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!
The first night back was a nightmare. She had escaped to her room. Scrubbed herself in the bath until her skin was pink and overly sensitive. It wasn’t enough to wash away the ache she felt deep into her bones. What was worse, was when she had seen her children, was the fact she saw Logan in them. Saw the dimples they carried from him as they smiled. The light brown of their eyes. It took everything in her to not cry.
And Logan’s sister didn’t seem to care to see Alys. It wasn’t anything new, but it made her feel more isolated. She had been sleeping along for weeks now, but the bed in the castle felt more cold than any night in the mountains could have been. It felt like to spread for miles and miles. She ached so awfully that she rubbed circles over her heart and then rubbed her arms. She twisted her hands together and eventually, the pain became so much that she rocketed out of bed.
She couldn’t stay there. She needed to be anywhere else. Alys first went to her children’s room, but couldn’t find it in herself to wake them. The silent tears on her face alone would cause them alarm. Which only left her to leave. Storming through to the military wing and without much thought, she came to the Captain Commander’s office. A place Logan hadn’t been in for a while, but it was the place where so many memories with him were within the walls. It was naturally locked, she jiggled the handle and pressed her forehead to the door. The cold wood biting against her head, and with her hand still on the handle, she cried for another time. Except in the empty hall, it wasn’t silent. Her breathing hitching… then a soft sob left her as she sank to her knees at the door.
Post by Hadrian Usher on Dec 23, 2022 13:12:51 GMT -5
Hadrian had planned to stop by the office on his way home. Just to drop some things off, he’d told himself. Then it was off to bed for sure. Valeria had always warned him he’d work himself into an early grave, and more and more he was starting to think she’d been right all along. His hair was grayer than it had been five years ago. And now some of the flecks of silver were starting to lace themselves with white.
He heard the crying before he reached the office door. Hadrian’s footsteps quicked until he was moving at a pace just short of a jog. His first thought was that it was Kennet, though he didn’t know why it would be. It was that thought that frighten him the most and sent him barreling even more furiously to his office until he was right up on it and saw—
The urge to scream built up in her, her hands curling more into claws against the door and her breathing growing heavier with each breath. Fighting that growing urge that wanted to tear it all down, especially because that very human side of her knew that on the other side of that door, she wouldn’t find Logan. She wouldn’t find the small pieces of him that had long been removed. It only made the animal in her hurt more.
A pained low whine left her, more animal than human, when she heard her name. It startled her, enough that she whipped towards the voice, her vision blurry with tears. It took her a few moments, her hackles that were under her skin ridged until she realized- “Hadrian.” It was a breathing word, one that wobbled as she said it and a new pain ripped through her. Regret that she had never made things right so Logan didn’t have to keep the two at bay.
Except now what? She wanted to stand and wipe at her face, to try and say she was fine. But the tears flowed freely and nothing made it to her lips. Even when she forced them apart, only a wrecked breath left her. Her ears burned with shame as she couldn’t find the strength in her to stand and leave. So she turned back to the door and let her curls fall like a curtain around her face as she cried.
Post by Hadrian Usher on Jan 12, 2023 22:23:19 GMT -5
As soon as his name dropped from Alys’s lips, Hadrian started to move. He and Logan had shared a bond of brotherhood. Yes, he and Alys had their differences over the years, but Hadrian wasn’t about to abandon her now. To do so would be to betray all that he and Logan had shared. Besides, he knew what it was to suffer. And in her, he saw suffering of the most acute kind. Hadrian swept to her side, guiding her up off the ground if she’d let him.
“Come,” He said, voice gentle and rumbling in the dark, “Come on, let’s get you off this floor and somewhere warm.” Once he had her up, he’d reach for the key in his pocket and lead them both into his office.[/blockqutoe]
She heard his movements and yet his touch was startling. Her head whipped towards him and her brown eyes wide with tear stained freckled cheeks. She looked more wild than normal, more animal than woman. But she registered his words, and her hands took hold of his arms as he guided her up. Her knees were weak and she relied on him more than she wanted to, but she didn’t fight him, allowing him to bring them into the office and shutting them within.
She eyed the blurry couch, tears still relentless in their escape. But then her eyes moved around the office. “It’s all… gone. He’s gone…” her voice hoarse and she felt anger as she looked around the office. Nothing about him was there in the office. Not truly Logan. And yet she wasn’t sure she’d handle it much better if he had been within those walls. “I’m so-“ her arms wrapped around herself and she squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m so sorry,” because she hadn’t been strong enough. Hadn’t been skilled enough. Because she couldn’t break a curse. Because he was gone.
