Tera was not the kind of woman who readily knelt to anyone.
She didn't know what her history was, who she had been before becoming a hunter. Oh, there had been clues, right enough. Her ready capacity for violence, even if one conceded that her amnesiac mental state—and perhaps, the Hunter's Mark etched into her will—inured her to the psychological costs, spoke of experience with weapons. Likewise, the easy way that her mind sought out books and records as she traveled through Yharnam, the easy facility with medicines and chemical implements, told of scholarship in certain fields.
But her personality was one that was not inclined to submit to outside authority, to make a show of groveling to power. She was not one to cringe before a throne.
Yet, she sank to one knee before the throne of Cainhurst. It was not a matter of submission, but rather respect.
She did not respect the power of Cainhurst. From what she'd been able to glean, that power had been little worthy of it. Arrogance and bombast were its hallmarks. Clothing and armor overdone and extravagant. Simple servants dressed up in finery and called "knights" in order to lend a sense of pomp and circumstance to the disposal of beasts. Blood traded rapturously in a corrupt indulgence. Even necromancy put to such purpose, the spirits of the dead forced to dance at the revels of the nobility. It stank of the worst indulgences of the titled, that smug rot of the soul that accidents of birth somehow made a person better, entitled them to indulge themselves as they liked without thought of others, or worse yet taking joy in causing pain. The name Alfred had cursed them with, "Vilebloods," suited them well.
But Tera had also seen what had been done. The castle left empty and desolate but for a handful of servants still mindlessly cleaning floors no masters were left to look at. And the dead... No longer did the dead dance at the behest of the nobility for their pleasure. Now it was the nobles themselves who were the ghosts. The elaborately-gowned shadows of noble ladies slain, some throat-slit and some carrying their heads in their hands, prowled the halls, ready to leap on anyone who touched the possessions of the fallen.
It had been a battle. No, it had been a scourging. The Executioners were the Healing Church's army, a force of hunters who hunted not beasts but other humans. And for what? Indulgence in "forbidden blood" that threatened the "purity" of the Church's blood healing? Tera had already been skeptical of the idea when Alfred had first voiced it to her. She'd seen what the Healing Church's "healing" had done, seen its cruelty in Old Yharnam, its abandonment of Central Yharnam to its own devices during the hunts, the way its black-clad doctors wielded their tainted knives. And everything she'd learned since then, of the School of Mensis and the Choir and the Church's true face as nothing but the mad doctors of Byrgenwerth dressed up in religious robes, if Alfred had spoken to her now of the Church's purity it would be all she could do not to laugh herself sick.
The Executioners had come, broken Cainhurst beneath the wheel, reaped them with the scythe, and now all that was left of the Vileblood line was one woman, thin and pale, an iron mask fixed upon her head.
And Tera knelt to her, not in respect for power, but in respect for her suffering, for she was queen now only over a great, vaulted tomb, emptier even than the hintertombs of the Pthumerians.
"Visitor... Moon-scented hunter... I am Annalise, Queen of Castle Cainhurst. Ruler of the Vilebloods, and sworn enemy of the church. Yet, Our people are murdered, and We are prisoner to this wretched mask. What is it thou'rt in search of? Speak thy mind."
"Why?" Tera asked. "Why did they do this?"
It was not, apparently, what the Queen had expected. While she did not flinch, there was a change in the air, a retreat of pressure, as if she was withdrawing in on herself.
Had no one ever asked this?
She must have interacted with hunters like Tera before, those bound in service to the Dream. The moon-scented who had come before her, like Eileen and Djura. And yet, no one had ever inquired?
No, wait; that can't be true. Not if Martyr Logarius had been standing watch out side her throne ever since Cainhurst had fallen. No one could have knelt here before her since that night.
