The fields were stained. Ornaments of the feast were broken, soiled, thrown asunder, and covered with reddish slime. Fragmented human remains were scattered about over the picnic gardens. The earth around the physical form of the worm spirit was covered thickly with sooty hardening sludge as she slowly pulled herself to her feet and clutched her forehead.

Fear kept the crowds from approaching, but those that had lost the most stepped forward. They approached with weapons ready until Dew's shout rose through the night air. He offered Nadia, whom he had been cradling, to the ground and retrieved her sword.

The villagers halted.

He turned two swords against the mistress, Nadia's and his own, yet even as he knocked her down with a kick to her stomach and pinned her neck against the ground with crossed blades, she offered no resistance. Dew stared into the sickly thin and pale face of the worm spirit while waiting for her defense.

Nothing came from the ground to rescue her.

As she was held to the ground, blades crossing above her neck, she betrayed no expression whatsoever and remained still. Her tongue refused to wield words. If she was to die, then that would be her apology, but Dew had other ideas. The swords released from the soil and the grip of the blades crisscrossing her neck loosened.

"Kill her already!" hollered a man with a bow on his back.

A murmur of agreement was heard throughout the crowd.

"That would be far too easy a solution," Dew explained, "but more of a problem."

Awlena, her ankle wrapped in a bloody dressing, burst from the crowd with a bow. She aimed her arrow at the mistress's head as tears streamed from her eyes.

"Brother?!" she screamed, "Have you no sense of justice?! This witch has killed our people. She has stricken us with losses that can't be regained. What of our mother?! How can you find mercy? How!? If I'm not to kill her, then tell me how?!"

"Awlena, tell me this," Dew said calmly, "Why would such a powerful being, unhurt, without the loss of the slightest of her former powers lay in wait for our judgment?"

Awlena had no answer, but she kept her bow ready.

"Why would she render herself helpless?"

The villagers began to murmur again.

"Let's discuss the matter before all the remaining elders," Hiroku suggested.

"This delay is wrong, we should kill her before the opportunity passes," Came the voice of a swordsman, the same that had earlier fled from battle.

"Kill her!" yelled another.

"Split open her skull!" a woman yelled.

"Cut off her head!" yelled another.

"Gut her alive!" came a voice from the back.

"Let Awlena kill her if the protector prefers to be a coward," a big man said.

"Dew should get it over with," murmured a young girl.

Another shout rose into the night air. Dew threw his decorated katana through the crowd, dispersing them like parting water. The katana stabbed the path, the hilt pointed upwards slightly as it became stuck in the dirt. He was left with the plain katana that Nadia had procured.

"Can't you people see that our enemy is not even among us!? If anyone has the right to decide whether this woman lives or dies, it is I and I alone," Dew hollered, "I am the prince of this village and the surrounding lands, and you are my people. I am obliged to seek justice for you. But just retribution does not always mean we return bloodshed with bloodshed, nor does such revenge best serve our cause. There are two women on the ground before you: one prostrate in shame, the other in death. The latter was my beloved. We had only to announce our commitment. She announced hers when she dove selflessly into danger for the sake of our love, and for the safety of this village."

Dew poked the black leaf with the edge of Nadia's sword and lifted it for all to see, said, "With this very sword she freed the spirit from a curse that was beyond her power to remove. Yes, the spirit who protects the worms that make our soil prosper was cursed by a malevolent force. We should devote ourselves to finding out what is afoot to deal with the real menace to our lands; not condemning our fields to lie fallow for the sake of a fool's revenge. As for Nadia, she has shown herself more than worthy of being my bride. You will not dishonor her by killing the spirit she saw fit to show mercy. Anyone who dares try will face her blade as it sits in my hand."

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Awlena's arrow was released to hit the trunk of a tree as she fell to her knees.

"Lady Garasa is lost," Awlena cried. "Didn't you hear me Dew, our mother is slain!"

Dew balled his fist and clenched his teeth, the people waited, "I will avenge her death against the true cause of these sorrows. I will not be made a puppet."

"What if she becomes controlled again?" Awlena asked.

Dew spoke forcefully, "My decision hasn't changed. She is a force of nature personified, a spirit, not a person, and will always be susceptible to control by more powerful forces just as we are. She represents the fertility of our land. Do you wish to destroy the land that sustains us for the sake of revenge!? Do you wish famine on our people?"

