The Cessation
Prologue
The minions of Skeletor stood collectively around the throne room, silent as stone. Tri-klops was giving some sort of long tirade involving a new elaborate plot involving some fancy weapon of his. Evil-Lyn stood in her usual place, beside the great chair. She was bored, idly stroking the great purple cat that lay beside her, stretched out next to the throne.
The young Dereskian looked up into the corners of the room, into one of the great hollows of the enormous cavern, and she smiled softly. There was Lady Moria, standing in the shadows of a high niche, with her arms across her chest and her back against the wall of the cavern. Upon noticing her daughter's smile, the elder woman winked softly, knowing in some primal way that her child would be able to see it.
Evil-Lyn saw a sudden small flash of an amethyst eye closing and then opening again, and her smile widened slightly. Her mother had been a part of Skeletor's horde for nearly a year now, and the entire population of Eternia was still ignorant as to her mere existence. The situation was laughable. In the entire population, there was only one woman who was even aware as to the possibility of Moria's existence, and she seemed content to think that the Dereskian had vanished from the surface of the planet.
Not even the so-called 'Masters of the Universe' were acquainted with the fact that behind Skeletor's recently improved plots lurked the mind of the Dereskian Queen. And their plans had improved lately, as Skeletor was forced to admit. They had not yet gained access to Grayskull's power, but he knew it was only a moment of time. With every battle they grew closer and closer to defeating the 'Masters.'
Skeletor sat in his great stone throne, oblivious to everything barring his own thoughts. And his thoughts lately all seemed to focus around one being: Lady Moria. He had no clue at that moment that his second-in-command was thinking much along the same lines. Moria had been a godsend to his plans. As soon as she had arrived, she began to point out the tiny, almost insignificant flaws to all of his evil schemes. What's more, she had sat down with him on more than one occasion to explain to him exactly what had gone wrong in each and every one of his many failed attempts on Grayskull, and then she had told him how his mistakes could have been avoided.
Skeletor had resented Moria at first, and a part of him still did. He was uncertain around her, and he supposed that stemmed from a childhood of growing up hearing stories of her. He did not acknowledge the fact that a large part of him feared the Dereskian Queen. Her power was obviously greater than his, and yet she showed absolutely no interest in dethroning him. She showed little interest in most things, Skeletor noted absently. The only thing she ever really seemed to care about was what her daughter was doing.
He looked then at the woman at his side. Yes, Evil-Lyn had grown very powerful in the time she had been in his service. He depended on her for more than one reason, and among the entirety of his cohorts, she was the only one he might actually consider trusting. True, her own lust for power equaled if not overpowered his, and that often made Skeletor more uneasy than he'd like to admit. The Gods forbid that she should ever get the idea into her head to overthrow him. With her mother at her side, Lyn could easily do so, and then take the power of Grayskull for herself.
However, looking at the young woman at his side and then at the older woman in the shadows, he realized that what he feared was unlikely. Ever since Lady Moria had come here, Evil-Lyn seemed more inclined to study with her mother than to try to overthrow him. He often wondered what it was they discussed when they were alone. But it was no matter. Sighing inaudibly, he slowly became more aware of what Tri-klops was saying, even if he wasn't paying attention.
Regarding the situation with an almost detached attitude, Lady Moria stood above the proceedings. Though she appeared to be paying rapt attention to whatever it was Tri-klops was saying, her mind had strayed to a place far away, and long forgotten by all others. In the haven of her mind, she walked alone in what was now termed the Sands of Time, but it was not as it was in actuality.
She looked behind her, unsurprised to find the endless sands. She put an elegant foot down upon the sand, and watched, smiling, as the impression of her foot seemed to ripple the way a pond does. A small green sprout began to appear beneath her foot, and it grew at an alarming rate. Lifting her foot, the small patch of green began to fan out and expand, until soon, at a soundless calling, the endless fields of sand seemed to melt away and become a lush and green place, full of trees and flowering plants, fertile and soft and growing. Great buildings appeared where only rubble had remained, their architecture stunning and aesthetically pleasing in every line and curve. This was her land, the way she remembered it.
Moria walked along the green paths, her feet making no indentations upon the growing flowers and buds.
As Moria began to recede farther and farther into the solace of her mind, her body slowly started to slump. Her arms uncrossed themselves and fell to her sides, and her lithe frame began to sag and lean heavily against the wall. Gradually, some hidden part of her psyche seemed to realize that she would fall, and instead shifted her body so that she sat upon the floor, legs extended, with her back against the wall.
