Chapter Text
Their first meeting is at Ranni's curiosity.
It has been many long years since Torrent vanished from the Lands Between, following his old master to someplace Ranni never knew. When Blaidd brought word that the spectral steed traveled these lands again, Ranni had initially held the briefest hope that she'd find a familiar figure upon his back. The hope died quickly when she brought herself to the Church of Elleh.
She lights on the roof's edge, fingers twining as she gazes down on the scene. Alongside the campground of a Nomad merchant, a strange woman lays curled in her bedding, a fine green traveler's cloak wrapped fast around her shoulders and hiding her face in its hood. Torrent lays beside her, so that her back rests against his flank, his head tucked gently against hers.
Ranni tilts her head, and her two faces, one of porcelain and one of starlight, conjoined upon a left-right eye, frown together in perplexion.
She falls from the roof, landing soundlessly with naught but a faint cold breeze to mark her passage. The woman shivers in her sleep, but does not wake. The Nomad sits up, suddenly wary at the sight of her, but he says nothing when she looks at him and puts a finger to her lips. With a wave of her hand she weaves him a gentle sleep, and he sighs and leans back against a stone pillar before the spell even reaches him, accepting it without fuss.
She draws closer, and Torrent wakes as well, raising his head to regard with deep eyes.
Ranni gingerly extends a hand to rest upon his flank, careful not to disturb the girl. Many questions pass through her mind. Where is thine old master, my friend, and from whence came this peculiar girl? How is it thy ring came upon her finger? A succession of choice, of kinship, or of blood?
She does not ask these things. In the end, they matter little. All she asks instead, is, "Doth thy new master treat thee well?" Her voice is a thin mist in the moonlight.
Torrent doesn't make a sound, perhaps out of concern for the girl's sleep. Instead, he simply flicks his ears, locking eyes with her in quiet challenge as he curls, ever so slightly, around his new companion.
Ranni hums to herself, and takes measure of the slumbering woman. Up close, the weary bags beneath her eyes are as clear as the scar sealing one of them shut. Her clothes are well-spun and well-tended, though the wear has begun to take. Her hair is such pale red it is nearly pink, and her face is young and prettily composed. If Ranni didn't know better, she'd mark the girl a finger maiden, but... no, there is a different sort of aura which clings to her. A faint smell of copper, a sense of lingering, waning gold. This girl is Tarnished.
How curious.
The girl stirs. Her eye drifts open, snaps to Ranni, and at once she erupts into motion. Scrambling backwards, she snatches a sword from beneath her bedroll and points it at the witch's pale blue face. "Back," she says, her breathing heavy and quick, her eye narrow with suspicious focus.
"Thou'rt in no peril," Ranni says. She's more interested in the blade itself, which she'd somehow completely missed. It is a curved thing, erdsteel, expertly forged and maintained with discipline far beyond the meager sellswords and soldiers of these lands. A faint glow of gold hangs about it, a blessing... but not the Order's blessing.
Curious indeed.
The girl isn't dropping her guard, and Ranni supposes that creeping up and ogling a girl while she sleeps fairly warrants this sort of response, so she deigns to explain herself. "I beg thee pardon mine intrusion; mine intent lay merely in ascertaining the nature of an old friend's new master." She inclines her head to Torrent, who whinnies mildly at them both. "But Torrent voucheth well for thy character. I bear no quarrel with thee."
The woman's breathing slows, and the sword dips a fraction as her eye traces Ranni's faces. She speaks softly, her voice high and careful. "You are Ranni the Witch, are you not?"
Ranni's lips, twofold, twitch upwards ever slightly. "And thou'rt a passing clever Tarnished, to ascertain my true identity so quickly."
The girl lowers her sword. Her eye appraises Ranni, her face guarded, and there is ambition there. Not uncommon in her breed, by any account, but... with a peculiar cadence to it. Not a hunger for power, or strength, or glory, but something deeper. Something that echoes, faintly, a yearning in Ranni's own heart.
