Chapters “Ugh… Where in the Dragon Mother’s name am I?”
That was the first thought that came to her mind once she awoke.
Her body sore, the lavender scaled dragoness picked herself up off the ground, and held up a claw. Razor sharp to a point, looking quite able to render a beast of any sort limb from limb. “Actually, for that matter, who am I?”
She knew she was a dragoness, that much was clear. Vague flashes of memories erupted from an otherwise dizzied mind. Clashes of steel, clashes of claws. Roars of pain, and a plume of hot red broiling flame. Piercing eyes, staring into a soul and the dragoness’ body quivered in fear. Those eyes, they felt so evil, belonging to something beyond her mind’s ability to depict.
Twilight Sparkle. That name came to her mind in a growling tone. She knew, in an instance that was her name. It fit her like a glove, it felt so warm and so right.
“Okay, so I know my name,” the newly coronated Twilight Sparkle mused, vague flashes of the finest gold and the finest jewelry entering her mind for only the briefest of moments. “The question is now, how did I get here?”
Spreading her wings, she noticed each was tipped in one razor sharp talon before she winced out in pain having to fight back a scream. “Okay, so flight’s out of the question… for now at least.” Twilight surmised taking a survey of her surroundings. Cold, damp. That was the only way to describe it, Twilight thought to herself as the dragoness continued to walk forwards slowly trudging through the wet grass beneath her claws.
More flashes came. Mountain caves, with other dragons of every size, shape, and description peeking out of them. Home, somehow she knew wherever that was it was home.
A small log stood in her way, bioluminescent fungi glowing a teal green. Foxfire, that’s what it was called. It was a calming sight really, letting her know that in this fog at least something could guide her way, as beyond her she could see small glows of illuminations from various other fungi in the thick beyond her. Following the small lights Twilight broke out into a sprint, her long and lean body -almost cat-like in some ways, if asked Twilight would later compare it to a panther or something of the kind- scything through the fog like a blade.
Twilight wanted to scream, this fog even with the help of the foxfire helping her guide her way through it was a real pain in the scales. A warm sensation began to build up inside her, and somehow knowing what to do Twilight continued to let it build until finally, it burst out of her like a tidal wave. A warm stream of hot flame cut through the thicket clearing a path and finally Twilight breathed a sigh of relief and smiled.
“Well, I am a dragon so it must have been natural to assume I could breathe fire if I needed in some circumstance…” she reasoned.
She remembered again, those piercing eyes and that breath of hot flame. She could almost feel the searing heat as it scorched her body.
She shuddered, it was best not to dwell on such thoughts. She wanted to believe it a nightmare, but she knew better. Something told her, whatever made those flames… It was responsible for her current predicament, Spurred onwards, Twilight continued to run as she now saw this same collection of mountainsides and passes engulfed in the fire and the flame dragons crying out in pain and fear for someone to save them. But nobody did.
Again, a shudder. Twilight knew she must never let that vision come to pass. She had to get home… somehow. Wherever home was.
It was a fool’s errand really, absolute folly! She didn’t even know where home was, or where she even was for that matter so how could she possibly find her way there? But she knew she had to keep on trying. She was urged onwards by this inexplicable force, continuously cutting through the fog with her flame blasts and continuously running until she screeched to a halt, as she heard the rushing of wind hit her face like a torrent.
She looked downwards, and waves crashed up against the rocks below smashing and battering them with all of their might and their force. As the fog finally began to clear, Twilight saw other islands beyond her own. Rocky crags peaking out in the distance, rising above a seemingly endless sea. It was enough to make one want to shudder, turn and run away back home. But Twilight couldn’t, not while she had a home to get to, beyond these lands of mystery. Letting out a deep guttural shriek, and tilted her head skywards in a challenge to whatever lay beyond her.
“Bring it on.” Twilight thought with narrowed purple eyes, her dark purple spines rippling and raising themselves. Nothing was going to stop her on her journey, not wind, not rain, and certainly not this endless sea. Beyond the horizon, there seemed to be nothing. No islands, no anything of the kind. But Twilight knew that was very well impossible. After all, everywhere led to somewhere. Even out here, in the middle of nowhere at the seeming ends of the earth, there was something just out there, lurking out of sight. Something else out there for her to see, and something else out there to help her find her way home.
When she healed, she would set off first thing in the morning. She’d follow the sun, she’d follow the stars. The oldest flyer’s and maritime compass that ever existed, and still the most reliable. For generations, she knew, sailors and the like had used the celestial bodies that lay in the sky above them as their guide, and if Twilight could just remember her constellations correctly perhaps she too could use them as her map. Now though, exhaustion began to overtake her. Now though, she needed to sleep.
Softly closing her eyes, Twilight let the realm of dreams overtake her.
Twilight drifted in and out of the realm of sleep for the next few days, almost restless in a way. It was unnatural for a dragon to stay out in the open, this defenseless for this long she knew that much. She’d found a cave, seemingly unoccupied and had taken up residence in it. If it belonged to somebody, they probably wouldn’t mind. And if they did… Well, Twilight deeply suspected a bearing of her fangs and claws and a quick blast of flame would scare them off.
Nobody wanted to risk becoming torched idiot for messing with something that belonged , and emphasis on belonged to a dragon. It just wasn’t wise. It was practically a planned suicide, depending on the dragon in question and how large they were.
Still, Twilight wasn’t healing as fast as she would have liked. While she could now move her injured wing without letting out a scream of pain or anything of the like, she still wasn’t quite sure she was ready to risk flying yet. Trouble was, she still had more recurring visions of that series of mountains engulfed in flame. She couldn’t wait on her body to heal, the time to move was now!
Some would have called her crazy she suspected, but she had no choice. It never should have even been a question. Taking a running sprint, she threw caution to the wind and spread her wings. If she flew, she flew. If she didn’t she didn’t. If she crashed on the rocky spikes below her, well she could say she died trying to do something.
A gust of wind, an updraft picked her up and she was thrown upwards and she let out a cry of triumph. Gliding between small isles, Twilight briefly flapped her wings once just to give herself some more airtime before she let out a cry of pain as her wings seized up and she at once grabbed onto the nearest ground she could find, tumbling through some woodland and smashing through a boulder her scales taking most of the brunt of the blow.
Bleeding slightly, and groaning out in pain once more, Twilight picked herself up off the ground once more. She was better off than when she started she supposed. After all, she’d covered some distance no matter how small.
“If you don’t succeed, try try again.” a warm motherly voice said to Twilight, another flash of memory hitting her. A white-scaled dragon, with a motherly gaze. Twilight, for whatever reason, let a small tear slip from her eyes at the memory before wiping it away. No, she was a dragon and dragons didn’t cry. That was reserved for the weaker species, and if Twilight was anything she certainly not was weak.
Turning her gaze towards the early afternoon sun, she sighed. Looks like these islands weren’t through with her yet. Twilight then smiled. She welcomed the challenge.
Author's Note
Okay, yes, getting ambitious here... But, I wanted to do this. Seemed like great fun. That and I love dragons and epic adventure stories.
Author's Note
Might want to get out your Norse Textbooks now...
1: Island
Twilight, craning her neck inspected her surroundings. She was in a forest, and that probably meant food. Groaning out in pain as she picked herself up, she suddenly realized she couldn’t feel her left hind leg.
“Broken, great. As if I didn’t have enough troubles to add to my collection,” the dragoness mused to herself. “Welp, guess hunting something’s out of the equation.”
She sighed, as much as she hated it, she’d have to forego the crunchy sound of flesh tearing and warm blood in her mouth for the time being. For right now, assuming this island provided it she’d have to eat fruits or something or that ilk. Twilight nearly gagged. She was a proud dragoness, and they didn’t just go herbivore at the drop of a hat.
“Welp…” she sighed. “As needs must I suppose. Probably going to sacrifice more than my dignity and pride as a dragon before this is all over.”
She had no idea how right she was at that moment really.
“Still,” Twilight thought to herself as she limped forwards through the woodland undergrowth. “How in the Dragon Mother’s name did I even end up on this island, in this situation, anyways? Missing over half of my memory, and with a bad wing?”
That was a question she probably would receive no good answer to in any short period of time. Though she did have another question. Last she checked, she shouldn’t have been able to glide for any small amount of time, and yet somehow just a few short minutes ago she did.
“Healing factor?” Twilight asked herself, before shaking her head. “No, that’s just outright ridiculous. It’s impossible to heal yourself via your own power. The… The idea alone is ridicule incarnate!” she thought in an exasperated tone.
She calculated her odds of survival, and sighed. Twilight didn’t like them, not one bit.
“Sure. Ninety-nine percent sure. Really? Ninety-nine percent? That's quite high. Is that the figure you're sticking with? Ok, ok, seventy-five. Well, that's jumped quite a bit. You've just lost twenty-four percent.” she thought to herself in a brief moment of panic before regaining her composure. No, a dragoness must never fall to panic. Panic got you killed.
“So, instead of panic Twilight,” the young dragoness told herself. “You resort to finding a way to survive. Welp Twilight, looks like you’ve got a lot of work to do and some things to figure out.”
Young possibly could have been a lie or a mistake on Twilight’s part, she honestly wasn’t sure how old she was exactly. Not that she probably would have cared, age was nothing but a number to a dragon. And she felt spritely, at least she did before she crashed and broke her leg.
But in all honesty, Twilight for all she knew could have been thousands of years old and she could have been none the wiser. Memory loss was funny that way, Twilight mused as she headbutted a tree and knocked down this strange red spiny fruit. Breaking it open with her claws, she then sucked out the juicy parts inside. Mulling over the taste in her mouth, she decided whatever this fruit was, it’d do… for now.
“But I’m going to get myself some meat soon, and that’s the end of it,” Twilight decided. She was so not becoming a vegan, the other dragons she knew lay back home would be laughing at her. By the Dragon Mother, she wouldn’t be surprised if they were at this very moment for either crashing and burning or deciding to even touch a fruit!
“Give me a good mongoose to snack on any day,” Twilight thought licking her lips. “Yummy!”
Twilight padded forwards, tossing the remains of the fruit behind her eventually stumbling across the bones of some massive sheep. Might have been a yak, Twilight didn’t particularly care to know. Nevertheless, grabbing two of the bones she tied them together with a piece of mossy vine around her broken leg to serve as a makeshift splint. She next grabbed a rib bone and tied it to her right foreleg able to be grabbed at a moment’s notice to be used as some sort of weapon.
“A lady always comes prepared, after all.” Twilight thought with a small smirk. Stepping out of the woodland and into a clearing with a small lake, a waterfall pouring down from the cliffs above for the briefest of times she found herself at peace as she looked at the sparkling waters. Walking up to the mirror-like pool, Twilight gazed at herself. Far from being a narcissist, she did admit however under the circumstances she did look rather good. But what drew her attention the most was this strange star on her hindquarters, seemingly glowing with an ethereal flame. Why? Why was it there, and what did it mean?
Twilight, shaking her head and deciding to think on these thoughts more at a later date before she got herself a headache gently stepped into the pool, the blood in her scales cleaning itself off almost as soon as she stepped into the cool waters. Twilight froze for just a second, wondering if the now bloodied waters would attract any sort of attention. She then smacked herself back to her senses, if that was the case her blood would have attracted predators long before! ...For all she knew, they could have been coming after her. Twilight quickly bathed herself, and would have stepped out of the pool ready to fight whatever came from the timberlands surrounding her before she spied what looked like a small cave opening at the bottom of the pool. Sucking in a breath, she dived into the waters and followed the cave to its end, soon finding herself in a cavern of some sort. This would make a good hiding place, an escape should anyone of the unwanted sort come to call she decided. And also, right now a good place to take a nap. Curling up next to the bloodred crystal that illuminated the cavern, she drifted off into dreamland once more…
Twilight’s dreams were a mire of confusion for the most part. She found herself walking through a foggy otherworld, seemingly without end. Images flashed by her head in a blur.
Villages scoured, as blazing storms rained down from above as small figures ran for cover or tried futilely to fight back against those who brought Hell from the skies.
“You see this?” a feminine voice asked the question seemingly directed at Twilight. “This is what we are, what we could have become. The terrors of the sky, and forever feared by those who walked the land.”
A bolo was fired from a catapult cutting through the air and the chaos of the dragonfire, and one dragon was knocked from the sky and sent crashing to the ground before figures in metal armor took axes to it. Twilight turned her head away, unable to watch as echoes of triumph and a drying roar bellowed in her mindscape. The little ones, she didn’t know their name just yet, but she knew now they could find ways to kill her kind.
“We needed someone to lend us a guiding hand, show us a better way of living then just terrorizing the meatsacks. Or we would have been eventually led to extinction.”
A pure white dragon soaring through the sky, and although she was unable to tell just how large it was, she could tell this dragoness was probably larger than most and bore spines on her back and tail that looked as if they could be launched at a whim like missiles. Oddly however, Twilight didn’t get a feeling of menace from this elegantly shaped dragoness, and when she seemingly turned to look at Twilight, the mare found herself at peace all at ease in her world.
“Remember Twilight,” the dragoness spoke to her, the voice now finding its source as on the dragoness’ hindquarters a sun blazed. For just a brief moment, Twilight saw something else in the white dragon’s place. A blazing sword, seemingly coming from the stars above cutting through forces beyond comprehension. “Remember what you are, and who you need to become.”
“R-Remember?” Twilight whispered out, her ears flattened. “I… I don’t even know what I’m supposed to do right now, other than find a way off these islands and get home!”
“So, let that be your quest for the time being. Find a way home,” the dragoness suggested. “But remember, the great blue one, he’s always hunting. Hunting you. You’ll need allies to survive your quest. Find them, before he finds you.”
