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!
Later, she would feel bad about losing her temper, but the entire situation had left her temporarily blinded to reason. She was sickly satisfied when the back of her head connected with his chin, although the force of her effort left her with a headache; when she grabbed his finger, he released her, spinning her away and leaving her dizzy. But before she could raise her guard for the next onslaught -
She didn't see the fist that broke her nose, but through the bones in her head, she heard it break. With a strangled yelp, she staggered backwards, heaving as blood rolled down the back of her throat. She was suddenly fiercely regretful (well, well, well, if it isn't the consequences of her own actions), and tears of guilt as much as pain began to roll down her cheeks. A hand lifted to her nose protectively and she hissed with pain at her own gentle touch. Blinking away tears and choking back a sob, she blurted the first thing that came to mind: "I'm sorry, okay?!" Because that makes sense, apologizing to the man who broke her nose.
As soon as the blow connects with her nose Koa realizes what he's done. Horror replaces focus on his expressive face, his eyes practically bulging as blood gushes out to coat the wrapping on his hand. "Oh, fuck, Soh--" he exclaims, reaching toward her as she staggers backwards, suddenly wanting nothing more than to hold her in his arms.
And then she's apologizing, as if he hadn't broken her nose. Koa chokes out a strangled laugh, shaking his head at the absurdity of it all. "Shut up and sit down," he commands her gently, placing his hands on her shoulders to guide her to the ground. "Head forward, so you don't swallow blood. Here-" He unwraps the already bloodied cotton, offering it to her. "Use this to soak it up. I'm gonna need you to move your hands so I can see, okay?"
His copper eyes are soft and caring, his voice radiating the quiet authority of a fighter who has seen his share of injuries. Tenderly he reaches to cup her face, brushing tears from bruising cheeks as he inspects the extent of the damage.
i can't decide if it's a choice, getting swept away
For the first time since she’d broken things off, Koa called her by name, and the relief that maybe they could eventually get to some semblance of normalcy had her choking back a sob. Perhaps a few moments ago, Soh would have prickled at his insistence that she shut up and sit down, but just now she was perfectly content to listen and follow his instructions. She sat, leaning forward as blood dripped from her nose onto the ground. ”I can’t shut up, Koa,” she insisted. ”I fucked up.” And for a girl like Soh to curse when she never had before, it was serious indeed.
She obediently took the wraps, gently trying to soak up the blood before moving her hands out of the way for Koa to examine her. It was strange, having him gently cupping her cheek, and a part of her felt like she was coming home. She swallowed through the pain as she focused on his copper eyes, so gentle and caring at the moment, and she tried to memorize the feeling, knowing it couldn’t last.
07-13-2023, 07:58 PM (This post was last modified: 07-13-2023, 07:59 PM by Koa.)
Koa
"Shhh." He doesn't try to contradict her, because yeah, she fucked up, but so did he. They were young and dumb and right now none of it matters very much, all that matters is that despite the hurt he still cares about her, and right now she's bleeding on the floor.
It's as though they exist in a perfect bubble, a glass prism through which nothing can touch. As he looks at the bruising on her pale cheeks Koa forgets that he will never be the man to kiss them better and how much the loss of that potential future hurts. Instead he focuses on inspecting her, gently pressing his thumbs along the swollen edges of her nose, trying to feel for any obvious signs of breakage beneath the visible trauma.
"You know," he's saying as he works, his voice calm and even, trying to take her mind off the blood gushing from her face, "You're taking this quite well. There was this one time early in basic training where I was sparring with this kid - Sabastien, I think his name was - and he clocked me right in the kisser with his staff." With the pads of his fingers he applies gentle pressure against her bridge, searching her face and eyes for their reaction to the pain.
i can't decide if it's a choice, getting swept away
She didn’t contradict him, didn’t try to argue. She had fucked up royally, and nothing she could do or say was going to change that. And while there were more pressing matters at hand, like her bleeding nose, she couldn’t help but find herself wanting to tell him all that came to mind. That she still cared about him. That she didn’t know what that meant. That she wanted to be friends. More than friends, even. But that was all impossible now, wasn’t it?
His hands on her face were warm and gentle, and she relaxed into his grip without thinking, inherently trusting him to know what to do and how to do it. As for taking it well… well, she deserved this, didn’t she? ”It’s no more than I deserve,” she muttered, so quietly that she wasn’t sure he’d hear. Besides, this was nothing in comparison to the trauma of her attack. At least this had been a training accident. She’s know what she was getting herself into in training, that there was a potential for injury. Sure, it hurt, but it was the kind of hurt that she could handle.
