Chapter Thirty-Eight | Where, When, Will Your Grave Be Marked?
She wasn't avoiding her friends. Really.
Was she hiding the fact that there's ghosts in her head? Most definitely.
The day was a lull, tea sipped in Dumbledore's office and a chill in her bones that made them ache, yearn for a taste of blood.
Catherine had forgotten what hunger felt like.
But now… now it was omnipresent. A thirst that sat in her gullet, a beast in her gut that waits, waits for but a sip, just a drop, just a- you never liked him anyways, you don't know his name, obliviate him, take it all.
Someone had bled that morning at breakfast. Nicked their finger on a knife trying to butter their bread and god damnit why were they using an actual knife for that? She'd smelled it across the hall, head whipping about to see a Slytherin girl cursing under her breath (she'd heard it, every word, fifty feet away and through the slog and toil of chatter) while she nursed her cut.
It smelled divine. Ambrosia, nectar, the wine on which only the gods may sup and raise a toast to whatever divines they themselves worshipped. If not themselves then the universe and every brightly burning sun.
Yharnam blood had begun to taste like molten gold. It was heaven in a bottle. Bright, floral, and spiced with something more, something she could not put voice to.
What was the Blood? Not just the blood, but the sacrosanct communion of which the Church partook?
Was it truly the blood of gods? She had seen that, spilled it, bathed in it beneath a moon cloaked in flame.
That blood was silver, yet its taste…
She could not remember its taste, but she could remember the feelings it evoked as she lay shuddering within the ribs of a spider that yearned to spread its legs along the cosmos.
Even through the haze that had clouded her mind, that primal fear that set every nerve alight and destroyed every scrap and fragment that remained of her shivering mind, that blood had sung to her. It was fire on her lips, hoarfrost on her tongue, a thousand glittering stars in her belly that danced and fought and twirled about to their heart's content.
It was joy and sorrow made manifest, and it had brought to light everything she had, and would feel in a single, glorious explosion.
Catherine had looked out across the Great Hall, stirring around a half-empty plate of rashers and eggs, wondering why now of all times everyone had begun to look so painfully young.
Fresh faces, not new, but unmarred by stress or the slowly creeping miasma of responsibility far more tiresome than anyone their age should ever bear.
After leaving Dumbledore's office she had stopped by the girls toilets, wanting to look into a mirror and see herself proper, not in the molten reflection of a bird bath.
Scars, limp hair, a twitch in her cheek every time the pipes rattled or the footsteps of an early riser pattered in the corridors beyond… all of those things screamed out to her that something was wrong, that this girl, fifteen (sixteen? Time had gotten away from her) and with the weight of the world crushing her, was not what she seemed. But her eyes. Her eyes.
One, all but blind and starting to grow lazy, not catching up with its twin quite on time. The other much too sharp, too focused to be mistaken for anything but the eye of one who had seen far, far too much.
She looked five years older, bent and broken with age not earned through time spent living, but time spent fighting through horrors that could not be voiced through fear that if spoken of, they'd come trickling into this world as well.
It took everything in her not to snap and snarl at Djura or Amelia when they would waver into existence and unburden themselves to her as if a priest confessional.
Amelia, she understood. Born into servitude, golden manacles snapped tight around her wrists the moment she had been unceremoniously dragged out of the womb, she had spent her entire existence living and breathing the Church. A figurehead raised from birth to be everything the Church could not be.
Kind, matronly, and above all else - charitable.
There were no questions about it. Amelia had done all she could in life to aid people. To help. But, she had been naive to the point of cruelty, a Marie Antoinette who knew only a world of immaculate wonder, spoon fed half-truths and brazen lies until the city she looked out upon each and every morning was nothing more to her than a fabrication spoken unto her by her masters. A fantasy that lived only in her mind.
Her praise was obnoxious, mutterings that whirled into one ear like sweet poison and drifted out the other charcoal, every word praise and devout worship.
Amelia, or whatever remained of her, looked to Catherine as if she was one of her many gods. Moreso, the image of all that the Church yearned for. Man made divine, a human who had not just slain a god, but caught the eye of one across the curtain of existence itself. One who spoke with a god, every day and every night, on grounds that, even though they weren't and could never be even, were as close to even as one could get without burning to ash as Icarus once had, glue melted and skull dashed across the flagstones.
No. Amelia, her echo, had been converted to the Church of Catherine, and with it she had gained yet more of Djura's ire.
The man was bitter. Vile, at times, his soul stained with the hypocrisy of self-aggrandizing attempts to fix a mistake he himself had wrought, in one motion condemning himself for the horror he had caused and lay witness to in Old Yharnam. In the other, he justified it whole-heartedly, placing more value in the life of a beast than that of his fellow man, even if he was killing them to prevent their eventual turning to that of what he most admired.
