Had a Cult of the Lamb phase a few months ago and started a fic for it I never finished. I think what it has is good (it was going to be about the Lamb's physical transformation into a divine being over time), but as I don't plan to complete it I thought I'd put it here. Spoilers for the end of base game.
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Transfiguration
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"Lamb! You will hold a moment."
He does not call them *leader*, nor does the Lamb expect him to. It's a delicate thing, the mortal life of one once immortal. Or at least, mortal enough. He's pushy, is Narinder---so befits a former god. It would be all the stranger if he were not.
But the Lamb listens to their flock, and so the Lamb turns from their work mending one of the forgotten fleeces to see the dark figure of the One Who Waited steal closer to them in the golden light of early morning. Dew clings to leaf and branch, those delicate drops collapsing into nothing as his bared paws stride through them.
The Lamb holds a moment, and Narinder stops before them. The physical form of the uncrowned god stands taller than the Lamb, though it's a matter of centimeters, with Narinder's sharp ears winning out over their horns. They try to smile at their latest ward, and await his words. Some months have passed since his fall, and he has grown ... less aggressive, at least. He looks them over, the Lamb's fleece gilded in the sunlight. The usual resentment is present, but in the slant of his lip and the squint of his eyes the Lamb finds something new. Interest? No. Curiosity. "I must know," he says presently, and without asking for leave reaches out his hand to take the Lamb's chin. He tilts their head left, then right, and lets go. Taken aback, the Lamb only hears his words after shaking themself in surprise. Narinder is smiling, in the sharp way he does. "Yes, I see. Slow, as are all things with the Crown. Very well. At least it is beginning."
The Lamb finds no answer, still baffled.
"Have you not noticed?" Narinder asks, and the Lamb tilts their head to one side in cautious questioning. "Do you think yourself an exception, because you are soft-hearted? Did you think you would escape the changes?"
"Changes," the Lamb repeats, brow furrowing. Change is eternal, ever-present. Of course they have changed over the course of their journey to this point: they have learned the price of living, of sacrifice, of mercy. Of godhood. They have paid for each in blood.
"Denial does not befit a god," says Narinder, and turns away.
---
The reflecting pool is a little thing, a wide basin wrought of iron and set between two flower-strewn stone pillars in a sunny gap at the forest's edge. It's a place of contemplation, and oft has the Lamb stood before the water, consumed with past and future.
Now they scrutinize their reflection more closely. The Crown, first, little more than a pointed black smudge of void atop their wooly head. Their horns are still sharp, their ears keen, their fleece white. They recognize the inky black their eyes have become with the Crown's influence---perhaps that's what Narinder meant?
Their thoughts are broken when another reflection appears. Blue-gray fur, delicate features, warm eyes, and with pen and ink ever at hand---yes, the Lamb knows this one. "Bregre," they say, turning. "You're well?"
"Well as ever, mighty leader," Bregre says, gentle teasing in the words. He takes the Lamb's hand in his wrinkled fingers as they look to him. "You look troubled."
The Lamb hums in thought, eyes again drawn to the pool. Bregre watches, ever observant. Poets must be, he has told the Lamb before, and as time has passed he has only grown moreso. "I wonder," says the Lamb. "You know me best, beloved. Have I changed?"
Now it is Bregre's turn to look thoughtful. "Seasons change us all," he says after a moment. "Time and life wear on body and soul, for most of us."
"What of gods?"
"Gods live too," Bregre says, looking them over. "To live is to change, I think. Without change, you become as stone---unyielding, inflexible. Is that what you mean?" The Lamb's shoulders roll in a shrug. It's a flowery answer, which they suppose is to be expected from Bregre. They still search their image in the pool, trying to see what Narinder saw. Bregre is quiet a moment, and then: "Your wool is softer now."
"What?"
"Softer," Bregre repeats, smiling as he lifts a hand to tug at one of the Lamb's curls. "Whiter, too, I think. I figured it was the better food."
"Nothing else?"
"Who am I to say?"
"My husband," the Lamb says, more plaintively than they had intended, and Bregre's laugh is like a chiming bell.