“A-Allies?” Twilight stuttered out. “And who’s he? Who’s he?”
“I cannot say anymore, my dear Lady of the Steel Wing,” the dragoness replied. “My time is limited as is. I required a great strength beyond my own just to reach you now. Hold fast Twilight, and remember cruelness and cowardice are not the dragon way. Nor has it ever been yours. Neither is holding onto your pride. Now GO!” the voice shouted before the whole world faded to black.
Waking up with a start, Twilight found a new strength filling her. Jumping into the water, she swam out of the cave and climbed out of the pool even as storm clouds rumbled on the horizon, warning of an oncoming torrent. Lightning flashed in the sky above in jagged streaks, as Twilight wandered to a beach far from the woodlands. Ruins of stone houses dotted this cragged beach, and black sand got up between her claws, and around her ruins of longboats had been smashed up against rocky faces as if some giant had thrown a temper tantrum and used them to satisfy his childish rages. Clambering upon the ruins of one such longboat, Twilight peered out over the horizon. In the distance, as far as her eyes could see -and believe you me, that was quite far indeed- there was nothing but a sea of gray. Rain could be seen in the distance, and it was coming closer by every passing moment.
“Can’t stay out here forever, have to make it back to my cave. Wait the storm out.” Twilight though, leaping off the wooden figurehead and then out of pure force of habit combined with a natural curiosity she looked towards the ruined homes, stone walls having crumbled down long before her arrival.
For a brief moment, Twilight wondered who lived here, and how they did so. What their day to day lives was like, and just what exactly caused them to abandon this place for… well, wherever really.
Then a horrific thought hit her. This village… it looked frighteningly like the other village in her dream. The one the dragons attacked. Her breath caught in her throat. What if… What if she was one of the dragons in that vision, one of the ones attacking the village?
“No… No, I can’t… I would never…” Twilight panted out, leather wings drooping to the ground in mourning even as the skies opened up and the pain began to pour. “I’d never… By the Mother, what if I forgot about that dragon, the one that was killed! I’m.. I’m a monster!”
Twilight swiftly regained her composure even as the cold battering rain pounded upon and soaked her scales to the bone. No, it was highly unlikely. There were probably hundreds, if not more villages that could resemble this one. It might have been just a coincidence this village bore a strong yet frightful resemblance to the one she saw in her vision.
“But whatever the case, something happened here,” Twilight thought to herself and as she walked past a ruined church, she saw a name carved into the stonework.
It read: “Hróðvitnir”, whatever that meant. Twilight felt a shudder go through her even as she recited the name, and a loud howl cut through the island. Twilight’s eyes widened. She wasn’t alone.
Instincts telling her to run, run like the wind, Twilight broke off into a sprint and then she realized something as she found herself above the waters. “I’m… flying?”
Twilight, eyes widened continued flapping her wings even as the torrent of wind and rain pushed her back, leaving a powerful wake in the water as she flew, faster than a thunderbolt.
With a loud triumphant roar, Twilight flew through an archway that jutted out of the water and then did a loop-de-loop letting off a blast of flames to show the world that yes, she was back. But still, she wondered how did she achieve flight in the first place? Her wings should not have allowed it so. Actually, now that she thought about it, how in the Dragon Mother’s name did she even achieve those feats she pulled back on that beach? Her rear leg was broken! She should not have been able to leap atop a viking’s longboat as she did, and yet somehow she managed it.
Keeping her from thinking on this any further, another loud howl, sound enraged beyond measure cut through the air. Twilight shuddered, not from the howling wind and cold battering rain that pounded upon her very form but from the sheer unearthliness of the creature’s rage.
“Hróðvitnir…” Twilight mused as she thought upon the name. Whatever it belonged to, chances are it must have had a hand in driving those vikings from their village and reducing it to rubble. She tasted the name upon her tongue, repeating it. It wasn’t a word she liked.
As like a guiding hand, Twilight flapped her wings, her talons sharpened and ready for battle as she pushed on through the storm. Whatever awaited her, she doubted it was friendly. But as that white dragoness had stated, cowardness was not the way of a dragon.
In hindsight, Twilight should have surmised foolishness and wisdom were part of being a dragon as well.
She found herself landing on a beautiful green island, covered from end to end in heather bushes. Largely flat with some hills, it was an otherwise peaceful place and seemed to be untouched by the wind and the rain. Magic filled the air, it was so thick Twilight could almost taste it and indeed Twilight found her power seemed to grow as she continued to walk through the lands where Gods once tread.
Her spines glowed with this ethereal purple light, flickering like a flame, with the star on her hindquarters flowing brighter than ever soaking up pure Æsir magic even as she walked down a small dirt path, the sun shining down through a hole in the otherwise violent weather patterns.
Twilight basked in the sun, letting it shine down on her cold scales, and smiled. At last, for what seemed like the first time since she awoke on this chain of islands it seemed like she was at peace. But that was only a wish, really, she surmised. She knew there was something on this island, something dangerous. Despite this island’s otherwise peaceful appearance, with it’s flowing green hills and fields made of heather that there was something wrong with it. Something so ancient, and so old it was before history had been recorded by man.
“Ragnarök…”little voices whispered in Twilight’s ears. “Ragnarök will come from this island. Leave now, young lindworms. Leave before the fame-wolf gets you in his clutches!” they warned, before songs and dance started up, fiddles playing from somewhere beyond Twilight’s field of vision, somewhere in the heather.
“Brœðr muno beriaz ok at bǫnom verða[z] muno systrungar sifiom spilla. Hart er í heimi, hórdómr mikill —skeggǫld, skálmǫld —skildir ro klofnir— vindǫld, vargǫld— áðr verǫld steypiz. Mun engi maðr ǫðrom þyrma.” Voices chanted in Old Norse all around her. Twilight continued onwards, knowing no Old Norse and therefore no fear came to her.
She continued to stride forwards through the fields and found herself in a small forest grove, leaves gently falling all around her. The grove looked peaceful, calm and tranquil but Twilight knew otherwise. There was this feeling, like a rippling across her scales that something was undeniably wrong about this place.
“Oh for the love of Týr...” Twilight murmured out in fear as she wanted to leave this grove completely, but vines and bramble seemed to close in all around her, entrapping her.
“Oh, that fool?” a low chuckle came from the brambles. “If you’re going to chose one of my family’s name to invoke, best you choose another than the one whom I bit the hand off of.”
Twilight’s breath caught in her throat again. In front of her, was this black wolf. Dark as midnight, and with piercing yellow eyes that looked into her soul. He was tied to a tree but by this fetter smooth and soft as silk but strong and firm like the steel of the Æsir themselves. Twilight’s eyes glittered with wonder, even as the wolf continued to speak.
“Ah, so I see you admire the Gleipnir young lindworm?” the wolf spoke out in her mind. He had to use telepathy, for his jaws were held shut via a sword. “It was a mastercraft of the dwarfs I will admit. I remember what I said to the Æsir upon my first binding of it. I said: “It looks to me that with this ribbon as though I will gain no fame from it if I do tear apart such a slender band, but if it is made with art and trickery, then even if it does look thin, this band is not going on my legs.”
“Looks like they bound you with more than just rope and twine,” Twilight observed, noting the stone slab placed deep into the ground, with Gleipnir slipped through it. Another rock was used as a binding peg. Mustering up her courage, Twilight continued to speak. “So, it is safe to assume you are Hróðvitnir?” she asked.
A high pitched cackle filled the air, chilling Twilight straight down to the bone. “Oh, is that what they call me?” Hróðvitnir asked with a small tilt of his head. “It is one of many names I bear yes. You should know me by a few others. If you’re smart enough, then you’ll figure out the rest.”
Taking note of the wolf’s bindings, and the many warnings placed before her as she had walked towards the grove, Twilight’s eyes widened.
“Ah yes, there it is…” the wolf smirked upon Twilight’s realization.
“Fenrir,” Twilight whispered out in fear and she took a few steps back before finding herself up against a tree. Wanting to breathe out flame just to incinerate the infamous God-Slayer on the spot, Twilight chose the wiser course of options and decided against it. After all, she knew she was powerful now from all the magic she’d soaked up. A blessing, but a curse. If she fired off her flames now, she would undoubtedly incinerate the bindings that held Fenrir fast.
“That tingling sensation running up your spine? Inevitability. And that bit running down your leg? Fear,” Fenrir chuckled. “And… Ah yes, the magics of the Æsir. Powerful, but dangerous. You could kill me, but you could very well free me. A cruel joke placed upon anyone who set foot, or claw as the case may be on this island by my dear father Loki. He wants his dear sonny boy free, even if he knows he could very well be killed by the same creature which he helped imprison!” Fenrir laughed.
“So… So if you’re here, bound to that tree and those rocks, why did I find one of your alternate names, Hróðvitnir etched out on the ruins of a village?” Twilight asked nervously, and at this Fenrir flew into a great rage.
“SO THAT’S WHAT THEY DO, DO THEY? BLAME ME FOR ALL THEIR PETTY LITTLE FAILINGS?” Fenrir howled out in rage. “THEY BLAME ME, FENRIR! For my son, Sköll, and his transgressions, they blame me for them! Why do they blame me for all their ickle sad failings? They use my name as if I spent my entire lifetime sitting on their shoulders, forcing them to commit acts they would otherwise find repulsive and vile. ‘Fenrir made me do this, he made me do that!’ Every damn time! I have never made anyone do anything, not ever! They live their own tiny little lives, I have never lived their lives for them!” Fenrir snapped. “Run now little lindworm. Run now before I decide to find a way to free myself from these bindings and destroy you where you stand for blaming me on my son’s transgressions!”
Twilight wanted to argue the point, that it was the mortals that blamed Fenrir for Sköll and his doings, but even as the vines and brambles gave way she found herself more tempted to run, and never look back.
“Why don’t you run?” Fenrir asked. “Are you not that prepared to die?”
“Call it… curiosity,” Twilight replied.
“That’s a dangerous thing, young lindworm. Think hard about what you choose to say next,” Fenrir warned.
“Yes… Well, if Sköll is supposed to be off chasing the sun goddess Sól, why is he ravaging villages? Is that not a neglect of duty, a casting aside of a role set for him?”
Fenrir seemed to think on this for a moment, before he responded. If he smiled, he would have.
“Yes, wise words indeed little lindworm. He is neglecting his duties, and for that, he must be punished!” Fenrir agreed. “I ask you to be my blade, hunt him down and if it proves impossible to persuade him to return to his duties then chop off his head and return it to me!” he requested, even as thunder rolled and rumbled in the background, and the sun gave away to more rain. “It shall be a great challenge indeed, but I have faith in you little lindworm.”
“And why should I do anything you request?” Twilight replied.
“Besides the fact that my son is out there ravaging villages and bringing harm to those meatsacked innocent?” Fenrir deadpanned, raising an eyebrow. “If you help me, and bring his head to me or return to from his duties I shall show you a way back home, and answer a few of the questions I know you undoubtedly have. Like for example, your strange healing abilities. Are you not curious as to how you have them?” he asked.
Twilight was struck silent, finding herself in a bind. On the one hand, she could ignore Fenrir’s offer, but on the other it would be folly and she would leave the warg Sköll to continue to ravage those who did not deserve it. But, he could have been lying about any knowledge he said he held. Even as old as he was, Fenrir was the son of Loki, the trickster. Surely the monstrous fame-wolf did not inherit some of his father’s tendencies? It would be folly to think otherwise.
“I know what you’re thinking, young lindworm,” Fenrir stated. “That I am lying. Good for you, you’re not as stupid as you look. So my hat is off to you. But, nevertheless, my son and his mania persists. And I have a tempting offer. You’d be wise to not dismiss the possibility I know more about your current predicament. In fact, I probably know a way back to your home, and it’s name. I am millennia old after all.”
The penny was in the air for the briefest of moments, and then the penny dropped with a resounding clang. Fenrir chuckled as he saw the gears in Twilight’s little mind began to turn at the possibilities.
“Ah, there we go,” he commented. “I knew you’d come along to my way of thinking soon enough. But be warned, as soon as you step off this island to chase my son, the magic of the Æsir will leave you. You will be the same as which you were when you arrived. And that power is not enough to slay one of my kin.”
“Then how do I…?” Twilight trailed off, cursing Loki and his kin under her breath.
Fenrir never answered.
Author's Note
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenrir
Just as Fenrir had stated, as soon as Twilight left the island of Lyngvi, the powers of the Æsir left her. For that at least, she was grateful. Having the flames of Sól burning within her, it felt like a high, and she knew that if she kept them for far too long, she would go mad from the power, and not want to give up the celestial created flames.
As she flew on back into the torrent, she set about on thinking how to kill Sköll, or at least recapture him. Without the flames of the goddess which he so chased fervently by her side, it would be an arduous task indeed for Twilight.
For that matter, she wondered if Fenrir really was an evil being as all the myths said he was. Sure, he was frightening as all of the Nine Circles of Tartarus, but Twilight knew very well the legend. Loki and Angrboða, they bore three children. One, Hela who would later be cast into Niflheim and given all the powers needed to be able to rule over her domain. The second, the World Serpent, Jörmungandr. And finally, there was Fenrir or Fenris depending on your preference. To be fair, a fair few of the Norse myth characters had multiple spellings.
And what did all of these siblings get upon the Gods learning that Loki’s children may possibly -emphasis on possibly- bring on Ragnarök? Well, Hela as aforementioned was tossed into the land of mists, and Jörmungandr got tossed into a great sea, impossible to comprehend in size in hopes of drowning him and Fenrir was chained away on the island of Lyngvi.
