A Chimerical Hope

The Weak Must

Smaller, with large eyes and round features, the nymph looked up to the refugee like a younger sibling to an elder. The refugee bore in her expression a look of calcined despair, of having lost everything yet gripping to one hope and determination. The nymph bore an emptiness, of having lost everything, of falling with nothing to hold on to‍ ‍—‍ as if they gaze out from within an ever‍-​deepening pit. Somehow, her white eyes did not look look bright.

The refugee had asked, Why should I let you live? to a mantis younger than her. The nymph had no answer.

Awelah’s grip on the spear slackened, and her eyes flushed with pigment as she peered at the nymph she was threatening. For one moment, the light all around was the color of baneful flames. She smelled ash and blood. She heard crackling tongues amid the pleading screams. She saw death and judgment.

In the heartlands, there is only one law—

The spear lowered, but it was still pointing at the nymph.

“What are you doing out here?” asked the refugee.

“I am gathering mint leaves. It will serve to make a salve. A roach nymph scraped their leg when running from a hound.”

Messy antennae twisted forward, intent, examining. “Where did the roaches come from?”

“Farmers from Duskhold. They tell me they once supplied food to the stronghold, but they must flee… whatever had happened there. The countryside is so dangerous now, and they believed I would be safer in their company.”

The spear now pointed at the ground. Both pawns claimed their mission required killing everyone from Duskroot. And this nymph wasn’t.

“What’s your name and epithet?” asked the nymph. Those large white eyes were looking her up and down.

The refugee had been drilled long on proper introduction, and her tone was rote. “I am Awelah, she who…” And already, a hitch, a piece that no longer fits.

Who was she? To Mewla: she who will be her mother’s pride (you’re my only hope, honeyhatch). To Akida: she who should keep trying (you might catch me next time, cousin). To Honorari: she who was acceptable at spears and survival (you’re the oldest still a pawn :‍– please keep up, niece). To Hotar: she who bore the noble name Asetari (you’d do well to act like it, child). To her: she who was not even worth the bother to kill (there is only one law, and you are its subject).

A scrape of palps together, the sound like a chorus‍-​roach clearing her throats. Then she at last said, “Awelah Asetari, she who will have justice for her clan.”

Awelah caught a twitch of red palps, a tightening of antennae. A smile, an determined arch? Was this nymph laughing at me? Or is she envious? Doubting?

But her reaction now only looked flat, polite. She bowed with raptorial arms lowered. “I… I’m Makuja, she of no name. Are you still going to kill me?”

Awelah stared down. Like an older sibling to her younger.

If the baneful flames were crackling, if she stood before Makuja, Awelah knew what answer she would have chosen. She could have, and would have.

“No,” Awelah answered. “Get up. Take me to the roaches.”

A stalwart tree had endured long, its roots carving into rock, and then faltered. Its branches grown thick, but long lain leafless and dead. Odd conic fungi grew underneath the boughs. They expanded and contracted as if breathing.

Beneath this tree waited seven chorus‍-​roaches. Bugs just barely bigger than the nymphal mantes, bright of chitin, pastel reds and greens. The largest of them pulled a small cart. Long, waving antennae greeted the mantes, rubbing a curl‍-​palped head against Makuja, but only stares advanced toward Awelah.

Makuja followed their eyes and inclined her head. A raptorial gestured toward her guest, and she said, “This is Awelah, she of clan Asetari.”

The red nymph had a quiet voice‍ ‍—‍ but if she had issued a shout of air from her throats, the roaches would have flinched the same. Antennae jerked back, glances were exchanged among them.

The largest roach met the refugee’s gaze with dark eyes. Perfume‍-​scent feminine, her limbs were thick and softly rounded with fat beneath chitin‍-​plates‍ ‍—‍ matriarch of this family? thought Awelah‍ ‍—‍ and the thick roach was folding her first two legpairs in a deep kneel; the other roaches followed suit.

“Honored Asetari,” she whispered with six voices, “we thought you had all died.” Noble roaches didn’t stridulate with their palps; they hissed through finely‍-​lipped spiracles along their abdomen.

