Disclaimer: Dark Souls and its characters are the intellectual property of From Software.
Chapter 5
Say what you will about Patches the Hyena: he always tried to see the positives in a situation.
Take Blighttown, for example. It was dark, and hot, and humid, and smelly, and full of big fiends that wanted to use you to incubate their eggs, and if you stayed down there too long, your skin would bubble with boils, and your veins would pump pus.
But even Blighttown had virtues. Just took a man like Patches to see 'em.
Adventurers! Blighttown was full of adventurers. Strong, brave, courageous, intrepid adventurers. Trusting, naive, easily-led, unwitting adventurers.
Adventurers carried trinkets. Shiny, pretty, expensive trinkets...
Exploring Blighttown, Patches found a spot that he liked: a rickety walkway that the scabrous lepers that inhabited this place had constructed from rotting wood and mildewed rope. He made himself comfortable, and soon enough, yet another gullible soul came stumbling out of the darkness...
"Hello, luv!" He furrowed a suspicious brow. "You 'aven't gone Hollow, have you?"
"I am no Hollow," said a female voice. "What business has a man loitering in Blighttown?"
Now, truth be told, this newcomer wasn't much to look at. She was dressed in a tattered, decrepit old robe, and was even walking around barefoot. Not much chance of valuable little goods to be scavenged from this soon-to-be corpse, he disconsolately noted. On the other hand, she did speak really posh. Perhaps this pile of rags was simply a disguise, and she was trying to conceal great wealth...
"An excellent question!" he grandly proclaimed. "It just so happens that I've spotted a very nice piece of jewellery dangling from a beam over there. It's amazing what you find just lying around these parts, isn't it?"
The woman's face was hidden from view by her cowl, but her shoulders lifted and she clasped her fingers excitedly. "A piece of jewellery?" she asked.
"Yeah! Gold, and encrusted with jewels, a little sparkle of solace in this ugly world! I found it first, but – curses! My back!" He contorted himself theatrically, putting a hand against his spine with a wince of pain. "I'm not as agile as I used to be! Injuries, you see. The perils of battling the Hollowed. Tell you what, you climb over and grab 'old of it, and you can have it for yourself."
She glanced hurriedly about. "Where is it?" she asked.
"Just over there! At the end of the bridge. You have to peer over the edge to see it. Go on, have a look! It'll shimmer you blind...heh heh heh heh..."
The pile of rags shuffled hastily to the edge of the walkway, and Patches had to bite his finger to stifle the laugh building in his chest. Oh, how fortunate for him that he was born into a world teeming with so many idiots...
The woman knelt at the edge, and peered intently into the darkness below. Patches tiptoed forward, joyously and excruciatingly aware that any of the wooden boards beneath him could creak loudly at any moment. He loomed over her, raised his right boot, and aimed a kick at her helpless rump...
His foot passed through thin air.
"Woah! Oh, curses!" The woman in rags was gone. Patches teetered precariously at the brink of a sharp drop, his hands flailing about, struggling to regain his balance. "What – what happened?"
He managed to steady himself, and then a hand planted itself on his shoulder, and sent him toppling into the abyss. The last words he heard as the darkness swallowed him: "Blithering fool."
()()()()()()()()()
Patches lay at the bottom of a grimy pit, the leg with which he had attempted to precipitate his victim now twisted at a very unpleasant angle. At any moment, Blighttown's wildlife would come scuttling, slithering or buzzing from the surrounding shadows, and make a meal of him. "Oh, heavens desert me!" he cried. "I'm done for!"
"What?" came the voice of his murderer, her voice dripping with mockery. "Surely the opportunist knows that if he spends his life dealing in trickery and deceit, he will one day meet his match?"
He scrambled about in the muck, peering into the gloom, trying to determine the location of the voice. "No, no!" he said, his voice suddenly imbued with righteous, affronted injury. "You have it all wrong! I do not live a life of trickery and deceit, I swear! I get these temptations, you see! I never mean to hurt people, I tell you! Oh, don't leave me here to the monsters, I beg of you!"
"Temptations? Hmmm. Perhaps it's best if I let the fiends have you. If I did save you, then what's to say you won't have any 'temptations' again? I wouldn't want the deaths of innocent people on my conscience..."
"Oh, Gods, I'll go Hollow!"
Bare feet splashed on mud, and then the pile of rags emerged from the blackness, and crouched next to his prone form. "What's become of your silver tongue, thief?"
"If you spare me, my lady, I will be a thief no longer! I promise! I'll become a merchant, and be humble and honest for the rest of my life." This last promise he made with his hand upon his heart.
