The weight of the truth

Time was of the essence, so they traveled mostly through the air, stopping only so Helia could eat and sleep. Now that her hair was black, like it had been back during her childhood, they thought she would not be recognized as Helia. Just to be safe, she cut it shorter anyway, and Ceres hid whenever she went into a town for supplies. No one gave her a second glance, luckily.

As they rushed through the land, Ceres explained to her how the ritual worked, and answered any other questions she still had. Of which she had many.

"How do the Solarists fit into all of this, Ceres?", this question had been gnawing at Helia for years, probably since the moment they met.

"I must confess, I do not know. If our Lor- If the Moon knew, He did not deem it important enough to share with me, either", Ceres was visibly dissatisfied with his own response.

"I can, however, tell you why the Cults of the Heavenly Bodies are forbidden. It seems related, don't you agree?", he offered, instead.

"Please enlighten me, oh Great Spirit Ceres", she replied with a fake deep voice. 

He rolled his eyes and sighed theatrically, and yet, he continued. "Hundreds of years ago, maybe thousands? I have lost count. Anyway, during the last natural Eclipse, the Sun and the Moon already refused to give each other up. Much like now, Shadows descended upon the world, heralding the end. Humans turned to each other trying to find who was to blame, and war erupted between the Sun and the Moon followers."

Helia frowned her brows. "So you knew about Shadows?", she reproached him.

"Sorry", he looked at Helia with remorse. "Usually, it only happens during Eclipses. But without enough Sun Priests, your influence as the Moon Priest created an imbalance. It would not have happened if the Cult of the Sun had been allowed to exist normally, instead of the tiny fraction that they are. It wasn't your doing."

 Helia sighed, still unwilling to let go of her guilt. "Whatever it was, it happened. It doesn't matter anymore. Please, continue your story."

Ceres hesitated slightly, wanting to reassure her further, but he proceeded, as she had wished. "I was not there for this next part, because I had already been corrupted and brought back into the Mana. I heard it from another Great Spirit of the Moon, Mella."

"There are other Great Spirits of the Moon?", Helia interrupted him, surprised.

"Of course there are! Why would I be the only one? Please, Helia, focus on the things that are important!", he replied, irritated. Crossing her arms with a frown on her face, she waited in silence for Ceres to finish. That he blamed her for her curiosity, when it had been him who had kept all of this from her, such audacity.

"Anyway!", he cleared his throat. "Mella told me that before the point of no return, the Sun and Moon Priests managed to set aside their differences, and summoned both Gods in an attempt to mediate between them. They had been expecting a mythical battle, but instead, they were confronted with two lovers. Apparently, the realization of what was happening, and the pleading of the humans, made the Moon change His mind. He let go, and so, the world returned to normal, at least for a while."

"I was reborn after some time, and by then, the Cults of the Sun and the Moon had almost disappeared, having been forbidden. Both the Sun and the Moon held only a fraction of what power they once had. Humans realized they were giving too much to Gods who did not care about them, and this was their attempt to preventing another calamity. Some time after that, the Solarists appeared, further enforcing this new rule", he finished.

"Maybe...", Helia mumbled. "Maybe we can try that again? Summon the Moon, ask Him to spare us once more?"

"Maybe", repeated Ceres, unconvinced. He did not dare shatter the glimmer of hope present in Helia's gaze.

They flew in silence for the rest of that day, as Ceres gave Helia time to process all of this. But, most of all, to work through the grief he had once again forcefully reminded her of.

At night, however, he had no choice but to teach her about the ritual. The world wouldn't wait for her to process her emotions, as was the case most often. 

“The ritual has to be done by a Moon Priest, in a specific place, at a specific time. That is why we must hurry”, he clarified. "Fortunately, our previous journey was taking us in a similar direction, so we are not too far away."

“But I’m not a Priestess of the Moon anymore”, responded Helia. “Will I be able to do it?”

“Even if you do not longer share a Pact, He is still your God. I know you believe in Him as a deity, despite yourself, even if there is no more trust. That ties you two together, whether He likes it or not. It is a bond that has power”, had been his explanation.

"I see...", Helia felt very uncomfortable at the thought of sharing a connection with the Moon, still. But she couldn't deny it, because she, too, could sense it. "What will I have to do?"

“Through the Mana, you will reach out to every Soul. All of them, take them within yourself, and once the way is open, walk through", Ceres nodded, seemingly satisfied with the way he had explained it.

And yet, the more he talked, the less Helia understood. “That makes absolutely no sense”, she declared.

“It’s not easy to explain!”, complained Ceres with a caw. “You were supposed to develop your powers, and harness that feeling for years, but there is no time.”

He sighed. “You can feel me, right? It’s just like that, but with everyone else.”

“You make it sound so easy”, she responded. They were connected through a Pact, of course she could feel Ceres. A fragment of her own Soul rested inside of him, after all. Nonetheless, she closed her eyes, and tried to visualize the other people in the inn they were spending the night in.