So, it seemed the Gods were acting on fears of what-ifs and possibilities that may have never come to pass if they didn’t pull this. To be somewhat honest with herself, and maybe Fenrir’s silver tongue had gotten through to her more than she’d have cared to admit, but perhaps the Æsir brought Ragnarök on themselves. If Twilight’s father had been an abusive bastard like Odin was -And abusive was only the start of it really, given he was known to rape at least one Goddess at one point, a woman named Rindr- she might have wanted to eat him as well.
Storm clouds crackled with lightning high above her, and a bolt just nearly cinged one of her wings as if Thor himself was displeased upon Twilight’s thoughts of heresy against his dear old daddy. But what of Fenrir’s children, his son Sköll and his daughter Hati Hróðvitnisson? Yes, they chased the sun and the moon and were destined to catch up to them, swallowing them whole and that would somehow free their father, but what if they were just playing old predetermined roles given to them? Of course, it was also entirely possible they were getting vengeance for the misdeeds done to their parent by Odin by paying evil unto evil. Swallow some of Odin’s relatives, see how he liked that when he lost a relation or two.
It was impossible to tell really, Twilight mused, as more thunder rolled in the sky above. The rains had finally stopped falling, and Twilight was dodging and weaving about some tall rocky crags jutting up from the sea. As she continued to fly, her thoughts ran wild. On clear nights, she mused, she vaguely remembered seeing how certain galaxies and collections of stars looked like branches. Perhaps these were the branches of the ‘world tree’ Yggdrasil as it was so named. But what did that make Níðhöggr? He was supposedly this great dragon who sat at the base of the world tree gnawing at its roots, but if the world tree was in fact branches of stars and galaxies where were it’s roots and what exactly was Níðhöggr? Was he a dragon, or was he something more? And was he a necessary evil, just gnawing away at the roots to make sure they didn’t overgrow? It was an interesting set of questions, and ones Twilight didn’t want to think too much on unless she actually wanted more of a headache than she had already.
Folding up her wings for a brief rest, she landed on a small isle and used her rib bone turned knife to slice away at a yak. With a groan and a loud thud it fell to the island’s grass beneath it impaling itself on a rock. Twilight with a little bit of effort removed the yak from the rock before she began to feast on it’s remains tearing away at flesh and using the knife to skin away the thick heavy fur coat.
Ripping and tearing away at the massive felled beast, soon she had a full stomach and her pride as a dragon had been restored. Eating away at fruits was not how she should have lived to be honest. It was unsightly for her.
“Thinkin’ on Götterdämmerung huh?” a scratchy voice commented as Twilight heard the flapping of feathered wings from somewhere above her, and looked upwards to see this mostly brown furred and feathered griffon, with a white head like that of a bald eagle’s. “And doing it while snackin’ on yak chow eh?”
“How did you know I was…?” Twilight trailed off, her head looking directly at the unknown griffon with her blood-caked maw making it a rather eerie sight to say the least of it.
“Yeah, might have been yammering on about figures like Níðhöggr and Fenris. Aloud to yourself at that, hard not to want to pay attention when you hear someone commenting on how much of a bastard the Allfather might have been. Gotta say, you’re up for some pretty wild -And in this part of the world, downright blasphemous even!- thinkin’!” the griffon remarked.
“Well, call me naturally questioning,” Twilight remarked continuing to tear away at the yak’s flesh and eating what she could. She coiled around her prey protectively, letting out a small snort of orange flame to tell this griffon to back off. Taking the hint, the griffon did so.
“Relax, Purplesnort,” she said with a dismissive wave of her claw. Twilight tried not to look indignant at the little nickname given to her. “Wasn’t even thinking of trying to go after your kill. One, not foolish or suicidal enough to do that, and two already had lunch earlier. Name’s Gilda.”
Twilight noted this griffon had one gold eye, the other silver. It was a curious aspect really. But upon another look, both of these eyes were just a normal yellow shade.
“You’re a bit far from home aren’t you Gilda?” Twilight commented. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t griffons Greek creatures?”
“Well, someone’s been studying their books! Hoo-ray for you, I oughta give you a gold medal!” Gilda stated in a sarcastic tone. “Newsflash, been spreading out as of late. Greece got rather boring really after some certain Gods up and left for Rome when times got tough several thousand years back. The fire of western civilization is moving, and so we move where the Gods do. Well, most of us. Me, I’m more of a free spirit, I just go where I want. So, here I am, out in the middle of bloody nowhere. Good enough of an answer for ya Purplesnort?”
Twilight rolled her eyes. “...I suppose.” she conceded.
“So, you gotta find Sköll huh? By and by, protip, don’t think aloud especially in these parts unless you want to get struck down by lightning. Hammer of the Gods and all that.” Gilda advised.
“Noted…” Twilight trailed off in a worried tone, casting another glance to the broiling skies above her.
“Anyways, finding Sköll. Well, suppose you probably should first start -No, we should first start- by finding Sól I should think,” Gilda suggested. “Must be awfully confused that Sköll’s gone on a dereliction of his duties. Or relieved really, considering he wanted to eat her.”
“How do you find the goddess of the sun?” Twilight asked. “Or catch up to her, depending on if you find her?”
“Well… That’s sorta the thing,” Gilda commented. “You sorta don’t. You have to make Sól come to you really…”
“Okay, but-” Twilight started before realizing something. “Hey, wait a moment. Wait just a moment. Who said anything about ‘we’? Who said you get to tag along on this little quest?”
“I said, so I go. Plus, questing’s always better with someone in tow to help you out. Dragoness or not, you’re hardly invincible. And Sköll? Son of Fenris remember? Hugely powerful. He’s practically a god himself!” Gilda explained.
“Point taken…” Twilight murmured, suddenly losing her appetite upon the thought of becoming chow for this massive wolf who was supposed to be able to swallow the sun like his sister was able to swallow the moon.
“Sorry,” Gilda apologized. “But I suppose I had to break the truth to ya somehow, knock some of that stubbornness out of your scaly head.”
“...Hey, how do you think whoever gets to be the Sun God or Sun Goddess is figured out? I mean, there’s tons of them in myth and legend, and only one sun! I mean, what’s going on here? Do they play soccer or something to determine who gets to be the Sun’s embodiment for the next millennia or so?" Twilight rambled, Gilda having tuned her out about halfway.
Gilda had used her claws to rip off some bark from a tree, and then grabbed some blood from the yak’s corpse to paint out the words: “Sól, please land here! We need to talk!”
Needless to say, after this display you’d probably take notice. Especially when you were being called out. And Sól, pulled on her chariot with her flaming horses cooled by bellows below their shoulders did, in fact, take notice of all this. Breaking through the cloud cover as her horses whinnied and snorted out flame, her figure became clear. A woman, bursting with solar flares all over and nearly blinding swooped around the island before touching down, intense waves of heat emanating from her form. Her steeds, Árvakr and Alsviðr just chewed on some nearby bushes which, of course, burst into flame upon the touch.
“Geez lady, can you turn it down, just a tad?” Gilda requested, showing no such respect that befitted a goddess at all. Twilight seemed understandably nervous at this and braced herself for a good old fashioned smiting. Angry goddesses, especially ones related to the sun you did not want to be around. Thankfully, it seemed Sól was in an even-tempered mood and did no such thing, and actually followed through on Gilda’s request, some of the blazing infernos that made up her celestial form subsiding.
“Apologies, it’s been so long since I’ve had the ability to land somewhere I’d almost forgotten I could do that,” Sól sighed before conjuring up this metal lawn chair and laying back on it as if trying for a tan. “Being chased by a wolf out to eat you whole will do that.”
“She’s… surprisingly cool about this whole thing, not even a small pint of annoyance at a wolf hunting her down,” Twilight thought to herself in surprise even as Sól drank a glass of lemonade. “Then again, suppose she got used to it over the millennia.”
“Anyways, you rang?” Sól asked.
“Yeah, suppose we sorta did…” Twilight muttered. “See, we’re trying to find Sköll,” she explained, quite content to leave out the fact that Sköll’s father had requested this figuring Sól didn’t want to know Fenrir himself was involved. “And going to either kill him, or return him to you to set the natural order back in balance. ...Well, the natural order of the gods anyways. Sorry if we have to return the guy who wants to eat you alive to you.”
“Oh, it’s fine! Totally cool!” Sól said with a dismissive wave of her hand. At this, both Gilda and Twilight stared at her.
“But I thought he wanted to… Y’know, devour you whole. And you actually want us to return him to you?”
“Oh, he wants to devour me, but not in the way you think,” Sól remarked with a knowing grin, and Gilda was rendered speechless for the next few moments. Twilight, on the other hand, muttered something to the effect of the philosophers sure as hell not knowing about that side of the story. “Basically, we had a little lover’s spat, and wolfy left in this huff.”
“Fenrir’s certainly out of the loop then. Then again, he probably doesn’t get many visitors…” Twilight thought to herself.
“Wait, so you’re saying you get hot inside, metaphorically anyways because you and Sköll have this whole thing going on,” Gilda sputtered out in disbelief. “This whole predator-prey fetish thing?”
“That’s about the size of it, yes…” Sól said, and at this Gilda fainted dead away.
Twilight, on the other hand, muttered: “Good grief…”
Now how could she break it to Sól that her lover was out killing mortals? ...She seriously wished she was a goddess herself about now. Might have made what probably came next hurt a bit less really, she mused.
Author's Note
See, this is me, taking myths and flipping them on their heads. If you know the legends of Sól and her pursuer, toss them out now. (Really wish there was an add umlauts key) Also, yeah. Gilda. Realized that most myth characters were only going to be around for several chapters or so, so Twilight would need someone to talk to, someone to bounce dialogue off on a consistent basis. So, that's why she's a character in here now. Plus, a griffon and a dragon. What could go wrong?
Feedback and thoughts on how this story's going are welcomed.
Author's Note
Okay, first off, sorry for the shout-out you'll encounter in this chapter, trying to tone them down. And secondly, huge thanks to PonyJosiah13 and Magic Step for helping me work out some of this chapter and future story plot points. Give them a huge pat on the back for me eh?
4: Gilda
Perhaps needless to say, Sól wasn’t exactly pleased per se about her lover having decided to turn to slaughtering innocents.
Becoming a blazing inferno looking like a demon straight out of Múspellsheimr, she screeched and roared right to the heavens, firing a pure blast of solar energy that punched a hole right through the clouds. Her twin steeds, Árvakr and Alsviðr whinnied and stamped their hooves in fear of the wrathful goddess as she roared out: “I WANT HIS HEAD, HE DARES? HE DARES BREAK THE ANCIENT LAWS AND TURN HIS JAWS TOWARDS THE INNOCENT?” Sól bellowed out, the ice and snow beneath her melting away in her tremendous fury. “I DON’T CARE IF YOU HAVE TO BRING IT TO ME ON A PIKE! I WANT MY HUSBAND DEAD, DEAD YOU UNDERSTAND? MAY HE BURN IN THE FIRES OF HELA’S INFERNOS FOREVER MORE!”
Turning their heads and averting their eyes to avoid being blinded from the waves of searing heat and the celestial glow the angry solar entity was giving off, both Gilda and Twilight nodded rapidly in fear.
“Yes… Yes, we’ll bring him to you! Relax, you’ll have your husband returned to you in no time, but we’ll bring him back to you alive if only so you can get the honor of dealing with him yourself.” Twilight stated, choosing her words deliberately, and carefully. “After all, is it not best an angry wife deals with her impetuous lover herself?”
“Quite true, Twilight Sparkle,” Sól stated venomously, her tone making Twilight shudder out in fear. Noticing the young lindworm’s terror, Sól calmed herself. “I… I apologize for all that, young dragoness. It is hard for me to contain my fury sometimes. Solar goddess and all,” she joked weakly. Twilight looked less than amused. “Right. Sorry… Anyways, I shall consort with Thor and try to quell his fury against you and the blasphemy you committed against Allfather Odin. Yes, I do know about that,” Sól continued making Twilight let out a very undragonlike small squeak. “Storm Gods, so quick to fly into a fury…”
“Like you just did a few minutes ago, nearly broiling us to a crisp?” Gilda thought, wisely not voicing these thoughts aloud upon seeing how quickly the sun could turn against you.
“Rest assured,” Sól stated, "I will find a way to clear away this storm system and give you a much safer flight through this island chain. Be careful, however, as even if I were to calm Thor that doesn’t mean the skies will be entirely safe. My husband’s sister, she still lurks in the shadows and night is her realm.” she warned before flying back up into the heavens and however she managed to do it, a few minutes later the storm finally subsided, and thundering clouds gave way to clear skies perfect for night flying.
Stars dotted the night sky like little white dots upon a dark blue canvas of a painting, and the ribbons of the Northern Lights were soon visible, making a perfect cover for flying through the night. For the next few hours, the twosome pressed on through the island chain the moon and stars as their guide till it finally came time to rest.
Eventually, Gilda and Twilight found the perfect rest stop for the night, this old abandoned village built on the side of a rocky cliff face, largely exposed to the elements. It was no small wonder that it had been abandoned in the long run, and had now fallen mostly to ruin since with ladders and even walkways between and leading between or up to homes now having fallen into disrepair. Gilda spotted a house that was perfect for their needs, and probably could shield them from the cold night winds for the most part.
Gesturing to it, Gilda nodded at Twilight and the two flew over to the entrance and tucked in their wings as they landed inside.
“And hey, if it still isn’t warm enough, we can snuggle up together,” Gilda teased, with Twilight blushing and balking at her suggestion. “Who says I’m kidding? That warm hearth of a fire burning inside your belly would be perfect for a good snuggle.”
Looking up towards the blue and green ribbons of the sky that painted a beautiful portrait in the late night air, Gilda smiled at the sight of the famed Aurora Borealis. It was something she never had gotten the chance to see back home, but she’d always wanted to.