Below her, Skeletor idly looked up into the corner, and witnessed the Dereskian's gradual slouch. Since Lady Moria was normally the epitome of good posture, this worried him slightly.
"Evil-Lyn," he whispered softly, so that only she could hear him. "What is your mother doing?"
Snapping out of her own reverie, the young woman stared at him for a moment while his words sunk in. "Hmm?" she asked softly, looking up at her mother. "Oh," she whispered back. "She's fine, just going into her mind. She does that often."
Had Skeletor possessed eyes, they would have widened slightly. "Oh, does she? I wonder what she's thinking about."
"I wouldn't know," the younger woman replied, gazing up at her mother.
An odd sort of chuckle came into Skeletor's voice as he said, "Find out."
The young enchantress looked at the Overlord of Evil slowly. "What?" she asked, almost appalled.
"Find out," he repeated. "It isn't as if you're actually paying attention anyway."
"Skeletor," she said softly. "I can't just go up there and tap into my mother's thoughts. It would be rude."
A dull red glow began to appear where Skeletor's eyes should have been. "And you have always been decidedly un-rude, Evil-Lyn?"
The young woman was silent for a few minutes. "No, but this is different. She's my mother."
"Which is why I do not think she'd mind, Evil-Lyn. Now go," Skeletor commanded, his eyes reddening even more.
With an angry sigh, the young woman raised her staff and gradually began to fade until her form had entirely disappeared.
If Tri-klops noticed her absence, he did not show it, instead he simply continued on in his filibuster.
Evil-Lyn appeared in the higher cavern, and knelt down next to her mother. She looked apologetically at the elder Dereskian's face, and slowly extended her hand. Before she had even made contact, however, she felt a great amount of mental energy surge into her mind, filing it completely and wrenching all possible physical sense away. Evil-Lyn collapsed on the floor next to her mother.
Gradually, the younger woman felt the surge of energy leave her mind, and she looked around in her mental state. Apparently, she had been brought into her mother's consciousness. The young spellcaster looked around absently, taking in the absolutely stunning site that lay ahead of her.
She recognized the architecture of the few buildings as being Dereskian, having seen the remnants of such in the Sands of Time. She gazed, openmouthed, at the lush green vegetation beneath her feet.
"What is this place?" she voiced aloud in the language of the Dereskïgiä, knowing that even if the mental form of her mother was not near, she would still be able to hear it. Evil-Lyn felt a familiar presence behind her, but she did not turn around until her mother spoke.
"This is the realm of my memory, dear child," Lady Moria said gently, placing an elegant hand upon her daughter's shoulder.
The younger woman turned around slowly. "This is what the Sands of Time once looked like?" she asked, amazed.
Lady Moria nodded. "It is. There was a time, not so long ago, when the entirety of the planet knew of and envied the lush, green lands of what you now call the Sands of Time. The sounds of gaily colored insects and birds filled the air. This place was an oasis, the glittering jewel of this world, Moritënia. Everywhere you looked, as far as the eye could see, there was a green piece of a paradise that has long since been forgotten. It became. this." The older Dereskian's eyes flashed once, and the growing green world and elegantly formed architecture had vanished, leaving behind only an endless sea of sand and half-crumbled buildings.
Moritënia looked out over the sand-strewn world, and her face became pained. "Why? What happened?" she asked her mother.
Lady Moria looked down at the ground for a moment, and then closed her amethyst eyes slowly. "I suppose you'll have to learn soon enough," she muttered. When she opened her eyes again, the area they were standing in had once again become the sparkling oasis she had loved so much.
She grabbed her daughter's hand, and they seemed to zoom over the landscape, stopping outside the walls of a great city.
The younger Dereskian looked on in wonder. "Where is this?" she asked.
Lady Moria sighed almost achingly. "This is the city of Elënuial, where the entire population of our people was destroyed in a single three-day period."
Moritënia faced her mother with an aggressive look in her eyes. "Show me," she more ordered than requested.
A sad smile fell across the face of the older woman, and she slowly reached out a hand to caress her daughter's face. Around them, the streets began to slowly show the fading forms of many people, all Dereskian. As the forms began to become more and more solid, Moria lifted herself and her daughter off the ground, floating above the heads of the people.
At a certain point in the proceedings, Lady Moria closed her eyes, and let the story unfold without witnessing it. She had already seen it once, and that was more than enough.
