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!
He had suggested that they meet at the Miana Pool in part because of the shade for Evie's fair skin, but also for the quiet of the place. Haulani was bustling and filled with excitement, but the noise in the market districts drowned out even the cries of the hels and Hadama prized the calm he had once lived and worked in.
Today, however, the Miana Pool was not particularly quiet. As Evie approached she would hear the sound of ringing metal and would arrive to find Hadama, draped across a rock jutting out from shore so only his flukes were in the water, hammering with intense concentration upon a small traveling anvil as he shaped a thick band of silver into a circle. He had been there for quite a while already, having arrived early to pass the time by working on his own project while he waited for their appointed hour to arrive.
This time he need not worry about her skin, because she has obtained a large floppy hat whose brim shadows her easy-to-burn shoulders as she approaches. The ringing of metal is a strange sound this far out from the city, but it doesn't deter her in the least. Whatever Hadama is doing she is sure is occurring for a good reason.
Once she is close enough to see Hadama hammering away at something, Micah's ears flattening onto his head at the noise, Evie's expression brightens to see him working at some sort of jewelry. "Hadama! What are you making there?" Approaching with a smile, Micah slinks near her ankles and peers out from behind her calves, clearly wary.
With the noise of his work he didn't hear his friend's approach until her voice lilted through the rhythmic strikes of his hammer. The mermanta paused his work and turned his head, a small smile lightening his usually stoic features and making him look five years younger. "Evie," he greeted warmly. "I am making an armlet. A quest for Safrin."
Sharp emerald eyes noted the kitten at her feet and a steely brow rose in curiosity. "Tell me. How have you been. And who is this?" He nodded gravely to the feline, respectful of a potential companion and also of one of Safrin's favored animals. The anvil and its work were momentarily ignored in favor of giving his full attention to Evie and the kitten, though he made no move to approach the wary animal, content to wait for the lady's answer and the cat's curiosity before offering so much as a hand for it to investigate.
Given how much forging is being done for Dygra's festival, she's admittedly surprised to discover that the armlet he's making is for something else entirely. "Oh! I thought it might be for the festival. I made a wire-wrapped ruby necklace, but I haven't been able to get the metal link to close properly onto the cord." Eyeing his setup, inspiration strikes belatedly. "Actually, do you think you could help me with that?" She's been carrying it in her bag in the hopes of finding pliers or other tools while she's in Torchline, but given how little time she can usually spend in this region before returning to Halo, pitstops weren't exactly easy.
Enticed by both the cessation of the terrible noise, Micah leaves Evie's shadow to present his dark nose to Hadama, sniffing fearlessly and venturing closer in case the mer decided to return the favor. Evie merely grins from where she stands, watching. "I've been very well. And this here is Micah - I saved him on Rainbow Road during my last visit and he bonded with me." Bonding had been a bit of an emotional rollercoaster, but things have settled in the past few weeks and now it feels more natural with every passing day.
"Ah." He gave a small shake of his head at her guess, quiet satisfaction in his voice. "I have finished that one." But at hearing that hers was still in process he reached a hand from the water, palm up. "I could, yes," he agreed, pleased at the chance to use his old skills in service to one of his closest friends. "It will not take long." A delicate application of strength and a pair of pliers with their jaws softened with a bit of leather would do the trick, he suspected.
Micah's approach shifted his intentions for a moment, however. His hand lowered and extended slowly to the kitten, and he looked up to Evie with concern darkening the glimmer in his emerald eyes. "What trouble at the Road?" he asked, taking on the mantle of his Kingship at least temporarily at the potential of a threat to his people. Anything that could require a Tide Jaguar's rescue - even a kitten's - might pose an even greater threat to humans or mer.
His easy acceptance of her request makes her smile, handing over the necklace with full trust in his abilities. "How heavy is that hammer?" she asks in a spur of the moment curiosity. "I've got decent arm strength but I've always admired the forgers in Halo." Part of her wants to ask to have him teach her to use it then and there, but she isn't sure if it would be rude - though it would certainly count as her workout of the day.
Micah fearlessly investigates Hadama's hand with little nudges of his nose, almost as if determining the man is allowed to converse with his bonded in a sentiment Evie has seen growing in him; a royal, snobbish protectiveness that makes her laugh. "The geysers bursting over time had collapsed a den or some other cavern structure. He was stuck inside." Nothing preternatural or out of place for the area, but he could always look into it. Evie's mastery lay in plants and soil, not rock and superheated water.
He listened gravely to Evie's report of the Rainbow Road, holding his hand still as Micah explored callused fingers and translucent webbing. He crooked his fingers slowly, gently, a few times to scratch a feline chin as the Tide Jaguar continued his investigations. "I see," he murmured, considering the threat she described. A common problem in the geologically active area, but not, at least, an unknown one.
Accepting the bauble, Hadama examined the construction closely. He wanted to make certain that he understood how the clasp should attach and how to make it best fit without damaging the completed work around the stone below. "Hmm? Not heavy," he assured her - though perhaps, given his own physique, his judgment on that scale was not entirely trustworthy. "It is for bending soft metal, not working iron." Though the steel head was certainly dense and gave the tool an interesting balance. "If it is arm strength you want, forging underwater will build it," he added, a mischievous twinkle in his emerald eyes as he casually flexed one bicep in demonstration.
It was also why he had surfaced to work on his armlet today, preferring the relative ease and speed that coldforging in air provided.
But his attention was on Evie's jewelry now, and he dipped a hand into his toolbag to retrieved his jeweler's pliers. The metal was carefully placed, then crimped and bent with efficient twists of strong fingers and blunted steel tools. He handed it back with a smile when he was done, his rumbling voice warm with admiration. "It is good work, around the ruby." A thought struck and he tilted his head to the side curiously. "Does human earth magic extend to metals?"