---
The flock must eat, and the faithful of the fallen Bishops still hunt for the Lamb's head. By now the Lamb knows the paths of Darkwood well, though, sent by the Merchant to retread Leshy's steps and retrieve his soul. Today is no crusade, though. They are only here to pick berries.
The Lamb enjoys this time to themself. Even alone in their grand tent at the clearing, there is always the thrum of busyness outside the cloth walls. There is always work to do, things to mend, things to tend. Here in the berry patch the Lamb is alone but for their basket and their harvest: not lonely in the way they grew up, the last of their kind, but merely in peaceful solitude.
The peace is not to last, though.
*Denial does not befit a god.*
They're almost done when the memory comes to them, their fingers stained purple-red from their labor. The Lamb pauses, frowning at them. It's a like enough color to blood to mistake it, unless one is the Lamb themself. The Lamb has seen blood on their hands enough times to tell the difference.
Is that what Narinder meant, then? White wool stained red with the lives the Lamb has claimed?
No matter, they tell themself firmly, and reach for another berry deep in the bush. Narinder will say anything if he thinks it might give the Lamb comeuppance, and they can hardly fault him for it. Forgiveness takes time, and may never arrive.
Pain shoots up their hand. The Lamb winces, snatching it back, and in the doing they run a vivid red line along their palm as the bush's thorns do their work. Beads of blood---the real stuff---stains their hand.
They sigh and shake their head, using their other hand to wipe the blood away. That's what they get for letting their mind wander, a dangerous thing in Darkwood. At least the scratch will remind them to keep their wits about them, they think, turning their injured hand this way and that to examine the damage. It's not so bad as it felt, just a faint line that looks so shallow that they're suprised blood was drawn at all.
No matter. Their basket is full, and there's always the handful of followers that fret until their leader's return. Time to be heading back.
That night, tucked into their tent, the Lamb wonders why the scratch hurt so badly. It couldn't have been that serious, after all: the wound had healed itself by the time they arrived home.
---
It's true the Lamb has wondered what the Bishops looked like in their befores; before godhood, before the assault on their holy bodies. They knew the four only after the Old Faith's glory days. Today, they only know one.
The Great Worm, the Chaos-Bringer, the Night That Knows No Dawn---Leshy looks surprisingly normal. Bandages still swathe his missing eye and the horns of his godly form remain, but he is otherwise unremarkable when compared to others of the flock. Even with the Red Crown, the Lamb sees no other trace of his once-divinity.
They get little more than glances at him, of course. Leshy must first be dragged to the induction circle, after the Lamb has pulled his soul back from the limbo. They are conflicted in this action, certainly: no mercies have ever been visited upon the followers of any of the Bishops, and an eternity in purgatory seems a fitting punishment.
Yet as Narinder says, it seems the Lamb has become soft-hearted as their power grew. They swore to themselves that they would not become like the despot gods, to keep in touch with their mortal origins. Narinder does not approve. *Compassionate,* he has said with a sneer. *Like moss one may walk upon, uncomplaining.*
Speaking of Narinder, he offers no help in the Lamb's attempts to calm the snarling Leshy. He watches from his perch atop the fence that separates wood from field. The Great Worm thrashes blindly on the ground, cursing the Lamb's name between spitting growls. All the flock has stopped in their work to watch the scene. Of course Narinder begins to laugh. "Welcome, little brother!" he calls, grinning his cat's grin from ear to ear. "Welcome to mortality and the indignities that accompany it!"
Leshy screeches in answer. The Lamb does not manage to stop the dirty look they shoot Narinder, and by the way his smile grows, that was his precise intent. He keeps right on laughing when Leshy launches himself at the Lamb, all teeth and wailing. They manage---barely---to keep his lamprey's mouth from latching into their shoulder. The flock whispers; the Lamb can hear their doubts. Jona, liberated from Leshy's followers, and Teger, whose family was slaughtered by the same, are silent. The Lamb will have to go to the two of them later, they know. The work of a god is never finished.
All at once Leshy's shrieks become wails. It takes the Lamb a moment to understand the words that issue from his gnashing teeth, but they soon resolve. "My sight! My eyes! My---my Crown!"
