somnia in lumine lunari

through war and triumph ( mariah braun ) rises, at ( eighty-nine) years old, serving as ( map maker & ta at kings college ) residing in ( kings hill ). she is a ( half-fae ) that resembles ( kennedy mcmann ). upon meeting her, she is ( peculiar ) and ( intuitive ). don’t be fooled, she can be ( awkward ) and ( isolating ).

( + ) peculiar: she is known to like the oddities and almost curiosities of the realm—mostly nature related, of course.  being half-fae, she has always been a girl that needs to be outdoors, but her peculiar mind drew her to the rocks, bugs, and flora around her. she likes the stranger side of life… 

( + ) intuitive: her intuition has save her many times over her life. she listens to it like a sixth sense, and relies on it more than any other sense. some call it superstition—but if she has a feeling that sometimes that logic can’t even explain… 

( - ) awkward: she was always the odd one out, so many social cues are lost on her. she was either nose-down in a book or out on a hike: she was never one to have many friends. when speaking to strangers, she doesn’t have the ease of conversing. small talk is a skill she does not possess… 

Mariah chortled sweetly at Damien. “Like your guards can find me. I’ve gotten pretty good at being ‘off-the-grid’,” she straightened her spine playfully. But as soon as that word dropped from his lips, her demeanor changed. She’s only read about it in dusty books in the dark corners of libraries. “Oh, my—I never thought I’d hear that word uttered aloud.” Mariah lifted her mug to her lips again and tried to recall the things she knew. “It was a ritual they needed my blood for then? I don’t know too much about magic… But what I do know blood is used for specific reasons. But, why now? I mean you’ve probably asked the same question…” Mariah trailed off looking around the camp suddenly aware of the setting sun.

"I am glad that I can't remember but at the same time, it is not nice to have holes in your memory. It's frustrating that there is something missing." There was something to say for both situations. "I remember the magic and how it felt. And the pain. Even though I want to forget it."

“You haven’t felt it? The storms felt dark…” Mariah blurted out a low whisper that the words barely left her mouth. She looked around like she felt eyes on her. There were some people about, but no one noticed the two talking. Mariah leaned over the table closer to Miray. “In my limited knowledge of magic, blood is used for something specific—calling on ancestors, looking for someone, binding. It was no coincidence that blood was taken. I'm not well versed in ritual magic, nature is more my thing…” She sighed softly and turned back again to make sure they were none within earshot of bystanders. 

“But I’ve felt it out there—” the half-fae gestured to the window behind Miray. It was shining blue presently: not a wispy cloud in the sky. “Darkness lingers on nature like invisible strings of a spider web. And I’ll be damned if I’m caught in that again.”

Sebastian wanted the most up-to date information in order to have the best intel towards continuing fortifying the borders of Kings Hill, let alone make critical decisions towards his military. As it was a human realm, it left them at a bit of a disadvantage unlike their fellow counterparts. Nonetheless, that didn't stop his desire to attain the best of everything Kings Hill had ever seen. Of course, to the benefit of its citizens and residents. “I certainly won’t judge. I’m not that artistic myself,” he chuckled as they entered his office before closing the door behind the two of them. “So tell me…how are your studies going? Can I get you something to drink?”

Mariah mused that her life has turned upside down in the span of half-year. This time last year she was getting drunk and into bar fights at some Dark World—Now she’s drinking casually with the newly crowned King of Kings Hill: her home realm. Mariah straightened her spine and let her hands drop to the cylindrical case that draped over her forearm. Mariah looked up and around the stately room, the sounds of the large door closing echoed behind them, but the sounds quickly deafened making the room feel warm. 

 The desk was in the center of the room and was surrounded with books of varying topics. Mariah nodded and accepted the drink her king handed her. She found her throat rather parched and her tongue felt like it was swollen between her teeth. She gulped it down and then answered his question. “I am almost done with my dissertation actually. I feel like I’ve been working on it for decades—but in actuality it’s been just a few years…” she began to ramble. “I’ve applied some of my research to this draft actually. The Royal Library is quite extensive, and super helpful. What I do have is just a draft, nothing super final artistically. But the features and topography are accurate. That I can guarantee.”

He watched her practically light up as she mentioned having purpose, smiling as she brought out the map to show him. “It looks great. I hope he paid you very generously for your work. If not, I can have a few words with him,” he offered. He always had a sense of protectiveness over Mariah. She wasn’t naive in the slightest, but that was something that lingered from when they used to date. The protectiveness. “Are you still working on it? Or are you finished and just enjoyed the wilderness?”

She watched as his fingers traced her scars that brushed her wrists. His touch was warm and familiar; she could feel the heat in her cheeks as he lingered. “The scars will fade—eventually. Like in nature,” she sighed like she was letting go of something heavy. She twisted her wrist over and could let her palm fall into his grasp. 