“It’s beautiful isn’t it?” Twilight whispered in awe. “You always hear tales about it, but seeing it for yourself…”
“Yeah, I know right?” Gilda whispered in transfixation reminded possibly not for the first time that the world was much larger, and more beautiful if not sometimes far scarier than she could possibly have imagined. In some ways, it made her feel very small, considering she was just one lone griffon -Well, now one lone griffon and a dragon companion- up against a world and it’s ever-changing mysterious forces.
“Words never can do it justice…” Twilight whispered back, her eyes glistening with tears of wonder.
“You know, heard tales from the Iñupiat, back when I was over in their lands for a time -long story really- that they believed that the Aurora, it was in fact made up of the spirits of small children who died really early on in life and that if you flew too close to it, they’d cut off your head and use it for games of Iñupiat football,”
“...Okay, thanks for that. Thanks for ruining it for me.” Twilight deadpanned with half-lidded eyes. “...Yep, definitely going to have nightmares tonight,” she muttered.
“Sorry Twi,” Gilda apologized, looking sheepish. “I just like to, when I travel the world and meet someone like you, share the tales I’ve collected. It gets rather lonely talking to yourself, ya know?”
“Well,” Twilight smiled as she draped a wing around Gilda, the griffon’s eyes widening in surprise. “You’re not alone now are you?”
“No… I guess I’m not,” Gilda smiled and to the sounds of the gentle waves lapping up against the shorelines far below her she began to drift off to sleep. “I guess I’m not…”
Gilda found herself amongst the desert sands of Egypt, walking through a blinding sandstorm colored the shade of crimson, a stone path beneath her slowly being eaten away and eroded by the grinding sands. Flaming torches were on either side of her, illuminating her path through the howling desert seemingly untouched by the winds. Evil laughter permeated through the air, a high pitched cackle that sounded like the rattling bones of death itself. Lightning flashed through the skies in bright white streaks.
Gilda knew who was responsible, it could be none other really. There weren’t many mythological figures in any sort of pantheon who had control over the powers of the sand and the storms.
“Seth…” she whispered to herself in fear, her feathers on the back of her neck standing right up as she felt… something breath behind her. More high pitched cackles and at that Gilda unsheathed her claws ready for battle, even if she knew challenging this particular god was folly. She would not go down without a fight.
“Bring it on Seth!” Gilda challenged, seemingly without a hint of fear in her tone though her quivering body betrayed her.
“Oh, you’re a brave one aren’t you?” the Chaos God said from somewhere behind her, and Gilda whirled around to strike but met nothing but empty air. The torches began to blaze with an infernal nightmarishly crimson flame. “Challenging me in my realm, and on my battlefield! You have no power here, little Falcon!”
Gilda blinked out in shock, her eyes changing color briefly. One gold, the other silver like the moon itself.
“You haven’t told her yet have you?” Seth laughed, his massive dog-like form becoming briefly visible through the raging storm clouds which were rapidly swirling above her in a funnel-like manner. “Your little secret?”
“What little secret?” Gilda asked, genuinely confused as to what Seth was talking about. By Múspellsheimr, she didn’t even know why she was here to begin with!
“Oh, so you don’t know?” Seth gasped, holding a hand over his jaw in shock. “My my, you’ll be in for quite a shock when it comes around!”
Suddenly, a blast of pure hot flame, blue in shade hit Seth right in the chest making him let out a nearly ear-splitting roar of pain.
“WHO DARES?” Seth snarled out, his jaws snapped and biting at the air, and Gilda looked upwards to see this pure white dragoness scything through the sandstorm, a sun on her hindquarters blazing bright with heavenly flame. Her back spines, they glowed with this ethereal yellow light, same with her twin horns.
“Begone Chaos-Bringer!” the white dragoness roared out, accompanied by the trumpeting of battle horns as armor covered her head, legs, and torso. Her tusks extended themselves and began to glow with this same ethereal yellow light before her neck glowed blue and she fired off another stream of hot scalding blue flames like a furnace.
“You… You dare show yourself here, mortal serpent?” Seth roared out, swiping out at the dragoness with one of his two symbols of his power, the was-sceptre. Nimbly dodging this strike, the dragoness fired off another blast of her inferno flame as Gilda was beginning to call it. “Stand still!”
“What, and let you hit me?” the dragon teased. No, she was outright daring -yes, you read right, daring! - Seth to try and hit her again even as she blasted him once more with a scalding blue flame.
“DAMN YOU!” Seth roared out, before vanishing and taking the storm with him leaving nothing but the clear blue skies above Gilda, a sharp contrast to where she was before.
Flapping her wings once more, the pure white dragoness landed on the sand dunes next to Gilda, some of the heat radiating off her making the sand below her steam and broil till she turned off her flames, for lack of a better phrase.
“Listen, I can only talk to you for a few minutes, give or take. I’ve already used up some of my time in this world fighting off that creature,” the dragoness stated her battle armor vanishing. “Whether that was really Seth or not doesn’t matter, it expended some of the energy my sister gave me to even come into this realm.”
“Who… who are you?” Gilda stammered out nervously.
At this, the dragoness smiled warmly. A warm motherly smile, one that promised home-baked chocolate chip cookies and all that and promised that at the end of the day everything was going to be alright.
“It’s Celestia,” the dragoness answered. “Were you scared of me, and of Seth?”
“Y-Yes,” Gilda whispered quite ashamed of herself. “Seeing all of that power on full display, it terrified me…”
“To me? Fear? It’s like a superpower,” Celestia commented nuzzling Gilda comfortingly. “Fear makes you strong. A wise man once told me this, a very wise man indeed and I listened. He said: Let me tell you about scared. Your heart is beating so hard. There's so much blood and oxygen pumping through your brain, it's like rocket fuel! Right now, you could run faster and you could fight harder. You can jump higher than ever in your life. And you are so alert, it's like you can slow down time. What's wrong with scared? Scared is a superpower! It's your superpower! There is danger in this room, and guess what? It's you. Do you feel it?” Celestia recited, repeated and placed her claw on Gilda’s chest. “What about Seth? Do you think he was scared?”
“No… No, not at all.” Gilda whispered, feeling just that little bit wiser.
“Loser!” Celestia mocked. “Let me tell you this, never be afraid… to be afraid. Let that fear in, don’t let it control you, but let it in. Now, be mindful of my daughter, okay Gilda?”
“Y-Your daughter?” Gilda stammered out in confusion not even questioning how this Celestia knew her name. Her eyes widened in shock. “You don’t mean…?”
“Yes, I do,” Celestia confirmed with a nod. “Be mindful of her. She’s in over her head now, and she needs a guide. Yes, she’s intelligent, but she’s rash and overconfident in her abilities at times, not to mention she doesn’t remember herself completely. She needs someone to steady her, keep her balanced. Can you do that for me Gilda?” Celestia asked, even as she began to fade away. “It’s no small responsibility, let me warn you now. So answer carefully.”
Gilda didn’t even need a second to think about her answer. She dragged Twilight along with her on this mess, chasing after the son of Fenrir and now she had to help her. “Yes, I can do it.”
“Thank you…” Celestia whispered as the whole realm turned to black…
When Gilda awoke, she found herself turning her head to avoid Sól’s morning sun shining directly in her face. Twilight was already awake, soaking up the morning sun in her scales and letting it warm her body. Given who Gilda now knew her mother was, this made a lot of sense to her. It seemed each Dragon had an element, and Celestia’s line was connected to the celestial bodies aptly enough. Her element was the sun, and although Twilight’s seemed to be the stars if the mark on her hindquarters was any indication there was a bit of Celestia’s solar power in her as well. To be honest, if not for the lavender scales and purple spines Twilight would have been her mother’s spitting image.
Gilda fought back a sniffle. She knew Twilight didn’t remember everything, Celestia had told her as much. Imagine, not remembering your own mother! Gilda, for a brief moment, wondered if Celestia had tried to contact Twilight and if she had succeeded. However, given how much of a strain it seemed to be for Celestia to be able to contact her she doubted the dragoness had succeeded with Twilight.
She may never know really, and for all she knew Twilight didn’t even know who Celestia even was. Gilda now understood exactly why Celestia had tasked her with protecting her daughter. Twilight didn’t remember all of her abilities, whatever they may have been, so she didn’t know just how powerful she could be or how to even use these abilities. For the upcoming fight with Sköll, this was hardly reassuring.
But Gilda swore, no she promised Celestia she would protect her daughter at any and all costs.
“Ready to go?” the griffon hen asked as she walked up alongside Twilight unfurling her wings.
“Yeah, let’s go,” Twilight replied with a small, worried smile before it faded. “We’ve got a god to smite.”
Unleashing a challenging roar towards the heavens, almost as if to say “Sköll, we’re coming for you, so watch your back!” the dragoness then took flight with a mighty flap of her leather wings with Gilda soon to follow her...
Flying by island to island, just in hopes of spotting a glimpse of the infamous Sköll wasn’t a particularly pleasing task Twilight had learned. Firstly, just flying by the winds and hoping to spot an island which had Sköll’s trademark trail of destruction was an arduous task, to say the least.
For one thing, it seemed the further out they went into the wild howling north, the more alike each island seemed to become. Gone were the grassy forested timberlands of previous islands, with the occasional coastline here and there. Now there only existed rocky crags jutting up from the barren sea, barren and almost devoid of life.
Eventually, Twilight knew, that too would be replaced by ice as far as the eye could see, and in fact as she landed on a small outcropping Gilda at her side, she could begin to see icebergs out in the distance. They seemed to mock her, saying that just beyond this islands was a place where no creature was meant to go, and yet to she had to forge onwards in hopes of finding Sköll.
“This… This is fruitless,” Twilight panted out, shivering from the cold blasts of wind that flew through the air up from the seas. “Can’t believe I’m following out orders from Fenrir, just in a vague hope he knows something about my past, and pursuing a spurned sun-goddess’ lover. Who may I mention, happens to be a wolf!”
“Well, you could always back out of this…” Gilda advised, nestling herself into the rocks and using her wings to block most of the crosswinds.
“Yeah, that’ll go over real well. If Sól doesn’t kill me for neglecting the mortals and not killing Sköll for her, Fenrir’s likely to send one of his minions -And he’s bound to have some, everybody has worshippers, even him!- after me for neglecting to carry out my task.”
“So, either way you look at it, you’re screwed basically… Am I right?” Gilda questioned.
“Yeah, pretty much…” Twilight whispered, sinking down into herself in fear. “I’m really beginning to hate gods and goddesses…”
“Well, look on the bright side, even if you went to Greece then you’d probably be off no better! I mean, let’s look it this way. Zeus, the big guy up high on his mountain. You want scary, look at Zeus!” Gilda lectured, looking to the skies every so often as if she was checking to make sure Zeus wasn’t watching or wasn’t about to strike them down. Thor, the Norse god of Storms was one of the calmer Norse gods, and even he was in a bad mood the last couple of days. Zeus was a whole ‘nother matter entirely.
“What about him?”
“Okay, let me give you some perspective here. Zeus, he’s in charge of law and order here right?” Gilda questioned. “This is a guy who threw down random lightning bolts and such whenever he got pissed off, and couldn’t keep it in his pants and therefore out went the whole “Death do us part” thing with Hera. Couldn’t even handle his own wedding vows nor his temper, so what wise guy put him in charge of keeping law and order? Hell if I know, but that guy… He’s in charge of making sure kings were acting wisely, oaths were kept, councils were respected and strangers were given hospitality. You nervous yet Twilight?” Gilda asked, still watching the skies, and while it was true they were a cloudy grey no thunder seemed to be rumbling… yet.
“Maybe we’re just out of Zeus’ jurisdiction. I mean, this is Norway... “ Gilda thought, looking towards Twilight, who was shaking at the sheer implications Gilda had brought up. Draping a wing around her, Gilda pulled the dragoness in closer. Just for comfort of course. Not like she actually wanted to snuggle with anyone who wasn’t her lover or anything like that! “That is, unless old Thunderpants has Odin on best buddy-buddy speed dial or something like that.”
“Okay, good,” Gilda said, though Twilight failed to see anything good about it. “Just sayin’, it could always be worse. Fenrir, god-slayer, yes he’s terrible and all, no doubt about that, but you could be dealing with Zeus. That’s what I’m here for, to serve as a guide on the dos and don’ts of mythology and to keep you upbeat.”
“Yeah, a real fine swell job you’re doing there,” Twilight deadpanned. “Keep it up, and at this rate I may not want to fly into a hurricane and get ripped apart.”
“Look Twi, listen… Uh, there’s something I should probably mention,” Gilda said. “A night or so back, I had this dream. Met your mom, or some dragon claiming to be your mom.”
She, of course, was neglecting to mention the fact that she’d met Seth and apparently Seth had this idea in his head that Gilda was somehow related to Horus or whatever. Twilight probably wouldn’t have believed that even for a second, might even have laughed her head off. Not that Gilda would blame her. She honestly doubted Seth -A god of chaos- was telling the truth anyways. Or that he was entirely sane.
“Y-You did?” Twilight asked, her voice shaky and sounding like she was near tears. For her, this was a huge revelation. She barely remembered a thing about her past, and just to discover one relation of hers was a huge thing. Even if it turned out to be worth nothing in the end, this was still worth listening to. Just in case Gilda was right, and she had encountered her mother. “W-Where did you… Where did you meet her?” Twilight asked the griffon.
The logical part of her mind told her that there was no way Gilda should know what her mother looked like, even as well traveled as Gilda seemed to be. It could have been a lie, it could have been just some dragon trying to curry favor with Gilda for whatever reason. Okay, maybe that was the pessimistic side of her. After all, what reason would Gilda have to lie, plus why would a dragon want to curry favor with her anyways? And finally, they had seen no other dragons, or at least Twilight had so again Gilda making this story up just to hurt Twilight seemed unlikely. After all, she was just an insignificant little lindworm so why would anyone want to make up any relations to her?
