Forsaken Family
Reina Featherfall.
28th of Quintetas, 1492.
House Za'Darmondiel Outer Tunnels, Zimysta Falls. Shujen Kingdom Dark Sky. Depth: 243,011 km.
19:19
***
I… noticed something, in these Falls. Or rather, we did. Me and Iris. we felt it, heard it, and saw it all at once throughout this expanse. Mycelium. Fungus. Whispers. Pleas. Like webs, they stretched throughout Zimysta, congregating in the furthest depths of House Za'Darmondiel, hidden behind a solid stone wall.
To much surprise, the drow trailing us distanced themselves as such wall came into view. Yet it wasn't long after passing through when we stood before another. She gazed upon me with eyes of white, shaded by a crown of fungus, moss, and mold. Streaks of bioluminescent paint dotted her cheeks and lined the underside of her lips, casting an eerie glow from the shadow of her brow as she broke the silence. <<"Quite a welcome surprise. Two Divine Mothers in the Falls of Zimysta. Nature who answered our prayers. I am Daulery, forsaken second daughter High Priestess Yela.">>
<<"I am the forsaken third daughter of Prime Matron Etyl Za'Darmondiel.">> Turning, I saw a familiar face, one so petite. Bald with a head wrapped in fine silks and jewels that left a probing feeling on the mind. Feelings I opened myself to at once.
"Mala," A voice as silky as her garb rang through my mind with so much clarity I was taken aback. And from the look on Iris' face, she was too. "For two hundred fourteen years, I have been a slave to my mother, Etyl. The negative radiation here in the Darkworld rarely causes a genetic mutation, you see. Mine bore psionic sorcery and a strong mental prowess."
Her face fell, showing more emotion than one could ever believe. "I thought she would be proud, learning of my power. Yet my mother wove a different fate for me. The same fate my older sister would later weave for her daughter." She motioned to Daulery.
"Are you… stuck here?" Iris approached her, kneeling with eyes as bright yellow as the pain strewn about the woman's face. "Imprisoned… in your own body?"
"The custom for drow is six daughters, two males." Mala's psionic voice echoed following Daulery's nod. "In our… servitude, we were forced to cull the weakest of our children until we had such a number. All for the sake of their goddess- the one who had never given us any favor, for we had been pawns from the beginning.
"I hate my mother, Lady Reina. To that, we can relate. Me and my children; my niece and her children hate her and her demon queen; as do more drow than you would believe. Before this day we could not oppose her. As for us here." She gestured around the room, "We do not want to, for we have seen Amun's way through you, and his walk.
"Liberation through Death."
<<"We are the same.">> I bowed, humbled by the path set before me. <<"I am the forsaken survivor of Feathered Grove Redagh; banished by Head Druid and killed hands my parents. Blessed to be an undying fiend beneath Owl's wing; cursed live among tormentors Elven Devil.">>
"You are so young," Daulery said to me in Common, still holding Iris' hand. "Yet, already, you have faced the pain of abuse by those called 'family.' I too have faced this pain. My knowledge of the Druidic arts bore my mother's wrath, for I was to be a high priestess.
"Forced then I was to have children." She gestured around to eight similar bodies, camouflaged along the mushroom forest as still stalks of painted flesh. "Together, we were forced to spread our reach to watch all that transpires in our domain; both here and above.
"Like you two, we hoped- prayed for salvation. Like all drow, we have longed for this day, the arrival of Telin's Champion. Now, Amun has come; and with him, you.
"Reina Featherfall. Divine Mother of Nature." My name- my title pulled my eyes away from Daulery, gripping Iris' glowing hand, to look upon this aged drow doing the unthinkable; saying the unthinkable.
"Mother of Flesh, free me from this suffering."
***
The Forsaken Mala.
***
Amun, his Troupe, and the monks may have been able to shield their minds from my probes, yet that was not the case for the tens of thousands of drow who called this place home. Not even the Priestesses and their Matrons were safe from me; it was just that I could not pry into them without repercussions.
The minds of Zimysta were like water droplets on a fine web; dissimilar in the sense that frustration, anger, resolve, and hope dyed those droplets with differing shades. On the contrary, the minds of the Elven Devil's Troupe were like the dark sky, expansive ground, and changing weather looming above those tiny webs; deciding, on occasion, to give those tiny beings small glimpses of the madness within.