The invitation had somehow reached Tera, summoning her to the castle. The carriage had arrived at the crossing and carried her here, to winter-blasted heights…even though it wasn't winter. She'd seen Castle Cainhurst from the broken bridge in Hemwick, and its battlements had not been wreathed in ice, not been the frosted sculpture she'd seen from the carriage window upon her approach. So there was something arcane at work here. Was the Queen of the Vilebloods sealed not only within her throne room, but within space and time as well? Was this place like the Dream, or like the nightmare slice of Loran where she'd fought the Amygdala?
Regardless, though Annalise had the ability to reach beyond her prison with the power suited to a queen, she had nonetheless never stood face-to-face with a dreaming hunter in this way.
So yes, Tera thought, no one ever had asked this.
She wondered if Alfred had. The longer she knew the young hunter, the more she thought that he'd never actually known Martyr Logarius or the executioners, just been a hunter inspired by his legend, idolizing a myth. A myth that, like every other story of the Healing Church she'd encountered, seemed rooted in lies and deception.
"They did this," Annalise said, "because We had given them all that they wanted from Us, and thus the continued existence of the blood-kin of Cainhurst became…inconvenient for them."
Tera scowled. How like the Church. As they'd used the hunters, as they'd used the people of Old Yharnam, as they'd used the orphans who became the Choir or the victims carried off by the School of Mensis. The Vilebloods of Cainhurst were their pawns, too.
There was a difference, though. The Church's treatment of the people of Old Yharnam had led to the spread of the beast plague. But the dead of Cainhurst were human in form, as were the still-living servants. The only inhuman creatures at Cainhurst, apart from the tick-like monstrosities and worms feasting on the spilled blood in the courtyard, were the gargoyle-like beings haunting the rafters, and they were few and far between by comparison.
"You wish to know more."
"Is it that obvious?" Tera said, unable to keep the wry twist from her voice. "I don't know why. Every time I pry into the Healing Church's affairs, all I find are more horrors. If I had any trace of sanity, I would keep my head down and kill beasts. And yet, I can't bear to let their secrets be, not until I've torn open the whole rotten lot."
All evidence told her that the Vilebloods were what their name suggested: the product of a corrupt nobility, where bloodline replaced virtue. And yet, they were surely the lesser evil compared to those who had brought them low.
Annalise, laughed, a cold and bitter hilarity.
"You amuse Us, moonlit one. And it is many days since We have spoken to another. So listen, then, to the tale of the fall of Cainhurst, and decide where your path leads. But tell Us, what lies do they speak of what they have done?"
"The only thing I've heard is that once a scholar from Byrgenwerth brought 'forbidden blood' to Castle Cainhurst, that this was what created the Vilebloods, and that you somehow threatened the so-called purity"—she could not the contempt from her voice any more than she could out of her thoughts—"of their blood healing."
"Forbidden blood," the Queen mused. "Yes, We can see how they would call it that."
"Then that part is actually true?" Tera couldn't keep the surprise from her voice.
"Oh, yes. We of Cainhurst are of the Pthumerian line, you see. Oh, We know what you are thinking. Yes, noble as Our bloodline is, we have fallen far from our ancient heritage. Though, to Our way of thinking, those of Yharnam, who crouch above the bones of their past glories, have fallen even farther, so far that the outsiders of Byrgenwerth were able to move into their cathedrals and chapels and claim them in the name of their so-called Church without the Yharnam-folk even knowing what it was they wrought."
Annalise shook her head, her long, pale hair sliding across her shoulders.
"But then, the noble Cainhurst line allowed the Church to use our past against us as effectively as they did against the Yharnamites, so what right do We have to hold them in contempt?"
It was a question, even had it not been meant rhetorically, that answered itself in the asking.
"So yes, a young scholar from Byrgenwerth did indeed bring us blood. He came to Us, and told of how their tomb prospectors delved deep within the ancient labyrinths, not only via archaeological expeditions, but in dreams, through rituals that brought the past to life in nightmare form, to see when the tombs of Pthumeru were still inhabited by their last watchers. It was the blood of the old ones, he said, the blood of the Blood Queens who reigned over lost Pthumeru, of whose line We descend. He gave this blood to Us, in the hope—so he said—of reawakening Our true glory."