“Yeah, that’s all I am… Just an insignificant little lindworm so why would anyone, in the end, want to even acknowledge my existence?” Twilight whispered to herself, and Gilda’s ears perked up at
“Is that really what you think of yourself Twilight?” the griffon thought to herself, pale amber eyes widening in shock before surprising even herself she pulled Twilight into a hug.
“Listen, never tell yourself that okay?” Gilda asked Twilight, smacking her upside the head. “Goddess only knows why I’m saying this, as I’m not exactly the soft and mushy sort -Ask anyone I know!- but nobody’s insignificant. That includes you Twilight.”
“Yeah, you say that, but compared to goddesses and titans and spirits and all that, I am rather insignificant. I’m just that small, compared to well… something like that!” Twilight said, pointing to Sól’s sun just barely peeking through the clouds.
“So?” Gilda shrugged her shoulders. “Listen, take this as you will, but everyone’s small compared to the sun. You need to be you right now, whoever that is, and not worry about your size compared to a goddess’ own. Everyone has their part to play, you just need to find yours. So, I ask, what is it?”
“Right now, it seems to be just a weapon of the Norse pantheon. No, a tool, carrying out their will and solving their little domestic squabbles…” Twilight trailed off. “Twilight, do this and you’ll get rewarded with knowledge! Twilight, do that and I’ll keep from frying you to a crisp!”
“So? Take a third option!” Gilda asked. “Break the chains that the Norse Pantheon are holding you to. Don’t do what they want, do what you want,” she told her friend sternly, poking her in the chest.
Twilight chuckled to herself at Gilda’s actions and thought: “Easier said than done when everyone’s got something to hold over you, or they’re simply much more powerful than you are.”
“My mother… what was she like? To you at least?” Twilight asked slowly, not sure if she wanted to know. What if her mother was the worse possible dragon there could have been, the kind she knew only cared about one thing and one thing only, gold? What if she just cared about hurting mortals, burning down their towns and frying them and their bodies to a crisp and eating whatever remained?
“You’re thinking your mother’s a monster aren’t you?” Gilda asked, and Twilight looked at her in shock. “What, don’t look so surprised. I’m good at reading creatures, figuring out what they’re thinking,” Gilda replied in this almost bragging tone. “For you it’s easy enough. I mean, you’re completely anxiety ridden, breathing hard and somehow managing to work up a sweat even in this weather.” Gilda continued.
“Was… Was I that obvious?” Twilight asked.
“Yeah, you sorta were…” Gilda trailed off. “But your mother, she wasn’t exactly an evil being. I didn’t get any of that sorta threatening feeling off of her. She was so kind to me, even if it was only just a dream we met in. Twilight’s eyes widened in remembrance.
A pure white dragon soaring through the sky, and although she was unable to tell just how large it was, she could tell this dragoness was probably larger than most and bore spines on her back and tail that looked as if they could be launched at a whim like missiles. Oddly however, Twilight didn’t get a feeling of menace from this elegantly shaped dragoness, and when she seemingly turned to look at Twilight, the mare found herself at peace all at ease in her world.
“Remember Twilight,” the dragoness spoke to her, the voice now finding its source as on the dragoness’ hindquarters a sun blazed.
“This dragoness…” Twilight said in a shaky breath. “Was she pure white, like the newfallen snow?”
“Yes… Yes, she was,” Gilda asked her eyes widening briefly in surprise and wondering how Twilight knew that. It could have been a lucky guess, but Twilight sounded too sure of herself for that. “And she felt so old, and yet so very kind. A great power, blazing like the sun itself. And with all of the warmth that came with it. But… But how did you know all of that?”
“Because… Because I met her in a dream as well!” Twilight stammered out. “Did… Did she give you a name? Did she Gilda?” Twilight asked, grabbing the griffon by the forelegs and shaking her. “Tell me!”
“C-Celestia!” Gilda breathed out. “It was Celestia. That’s all I know. I promise.”
“Celestia…” Twilight whispered, letting the name run across her lips. It felt so warm and so right. Like the sun itself, or perhaps the world’s finest hearth you felt comforted by it’s very mention. Even now, in spite of her fear of what was to come, just hearing that name Twilight knew everything would come out alright in the end. Corny as it sounded to her, that’s what she believed anyways. Gilda would probably laugh at her if she even said this aloud, but Twilight knew right then and there something was right in the world if someone was willing to reveal themselves to her and let them know that they were on her side. Made this land of gods and monsters seem that little less frightening really.
“Celestia, I’m coming to find you…” Twilight thought to herself even as the sun set across the lands, casting an orange-red glow over the waters. The skies soon once more became a river of night and then a belt made of stars and glowing green ribbons of light. “No, that’s not right. Mom, I’m coming to find you. And then, just then maybe I’ll find out more about my past, and who I am.”
Author's Note
Okay, so not much happening here, at least on the surface. But this chapter was mainly made for more bonding between the two leads, and to get me back in the swing of things. Next chapter, hopefully, it'll be more action packed with Gilda and Twilight finally meeting up with Sköll himself.
As ever, comments and thoughts along with feedback are welcomed so feel free to ask away. And as a bonus, here's some music for you to listen to while you read this story. It's what I use as writing music for this story as well. Really gets you in that Viking mindset.
Author's Note
Huge thank you to Shadowmane for his help on this chapter.
6: Sköll
Perhaps in hindsight, Twilight mused she probably should have anticipated just what kind of creature Sköll was. Shadows and mist, that’s one possible way of describing the being who was said to eat the sun.
It had started off simply enough, Twilight and Gilda flying head-on into this dense thick fog. They’d thought nothing of it at the time, the natural climate of the islands often brought upon these fogbanks.
But that’s when the trouble began. As the winds around Twilight and Gilda stopped dead, the air becoming as lifeless and cold as the waters beneath their feet. It lasted a few seconds, before they picked up again, bobbing and weaving through their claws and wings. The howls screeched with a sheer intensity that caused the two to clutch their ears shut, which only prompted the violent weather to throw them off of their feet, into the unknown veil of mist beyond.
Twilight found herself slammed against a cliff-face, and in the mist she swore she thought she saw the head of something canid, two sharp yellow eyes peeking out before this figure vanished back into the fog.
“Gilda?” Twilight called out, using her flames to light a path through the nearly choking cloudbank. “W-Where are you?” she asked, her voice trembling in fear. For the last few weeks, she’d felt Gilda’s presence by her side, a comforting warmth through the dangers of the wilds. Now she was gone, swept away by the howling winds. A bitter, biting cold. That’s what Twilight felt as she flew through the mist, narrowly dodging rocky cragged outcrops.
“So… You are the one who dares to step forth, into my domain?” A voice ruptured the silence around her, sounding almost like a demon from the darkest depths of Helheim. “Be it bravery or foolishness, a mistake nonetheless.”
“Sköll.” Twilight whispered. It could be none other.
“You know of me? Then you surely know what I am to do next.” He remarked, the winds around Twilight turning to invisible blades of ice. “What my destiny is in existence, and the consequences it will have on the world?”
“For just a moment, you defied that destiny. Sól! Remember her?” Twilight called out into the void. “She seemed quite taken with you, for what reason I have yet to learn. But from what she told me, you and her? You defied what you were created to do, sure you chased her but not out of malice. But out of love. Now, I don’t pretend to understand this whole predator-prey fetish you’ve got going on, but why did you…?”
“Destiny is merely for guidance. It is not set in stone, nor will it ever be. Prophecies can be faked. Prophecies can be denied. All that they serve to do is act as a signpost for the story to advance. But not all stories are told the same way now, are they?”
“Hard to argue with Sól herself isn’t it?” Twilight asked. “I spoke to her, actually. Me and Gilda. She loved you. So why did you go back to your old ways? Slaughtering the innocent? Are you really that intent on following the course you’re said to take?”
“No. However, the other gods are so determined to fulfill their roles and fight in Ragnarok. The Götterdämmerung. In a way, I am following their destinies, not my own. I will start their story and close mine off, liberating myself from the chains of destiny.”
“Destiny is merely for guidance. It is not set in stone, nor will it ever be. Prophecies can be faked. Prophecies can be denied,” Twilight replied, the head of Sköll circling around her. It was impossible to see his full form, and Twilight was glad for that. To be perfectly honest, she wasn’t entirely sure if she wanted to see it. It scared her, he scared her. “Did you not say this?”
“I did. And I am denying them the prophecy that I were to perish with Ragnarok. That is what they say, right? That the one who inflicted the war will fade along with the others? Not a chance. When it all comes to an end, me and Sólvwill finally be alone, free of everything. We can and will do everything we have ever wanted to. Together. Forever.”
“You don’t get it do you?” Gilda asked, flying out of the mist and Twilight felt a sense of relief fill her. “When the Götterdämmerung comes, and it will as soon as you eat Sól, Valhalla and all the rest of the realms of the Gods? They will cease to exist. YOU will cease to exist, once Odin slaughters you for killing one of his family.”
“He is but a god held within a mortal shell! I am more than he could ever hope to be!” Skoll roared, the winds throwing Twilight’s body to the ground and shackling her there. “Mortals should never question the gods. Be they good or bad. Seeing as how you wish to challenge my views, perhaps you would like to follow through with some physical resistance?”
“So why did you take to slaughtering mortals,” Twilight questioned holding her ground frightened as she was by Sköll and his power. “Do you really think them that beneath you? Mortals, yes, sometimes they stumble and they’re nowhere near your level but does that give you the right to kill them as you see fit?”
“I didn’t think. And they didn’t either. They KNEW they were beneath me, and yet they blindly continued. What is the saying you humans use? ‘I told you so’ or something?” He asked. “In any case, I didn’t choose to kill them. Instead, they walked into my embrace and accepted my blessing of a chilling end.”
“But… But Fenrir said-”
Sköll broke out into a burst of harsh laughter, high-pitched like the cackle of a hyena. “Fenrir? Fenrir, the fame-wolf? Dear old Hróðvitnir? What did you expect from the son of the God of Mischief?” Sköll laughed. “He lies and deceives like it’s second nature to him. I almost pity you, little lindworm. But you, like so many others before you have fallen for one of his lies and managed to be swayed to his line of thinking. What did he tell you? No, it doesn’t matter. He just wants to turn anyone against his family, all simply because they imprisoned him on that island. He, after all, is the one who will devour Odin in the end. Karma, really.”
“Y’know, you talk a whole lot for a guy who just has the power to control wind and snow. Why don’t ya actually try being intimidating for once?” Gilda scoffed. Twilight growled, she was hoping to actually try and persuade Sköll away from killing them.
“Perhaps you have this whole story of Ragnarok being misled. It shall not be I who brings about the start of the end. It shall be the rift that drives the gods apart once it is revealed that Odin cruelly cast out Fenrir and his siblings that will start Ragnarok. Once the bonds of trust sever, everyone will have their weapons poised at each others’ throats; with every strike rupturing the planet as we know it. You cannot stop this. I cannot stop this. No other mortal or god can stop this. So why wait for it to start?”
“So, that’s all this is? You giving up?” Gilda asked in disbelief. “You basically saying, screw it, why bother at all? I’ll just have to follow the whims of the father? You, with all your power, haven’t even thought of trying to challenge Ragnarok? The story has yet to be set in stone, it’s only just whispers and rumors in the minds of the Gods.” she stated, her eyes once more changing to that silver-gold mixture as she stared down Sköll like… like almost well, a falcon.
“Not rumors. REALITY!” Skoll burst out, the winds force-feeding themselves to Gilda as her body was filled from the inside out with air. “Call it nihilism, call it acceptance, call it whatever you wish, but this chapter will end!”
Gilda was thrown into Twilight, coughing up blood from the sheer force of the blow Sköll had given her.
“I… I tried to reason with you. I tried to talk. I want you to remember that. I tried to reach out, I tried to understand you, but I think that you understand your position perfectly…” Twilight whispered.
“Reason is lost upon a god. And hope is lost upon a mortal who dares to challenge one.”
“And I think you just don't care…” Twilight continued as Sköll went on.
“Your deluded dreams of peace and prosperity are over,” he stated, and Twilight continued to whisper to herself.
“I don't suppose it really matters now. You are a monster. That is the role you seem determined to play.”
“Now, it is time to wake up and face reality!” Sköll roared as needles of ice shot out of the mist and darted towards Twilight even as Gilda called out her name before slipping into unconsciousness.
“So it seems I must play mine. The one who stops the monster.” Twilight stated, before rolling to the left and unleashing a blast of pure hot purple flame. It pierced through the misty veil, but it quickly recovered and spiralled towards her, almost like a miniature tornado.
A wolf’s howl sounded, as more and more yellow eyes sprung out from the winds around Twilight and Gilda. They lunged out at the two of them, projections of a pack striking and thrashing at their prey.
“I am the hunter, and you are the hunter,” Sköll stated simply before Twilight grabbed Gilda in her claws and took flight darting through the icebergs with the pack nipping at their heels. “It all comes down to who hunts better…”
“Is this really how you want your love, the Sun herself, to remember you? As a killer?” Twilight asked, going into a swooping dive after setting Gilda out of sight. She then looped upwards, firing off another blast of flame into the pack scorching them. She then spun like a drill coating herself in a flame that turned from purple to an even brighter shade of pink, ripping through the remainders of the pack.
For just a brief moment, Sköll faltered.
“Twilight Sparkle. I know that she won’t. But why do you have any concern between me and Sól?” he asked. “This is not your fight. It never should have been, you should be far and away from here. For when the twilight of the Gods comes, it will shake the earth and I do not want innocent lives to be lost.”