Dew turned to the worm mistress, "Your creatures will gather and bury the dead here in an honorable fashion, and will not corrupt their flesh as those others that die. You will atone for this destruction by using all your power to see that the land around Nenkyo village is forever productive. Most importantly, you will destroy any creatures that have committed crimes against us and all those that may threaten the life of other living creatures. Then you will never again show your face in this village. That is my edict."

The worm mistress acknowledged him before crawling to Nadia's side. Dew readied his sword as she felt Nadia's wrist, then her neck, and listened for Nadia's breath before speaking quietly.

"She is not dead, but severely poisoned," she said, "I can make a cure with night shade, which will prevent her death. She must be cleansed of the powder and given fresh dressing while I gather the ingredients. Please, let me do this one thing to help atone for my sins."

Dew stood still, his mouth open, his eyes moist.

"Go now," said Awlena, who began the task of bearing Nadia to the bath house.

Once in the bath they laid Nadia down on a long wooden bench. The remains of her clothes, now in dirt covered tatters, were cut off her body. Her skin was marked with an inky black substance, which the elders had to scrub vigorously with hot herbal water and strong soap. Her ankles had to be wrapped in herbal bandages, as the skin splayed into an array of painful vertical slices.

Cleaning revealed cuts and scratches that ran along her back, shoulder, and neck. Some of the wounds were deep enough to bleed again once cleansed. A salve applied to the wounds reduced the swelling before they were bandaged. It was an hour before Nadia was born out of the woman's bathhouse on a stretcher, her cleaned body covered with a light blue cloth.

They took her back to the guest house to rest on the garden enclosed bed she had occupied since her first night in the village. As they laid down her head she sighed heavily. Fitful, weak breaths pushed through an open mouth as her forehead burned. A poultice of crushed leaves on the forehead reduced her fever.

-----

Later, Awlena brought the stems of nightshade plants that grew at the borders of the forest back to the village. They were boiled in a stew along with the black leaf. Awlena and two other women took the broth to Nadia's room, lifted her chin, and slowly poured it into her mouth, helping her to imbibe the bitter drink.

Awlena sat with Nadia, though Dew took her place when she was called on her errands. He sat by the wall for hours, gazing at her until her eyes opened.

Nadia squinted because the lanterns were a heavy light to her widely dilated eyes as she launched into a fit of coughing.

"Nadia, can you hear me? Can you speak?" Dew asked.

"Dew," she said Faintly.

He fell atop her and squeezed her in an embrace, which made her gasp and cough.

"Dew."

"Yes, my love."

"You're heavy. I can't breathe," Nadia gasped.

He pulled away and sat beside her.

"I'm sorry, how do you feel?" he asked.

"How come everything is so bright? Why can't I move?"

"The antidote to the black leaf which poisoned you causes a temporary paralysis. It'll wear off eventually. Let me massage you so the paralysis will pass all the more swiftly."

"Don't you ever let up?" Nadia asked tiredly, "How can you think like that after the death of all those people?"

"I'm simply concerned for your recovery. Why don't you let me rub your feet? How could there be any harm in that?"

"And risk you trying something," Nadia coughed, "Don't you dare touch me! I'm tired. Leave me alone."

"What happened this morning was an accident, and if you still mistrust me, why risk your life to help me and my village?"

Nadia blushed mildly, "Because I didn't want to see your sister suffer because of your reckless stupidity. I have a sister too; I know how she would feel if something happened to me. Actually, maybe I was the reckless and stupid one."

She heard the door slide open, and at once knew Dew was serious about leaving.

"Leaving so soon?" she asked sarcastically.

"I'm going to pray for the soul of my mother."

"I didn't mean... I'm sorry."

"You don't need to be sorry. If it weren't for you, I would be dead and this village would be lost. I owe you my life and eternal devotion now. We all do. I used to think in terms of finding a woman worthy to be my bride and serve me. Now, I wonder if I will ever be worthy to serve you."

Nadia said nothing.

"I'm sorry," Dew said, "Too much has happened, please get rest."

The door slid shut. Dew was gone. Nadia squirmed under her blanket. Despite the paralysis, she had enough feeling to know she was unclothed. A naked girl who can't move underneath a blanket, she thought, who knew what he could have done?

He hadn't done anything, but it didn't change the fact that he could have. Is this what she had been reduced too? Being turned into a woman was a tragedy, she thought, but being helpless in addition was a nightmare. She wished it was just a nightmare. The lantern swung lazily overhead, back, and forth, her eyes following it, then staring through it as she gave up thinking.

For the next hour, it became her only entertainment, for she was too nervous to sleep and the paralysis refused to let her lower body move an inch.

"It's not fair!" she screamed angrily.