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He was not a father.
He was a King. A God. A perfect being, as he must be, so that his kingdom may thrive under his meticulous watch. Sometimes, the concepts tangled together, as he knew they did for his subjects, but they were divorced enough that he could not claim the title of parent. Certainly, they could not coexist within the path he had wrought for himself, placing the safety of his kingdom above all else. It was not in his name, in what made his new form, in what differed him from the ancient corpse buried on the outskirts of the savage wastelands. It was not in the future he had divined for himself, when the world was small and he lay dying in a grave he had dug for himself, choking on the cocoon in his throat.
...It was not in his past, in the Abyss far below, where millions and millions of broken shells lay lifeless. He had forsaken that thread of fate when he had forsaken them. His regret filled an ocean, filled a rift as wide as it was deep, and yet that would not change the fact that he was not, and never would be a father. He had choked away that possibility when he had submersed his eggs in the Void lapping the dark, dark shores. He had forsaken his role as their parent when the Void swallowed their light, swallowed their voices, swallowed their mind. He had set his fate in stone when he had called them up, cast the spells to cull the weak, and had watched clutch after clutch fall back down to their deaths in the depths below, destroyed for the simple flaw of being alive. For not being hollow.
(The Void Sea writhed, now, and writhed angrily, an instinctive agonized lash of tendrils reaching out to the living like the claws of a creature that feared drowning. The unsettling, sleepy shifts under the surface from his first experiments of the void were no longer gentle.)
He could not be a father, with their blood on his hands. He could not even be considered their sire. He was their creator, and they were animated void constructs wearing the faces of something that could have once been his children, in a world where he could afford to be a little bit kinder.
But that was not a world that he currently lived in, and so it was useless to wish for it to be true. Foolish, even. Gods did not often die of old age, and his kind were not known for coexisting peacefully with each other once the offspring grew old enough to attract followers of their own. It would have ended just as his own childhood had- with them being forced to choose between being chased out of the lands of their birth, to find and conquer a kingdom of their own, or to kill him so they may take his throne and his divinity. It did not matter if they chose to stay as a subordinate, taking no subjects and refusing their own ascension, or if they challenged him to a duel to the death. Either way, one of them would die.
Either way, one of them would suffer.
And that was not accounting for the other children who would be taken by their own wanderlust before they even opened their eyes, losing themselves to the endless beyond before either he or the White Lady could carry them from the nest. It was not often that a wyrm child who wandered alone went back to the valleys and tunnels that they were born, but it was also not so uncommon that he could dismiss the possibility of it occurring. He had no chance of knowing how much of his savage ways lingered in the body he had taken when he decided to be born anew, and he would never be able to risk it anyways, not if he cared for the bugs under his rule.
He had had a choice- his family, or his kingdom. The momentary bliss of two gods, or the upheaval of millions of lives in exchange for a dark stain of unhappiness over the long years of their eternity.
The math was simple. They could not be so selfish. The White Lady had not been happy with it, but she had agreed with him when he had presented her with the facts, when she had felt a hint of his own discontent shining out through their shared soul. This was what they had chosen when they decided to rule as King and Queen instead of dominating as God and Goddess, this was what they had to sacrifice to ensure that Hallownest lasted eternal.
He was the Pale King. He was not a father. He never could be.
And yet.
The sleeping bundle in the corner of the room claimed otherwise.
Not for the first time this night, he found his attention drawn to the cradle resting in the corner. No movement stirred it- not that it could be stirred much, wedged firmly between two hefty stone tablets as it was- but that did not stop him from craning his neck to see if anything disturbed it, if there was any indication of discomfort from the tiny thing sleeping within. Another useless gesture, as the baby bundled up under the blankets was very vocal about everything that irritated them, but he could not seem to stop himself from wasting his time on visually checking, making sure that they were still safe, that they were still breathing. Even when his foresight did not warn him of impending suffocation, he found himself rising up onto his hindmost legs so that he could check to make sure the blankets were not cast over their face, that the dark grey of their eyelids were not flickering with the unease of a bad dream, or with the coming of some ailment that would choke out their cries.
All was well. The child’s round little face rested free of the blankets, a comforting curve of white contrasting against the bright red. One dark hand rested by their head, tiny claws flexing as they slept, but nothing in their dreams seemed to disturb them. No fervent flickering from the scalding light, no whimpers of terror from the beating heart, nor the still dead-sleep of the ones lulled by the Void Sea. Just the usual twitches and squirms of a newborn grub, testing their newfound freedom out of the egg; perfectly normal, according to the centipede down below, and she certainly seemed learned enough for him to trust her. Anything with the awareness to try to block their mind from a god probably had the knowledge necessary to account for what resulted from the breeding of said god to their mortal queen.
The pure black of their carapace seemed to mock him, though, each glance at the void staining them another lance through his heart, a reminder of the burden weighing in his chest. Surprising, for it to manifest on a child born away from the dark pits of the Abyss, but not unrealistic, given its nature. Void corrupted, void reacted, drove itself past barrier and spell to dig into the flesh of the living, dissipated itself into the air to passively be taken in by the lungs of the unwary. It hungered for life, driven by the primordial instinct that dictated all things that once lived, and he had spent many years in its presence, steadily ignoring the way the stains in his claws refused to wash out after every experiment. It was only logical to assume that it had worked itself deep enough into his body to affect the children that resulted from couplings with him. The shock of it should have faded by now.
(Somehow, though, he felt like it never would.)
He tried to focus on the reports spread out on his desk, yet found his attention lacking. It was impossible to sort through mundane building requests with the soft sound of another's breathing echoing through the room, impossible to tally new body counts when one so new was in the room with him, the sensation unfamiliar with his lady wife gone, overseeing the rogue tribe of mantids bickering in her gardens. He would blame Herrah for the prickling unease under his carapace, yet knew he knew it was not her fault- not this time. It was merely a grain of sand at the base of an unstable cliff- all that it needed was a push, and he would be buried alive.
Six new cases in the westbound province, by the fourth major canal leading into the Waterways. Eyewitness reports (other than Lurien) had made special mention of the victim's bodies bleeding gold, before they were fished out of the gully. His Watcher had confirmed it, and had written an extensive report detailing the families affected, their soul signature, and whether or not their families or friends made note of them having strange dreams or false ideas of grandeur when they inevitably went to him for aid.
It was several pages of silk paper long- Lurien had only been emboldened by the new trade with Deepnest, not deterred by the price of its products- and all of it was written in his usual cramped, scratchy handwriting. The Pale King had to force himself not to let out an exasperated sigh at the sight of it; Lurien's letters and reports were interesting enough that they did not deserve his scorn, and he knew that if it weren't for his current predicament, he would be digging into the documents with grim determination. His Watcher was thorough, as much a a magical scientist as he was an artist, and if he could find any more cues to slowing the Infection, then maybe-
A snuffle came from the cradle, and the grain of sand slipped.
