Work Text:
Causality is the pull between meanings; that which links all things in a chain of relation.
Regression is the pull of meaning; that all things yearn eternally to converge.
*
He is excised from her flesh for a purpose.
You, she mutters, are but a part of me.
No, he thinks, but does not say - you do not understand. Marika has never understood.
We have always been a hated part of the other.
*
Causality, she mutters, moving pawns across a battlemap, selecting a spouse like a general for the front lines as he watches in mild horror. The Greater Will dictates thus - it is all to be connected. Someday, Radagon, you will understand this.
He is one of those pawns, if only to the part of her that is still called Marika. To the part of him he will leave behind for open fields and bloodshed and the hard, bitter work of tying up all her loose ends.
I, she says, quietly, as if sensing his reticence, do not get a choice in this either.
That much is true - the Greater Will is a hard force to shake. It is hard to remember, sometimes, separated from his worse half, that she feels the same drive to order as he does. That she, too, was built upon it, reforged in godhood and gold and coldly concealed fabrications.
It speaks only to you, then? he asks, just to make his point.
It’s one force, Marika says, flatly, but not quite coldly. There is a hint, Radagon notes, of something approximating… it’s almost fear, he thinks, numbly. So she still knows what it’s like to feel that.
One force, he repeats. But two voices, now, my other half - that was the choice we made.
Two fingers, she says, setting down the small pawn with a finality that makes his skin shiver. Channel to one voice.
Like us, she means to say, he thinks, because at the end of the day, that’s all that’s left of them, isn’t there? Two arms of something greater that they pretend to be.
It’s a pity, he thinks. Marika’s eyes remain firmly on the future because she cannot bear to look behind her at what she’s lost. What the pair of them gave up to become what they have. To acknowledge it, he knows, means to make a choice between disregard, which she cannot, or mourning-
-which, he notes, as Marika runs a hand down the cheek of what’s become of their half-brother. Maliketh stands at attention, loyal and vacant and silent and left with even less autonomy than them-
- is too painful to bear.
*
Marika the Eternal’s shield secures Liurnia, as commanded. The Carian nobility will not be allowed to flank the bulk of the army, and his work here is done.
Radagon of the Golden Order’s hammer carves through Leyndell, as ordained. The crucible knights will fall in line and bend the knee to the new order of things, and her work truly begins.
It’s strange, Radagon thinks, the corpse of a scholar-turned-soldier at his feet. The bulk of their purpose - to seize sovereignty, raise a faith from a single, split seed - feels like a mere footnote in the grand scheme of it all.
Hoarah Loux is recast as Godfrey, Consort to the Eternal - rewarded for his loyalty under her banner. It is a decision born of practicality, because what comes next is more important than anything else. Marika seeks to build a world on strength and loyalty, and for that she has selected a controllable subordinate, for Radagon knows she will never consider Godfrey an equal if even he-
Because he isn’t, he thinks, much to his chagrin. Or at least, Marika doesn’t see it that way, and even unequal, they are fragments of the same mind. Marika fears the day she meets an equal who does not share her vision of the world. This is why he-
-was sent off-
- left -
-is no longer by her side.
Strength, he thinks, as the enemy general throws a blade of light at his feet, staring down - no, up at - a demigod with nothing more than a stick and a couple decades of education. Loyalty, he thinks, as the Queen of Caria surrenders, with the condition - no, the demand - that her soldiers leave with their lives.
The gesture, the faith - in not just the men but him, as well - tugs at something deep in the pit of his stomach.
Ah, he thinks, as the world shifts with but a glance from his once-enemy. I understand now, Marika.
We are more alike than not.
*
Gods do not care for weddings, he knows, for Marika has eschewed mortal formalities, leaving Godfrey to run a city while she does The Will knows what.
Queens do, however, bound by their own duties to their subjects. And he is no longer a god, is he? They had agreed upon the matter, he thinks bitterly - Marika was to serve as the immortal champion of the Greater Will, a mouthpiece and golden idol, and Radagon was to inspire faith as a more mortal flagbearer.
He does not miss her, he thinks, his wife’s arms tight around his frame, mouth hot against his own. The chapel is scented with sweet flowers and it is impossible not to lose himself in the roar of the crowd, the singing of the choir, and the light of joy in another person that he had almost forgotten.
He does not miss her.
She is not a wound in his soul.
*
How could she be? They have always been more than that - one soul, now wounded.
It was not Marika who drew the blade, for her hands at the time were equally his.
*
She bears a child. Godwyn, they call him. The golden hope of Leyndell, a beautiful catalyst for a new era.
He can tell that Rennala knows something is wrong. Truly, he had no hope of hiding it from her - she’s the most observant person he’s ever met. More than that, she’s never been one to push, and that kindness cuts deeper than any mortal wound. Perhaps because it is, he thinks, a genuine desire for his own happiness rather than blind faith. Perhaps it stings because such kindness comes from her.
Rennala is a patient woman in more ways than one. Radagon knows some of mortality, but little in the way of husbandry - in both senses of the word. Peace is unfamiliar to him, and marriage is something he’s only ever encountered by proxy until the Greater Will drove him thus-
- no, he thinks. This was mine. The Will may have made me what I was, but I chose this.
I chose her.
At the core of it is this: while he has long walked the world as a man - ever since he became Radagon and not Marika - he has never done so as a mortal man. Masculinity and all its trappings is a piece of him, but not one he has ever truly bothered to engage with beyond necessity.
It is, he thinks, as he dwells in the space of another for the first time without a battlefield’s context of bloodshed, something he is surprised to find he wants.
And it has nothing to do with Marika, nor her son, nor her consort.
Rennala, he mutters, one night, as she presses her lips softly to his own with her usual chaste restraint, her patience , Rennala, I would ask you to-
She pulls back, staring up at him, eyes bright and knowing but teasingly curious. Her expression is something to behold, and he finds himself lost in the majesty of it all - of his choice and her face and that deep, burning sense of finally being seen - that he cannot help but reach to brush a stray strand of dark hair behind her ear, cherishing the softness of it. She smells like a morning after rain - enticing and new and deeply alive.
