as a maiden she tiptoes shy with her light...

Thothaga was pretty sure she had died and gone to some spider paradise. Their plan had worked and now there were beetles everywhere at her feet. She did not know where to start. Thothaga scooped up piles will her fangs and began shoveling them into her mouth parts. Crunchy and juicy, they were exactly how she imagined to be. She turned and saw someone had laid out magically grown bananas that attracted more beetle. Thothaga, wiggled her abdomen and leapt on top it, hungrily picking them off the fruits.

She continued to gorge herself on the bugs until her abdomen became big and full. There were still so many shiny beetles however. Thothaga decided she should save some for later. It wasn't every day that Cetus had feast laid out before her. She pulled sheets of silk from her spinnerets and began wrapping up the sleeping beetles in large bundles of tight, white cocoons.

"I have not eaten this well in cycles." Thothaga paused, beginning to feel the consequence of her gluttony. She wished spiders could burp. "Oh dear, I might have to molt after this..."


"Thothaga speaking."
Thothaga thinking.

@Serek @Naja @Hera @Dragon

He watched--somewhat proudly--as his brothers sprang into action. The bananas were there; Septiezal was mirroring him, sinuous and far better than he at reaching the hidden spots in the bark. Smoke billowed skyward, and he hissed in satisfaction.

Yes. Good. This was good.

At the flood of insects pouring forth, he turned to watch them. Many appeared stunned by the smoke, but others alive and well, and the alligator inhaled. He changed the focus of his magic, and the burning of his skin ceased, the smoke tapering away. Septiezal was better at it, anyway; he would focus, now, on killing what remained.

He realized that, with the tree present--and angry, and sentient--he couldn't blast full-on plumes of fire directly toward it. He realized this slightly too late, and bit it back, coughing on its searing heat and its smoke. It hurt, the fire that lanced over his tongue and burnt the roof of his mouth, but it was nothing, by now, that he wasn't used to. After a moment he tried again, this time releasing small blasts of flame from his open jaws, burning away small groups of the insects here and there wherever they got far enough from the tree.

He wasn't sure if it'd be enough, alone, but it was something, at least; it was his contribution.

As the bugs suddenly streamed out of the roots of the tree, Serek jumped back with disgust. He hated bugs and beetles and all that like. Despite the fact that Cetus was absolutely crawling with them. But they were on a mission and he had to stay focused. He caught Septiezal's eye and smiled shyly back. But then a moment later realized that he should be proud of what he had done! So he jumped back into action. A little farther from the roots he laid down more sparkling bananas to try and lure the bugs away from the tree roots. No too far that they would get disinterested but not close enough that it would be easy for them to just run back to the Divine.

He glanced over at the spider, watching her shovel beetle after beetle into her mouth. It was kind of gross to watch but it made him kind of interested. He leaned down and licked up a few of the beetles. Their little legs tickled his tongue but he forced himself to crunch down. A strange fluid poured from their bodies and coated the inside of his mouth like a layer of mucus. It tasted like dirt and feces and everything disgusting. He immediately spat it out with a strange noise, collected saliva in his mouth and spat out some more. How disgusting.

He looked like an absolute moron, didn't he? Frustrated, he started stomping down on many of the beetles, as if to make up for his pathetic display.

A ripple went out.

It was magical in origin--of that, there could be no doubt--and this time, it touched the minds of all present, not just Serek. It was feminine. It held hope, encouragement.

"Yes, yes, DRIVE them out! Only a little more-..."

The flood of beetles began to slow, their rainbow carapaces burnt to crisps, falling limp in the smoke... eaten...

@Septiezal @Serek @Dragon @Thothaga @Naja @Hera

Serek froze when he heard the voice of the Divine touching him once again. His mouth gaped with surprise for just a moment before tears came swimming to his eyes. She spoke to him again. Even if it wasn't just him. She spoke. He let out a laughing cry and lunged forward, stomping his hooves on every beetle that came towards him. "Yes, I'll drive them out! I'll destroy them for you!"

He wasn't making a huge difference but it was the effort that counted, right?

Dragon reared his head back, inhaling, and prepared to let loose another stream of fire. Again, due to the proximity of the tree, it wasn't as large as it could have been, reaching only a few feet outward--but the crackling swell of magicka and subsequent gout of flame still had him giddy with the power of it. The voice in his head barely even registered.

A bellowing laugh escaped him as he saw hundreds of insects lying all around, smoke twisting up from their now-black, once-iridescent shells.

How magnificent! How beautiful! How... fiery!

His head lowered down again, conical teeth white against his dark hide, and another (small) flame engulfed the swamp before him.

as a maiden she tiptoes shy with her light...

Sluggish from her feast, Thothaga continued to wrap up her left overs, though it seemed there wouldn't be many edible beetles left as the Big Lizard spat stinging flames at the sleeping hordes, roasting them to charred shells. The voice of the Divine encouraged to make sure no beetle was left alive, or un-cocooned. She did not want to experience its horrible shrieking ever again.

Thothaga paused for a moment, feeling light-headed as the thick smoke began to interrupt her passive breathing, and moved away from the black-shrouded tree. As she began to groom the powdery soot off her blue-black bristles, Thothaga reached out to the Divine once more. I have never seen a beetle like this, where did they come from? She asked it. The spider wanted to stamp out this infestation once and for all.



