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!
His blood is up and ice has already begun to cling to his antlers, such are the depths of cold during Halo at Deepfrost. Only consistent movement ensures that Ronin doesn't succumb to these sorts of temperatures, even with his superhuman endurance, and so he prances quite beautifully through the hoarfrost. The thunder of his hoofbeats feels as though it should echo, but the mist swallows it up, and it's with a toss of his head that one might deem joyful that Ronin picks up his pace.
To say that this season sees him in complete opposition to his Leafchange moods is putting it mildly; warm, sociable and eager to please, some might say the Nova is the best of himself at this time of year. Which is all well and good, but as of right now, he's not sharing. In fact, he's quite hoping he's being hunted down.
Unlike a certain luxere who can prance away to his heart's content to keep away the chill, a certain manticore is far less likely to be mobile enough to keep the worse of the chill at bay. Now of course Remi could blaze through the fields as an Ifrit, but then he'd have none of the senses necessary to track down his husband. So it was, that despite the bitter cold, the manticore was forced to prowl through the winter winds covered in fur and feathers rather than flame.
With his green eyes narrowed to slits against the snow glare and one wing raised to block out the wind, Remi relied heavily on his nose to pick up the familiar oak-berry scent of Ronin's luxere form. Ears pinned, the manticore picked up a loping pace once he'd found a fairly fresh set of tracks. Come out, come out, wherever you are. He called through the attuned bond, knowing that it would tell him only whether or not he was close enough for Ronin to hear him, but not give any sort of directional-clues.
trying to take what's lost and broke and make it right
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
You know I couldn't come out even if I wanted to. Have you not seen the mist? Ronin calls jovially back to his husband, even his Attuned voice sounding out of breath and warm with exhilaration of running. Remi, of course, is bound to catch him sooner or later given the fact that every hoofprint leaves a mark in the frost, but Ronin tries to make things more interesting for the Lullaby.
Unlike in the Greatwood, there's a lot of space out here to prance and jump, and yet he's still unlikely to be seen. And so Ronin cares little about running over his own tracks, turning back on himself, and even attempting a little pirouette mid-spring. This, of course, has him landing in the frost with a whumf, and Remi will probably come across that very strange mark in the grass soon enough.
Oh, is there mist? I must have- Remi's pause almost invites an eye-roll. -mist it. Thank you, thank you, he'll be here for the rest of your life, Ronin.
With his eyes trained now on the tracks Ronin has left behind, it's with increasing curiosity and amusement that Remi tries to imagine just what the actual fuck the luxere has been doing in order to create the tracks set in the thick snow. Husband, do you have a new shift you have not told me about? Remi calls out, having just encountered a shape in the snow that suggested Ronin's luxere might have several heads and a tail based on the imprint.
It is fine if you do, I am not judging. He adds, prowling forward at a faster pace now that the luxere seemed to be focusing more on fuckery than putting distance between them.
trying to take what's lost and broke and make it right
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Don't, Ronin begins, but Remi is already doing it, and the luxere manages a groaning sort of sigh down the Attuned bond. But it's true - Remi will be here for the rest of his life, and Ronin wouldn't have it any other way. Never stop telling me awful puns, he says warmly.
The Nova? Focused on fuckery in a luxere shift, in the middle of Deepfrost in a snowfield? Whoever would have guessed? I might have fallen, he admits with a chuckle, busy trying to prance out figure eights in the frost when the sudden sight of a manticore loping through the mist has him S T A R T L E D.
Ohfuck-- Ronin blurts, instantly turning to bolt away.
That implies my puns are awful. Remi counters back, following the tracks with increasing speed. Spreading his wings out from his sides now as if that might give him some sort of aerodynamic boost (it doesn't, but it looks hella cool), the manticore catches a glimpse of brown fur followed by a soft glow that snares his attention.
Unlike his counterpart, Remi doesn't make a sound as he swiftly adjusts his path. No longer following in Ronin's tracks but instead cutting straight across from them that he might reach the luxere all the sooner for not taking such a meandering trail, Remi stretches out his limbs in earnest now, paws gripping at the snow as he pushes himself along swiftly in his husband's wake.
trying to take what's lost and broke and make it right
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Of course not! Ronin tells his husband quickly. Your puns are very witty, and handsome, just like you are handsome, and-- and-- STOP CHASING ME The luxere's panicked call comes enveloped in laughter, Ronin forced to leap over a fallen log and finding himself zigzagging without meaning to.
It's only when Remi appears to be almost on top of him that he dares to turn and glance over his shoulder, tossing his antlered head and snorting out something like defeat. He's going to get pinned by the manticore either way, and so he may as well do it in the most hilarious way possible. So saying, Ronin abruptly tries to stop himself, hooves skidding through the frost in an attempt to make Remi fall over him.
STOP RUNNING THEN. Whereas Ronin runs like a drunken man, the manticore follows with ineffable precision, only to have the luxere go and ruin the whole thing by skidding to a stop.
With paws made for tearing rather than biting into icy terrain, Remi is forced to flap his wings awkwardly to try and slow himself down though there's nowhere near enough time or space for him to do anything other than collide with his husband's snow-white ass. Shoving them both violently forward in the snow, amidst his own laughter Remi only has time to tuck his tail harmlessly against itself so that he doesn't inadvertently stab Ronin with it as they both leave behind the sort of tracks that are sure to confuse even the most seasoned of hunters.