"I wish to offer a gift," Ranni says, though she had not perhaps planned to. "To thee whomst Torrent hath chosen." She draws her lower-left arm out of her robe and presents a minor treasure to the woman. "'Tis a bell for the calling of spirits. It belonged to Torrent's master long ago, and in her stead I bequeath it to thee."
The Tarnished stares at the gift in cautious surprise, gingerly reaching out to take it. Their fingers brush, for but a moment, but there is a sudden intensity in the contact. The girl's hands run terribly hot, as if she were gripped with fever, and yet her skin is flush with healthy color, her eyes clear. It is as if the girl is ablaze from within.
It startles Ranni, and she subtly steps away as she assesses, but—no, there is no Frenzied yellow lingering in the woman's wide right eye as she examines the bell, though her left is still burned shut.
So terribly curious. That Torrent hath chosen such a strange master and brought her here, to this land, at this tumultuous time...
"I welcome your gift, Lady Ranni," the woman says, tucking the bell within her robe. She seems to search for words, for a moment, but says nothing.
"Then all is well. Forgivest mine intrusion, Tarnished. 'Tis unlikely we will meet again, but I wish thee fortune on thy travels." Ranni gathers herself, drawing back and beginning to slip away. Still, a curiosity stirs her—that heat, that fire, the oddness of the girl's bearing...
"I wonder..." she muses, as her body begins to dissolve into mist. "Art thou merely another servant of the Two Fingers?"
At this, the Tarnished face betrays her only slightly. It is a mere tightening of the brow, a curling of the lip, but it tells Ranni plainly that she has guessed the edge of something. "No... thou'rt something else altogether." Ranni smiles, and as the illusory doll melts away she is there in spirit alone for a moment, wavering moonlight. "Perhaps we will meet again after all, clever Tarnished..."
Ranni mulls over the encounter for a week after. The girl's burned eye, that heat, the odd blessing upon her sword... that Torrent would have found his way to her. That a fresh-faced Tarnish wouldst already sneer at the Two Fingers.
The Witch's curiosity continues to grow, until the day Blaidd returns from his hunt with peculiar tidings.
"...Darriwill is dead," he says, kneeling before her in spectral form. "But I'm ashamed to say it wasn't my hand that dealt the blow."
Ranni steeples all her fingers. "Worry not, my dear shadow," she says, and her heart warms at the shy smile she receives. "'Tis no matter how the traitor was silenced." Her lips curl. "Though thy words leaveth me curious; what soul would brave Iji's evergaol to slay a Bloodhound Knight of no renown?"
"A strange one, My Lady. She sought me out in the Mistwood at the behest of a mutual friend. At first I thought her a Finger Maiden, but if so she's the deadliest bloody maiden I've seen in my life."
Ranni's eyes widen slightly. Surely it is a coincidence, and yet... "A one-eyed Tarnished, perhaps? One who wieldeth an erdsteel sword with a curved blade?"
Blaidd tilts his head. "You've met her, then?"
"Once, in passing," Ranni says. "Though I confess I failed to ask her name."
"Melina, she told me."
"Melina..." Ranni tastes the name on her tongue. A pretty name, befitting a pretty girl. "Didst thou learn aught else of her?"
"Not much of substance," Blaidd responds. "And I'm no keen judge of character, as you well know. But she struck me as friendly, if a little single-minded. Nigh-unbearably well-mannered, as well—I ended up not calling Darriwill half the things he deserved, in an effort to preserve her ears."
Ranni suppresses a chuckle with her upper right hand. "You like her, then?"
Blaidd turns his head away. "She's... a good listener. And a bloody terror in battle. She wields that blade like a storm, and she's picked up some stranger arts as well."
"Stranger arts, pray tell?"
"Sorcery or incantation, I've not the foggiest. She only did it once. See, there was a point in the fight where she stuck Darriwill through the shoulder, and the bastard stopped trying to grapple with me and went after her full-wrath. Only time I saw her on the back foot. But then... it's difficult to describe. She... reached into her chest, pulled out a glob of fire, and hurled it in Darriwill's face. Sent him stumbling and screaming right back into my sword."