He was across the room before he even registered getting up. He was at the cradle by the time he truly realized how quickly he had reacted, peering into the little basket as his tail anxiously swished behind him. His wings, unbidden, fanned up and around his head as if he could shield it away from watching eyes, create a little pocket of the room that was safe and hidden away from any dangers the world could offer. As if he wasn't the most dangerous of them all, as if he was not damned with filicide long before they were anything more than a concept laid out on a table.
(He would not harm them, could not harm them, even without Herrah so near. But he had never dreamed of lowering his eggs into the abyssal ocean when he had first laid himself in the arms of his lover, and his claws and fangs were made to rend flesh much stronger than their own. It would be laughably easy, to kill this child like all of his others. So horribly, laughably easy.)
His hatchling was quite undeterred by the morbid paths their parent's mind wandered down; with little prompting (ah, were they waking? Oh no, oh no he was not prepared for this ), they snuffled again, scrunched up tiny fangs under their bright white mask, and yawned. A chubby fist came up, rubbed clumsily at their eye: with a heart-stopping lurch, he dimmed his own light, worried beyond reason that he had hurt them, but that did not seem to bother them much as it previously did, as they shifted restlessly about with their eyes still closed, aimlessly grasping hands searching for something beyond their reach.
What could they be looking for? The soft, stuffed toys he had seen in the nursery of Deepnest were still too large to comfortably fit in with them, and posed too much of a suffocation hazard for him to risk it. Their blanket was tucked neatly around them, safe and secure. And the walls of the crib offered them shelter, a little nook in the cranny of an already-vast room, made to hold both him and the Lady. They looked comfortable, and yet…
...Could they be looking for him?
The thought sunk into the tangled briar of his thoughts, and lingered- not too long, for his hatchling grew more restless by the moment, as they made another grasping motion at his general direction, punctuated this time by a sharp, stressed squeak. Instinct took over before reason did, a faint memory of the Midwife talking to him of childcare echoing in his head as an answering rumble built in his chest, unbidden, unwanted. It vibrated in his throat, vibrated the tips of his mandibles against each other until his head rang with the buzzing, a soothing thrum made to travel through spans of unyielding rock, and they quieted at the sound of it, their own primal instincts urging them to rest with the knowledge of their father so near.
As long as they knew he was close, it appeared, they would feel safe. They, after all, had no idea of the blood staining his claws, how easily he could reach down and snap their head from their little neck, though the very thought made him want to retch, to peel off his very carapace and drain his soul reserves dry so that he may never harm them the same way he harmed so many of his other children. They had no idea of how far the sins of their sire stretched, not with how young they still were.
...Their father. He was their father.
He tried to quell the bitterness rising in his chest at the thought; it was not the child's fault that they had been born to him, that they were the first grub he had sired with a mind of their own. That was a dilemma of his own making, wrought with his cowardice and his idiotic insistence on attempting to attack a god whose realm so complimented his own. It was not their fault that he had decided to conquer Hallownest, so many centuries ago; it was not their fault that he had thought himself better for making the battle relatively bloodless, rather than ensure the death of his enemy like any other wyrm would. Nor was it their fault that Herrah had been pressed to use him to spawn an heir, with the corners he had pressed her into when he had asked for her life- the circumstances of their creation was never something he blamed them for, even when they were but a kindling spark of potential in the egg.
No, these flaws were all his own.
Indeed, the very thought of resenting them for the results of his own incompetence left a bitter taste on the back of his tongue, a painful squeeze in his chest that laboured his breathing and built nausea in his throat. What blame could be laid upon them, when his sins were so expansive that the corpses of his children ran miles deep within the Abyss? What blame could be pressed upon such a small, helpless being, their life a mere spark against the many thousands he had already sunk into the sands? It would be foolish- and beyond selfish- to blame them for his own mistakes, when they stained him so thoroughly that the very sin of being born could not even begin to compare to the millions of scraps of refuge in the Abyss, if such a thing could even be considered a sin at all. Though the mortals of his realm often shirked children born outside of a married couple’s bond, his kind did not play by their rules, and to any wyrm, this little one was a trueborn child of his blood.
His responsibility. His baby.
His fault.
His tongue flicked out between his mandibles, a rising hiss tearing at his chest, but he caught no wyrm-scent in the air but his own. The Pale Gift shifted in their cradle, little claws pawing at their blankets, and his hiss eased to a soft sigh, the animal part of his mind calming at the lack of foreign intruders within his territory. The only threat to the child in the cradle was him, and the thought of his claws sinking into their fragile carapace was revolting enough to threaten him with the possibility of dry-heaving.
No. The bitterness he felt was no fault of their own. Even when their restless cries had prompted their mother to force them together to trick them into a bond, it was not their fault that he had flinched away at the thought of it. Nor was it their fault that he was so distracted, with the weight of the world pressing down on him, their soft little peeps and squeaks pulling him away from his work, drawing soft animal calls from his chest. Not their fault at all.
The hatchling stirred again, face scrunching, and he watched silently as their mouthparts spread open in a big, wide yawn, baring tiny fangs to the cool air of the workshop. One chubby fist came up to rub at their eye, the thin, delicate membrane of their eyelids briefly flickering open before they stuck their arms out and beeped again. Up at him. Just a little noise. Just a little gesture. Akin to a belfly, almost. Easily to ignore if he tried. It was, after all, so inconsequential a noise. So inconsequential a movement.
He was reaching down to pick them up before he had a chance to figure out just what in the worlds he was doing.
The moment he touched them, images burst into his mind, a virtual torrent of thoughts and sensations; this child was nor just tangled in the threads of fate, they were damn near ensnared in a web of it, and the flood of information had him struggling to breathe, struggling to think.
Red cloak red sigils flashing on ash white and wasteland grey. A needle arching through the air, a fierce war-cry, the ring of blades.
A child toddling after her- her?? - mother, asking in a high-pitched voice when she would come back, in the quavering tones of one already on the verge of tears.
The rhythmic beat of Deepnest's war-drums.
The beat of the hunting-drums, of the mourning drums. They had been of little consequence to him in his stay, but now they pulsed through his mind, through his heart, until they sang in his blood and forced his heart to beat to the same tempo. Blood of Wyrm, Child of Beast, Ruler of the Nest.
Silence.
Silence.
A relentless, tearing scream. A needle slicing through darkness, through Soul, severing all in its path. Sharp and lethal and cutting. Danger, danger, danger.
Silence.
And then, from a faraway distance, ringing over stone and sand and the echoes of the mountains, an unfamiliar chime.
Bells.
Daughter of Wyrm, child of Beast, your legacy is one writ in violence. Will you ascend beyond your wild instincts, and tear this kingdom asunder? Will you be consumed by the same hunger that won them their crowns? Or will you show restraint, and let yourself be shackled willingly to the cruel mechanisms of the uncaring gods beyond?
Tread carefully, child. They cannot hear you. They will not listen to your screams.
