43. Chapter 43
We sat there for a moment, letting our hearts slow as we gazed up at Rida, her branches unfurling to new heights and watching as leaves sprang anew from their reaches.
I could still feel that chill I now knew as myco creeping along the Yllsora's underbelly, but now, instead of feeling like I would succumb to it at any moment, I felt it move with me, like a tide does the moon, and let the roots be, letting them recover from all that had just happened.
Everything felt very still in that moment, as if all Yllsora was adjusting to its new reality.
I myself could not wrap my mind around what happened, or how what I had thought was the truth was really a lie.
So much of what I always thought was impossible and forbidden was exactly what needed to be done.
So much of what I had worked against, was exactly what I had needed to be doing all along.
I would not have been able to save Rida without Malik, and I would not have been able to defeat the mainland men without the revelers.
I looked back over to Malik then, studying him, covered in dirt, soot, and blood, much like I was. He looked tired, but more at peace than I had seen him this entire journey, no doubt because he no longer had to hide everything that Myaella had bestowed upon him and could now live just as he was.
"How did you know that would work?" I asked him, looking up at Rida again.
"I didn't," he answered. "But if we are meant to balance each other out, our powers have to work together. And I saw your panic and knew I had to do something. So, I did."
I leaned against Malik then, finally letting myself feel the weight of all we had been through, letting my body relish in the thought that this part was all finally over, that we could now live the life we had always wanted to, with nothing—no politics, no Divine, no men—to hold us back.
"We did it, Malik," I said, the relief making me feel as if I were floating, the weight of everything I had been holding for so long finally gone.
"You did it, Lyra," Malik said. "You saved Rida, just as you wanted to."
I clutched his hand in disbelief, looking around at the field where everything had transpired, finding the absence of everything that had been here just a moment ago unsettling.
Gone were the leagues of revelers, sent back to wherever Myaella had placed them on Yllsora, the mainland men gone on a breeze.
Gone were any swords, any blood that had soaked into the ground.
It was as if the fighting had never happened, the only evidence of it being the scorched trunk of Rida left behind by the flames.
Malik brought my hand to his mouth, kissing it gently.
"Now what?" he whispered, his lips on my knuckles.
The wind shifted over the plain once more, and I heard Myaella's voice one last time:
Now, there is a long road ahead, her voice sang in my ear.
But one that must be traveled. The king will ask what happened here, and when he discovers the destruction of his power once more, he will stop at nothing to destroy the Mother Blessed, which will only affect the balance further.
That is your charge now. Uphold the Mother Blessed, uphold the revelers, uphold the balance.
And do not fail. And most of all, take care of Yllsora, and she will take care of you.
~~
I never heard the Mother again, and I would always wonder if it was because she had realized her sister was right—that for the Mother Blessed to be truly powerful, we needed a balance, something to hone our powers against. Or maybe she had been cast away somewhere deep in the rift that connected the Caelium and all its worlds, destined to drift for the rest of her eternal life, damned to never find a home.
As time went on, I found that I did not care to know what happened to her.
My brother returned to Sorrel and helped my mother rebuild what the village had once been before the Shroud, her leading the Mother Blessed, and my brother stepping into the role our father once held. They seemed happy and at peace, and there was nothing more I could ask for than that.
Malik and I stayed in Hythe, helping the city rebuild while also rebuilding our relationship.
That first year was the hardest, as we had to find our way again now that we weren't running for our lives, now that the common goal of getting to Rida was gone, replaced by something else.
We now had to contend with everything that had happened, both before and after he returned to Sorrel, being truthful with another in that terrifying way that is the base of all relationships.
We spent many nights under Rida's limbs, the eir lighting our faces as we worked through our heartbreak and our hurt, rebuilding the trust that had been broken.
We both had more fear about the destiny that had been set upon us than we first thought, the pressure of it hanging over us every day, yet we forged ahead, finding ways to do what needed to be done for the sake of Yllsora, but also for ourselves.
We also had more trauma from the years following the Shroud than we knew what to do with, often causing us to need moments of reprieve to gather ourselves and remember how we had fought for one another, how we had wanted exactly this.
And no matter how bad it got, we would always come back to one another, that undeniable pull tugging at us both, no matter where we went.
Even when I was shaking with fear, I knew I could find peace in his arms.