“Because… Because I want to help where I can. Because I want to shake off the perceptions of my species, a race of killers who only dive down from the mountains and the skies to scorch and burn a town and steal its wealth. Ask yourself this, why is someone who barely remembers her own past trying to help someone who seems determined to play the role of a monster?” Twilight continued, dodging Sköll’s snaps and bites. “Because, simply because you remember your own past, and know what is to come. I know neither in my case.” Twilight stated.
“And what of your friend, Gilda?” Sköll asked.
“She… she is just someone who decided to come along with me, in my journey home. A guide through these lands. She’s been instructing me on how to avoid pissing off the Allfather, and any of his children. I am not a fan of Odin, for how he treated Fenrir. I can imagine neither are you. Your father’s family, tossed into realms they couldn’t possibly comprehend when they were only children and your father chained and bound to an island all because of what the Gods feared they could do. Yes, you’re a monster but only because you choose to be.”
Sköll probably would have spoken, and he had seemed to remove any ideas of hostility as he had been listening to Twilight once more. Sadly, this brief moment of peace was interrupted as a lightning bolt split through the skies and a powerful blow from a hammer struck Sköll. He roared out in pain, cursing in the language of the Gods and all Twilight managed to see before she was swept away by powerful winds was this figure, shrouded in lightning...
Author's Note
So... Yeah, starting off In Media Res, if you will. You'll only learn what happened to get Gilda here over the next few chapters...
7: Guilt
So, here Gilda was… Hanging a few inches precariously above broiling bubbling lava wrapped in chains looking towards a massive throne. Atop that massive throne was an equally massive figure about the size of your average two-story house. Humanoid from the waist up, but instead of a human head, he bore that of a jackal’s.
“...Er, apologies for busting in like this…” Gilda laughed nervously as her chain swung her slowly around, some of her head feathers singed by the lava. She coughed and wheezed from the sulfur and the smoke. Was it possible to die in the land of the dead, she wondered? “...But uh, desperate times called for desperate measures really. You know how that is, right milord?” she asked cautiously. “...I actually didn’t mean to party-crash. If I had a choice, I would have taken a left turn at Hades to get to… well, that’s not exactly any of your business is it?”
Gilda wondered if back-sassing the God of Funerals was really such a good idea, in hindsight. Given this guy basically guided your soul to whatever afterlife awaited you, ticking him off was probably not the brightest of ideas.
“I see that you’ve entered my domain as Ra would bring about the light of the sun,” Anubis glowered at Gilda and flared his nostrils, small puffs of fire coming out. “Exactly what is it that brings a mortal like you to the my domain?”
“Er… The very nice internal heating?” Gilda laughed nervously. “Seriously, after spending so much time in Norway, you’d long for a bit of warmth. Brr, that does not do this bird good!”
Anubis raised an eyebrow, an ear perking up at the mentioning of a realm that was not a part of his own. “The realm of Midgard is where you herald from?”
“Technically anyone sorta alive heralds from Midgard really… Even dead Egyptians.” Gilda replied. “Matter of perspective I suppose…”
“And here Osiris told me otherwise, that accursed dimwit…” Anubis grumbled the curse of a thousand unworthy souls beneath his godly breath. “I presume that someone who’s not deceased wishes to escape this realm then?”
“Wanted to just use the Land of a Dead as a little shortcut, you understand. Take this road through the Duat to Niflheim. ...I may sorta have responsibilities to uphold there.” Gilda murmured looking away in a guilty fashion.
Anubis let out a slight chuckle. “Such a cocky bird you are,” he said. “Most who would dare wander into this domain willingly would simply beg for mercy and be seen as little more than disposable,” He stood up and approached Gilda who by now was trying very hard not to let her fear show. Chances were, if Anubis got wise to the things she had done he’d feed her heart to Ammit. She looked to the side of Anubis’ throne. Even now, the small little poodle-sized creature was licking her crocodile lips eagerly. Honestly, she was expecting her to be larger but given she only needed to devour a heart… Actually, come to think of it, Gilda rambled to herself where the Hell was Osiris? Shouldn’t that be his throne?
“You, however, show no fear. You show courage and worthiness,” Anubis commented at Gilda, who had to scoff. She was hardly worthy of anything and she was hardly a brave soul. “The strength of ten thousand mortals flows through your veins.”
“Show no fear…?” Gilda laughed again. “Here I am, standing in front of you -well, maybe not standing but you get the idea- and I’m actually pretty fucking terrified.”
“Then you don’t show it outwardly,” Anubis gave as close to a smile as any member of the underworld’s judgemental service could without sending a million souls fleeing into the dark depths of the abyss. Easily a thousand sharp teeth like swords in that grin. Gilda shuddered. “I will grant you the wish you desire, but be warned that your journey is destined to become a thousand times worse than it is now.”
“Eh, I have a tendency to make great mistakes more often than I’d care for…” Gilda murmured guiltily. “Hell, one’s the reason I’m here anyway. I’m just hoping this one works out in the end.”
“I cannot say for certain if it will.” Anubis’ hands glowed a vibrant white. “What I can say, however, is that Osiris -when he returns- won’t be pleased.” With that, the world around Gilda blindingly bright; the world as far as she could see being nothing more than white.
A few days before…
Twilight couldn’t honestly see the whole point of telling stories about heroics, about her challenging the oh so great Sköll and coming out alive. She’d really blundered into that mess, hoping to actually reason with him. But from the way Thor himself was telling it, she looked like a brave dragon. She laughed bitterly. That was hardly the truth. Desperate maybe, but brave? No… No, she honestly would have given that to Gilda, for following her into Sköll’s domain without even a question.
Lurking out of sight, if only barely, they listened to Thor spinning his yarns to a bunch of Vikings inside a grand hall.
“Ugh… Vikings…” Gilda muttered in disgust beside her. The griffoness was shaking her head.
“And then, the great wolf leaped towards me, but Mjolnir was able to stop him in his tracks!” Uproarious cheers filled the air; mugs rising into the air as songs were sung over other songs. “I hit him with the biggest lightning blast, in the history of lightning blasts!”
“Bunch of slabs of meat with barely a brain atop their heads, only thinking about the next village to rape and plunder…” Gilda continued. “Building armor, axes, and boats. About all they’re good for. Give me Greeks, give me Romans any day!” she muttered to herself looking skywards as if to pray to some other pantheon to free her from this chaos.
“Oh, I suppose they’re not all that bad…” Twilight remarked taking a bite out of a huge turkey leg. “They cook well enough,” she remarked moaning in pleasure.
“And here I thought it was the men whose only way to their hearts was to their stomachs…” Gilda commented with an eyebrow raised.
“What, I’m a dragon. I need my meat!” Twilight shrugged.
“Yeah, but you wouldn’t want to ruin that long, lean figure of yours would you…?” Gilda teased. “No, instead you want to stuff yourself fat! You’ll barely be able to fly by the end of tonight!”
“Oh, and I presume you like my figure…” Twilight teased Gilda stuttering and sputtering out denials while Twilight laughed her head off. Gilda grumbled something under her breath. Damn dragon, she thought to herself.
“Oh, my dear Gilda…” Thor commented. “What on Asgard is the matter with you? I personally find this a merry gathering of souls! Verily!”
“...I don’t,” Gilda grumbled. ”And what’s the matter?” she hissed out pulling Thor out of the hall and into a side room Twilight following. “I’m surrounded by the biggest collection of oafs ever since I met Naiads on Colchis!”
“Oh, you get used to them…” Thor commented with a small smile.
“I don’t want to get used to them,” Gilda hissed back with Twilight watching this whole exchange with an amused smile and eating more of her meat. “They’re a pack of stark raving idiots, that’s what they are! Oh, when I went to take a… Well, you don’t want to know what happened to the plumbing! And oh, did I forget to mention they have no concept of silverware!”
“Oh, woe betide the griffon hen who doesn’t like to see silverware destroyed…” Twilight commented rolling her eyes. “I wasn’t aware that they enjoyed such things.”
“It’s silver! It’s not the item itself, but what it’s made of! They’re blunting the bloody stuff, making it unusable! Have you not heard of where we came from?” Gilda asked. “Arimaspians, central Asia! That’s where our ancestors came from, and the Arimaspians were who we feuded with over the spoils of the mountains!”
“...Basically, you’re annoyed they’re ruining your precious silver to hoard then?” Twilight deadpanned. “I didn’t think you’d even have the ability to start up a hoard. I thought you wanted to see the world!”
“Yes, but after this is all over? I’m settling down Twilight. Me, and a whole bunch of gold. Maybe meet handfed to me by beautiful maidens I kidnapped from Princes.” Gilda commented stroking her chest feathers with a talon.
When Twilight stared at her in shock and whispered: “But I thought…?”
“Oh for Muspelheim’s sake…” Gilda grumbled to herself. “Don’t give me that poor sappy oh woe is me puppy dog eyes… I’m a griffon. We don’t do good. We only look out for ourselves and that’s the end of the matter!”
“B-but you said you’d be with me to the end…” Twilight murmured close to tears as she thought back to a couple of nights before.
“Listen, never tell yourself that okay?” Gilda asked Twilight, smacking her upside the head. “Goddess only knows why I’m saying this, as I’m not exactly the soft and mushy sort -Ask anyone I know!- but nobody’s insignificant. That includes you Twilight.”
“Yeah, you say that, but compared to goddesses and titans and spirits and all that, I am rather insignificant. I’m just that small, compared to well… something like that!” Twilight said, pointing to Sól’s sun just barely peeking through the clouds.
“So?” Gilda shrugged her shoulders. “Listen, take this as you will, but everyone’s small compared to the sun. You need to be you right now, whoever that is, and not worry about your size compared to a goddess’ own. Everyone has their part to play, you just need to find yours. So, I ask, what is it?”
She remembered Gilda’s words to her back then, the griffon being her rock throughout this entire journey. And it was all… She stumbled over the words scarcely able to believe them. It was all an… act? No, it couldn’t be. It just couldn’t. Could it?
“Yeah, to the end till I find a nice stash of gold and gems which your mother will undoubtedly reward me with when I return you home!” Gilda snapped back. Thor had found it wise not to interfere between the two and their spat. Between Twilight’s flames and Gilda’s claws, it was probably not a wise choice to interfere. “Newsflash Sparklebutt, we griffons are not nice creatures! Open up your eyes, wake up and smell the roses! I’m only doing this for the reward. That’s the only reason I’m keeping you safe, not because I genuinely like you or anything!”
Twilight stifled a sob, before flying out through the nearest window.
Gilda rolled her eyes, before looking up at Thor who was giving her a staunch look of stern disapproval.
“Oh, what?” she commented. “If you’re going to chew me out, do it to someone who actually gives a flying feather about what people think of her!”
“I was going to do no such thing,” Thor replied. “I was merely going to stare at you until you decided to go and apologize.”
“Oh, oh so you’re guilt-tripping me then?” Gilda replied. “Newsflash! Never worked on me before, and isn’t going to start working on me now.”
Granted, Gilda admitted Thor staring at her was a bit more effective than anyone else doing it, given the smell of ozone in the air, and the lightning crackling in his eyes. And was that thunder she heard in the background?
“...Okay, so maybe the ‘stern look of disapproval’ shtick does work…” Gilda murmured fearfully before she unfurled her wings -and if it was a little bit quicker than she normally did, Thor refrained from commenting on it- and flew after Twilight. It took her a few minutes, but she found her on a small collection of rocks just off the island shoreline, trying to hide her tears with her wings.
When Gilda tried to approach, understandably a small blast of flame was sent her way singeing her head feathers.
Truth be told, Gilda wasn’t entirely sure where she stood on Twilight. She was a nice enough dragon, if not a bit naive but that made her easy to use for her own ends. Truth be told though, Gilda didn’t particularly care for dragons all that much given that they often rivaled griffons in competing for riches.
But then again, looking at Twilight now, curled up on some rocks sobbing pathetically… Gilda… Well, she had to wonder if all treasure really was silver and gold, and was using Twilight actually worth it in the end? And she did promise to the dragon who claimed to be Twilight’s mother to protect her.
Of course, what Celestia knew or rather didn’t know probably wouldn’t hurt her… would it? After all, if her precious daughter got lost along the way towards wherever she called home then what would it matter? Gilda could say she tried her best to help guide her precious daughter home but the whims of the Moirai could not be avoided.
Gilda, keeping her distance continued to think. By the Primordials, this was ludicrous. Why was she sticking her neck out for a dragon she barely knew? And then there was what Twilight was trying to do. Help out Fenrir, who in an old poem… well, it sorta said it all.
“Then is fulfilled Hlín's second sorrow, when Óðinn goes to fight with the wolf, and Beli's slayer, bright, against Surtr. Then shall Frigg's sweet friend fall.” Gilda murmured to herself… Really, if Twilight was a smarter dragon, then she wouldn’t involve herself in the affairs of the Æsir and just try and find her way home by herself.
“But that’s the thing isn’t it?” Gilda thought. “She doesn’t even know where home is does she? She needs the help of allies, no matter how strange or distrustful to find her way back!”
Personally, in Twilight’s position, Gilda would have tried to have made the best of what she had and just carved out a life somewhere out here. Well, maybe not exactly here here as it was filled with gods and monsters and other grand schemes, but somewhere that wasn’t quite her home but she could make it so. Be pragmatic, or more realistic about things. Because quite frankly, what were the chances Twilight would know her real home even if she found it?
“This is foolish!” Gilda muttered to herself. “It’s like helping to lead a blind horse to a book! They’ll never be able to read it, and in that stead, Twilight would never recognize her home even if it danced up to her nude and bit her on the ass!”