You would ask something of me? Rennala repeats, with no small degree of jest, but ah - it is good-natured, he knows this by the curve of her smile, the warmth in her countenance-
- yes, he mutters, bringing his forehead to hers, if only to feel her more closely while still speaking. This- he has not truly ever wanted something for himself since he-
- since you became your own person, he can hear, in the voice of that cynical piece of himself he thought he’d left behind the day they parted. You were never made to want, Radagon. Your will is but a fraction of one Greater.
But the voice is wrong.
Desire is unfamiliar but it is visceral and stronger than any divine ordinance he has ever felt. The world has narrowed to the sense of skin against his own, the weight of Rennala’s gaze and the strength of her arms and the twisting in his gut-
-oh, he wants.
He wants so badly it is difficult to pin down the nature of his longing. Mechanically, he understands, or at least, he knows what it is supposed to feel like in a theoretical sense. And it’s not an entirely new experience, to be certain - he has long been attracted to his wife. This- yearning, it began the moment she burnt a sizeable portion of his shoulder off on the battlefield, the moment she put her faith in his mercy, the moment he inexplicably wanted to be what she desired of him far more than for Marika, and that’s love, isn’t it? To care for another far more than yourself, to want them to want you, to long to be the better version of yourself that you see reflected in their eyes-
- Radagon, she mutters.
There was something he was to ask, he recalls, dimly. It was important, just a moment ago. It was critical.
Oh, he remembers, stomach twisting as Rennala runs her thumb along the slackened line of his jaw. It was about Marika.
I want, he mutters, trying to reconstitute some semblance of self-control, Rennala, I would- I think, maybe, it is time- don’t, please, let me speak-
Rennala pulls her hand back, the playful expression now focused, and oh, there’s softness there. It does something to him, the idea of her being fond enough to listen-
-please, he mutters. I want a child. I want you to-
It is hard to speak much after that. It is harder still to muster the will to stop her - her mouth, her hands - long enough to do so.
Rennala, he says, wrecked voice cracking, Dear Rennala, I want this too, but first-
-first what? she asks, tracing the line of his collarbone with her mouth, and it hits just now that her lip twitched as he spoke, when he said he wanted this-
- a child, he gasps. Show me, I- you know. To create one. I must- I need-
She freezes.
- your expertise.
*
It is not a misunderstanding.
He knows he is no fool - mortal children are made in a marital bed. But he needs more than that, he realizes. Marika, as she’s always done, drew his gaze backwards to the glaring void he’s never bothered to look at.
For all he pretends, for all he serves , for all he feels… he is no true mortal.
Still, he thinks, Rennala above him, tracing a gentle hand down the planes of his chest, hips thrown over his own, is he not serving the Greater Will in this, too? Marika demanded a mortal general, and Radagon assented, and now he’s in bed with a woman who shaped moonlight for him, and the universe has not deigned to punish him for it yet.
So they will conceive a mortal child, and he will relish every minute of it, as if this too could be taken from him somehow, as if he will be punished for wanting when his desire is the raw material of the cosmic order. How, he thinks, a pained noise escaping his lips, covered but a moment later by Rennala’s - how can this fail to suffice?
The twinned fingers will not release its hold upon them without an heir they find sufficient, and sufficiency demands divinity.
This, he thinks, as nails dig into his back, as he buries his mouth in her neck, the smell of sweat and floral soap and something viscerally mortal… this - this should be more than that.
*
It is not a misunderstanding.
In the hall, before they retire, Radagon explains to his wife between shaking breaths that there are miracles in moonlight, and asks for her help.
In the bed, before he loses himself utterly in her, Rennala demands between kisses and soft sounds of contentment that the man she brings to the brink of wordlessness articulate the finer points of magical theory.
It is a game they play. Radagon traces rings of light into her hip. Rennala draws him into an illusion of a grand lake. He asks her to help him use a great rune to birth a daughter while she has three fingers inside him and he can’t finish sentences, and Greater Will forgive him, Marika forgive him, he loves every moment of it.
Their daughter is born the same night their son is conceived.
Like twins, Rennala says later, combing fingers through his tangled hair, lips lingering at the crook of his neck.
Ranni is born the same night he hears about Godwyn. Rennala can sense there’s more to it than simple desire, but she does not press him, though she presses her hands to his. Her fingers guide his own to his core, coaxing each digit as he pulls a piece of light from between his ribs, a shining fragment of a rune that turns to liquid amber in the moonlight, crystalizing like tree-sap-turned-resin.
You are incredible, she mutters, as the stone takes form between their joint hands, pressed up against his back. And someday, Rennala says quietly, my light - you must tell me what you are.
He should. He owes her the truth, and someday, he knows that the consequences of his existence as a bound creature will fall upon the both of them.
He shouldn’t. He cannot bear to disappoint her. Not tonight, at least - he will not sully the fragile time they have by burdening her with pain that is rightly his to bear.
But as he looks at the creature in his hands, formed from tree sap and hopes and desperation to do things right, still coming down from the strongest emotions he’s felt in his life-
-it is the first time, Radagon notes, that he cries.
Your daughter, Rennala says, in loving amazement, she’s-
-our daughter, he corrects, voice cracking. Ranni is the spitting image of her mother, in spite of being born from one - split - soul. His desire for stability and Rennala seems melded into one: a small creature with the delicate blue eyes of the woman he loves, the very spitting image of her mother. You helped form her.
She looks like me, Rennala says, in awe. There is something more there, in the depths of her voice - an undercurrent of understanding, a shift, a realization. She knows something, he thinks. She is far too smart not to.
She looks like you, he repeats, gently, because I cannot keep you from my mind.
I close my eyes, he starts to say, resting a thumb against her bottom lip, my desire made manifest by your aid, and you are surprised that yours is the only face I see?
The press of a forehead to his own. I am no goddess, Rennala says, so close that the infant cradled between them can rest easily in all four arms. I do not purport to come before one, golden one.
*
Years later, hearing the tales of horror drift towards the Erdtree from the hidden tunnels of Mt. Gelmir on solemn breezes, he thinks perhaps this is it.
