Inspiration: Tales from the White Palace Chapter 5
Hornet does co-schooling in Deepnest and Hallownest. However, the snobbish noble children in Hallownest continually snub her. Eventually, she gets fed up with it, and demands to know what it’ll take for them to respect her. One kid floats the idea of visiting Kingdom’s Edge, a taboo place which is rumored to have a giant monster living there. A test of courage type of deal.
They were skipping class in the first place to have this conversation, and Ghost runs across them in the Queen’s Gardens. Curious, but understanding (he’d never subject himself to the torture of lessons, no matter how much the Pale King insists), he decides to leave them be. However, he overhears the conversation, and decides maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to go scold them for playing hooky, hoping to cow Hornet and discourage her from such a foolhardy trip without outright saying it.
It doesn’t work, obviously.
In the middle of the night, she sneaks out to meet with her classmates. She takes a stag from the Palace Grounds to King’s Station, then meets them at the entrance to the Royal Waterways (since the stasis hasn’t happened, maintenance is regular, so they aren’t gonna be wading in shit to get past where Ogrim was). From there, they navigate the Waterways until they reach Kingdom’s Edge, eventually making it to the Cast-Off Shell.
Once in sight of the supposed monster, while the rest of her classmates are trembling, Hornet realizes that its just a corpse. Emboldened, they dare each other to venture into the gaping maw. Then, of course, they all gang up on Hornet to go, saying that she’ll never prove herself as a royal of Hallownest if she doesn’t do it. Angry, she intends to do just that. She isn’t expecting Ghost to melt out of her shadow (Shade Lord).
He’d only heard that the children intended to go to Kingdom’s Edge, not that they were going to seek out the Wyrm’s corpse (they’d lowered their voices for that part of the conversation, even though nobody was around). As stated earlier, Ghost hoped Hornet wouldn’t try to sneak out, but decided to hide away in her shadow in case she did. And it turns out he was right to do so.
This time, he scolds her properly, and Hornet obviously gets mad. She starts screaming shit like I’m the King’s daughter, I have a right to know these things! And I’m old enough to make my own decisions!
“You fancy yourself grown…?”
“Yes! I’ve already molted twice! I’ve trained with the Weavers of Deepnest and Hive Queen Vespa! I’m the daughter of Herrah the Beast and the Pale King! I can take care of myself! Return to the Palace, Ghost- this has nothing to do with you!”
Wordlessly, Ghost drew his Tainted Greatnail, holding it limply, the point digging into the layer of decomposing ash covering the ground. A sense of terror gripped Hornet, like a hand squeezing her heart. She and her classmates- who were watching the confrontation with poorly-disguised glee (anxious to see the stuck-up spider princess get punished or something, so they could spread gossip)- all skittered back instinctively, flight response rearing its head in the face of insurmountable danger.
“G-Ghost?” Hornet stammered. She was paralyzed by fear, unable to even reach for her weapon.
“It seems… Words will not be enough to dissuade you from going further. You will learn. Draw your Needle!” the Vessel barked.
“Wha- no… I- I can’t fight you! That’s not fair!” Hornet cried.
“Really? And why is that?” Ghost drawled, lazily stepping forward. His long legs covered a good chunk of the distance between the half-siblings. “Have we not sparred before, when I taught you how to wield your Needle?” He took another step, and the spiderling scuttled back.
“That’s- different! That was training! I can’t- you’re a God!”
“Excuses,” Ghost scoffed. “I had already killed my first God when I was smaller than you are now. Come, oh brave one,” he jeered, “Prove your might. Or is all your training under me, the Weavers, and the Hive, just for show?”
Tears were starting to well up under her mask, borne of a mix of frustration and fear. “I… Look, I’ll go back to the Palace! That’s what you want, right!? And I promise I’ll never return here!”
“Draw. Your. Needle.”
“That is enough, children.”
Everyone in the clearing turned to stare at the interloper. The Pale King himself stood off to the side, head tilted up to stare blankly at his son. “There is no need for the dramatics. A simple warning would have sufficed, I think.”
Kids taken back to Hallownest, PK and Ghost talking on a balcony.
“I suppose I should thank you for warning me about Hornet’s plans. You have my gratitude,” the Pale King said with a slight bow.
“You were late,” Ghost growled.
“Perhaps. But I knew you would be able to stop her before she did anything too dangerous.”
“Then why did you show up at all, if you knew I could handle it?”
“I came to stop you.”
“...What?”
“In one of the futures I Saw, you permanently ruined your relationship with Hornet by challenging her to a duel in front of her classmates. You knocked her around with ease- you even broke her Needle by accident. The other children talked, and Hornet was so ashamed to be seen as weak, no matter your reputation as the most powerful warrior in the Kingdom, that she begged Herrah to never send her back to Hallownest… And Herrah agreed. Hornet would have never forgiven you, had you gone any further.”
Ghost became more and more tense the longer the Pale King spoke. He released a shuddering breath. “Is… Is it too late to apologize?”
The Pale King was silent for a long while, each passing second ratcheting up Ghost’s anxiety. “I do not believe so. She will either forgive you now, or sometime soon. You seem to have the highest chance of success if you wait about two days. Don’t wait too long, though, or she’ll think you uncaring.”
Ghost tilted his head. “Did you… Use your Foresight?”
The Pale King merely nodded.
“...Thank you.”
“Just remember, Ghost; you and Hornet have had vastly different upbringings. What makes sense to you will not make sense to her.”
Ghost stared at his father. “I’ll keep that in mind,” he finally said, then strode back into the White Palace. He needed to find something to occupy him for the next two days or so.
“The arrays of land that long vanished from any ancient maps, from the times before any bug stepped their feet upon them. It looks more like a battlefield than a simple ribbon of wavy pathways across the huge terrain of never ending, bottomless canyons.”
Nightmare King’s observation:
“These roads lead almost nowhere. No village. No town… One doesn’t have to mention kingdoms. If there were any - they existed long before any god of bug was born.”
