Mother Nature is one of the first of the Elder Gods' daughters and mistress of the world of Man, yet to one's eye she does not appear as such. She often questions her makers' reasoning in giving unto her such a form, at times vehement words escaping her lips. At first, those who come after her think to treat her in a manner they think befits her form; she is ridiculed day by day.

Those foolish beings soon come to learn their place.

Though Calamity had been one of the very few to treat her as her power and station demanded, Mother Nature did not like to linger often in her presence. Where Calamity walks, ill tidings often follow, and so when she comes suddenly to visit with her, Mother Nature knows to remain watchful. Calamity does indeed bring tidings, though upon hearing them, Mother Nature does not possess the mind to consider it ill or otherwise. A fury consumes her being instead.

The nymphs had been dear to her, and she had called them her daughters proudly, ushering them into her inner courts where not even her many other children set foot. She knows not their reasoning, but she does not want to; all that matters is the death and destruction they bring upon her world as they unleash their poison. She feels the pain of the earth and hears the cries of the forests; as the poison spreads and sinks deep she feels it gnawing throughout her being. It almost cripples her beyond rescue.

So when Calamity tells her that one yet lives, Mother Nature can think of nothing save vengeance. As her brothers and sisters by the hand of the Elder Gods had mocked her for the form she took, she had grown spiteful, a vengeful spirit taking root within her. Her makers had been forced to chastise her for slewing a number of the pantheon. Now, that same spirit takes a hold of her and sharpens her eyes and ears as she hunts for the nymph.

But as she stalks through her forest, her many children gathering about her as they lend their eyes and ears to her cause, she gradually comes to a realisation. In the wake of the nymphs' actions, she knows that Man had been the first to strike in vengeance, Calamity had told her so. She knows that the nymphs had tricked humankind into searching for the seeds that had brought poison to the earth; Calamity had told her this also. But what she did not know is the methods to which Man turned in pursuit of the nymphs' treacherous gift.

Mother Nature pauses in her stride, her eyes surveying that which presents itself to her. As she looks, she knows beyond doubt that this is not the work of the poison. Trees lie scattered to and fro, their trunks brutally hacked to pieces. The earth is scorched, rendered as nothing more than ash, the sustenance it once offered to her children no more. She sees a vast path cut through the forest, and in the wake of Man's avid search is left nothing but destruction.

Mother Nature is caught in a long, stretching moment where her thoughts are naught but turmoil. Who does she condemn for the senseless violence she sees before her, the nymphs or Man? She reluctantly accepts that humankind has their needs, but that does not mean she likes what they do in order to satisfy them. She watches them with an ever increasing vexation.

But this…this is far beyond the realm of needs. She looks and sees nothing more than violence for the sake of violence. Fuelled by their desire to claim the nymphs' secrets for themselves, Man had put her forests to the blade and torch.

"And they would dare to live on as though they have done no wrong?"

Mother Nature speaks with a voice of rage, and her children scatter from her as her being radiates with it.

Oh, she may indeed possess the form of a mere child, but it is folly to vex her. She may possess eyes the colour of honey that seem to be brightened with the light of compassion, but the clench of her fist and the curl of her lips speak of passionate fury. She may adorn her dress with flowers as the hand of a child might, but her hand knows death as well as life. Her many children and even the forest itself shudder at the sound of her voice.

"Man will suffer for this".

A/N: #Duke Serkol, nope this has nothing to do with The Queen's War, the one thing I've carried over from that to this is the idea that Phosphora is a nymph.

And I wonder, are other readers thrown by my not using the characters' names? I anticipated some ambiguity with 'the Nymph', but I figured a connection could easily be made with the story having been listed as Pandora/Phosphora.