Chapter Text
The Pureblood Knight’s Medal is proof that one is a glorious knight of the new Dynasty of Mohgwyn that the Lord of Blood will inaugurate. Use to be granted audience with Mohg.
Only, it is not yet time. For Mohg yet slumbers beside the Divinity. Be Patient. The new dynasty is nigh.
Millicent knelt in the snow and cleaned the corpse wax from her blade. The blackened gargoyle lay still, its hamstring severed by Millicent’s shamshir and Idril’s greatsword embedded in its chest.
“Perfect timing, as usual.” The tarnished knight wrenched her blade free. “That’s twice you’ve saved my life.”
Millicent inclined her head. “Even, then.”
“More than even.”
Idril’s tone was friendly -- friendly for Idril, at least. Still, she maintained a respectful distance, as per Millicent’s request. They would part ways soon, as they did after every chance meeting. For all of Idril’s offers to travel together, Millicent always refused. She couldn’t bear the thought of passing her curse on to another.
She sheathed her shamshir. “Until next time, friend.”
“Wait.” The knight reached into her tabard and withdrew something small and metallic. For a long moment, she regarded her clenched fist, brow furrowed. “I have a favor to ask of you.”
“Name it.” Idril halved the distance between them and spoke with a lowered voice. “I am being followed. And I suspect Ofnir’s men.” She opened her gauntleted fist, revealing a broken disk the size of Millicent’s palm and a black medal edged in gold. “The moment I cleared a path through Leyndell, he started dropping hints that I ought to be looking for Lord Miquella and the Lord of Blood.”
Miquella. She’d seen that name on a half-dozen different memorials as she retraced Malenia’s steps, but that was not the source of its familiarity.
Millicent hesitated, then gingerly picked up both trinkets. “What does this have to do with me?”
“I don’t know what Ofnir wants, but I don’t trust him.” A growl crept into her voice. “I won’t be played for a fool, not by Sir Ofnir and not by the Two Fingers. I won’t lead him to either of his lost lords.” Idril took a deep breath. “That’s where you come in. You’re not tarnished, so Ofnir has no reason to watch you. If you can find Lord Miquella, then perhaps we can both have our questions answered.”
***
Millicent pressed her back against the pillar, breath frozen in her throat.
A single one of those black and red clad nobles had nearly killed her, giving more of a fight than even the apostle she’d faced in the windmill village. These ruins were practically crawling with them, patrolling in twos and threes or standing guard tucked into corners, ready to ambush intruders.
She held her breath as two more passed by, conversing in low tones with a man in a white mask. Skirting around the pillar, she continued up the slope as quickly as she dared. From the moment she’d been spirited away to this subterranean ruin, her destination had been unquestionable -- the temple.
The pull on her soul strengthened with each step toward the lofty structure, so overpowering she almost expected a physical tether to manifest. Something was up there, something familiar, something that she must reunite with.
***
The egg was massive, big enough to envelope a young dragon. Something had split it down the middle, leaving a rift from which a single arm extended. Gnarled fingers stretched toward the false sky, reaching out almost plaintively.
Millicent crouched just inside the temple entryway, concealed in the shadow of the doorframe. Miquella was here. She knew it just as she knew that she was once a part of Malenia, just as she knew how to handle a sword as if she’d been doing it for decades, a shadow of a memory that often felt more real than her own thoughts.
He was so close. She slowly rose to her feet. Surely he would answer if she called out. He’ll remember me... No, how could he?
Just as she opened her mouth to shout, the arm dropped. Like a bird shot dead, it collapsed, limp, boneless. The knuckles struck the marble dais with a sickening pop. A stream of blood flowed from the egg, tracing from shoulder to wrist, a trickle, then a torrent.
Millicent watched, petrified, as the blood spread out to cover the floor, impossibly smooth, a glossy red mirror. The horns emerged first, black and curling like a nest of thorns. Then the eyes, redder than blood, and a mouth full of fangs. Massive clawed hands gripped the bloody paving stones, dragging the beast up out of the pool. With a mighty shudder, he shook his wings and robes clean of blood.
The demon turned, taking the limp hand and pressing it to his brow. He spoke in a soothing croon, too low for Millicent to make out the words.
The arm spasmed. With a sound like tearing flesh, the egg split fully in two, the sundered halves falling away on either side. The figure within thrashed, and writhed, and then it too began to tear. Something pushed up between its shoulder blades, an insect crawling out of a shed carapace.
With a cry of elation, the demon wrenched the fleshy husk away, leaving the newly emerged creature to crumple at his feet. It was a stretched out, emaciated thing, forced to grow too tall, or too quickly. A long spur of bone curved upward from the left side of its head, while two shorter horns emerged from the right. Something limp and filmy draped over its back like a cape, plastered flat by the blood that coated the creature from head to toe. With a start, Millicent realized that they were wings.
“Miquella. My beloved.” The demon prowled closer, his voice almost gentle. “Your curse is broken. Though you spurned me, my tainted blood was your salvation.”
