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!
It took a lot to make a place feel like home. For Zahir, one of the most important foundations of homeliness was connections. Specifically, connections to local linchpins: the powerful, the rich, and those shadowy figures who pulled the strings out of eyesight. Connections made for safety. Until he had a web to dance across, he was without the delicate sense of control he’d managed to cultivate in past homes. It felt like how he imagined a turtle might feel stuck on its back, vulnerable, belly-up.
So maybe ae’d adjust to the heat and the humidity and the sun all a little better once ae had aer familiar comforts restored. The beach was at least cooler by the day, the seabreeze brushing Zahir’s face, leaving his skin salt-kissed and pink about the cheekbones. And, if he had any luck, this beach would bring with it the comfort of another connection.
He’d been told the rocks he’d sat up upon, stretching and vanishing into the ocean, would give him the perfect spot to be happened-upon by a man by the name of Ronin. Not only was this man Flora’s adoptive father, his reputation was that of a man so powerful he had no choice but to be a part of the machinations of the world. Given the choice, Zahir preferred to start smaller, build ties with those less a literal demigod, but ae felt ae had to move quickly. Being hunted put a dread in aer bones ae would do just about anything to silence.
Zahir hoped this was the right balance of unobtrusive, whilst not so subtle as to have him go unnoticed. He had a waterskin with him, filled, ready to offer to a parched demigod out on his routine run. He watched the shoreline, waiting for a figure to appear, braced. These early stages were so precarious. And Naseem seemed to like this place, for all Zahir’s bitching. Ae just hoped ae could make it feel like a home, for the both of them.
Luckily enough, it is a routine run this afternoon, and Zahir's information is correct, regardless of where ae'd gotten it from. Ronin has been caught in the rhythmic pounding of his feet on the sand and the huff of breath in his lungs for a long while now, such that it has quieted the itching in his bones and the fluttering feeling in his spine that makes his skin crawl. Now it's just the burn of sweet air in his throat, the way the seabreeze whips across his cheeks and the drone of the waves against the shoreline.
Where he might be immediately visible to Zahir, however, the same cannot be said for Ronin, and Torchline's newest stranger is all but hidden by the position of the sun as he alters his steps to run across the stretch of rock and back down onto the other side. The result, of course, is a near collision that the Nova avoids only by a swift sidestep and a digging of his heels into the stone.
"Gods, sorry--" He huffs automatically, reaching up to shield his eyes from the sun to gaze at the stranger properly. "Didn't see you."
Admittedly, Zahir had not factored ‘nearly get run into by a demigod’ into his plans for the day. Ae had boldly assumed Ronin was purposefully running towards him and that the plan had gone off without a hitch, until Ronin didn’t slow down. If this was some play to throw Zahir off his game and guard, Ronin wasn’t only a demigod but a damn genius.
Thankfully, Zahir was accustomed to thinking on his feet, or, in this case, on his ass, half sprawled backwards from where he’d flinched out the way of the collision. Squinting over his raised arm, Zahir looked up at Ronin; Ae had heard the demigod describe as the Supernova, and now, the sun beaming behind him, he didn’t half live up to the name.
“No need to apologise, Sir,” Zahir said, speaking with a smooth calm his racing heartbeat did not merit. “My fault entirely. I’d heard this was a running route; I should have chosen where I sat more wisely.” Well. At least this proved his calculations about how to get noticed had paid off, in a manner of speaking.
Lowering aer raised hand, Zahir stood up, dusted himself off, balancing somewhat precariously on the rocks with aer cane, and appraised Ronin as if ae had not been expecting him. The demigod was about what Zahir had expected: gorgeous, well-built, and a certain kind of unnerving Zahir associated with the divine; though, perhaps that last aspect was mere projection.
Ae offered a hand to shake. “Zahir. Here,” ae took from aer satchel the waterskin and proffered it to the demigod, “you look like you might need this more than I do.” Naseem would have grinned and flirted, or at least aimed for friendly. She was good at making friends. Zahir didn’t try to fake an amicable smile; ae knew well enough that on aem, such expressions often registered as uncanny. Out of place. So, he aimed for polite, courteous, studying Ronin to try and judge his character beyond the sweat and near-death greeting.
Scoffing and still trying to catch his breath, Ronin shakes his head to the stranger. "Sir is what people called my father," he tells aer with a rough laugh. "I'm just Ronin. Though I feel like I should apologise - I daresay this is only a running route these days because of me." In fact, the Nova would be surprised if he hasn't worn a trench in the rock itself by the time Leafchange comes to an end. Embarrassing, to say the least.
As ae offers aer hand to shake, the Nova ensures he's wiped his own off on his pants, knowing better than for his first impression to be one of a damp hand from exercise. "Nice to meet you," he says, absently rolling the tightness from his shoulders and ignoring the pins and needles building in his legs from the sudden stop.
He doesn't expect the waterskin, and whilst he'd usually deny the offer out of politeness, he does find himself accepting it from the new acquaintance with a nod of gratitude. "You're too kind," he murmurs, offering it back when he's finished. "Hope I didn't disturb you too much."
hearts turn to dirt along with the rest of your body
Despite himself, Zahir returns Ronin’s joke with a small, amused smirk. Though Flora may be his adopted daughter, they have the same easy charm, the kind that feels effortless and intuitive. Everything Zahir is not, in short. “Sir is a habit. One I’m afraid will likely happen again. A lot of folks I’ve known don’t cut the Sir silhouette, so no one shows them that kind of respect. I suppose I use it in case someone has been short-changed in that department. Everyone deserves a little respect. Most of all those whom Sir doesn’t often get applied to.”
