Malkanth, the Deceiver

"The whole of the Court's lineage is unworthy. History would say otherwise. But history is not truth. That I alone see the flaw in our future is a crime for which all others shall be punished."

- Malkanth

Malkanth, the Deceiver was a Wizard of the Hidden Swarm who believed the Sword Logic had failed and that the Swarm should be purged of weakness lest it cease to exist. Along with her siblings Akrazul and Azavath, she concocted a plan to assassinate the court and take over what was left of the Moon's Hive.

The Heretical Plot
"Zulmak is our instrument of destruction. He is that which will shatter the logic. He is that which will break the cycle and prove the lie of the Court and its King, they who led us to ruin here in this dead system on this dead orb."

- Malkanth to her siblings.

After Crota, Oryx and much of the Hive nobility had been slaughtered by Guardians, Malkanth came to believe the Sword Logic to be faulty and the heirs of the Osmium dynasty unworthy of the now vacant thrones. She saw them as spoiled liars and manipulators, unfit to rule the crumbling Hidden Swarm. Through studying forbidden knowledge, she prepared a scheme to overthrow the Daughters of Crota and punish all who had contributed to the Swarm's misery. The way of achieving that would be a heretical ritual of sacrificing Azavath in order to place Akrazul's essence in her body - while a great and powerful fighter with unbridled rage burning in his heart, Akrazul had been maimed by Guardians and now lacked an arm. He would then challenge Zulmak, a champion of the Pit, and enact vengeance upon the court.

The ritual Malkanth had studied was the Inquisition of Self, a way of severing a being's essence from their body. The siblings hid away from prying eyes and prepared two altars on which Akrazul and Azavath laid down, Azavath having been pinned down to restrain her from fighting through the blinding pain. Though her sister's screams cut her to the core, Malkanth managed to conduct the severing, and placed Akrazul's essence in Azavath's empty husk.

The Unforeseen Consequences
"Your purpose is served." "How so, if I have failed?" "You have failed in furthering your own goals, poor thing, not mine."

- Savathûn to Malkanth in her final moments

Unbeknownst to Malkanth, Akrazul was being whispered to by Savathûn, the Witch Queen during the ritual - tempted to strike against his sister, rendering her deceitful and having used her siblings to further her own goals. When he woke up in Azavath's body and saw Malkanth smiling at him, he considered the whispers and slid his blade through her sternum.

Savathûn reached out to Malkanth in her dying, explaining that she had orchestrated Azavath's attack and how the sibling's actions would serve the Witch-Queen's purpose. When rejected by the Witch-Queen to be taken with and left to fade away, Malkanth's last thought was of her sister.

Her body was then used as a vessel for Azavath's essence saved by Savathûn, and in that body Azavath approached her brother to unmake him with her Deathsong, ending the sibling's failed inquisition.

Personality
Malkanth was clever and cunning, and possessed a deep hunger for knowledge both legitimate and forbidden. Seeing the ruin of the Hidden Swarm brought upon them by Guardians made her grow disillusioned about the Sword Logic, and she loathed the Hive royalty who preyed upon those below them in their ambition and greed. The sacrifice of Azavath deeply pained her, and she both mourned and took pride in her sister's unrelenting desire to rebuild the Choir. Her brother Akrazul she saw as noble and brave.

List of appearances

 * Destiny 2: Shadowkeep