36. Chapter 36
Residents of Hythe emerged from their homes at the sound of the commotion; mothers, fathers, and children all gathered in the street to see what approached their home.
Leagues of men in armor, densely packed, their faces indistinguishable, poured into the valley just below Rida, their marching call echoing through the air.
I watched despair wrinkle the faces of the residents of Hythe, knowing that there wasn't anything they could do to stop this onslaught of men determined to destroy their home.
The men came from all sides, surrounding the city, leaving no way for the residents to escape the plateau their home sat on.
I always knew that the mainland men landing on Wellea would affect more than just Sorrel, but seeing the families of Hythe and everything that they had built here now threatened sent a new surge of undiluted anger through my body.
These men did not care for those they were affecting with their grasps for power.
They only cared for their victory and would take down anyone who got in their way.
That anger I was prepared for, as I had been suffocating it for far too long now, letting it become a festering wound underneath my skin ever since the Shroud. I knew how to tamp it down, how to bottle it up, how to handle it.
But what I was not prepared for was the betrayal of seeing my father, marching through the mountain pass with the mainland men, approaching the very thing he knew I had dedicated my life to.
I had never expected him to go that far, to actually march alongside the mainland men in a quest to destroy Rida.
He knew that the Mother Blessed had worked tirelessly for this planet and its people. He knew we had sacrificed so much, working endlessly to bring Yllsora back to what it was after the Shroud, hurting ourselves in the process. And yet this is still how he repaid us.
I wanted nothing more than to scream at my father, to tell him the truth of what the mainland men had planned for not only Rida, but for all Mother Blessed of Yllsora.
How what was happening here was much bigger than just men vying for power.
I wanted to tell him that what he was doing would not only destroy our home, but everything that I was.
Unless he knew that already and didn’t care.
I never thought my father was one to yearn for power, but as I watched him march with the mainland men, I knew something had changed.
Whether this stemmed from contempt against the Dures for showing up to Sorrel as they did, or whether the king had seduced my father with the promise of power through Therian, I would never know.
Either way, I could see in the way that he carried himself that he was no longer the man I grew up with.
He hadn't been for a long time; the Shroud changed my father just as much as it had me, but instead of facing the challenges we were met with head-on, he grew bitter and spiteful towards the world instead of trying to save it.
That was likely the hardest part of it all, watching someone you love morph into someone you no longer recognize.
Watching my father approach with the mainland men had distracted me, and it was only when the people of Hythe started pointing to the water, the panic in the air rising, that I saw what was causing such a commotion.
Just offshore, ships were scattered across the entire ocean, painting a looming picture of dotted lights across the water that would be otherwise beautiful, if not for what they represented.
More mainland men were coming from the water in addition to those that had already been following us from the north of Wellea. And there were thousands of them, each representing ships full of men ready to destroy Rida.
"What is this?" the Mother Blessed next to me asked, her voice laden with disbelief as she took in the scene before her.
"The men from the mainland, they've come to destroy Rida," I whispered, fear sharpening every word.
I did not have time to panic, as the mainland men approaching from the forest had already begun their ascent up the stairs that led to Rida.
There were hundreds of them, as far as the eye could see, and as I looked around, I suddenly felt foolish. We had no men, no army to fight for us. It was just Malik and I against these men with the power of the king behind them.
But even with my foolishness, I did not feel afraid.
Standing there, at the base of Rida, I knew I had an advantage that these men did not.
They did not have the Divine whispering in their ear as I did, did not know how Yllsora moved beneath their feet as I did.
These things that had plagued me for so long were finally at my advantage once again.
The only thing left was the courage to use it.
The wind shifted then, the hint of spring in the air replaced with a gust of cold. I froze where I stood, knowing what this was, what this meant.
The king's men I had been prepared for, but the revelers I was not.
They appeared in the town on gusts of shadow, the townspeople screaming as they ran to safety, useless as it was, for I knew these revelers could stalk the townspeople anywhere they wished, but only if I let them.
So, I did not think, only moved.
I drew roots up from the ground, letting them surround me as the eir did Rida, their movements mimicking mine in perfect synchrony.
I waited for a moment, just long enough to look at the darkness where the revelers' faces should have been before I shot my arms forward, the roots following the movement, wrapping themselves around every limb of the reveler.
I yanked, pulling it to the ground with a force that wedged it into the earth before me.
"Why are they here?" I asked Malik who stood beside me, readying himself to fight if need be. He watched as more revelers continued to make their way into the town, all of them headed towards Rida's base.
"I think they are trying to stop you," Malik said. "They know you want to stop the rot, and don't want to let that happen."
Now that I knew that the rot—the myco—served a purpose, I found myself conflicted.