So why was she helping her, Gilda had to ask herself. Really, this entire thing was just nonsense and a good way to get killed before she even reached middle age! And what did she get out of this? Treasure? Well, maybe. But probably not a lot, and this again presumed she was even rewarded by this Celestia presuming she was ever found.
“Oh… By the Gods… What is the matter with me?” Gilda muttered before she flew down towards Twilight, and pulled her tight into a hug as the dragoness sobbed.
As dawn broke, the search was resumed. At least, that was the plan anyways. Thor was having none of it. “You presume to track Sköll once more?” he asked. “You would be fools to do so!”
“Yes, but-”
“Twilight, Thor’s right,” Gilda commented. “We can’t kill him. He’s a little bit beyond us I should think.”
Twilight gave her a withering glare. Apparently, she still hadn’t forgiven Gilda after the events of last night. “As she very well should…” Gilda thought to herself looking away in shame.
“I didn’t say kill Sköll,” Twilight replied. “I want to reason with him, tell him he doesn’t have to follow the myths people have written about him. He and Sól… Well, from the way he talked about her, he truly seemed to love her and Sól loved him back.” Twilight sighed sadly. She wanted to get these two back together. Call her a hopeless romantic, but it seemed… right.
“Hello, did you not hear Sköll?” Gilda sighed in exasperation. “He seemed rather adamant that if people thought him the monster than that’s what he’d be!”
“Always the cynic, aren’t you Gilda?” Twilight deadpanned. “Never considering there are possibly other paths one can take in life.”
“Oh, if you only knew…” Gilda thought to herself wondering if she should voice Twilight’s other option.
“I must admit,” Thor commented. “Learning of a relationship between Sól and Sköll is truly… surprising. But I cannot forbid it. The heart wants what the heart wants I suppose… Unlike my father, I am more lenient on things, and truth be told I was never pleased with what he did to my brother’s children…” he muttered. “If what he did has truly led us on the path to the Götterdämmerung then I must try and find a way to change fate. Perhaps maybe, just maybe Ragnarök can be halted.”
“The fact remains though,” Twilight replied sternly. “ Sköll must be halted one way or the other. We cannot let him go around, killing innocents. No, that should never be an option!”
“I like your spunk, Twilight Sparkle!” Thor laughed uproariously. “You remind me of the Lady Sif! A true warrior. That being said if you attempt to go after Sköll as you are… You will surely be killed.”
“...Then I presume you’ve already got a space in Valhalla picked out?” Gilda deadpanned before Thor gave her a nasty glare and began muttering ancient magics under his breath. Twilight’s scales rippled and glowed before they lit up a bright purple and she tilted her head skywards firing a powerful blast of magic through the gathering storm.
Now, Twilight mused to herself. Now, she was ready. Eying a thick fog bank that seemed to take the shape of a wolf, she flew towards it, eyes narrowed.
Twilight’s heart pounded like a drum as she rocketed towards Sköll, the magic of the Æsir sparking off her every so often like purple flares and carving a blazing path through the fog bank.
Something… something moved just out of her field of vision. Something black, canine shaped. Twilight’s eyes narrowed. Sköll. It could be none other. Then she heard it.
Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.
Beating out a crescendo of noise that seemed to fill the air around her. The low drumbeat-like sound continued to echo.
Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.
Twilight’s eyes widened in realization at what it had to be. A heartbeat, belong to something much larger than herself. Her whole body shuddered, quivered in fear as her thoughts ran wild. Was this really such a good idea, she wondered. Sure, she felt the power and the might of the Æsir coursing through her very veins making her whole body feel awash with power, but Sköll… He was much larger than she and had far more experience thanks to his years.
Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.
There it came again. That awful, horrendous sound. Twilight shuddered in spite of herself.
“So… Your mind is made up, youngling?” Sköll’s voice —his echoing, thundering voice— boomed out as cold air gripped Twilight from talon to horns. “You still seek to challenge me, young lindworm?”
He laughed once more, a horrible sound resembling that of a hurricane. Below the fog bank, ruined villages could be seen. It was as if a massive claw had carved a path through the longboats and homes and rendered them to ruin.
“Well, I must give credit where it is due. You are a brave one. A stubborn one. Possibly the most stubborn little lindworm I’ve ever seen in ages! Perhaps even more so than your mother!”
Twilight’s eyes widened in shock, and she briefly froze in place.
“Y-You… You know of my mother…?” she whispered.
“Oh yes. She would always try and fight the cold. To fight my embrace. Believing that, through conquering adversity she would find completeness, and that her young would be able to rise to any challenge placed before them,” he stated, seething yellow lamp-like eyes glaring into Twilight. “Sadly, she played the odds one too many times, and look where it got her. I had to send her away from this land. I did not want to, you understand. She was a good friend, with a heart as warm as the sun. Celestia… she, in fact, convinced me to ask out my future wife. But this was not her land, it was mine. Now you, the offspring destined to overcome those very same odds stand before me. But why do you fight me? To fight what has been preordained? Surely, you must know that if I do not bring Ragnarök, then another god will. There is no stopping it.”
“Is that what the mortals say, or is that what you believe?” Twilight asked of Sköll. “Are you just following what the myths and legends tell you to because they tell you it is what you must do, or are you doing this because you want to?” she asked. “Sköll, I’ve come to bargain! Leave the mortals alone, and I promise you, I will get the Æsir to believe you are not a threat and oblige your marriage with Sól!” Twilight explained.
“As much as I would appreciate a clear name, The Allfather would never believe you. You are a simple dragon. To talk to the gods is a holy and divine blessing, not a negotiation to prove that someone is not evil,” Sköll turned away. “I appreciate your efforts, but the Allfather and his followers will never listen to you. If anything, they might sentence you for speaking heresy of one of their own. You don’t want to end up like Hel did, the offspring of the God of Mischief himself?”
“No, but I have spoken with both Sól and Thor, and Thor actually agrees to your marriage!” Twilight pleaded. “He blesses it!”
“If you want me to stop, then prove Odin wrong. Change the Allfather’s mind. That is... if he will even want to speak with a drake from the mortal world…” He turned his back to Twilight. “If you can pull off this miracle, I will cease harming mortals.”
“I… I cannot,” Twilight admitted. “At least not right now...”
Inwardly, she doubted Odin would even want to speak with her, given she’d made bargains with Fenrir to try and regain some knowledge of her past.
“Do you know the definition of honour, Twilight Sparkle?” Sköll asked. “Honour, is to be recognised for what you do, to be appraised for what you do, and evaluated on everything you do. If I am to gain honour in a life of destruction and heartbreak, then I shall do it.”
“Honor! That also means to give adherence to what is right or to a conventional standard of conduct! This, if anything is anything but honorable! This is just rampaging against the mortals, for telling stories about you!” Twilight pleaded, hot tears staining her cheeks. “Please… Sköll, don’t prove to the mortals you are every bit the monster they say you are!”
“It is too late for that. Odin has decided I am a monster. The Allfather demands my death. And you are his messenger. His assassin from the throne of Valhalla,” Sköll turned back, the winds whipping up as he bore his fangs toward her. Suddenly, Twilight realized how bearing the magic of the Æsir must look to him. “That is my fate. My fate is to die at the hands of a god. Or rather. A god’s puppet. If you are to kill me, Odin will pardon your crimes for conspiring with my son. If not, at least you have validated his point, proved his stubbornness is the only way to rule a pantheon.”
“So… That’s how it is… is it?” Twilight whispered. “I… I just wanted to let you know I tried to reason, tried to talk. But as it seems you want nothing to do with me, and just want to be a monster. So it means I must play the role you have given me… Sköll, son of Fenrir, the fame-wolf and the fen-dweller. I must play the role of the dragon who stops the monster.” she laughed bitterly. “Ironic isn’t it? For years, we dragons were always the ones doing the pillaging, and now… I must save everyone from someone doing just exactly that!” she whispered sadly with Sköll nodding in agreement and looking away briefly in shame.
“Truer are the words of Odin. To let evil be cleansed by holy pyre, led by the hands of Valkyries or noble heroes. There is to be only good in this world. To let the balance tip over and let Odin reign supreme in a world governed with nothing but light, completely expelling any and all who do not fall within that category,” Skoll howled, the skies darkening all the while. “If that is to be the case, then I will stop Odin’s words from poisoning his fellow gods and mortals. I will save everyone from the Allfather’s wrath…”
As Sköll and Twilight went to battle, purple flames lighting up the afternoon skies Gilda flew towards the site of battle, wings spurred onwards by a force she couldn’t quite understand and heart pounding like a drum. Why she was heading towards this fight, she didn’t know. Maybe it was guilt, for abandoning Twilight and telling her how she was only a means to an end the night before or maybe it was something else. She wasn’t sure.
The battle was easily visible even though a thick fog bank. Flashes of purple and white flame were visible in the distance, and Gilda could have sworn her eyesight was better than it usually was. She could make out a small figure darting to avoid massive claw strikes, then igniting the claws with purple flame. The residue left over from each strike coated the ground, causing all sorts of havoc for the land below.
“Twilight…” the griffon then whispered, just dodging ice shards sent her away by Sköll, who seemed determined to keep her away from the battle.
“Stop young one,” the monster wolf’s voice rang out in her head. “I will not have any more caught up in this battle. I do not want any more casualties than I have already committed. Killing one more innocent… I will not stand for it!”
A thick wall of ice jutted up in front of Gilda, stopping her dead on in her tracks.
“La vinteren gå gjennom huden din!” (Let winter run through your skin!) Skoll called out, causing a violent snowstorm to burrow into Twilight, the snow slicing her wings and skin, sapping her strength all the while. “Hvis jeg skal dø, så i hvert fall, vil jeg dø utføre handlingene avbildet av Allfather!” (If I am to die, then at least, I will die performing the actions depicted by the Allfather!)
Gilda punched the ice wall over and over even as she heard Twilight roar out in pain. “Hold on Twilight, I’m coming!”
Why she thought she could stand against the wolf was a good question, but she knew she had to help Twilight… somehow.
As for the dragon herself, she melted away the snow sapping away at her strength with a burst of fire. Her next action was to send a powerful blast of hot purple flame into Sköll’s face making him let out a howl of pain.
“This is pointless, Sköll!” Twilight continued to plead all the while. “You are only proving yourself to be the monster all the mortals said you to be! What would Sól think!?!” she shouted.
“Odin proved I was the monster all the mortals said I was! He violently attacked me, banishing me from Valhalla and forever depicting me as a scourge on existence!” Skoll retorted. “He is to blame for the road I have walked. Do you still have faith in a god who exiles those because of their titles? Of their destinies? Of their birthright?”
“Never… never said I did!” Twilight agreed. “What Odin did to you and your father was wrong, yes! But now, you are only vindicating him! I ask again! I ask what would your wife Sól think?” she asked tears once again staining her face. “What, I ask, would she think?” Twilight demanded.
Hesitation. That’s what she sensed in Sköll at that moment. He did seem to be thinking those words over, and he had relented in his onslaught. And if Twilight didn’t know better, she heard what she could have sworn to have been muffled… sobbing? No, that couldn’t be. Could it?
Gilda heard the sound as well. How could she not, being as close to the battle site as she was. She continued to tear at the icy wall in some desperate attempt to break through and reach Twilight, but no matter how hard she sliced at it, it still wouldn’t even chip for her.
“What is the point in existing? What is the point in life if all we exist for is to be judged, to be cordoned off to a particular aspect thanks to a one-eyed man sitting atop the throne of heaven?” Sköll asked, looking into Twilight’s eyes. “What is the point of anything if we are doomed to be dealt a losing hand?”
“We manage. Life hurts, and it manages to punch us when we’re down more than a few times than we’d like, but you know what we do? We pick ourselves up off the ground again. We prove that we are not fate’s puppets.” Twilight soothed rubbing her claw gently across Sköll’s face and through his fur. He had turned from mist into a more physical form and was now a giant black wolf crying, his tears forming patches of ice on the ground wherever they hit. Despite what a monstrous creature he was Twilight could feel only pity for him.
“How will Odin feel about all of this? To know that I am defying my fate?” He asked, his claw reaching into hers. “If he knows that I have strayed from my path, all in the name of love for Sól. He will bring Gungnir down upon me, in an attempt to erase me from existence…”
“And how do you know Thor and Sól will not attempt to argue in your favor?” Twilight asked. “Do you give up so readily? Fate isn’t what is decided for us, not by a long shot. No, it’s what we make of it.” Twilight stated.
“But fate is created by the Allfather. He marks the roads that we are all to walk. We might choose to ignore our fates altogether, but in the end, Odin will have the final say in everything,” Sköll sighed to himself. “If you divert from your path, Odin will find you. Then you will have to prepare for what comes after.”
“If I must face the Allfather himself, then so be it!” Twilight stated. “Blasphemy or not in his lands… Well, to put it simply he can go vögeln himself. Him and the horse he rode in on.”
Gilda’s jaw dropped from behind the ice walls as thunder broiled in the sky above. And with one single bolt of lightning, the wall of ice was shattered entirely, shards raining down onto the world below. puncturing everything that they struck. Gilda was thrown backward by the force of the blast and slammed into some rocks slipping away into unconsciousness.
“And what horse would that be, Twilight Sparkle?” A voice split the air around them. A voice they both knew all too well. Or, at least Sköll knew all too well.
“Oh, sche…” Twilight hissed, biting her lip. Karma was one of the biggest bitches she could have thought of. No, not Karma she realized. Spies.
“It would seem that perhaps you dare to challenge me. To challenge the nine realms and the order they stand for…” Odin appeared before Twilight in another flash of light, Gungnir in hand and All-Seeing Eye clear as day. Two ravens, Huginn and Muninn flew above him. Twilight realized they had probably been watching her every move since she awoke in these islands. “For conspiring with that of Fenrir and now of Sköll. It would seem that their evil is poisoning your mind. An evil that I must eradicate.”