Ranni sits forward suddenly. That heat under her skin. A flame within her breast... "Surely 'twas not—"
"No." Blaidd shook his head firmly. "If it were the Yellow Chaos I'd have slain her on the spot. 'Twas a red flame. Clung to Darriwill oddly, but... well, I know sod all of flame magicks. Might have been a Fire Monk incantation, or some Dragon Knight trickery, but I can't say for certain either way."
Ranni hummed, leaning back in her chair and inclining her head to her dearest friend. "I see. My thanks to thee, Blaidd. Art thou well enough for another trip down the Well?"
Blaidd nods, his posture straightening at once. "Fit and fixing, my lady. I'll ferret out a way back to that damned city yet."
"Thou hast my faith as ever, my leal shadow." Ranni smiles at him, unable to conceal her gratitude. "But please, take some few days rest if thou feelest even the meagerest ache from thy battles. I could never bear it shouldst thou wear thyself thin on mine account. Our campaign hath ever been a long struggle, not a swift one."
Blaidd kneels, his own fond smile apparent as they play for one another the roles they've always played. "As you say, Lady Ranni."
He vanishes, and Ranni sighs a cold mist into the air of her chamber.
A time passes, her mind drifting back to Blaidd's words. A Tarnished who commandeth a flame unfrenzied...
She draws herself over to her books, piled high as they are, and searches the spines. Many forbidden volumes live here, collected over many years out of a mix of spite and tender curiosity, and she finds what she seeks in an aged grimoire bound in red leather. Testament of the Fire Giants, written by an traitorous fire witch after Marika's nigh-forgotten campaign.
She flips through the pages with tender care. It is a rambling text—the witch was clearly half-mad by the time, her hand shaky as she penned these heresies—but the tale unfolds itself before Ranni's discerning eyes.
"Lo, the mighty Giants! Those noble creatures born of Primordial Flame, the rightful rulers of this land, usurped by the Erdtree's hideous radiance! Let it be shouted from on high to all below that these great sages were silenced not for any justice, but from cowardice! For their ancient, oldest, holiest fire, the Flame of Ruin which warms the whole great world from on high, would devour the Erdtree in mere moments were it truly set loose! And let it be known to all those wretched cravens of the Golden Order that that Sacred Flame yet burns eternal at the mountaintop's very peak, and it will never die until its just vengeance is fulfilled at last! Death to Queen Marika! Death to the Erdtree! Let Fire devour the Order of Gold and render all anew from its sacred ashes!"
This is all on the first page. Rather maudlin, really, but intriguing nonetheless.
It's well known that to burn the Erdtree is a cardinal sin. Yet, the task itself is not as easily accomplished as such a prohibition suggests. Even the tiniest sapling is a terribly robust thing, far too resilient for a mere pocket match to singe the thinnest leaf. It takes a roaring bonfire to kill a shoot, and to incinerate a proper Minor Erdtree is an utterly absurd challenge—to Ranni's knowledge, it has happened only once since the Shattering, when Rykard's experiments in Mount Gelmir's caldera finally bore fruit. Yet even then, a volcano is not the sort of weapon one can mass produce and mount upon carriages, and one charred husk will not fell the Order.
The Scarlet Rot and the Frenzied Flame are the only realistic options, for one truly plotting to tear down the Erdtree's rule. Both, of course, are unthinkable. Ranni has no wish to make a Caelid of the whole world, nor does she particularly wish to be "melted in the yellow love" as one madman's scribbled journal—tucked away on a top shelf of her collection far away from curious hands—so eloquently put it. Even Rykard, in his deepest fury and growing madness, balked at their use.
And yet... a primordial red flame that is true anathema to the Erdtree's very flesh, sealed away in the frozen mountains by Marika herself in a long-lost age... that is an intriguing thing to one who wishes to usurp the Golden Order. Ranni had long considered the notion of striking down the Great Erdtree a functional impossibility, its golden bark an obstacle to be circumvented rather than destroyed... but if it could be...
