Despite this place being so new and so foreign, something about this place seems right. It’s something she cannot explain. She cannot tell you why she feels the need to help the Night Court rebuild. She cannot tell you why the screams of strangers pull on her heart strings. She just knows that this place needs her help and she will not stop until she feels the task is finished. Only then will she decide her next move.
She meanders towards the mountain pass, four burlap sacks hung over her back. They are filled with seeds and saplings, all the things needed to make this place beautiful again. While the sacks weigh a good bit, she makes no complaint. She is large and build for hauling large things such as this. While she could spend her time other places, she feels as though she is best suited here. Her weight and build will make moving the large boulders easy, well, at least easier than someone of a more light build.
By the time she arrives, she can see the destruction. She doesn’t know what has caused such destruction, but she feels that perhaps this had been her calling. Perhaps she had been called to Novus in order to help in this process of rebuilding. She asks no questions, she simply puts her name in the mix to help the others.
Lowering the bags of seeds and saplings, she looks to her left and sees some slings that have been tied to a sturdy log. It almost looks like it had been prepared to lift boulders and carry them out of the pass. This is where she can help, she’s confident of this.
She lowers her head, pushing all of her weight into the boulders until it begins to move. Slowly she is able to move the boulder towards the sling. But she needs some help to fit it into the sling. She looks to the first passing individual. “Can you please hold this sling so I can get the boulder into it?” While she waits for an answer, she’s already working on a second rock to go in the opposite sling. Only then can she lift the two and carry them out of the pass.
He would never admit it to Marisol, but he is relieved once they are safe in Denocte. Far more difficult was facing the decision to ask his court to be temporary refugees in the first place; now that he has already failed, the weight is easier to bear.
It helps to have work to do. It keeps him grounded when his thoughts are tempted to fly, to reach for stardust and stories and forget what he must do. The bay stallion is no more a wanderer; he is a king.
But he does not walk like a king as he weaves through the valleys and foothills up to the pass where a gate once stood. It is a bright spring day, and there are birds singing from the brush, returned from their winter grounds. It feels good to walk, to stretch weary muscles. It feels good to anticipate the work ahead, shoulder to shoulder with others.
Asterion thinks more than anything of Ravos, of the time the earth-goddess had turned her followers’ land to something treacherous. This replanting was not so different, and he again had his gift of water to help settle each sapling and seed, sinking it down into thirsty soil.
It is Ravos he is still dreaming of when the voice cuts through his reverie, and the king blinks his dark lashes and looks up at her.
“Of course,” he says, and dutifully draws to a stop, his gaze curious as it skims her features until the sling draws taut with its new weight. When the mare gets it settled and switches to the other side he holds it the same as the first, the sun a warm hand on their backs.
She is not one of his; in the past few weeks he has come to know most of the faces of Terrastella, and certainly all that had traveled with him from the Dusk Court.
Asterion wonders how long she had been a citizen of the Night Court, what she must think of all the changes the past year. “Were you here when the wall fell?” His voice is not so soft as it once was – the boyhood timbre of it has gone. But there is still a dreamer’s tilt to the words, a colt asking to be told a story.
Katniss is thankful that the young stallion has offered to help her. She knows that she is a new face amongst the old and none of these individuals owe her anything. She is just happy that they are willing to allow her to help their rebuild process. She wonders what this place once was, if it had been grand and mighty. She briefly thinks of her time on Rift…the small little land that she had called her own. It had been a haven to all who asked for one and she can only hope to one day impress that idea upon another. But now is not the time to be making suggestions. Now it simply the time to rebuild.
Her eyes rest on the bay stallion and it almost appears as though she offers him a smile as he agrees to help her load the slings. “Thank you, kind sir.” She does not know him, has never seen him before. She doesn’t know he’s a king, that he’s from another court, or that he is having his own reflections. In this moment, they are just two individuals with a common goal: to rebuild.
As she is loading the second boulder into the sling, she can hear the question that escapes his lips. She pauses just as the boulder falls into place. Eyes look back to him and she offers him a soft shake of her head. “I was not…” She kneels down, slipping her head beneath the log and with great effort and strength, the draft mare lifts her body and subsequently, the slings full of boulders. “I have only just arrived, but it appears this place is in need of help.” She wishes she knew what had caused this great stone gate to fall, what tore down the markets and what caused the air to wreak of smoke. But she was not here for any of those events. So instead, she hopes to help restore this place to its former glory so she might get a glimpse into what sort of place this once was.
