Title: Homecoming
Disclaimer: I don't even own the clothes I wear, how could you think I owned any of this?
Summary: Maladicta returns, and the Whoms are Not Amused. Oneshot.
Rating: K+ for mild language and kissing. But it's being prudish.
Maladicta felt an unsure pride making her chest swell as she hastened up the steps leading to the newly converted office. It was foolish to believe that she didn't know that she was here. She always seemed to know.
She hesitated before entering, but she knew that she was never upset when interrupted. Never, under no circumstances, and she had been interrupted under a lot of those.
She looked up as Maladicta entered, or at least she suspected she did. Her face was obscured by shadows, and the only thing visible were her legs, enveloped by a pastel purple skirt. A blue stream of smoke was rising from where she assumed her face.
Unsure whether to bow or to curtsy, she decided to do neither as she walked up to her on shaky legs. "Ladyship", she said.
A stream of smoke, nothing more.
"I'm sorry, Ladyship."
Legs were crossed.
Maladicta felt the weight of silence increasing, threatening to crush her. "I should have told you. It was not right." Still, nothing. "I know what you are thinking now", she went on, fully aware that she was steering herself into an abyss. The silence didn't change a bit, but at the same time very clearly asked, "Oh, do you now?" And worse even, it raised an eyebrow. "It was childish and rebellious of me to go off without a word. Not to mention dangerous."
"…"
The vampire's desperation was thickening in equal amounts as the smoke was. "You are not my mother", she pointed out. "I do not have to answer to you. You do not control me."
"And yet you are here", Ladyship did not say. No one could fill silence with quite as many carefully calculated threatening, unspoken words as Ladyship could, and at the same time give you the impression your eardrums were going to implode. Maladicta's left eye twitched.
"I am here because I want to be! Because it is my own decision to be here, and I can walk out any second! I am a free person! Answer me!" Her hand twitched to the sword at her side, but her vis-à-vis proved unimpressed. She had every right to be – someone who was as old as her had seen worse than a gauche attack by a coffee-deprived, angry vampire with a sword. Hell, she'd probably laugh. "Answer me", she pleaded, sagging to her knees before her and reaching for her hand to press it against her lips. "Please."
Ladyship freed her hand from Maladicta's clutches and rose to her feet. Flat, sensible shoes, instead of high heels. Shell pink toenails. But the voice – oh, the voice was still the same. Smoky, in a sensual sort of way, promising the fulfillment of every carnal desire.
"It is a surprise to see you here, Maladicta", Ladyship said.
"You are surprised?"
"No. I said it was a surprise." Ladyship carefully placed her cigarette in the ash-tray, shaped like a bat. "I trust your… excursion was instructive?"
"I joined a regiment. I met people. I fell in love."
Ladyship nodded in thought, but didn't voice any of it. "How is your dear mother these days? I have not heard of her in ages."
"Were you even listening?"
"Oh, yes, yes. Of course. Carry on."
"We were all girls, as it turned out. I knew from the start, but… we were women! Do you understand? And we defeated the Zlobenians! And Ankh-Morpork!" Maladicta's eyes lit up. "We! A group of untrained girls! More than both their armies together!"
"Oh yes, of course. The 'Monstrous Regiment of Women'." She gestured to a newspaper lying on the coffee table. "Tell me, who was it to kick the Prince in his crown jewels? I do not assume it was you, otherwise he'd be wearing a very peculiar type of earring now, and I doubt the press would miss out on that."
"You are making fun of us…"
"Indeed, I am." Ladyship did very much not whirl around with her fangs bared, and instead turned calmly, a newly lit cigarette at her lips. "Don't let that interrupt you, however. I can multitask, make fun and listen at the same time. One of the many advantages of being a woman."
"My lady…"
"Ten years, Maladicta, without a note. And you hid so well on the iconography. There were not few who thought you were dead."
"Not you, though."
"Not I, no", Ladyship confessed. "But your mother. Your father. Your sister." She took another draw from her cigarette, and Maladicta could tell she was mildly annoyed. "You have caused the League a great deal of trouble, my dear", she claimed. "You have caused me a great deal of trouble."
"Impossible! How would my disappearance have anything to do with you?"