She catches herself, gently closing the book and setting it back in its place among her collection. 'Tis a curious concept, true, but that a Tarnished of no renown might possess such a power is of course a laughable notion. Even if the heresy of flame magick is indeed descended from the Fire Giants, it possesseth no such power now.
Still... that she wieldeth flame at all... perhaps I ought to keep an eye on the girl.
So she does. Discreetly, this time. She conceals herself, watching from afar as the woman who is Torrent's new master heads south for a time, circles the Weeping Peninsula, then rides north again, skirting the edge of Caelid before sweeping west across the southern edge of the lake towards Stormveil. It seems she is contemplating something. Ranni finds her on nights when she is alone, sitting by her campfire with her sword in hand, turning the blade this way and that, catching the gleam of the flames in its blade. Other times, she seems to look towards Stormveil Castle itself, her expression twisted between trepidation and resolve, her fists clenched tight.
Once, (and by accident, assuredly), Ranni manifests to find Melina bathing in a stream, her robes cast off on the bank. There are scars across her body, on all of it. The distinct, mottled prints of flame's searing. And yet... again, no sign of the Frenzy.
(Ranni assuredly doesn't stay long that day, and if she does, it is for no reason but curiosity. Assuredly.)
And then, with no instigation save her own will, Melina makes her move. Ranni finds her in the dead of night, slipping into Stormveil like a wraith. The soldiers are all weary, half-mad from years of vigilance among their own decay, and she steals past their fortifications with eerie focus. When one finally does see her, her sword opens his ribs before he can raise his signal horn to his lips, leaving him to gurgle into it feebly as she flicks his blood from her blade and presses on.
Ranni follows at a distance, hidden by tricks of the moonlight, until Melina reaches the bridge before the castle's main gate.
At which point bloody Morgott appears out of the blue.
...No, it is Margit, of course. The Fell Omen, the scourge of the Tarnished, the Wraith of Altus whose Night Cavalry stalk the roads of the Lands Between on black-shrouded horses. No relation, assuredly, to Morgott the Veiled King, for the idea that the Lord of Leyndell might be an omen beneath his resplendent coverings is absurd.
(It's a transparent deception when one looks closely, but Ranni can hardly blame the withered old goat. She knows well enough the necessity of secrecy and obfuscation.)
Melina tenses, as Margit looks down on her from the battlements, the horns twisting from the side of his face glinting sharp in the moonlight. He leaps, crashes down on the path before her, and though the stones crack there is a distinct lack to the impact that catches Ranni's attention. A projection then, sent all the way from far-off Leyndell to defend Godrick from a nameless Tarnished. It beggars belief.
But his words catch Ranni's attention most of all.
"Foul tarnished, in search of the Elden Ring," Margit rhasps. He takes his stance, slamming his stave into the ground. "Someone must extinguish thy flame of ambition. Let it be Margit the Fell!"
A peculiar—though characteristically overwrought—choice of words. What doth the old king know, I wonder...?
He lunges, his teeth bared in righteous fury, and Melina meets his advance.
She fights as well as Blaidd described. She moves like smoke, like wind, her strikes quick and precise, and often telling. Yet, even in this lesser form her opponent is still Marika's son. He only needs to catch her with his staff but once.
The blow lifts her, small of frame, and she hits the ground hard, a scream tearing from her throat as her arm snaps under her momentum and she rolls to a stop on the path, leaving a smear of steaming blood on the cobbles. Still, she tries to rise, bracing herself with her one good arm and struggling to crawl to where her sword lays.
Margit towers above her, his gaze inscrutable. "Put these foolish ambitions to rest," he says, and raises the butt of his staff above her head.
Ranni is not sure what exactly moves her to intervene. It takes but a gesture, a faint twitch of the wrist, and Melina is gone, vanished into mist as Margit's blow cracks the cobbles. Another flick, and her sword goes too. No sense leaving it behind after all.
Margit whips his head around, lips curled in anger as pure as the light he reveres. "Who dares!?" he roars, and Ranni covers her mouth to keep from laughing as she flickers away.