Rykard and Ranni. Conceived in a single night, born in two, both adrift in the sea of powers greater than the three of them.
They were born from desire, he thinks, and duty alike. That singular piece of his soul that was his and his alone - duty, for certain, but no duty to Marika, nor the wills.
To Rennala, he thinks, and everyone like her.
Children of desire, of a longing for a long-denied autonomy.
*
It all comes to a head with a dog on his doorstep.
My guiding light, Rennala says, quietly, as their daughter tugs at the hem of his skirt, her tiny, serious face the very picture of her mother’s, both framed in dark hair - albeit different shades - and an expression demanding explanation. Radagon, darling, his wife continues, who is this boy?
Blaidd, the shadow says, with all the requisite propriety. I am from the church, to serve as bodyguard for the lunar princess, as is-
- he pauses, uncertain.
(The boy doesn’t even know, does he?)
As is demanded, Radagon finishes, kindly, and Blaidd looks relieved. It is traditional.
For firstborns? Rennala asks, in a tone of voice that suggests she knows vividly that this is not the correct answer, and he wants to kiss her for helping him save face.
In a sense. He knows what this boy is - a fragment of someone who once was more than a vessel, much in the way he is. A knife in the dark, a consequence of his decision to sire a divine - yet mortal - daughter.
A warning shot from the Greater Will.
I wish to swear my life to her protection, the young Blaidd says. It is the purpose I was raised for.
We are no stranger to hounds here, Radagon says, forcing himself to smile. I have a shadow of my own, little cub. But I will not force dear Ranni to adhere to tradition, if she wishes to follow more in her mother’s footsteps.
It is a lie he deeply wants to believe. There is no choice here, and the subtle burning in his chest, in his fingers, each peripheral nerve - it good as confirms it. There is a certain amount of leeway he will have before the Greater Will twists his arm, and they will not permit an Empyrean to be raised and schooled by witches without supervision.
But he needs not fight it. Little Ranni has no qualms, in the end.
Little vassal, his daughter says, cautious but firm- I will acquiesce. The fingers will hear no complaints leave my lips.
*
It is then, of course, that it all comes crashing down.
A vassal of the Church of the Eternal sent to Caria, for the Lunar Princess’s personal guard? The doings of the two fingers do not escape their divine figurehead, and a summons reaches his court within a fortnight.
A second son is born. Ranni grows alongside a blade in the dark. His hair mars all three children.
Another letter comes. He ignores it. Marika will not kill his child, he knows - she would not risk deliberately forfeiting their last tenuous connection. But she will not let this stand, either, and therefore a compromise must - will - be reached. So there is another letter, another summons.
One more. Another. He ignores them all. Rennala does not pry, but his reticence weighs heavily on her as well.
Marika, as predicted, does not press him, busy as she is with warmongering and ill-omened twins and divinity. He does not turn his back on his own duty, no - he lets the half-wolf remain, raises him like a third son.
It is not a reticence to serve, he thinks, nor is it a reticence to explain himself. He stands by his choices, and little Ranni is the spitting image of her mother except for his hair, so Marika can seek information from the Two Fingers herself, consult the Greater Will itself if she’s so curious as to his process.
No, it is this - he simply cannot bear to see her again.
It feels like a cataclysm on the horizon - the catalyst for some grand, unbearable shift. And it is not a welcome one - the mere thought of change is unbearable to him at the moment. Perhaps it is the fact that this is the first time he has truly felt that joy - or something akin to it - may be in his grasp beyond mere ephemeral moments of happiness.
And with each letter, the string of fate wraps tighter around his wrist, pulling him back to a home he never chose, a woman he never wanted to be.
*
He tunes out the letters for several years, until the ebb and tide of battle comes to a standstill. Two things arrive in short succession at the conclusion of Marika’s war on the giants.
First: the news - there is uproar in Leyndell, for the Elden Lord has renounced his title. That is the popular story, though if you ask the religious (and Radagon certainly did ), they state that Marika’s faith in him has waned along with his utility, and he makes for the Badlands once more, reputation tarnished. Radagon does not particularly care which, in light of the second arrival - a reason for the sudden absence of letters.
Marika graces the threshold of Caria only once, without invitation or fanfare. Gods are not meant to walk amongst mortals, most ardent mortal representatives included. And so, the Queen of Caria hosts an unexpected dinner with as much discretion as she can muster on short notice.
All three children attend, of course, along with dear Blaidd, who is as good as a fourth until the day Ranni attempts to assert what little free will she still retains.
Marika, he notes, is strange around children. Ranni can sense something, he thinks, for her eyes never leave Marika when the goddess’s attention is elsewhere, and as reserved as the girl is, he can tell that whatever drew her focus is certainly not admiration. Thankfully, she has her mother’s intelligence and knows which fights are appropriate to pick - and when.
Radahn, however… arguments are no concern with him, but what is a concern is how the boy gushes about Godfrey’s martial skill, which-
Radahn, he urges. Child, please. While your esteem for the man is admirable, we must not make our guests uncomfortable.
Something strange passes over Marika’s face, and it hits him. There was some merit in the church’s words, perhaps - the man must have been exiled for something beyond a simple whim, and he should have known better than to entertain the notion that their parting was choice of Godfrey’s. Marika has never been one for acting on a whim.
It is fascinating, the Eternal says, to see a child so deeply his father’s son, and yet so distinct.
His two eldest take her words as an insult - Rykard finally deigns to look their guest’s way, eyebrows raised, while Ranni turns to him, as if to wordlessly ask will you permit this?
Radahn, his dear boy, takes the half-compliment she’s thrown him as a whole, beaming and proud, and it makes him want to break something, because Marika has not come here to pay a simple visit, to compliment children or wish him a life of happiness-
- you must excuse me, Radagon says to his family, rising in one tense, abrupt motion. I owe our guest a long overdue audience. And while hosting her has been our duty and an unexpected pleasure, I will not insist on wasting more of her precious time.
Rennala knows him well, and such knowledge pains him, for when he meets her gaze, he can tell that she knows he spoke the truth. He did not let Marika in the castle for fear, but because he truly does feel like he owes her that much, at least - the duty remains, cradled in the core of his being, to their twinned purpose.