The Lamb opens their mouth to speak, only for Narinder to interrupt. "Gone," says he, sharply, bitterly. "Gone, Leshy. Better you get used to it."
"Brother!" Leshy cries, lurching toward Narinder's voice. He trips. He falls. A murmur of laughter ripples through the flock, silenced by the baring of the Lamb's teeth. "Brother, please!"
"You are no brother to me," Narinder says.
"You must help me," Leshy says, pulling himself along the ground until he reaches the fencepost, and with it Narinder's dangling legs. He latches onto one, even as Narinder tries to kick him off. "Narinder, I feel their hatred all round me. They will tear me to pieces. You must help me. You must kill me! *Please*!"
Narinder's expression does something the Lamb has never seen before. It flickers, just for an instant, into shock, and then into horror, and then into fury. "You wretched belly-crawling thing, you *dare*---"
"*Enough,*" the Lamb says, and all the field falls silent. Even the panicking Leshy stills in his clutching at Narinder's robes, allowing himself to be shoved away. He sits pratfallen on the ground, his gnarled and woodlike fingers clutching the grass. "Get up," the Lamb tells him, crossing to help him do so. "Don't make choices in haste and panic."
The Great Worm, silent, allows himself to be drawn to his feet. He allows himself to be walked to the induction circle. He allows the Lamb to say the words and make the gestures that declare him one of the flock, and goes uncomplainingly with Bregre to be shown his quarters. Narinder is gone when they turn back, and the Lamb's head aches.
---
The sermon the Lamb gives that evening is frank, plain-spoken: forgiveness is no easy thing, but revenge leaves bitterness in the mouth. They do not think it is a very good sermon, and by the looks on the faces in the temple, neither does their flock. They linger by the pulpit after the crowd disperses, tracing their fingers over wood that still remembers when it was new.
"Not so easy, is it, Lamb?"
Later, the Lamb will suppose they should have expected Narinder. In the moment, they nearly jump out of their wool. Narinder, sauntering out from the shadows beneath the altar, smirks at them. "What is it," the Lamb says, less question than exhaustion. "What do you want."
"I want for nothing in your beautiful cult, do I?" Narinder returns, leaning an elbow on the pulpit. "All flowers and hand-holding here. At least until you made the mad choice to drag Leshy's flayed soul back here, O God of Death. Tell me, do you expect Teger to take your pretty preaching to heart? Do you believe she will simply bow her head and forgive that coward for her family's deaths?" His eyes narrow. "I still fulfilled my duties even chained, you know. I saw each soul through to eternity. Her brother begged me to send him back."
"Then why didn't you?"
"Should the shepherd cave to every bleating sheep?"
The Lamb's head pounds. It makes every word a barb in their skull. "There is a new shepherd now," they say, clapping shut their book of doctrines and making their way down from the pulpit. "A new faith, and a new way forward. I will see to Teger, and to Jona, too. *And* Leshy. They are all under my crook."
Narinder regards them from the pulpit, now, his haughty air fading. "I was idealistic too, once," he says. "I thought I could change the shape of death. See where it got me, shepherd."
A night breeze ebbs into the temple, pulling at the Lamb's fleece. It seems colder than usual, finding its way more easily under their wool in a way they are not used to. They hold back a shiver, and turn to face the usurped god. Their own words surprise them, tired and soft. "I see it. I hope it is a better existence than one of chains. You can always leave, Narinder. I don't hold you here."
There is no reply. Not until they reach the door. "Mind that headache," Narinder calls as he pads up beside them, making the Lamb stop in their tracks. "It might get worse."
"How did you---?" the Lamb begins, but Narinder pushes past them and slips out into the night.
---
The flock has, by some grace, a practicing doctor. No-nonsense, blunt, and quick to action, Falu the dog is one of only a handful of the Lamb's followers that still treats them as a person, not a godly thing.
She has not, however, been able to diagnose their headache. She's tried standard remedies, old folk cure-alls, and half a dozen other increasingly outlandish treatments. Today she has brought them a foul-smelling salve to rub into their temples and forehead. The pain has the Lamb irritable and impatient, but they meekly allow her to massage the stuff into the fine wool on their face. "You're a difficult patient, you know," she says conversationally. "I only know what's normal for a mortal, and even then I don't know what qualifies as normal for a sheep. Do you always lose your fleece this time of year?"
