Vigilante Game Twenty Eight: Into the Fey

We found the mother hoping to cleanse her, to remove the corruption that made her want to shatter homes and dismantle cities. We didn’t bring a weapon to face her. We brought a battery.

The mother used to have a name. She used to be a woman, a powerful and capable Druid who was corrupted long ago by wizard who radicalized her. Now the mother has the form of a massive tree blanketed in a thick forest, and from this forest she planned to end civilization as we knew it.

           

MED knew all of this as we traveled to meet the mother with a band of druids and a necrotic battery. We had been told that the mother had to be stopped, but she also had to live. Through prayer and visions we were told that her death could destroy our world. But, we had a plan, a ritual that we invented to draw the corruption out of her and into a battery that we found in the umbral tower. We knew that, maybe, it could work.

There was a lot we didn’t know, however, which is why we were surprised when the Wild Hunt appeared, intent on stopping us. For better or for worse, they failed and we traveled into the massive tree, seeking the mother’s core.

We had to call in favors to find her. To slay a dragon that waited deep within the mother, we called on our friends and allies, summoning a hoard of Fey Barbarians, a co-conspirator from our time undercover with the Ocrait, and friend and former teammate Martin. While the dragon fell, we realized with horror that something was deeply wrong with our friend. We assumed that Martin had left willingly, aiming to serve his demonic patron more directly. This was clearly untrue. Martin didn’t recognize us, and then there was the way his eyes glowed. He moved with deadly intent past us and towards the heart of the tree. We un-summoned our friend in distress. It was clear what he meant to do, and the mother had to live.

Our next hours were fraught. We found the mother’s core. The figure of the woman that she used to be was surrounded by a clear glass-like globe and wrapped in thick roots. While we rested, we debated our plan. Everyone we consulted before this ritual warned us that it could end, so easily, in disaster. Even the dragon, in it’s last moments, called on us to stop.

In an attempt to ensure that we weren’t about to destroy our own world, part of the party traveled into the Feywilds aiming to call in one more favor. Back inside the mother our bard, Ereden, learned through magical research that the mother’s heart was in the Feywilds, and if we could guard her heart there while the ritual took place then we could better ensure her safety.

Regretfully, safety was a luxury we couldn’t afford. The party that remained in the mother was forced into action. Deep in a place so thoroughly corrupted, they could not afford to wait for our safety measure to be put into place. And so, they acted.

They pulled the corruption from the mother, and as they did the sphere surrounding her cracked. For the first time in ages, the mother spoke as a human, or something close.

We learned that the mother’s roots grew into the ley lines of our world, and in many ways she became a living tower, a living seal. By purging her of her corruption, we shattered this seal, accidentally weakening the meager holds on the word-breaker. She told this to us, but stated there was hope, a way to save the seal. If we could heal the heart of the mother, deep in the Feywilds, we could reverse the damage we had done. She would hold the seal together as long as she could, but we had to hurry.

The party was rejoined outside of a beautiful city, surrounded by fall-colored trees. We were happy to be together again, to have a clear and pressing goal, but the words of the mother concerned us. We would have to make sacrifices to fix what we had done. And then there were thoughts of Martin, our friend. What had a hold of him? Could he be freed, or was he lost to us forever? And, of course, we remembered the moon. Something terrible was coming for all of us. It was time to move.

(So we went on a shopping spree. You know. Obviously.)

-- Arlyn LaBelle is a poet, flash fiction writer and legal assistant living in Austin, Texas. Her work has appeared multiple times in the Badgerdog summer anthologies as well as The Blue Hour, LAROLA, JONAH Magazine, The Oddville Press, Songs of Eretz, Grey Sparrow Press, Cease, Cows and The Southern Poetry Review.