The peace that formerly reigned in Terra Nova has eroded, now little more than a memory. War ravages the continent. Disputes divide kingdoms; ideals divide families. The quest for power consumes absolutely and indiscriminately. None are immune to its allure.
Who will rise and who will fall? Only time—and ambition—will tell.
UPDATES
05.26.2023
2 month character creation hold for all existing members begins 6/5/2023. Ended 8/5/2023.
10.29.2023
Change in how times flows. Was 4 IC seasons, now only 2 IC seasons per 1 OOC year.
5 whole years of Heir Apparent goodness! When I started the site, I knew I was hunkering down for the long haul, but I never could have predicted the numerous twists and turns this roleplay site has seen. Hundreds of plots, characters, and members have come and gone, all leaving marks on the site. I am so very thankful for those who have invested. Because you keep coming back, keep getting on, and keep writing, Heir Apparent has the legacy it does today. Three cheers to us!
Hadrian was in no state to ride home. But then again, many of the party guests weren’t either.
When the whiskey was gone and his voice hoarse from singing, Hadrian had retired to the room that had been made up for him. He shelled off his shoes and dropped onto the bed, fully clothed and still humming away. Hadrian wasn’t quite sure when he drifted off, but when he did Kennet inhabited his dreams in flashes. The curve of her jaw, the sparkle in her eye, the shine in her smile before she said—
“Call on me first.”
Hadrian’s eyes snapped open as a beam of light fell on his face. It was still early, the sun only having just emerged above the horizon in its entirety. Though most of the house was likely still sleeping, Hadrian pulled himself out of bed onto his feet. Immediately the room started spinning. After swaying for a moment, thinking he might be sick, he hastened to the basin in the corner and splashed water over his face. Changing his shirt did little to make him more presentable, but nevertheless, he pulled on his boots and marched out the door.
Every step he took thrust him further into the headache starting to burn in his temple. But it also brought him closer to Kennet’s room, if the slightly bewildered servants he asked directions of were to be believed. Planted outside, Hadrian rapped firmly on Kennet’s door.
Post by Kennet Caern on Aug 18, 2022 19:49:47 GMT -5
The knock startled Kennet from her sleep. She was not, as previously surmised, a creature built for the early hours of the morning. It would be hours yet before a servant came in search of her, which meant the first knock she heard was ignored with a mild groan of protest and a determined turn of her shoulder. It was the next that made her blink, glaring at the pale light pooling beneath the curtains on her window before she remembered where she was and—
Kennet bolted upright, head spinning from the sudden motion and the haze of yesterday’s drink. She had already paid off Patrice, pairing her bribe with a subtle threat and an easy grin. Of course, that meant precious little where Brenna Delaney was concerned. The loyalty—and fear—she cultivated in her staff was a thing to behold. A frustrating, ridiculous beast of a thing. Kennet threw back the blankets on her bed in a moment of irritated decision. One after the other, her bare feet slapped the floor as she made her way to the door with every intention of informing her mother that—whatever she had heard—it could wait until breakfast when—
“Hadrian.”
Kennet stood just inside her door, dark hair in a wild, unkempt braid over a shoulder left far too bare under the thin straps of her shift. Panic and anger tripped over one another in a rush for her senses while an uninvited, and exceedingly frustrating smile pulled at her bare lips. “What are you doing here?” her voice fell to a whisper, green eyes darting from the empty corridor over his shoulder back to Hadrian while an unnecessarily ridiculous excitement overtook her panic and her anger to seize control of her senses.
Post by Hadrian Usher on Aug 19, 2022 19:27:24 GMT -5
For an unnecessarily long moment, Hadrian just stared at her. His eyes flickered from her face, to her touseled braid, to her bare shoulders and, well, the rest of her. Reigning in his smile was a hopeless endeavor. By the time his gaze found Kennet’s face again, he was beaming while running a hand through his hair.
“I—” Hadrian cleared his throat, “You said to call. So, well,” Hadrian held out his arms with a satisfied grin, “Here I am.”
Post by Kennet Caern on Aug 19, 2022 19:49:28 GMT -5
Despite herself, a hint of color rose to stain her cheeks. Kennet was not accustomed to faltering under inspection—on the contrary she generally thrived under scrutiny—but she was equally unaccustomed to being witnessed in such a state, face devoid of its mask as well as its usual trappings. Her lips and eyes were bare, her hair unkempt, her dress…entirely lacking.
Lifting her chin against her own insecurities, Kennet felt her nerves ease with the spread of Hadrian’s smile, taking solace she refused to admit she needed in the fact that he didn’t appear to have found her wanting.
