Amara and Leiyu looked at each other in surprise after the mysterious woman before them addressed Amara as the Goddess of Fire.  Then Leiyu suddenly had images of graceful female statues in temples and scroll paintings of a woman clad in flowing blue robes flash through his mind.

Turning to the woman, he asked, “Are you…the priestess of the Goddess of Water?”

The woman smiled. “Indeed.”

Leiyu dropped to his knees and touched his head to the ground in a kowtow.  “My lady…”

Amara stared at both of them.

Looking back up at the woman, Leiyu asked, “May I know your honored name?”

“My name is Suiling,” the woman replied. “And your names are?”

“This humble one is named Leiyu.”

“My name is Amara…although I sometimes go by Thallios.”

Leiyu gave Amara a subtle side glance.

“Amara,” said Suiling, “since you are an avatar of the Fire Goddess, you were able to cross the barrier to my sanctuary.  How did you find it though?”

“Eh…we weren’t really looking for it in particular.  We just happened to go down a waterfall and the next thing we knew, we were here.”

Suiling looked at her blankly.  “I suppose there’s a long story behind that…

“Well,” Amara said with a smile, “if you’re really interested…”

***

One hour later…

“My goodness, you’ve really gotten yourselves into a predicament,” Suiling remarked.  “This is why I chose to go into seclusion in the first place.  The outside world is just too much sometimes…”

“My lady,” said Leiyu, “if you don’t mind my asking, how did this all start?  The system with the four goddesses and all these rules?”

“Ah, you’re a curious one!  Most people don’t even dare ask such a question.  Well, if you really want to know…” Suiling took a deep breath before continuing.  “No one really knows when the four goddesses first appeared in the world.  As far as everyone is concerned, they’ve always been here.  Some people say they are sisters and some people think they are actually just different aspects of the same goddess.

At some point, the world was divided into four regions, and a goddess was assigned to watch over each one.  Each goddess had an avatar and they agreed not to interfere with each other.  They were supposed to watch over their regions for all time.  However, all those years of watching over their region took a toll on the avatars’ bodies.  At some point, it was easier for the avatar to create a younger version of herself by giving birth to a daughter, and then that daughter would take over the avatar’s duties.

Goddesses have a certain base level of magical power.  That power becomes greater the more followers the goddess has.  When people build temples, shrines, statues in the likeness of the goddess, or even make offerings, the goddess, and by extension her avatar, becomes more powerful.  In return, the goddess offers blessings and prosperity to the people.  It’s a symbiotic relationship.

Of course, the reverse is also true.  If people start to lose faith in the goddess, and stop worshiping her, she becomes weaker and cannot offer as many blessings.  It can become a downward spiral.  People stop believing, the goddess cannot improve their lives, more people stop believing.  This happens often when there is chaos in people’s lives - like drought, famine, earthquakes, and war.

There is also the situation where people start asking the goddess for unfair advantages, like helping to defeat their enemies.  It was a total disaster when that happened, so the goddesses adopted the rule of non-interference in worldly affairs.

This also extended to the individual level.  The goddess avatars are human, and thus subject to human needs and desires.  In order to keep focused on their duties, the goddesses also agreed to stay celibate for life, and only have daughters on their own.  They were not to have children fathered by other men, since that would cause too many complications.”

“Heh,” said Amara.  “Complications indeed.”

Leiyu gave her a look but said nothing.

“I’m sorry, Amara,” said Suiling.  “I don’t really know what happened with your mother or why she chose to abandon her duties.”

“As you said, human desires,” Amara replied.

“I suppose the Fire Goddess has always had a more …fiery…disposition.”

“Just imagine, Leiyu,” said Amara, “if my mother had followed the rules, I would have also been a priestess on a mountain.  Doomed to a life of solitude, until I had a little daughter of my own.”  She looked at him solemnly.  “Then I wouldn’t have been able to meet you…”

Leiyu was stunned into silence.

“You make it sound like such a horrible thing,” said Suiling.  “That’s how all the avatars lived for centuries.”

“Where’s your daughter?” asked Amara.  “When we visited the Wind Priestess, she had a little girl already.”

“I’ll have one eventually.  Although living in seclusion has slowed down my aging considerably, so there is no rush.” Suiling suddenly thought of something else.  “Actually, there is an exception.  The Earth Priestess is not known to have daughters.  She conceals her face so no one knows what she looks like or how old she is.  It is possible that she is immortal.  She is also known as the Goddess of Life and Death.”

“She cursed my mother to die slowly over the years.”

“Yes, I’m sorry you had to experience that.  I suppose it was in response to the Fire Priestess having a hand in the destruction of cities in the Southern Region.”