"What?" says the Lamb, opening one eye. Falu's old face wrinkles in a frown. "I don't lose my fleece at all."
"Hm," Falu says, and takes her hand away. With it comes a handful of white fluff, the puff of wool that normally lies over their brow. As the Lamb stares at it, she uses her other hand to push back what's left of the lock. The Lamb *feels* it pulling away from their skin, and all in a panic they jerk backward, frantically patting at their fleece. Falu watches with an impartial interest as to the Lamb's horror, their fussing peels half the wool on their arm away. "Not normal, then."
Karlach cocks her head to the side. Right braces for the verbal blow they know is coming. "Sorry," they add hastily. "Sometimes I ... I don't always pick up hints."
"You don't, do you?" Karlach says with a dawning kind of thoughtfulness. Her tail flicks behind her, contemplative. She smirks. "No worries. Always liked being straightforward better anyway. I'm trying to get you to come to bed with me, give the new hardware a test run. What d'you say?"
here's almost 10k of karlach railing my partner's tav. enjoy!
HEY. hey. listen. get a block of tofu. EXTRA FIRM. SUPER FIRM. make sure it's FIRM. put it in your freezer. DONT take it out of the package first. wait. take it out of the freezer. put it in the fridge. wait.
when it's thawed you gotta squish it. for a while. you have to get the liquid out. i use a tofu press with rubber bands and stuff. you can use whatever though. as long as it can go back in the fridge.
put it back in the fridge. wait. wait like at least a day. maybe three. you can forget about it for a little while.
remember the tofu. get excited. take it out of its press. put it on a cutting board and marvel at how much smaller and denser it is now. remember how you froze it. think about how the water in the block crystalized and tore up the inside of the tofu in a way that will let it absorb as much flavor as possible. it's a honeycomb in there now. it's different.
cut the block into cubes. heat up a pan. i use coconut oil. put in the tofu. add a splash of soy sauce, a splash of sesame oil. use a wooden spoon. move it around. let it sit for a while. add another splash of sauce, of oil. layer the flavors. let it set. let it crisp. maybe add another dash of sauce at the end.
kill the heat. put the tofu into a tupperware you kept from chinese takeout a million years ago. spoon some of the tofu over whatever you want. noodles. rice. vegetables. i don't know. maybe add some red pepper flakes. more soy sauce. whatever you want.
eat it. think about how you wish you'd learned tofu could be this good years ago. revel in the delight that you can get five or six servings out of a single block of tofu, a block that costs less than $5. think about other things you can do with tofu now that you know. think about how many other things you'll love that you just haven't learned about yet. remind yourself there are things in the world worth sticking around for.
go on the internet and write a long post about how to cook tofu. hope it lets someone learn it earlier than you did. be well.
done is better than perfect so here's the site i've been archiving my writing on! it is. 90% stuff about fray and his ten thousand AUs. most of it does not have the context it needs to be understandable because all i do anymore is write stuff to make my partners go A.
but it's my birthday today so you have to be happy with that!!!!
I'm over 10k into this rivals-to-??? Revalink thing with no end in sight so I'm posting some bits without context in hopes of scoring a dopamine boost to push through it haha. if you like what you see, comments do a lot for me in terms of motivation!
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His demands turn into an outraged squawk when Link pauses near a dark alcove, judges it appropriate, and grabs Revali by his scarf; he goes silent when Link slams his back to the wall, pinning him by his skinny shoulders with one arm. Not because of any startle or fear, but because Link has grabbed his beak to hold it shut.
Link's Hylian sounds at least as strange to listen to as Revali's. He much prefers to sign. Speech is painful and his words come out with their own harsh, uncanny cadence. His voice grinds and sticks, and he's been told it makes him sound like he's on the brink of death. But while it's good for very little, it does have some uses. Intimidation is one of them. "You will be ci---ivil to Mipha," Link says, heavy and final, like a portcullis falling shut. The Master Sword still hangs on his back, and he's well aware that Revali can see the hilt of it over his shoulder. "Or we'll see how well you fl---y without feathers."