He tore himself away with a gasp, struggling for breath. It felt as if he had torn his head from raging waters, the future clinging to him, to his sight, to his eyes, clinging and keening out its prophecies. The child squirmed restlessly in his grip- she squirmed restlessly in his grip, his mind supplanted numbly, for that was right, 93.487% or more of the threads had the child choosing to be a girl- her little dark hands kneading at his robes, and, with a shaking hand, he reached up to cradle the back of her head, walking mechanically to his room and to his bed so that he could nest with her and forget the thousands upon thousands of futures he just saw when she was either dead or so, so alone. So that he could forget the thundering river that would soon be her life, whether she lived past childhood or not, a silver stream of fate that glowed brightly and headed into a darkness that he had no desire to try to parse.
By the stars and the lakes and the endless seas of the great world beyond. He had no idea how something so little could have so much death ahead of her. He opened his mouth, to try to say sorry, but there was something thick in his throat and something constricting his chest, and the words were strangled into silence before he could speak them. It was better to take her to his room, where it was safe, where he could hold her now and know that she would not suffer anytime soon, not with him watching and her safe in his embrace.
(Had the eggs born of him and his Lady had that many futures, before he drowned them in the black sea? He had not looked, he could not have looked, he did not want to-)
Silver sheets, glowing through windows left open to the sprawling gardens beyond. Unfocused, unclear, a film drawn over his mind’s eye, thoughts not processing this extra, gifted sense. He blinked, and inhaled, and was met with the sweet, fading remnant of his Lady's scent, layered under the flowers, a memory that made far more sense than the blur of light and dark before him, before everything suddenly snapped into focus and it was all too much. Feeling as if he was moving slowly through icy waters, he swept his way over to the windows and double doors, and closed the curtains against the gentle chill of the night air. He remembered to hold the child's head close to his chest with one arm to protect her sensitive eyes from the brighter motes of soul hanging out in the gardens, little stars in the darkness of the caverns beyond, but she barely reacted, content, for now, with him holding her.
(And for a moment he wished that it was the Hollow Knight's horns he felt beneath his palm instead of her own, and he felt horribly, terribly guilty.)
With the lights dimmed and the curtains settled, the illusion of a cave was enough to calm the animal part of his brain, that irrational dark-seeking thing of endless burrows and cool earth. He blew out a hard breath, inhaling with his mouth open to taste the air again after his lungs were fully emptied, and felt a little better at the sweet tinge of his mate's scent still hanging around the room. This was a safe place, a sacred place- nothing, he knew, would ever get them here. They wouldn’t dare.
And if the White Lady wasn't... busy , she may- may- have even been okay with watching the child while he succumbed to the utterly ridiculous desire to rearrange his entire bed into the rough approximation of a nest. It was better, he supposed, as his two free arms awkwardly mussed it into shape, that she wasn’t here. For she would enable him, and laugh lovingly at him as he hissed and growled at the pillows that simply refused to settle in the way that he desired them to, as she had the first few times he had sensed her with child and fought and failed against the urge to nest.
And then he would have to listen to her wonder, in her sweet, lovely voice, if he would do such a thing when they finally had a clutch that really mattered. If they did. If it was possible. If some day, after it was all over, he was less careful with himself, and she was less mindful of her desires, and her scent would grow thick with that heavy, fruity edge as it had when she had been developing their eggs. Not to lay, for she could not hold them long within her, but letting herself grow out so that she could form them within seed pods, half the hard, glossy shell of wyrm eggs and half the swirling, tough bark of her own kind. Stronger than a wyrm's egg, more guarded, but no less deserving of care, for they needed her careful attention and his watchful eye to ensure that they grew strong enough to survive being separated from her.
How nervous he had been, those first few times. How broody, alternating between pressing himself against her and staring at the white shells half-hidden in the gardens, where she had temporarily rooted herself to develop them further. The soft undergrowth had nearly been a nest in of itself, the creeping vines and bushes ensuring that they were hidden and safe, but he had nested all the same, waking time and time again in his bed to find himself blinking down at soft dried moss between his claws, from where he had shredded the pillows. Blinking awake to find his jaws aching, not because of a great meal or long speeches, but because he had stuffed a quilt into his jaws and attempted to drag it up and over his nest in his sleep, to shelter him as he curled up within it. Slowly waking to find her smiling down at him, brushing along his fangs and jaws, while he coiled around circular pillows and tried to pull them close to his chest and stomach, where he could incubate them, could keep them safe.
He had stopped after the third clutch. By the fourth, he no longer had any contact with the eggs but to guide their creeping vines into the endless stillness of the Void Sea. By the fifth, he had programmed the Kingsmoulds to do the same, so he no longer had to watch as they were taken by the void, his gaze staring dully at some finite point in the distance as he guided them down, down, down to the dark shores.
He had lost track of how many they had had after the sixth. If he really searched inside himself, in the tangled quagmire of his memories, he knew he would find the answer. But he did not wish to know how many children he abandoned to those hostile depths. The first clutch was already far too much.
Would you love them? Could you love them?
(He did not. He could not-)
A soft squeak from the child, another fragile little belfly-sound peeping against his throat, and he dropped down into the nest, hiding away within the pillows. It was messy and rough, both from lack of practice and his creeping exhaustion, but it was enough, and offered him shelter as he pressed his back against the piled plush walls, loosening his grip on the spiderling. It was soft and safe for her, still so little, his tiny little hatchling that was far smaller than any of the vessels birthed from the Abyss. Even on their hatching days, they had been larger, able to move and run about as they pleased, whenever he commanded it. This little one, however, was almost entirely helpless, in a way that clenched in his chest and drew anxiety forth from his heart like water from a stone.
The hatchling snuffled in her sleep, seeking his scent, and settled closer to his chest, her tiny claws latching tight to his carapace. Entirely on instinct, he wound himself around her, tail-tip coming to rest under his chin, the frill on the end of it fanning to protect them both from the dark, velvety openness of the room outside the nest. It was a far cry from the coils he would rest in his wyrm form, but it hardly mattered here, in the safe corners of the kingdom away from the gnashing fangs of other gods. Here, only one curl was enough to wrap himself around his hatchling- a daughter, a daughter, he had a daughter- and guard her against the terrors of the night. Here, one curl was enough to guard her tiny form, to consolidate her entire world into a soft little place far from all harm.
Maybe in the morning after she left, he would feel guilty at stealing her away from Herrah, for they had such precious little time together already. But for now she was here with him, away from her mother, and there was nothing of the world beyond the nest.
What was this strange emotion, clawing its way up out of his chest? Guilt was easily recognizable, a familiar weight chained around his neck, a stone that grew heavier with every life lost to the war. But this new sensation haunted him. Familiar it seemed, caught in flashes with the Hollow Knight, tangled up in the protective burn he felt when he lay awake at night and browsed through the dreams of his civilians, when he listened to their prayers whispering at the forefront of his thoughts. That burning drive to protect, to tear down the skies and bleed the very sun for their chance at freedom, to coil himself around his city and watch them reach their full potential, wherever he could give it. The wyrm urge to destroy, contrasted against the desire to keep them safe.
But gentler. Warmer. Something that coaxed a gentle rumble from his chest, a humming lullaby older than Hallownest, older than the Radiance. Older than the very earth itself, his instincts whispered to him, though he knew such a thing could not possibly be true.
