dragonsatdawn: Thanks for the review! Heh, I actually hadn't thought of the dancing parallels. XD
Well thanks. ^_^
To be fair, it's still got to fare better than Ninjago City. :P
ForeverFictional: Oh, you're new! Welcome to the fandom! Hmm, teenagers do make sense, for the original Serpentine Wars . . .
JustRandom: Thanks for the review! That's a nice thought . . . If anyone could, I guess Lilly would be a good candidate. Canon Lilly, anyway. Mine's got her own problems. :P
Oh boy, so you're down for possible ninja dysfunction and cruelty, huh? Well. I might give it a try, then! I'll see if I can get a handle on it and how my other writing projects go.
Well thanks!
I hear ya on that one! Misako got my goat the moment she showed up, and I haven't been convinced to like her very much ever since then. Man, nice catch on the "forgot to give Lilly lunch" hint! I did mean for that to sorta be foreshadowing her irresponsibility towards Lloyd. She gets buried in her studies and nobody else matters.
That's nice of you to say! I have no patience for fight scenes either, so maybe we just have the same tastes. :P
Oof, that's become an identifiable pattern already? Dang. I'm not even halfway through doing that. XD That's not too cheesy though, you're fiiiiiiine.
Noon was sweltering. Lilly dashed sweat from her chin and shook herself, trying to get her shoulderplates into a more comfortable position. Life was rough when you had to choose between dismemberment and heat stroke.
She was approaching a new village. Far up ahead the same drab weather-beaten huts as every other village crouched sullenly in the sun. On either side of the path she was walking, the meadows were morphing into farmland. Some farmers were tending to the crops, and the air was thick with the scent of sun-heated earth. Lilly breathed deep, feeling both better and worse simultaneously. The scent was her idea of heavenly, but it was also dangerous: even now, if she thought about earth too much while battling, she sometimes ended up invoking it. Several times over the past few years she had rippled the ground in the heat of the moment, and then had to scrabble hard and fast to devise cover stories.
"A good day to you, Miss!"
Her head lifted at the shout. A cluster of farmers nearby was looking her way.
"You look like you could use a drink," called one of them, already approaching with a pail of water and a ladle. Lilly hesitated, but finally nodded and stepped off the path to meet him.
"Kind of you, sir."
She drank from the ladle, uncomfortably aware of the farmer's eyes roving over her greedily. She was usually at home in her body and didn't give it any thought, but when she was around other people she was forced to take notice of the way adulthood had molded her. She knew she was trim and muscular, roughened by travel and sunshine. Based on the type of attention she received, she must be attractive. She had learned not to acknowledge advances.
"Where might you be off to, ma'am?" said the farmer, with the excessively casual drawl men always adopted when they were planning to hit on her.
"Nowhere particular," said Lilly crisply. "I'm only passing through. I offer my services to anyone who needs defending."
"That must be a rough life," said the farmer. "What's a noble lady like you doing sleeping out in the open? It's just not safe these days. Could I offer you a bed for the night?"
Lilly gave him a flat look. Not in his life.
"We have a spot in the hayloft," offered another one of the farmers. "But you'd have to ask the missus if she didn't mind."
Lilly sized this one up in turn. A married man, that was a safer bet. Of course he'd want something in exchange, though.
"I'm afraid I couldn't pay you," she said.
"If you'd be willing to help out in the fields today, that would be enough."
"All right, thank you," said Lilly. She was aware of the first farmer, with the pail, glowering at her back, but she didn't deign to acknowledge it.
She always relished the times when she got to work with farmers. Despite the heat and back strain, she loved every minute she could reconnect with her element. She could shed her armor, forget about spilling blood and inflicting pain, and sink her hands into warm, crumbly soil. Sometimes she thought she could almost feel energy traveling up her arms, rejuvenating her.
They worked in the fields till dark. The farmer, Elias, and his wife shared supper with Lilly, then showed her to the hayloft. She was grateful for a roof over her head tonight.