“At dawn?” she laughed, crossing her arms over her chest while the chill of the morning chased goosebumps across her skin. “It’s not exactly what I had in mind.” Her grogginess was fading, ebbing under the realization he was here. Now. Her heart skipped another uncertain beat and she tried in vain to rein in the corners of her smile.
Another beat passed, a silent one that made her toes curl against the cold of the floor while she shifted from one to the other. “So,” Kennet demanded at last, voice barely above a whisper for fear of drawing attention to the fact that he was standing outside her door. “Have you come to your senses?” It was meant to be a tease, delivered with a coy grin and a hint of mischief. To her credit, it very nearly was. But there was a tenor of uncertainty laced between her words, a vulnerable warble that pulled at the threads of an already fraying act.
Last Edit: Aug 20, 2022 11:36:28 GMT -5 by Kennet Caern
Post by Hadrian Usher on Aug 20, 2022 11:43:33 GMT -5
Hadrian smiled sheepishly, glancing at the low early morning sun in Kennet’s window. Yes, perhaps he should have taken Kennet’s late-rising habits into account, but as a military man, Hadrian was a man of urgency. And this seemed as urgent a matter as any he’d ever encountered in his years of service.
As Kennet’s feet shifted on the floor, Hadrian glanced down the hall for any spying maids or wandering servants. Finding none, he kissed her, hand slipping to her waist and pulling her to him for far too brief a moment before letting her go again.
“Hardly,” Hadrian grinned, pushing a strand of hair out of her face, “I’m afraid I’m still quite mad.” His eyes searched her features, cheeks hurting from the strain of smiling so much. “And what of you, Lady Delaney? Are you going to force me to regain my sanity?” There was a hint of apprehension in his voice; fear that Kennet might crush the dream he’d lovingly sustained all these years.
Post by Kennet Caern on Aug 20, 2022 12:00:57 GMT -5
His hand found her waist and his kiss stole her breath before Kennet could so much as pretend to protest. By the time her bare heels fell to the floor, a flush of red burning in her cheeks while her hand curled against his chest, Kennet had all but made up her mind.
Her eyes skipped once more between his, terror battling with an aching, overwhelming sensation that made her chest hurt and her breath stagger. It was the way he said Delaney, carrying her backward in time to the world as it might have been, as perhaps it should have been. It was the fact that he was here, brushing a strand of hair from her face with more care, more tenderness, than she had ever hoped to know, despite the fact that she had pushed him away time and time again.
She should have turned from the door. She should have found her slippers and her robe and led him anywhere other than her door. Instead, Kennet breathed in another shuddering breath before her hand fell from his chest in search of his hand. “If you get caught standing there,” she teased, taking hold of his hand to tug him into her room, “I just might.”
Post by Hadrian Usher on Aug 20, 2022 14:28:42 GMT -5
Hadrian didn’t need telling twice. He let Kennet lead him in, kicking the door shut behind him, his eyes not once leaving hers. Once again he pulled her close, too tired, hungover, and smitten to fear the wrath of Brenna Delaney. Hadrian kissed her again and again, wrapping himself around her as if she were a dream that might evaporate.
Hadrian would only part if Kennet made him, or until his breath ran out. When either of those things happened, he’d look at her, eyes once again running over all the little unrefined details of her appearance—from her unraveling braid to the way her curves showed through her shift in the morning sun.
“I like you like this,” Hadrian said, humming with happiness as he tugged on her braid and put a hand on her waist.
Post by Kennet Caern on Aug 20, 2022 15:52:24 GMT -5
She should have told him to stop, but his mouth was on hers and Kennet lifted to meet his kiss with her own. One after another, until her hands were trembling against the nape of his neck and they were both gasping for breath. After another shuddering breath, her eyes lifted in search of his, wide and terrified and wanting.
His hand fell to her waist and another involuntary shiver ran up her spine to where he tugged at the fraying ends of her braid. “Indecent and freezing?” she teased, hiding behind a flimsy, breathy laugh and an uncertain whisper. She wanted to tell him he was a fool, that he would tire of her unruly braid and her naked lips, that he was a man still chasing a shadow in the dark, that he didn’t know—
Her lips parted a second time, searching for all the things she knew she needed to say, all the things he deserved to know, but she could still feel his hand against her hip and the promise it offered and she lifted onto the tips of her toes one more time for kiss of her own making. A slow, fervent apology that trembled from her lips to his, aching to be anything other than what it was.
Post by Hadrian Usher on Aug 21, 2022 19:27:37 GMT -5
Hadrian didn’t detect the apology. He was still far too drunk on victory to entertain any doubt. He kissed her back with confidence, hands holding her with the steadiness of a sailor on a mooring line.