As for pleasure, he is not so certain that was a lie, either. It is a confusing thing, to see her again - not a delight, nor pleasure in the sense of how it feels to spend time with the woman he loves, but a piece of himself, he realizes suddenly, is frustratingly relieved to see her. Like the falling of a stone he had been waiting to drop for years, perhaps. Evidence that, in spite of it all, she does not seem to despise him for what little individuality he maintains - respects his taste, even. She has saved her usual criticisms, bar the one underhanded compliment - it is almost as if she is-
-trying not to irritate him.
Which is why they must speak. Marika has not come here purposeless, and will take her time from him one way or another. She is known for many talents, but patience is not one of them.
He is much the same way, he thinks, begrudgingly.
But Rennala meets his gaze, and something painful takes root in the back of his throat, for there is fear in her eyes. But worse, not fear of him, not what he will do, how he will act, but fear for him.
She’s seen the letters. She asked only once why he refused to acknowledge them, received an explanation - a truthful one, even, or as truthful as he has license to be - and knows that gods are not used to a lack of response.
He loves her all the more for it.
But Marika sees it too, and Radagon does not like what he sees in the line of her brow.
*
Marika has always had a way with symbolism, which he supposes is a prerequisite for divinity or perhaps a side effect of it. Regardless, she leads him to the old church overlooking the lake. She did not attend the wedding all those years ago, he remembers. There were appropriate well-wishes sent from Leyndell, a well-calculated gift for public appeasement, and a letter, but her presence there could only have ever been symbolic.
Until now.
So they speak in the church. Or, rather, Marika delivers a scathing commentary on the suitability of his children. How Radahn is brash, undisciplined, and meddles with dangerous forms of magic, Rykard appears interested in nothing but himself, things she isn’t equipped to comment on considering her own history-
-they are of no consequence to you, Radagon says, coldly. And let’s not pretend you have use for loyalty they might’ve had. But let us call a spade a spade, Marika - this is not about my sons. This is about my daughter.
You’ve not changed, Radagon, she says, tracing a finger across the surface of the stone dais. There is not a speck of dust, for the pastor keeps the place spotless. But you have missed the mark. This is about our duty.
There is intrigue there, he can tell. She has, Radagon realizes, not yet come to the understanding of Ranni’s birth or status - a puzzle she has not yet relinquished, he can tell by the slight shift in her expression.
I have spend many hours in contemplation, Marika says, slowly.
Let us hear the results of your extended thought, then, he responds. Perhaps you will manage another before the year is out.
Radagon, she says, bluntly, the Greater Will desires something from us. You can feel it, can you not? Your daughter’s birth confirms it - there was a great silence after the birth of Godwyn.
I have an heir, Radagon says, reluctantly. I need no other. If you wish to learn-
-she will turn, Marika interrupts. She was not bound to it, and you know this to be true, or else you would have not feared acknowledgement of my letters to you.
The choice to serve is hers, Marika, he says, ignoring her comment about the letters. We ourselves do not have a choice. I will not demand that of my daughter.
You will demand it of a child, Radagon, Marika says, firmly. Just as well that you do not demand it of her, for she takes too much after her parents-
-caution your tongue. Here, in this place, under no eyes but those of the cosmos, they are two halves of a whole. God or no god, he is not above blasphemy.
It does not just want my child, Radagon. Marika stares him down, one hand on the dais, and the true meaning of his words reaches her-
- no.
Deny all you want. Do not act like I have not spent more time fighting this than I ought. Do you not know how strongly I wish they would recognize Godwyn? I-
Her voice cracks, and something in him shatters, because Radagon can hear the bitterness in each syllable. For the first time, he notes dimly, she despises it. That the Greater Will would demand this of her.
But his response is instinctive. I mean it. I will not, and for all you refuse to do so directly, you cannot ask this of me. Do not- do not ask this of me.
The shift in her voice is eerie - it is not all the way to apologetic, for he’d never describe her as such, but there is quiet dissatisfaction with the news she is delivering and Radagon doesn’t know what to do with that.
Just for a moment, the hatred cracks. The lump in his throat fills the empty space with pity.
I know you, Radagon. You were me, once. The piece of me that knows this to be true is the same piece that forms the foundation of yourself. At the end of the night, our desire - our duty - is aligned.
This is not an issue of duty-
-I will give you time to think, Marika interrupts. But we both know what the answer will be, when next we meet, Radagon.
The world, she says, bitterly, is not worth the happiness of one woman.
What of my happiness, he thinks - what of the part of me that is Radagon and not Marika? Why should he not be allowed to remain with Rennala, give Marika what she wants with his wife’s consent and simply retain what little happiness he’s managed to carve out of this world?
He could bend her over the altar and end it all in one painful moment, and pray that it’s enough to take root and be done with it, that she’s taken what she wants - what she argues the Will wants - and be done with him. And through the anger, he bitterly realizes why she can’t.
A goddess needs a figurehead. Someone will have to hold Leyndell until Godwyn comes of age, and Marika has never trusted a person she cannot control. He will not be allowed to remain in Caria even if he forces her to drag him-
- home, a pitiful, disgusting part of him thinks.
A goddess that exists to be loved by all cannot be spurned by the father of her child, and a goddess whose faith he exists to preach can have no fault worthy of turning from her side to what would become akin to adultery - it would be an insult none would tolerate.
Leyndell must have a lord.
A hand on his shoulder, as she departs. Her fingers are like ice, and it is too much - the familiarity, the presumptiveness, but most of all, the pity.
He does not want her empathy, not after this.
(He has always wanted her empathy, he craves that understanding like a plant needs sunlight-)
For just a brief moment, he wishes gods could die.
*
He loses track of time, sitting by the side of the lake, watching the stars turn in their orbits, simultaneously thinking and trying desperately to do anything but think . By the time he returns, the children are long retired to their quarters and the moon hangs heavy in the sky.
Rennala waits for him in his quarters instead of her own, comb half-forgotten in one hand for the sake of her reading material. That, alone, is too much.
