Maleficent - Diaval Fanfic – I'm Alive by Raven Diablo
Chapter 1: First Meeting
Diaval knew he ventured too far into the village, but the succulent smell of fresh corn drew him to the farm. He didn't see anyone or anything in the far corner of the cornfield and picking at some corn really quick shouldn't cause any harm. Or so he thought. Not long after he landed on the corn stalk and started to pick at the corn when all of a sudden he was enveloped by a large net.
In one moment he was trapped under a net with nasty dogs drooling and barking over his head and farmers were with sticks and clubs threating to beat him. And the next moment he could feel his feathered body twist and contort into an unfamiliar shape. His eyes seemed to move forward and his vision changed. He could see deeper, but not as far. He looked his attackers straight into their faces...the dogs jumped back, howled and ran off. "Ahhhhhhhh, It's a demon! one of the farmers exclaimed" Soon all the men all ran off not far behind their dogs. One of the farmers seemed to have lost his bladder in the process as a distinct wet stain formed on the inside of his leg as he ran away.
Diaval took the net off of himself and then he noticed that he no longer had feathers, but bare skin. He had another set of limbs which ended in hands, human hands. He was completely naked and covered in mud. He turned to look at his back and his wings were gone. He reached back to make sure and all he found were shoulder blades instead of wings. He proceeded to caw, but noticed that even changed as well. All what came out was a scream...a human sounding scream. What was this? He scrambled over to a puddle that had formed in the mud nearby and took a good look at his reflection. He was in shock at what looked back at him. He jumped back in fright, and then slowly took a look again. His bird head and beak were replaced with the face of a man. His plumage was replaced by hair, mainly on the top of is head. There were scars around his eyes and he ran his fingers around them. They felt like tight ridges and they split like tree branches around his eyes. He found the same scars down his neck, collarbones and a large one that extended from the base of his neck all the way down to his abdomen. By now he realized he was somehow turned into one of those dreadful humans. Not just any human, but a rather ugly one with a badly scared body. Not that he thought any human to be as beautiful as a black raven. But how? How was this possible?
Just then a dark figure approached him, thinking it was one of the farmers again, he tried to get up and run away, but his new legs were foreign to him. He fell down into the very puddle he was looking into moments ago. He could see in the reflection that figure was now towering over him. He turned around to get a good look. This figure was not a farmer, but a woman. While similar to a human woman, she wasn't like any other woman he seen before. The woman had two huge dark black curving horns that protruded from her scalp. She had hair that extended down to her waistline. She was dressed in a greenish brown gown with large sleeves. In one hand she carried a staff made from a very straight tree branch and it had some kind of stone encased on the end. She was wearing jewelry of some kind made from natural items and one thing that caught his eye was a ring on her right forefinger that was made from the skull of a bird. He cringed a bit staring at the hideous trinket for a while. He also noticed she had some kind of rings that adorned her horns. She appeared to be a person of some importance.
Her face appeared visually striking to him. She had a pair of interestingly colored yellowish green eyes. Her lips were as red as the rose. Her cheekbones were very high up and protruded slightly from her face, more so than any human woman he has seen. Then he noticed her pointed ears. He had heard talk of fae folk within the moors amongst other winged birds and that faeries generally always have pointed ears. But he was used to seeing faeries being small and with insect like wings. This woman that stood before him was the same size as a human only with horns. Could it be possible that this woman was responsible for his changing into a human?
"Come now", the woman spoke in a dark smoke like tone. Her voice seemed very pleasing on his ears. She extended a hand to him. He slowly raised his hand to hers. He noted how her fingers were very long and her fingernails were tapered to a point. Her hands didn't look anything like his. Her fingers were very narrow and dainty. She grabbed on to his hand and began to pull him to his feet. He noticed that she had a very strong grip for a woman with such dainty hands.
Standing up now he was just as tall as the woman, not considering her horns, and could see more clearly into her eyes as they were just about level with each other. He got a better look those eyes now and in addition to being yellow and green, they were also a bit red around the pupils and she had a bluish corona around the edge of her iris. He had never seen eyes like this on any other being.