She settled back into the sweet-smelling hay, tired but not sad. She thought back over the day wistfully. She often asked herself why she didn't just hang up her sword, settle down, grow sweet potatoes. She was so much more okay with herself on days when she got to work in the fields.
On some level, though, she knew it would never happen. She had sunk herself too deep into the warrior's lifestyle. She started to itch anytime she went too long without a blade in her hand. And besides—how would she live with herself? How could she live a quiet, peaceful, self-absorbed little life on a farm, knowing all the while that her father's sins still hung over her?
She was going to keep running till she bucked her past. That or till she died.
"Lilly."
Ohhhhhh, wonderful. Just what she needed tonight.
"Kill them in their sleep, Lilly. Slit their throats."
Groaning, she rolled over and burrowed down into the hay.
The next morning Elias offered her breakfast as well. She was a little surprised at his generosity, but had some inkling of its motivations.
Sure enough, as she ate, Elias cleared his throat hesitantly. Lilly looked up at once, knowing that he had a request of her. Good, it had been a while since she'd unsheathed her blade.
"You said you defended people, didn't you?" he began.
"Yes," said Lilly, already all business. "What can I do for you?"
He looked a bit flustered at her acumen, but recovered and pressed onwards.
"I thought perhaps I might ask a favor of you," he said. "I was robbed, you see. But nobody in this village is brave enough to help me obtain justice. And I . . . hesitate to cause tensions."
"Tensions?" said Lilly.
"Well, yes." Elias twisted his hat between his hands, visibly unsure about continuing. Finally he sighed and took the plunge. "You see Miss, I hate to say it, but it was one of my own neighbors. Domo, at the big farm down the road. I used to own one of the few carts in the village, and he kept asking to buy it; he said he needed it more because his farm was larger. When I refused to sell, he came in the night and took it. Now he keeps insisting it's actually his, that he bought it at the next village over. It has my own symbol right there on the underside! But Domo has a lot of influence in the village, and a ferocious temper. Nobody dares to challenge him. Not . . . not even me," he admitted, hanging his head.
"I see," said Lilly. "And you want me to go get your cart back."
"If you would be willing, Miss," said Elias humbly. "I'm just a simple farmer. Domo was a warrior, back in his day. He would cut me down in an instant."
Lilly felt a smile tease at the corners of her mouth. Today might be one of her good days. Here was a chance to obtain sorely-needed justice for a kind, hardworking man, to finally do a little good. Even better, it wouldn't be one of the usual endless arguments, or pathetic clashes with a clod waving a farming tool. She would be up against someone who could fight. Of course she would try to solve this peacefully first, but . . . well, she wouldn't necessarily try hard.
"All right," she said, pushing back from the table. "Show me what your symbol looks like."
Some half an hour later, Lilly approached Domo's farm. The farmyard was empty for now, nobody was out and about yet. A weather-beaten cart stood beside a large animal shack. Lilly went over and bent to look underneath it. Sure enough, there was the symbol Elias had showed her.
"Hey!" barked a voice. "What're you doing over there?!"
She straightened up to find a large, angry-looking man powering towards her. He was dressed like any farmer, but she could see in his face and his bearing that he really had been a warrior. Serpentine Wars, probably. She quelled a bout of nausea.
"Good morning, sir," she said, drawing herself to her full height. "There's no need to get angry. I'm here to see about your neighbor's cart."
"Like hell you are," snarled Domo, and whup, there was a scimitar already. "That's my cart."
"Liar," said Lilly.
Domo had drawn first. Domo lunged first. Lilly smoothly drew her blade and met him head-on. In the back of her head the mind-creature howled joyfully, urging her to finish this quickly.
It did finish quickly. But not necessarily the way Lilly would have liked. Domo, although clearly rusty, had frothing rage on his side. After just a few clashes he drove his blade deep into Lilly's arm, just where the armor ended. Lilly screamed.
The pain momentarily threw her. Domo, his face twisted, drew back the scimitar. Lilly didn't wait to see what he was planning. Faint with pain and shock, she lurched forward and ran her blade through his gut.