She turns to stare at the sharp inhale, and he is barely two steps inside the room before he is pressing his eyes firmly closed, because what is he supposed to do?
(He knows what he is supposed to do. A piece of him longs for it. But gods, how desperately does he wish he wanted anything but that?)
Radagon?
He can’t face her.
( Coward, Marika’s voice echoes in his mind. You chose this. Causality, Radagon. Bear the consequences and don’t flinch.)
Radagon, Rennala says, far too patiently, we both know in spite of outward appearances, you’ve put that audience off for years. I would think, after all this time, perhaps you are able to trust me with the reason for that.
I owe you answers, he says, voice catching. I owe you far better than I can ever deliver, but I- she-
-Radagon, Rennala interrupts, sit. You look about to bolt.
I cannot face you, he chokes out. What she would have me do, Rennala - I despise m-
-yourself? Rennala’s interjection is careful, measured.
Marika, he says. It is not a correction. As much as he despises her, they are two sides of the same coin. He cannot despise her without it bleeding over into his own heart and soul, for it is his nature that he cannot extricate himself from understanding Marika, and the thought is infuriating because the reverse, of course, is true, and yet, she insists-
-she wants me to return. The words escape his lips before he can silence them. Rennala, forgive me, if there was any other way, I-
-then explain, Rennala says, bluntly. And I will strive to help find another way.
This is not the answer he was expecting, and the sheer thought - Rennala, steadfast against the Greater Will, for his sake? It’s enough to make his heart skip a beat, because he knows there is no hope, but that she is even willing to try, unknowing as she is-
(That’s exactly why it wants him away from her side so terribly.)
The brush of a thumb against his cheek. Oh, he thinks dimly, how have we gotten to this point? He has not cried since the birth of his last child, and he cannot seem to control his own face, but he had not even noticed-
- I would, Rennala starts, have you start at the beginning. You are her champion. Why?
No, he mutters, because fuck it all - he’s damned, he’s got nothing left to lose and only Marika to hurt by proxy - no, not her champion.
The church-
-the church is wrong, he interjects, stronger than he intended to, because if he doesn’t get the words out now, he’ll carry them to whatever grave they make for gods when some poor miserable fool comes to take his place.
It was an agreement, he mutters into her shoulder, because it is easier if he does not need to look her in the eye. A unilateral decision. I was created for that purpose. I created myself for that purpose.
A hand on his forehead, brushing hair out of his face, but he presses closer to her still, and the arm comes to rest on the back of his neck, fingers scraping gently at the base of his skull. So- your experience with forging souls from your own-
-Ranni was different, he mutters. She was a child, I was- I am- we are-
-you’re her, Rennala says, quietly. You and Marika-
-I was. We are. My will is not my own, I swore as much to you when we wed, but I- I want what it wants, but I am not satisfied, and I have-
Breathe, Rennala says. Breathe.
I despise this body because it is hers, he says, the words spilling out. The only time it feels like it belongs to me is when we are here together, and- it is selfish, Rennala, but-
-quiet, she mutters. Quiet. May I touch you?
Please, he begs. I don’t want to think about any of this.
Rennala swallows. I can arrange that.
He is not so far gone to miss the fact that her voice cracks.
*
He cannot help but compare the farewells, and he despises himself for it.
Marika’s hand upon his shoulder was cold and unwelcome. Her touch was nothing like Rennala’s fingers, warm and twisting inside him until he gasps, reaching for something, anything.
I, he chokes out, I- forgive me, I cannot-
-do you know how long I’ve guessed? Rennala whispers into the crook of his neck. The warmth of her breath sends another shudder through him. He cannot surrender this. He cannot tell if her suspicions make this better or worse in the end, for if she knew, she had to know that this was coming, that duty-
Rennala’s fingers shift, and he can no longer think.
The moonlight filtered through the glass panes of the bedroom windows clings to her skin, and oh, even to lose this, to have had it at all is a blessing-
(His alone. Marika will never understand, envious til the last.)
Longer, Radagon says, pulling back just enough to speak with monumental effort, longer than I should have- you’re so smart, I knew that if anyone-
-what am I to do with you? Rennala asks. I have had a god in my bed for decades and he had not the decency to admit he was more than a mere mortal.
I owed you better than that- he mutters, and just like that, the fingers are gone and he has to bite back a scream-
A hand trailing across the exposed skin of his chest, thumb brushing the line of his collarbone. She’s casting something, he realizes, in the hand that was-
I could, Rennala starts, patiently, have made so much more of it than I will have the opportunity to do so now.
I’m not- he gasps out, -her, per se, I’m-
The hand stops. Frustrated, he tugs at her wrist, for he is not above pleading. Put that back, he mutters. Please-
-no, Rennala interrupts, you are not her. You’re everything she thought she needed to leave behind.
He missed the motions of her other wrist, he thinks dimly. That was why the fingers were gone, and he wants to cry, but instead focuses on trying to breathe, because the familiar shape of her presses into him, and the pressure combined with the weight of her above him, his knees pressed into her back, the rough motion of it all-
-it’s Rennala at her kindest and harshest, it’s everything he’s let himself become accustomed to, it’s exactly what he needs, because the rhythm is so good that he almost can’t think, it’s perfect-
-and it’s the last time, a voice in the back of his head points out, coldly and cruelly because he was enjoying himself-
A forehead against his own. The sensation of sweat. It’s exhausting, matching her pace, and he forces the thought out because at least he has this now, in this moment, in these memories-
-you could never be her, Rennala gasps. A god who threw you my way only to beckon you back home like a dog is not a god worthy of esteem- don’t stop-
-she’s me, he cuts in, I’m- it’s not just-
I know. Her voice hits him like a blow to the chest, because the syllables crack and not in the way he was hoping for, the way she gets when he knows he’s doing something right- but you’re better. You’re better than that.
-no, he thinks, dimly, as she pulls back, hauling him by his thighs to a different position so she can kneel, hair hanging loose around her face affording her some semblance of dignity.
-he reaches to brush it aside but she catches his wrist halfway into the motion, gripping tightly, but does not stop.
You’re crying.
