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!
A late bloomer by any definition, Hadama had only just begun to come into his people’s magic. It was still so weak that it was barely perceptible in the ocean where tide and current hid and obscured his efforts, so he had come topside at the shore of the Isles to practice with it, a mere stone’s throw from one of the beaches. Practice makes perfect was a saying as much under the ocean as on dry land and he had certainly done so in the past. Now those habits would hopefully stand him in good stead as he worked to increase his control and distance.
But at the moment both were limited and it was a good thing that Hadama was a patient man as he drew a small amount of water up out of the ocean and traced a figure eight with it through the air, a look of intense concentration on his face as the liquid wobbled and flowed through the patterns he set it. So deep was his focus, he wouldn't notice anyone approaching from the land side unless they announced themselves.
If Wessex is any indication of the earthly and sea-dwellers’ motto, then yes, practice brings one closer to perfection. Not perfect. None of the demigods are perfect, but close to it, because luck is a tricky thing sometimes.
It’s been a long time since she’s visited these Isles and teleportation makes the isle-hopping infinitely easier, so the demigod is spending a small amount of time amusing herself by flicking back and forth between the sand, trees, and water. Anyone watching would surely wonder what’s gotten in to her. And when she finds herself on a new isle, the Wraith pauses for a moment, only to find a mermaid behind her, facing away, and - oh, yes, she vaguely recognizes him. It’s the hair, really. She recognizes the hair. A bit cheekily, Wessex attempts to sneak up on him, summoning a pair of encantados to leap up around the merman’s head and potentially through the water figures he's making.
Even if he'd been expecting trouble on the landward side he wouldn't have heard the demigod's silent steps. Between her light-footedness and his concentration he was startled at the sudden appearance of the pink dolphins he hadn't sensed approaching through the waves. One splashed through his watery creation and it fell apart, streaming back into the ocean as his focus was shaken loose.
His stoic expression only shifted a little in surprise as he looked around--
And saw a human(looking) woman who was familiar, though he'd never learned her name. Relaxing a little - but keeping a weather eye on the encantados now - he nodded a courteous greeting to her. "Welcome back," he rumbled. After a moment's thoughtful hesitation to remember their last meeting he tilted his head curiously. "Did you investigate the frost in King's End, too?"
She nods a courteous greeting in return, though a welcome feels odd. She has to remember that this more his home than hers (something something about the philosophy of the world being her home, but let’s not get into that). “Oh - unintentionally, yes.” Grimacing, as if she were distressed about it (and in a roundabout way, she is) “I ended up there and sorry to say that its much the same. Cold. Frosty. Just a little better equipped to deal with it than here, I think.”
The encantados lurk in their vicinity, casually swimming around the two of them in the midst of their play, which draws her attention back to the water and what Hadama had been doing. “Water magic?” she asks. “I’d heard that merfolk have it, but never seen anyone use it.”
Usually pods of pink encantado are a welcome sight on the waves - but not this time. Bobbing, not swimming, these creatures look as if their have been dead for some time. Pale and bloated, they appear to have been entirely drained of blood.
Hadama tilted his head in acknowledgment that King's End was suffering the same misfortune. "Hopefully the curse will not continue. The fish schools have already begun to decli--" He paused as more encantados drifted closer in the water, but these were far from the frolicking, lively pair that had appeared with the woman. Breaking off the conversation for the moment, he swam over to investigate and returned with furrowed brows a moment later.
"There is no threat but... I do not know what happened to them." Strange and troubling, but not something that had happened recently and nothing he could do anything about now.
A slight shake of his steely head followed another glance at the dead pod before he tried to focus on the human again. "I am... I think the saying is 'an overdue bloomer?'" He tilted his head at Wessex with a slight questioning tilt. "It is a recent talent. One I am trying to train for defense." He lifted another small, wobbly globe of water in front of him and flattened it into a spinning disc. It wouldn't be able to stop anything, but there was a chance it might deflect an incoming projectile.
Summoned animals aren’t like real animals; real animals would have been in distress long before the small pod of pale pink corpses bobbed into view. Not hers. They frolic together until either Hadama or Wessex notices the grim sight and then the Wraith sends them to investigate. They swim along after the merman, poking delicately at their bloated kin before making sad encantado sounds - which prompts the demigod to dismiss them.
She hadn’t thought the animals were a danger - or that the two of them, here, were in any danger, but that’s the luxury of being a demigod, isn’t it? She doesn’t quite think like normal people do anymore. And it isn’t until the merman returns that her focus comes back to him, brow furrowed for a moment. “That’s… very odd. They’re obviously dead, but was there anything noticeable? What can kill a whole pod like that?”
Then, like a child whose attention has been sparked by something shiny, she perks up a bit. “Would you like to test it out? Training people is kinda my thing.” Offering Hadama a small grin, she looks between him and the water, but out of courtesy, remains on dry land for the moment.
The unsummoned encantados gave the mermanta a moment's pause, but Attuned were known for such things and he was far too focused on the strange happening to think about so harmless a display of the woman's abilities when they had bigger dolphins to...
Best not to finish that thought right now.
The final question was an echo of the same one in Hadama's head, but he had no more answer for the drylander than for himself. He only met her eyes grimly, his words slow as he tried to pull further details from the macabre display. "There is no blood in the water. No sign of battle wounds. But... it is as if the blood was drained. From the entire pod." That last was the strangest. That the entire group was similarly affected... "I have never heard of such a thing."
