BLIGHTTOWN
Warping the restored Quelaag had caused the bonfire to hiss and spit Chaos lava. Warping the Lord of Death was a bit more dramatic. The lonely sewer bonfire shrieked and moaned as its fire burned black, and the horrid swamp water that teemed with parasitic life suddenly fell silent. The writhing darkness oozed out of the Occult flame as the skeletons of countless dead formed into a single humanoid mass. The Gravelord lifted his head as if to sniff the air.
"Disgusting. I recognize the state of the region is the fault of Anor Londo, but honestly, do hurry in cleaning this up."
"Of course, your Lordship. As soon as we're able. It's an honor to have you again, sir."
Quelara had come to meet Lex and Nito, while the other two had returned to the palace.
"The honor is mine. I apologize for my briefness at out prior meeting, but I did not wish to steal the limelight at another's wedding."
Lex quirked an eyebrow.
"You knew that was Nito, and you didn't stop Quelaag?"
Quelara violently coughed a bit of lava into a gold-hemmed black handkerchief.
"Mother has been gone for centuries, and I've got one foot in the grave. Quelaag needs to learn to control her temper on her own."
"You've had more than a foot in my domain, treasure-hunter," the Gravelord chuckled. "Well, I wouldn't worry about your impending demise too much. If your sisters can keep the lava from destroying your bones, I'll ensure you survive, so to speak. A reanimated husband and wife – such a novel idea! I can hardly wait!"
Quelara cringed.
"Well, we can speak of that another time. We have more pressing matters to attend."
"Ah, yes. The young master of Dark. Let us see what can be done for the girl."
Lex nodded and led them up the slope and up to the broken bars. Burning glyphs and vines that crackled with flame twisted around the red iron, forming an impenetrable barrier. Lex raised his hand, and they parted to make way. He and Quelara simply stepped through, but Nito was forced to reassemble his massive body and slither through as a serpent of clattering bone before retaking his humanoid form inside. The outer ring of the chamber was dark, lit only by the glow of the still more sealing runes around the edge, but the pit in the center was a field of absolute black darker than even the Tomb.
"You know, kid, that shit who kidnapped me told me that Dark grows stronger if you cram it all in a corner. I got to admit, I can think a lot more clearly in here. But I bet I'd think a lot more clearly if you gave me that delicccccciousssssss glob of hhhhhumanity that you're hhhhholding onto!"
Wraith Beatrice rose from her tiny Abyss, and the wards around it sparked and hissed with the Flame of Life. Vines grew out from the runes and quickly bound the monster as it floated above the void. Her white hollow's eyes glowed out of the shadow as she looked down at them.
"You've got one hell of a monster fetish, kid. Have you made any boner jokes yet?"
"I was saving those for Vamos, actually," Lex said nonchalantly. "Male bonding sort of thing. Also, all the hammer jokes. The hammer is his penis."
Nito stared back at her with his own glowing eyes of Death.
"I'm afraid we've not been introduced. I am the Gravelord, Nito, and you don't seem to have been given a proper burial."
"Well, they're not exactly going to pray for the soul of the one who burned down one of the Dragon School's dormitories with the students and faculty trapped inside," Beatrice hissed. "I was lucky they weren't betting on me biting my tongue."
"So that disaster wasn't an accident. I had wondered, but I can learn little more than what is said during the ceremony. I wonder if you are any better than those Kings you replaced."
"Those shits started it! They deserved to burnburnburnburnburnburnburnburn!"
Beatrice's form began to warp and become more monstrous again, but she shrieked and forced herself to return to normal. She adjusted her hat.
"You know what's said at funerals, right? Witch Agatha."
Nito was silent for a moment, tilting his head in thought.
"Ah. Burned alive. The eulogist swore vengeance. So that was you. I cannot say your actions were any more wrong, but the Dark preys on such vivid emotion. If anything, you may be more dangerous than those Kings ruled by hubris."
"Stuff it in your eyesocket, you bag of bones. You think I don't realize when my sleeves start trying to eat me? It's all I can do to stay normal when every other thing you idiots say pisses me off."
Lex rubbed his chin.
"You know, this might be all right. We just need to get you something to meditate on, to take the edge off. Would you be okay with a mantra? I've got one that works out pretty well for you."
He didn't wait for a response before starting:
Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
The Fo- "…uh…" Dark shall set me free.
"Whatever, kid. I'll try it," Beatrice sighed. "I'm guessing you didn't come here to recite poetry. What do you want from me? You owe me, not the other way around. Where are all those sorceries you promised me?"
"Well, you already got the Dark stuff, obviously, so you just need to head up to the Archives. Looks like Seath himself is hanging around with the sorcerers we've got over there."
"Yeah, I'll just walk back up to the city of the gods. It's not like I'm tied up in its sewers or anything."
Quelara smirked and traced her foot along one of the glyphs.
"Does it sound like I need to add a bit of Chaos to the seal? We let Quelana bind you because she's not tainted like the rest of us. Her flame doesn't feed on humanity. I wonder how long you'd last if I added my own power to the mix."
"You wouldn't dare!"
"You know, we're going to have to deal with Mother soon. Would you like to be food for the Chaos Flame itself?"
Beatrice hissed and spat but mostly kept her human form.
"…set me free…" she whispered. "I'll try again. What do you shitstains want?"
Nito gestured to Lex, who nodded.
"We need your portion of Gwyn's Soul to open the Kiln of the First Flame. We can work out a mobile binding for you, but if you can keep yourself under control, we'll let you go. You're not an immediate danger to the world itself like the Four Kings or Manus. I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt for Alsanna's sake."