What am I supposed to do? Rennala chokes out. Weep for joy? That as much as I know Radagon would like to remain, a piece of him - of her - will always have to put demands from Above before what they want?
I wish- he starts, but Rennala cuts him off. If I could come with you I would. I-
- there’s the tears, running down her cheek and off her chin. One falls to his navel, near where their bodies are joined, and the sensation makes his stomach turn. Before she can finish the sentence, his knees wrap tighter around her back as he hoists himself up to sit atop her, taking over the bulk of the work.
I, he mutters, mouth to her forehead, her cheek, the delicate line of her jaw, will never cease to love you. And if anyone can find a way for us to be together in the end without the Greater Will tearing me to shreds from the inside out, I have faith, Radagon continues, that it will be you, please-
There’s a sob, and her lips are on his as she matches the new pace he’s set. They’ve done this long enough for it to be familiar - they know the intricacies of each other’s bodies, he knows exactly how to move his fingers against her, she knows how to meet his hips as he rides her to correct the angle, and it’s not long before it becomes altogether too much and not nearly enough -
-a sharp motion, and she’s shuddering below him. The stutter in rhythm is nothing, and he works her skillfully through it until she’s recovered enough to pin him to the mattress by a shoulder and hip, and the added pressure combined with it all is just enough to take him out of his head, and then she hits something deep and unexpected and he’s over the edge the same, nerves alight and alive and-
Oh, he thinks dimly.
He’s crying again.
*
Goodbyes are altogether something new to him.
Rennala cleans the sheets with a halfhearted wave of her hand and some incantation he’s always meant to ask her about but never bothered to try to learn, and settles down among the pillows as he catches his breath.
I meant it, he mutters. I know you- you do not owe me this, but it would help to know that- I do not trust myself to find a way, and if there exists any possibility, I want you at my side-
I don’t think you realize what you’re asking, Rennala says quietly. The Eternal, in my bedchamber, asking me to do better than a god?
I think, Radagon admits, I like to think I do better than her, for not being-
-Radagon, she interrupts. Not to- it’s just, did she-
Ah, he thinks.
What he guesses she’s asking was his first question as well - what would become of his children? They would lay no claim to Godwyn’s throne, but it would be considered an insult for them to spurn his new role, so to Leyndell they, too, must go. Not to mention, and Marika so kindly raised this as well - the risk of demigods raised through their adolescence by a mortal would far more likely lead to opposing positions on a battlefield. Tragedy would be minimized for the world and the cosmic order, and thus it must be maximized for-
- Rennala, he says quietly, Rennala, I will not let her harm a hair upon their heads.
She does not respond, for what can she say? He is taking everything from her, and he cannot even truthfully say he does not want to when that central, constructed piece of him does-
-the wolf, he says, quietly. He will stay at your side, in my stead.
A poor substitute, Rennala jokes.
But Radagon is not joking. It takes some degree of effort to rise from where he lies, for she truly did a number on him, but there is-
-there is one thing he can still do.
A soft light, a gentle tug, a surprised noise and then-
-it is excruciating and invigorating and deeply, truly cathartic to wrench a second ( Third, Marika’s voice reminds him, for you were the first, and the girl was the second ) piece from the core of his being-
Somewhere, deep within Leyndell, a crack forms in tree bark.
Rennala rises, eyes widening in confusion and amazement and no small degree, he notes sadly, of dread as the fragment of a great rune he’s torn from himself coalesces from a perfect circle into a similarly amber resin sphere.
Like an egg, Rennala mutters, in awe.
If I cannot stay, Radagon says, by way of explanation, this can. A piece of me, bound to you. I will not forsake you and surrender you to the political games of gods without leaving you a winning card to play.
Something, he says quietly, to remind us both of the path we might have had, to this day yet unlived.
*
The second Elden Lord takes up his mantle in the heat of the summer.
He takes to his role like he was made for it because he was, and while Marika has always been the theorist, Radagon knows what makes mortals tick. He smiles sweetly, he pays the necessary obeisance, prays at the public temple every week.
He serves his purpose and does his duty, bears the crown like a king and not the fragmented shell of what could never have truly remained a broken man.
The second Elden Lord remains, as he always has been, dutiful to his goddess. He swore an oath as eternal as she is, as binding as her own. His children follow him into the heart of Leyndell, and they flourish alongside their stepsiblings. Godwyn takes kindly to Radahn’s youthful awe, Rykard finds himself at home in the grand libraries, and Ranni-
-clings to Blaidd like he’s an anchor in a storm instead of the edge of it, shadowing the shadow, watching and waiting.
Radagon, too, watches.
He does not like what he sees.
Leyndell is most loyal of all the kingdoms, but above that, it is most ardent . The people cry from the mere touch of his hand for the blessing of it, Marika’s favor is a coveted rarity, and all he can think is that there is so much they do not know.
Above it all, that they have no idea that Marika is the piece of himself he despises most.
He does not write to Rennala. It is purely out of fear of making the separation harder on her.
It is certainly not because each time he sits and ponders the notion, there is a tightness in his chest and he cannot even bring his quill to the ink.
*
Sex with Marika is nothing like sex with Rennala.
There is no love in it, of course, but that goes without saying. On the surface, it feels purely methodical - utilitarian at best. It’s fast, it’s bitter, it’s efficient.
He could argue that’s all it is. He’d be lying to himself.
Marika can fool a world’s worth of people, but not him. Never him. Never herself.
For all her superiority, she’s as much a person in bed as he is. As reserved and as bitter about their shared circumstances as she is, Marika gets something out of it the same way that Radagon is ashamed to admit that he does.
A punching bag. Self-reproach - punishment - at the hands of another. Self-punishment in the form of fingers digging into skin he cannot properly feel, hard enough to hurt and without the pressure of caring about it.
Sex with Marika is brutal and messy and cathartic.
If it was just about the offspring, they’d have stopped the minute she was pregnant. To a degree, he knows why it didn’t - why it never would. She’s the only one-
(Not true, the piece of him who remembers hushed words in Caria’s old manor thinks.)
-the only one who can truly understand him.
Even if she doesn’t understand him at all.