"Thothaga speaking."
Thothaga thinking.

As the last of the beetles died, or scurried off into the swamp, the marsh seemed to go very still.

The other insects that trilled through Cetus fell silent, as if in hushed reverence, and the leaves of the trees were as frozen. The cave was a painting, wholly still, even the mist seeming to pause in time.

A link glimmered open, whispering into the minds of the Children with the weight of ages untold. Its voice was mournful, and distant; its language ancient, yet familiar. Like the whispering leaves, it spoke to them.

"You call yourselves... Children. You seek... knowledge. This will be my thanks to you. It has been... long. But sometimes, there are things... that I remember."

Now the trees did rustle, as if memories were rushing past through the highest canopy, pushing through leaves and brushing aside pine needles. "Once... I was other."

___________

Those present felt the world peeling away, ages--immeasurable by their standards, but so many cycles--retracting. They saw the swamp brighten. Dancing light shifted down through the forest. The mist was not thick, not oppressive, but diffused with light, and joy seemed to sing through the wood. A figure was visible, in the distance: feminine, clad with sheets of ivy and her skin a deep, rich brown, rich as if painted with hues of soil and tree bark. As she stepped delicately over the earth with root-like feet, the birds swept up and down, dancing at her passing. Some landed in the foliage that made up her hair; others perched in the branches that formed her fingers. Her eyes glowed a soft silver, and wisps seemed to dance around her. There was a shimmering pendant at her forehead, and flowers in her hair.



"I do not remember... everything," the voice whispered, and its rustling song was touched with grief. As the strange creature passed gracefully through the forest, the woods were not only bright, but full of life. Flowers, vines and ivy choked every inch of soil in a colorful carpet; ferns and bushes swayed at every height. The birdsong filled the air, and it seemed to follow and surround the figure. "But I remember... when she came."

The voice had grown dark, its ancient tongue filled with thunder. The forest went dim, and the sound of buzzing filled the wood. The birds fell silent, and fear filled the air. The mist grew cold, and all of Cetus reverberated with this new sound.

There was a flash of light. The feminine figure writhed, as if in struggle; there were screams, and then the groans of tree bark, the buzzing growing louder. The flashes of light grew too bright, and the dryad-like being's figure stretched, and grew, and went dull grey-brown, her leaves withering and her rich skin gnarled. Her face became trapped in an eternal expression of horror, and rage. "I do not remember all of it... but I remember this." The ancient voice in their minds held depths of hatred unfathomable to those their age: anger that had festered for centuries, or perhaps even millennia. The sense of deep injustice.

"And I remember... my children." And now it was joined by grief. Others, like her: others, walking the forest, now gone dim, others who tried to do as she had done. Others, who were met by the withering curse, and who died as they stood in the swamp, fading into bark, twisted into silent, towering figures. The howling voice rang in their ears, as a tree shaken by a storm. "WHAT SHE DID TO THEM..."

It subsided. The forest fell away, rotting and dimming, until the trees were grey, and instead of flowers, only half-dead reeds lay in their place. The waters rose, and black swamp, putrid and cold, filled what was once beautiful. The Children would find that their minds had returned to the here, and the now. Where the figure had stood, gnarled and frozen, now towered the Divine--still fixed as if writhing in place, still twisted as if once, it had been something more than just a tree.

"This was a beautiful forest, once... but now I am only her tool. This was my home, and it was to be my children's... but now it is only our grave."

The voice faded, the connection flickering away, only grief remaining--as if Cetus itself was nothing but a pool of Her tears.

@Thothaga @Naja @Hera @Septiezal @Serek @Dragon

Serek listened to the Divine's voice as if it were the voice of his goddess. Perhaps it was and he drank her words in eagerly, he listened as if each word were keeping him alive one day more. He sighed as the world melted and watched with awe and tears the images that she showed them. It was cruelty to make such a dark, misty place from something so full of light. A tear dripped from his eye and he sunk to the ground pitifully. "How cruel...to turn such a beautiful place...into this..."

He bowed his head before the Divine and continue to murmur softly. "Is there any way to reverse this curse? Any way to bring back all that light, all that love and beauty? Is there any way to save you from this horrible fate?" He raised his head, tears leaking from his eyes. "I will do anything!"

@Thothaga @Naja @Hera @Septiezal @Dragon

Dragon listened in silence, and fell still as the magic enveloped his mind.

He watched as the strange tree-woman strode through the swamp; watched the birds (which whetted his hunger, a bit) perch atop her branches and flit here and there. But when the buzzing came, when the Divine grew angry, he barely noticed. He was too busy reacting to the buzzing, himself.

Dark eyes sprang wide, and a low, guttural alligator's hiss-bellow erupted from him. He remembered that sound. The noise that had been present at his hatching. The noise that had come when Nemean had appeared in Polaris. And what she had done--! If it had been her--but it had to have been. She was evil. She had trapped the creature as a tree?! And killed its children, somehow--children! Children were sacred!

Dragon's roar rang out, loud and echoing and consisting of precisely three words:

"That little SHIT!"