A/N: purposes of this story they are all equivalent to being in their early twenties, with Guaraha being a couple years older than Meru.

Enjoy adults trying to be okay with things. This chapter has more implied awkward sex in it. Written as tame as possible for publishing guidelines.

Wow! I'm happy to say that today is the 10th anniversary from when I originally started this whole story. It feels good to dive back in, rework, and finally continue it.

Tolten

Reader Discretion is advised

Content warning: mentions of sex and nudity, miscarriage, blatant sexism.

Chapter 5: Leaving

A month passed as the preparations of the wedding ceremony went forward, practicing the synchronized steps of the couple's dance for hours, days, and weeks together as the season steadily waned into even cooler days and nights. The chatter of forest wildlife slowly quieted into the dormancy of development, and so did the people of her village. The warrior's ceremony was complete, and Guaraha officially stood among them in high rank. The two were to be married soon in hopes that they would overwinter and successfully produce children by late spring. Everyone in the village blessed the young pair with wishes of happiness and fertility more strongly than usual.

Meru sat under the old tree outside of her home and continued to twist the bunch of dried pine needles through her fingers, spinning a new basket in her hands as she wove and wove the spiral of life along with blackened thread. The decorative design she wove along the coils represented the story of fate and she reflected on it differently these days. In a few days she and Guaraha would be officially recognized in marriage, and she was really going to be trapped in the mountainous forest like the rest of her people. Forever, or at least until the end of her life in the next several hundred years, married with the hope of children to the man she grew up beside, born from a relation too closely for much comfort. Meru thought back to that moment along the cliffside path, the two of them hidden by the old ancient trees and their younger and still admirably sized offshoots, naked and coming to the grim realization of their very real future together. The two had embraced awkwardly if not for a lack of enthusiasm and without much pleasure or ease in the first attempts of trying such a thing, but over time learned their bodies and eventually began to leave fear and embrace the buddings of passion. Meru's personal opinion was that Guaraha gained much more from their practice but she hadn't spoken about it with anyone, not yet anyways, because it was their secret until after the ceremony since such a practice was unwise.

The silence of the coming winter had allowed her much time and freedom to reflect over her first times laying privately with her betrothed, and the dreaded drudgery of continuing to lay under him in domestic life despite the horrible tug in her gut that that life wasn't meant for her. She did her best to ignore it, and avoided talking to the moon as her marriage ceremony crept ever closer and pushed any thoughts of seeing the world for what it was all out of her mind. Even more concerning for Meru than the Moon and her dreams, she had noticed a small feeling of fullness developing deeply in her abdomen and a difference in feeling whenever Guaraha came to her over the last month. At first she thought it was some change the body underwent as she became more accustomed to him but then she began to wonder if it was something more urgent.

Meru had learned under the forest healer, a powerful old woman named Idina, and helped her deliver many forming eggs from the women. Idina had taught her the stages of child development and how to successfully join the eggs into their brooding chambers with protective magics, and she easily excelled in the ways of healing magics and preparing herbal potions. Idina recognized that Meru was exceptional and told her often that she had greater potential than her peers, and would do well with her power. She had always felt that the message shared-as the old woman's eyes glazed over in sight of some faraway place-encouraged her to leave their forest without saying so directly. The healer taught her and the other children, mostly girls, everything that she could.

Even with the power of Idina's magic, there were many times Meru had witnessed both nonviable eggs and the death of women during their passage. It terrified her, she did not want to become one of them. She worried day and night over this potentially new development in her life but did nothing to announce it or seek assistance from her teacher before the ceremony. She held her tongue whenever anyone inquired on their plans and was determined to avoid discussion of healing magics or potions until well after their official consummation. It had been their secret to discover each other comfortably before the ceremony and she was determined it would stay that way. The young woman often looked up at the Moon in thought, and though she never said it aloud, the Moon heard and understood her true desire to be free. That day Guaraha came to her and laid her down once more under the whisper of trees, and as she wanted to please him as her future husband, she let herself be filled with as much as he could give in his adoration of her. She did her best to be present and meet his passion, but for all that she tried her mind couldn't let go of the ebb and flow of things. He held her close and kissed her repeatedly in the following quiet.

"Soon I'll have you in bed as my wife." He said, giddy, and she said nothing.

The empty egg easily passed from her body into the muddy thicket that night. She numbly stirred the useless pile of goo into the wet soil and covered it over before returning inside for bed. Such was the way of things, so she told herself.

She cursed her own feeling of being ensnared in the woven web of her people, powerless to change the future in the current moment, powerless to change the present as her people slowly dwindled on into death and extinction, powerless as she was stuck in their wave of fear and anguish. Meru still profoundly longed for a different life, and despite the fact that she'd focused her sights instead on the life offered before her, a deep calling to see the world outside of the forest and escape still churned inside of her. She tried as she could to just accept that which she did not want, but it wasn't her truth. It never would be.