*
Self-hatred is not new to him. He’s dwelt at the threshold of it since his conception.
Marika pulls him close to her by the shirt she’d rather tear than remove, because he’s the only one she can truly afford to be destructive - or anything less than perfect, divine - with, and she squints at his forehead, where a piece of hair has fallen from his braid, and says nothing.
She does not need to. A single look is enough.
It is the first time, he thinks, her heels digging into his back and his hand pulling at her own hair just to create some space, that he truly despises how he looks.
Red hair sticks out like a sore thumb in golden Leyndell. It’s not that he minds the color - just how Marika looks at it. How it’s the main point of distinction between the two of them. It’s how she points it out without a single word, glaring and gripping his jaw tighter, kicking and shoving and it’s over too soon and not soon enough.
She doesn’t need to speak, he thinks, as he sits at the edge of the bed afterwards, still as half-dressed as he was a moment after he mindlessly wandered in here. Just a glance is all she needs to make him wordlessly feel lesser.
*
The twins are born, and the relief is palpable. They’re precisely what Marika wanted, and what he wanted as well.
She has her heirs - twin Empyreans. The Greater Will is satisfied. For him, the nightmare is over - and the moment he takes the first child, little Miquella, there is an overwhelming sense of catharsis.
Even if the second is his spitting image.
*
The twins are born, and the relief is short-lived. They are what neither of them wanted.
Marika’s dream dies with Miquella’s failure to age, for the pair of them - Marika, Radagon - have tainted her ideal. Radagon’s hope dies with the pain he’s brought them by virtue of their birth, for he cannot shake the notion that his doubt lingers with each extension of himself, like a curse he cannot help-
-that all comes back to this: they cannot control causality.
The day Malenia blooms for the first time, when the rot that took root first shows its face, Radagon is as stoic as the situation demands. He remains calm and collected, he controls the situation, the guards murmur - reassured by his insistence that this is not the end of the world - but the moment the doors close behind him, he cannot stop the tears flowing.
It’s ugly and bitter and the moment Marika enters, pitiless and frozen, because she can’t acknowledge that she was the source of all of this or it’d break her as well, so the burden of it all is left to Radagon-
- the moment she enters, she stops, hand still on the doorknob, staring down as he looks up at her, one hand damp and another gripping the hem of his robe, and instead of budging a single inch she flashes him a look of disgust.
The moment snaps. He doesn’t need to speak, either, because she can feign detachment for the rest of the world the same way Radagon can feign faith, but he will always be the only one who truly knows it’s an act.
The audacity of pretending she doesn’t care when this is all her fault, this is the natural conclusion of her ambition-
- she coughs, and a better person would expect some concession, an apology even, a single shred of empathy or at least an attempt at it, but Radagon knows better. Marika has never known anything but the impulse to double down when effect is misaligned with cause.
It’s the law of regression, he thinks, that you will never grow beyond that shard of a person you made yourself. The elastic will always snap back.
But in the end, this is how it goes: the moment snaps. In an instant, his blood boils. The world believes the god mourns the fate of her daughter, attended by her loyal consort, but Radagon pins Marika to the wall, palm wrapped around a throat that’s as good as his, and says I do not fear deicide.
*
They move past it. There is no going back, not until the pair of them are dead, or Rennala, by some slim hope, is able to find some way to break him from the grasp of his own oaths.
The children move past it as well, as best they can. Marika’s are loyal to a fault, though the golden boy has far fewer than most, and if he strains, he can see a hint of himself in them - unlucky fools who don’t falter even under undue burden. His own offspring are strange and eccentric, scholars like their mother with a dash of their father’s rebellion, but, like Marika - like him, not her, that’s his - they remain faithful to the purpose they have chosen.
The unlucky little thirds struggle to meet the mark of the first two. Radahn trails behind his older siblings, muttering about the haunting light of the stars and horse races and the long-gone Lord Godfrey while the pair of them chatter about philosophy and glintstones and the fundamental rules of the universe. Mohg keeps to himself as Godwyn and Morgott plan for the future of a utopia that will never include him or his twin, fading into the background and wandering deep within the old sewers as often as he can slip away.
Not to mention the third set. The twins have nothing but each other and what little of his time he can afford. Miquella presents him with rings of light that he builds off of, miracle upon miracle. He looks at his son’s face and sees his own, and wants to dream and cry in tandem. Malenia restrains her rage and emotions alike, and he has no standing to push her to engage with either when the notion of the slightest admission of his own frustrations seems enough to make existence insurmountably challenging. Beyond that - he cannot help them when their problems were forged by his own hands in the first place.
Existence persists, but Radagon knows (and Marika ignores) it stands, like Mohg, on a knife’s edge. The twins shrug off rumors. Ranni keeps to herself. He ignores Marika unless she decides it’s worth indulging in something as bitter and brutal and agonizing as feelings and pulls him into her quarters and they fuck like the bitter monsters they’ve become so she can at least control the shape of them. Marika ignores him unless he digs his nails into her forearm and she orders him around but lets him bite bruises into her collarbone, giving as good as she gets, just enough to keep him from throwing in the towel and facing the consequences of what it means to defy the Greater Will.
It’s good enough.
Until it isn’t.
*
Philosophy, as it turns out, cannot be resolved unless practically tested.
Death comes twice over for them all. He should’ve known that Rennala was the only one who could’ve circumvented the Greater Will, in the end.
Marika’s son and Radagon’s daughter. One loss felt more keenly by the world, another by a single soul. Dead in spirit and body.
Godwyn’s body, now soulless, cannot be contained. Morgott disposes of him, deep below the earth, calls it finished and guards the secret, finding his purpose in what will be decades of cutting the rot out of the roots when the tree finds no soul in the living flesh it consumes.
Radagon’s daughter, he prays, escapes whatever mark was carved unto her rotting corpse. It is made abundantly clear that it was done by her own hand in spirit, if not in body - the Black Knives admit as much under duress. And if that was not enough, Rykard confesses to his dedication to uprooting the whole of it before retreating to forge his own path towards the continuation of Ranni’s work.
