had avoided the region quite a lot, to be frank. He’s always hated the cold, only having to step within its borders when he absolutely had to. But the subject switches to Phoebe and he listens as he offers his own little tidbits, his gaze drifting from Noah back out over the grasses as he times his breathing, mentally checks his heartbeat.
He nods to the history comment, though. “I haven’t asked Frey, though they did think it amusing that they got both her and I now.” He tilts his head back to squint at the sky for a moment, before his head tilts back toward Noah. “Last I heard she got remarried.” To Harper – a man he’d had to convince to give her a shot. He wonders if that made him better in the eyes of Phoebe or not, or if he was still the monster she seemed dead set on portraying him as.
But Noah’s last comment, his laugh, is one that twists Sunjata’s lips into a small smile, a hum of a laugh leaving him too even if it ends in a cough that rattles against his broken ribs. “Hey, don’t underestimate her.” He offers once he gets a handle on himself. “When we broke it off, she destroyed my bar.” Which unfortunately seems to be a common thread between his exes.
a new pill, or the poison you know, let it spill && i swear that i'll go
SUNJATA
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
Noah nodded and chuckled, sure in Frey's delight at having two demigods with a rich history together -- especially in just the way that Frey loved. They had been married, after all. "Yeah, I heard that around Torchline when I was there last. I hope that, if she is out for something with Frey, her husband at least gets to be with her." Noah knew what it was like to separated from someone you loved, as he assumed Sunjata did as well. At least, it was a conclusion that Noah could come to based alone that he and his husband stood on opposite sides of everything. Surprised by Phoebe's rash behavior, Noah couldn't help but laugh again, in the way that wrinkled the corners of his eyes. "Well, I'll definitely keep that in mind." Though, he didn't plan to betray the blonde in such a way.
After his laughter dissipated into the night, Noah sat in a few moments of silence. Even as the tension lessened by his choice to release some of his prejudice against Sunjata, Noah still shifted uncomfortably. "Sunjata...how will things work when you and your husband are tied to opposing gods?"
// do my worst, shoot the moon, stab the sun. got a curse, on the tip of my tongue you go first, and i swear that i'll jump. born to kill, tiny slice of the throat //
“Hopefully.” Sunjata responds, though it isn’t something he admittedly is thinking much on. Whether Harper joined Phoebe on those adventures wasn’t his business, and the fact that the Flood no longer had a hand in Torchline? It was extra not his business anymore. Still, a small smile tugs on the corner of his lips as he draws a laugh out of the Sentinel. Perhaps if he knew more of the context he wouldn’t be laughing, but Sunjata doesn’t intend to tell him.
Some secrets can stay secrets after all.
Though nothing quite relates to how Sunjata’s ease (even if he’s in an incredible amount of pain) shifts to placing that mask back up, his chin dropping slightly as he looks down to the grasses by his feet. “They uh, don’t. Really work.” He admits, head tilting slightly before he turns his head to look at Noah with a small shrug. “You don’t really get to pick who you love though, you know? I just try my best to make sure I don’t lose him. Do whatever it takes.” His gaze averts from the Sentinel again. “It’s why I had my daughter with Safrin. It’s why I switched to Frey.” He pauses, muscles feathering in his jaw. “To try and protect him.”
a new pill, or the poison you know, let it spill && i swear that i'll go
SUNJATA
No permission needed for power play!
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
Noah knew that, sometimes, when called for a duty the demigods did not always have a chance to gather up those they loved and bring them along. Cordelia was here in King's End staying with Deimos, while Noah moved across the world doing his best to fulfill what Vi wanted from him. He didn't want anything more, as his heart ached, than for the woman to be at his side. It was an interesting love they were developing, having rubbed shoulders in Halo for so long and not initiating anything. Perhaps that had been obliviousness on Noah's end, or perhaps it had been the presence of Weaver that drew other women away from Noah, even if the two had never shared romantic feelings for one another.
Sunjata answered Noah's question, and the Sentinel hummed his agreement. They couldn't help who they loved. There were some that Noah cared for deeply that chose to go to the Voice, but at the end of the day Noah knew he had to do what was right. The Voice was not that answer. "What has he done to protect you?" He wasn't sure it was his place at all, but perhaps the previous question hadn't been either, but either way, the Sentinel asked it with a raised brow and skepticism behind his glacier eyes.