She looked up at him and then back down at her map. “It had been almost a century since the Crown had had an up-to-date account of the it’s northern borders. And with the way that it’s felt since the coronation, the more distance I have from court, the better. The forest has seemed darker—” Mariah’s voice trailed off and she looked past Damien towards the thicket that surrounded them. “Spring is almost here, but the darkness seems to linger…” she looked back to meet Damian’s gaze, “like forgotten spider threads left behind.”

"I don't remember a lot. Nearly nothing." Miray wasn't sure what was better. It was clear that she had pushed it all away, because as far as she could remember, she hadn't been unconscious - only during the kidnapping itself. "I only remember flashes of it all." And pain when someone had cut into her skin. "How are you coping?"

"Minus the phantom pains and restless nights--" Mariah let out a dry laugh as the all too real truth passed her lips. Since the kidnapping, she’s only truly felt at home amongst nature. They only times she feels calm is during a storm, lighting in her veins calling out for the bright embrace of the bolts that crack open the sky. “I’ve been better…” she trailed off trying not to get lost in the reel of trauma going behind her eyes. 

“Be glad that your memory is granting you a favor. I remember it all, except for the faces. They seemed to be obstructed—” Her words tumbled out so freely. Talking to Miray seemed to make Mariah feel lighter. “It was very powerful magic, nothing I have ever felt before.”

Blue eyes narrowed as Finnian's ears strained for any response after calling his cousin's name. Near relief slowly trickled over him akin water dripping from a loose faucet, at the familiar sound of her voice. He moved carefully as he neared the area that he'd heard her. If it was a trap, whomever was on the other side were in for a harsh and violent reality if Finnian Ambrose came face to face with anyone other than his cousin. He couldn't handle the idea of explaining to her parents if anything had happened to Mariah. Especially not anything that he could've prevented.

At the sight of her form, Bear almost sighed and relief almost claimed him. Except, as a former spy and a betrayer of his former home-realm, Finnian Ambrose knew better. He knew that disguises and distractions and traps were real. The guardian faerie spoke to the redhead in German. There would be only two reasons for why she'd answer back in the same language. Either it would be Mariah, herself. Or an imposter who also knew the language. "What did you almost major in? And what's grandma's favorite song?" He asked, testing her as he stood over her. Against his own instinct, Finnian made no move to help her to her feet and remove the handcuffs from her limbs. He had to know who she was. If she were really his cousin, then she would know. And if not, then Bear would kill her. Whomever she was. If only for simply wasting his time.

“Ballet,” she heaved out like gasping for fresh air. A welcome relief washed over her as the cuffs clattered to the slab floor.  “—And Edelweiss—You’ll never let me live that down. I liked the dresses the ballerina’s wore.” Mariah looked up and flung herself for a hug. Finnan coming grounded her, and she was able to finally see what was around her. Her disco clothes were now tattered and covered in dust; several sequins were missing and her stockings had snags running the length of her legs. 

“We are still in Kings Hill?” Mariah asked more for confirmation rather than ignorance. She looked around her and listened to the fauna that was near. She could recognize the bird songs and the air smelled the same as it did outside the discothèque. “How did you find me?” Like a reflex, she lifted her hands up and grabbed around her wrist to soothe the pain. “The rest of the family?”

Of course, her guard was also in the crowd so she never worried. She just admired the stands, and the art caught her attention. As she admired, she absent-minded caressed her baby bump. Her not-so Little Bean would be here in a few more months. Unless someone sped up that timetable again. As she was lost in the moment, she didn't realize she was standing next to the High Lady of the Heights.

"Is that what you get from the painting? Death delaying love?" she asked curious as she had overheard the other woman's statement. "It's been a while. How are you?"

Louisa blinked back to reality and her eyes settled to see her dear friend, Rowen. They were the best of friends, but courtly friends. They would gravitate towards each other when social functions were roaring around. Louisa likes a good party as much as the next, but a friendly face was always much more fun than the vapid vampires of her court. Louisa’s face warmed as she took in Rowen’s.

She looked Rowen up and down and saw her swollen belly. It was a bittersweet feeling that bit her tongue as she tried to find the words to say back. While she should be happy for Rowen, a baby is a blessing. But it is the proof that made her position as the Hybrid High Lady sit on a razor's edge. She is jealous of a babe yet to take its first breath. 

Louisa looked back up at Rowen to respond. “I rose up from the dead—if the tabloids are to be believed,” she chuckled. “I’ve been good. Glad to be out tonight now that the full moon has waned away.”

Louisa watched Viggo’s face with contentment as his eyes wandered off the paintings. When she was going through the collection, several of the said paintings she forgot that the family had in their collection. Some were still in the original packagings that the Trust received them in. She nodded as he went on about the school. “I think it’s a bloody brilliant idea,” Louisa moved closer to look at the paintings with him. “We need more places like this—a home to foster the arts. It’s the only way forward.”