Because they could not think, perhaps?
No trolls or half-turned men to be found in Old Yharnam, still subject to the cruel whims of a sapient mind. Only the blood drunk and ailing, wrapped in bandages and spitting disease at all that would pass, called Old Yharnam their home. Those unaffected by the poison of man, the ability to commit pain for pain's sake and find joy in such an act.
Beasts looked for one thing. Sustenance. They were all but animals, and perhaps that was why he took solace in his self-imposed struggle.
It wasn't until the doors had been shut behind them and the ward left to burn that the Powder Keg hunters had realized their wrongs, and even then their anger (his anger) had not been directed towards themselves for doing such a thing. No, it had been pointed at the Church for having coaxed them into it with promises of money, glory, women, and to have their names written in the sands of time for taking their holy blades and bombs to the unwashed below.
Was guilt of motivation less worthy than guilt of action? Where did the blame lie, and in it, where too should retribution begin and redemption end?
Djura was not a kind man. He was not a pleasant man. He was one who held his ideals in a fist of iron and bludgeoned to death those who would question him.
He looked on his actions in Old Yharnam as necessary, but ultimately futile, instead choosing to live the remainder of his long, long life seeking recompense by dedicating it to the well-being of beasts and beasts alone. And then, he had his throat torn out by a maddened girl atop a tower.
Catherine could admit the man had reason to be angry, but the words that spilled from his lips made her want to carve her own ears off, to plug them with termites and sharp, biting things so as to leave her too pained, too deaf to listen to it for a moment longer. But, one could not silence a ghost of the mind, and even if she drove stakes into her skull, turning the part of her brain that took and translated the guttural vibrations of meat on meat into nothing but a mess of hemorrhaged sludge, his voice would still sting her ears.
Gascoigne…
Gascoigne spent his time thanking her for saving his daughter, and though the sorrow in his voice was evident, some measure of his jovial nature yet remained. He laughed and joked and spun tales of his life as a hunter, comparing himself to Catherine with clear awe in his voice to witness her change from shivering girl to a woman made monster by the blood, who still clung to her sanity when by all means she should have been lost to the drunken haze that stole him away months ago.
He barked insults at Djura whenever the man reared his ugly head, spitting at him and exclaiming 'If you hadn't have tried to kill her, you wouldn't be dead, you fool.' To which Djura would reply with furious whispers, curses on curses all laid on her soul in an attempt to drag her into the deepest, darkest hell hunters knew.
The Nightmare.
They spoke of it as if they had visited it themselves. Perhaps a part of them did, and what remained here, with her, were the last fragments of their souls unclaimed by the dark that waited for them.
There had been tales of hunters journeying to the Nightmare, only to return a gibbering mess. The Church studied it, Amelia having heard mutterings in her circles at the highest echelon of the Church elite, but being the puppet leader she was, they were only stolen moments heard by eavesdropping or careless admittances.
If Catherine wanted to know how to reach this Nightmare, she would have to find the Choir and batter down their doors, drain the knowledge from their mind by magic or blood and seek out the tomb of her saviour's child.
Because Kos was a saviour of hers, in a sense. She had prevented Catherine from gaining the attention of a god less influenced by the whims of humanity, who showed no interest in such a thing and whose wants and needs were so alien to her own as to be indiscernible at best, and would leave her drooling and broken at worst.
Looking out over the dinner table, Hermione huddled against her side and casting soft, questioning smiles her way, Catherine sent a silent thanks to Kos for shielding her from the fancies of a being so far beyond her comprehension as to shake her very soul. Not that Kos wasn't beyond her comprehension. Of course she was. She'd thankfully spent enough time around humanity to learn of them, to not float off into the ether and forget the rules and laws that bound the world that simple, hairless primates were dictated by.
"So…" Hermione broached, sending Ron a look, as he spluttered around his chicken thigh and waved his wand, a silencing charm encompassing their portion of the table. "What happened?"
Her spine shook as her head turned, jerkily, to look up at her girlfriend - as if she'd stolen this body and was still learning how to pilot it, its intricacies evading her. "I can't… I can't tell you."
Wise.
She shuddered, a silent whisper in her mind. I can't tell them.
No, you can't, Kos spoke, resolute. Lest everything you hold between them, friendship, love - it all fall to ruin.
And are you to tell me of which god tried to drag me into Yharnam? Which one you intercepted?
There was a pause in their connection, fleeting and hesitant. The Moon.
The Moon.
She could picture a body of stars nodding, bobbing and blinking as if to portray its agreement. I believe the Moon is who tried to steal you away, stole that boy so many years ago. Flora, is her name.
And the Dream?