Her daughter watched with rapt attention, screaming in frustration at the Eternians' blatantly heartless nature as they disregarded the day of mourning and poured into the city.
As the images of the carnage faded, Moria opened her eyes and took her daughter's hand. "There is more to this than can be shown here," she said gently, taking a single step and causing them to appear over the Ancient Eternian prison.
The screams of her sister could be heard, and Lady Moria winced, shutting her eyes and covering her ears with her hands as they went deep within the compound. The story unfolded anew, but the elder woman did not watch it.
The story continued to unfold before Moritënia's eyes, going through the entirety of the long and painful experience of her aunt's death, and what her mother had done afterwards.
At long last, the images began to fade, and Moria opened her eyes and looked at her child. Her daughter had the beginnings of tears in her eyes, but did not permit them to fall.
"I think I just realized why you're so infuriated with the Eternians, Mother," she said softly, reaching her arms around the older woman's neck.
Lady Moria smiled softly at the unexpected hug, and held her daughter to her closely.
"And why you regret nothing you've done since," her child added, holding her mother tighter.
Moria pulled herself away to look into her daughter's eyes. "Not entirely true, dear. There are things I do regret."
Moritënia regarded her mother curiously. "Such as?"
A look that was both sad and soft came into the elder Dereskian's eyes, and she lowered her gaze to the floor. She was silent for a long moment. "Many things, dear," she said softly, bringing her eyes back up to meet her daughter's. "But mostly, I regret not being there to raise you. I regret having to watch from afar as you grew up. I regret not being able to get to know you until now."
"Morämé," her daughter said, using the Dereskian word for 'mother.' "That wasn't something you could control."
Moria shook her head softly. "But I should have been able to control it, dear. That is what I regret."
A slow smirk came upon the younger woman's lips. "Well," she said amusedly. "At least you don't regret all the blood that you've spilt."
The older woman laughed darkly. "Now why in the nine hells would I possibly regret that?"
"You're right, Morämé," her daughter said, laughing. "That was quite a silly notion. I don't know what I was possibly thinking."
Lady Moria held her daughter close. "Now, I have done terrible things, yes. And of course there are things that I have done I may not be especially proud of, but I do not regret them." she lovingly ran her hand down her daughter's cheek. "What would the point of that be?"
The young Dereskian smiled. "I have no idea," she laughed. Moritënia looked around at the now-sandy remnants of the shining oasis. "You must have truly hated the Eternians for what they did," she noted.
The Queen of the Dereskïgiä regarded the background almost absently. "Yes," she agreed. "But it was not anger that fuelled my actions." Her daughter looked at her curiously. "Well, it was," the elder continued. "But not in the way that you're thinking. Yes, behind all of my actions there was my ever-present hate of the Eternian populace, but I never struck out against them with my anger as my guide. That would have been very stupid."
"That's what Skeletor does," Moritënia commented, with a curious smirk on her lips.
Moria nodded. "My point exactly, dear," she replied, smiling. She pulled away from her daughter and raised her hand, causing the scenery to change to watching all of Skeletor's failed attacks. She walked forward and regarded the goings-on as if it were a form of entertainment. "The reason why Skeletor's wild schemes do not work is not because he lacks the power or brains to do so, it is because he is fuelled by his hate. You see, dear, if you strike out in anger, you are going to make mistakes, because anger has the tendency to blind you. You throw caution to the wind, and you make idiotic choices. So, to prevent that, you should let anger be in the back corners of your mind, and instead fight with wisdom."
"Does this go back to your 'empty yourself of emotions' idea, Mother?" her daughter questioned, a secret sort of smile on her lips.
Moria regarded her daughter out of the corner of her eye. "You can laugh all you want, dear. The result will be the same. Emptying yourself of feeling at least prevents the idiocy of rash actions." She paused and felt her daughter walk up next to her. "The drawback is that if you let your emotions fade away, you tend to forget why it is you're bothering to fight in the first place."
The younger woman looked at her mother uncertainly. "Then what do you fight out of, if not anger, and if empting yourself doesn't work?"
Lady Moria sighed softly. "I have nerve really fought out of anger, so I would not know what it felt like. .No, wait, I take that back. When I killed the idiotic Captain Mindor; that was anger. Other than that.I don't fight out of hatred as a rule, dear."
"Then why bother to fight at all?" Her daughter asked.