The pile of rags contemplated him silently for a while; Patches could somehow feel plans and strategies forming within the pool of nothingness that concealed her face. Eventually, she came to a decision, and slowly shook her head.
"No..."
"Oh, cripes!"
"For the time being, I need you to be deceitful and cunning. Don't bite off your silver tongue yet, snake. I need a trickster. You can become humble and honest when I no longer have a use for you."
()()()()()()()()()
Quelana fixed Patches leg. He yelped with pain as the bones reset themselves, and then he leapt nimbly to his feet, and flashed Quelana a predatory smile. "Much obliged!" he grinned. "Nya ha ha ha ha!"
Quelana regarded him silently, long enough for his smile to falter, and then she plunged her hand into his chest.
()()()()()()()()()()
When the agony receded, Patches could tell at once that something had changed. Blighttown seemed to be filled with voices – chattering, babbling, squeaking voices – and it took him a few moments to realize where these voices were coming from.
All of the insects in the swamp were speaking, and he could understand them all. The flies complained of how thick the air was. The maggots commented on the diseased meat that they slowly devoured. The pupae murmured and sighed, nestled deep within the infected flesh of their hosts.
Patches pushed himself to his hands and knees. "What – what's happened to me?" he mewled.
"I've charmed you." Quelana reclined in a corner, the uncaring easiness of her posture all the more incongruous for the forbidding void of her cowl. "Charming, isn't it?"
Patches struggled to his feet, and tried to regain his bearings. "I can hear the creepy-crawlies talking," he said.
"Indeed you can," said Quelana. "I wouldn't listen too closely, though, if I were you. They think you're quite the contemptible little twit."
Patches groaned. "I have to do everything you say, then, do I?"
"Mmmm. You are in my thrall, now. Your will is not your own. But you still have your wits. I need you to be crafty. Like a fox."
"Aren't you crafty enough yourself? You tricked me!"
Quelana continued, ignoring him. "At the far end of Blighttown is an ancient oak, called the Great Hollow. Inside the tree, there are thick vines, leading ever downwards. When you finally reach the foot of the Great Hollow, you will emerge onto the shores of a lake, many miles beneath the surface."
"Yeah? And what do you want me to do when I find this lake?"
"Seek out the dragon."
"The dragon?" cried Patches, staggering backwards. "You're going to have me spend hours climbing down a blazing tree, so I can be burnt to ashes by a dragon?"
"The dragon won't harm you," replied Quelana, uncaring, "as long as you are polite. You will parley with the creature, as my agent. There is a piece of knowledge that I desire; the dragon may possess this knowledge, or it may not. Whether it betrays this knowledge depends on your persuasiveness."
Quelana ordered Patches to sit before her. She took a deep breath, and forced herself to be patient; tutoring a girl as gifted and intelligent as Nemeta was trying enough, but instructing this cretin, she knew, could well drive her insane.
Quelana explained a message that she wished Patches to deliver to the dragon, and commanded him to repeat it back to her. "What do you need me for?" he moaned. "Can't you talk to the big scaly thing yourself?"
Quelana drew close, and ensured she had the blackguard's full attention. "Do not mention that you are in my service," she stated. "If the dragon finds out that you are a servant of Quelana of Izalith, it will kill you."
()()()()()()()()()()()
Ash Lake. The entire world was held aloft by trees. Lordran, Vinheim, Astora, Carim; deserts and mountains and castles and cities and plains and oceans hoisted to the sun on pillars of ancient, gnarled wood. Here and there, far, far in the distance, shafts of light pierced through the mist, the rays of the sun penetrating the earth and shining upon an endless expanse of black, deathly-still water.
Patches treaded warily along the bone-white coast, deeply unnerved at how the water simply lay motionless at the edge of the shore, never stirring, never rippling, never finding the strength to form waves or a current. Even worse were the suggestions of life; more than once, Patches spotted massive shapes moving about across the surface of the lake.
He was having difficulty finding nice things to say about this place.
How did I let myself get into this? Bloody pyromancers...I suppose those lousy clerics are right, sometimes...
Well, no matter. I've still got my wits about me. I'll bide my time. I'll wait 'til her guard's down, and then she'll see! I'll turn the tables on her! Nya ha, nya ha ha ha ha!
Oh, who am I fooling? I'm not some diabolical schemer! I kick people down holes, for pity's sake! I try anything with her, she'll roast me on a spit! Oh, what shall I do?