Is her domain.
Her friends unaware of the silent conversation taking place, Catherine's brow crumpled as she stared down at her plate. I want to kill her.
You would sacrifice the Doll for revenge?
Voldemort was created at her behest. Who's to say she won't try to take more from my world? What if I hadn't been so lucky as to have caught your attention? Where would I be now?
Mad, bloodthirsty, and soon to take steal the crown from that man, that boy who wishes you dead.
Hermione was tapping her shoulder, a questioning look on her face.
Were I to kill her?
The pause this time was weighty, a falter - trip in Kos' step. You would Ascend. Not man, not godling, but something different.
And Catherine's world, wants, and needs all came falling down. Her legs cut out from beneath her with the knowledge that were she to wish for it, she would become so much more.
It wasn't that she lusted for such a thing. Instead, she feared it above all else. But the chance to save the Doll, to save everyone if she so wished. Power untold, all of it at her fingertips, to use as she saw fit. She could break the chains of Yharnam, rain down hellfire on the Church and settle things once and for all. A god, looking down on them with contempt, anger at their hubris, destroying all that they had made, destroying that which they dared to attempt.
To have one's gods step into the world and destroy that which they had crafted would send a message far and wide.
Do not dare to tread where the gods may walk.
"-Catherine! Catherine? Are you alright?"
Wavering in her seat, she blinked at Hermione. "Yeah, yeah. I'm… I'm fine."
"What happened?"
"I said it already. I can't tell you."
"Is it… is it that bad?"
Lost to herself, she looked blankly into Hermione's eyes. "Worse."
You can choose this. It is not the only road, child.
"I need to- I need to think," she uttered, getting out of her seat and fleeing the Great Hall, a few curious glances sent her way as the scope and reach of Catherine's world was burnt and rebuilt anew.
"Damnit, god damnit." The curses flew from her lips like ash, floating in the wind only to be swept away to some long forgotten land. "What the hell."
Her steps took her up through the castle, through corridor and over step, until she stood before the Room of Requirement, throwing herself into its waiting doors to see a fire roaring, soft, inviting seats, and the mist of the messengers atop a table as the brought through it a bottle of Yharnam wine.
Desperately, she tore at the cork, wrenching it free and bringing the bottle to her lips, taking long, greedy gulps of blood-mixed wine that danced like sparks of electricity off her tongue and coiled in her belly. Inevitably, her lungs screamed, Catherine pulling reluctantly from the bottle and setting it back on the tabletop, a third lighter with her chin dripping red.
Collapsing into the sofa, she couldn't tear her eyes away from the fire burning before her. It crackled and hissed, pops echoing throughout the room as embers jumped around in their tiny cavern of stone and smoke. Tentatively, she took up the bottle and poured it into a glass, trying her best not to think too hard and long about how she'd never drank before, nor that she was already a third of the way in and had no plans of stopping until the bottle was gone and another was sat in front of her, ready to carry her into the soft embrace of delirium.
The voices in her mind slowly died out, not replaced with silence but simply growing quieter. Maybe she was just able to ignore them, as the rapid metabolism of her blood-addled body already set to work on devouring the alcohol in her belly and letting it run wild along the highway of her veins. It was welcomed… more than welcomed, in fact. The doors were thrown open and trumpets piped a happy tune, streamers rocketing around every which way and banners hanging from the ceiling that all bore a single phrase - take my mind away.
"A god?" she squeaked between frantic sips, hand shaking as she put the glass away, out of reach. "A god?"
One of us, yes. But… not quite.
"How? Why?"
Have you ever wondered of magic, my dear?
Yes, of course she had. Who wouldn't? At some point, every single denizen of the magical world must have sat down, sober or otherwise, and pondered on what exactly magic was.
Where did it come from? How did it work? Why, exactly, were they so blessed as to be given that power and not the entirety of mankind?
Scholars had spent millenia - since the first time humans had put pen to paper, chisel to stone, knife to bark - trying to suss out the intricacies of what made magic work. Arithmancers, rune masters, alchemists, a veritable tide of researchers and warlocks all united in their purpose, their unending need to learn not just about the world they lived in, but the powers that sustained it.
So, yes, definitely, unanimously so, of course she'd wondered of magic. Of course she'd spent the first year here in this world, her mind soft and pliable, looking out at everything she could with wonder and rapturous joy. She'd dived headfirst, poring over every book and scroll she could get her hands on with reckless abandon. The world was her oyster, and there were so many, many pearls to be found, all of which shining with every colour of the rainbow, sharp and bright and glorious to behold.
What could she say, other than, "Of course"?
Would you like to know?
"Yes."
And just like that, a spoken word and in an instant the very secrets of the universe were laid bare at her feet. That's all it took for Kos to begin spinning her tale.