Where many would see such a sight and freeze, more would lose themselves upon witnessing such a light hidden within such darkness. Where few would gaze upon such a wondrous thing and begin to plot and scheme, even fewer would embrace it wholly- those like us.
In the same way as many drow to come, I performed many firsts in the presence of those young deities, for the first time since it was thrust upon me, I removed my headdress, casting it to the ground to allow the full heat of the realms to embrace my head.
For the first time since I came of age, I prayed from the depths of my heart, allowing pure emotion to swell through my mind and flow into this woman- the one I wished to be my mother.
For the first time in my life, I prostrated myself on the ground of my own volition, for if I wished to become more and rise from this web of chaos, I had to reduce myself to prey and taste the bite of a maw one couldn't begin to imagine.
However, the bite never came. If it did, it was in the form of a gentle hand resting atop my shoulder, paired with a voice so gentle; whispering, "Stand."
It wasn't so much her pull that lifted me off my feet, and it wasn't her embrace that kept me there, yet I felt her warmth flowing into me all the same. I saw it in my mind's eye as a distant gold hue that illuminated the lingering clouds of gray, revealing not a web of minds but a world of interconnected beings. From insect to drow and beyond to this Divine Mother and the ones she came with; the shining stars of Celestials; the dark voids of the fiendishly undying, and… something else, I saw.
"Just look," Reina said. "This very thing is what we came here to do."
In my mind's eye, Iris Cole appeared like a wall of deep blue. Like stone or metal; impenetrable to both mind and body. Yet she was aware. And by looking upon her I was made minutely aware of the sheer depth contained by that wall, staring back at my tiny frame.
Through my natural eyes, I saw that same wall in the form of archaic and angular blue veins stretching up her wrists. They poured into Daulery's hand much faster than the dark brambles of flowery light enveloping me and my family.
Indifferent to our case, those veins radiated out from her frame in waves, ebbing into the stalks of her family and the moss, slime, molds, and fungus that kept them company for centuries; the very things left cradled in their hands once the power flowed back to them.
Only after their caps and molds of divine veins formed did I look upon the young Goddess to see a starkly different expression compared to the benevolent pain displayed by Reina. It was a look that coincided with the coldness in her touch.
The wrath of a dragon burned in those blue eyes of hers, fueling the grit in her words as she said. "Eat. Take back what they have taken from you. Reboot as the first Mycodroids and become indomitable. Use this power to never be trapped again."
They needed not telling. They ate the exotic metal she produced the moment their hands touched their blessings. Yet they chewed faster and ate more voraciously as she spoke. Some even cried as the blue glow ebbed from their bodies once again; this time to travel through the mycelium they spent so many years spreading across the Falls.
The giant stalks around them fell in their wake. The metal trinkets and rusted arms once tossed inside as trash rusted into powder. The stone around them crumbled. The Falls of Zimysta screamed louder than the maddened joy of the rebooted House Daulery as they took what was taken from them; from all of Zimysta and Nydorden Halls.
Their power flowed into them one final time, aggregating into legs, arms, bodies, and visages fit for any drow, yet comprised of the same metals and stone they'd taken from their takers. Violet chitin skin as smooth as silk stretched beneath follicles that bore silver-white hair-like mycelium, long and silky to frame the blue jewels of their eyes around their newly animated faces.
Driza. Dilyzina. Dhelyanya. Dirzna. Drisidil. Dilisstra. Datton. Duaglez. One by one, they stomped on the ancient stone and pushed themselves to their feet; uncaring of the tumbling rocks shattering on their hardened frames.
In a true show of power they disappeared, fading into thin strands of blue that leeched into the stone; leaving me, my children, and our Divine Mother of Nature in this crumbling pit of torment. At least until we were no more, having faded into a crimson sea within a verdant womb.
Through the flesh of that membrane, I witnessed the Flesh Mother conjure a staff that looked just as divine as a Life Tree, and slam it into the ground; ceasing the trembles as quickly as they came; leaving only this chamber of flesh incarnate and her loving voice, echoing through the abyss.
"Your rebirth will take a little more time, darlings. But when we are done, no one will need to replicate your circumstance again. For it will be you who will decide who is blessed with this gene."