Melina is unconscious when Ranni reaches where she stashed her. It's a little glen at the side of the road, past the Stormgate, and though Ranni cannot see it clearly she can feel the faint touch of Grace here. Gingerly, she props the broken girl beside the source of it, using her other hands to dig through Melina's satchel. She finds an amber flask—a proper one, to her surprise, wrought from brass and gold, and quite unlike the makeshift canteens most Tarnished cobble together. It is filling as she watches, siphoning the Grace's invisible light and tempering it into that ubiquitous restorative liquor. The smell of it rankles Ranni's nose—she's never had need of the stuff, but Blaidd insists it tastes quite good "once you get used to the aftertaste."
With tender care, she uncorks the flask and tips its contents down Melina's throat.
The change is instantaneous, golden light suffusing the Tarnished's many, many wounds and closing them from within. Melina twitches, gasping as her shattered arm twists and snaps itself suddenly back into place. The process finishes, and she lies there panting, her head resting on Ranni's lap as she recovers her senses.
When she opens her eye, she appears completely dumbfounded. "...Lady Ranni?"
"Thou'rt a passing fine swordswoman," Ranni says. She brushes a hand absentmindedly over Melina's hair. "But one requireth more than mortal skill to best a demigod."
At this, the girl looks abashed, her eye canting off to watch the horizon. They're on the rise of a low hill, with a lovely view over the moonlit sea. The briney wind is playing through the tall grass, the air alive with fireflies. The still stars hang over their heads like chandelier crystals from the vault of heaven.
"Your words are not without truth," Melina admits, gaze still cast away. "But I fear I still do not understand why you have deigned to aid me yet again."
Ranni hums to herself, still stroking Melina's hair, though she's not sure what compels her to do so. "A fair question. Thou'rt a curiosity, Melina of the Curved Sword. Tell me, for what purpose didst thou steal into Stormveil Castle tonight?"
Melina looks at her, appraising. She tries to sit up, but winces as she tries to put weight on her recently-broken arm. "What care is it of yours?" she asks, though her words are backed by little real defiance.
"Merely a question for a question. Thou wouldst know my purpose—I'd know thine."
Melina sighs, letting her eye slip closed. "I wished to lay eyes upon Godrick and take his measure."
"To know if thou might slay him?"
Melina pauses a moment before she speaks. "There is a girl down the road from here, in an abandoned shack. Her name is Roderika. She was a sacrifice, sent by some distant noble in tribute to Godrick the Golden ."
Ranni suppresses a shudder. "To be grafted."
Melina opens her eye, looking up at Ranni dead on. "Do you know what that girl said to me? About why she stayed in that shack, when all her guards went off to become one with a child of Godfrey?"
Ranni stares back, gripped by something greater than curiosity. "Tell me."
"That she was a coward," Melina says. Her voice is soft, but that is merely her way of speech, and from anyone else's mouth it might have been a scream of bitter fury. "That she, a child hardly of age, was a coward for fearing what would happen to her behind the walls of that castle. That her friends were so much braver than she, for going where her parents bid, to let themselves be torn limb from limb and stuck on the spider's body like petty baubles."
"'Tis a barbarous practice."
"'Tis evil, if such a thing may exist in all the world." Melina closes her eye again, exhaustion painting her features. "That is why I stole into the keep. As Tarnished, I'm told it is my destiny to seek the Elden Ring and its disparate shards, to slay their bearers if needs be. I supposed that, perhaps, it might then be possible for one such as I to avenge such injustice."
Ranni hums to herself, considering. "But before this Roderika spurred thy hand... that lofty quest held little appeal to thee. Is it not so?"
Melina frowns. She moves to sit up, and this time manages to do so. If Ranni misses the weight of a head on her lap, or the feel of fair hair beneath her fingers, she lets none of it show.
"Let me speak plain," Ranni says. She reaches to her side and takes up Melina's blade, turning it to present its hilt to its owner. "Thou art maidenless. Ustoried. Clearly thou hath skill, but there is little power behind it."
