Hello everyone. I apologize for the greatly long wait on this chapter. I'm going to college, and this semester has been excessively heavy. I've become much busier since publishing chapter 3. This chapter has also been very hard to write; it took a lot of thinking to really make the pacing work. I hope the wait was worth it!
A small update, you might notice the chapters are named now! I was originally planning this fanfic to be a one-shot, but since it's becoming a full-length story, I decided naming the chapters would give it a better feel.
I decided to split up this chapter into 2 parts, to prevent this one from becoming too long. I know exactly where I want to go with chapter 5; hopefully it shouldn't take me as long to write.
"Milady, please wake up. Please."
Her eyes fluttered open to the same darkness they'd known since she was a girl. Her whole body burned with scarlet flame. It oozed from her pores, coating her skin and dripping from her limbs. She couldn't move. It felt as if her body had been hijacked. Her shallow, panted breaths were not her own. Her blind eyes flicked back and forth against her control.
"I know you're still there, Milady." The woman's voice was dry, and thick, and it warbled as she spoke. "You have to be. Please wake up."
"… The bloom," she groaned, so softly that even she almost couldn't hear it. "The bloom has flowered once more."
"We escaped the bloom, Milady!" the voice implored. "We are home. His Majesty your brother awaits. There is no more rot."
Brother? She… she had a brother?
"Th-There…" Her breaths, tight and choking, quickened. "There must be. I brought forth the Scarlet Aeonia. Such is my purpose."
"No!" The woman's voice rose. The desperation that twisted her throat made something in her stir. "Please, Milady, remember who you are."
Her senses were still wreathed with grog and pain, but she registered the feeling of two armored hands placing themselves upon her shoulders.
"You are Malenia," the voice implored, trembling. "Blade of Miquella."
Her blind eyes blinked rapidly. Her fingers, heavy and paralyzed, began to twitch to life.
"I-I…" she exhaled. "I…"
"Please, say it. I am Malenia. Blade of Miquella. I am Malenia. Blade of Miquella. I am…"
Malenia?
Tentacles of rot lashed out at the thought of such a name. They whipped and batted at the word, slicing its form until it was ribbons. She winced at the sensation of having her thoughts flogged. It hurt. It hurt to think.
"Milady! Stay with me!"
Her head lolled to the side. The hands on her shoulders shook her.
"Answer me, dammit!" The woman was shouting now. "I will NOT fail you! Do you hear me? Wake up, Malenia! Wake up!"
There was that name again. Whips of decay slashed at it the same as before, but as she watched the word disassemble, the shreds that remained did not dissolve. And so, through the suffocating, paralyzing scarlet pain, she picked them up and pieced them back together.
"M-M… Malenia?" she mumbled.
There was a gasp. The hands on her shoulders squeezed.
"Milady?" The woman's shout had died to a subdued murmur. "A-Are you there?"
"… M… Malenia… Malenia… I…"
She drew in a slow, labored breath, and held it for a long, heavy moment. When her chest finally released it, it left her lungs as a string of words.
"I… am Malenia," she murmured. "Blade… of Miquella."
For a few seconds, the hands on her shoulders clasped her so tightly that it began to hurt. Then, with a shuffling of armor, they fell away.
"Yes," Finlay whispered. "Yes, you are."
Malenia awoke unceremoniously. The first sensation that flooded her mind was her throbbing head and the dull, clenching ache that wracked her whole body, stemming from the sharp locus that pinpricked her sternum. The second was the rush of panic that jump-started her groggy mind at the recollection of what had just happened—the palace, Mogh, Miquella, the mysterious girl the Tarnished called Melina…
The third was the overpowering stench that surrounded her on all sides.
She'd wound up on her severed lopside since she'd fallen unconscious; she rolled onto her belly with a stiff, sluggish movement that was accompanied by a low groan. She tried to plant her hand on the floor beneath her—only to remember that she no longer had it, nor her sword. Gritting her teeth, Malenia shuffled awkwardly into getting her one remaining arm beneath her, propping herself up with a soft, shaky huff, the effort eliciting another wave of pain throughout her body. Her jaw clenched as she hauled herself to her knees and looked around. Not that she could see, but panning her sense of sound and smell around her surroundings was better than nothing.