Then again, he had never thought himself capable of such gentleness, either.
The baby squeaked, wriggling in his hold, and immediately he let his coil go loose, cupping her little head so that he might try to assess the situation. She fit neatly in his hand, and could barely lift her head up when he tilted it- tiny, she was far too tiny , and now the cold clutch of anxiety gripped him, along with the near-blinding urge to hunt. She was too small, too delicate, he must feed her, and he couldn’t even touch her fragile little mind to his to figure out what was wrong, for fear of upsetting her. He could feel her heartbeat against his palm, her soft plates doing little to muffle it, and it was both a reassurance and a terror. A hatchmate blind with hunger could tear through her soft flesh without a second thought. She was born too little, too early, too weak. Just like he had been, but he had been strong enough to hunt even fresh out of the egg, he had been strong enough to kill, he hadn’t been this little weak blind thing that squeaked and wailed for reassurance, he must feed her so that she could grow stronger and larger, large enough to endure the wastes beyond the nest, strong enough to hunt and and to outlast…
Outlast...him?
What had come over him?
The little one squeaked again, and all thought deserted him, his concerns fleeing from his mind as his attention returned to her. Upon a second examination, she didn’t seem to be distressed, but he could spot the thin veil of her eyelids drawn tight over the dark expanse of her eyes. Atypical of a spider, to be born blind, but not so for a wyrm, though the ones who chose to give themselves eyes often did so far later in life. Nor she did not have the multiple layers to protect from rocks and scratching dirt, the membranes far too thin to protect her if she wished to burrow through the earth. He could not tell if she had the scenting abilities of a wyrm either- it was far too early to tell- but just to be safe he pressed himself closer, touching the tip of his mask against hers, pressing her up under his jaw, where his scent glands were. She should know the scent of her father, she should know that he was near and that he was hers, even if she was far too young to decide if she wanted him back.
(The future whispered and laughed at him and he pushed it away, just as he pushed away the surge of cold, sharp hurt at the knowledge that no sane child would ever want him as a parent.)
(If that was their choice, then so be it. He was not the god of free mind for nothing.)
Her little huffing breaths puffed out over his muzzle, colder than he’d like them to be, but she snuggled against his face with nary a complaint, little pinprick claws batting at his mask. He had to struggle not to shift her around so that he could press his face to her little chest, to pick her up in his jaws and hold her securely like he would have if he were still a wyrm, but she seemed safe enough, her tiny body pressing up against his throat, feet kicking sleepily against the side of his neck. And nothing would dare to reach him here in his nest, with an army of knights and kingsmoulds around him and Herrah in a room next to his, with another Higher Being within mind-touching distance. She was as safe as she could possibly be.
Still, she was out in the open instead of a tight, deeply-dug burrow, and that was causing more distress than he’d like to admit. Instinct was hard to shake, with the scent of hatchling drifting faintly in the air, under the nothingness of void and the sweet scent of the flowers. Slowly, carefully, he extended his mind out, taking care not to touch the blurry newness of her thoughts, until he saw the blazing white lines of a kingsmould’s activation glyphs flare up before his eyes, dim with a lack of energy. And then carefully, ever so carefully, he nudged a thread of power into the lines of the glyphs, until they lit up bright enough to make his inner eyes ache, and whispered to it, through the link of creator and soul:
Send me the Pure Vessel.
The kingsmould stamped its foot once in affirmation- a useless gesture, in an empty hallway, but he had trained it within them and they were not living beings in any sense of the word- and set off. Carefully, he wound himself back into his mind, ever so careful not to bother the child, until he was safe within the confines of his own thoughts, with no threat of disrupting anyone’s sleep.
The little one squirmed about, unbothered. At only a week old, she cared naught for anything other than sleeping, squeaking, and eating, but she was far more delicate than any other god’s child, and once again, the thought of harming her in any way brought such acute agony that he felt his chestplates ache. Ironic, that he would be affected so, after watching his trueborn children struggle to reach him and fall, over and over and over again. Horribly ironic, after watching his first clutch struggle free of their eggs, after feeling them die and fall to pieces in his claws. He was no father. He was a king. This living, breathing bargaining chip should, theoretically, have no effect on him, and yet here he was, in a poorly-constructed nest of his own making, coiled tight around his one living child as if he were still in his more primal, ancient form, fully accepting of his fate and his role, even after so many years of rejecting it for the greater good.
But he had chewed on those old bones long enough. And if the building pressure between his eyes was about to warn him of a coming screaming fit, his blasted foresight finally good for something, then finding her something to eat was more of a concern to him now than all the vessels dead and gone.
The door clicked open, a flare of light flashing briefly into the room before being overtaken by the shadow of horns, and the Pure Vessel approached the bedside soundlessly before it knelt gracefully among the rich white carpet, as mechanical and empty as the kingsmould that sent it. Seeing it before him was at once a blessing and a damnation, relief crashing over him even as the bitter taste of guilt welled inside his throat, as corrosive as the acidic mist he used to spray as a wyrm. His two living children were with him now, in a place where he knew they would be safe, and he could untuck his curl and rise to meet his Pure Vessel without feeling that creeping sensation of danger everytime an activated kingsmould came too close.
"The heir of Deepnest requires sustenance,” he rasped, in a voice rougher and deeper than he anticipated. He had been consistently rumbling, it seemed, and he only just noticed after it had forced his voice to drop, to become something more akin to grinding stone than the whispering-water rush of his usual tone. But the Pure Vessel, paused at the edge of the nest, did not react to the change in his voice, looking down at him with its nail held tightly in its usual guarding stance. Utterly trustworthy and dependable, even as his scales itched with the knowledge of the endless darkness swirling beneath its shell. “Watch her."
The Pure Vessel’s eyes gaze shifted to the bundle in his arms, and he was suddenly struck with the urge to take its throat between his teeth and give it a gentle growl and shake; not to harm, never to harm, but to teach it a lesson of how roughness around its younger sibling would be tolerated. But then he blinked, and the urge passed, and he had to shuffle over and awkwardly pat the space in the nest pressing against the headboard to show it what he meant, trying not to wake the baby with his movements. “No, forgive me. I mean watch her in the sense of minding her. Come into the nest, and let me show you.”
The Pure Vessel’s attention zeroed in on his hand, before its gaze moved to its longnail. Carefully, it settled it by the bed, well within reach, before awkwardly folding its long limbs up and into the nest. It moved without its usual grace, its huge horns wobbling back and forth as the soft pillows threatened its balance, but the bed had been made to fit the White Lady, and her child fit perfectly within it. The radiating chill of its void body as it settled close to him put him on edge, even as some part of him longed to pull it down and groom its face, to let it meet its sister and be part of the family he would never let himself have.
"This is the heir of Deepnest. Your half-sibling." He did not call her its sister, not yet. Even if the Pure Vessel lacked the capacity to understand the concept of gender, that was for her to figure out on her own; he would make no mention of knowing it until she found herself, too wary of his influence on her future to spoil such a thing. "They are far, far smaller than you were at hatching, and far more fragile; as such, they require more care and attention than you ever did. Hold your arms like so, and I will show you how to hold them."