After several miles, the way forward narrowed, and he found his path enclosed by vines and branches, the foliage thickening and pressing closer each step he took. When he finally reached his destination, almost all of Ash Lake's peculiar light had been blocked away, and the dragon's grotto swam with its own strange, languid blue glow.
Patches had seen a dragon once before. He'd seen it from a very great distance – and then when it had flown away, he had crawled out of his hiding place, and scurried down to help himself to the belongings of its freshly-cooked victims. He remembered the dragon as a savage, foul-tempered thing, a snapping, slashing, roaring flurry of fire and teeth and claws.
As he approached, the dragon of Ash Lake unfurled its great, black wings, and Patches saw that it was different. His first impression was of lumps of sculpted stone jutting out of a forest of thick, black hair; a reptilian face, a ridged chest, horns, claws, all carved from rock, all protruding from a mass of dense, dark fur. The dragon did not roar at him, nor lunge at him, nor fill its lungs and breathe upon him, nor pull a chair up and encourage him to make himself at home. The creature watched him approach, its expression entirely inscrutable, and Patches realized with a sinking heart that he had no way of knowing whether or not it intended to squish him like the bug that he was.
"Hello!" he said, cheerfully.
The ancient dragon did not return his greeting.
Patches cleared his throat, and went on: "Was passing through the area, just minding my own business. Got a bit of news, though, you might like to hear. Did you know that the flames are about to be linked?"
Buggered if Patches understood what that meant. From its impassive countenance, he had his doubts that the dragon understood, either. Nevertheless, Quelana had made him repeat it to her five times, and that was what he came down here to say.
Patches gave an exaggerated shrug; the dragon was a very large beast, and Patches just decided that it was conducive to good communications to exaggerate his bodily mannerisms. "Yeah," he said. "The First Flame is about to be renewed. Just thought you'd like to know! Knowledge is power, and all that."
At that moment, Patches realized that he was hopping nervously from one foot to the next – dancing a jig before an enormous, aeons-old dragon. He instantly snapped himself back into a confident stance.
"So, how does that make you feel, chum?" According to the rotten pyromancer that had enslaved him, the news would make the dragon very unhappy indeed. That's right, I've been sent deep into the bowels of the earth to deliver bad news to a dragon. "Does that make you happy?"
The dragon remained determinately uninterested. Patches abruptly realized that he was hiding anxiously behind his shield, and reminded himself to feign fearlessness.
Patches continued: "The Age of Fire will continue for another thousand years." He didn't know what that meant, either. "Sound good to you? Looking forward to another thousand years of sunlight? Who doesn't like sunlight! Of course, if you don't like sunlight, you've always got your lake here. Yeah! Who wouldn't like to spend another millennium in this place? Lovely ambience! Very peaceful! No wonder you're so easy-going, so much time alone to your thoughts!"
()()()()()()()()()
Quelana had known of the presence of the Everlasting Dragon in Ash Lake for a very long time.
At her most wretched nadirs, she had considered presenting herself to the creature. She knew that it would take one glance at her, and tear her limb from limb. It needed only look at her eyes. Her mother's eyes. The eyes of the Witch of Izalith, the woman that had slain so many of its brethren, and expelled its beloved Darkness.
Had Quelana ever succumbed to suicide, it would have been at the hands of one of the last surviving members of a race that her family had almost exterminated. She was not so selfish that she would sink a knife into her heart in some remote, lonely corner. Better that she kill herself in such a way that it brought a fleeting moment of joy to another.
For the first time in a thousand years, however, the Everlasting Dragon had real power over Quelana. For the first time in a millennium, the Everlasting Dragon could do more than rend her flesh, or cook her to cinders; it could cause her grief. And all it had to do was withhold a fragment of knowledge from her, keep a secret just out of her reach.
Quelana suspected that Kingseeker Frampt was misleading her student. She feared that the Primordial Serpent did not entirely have Nemeta's best interests at heart.
Oh, but how to find proof?
What did Quelana of Izalith know of Kingseeker Frampt? She had encountered him on a few occasions, though that had been over a thousand years ago. Her mother was an ally of Gwyn, and Frampt was the Lord of Cinder's advisor and confidante, so it was to be expected that their paths would cross, once or twice. Quelana remembered Frampt as a pompous, pedantic old bore...but was he also a liar? A deceiver?
Quelana conceded that, at his heart, Frampt was possibly a fundamentally good soul...but what if the 'good' that he believed in was a greater good, the sort of 'good' that came before the well-being of individuals? Was Frampt willing to sacrifice Nemeta to some abstract ideal?