He tried to speak and surprisingly he was speaking exactly like the humans do in their own language. "Did you do this to me?", the woman's eyes closed partly and she dipped her head down once, nodding a 'Yes'. Now he knew she must be a faerie as she could do magic and apparently a spell was placed upon him.
"What have you done to my beautiful self", Diaval said to the faerie.
"Oh! Would you rather I have left you to be beaten to death by those farmers?" She spoke out in a coy tone. "I saved your life".
Realizing that he was in the wrong and she was correct, he quickly changed his tone. "Forgive me. This is all new to me and I am a bit shocked".
"Understood." she replied.
Wanting to be correct and showing his gratitude, he continued, "I do owe you my life and in return for your kindness in saving mine, I offer to be your servant for as long as you are in need of my services or until my life ends".
"Very well." Satisfied with his offering. "I am Maleficent, Guardian of the Moors. What do I call you?"
"Diaval, my mistress" he said while bowing to her kneeling on one knee in reverence. Apparently she was person of great importance and, in a show of respect, he proceeded to take her hand and give her kiss on the hand as he had seen other humans do when addressing royalty. As his lips touched the back of her hand, she immediately pulled it away. She had a look of disgust on her face.
Diaval was a bit shocked by the sudden movement.
"Don't touch me! I don't like to be touched and you are to refrain from doing so in the future. Are we clear on this?" she scolded him angrily.
"Yes, my mistress." he replied in slightly scared tone. "What is it that you need from me" he asked.
"Wings" she answered in her normal voice looking up scanning the sky. Then she started to walk around him, examining her new servant from head to toe. "I need your wings. But, first there are rules." She returned to face him.
"Yes, of course."
"Number one, the castle over there in the distance. You are to spy on the king and queen for me. I want to know anything and everything that goes on there. The littlest detail you hear or see, I am to know about it. Number two, whatever I ask of you to do, or whatever you see me do, you are not to question me. Number three, you already know, you are not to touch me without my consent."
"Understood, my mistress." Diaval agreed "But, may I ask why you don't like to be touched?"
Her eyes glared into his, and he suddenly realized he already did something wrong.
"No, you may not, that is rule number two." she said a bit in an angered tone.
"Yes, I'm Sorry."
"Furthermore, there will be consequences for breaking any of my rules."
Diaval didn't like the sound of this, but he figured there were not many rules to follow and as long as he stuck by them, there would be no reason for him to be punished.
"Let's start back" she said.
Diaval took one step forward and slumped to the ground again in the mud. He struggled to get back up and again tried to gain his footing.
"I am sorry, my mistress, but I am having trouble getting used to this body".
"Well, you are going to have to learn to walk properly if you are going to be any help to me" her voice sounded very stern.
"Come now, let me have your arm, we have a long way to walk back home", she said.
Diaval was hesitant to take her hand again considering that he was scolded just moments ago. But slowly.
"Come, Come, I haven't got all day, I have given you permission." With that, she grabbed his hand and pulled him up and then placed his hand in her arm holding his wrist. "Hold on, I almost forgot."
With a snap of her wrist and some yellow wisps of magic, Diaval was all cleaned up and was fully clothed.
He thought to himself that Maleficent surely possessed some great powers to do the things she did. She proceeded to guide him along as he took his first steps slowly at first, but then a bit faster as he was getting the gist of walking. Occasionally his body did bump into hers and he was afraid he was going to be scolded again, but she didn't. As he was walking with her, he noticed that she gave off a very sweet smell. He couldn't identify the smell, but he certainly was drawn to it. Perhaps it was something given off naturally since she was a faerie.
Maleficent showed him the way into the Moors should he ever be on foot so he wouldn't loose his way. Diaval noticed something different about the Moors, a huge thorned wall seemed to now surround it and that wall was not there a couple days ago.
"What's this?" He asked.
"Don't you know a wall when you see one?", she said sarcastically.
"Yes...but who or what put it here. It wasn't there the other day."
"Raven's are supposedly smart birds, take a wild guess", her voice was becoming a bit annoyed.
"You?"
