In the chilly castle tower, Raven was also grinning.
"Why do you never smile at me like that?" Malchior lamented half-heartedly. Raven was learning not to give into his patronizing questions.
"You don't deserve it," she stated plainly, sipping tea and continuing to grin like the Cheshire cat.
He huffed in his chair, scratching the rim of his own teacup with nasty black claws. Raven watched as his appearance grew worse with every hour.
His face was cracking, the skin on his hands was almost completely reverting back to scales and a single horn was growing on the right side of his head. His right pupil had returned to the shape of a slit, like a cat, while the other remained human-looking.
For now.
"Fine," he stated, also plainly. "Go ahead and be proud of your little green friend. I'll be right here when he fails, a shoulder for you to cry on if you will."
"Your shoulder is looking a little too sharp for anyone to rest their head."
It was easier to see him bristle now when his scales rose and fell in irritation.
"No matter," he attempted to remain charming. "We can go and pick out another vessel together when this is over. Anyone you want. I want to make sure my appearance appeals to you. Once you're mine."
She rolled her eyes.
"You still believe in your little friends' abilities to stop me?"
"After this is over," she said, "I'll make sure you never steal another soul again."
He laughed. Raven remembered when his laugh was comforting and charming. Now it was terrible and scratchy. A small part of her wanted to reminisce fondly on those old feelings of acceptance for him, maybe even what she thought had been love, but seeing him now and the thing he had become - the thing he had always been - made it very difficult to summon any feelings for him other than disgust.
She gazed longingly at the board game, wishing that she could help her friends. All she wanted to do right now was tap into her own magic and power to use it against this creature before her.
Instead, she smiled a little, I'll just have to trust Beast Boy with my life.
"Perhaps then, sweet Raven, I'll make you a little deal."
Raven turned back to look at him.
"What are you talking about?"
"If your pathetic little friends lose, I will recollect your physical form from the Tower and cure you of your illness. Even more, I'll never steal another unwilling soul again."
Raven narrowed her eyes.
"Why?"
"I've already told you. Things would go so much more smoothly for the both of us if you would just cooperate."
Her skepticism ran deep.
"And what about you? If you don't harvest vessels, you'll stay a dragon forever. That wouldn't go unnoticed on Earth."
"Ah, see, that is your half of the bargain. I do not have to harvest a vessel, should you build me one."
And there it was. The ultimate reason that he was holding her hostage. He preached about loneliness, about being misunderstood; that there was no one he could relate to, but that was all a manipulation; an attempt on his part to pull at her heartstrings on the off-chance that she still cared for him. He wanted to use her for her powers again, for something that would benefit him and his own interests. It was always just another lie.
Like everything else in the game.
Raven leaned back against the couch and softened her gaze at him. Her relaxed expression put him on edge.
"You already have a spell for this," she said and it was not a question.
Malchior fidgeted in his chair.
"I'm assuming it requires sacrifice," she said easily. "Probably mine."
"Not exactly."
"But still a sacrifice?"
"Of freedom, not of blood or bone."
Raven frowned in confusion.
"What do you mean?"
Malchior was growing more uncomfortable by the second.
"Do you accept my terms or not," he demanded of her.
"You would allow me control over my body again," she repeated slowly, "and you would cure my illness, and you wouldn't harvest human bodies to possess? Ever again?'
"Yes."
"All for my cooperation and the building of a new permanent vessel for you?"
"And a sacrifice, Raven."
His serious tone gave her pause. Perhaps he was a liar, but she strongly believed that he wasn't trying to trick her this time. Of course, a deal with the devil was always quite serious.
Raven considered the offer he was presenting. While she'd never in a million years want to accept, nor would she ever doubt that her friends could defeat him, on the very small chance that they did fail, it would be better to strike a deal than have Malchior eat her soul.
"You've already threatened to let me rot in my own head, burn up with fever and die," she told him. "You threatened to 'consume my soul'. Why should I believe that you'll just save me and disappear forever if I help you?"
Malchior didn't answer, but his jaw was clenched as though he felt a blow coming.
"Why do you look so…" Raven wasn't sure what the emotion was that was on his face, but it was almost fear. "What is the sacrifice, Malchior?"
Malchior stood up from his armchair and began to pace in front of the fire. Raven somehow felt more ill at ease with him like this than when he was furious with her.
Finally he stopped, not looking at her, but instead into the flames.
"Your freedom, Raven. A soul bond."
A soul bond.
Old magic.
Dark magic.
The kind that had been lost to history, and for good reason.
Raven swallowed.
"You can't be serious."
"Ah," he said, his shoulders drooping, "I suppose you have learned quite a lot since we last met."
"I may have read the grimoire."
"How many times?"
Raven almost smiled to herself.
"A few."
"Then you understand."
Raven sighed and tossed her hands up into the air and let them fall back down onto the couch in exasperation.
"You're basically proposing to me, Malchior, you realize that right?"
"A soul bond can be willing or unwilling," he told her, finally turning from the fire to look at her. "It would be easier on the both of us if you simply work with me."