The creature rose to his knees, pain showing in each movement. With shaking hands, he reached up to touch his new horns. His voice came out raw, hoarse from disuse. “Mohg? Where am I?”
“I have forgiven you, my love. In your cursed form, you could not see the necessity of my vision.” Mohg stretched out a hand. “But now you are older, wiser. Will you join me now? Will you take me as your Elden Lord, that I may usher in the new age in your name?”
The creature... Miquella... finally looked up, eyes wide and glassy. “Mohg, how long have I been gone?”
A flicker of displeasure twisted the demon’s features. “Am I not even worth your thanks?”
“Brother, please!” Miquella stumbled to his feet, swaying as if the effort might send him crumpling back to the floor. “It wasn’t finished. Without my blood the tree will wither, they will all die!”
Mohg’s visage hardened. He gave no answer.
Miquella’s bony hand darted out, resting on the omen’s wrist. “Please,” he whispered, “how long?”
The Lord of Blood seemed to recover himself, concealing his anger with a mask of haughty gentility. “It has been... Not quite two hundred years since I began your treatment.”
A shudder wracked the smaller man’s body. He took a single unsteady step back. “Mohg, what have you done?”
“I saved you!”
The omen’s roar echoed through the temple, the change so abrupt that Millicent nearly dropped her sword. With the deadly grace of a panther, Mohg snatched Miquella by the throat. Paying no mind to the long nails clawing at his wrist, the omen dragged his prey closer, eye to eye. “I saw the potential in you that you refused to see yourself. I swore my loyalty to you. I would have broken the gods themselves for you!”
Millicent strangled the hilt of her shamshir, every muscle coiled, ready to snap. She stood no chance against the Lord of Blood, she could only wait, could only watch and pray for an opening. Yet the shadow memories screamed louder than caution, turned her vision crimson, demanded that she leap from her hiding place and rend Mohg to bloody shreds, shatter his bones, make him take his hands off of my br--
“And still you cast me aside! Still you prefer the company of weaklings, those pathetic souls desperate enough to see you as their savior!” He cast Miquella back to the dais, leaving him wheezing for breath on the unyielding marble. “As you say, they are surely lost to you now. Who else will you turn to, if not me?”
Miquella coughed, adding a spray of blood to the tide pooling out from the remains of the egg. His voice came out so feebly that Millicent couldn’t hope to catch his response.
Mohg laughed. “Miquella, she didn’t even look. The mad dog went tearing after Radahn the moment that you weren’t there to hold her leash.”
With a theatrical flourish of his cape, he turned back towards the entryway. His hand thrust upward as if conducting an orchestra. The pool of blood rose in response, thorny tentacles whipping up and twisting around Miquella’s arms and back. Mohg snapped his fingers, and the blood whips congealed, pinning his captive to the dais.
“The Formless Mother does not desire your mind, Miquella, nor your will. She requires only your Empyrean flesh.” Mohg cast one last look over his shoulder, all pretense of charm lost to a sadistic sneer. He stood so close that Millicent could have reached out of the shadows and taken hold of his robe if she wished. “I leave you to consider your choice. Rule at my side, or serve as my vessel.”
***
Mohg’s footsteps faded away, and he was left in blessed silence.
Distantly, he knew that he should struggle. He should test his bonds, he should look for a weakness, a way out. Any such notions were drowned in the throbbing of his head and the lance of pain driving through his ribs.
More footsteps, light and cautious. Someone else was on the dais. He shivered, preparing for another wave of agony.
A gloved hand touched his shoulder, too small to be Mohg’s. “Lord Miquella? Can you hear me?”
He tried to lift his head. The patch of floor that dominated his vision blurred, and he slumped further into his bonds, the pain of the blood thorns nothing compared to the pain of attempting to hold himself upright. A hand curled around the bindings at his throat and pulled, to no avail. The knuckles pressed against his collarbone were cold and metallic
Oh.
There were a thousand reasons why it wasn’t possible, why she couldn’t be here, and yet to his exhausted mind her presence was the most logical thing in the world. Of course Malenia had come to save him.
Gathering what remained of his strength, he reached out as far as his bonds would allow. “M... Malenia?”
His rescuer fell silent. “No,” she stammered. “No, I’m sorry, my name is Millicent.”
Miquella finally managed to raise his head. The girl was young, barely of age. For a moment he assumed her to be a servant, sent by Mohg to ensure that he did not die before the Lord of Blood was finished with him. Her furtive manner ruled that out -- she obviously wasn’t here by invitation.
“You have to go,” he rasped. “He’ll kill you.”
The girl set her jaw, the resemblance to Malenia now undeniable. She drew a curved blade and chiseled doggedly at the blood whips holding his wrists.
“Welcome, honored guest!”
No.
Millicent whirled around, sword held high. Mohg stood in the entryway, his hulking form obscuring the door. The trident in his hand gleamed, shining in the false starlight to match his bared teeth.
“Ah, not a guest then. Not even a tarnished.” He stalked towards the dais, grin widening with each step. “Did you think I didn’t see you, little trespasser?”