Her tongue retched with the taste that wafted into the back of her throat through her nostrils. Her stomach roiled. The smell around her was clear as day now. It was… rot. There was no mistaking it. It was all around her, but not to the same degree as it was at the Haligtree. No, this was much, much worse.
It wasn't her sense of smell that told her that. No, as soon as she realized the odor of decay; heard the wind blow through sparse, dry grass; the distant shuffle of some pathetic manner of creature; the sun beating down on her skin, the pleasant warmth thickened and choked by the heat of rot—she knew exactly where she was.
The one place she dreaded the most. The place she'd spent centuries hiding from. Caelid. Her scarlet kingdom.
Her breath caught in her throat. Even as her whole body hitched and tightened at the realization, her stomach still found room to sink. The horror that clasped her gut like thorny spires of death-blight only intensified the feeling of nausea as the scent of scarlet rot thickened in her throat.
"No…" she whispered. Her voice shook. "N-No, why… why am I here?"
For several moments, she simply lay there, half-straightly, golden legs gnarled over each other, attempting to catch her breath that oscillated through her chest in ragged huffs, labored by a mixture of pain, exhaustion… and mounting abhorrence.
She was… she was back. The scarlet queen had—
Malenia felt herself lock up. Alongside the horror of her predicament, a feeling of hard, leaden dread weighed down her stomach.
The scarlet queen… Malenia rolled onto her back and sat up, ignoring how her whole body clenched with that constricting ache. With her one remaining hand, she reached for her breast and found the needle, brushing her fingers along it frenetically. It was still there, but it was shaking more violently than even she; the severed goddess could feel it rapidly twitching within her flesh, like a concentrated seizure just above her solar plexus.
It was still there. But it was struggling. And in the back of her mind, Malenia could feel a familiar disquiet beginning to form.
She could almost hear it, whispering inside her head.
The Scarlet Queen has returned…
Repulsion gripped her. "No!" Malenia shouted. "I am no one's queen but my own! I am no one's vessel! I-I… I am…"
She couldn't find the words. Her jaw worked, her voice rasped, but nothing articulate left her lips. Her heart pounded. Her trembling breaths quickened. The hissing voice in her head spoke up again, more loudly this time.
You know what you are. What you always have been. You are the usherer of a new age. You are the Goddess of Rot. You are the Scarlet Queen.
"I-I am… I am…"
She drew a long, slow breath, batting away the tendrils that tried to snake its way up into her thoughts.
"I am Malenia," she finally stammered out. "Blade of Miquella. And I…"
Her words died in her throat. Not because she had forgotten them, but because their meaning had died—she spoke falsehoods. Shaking her head, Malenia found her feet and slowly creaked her way upright once more.
"And I must find my way home," she finally said.
Home. She needed to find the path home. From there she could relocate that waygate and return to Mohg's underground hideaway.
Malenia forced her breaths, staggered like a terrace, to slow. She had something to focus on. All that was left was to focus on it.
She took a step forward. The grass, dry and uncomfortably warm, crunched beneath her feet. Though there were no nerves in her prosthetic soles, she could feel the pressure of the ground change as the blades split open under her step and… liquefied. Some kind of thick fluid oozed freely from the broken stems of grass, some of it coating her feet and the rest seeping into the damp peat beneath her.
The grass was rotted. The water it drank was rotted. This whole place was rotted.
Malenia's toes curled repulsively as she forced her legs to carry her forwards. Vessel of rot though she may have been, the loathsome decay that her contaminated blood brought always instilled in her soul such sick antipathy. Her fist clenched and unclenched anxiously; her nails dug irritably into her palm. Shaking her head at the sensation, she brought her hand up to her opposite shoulder and squeezed. Her grasp closed around the lip of the hollow socket where her prosthesis would go, the metal warm and crusted with freshly-dried blood underneath her fingers.
She had to stay focused. She had to get out of here.
… But which way was out?
Malenia realized then and there just how lost she was. She had been to Caelid all of one time, hundreds of years ago, on a march to war, and since then the land had… changed. It was a scarlet-bloated, contorted, broken shell of its former self. This place was completely unrecognizable. Which way was the way forward?