Rennala, he hears, shatters at the news. Reports from Caria - which he cares far more about than the storm of grief in the castle at Leyndell, for Ranni was dear and precious and he gave her free will only for her to choose to end her own life-
-reports suggest that Rennala is consumed with the shard he left. Someone begs him for the body on her behalf. He cannot bear to give her false hope. There are corpses throughout Caria, recycled and repurposed and none of them Ranni.
But that is nothing to the storm that is Marika.
You were the cause, he spits, bitterly. They died because you tried too hard to force them to follow in your footsteps-
- Marika regresses. A pity, he thinks, as news from Farum Azula reaches him - Maliketh has taken an oath of flesh to ensure there is no repeat performance - that it takes this for her to admit she was once a person.
But the moment she does, it is worse.
Marika regresses, bitter and burning with impulsive audacity. Radagon feels himself slipping into something he will not be able to return from. It feels like the approach to a cliff’s edge - a cataclysm on the horizon, for they are grown too close and too distant and-
-too like each other in grief, too. Not just ambition.
What ambition is left, he wonders, when we have irrevocably tainted the future with the past?
Marika rails against what her duty has seemingly snatched from her by her own oath and hand. Radagon moves through the chaos like a stone in a storm, unmoved and unyielding, numb and effective.
They are, he notes, with a dawning sense of horror, becoming each other.
*
It all comes to a head in the Erdtree.
A call , he thinks, a burning sense of urgency moving him before he can think. Marika stands before the forge he was truly born upon, hammer gripped tightly in hand.
Leal hound, she spits, turning to face him. Loyal to a fault.
Put it down, he says, biting his tongue at being called a dog. Maliketh rots outside of time. Blaidd was like a son to him, and they’ve not found him since the cataclysm. You’ve wanted everything but this. The world should not be shattered for failing to meet your standards.
You don’t know me, she retorts, incredulous. You may be a fragment of me, some broken offshoot, but you’re not me.
I know you well enough to know that you’ve never been able to lie to me, and-
- Marika laughs, a broken and bitter and painfully familiar sound. It’s a laugh he hasn’t heard since it was his.
And I, she interrupts, pointing the hammer, know you well enough to know that you may be born of me, but you’ve never become me. Pitiful Radagon, Marika continues, you want to understand? You’ve yet to become a god.
And who wanted that, he interjects, walking towards her with purpose - was that not your intent? I am many things, Dear Eternal One, but let us not pretend that I am a fool for the sake of sparing your feelings regarding the fact that I am just another failure in a string of our joint mistakes-
-you’re right, Marika interrupts, eyes alight with something golden and burning, an energy and severity he’s never seen, and the image makes him pause-
-for just a moment too long.
Let us be shattered both then, Marika says, in a broken, quiet voice, as much full of fear as it is of intent, and he scrambles for her as she continues to speak- mine other self.
She pulls the hammer back.
He grabs her hand, her wrist-
-it is simultaneous, and it is far too late.
*
It is, the Greater Will rules, a joint shattering. Marika wields the tool, shatters her hand, the ring, Radagon’s own where it pulls, overlaid with hers. The shards float on the breeze like small fragments of grace-tainted light.
It was her sin, but she is his sin. They have always been culpable for each other.
Causality, the beast mutters, as a force beyond him drives him to grip the spear that is both his and not his in his remaining hand. Causality, it whispers, as it seizes control of one who was born to grant it, forces his hand, impales the both of them threefold upon the paltry remaining shards of the Elden Ring. Radagon is Marika is Radagon is to be punished.
They are both, and yet one, and-
Causality, it whispers.
Regression.
*
Immortality is as much of a curse as Marika pretended it never was.
And in this endless, graceless space - punished for the sins of his other half (for he claimed to be her) - the tragedy of what they’ve become finally hits him.
They can never truly forge a human connection the way Marika had always hoped - by force, imposition, the world naturally falling into place behind her footsteps - when the oaths they swore would fundamentally pull them away from those they loved in the end. How, he wonders, could she watch the agony of his deliberate parting from Rennala and fail to see the loss of Godwyn on the horizon?
How could he not see, she wonders, that little Ranni inherited so much disdain for the ties that bind that she was willing to die for it?
*
She was willing to die for it, Marika thinks, incensed and grieving and finally, finally understanding.
Causality is not solely forged upon an anvil of good intentions with an instrument of brute force - it is the sparks that fly when steel hits steel. It is the fire that sparks in the eyes of another, a burning desire for consequence, change, something new.
She was willing to die for it, Radagon thinks, broken and grieving and, finally, finally understanding.
Regression is not limited to gods falling into old patterns. He was built upon it, and, in the end, he helped her to destroy everything. And progress followed in bloodied, red footsteps solely due to that lingering desire retained in his soul for something better, the dawn of a new age.
Ranni’s betrayal of everything he- she- they- purported to hold dear, that bound them to the path they had chosen for the future- the past-
- was for love.
They die at his daughter’s hands, as Ranni draws their era to an end - one carefully orchestrated through intricate puppeteering that claimed the lives of two more children directly and the rest via happenstance. It is a betrayal of every ideal they purported to have through her own desire to further them.
It was a betrayal, Radagon knows, of every ideal they built the world on-
-to free them, Marika notes, incredulous, from them .
Goodbye, dear daughter, he thinks, fading as stone crumbles into dust beneath cold, porcelain hands. He spares one last thought for her mother’s broken form, for Rennala will regain a daughter and lose hope of a lover’s reconciliation in a single night. One last thought for Rennala, and one final-
-prayer.
May you find the happiness that I could not, in your chosen course.
Because, in the end, she is his daughter - he loves her, he is proud that she of them all, is the one to succeed him-
-and he despairs, in kind, for the hand that caresses his brow for the last time is one fractured in spirit as well as body, for the twisted ropes and cracked pottery end in incorporeal eyes overlaid upon a face that was never his daughter’s.
Ranni’s spirit pledges a world free from the Golden Order.
Renna’s puppet body continues to rot.
Oh, he thinks, as the last piece of him - last vestige of Marika - crumbles into nothingness, oh no.
She cannot see the tragedy in what she’s done.