The elder woman smiled softly. "Well, I don't. Not anymore. My role among this." she gestured to the image of the minions of Skeletor trying to attack Grayskull, "is minimal, as you know. I find little use in actually fighting."
A slow smile came across the younger woman's face. "Out of sheer curiosity, what do you do when we're busy battling the 'Masters'?"
"Oh, I make sure you're not getting hurt, I write in the sacred texts, I draw, I visit Grayskull and annoy the hells out of Teelina, basic things like that," Moria said, winking.
Moritënia's eyes widened. "You go inside Grayskull? While we're fighting to do so?" she asked incredulously.
"No," Lady Moria said, smiling. "I stay in my own chambers and project my thoughts into her head. That's always entertaining. Especially when she's sleeping."
"Why?" her daughter asked. "Why not just go inside and confront her personally?"
The Dereskian Queen slid her hand down her daughter's cheek affectionately. "Because that would alert her to my presence, dear. This way, I can be inside her thoughts and dreams and she has no idea that I'm still alive and that she's not just randomly imagining it all."
Her daughter raised an eyebrow. "What exactly can you make her see?" she asked with a mischievous smile on her face.
Moritënia's smile was mirrored on her mother's face, and then became wonderfully wicked. "Anything I want to. It's quite amusing, the number of things I've made her see or .do."
Her daughter looked as if she would question further on this point, however, at that moment, Lady Moria turned her head away and looked in the distance. "Someone draws near," she said gently. A soft sigh escaped her lips as she faced her child once more. "Time to wake up, dear."
Evil-Lyn felt the soothing presence in her mind slowly recede as she gradually left her mother's mind. She came slowly back to reality, stretching her muscles out and stifling a yawn. She opened her eyes and saw her mother looking beyond and below her. The young woman looked down, and saw the shape of Skeletor standing beneath them on floor level and regarding them. The rest of the throne room was empty.
"Our attack begins, Evil-Lyn," he ordered, and then left quickly, his purple cape swirling behind him.
Moria looked gently at her daughter, her eyes smiling. She nodded, and the younger woman smiled, jumped off the high ridge, and left.
Lady Moria waved at the retreating form of her only child. "Be careful, dear," she whispered in her own tongue, and then she vanished into the floor, and was gone.
The minions of Skeletor stood collectively around the throne room, silent as stone. Tri-klops was giving some sort of long tirade involving a new elaborate plot involving some fancy weapon of his. Evil-Lyn stood in her usual place, beside the great chair. She was bored, idly stroking the great purple cat that lay beside her, stretched out next to the throne.
The young Dereskian looked up into the corners of the room, into one of the great hollows of the enormous cavern, and she smiled softly. There was Lady Moria, standing in the shadows of a high niche, with her arms across her chest and her back against the wall of the cavern. Upon noticing her daughter's smile, the elder woman winked softly, knowing in some primal way that her child would be able to see it.
Evil-Lyn saw a sudden small flash of an amethyst eye closing and then opening again, and her smile widened slightly. Her mother had been a part of Skeletor's horde for nearly a year now, and the entire population of Eternia was still ignorant as to her mere existence. The situation was laughable. In the entire population, there was only one woman who was even aware as to the possibility of Moria's existence, and she seemed content to think that the Dereskian had vanished from the surface of the planet.
Not even the so-called 'Masters of the Universe' were acquainted with the fact that behind Skeletor's recently improved plots lurked the mind of the Dereskian Queen. And their plans had improved lately, as Skeletor was forced to admit. They had not yet gained access to Grayskull's power, but he knew it was only a moment of time. With every battle they grew closer and closer to defeating the 'Masters.'
Skeletor sat in his great stone throne, oblivious to everything barring his own thoughts. And his thoughts lately all seemed to focus around one being: Lady Moria. He had no clue at that moment that his second-in-command was thinking much along the same lines. Moria had been a godsend to his plans. As soon as she had arrived, she began to point out the tiny, almost insignificant flaws to all of his evil schemes. What's more, she had sat down with him on more than one occasion to explain to him exactly what had gone wrong in each and every one of his many failed attempts on Grayskull, and then she had told him how his mistakes could have been avoided.
Skeletor had resented Moria at first, and a part of him still did. He was uncertain around her, and he supposed that stemmed from a childhood of growing up hearing stories of her. He did not acknowledge the fact that a large part of him feared the Dereskian Queen. Her power was obviously greater than his, and yet she showed absolutely no interest in dethroning him. She showed little interest in most things, Skeletor noted absently. The only thing she ever really seemed to care about was what her daughter was doing.