“How would she have done that anyway?  I was a baby then.  Wouldn’t she have been taking care of me and not fighting on the battlefield?”

“A goddess avatar can use her powers directly or indirectly.  If she blessed the soldiers and their weapons, they could fight with a strength greater than ordinary mortals.”

“And in turn, the soldiers would make offerings to her to show their devotion, which would feed back into her power?”

“Something like that.”

“A feedback loop…So when she was cursed, she could no longer continue to support the soldiers through her powers?  Which would cause them to stop winning every battle until they stopped altogether?”

“That would seem to make sense.”

“Huh…”

“Besides the soldiers, the ordinary people of the Western Region would also be affected by the loss of the Fire Priestess’ powers.  Their lives might start worsening, and then they’d start losing faith as well.”  She took another breath.  “This is not the first conflict between goddesses.  The goddess avatars have been around for centuries, and it has not always been civil.  Nevertheless, no matter what happens, even if one avatar ends up destroying another and leaves her with no descendants, a new avatar will eventually be born, restoring the harmonious balance.”

“Hmm…” Amara pondered for a while.  “Oh!  I have another thing to ask!”

“Hm?”

“Leiyu has a suppression spell placed on him.  Could you help him remove it?  One of the Earth Priestess’ minions placed it on him.”

Minion? Leiyu thought in disbelief.

“He did the same to me when I was in my Thallios form, to keep me from turning into my current form.”

Thallios form?  Leiyu sighed.

“I did get the suppression spell removed by this other guy before I went back to rescue Leiyu though.”  

Wait, what other guy?  Leiyu thought indignantly.

“I was wondering if you could do the same for Leiyu.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

***

Suiling sat on a rock with the guqin in her lap.  She strummed it and an energy wave was emitted from the instrument.  Leiyu arched his back as he was hit by the incoming wave.  Silver threads materialized from his back and curled outward before disintegrating.  A series of dark waves radiated outward from his body.  He collapsed forward.

“Leiyu!” Amara exclaimed.  She ran over to help him up.

Leiyu breathed heavily.  “It feels like my qi has become unblocked and is flowing freely through my meridians now…”

“Your qi is flowing through your what?” Amara asked in confusion.

“My life force is returning.”

“Ah, that’s good.”

Leiyu kowtowed to Suiling.  “Thank you, my lady.”

“No need,” she replied with a smile.

“Shall we go back?” Amara asked Leiyu.

“Yes, we can.”

***

Leiyu and Amara walked through the forest.  

“Amara, you said earlier that someone removed the suppression spell from you.”

“Ah, that.  When you teleported me away, I landed in a marsh and met a pair of twins.  A sister and a brother.  They both had interesting powers.  The sister could see auras and the brother could see things made from magic.”

“Oh?”

“They were outcasts actually.  Kinda sad.  It’s because of how they looked.  White hair and red eyes.  People called them the Ghost Twins.  The brother removed my suppression spell.  They were quite nice.  If I ever get a chance, I’d like to introduce you to them.”  She paused for a moment.  “Actually…”

“Hm?”

“I was thinking, the Earth Priestess has a grudge against me because of what my mother did.  Maybe I should just meet with her and settle things.”

His eyes widened.  “What?  No!”

She looked at him in confusion.

“We’ve been running for so long, and now you just want to give yourself up?”

“If it’ll end all this.  Then maybe things will go back to normal.”

“Do you think she’ll let you live?  I swore I’d protect Thallios for life.  And by extension, that means I’ll protect you too!”

“Leiyu, you’ve already been injured so badly.  You just recovered.”

He gritted his teeth.  She had a point.  “It doesn’t matter.  I just want you to be safe.  We can stay here in this sanctuary if that’s what it takes.”

“Other goddess avatars can enter this place.  The Earth Priestess might eventually find us here.  This is the Water Priestess’ sanctuary.  We shouldn’t wear out our welcome as guests.  Besides, wasn’t your goal to travel the world?  Do you really want to live here in seclusion for an entire lifetime?  Won’t you end up resentful after years of being tied down by a promise?”

He was taken aback.  “Resentful?”

“I just don’t want you to feel burdened because of me.”

“Burdened?”  He felt his heart palpitate.  “How could you…say that?”

He reached his arms out toward her.

“Hm?” She looked at him, somewhat confused.

He put his arms around her and pulled her in closer.  “You’ll never be a burden to me…”

“...”

“Don’t go…please…”

“Leiyu…”

They stood in a silent embrace for a very long time, listening to the sound of each other’s soft breathing and feeling the faint pounding of their mutual heartbeats.

She looked up at him.  “We should head back to the cottage…”