The Moon thrummed deeply to her as it did all those nights ago in the springs, and she heard the healer's words echo in her memory. She sat up in her bed and huffed in frustration with herself for pretending this was her truth. Maybe somewhere else with someone else, but not here.

"I'm through with feeling sorry for myself!" She hissed into darkness, and angrily set herself to packing her most important belongings. The Moon thrummed to her in the night. She did have power, she did have choice, and she would leave.

In the mist of the night she walked along the familiar village path she would walk with Guaraha leading near his usual post until she found a small break in the bushes and stopped. Meru stood there for a moment, her knapsack suddenly feeling heavier at her side. She strongly felt that she must continue, that she must stop pretending she would be happy and yet her feet kept her still. If she continued on and left her village, she would leave a mess of emotions in her wake and be unable to return. Meru thought back to the faces of her parents, siblings, and closest friends. Meru thought of Guaraha, their arrangement of marriage and growing positions within the community. She thought back to the thicket, the mess of things.

After a moment Meru shook her head and came back to the truth. The Moon, the echoed words of her ancestors, her intuition, all of it drove her forward as she continued deeper into the shadows of the leaves.

Meru continued away from the pathways and quietly made her way to the threshold under the cover of bushes and shrubs, led by the ancient voices of her ancestors urging her forward. The magical barrier hummed louder and louder as she came to it, and soon she saw the faint white haze of its power hanging in the air past the trees. She stopped and placed a hand on the feathery-worn bark of an old tree, feeling the energy pulsing through it.

"I imagine it's a fine evening to leave." Came a familiar voice from her right.

Meru jumped and turned to see the elder Blano stepping slowly out from behind the trees, "E-Elder!" She sputtered foolishly, stuck on the spot.

"Yes, I knew that you would leave us one day." He sighed heavily as one does when faced with loss and failure, "I admit I did my best to keep you home, to protect you."

"Elder..." Meru began again, more gently. While it was true that the village defense was well established within their means, she understood the truth. They were barely safe from invaders within the veil of illusionary and protective magic. Winglies were still many separated peoples and at odds from within after so many millennia since the Campaign, "Forgive me, but I know that I need to do this."

"I know my child," he answered quietly, "The spirits told me even before you were born to your parents."

"You mean… You can hear them too? The voices in the trees and the mountains? The voice in the Moon?"

He nodded. "Yes, I hear the voices of our ancestors, but just barely. I remember all those years ago when they told me of your arrival in being, of your future power and potential, and… that one day you would choose to leave us… The healer Idina confirmed that reality to me with her many gifts..." he walked along the barrier before them, "Meru, you are a child of great potential within our village with the power and heart to lead us into a golden age. You have been given a gift which has not been seen among our people for millennia, and I have no doubt you will pass our barrier with ease. You are unfortunately also aware of what it means to leave our home."

Meru watched him pacing, watching the barrier shift in a thick miasma of fog. If she left she would lose everything she knew, but if she stayed she felt something deeply terrible would happen. She had to listen to that feeling above all else.

"Yes Elder, I do. I need to go, I know it's forbidden but I feel that this is something that I really need to do. If I stay I feel that something terrible will happen, something we have never seen."

He sighed deeply, nodding, "I see. Leave here and join the Humans at the base of our mountains. They reside in the city surrounding the forgotten palace, and elsewhere across the earth. Never reveal your lineage or our location to the Humans, Meru. They will surround you and viciously kill you if you do, and then they will come for us." He said in deadly seriousness, "Be wary of all, but follow your destiny. I'll handle the others here."

She nodded in understanding and took a step towards the barrier, then after a moment turned back to him one final time.

"Goodbye, Elder. I know that I may never return but if I am able to find a way to benefit our people I will come back with it."

"Meru," he smiled sadly, "You would have made a fantastic healer and elder of our village. May the will of the Gods be ever in your favor."

"Thank you, Elder." She nodded deeply to him before turning away and walking forward to the barrier. She stood before it and reached her hands out, palms flat as it rippled warmly against them. There was no turning back.

With a deep breath she focused on separating the thick and heavy mist of it, which crackled and fizzed as Meru pushed it gently apart. A small hole just large enough for her to get through had formed and hung there. A cold air began to blow in, and a great wind began to blow around her and suck her forward through the hole and into the darkness of the forest. She gasped as she felt herself caught in a fight for equilibrium between this new air and the air of her home, her body being pulled through a deep and dark tunnel of strange trees and rocks suspended within a void of darkness and a myriad of colors. There was no sound other than the blustering current dragging her to what felt like impending doom, no clear vision and no smell, and Meru only felt the heavy drag of gravity through the pit of her stomach as it wrenched her towards a wavering sliver of light. That light was the end of the barrier.

Focusing on that sliver, the brightest thing before her, Meru remained breathless as she hurtled through towards it. Then, everything was overtaken by that bright light.

A/N: Okay! I struggled with this one for awhile but I'm happy with it. Enjoy :)