Mother Bird

by The Cat was the Mastermind

Malenia was awoken from nightmares and charmed slumber by a nearly-grown daughter, dying from their shared affliction, and a Tarnished who'd followed her. A month and a rebirth ritual later, she is woken again by her daughter in better circumstances, but her mind is disquiet.

She was awoken from shallow sleep, as she now often was, by her daughter's cries.
The woman rose, listening keenly. No sound; naught but the little one's crying. Babies communicated largely by crying, she'd known, but she'd learned in the past month how many kinds of cries they had. This one she recognized well: a huffy, nasal, dry cry, and louder by the moment. The baby cried like this whenever—well, whenever she was uncomfortable. A nappy that needed changing, the room was too cool or the blankets too warm, too much noise or fuss, or she was tired and wanted a nap…
"They're fussy at this stage," the nurse had said, cooing at her charge. "Worry not about spoiling her, m'lady. Little bairns need to be held."
That was just the problem. She was deathly afraid of holding her daughter. Even using her prosthetic arm, gleaming Unalloyed Gold, even with her daughter's miraculously robust health, the old dread lingered, given new and terrible form.
What if by holding her she reinfected her with the Scarlet Rot? What if it was already in her blood, rooted, growing insidiously slowly, to avoid the healers' notice?
In truth, the urge to run, to try to save this somehow-alive child by putting herself as far away as was possible (and as far away from everyone as was possible, some hidden cave in the snowfields or even in the mountaintops further up, where she couldn't sicken another soul with her curse) was still strong. She might have, but for knowing how she'd failed her daughter already.
She failed from the start; how fitting, given that her gravest sin and most egregious failure conceived her daughters. Of course, she failed no less than four girls permanently, naught but withering flowers now. Of course, merely by having them, she'd damned them.
There was only this little one. The strongest, or perhaps the luckiest, who did not fall under the Rot's violent sway. The brave, determined one, the one that the Tarnished wanderer had called, Millicent.
What was Malenia to do, when her daughter had been born, grown, died, and been born anew by a Great Rune, and she had only known her mother's care for a few agonizing days? She feared too, abandoning her daughter once more. Feared becoming her own mother in part, who held Malenia distantly and carefully, as though she was too brittle for contact, from the moment it was learned that she had the Scarlet Rot within her. What parent had Millicent, but some Rot pest disguised as an old man who had plotted her death and ascension? Hadn't this unexpected child endured enough?
Millicent was the product of a calamity, borne of the Scarlet Rot's bloom. But she was ultimately a victim of Malenia's weakness, as so many in Caelid were. She was no Kindred of Rot, much as they'd tried to fashion her into their image, into their divine and rotting princess.
She was a child. Malenia's child, not the Rot's.
She quieted her terrors once more, reciting the facts to herself as mantras. She is free of the curse; she is born anew; my Great Rune protects her; Aunt Rennala's rune and magic protects her; the healers' magic protects her.
Malenia crossed her chamber, dipping a finger beneath her nightgown collar to make sure the Unalloyed Gold needles in her breast were still in place. To be doubly sure.
As soon as she had returned with Millicent, she'd ordered the crib for her daughter made and made finely. Wood split from the healthy side of the Haligtree, veined with Unalloyed Gold, was carved to make the frame. Their strongest masters of Miquella's incantations set the protections into its engravings. The softest cotton made the warp and weft of her bed. Dame Loretta, showing one of her many hidden talents, was embroidering a little blanket with swallows in flight, to be finished when the babe could safely sleep with objects in her crib.
In the finest and most protected crib in the Haligtree, Millicent cried. No baby was beautiful when crying, the daughter of a demigoddess no exception. Her face was red and already swollen, wrinkled with outrage. She cried a touch harder when Malenia came into view, as if prodding her to hurry.
By the estimate of the healer they consulted, when Malenia returned to the Haligtree with a healthy baby girl instead of a dying young woman, she was about three months old. One month has passed now, and the change was remarkable. From a tiny bundle that slept whenever she wasn't eating, the baby now stayed awake more often, alertness in her golden eyes. She reached for any object nearby, doubly so if it was shiny or made noise, though she seemed to like loose locks of hair best. She watched the faces around her, especially Malenia's. She smiled and gurgled often, especially at Malenia.
She'd started keeping a journal mainly to monitor her daughter's health and keep keen watch for any symptoms, but now its pages were fast filling with whatever thing Millicent had done that day that seemed to be new or astounding.
And many days there was something new: a new noise, a new interest in this or that thing, a look into her eyes as she lay in Malenia's metal-and-flesh arms, an expression, an uncoordinated motion of her limbs that she had not tried before. And everything astounded Malenia. How could it not? Who, but parents, knew this swift growth and its fascinating progress, these first glints of potential and personhood? The future lay before her, known and unknown, promising and new.
