Chapter Text
The air on the Howling Cliffs was forever grieving. A thin, keening cry that tugged at the grey lichen and whistled through the stone teeth at the kingdom’s edge. It moaned, whined, and scraped long, invisible nails across the ancient rock, an endless wail that would outlive the tragedies it mourned
Elder Rem had grown fond of its perpetual dirge. True, it made for a lonely companion, but one more honest than most. It asked for nothing but to be heard, and Rem, a mourner in both trade and temperament, was content to listen.
The wind was proving particularly ferocious that day, dragging grit across the cliffside and turning the climb into a long, grueling trial. Rem leaned into it, unshaken. This was neither the first nor the last storm he would conquer, and he would prove there was life in these old limbs yet.
With claws raised against the stinging sand, he clambered upward and at last pulled himself onto the summit. There he paused, drawing a long, steadying breath before sinking to the ground. He withdrew a river rock from his pack, its surface etched with a name, and set it carefully at the foot of another cairn - this one for a miner of the Crossroads, an industrious little pillbug who had spent his life splitting stone and coughing dust.
It was a vicious irony that claimed him in the end - the familiar dust of his trade giving way to something far more insidious. Golden light, tender in appearance, yet merciless in its promise. The Infection took him faster than most. By morning, his mind had been all but snuffed out, leaving behind a mate and their still-unhatched brood.
“Find rest in the quiet earth,” Rem muttered. He spoke it so often nowadays that the words had lost their shine. “May your shell return to stone, and your mind to the tender gloom.”
There were no bodies, of course. Corpses were snatched up by the King’s guard, carted away and burned, leaving only dread for those grieving to endure. Yet Rem kept vigil over them all the same. He smoothed the edges of the stone piles, brushed away the dust, and ensured that someone still remembered their names.
He was setting the last stone when he stilled, claws hovering above the cairn. The wind shifted, and for a breath it carried something different than grief. A sharp gust tore across the cliff face, and with it, a scent he didn’t recognize. It wasn’t the dry breath of sand and stone, nor the metallic tang of the distant sea below. This was different. Organic, and laced with a wrongness that lingered in the air.
Rem paused, antennae tilting to catch the wind. Beneath the Cliff’s endless lament, another sound surfaced. A thin, frightened gasp, nearly swallowed by the storm.
His mind immediately went to the Infection, fearing some husk had strayed from the forgotten road and clawed its way up the Howling Cliffs. But husks did not gasp. They did not fear, or flinch, or plead. They staggered through the world emptied of thought, mindless until the moment they erupted into violence.
He stayed where he was, claws tightening against the knob of his walking staff. His duty was to the dead, and to linger among them was far safer than seeking the source of that breath.
But once that strangled sound reached him again, Rem found his legs already shifting beneath him. With cautious steps, he followed it to a fissure in the cliff wall, partly hidden by a tangle of thorns, and discreetly peered inside.
What lay within was no husk, nor anything the cliffs had ever borne before.
His compound eyes struggled to make sense of the lump sprawled in the sand. It wasn’t right. It had no carapace. No plates. No honest shell to keep its guts contained. Its body was bizarre, made of soft-looking flesh, vulnerable as a grub pulled too soon from the egg, with a tangled mass of fine filaments on its head.
And its face… By the Wyrm, it was all yielding tissue. No mask, no chitin - just a twitching slit for a mouth and two massive eyes squeezed shut.
A monster. The words leapt unbidden, a reflex older than the beating of his wings. But Rem was a mourner, and mourners did not recoil. They listened and witnessed. And this huddled thing didn’t attack. It only trembled, curling tight against the stone as it shook. Clear liquid traced crooked lines down its terrible, soft face. Tears. The realization stilled him more surely than fear. It was crying.
Compassion pressed against caution. He let it sit there a moment, weighing heavy in his thorax, before it finally tipped the balance. This was no beast, but a stray blown loose from the order of things. Neither animal nor kin - its shuddering made it seem scarcely more than a fledgling clinging to life.
“Shhh,” Rem said, his voice a soft rasp. He kept his distance, not wanting to startle it further. “Be still, little mote. Be still. The wind cannot hurt you here.”
