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“Is this what you wanted, child?” The disembodied voice shakes Keyleth to the core. She shivers and clutches her mother’s bleeding head closer to her chest, a second wave of tears pricking her eyes as she uses her thumb to swipe away the trail of blood running out of the corpse’s open mouth.
She only stains her mother’s chin.
The open clearing in the forest that Keyleth had once thought to be her home is now malicious and terrifying. She sits on her knees against a bench made of cracked stone, fear rendering her too weak to pull herself up.
A flaming humanoid stands before the thick darkness of the forest, the setting sun that had once seemed beautiful now tragic in it’s definitive ending behind them. Their smile was what they most likely percerived to be inviting, but all Keyleth could take from it was how sharp their teeth were. Black skin like charcoal and empty eye sockets. Nothing but fire, fire, fire...
“I asked you once, lonesome girl,” they speak again. Their mouth moves but the voice Keyleth hears comes from all directions, booming and deep. “Is this what you wanted?” They take a step forward. The grass beneath their bare feet singes and sends small wisps of smoke into the air.
Keyleth opens her mouth to scream when a shrill voice behind her causes her voice to catch in her throat, petrified.
“ASMODEUS, STOP TERRORIZING THE POOR GIRL.”
The sudden furious flapping of wings behind Keyleth makes her flinch, closing in on herself further as a winged figure zips past her and right up to the face of the burning humanoid.
“You are just about to SCARE HER to death! Now, I swear, you are on THIN IC-,” the figure gesticulates wildly and even with their back to Keyleth she can tell that their expression is shifting just as rapidly as their beating wings. “YOU’RE NOT EVEN ALLOWED HERE, ASMODEUS, THIS IS MY TURF. SHOO! SHOO!” A hand raises and swiftly slaps the humanoid, the fire appearing to not harm their in the slightest. Keyleth eyes the two of them like a small deer, intrigued but cautious.
The flaming humanoid tilts their head to get one last look at Keyleth, expression now annoyed, and vanishes into smoke.
“Lousy, good-for-nothing little...” She hears the now lone fluttering figure mutter. Though still very, very much afraid, Keyleth feels a bit safer with this one, especially considering the fact they seemed to easily control the other so well, just like that.
The figure twirls to face Keyleth, hands clasped together like a praying woman as a large smile can now be seen on the face of a beautiful lady. Her skin was a light shade of green, shiny iridescent scale-like leaves trailing up past her collarbones to fade into her neck. They seemed to be attached to her, like hair or fingernails would be. A radiant pure white dress flowed down past her feet, and the wings on her back were of the butterfly-nature, from what Keyleth could tell.
Keyleth still sits with her back against the stone and her mother in her arms, eyes red from tears and face bruised and dirty from the fight that had broke out just minutes ago.
With quick dips and twirls, the winged woman makes her way over to Keyleth in the blink of an eye. The suddenness of her being by Keyleth’s side makes her flinch away from the woman, who then takes the hint and chooses to hover a few feet away.
“Oh, you poor thing,” The woman coos, sympathy in her voice and eyes without pupils flickering from Keyleth to her mother and then back to Keyleth again. “What happened to you?”
Keyleth shakes her head and buries her face into the safety of her mother’s hair, sprawled out across her lap and into the grass underneath them. “I-I didn’t w-want it.” She answers the question belonging to one no longer with them, voice hiccuping and weak from the tears she had shed.
“Oh dear...” The woman gently flutters to the ground, lips pursed as she kneels before Keyleth and places a comforting hand on her shoulder. Keyleth tries to shrug it off, but the touch soothes her. She steadies her breathing.
“There w-was,” Keyleth chokes out, “There was- w-wolves. Bi-ig wolves. And a man. He-he-he-...” Keyleth’s voice trails off. She wants to cry. She wants nothing more than to lie in the clearing and cry forever, but no tears come forth and her voice continues to shake. She feels around the dirt with her free hand and picks up the shaft of an arrow, broken and splintered.