---
[...] it's not the same as he remembers how he once had such feelings. There is nothing sweet to it, nothing innocent. He wants to pin Revali to the wall again and feel his heart pounding. He wants Revali to knock him to the ground and dig those claws into the flesh of his thigh, he wants to drag Revali down after him and bite down hard on his neck. He wants to devour him and be devoured in turn.
More than once Link wonders if this is some kind of twisted response to the years of cold shoulders. If this new strain is the only kind of affection he can crave now. More than once he decides it doesn't really matter. It's not like he's going to do anything.
---
"If I come back and find you two at each other's throats again, I'm plucking Revali and using the feathers to tar Link," Urbosa says, which pulls giggles from the other women. "Find ways to occupy yourselves. We'll be back."
It's a testament to Link's distraction that he doesn't realize he is once more alone with Revali until the very moment the box seat's door slides shut behind. If he were not already drenched in sweat from the lava-baked air, he would have begun to become so at once.
"Occupy ourselves, hm?" Revali says, pushing himself up from the edge of the balcony, and the willow sound is once more in his voice. He saunters purposefully toward Link, and stops in front of him, stretching out one wing---
"Let me see the sword."
Link blinks, twice, and squints at him. "No," he signs.
"I'm not going to try to steal it from you," Revali says, rolling his eyes. "I just want to see it."
[...]
"A magic sword," Revali says with disdain. "I suppose that should have been obvious. Tell me how a magic sword chooses its wielder, then."
Link does not want to tell that story. "I found it on an altar in the woods," he signs after settling the sword to lean against his arm. It's his usual explanation. It's not untrue.
"What woods?"
"The woods by my house?"
Revali glares at him. "Oh, naturally," he snips. "I suppose it made you a master swordsman as well?"
"Yes," Link signs, face devoid of expression. "In that finding it ensured the rest of my life would be nothing but training for that."
"Oh, come now. A few years in the royal guard can't be that bad."
"I was eleven when I found it."
It's not quiet even up here in the private seating, with the muffled rumble from the festival below filling the air. This is all that saves them from a true uncomfortable silence.
---
this thing is going to need a pretty thorough redrafting when it's done but I think it's got legs!
posting fic wip for that dopamine hit. sequel to you do not have to be good
---
“I do not get along with most people. Master Teba happens to be one of them. That’s all it is.”
Link, trying to calm the low panic that had risen in him with Revali’s vanishing, says to his back, “I think you’re m—ad he’s ta, taller than you.”
At this Revali turns, fully, to regard Link with unamused eyes. “That’s ridiculous. Since when am I sensitive about my height?”
“He’s taller than you, and he has your old title,” signs Link.
“There’s always a master of the mob,” says Revali with an impatient clack of his beak. “It’s the core of our defense strategies. The fact we share—shared—a title does not put him on my level.”
“Taller, has your old title, and,” Link finishes, “he grew out of his cheek patches.”
Revali’s crest stands on end as his eyes widen and then narrow. “My ch—I know what you’re doing,” he says, putting the book down with a thud on the shelf. “You are trying to rile me up and get me off my guard, and then you will pepper me with questions to trick me into telling you what you think I’m not telling you.”
Link lifts his eyebrow and nods, splaying his hands in an obviously? sort of gesture.
it's 11am. i log into tumblr. i see a drawing of an anthropomorphic dog with tits. "he/him," the description says. i nod. i am filled with peace.
it's yesterday. my partner messages me to say he ordered some femme clothes he's excited about. i tell him i can't wait to see. i tell him i'm looking forward to painting my nails again soon. i hold joy in my heart.
it's one in the morning. i am watching a cartoon about centaurs. my fingers hurt from the combined effort of learning to play ukulele and holding the tools for the craft i'm working on. my bird is asleep in his cage. i am tired and content.
it's almost noon. i've accidentally turned a shitpost into a poem. (Again.) i feel good in my body. i'm full of a nervous excitement for my future. I press post, and i get up to start my day, and i am thankful to be here.