The creature flinched at his voice, its head snapping up. Two vast eyes glistened open - liquid, searing, their hue unlike the steady black of his kin or the sickly radiance of infection. Terror filled them, yet beneath it lay unmistakable awareness. They saw him. It knew him for a thinking being.
Inconceivable - that such a thing might exist beyond the king's blessing.
The creature lurched backward, driving itself against the stone until the rock bit into its tender flesh. Rem’s mandibles clicked with unease. Surely that must hurt? The creature made a sound in some round, fluid vocalization that meant nothing to Rem. But its desperate retreat spoke a universal language. Stay away.
“I will not harm you,” Rem murmured, slowly lowering himself to the ground to appear smaller. He set his staff aside. “You are lost, aren’t you? Cast adrift. I understand.”
He looked at this quivering, terrified creature, and his resolve hardened. It was in desperate need of shelter, warmth, and protection from the sandy storm. How it had endured until now, Rem could not fathom, but he knew with absolute certainty that if it remained here, it would not last the night.
But the how of it eluded him.
The coarse wind would shear straight through the creature’s thin skin before it could take two steps, and Rem couldn’t strip himself of protection to grant it.
His gaze roamed the barren ground, searching for an answer, until it caught on his satchel. Of course. His spare mourning robes, rough-spun and dyed a humble grey. He could wrap the creature in those, and offer his mask as well - its downslanted eyes streaked with gray lines, a vessel for sorrow, a symbol of identity.
Here was a way to offer both protection and anonymity. Moving slowly, every gesture open and measured, Rem unslung his satchel. He drew out the bundle of grey cloth, then lifted the mask from his own face, exposing weathered chitin and fur stripped thin by age.
“Take them, this will shield you,” he said, holding them out. “They will give you warmth. A shape.”
The creature trembled, confusion warring with fear. Its gaze flickered between the empty mask and the bare view of Rem’s face.
He placed the items on the sand and withdrew several steps, turning away to give it space. He listened to the sounds behind him. First, the silence of hesitation, then the rustle of clumsy movement. He heard a faint gasp of pain as a sharp stone doubtless scraped that soft flesh, the whisper of cloth being dragged and fumbled with. There was a long period of struggle. It clearly did not know how to don the garments.
Rem waited a moment longer, listening to the rhythm of calm that had replaced the struggle, then carefully allowed himself to look.
May the Wyrm’s light, in its infinite mercy, forgive him for the thought - for it was a blasphemous, selfish peace that washed over him. The bizarre, fleshy horror was no more. In its place stood an anonymous mourner, shrouded in robes that pooled around its feet. Its clumsy-looking claws were tucked into the wide sleeves. And its overly mobile face was now the placid, empty white of the ceramic mask. It was still. The embodiment of solemn, silent grief.
Rem thought, with some astonishment, that it was almost dignified.
The creature lifted its paws, its strange claws now sheathed in cloth, and gingerly touched the mask, tracing the slopes and hollows of its sorrowful expression. A fine tremor still ran through its frame, though the raw edge of its panic had softened, blunted now by a heavy fog of confusion.
“There,” Rem murmured, a soft approval in his tone. “Now you have a form. Now you are of Hallownest, at least to any eyes that might find you.”
He approached slowly, and this time the creature did not retreat. It just watched him through the holes of the mask. Rem reached out and gently adjusted the robe’s collar, his claw clicking softly against the mask’s unyielding surface as he did so.
“My home is not far,” he said, gesturing toward the path. “It is humble, but it knows how to keep the wind out.” He gestured for it to follow. “Come, little mote. These cliffs have no more comfort to give.”
To his surprise, it understood the gesture. It took a hesitant, shuffling step forward. Then another. Its gait was an unsteady, bipedal totter. Rem’s pity deepened, swelling deep in his thorax. So utterly helpless.
He led it from the fissure onto the winding path. The creature followed, its masked head turning constantly, taking in the desolate landscape. To offer the comfort of a calm voice, he spoke softly of the kingdom it had stumbled into, of the King in his shining palace and his vigilant Knight.
