My Majesty
Part 2: Descent
She is like no lowblood you have ever seen before. She is beautiful, a butterfly, brilliant and hollow. She speaks with eloquence far above her caste, moves so fluidly, but her eyes are always dead. Ever since she first came to the palace on the day of your coronation, she has never smiled or given any hint that she is enjoying herself here. She must know this is for as much your own ends of uniting the castes as it is for her own good.
You shower her in gifts, dress her in the best dresses made from silks from the ends of the galaxy. You must make her beautiful again, to erase the memory of when her ragged, chained form was first dragged into your throne room. Her eyes were so dead then, already resigned when she reached you. There must be something under that mask, something fiery and alive. But out here by the sea that fire is extinguished. You will have none of this, however—the empress always has her way in the end.
Eridan mocks you for this. He is disgusted by your infatuation, your obsession, with her. He says she has strange wiles, that she has led highbloods down this path of trickery and lust before, but you will have none of it. You remember Equius's futile attempts to mold her into a more civilized highblood, how he did such an unspeakable act as to switch her blood color from maroon to blue. No matter how much you wish she could understand you, you would never commit such a horrible crime as to force her like that. Her wild, untamed allure is precisely what makes her so beautiful, and, yet, so unattainable.
You remember back in the game, sweeps ago, when you battled alongside your friends of all castes to win back your universe. You remember her as she was then, strong and unperturbed by anything, not even death. Before the game she had been different, less frigid, but that is out of your knowledge. You want to see this side to her, though, this lively side Eridan scorns so often. You do not even know why you keep him around anymore, he can be such a nuisance.
When you all returned you wanted to see her again, but your hives and neighborhoods were too far from one another. You eventually were crowned empress, and as if by fate you stumbled across a certain Aradia Megido, on trial for the crime of desecrating the late empress's hive. One look at her face, even sweeps later, brought back all that insatiable curiosity and wanting you had not known you had back then, and you called off the trial to take her in as a maidservant.
But she will not be moved. Is there nothing you can do to light a fire in those yellow eyes? Even a you touch her, kiss her, bite her, there is nothing. She may reciprocate at times, but there is no feeling, no passion behind it. her long fingers brushing against your skin mean nothing to her, and consequently mean nothing to you. It only drives you even more mad.
At times you hear her mention a name to the other servants: Sollux. You vaguely remember it, too, and remember the brief matespritship you two shared in the game, but a matespritship when you were six sweeps versus your feelings and lust now at ten sweeps are radically different.
She will forget about him. You will not have her mind wandering to another while yours is so trapped and fixated on her. It is not enough, it is never enough. You will not be refused by someone of a lower caste than you. Every dead glance she gives you, every lackluster kiss she presses to your lips, it only reminds you that being empress does not give you everything. So why is Aradia the one thing you cannot have?
She is like a poison, seeping into your mind. You begin to dole out harsher punishments to criminals, sign stricter acts into law. You cannot allow the troll race to deteriorate into anarchy as you work to unite the castes. There must still be order, despite the chaos in your mind. More trolls are brought in for trial and the gallows hang low with the convicted. You will not have any other trolls traveling about the galaxy capable of such maddening trickery—but you are not the one being tricked, you are the one in control. Always in control.
Eridan does not speak to you anymore, claiming you too tainted by low blood. The last thing he ever says to you before returning to his hive for good is that you are unfit to be empress.
Your love for her has turned into an obsession, a hatred. There is blood now when you sleep with her, deep maroon bleeding from bites and scratches. You must make her feel something, and if it is not love she will look at you with, then let it be hatred instead. Her eyes are still soulless and dead, but her teeth are sharp and perfect and she makes the occasional use of them. Those times when you nurse your wounds afterwards almost feel sincere.
You hate her like you never knew you could hate another troll. You curse her name, despise how much you need her and yet cannot have her even when she is right there under you and running her hands through your clothes and unbuttoning your dresses. She is indifferent, only doing the bare minimum to be passable but never satisfy you. Does she realize how much you hate her, why you hate her? You so wish you could kill her, send her off to the gallows to be hanged and her body desecrated before a crowd to prove your hatred, but the thought of ending her life, leaving you all alone, is too much for you to handle. She has stopped mentioning Sollux, does this mean that you have won at last? But the intense desire in your heart, your need for her touch, burns so vividly that you know this battle is not finished.
You do not know if this will ever be won, but you continue on. You may be locked in this terrible maze forever, but you know one day this ordeal will come to fruition—because you are only doing this for her own good.
Sweet, so we've got some blackrom up in here! I really liked writing this - it was the first part of this fic I wrote, actually. I loved writing Feferi's thought process and slow progression into insanity and hatred (that sounds so creepy... eh, I'm a writer, it's what I do). I never thought I'd write a Feferi centric fic, but this was fascinating to plan and work on! And I also discovered I really like writing kismesis, who knew?