He looked then at the woman at his side. Yes, Evil-Lyn had grown very powerful in the time she had been in his service. He depended on her for more than one reason, and among the entirety of his cohorts, she was the only one he might actually consider trusting. True, her own lust for power equaled if not overpowered his, and that often made Skeletor more uneasy than he'd like to admit. The Gods forbid that she should ever get the idea into her head to overthrow him. With her mother at her side, Lyn could easily do so, and then take the power of Grayskull for herself.
However, looking at the young woman at his side and then at the older woman in the shadows, he realized that what he feared was unlikely. Ever since Lady Moria had come here, Evil-Lyn seemed more inclined to study with her mother than to try to overthrow him. He often wondered what it was they discussed when they were alone. But it was no matter. Sighing inaudibly, he slowly became more aware of what Tri-klops was saying, even if he wasn't paying attention.
Regarding the situation with an almost detached attitude, Lady Moria stood above the proceedings. Though she appeared to be paying rapt attention to whatever it was Tri-klops was saying, her mind had strayed to a place far away, and long forgotten by all others. In the haven of her mind, she walked alone in what was now termed the Sands of Time, but it was not as it was in actuality.
She looked behind her, unsurprised to find the endless sands. She put an elegant foot down upon the sand, and watched, smiling, as the impression of her foot seemed to ripple the way a pond does. A small green sprout began to appear beneath her foot, and it grew at an alarming rate. Lifting her foot, the small patch of green began to fan out and expand, until soon, at a soundless calling, the endless fields of sand seemed to melt away and become a lush and green place, full of trees and flowering plants, fertile and soft and growing. Great buildings appeared where only rubble had remained, their architecture stunning and aesthetically pleasing in every line and curve. This was her land, the way she remembered it.
Moria walked along the green paths, her feet making no indentations upon the growing flowers and buds.
As Moria began to recede farther and farther into the solace of her mind, her body slowly started to slump. Her arms uncrossed themselves and fell to her sides, and her lithe frame began to sag and lean heavily against the wall. Gradually, some hidden part of her psyche seemed to realize that she would fall, and instead shifted her body so that she sat upon the floor, legs extended, with her back against the wall.
Below her, Skeletor idly looked up into the corner, and witnessed the Dereskian's gradual slouch. Since Lady Moria was normally the epitome of good posture, this worried him slightly.
"Evil-Lyn," he whispered softly, so that only she could hear him. "What is your mother doing?"
Snapping out of her own reverie, the young woman stared at him for a moment while his words sunk in. "Hmm?" she asked softly, looking up at her mother. "Oh," she whispered back. "She's fine, just going into her mind. She does that often."
Had Skeletor possessed eyes, they would have widened slightly. "Oh, does she? I wonder what she's thinking about."
"I wouldn't know," the younger woman replied, gazing up at her mother.
An odd sort of chuckle came into Skeletor's voice as he said, "Find out."
The young enchantress looked at the Overlord of Evil slowly. "What?" she asked, almost appalled.
"Find out," he repeated. "It isn't as if you're actually paying attention anyway."
"Skeletor," she said softly. "I can't just go up there and tap into my mother's thoughts. It would be rude."
A dull red glow began to appear where Skeletor's eyes should have been. "And you have always been decidedly un-rude, Evil-Lyn?"
The young woman was silent for a few minutes. "No, but this is different. She's my mother."
"Which is why I do not think she'd mind, Evil-Lyn. Now go," Skeletor commanded, his eyes reddening even more.
With an angry sigh, the young woman raised her staff and gradually began to fade until her form had entirely disappeared.
If Tri-klops noticed her absence, he did not show it, instead he simply continued on in his filibuster.
Evil-Lyn appeared in the higher cavern, and knelt down next to her mother. She looked apologetically at the elder Dereskian's face, and slowly extended her hand. Before she had even made contact, however, she felt a great amount of mental energy surge into her mind, filing it completely and wrenching all possible physical sense away. Evil-Lyn collapsed on the floor next to her mother.
Gradually, the younger woman felt the surge of energy leave her mind, and she looked around in her mental state. Apparently, she had been brought into her mother's consciousness. The young spellcaster looked around absently, taking in the absolutely stunning site that lay ahead of her.