Unlike the hurt that came from Koa’s absence from her life. That hurt was much harder to bear. I still care for him, she realized belatedly, silver eyes searching copper as he tended to her wounds. Shit.
”Wh-what happened with Sabastien?” she asked, wincing at the pressure of Koa’s fingers on her nose. Maybe if she could distract herself for now, she could think about Koa and her feelings later, in private. Where they couldn’t hurt anyone but her.
He doesn't hear her, or pretends he doesn't, though a pang of guilt does shoot through him at her quiet self-deprecation. While he doesn't know the depths of her past trauma, even a boy as dense as Koa can see that Soh is hurting, and in the absence of context and the presence of violence he can only blame himself. It's bizarre: minutes ago he was furious with her, and now all he wants in the world is to dry away her tears, to hold her close to his broad chest and protect her from the dangers of life.
"Oh, Sabastien was fine." The bleeding hasn't slowed at all, and Soh's nose is quickly ballooning in size. It's definitely broken, and Koa bites back a grimace as he considers what will have to come next. "I, on the other hand? I had a full-blown meltdown. Convinced myself I was dying. There's blood gushing out of my mouth, my jaw is on fire, and I'm just bawling." He screws his face up in demonstration, adopting the façade of a distraught child.
"So my Ma comes over, right? And she says absolutely nothing, just grabs my face between her hands and pop!"
And as he says it he does something similar, popping her nose back into alignment with practiced, careful hands. It'll hurt like a bitch, but if he's done it right (dear gods above, please let him have done it right) the pain - and bleeding - should start to subside.
i can't decide if it's a choice, getting swept away
It hurt, but it was nothing compared to how she’d made Koa feel, she was sure, and she gritted her teeth as he continued to examine her face with gentle, practiced hands. Tears squeezed from her eyes, appreciative that he was able and willing to be so kind to her after everything that had happened between them. She wanted to hug him, to hold him close, to beg for his forgiveness and ask if they can just start over.
Instead, she listened to his story, entranced by the young Dragoon’s tale, until a sudden pop set her nose aflame and she cried out in sudden shock and pain. Fortunately, the pain lasted but a moment, and then it began to subside. Of course, she was still a mess: blood had cascaded down the front of her shirt, and with the rapid swelling of her face, she was sure that she was going to be disastrous to look at until she could get home and clean up.
With her nose reset and the pain subsiding, Soh blinked up at Koa through wet lashes. ”Thank you,” she whispered miserably, tears still falling. She deserves the hit but she didn’t deserve his kindness, and she hated herself for wanting to soak it up while it lasted, before he went back to hating her.
Her cry is not unexpected, though Koa still winces and pulls his hands away with a "Sorry, sorry!" once the nose is set. Maybe it was rude not to warn her, but in Koa's experience it was better to get the pain over with quickly rather than draw things out.
No comment on how that may relate to their recent conflict or the handling of it.
His main task done, Koa sits back on his heels, making some much-needed space between himself and Soh. Now that he isn't entirely focused on correcting the injury he's caused, Koa finds himself rife with ambivalence, both wanting very much to get away from this situation and knowing there's no possible way he can leave her in this state. His gaze slips from her tear-stained eyes, down to the bloody wraps on his hands; wrinkling his nose, he sets about carefully removing the red-stained fabric. "You should still go see a doctor," he tells Soh gently, not looking up as his fingers come free, "But for now the bleeding should ease up."
What else is he supposed to say? I'm sorry? You're welcome? Nothing seems suitable to encompass all he feels, and besides, Koa has never been the type for eloquence of speech. So instead of any of that he rises and offers Soh his hand, an olive branch, a tentative hope that now that they've broken each other down, they can start to rebuild.
i can't decide if it's a choice, getting swept away
That he should be apologizing to her was laughable; although she knew that this was an accident, that he hadn’t planned to break her nose, she still felt like it was well-deserved. And maybe a small piece of her hoped that breaking her nose in return for breaking his heart was a fair trade. Maybe now they could move forward with less awkwardness, less anguish. Maybe now they could start to be friends.
Then again, maybe that was wishful thinking. But at this moment, the hope was enough.
No longer angry, Soh nodded. ”I will,” she said. Truthfully, she would probably book a skyship to find someone with healing magic, which she still couldn’t find in Stormbreak, but that was neither here nor there. Koa rose from the ground and offered his hand, and she took it gratefully, rising to her feet and squeezing his hand gratefully before releasing it. ”Well, I better, um… go find a doctor,” she said. ”But, um… thanks.”