The years passed quickly in Hythe, and I missed my brother and mother greatly, so we visited Sorrel as often as we could, watching the village slowly become what I had always wanted it to be, a thriving home in the mountains, quiet yet undeniably strong.
I always loved those visits back home, our travels north allowing us to reminisce on that first journey to Rida, and how far we had come since then.
We watched Wellea grow and blossom as time went on, us along with it.
My powers only became stronger as Yllsora healed, and as the years went on, I watched as everything Myaella said come to fruition.
Yllsora once again became the world I had known it as, lush and filled with life, a prosperous place for those who stopped and listened to what she needed.
It was my greatest accomplishment, and the hardest thing I’ve done.
Malik and I eventually married, back in Sorrel under the Astaros we had made so many memories under, with my mother, brother, and Malik's father watching on.
We remembered all those we had lost, paying homage to Malik's mother, the boy from the night before the Shroud, and all of those who died following.
It was long overdue and my favorite night of my life, one filled with so much love and peace that I often found myself reminiscing about it, wishing I could go back to those few hours where everything was just right.
We were invited to stay in Sorrel, to continue what we had started, but we both knew we had more to accomplish.
We traveled all of Yllsora following our marriage, constantly wondering when the mainland king would retaliate, when he would try to reach for power again, but he never did.
I knew he was waiting for the perfect moment of weakness in the Mother Blessed, waiting for us to falter, to strike when we were weakest. It gnawed at me, knowing he was waiting to throw the world off balance once more, but I did not let it stop me from spreading the word of the Mother Blessed as it might once have.
As time passed, I wondered how Yllsora would continue on when Malik and I were gone, if the balance would be able to continue with just the Mother Blessed and the revelers, as Malik and I would not walk this world forever.
I did all I could to prepare for that day.
for when the mainland king's secret supporters would try to usurp the Mother Blessed once again, twisting history and saying we were the cause of the deaths of all those lost that day under Rida.
I documented everything I could and worked to rewrite the compendiums that were lost in Sorrel while in Hythe, days upon days spent recounting my every discovery, all carefully documented and copied, and stored for safekeeping, this one being the last. I worked to preserve the history of everything that had happened in my time, teaching the next generation of Mother Blessed the truth of what happened during the Scorching of Rida, how Yllsora evaded a near life-ending event.
Most importantly, I wanted to teach them the benefit of the balance, of why both Mother Blessed and revelers were needed, why we all—common men, Mother Blessed, and revelers alike—needed to know what really happened, and why we could not repeat it.
Years passed, and word of false histories about the Mother Blessed being spread on the mainland made their way to Wellea.
We made it a mission to dismantle those rumors, moving and finding permanent residence on the mainland, working on the frontlines to ensure the truth was known.
It was a long effort, one that is still not done today but continues on, though there will always be those who will believe whatever it is that benefits them the most.
And the more we taught the truth of what happened that day, the more we realized that we were no longer Mother Blessed at all, no longer acolytes of the Divine that created this world.
Instead, we were caretakers and vessels for Yllsora, and thus we required a name that emulated such.
So, we became known as Sources, reflective of Yllsora, the Source of all life, the true Mother to everything that lived.
The name freed us from the false story the Divine had spun and allowed us to begin anew, for now a new story was to be written.
As the years passed, and Malik and I grew older, our names and who we were now preceding us, I often found myself looking at him, wondering how I never put it together that we were always more than just a boy and girl born to the mountains.
We were two opposites, promised to a destiny bigger than even the Divine could ever imagine, the signs there all along in our childhood.
And even with everything and everyone that had tried to pull us apart, some things are stronger than the Divine itself.
I knew what we had done that day at Rida would echo through centuries to come, the tale no doubt subject to being twisted and transformed many times over into something more of a fable, something told around fires and sung in songs.
But I did not want us to be remembered as far-away heroes. I wanted us to be remembered as people with faults, people who stumbled until they landed at the right place at the right time, just as any common man does when faced with adversity.
I wanted the truth of it all to be documented and preserved, kept safe and passed down through the Sources, for fear that someone may try to tell a false version of our story that was essential to Yllsora’s survival.
That is the story you now hold in your hands, and that is why, even after all these years, I still write these words, lest anyone forget how we Sources came to be—our truth, and everything in between—for there is nothing more dangerous, than a history unknown.
THE END.