He did not know why he rambled so. The Pure Vessel did not know of the guilt that scraped his insides, or require a lesson in holding small children, for it had held its sister once, not long after her hatching. Its very nature ensured that such instruction would be retained, even if no reinforcement had occured in the days between the arrival of Herrah and her child. Still, he rambled, if only to fill the empty silence, and to allow himself to review the information the Midwife had given him when she had told him how to care for young spiderlings. It would be beneficial for him and his daughter both, even if each word had nearly been emblazed into his mind from the centipede's teaching.
"Adjust your arms a bit, you need to be able to support their head more. Correct." He hesitated, looking at the Pure Vessel's empty arms- perfectly positioned, open and waiting for its little sister- before reaching out and stuffing a blanket against its chest to stave off the chill. It did not react to his touch, but he could feel how cold its carapace ran, even without direct contact, and he did not want the Pale Gift to feel chilled.
Still, he was less reluctant to ease the baby down into its arms than he expected, if only because he knew that the Pure Vessel would follow every order of his to the letter. Even if they were as empty as the kingsmoulds, there was just... something with them that made them feel safe. A misguided kinship, to a creature that was his child only in body, but it settled the wild part of his mind, their presence a reassurance rather than a discomfort. "Now, be prepared for them to squirm. They are very young, they do not yet have full control of their limbs. Watch your claws, and be gentle."
The Pure Vessel responded accordingly, scythelike dark claws curling in towards its palms. With an air of finality, he placed the Pale Gift into its embrace, fully expecting a cry of indignation- but none came. Instead of wriggling and squeaking like she had before, his hatchling merely yawned and snuggled closer to the vessel, tiny claws kneading at the blankets surrounding them. Little fangs worked, chewing sleepily on the edge of her shirt, and something in his chest hurt at the sight, a clenching, physical pain that made it hard to breathe. The Pure Vessel watching her only made the pain hurt worse; there was something right to them being in the nest with her, a sense of security he couldn’t shake.
“Stay there,” he ordered, because saying anything else would hurt; even that short order scraped in his throat, the words forcing themselves out through the lump in his throat. What an inconvenience. He should not be this affected; this was the life that he had chosen for himself. A family, or a kingdom. The death of his children, or the death of the millions of other lives he had raised from the dirt, an entire thriving world threatened by one vengeful goddess. He knew the cost, and he had paid it accordingly. This was him reaping what he had sown. “I shall return shortly with the child’s meal. If they start to cry, soothe them.”
The Pure Vessel’s dark, empty eyes bore into his. It gave no sign of understanding what such an order meant, but there was an eerie stillness about it that seemed to affect its half-sister by proxy, her breaths slow and even as she chewed on the blanket wrapped around her. He took one step back, testing to see how she would react to him leaving her, and then another- but she did not stir, safe in the arms of the Pure Vessel, quiet in a way that she had not been for Isma, kind as she was, or Ogrim, despite how jovial he had been on her arrival. Even in the few times he had seen her been handled by Midwife, just after her hatching, she had wriggled and screamed and screamed and screamed until she was safe in Herrah’s arms, or laying asleep in her cradle, with him staring down at her, wondering just what he had brought into the world.
He let his mind linger on this anomaly for a moment, on how quiet the child was with the Pure Vessel, as if she somehow knew that it was her family and that she was safe in its arms.
And then he turned and left, letting his gaze fall on the scene no longer. It was not fleeing- he had nothing to run from. The Pure Vessel was as loyal to him as any void being could ever be, and his infant daughter was still too young to crawl, let alone assault him in any way that mattered. He had spent centuries tunneling through miles of earth, hunting down the unascended, fighting off the other wyrms that dared get in his way, taken on a goddess of dreams in a battle of wit that he had won, fought off a bloodthirsty she-wyrm before he had even learned how to fly in his new body. His newborn child could not harm him.
And yet.
Using foresight to avoid the few scattered servants that were still awake was surprisingly easy. He did not let himself lapse further into the tangled, ever-shifting web of the future than he required, focusing only on what was immediately available to him. Down that corridor was a looming confrontation with two retainers; the other would see two lesser lords pass by, giggling, as they drunkenly made their way to an empty bedroom, but that would be long after he was gone. Pause in the hallway for a three-second beat, to allow a chef ahead to walk sleepy-eyed out of the cooling room, and then wait another five seconds for them to turn into a different hallway, so that he could slip into the vast expanse of the kitchen and sneak silently past the many hanging meats, feeling oddly like an eggthief stealing from the nest of his own castle.
The thought of such a fiend had him baring his teeth at the decapitated corpse of a Vengefly King, simmering in a vat of marinade for lunch tomorrow. Not the best comparison to make right now, not when he was feeling so out of touch with his own body, his broodiness a near-physical lure in his chest tugging him back to his nest. His children.
Child.
(The Pure Vessel was never his child, never one he could truly call his own.)
He found the bottle of liquefied garpede with relative ease, given the fact that it was set far away from the other meats within the cooling chamber. He took it out, eyed the void running through the glass tubing with suspicion, and then tucked the bottle in a sleeve under his robe before reaching for a smaller cup to hold it in. Herrah had brought it with her on the off chance that she would not be awake to melt the Pale Gift’s food down for her, but he suspected that she thought it unnecessary. Even if she’d spent a good half-hour lecturing him on how to feed her, as if feeding a hungry baby required any skill. It was him who felt a tug of fear everytime he saw how small his daughter was, it was him who itched with the urge to bring back fresh prey for her to devour, to force her to grow bigger, stronger. No matter how much he tried to reason with himself, the wild part of his mind that remained a creature of the tunnels and burrows twisting through the earth was convinced that without proper feeding, his daughter was a runt who would perish before her first spring, and he would be responsible for her death, another child’s blood staining his hands.
He realized that he was staring blankly into the distance, lost in his own thoughts, and tore himself out of his fugue with an irritable jerk, slinking out of the kitchen. He could not waste his time here- his child was hungry, and would wake soon, regardless of whatever odd soothing effect the Pure Vessel had in proximity to her. He had to get back to the nest, preferably before anyone found him wandering about, and delayed him further. He could already sense his daughter’s hunger, lurking on the horizon like a coming storm, and he would not react kindly to anyone who got in his way.
(Would he have reacted so with the Pure Vessel, if they had proved a need to eat, would he have been overcome with his desire to hunt as he was with the Pale Gift-)
He turned the corner, and ran straight into Lurien.
Sight and scent didn’t register at first; he knew only the fact that someone had caught him at the hunt, and instinct took over before reasoning could temper him. With a sharp, angry hiss, he recoiled from the bug in front of him, flaring his wings and baring his teeth; the shape in front of him didn’t make sense to his eyes, appearing as a blur of motion instead of someone that he remembered as a bug. Lurien responded in turn, weak wings twitching under his cloak as he stepped back with a muffled exclamation of surprise, and the movement of the cloak caught his attention in an instant, the desire to strike aching in his jaws.