Melina looks away, frustration and shame evident.
"But that is no fault of thine," Ranni continues. "Ye Tarnished are given only the vaguest purpose, even if ye be granted entrance to the Roundtable Hold, which I sense thee hath not."
Melina nods.
"Allow me, then, to offer thee an accord." Ranni realizes the full implications of what she is saying only as she says it... but it feels proper, regardless, and she presses on without hesitation. "I, Ranni the Witch, would play the part of thy Maiden."
Melina's head snaps around so fast that Ranni half-wonders if she's broken her neck. She opens her mouth to say something, but Ranni holds up a hand.
"Pray, allow me to finish laying out my terms," she says, evenly. "Though I am no Finger Maiden in truth, I'd be well able to play the part of one. I could even grant thee entrance to the Roundtable Hold, though I ask that thou keepeth mine identity from thy compeers. 'Twould raise questions and ire were word to spread that a demigod was meddling in the Hold's affairs, and I've no wish to incur such attentions."
Melina nods, slowly, contemplative. "And in return?"
Thus came the part Ranni was most uncertain of. "Thou wilt tell me," she says. "With honest tongue, thy ambitions and the principles thou wouldst follow. Though we hath met but briefly I sense... possibility in thee. Thou'rt no mere seeker of glory; 'tis plain as the manifold rots that ail these Lands Between. I would know thine aims, and if, perchance, we shouldst align, I would share mine with thee in turn."
Melina watches her carefully, as if trying to glimpse truth through a heavy veil. "I will confess, I yet fail to grasp what I have done to catch your eye so keenly."
Ranni is not wholly sure of it herself, and she's not quite ready to give away her suspicions, so she settles for a half-truth. "A collection of things. Recall thee Blaidd? The man is a servant of mine, and speaketh highly of thine skills and character. Torrent, as well, would not accept any common Tarnished for a master. And while I know not this Roderika, thy motivations bespeak a kind heart—a rare quality in this age."
The girl is blushing faintly at her accolades, but she maintains her comportment regardless. "Be that as it may, it yet fails to answer my question."
Ranni pauses a moment, to choose her phrasing carefully. "...Then I shall speak mine underlying motives plainly. One day or another, the state of things will shift. Perhaps the Scarlet Rot shall break free, or what remains of dear Radahn will lose his grip on the stars, or old Morgott himself will finally be deposed. It matters not the form of it. More Tarnished arrive on these wan shores with each passing moment, and each bringeth with them a new unknown variable into the equations of power. And any amongst them—kind or cruel, it matters not a whit—might one day attain the strength to become our Elden Lord."
Melina listens, patiently, her brow furrowed through the whole spiel. "And you would have that Tarnished be me," she says. Disbelief laces her voice.
Ranni smiles. "To be unskeptical of such an offer wouldst mark thee a fool, but note that I make no immediate demand of obeisance. Shouldst thou find mine aims distasteful, my presence cloying and unpleasant, then we shall take our leave of one another. I will make no threat of retaliation, unless thou shouldst turn thy blade or tongue against me."
Melina considers it, and Ranni knows, deep in the well of her soul, what her answer will be. Still, there is one more hook she would set, one last curiosity to explore.
"Thou shouldst know," Ranni says, "that mine aims are not those of the Two Fingers."
Melina's eye snaps to hers, and Ranni grins with teeth both porcelain and spectral, her chest tightening with uncommon anticipation. "Accept mine offer," she continues, "and we shall speak of our ambitions further. Refuse, and I shall relinquish thee to thy journey, and thou may remain ignorant and unconcerned with my meddling. I compel thee only to choose."
The faint breeze trembles the grass. The clouds above them are quickening, the Stormhill living up to its name. Far off, lightning strikes the earth, and the moon watches keenly from on high.
Melina closes her eye. and gives her answer.
Ranni smiles, and speaks. "Then layeth thy hand upon mine, for but a moment, that I may turn thy runes to strength..."