As the Chosen Undead, Nemeta had been charged with re-kindling the First Flame, but how did the First Flame work? Goodness knows, Quelana's mother tried to find out, and see what it brought her...
Gwyn vanished when he set out to rekindle the flame. What became of him? He marched into the deep with his retinue, and was never seen again? Why?
Quelana rathered the universe go dark than anything unpleasant happen to her pupil. The silly little chit had her head filled with fanciful little visions – that blasted Primordial Serpent put many of them there! - and she was convinced that she was going to replace Gwyn, and rule over the world for a thousand years. Queen of Sunlight, indeed...
Quelana had come to a decision: If she could satisfy herself that the Kingseeker was manipulating her pupil, she would forbid Nemeta from linking the flames.
I'll bind the stupid girl in chains, if need be.
()()()()()()()()()
The dragon's gaze remained steadily upon him, and Patches assumed that the creature was at that moment probably wondering how far it could toss him across the surface of the lake.
"Great news, eh? I tell you, it really puts my mind at ease, knowing the sun is going to be sailing across the sky for the foreseeable future. Oh, that lovely, warm, bright, shiny sun! I'm so grateful that the Age of Dark has been postponed yet again! And you?"
"You're sending me to antagonize a gigantic, fire-breathing lizard!" Patches had wailed. "Can't you just burn me to a crisp, now, and spare me the walk?"
"Hush, child," Quelana had replied. "When you enrage the beast, it will be less careful with its secrets."
"I heard the news from a fellow called Kingseeker Frampt," said Patches. Never heard of him. "Yeah. He told me this 'Chosen Undead' had come along, and that he was going to replace Gwyn, and take his place as the new Lord of Sunlight! Cor, I tell you, if I ever meet that bloke, I'll shake his hand!"
Somehow, the dragon restrained its boundless fury still. Perhaps it enjoyed being insulted...
Patches idly traced a pattern in the sand with the toe of his boot. "You're quite old. Did you ever meet Gwyn?"
The Dragon's voice did not come from its ancient lungs. No breath was pushed through its stony, dust-smothered throat. When the dragon spoke, its words reverberated around the landscape, and Patches could swear that the ageless creature's vocalizations came from the trees, and the black depths, and the mists themselves.
WHAT MANNER OF FOOL CAPERS AND GAMBOLS BEFORE US? WHEN THE NEW LORD OF SUNLIGHT COMETH INTO HIS DOMAIN, WILTST THOU TAKETH THY PLACE AS HIS GIBBERING JESTER? OH, MISGUIDED ART THOU! FOR NO COURT SHALL THE NEW SUN OVERSEE. NO THRONE SHALL THE NEW SUN INHERIT.
INDEED, THE USURPER GWYN DID BANISHETH THE DARK – HE AND HIS CONSPIRATORS, THE BEGGAR KING, AND THE WHORE OF IZALITH. INDEED, THE USURPER GWYN DID CONDEMNETH OUR KIND TO A WRETCHED EXISTENCE, TRAPPED IN THIS DETESTED LIGHT. O, BUT SUCH SUFFERING DID HE ENDURE EVERAFTER! SUCH TORMENT DID HE BEAR, IN THE EMBRACE OF HIS ABOMINABLE FLAME! IN SUCH AGONY HAS HE ABIDED, IN THE ROILING HEART OF THE VERY FIRE HE KINDLED, FOR HUNDREDS OF YEARS!
COME FORTH, THEN, THE NEW AGE OF FIRE! LET THE CURSED SUN BLIGHT THE SKIES FOR ANOTHER AEON. THE SUFFERING OF THE USURPER GWYN DID SUSTAIN US FOR A THOUSAND YEARS. THE SUFFERING OF THOU BELOVED CHOSEN UNDEAD SHALL SUSTAIN US A THOUSAND YEARS MORE.
Patches listened politely, smiling and nodding. "Well, I certainly respect a fellow that can see the positives in a situation!" he said.
And then he was on his heels, dashing his way out of the Everlasting Dragon's grotto, tearing along the coast of Ash Lake, racing towards the foot of the Great Hollow, so that he could climb its innards to the relative sanity of Blighttown, and leave this nightmare behind him.
()()()()()()()()()
The insects reached Blighttown before Patches did. They returned to their Mistress, and enacted the conversation that had taken place between a Dragon and a Hyena. Quelana listened, and her breathing quickened, and her blood raced, and she climbed unsteadily to her feet, suddenly filled with a urgent, overpowering need to find her pupil.