The couple she had seen walk into the room besides theirs. The lady tending the counter. The cook working the kitchen. The young man serving tables. All the patrons enjoying the food and ambiance. She imagined a flame of life inside all of them, and stretched the metaphorical arms of her heart out.

Helia could see them in her mind, faintly, moving about the building. Some lights were tiny, others were bigger. The colors, too, differed between each of them. But it was very probably her imagination, she had no real way to tell. 

“I don’t know, Ceres”, she started to say. “How will I even know if it works? What if I walk through, and I am alone?”

“I know you can do it”, he tried to reassure her. “You will know. And, no matter what, I will be there with you. You will not be alone.”

She still had doubts, but she had ran out of time to dwell on them.

The following day, when Helia woke up at dawn, she could tell something was wrong. Well, more wrong than usual. When she finally managed to wake Ceres up, he squawked loudly in fear.

“It has started”, he announced, sending a shiver down her spine. “But why? How? We should have more time. A few more days, at least! This makes no sense!”

With no answers to their questions, they flew in silence, pushing themselves to their limits in a desperate flight. Once the Moon and the Sun finally met, and night fell, Shadows started appearing below them, corrupting everything with their touch.

Helia’s heart wept as she watched numerous people helplessly succumbing to them. It took all of her strength to not jump down and help them, but she understood this would probably help more in the long run. From time to time, flying Shadows were attracted to the Wind accelerating their advance, but Helia dealt with them swiftly without Ceres having to slow down.

“There it is”, he said as the ocean was finally directly below them.

Helia got herself ready to land, but he didn’t descend. “Wait”, he added, instead. “What is that?”

Instead of a rocky cliffside welcoming them, a city rested on the hidden side of the cliff; magnificent white and gold buildings scattered about and into the earth. And all across it, people wearing white and red clothes fought with Shadows.

“Solarists?!”, exclaimed Helia, surprised. “But why? Why here?”

In the midst of the chaos, a glowing light got their attention. The fighters turned towards it, but before anything happened, a burning wave of flaming destruction erupted from it. The Solarists, the Shadows, and the glowing figure, they all disappeared in the blink of an eye.

“Was that…”, Helia started to ask, even though in her heart, she knew.

“The Sun”, Ceres confirmed her suspicions. “I think I know where they got their prophecy from. Let’s go, now”, he added, taking off once more, this time towards the top of the cliff.

There, warriors and Handlers fought desperately against an endless stream of Shadows. Ceres took her to a spot near the edge, and he cawed with displeasure. “Why is there a grid blocking the way?”

He landed near it, and Helia ran to try and pull it open as Ceres kept Shadows at bay. It was welded shut. “It won’t move!”, she despaired.

“Who are you?”, they heard an unknown male voice ask. Seemingly a Solarist warrior, he looked at them with confusion. Suddenly, his eyes widened, as if he had recognized Ceres.

“You!”, he accused the Spirit. “That means… You must be the Moon Priest!”

Helia cursed inwardly at their fame, even though in this particular case, that wasn't a variable. “Please”, she pleaded, raising her hands in surrender. “We just want to go down there, we can help!”

“This is all your fault! If I kill you, everything will be saved!”, he hadn’t even heard her words, and instead, moved to attack her with his sword.

She dodged while Ceres was still busy repelling Shadows with his Wind. “Please! Listen to me! If I don’t go down there, everyone will die! I don’t want to hurt you!”, she omitted the part where everyone would dire no matter what, but that was too complex of a conversation for how little time they had.

“Liar! You did this!”, his tone was full of hatred.

Helia understood there was no getting through him, who was weighted down by years of preconceived notions about what she represented. He slashed at her repeatedly, intending to take her life. She simply avoided his attacks, and when she had an opening, shoved him away from her with a gust of Wind.

“I’m sorry! I have no time for this!”, she told him as he flew a few meters backwards, rolling down on the gentle slope opposite to the ocean. Still stunned, he succumbed to a Shadow before he could get back on his feet. 

Helia had never killed anyone, and she was unsure if this counted as such. At least, it felt like it. The guilt washed over her, threatening to take over her body. It had to be done. She had no other options. He had not listened to any of her words. All of these pointless excuses she did not believe in were all she could muster to keep herself going. 

Forcing herself to focus on something else, she joined Ceres back at the grid. “Is there another way in?”, she asked.

Ceres looked at the sky, surveying the position of the astral bodies. “There’s no time”, he lamented, then he proceeded to dig around it using his beak and his talons, trying to pry the whole thing off.

Helia took over in defending them both from the Shadow rampage. They kept coming endlessly, attracted by the same Handling she had to invoke to fight them off.

After a couple of minutes that felt like years, the dirt around it gave in, and Ceres was able to tear the grid out. Helia jumped on his back, and he took off, plummeting into the narrow passage with absurd speed. Before diving into the water below, he stopped their descent by opening both of his wings, accompanied by a mighty Wind.

Something made a crashing sound, and growled. A Shadow. Helia dealt with it in a single hit, and only then did she notice the person it had been previously targeting.

A lone Solarist, sitting down inside a strange circular room.

Arthem.

She couldn’t help but aim for him.