She recognized the architecture of the few buildings as being Dereskian, having seen the remnants of such in the Sands of Time. She gazed, openmouthed, at the lush green vegetation beneath her feet.
"What is this place?" she voiced aloud in the language of the Dereskïgiä, knowing that even if the mental form of her mother was not near, she would still be able to hear it. Evil-Lyn felt a familiar presence behind her, but she did not turn around until her mother spoke.
"This is the realm of my memory, dear child," Lady Moria said gently, placing an elegant hand upon her daughter's shoulder.
The younger woman turned around slowly. "This is what the Sands of Time once looked like?" she asked, amazed.
Lady Moria nodded. "It is. There was a time, not so long ago, when the entirety of the planet knew of and envied the lush, green lands of what you now call the Sands of Time. The sounds of gaily colored insects and birds filled the air. This place was an oasis, the glittering jewel of this world, Moritënia. Everywhere you looked, as far as the eye could see, there was a green piece of a paradise that has long since been forgotten. It became. this." The older Dereskian's eyes flashed once, and the growing green world and elegantly formed architecture had vanished, leaving behind only an endless sea of sand and half-crumbled buildings.
Moritënia looked out over the sand-strewn world, and her face became pained. "Why? What happened?" she asked her mother.
Lady Moria looked down at the ground for a moment, and then closed her amethyst eyes slowly. "I suppose you'll have to learn soon enough," she muttered. When she opened her eyes again, the area they were standing in had once again become the sparkling oasis she had loved so much.
She grabbed her daughter's hand, and they seemed to zoom over the landscape, stopping outside the walls of a great city.
The younger Dereskian looked on in wonder. "Where is this?" she asked.
Lady Moria sighed almost achingly. "This is the city of Elënuial, where the entire population of our people was destroyed in a single three-day period."
Moritënia faced her mother with an aggressive look in her eyes. "Show me," she more ordered than requested.
A sad smile fell across the face of the older woman, and she slowly reached out a hand to caress her daughter's face. Around them, the streets began to slowly show the fading forms of many people, all Dereskian. As the forms began to become more and more solid, Moria lifted herself and her daughter off the ground, floating above the heads of the people.
At a certain point in the proceedings, Lady Moria closed her eyes, and let the story unfold without witnessing it. She had already seen it once, and that was more than enough.
Her daughter watched with rapt attention, screaming in frustration at the Eternians' blatantly heartless nature as they disregarded the day of mourning and poured into the city.
As the images of the carnage faded, Moria opened her eyes and took her daughter's hand. "There is more to this than can be shown here," she said gently, taking a single step and causing them to appear over the Ancient Eternian prison.
The screams of her sister could be heard, and Lady Moria winced, shutting her eyes and covering her ears with her hands as they went deep within the compound. The story unfolded anew, but the elder woman did not watch it.
The story continued to unfold before Moritënia's eyes, going through the entirety of the long and painful experience of her aunt's death, and what her mother had done afterwards.
At long last, the images began to fade, and Moria opened her eyes and looked at her child. Her daughter had the beginnings of tears in her eyes, but did not permit them to fall.
"I think I just realized why you're so infuriated with the Eternians, Mother," she said softly, reaching her arms around the older woman's neck.
Lady Moria smiled softly at the unexpected hug, and held her daughter to her closely.
"And why you regret nothing you've done since," her child added, holding her mother tighter.
Moria pulled herself away to look into her daughter's eyes. "Not entirely true, dear. There are things I do regret."
Moritënia regarded her mother curiously. "Such as?"
A look that was both sad and soft came into the elder Dereskian's eyes, and she lowered her gaze to the floor. She was silent for a long moment. "Many things, dear," she said softly, bringing her eyes back up to meet her daughter's. "But mostly, I regret not being there to raise you. I regret having to watch from afar as you grew up. I regret not being able to get to know you until now."
"Morämé," her daughter said, using the Dereskian word for 'mother.' "That wasn't something you could control."
Moria shook her head softly. "But I should have been able to control it, dear. That is what I regret."
A slow smirk came upon the younger woman's lips. "Well," she said amusedly. "At least you don't regret all the blood that you've spilt."
The older woman laughed darkly. "Now why in the nine hells would I possibly regret that?"
"You're right, Morämé," her daughter said, laughing. "That was quite a silly notion. I don't know what I was possibly thinking."
Lady Moria held her daughter close. "Now, I have done terrible things, yes. And of course there are things that I have done I may not be especially proud of, but I do not regret them." she lovingly ran her hand down her daughter's cheek. "What would the point of that be?"