We once lived among your kind, thousands and thousands and thousands of years ago, before you had ever dreamed of standing still and taking a plot of soil, to nurture it and let it bear fruit and seed. My people granted your kind secrets. Knowledge. All in the name of worship.
One woman, in time immemorial, was curious at the wonders we could will into being with but a thought, and came to question the how and why just in the same manner as your people will until the stars grow cold and every galaxy turns dark as night. She was the first to ask, the first to not prostrate herself and preach offerings of indefinite servitude.
She asked the oldest of us, the grandest, one above ourselves and of the cosmos itself, Oedon, for a bounty. Knowledge of ourselves, how we worked our craft and built worlds out of the strings of reality solely out of curiosity. To see what would happen were we to breathe life into the rocks and oceans, to encourage the bubbling pockets of gas and let the sands of time run faster. Life is beyond even us, but we can take the pieces and push them together, coax them forward and guide their flow. Thus we found our purpose - for a while, at least.
Oedon, amused at an ant requesting gifts from a boot as large as to blot out the suns above and beyond, granted her not just the bounty, but magic itself. A pittance, a fraction of what we ourselves capable, but He gave it to her all the same. In return, He asked her to bear His child, for it to live on and be a god among men.
From there, from our first dalliance with humanity as not just pets - livestock for our amusement, He laid upon us a curse so foul and deep that our people cried out and fled to the stars, fled every world they resided upon, never to interact with your kind or those we had fashioned again.
Every child stillborn, every new addition to our infinite ranks but a wink of pain and misery stretched out across time and burdened with unassailable agony.
But Oedon's child did not fester. It did not turn diseased, pocked with pus and boil, but instead flourished, and with it came your kind.
It was no god, but the blood of the cosmos lingered in its veins, and with it came power. Magic, a simple word for something far grander than you or your kind should ever have been capable of. Humans, Pthumerians, the unhallowed of Ihyll, beings of thought and form never imagined by your kind spread out across existence, a million civilizations upon a million, spinning worlds, all granted His blessing as He sought to sow the universe itself and fashion it in His image.
That is your magic. The dregs of our blood taken not with needle nor chalice, but with the Breath of Creation poured down your needy throats. It runs in your veins, a shadow, the afterbirth of the gods offered from parent to child. Were you to ascend, to grow beyond the chains that shackle your kind, you would become a half-breed, something too human to be a god, and too grand to be human.
Thus I offer you the option. The choice. The knowledge, given unto you not by Oedon but myself. You may take this if you wish, may follow the steps of the Church and pave beyond their feeble, faltering scratches at divinity, and walk into the great, cold dark of the cosmos. Or you may stay as you are, human and barely touched by something you yourself have witnessed, have been broken by. You may stay and learn, may stay and live evermore caught between worlds, and grow comfortable in your sliver of reality, beyond that which your kin may understand.
A choice.
Not once had Catherine ever been offered any measure of choice. Her life from front to back had been naught but decisions made at her behest. Oh, she had followed along in those decisions with nary a question nor complaint, choosing to walk the path of least resistance and simply let the vitriol rain over her shoulders and splash to the dirt below, but she had allowed others to choose for her - either through comfort or fear she did not know, but she had done it all the same. It was only now, with Dumbledore offering guidance and not ultimatums, with her brewing rebellion against the Ministry itself after having spited Umbridge so thoroughly and embarrassingly, with her refusal to heed the call of the Church and instead burn all they had grown to cinders… it was only now that she had begun to choose.
But this- this was beyond simple decision. This was not so fickle as whether to fight or roll over. This was not something that could be chosen given a year of thought, a decade, a century. It was far too great, far too impossible to even put to words, human language too fickle to describe such a calamitous choice.
It would not just shatter her world but her very being, rewrite her soul and cast it through the slop of existence before dragging it back up, wringing it out to reveal the new colours and stains that patterned its shimmering length. This was to cut and dice all that made her, her, dash it against the stones and reform it entirely.
"I… I'll need to think. I can't- it's so much. It's so much."
Hermione, Ron, Dumbledore, Sirius- god, she hadn't even spoken to Sirius since the hols.
How could she ever broach such a thing? To tell them of how she had been offered godhood? Could they even believe horror quite like that?
Because it was horror, was it not? To lose yourself and all you were, to be torn from the world you had known and dragged, kicking and screaming into something the human mind could not begin to dream of? So far beyond comprehension as to be anathema to life itself?
The world around her shuddered, breathing in and out just as her lungs filled and emptied, a thick glob of spit hanging from her lip and her eyes unseeing, only focused on the push and pull of the air - the universe - around her.
Her eyes had been opened, and with it, the horrors had come pouring in.