"Want To Try Drinking Me Under The Table, Honey?" She Asks Between Laughs, Looking Down At The Falling

"I imagine that it must be a rather bittersweet," Robin muses lowly, eyes flickering to meet Laer's with a raised brow before they flicker back to the golden tree. There is far too much fascination on her gaze to allow herself to look away from the tree. Not at least until her inner sense alerts her it is time to attend Aurora's celebrations. She wants to burn her the image into her memories, ensure she will never forget the sight before her and the marvel that it brings, heart lightened to know that they are safer now they have been for nearly a year. "The price of knowing this love once more was high, and yet we cannot deny it's call." Not when the sense of safety it's something they have been desperate to get back after their overwhelming loss. Shaking her head, Robin finally turns to face Laer, paying rapt attention of his description of his Court. "I shall open some space on my schedule to do just so. I have always been fond of the Summer Court's appearance."

"It's like I remember it." Laer moved to stand at Robin's side as he looked up at the breadth of the great, golden tree. When standing directly in front of it the creation all but blotted out the horizon. There were so many stories about Laurelin and Telperion; immortality, ambrosia, the list went on but that's all they really were. Stories. Tamlen's fate was tethered to this tree, that was reason enough to wish to understand the truth of it, even more so was the strength he felt under its glow. "It feels like nothing in the world can touch us again, pure like..." He thought of Sune, "Love." To answer her questions, Laer managed to look away from the tree for a moment, "Well, we've moved through the oceans encompassing the island, the borders where they end and ascend into the sky, the clouds. You should come visit some time, you and your court are welcome in the canopy above anytime."

Winter arrived with it's full splendor, it's icy touch spreading through the Lunar Court and beyond Gate. Frost had reached the boards of the Dusk Court that it shared with Aurora's court, the last days of Autumn smattering with coldness. It's a rather beautiful sigh, the slow combination between Dusk and Lunar, and she quite enjoys walking near the borders, the chill settling on her bones as she observes the results of entropy on action. Alas, duty calls, even as the Solstice Festival it's at it's apex. Robin had turned in early, as soon as Aurora had been called away for a manner relating her denizens, and had made it to the boarder between the courts with a languid step, only to be called away by one of the fluttering pixies regarding an audience with a Dusk elf whose name she does not recognize.

How curious.

Part of her training before her sacrifice to the Holt, had been to memorize the name of the survivors that had followed them to the Fey's Forest after the court fell. Hesperia is not a name she recognizes from amidst the survivors, and she wonders if she has found herself a pilgrim for her court. Perhaps Laer has finally met his match.

Snickering to herself at the thought, she makes it towards her office where the stranger awaits and opens the door to a strangely familiar presence. How curious. She had not known her by her name, but she did know the stranger before her. Robin needed a glimpse of her face to be sure, but if she is right, her Court owes the stranger for Robin's life, and she is very determined to fulfill her debts.

"Far from it, that you asked for an audience despite the festivities is telling," she comments as she moves to sit on her desk chair and gestures at the other to stop bowing. She understands the decorum, but she has never been one for it outside from formal situations. "If the matter is important, I am thankful you want to bring it to my attention sooner than later."

Date: December 17-23rd, one of the nights after the festival Location: Audele, Dusk Fields Characters: @thegoodfellow & @hidinghesperia Notes: future pumpkin wives

The first brush of winter had come to the world and yet nothing gave her sibling joy, not even the gently drifting snowflakes. Hesperia went to the Lunar Court first, if only because she had been terrified that the Lunar Chancellor would deny her 'useless' sibling any welcome. That paranoid fear had been for nothing but The Tranquil was Hesperia's priority so, with the assurance that her sibling was welcomed and being looked after, Hesperia finally headed to the Dusk Fields and to who she knew to be her new Chancellor. She remained quiet, out of the way, soft-spoken and stubbornly mysterious despite the curiousity that she could feel emanating from the other Dusk elves that, most of them, had likely never seen the common elf before. Hesperia only spoke to ask where she could to find the Chancellor and was led to wait for an audience with her. Robin, they said was her name. Young but tenacious. The other common elf had gossiped how their Chancellor had succeeded a traitor in the midst of brewing war despite never having prepared for the role. That sort of challenge would make anyone crass and so Hesperia only hoped for her and her sibling's sake that that wasn't the case. She was terrified for them. For their sake she needed to make a good impression - she needed to grovel on her knees if that's what it took.