I did not want to destroy something that was crucial for Yllsora and Rida's survival, yet if the revelers continued to attack because they thought we wanted to destroy the roots' source of life, we would not make it out of this alive.
The reveler I had captured squirmed beneath the roots that held it down, reaching a hand out to rot the ground before my eyes, and pulled itself out of the ground before I could stop it. It ran towards me with an unnatural swiftness, faster than I could make sense of.
I shot another wave of roots its way, this time aimed for the neck, and pulled once they roots found purchase, holding the reveler in place so that they could not attack again.
"Please," I begged. "I understand that I was wrong. That you are just trying to help the myco feed the roots. I want to work with you now that I know. Please."
The reveler stilled, and for a moment, I wondered if this was the beginning of an alliance, of a shift between the Mother Blessed and them. Perhaps this could be the chance we had been waiting for to bring the balance Yllsora so desperately needed to its lands.
The sound of steel caught my ears then, and I turned my attention away from the reveler to find that the mainland men were now making their way towards the base of Rida, where more and more Mother Blessed were now emerging.
I saw men from Malik's camp marching with them, their eyes ambitious as they took Rida in.
Malik raised his sword, ready to stop them. And at this, one of the men surged forward, ready for a fight. Malik parried his attack, bracing his sword against the other man's in a struggle for power.
The mainland men did not hesitate at the first sound of fighting. Together, they rushed towards Rida, charging towards the Mother Blessed who called Hythe home, torches ablaze.
I dropped the roots that held the reveler, but before I could guide them, the roots shot out from underneath me, snaking along the ground in the direction of the mainland men.
It was not my first experience with the roots acting of their own accord, but it was my first time witnessing their power in my favor.
The roots attacked the mainland men, striking at their shields and swords, grabbing their weapons from their hands before turning their own steel on them, the metal finding purchase in their guts, their necks, their eyes.
Then, and only then, did I understand why men feared this power, why they were willing to burn and kill to stop it, to take it out of the hands of the Mother Blessed.
I took the alliance of the roots as motivation, as reason to keep going, even if there was no end in sight to the men pouring into the city.
I did not know what to expect, as I had never fought before, but for my home I would do anything I could.
I would not let men shape it into something of their own making, into something it was not.
I gave myself over to the roots as I moved, guiding them in the direction of the mainland men that continued to surge into Hythe.
Some were successful as they raised their swords, swiping down at the roots and cutting them down, while others were not, their arms caught by the roots' limbs and dragged down to be consumed.
All around me this happened, the roots feasting on the men who could not stand against them. I watched as the bodies of mainland and Uscal men alike were sucked down into the earth, leaving nothing but their screams behind.
My hands shook at the sight, at all the death before me, but I now knew that this is what Yllsora needed, that this is what the roots needed.
It was against the code of the Mother Blessed to kill, but what if it meant the prosperity of Yllsora?
I worked with the roots then, sending them forward, letting them capture who they deemed fit. The men tried in earnest to escape our ministrations but often found themselves succumbing to Yllsora's power.
Over and over again did I dance these steps with the mainland men, a push and a pull in tandem with the roots, the men's taste for death against my respect of life.
I did not wish to kill them, only to stop them from burning Rida, the bright light of their torches scorching against her base and lighting Hythe in the dead of night.
The Mother Blessed who had been next to me when the mainland men arrived fought at my side, but I could see her fatigue beginning to set in as mine did.
But together we kept moving, kept orchestrating the roots to bend to our will against the unrelenting waves of mainland men, knowing there was no way we could continue on for long.
I lost track of the revelers that had entered Hythe, my sole focus on the mainland men who now wished to see Rida burn.
But as the mainland men kept pushing and the Mother Blessed and I kept fighting, I saw a dark shadow beside me, then the expansion of rot beneath me, headed towards the mainland men.
I watched as the rot moved forward towards them, the ground beneath them becoming so dark, so damp that it abruptly collapsed, leaving a hole in the earth, the mainland men falling within.
I whipped my head around to the chilling presence looming beside me, only to meet the void-like face of a reveler. It was crouched down to the ground, its hands digging into the earth, sending the rot forward towards the men who bared steel meant for the Mother Blessed. Helping us, aiding us.
The reveler and I looked at one another, and even with no face or features to define it, I saw the small bit of the being they used to be underneath the void, saw that they maybe at one point in time, they were like me, and now had become something else, for whatever reason.
We continued to look at one another for only a moment longer, unspoken words of a common goal passing between us.
This was their home, too, I realized, one they had a role in protecting, the mainland men threatening to destroy them as well.
This is the beginning of the balance, Myaella had said.
Life and death, working towards one common cause.
I nodded to the reveler, and together we stood and faced the mainland men.