The creature made a soft, muffled noise from behind the mask. It was listening, though how much it understood, he could not tell.
A deepening chill bit the air, promising rain. Rem quickened his pace, a stir of relief going through him as his home came into view. He eased the creature through the low doorway of the weathered hut, ushering it inside with his claws guarding its head as it ducked. The interior was plain and bare. A pallet of moss lay beside a cold fire pit, and a stone table showed the worn marks of countless meals and repairs. On the shelves rested little more than tools, dried herbs, and a clawful of meager provisions.
The creature lingered in the middle of the hut, its masked head tilted warily as it scanned the sparse interior. Anxious claws fretted at its sleeves, the fabric fluttering with a faint, nervous sound.
Rem gestured to the low seat by the cold fire pit. “Sit. Rest. My stool will not bite.”
It eyed the furniture warily, then glanced back at him before easing itself down. From then on, it kept its gaze firmly fixed on Rem while he busied himself with lighting a small fire. Only when a tiny, stable blaze was nibbling at the kindling did he rise, his joints cracking, before he moved to the table.
From a sealed jug, he poured water into a simple clay cup and offered it, along with a pinch of tough Tiktik jerky from his pouch. Though understandably hesitant, his peculiar guest seemed parched enough to accept his meagre offering. A pair of soft claws emerged from the depths of its robes to receive the cup, and it lifted its mask just enough to reveal the terrible, soft slit of a mouth beneath.
Rem couldn’t look away, morbidly fascinated as the creature’s throat convulsed and bulged with each desperate swallow. He followed the water’s passage down its gullet until the last drop was gone, and only then did its breathing completely level, the shaking in its paws quieting to stillness.
A long moment passed before it shifted focus to the jerky, turning the strip of dried meat between its claws as though puzzling over it. The little mote’s glance flickered from the food to Rem and back again.
“You must eat,” Rem encouraged softly, his own mandibles clicking faintly as he motioned towards his mouth. “To sustain your strength.”
Seeming to understand, the creature raised the jerky to its strange mouth. A faint, wet sound was followed by a hesitant pause, and then a piteous, needling squeal.
Ah, of course, Rem thought, his antennae dipping. It has no mandibles. It can't break the meat down.
His claws were already moving toward a jar of nut-paste when the creature tried again, and this time, a sharp, dry crack echoed in the space. Rem leaned forward, his compound eyes narrowing. Inside its maw, he glimpsed unusual, pearl-like protrusions grinding a piece off.
Denticles, his mind supplied. Oddly shaped denticles. It worked at the tough meat with a grinding persistence, pulverizing the jerky down into pulp. He watched curiously until the final piece was gone, tracing a path down its gorge just as the water did.
The act of eating seemed to have finally grounded the creature. Its tense posture slackened, yielding to a calm exhaustion as its gaze fixed on the flames heating the room. Firelight danced across the smooth planes of its borrowed mask, and for a long while, the only sounds were the pop of sap in the kindling and the distant, muffled keen of the wind.
The silence, peaceful as it was, became a breeding ground for Rem’s curiosity. The need to know more was an incessant pull, growing inside him until he could bear it no longer. The old moth raised a claw, tapping it firmly against his own shell.
"Rem," he said, his name falling from his mandibles in slow, clear chirps.
The masked figure turned to him, and Rem pointed a claw at the creature, waiting to see whether it would disprove his theory or instead prove it true. Was this thing truly sentient, or merely a clever beast?
Deny it, he thought. Confirm it. Give me a sign.
It stared for so long he was sure the attempt had failed. Just as his disappointment settled in, it moved - lifting a robed arm with surprising, unsettling grace and pressing its claws to the semblance of a thorax.
Then, slowly, it pointed back at him.
“Rrreh…m,” it breathed. It was almost eerie, how smooth his name poured out of its maw. The clicks were oddly hollow, its chirps too soft and rounded - like he was hearing it speak through a veil of water.
"By the Pale King's light," Rem whispered, his voice barely audible above the crackling fire.