"Chancellor," Hesperia greeted, immediately standing up as the door suddenly opened. She didn't even give herself enough time to properly look at who Robin was before the common elf inclined her head respectfully and turned her gaze downward. Hesperia was lithe and clad in dark, simple elven clothing, the sort of clothes made for lots of free movement. She had covered her hair and her ears with a equally dark scarf, if only because it had made it easier for her to sneak around that way while in the Otherworld and now it served to hide her ears from mortals. "I apologize for asking for an audience so late and during city festivities."

zahryaofspring​:

✿*° ‘° ･

Zahrya hums, a finger on his chin as he grins in Robin’s direction. She and the others were sights to behold, as any eladrin in their status would be, but neither she nor Aurora had the years to let their beauty flourish as he had and Laer once put it best—-summer follows spring.

“Yes yes, beauty is easily obtainable but wonderment goes further. You must dazzle, stun, and amaze all at once with your very presence. Perhaps one day you’ll shine nearly as bright as me!” he giggles, clearly amused by the idea. It was his to rise and hers to fall, so he didn’t think it was possible but who knows. Maybe Robin carried within her an autumn the likes of which Zahrya has never seen. Doubtful, but possible nonetheless. 

He loses himself for a moment in the scene of small critters enjoying their blissful day. Robin is correct in that regard at least, displays like that are one of the treasures of this forest. “It’s not just for her,” he shares. “We deserve a place of our own. Here, we can make our own and raise our young ones safely. I was the only one afforded that luxury, and though this isn’t on the scale of the maze, this forest will suffice.”

...

Robin has an inkling on the direction Zahrya’s thoughts are going, an idea as to what he is alluding amidst his works. Each of court had their innate sense of superiority over the others, and Spring tended to brag about it’s ability to create life. If she isn’t wrong, she knows exactly what he was implying.

She wonders if he realizes how particularly infuriating that belief is, but Zahrya had never been particularly aware nor smart so she doubted it.

“I suppose that is possible,” she concedes, a brief nod to mimic an agreement despite none of her words were a true agreement. Zahrya could keep his misconceptions and biases, for he had so few on his life outside of that and his devotion to the Queen. She wouldn’t want to take that away with the truth. Not when she is trying to mend bonds.

“I am sure the courts appreciate it, I know I do,” she confesses, despite the tugging of guilt at the knowledge she has stolen the Tiber’s land. And yet, the courts now more than ever.

chancellorxlaer​:

-

“Fortunately he’s apparently less skilled at hunting fey than he is demons, one would assume anyways.” Came Laer’s simple offer, he was glad that Robin was still alive, they didn’t have much in the way of a personal connection but she was a chancellor and any loss of fey life was a tragedy. That a single, simply human had gotten the best of her was worrying, “You should keep this encounter to yourself, I won’t tell anyone else.” He could only imagine how people would talk, how opinions of her place among the chancellorship might change. Zahrya, Aurora, and himself would have returned with the human’s head or a newly-minted changeling had they been placed in Robin’s position. Weakness of youth, mortals deserved little consideration as far as the Summer chancellor was concerned - particularly those that had affiliated themselves with the Eye. “That alpha was adamant that we should focus our efforts on the Eye, maybe you can bend your vengeance towards his. I can only imagine that there are copious amounts of our own kind in their cells.” 

....

“I had enough foresight to at least keep it that way,” she offers, a grim smile on her lips as she avoids the entire truth of the encounter. There is no other survivor but Wade, after all, and bringing further vengeance upon him will make her plans useless. She needs to get to the Eye through him, meaning he is only useful to her as long as he is alive. And when he stops being useful? Well, Robin had seen how conflicted he had been at hurting her, she had taught him that not all supernatural creatures were evil, knows that he believes so. What better way to get revenge but to show him that he is the same sort of monster that had killed his family? When she sees the despair on his eyes, when she sees that he realizes how far he has fallen, that is when he will deny, tortured by the reality of his actions, rather than alleviated by the salvation that fulfilling his self-assigned mission would bring him. “I will keep it to myself, yes,” she nods in agreement. ‘And I have heard the alpha’s argument. I am thinking on reaching out to one of the members of the pack to begin the planning in a few days.”

"Every once in a while, I feel your judgement loud and clear," Robin drawls as she rolls her eyes but keeps herself smiling politely at the other guests. It's truly a surprise how easily different species are mingling, and she truly does not know if she feels all that comfortable about it. Regardless, it was Meryasek's wish for all of them to be there, and she will be indulging him as much as she can for the rest of the festivities. After all, one only got married once, if they were lucky. "Considering I have an actual home, I truly don't know how to feel about it."

@thegoodfellow location: Royal Wedding Reception notes: he's her date because she's maidenless and he likes food

Nirvaan had really planned this whole thing? Planned this whole wedding and never mentioned it even once, not exactly best friend behaviour of him. They even had sex that one time. For the moment Robin was Assan's best friend again as he stood at the long reception table and stuffed his pockets endlessly. He wouldn't have sex with her, not after the Bill thing but they were still friends. "Tuna." Assan said with a nod as he inspected a piece of fresh tuna before he popped it into his mouth.

title: the hunt continues when: post the tinkerer where: rome, Audelë, more trigger warnings: usual stuff

Agony.