Troubling. Exceedingly troubling. But Hadama was a pragmatic man, and the encantados appeared to have been dead for some time so he judged the danger to be a distant one.
That, or an even greater motivation to improve his defensive magic in a hurry.
"Thank you, I would appreciate your experience," he agreed solemnly but with open curiosity in his eyes. The woman certainly looked capable and no stranger to combat, and he made a welcoming gesture into the shallows if she would care to join him there. He held the spinning disk between them, roughly the size of a dinner plate and a little wobbly as he concentrated on its shape and speed.
“Me neither…” she admits, quietly musing over the facts they’ve been presented with. “But I would guess either something a lot bigger or multiple, smaller somethings.” One for each encantado. Both situations pose a challenge, but in the absence of a clear and present threat, that’s neither here nor there because they have a more pressing matter to attend to: training. Wessex turns from the pod to the merman with a tiny raise of both brows. “Great.”
She wades with ease into the shallows, sending little waves towards her counterpart. She’ll have to go easy on him, which leaves most of her magic out. Except for the least harmful, perhaps. With the sun at their backs, Wessex is able to reach for a little-used, but fun bit of magic - one of her firsts - and directs their shadows with little unnecessary gestures until they rise up out of the water; one attempts to break through the water plate and the other dives back down unto the water to rudely target Hadama's tail.
Neither something big enough to drain multiple encantados nor something small and swarming were particularly comforting thoughts, but Hadama simply nodded agreement with the woman's assessment. With luck it would be one of Caido's mysteries they never encountered again.
But no one's luck score was that high.
Having seen her turn into a fox and summon beasts, Hadama was surprised by a magical approach. His attention was held by the first shadow as he shifted to keep the water shield between them, attempting to deflect the manifestation's attack to the side using the momentum of the spin since the water couldn't repel a direct frontal assault.
But while his attention was held there the second shadow was able to successfully goose his tail and the mermanta whipped the long, slender length of its tapered end instinctively in reaction. "Madame," he rumbled, a slightly pained note in his voice that had nothing to do with physical bruising. "I do not even know your name." Much less received dinner or flowers anemones, first!
It’s a good attempt, and since Wessex has committed to playing on easy mode with the merman, she allows the shadow to gently glance off the shield, easily pushed by the spinning water. “Good -” Wessex begins, about to add a suggestion when it appears the second shadow was successful.
The Wraith laughs brightly at the joke, dropping the shadows for a moment. For better or worse, it doesn’t occur to her that answering with the truth might sour whatever budding friendship they have, so she offers a very polite bow and an apology. “Ah, of course. My apologies, good sir. I’m Wessex.” And then with a mischievous glint in her eye, she tells the tail-shadow to pester his tail again, in order to make the merman choose which part of him to defend - the top half or the bottom half? Can he split his focus?
The stoic merman didn't grin, but the corners of his eyes crinkled in shared amusement as the woman laughed. The name that came might have been legendary across the realm but it hadn't directly impacted the merfolk and besides, surely there were other Wessexes in the world? He might ponder his way to the correct conclusion eventually, but for now Hadama had no reason to jump there and he only tilted his head politely as they finally finished the ritual of greeting begun so many weeks before. "A pleasure to meet you, Wessex," he rumbled.
And then it was back to business and the drylander's shadows advanced once more.
After the goosing, the mermanta's attention was understandably focused more on the unexpected siege from below. A second, smaller spinning vortex twisted in the water to protect his vulnerable tail but splitting his focus against attacks from two directions was far more challenging than the training he'd undertaken with Melita. When his eyes dropped to follow the underwater shadow's attack and twist it aside he lost track of the one in the air. He almost managed to deflect it even so, but the spinning water disk wobbled as his attention was diverted and couldn't maintain enough cohesion to divert the second strike. The shadow smacked into his shoulder and he took a deep breath of the salt laden air before shrinking the first floating vortex and firming it up as he reached out with his hands to help direct them.
Great, he’s made a choice; that’s usually a good first step in learning how to deal with a multi-pronged attack. If you can’t tackle both opponents, best to choose one, deal with it, and then hope you have enough energy to come back to the second.
The above water shadow hovers at the merman’s shoulder, going from a shoulderish check to a hovering presence. Not threatening, exactly, but after a moment, it starts poking Hadama in the shoulder, much like an obnoxious younger sibling might if they were trying to get attention. It’s all but saying hey, hey, hey in the Merman’s ear, trying to goad a reaction or break his concentration. Meanwhile, the underwater shadow, because it has become corporeal, is also subject to the laws of water physics, or whatever you want to call them. It cannot move as quickly as it wants to and is effectively redirected by the vortex.
"Hmm." A quiet rumble of discontent emerged as his shoulder was poked. That particular shadow was indeed distracting, and all the more because of how close it was. Hadama couldn't seem to position the water shield effectively to prevent the 'attacks' from getting through when each jab disrupted his concentration just enough to cause his magic to waver and threaten to fall apart - allowing the next poke to slip through more easily.
At least the ocean was slowing the shadow below, so even though the mermanta's attention wavered he was able to recover and shift the second small vortex into blocking successfully, protecting his dignity for a while longer.
Realizing that he was at a disadvantage, a gleam of mischief came into Hadama's green eyes and he shifted tactics. Letting the floating water collapse into a blob he instead narrowed his gaze in concentration and sent the water squirting towards Wessex's eyes, intending that the liquid's momentum would carry it past the limit of his magical control.
