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Fate touched.
The Raven Queen had seen the strands of fate weaving and bending around their kind before, but it had been a long time since she'd seen something like this.
It wasn't uncommon for those who were fate touched to find one another, but a group of eight, working so quickly across the web? This was unprecedented.
And so she watched.
None of them held any particular faith, save for their gnome cleric. But she was already pledged to Sarenrae, who had stepped in long ago with her claim, long before anyone else would have realized Pike Trickfoot's potential. The Raven Queen felt a sense of amusement at that. Good for her. She could appreciate that.
They were all fascinating though. As fascinating as they were -- ah, vexing, she thought, with a smile.
But her gaze was continually pulled back to Vax'ildan. He threw himself into danger at seemingly every opportunity he could. Were it not for his own innate ability to navigate and manipulate the lines of fate -- and her own hand, pushing his luck when she could -- she knew he would have died and come to her long before.
They were all fate touched. And they would all come to her, in the end. Everything did, eventually. She would take any one of them she could, and consider herself fortunate to do so.
But she knew the one she wanted.
She looked at Percival with interest quite often.
His soul was spoken for, but she saw the way this group worked. She doubted that Orthax's claim would last. Until that contract was broken, there was little she could do, however.
Still.
Of all of them, he seemed to be the one most likely to come easily into her reach.
Every day, Vax'ildan moved closer to Sarenrae's grasp, to the Raven Queen's unending frustration. Her hands were tied when it came to the fate touched, especially when they had no faith for her. It was an unsettling feeling. It reminded her of being mortal.
She watched, and she waited. An opening would come.
Her rule was the moment of death -- the transition between living and not. It was a liminal space, just as she was a liminal being, and as far she was concerned, it was a temporary limitation. She was divine now, and if death and winter had taught her anything, it was patience.
But for now, this was her time.
Vex'ahlia's soul was hers now, and she contemplated her options. She had not made herself known to the half-elf yet. She held back on her moment, eyes cast toward Percival, who loved her, and Vax'ildan, who needed her.
She could have them all, perhaps. But--
"Take me instead, you raven bitch!"
-- she only needed one.
She only wanted one.
And while it was true that she was ambitious -- even now, she had a vision for her own future -- she was not, technically, greedy.
She nodded.
Her champion hated her.
She tilted her head to the side, a pure corvid movement, as his druid attempted to magic her influence out of him. It was an interesting sensation, if she paid attention to it.
She didn't.
She focused on her champion -- her beautiful champion. He didn't understand her, and she did her best to help. He was pledged to her, but he wasn't listening. She reached her hand into his dreams.
"Look at me," she whispered.
'Look only at me,' she thought.
She had never been in love before.
The Raven Queen hadn't, at least. As a mortal, she had fallen in love a little too easily, perhaps a little too deeply. But she had been good, even then as a mortal sorceress, about protecting herself. Power came first, always. The way that magic bubbled up from within her, owing to some ancient wellspring she had no knowledge of, had always been there, before any love, before any names.
And now that she was an ancient power, it was love that came forth from the wellspring.
She watched him. She listened to his prayers. She answered. She traced a finger along his shining line of fate.
And she waited.