Annalise punctuated that statement with a bitter laugh.
"For a time, it was true. The old blood took root within Us, and with it did the blood arts of the Cainhurst heritage grow strong again. The rites of communion of blood with the Queen were restored, as were the ecstasies of Blood Rapture, and We gloried in the restoration of Our lost legacy alongside Our followers.
"And then, at last, was granted to Us the highest honor of the Blood Queens, for We grew pregnant. Our womb quickened, not with the seed of any king, but with a Child of Blood. For it is written that the Formless One carries no flesh, and cannot spawn a child through mundane means, but only when its voice slips quicksilver-like into a womb well-made for the great work."
Tera blinked in surprise.
"Formless One…do you mean Oedon? The Great One for whom Oedon Chapel in Yharnam is named?"
"Ah, so you have heard of Him, then? He is not forgotten entirely in the city?"
"Only scraps of knowledge. I think it was more Byrgenwerth that came to know of him than any real understanding in Yharnam. It was their runesmith, Caryll, who transcribed runes that convey the utterances of the Great Ones in a form at least vaguely comprehensible to human minds, and some of those runes speak of Formless Oedon, who dwells in the blood rather than in shape. But…you have a child?"
"We had a child."
Tera felt her gut clench at the proclamation.
"Had…"
"They took him from Us. The Child was what they wanted all along. They had learned of the heritage of the Blood Queens of Pthumeru, and what Their role had been in long-forgotten days. The Queen was to bear the child of a Great One. The role rose from being a simple service offered to their masters to the mark of a leader. They chose the greatest from among their ranks to accept this honor, and to lead the Pthumerians in the name of the Great Ones, and to pass the role on to her chosen heir. They knew that we of Cainhurst carried the bloodline of the ancient Queens, and they did to Us what was necessary that We could truly fulfill that role.
"Only, they had their ambassadors—their spies!—among our number, and when We were blessed with a child at last, so did this cringing minion send word to her masters, and so did the scholar come again. Only, he was not merely a scholar, then, but rather he had become the First Vicar of the so-called Healing Church, and at his back strode Executioners. We were caught off-guard, and though we fought with all we had, we fell, slaughtered to the last."
"All but you."
"All but Us, for We cannot be slain." She laughed long and bitterly. "Ah, they tried, well enough. A young soldier ran Us through, and Our head was severed from Our body, but it meant nothing. Our flesh remained, and Our will, and We struck them down in turn with the power of the corrupted blood they had forced upon Us. But then they brought this mask, that their master had crafted from the lore of the past, and We were made prisoner to it, much of Our power sealed, and the hateful Logarius stood guard outside Our throne so that none might disturb Our silence." There was a pause, and Tera could, from the tone of Annalise's next words, imagine a smile beneath her mask. "Until you accepted Our invitation."
"Is that what this was about? To slay the guard at your gate and set you free?"
"You think that We would run? To escape Our cell and flee like a dog in the night? We are Queen, and though imprisoned and masked we are Queen still, and we will not be driven from Our throne by a cringing cur, whether he drapes himself in the robes of a scholar or a priest!
"We shall fulfill the duty that was taken from Us."
"The duty?" A Queen didn't owe a duty, except in the sense of what she owed her people and her nation, and even then far too many rulers thought that it was the other way around, that the nation was their private possession meant to serve their whims, tools as much as their pen or their shoes. And Cainhurst was a destroyed kingdom, anyway; even if Annalise was the kind to appreciate the burden and responsibility of rulership, there was nothing left to be responsible for. There was no Cainhurst, no Vilebloods reaching out for their Blood Queen to…
Oh.
"Wait, you don't mean…?"
"The Queen shall bear the Child of Blood. This is the duty of the Pthumerian line, come down though the ancient cities have fallen to ruin beneath the earth and pale imitations built upon their bones for the degraded to prowl. We have accepted this mantle, and We will not fail it, hunter, even though this mask would strip that from Us.
