“That makes me wonder what kind of friends you keep.” Remaining calm just got a notch harder. There were precious few people who know him good enough they would include him in favours. Probably one of his men but who? But when silence stretched between them, he only huffed and made himself a reminder to ask again when things….well when things were a bit less tense than this.
So he listened in silence. I wonder how she found out about me and Delilah. Either she did mention me or maybe one of her witches. I just hope she dealt with her once and for all. He shifted slightly, not wanting to admit how uncomfortable this position was. I am sure getting old. “Very well then. It is not like I am in a position to decline. Besides.”, he paused, casting a glance at Corvo and then back at her. “You will be the first ones to hear what happened. And I think you deserve to know.”
“It started just after the assassination.” He wondered if they would flinch of that memory, which each of them shared but in positions that could not be more different. “The Outsider warned me of a name. Delilah. Six months later, I got word of a whaling ship with that name. I tracked down any information I could get. It appeared that Delilah had been a bakery apprentice at the tower.” He paused and looked at Corvo, wondering if he remembered her from then.
“I found her at last, trying to take down my gang. I followed her trail to Brigmore Manor. She had built herself a coven of witches, being blessed just like we are.” I wonder if the Outsider still favours you, Corvo. “Her magic builds around paintings. I don’t know how, but she can paint gateways into the void, or impose statues with her will. But of course she was not satisfied with that. She had set her eyes on a better prize.” Daud fixed Emily with his eyes. “You.”
“She wanted your throne. To rule. And she had been preparing a ritual to do just that. That was just before your father came for me.” It feels like a lifetime ago. “She was trying to push your spirit out of your body and enter it. Rule through you. She was half mad with the obsession to rule. Her witches would follow her. And we both got a taste of how that would be. An Empire at Delilah’s feet. I followed her into the void and managed to twist the ritual in a way that she got bound into the void instead of your spirit.”
“I had to stop her. Simple as that. She almost tore my gang apart and would do the same with the Empire. And I was the only one able to stop her.” But there was no pride in his story. He just did what needed to be done.
“My friends are no better or worse than yours,” she says with a faint smile. And that’s true. Billie, her friend and his. Whaler and captain. She’d never have thought she’d have a friend in common with Daud, of all people, but here we are. Here we are.
She deserves to know...she appreciates that. She wonders if he knows about the coup, about Delilah’s return. What has he heard, hiding as he has? What does he know? What can she surprise him with? Her Mark, at least -- that’s new enough. He’ll be shocked. The little princess, grown and brave and with magic of her own. Chosen by the Outsider. But then, given what he says...he might well expect it. The Outsider chose her long ago, the day he sent Daud after Delilah.
Her hands clench on the arms of the throne when he mentions the assassination, stifling an undignified shudder. She sees Corvo close his eyes, pain flashing across his face at both that and the reminder of the six months he’d spent in Coldridge. But that would mean...that would mean this had been going on at the same time as Corvo’s work with the Loyalists? The irony would have made her smile if it didn’t sting.
“We know,” she says quietly. “She was my aunt.”
He doesn’t know that, she knows that much. It wouldn’t be known. No one knew, not until the coup, and even then, she doesn’t know if half the people who had heard believed her. She had certainly had trouble with it, but...she knew it was true.
She swallows at the rest of his tale. Brigmore...that explains why Zhukov had been there. Had he been looking for witch’s bones, or witch’s charms? Or both? And to think of what she’d nearly done was terrifying. Worse than sitting on her throne, Delilah would have sat in her skin. It makes her flesh crawl and she can see Corvo’s face matches her own in its surprised disgust. “I know what she could do, seen it,” she says. “But I didn’t know that.”
She’s quiet for a long moment, they both are. She had been aware that he’d saved her, in a distant sort of way, but now it was fact standing before her.
“Thank you,” she says quietly. “For saving my life.” A deep breath.
And now she has to make her choice -- in fact, she thinks she already has. Half of her hates it (the half that’s a bereaved daughter still grieving), but half of her knows it’s what’s...not right, but what’s necessary.
romaincrisis
s-u-f-j-a-n-s-t-e-v-e-n-s
stormborns
turnnoffyourmind
pixelskylines