"An unwilling soul bond would suit you just fine," she snapped. "You've already threatened it once. Why not just do that? Why this game? Why…"
He watched many thoughts flicker across her face all at once.
"No," she finally whispered. "You've already set it all into motion? You set a willing soul bonding ceremony into effect using my friends? Stand-ins for the 'family' who would suffer trials to earn the right to give my hand away in cosmic marriage to you?"
"I assumed you had no blood relatives left, so yes. And besides, marriage is such an ugly term for what I'm proposing," he grumbled quietly. "You are not property in this arrangement. And you know that an unwilling bond would be… painful for you. Irreversible."
Raven ground her teeth together.
"Why would that even bother you?"
He shrugged.
"You imagine my affectionate consideration for you is meager and manipulative; fake. I may have overplayed my hand earlier, Raven, but I did not lie. You are the closest thing on this planet, in this and any other dimension I have come across, that is similar to me. I value that. To turn you into a husk - an empty shell of your former self? What a waste."
Raven crossed her arms and thought for a few minutes. The silence between them was almost comfortable, as he clearly no longer wanted to speak. He was probably grateful that she understood the process so that he wouldn't have to explain.
He wouldn't want to debase himself by truly asking her to do this for him.
What he was proposing was a complete equality between them. She would lose her freedom, and he would lose his power over her. A soul bond would cement them as two sides of the same coin, almost a single being in separate bodies.
Raven would be tied to him for eternity, long outlasting her lifespan as she fed off of his magic and immortality. Her freedom as an individual would be gone. There would be no "Raven" or "Malchior", but simply an eternal "us", and she could never love or belong to another. A tight, eternal knot that would bond their souls until their mutual deaths.
The new body for Malchior that resulted in their union would be a living, breathing, powerful vessel that harnessed all of Malchior's magic, and his knowledge; he could do anything with that kind of magic. With her magic.
And Raven would have his magic, too.
"You also realize," she said at last, "that I would have access to your power if I gave myself willingly to the union? I could do whatever I wanted and you wouldn't be able to stop me."
"Well," he said with a wry smile, "I could ask you nicely. As partners tend to do."
Raven sat shocked upon the plush couch and was at a loss for further words. Malchior had concocted this plan from the beginning, initiated a willing soul bond ceremony, pitted her friends against dangerous trials, all to achieve a permanent body. One that he wouldn't have to change out every few weeks for a new one. He wanted to harness all his powers again, to be free from the limbo she had ultimately trapped him in.
To rise again, and consequently bring her with him.
What was most shocking, Raven considered, was that he was willing to become equals with her. She knew he saw her as a lesser being, even more so now that she didn't have her demon side to draw power from. She was akin to a witch, a human sorceress. Not the demoness and apocalyptic portal he had met once before, years ago.
"Why now?"
Somehow that was the most pressing question on her mind.
"Why not back when I was pulling you out of the book? You were fine with being a dragon then, as I recall."
Malchior sat down heavily in his armchair with a light thud.
"You hadn't sealed me away into the cracks of the dimensional fabric then. In that form, I was perfectly capable of making my own vessel. I didn't need you. Now, however," he raised a clawed hand and observed it, "I am simply a shadow. A ghost that is neither of your world nor any other that I inhabit. My power is strong but impermanent. I have… no grounding. No root in any world or dimension. I have to keep hopping between dimensions, I have to change vessels. It is the only way I do not disappear forever."
"You need my tether to reality."
"Yes," he whispered, dropping his hand. He looked exhausted. "Our bond would allow me to tether to reality, and it would allow you to become my equal, and access any and all power that I possess. You wouldn't understand how to use it, but I would teach you, and it would be part of you. As you would become part of me."
"But I'm not like I was when we met, that's my point. Before, I was so much more than I am now. You're willingly tethering yourself to a weaker witch. Practically a mortal!"
Malchior displayed a ghost of a smile.
"You are not weak, Raven. I wish you were, this would be far easier to negotiate."
"I…" she hesitated. "I can't agree to this, Malchior."
He didn't seem surprised, but he wasn't done.
"Oh, put aside our past and your childish sense of morality, Raven. You would wager your life on your friends rather than take this incredibly generous offer? You realize that if they lose, and they wake up, the wager they agreed to is forfeit, I win, and the ceremony breaks. Then I'll have your soul with or without your consent."
Raven did know this.
"If they win we go away from this place forever, and you'll have to find another option."
"And how many more souls will I take in exchange for your freedom?" he countered.
Raven bit down on the inside of her cheek.
"Do not lay deaths at my feet that are not mine to claim. When this is over, I'll put you out of your misery."
"You still think you have a chance?" he asked.
"I trust them."
"With your life?"
"With my life."
There was no hesitation in her voice now. Malchior sighed, the horn on his head sharpening to a point, while the second began to crest out of his dark hair.
He was losing time, and so was she.
"For both our sakes, Raven, I hope you are right."