He went still, a scream caught in his throat. As she yanked the blade out he collapsed, curling over the injury.
"There." Gasping, Lilly drew back and, however unnecessary, held him at swordpoint. "I said you didn't have to get angry, sir."
She grimly shrugged off the voice screaming "kill him kill him KILL HIM!" Clutching her wounded arm, she headed resolutely over to the cart and began to tow it away, awkwardly bracing the pull bar against her waist. She knew there must be other people around the farm—somebody would find Domo and get him medical attention soon enough. Probably futile, but all the more reason she didn't want to be the one raising the alarm.
She gritted her teeth as she labored down the road with the cart. As always, she was angry and disgusted with herself. How did she claim she was doing good, when she hurt so many people along the way? Deservedly, of course, but . . . was it, really?
She arrived at Elias' farm. He was waiting at the edge of the road, and his face lit up when he saw her.
"Oh, you got it!" Then he sobered. "You're hurt."
"It's nothing," said Lilly gruffly. Her anger with herself spilled over into frustration against Elias. "Here, take your cart."
"Did anyone see you with that?" said Elias. Lilly gave him an odd look.
"No."
As he took the pull bar, a strange expression crossed his face. Lilly was beyond asking questions. Turning her back without waiting for Elias to offer thanks or compensation, she limped back the way she had come. She had a mind to go see the village healer, if there was one and if they weren't busy with Domo.
As she came shambling towards the main cluster of buildings, a knot of young men and women came dashing the other way.
"Come on, hurry!" shouted another one farther down the road. "Elias has finally done it! It's a massacre!"
Lilly paused. "Elias has finally done it"?
She pulled aside an elderly lady also hurrying in that direction, taking care to turn so her wounded arm was out of sight.
"What's happening?" she said. "What has Elias done?"
"He must have stabbed Domo," said the old lady, already trying to hurry on in her excitement. "Ohhh Miss, if you could see the things that went on here! Domo and Elias have been at war for a decade, I always knew I'd see this day—"
She was already rushing on. Lilly let her. With a sinking heart she put the pieces together. Domo's insistence that this was his own cart. Elias' strange question, his strange expression. He had either lied about that symbol being his, or who knows, maybe even snuck onto Domo's farm overnight and carved the symbol himself. She had been sent to attack and rob an innocent man, a pawn in some senseless feud between neighbors.
She stood in the middle of the street, still holding her wounded arm, and tried very hard to be shocked. Even just surprised.
Not a chance, though. This was far, far from the first time she had been tricked into the role of hired thug. She had learned quickly in this line of work, things were almost never as clear-cut as they were in knight stories. There were rarely true villains or pure oppressors. Most of the time the people she was attacking turned out to be arguably no worse than the people she was defending.
She may have pledged her life to protecting the innocent, but she had yet to find any.
Between the wounds to her arm and her soul, Lilly decided she'd better take a hiatus. She stopped by the monastery. Wu looked older and tireder than she remembered, but he still seemed happy to see her.
"I see you've been busy," he said, noting the wound on Lilly's arm.
"It's not my dominant side," said Lilly crisply. Wu gave her a searching look, reading into her reluctance to talk about her travels.
"How are you finding the life of a roving warrior?" he asked mildly, offering her a cup of tea.
"Terrible," said Lilly. When Wu raised his eyebrows, she shrugged. "I'd be even more miserable doing anything else."
"I'm sorry to hear that," said Wu.
Lilly looked away, sighing. Seeing that she was averse to the topic, Wu didn't press.
"How about your Earth powers?" he said. "Have you been practicing?"
"Not really," said Lilly. "I was . . . kind of hoping to, actually."
She didn't know why she'd said that, but now that she had, she could kind of get behind it. The disuse of her powers was almost a physical ache by now. Maybe if she could release a little of her pent-up frustration that way, she would feel better in other respects.