Post by Hadrian Usher on Jan 13, 2023 20:59:54 GMT -5
Thankfully, Alys could stand on her own two feet enough to make it into his office. Though Hadrian had been ready to carry her, the situation's complexity made it better that he didn’t have to. He remembered the last time she’d missed Logan. When they’d commiserated about Logan’s absence, she’d lay her head on his lap as he stroked her curls, and he could still remember how they felt on his fingers. Yes. It was better that he didn’t carry her.
Hadrian shut the door behind them with a soft click. He watched Alys with an ache in his chest. It hurt to watch her. Grief hurt everything it touched.
“You’re alright…” Hadrian guided her to the couch so that she’d sit down on it. He crouched on one knee, taking her hands from where they gripped and holding them in his own. “You have nothing to be sorry for.” His voice was soft. He squeezed her hand before brushing away one of her tears and standing.
“I think I remember you like whiskey.” Hadrian went to his desk and pulled out a bottle and a couple of glasses.
Alys hadn’t forgotten about that night either. How the two drank together, laughed, almost kissed. Sometimes she wondered what would have happened if they had. But they had wound up curled on a couch together and spending the night with some company, innocently and fully clothed, with a touch of whiskey on their breaths. It was a comfort she had never forgotten about that he offered, and she had hoped, despite everything after, he thought of it as that too.
She didn’t fight his direction, letting him ease her onto the couch and while she knew it was soft… it felt like she had been sat onto the hardest rock found in the mountains. She was almost distant in her gaze, as if she was seeing the office in a different time. Where she sat across from Logan and gave him navigation lessons… was that the map behind the desk she had given him? Would Hadrian even know that? But just as she started to trip on a memory, her hands were pried from her arms and held in a warm embrace of Hadrian’s hands.
Drawing those warm eyes back to him, blinking him into focus as his soft words came to her in shocking sound and his touch was even more gentle on her face. It made more build, as if the tears themselves were happy to be wiped away by the callused fingertips that Hadrian offered them. The mention of whiskey had her nodding, something that offered a warmth to her belly if she drank it and a familiar taste on her tongue. But she was still tripped up on his previous statement. “I couldn’t save him, I tried.” She looked to Hadrian, noticing the few extra gray hair that caught in the moonlight than before. When was the last time she had seen him?
Post by Hadrian Usher on Jan 19, 2023 18:47:58 GMT -5
Hadrian pushed the whiskey into her hand, careful to make sure she had a grip on it before releasing the glass. He took a sip as she did and sat down on the couch next to her. Her words twisted like a knife in his gut. He was surprised to find himself angry. Angry that Logan could do this to her. Leave her like this to pick up the broken pieces of the shattered life he’d left behind. But Hadrian buried his anger. It wouldn’t do either of them any good.
“I know you did,” Hadrian smiled sadly, his voice soft and soothing, “He knows you did too.” He honestly wasn’t sure how much Logan knew at the end. But he knew that Alys loved him, of that much Hadrian was sure.
Her fingers felt numb, and she focused to ensure her grip on the glass just as much as Hadrian cautioned her hold with his own. She placed a hand under the glass to steady herself and drew it to her. While Hadrian took a sip, she downed the whole thing. The sting of the alcohol made her eyes prick further but she took a deep breath after and hung her head. Curls falling to block her face as the couch beside her dipped from his weight.
Warmth spread in her from the alcohol, but it didn’t fill the hollowness in her chest. She toyed with the now empty glass and focused on it, raising her head and shaking back a few curls so she could see him from the corner of her eyes. More of a military response to keep the others within view than anything else. The next question was one she hadn’t asked anyone yet about… but she knew he was the right to ask. “They did right by him, at his…” she looked at Logan’s best friend. “Funeral?” They waited, from what she was told, but couldn’t wait longer. Alys never got the closure of sending Logan out to sea.
The hard part was knowing it was probably both harder and easier with Alys not there.
Post by Hadrian Usher on Jan 20, 2023 20:10:45 GMT -5
Hadrian reached for the bottle on the side table and refilled her glass. Now was not the time for restraint. Now was the time for numbness, for anything that could dull the sharp edge of Alys’s grief. When she looked up at him, Hadrian smiled sadly, eyes soft and kind. Here, they weren’t the captain commander and the King’s Witch. They were two people, bound together by history and mutual love for Logan.
“They did,” Hadrian said softly, “I’m sorry you couldn’t be there, but…it was the only way.” For he was sorry.
The weight added back to her glass was welcomed, she even automatically brought it to her mouth and took a drink. Heavy pull, but didn’t down it completely as she felt her shoulders sag. “Good… that’s good…” her voice was heavier than she wanted it to be. “He deserved to have his family there… he deserves to be remembered.” She didn’t point out that she knew they had probably showed more respect since Alys wasn’t there to remind them that he had picked her.