Malenia's panting quickened. She had to think. Focus. Her eyes closed behind their scarring, forcing open the door to her mind's eye and trying to dredge up any memories of Caelid. Colors of green, lush and lively, coalesced in the red-tinged mist of her mind. Crimson tendrils snaked around the edge of the scene, trying to obscure the image.
Look not at what once was, the rot beckoned, its voice just as slimy as the scarlet cirri that pulled and tugged at the fringes of her mind's eye. Look only at what is now. The Scarlet Queen must fulfill her duty.
"I am NOT your queen!" Malenia growled through gritted teeth, drawing another long, choppy breath. "I-I am Malenia. Blade of Miquella."
Her jaw clenched. "I am Malenia. Blade of Miquella," she said again. "I am Malenia. Blade of Miquella."
Malenia drifted awake to the sound of heavy, arduous footsteps. Finlay clasped her arms, both true and prosthetic, to her armored chest, keeping her leader strapped firmly to her back as she trudged along. Her gait was slow and clumsy, debilitated by the weight of the demigoddess lying barely conscious atop her back.
The waking world slowly crept in. Malenia registered the sound of fighting. Men stampeding, yelling, roaring… and screaming. Screaming as the rot swept through the plains. Screaming as it contaminated the ground beneath their feet. Screaming as it clawed its way into their veins, setting their very blood boiling.
Malenia flinched, shying away from the chaos of the bloom. Like a frightened child, she turned and buried her head into the nape of Finlay's neck.
"What have I done?" she whimpered to the knight. "What have I done, Finlay?"
The Cleanrot warrior did not reply, pressing on silently. Malenia shivered atop her back, her body ravaged from within by a storm of exhaustion, rot… and sheer, overwhelming horror.
Just as quickly as she had awoken, however, she slipped back into slumber, her tired body keening for the embrace of the warm scarlet bud she'd left behind. As she slumped against Finlay's armor-clad back, the knight crested a hill and came upon a highway.
A… A highway. Her army had marched along a highway. And to the east of that highway lay a swamp.
Malenia's next step generated a soft splash. A dense liquid sprayed out over her calf as her foot plunged into a mud-lined mire. With a start, Malenia realized that she was standing on some kind of shoreline—but not just any shoreline.
The swamp! The glimmer of recognition made her gasp. She was standing on the shore of the swamp. She knew where she was! The swamp was to the west of the highway that led into—and out of—Caelid.
But which direction was west? Malenia's swell of surety faltered. Her sense of cardinality was hopelessly absent in a land as unfamiliar as this. For the first time in a long, long while, Malenia found herself truly cursing her sightlessness.
Malenia wandered further into the waters of the swamp. Before long, the sickly mire was around her ankles. As she walked, a sensation began to prick at her mind from the outside. A pull, a beckoning, from the heart of the swamp. It felt not unlike the connection, the empathic link Malenia had formed with her soldiers at the Haligtree—or, rather, she reflected with a purse of her lips, their rot. But this one felt different. It was much more powerful, much more in-tune with the disease, not unlike the auras of the wretched Kindred that infested her home… and yet, there was that feeling of resolution, of duty, that her dear soldiers carried even in their ravaged states.
Unsure of what else to do, and against her better judgment, Malenia trudged towards the signal. The further she moved into the swamp, the more unsteady the ground became. Hot geysers of rot rumbled, then burst at the surface, sending showers of boiling scarlet water spraying. They seemed almost to give Malenia a wide berth, as if the pond itself knew that its goddess waded through its waters.
The signal was no doubt strengthening. But as Malenia approached, she realized it was not just one telepathic beacon that was reaching out to her—it was several, scattered thinly around the innermost landmass of the swamp. All of them were coated thickly with horrendous late-stage rot, and yet all stood proud. Proud and… hopeful.
Suddenly, the sound of slow, pacing footsteps could be heard over the din of erupting geysers. Somewhere ahead of her, someone was nearing—she felt them in her mind just as clearly as she heard them, and they were only a few meters to her right. She clutched her blood-encrusted shoulder socket, bracing herself for whatever poor rot-infested person was about to stand before her. The footsteps, and the aura, approached obliquely, as if rounding a corner—and then stopped, right in front of her.
The sound of words met her ears amidst the roiling of the swamp.
"Lady Malenia?"