The woman looks from her hand to Keyleth’s mother and sees a protrusion from her chest. Broken and splintered just like the arrow in Keyleth’s hand.
“I tried to-I tried to get it out. It only h-h-hurt her more. She-I-I wasn’t strong enough to help her. I couldn’t h-help her.” The arrow falls out of her hand and onto the ground with a small clatter.
“Darling, you did all you could, did you not?” Keyleth sniffled and shook her head meekly. One of the wolves had knocked the breath out of her. She was dizzy and the fight was over before she could get back on her feet, the man and his wolves vanishing into the forest. Keyleth did not follow them, but instead found her mother, immobile and bleeding.
“Oh honey...” The woman makes another noise of pity. It does nothing but make Keyleth feel worse.
“I wish-I wish I was str-strong enough...”
“You do?” The woman hums in thought. “Would you like me to make you stronger?”
Keyleth’s head snaps up, eyes wide, “You can do that?” She processes the question and eyes the woman, confused. “I’m s-sorry, but...Who are you?”
“I am the Queen of Leaves and Light, pleasure to meet your acquaintance, my darling.”
“I-I don’t-”
“It’s okay if you don’t know who I am, darling, most people don’t. What you do need to know is that I am a lady of the fey, and I came here once I felt the distress you were going through. I presume that’s why Asmodeus was here as well. Nasty fiend. Literally.” Keyleth could gather from the way the queen spoke that she was not too fond of the fiend called Asmodeus. She wasn’t either.
“You c-could feel that I-”
“Details, details. Those are for later. Now, what did you say your name was?”
“I d-didn’t, you ne-”
“What is your name, young lady?”
“...Keyleth.”
“Keyleth! Oh, what a lovely name! Tell me Keyleth, dear, you did say you wished you were strong enough, yes?”
“Y-Yes...”
“And what would you do if you were strong enough, Keyleth? Would you seek revenge?”
“I-I think so...”
“Then let’s make a pact.”
“A pact?”
“Yes, a deal! I make you stronger so you can avenge you dear sweet mother and while doing so you can just, oh, go off and be my little soldier.”
“Soldier?” Keyleth was skeptical at first. The idea of being a soldier, someone strong and righteous, filled Keyleth with...hope.
“Yes! I have many of those! I grant them magic to go fulfill any little wish they desire, and in turn they also use their magic to fight terrible creatures of this world!” Once again, the queen began to make wild hand motions, miming thrusting a sword in the air and stabbing invisible opponents. “If we make a pact, you could be one of those valiant soldiers! There is, however, a catch.”
That was not a surprise to Keyleth. She had been expecting it. However, she did not expect the lady to come right out and say it. “What's the catch?” And yet, Keyleth continued to consider the deal.
“This pact of ours would carry on for the rest of your rather short half-elven life. You would travel the world, do as you wish, but when it came down to it, you would be fighting for me. A small price to pay for such a lovely deal. I am quite a delight, I assure you.”
“I get to avenge my mother, and a-all I would have to do was just...pledge my fealty to you?”
“If you want to put it that way, yes! I mean, of course, it is up to you. Your decision is what matters ultimately and there could always be other options, but...this is your option now. I am offering you a deal, and you are under no obligation to take this deal.”
Keyleth looks down at her mother’s face, eyes closed, never to open again. She tries to rub the blood off of her face again, but it has begun to dry up and turn into a crusty, gooey stain on her otherwise beautiful face.
Keyleth had always thought her mother was the most beautiful woman in the world.
A foreign hand reaches to caress her mother’s face and Keyleth instinctively grips onto her mother tighter. She glares at the queen, who does nothing in response but mutter a few quick words. The blood on her mother’s face vanishes and the hand retracts.
“Would you like to make a pact, Keyleth?”
She remains silent for another good minute, brushing a hand scattered with cuts and scrapes through her mother’s long red hair. The silence is almost comforting, in a way. It feels as if time has stopped moving and she is alone in the universe with no one but her mother, and all is well.
But all is not well.
“I would.”