"How generous," Beatrice spat. "Lock me up, then offer to set me free."
"You tried to eat me, remember?"
"So did your ladyfriend!"
Lex started to respond, then crossed his arms.
"That-! Okay, fine, that's a good point. Just promise me that you're not going to try and steal Manus' soul. That's the giant lump of humanity."
All of the wraith's mouths ground their teeth.
"Ffffffffine."
Lex sighed.
"All right. Go ahead and let her go, onee-sama. Beatrice, wait for us at the Archives. We'll be heading up there to rob Seath before we head down to the Kiln. Just don't kill anyone up there."
"I already promised you one thing. What do I look like, a genie?"
"Well, I guess this is sort of like a bottle, so-"
"Just let me go, you shit!"
Quelara waved her hand, and the restraining the wraith released their grip. Their flame faded, and one by one, the glyphs went out. Beatrice's monstrous form fully returned for a moment before she forced herself to compact into a human shape again. Unbound, the Dark rushed out of the pit. Without another word, the wraith followed it upward through the vertical shaft and was gone.
"Still probably not the worst decision I've made here," Lex said, shrugging.
"That would be marrying Quelaag," Quelara teased. "We should return at once. With Lord Nito here to help, it's finally time to settle our family matters. I imagine you skipped the nearest Lord Soul deliberately."
"Right…" the prophet said awkwardly. "I didn't exactly know what you wanted to do as far as that went. You're supposed to die guarding the entrance alongside Kirk, so I was kind of assuming you wanted to avoid killing the Bed outright."
"Come along," the witch said, waving. "I'm not so sick that I can't walk and talk." As they headed down the ramp and into the swamp, she continued, "To be honest, we're not sure if that creature is Mother at all. The woman-shaped tree is her body, true, but Chaos is inherently parasitic. I hesitate to believe that even in madness, she would create such an ill-conceived thing as that Firesage."
As they walked, the normally hostile creatures of the swamp shied away from them. Ordinarily, they recognized the Daughters as fellow monsters and did not attack for fear of the witches' strength. Now, they outright retreated as the Lord of Death hobbled through that swamp of twisted life.
"I would echo Quelara's concerns," Nito said thoughtfully. "However, my opinion on the matter is quite transparently to put an end to the thing, Quel or not. Between Chaos and the Dark, I fear the former all the more. A world where the only living things are brute demons is uninteresting. Each death would be a matter of simple violence, and so Death as a whole would be meaningless.
What demon contemplates his own mortality? At least the beasts of the Dark know fear."
"I kind of wonder what Alsanna would be like as a Yellow Lantern."
"I'm sorry, I don't follow. You did mention that name before."
"Just a tangent. Alsanna is the Child of Dark-slash-Daughter of the Abyss that's the Augur of Fear. A Yellow Lantern is a fictional thing that's sort of like a sorcerer – but powered by fear."
"I see. An interesting thought to be sure, but I feel you should be more focused on the fear of meeting your mother-in-law. Ordinary ones give their new sons a hard time. I hate to imagine what the Mother of Demons would do."
Lex smirked.
"She's the wickedest Witch that ever was! I'm living under her curse! Wish I could make her disappear! Or maybe something worse! After she spends an hour or two, I always need a nurse! Mother-in-law is the scariest thing in all of the universe!
Grandma's coming, I can smell the smoke! I'm quaking in my boots, and this ain't no joke! Grandma's coming, I can see the steam! Grandma's the only thing on Earth, can make a dinosaur scream!"
"Oh? Grandma? Are you and Quelaag already expecting?"
The human choked.
"Uh, not…yet… probably. Does an Undead's special sauce even work? Quelaag, uh, seemed to think so, but she's also literally lived under a rock for a few hundred years."
"I wouldn't know. Quelara?"
The witch shrugged.
"I'll check Mother's journals. The condition was very rare before the accident, but if anyone would have known, it would have been her. Given what I've heard from Kirk, I doubt any children conceived from or by Undead in the rest of the world are especially talkative about it."
"Well, that's something to research, I guess. Maybe Seath knows too."
QUELAAG'S DOMAIN
Nito had to hunch over to pass through the entrance tunnel, and here too, the egg-burdened hollows fled from his presence. At the end was the familiar fog wall, but in crossing, they found the associated boss was different. Quelaag was absent from her usual perch at the Bell tower's entrance, and instead Priscilla stood awkwardly in the center of the room. She tugged anxiously at the bottom of her new spider-silk summer dress and hugged at her exposed arms. Admitting that her usual fur coat was a little warm with all the lava around had been a mistake – this was entirely too much exposed skin.
"Oh!" she yelped, straightening her clothing. "Lex, Quelara! Welcome back! And thee, sir!"
Lex covered his mouth so that she wouldn't see him snicker at her embarrassment. Quelara made no effort to hide her grin, and Nito's reaction was impossible to gauge from his featureless skull. She relaxed a little as the three approached. Someone who thought bonewheels were "kind" had no prejudice against a mostly humanoid skeleton.
"Ah! You must be Velka's first. I am the Gravelord, Nito. A pleasure to meet you."
He extended a hand in greeting, but she shrunk away.
"Please. The touch of my skin is dea-"
"My dear, I am Death's very emissary."
He pat her on the head gently, suffering no ill effect. She looked up at him in wonder, then felt the top of her own head.
"I must confess that the fault for your affliction is in some way mine. Had I dealt with that Pinwheel sooner-"
He was cut off by the creaking of his own bones as the half-dragon hugged him to the point of breaking.
"Well, I'll see you around, Papa Nito," Lex said, waving. "I need to go find my father-in-law and ask him uncomfortable questions about cross-species reproduction."