“The freezing I can take care of,” Hadrian breathed as his lips parted hers, the smile he’d entered with still pulled taught over his features. He looked down at her, eyes bright and hopeful, full of the promise he’d thought Kennet had given. That she’d be his. His.
Post by Kennet Caern on Aug 21, 2022 19:42:53 GMT -5
This time, Kennet dragged her lips from his with reluctance, not with the heat of an eager breath but with a slow, aching regret. Her eyes lifted to meet his once more, her smile smaller than it had been, a reflection of the nerves clutching at her chest. “Of that,” she murmured, the anchor already dropping in her voice despite her intent at a tease, “I have no doubt.”
Her toes curled against the floor, indifferent to the cold despite the flurry of goosebumps across the bare line of her shoulders. “But first…” Kennet rushed the words, hurrying to add them to her smile before Hadrian had a chance to make good on his promise and chase the truth back under the lock and key where she kept it. “There’s something you should know.”
She would have preferred to look away, to bury the fear that climbed from the pit of her stomach into the dark of her eyes, but she couldn’t. Instead, her hands fell to his arms, seeking support she had no right to ask of him or anyone else.
Post by Hadrian Usher on Aug 21, 2022 19:54:11 GMT -5
No.
The panic squeezed at his chest, making it difficult to breathe. Hadrian had come too far to lose her now. Whatever it was, they could overcome it. He wrapped his arms around her more tightly, fearful that the siren might yet slip through his fingers. His eyes searched her face to look for any sign that Kennet might be retreating once again.
“What is it?” Hadrian gently took Kennet’s face in his hands, thumbs brushing along the soft line of her cheekbones.
Post by Kennet Caern on Aug 21, 2022 20:09:13 GMT -5
This wasn’t the way she wanted to tell him, but Hadrian’s arms tightened around hers and her chest ached. By the time he took her face in his hands, it was all Kennet could do to keep herself from trembling. Because she had led him here. Knowingly. Willfully. It was her fault—
“Last night,” the words fell from her lips on a whisper so soft Hadrian might miss it if he happened to breathe at the same time. The second time her lips parted, it was in a silent, desperate search for all the words she thought she would have had more time to craft, to perfect. “Last night, you asked how many children I wanted…” She wanted to reach for his hands, to anchor herself against them. Instead, she blinked, damming the water burning the back of her eyes because it was the only thing she knew how to do with her own tears.
They should have been walking. Outside. She should have started the conversation with a smile, and an explanation. The facts as she wanted him to hear them. Not like this, not with his hands on her naked face, not with the taste of his kiss still burning on her lips. Not with something more, something she refused to acknowledge, something she was terrified to admit she wanted, standing in front of her, aching to be seen.
Post by Hadrian Usher on Aug 22, 2022 19:12:04 GMT -5
Hadrian's smile fell, replaced with a look of overwhelming concern. His hands didn’t leave the sides of her face. They stayed there, just in case she got it in her mind to turn away. For that was what Hadrian feared most; for her to retreat at the last moment, to walk up to the cliff, hand in his, and refuse to jump. Hadrian had told himself he wouldn’t drag her, but now? If Kennet asked him to let go, he wasn’t sure he could.
“What is it?” Hadrian whispered in fearful apprehension, thumbs stroking her cheeks, heart thundering in his chest. Please don’t find a reason, he begged her. Please don’t walk away.
Post by Kennet Caern on Aug 22, 2022 21:03:38 GMT -5
What is it?
Kennet bit her lip, green eyes glassy and frozen between his. “I do,” she managed, reaching for the hands he held against her face. “Want children.” Her hands trembled against his, fingers curling against his palms with every intention of bringing his hands down between them.
“With Larcien—” the words made it as far as her throat before they evaporated, making her stomach turn and her grip on his hands tighten. She released them a moment later, turning to make her way across the room, to put some distance between them so that she might breathe, so that she might think. “He wanted them before I did…” Her voice trailed, not in search of the right words; there were no words to make what she needed to say now. No, her voice trailed now not in search of words but in search of her nerve.
Last Edit: Aug 22, 2022 21:49:30 GMT -5 by Kennet Caern
Post by Hadrian Usher on Aug 24, 2022 19:06:23 GMT -5
Hadrian let her go, however much it hurt to do so. It was him that needed her close now. Selfishly he wanted to hold her, to purge whatever it was that made her voice shake and hands tremble. More than anything, Hadrian wanted Larcien alive so that he might kill the man himself.
Hadrian said nothing. He just watched her patiently, stormy gaze tracking her path across the room with pained gentleness. As if it hurt him to stand still.