With great effort, she slowly turned to make her way back down the mountain to place these boulders in some other sort of location. Her eyes looks back to the bay stallion and she wonders if he was here. Perhaps he knew the answers she sought. “What happened to this place?” All she has seen is death and destructions. And yet, she knows there is more to this story than that. This place was once great, she can feel it.
He dips his head in response at her thanks, saying nothing and instead only settling in to help. So often in the past weeks had he put the strain on his magic and his courage; it feels almost strange to work his physical muscles, to lift and hold and carry.
When she tells him she is new an expression of surprise glances across his face, brief as a shimmer of sunlight on the sea. “It’s doubly kind of you to help, then,” he tells her, and thinks that not many newcomers would so readily help a court they knew nothing of.
Initially he’d intended to do most of his work today replanting and watering, as he’d done in Ravos so long ago, but as she finishes with her load he finds a pile of yoked baskets along a stretch of the wall. Soon he, too, is piling stones, using his telekinesis to place them in the wicker baskets.
But he stays nearby - close enough to catch her question, and let his lips twist in a wry smile as he considers how to answer it.
“So many things,” he says, finally. “If you mean the gate, that goes well before my time. It was only recent that it was torn down. Before that, at the end of the last regime, the gate was closed after a few….incidents between Denocte and the other courts. It must have been Queen Isra’s decision to tear it down.” He should ask the unicorn about that, he thinks; he admires the decision, but he also wonders if she has had any resentment from it.
There were many that did not like to see traditions abandoned, much less dismantled stone by stone.
“If you mean the disasters…all that is known is the gods appeared just before they began.”
Asterion glances back at the draft, admiring again each line of her muscle, the way she bore her burden with grace. If she had been a wanderer, then Night Court was lucky she’d arrived when she did.
This makes him wonder just where she had come from - he can’t remember the last time he heard news from another world. With the weight of his own baskets now balanced across his shoulders, he turns to follow the stranger, his glance skipping over her features like a stone on a quiet sea before settling back on the uneven ground at his feet.
“How did you come to be here? I doubt you expected this is what you’d be doing, first thing in another land.”
There is greatness here in Novus, here in the Night Court. Something about this place calls softly to her and it is a calling that she cannot ignore. She might not be familiar with this place or those that live in it, but she cannot deny the calling. It feels right to be here helping in this time of rebuild. It gives her purpose and she is thankful for that. Once this place is on the mend, then she can begin to forge friendships and get to know the leaders. She can then offer a different skill set for their use.
His voice breaks her thought and she turns her head to look at him with a soft expression of thanks and yet, she humbly accepts his praise. “It is my upmost pleasure. This place needs help to rebuild and I have the muscle to help. I am able bodied – I see that not everyone is.” Some where displaced, sick, and injured. Why should they be responsible for rebuilding their homes when she is standing here healthy and strong? It doesn’t make much sense.
She asks what has happened to this place. The question was vague, then again, she wasn’t sure what she meant specifically. This court was riddled with destruction, as were the others. Something big had happened here in Novus, just before her arrival. But he doesn’t shy away from the question, answering her first about the door that she is currently working on clearing. “I am curious about this Court’s history – it seems rather solemn.” She had been in lands before that were divided. So naturally, it didn’t really surprise her that courts had clashed and a physical barrier had to be installed.
But when he began to talk about the disasters that had most recently taken over, he had Katniss’ full attention. He speaks of the return of Gods followed by the disasters and she pauses her activity in order to look at him fully. “Did the Gods cause this?” Her voice holds a sense of sadness. Gods were supposed to protect their subjects, not destroy their homelands. “Surely something else is to blame. Aren’t Gods supposed to protect, not destroy?” At least, the Gods she had once worshiped had been kind gods, incapable of such destruction. They often facility love and friendship. Something about what the stranger was saying sounded untrue – though she had no reason to believe that he was lying to her.
