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!
'Oooh, yesss, Flora agrees.' Of the fire-looking lilies. Knowing nothing about Aoife other than the few things her Dad has told her, now she surrounds the girl's mention image in her mind with a roar of flame and flowers the snarl like a wildfire.
Reaching for the flowers, her fingers carefully holding the paper sheathing around them, Flora looks up with her lips slightly parted. 'On your...you mean, I can..? She breathes, hardly daring to believe it. Shaking her head hard enough to dislodge a few bits of blonde hair from her ponytail, Flora blinks her pale green eyes up at Ronin. "You mean it? We can go on your nimbus?"
there will be scrapes and sutures; viciousness and victory
Grinning now (and only trying a little bit to hide it), Ronin reaches out to tuck her hair back behind her ears. "Well, let's see..." He hmmmmmms exaggeratedly as he looks her over, tugging gently at her ear and examining her shoes as if that makes any sort of difference. "Yes, I think you will be able to fly on my nimbus with me. I don't think you are big enough yet to ride a dragon or a luxere, but a nimbus should be fine."
Whistling for his cloud, it whizzes down before them, low enough for Flora to be able to climb aboard. In the meantime, Ronin sinks down as well, his legs dangling off the edge of it. "Quick quick, or it will get impatient," he warns, gathering the rest of their purchases as well.
Preening just a little as he fixes her hair, Flora's eyes follow his down to her feet as she holds her breath with nervous excitement. It doesn't occur to her at all that this is a game; every ounce of her thinks that this is some test, and oh! how she wants to pass. So, standing up slightly taller and sucking in her stomach (why? shh), and making her sure her toes are pointed straight and not turned crookedly, she awaits his judgement.
'Eeee! Thank you, thank you!' She cries, too jubilant to rein in her excitement. As Ronin tells her to hurry! Flora squeaks and grips the cloud with her fingers while trying not to crush the lilies she holds. '—hnfff!' She groans, squirming her body back and forth, believing at any moment at all the cloud will simply buck her off, and Ronin will realize he'd been wrong about letting her ride his nimbus.
there will be scrapes and sutures; viciousness and victory
Chuckling as she climbs aboard the nimbus, Ronin makes sure there's no way she'll go rolling off (mainly by putting his arm around her) and ensures all of the items they've bought are with them before it's up, up, up and away!
The nimbus rises and whizzes through the streets and over stalls, though he's careful not to soar too high just yet. If Flora happens not to like heights, they'll soon find out, and if that is the case then Ronin will want to be able to take them lower.
All the same, though, they start to cut through the crowds to make their way towards the Aumakua. Aoife's grave is very close by, so they can stop off there first. "How are you finding it so far?" Ronin asks, gazing down at Flora with eyes made brighter by the blue skies.
Scared of heights? Absolutely not. So far there's nothing Flora is afraid of (nothing tangible anyways; disappointment, embarrassment, not being good enough though? Oh yes. Those are very real fears). "Does it go...faster?" Flora asks casually, knowing that it absolutely did. She'd seen Ronin on his nimbus plenty of times. Enough to know that it could go much faster, and also that she was quite safe.
With their items securely stowed (and their tray tables in their locked and upright positions) the girl is free to spread her arms wide to let the wind stream around her. Laughing at the tears that streak from her eyes, Flora tilts her head back and pretends that she's flying the way her Dad can.
there will be scrapes and sutures; viciousness and victory
"You know, I think I might be able to make it go a little faster. And a bit higher, too," Ronin says, as if it's something he might have to tease out of his nimbus, rather than something he knows the cloud is more than capable of doing. "Are you sure you will be able to handle that, though?" He does his best to sound dramatically full of doubt, but beneath them, the nimbus is already whizzing away over the stalls.
And as they leave the market place and it's a clear stretch up to the cliffs, the cloud nearly rockets away, and Ronin is grinning as well. "Is this fast enough for you?" he asks, having to speak a little more loudly so Flora will be able to hear him over the wind.
"Yes," Flora agrees with an emphatic nod of her head, hoping she wasn't lying to them both. As the market became a blur and the cliffs roared toward them, the girl was forced to narrow her eyes if she wanted to keep them open, but even then tears still swam and then streaked down her cheeks. With her ponytail streaming out behind her, she had to lean forward slightly to counterbalance, finding the way she had to sip in air rather thrilling.
"This...is...the best!" She yelled back, hazarding a quick glance in Ronin's direction to offer him a rosy-cheeked grin. "Does the cloud ever get tired?" Glancing thoughtfully at the nimbus, Flora releases one of her tightly-clenched fists to give it an experimental pat as if it were some beast of burden tugging them along.
there will be scrapes and sutures; viciousness and victory
Ronin can't help but laugh to hear her cheer beside him, the Huntsman keeping his eyes sharp for the marker for Aoife's grave, a sight that slices deeply into his heart no matter how many times he sees it. "It only gets tired if I get tired!" he calls back, the nimbus slowing considerably as they reach the top of the cliffs, as he spots the grave site in the distance. "And I don't get tired all that much," he adds.