The valkyrie's breath hitched. That voice—she knew that voice, clear as day. Could it be…?
"Orthis?"
The Cleanrot Knight was silent for a long, tense moment, the scarlet-laden air crackling with tension. Then, he took a careful, almost trepidatious step forward.
"I-Is it—really you?" he asked. With the way his aura shifted and pulsated in Malenia's mind, his disbelief was, quite literally, palpable. "Milady, it's been so long… You… you've returned."
He took another step forward. This time, Malenia did so in kind.
"Orthis—Knight Commander…" she said again, her voice subdued. "You… stayed behind?"
"Yes, Milady," he affirmed. His voice—it was dry as sandpaper, yet at the same time, seemed to almost gurgle with the rot that flowed through his flesh. "Many of us did. To fight, so that Leftenant Finlay may bring you home."
Malenia licked her bone-dry lips. "Finlay…"
"Lady Malenia," Orthis suddenly went on, interrupting her thoughts. "It… brings me such joy to know you are not only alive, but to see you again—oh, Milady, I… we have missed you. We have missed you so very much."
At hearing those wistful words, Malenia found the barest hint of a smile coming to her lips, in spite of everything that weighed down her mind and body right now. For a brief moment, the voice of rot in the back of her mind quieted.
"I've missed you too, Orthis," she murmured. "Where… where are the others?"
Orthis paused, and in that time, another pulse of pain swept through Malenia's body from the needle. She gritted her teeth as her head started to pound. Crimson appendages appeared at the edges of her masked vision.
Do not deny your calling. To these knights, you were once a simple general. But now you are an empress.
"I am Malenia," she growled under her breath. "Blade of Miquella."
"Those that remain…" Orthis's somber voice jolted her out of her head. "Have largely withered away. They still wander these waters, on an eternal vigil, but I am doubtful that they know why they patrol so proudly. Many have lost their minds. More still have lost their voice, silently upholding their oath to you for… who knows how long."
A low, burbling, mirthless chuckle issued from Orthis's pneumonic throat. "I fear that I will follow suit before long," he remarked, ruefully. "Little by little, the rot takes its hold. 'Tis a miracle I've persisted as perennial as I have, in truth."
Malenia winced. "I'm sorry—" she began.
"But, Lady Malenia, I must ask," he went on. "Elated though I may be to see you—why have you returned? Whatever awaits you in this decaying land?"
Malenia opened her mouth to reply, but the only thing that left her lips was a tight, choking cry. Another wave of searing agony resonated throughout her body from the needle. This time, the pain seized her. Her limbs locked up as the pang swept all the way to her extremities, the surge so great, so horrid, that it shorted out her nerves—but only for a moment; her onset of paralysis was quickly followed by a spasm as her body reflexively tried to wrench back control of itself.
Malenia sank onto one knee and landed in the rancid water with a soft splash. Her hand, previously clinging to her shoulder socket, moved to clutch at her breast. Her cry of pain died into hard, heavy pants that filtered through her teeth.
"Lady Malenia?" Orthis rasped, overtaken by alarm. "What's wrong?"
There was a sloshing of water as he limped towards her, but Malenia shot her hand out, as if pushing him away.
"Don't!" she ordered breathlessly. "Stay back!"
A feeling not unlike a surge of bile welled up in Malenia's throat. She wanted to gag, to hunch over and retch, but she knew nothing was there. No, this feeling was more than familiar. It was a resurgence—a revolt, even, within her own body. The rot that festered within her was fighting tooth and decayed nail to lay claim to her, held back only by the small, pitiful golden needle lodged underneath her breastbone… an overloaded needle that had let slip wisps of the Outer God's influence hours ago.
Behind her mask of scars, those familiar, sickening scarlet tendrils wreathed the edges of her vision. The voice echoed in her ears, faint, yet positively deafening, drowning out even the gurgly cries of shock issuing from the Cleanrot Knight that staggered towards her.
How many times have you bloomed by now? A hundred? A thousand? the voice hissed. Its tone was… jeering. It was mocking her. Mocking her efforts to muffle its sound, to will away its influence. Upon the third bloom, you were meant to become a goddess! A Queen!