As he fills his baskets and gets them settled upon his shoulders, Katniss turns back towards the path and begins to lead the pair down the mountain. She doesn’t realize that he is staring at her. Perhaps it was a good thing. Katniss would insist she is not worth staring at. She’s had a lot of hardships in her life and each scar that lays across her coat is testament to each one of those hardships. She has made her mistakes in life and she has swore to correct each and every one of them. Her burdens were great and she carried many skeletons in her closet. There was only one who truly knew her baggage. She wishes he was here. Her heart aches for him…for Metaphor.
Thankfully, the young stallion behind her speaks up, her ears leaning back to capture the sounds. He had broken her train of thought and she will forever be thankful for him. Now is not the time to dwell upon the past but to look to the future. “I am quite used to it. I have lived in many lands and each one I helped to build.”…And each one she had watched destroy itself again. “I have been wandering since my last home was lost to devastation.” She pauses a moment before she offers a small smile – a smile that the stranger cannot see. “I have been looking for someone – but I have been unable to find him. It’s time for me to settle down again – to help another land rebuild. It is my calling.”
As she comes down the small path, she can see that there is a small pile of boulders already set aside from the torn down gate. She carefully lowers her slings of boulders and begins to unload them, curious as to the magic she had discovered. Never has she had magic before. And yet, she can think about moving these rocks and there they move. It is fascinating. “My name is Katniss.” She brings her eyes to rest on his, offering him her name. They’ve been working side by side and never once has she said her own name. Perhaps she should start showing her manners more. How rude of her to forget.
There is a sadness that grows and grows in him like a cold spring when she mentions the solemnity of the Night Court.
For him it will always be a complicated place, a tangled kite string tugging at his heart. He thinks of the great love that Denoctians carry for their home - too great, sometimes, to open their eyes to reason. He will always think of it as the court of stars, of dreaming - of bonfires and dancing and promise.
Now it is solemn, and he prays it will not last.
When he speaks again, it is with both the sadness and the hope on his tongue, slowing his words to something quietly thoughtful. “It isn’t always so. The Night Court has always been fiercely passionate - about its arts, about its differences, about its people. Though I suppose every court would say the same.” At the last he smiles, wry - but the expression fades when they talk again of the gods.
He meets her steady gaze, and sighs. “That is an answer I wish I knew.” Even Vespera herself had told him nothing; Asterion has not prayed since. When he closes his eyes to try all he can see is the scene at the Summit, trapped in that dim place with only a warning of change.
For a moment there is nothing, just the steady rhythm of their walking and the bright spring sunlight on their backs. When she answers his latest question, his curiosity sharpens, and he wishes he were more surprised to hear her words. Ravos, the Rift, Helovia - how many other worlds lost to darkness?
“I know so many with a similar story. Once I would have said this place is sure to be uneventful in comparison, but…” he shrugs a dark shoulder, glancing at the tumble-down of stone around them, the trunks of trees still black from dragon-fire. Asterion remembers those early days when he had thought Novus was dull, a page in a storybook to only be skipped - now he wonders at the innocence of that boy.
But to her last words he looks back at her, his gaze softer. “Perhaps you’ll find him here. I have had a few reunions in Novus I never would have expected.” Florentine and Calliope - a sister and a friend. Sometimes he wonders about the others of Ravos who had gone to the rift, the way the unicorn and Raymond had - whether they, too, would appear in Novus one day, wandering at the edge of the sea.
On the heels of it he wonders if this place, too, is one that they would speak of in the future, hushed tones with respect for the dead. I left at the devastation of Novus… Before he would never have believed it, but the bay has learned since then.
He is grateful for the distraction of unloading their rubble, and of her offered name. “Asterion,” he says, and gives a smile like a handshake. “Of the Dusk Court.” He says no more, least of all that he is a king.
Right now he is nothing but another survivor, a refugee helping rebuild.
She listens quietly to him, taking in all the information that she could about this new court. She longs to learn everything she can about this place, it’s people, it’s history. Some hate the subject of history and yet, Katniss finds that she can learn more about a place from where it’s been then from where it’s going. History holds so many truths, truths that she enjoys learning about.
As she walks, she listens to his description of the Night Court and she cannot help but think that he is right. While she doesn’t know much about this particular court, she remembers her past homes. All were equally as passionate about their ideals, their people, and their goals. It’s what made the lands unique and allowed them to grow further.
