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When Champion Suul fell in the fires of the Calamity and his body was spirited away by desperate acolytes and laid in the tomb, there were those among her followers that thought she might raise him once more. The world was chaotic and contradictory as the gods and titans warred—and mortals crave familiarity and comfort. Champion Suul led the faithful in her name through death and battle. It was only natural that they wished for his return.
There is room on the path for the faithful to stumble, to indulge in grief, to briefly entertain heresy. A few fell away from her flock when he died, and a few more when she refused to restore him. But more came under her banner, shocked and horrified by the tide of undead her enemies raised, genuine in their prayers and their devotions. They came into her cool, encompassing shadow, and loved her for guarding that moment which all mortals fear.
She chose none of them, mantled none of them, anointed none of them. It was not time, and none of them were right. The Matron of Ravens sunk deep into dreaming and saw him, a head of dark hair and wounded eyes set in a sharp young face, and knew that she would choose none but Vax’ildan to bear her vestments.
The other gods have their martyrs and saints and ill-fated lovers. The Matron has her patience, her clarity, her absolute certainty—the golden thread of fate reaches forward in time, wrapping around the heart of a terrified, sharpened, beautiful Champion. She knows the shape of his soul long before he is born.
It is only a matter of waiting.
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She could have had him early. She could have claimed him at his birth, set a sign on his brow and led one of her acolytes to discover him, had him brought to her temple and raised in the inner chambers, coaxed and sculpted until he would gaze at her altars with pure, worshipful devotion. She could have had him wrapped in dark silks and velvet, hidden away in the deep shade where nothing of the world could touch him, where he would take no wounds and earn no scars. She could have shielded him from pain, guarded him from sorrow, kept him from hunger—it was her right. He was born to be the Champion of the Matron of Ravens. He was always, always going to be hers.
But then he would not be Vax’ildan. Vax’ildan, brother of Vex’ahlia. Vax’ildan, beloved member of Vox Machina. Vax’ildan, who would kill a man for coin but tend to a wounded bird and shed a tear when the time came to let it go.
The gods can be tempted. They can be tricked and fooled and led into bargains that ought not be made with mortals. They can even, though they hate to admit it, make mistakes.
When Vax’ildan sets foot in the Champion’s tomb, she knows that she has not. He is already there, set in the mosaics, even if he cannot recognize himself. And he is perfect.
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He is so frightened of her in Westruun. There is a touch of awe, but beneath it he is all writhing, mortal fear, and she loves him for it. It is not a love that he could comprehend, as he is now. It would drown him as surely as the blood, shackle him as firmly as their covenant. But it is true, even so.
A champion's oath is not like any other sort of vow—and she is not like any other sort of god. But Vax'ildan, Fate-Touched; Vax'ildan, Goddess-Loved, her champion and her prophet and her dagger all in one—it is not like any other sort of vow. In many ways it is more restrictive than a deal with a demon or an archfey.
He fears she will ask for his life, for his soul, but she does not
need
to. Such things cannot tempt her; they are already hers, promised from the start and affirmed in the tomb. The world has bent in such a way that Vax’ildan was set on this path, and he has walked it step by step into her arms. How many choices had to be made, to bring him here? And even now he flinches.
He fears her in his raw, unpolished way: he fears being her puppet because his mind can conjure up nothing else when confronted with the threads of fate. He fears their pact because he imagines it is something that can be revoked, that she would cast him out and draw the breath back out of his sister’s lungs. He fears the weight of her hand on him, her voice in his ear, the way she shows him the ruin so many make of the world.
He is beautiful, this new champion. He is beautiful. He cannot know how it echoes out from him, the wrinkles he smooths in the tapestry of the world. He does not see himself as she does, the glorious silver edge of him scything through hordes of undead in Whitestone, his fantastic desperation on the floor of the tomb, the true and shining rightness of her vestments wrapped around him.
And what could she do, to make him see it? She does not want him to be anything other than what he is—and if he did change, some other god might set their gaze on him, try and steal him away. He is still young. Perhaps in time he will learn to read the currents and compromises of fate, not just occasionally catch a glimpse of the threads. Perhaps he will learn not to fear ravens, or death, or anything within her domain—none of it will bring him harm. None of it would dare.
He has already paid the price; he is her creature, from the first day to the last, and even beyond that. She waited an age for him to arrive.
And she will never, never let him go.