Tamlen’s death had been painful, the drainage that followed a rip on their plan. But Tamlen had come back to them against all odds, and the relief had been overwhelming.

Inan hadn’t.

His death feels like being unraveled, like losing a part of herself that she assumed would always be there. The second heartbeat behind her chest is gone, the thread of devotion and steely determination rotting away as death came to take her warder’s hand. Somewhere, a drow is being born. In Rome, Robin’s warder dies, an unfinished melody, a hunt cut short. 

She hadn’t even been able to convince him to call her by her name. 

Lain’s death had hurt, the growing care she had felt for the lycan, a sharp stab to her chest, but she had not loved the wolf. Not quite, not yet, and now never for he is gone, and she knows that even if Death was the one to collect what was due, she had played a part in that game. It is a tragedy, a story unfinished. 

It was not love. 

Inan was her warder, she had welcomed him in and invited him into her soul. Loving him was not unlike loving a part of herself. She had kept that emotion at bay, well aware that she had done nothing to earn anything from him but his loyalty, suppressing it to prevent any more awkwardness between the two. Inan’s story with Fen’harel is well known, and she would not push through his boundaries after that betrayal. 

Would not have. 

But in the end, it did not matter.

Her warder is dead, decay spreading through Rome as Thanatos collects his due, and all Robin can do within the Titan is sink her thoughts with her fellow Chancellors and fall upon the song of destruction they are weaving until they cannot do so any longer. 

The Titan falls, and with the fall, their end is marked. 

There is no opportunity to fight, no magic to summon, no song capable of stopping the Great Old Ones as they fall upon them like predators upon their prey.  

The next fifteen years are spent in the ground, all thought lost beneath the agony of the song of decay and rot, of the end and the beginning. 

The darkness is a familiar call, the pain an old comfort, akin to the ritual that had seen her confirmed into her role as Fall Chancellor. A legacy of the Dusk Elves that they once were, the ritual recalled costumes of old, and it is now the only reason Robin does not lose her mind to the slow movement of rot, slowly spreading through her body but keeping her alive to keep their nutrients. It’s a song of fungi, beautiful on its ugliness, on its destruction. She doesn’t lose herself to it, doesn’t break down and lose hope, but it comes close. Were it not for the familiarity of the torture, she might have.

She doesn’t. 

She awakens to the astral bombs falling and to freedom that tastes as sickly sweet as the rot that had settled on the back of her throat over the last decade. There is no hesitation when she joins the other Chancellors into a song and they come together to become the Titan once more. 

For one last time in this timeline. 

Robin dies in the battlefield, only to awaken in a Rome that has not yet been Forsaken. 

The battle is set aside, more pressing matters coming into the forefront as they find themselves changed. The Chancellors’ retreat, the war pushed back and with it their destruction of Rome, far more important things to do than to deal with the mortals that destroyed them and saved them alike. The world changed one more time, and Robin changed with it, working with the four other chancellors to create Audelë, a new home, alike the Courts that sheltered them for so long, but something new altogether in the same breath.  As the dust settles, she finds Inan, brings him forth into a hug despite his arguments against it and laughs before letting go, polite distance that he is so fond of falling upon the two once more. 

Peace fell upon their kind once more, a deal with the dark elves set in place. And the Courts? The Courts protected once more.

It’s not enough. 

It will never be enough, but her people deserve the rest. Dusk has fallen upon them, and with it comes a new world they need to learn for themselves. Ignoring it all in reckless rage would be foolish, and the tricksters that hide in the shade are anything but that. 

They will wait, they will watch, and they will be ready.

The hunt is eternal, and so are they.

"If that is how you feel, there is nothing else to say about it. However, if you ever need my aid in this matter, I will do so freely, as a repayment for the transparency." There is something rotten about having to word their relationship as transactional, but there is a desire to respect Inan's boundaries and they have time to build on the fragile trust he had chosen to extend to her after Fen'harel's betrayal. "I will, yes. I am curious to see what this Count is capable on this matter. You?"

"That's not my intention for coming here," Inan was not looking for permission, "I only wanted to be transparent." He thought carefully over his words to follow, elves had to be mindful of such things but whenever Inan spoke it was from the heart. "My brother died long ago, I won't know a drow renowned for terrorizing my people." Even if it hurt to think of Somniar as such, it didn't make the notions any less true. Onto some brighter tidings, Inan had also been meaning to ask, "Will you be attending the party in the mortal realm?"

TATI GABRIELLE as Nadine Ross Braddock in Uncharted (2022)