Katniss thinks about Elysian and what her own ideals had been as their queen. She had wanted her land to be a refuge and it had been just that. So many had come looking for shelter and so many had come to find Elysian home. It had been a beautiful place. God, she missed it.
She talks about where he’s been and where she’s going and he seems to understand. He knows that so many lands have been built up only to fall. Katniss has been there for several. She’s helped make them great and she’s grieved when they fell. It was a cycle she wanted to stop, but she was only one person. She couldn’t do it all by herself. Perhaps that is why she keeps on rebuilding. Perhaps she still has hope that at some point, a place will thrive.
Katniss speaks of Metaphor, of her diligent search for him and yet, she has started to lose hope that she might ever find him. Perhaps it was best to move on. She had opened her heart to the stallion and now she felt the pain of his loss. She didn’t feel his presence here and she knew that finding him here would end in heartbreak. Perhaps it was best if she closed off her heart again. Love made her weak, it seemed. “I cannot feel his presence here. I do, however, feel someone…” She thinks of all those that she’s met in other lands, but she cannot be sure who she feels. Perhaps she would find them sometime.
Their conversation has turned solemn and Katniss can feel the weight of the conversation weighing heavily on them both. She gives her name, hoping to break up the tension and onto something a little lighter. He says his name is Asterion, of the Dusk Court. “I am happy to have met you, Asterion.” Perhaps it is best she does not know he is a king. Perhaps it is a good thing that he does not know that she was once a queen. The two seem like an unlikely pair and yet, Katniss cannot help the way conversation flows so easily with him. It’s refreshing. It had been a long time since she had simply talked with anyone like this.
Once her slings are unloaded, she picks it up once more and balances on her withers before she turns to head back up the mountain. At first she is silent, but then her voice carries towards him. “So tell me, Asterion of the Dusk Court, what has brought you here.” She pauses a moment. “I suppose the same can be said about your own willingness to help a court that is not your own.” He did not have to help Night Court and yet, here he was rebuilding.
“You won’t be alone for long, regardless,” he says, and there is something like humor in the curl of his dark lips. Asterion had long considered himself a wanderer (an adventurer, really, when all he truly had been was a dreaming boy), a knight who needed none but the stars above and the firm ground beneath.
But now he is grown, and he can see how much his friends have made him what he is. If he were the kind to pray, it would be only to give thanks: for Eik, for Florentine, for Marisol and Cirrus. For all those that now had a piece of him, so that they carried one another wherever they were.
Oh, but love has also made him weak, made him blind; that was the trick of it. That it could lift him high or tear him to bits, fashion him into a sleeping sea or a Charybdis.
Asterion, a voice interjected, and he flicked his ear, feeling like a chastised boy at the intrusion of his bonded’s thoughts. The seagull knew him well enough, now, to know when he was being maudlin, and he could hear the laugh in her voice even as she scolded him for it.
His name on Katniss’s tongue startles him back to attention, and he dips his dark muzzle to her. “Likewise,” he says, and means it - but a shadow passes across his expression at her next question.
It is followed as quickly by a smile, but this one is soft as a sigh. “Denocte was not the only court to suffer disasters,” he begins, falling into step beside her. “My court, Terrastella, was beset by floods and mudslides until there was no grass left, no grain. Many were injured, and some lost. We are sheltering in this court, for now.” A breath of silence stretches between them before he finishes, “I am grateful for Isra’s kindness.”
Now he feels almost shameful for not mentioning his role; it had been his decision, after all, that Dusk seek refuge in Night. But it seems a strange time to mention it, his title - it was only his guilt to wrestle, and he had not yet settled how he felt.
Cirrus interrupts his thoughts once more; he could sense the seagull clack her beak, the shuffle of her feet. You are asked for, his bonded says gently through their telepathic connection, and the bay’s gaze goes to Katniss.
“I am sorry,” he says truthfully, his dark eyes soft on her. “I came to help replant, further up the mountainside. I ought to meet a few of the Dusk Court there. But I am sure I will see you again, Katniss.” When he smiles then it is like the sun slipping out from behind a veil of clouds, and just as brief - and then he is gone, running up the hillside, quick as a dark ripple of water over the surface of a lake.
@Katniss sorry to cut it off so soon but this should let you get those rebuilding signos! they'll have to meet again soon :)