"If you would swear oath to the Vilebloods, and raise your blade against the Church, then bring to Us the very dregs found in coldblood, If this mask curses Us so that we cannot hear Oedon's voice, then We shall bring that voice directly within Ourself, so that We may hear it sing in Our blood once more. Above all, seek the blood of the Church's hunters, for they use the blood to enhance their flesh, techniques we knew even before Laurence's poisoned chalice, and His voice speaks the strongest therein."
"I don't know if I can, Your Majesty. I have my own purpose to fulfill, and my own service to offer, and I won't offer you lies to use your strength to my own ends. But I will try."
She rose to her feet.
Tera still held very little opinion of royalty in general. But for Annalise of Cainhurst, she legitimately held the deepest respect.
~X X X~
A/N: Cainhurst Castle, as the incredible datamining community following this game has determined, went through many, many changes as Bloodborne progressed through development. Martyr Logarius's role, for example, went through numerous alterations, which is why his design elements may seem confusing. In one iteration, he was the King of Cainhurst, hence the crown and his generally Pthumerian appearance.. In another, he was its executioner, hence his use of the same ghostly magic as the Executioner's Gloves. At one early point in development, Cainhurst would be located behind the Great Cathedral and was the final area of the game!
One of the very last changes made was the nature of Queen Annalise's covenant questline. In what appears to be the next-to-last version of the quest, Annalise bore a child of blood, which was taken by the Church, and she requests Vileblood player characters to fetch her blood dregs to cleanse her blood of what was done to it to make her a suitable "womb" for the child. And what became of the child? Well, that actually made it into the game itself, at least in the 1.0 version of the US release. The description of the Third Cord found in the Abandoned Old Workshop actually states that it had its origin in the "child of the Vilebloods." So yeah, Laurence & Co. did to it exactly what the player can do to Arianna's child. And that was the Third Cord used to summon the Moon Presence and conceive the Hunter's Dream. (This version of the description actually made it into FuturePress's official guide, since it was only removed, in the US, in the Day One patch.)
The final version of the questline that made it into the game reverses the purpose of the Blood Dregs—instead of changing her from something that can conceive a "child of blood" into a human, Annalise wants them to allow herself to conceive such a child. (You can follow along with the sperm-like appearance of the Dregs and the references to Oedon's presence in blood.)
But these changes only speak to Annalise's motivations during gameplay. They say nothing to the reasons for Cainhurst's extermination at the hands of the Church executioners. (Alfred's repetition of the "threaten the purity of the Church's blood healing" cover story is obviously arrant nonsense no matter what development iteration you're looking at and speaks solely to his fanaticism.) Nor do they explain where that Third Cord in the Workshop came from. (We know the origin of the Cord from Arianna's baby, of course. The one we find after Mergo's battle was very likely Mergo's own. And the one we get from Impostor Iosefka is almost certainly the one from the Orphan of Kos, given how its description discusses Master Willem and that the Hunter expedition to the Hamlet was done at the behest of Byrgenwerth. (And no, Impostor Iosefka isn't pregnant, though it's easy to understand how people could mistake that.))
Therefore, the explanation that makes the most sense is that the cut content backstory for what happened in Cainhurst remains the backstory, and the only thing that changed was Annalise's reaction to those events: rather than resent them and try to retreat, she instead seeks to conceive a second child, one that she hopes will live. I rather prefer this canon version of her myself. Not only do I find it more suitable for a Cainhurst Queen, but the idea of "please murder people to cure me" as a covenant questline doesn't resonate with me. (Contrast a similar theme in DS1's Fair Lady, who doesn't know where the Humanity her followers give her to ease her pain might be coming from, but they're instead doing it for love of her.)
Also, keeping track of capitalizing when Annalise uses the "royal we" while not capitalizing when she uses "us" and "our" to reference the Cainhurst population or noble class as a whole is not what I would call a fun writing time!