Deus Necros

For several seconds, Titania did not answer him.

The golden veil surrounding her body continued to shimmer with the same quiet radiance it had held since Ludwig opened the door, but now that he understood its purpose, its beauty became grotesque. It did not resemble a blessing anymore. It looked like a layer of stained glass placed between a worshipper and the heavens, letting the colors through while blocking the voice that should have accompanied them.

Titania’s gaze lowered to the veil across her chest, then shifted toward the pale restraints around her wrists. During all the years Ludwig had known her, even through conflict and battle, he had rarely seen her expression betray anything beyond mild annoyance or the patient boredom of someone who had been alive long enough to find panic repetitive. Now, for the first time, she looked genuinely uncertain.

It was not because Ludwig’s conclusion was too complicated to accept.

It was because it was simple.

Far too simple.

”I believed they needed me absent,” Titania said eventually. Her voice remained level, but the ease behind it had thinned. ”I believed Clementine and the people working beneath her had an agenda they could not advance while I remained active within the Sacrosanctum. That much was obvious. They wanted the Hero protected, they wanted my voice removed from the investigations, and they wanted Misty contained where she could not create further disturbance.”

Misty’s hands tightened around the shaft of her anchor as Titania spoke. She had been staring at the golden veil ever since Ludwig explained what he believed it was, her earlier relief at seeing him replaced by a slow and terrible understanding.

Titania continued, her eyes still on the restraints. ”Yet through all of it, I never believed they had truly neutralized me. I believed myself delayed, inconvenienced, perhaps cleverly handled, but not removed from the conflict. My gods have spoken to me through sieges, through wars, through the collapse of kingdoms and the rise of worse ones afterward. I believed that whenever the threat became great enough, they would call upon me, and when they did, no mortal authority within the Sacrosanctum would be sufficient to prevent me from answering.”

She let out a quiet breath and closed her eyes for a moment.

”I spent months waiting for that revelation. I told myself their silence meant the danger had not yet matured enough to demand my action. I told myself I was being patient. Faithful. Disciplined.” Her expression twisted slightly, the first visible crack in the perfect stillness she wore so well. ”I never considered that I was merely sitting here waiting for a voice they had made certain I could not hear.”

”Lady Titania,” Misty said softly.

Titania did not seem to hear her at first. Her gaze moved toward the young nun, and Ludwig saw the realization worsen rather than soften. ”You tried to leave,” Titania said. ”Twice. The first time, they warned you. The second time, they struck you down and returned you here. After that, I was the one who ordered you to remain in this room.”

Misty immediately shook her head. ”You protected me. Had I gone again, they would have killed me.”

”Yes,” Titania replied. ”That is what I believed as well. That’s what they made me believe”

The quiet in her voice made Misty stop.

Titania turned her wrist slightly against the chain. The holy inscriptions along the metal brightened in response, pressing her hand back into the bedding with a soft flare of golden force. ”Perhaps that fear was justified. Perhaps they truly would have killed you. But now I must ask how much of that decision was mine. I could not receive revelation. I could not properly sense the movement of divine authority within the Sacrosanctum. I could hear prisoners crying beyond this chamber, smell blood beneath incense, and know that the institution I served was moving against everything I once swore to protect, yet I still chose inaction because I feared what would happen to you if I forced the issue.”

Misty’s face paled. ”They manipulated you through me?”

”They did not need to alter my thoughts,” Titania said, and for the first time there was anger beneath her voice. ”They only needed to isolate me, threaten what remained close to me, and let my own caution become the final shackle. I have guarded the Holy Order for centuries. I have watched enemies try to corrupt it from outside, watched nobles try to buy it, watched kings try to wield it. And when the rot finally grew from its own head, I allowed myself to be placed in a pleasant room with books and meals while people suffered beyond the door.”

The golden veil brightened sharply.

”I was... Slothful.”

The room trembled.

The books on the nearest shelf shifted in place as pressure spread from Titania’s body, not exploding outward, but gathering with enough force that the silver handle on the door rattled and the anchor beside Misty gave a low metallic hum. Even chained to the bed and bound by an oath she could not directly violate, Titania’s fury changed the air around her. The gentle warmth of the chamber became oppressive, saturated with holy power that did not know where it was permitted to strike.

Redd instinctively took a step forward. ”Don’t put that all on yourself,” he said, his voice rougher than he likely intended. ”They built this to fool you. The people doing this knew exactly which parts of you to use against you.”

Titania’s eyes flicked toward him. ”That is a comforting way to describe failure.”

”It isn’t comfort,” Redd replied. ”It’s the truth.”

The pressure in the chamber continued to rise. Misty reached toward Titania’s chained wrist, but stopped before touching the glowing restraints. ”My lady, please. You cannot break the oath by force. You know what it does when you resist too harshly.”

”I know,” Titania said.

That did not make the light around her dim.

Ludwig watched the inscriptions along the chains grow brighter and felt the same cold pressure he had sensed in the cells above. The restraint reacted to her anger as if it had been designed for this exact possibility. Every rise in her power fed back into the veil, reinforcing the isolation around her, turning her own rage into an argument for further imprisonment.

”Enough,” Ludwig said.

Titania turned her gaze toward him. There was no boredom in her eyes now. They shone with enough restrained violence that a lesser person might have lowered his head without being told.

Ludwig did not. ”You can spend the next hour blaming yourself if that helps you feel properly miserable, but this thing is still around you, the dead are still trapped upstairs, and the people responsible are still using the time you give them. I am already late once. I’m not going to stand around while you punish yourself for being deceived by people who built their entire plan around deceiving you.”

The veil shuddered again, but this time the pressure stopped increasing.

Titania stared at him for several long seconds, then slowly rested her head back against the bedding. The golden light around her settled, though none of the anger beneath it vanished.

”You have become more unpleasant since I last saw you,” she said.

”I had a very educational few months,” Ludwig replied. ”Most of it involved dying.” That part was spoken too softly for anyone to hear.