What a fierce look her daughter already had, gold eyes piercing. What strong lungs and a strong heart, to create such a noisy cry and bright flush on her round face. What a fast-growing mind and voice, to communicate to Malenia what she wanted without words.
Malenia scooped up the infant form of her daughter, holding her, as she always did, carefully as she could. She swallowed her fear and reminded herself of the protections sewn into her clothes, before holding her daughter to her breast. She was not hot, nor did she need to be changed, so Malenia held her.
She walked the circumference of the room, humming St. Trina's Lullaby. She counted the minutes by the verses.
By the fifth, Millicent had stopped crying in earnest, only fussing as if complaining of it all. What a wretched thing, what woke me and to cry so long too, she seemed to grumble. Malenia wondered and feared it was nightmares. Terrible nightmares were an infamous symptom of the Scarlet Rot. Malenia herself could barely sleep without incantations to hold them at bay. In this the exhaustion of parenthood was a twisted relief; she now rarely slept deeply enough to dream at all.
Rot nightmares are impossibly persistent, Malenia reminded herself as she rocked Millicent, and she often wakes from hunger, or discomfort. There's no evidence that it's the Rot. Malenia checked the water clock again. There was an hour yet until Millicent was usually fed, but perhaps she was already hungry. She took them to the pantry.
Millicent grasped a lock of Malenia's hair, and tugged. Malenia huffed, bemused. "I wonder if you will ever take interest in a toy, when you are so fascinated by others' hair."
Millicent made a sort of humming, gurgling noise. At least she didn't put hair in her mouth.
Malenia set the milk from the icebox to warm over the room's hearth. Millicent yawned, and Malenia idly brought up a hand to rub her head. Her hair was growing in the flaming red shade they'd both inherited from Radagon, but curly, rather like Malenia. If Malenia looked closely, she could see a hint of Millicent as she'd first seen her as a young woman and was determined to see her again: a pointed chin, deep-set eyes, a proud and low brow. She looked much as Malenia had in youth, but not exactly; the shape of their eyes and nose differed, Malenia's features more sharply drawn and severe. It was a glad thought that Millicent would look distinct, her own person.
The girl's first words to Malenia still haunted her, piercing her as a dagger plunged deep despite their youthfully earnest goodwill, the quiet of her voice loud from holding in pain: "I am here to fulfill my purpose. To return what was lost."
The Tarnished had had to lunge to stop Millicent from pulling out the Unalloyed Needle. It was nearly too fast for Malenia's sleep- and Rot-fogged mind to grasp. But her eyes met Millicent's, and she understood from that grit jaw what she intended. Malenia's strength, her truest gift, her only one, had been enough to hold Millicient back, then hold her as the healers replaced the broken needle only to declare there was naught left to do and but days left for the girl, then to carry Millicient swiftly enough, with the Tarnished's aid through the opened sites of Grace, to Raya Lucaria.
The greatest work was done by others: the Tarnished watching over Millicent and protecting her on her journey all the way to Malenia, the healers who found the damage in the Needle and the eerie Rot-smelling substance holding it together, Millicent's Tarnished friend again giving counsel on Queen Rennala's ritual of rebirth and opening the way, Queen Rennala who performed the ritual and wove protections over them. And Miquella, her brilliant, wonderful brother, who rescued them both, even absent, with the carved needles that smothered the Rot.
Malenia had carried Millicent, kept her as safe and comfortable as was possible. That had always been her role. Her talent.
It didn't feel like enough. And as a protector, she was lacking.
The slowly-rotting Haligtree, the void where Miquella had been, Millicent's small noises of pain then and her cries now, even the rotting of Caelid—all were proof of it.
Little culver, why hold thyself away from me? Aunt Rennala had asked as they waited for the ritual's finish. As dazed and drifting as her manner now was, lost in her own mind and imaginings to escape the blows and betrayals she'd been dealt, Rennala's tone was clear in her hurt, her knowing concern.
I will hurt thee; my curse will spread, had been Malenia's reply, across the library from her fragile aunt and far more fragile daughter.
Rennala had simply clucked her tongue without any harshness, just as she had always done, and said, Thou give thyself far too little faith. Have dear Miquella's needles ever truly failed? Come now, and give the foul Rot no fear; it deserves no more of you.
Malenia still had not allowed Rennala to hold her, but she moved closer all the same. Somehow, her heart eased, in the face of her aunt's unwavering love, undaunted as ever by the facts of Malenia's birth. Malenia had asked, desperately, What shall I do for her? How can I protect her?
Clothe and arm the little one with thy love, dear Malenia, said Rennala, quiet and sure as a river flowing. Be as thou art: a pillar and a wellspring for young Millicent to rest at. She has her mother's strength already. Now thee must ensure she may sustain it.