"Everything!" she snarled, for an instant losing her control. Her eyes flashed angrily, but she regained her composure quickly, and carried on, "They blamed the League for your death. Not so much that they cared for your person, heaven forbid, no; but there are always critics – vultures – aren't there, for whom a stinking occurrence such as this makes a lovely carrion to feast upon. They said the blood deprivation had made you weaker, had made you defenseless. It meant nothing to them that I reassured them the methods to kill you were still the same, if not less effective. Mind you, there have been cases in which members have died of… more mundane causes, but you?" She shook her head. "We lost members, Maladicta. We lost influence. We lost control. Because of you, your stubborn childishness, your selfish desire to emancipate yourself, to distance yourself from what you now must regard as your family. Because of you."
"Are you commanding me not to emancipate myself? Not to fight for my own rights?"
"Please, Maladicta, do not intentionally misunderstand me. Emancipation is a wonderful thing, and I understand perfectly well if you should wish to prove yourself not as a man, not as a woman, but as a fully capable being to the world. All I ask is that you should have discussed with me first. Tell me where you are going. Why you are going. How long you are going. Whoever said I would not have understood? Not have wholeheartedly supported you? We could have combined our quests, Maladicta, instead of working against each other."
"You would have told them where I was going. They would have interfered."
"So little trust you have in me, my dear? That I could not have kept them?" She shook her head slowly. "Maybe you are right. Maybe I could not have. But would it not have been merely another obstacle to overcome? Would your success not have tasted all the sweeter? You could have helped two at once, the League and yourself, by telling us. Me."
Long and heavy silence ensued. Maladicta's cheeks were burning like fire as she held her gaze fixed on the artfully rough stone on which she was kneeling. Under the painful sting the acidic words – even worse, not anyone's words, but her words – caused in her chest, she barely registered her knees growing numb and sore. One thing was for sure: once Ladyship had decided to harangue you, she did it like none other; but once she had got you to deem yourself nothing more than a worm, a maggot in a rotting corpse, you could count on having a clean slate with her again.
"But now it is going to be okay, isn't it?" Maladicta asked therefore, hopefully looking up at Ladyship, who had sat back down.
There was a snort from the shadows. "Of course it is going to be 'okay'", Ladyship mocked. "What did you think? Who would I be if I could not handle the interference of such an unimportant person as yourself?" She shook her head as Maladicta opened her mouth to state her indignation, and carried on, "Thing is, my dear, you do not quite understand what a single person can achieve. Take yourself, or your little group of women. They have achieved so much, so many things so many men have not achieved in so many years. One man – or in this case, one woman – can make a difference in history." The tip of the cigarette lit up again, a red dot amidst the blue smoke. "Lucky for us, this difference is hardly ever permanent. History will always find a way around you. Around the individual. Like a stream will always eventually find its way around a stone and return to its initial bed. You will see that already now, Borogravia is back at war with Zlobenia. As if you had never been there."
"So what you are saying… I'm a delay?"
"No, Maladicta. You are not even a delay. You are, as Sir Samuel would put it, a bloody annoyance."
Maladicta barely dared look up at her. She had not risen to her feet; she had not even changed her posture. Only her legs were crossed, again. It was just about the most menacing thing you could do with legs, Maladicta found.
"I'm sorry, my lady", she whispered. "I will find a way to make it up to you."
"Oh, please, not to me. I have nothing to do with the course of the League. I am merely a member. This conversation isn't even happening. But of course, being the engaged member I am… I'd be most obliged if you found a way to make it up to the League."
"I will."
Now finally, and for the first time during their conversation, Maladicta felt Ladyship smile. A genuine, benevolent smile.
It was almost more frightening than the legs.
"Please do me the favour of being my guest for tonight, Maladicta. I think I have a spare coffin or two, and if not… well, I am known for finding solutions."
A huge load tumbled from Maladicta's shoulders as she finally dared rise to her feet again. Her head was spinning. "Thank you, m'lady", she mumbled, bowed hastily and retreated from the room.
In the shadows, Lady Margolotta smiled and crushed her cigarette.
How she hated those things.
It was only when Maladicta was back out in the sunlight that that it occurred to her that the reassurance that she would find a solution did not necessarily mean Ladyship would find her a place to sleep.