He shakes Ronin’s hand, grip firm, mentally noting how the man shakes back, his whole disposition. The man seems… not tense exactly. On edge? Restless, perhaps. But he’s polite, wiping his hand clean for shaking, and Zahir will always appreciate small acts of grace. “A pleasure to meet you, too.”
Ae watches Ronin drink, choosing aer moment. Ae waits until Ronin speaks first, and answers, carefully, “Not at all. I feel like really, I came out here to be disturbed. This place is a lot bigger than I’m used to. Crowded city streets are more my speed, the kind of crowded where if you’re not barrelled into by some stranger, something must be amiss. So really, I should be thanking you for making this feel like home.”
He looks Ronin over again, considering, like he doesn’t already know exactly who the man is. “You wouldn’t happen to be Flora’s father, Ronin, would you? Only she’s been kind enough to welcome myself and my traveling companion to Torchline. We came across her picking up the pieces of her bar, and likely got in the way more than we helped, but— the thought that counts and all that.”
Tilting his head in obvious curiosity, Ronin finds a smile teasing across his face despite himself. He doesn't want to feel effortless and social and (gods forbid it) entertained by another person's presence. But the Nova has been a socialite for a lot longer than he's been a brooding mess, and he's drawn like a moth to a flame by good conversation.
"How very noble of you," he remarks to Zahir, the rumbling tone of his voice playful but no less honest for it. "For me it always feels as though someone is going to ask me to be responsible for something." Not that he'll begrudge his new acquaintance aer habits, of course.
Ae continues, though, and Ronin is reminded of his own city-boy origins, casting his eyes towards Haulani in the distance. "Mm, even the most crowded of places here seem easy-going, don't they? Have you been up to Stormbreak? The Silk Houses might be exactly what you're missing." For better or for worse.
Ah, but then ae's mentioning Flora, and despite himself Ronin feels heat rise in his cheeks; he and the Doubletake's parental relationship has not always been a simple one, and he's grateful more than anything these days to be considered good enough to be a father figure. "Her step father," he corrects nonetheless, because his husband is still her blood, after all, "but that's very kind of you to say. I had heard that The Hanged Man was still in pieces. A shame, honestly - it was my favourite place to drink here."
hearts turn to dirt along with the rest of your body
Matching Ronin’s humour, Zahir huffed a low chuckle at the responsibility comment. Humour, he knew well enough, didn’t show well on his face. Naseem had described the mood on him as putting her in mind of creepy painted dolls with waxen, fixed smiles carved into their faces, if it registered visually at all. In the hopes of not scaring Ronin off entirely, Zahir pushed his dark-tinted glasses up his nose, hoping they might hide how his smiles never much seemed to show in his eyes.
“You don’t know me well enough to know the truth of this, so just take it on faith: I would never expect responsibility from anyone. If you ever happen to meet my travelling companion, Naseem, you’ll understand fast enough why I think that’s a fools game,” ae hums, tone wry. Ae had yet to discern how serious Ronin was, how dry his amusement, what worked with him, in short.
“I’ve blown through the Silk Houses once or twice,” Zahir answered, as Ronin gazed elsewhere, and Zahir kept aer attention neatly on Ronin even as ae turned aer head as if to follow his looking. “From what I’ve heard though, Stormbreak is best avoided by people like me, and in want of people like you— hence why I imagine you don’t want anyone extra laying responsibility at your doorstep.”
And speaking of responsibility, Zahir didn’t miss the way Ronin flushed at the mention of Flora. Interesting. Zahir filed that way for later inspection, and made a mental note to do a little digging on the history of those two. “A great shame,” Zahir agreed, trying to judge where Ronin sat on the more illicit activities Zahir understood to have operated out of the bar. “Home for me is always seedy corners in shadowy bars. Kind of goes with the whole only-wears-black aesthetic and all.”
Ae looked, for the first time, away from Ronin, back at the beach he’d come from. “But I fear I’ve interrupted your run too long. I don’t wish to impose. Or, if you’d like, I could walk you the rest of your way. If you don’t mind a slower speed. And I can warn you of any strangers ill-placed in the sun to avoid walking into. One meet cute per day is probably a good rate to stick to, else you’ll never get anything done.”
As a man whose smiles also fall short these days, whilst Ronin's affliction might be more transient than Zahir's, he'll not begrudge the bespectacled stranger aer quirks. And ae makes the sort of point that Ronin can appreciate, besides. "After a lifetime of it, the less responsibility I can get away with, the better," he agrees with a scoff, taking a moment to roll his ankles since he's paused his run for the time being.
"Stormbreak has become more open minded these days, if I read you right," he adds; the Abandoned are no longer grabbed by weird enchanted hands in the ground, for example, and they don't literally turn to stone when setting foot within the region's borders. "But I suppose it will all take time." He doesn't know what Rome is, but he'd agree it wasn't built in a day if he did.
Alas, the same has to be said of The Hanged Man, and it's with a smile that tilts towards crooked that he nods his understanding. "You might be a little disappointed when it's rebuilt - Flora is more fond of music and dancing than shadowy corners. But maybe we can install one in the rebuild."
Finding himself warming to Zahir despite all attempts to remain prickly, the Nova considers the distance between here and the stretch of beach that will take him home, and nods, surprisingly content for the company. "We can walk," he says readily. "I'll treat it as a warmdown. What brings you to Torchline, anyway? Given that busy city streets are more your thing."