Makuja tilted her head. “Why?”

The thick roach glanced between the two mantes. Would, should, Awelah answer?

The refugee thought of the ruins, the massacre, and scowled.

Then the roach was speaking. She had an intonation, a cadence‍ ‍—‍ mothers told their nymphs many stories. “The noble clan Asetari wandered the heartlands for generations, chasing the flight of their ancestral spirits. Their wandering dead guided them to a sacred mountain upon which they built a magical castle wherein their buried dead would live and rule eternally.” A pause, a shudder that jolted along her underspine, and then she finished. “Then four days ago a cursed storm prowled in, visiting otherworldly destruction upon their promised stronghold.”

Awela gave an enigmatic grunt. This roach was a fool, then. Grandmother Uvema was one of three who’d survived an encounter with the Second Antiscourge, and she had understood the clan’s techniques so deeply she had crafted the astral plane herself :‍– and Mewla had told Awelah that Uvema’s greatest accomplishment was convincing the clan that letting her play queen had anything to do with their traditions.

The clan believed the story, the bugs of Duskhold believed the story, Awelah believed the stories when the lessons recounted it‍ ‍—‍ and she’d excitedly repeated the tale of the Asetari clan founding to her mother one evening.

Rootless mysticism, all of it, Mewla told her. Don’t let them fool you. “Ancestral spirits”? “Sacred guidance”? “Nobility”? Her stride had broken to spit loudly. All bullshit. Play their games, honeyhatch, but do it for money, do it for favors. Never do it for dead bugs and sweet words.

Six voices jarred her from the lash of memories. “Are you from beyond the hold, pup?” The matriarch hummed something like a coo in her throats. (Now that she did not kneel, now that she stood up with midlegs at full height, she was the only roach eye level with the mantis nymphs.) “My apologies if this is how you had to find out.”

Awelah’s antennae curled tight. Tight. “I was there,” she ground out.

“Yet now you are here. I thought the Asetari would have died protecting that domain.”

Purple palps tightened, scrapers pressing together wordless. Then her gaze fell, and her antennae unfurled to fall too, over her eyes.

Why did this sting? She had already been measured, already knew where she stood. (She was not the law, but its subject.) Those who had fought had died. Mewla wanted her daughter to live.

Wasn’t it a good thing she did?

…Was it a good thing her clan only had a coward to its name?

While the roach matriarch and her dark eyes lingered on Awelah, they’d lost the interest of the younger, smaller roaches, who’d turned to hiss among themselves. There was a restlessness in how they circled and tapped the ground.

Makuja had stepped forward, too, leaving Awelah to face the roach mother alone; she knelt before a small roach. That one had moved little, walking on five legs with a six curled up. Makuja was wiping it down and wrapping it in wet cloths.

This was why they’d stopped, Awelah recalled. They’d set off soon, then.

But first, the matriarch directed one last question to Awelah. She shook her head and declared, “We have no accommodations for a vesperbane pawn, nothing fit for clan Asetari. But if you can endure that, you may accompany us.”

Awelah stared at the roach’s light green face, met once again those eyes. What dwelled within them? Did she blame the Asetari‍ ‍—‍ blame her, for she was the Asetari, now‍ ‍—‍ for inviting the destruction that drove this family of roaches from their home? The purple nymph could scratch some rebuttal, mount some defense, and felt an urge to‍ ‍—‍ but the pain and disappointment in that face…

The Asetari had kept roachservants, maids who’d practically raised Awelah.

Had.

Wary dark eyes looked up at her, listened to her present silence, and saw her hands clenching into fists. But the mantis did not feel anger. It had been three nights, three nights cursing her weakness, three nights remembering her family in nightmares‍ ‍—‍ but this touches a different wound. With the loss of her clan, Awelah lost purpose, honor, expectation. But she hadn’t just burned the Asetari, even if they had been her target. Reminded now, of the loss of the roaches who’d sung her to sleep, holding her like their own nymphs?

Awelah let out a gasp, and articulates nothing else.