Falling to a halt and no longer needing to be in precisely this form, Remi shifts so that fire begins to lick up and down his arms to ward off the chill from the snow. "You know that is not what I meant." He huffs, absolutely assuming that Ronin would try and pin this entire ordeal on him for having told the luxere to stop running.
trying to take what's lost and broke and make it right
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Laughing, at first through their bond and then out loud as he shifts, Ronin is left in his dark, starlit leathers, a mantle of phoenix down coating his neck and shoulders to keep him warm and with his crown of luxere antlers still firmly in place. "It might not have been what you meant, but it is absolutely what you got," he informs the other man, wriggling and turning in the snow to grin up at him.
"I really couldn't live without you, you know," he says with sudden sweetness and a hot flush to his cheeks. "I'd not know what to do with myself if I couldn't have you hunt me through the snow every Deepfrost, or keep me from losing my mind every Leafchange." Or in Remi's case, encourage him to lose his mind.
soft spoken with a broken jaw we step outside, but not to brawl
"I feel like that could be the tagline to our marriage." Remi counters, looking at Ronin and grinning stupidly in response. Letting his flames melt the snow until it pooled and then flash-froze as the bite of Deepfrost battled against the elements, the Lullaby reaches over with firey fingertips to brush softly at the crimson down peeping out around his husband's neck.
"I am not sure I could ever see the snow the same way again, with you. Nor anything, really." Ronin had imprinted himself onto each and every facet of the Lullaby's existence so completely as to be ineffable. "Although..." Trust Remi to ruin a moment that could just have been sweet with nothing to sour it. "..if I ever did lose my immortality..if un-demi-ing was ever possible...there would be a time when you'd live without me." He points out softly, turning to lean on one side before rolling his shoulders so that his wings could rise and curl around them to block out the worst of the wind.
Every shade of hurt you know From the deep blue to the marigold
It's gonna make sense someday lookin' back
Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Bouncing his eyebrows at his husband and grinning, because yes it absolutely could be, Ronin tilts his head to better let Remi's fiery fingertips explore however they like. There's only so long even the likes of two demigods can snuggle on the ground in the Frostfields at this time of year, but they've got a couple of minutes, he figures.
What begins as something sticky-sweet in the back of his throat abruptly turns to fire in his lungs, however, as the reality of Remi's implications begin to sink in. Maybe it's the season or the moment or just Ronin's feelings, but the very thought of living without the other man has the colour draining from his cheeks and the joy fading from his expression.
"Shut up," he says in a tight voice, and no sooner have Remi's wings covered them when Ronin's lips are against his husbands, as if he can kiss the words back and swallow them up where they can do no harm. "The day you die is the day I die too," he whispers feverishly. "Whether or not my heart is still beating is irrelevent. I mean it - I can't live without you."
soft spoken with a broken jaw we step outside, but not to brawl
It's funny, how sometimes Remi is the emotional one and Ronin the rational, and other times they are the complete opposite. Before he can argue, the Nova's lips are against his and despite the brutal chill around them, the Lullaby is instantly warmed to his core by the golden string that temporarily connects the two where they touch.
Curling his wing until the longest of his flight feathers are resting into the snow making it seem as though they were once again snuggled together in a cave, the Lullaby sighs softly as his flames lick up and around them. "Then what use is your immortality, if I lose mine?" He wonders softly, green eyes brimming with golden light from the fire. "I never want to be without you, even in death and never in life." If one should be immortal, better they both be; similarly, if one should lose it, perhaps better the other does as well.
Every shade of hurt you know From the deep blue to the marigold
It's gonna make sense someday lookin' back
Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"...Where is this coming from?" Ronin whispers into the minimal space between them, something soft and desperately sad in his blue eyes, his hand coming up to rest against his husband's cheek. "And why should that matter? I just told you, if you die, I won't be long behind." And it won't take long, regardless of whatever his immortality clause says. Ronin happens to be able to provide his own means of suicide, if it comes to it.
"Neither of us are going anywhere," he says, though it's more to reconfirm it to himself than anything else, Ronin resting his forehead against the Lullaby's as if to try and seek out his light in the sudden stormy seas of his own emotions.
soft spoken with a broken jaw we step outside, but not to brawl
"I just..." Sighing softly, having not meant to turn their playful outing into this, the Lullaby does his best to properly collect his thoughts, difficult as that was with the warmth from his husband's kiss still on his lips and the Deepfrost cold on the back of his neck.
"I suppose after speaking with Noah I have been wondering more and more if it would ever be possible to stop being a demigod. Of course, I knew that meant giving up my immortality, but I never thought past what that would mean until very recently." Closing his eyes as Ronin's forehead presses against his own, the Lullaby tries to somehow mentally represent how he'd only been toying with this small string of thought, only to find everything unravelling into a sea of knots and loose ends.
'And now with what is happening with Safrin...for however much I hate being called upon by Ludo, I am not sure I could bear to let you go off alone in moments like these." He also was not sure whether or not that was pure selfishness and possessiveness on his part, either.
Every shade of hurt you know From the deep blue to the marigold
It's gonna make sense someday lookin' back
Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
