Haya Maxwell

Haya Maxwell

Courtier Winter Mantle •

Beast Windwing

Played by Palmedfire (Inactive)

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Mein

In her fae mein, Haya's hair is replaced by a cap of small blue-gray feathers that cover her scalp and the back of her neck to spread out across her shoulders and down to about her mid back. Feathers also sprout from her arms, thickest along the back edge, all the way to the base of her little fingers. There is a yellow ring around her eyes, and while her nose and mouth haven't quite merged into a true beak (she still has teeth), it's pretty close.

Mantle

Winter has still only settled lightly around Haya. Those standing near her will feel a light but cold, crisp breeze

Background

Haya had what she considered a pretty normal life growing up in Elk Grove, at least as far as she remembers. Her father owned several of the local fast food franchises, and her mother taught drama at Laguna Creek High School. Her strongest memories are of her younger brother Ken. She remembers him singing, almost constantly, and his quiet confessions that he wanted to be an actor, which their parents would never approve of.

She remembers going to Sacremento University on a track and field scholarship, but the details of her actual studies have grown hazy. She's pretty sure she was studying business administration, or maybe sociology. Something her parents approved of, that she knows.

Most of all, she remembers that night. Practice had run late, and she attempted to take a shortcut back to her dorm, a walk she'd done many times before. But that night something was different. She felt like she was being watched, so she started walking faster and faster, before finally breaking into an exhausted run. She'd almost, almost made it back to her dorm when something hit her from behind, knocking her to the ground and stunning her. An impossibly tall man rolled her over and smiled down at her with a mouth full of pointed teeth. "I'd hoped you were swifter," he said "But perhaps you can still fly." Then he touched her forehead, and everything went black.

She doesn't know what happened, not really, because the next light she saw was bright sunlight, and the feeling of being tossed into the air. And then she spread her wings and flew.

Her Keeper had refashioned her into his pet hunting falcon, and her days were uneven periods of darkness interspersed with light and glorious flight. She remembers all too well the savage joy of swooping down on unsuspecting prey, of the taste of hot blood and warm flesh as her Keeper tempted her back with tasty tidbits.

How long she spent like that, she doesn't know. All she knows is one day she was preening herself when she noticed something strange under her feathers. Something she suddenly remembered were fingers. With that realization came a host of fragmented memories and she realized she had to get away. Had to find… home. She had a home. Had family and friends and how had she forgotten? She took off again, flying as fast and as far away as she could. She heard the sound of hunting horns, and knew her Keeper wasn't going to let her get away easily, but there was nothing she could do but fly.

Eventually she reached the Hedge and dove in, the Thorns catching and tearing at her wings, tearing out feathers until she was forced to land and first walk, and then run as her legs reacquainted themselves with being used for movement. As she ran she found bits of… something that felt like her. She's not quite convinced they were bits of her soul, but she took them, and made them a part of her as she ran. They helped her run faster after all, and came with more random flashes of memory. Random things. Snatches of her brother singing in the shower. The taste of the really good tuna salad sandwiches at the deli near campus. The sensation of placing her pole just right and flinging herself up into the air.

She broke out of the Hedge in the middle of the practice track on the University's campus, fortunately at night when there was no one else around. But she kept running, because really, it couldn't have been that easy could it?

It was her brother she found first, little Ken now grown up and living in Sacramento, struggling to make it as an actor without his family's blessing. And without hers apparently, considering the bitter and suspicious looks he gave her when she met him for coffee a few weeks later. She'd apparently graduated and returned home, and had joined their parents in berating Ken for his desires for the stage. Their one conversation ended on such an awkward note, Haya's not been able to figure out how to contact him since.

She joined up with the Winter Court almost immediately, the Court's emphasis on Sorrow striking a cord with her, both because of the loss of her human life, but also the loss of the freedom of flight she'd experience in Arcadia. Not that she has any desire to return – she's still struggling with human rationality against the all-encompassing NOW of animal thought – but she still dreams of spreading her wings.