Then she inclined her head‍ ‍—‍ what might be a single nod, or a small bow. She wondered if this was a level of deference a roach farmer would never expect from a mantis, a clan mantis. But she turned and Awelah could read no more of her expression.

When the journey resumed, Awelah followed after.

Long stretches of the road passed, the chorus‍-​roaches singing folk songs in their throats. The pale nymph fell back, kept her distance far behind the convoy of roaches. From here, they couldn’t see or judge her.

At night, Awelah perched on a rock as the roaches tucked into tents to sleep, and she stared heavenward. Stars struggled to shine amid a enervate‍-​dark sky; Awelah struggled to sleep amid the nightmares, struggled to grasp some purpose as spear‍-​steady amid… Nothing. She had nothing.

She caught a hint of movement from the shadows‍ ‍—‍ empty when her gazed jerked over to look. Where was Makuja sleeping?

Morning now, and the roaches served a vegetable stew. Awelah did not take a bowl. Instead, she marched into the hills, perched on the branches of a tree until a little horned beetle skittered by, leaves in its mouth. Awelah pounced, and seized her breakfast. She offered to split it with Makuja. The matriarch’s dark eyes linger on her.

The journey was north. Awelah had studied the maps, and three directions blurred. North of Duskhold was Windhold; and east of Duskhold, and south. The teritory‍-​grasp of the largest stronghold cradled what was little more than a forested mountain and the outlying fields. West was Bleedhold, but west was a mountain passage.

Who would claim Awelah’s old home, when wind blows the ash away? Honorari called Duskroot a cousin of the Windborne Stronghold. Uvema was a champion of Westhold, before it fell, and Duskhold was awarded like a prize for her battle with the Second Antiscourge. An extension of Westhold’s interests and community, distinct only on paper.

Hotar declared Windhold the proper successor to Westhold, as far Duskroot was concerned, and so the smaller stronghold fell in line. (Measure yourself by the one who directs you, went the Asetari clan refrain. Loyalty is strength. Obedience is power.) So Duskroot would remain obediant.

But where was Windhold when the castle was burning?

Awelah had nothing to clench, so her raptorials just tightened, spines digging into herself.

She wore no headband, so Awelah could only guess at what could have motivated her. Windhold had no reason to move against her‍ ‍—‍ so was this the opening move for Bleedhold conducting a trial by battle? Or perhaps there was no politics in the act.

There was only one law in the heartlands, and she claimed she’d done this simply to enforce it. Not a law of nations, not a law of words written. It needs no explanation. Surely you Asetari already understand obediance to power?

What the strong will, the weak must.

She had measured the strength of their obediance, their loyalty.

(And only the coward child survived.)

“How did you do it?” Makuja had matched her pace, empty white eyes staring up at her.

Awelah scowls back at her. “What?”

“Duskroot. How do you escape the attack?”

“Why?” Awelah’s antennae tightened into spirals.

“My m—” Makuja’s voice hitches. “Someone once told me that secrets are surprises, and surprises get banes killed. Sometimes it’s your enemy, but sometimes it’s your allies. Sometimes it’s yourself.”

“Are we allies?” Awelah asked.

“Maybe we’re enemies. Then it would make sense to keep secrets.” Makuja’s mandibles opened in a smile, like doors rickety on their hinges. “Secrets are weapons, but holding onto a weapon for too long means your fingers blister at the handle. You hardly sleep. There’s trouble in your eyes. I am asking about your journey away from Duskhold, and then I am going to ask how you are feeling.”

Strange way to ask ‘how are you?’ Awelah thought.

“And if I don’t answer, you’ll think we’re enemies?”

“Are we?”

“You’ve been helpful. I don’t want an enemy of you.” Awelah sighed. “I watched my heritage burn.” I killed, and then I cannibalized, and then I almost killed you. “You don’t understand.”

Makuja paused a moment, palps working‍ ‍—‍ as if there were many things she could say. “You’re right. I don’t have a family. But I traveled in this storm. I didn’t do it alone. Yet you did. How?”

Then Awelah palps, palps working, and she answered.