"Sire?" Lurien's quiet, surprised voice snapped him out of his stance, his defensive thoughts trying to equate danger with memories of companionship, and failing. This wasn’t someone who would keep him from his nest; this was Lurien, Lurien , a bug who wouldn’t hurt a gruzzer. Lurien, who was staring at him with his hand clutched to his chest, carefully out of range of his fangs. “A-apologies for startling you. What ails you?”
He was being careful, staying still, speaking softly, and it was clear from the way he was looking at him that his concern was focused on his king’s wellbeing, not his own. The Pale King felt a strange wave of guilt roll through him at the sight; Lurien, too, would be gone at the end of this. All of those days in the Watcher’s Tower, gazing out at the city below as they talked of art and politics over tea, given away for the kingdom whose love they shared between them. That quiet kinship between them, so difficult to grasp with other beings, gone with Herrah, gone with Monomon. All of them, sacrificed along with the empty shell of a child cradling his hatchling.
He had grown used to the clamour of their meetings ringing through the corridors, arguing with each other or their attendants, listening to the sound of Herrah and Monomon laughing and joking with the White Lady in the gardens while Lurien faintly tried to protest against some of their teasing. He had grown complacent in their company, in the simple pleasure of watching the mortals interact with each other from afar, or conferring with them after their meetings were over and he was tired from working through the sealing sigils the Weavers had sketched out for him. Isolation was a key factor in the life of a wyrm, but these were not territorial fiends coming to wrench his lands out from under his grasp, these were people who came to him because they required his assistance, or simply because (for some unfathomable reason) they desired his company.
He had not realized just how quiet the castle would be, after they were gone.
“I am fine.” His voice still hissed a bit, too flat and hostile for his own liking. Lurien didn’t flinch, acclimated to his idiosyncrasies, but he felt a hot spike of shame pulse through him at his own savagery, even as his instincts clamoured at him to brush Lurien aside and race back to the nest. He may have taken the form of a bug, but the nature of his ancient form lived on within him, a coiling predator dwelling deep in his chest. He could not shake it, even if he wanted to. “But I must go. The heir of Deepnest demands another feeding.”
“But- oh, no, I understand. My apologies.” Lurien stepped aside and back, with a quick, awkward bow; his usual grace had been shattered, it seemed, by the run-in and the late hour. Which would be concerning if the Pale King wasn’t already aware that Lurien was used to keeping odd hours, and sleeping little, and there wasn’t currently a ticking timer in his head whispering that he needed to be back at the nest now. “Good luck with your grub.”
Your grub. He blinked at him, because even when spoken by one of his closest advisors, it didn’t feel real. And then, all at once, it was far too real, and he was mumbling farewells as he brushed past his Watcher to the corridors beyond, his foresight crackling at the edges of his mind like a prey-seeking electrical field. There were nobody immediately ahead of him, if he moved quickly he could-
“Your Majesty, wait!” Lurien’s voice wasn’t so much a shout as it was a rather loud whisper; still, it echoed through his foresight a few seconds before the sound passed through his mandibles, resulting in a rebounding effect that made him flinch, forcing him to a standstill. Lurien, at the very least, appeared to sense the tension within him, and hurried to his side before he could come up with a relatively polite dismissal. “Herrah mentioned arriving with a premade meal earlier. If it was kept within the cooling chambers, it will be too cold for the spiderling to eat. Allow me the honour of helping you with the heating spell.”
He stared at Lurien for a second- how could he have forgotten such a thing? Grubs were weak to the elements, he could have hurt her- before urgency came knocking again, and he silently withdrew the flask from its pocket in his cloak. The pale, fleshy blue slush swirling within was quite unappetizing, but it would be quite easy for a young spider to melt down, if she even required such assistance at all.
If Lurien was disgusted by the contents of the bottle, he didn’t show it. Instead, he crossed the distance between them in two quick strides, soul already glowing bright on his palms, and closed his hands around it with a muttered incantation, sigils of warmth flaring bright between his hands. The Pale King breathed in deep, absorbing the motes of shed soul from the air, and tipped his head gratefully as Lurien stepped back with a weary sigh, tucking the now-warm flask back into his robes.
“Many thanks, Lurien,” he murmured, before waving his hand dismissively; he didn’t want to appear ungrateful, but urgency tugged at his chest like a chain linked through his heart, and it was getting harder and harder not to hiss at him. Lurien, though harmless to the nest, was still far too close to it for comfort. Everyone in the castle was far too close for comfort, save for the Pure Vessel and Herrah, and she would only be allowed close because his wariness around her outweighed the urge to defend his kin. “I shall speak with you again on the morrow.”
“Of course, my King. May you rest well tonight.” Lurien bowed again, but he did not linger long enough to see the end of it. As soon as Lurien’s voice ceased its echo, he was striding on through the endless white halls, weaving a path back to his bedroom. Distantly, he wondered what his kin would think of him, building his den among so many mortals, but he dismissed the thought before it came to fruition. It was not worth it to wonder, when he already knew what the answer would be; disgust at his negligence, turned to fury when they discovered the Abyss. Infanticide was common amongst his kind, but killing the clutch of an enemy before they could develop into a proper threat was a far cry from purposefully abandoning them to die in a hellhole. His guts would be scattered over the hills for the carrion-beasts to feast upon, the stinking, flayed remains of his corpse strewn about the borders of Hallownest as warning. Few wyrms would wish to take a land so marked with death, after all; it was only his own territoriality and ascension that had saved him from such a fate.
(Not that he didn’t deserve it, but he simply did not have time to die right now, not when there were so many lives hinging on his ability to banish the old light, not when the cost of his sacrifices have not yet paid off.)
The kingsmoulds at the doorway of his bedroom jolted to life as he came close, deadly scythe blades gleaming in his light; with a curt wave of his hand, they reset into their idle positions, soul-bright eyes dimming as the door creaked open. He felt himself bristle a bit at their proximity to the nest, but that was an ire easily quelled by their lack of scent, and it wasn’t long before he was disregarding them entirely, his breaths deepening as he swept into his room and tried to catch the scent of any new intruders.
And he was right on time, it seemed, for the Pale Gift was squirming in the Pure Vessel’s grasp, protesting her empty stomach with soft whimpers. The Pure Vessel was stroking her back slowly, a perfect mimicry of Herrah’s soothing actions, but their- its- head had snapped up to look at the Pale King when he reentered the bedroom, something that its little sister seemed to be able to sense.
Herrah had told him that allowing the Pale Gift to grow accustomed to the Pure Vessel would be an event that reaped as many benefits as it did punishments. Was this what she had meant? The illusion of an older sibling, offered as a comfort? The Pure Vessel was no more than a complex machine operating on the whims of him and the other royals, but that meant little to one so young, who knew only the safety of her parents, her caretaker, and her plush dolls. Was this what she had meant when she let the Vessel hold her tiny hatchling, despite knowing how empty it was? Was this what she had wanted, when she watched the way her baby had snuggled close to something that should have been her family, were it not for the endless darkness swirling under its carapace? The child didn’t even know that it was heartless yet, only that it looked like her father and loomed over her like her mother, another kind-faced doll to add to the illusion of a family that she didn’t have, with half taken by disease and war and the other half long lost to the sands and time.