06-23-2023, 08:30 PM (This post was last modified: 06-23-2023, 08:31 PM by Evie.)
EVIE
the light of dawn is coming
Micah graciously allows the gentle scratching of his chin, and at last a throaty purr starts up in his little throat; clearly, Hadama has passed the test and has been deemed acceptable as a friend. Evie hides her snort of a laugh and instead focuses on the examination Hadama does of her necklace.
"Darn, I was hoping to get my workout in today and thought it might be a good idea. Underwater forging is a little out of my depths." The shameless wink makes it clear the pun is intentional, if subtle. She makes an appropriately dramatized ooooh of sound as he flexes, laughter underscoring the sound. It was always nice to have these moments as friends instead of leaders.
Watching him work, she has to restrain a pout at how quick and simple it all was with the proper tools. Still, she is grateful, and takes it back with a smile. "Thank you. I did myself actually." Carefully wrapping and twisting the wire to encase the ruby in a delicate display. And she had used her magic to help. "It does, yes. But not as well as you'd think. Ores and the like are easiest in their raw form, but if you have fire or creation magic as well it pairs better for molding and shaping." Squinting slightly with her humor as Micah abandons Hadama to wander back to her side, Evie grins. "It does make me a very good treasure hunter though."
"Hmm." He accepted her pun with a look that said I see what you did there but he didn't dignify it with a response. It was just as well that Evie didn't have access to the Attuned bond or she might catch a hint of the laughter that he held behind his stoic mask. Instead he nodded gravely to Micah's approval as he spoke. "We can still work out together," he suggested instead. "I could use the training as well." Though Noah had proven to be an excellent sparring partner over the last few seasons, he would always have a soft spot for time spent with Evie, whether they were sharing food, trading spells, or just spending a quiet hour in each other's company.
The mermanta was unsurprised to hear that the delicate, graceful wire work had come from Evie's hands, and he nodded in satisfaction. Curious about her earth magic, he listened to her explanation and tilted his head as he considered the power of melding different schools of magic, his lips quirking back up towards a smile. "Indeed. Is that how you found your co-Warden?"
Brightening when the notion of working out does not die a swift, sad death, Evie hangs the pendant around her neck and admires it briefly before refocusing. "I would like that. What were you thinking?" Hand-to-hand, magic, something more focused on the likes of endurance? Even a game of tag had proven to be a workout for her in the past with Deimos, nearly anything could count these days.
His unexpectedly mischievous question has her laughing loudly, pleasantly startled and deeply amused. "He's less of a cave dweller and more of a mountain man, so he evaded my radar for some time," she chuckles, always happy to talk about her beloved and showing it abundantly with the warmth of her expression. "But you could say it helped."
He nodded, pleased with her agreement to a workout but he took his time to consider their options. There were many, indeed, and with their powers combined they were capable of quite a few different feats of training. A physical contest, magic alone, or some combination of magic, shifts, and weapons...?
While he pondered he took the opportunity to tease his friend, enjoying the way Evie's eyes lit up when she spoke of her Halovian beau. Though he had not met the man in question he had heard much of her co-Warden in the course of their friendship, and he had a great respect for Halo's other leader. "Mmn. I need to work on my evasion as well," he admitted. "How is your aim?" Emerald eyes gleamed with challenge as he set aside his tools and swam further out into the Miana Pool, away from his armlet and anvil.
How is her aim? Ohohoho. Evie brightens immediately, something foxlike and mischievous surfacing in her freckled face. "I have great aim. My first weapon was a set of throwing knives that Deimos trained me in." Something she never truly put down again, and which she has only improved upon over the years. Currently she is adapting her form to working with a kusarigama, but it is still in process.
Glancing around at their surroundings as she leans down to pick Micah up from where he is headbutting her calf insistently, she lays the jaguar cub on her shoulders and raises a brow at Hadama. "What were you thinking of having me throw?" Or would this be magical?
"Hmm. I have practiced dodging rocks and arrows," Hadama mused, his own streak of mischief rising to match Evie's as he pretended to solemn seriousness. "But not knives." He watched her scoop her kitten up to his new perch, amused at the young cub's insistence, then gave her question due thought. There were not many easy options (aside from the rocks he had already trained with thanks to Melita), but one did come to mind...
The tallest trees that shaded the Pool, growing right up into the beach, had slender, graceful trunks crowned with broad green fronds. They swayed in the wind, and clusters of their ripe fruit occasionally knocked together. Though one had not fallen during their conversation so far, the ground beneath was littered with a half dozen or so that had dropped in earlier days. Several had even split their husks upon landing on hard rocks, their seeds peeking out and easy to retrieve.
"Have you considered a coconut?" he asked his friend with all due gravitas.
"Likely for the best - wooden training ones are the safest option, anyway." And she has none of those readily on hand, inconveniently. Though someone else in the world (or beyond) must surely be feeling the urge to throw sharp things.
Hadama's gaze ventures along the beach, and Evie slowly turns and looks in turn as he proposes a suitable projectile. Coconuts. 'Nutty', huh? Who would have ever thought? Certainly nobody sane or respectable. Evie is appropriately delighted - and oblivious, bless her enviable heart.
"Perfect! I can use my arms or my magic that way." Considering Micah on her shoulders, likely the latter. It's an easy thing to meander down the beach to the convenient ammunition (and she will not mention anything about the island - which Torchline isn't - supplying anything, and certainly not with certain words). A bit of magic has one hopping into her hand, and Evie gives no warning as she turns and lets it fly like a fuzzy, orb-shaped missile right at Hadama.