Falling predictably quiet, as if this is no different to climbing the stairs in the guildhouse when Aoife was napping, Ronin's nimbus lowers to the ground a few feet away from the marker, the Huntsman climbing off and holding out his hands to help Flora get down as well. "Alright," he says, "We're here."
Grinning, Flora playfully rolls her eyes. "You don't get tired at all." She counters. "Unless you're trying to get out of something." Giving him a you-can't-fool-me-look that has Remi written all over it, the girl turns her gaze back toward the cliffside as they begin to slow and descend.
Hopping off and finding her legs a touch unsteady, Flora reaches out appreciatively to Ronin. Quickly snatching her hands back though so that he wouldn't think she was a baby, she grabs the bright flame-coloured flowers brought for her step-sibling and began to march purposefully towards the gravemarker. When your Dad was Remi and you were too young to have experienced loss, visiting a grave was a bit like looking at an old photo album. There was no nostalgia or sadness, just keen interest in a life that you'd missed by a few years. "I hope you like orange." She trills, trying to push the stems down into the rocks so it would look like they were growing.
there will be scrapes and sutures; viciousness and victory
"Hey!" Ronin protests, though she's absolutely right - and he's struck, all of a sudden, by how much she knows about him even as he's been trying his best not to be involved in their lives. He shouldn't be surprised, honestly, that children are so perceptive, but it doesn't make him feel particularly good about his behaviour thus far. And so it's a brooding Huntsman that follows Flora towards Aoife's grave, leaving the rest of their offerings for Safrin in their place on the nimbus.
He feels the nostalgia and the sadness for both of them, standing nearby and watching as she arranges the lillies just so, Ronin leaning in to fix one of the stalks where it tries to fall down. "I think she would like these," he says quietly, letting his fingers graze over the stones before straightening up again, clearing his throat. "Come on, let's go to see Safrin's lighthouse," he suggests. He'll come back later, when he can have some time alone.
"Yeah?" Flora asks, sounding hopeful. The flicker of a smile that touches her lips disappears as she glances over her shoulder and up at Ronin, spying his sadness and the permanent markers of his grief. A small and black voice whispers in the back of her mind that Ronin has already had two daughters, and that she's too late to ever receive any of his love. That he'll shrug at her grave one day and always be a third, fourth, or even fifth afterthought in his mind.
'Okay.' Trying to keep her own sadness from weighing her voice down lest he think her selfish for making this moment about her, Flora does her best to brighten. "Can your cloud carry our things? I don't want to break the brooch in case I trip."
there will be scrapes and sutures; viciousness and victory
Ronin is the selfish one, perhaps, for making this moment about him, but it has been some time since he last came to visit his eldest daughter. It has taken him off guard, but he does his best to move past it. Inhaling deeply and turning away from the grave, he moves back towards the nimbus and nods to Flora. "Of course it can. You can put whatever you like on there," he says, clicking his tongue for his nimbus to come closer.
Making sure that his flowers and vase are arranged appropriately, he glances back to Flora. "Would you like to ride on it as well, while we walk to the lighthouse?" he offers, nodding at the cloud. "Wouldn't want to wear you out before you've bene in Torchline for even a day."
"Nah, I'll walk." Flora replies, though her confidence isn't necessarily indicative of what her muscles can handle. Even so, she hadn't been lying before when she said that Ronin never got tired. Remi didn't either, and Mateo always seemed to be doing something. The last thing Flora wanted was to be known as the lazy baby of the family.
"Race you!" A terrible idea and one she had no chances of winning, but even so, it was with a dash of enthusiasm that the young girl begins to charge her way up the winding path. Ignoring the loose gravel and shale, it was only as she scampered around one of the switch-backs that Flora realized what inappropriate footwear she'd put on. Seconds after that one of the straps of her sandals broke, sending the leather skittering out from beneath her foot and forcing her ankle to catch her at a horribly wrong angle.
Collapsing on her butt, her knees scraped and bloody and her pretty dress now covered in dust, Flora tried to close her mouth around the rising sob in the back of her throat. Whether or not her bravery was bigger than her pain was a question quickly answered, as she gasped out a strangled cry of alarm to see the way her ankle was disjointed and clearly broken.
there will be scrapes and sutures; viciousness and victory
"If you're sure," Ronin trills back, more than happy to let her scamper off ahead to race him if that was what she intended. He fully plans to cheat, of course, and there's already a projection waiting for Flora outside the lighthouse, playfully tapping his foot. No sooner has he conjured it, though, when it all goes to hell.
The cry of alarm is enough to have his loping strides turning into much more of a run, and it's with a swiftness that he's sure is new that he comes upon Flora, with her scraped knees and obviously broken ankle. Hissing in a breath through his teeth, Ronin acts before he thinks (which is nothing new, of course) and sweepts down to kneel at the girl's side.
"Hey, it's alright. Don't look at it, look right here, okay?" he says, his voice low and quick, and he motions with one of his hands to tap on his shoulder, where Flora should keep her gaze. "I know it hurts but I'll get it fixed for you. Just keep looking and take some big, deep breaths for me, alright?"
Already the glow of a supernova is beginning to ignite in his bones, and when he's ready to let it go he reaches out to shade Flora's eyes from the light, letting it wash through her to soothe away the grazes and to fix and set her ankle.