How lonely would she be, when she finally realized how much of her family was a lie? A temporal illusion at the most, a scattered handful of well-meaning individuals at the best. He did not glean much from his unwelcome dive into her future, but the road to divinity was a long, winding one full of pain and unbroken loneliness, and this little one had a thread of it within her whether he wanted her to or not, shining bright like a mark of holy damnation.
Whatever it was, it did not matter now. He withdrew the bottle of shredded garpede meat with hands that were remarkably steady for his current mental state, and poured out a sufficient amount of soft flesh into one of the smaller glasses, crawling up into the nest next to it. The Pale Gift cried at his light, a high, shrilling squeak, and he felt that telltale rumble start up in his chest as he dimmed it back down, a soothing reminder that he was here, she was safe. “Move over. I shall teach you how to feed her.”
The Pure Vessel shuffled to the side, long legs awkwardly tangling in the blankets of the nest, and he sighed and stopped its motion with a hand on its arm before it moved far enough away to unbalance itself without the support of the headboard. It was unnecessary to train the Pure Vessel in manners of childcare, just as it had been unnecessary to teach it how to hold its sister. Still, he found himself doing it anyways, as he coiled his tail around himself and reached out to take his fussing child from their arms.
“They are mostly capable of feeding on their own. However, care must be taken to ensure that they do not choke on the food, or eat so fast that they inhale it.” He adjusted his grip on his squirming, squalling hatchling, quietly thinking to himself that another pair of arms would be quite useful, before tipping the warm mush close enough to touch her mouth. Sure enough, she started feeding right away, her irritable squeals fading to the messy sound of her eating, her soft breaths and awkward attempts to chew magnified by the cup. Minuscule claws scraped and scratched at the side of the glass, darker than night, and the sight of them did funny things to his chest, a light, floating sensation emanating from his heart as he touched his thumb to hers, and compared the size of their claws.
How could something with so much potential be so petite? Even the Hollow Knight had been large enough to hold a nail when they had crawled out of the Abyss- he still couldn’t wrap his head around how little his baby was, even if the comparison pangs of fear coursing through him. Hopefully, frequent feedings would get her to a healthy size soon enough, even if the logical part of his mind kept trying to remind him that the Midwife had told him she was a perfectly normal spiderling for Herrah’s kin. “You are my most trustworthy knight. If either I or the White Lady am not around to ensure that they eat, then the task falls to you to make sure that they get fed. The procedure is relatively simple, even if it falls outside of the expectations of your training. Come closer now, and observe how they feed. Be careful not to drown them in their own food.”
He was not sure why he told it to come near, when it was already close enough for him to feel the chill radiating off of its voided carapace. Perhaps it was one of his instincts, warping his perception of logic until it matched his desires; perhaps it was because he truly wanted another bug by his side, one that could be trusted to keep his hatchling safe. Either way, he felt something flighty settle in his chest when it crouched down enough to be able to watch her clearly, the empty eyeholes of its mask nearly big enough to fit her within one. A security that he hoped his daughter felt, with her father and her half-sibling crowded around her.
He had not had this when he was a hatchling, the safety of another watcher, the presence of a sibling tucked close. He had been born too small, too early, and had ruined that dream before he was even truly alive, chewing through the hard shells to feast upon the still-soft bodies beneath. He had not thought of what he was doing, when he was small and hungry and his weak cries were met with no answers, other than the faint chirpings of the other hatchlings, still sleepy within their eggs. He had not thought of anything, besides the pain lancing through his tiny body, the fear of knowing how weak he was, how that cramping agony would soon extinguish him before his light ever had a chance to shine. And when his mother had dug up the next, her soothing rumble shaking the whole world, she had found him coated in the blood and yolk of his far more unfortunate siblings, still so hungry, still so scared.
What would his mother think now, if she saw him curling around his hatchlings? What would she think, to know that the runty little son she plucked from the ruins of her nest would go on to murder so many of his children in turn? She had spent so much of her time away from the nest, hunting and hunting and hunting until he had grown big enough to deathroll without help. What would she think, if she saw him reborn in his new form, his black-stained claws nearly melding into the dark carapace of his one living child?
He found that he didn't want to know the answer to such a question. The life of a wyrm was one dictated by violence, but even he had far overstepped his bounds. Divinity made for poor choices, made monsters out of the most reasonable of gods, and he was the worst case out of all of them, with the blood of so many of his children coating his palms. He could not even claim the same of the Old Light, monstrous though she may be; something had brought her back from the brink of her final death, and the fury she was wreaking on his people was a result of his failure to completely destroy her, not an unusual propensity for cruelty among her kind (though she certainly was horrifically, needlessly cruel, a nightmare formed of sugar-sweet dreams and sticky, syrupy rot). All of this suffering was because of his own cowardice, the worst thing that a wyrm could be.
He had been too cowardly to fight her head on, too weak to fight his way into her realm to kill her as any other wyrm would, and so he had killed millions of his own to try to seal her away, to take her on where he couldn’t. Instead of risking his own life to die honourably, in a glorious battle to the death, he had sacrificed countless others to suffer so that he may continue to keep his kingdom, to perpetuate his perfect eternal world. He knew how the other wyrms would react to his infanticide- he didn’t need to imagine how his mother would react to his failures. He could almost already feel her fangs tearing through his body, her grief outweighed by her murderous fury at what he had become.
He looked down at the child in his arms, smearing garpede goo on her face with every sleepy little bite she took, and his heart wrenched at the thought of her ever feeling that sort of hatred for him, the unthinking comfort she took from his embrace warped into betrayal and pain. He was supposed to protect her from harm, to keep her safe from the horrors of the world, and instead he would be the one to murder her mother and seal away her half-sibling. This fragile peace could not last.
The Pale Gift’s feeding slowed, becoming something more languid and thoughtful rather than ravenous, before eventually stopping altogether. She lifted her head, chelicerae working, then pushed the glass away with a surprising amount of force for such a small hatchling, a sleepy huff puffing out of her with the movement. She was falling back asleep already, seemingly oblivious to the blue goo dripping off of her chin, until she reached up with one chubby paw and clumsily swiped at the garpede dripping off her, smearing it all over her white mask.
“Ah, no, allow me,” He whispered to her, feeling an odd sensation tug his head down towards her; instinct, apparently, was trying to urge him to push her face into the dirt, to scrub her clean with the soft earth and moss that was a key part of any good wyrm nest. There was none here, though, so he forced himself to uncurl enough to pull a spare handkerchief from a pocket in his robe, transferring the cup to the table with another hand. Only a part of the garpede mush remained in the bottom, and he felt an odd spark of pride at her feeding abilities, in knowing that she felt safe enough and happy enough to eat. A little bit of water poured from the pitcher by his bed made for a good cleaning cloth, and he set to the task of cleaning her with a surprising amount of serenity, a little bit of his tension easing away as she scrunched her fangs and leaned away, squeaking irritably at the cool water on her face. “Make sure to clean them afterwards as well. No predators can track their scent here, as they can in more dangerous territories-” and he pressed his daughter up under his chin without thinking about it, rubbing the scent glands under his jaw over her forehead so that she would take on his scent instead of the faintly sweet smell of raw garpede meat- “but cleanliness is an important habit to instill, even in one so young. Particularly if they are going to be trained to be a skilled hunter, as this one is sure to be.”