The creature tilted its head, studying him through narrow openings. It seemed to catch his surprise, its posture shifting into something almost inquisitive as it raised a claw and pointed at him again - this time with the faint assurance of a child realizing it might be understood.
"Rrrem," it said again, and the old moth felt the dynamic shift.
He had been right. Within that soft, uncanny shell lived a mind capable of grasping and growing. How much, that was a different question. One he wouldn't have an answer to for a very long time.
The creature lowered its paw, its gaze steady behind the mask. It waited, expectant, like a pupil before an uncertain teacher. In that moment, Rem understood. Its needs had outgrown mere food and shelter. It needed communication, lest it become a prisoner within its own mind.
He gestured to the clay cup still clutched in its claws. “Water,” he said slowly, enunciating carefully.
The creature’s jaw worked, hesitant, as though chewing on the unfamiliar word. It glanced down at the vessel, then let out a gurgling click. Cup raised, it forced the sounds into shape. "Wah…ter?"
Truly, it was like hearing a caterpillar babbling its first word. A thrill stirred through Rem. It was a feeling he had not known since he was young, first learning to look beyond his tribe to the vast, unfolding wonder of the King’s world. He nodded vigorously. "Yes, water."
He pointed to the flames crackling low in the hearth. “Fire.”
The creature followed his gesture. “Fy-er.”
"Good. Very good," Encouragement warmed his voice before he could temper it. He pointed to the crude chair beneath it. “Stool.”
"Stoul." This time the replication was faster, more confident, though the accent was still deeply strange.
Their little game continued. Word after word. Rem named everything within sight - the wall, the floor, the roof, his staff, the moss of his bed. The creature absorbed each word with a terrifying, ravenous intelligence, spoken once in his tongue, then echoed back in the creature’s softer cadence.
Finally, when the lesson had run its course and the fire burned low, Rem felt compelled to complete the exchange. He pointed at the creature one final time, his voice gentle but expectant.
"And you?" he asked. "Who are you?"
The creature went quiet, head tilted in consideration. It stared through the mask's empty sockets for a long, silent moment before it caught his meaning and opened its maw.
What emerged was… hard to describe. It granted him neither clicks of civilized speech nor the harsh cries of a beast, but something entirely different. A flowing, melodic sound that ebbed and flowed like wind through tender wispgrass. It seemed to come from deep within its throat, resonating in chambers that may be the first of its kind in Hallownest.
Rem's antennae twitched in bewilderment. He tried to parse the sounds, but they slipped through his understanding.
Chit-ch-click. His mandibles attempted the first flowing tone, but all that emerged was a harsh, chittering approximation that bore no resemblance to the creature's smooth cadence.
He tried again, focusing on what seemed like a simpler sound, but his voicebox simply wasn't built for such fluid articulation. Where the creature's vocalizations flowed seamlessly from one tone to another, his attempts fractured into awkward clicks and stilted pitches.
His guest watched his struggles with what might have been patience or pity, it was hard to tell. When Rem's third attempt devolved into frustrated clicking, it repeated its name again, slower this time, pulling the tones apart as though offering him the pieces.
It was hopeless. Mandibles and spiracles could only clatter, chitinous chambers could only rasp. They were simply the wrong tools for the job. To ask him to repeat the creature would be like asking a drum to carry a melody. No amount of effort would change that.
With a soft, rattling sigh, the old moth shook his head, hoping the gesture conveyed inability rather than refusal. “I cannot,” he admitted. “It is beyond these old mandibles.” Seeing the disappointment, he offered the only thing he had left. “I suppose I might as well continue calling you what I first named you.”
He leaned in slightly and said it again, slowly and clearly, so the designation would be understood. “Little Mote.”
The creature’s masked head tilted.
“Little Mote,” Rem repeated, gesturing towards it. “You. Little Mote."
“Lih…tul,” it attempted.
“Little,” Rem corrected gently.
“Lih-tull.” It tried again, then moved to the next. “M…Mote.”
“Little Mote,” Rem said, combining them.
The creature took a breath, focusing. “Litt-ull Moht.”
A warm, rumbling chuckle rolled out of Rem. "Yes," he said, placing a weathered claw over his ruff. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Little Mote."