"Hmmmm." Wu glanced up at the sky. "It's getting late today. Come back tomorrow, and I can show you a place where you can use your Earth powers undetected. I just discovered it recently."
"Thank you, Master Wu. I'd like that."
They talked a little longer. Somehow the conversation never felt as cozy as it had when Lilly had been younger, but it was all right. As she got up to leave, Wu looked down at his teacup, clearly preparing to say something difficult.
"Before you go, Lilly," he said. "I assume you haven't visited Jamanukai yet?"
"Oh. No, I haven't." Lilly felt her face set into an expressionless mask. She wasn't in the mood for any nagging. "Why do you ask?"
"You should know," said Wu. "I'm sorry to be the one to tell you, but just last week Mila passed away."
"Oh," said Lilly again.
She stood there for a moment, trying to feel something. The woman who had cared for her, helped raise her, ached when Lilly went away, was gone forever. She hadn't had a chance to say goodbye. Wasn't she supposed to be feeling something?
"I'm sorry," she managed at last, trying to force emotion into her voice. "I'll go visit Mr. Tang and give him condolences."
Wu gave her a long, shrewd sideways look. She quailed beneath it, knowing that as always, he knew lies when he heard them. After a long silence her nerves failed her, and she turned away angrily without saying goodbye.
The next day she was back, though. Wu didn't say anything about yesterday. He greeted her pleasantly and led her partway to the spot he had in mind, then gave her directions the rest of the way.
She didn't have a hard time finding it. Most people would have had a bear of a time, because the valley Wu had told her about was incredibly secluded. It folded itself into the contours of the mountains, ridged on every side with near-vertical peaks. Lilly could feel it from a distance, but anyone without the power of Earth stood almost no chances. She wasn't sure how Wu had come across it.
Once she had tumbled her way down to the very bottom of the valley, she shed her armor and stood in the center, taking in her surroundings. It was dim here. The sky overhead was hot blue, but it was fringed with grim gray stone. The ground beneath her feet was soft, loamy. It would absorb earthquakes before they reached the nearest village. The air was still.
Drawing in her breath, Lilly held out one hand and swept her palm over the ground. A wave of soft soil heaved up and followed her hand, sloshing back and forth like water. She drew it in a circle around herself, feeling it shift beneath her feet as she pulled one way and another. The usual revulsion was there. Earth, the element of traitors, killers. She let the shame wash over her, embraced it; she was tired of trying to escape it.
She doubled the volume of earth under her control, the waves now rocking almost as tall as her, back and forth, spewing plumes of dust. Rocks tumbled from amidst the soil in showers. A study grumble began as she scraped bedrock.
She wasn't tired yet; nothing near it. It felt as natural as breathing. Somewhere in the back of her head she heard the mind creature screaming, but for once the roar of the earth around her drowned it out. In this moment she hated everything: her father, the entirety of Jamanukai, all the narrow, vicious, two-faced people she had blundered across in her travels. The liars and schemers and thieves. Those who tormented others with their actions, their inaction, their selfish love and their withholding of love. Wu, even. Garmadon, Misako. Most of all herself.
The stone walls of the valley were trembling by now. They began to hum eerily, subjected to forces rock wasn't meant to withstand. Gritting her teeth, Lilly clenched a fist and yanked, ripping boulders from the cliffsides. She hurled them back and watched them shatter into tumbling shards of stone, mixing with the soil frothing up the valley's sides.
She was suddenly starving for destruction. Sucking in a deep breath, she swept the entire valley around her into her control. Pulled. The stone resisted. She tightened her hold, screaming above the roar of earth and the groaning of rock, and finally the cliffs snapped. Masses of stone peeled away from their roots, teetering, collapsing, keeling ponderously over. The sound was deafening; the dust momentarily blocked out everything.
The grumbling of stone and the clinking of pebbles abated, gradually. The dust swirled upwards in lazy columns. The valley had been essentially obliterated, pulled down into itself. It was silent except for the occasional pebble seeking lower ground.
