Arius' Story - Forsaken Resurgence
Arius rules over her pride with a cruelty that is not mindless, but deliberate. Her word is law, and her judgment is absolute. She does not roar, she hisses as she stares at the injustice done to her and protects only the worthy.
The Depths would never be merciful, and neither would its queen.
It was no ordinary cavern. The god-carved stone twisted like a living thing, swallowing the foolish and the weak. Legend spoke of creatures that slithered, unseen in the shadows, scales scraping against stone with a leathery sound that set fur on end, eyes never blinking. The greatest of these were the basilisks. Serpents of unearthly proportions that no lion had seen and lived to tell of. Only whispers remained. Whispers, and Arius, whose very name inspired chills in the unworthy.
Once, she had been among the condemned. Cast off by her father, for her wild nature. Her inability to bow her head and take his word as law. A challenge to his shale throne. He had thought the caverns would consume her like they had so many before. And for a time, they had. The darkness had wrapped around her like a second pelt, the ceaseless hissing of unseen things had been her only company. The bones of the fallen crunched beneath her paws, and every step was haunted as their shards whispered to her and embedded themselves in her pelt.
But Arius was not like the others.
She learned and endured. She hunted the snakes for flesh, ripped them apart, trying to fill the gaping maw of her stomach, and swallowed them whole. Their venom seeped into her veins until the darkness, her resolve, was absolute. Her heart was devoured by something not entirely of this world.
When she emerged from The Depths, she was something else entirely. The pride had not expected her return, let alone her attempt at ascension. The king had barely risen for the day, still sleeping, when Arius struck.
Arius’ fangs sank into his throat, and he fell gasping, her venom working through him as surely as his startling fear. The pride watched in silent horror as their ruler withered before their eyes, his body failing, seizing in agony.
They did not resist her after that. They would not dare, cowed entirely by her gaze.
Overtime, her new pride begins to learn. The law of The Depths is simple: treat those around you well, or be killed. Aris will plunge you into the depths by the scruff, and set the Basilisks on your scent with a simple flick of her long, long - god, why is it so long, so snakelike - tail.
There are murmurs that the Basilisks do not attack her because they see her as one of their own. That her heart does not beat as it once did. But no one dares to ask.
When a kit had approached her, mumbling about bad dreams of snakes and dead things and stopped hearts and being cast into the Depths, she licked their forehead and told them to be still. To be calm, and kind, and nothing would go wrong.
Later, she brutally strikes an elder submale down, for his crimes against the lionesses in the clan, for taking what he thought was owed to him. It was not.
After she has finished, the remaining clan are struck with fear by her ruthless culling of the irredeemable. And even if these lions were evil, vicious - they were family to someone, too. No matter how wrong they were in their actions, some disagreed with her way of handling things - so black-and-white. A tentative resentment built, but over time, it eased a little.
Her pride’s opinion of her ebbed and flowed like the undulating scales of some slithering creature, finally settling on some kind of awed respect, a hungry gratitude she had no use for. And in time, she would welcome more to her pride. New, kinder souls, for she would strike the evil down with a crushing blow.
And when her reign finally ended, they would be safe from their original fate. No longer would they be ruled with brutality, for her plan would come to fruition at the ultimate cost - she was destined to become a Basilisk, and return to The Depths.