The young Dereskian smiled. "I have no idea," she laughed. Moritënia looked around at the now-sandy remnants of the shining oasis. "You must have truly hated the Eternians for what they did," she noted.
The Queen of the Dereskïgiä regarded the background almost absently. "Yes," she agreed. "But it was not anger that fuelled my actions." Her daughter looked at her curiously. "Well, it was," the elder continued. "But not in the way that you're thinking. Yes, behind all of my actions there was my ever-present hate of the Eternian populace, but I never struck out against them with my anger as my guide. That would have been very stupid."
"That's what Skeletor does," Moritënia commented, with a curious smirk on her lips.
Moria nodded. "My point exactly, dear," she replied, smiling. She pulled away from her daughter and raised her hand, causing the scenery to change to watching all of Skeletor's failed attacks. She walked forward and regarded the goings-on as if it were a form of entertainment. "The reason why Skeletor's wild schemes do not work is not because he lacks the power or brains to do so, it is because he is fuelled by his hate. You see, dear, if you strike out in anger, you are going to make mistakes, because anger has the tendency to blind you. You throw caution to the wind, and you make idiotic choices. So, to prevent that, you should let anger be in the back corners of your mind, and instead fight with wisdom."
"Does this go back to your 'empty yourself of emotions' idea, Mother?" her daughter questioned, a secret sort of smile on her lips.
Moria regarded her daughter out of the corner of her eye. "You can laugh all you want, dear. The result will be the same. Emptying yourself of feeling at least prevents the idiocy of rash actions." She paused and felt her daughter walk up next to her. "The drawback is that if you let your emotions fade away, you tend to forget why it is you're bothering to fight in the first place."
The younger woman looked at her mother uncertainly. "Then what do you fight out of, if not anger, and if empting yourself doesn't work?"
Lady Moria sighed softly. "I have nerve really fought out of anger, so I would not know what it felt like. .No, wait, I take that back. When I killed the idiotic Captain Mindor; that was anger. Other than that.I don't fight out of hatred as a rule, dear."
"Then why bother to fight at all?" Her daughter asked.
The elder woman smiled softly. "Well, I don't. Not anymore. My role among this." she gestured to the image of the minions of Skeletor trying to attack Grayskull, "is minimal, as you know. I find little use in actually fighting."
A slow smile came across the younger woman's face. "Out of sheer curiosity, what do you do when we're busy battling the 'Masters'?"
"Oh, I make sure you're not getting hurt, I write in the sacred texts, I draw, I visit Grayskull and annoy the hells out of Teelina, basic things like that," Moria said, winking.
Moritënia's eyes widened. "You go inside Grayskull? While we're fighting to do so?" she asked incredulously.
"No," Lady Moria said, smiling. "I stay in my own chambers and project my thoughts into her head. That's always entertaining. Especially when she's sleeping."
"Why?" her daughter asked. "Why not just go inside and confront her personally?"
The Dereskian Queen slid her hand down her daughter's cheek affectionately. "Because that would alert her to my presence, dear. This way, I can be inside her thoughts and dreams and she has no idea that I'm still alive and that she's not just randomly imagining it all."
Her daughter raised an eyebrow. "What exactly can you make her see?" she asked with a mischievous smile on her face.
Moritënia's smile was mirrored on her mother's face, and then became wonderfully wicked. "Anything I want to. It's quite amusing, the number of things I've made her see or .do."
Her daughter looked as if she would question further on this point, however, at that moment, Lady Moria turned her head away and looked in the distance. "Someone draws near," she said gently. A soft sigh escaped her lips as she faced her child once more. "Time to wake up, dear."
Evil-Lyn felt the soothing presence in her mind slowly recede as she gradually left her mother's mind. She came slowly back to reality, stretching her muscles out and stifling a yawn. She opened her eyes and saw her mother looking beyond and below her. The young woman looked down, and saw the shape of Skeletor standing beneath them on floor level and regarding them. The rest of the throne room was empty.
"Our attack begins, Evil-Lyn," he ordered, and then left quickly, his purple cape swirling behind him.
Moria looked gently at her daughter, her eyes smiling. She nodded, and the younger woman smiled, jumped off the high ridge, and left.
Lady Moria waved at the retreating form of her only child. "Be careful, dear," she whispered in her own tongue, and then she vanished into the floor, and was gone.