“I know.” She responded finally, drinking again before she stood and moved to the bottle. Taking it in her hand and returning to her seat. Abandoning the glass on the table before she reached out to top Hadrian off. “I thought,” she took a drink from the top of the bottle and shook her head a bit, looking around the room. “Maybe… there was a bit of him here… I haven’t-“ she looked at the bottle in her surprisingly small hands. “Made it back to our home. I just can’t yet.”
Post by Hadrian Usher on Jan 22, 2023 18:49:42 GMT -5
He deserves to be remembered.
The phrase struck him in an odd way. Hadrian grimaced, almost raising his voice to push back against her. How much was anyone really remembered, after they were dead and buried? Logan’s children would remember him, Alys too, but life continued to be a thing of the living. When he died and his body set to sea, Hadrian had no doubt he too would start to fade. A man no more deserving of recognition than those who’d come before.
Hadrian took another sip, watching Alys intently. There wasn’t pity in his gaze, but there was softness. As if his eyes promised to be a place to land amidst all the pain. “Give it time,” Hadrian said, “It’ll hurt, but in time you’ll be able to stomach the pain. In the meantime,” He gestured around the office, “You’re always welcome here."
She could feel Hadian’s eyes on her, normally it would have caused her jaw to feather in annoyance because surely it was nothing good. He had judged her for a long time, seemed to dislike her even and it always dug under her skin. People didn’t like her, that was fine. But something about Hadrian not… had really left a sour taste in her mouth. She drank from the bottle as if to wipe the memory of that taste away.
His gesture drew her eyes to him, naturally following the movement as he offered the office to her. Always welcome. “Careful what you offer,” she raised a brow, eyes studying him before she put the neck of the bottle to her lips and drank again. Always feeling the tingling in her fingers from the two glasses she had already had now starting to settle in. But she gave him a smile as she lowered the bottle from her mouth and let it hang in her hand between her knees.
Leaning back, she let her head drop against the back of the seat. “I don’t like that we don’t get along.” She said it as if she was talking to the ceiling, her eyes fixed there. “I always hated it. I didn’t like you not joining us for dinners… or when you did it was when I was not there. Or when I was not going to join until late.” He seemed to disappear quickly after her arrival. She felt a small squeeze of her heart. “I never wanted that for you. Or him.” She had just been another thing between Logan and the rest of Nevermere. The wedge. She didn’t speak with self pity, but rather like an apology. “I can’t fix the past,” she turned her head, looking towards him with glassy eyes. “But I hope we can do better going forward.”
Post by Hadrian Usher on Jan 27, 2023 16:02:20 GMT -5
Hadrian chuckled, shaking his head. It was funny: there was a time when he would have loved nothing more than to have Alys Roggar visiting his office in the dead of night. How quickly the pendulum had swung in the opposite direction, blame and betrayal for Logan catching her in its crossfire. Yet here they were again, sitting, drinking whiskey just as they had when Logan had been away in Lorendale.
Life had a funny way of unfolding sometimes.
He wanted her for a long moment, giving the offer all the consideration it deserved. To accept the hand of friendship in haste would have been a hollow gesture. Hadrian wanted it to mean something. They owed Logan’s memory that much. Suddenly, Hadrian was struck by a swell of emotion, one that he hadn’t allowed himself to feel since the death of his friend.
He nodded, eyes similarly glassy as he reached out and took her hand, squeezing it tightly in his in what was perhaps an overly-familiar gesture. “Better, yes.” After a lingering moment, he released her and took the bottle, having a swig of the warming liquor before offering it back.
There was no missing the way his hand swallowed hers but the warmth of it had her sighing in relief. Her shoulders slumping almost, but she squeezed his hand back, a wave of emotion leaving her to sniff lightly and brush the back of her hand to her nose as he took the bottle. Doing the best she could as she turned her face from him to hide the new tears that welled.
Her hand gripped his a bit harder as he pulled away, reluctant to let him go but eventually doing that. Her hands releasing as if he burned her before he took the bottle himself. It seemed the two of them would be drinking themselves into the night. When it was offered back, she took another long, hard pull from the neck before she set it firmly on the table. Nothing close to breaking it, but enough for the sound to echo once in the room.
Leaning back on the settee, her head angled to look at the ceiling and elongating her neck and letting the light, though not bright, catch her freckles and curls. Her eyes looking over the ceiling.
“How can I help you going forward?” She asked him. A soft hiccup making her jump a little before she settled.