Malenia's head pounded. Her hand, previously having raised to wave Orthis back, retracted and slid itself up under the visor of her helm, laying upon her hot temple. Rivulets of sweat had formed and were starting to leak down her face, matting the roots of her flaming hair.
The time for fighting is over, the Rot beckoned. You are more than ready. The fruit you shall bear will feed your kingdom for eons to come. Take the needle out. Bloom once more. Become the flower you were always destined to be.
"I-I am Malenia," she growled. "Blade of… of Miquella."
Though the blood roared in her ears, she picked up faintly the splashing sound of Orthis's footsteps.
"Milady, what is wrong?" he pleaded. An armored hand placed itself upon her shoulder. At once, she jerked away.
"Stay back, I said!" she barked.
At such a hearty command, Orthis jerked backwards, falling silent. Malenia brought her hand back up to her temple, trying to steady her pained, agitated panting.
"Knight Commander Orthis, y-you must run," she muttered.
"What? Run? Milady, you can't be serious."
Malenia's teeth clenched. Her jaw hardened. "I am," she insisted, in a snappish tone that made Orthis take a slight step back. "Get out of here!"
"I… Milady, you ask me to abandon you? I could never—"
Malenia surged up from the earth and launched herself straight at Orthis. The Cleanrot Knight had no chance to react as his leader barrelled into him with astounding force. A grunt left his chest as his back collided roughly with the half-liquid wood of a huge, rotted root.
At once, Malenia's one remaining hand was against his throat, squeezing around the scaled armor of his helm with a grip tight enough to crush. In a violent, malicious act of pure fury, she yanked him off of the wall by his barely-protected neck, only to slam him back into it, eliciting a hoarse cry of pain.
"DO NOT DENY YOUR QUEEN!" she bellowed, slamming him into the root yet again.
Orthis's weapons fell with showers of water to the earth. His hands batted frantically at her arms, trying to issue relinquish of her grasp. "M-Milady!" he stammered.
"I AM THE LADY OF ALL THAT IS SCARLET!" She pulled Orthis away once more, this time raising him up over her head, glaring at him from behind her mask. His legs kicked and flailed as he was held aloft, his hands wrapping around her scarred, rotted wrist and tugging, but he was no match for her strength.
"You seek to resist me?" she bayed. "Petulant grunt!"
Her hand tightened around Orthis's throat. The armor that shielded his trachea from her grasp was beginning to warp under her crushing palm. The sounds of the bubbling swamp were drowned out. The feeling of sickness in her gut was nullified. Even the overwhelming pain had naught but disappeared. All she could sense in this moment was pure, bright, white-hot rage… and the object of her frenzied ire.
But through the hot whirlwind that spurred her grasp to tighten around his throat, a voice just barely grazed her ears, the faintest rasping whisper over the din of her fury.
"M-Malenia…" Orthis choked out in a small, terrified gasp. "Please…"
Malenia… just as quickly as it had come, her livid fervor vanished. The sounds of the swamp rushed in, flooding her blood-rushed ears with noise. The dull ache that wracked her whole body set upon her flesh.
And within an instant that felt like the impact of a speeding carriage, she realized what she was doing.
Her jaw dropped like deadweight. A gasp entered her lungs with almost enough force to drown out the sounds of Orthis's pleas. In an instant, her grip relaxed, and her hand recoiled from its prey. The knight fell into the water like a corpse, coughing and sputtering as if he'd been held under the surface.
Malenia stumbled backwards away from her soldier. Her heart hammered in her chest, a chest that rose and fell in rapid, uncontrolled, panicked breaths. Her head tilted towards Orthis for only a moment before she slowly wrenched her gaze around to stare agape down at her hand. The limb trembled like a leaf in the wind. Gazing in utter disbelief down at it, she slowly clenched it into a hard fist. Blood welled up in her palm as her nails dug furiously into the skin.
"Wh… Wha…" she whispered.
She flicked her unseeing gaze up to Orthis, then back down to her hand. The most disorienting, gut-wrenching, nauseating mortification she'd ever known exploded underneath her flesh and gnarled her innards, twisting them like bramble. The harder she clenched her fist, the looser her jaw hung agape in dumbfounded disbelief.
"N-No," she murmured, in a small voice. "No, I…"
Just then, Malenia really registered the sound of Orthis's feeble coughs. Snapping her gaze up to him, her disoriented horror was quickly supplanted with heightened worry for her soldier.
