Maidenless No Longer (Elden Ring)

Chapter 5: Roderika

A/N: Roderika, everyone's favorite Spirit-Tuning gal! I tweaked this first encounter a little bit, to acknowledge that the Tarnished has... ALL the Spirit Ashes already, lmao. Roderika has a knack for that sort of thing, so it makes sense she'd notice and offer a little bit more information than otherwise.

-x-X-x-

Roderika sits in the shack atop Stormhill and waits. Not for death, for so long as she remains here behind her ward, craven as she is, she will not die. Nothing can harm her here; nothing can touch her. Everyone else is dead but her, and here she lies, cowering like... like the coward she is. Biting her lower lip, Roderika stares down at her hands. The blonde tries to imagine what it might be like, to become one with the spider.

A shiver of sheer terror runs down her back. She doesn't want it, even now. Even if it means joining all her friends. No, she's just too afraid. They called her and her people Tarnished. They'd all crossed the sea to come here, to the Lands Between. And they'd all fallen, one by one, to the Tarnished Hunters. It all seemed like one great bit joke. But it was so very frighteningly real.

Flinching as she hears the sound of galloping just down the road, Roderika looks up for a moment, before shivering at the howling of wolves. That's right, there's a wolf pack in the area, isn't there? If she were braver, she'd get up and go out there to try and help whoever it was fighting the wolves. Knowing her luck, it'd be some of the Grafted's soldiers, and they would take her to the Castle, to join her friends.

The wolf howls abruptly cut out into high-pitched sharp wines, prompting another flinch from Roderika. Heavens, just how craven can she be? She's perfectly safe here, and she's still jumping at shadows and flinching at every little noise she hears, isn't she? Ah, but cowardly as she is, she's also curious. The battle sounds like it's already over. The wolf pack has either been chased off... or annihilated.

She could go and check... but she dares not leave the bounds of the ward. Instead, the blonde stays right where she is, relying upon the dilapidated walls of the shack and her red hood to protect her from the windy elements, up here upon Stormhill. And she waits. Though at least she doesn't have to wait long before the one who fought the wolf pack steps into view.

He's a Tarnished like her, she immediately recognizes. But no, not like her. For one, he's the most well-armored Tarnished she's ever seen. Better armor than even the Tarnished Hunters had been sporting. Certainly, better armor than any of her friends had brought with them. His weapon, stained with wolf's blood, is held out in front of him for a moment... before he quickly sheathes it as he steps towards her.

In that moment, as their eyes meet, Roderika's breath catches in her throat. Before she knows it, the words are spilling out of her mouth. She does not know this man, this Tarnished, and yet something about him is so warm, so welcoming, that she bares part of her soul to him all the same.

"E-Everyone's been grafted. Everyone who came with me. They crossed the sea for me. They fought, for me."

Roderika shivers, knowing that she's... she's rambling. And yet, she can't help herself. She needs to say it. Needs to speak the words out into the open air and know that at least one other besides herself heard them.

"Heh. Only to have their arms taken. Their legs... taken. Even their heads... taken. All of it, taken and stuck to the spider."

A tear coalesces in her eye, and she sniffs delicately as she gazes up at the silent, stalwart Tarnished who's happened upon her shack.

"Did you know? If you're grafted by the spider, you become a chrysalid. Quite the lark, when you think about it."

Then she laughs. A shrill, helpless sort of laugh that ends almost as soon as it began. There's no true humor in it, no happiness. But she has to laugh, or she will cry endlessly, sob and wail and moan. And she... she'd already done that. It had attracted the wolf pack this Tarnished had killed at one point, her wailing. But the ward had protected her, and the wolves had eventually left when she'd quieted down.