It did not escape Malenia, that her own resources of maternal support were inconstant. She never would've asked her own mother for advice, had she even been there. As a child she went to her older siblings, the doting finger readers who looked after them, and her aunt. What memories Malenia had that were tinged with a maternal warmth were all from visits to her aunt with her half-siblings or when the youngest demigods in Leyndell were left under the crones' care, which was fairly often.
Malenia would not have survived the Rot long enough to meet her mentor or the passion and meditation of the art of the sword, or for Miquella to finish his creation of Unalloyed Gold and incantations to forestall the disease, without knowing her aunt's steady affection or her nurses' stubborn adoration. She understood. Now she must be someone her daughter could always turn to. She must be the voice, warm with affection and unwavering with love, that counteracted the Rot's insidious whispers. She must be the cracked door, always open for when it became too much to deal with alone. She must be the steady fingers taming unruly red hair and brushing dirt off skirts, never hesitating to reach for a girl who must deny herself others' touch to avoid hurting them. She had to be all Miquella, Godwyn, her other siblings, her aunt, her nurses, and her teacher had been to her.
So Malenia went again and again, to conquer her fear to hold.
Malenia had only been able to hold Millicent but at the bitter end in her first life, but Millicent would never not know the protective warmth of her mother's arms in this life. Here, here she was safe. She was small and easy to shield and hide in Malenia's arms, light yet weighty somehow. The fear tried to poison her joy, but it could not.
It was not a small joy. Millicent's weight was like a keystone, like the weight of armor, but tender and soft. So very alive in her little movements. She was a perfect weight for Malenia's arms, once she learned how to hold a baby. When she grew into a girl, Malenia would have to learn how to carry a girl; she got the hardest part first actually, she thought. She had no practice to draw upon when she first picked up her dying daughter, an unwieldy thing with long limbs and flesh so tender and sickly it split at any wrong movement. But she had learned how to hold Millicent safely then. She would learn now. It would never be hard to carry Millicent again.
So long as she leashed the Rot and fear alike.
I am here to return what you lost at Caelid, Millicent had spoken before her voice failed her.
"…'twas not true then, and it is not now. Caelid was my own failure. I will never regain my pride there, nor should I." Malenia said to Millicent. In the chambers, there were no echoes; the words sunk into the wood of the Haligtree and left the two in quiet. "I will have to rebuild myself, of more than Unalloyed Gold. To never bloom again." She looked into the babe's gold eyes. "My duty is to you, and not the other way around. I need you to live, to be well. That is all I will ever ask of you." The urge to press Millicent close to her breast was there, but fear stiffened her arms.
Her daughter looked back her with round, trusting eyes. The urge swelled and pressed against her ribs, and this time she heeded it. She hoped Millicent could not hear her racing heart. "I will battle the Rot God itself," Malenia promised, her chest tight with the desire to hold her daughter without fear. "I will cure myself. I will hold the line forever. Because of you, Millicent. For you. My dear daughter. No more tears, now. Your mother is here, and she will always be here, for you. My brave little bird."
Millicent was calm now, though her face was still reddened and swollen. With a soft cloth and warm water from the basin, Malenia washed her face. Millicent murmured, and calmed further. She looked at Malenia with sleepy golden eyes.
"A bit to eat, little bird, and then back to bed," said Malenia.
She tested the warmth of the milk before giving it to Millicent, who latched eagerly. She had a big appetite. It was good. A little bairn should have a big appetite.
Of course, that was well-matched with a vast need for sleep, and Millicent nearly dozed off in the middle of feeding. Malenia bounced her. "A bit more, Millicent, then sleep."
Millicent protested a bit at the movement, scrunching her face. A stubborn one, set on what she wanted. Malenia smiled. Perhaps it was too early to say, but Malenia thought she saw it. As a mother, shouldn't she know? And she was quite sure of where Millicent got it from.
Laying a towel over her shoulder and Millicent against it, she considered her daughter. It would be quite a few months yet before she could sleep with a blanket, and months more before her babble would attempt to be speech. Walking was years from now, practice with a wooden blade years beyond that. Would Millicent have a head start of sorts, from having grown up once? Or would she grow and learn at the same pace as any child?
Millicent abruptly spat up a decent bit of the milk, not all of it on the towel. Malenia did not even twitch at it anymore. She simply rubbed the infant's back until it was up, and then wiped up the mess. When she checked, it wasn't very much. "Full?"
Millicent hummed sleepily. Malenia retrieved the cloth again, this time to wipe her mouth. Millicent had dozed off when she was done.
Malenia sat upon her bed and watched her contented face. She could place her in the crib without waking her now, but she wished to sit a while instead. To hold her sleeping daughter.