"Knight Commander!" she exclaimed, reaching her hand towards him. "Orthis, forgive me, I—"
As soon as she leaned forwards, there was an immediate change in the aura she sensed from him. A cold, heart-pounding fear overtook him. An audible gasp issued from his putrefied throat. The loud clinking and shuffling of armor met her ears as the breathless knight scrambled to move away from her.
Dismay pierced Malenia, hot as the tarnished needle. "Orthis," she pleaded, "I'm sorry. That beast you saw—it was not me."
She took a cautious, deliberate step towards him. "Orthis," she repeated. "Orthis, my knight—"
It was then that she realized the landscape in her mind had shifted. The other auras she sensed within the swamp—auras which, she now realized, were more of her Cleanrot Knights—had converged on her location, drawn by the commotion. Malenia straightened, flicking her head around the mire.
She could feel their hearts burst at the sight of her. Tidal waves of disbelief crashed into her own mind from all directions as her knights laid eyes upon their long-lost leader… but only some of them were taken as such. Others barely flickered with recognition. Malenia could feel it. Their minds were barely hanging on by a thread. Others still gazed upon what was happening and fluttered with confusion—or welled up with sadness.
From the edge of the encirclement, she heard one of the knights whisper, in a torn, waterlogged voice: "It's taken her… the scarlet rot has taken our lady."
At once, Malenia's head snapped in the direction of the voice. "No!" she protested, voice hoarse. "N-Nothing has taken me! I am still right here!"
The sound of footsteps, multiple sets—stumbling, splashing through the murky water—approached her. It was the knights whose minds were gone. They approached limply, dragging their withered frames along like zombies.
"The Scarlet Queen…" one droned, in a voice that was less than human.
Malenia nearly stumbled at hearing those words. Her whole body froze. Her own knights… No. They had… given in. Her Cleanrot Knights had become subjugated by the rot. Her brave, loyal warriors, reduced to nothing more than wretched Kindred.
The rotted soldiers closed in on her. Malenia willed her legs to run, but they remained rooted in place. One of them tripped over Orthis's trembling form, landing with a loud splash in the reddened water, right in front of her. Suddenly, Malenia felt his gloved hand brush against her calf.
"The Scarlet Queen… has returned," he chanted. He spoke with a dead tone, sounding more like a hivemind drone than anything else. A nauseating horror surged up in Malenia then. Like flipping a switch, she found her feet… and jerked them away.
"No!" she shrieked, stumbling backwards. She slipped clumsily between the forms of two approaching knights, landing ungracefully into solid, if bemired, peat. The shore of the swamp, opposite to where her trek had begun. She scrambled to her feet, using her one remaining hand to brush aside another, observing knight. Their aura emanated confusion and fear.
"I-I am NOT the Scarlet Queen!" she clamored. "I am—ah!"
She careened to the ground, landing on her knee. Her hand came out and barely stopped her from faceplanting into the mud. Her body was suddenly overcome with that aching pain again, beaming outwards from the trembling needlepoint in her skin.
The whole of her vision was tinged with red. The tendrils that snaked around the edges of her eyesight seemed almost to glow dimly, lit aflame by the agony in her temples.
Give in. Give in. Give in. You are the Scarlet Queen. Look around you! This is your land! Your land, of your make! Rule your kingdom. You are the Scarlet Queen!
An angry shout slipped through clenched teeth. Malenia's fist slammed into the peaty earth.
"Get out of my head!" she snarled. "Get out of my head!"
Gasping with the pain that came from such an effort, she hauled herself to her feet. Her head pounded and pulsated to the beat of her racing heart. She fell against the decayed wood of some large flora, holding herself against it with her arm. She leaned against the slippery support for several seconds, heaving and panting as she silently pleaded for the agony to subside, but as her mind registered the approaching auras of her subjugated knights, she bit down hard and heaved herself forwards, stumbling in the opposite direction. Leaving her soldiers behind. Leaving them watching her, confused and scared and forlorn. The last trace of their leader was her shaking voice, muttering the same phrase over and over again.
"I am Malenia. Blade of Miquella. I am Malenia. Blade of Miquella. I am Malenia. Blade of Miquella."