The Pure Vessel watched him closely, the void within its eyeholes flickering and writhing with some unseen, unknowable force. He stared back at it, a weapon made to kill gods, crouching low within a rough-built nest made of pillows and blankets, and felt exhaustion crash into him, along with something dangerously close to grief. The soft rumble in his chest faltered for a bit, stuttering in his thorax, before the kneading hands of the Pale Gift brought it back again, her sleepy squirming distracting him from the desire to pull the Vessel close and curl around it, too. It would not be far-fetched, with all the lapses in his judgement he had made tonight.
It was wrong, to be treating it as such. It was wrong and he knew it. Instinct was clouding his thoughts, rendering his reasoning obsolete; the only child he had was the one falling asleep on his chest, her little claws catching on his robe. The Pure Vessel was nothing more than the half- dead body of something that could have been his hatchling, reanimated by a power made to kill gods like him. If he commanded it to seal the Radiance, it would. If he commanded it to kill him, it would. To coddle it because it possessed the features of him and his lady would be like coddling a kingsmould because it was formed in the shape of a child; an utterly foolish endeavor, one born of loneliness and desperation instead of logic and intellect. There were no solid benefits to such a thing as there were with holding the spiderling close; the Pure Vessel certainly wouldn’t care about such a thing. It was a machine, a weapon, and he had taken it into his nest because he was a weak, pathetic old fool who was too exhausted to control his broodiness.
(He thought of the day he would need to seal them within the temple and his heart cried not yet, not yet .)
He sighed, and rubbed a clean hand down his face, weary of the self-loathing throbbing through his head. His heart felt like a tumor in his chest, aching and overburdened; he longed to tear it out, to cast away the defective cog in his machinery, to fix himself so that the pain would stop and he would feel nothing again. Maybe if he wrenched himself away from this irrational, cloying ache in his chest, he would be able to do what he needed to secure the fate of Hallownest; maybe if he had been heartless, he would not be where he was today, his mind turning in circles over all the bodies buried below him while children mourned their mothers on the streets of his city. If he focused on their prayers now, he could hear them, all his people crying out at the suffering destroying their bodies, taking their minds. He could not afford to falter when the time came to seal away the Radiance, no matter what grief might come out of it.
The sacrifice of a few for the good of many was, logistically speaking, a fair deal. Three and a half lives lost to save millions was practically a steal; he would be selfish, unreasonably so, if he let his emotions break his resolve before he could make the trade. He was a king, a god, and he held the lives of millions under his power- if he allowed them to perish because he was too weak to see logic, then he would be worse than the coward he already was. They were mortals, frail and fragile- it was his job to protect them, his duty to enlighten them, to allow them to thrive in his coils. If he could not save them, after they gave their dedication and loyalty and lives to him, then he was a failure of a god and ruler, and deserved to perish for the crime of ineptitude. What use was his gift of mind, his light, if he could not protect them and guide them to the fullest extent of their capabilities? What use was his life , if he could not give them the promise of eternity, of safety through the endless, dragging centuries?
And if Hallownest fell, it would make all the little lives lost in the Abyss worthless. That, if anything, made the pain tearing through his heart nearly agonizing. That their suffering, their struggling , would be for nothing.
He had watched his firstborn fall apart in his hands, gasping out pitiful cries from a throat not built to handle the weight of their suffering. He had watched thousands of others gash themselves open upon the rocks, be pushed from the platforms by the mindless creepers below, break their masks in their desperate, flailing falls. He had heard the impure scream out to him in voices choked by darkness, warped by the void, begging for the mercy of their parents as the abyss ate away at all that they were. He had cast the spells to trip the angry, the sad, the mournful, the lonely. He had been their god, their creator, their killer, and he had watched with empty eyes and numb hands and a cold heart as they all fell away into the pit below, to become the debris that lined their sibling’s nests, the dirt that they were buried in, the ground that they had died upon.
If their agony had all been for nothing, then he might as well condemn himself to the endless entropy of the Dream, and allow himself to rot away. There was nothing he could do to redeem himself after the horrors of what he had done to his children. There was no way that he could be anything more than their killer, their judgement, their nightmare, their deaths only justifiable in the event that they saved millions more than those that had fallen.
He had been given a choice, and he had made his decision. A kingdom, or a family. Eternity, or entropy.
It had seemed like such an easy choice to make, back when he was desperate and cold and cruel. What were three lives, lost to the dream? What was one clutch, killed before they had even hatched? The loss of a few could have ensured the future of millions. He had not looked ahead then, when he laid out the diagrams and calculated his losses. It had seemed so easy- a disgusting loss, yes, but easy. A plan well worth the price it demanded.
Oh, what a fool he had been.
“Return to your bedroom. You must be well rested for the day ahead of us.” He closed his eyes as he felt the Pure Vessel move away, grabbing its longnail; if he watched it, he feared his own reaction, the rising protest in his throat nearly choking him. How badly he wanted to grab onto its cloak, to pull it down into the nest with him, to brush his hand over its mask and tell it how proud he was- but that was the life he had forsaken, and it was foolish to weaken it for the day before. It felt nothing, thought nothing, but a body was a body, and it required sleep like the rest of them. It would gain nothing by standing vigil beside its family, other than a weakened performance on the morrow. “I shall call for you when I require you again.”
He didn’t need to look to know that it bowed to him, with the mechanical grace of the unthinking, the enslaved. Nor did he look even after the soft chill of its presence faded behind the muffled clang of the closing door, feeling that weak voice cry out within him at its exit. He merely sat, and breathed, and listened to the whisper of his heartbeat mingle with the soft flutter of his daughter’s pulse, before coiling around her sleeping body with a sigh that pitched dangerously close to a sob. Soon, she would learn to walk; soon she would learn to run, and hunt, and to be herself, to announce who she was to the world, the one child of his with a mind of her own and a will to speak it. Soon she would learn that he was a monster, and a murderer, responsible for her suffering and the loss of her family, and the tiny claws kneading against his chest while she slept would one day turn against him, to try to inflict upon him the pain he had brought to her, to bleed it out in a way that mattered.
But that was in the future, and he was with her now, breathing together in this little slice of safety he had carved out for the both of them, through the deaths of countless others. All the streams in time had crossed to this point, luck and misfortune culminating into her miraculous existence, and he could afford to play father for her, at least for a little while. Just long enough to ensure that she would be safe. Just long enough to give her some illusion of happiness, before he tore it all away.
No cost too great.
He laid his head down, his tiny hatchling tucked securely under his chin, where she was safe, and let himself drift off to sleep.