Chapter Text
Marika the Eternal wasn't always.
Contrary to the name, she was once considered the lowest of the low.
Now, saying this in public would get you declared a heretic, strung up and promptly burned in due order.
That was her fault, she supposed.
She was simply too good at inspiring zealotry and faith, a skill she'd cultivated over the thousands of years of her reign- but before that, her skills were in the manipulation of thread- a weaver! imagine that. The almighty Queen Marika sitting at a loom, weaving in and out not the threads of fate, but the wool of sheep.
...She misses those days.
She has endless dreams about a village- silent in the hills.
A humble town, small in stature, bathed in gold, and completely and oh so utterly empty.
...She remembers when that silence fell.
The grief.
The rage.
The acceptance.
The plan.
The Betrayal.
She had screamed and cried and wept- she'd returned to her home as a maiden no more, having consorted with a warrior to the north, excitedly wishing to tell her mother that she was going to be a grandmother.
But her home was empty. The fields were quiet. The trees were barren of wildlife and even the graveyard had been ripped up and lay open, free of their contents.
What had happened here?
She spoke to the Grandmother, who told her of the Hornsent. Her...enemy. She made a vow to avenge to burn to strike them to the ground and devastate them with the power of the divine. For yes, she knew what they were after- she could see their precious tower from afar, she knew what they were building, she knew what they wanted. She would have it. She would take it. With her fury honed as gold, she would take their hearts. She would become a god.