Maleficent looked towards him, dipped her head a bit and raised her eyebrow, "Uh huh."
The manner in which she answered him, the look on her face seemed very appealing. She certainly didn't seem like any other queen he has come across in his travels. But then again, he hadn't come across any faerie queens.
With a wave of her hand, the thorns pulled in and created a tunnel so the two could enter. The thorns closed in behind them as they walked into the Moors.
Diaval looked at the thorn wall behind them and asked, "To keep out, or keep in."
Maleficent reached her free hand up to her forehead in disgust, "Rule number two", she said wearily, shaking her head back and forth. "Oh, we are going to have to work on this one. "
She blurted out the words shaking her head slightly, "Out! If you must know", her voice was showing she was loosing her patience. Her arm fell back to her side. She continued, "It is to keep the king's army out. I live in here, this is where my home is and where my followers are so I put up the wall for our protection. Now I hope you are satisfied and will stop asking me questions!"
"Oh, thank you, I see now. But are we at war?" She stopped and tilted her head back and closed her eyes. He could feel her hand tighten around his wrist uncomfortably.
"Diaval, I do not want to have to punish you on the first day." She said, glaring straight into his dark eyes. "But I will if you keep pushing", she was becoming angry and squeezed his arm even harder her pointed finger nails starting to dig into his arm.
Starting to become painful, he winced. "Ouch! I'm sorry, my mistress, I will be quiet from now on".
"Good, I need to keep my head clear and think. I will answer most of your questions in good time on my terms", she calmed down and let up on her grip.
Apparently things became clearer to Diaval now and he put two and two together and he figured out there must be some kind of conflict going on between the land of the Moors and the castle that he was instructed to spy on.
"Yes, we are not on good terms with King Stefan". She ended up answering his question anyway.
And she lead him towards the center of the Moors. Diaval looked around and was in awe. While he flew many times through the Moors on wing. Walking on foot and the new vision he had as a human gave him a different perspective.
During their walk back, Diaval couldn't help but look at the statuesque woman that was very close to him. Her gait seemed very proud. He tried to keep passing glances at her to study her face, but tried not to be obvious. In doing so, he felt some sort of feeling he didn't experience before as bird. It was almost like he felt an urge to look at Maleficent's face. Even though Maleficent looked very much like the humans, she was very different and she looked different. Somewhat appealing. He didn't understand this feeling as normally being a bird he was only attracted to those of his kind.
In the distance the two approached a large Rowan Tree. Clearly larger than any other tree on the Moors Diaval was sure to have seen it when he used to fly across the Moors and perhaps once or twice even landed in it. It was on a hill and it had a good view of that part of the land. The large twisted trunk became very wide at the base and then it appeared as if the roots started about 1/3rd the way up the trunk and split themselves down and into the ground like spokes of a wheel. Around this part of the tree a large straw and wood twig structure was built around it that extended up the trunk and into the canopy of the tree. It was almost like the tree had two trunks, one built around the other. As they grew close to the entrance of the dwelling, Maleficent stopped and released Diaval's arm and turned around in front of him.
"This is my home." She said raising her hand in front of her towards the tree. "You will be living here with me."
"Yes, my mistress."
"I will build you a nest in the tree so when I need you, you will be nearby."
"Thank You, that is very kind of you." Diaval was surprised at the generous offering in that he didn't have to go through the trouble of making his own nest.
"Every morning at sunrise you are to go to the castle and report back to me before sunset", she said.
"Now, be off with you, go to the castle now and return to me tonight." With a twist of her wrist and a small yellow plume of sparkles, Diaval changed back to his original form. He jumped up and took wing and circled around the Rowan tree. From far up his good vision returned to him and he could see Maleficent staring up at him watching his every move. She pointed her long finger towards the north end of the Moors in the direction of the castle. With one more swoop around, he sailed off in the direction she was pointing cawing as he went.
She continued to look up in the direction he was flying and then she looked all around the sky. Her eyes misted over a bit. And then she looked down to the ground where she was standing. She looked back up at the sky again and said, "Take wing my new servant and hopefully you will bring me something I can use, something that I can have my revenge".