It wasn't the first time that Miray had seen Mariah around the library but never had the young woman approached the other. She had watched the other from afar for a bit. The sight of Mariah gave her vague flashbacks of the dark room where they both had ended up during the day of the coronation. That was the reason until now that she had not approached Mariah.

The silence of the library had been a safe haven for the both ot them, that much was clear to Miray. So her voice was nothing more than a whisper, even though there was no where else to be found.

"Hi, is it okay if I sit down here and that we could talk for a bit? I am not sure if you remember me but the same thing happened to us on the day of the coronation."

Mariah pulled off her earphones and reached for her Walkman, she pressed pause as Miray walked up to her. She'd seen her around in court before she left for the north, and at the coronation. "Um, ye--yeah..." She shuffled aside her papers and books to make room for Miray. When she met Miray's eyes, the half-fae echoed the same feeling. It all came back in a rush, taking the breath with her. Mariah let out a cough that vibrated off the hushed library walls.

"I remember it too well," Mariah pulled down her sleeves to cover her scars that wrapped around her wrists, the only visible reminders left. Everything else was in her dreams.

“And when you do dream? At least you’re sleeping. Or at least I hope you’re sleeping regularly. Are you? Everyone is good. We more so tried our best to stop what happened but they came for my mom so my dad had to leave the circle, and without the ancestors' power within him, we just couldn’t fight what came.”

“I dream about this—the woods,” Mariah smiled while taking a sip of her tea. Her eyes shifted upwards towards Damien over her cuppa. “I dream more than I am plagued with terrors. I think that it helps though, being out here,” Mariah took another sip and put it down on the nearest surface, which was a beat-up wooden stool. “And I have a purpose!” She smiled walking into her tent. Whilst it looked like a normal small canvas tent from the exterior shape and size, it was much bigger on the inside: about the size of a small apartment. 

Several years back, Mariah  came across a witch that struck a deal with the half-fae: a magic tent for lightning in a bottle. Mariah didn’t ask for what, but she made the deal. If she didn’t have to go back into society ever, she would be quite happy in her tent, amongst the flora and fauna. Mariah emerged from her apartment-tent with a rolled up paper in her hand. It was stained with coffee rings and dirt smudges, but she rolled it out to show Damien. “King Sebastian commissioned me to make a map of the northern borders of Kings Hill. And I think I did a bang up job…”

It was always a joy to see Louisa and meeting and catching up with her was much needed. The other woman was quiet and seemed distracted, almost as though she hadn’t noticed Iris on her phone handling a matter that came up. Iris had even excused herself for a time before returning in time for Louisa’s attention to come back to their conversation. “Of course, who doesn’t? They’re right up there with Mother Nature .” They were a well-known myth of creatures responsible for the creation of other immortalem and really all of supernatural kind. Right in line with Mother Nature being responsible for nymph abilities. “Why do you ask?”

Louisa bit her bottom lip as Iris answered her question. “I keep thinking of the stories that my father would tell me and my brother when the storms would lash at our shores. There is something about it that rings so familiar,” Louisa looked up with a quizzical brow that hung over her soft brown eyes. Louisa got up and moved over to the bar car to pour herself another glass of Chardonnay. “When I was seeing Aries, he had this darkness about him. I hadn’t felt anything like it before. It was consuming—” she confessed. “I felt that same darkness roll into Kings Hill from the storm…”

Where: Northland Heights, Fusion Cocktail bar

Jacen had been actively trying to occupy hybrid spaces as of late in hopes to meet and befriend more hybrids. He was out at this new spot for hybrids and vampires alike who specialized in blood-infused cocktails, blood in fancy, posh blood bags, and food infused with blood. They, of course, had food for non vampires and hybrids as well, but that wasn’t the main focus of the cocktail bar. As he was heading to find a seat, he noticed a familiar face. The High Lady of Northland Heights. He approached despite her guards. “High Lady Louisa, are you dining alone? Would you like some company?” He was also getting more into the habit of breaking out of his overthinking shell and just doing rather than thinking about doing things. The worst she could say was no or that she was waiting on someone else.

Louisa watched as her denizens enjoyed themselves, and she couldn't help to feel a sense of relief to be among her own people again. She'd had felt so surrounded by anyone but people with agendas. She always would make a non-official public appearance during the off-season of social events. It was the calm before her social calendar would fill up.

"Mister Warren--" Louisa smiled letting all her teeth show. "That is nothing that you can fix," she plopped down on the lounge sofa and reached for her signature drink (a blood negroni topped with her champagne). She lifted it to her lips and leaned back, she gestured to the seat near her on the dark velvet sofa. "By all means, what are you drinking?" She motioned to her body man waiting for Jacen's order so she can have him get another.