After a moment a portion of the debris heaved, and Lilly stumbled out. Heaving for breath, she tottered to an overturned column of rock and slumped atop it, pulling herself together. She felt utterly drained. Wiping dirt from her face, she looked around at the destruction she'd caused and asked herself if she felt better. She had been hoping, on some level, that this would have been cathartic. A chance to finally release all her buried disillusionment and anger, let it flare and burn itself out.
But as much as she grasped for any hint that she felt relieved, she didn't. There was no satisfaction. Only emptiness.
Sighing, she rested her forehead on her knees and let her eyes close.
"Very impressive, Lilly." The creature sounded pleased. "Your power is incredible. Once I own you, the damage you will cause will be the stuff of legend."
Well. At least someone was satisfied by all this. Lilly didn't even muster up a token resistance this time. She lay back, splayed out on the stone, and let the creature prattle on.
Besides the monastery, she did visit one other place: a small house nearby. Misako answered to her knock.
"Lilly!" she said, sweeping her into a hug. "So nice to see you again!"
"Good to see you, Lilly," agreed Garmadon, passing by the end of the hall. Lilly couldn't help noticing the way Misako's expression tightened at his voice. She didn't think too much of it, but she filed the observation away.
They invited her in for tea and asked questions about her adventures. Lilly found talking to them a little less stressful than talking with Wu, but she still couldn't enjoy it. She had a heavy question weighing on her mind.
"Misako," she said at length. "I wanted to ask for your help."
"Oh! Yes, dear?"
"The—the voice, you know?" Lilly cringed at mentioning it out loud, as she always did. "I know we tried to find information on it once before, but could we try again? Or even if we can't figure out what it is, could we look for similar cases, and how people fought them?"
"Of course, we can do some more research." Misako looked concerned. "Is the creature giving you more trouble lately?"
"Not really," said Lilly hesitantly. "But I worry, now that I'm older and stronger, I could do a lot more damage if I do turn . . . " She swallowed, unable to find words she was willing to say. Across the table she saw Garmadon's eyes flickering away.
"It might also be getting stronger, but so slowly that you aren't aware of the change," said Misako quietly. "That can happen."
Lilly said nothing, unsure what was under these dark waters.
She stayed with them for a few weeks, once again tearing through ancient texts searching for any kind of clue. They found nothing helpful. The few texts discussing creatures of the Cursed Forest made no mention of mind-invaders. There were some accounts of possession or mind control by other entities, but none of the techniques that worked for those worked for Lilly. The voice perched in the corner of Lilly's consciousness and chuckled at their efforts.
During her stay, though, Lilly became aware of a distinct discomfort in the dynamic between Garmadon and Misako. Something just felt off. They were both still cheerful, casual, and kind, but they seemed to talk past each other rather than to each other. Misako would sometimes point out something funny in a book, or some little animal in the garden, and Garmadon would scrabble to show interest. There was almost an air of desperation to him, like he was constantly trying to win her back after some argument. Meanwhile, whenever Garmadon made little bids for attention, Misako would act like he hadn't spoken and continue fussing over her own matters. At best she would give him an acknowledgement that was perfunctory and distracted. It was like watching two actors on the same stage, obliviously acting out completely different plays.
Sometimes their conversations would choke or taper off strangely. Things seemed to pass between them that Lilly couldn't divine. Misako seemed to always be tensed and waiting for Garmadon to say or do something inappropriate, and her sharp interruptions were frequent. Garmadon seemed at turns resentful at and cowed by her supervision. They were a screaming match always brewing and never coming, and both of them seemed completely unaware of it.
Lilly wondered what Misako did during Garmadon's episodes. Wu had given her to know that they were more frequent now. She did see flickers of red in his eyes at least every other day, even when he seemed to be behaving normally.
Sometimes she would get a strange premonition, and she would go out for a long walk in the evening. Usually when she returned, either Misako or Garmadon would be conspicuously absent. Often whoever remained would be silent, eyes bright with unshed tears.