Sköll growled fangs bared before standing in front of Odin. “And what would you do to her? Drop her into the sea like you did Jörmungandr? Bind her to an island forevermore like you did my father? Throw her into the lands of the mists like you did Hel?” he demanded.
“I would simply have her exiled from the mortal coil. Gungnir driven into her heart, expunging her flesh from this world.” Odin pointed the spear at Twilight, runes beginning to light themselves all the while. “Someone who is willing to conspire with the actions of two gods who will bring about the end of the world is to be put down. To be destroyed before they commit to the darkness they harbor. The darkness you harbor, Twilight Sparkle.”
“And you are any different?” Twilight asked. “You threw and bound Loki’s children into fates they did not ask for, all because of some prophecy that may or may not come true! You created your own worst enemies! You created your son’s killer!” she shouted, the flames on her back broiling hotter than ever. The little charcoals in her heart had ignited into a blazing inferno.
“That’s enough!” Odin howled, lightning pouring down all around him, knocking Twilight into the nearby mountain. “I will not listen to your words of treason, Twilight Sparkle! You are a mortal! A Fleshling! One who is nothing more than a martyr willing to die for a cause that is unjust!” He darted towards her, Gungnir poised and ready to strike. “On my honour. No, my DESTINY as the Allfather, I will see you and those who stray from fate DESTROYED! ”
Lightning lit up the air, and all went black.
Daybreak. Gilda had heard of the news from Sól, who had screamed and blasphemed at the heavens shouting untold curses towards Odin. She sobbed for a good hour or so after the news came to her. She had failed to protect Twilight. She had failed.
Her eyes still wet with tears, she looked out towards the horizon where Sól had created a beautiful display of sunlight and clear skies to mourn for the loss of the dragoness who had tried so desperately to save her lover. As for what happened to Sköll, nobody was sure. He had not been seen since. Maybe Odin had killed him as well, or maybe Sköll had vanished from the lands forever in shame and grief. Grief for Twilight, and shame for not protecting her and being the indirect cause of her death, to begin with.
“So… So what do I do now? How… How do I break this to Celestia?” Gilda asked her breath ragged before a voice answered her.
“Hello Gilda,” a male’s voice replied. Gentle and warm, but still firm like that of a hardened warrior. “Do not grieve. All is not lost…”
“Don’t… Don’t grieve?” Gilda asked snapping at the voice. “Twilight’s dead, and all because I couldn’t-” she started before choking back another sob.
“You couldn’t protect her anyways, you know that…” the male stated and Gilda growled at him.
“Don’t you think I know that? That was the Allfather himself who smote her! And now…”
“She is in unknown lands. At least… At least to you. But not to me. I can be your guide to where she now resides. Hello Gilda, my name is Horus.” the voice explained and Gilda’s eyes went wide in shock. No, it couldn’t be… could it? And yet… this would explain the strange dreams and feelings she had been having. Why her vision was greater than normal now, why she had dreamed of Seth.
“Okay then… So what do I… No, we do?”
“Listen well…” Horus began...
Author's Note
So yeah... that just happened. Yep, that happened. Twilight's dead, and Gilda is Horus' host. Also, huge thank you to Shadowmane for providing a voice to Sköll and Odin, and because I forgot... To Vertigo for Anubis in the last chapter.
So, what now? Speculations and critique are welcomed.
Author's Note
So... Time for Egypt's pantheon to join the fray...
9: Horus
Personally, Gilda was downright dumbfounded on how she could possibly sharing a body with a God. Sure, some things made sense now but it still came at her like a shock. Surprisingly, she was taking this rather well all things considered. Or maybe her brain had numb from all the rather stunning things that had gone on in her life as of late, so what was one more to add to the list eh?
“You know, you really don't have to treat this as such a bad thing you know!” Horus crowed. “You know you should be honored! Playing host to one of the mightiest of Egypt's pantheon! It was me who fought Seth hand to hand to avenge our fallen brother Osiris, after Seth had slaughtered him brutally so!”
Gilda vaguely remembered in some tellings of the legend Osiris was, in fact, Horus’ father and Seth’s as well. But in others, he was their brother by Nut and Geb. Egypt myths were funny in that way really Gilda mused. “Surprisingly, hosting people is looked down upon!” Gilda mentally screamed back at Horus even as she trudged along the sands of a beach, washed up Viking longboats littering the coastline. “So excuse me if I'm not so pleased to be playing host to your mind.” Gilda deadpanned. Horus could only chuckle.
Further on up the shoreline where the sand turned to dirt and grass and stone were various huts. These huts were glowing with fires alight within and songs sung of mourning were wafting out of them. The tunes of course, were for a certain brave Dragoness who dared challenge the mighty Sköll. Gilda’s eyebrow twitched when they dared mention Odin smiting her as the end result for the foolish dragon. She had half a mind to go in there and slice them all to pieces.
“Oh, you have such a fire within you. You almost admire me of my sister in some respects. You would make a great pharaoh. Trust me, it can be done! Just ask Hatshepsut. Oh, when she put on that fake beard I was stunned as the next God…” Horus began to ramble and to his credit, he quickly seemed to realize this and cleared his throat with a coughing sound. “But I'm veering off topic anyways. You would have realized you were playing a host body to my essence sooner or later. I'm glad you realized as soon as you did. Otherwise, that would make certain things particularly troublesome. Trust me Gilda, last thing either of us want is for us to be stuck in a battle against the forces of Chaos and you not be able to defend yourself with the proper combat magics. All because you didn't realize you didn't know I was here and thanks to me you can use them!” he stated. “Let's face it. I'm awesome aren't I?”
“Yeah… awesome. Always wanted to be possessed by a god!” Gilda ranted to herself throwing her forelegs skyward in frustration.
“Oh, you are hardly possessed! Hardly!” Horus laughed. “We gods can exist in many different places at once. I'm also inhabiting a few shrines to me as well amongst other places alongside you! And trust me, you will be grateful for my presence in the journeys to come!”
Gilda laughed bitterly. “Oh, if you were here… me? Grateful? Oh, now that is a laugh! Where were you when Odin smited Twilight with that damned spear of his?”
“I thought you didn't like her? That you only saw her as a means to an end? A sizeable reward?” Horus asked raising an eyebrow.
“Maybe at first, and maybe I still do in some ways. But she was still the closest thing I ever had to a friend and her mother entrusted her to me. And I broke that promise. The least I can do is make it up to her… somehow.”
“Like I said,” Horus nodded sagely. “You would make a fine pharaoh. Or at least a fine royal consort…” he mused and even as Gilda balked in indignation Horus continued on. “But I confess, the reason why I did not help you when I did was because I was scared. Scared of all the Allfather and his power. And… scared for you really.” he admitted and Gilda’s beak hang limply in stunned silence.
“Scared? Scared for me?” she asked.
“Yes, quite. And I mean this in the nicest way but you are a weak little vessel. Odin would kill you easily. And I… I would be banished deep into the Duat possibly taking years to claw my way back out again. If even that!” Horus explained to her and if Gilda felt any offense at being called a weak vessel she decided not to say anything. Best not to argue with a God in any form. She’d seen where that could lead.
“The… the Duat?” Gilda asked in confusion. “Um, Lord Horus? A little help here? What exactly is the Duat?” she asked showing as much respect to Horus as she possibly could.
“Lord Horus… I like the sound of that! Possibly even better than King Horus!” the god in question murmured to himself probably rubbing his beak in thought. “But yes… anyways. The Duat. How best to explain it to you in a way your mortal mind could comprehend… Ah! I know!” he cried. “Look out to the horizon. What do you see?”
And so Gilda did exactly as instructed looking out to the horizon and seeing as far as she possibly could. Mile after mile of ocean, mile after mile of water only broken up now and then by the odd island or so. “I see… water. Just endless water. Few islands here and there but mostly wate…” Gilda began before her eyes widened in realization as she slowly figured out what Horus was starting to get at. She might not have been the brightest griffon in the world, like classically book dumb if you will but given time she could figure certain things out. Just at times took her a minute, that was all.
“Exactly. You see the sea. And in some ways, that is exactly what the Duat is really! Just a sea of magic and realms, or islands if you will in this analogy. You pick things up fast little hatching!” Horus appraised. “Anyways, these realms could be various things. Places where the gods could exist in their true forms incomprehensible to man or deep dark chasms of Chaos where demons dwell and we are too afraid to venture. It exists beneath the waking world with many layers and regions, like the Land of the Dead for instance. Cultures all over the world have different names for it. The Norse, for instance, calling it Muspelheim and the Greeks know it as Tartarus. You starting to get the picture?”
Gilda felt a headache coming on from all this new information. “Ugh… yeah… sorta…”
Horus ‘hmmed' to himself before speaking once more. Gilda thought he also made mention of the glory of his precious Amaterasu, her dwelling Takamagahara and a place between worlds called Ashihara no Nakatsukuni that humans also knew to be the Duat but she suspected she might have been imagining things. Horus and his ramblings had all become a bit of a blur honestly.
“Yes, I do admit it is a lot to take in at once. I hate having to explain everything so quickly. But time is of the essence now. Now that you are aware of your status the forces of those loyal to Chaos will be after you.”
“Great… wonderful. Fans,” Gilda stated dryly. “I’ve never felt so loved in all my life…”
“Oh, it could be worse…” Horus trailed off. “You could be in Sobekneferu’s position.”
“...Er, I dare to ask, but who is…?” Gilda trailed off not sure she really wanted to know given the tone in Horus’ voice.
“Sobekneferu,” Horus repeated. “Final pharaoh of the Twelfth Dynasty of Egypt. Also a woman. Name meant the beauty of Sobek, although why anyone would consider that reptile beautiful is beyond me…” he murmured to himself. “Anyways, my sister Nephthys played host to her, and sadly Sobekneferu was a woman of fire like yourself while Nephthys was a water goddess. As you can probably imagine, it did not end well trying to teach her the ways of the gods and the forces of chaos were soon to overwhelm Sobekneferu and end the Twelfth Dynasty. Met a ghastly end she did, ghastly… I do not want the same fate to meet you hatchling, understand? Sadly, time is limited if we want to save your mate’s spirit.”
“She… Twilight is not my mate!” Gilda screeched out.
“She isn’t?” Horus blinked in confused. “Funny, I must have been mistaken given your interactions… Ah well, it happens I suppose…”
“And what do you mean time is limited?” Gilda inquired.
“Ah… Right. I suppose I should have mentioned this… Silly me! Maʽat, I’m getting as absent-minded as Thoth, the old bird!” Horus muttered mentally facepalming. “Yes, her spirit rests in Niflheim but it does not have long before it is impossible to retrieve. 48 hours I believe if I remember correctly…”
“And you couldn’t have told me this before?” Gilda screeched out at Horus. “You… You… GAH!” she growled out too angry at Horus for words.
“It slipped my mind okay?” Horus said trying to sooth the raging griffon. “I’m not perfect! Anyways, she can be retrieved. It won’t be easy, heroic deeds never are of course, but it can be done! All we need to do is slip into the Duat and use it as a shortcut to Niflheim, that’s all.”
“Why would she be in Niflheim?” Gilda had to ask.
“From my understanding, that is where Hel rules correct?” Horus asked and Gilda nodded in return. “Okay, it’s basically the homeland of primordial darkness, cold, mist, and ice. Not a very nice place to be by any stretch of the imagination. Ever heard of the phrase “A cold day in Hell?” ...Well, now you know where it came from. Normally, warriors who die in battle in Odin’s domain are sent to Valhalla, and normally Twilight would fit these criteria,” Horus continued to explain. “However, given she ‘defied’ him obviously she would not be sent there. No, he would send her to the worse possible place he can imagine and for him, that would be the birthplace of one of his mortal enemies. Ymir. Plus, Hel is not a nice woman even at the best of times. She’s of both fire and ice, literally a split-personality. Met her Niflheim side once and… Well, needless to say, I’d rather not meet it again…”
“So basically, Twilight’s being tormented by the Gods knows what…” Gilda murmured her wings flaring out in anger and the ground beneath her glowing in green hieroglyphs. Only briefly did her eyes change to both gold and silver. If Horus took notice -which he undoubtedly did- he made no comment on the subject.
“Anyways, first things first… we need to find a river. That is the only way to the Land of the Dead. Or we could have someone create one for us, but most of the Gods here do not like other pantheons intruding on their lands so… Uh, doubtful they’d be willing to help us especially if they were to learn what we plan to do,” Horus grumbled before muttering something under his breath about unhelpful old fogeys who really needed to get up off their backsides. “If I was in a more powerful vessel, I’d use my awesome abilities to split the earth in two and make a river erupt but sadly we are not in that position. So, we must find a river and then take a longboat down it into the realm of magic.”
Gilda looked around the beach and gestured to the many smashed longboats around them. “Well, thank the Gods that we are not short of those!” she told Horus who didn’t seem to particularly care that they were all smashed to ruins.
“Meh, this isn’t exactly a problem. An absence of rivers is one thing, but broken boats? Please, you don’t know how many pharaohs were poor sailors! Oh, trust me Ramses the Great may have been a powerful king, but sailor he was hardly so ‘great’. There’s a reason he always kept a court magician on his boats. ...I do hope he paid him overtime. Alright, crash course in Egyptian magic! First, think of a crook and a frail. Classic tools for magic this! Are you thinking of them?”
“Y-Yes…” Gilda murmured and Horus smiled.
“Good! Now summon them to your grasp! These are your wands for lack of a better term.”
Gilda thought up the image of a classic pharaoh’s crook and flail, and soon found them within her paws. “Now… Now what?” she asked aloud.
“Hi-nehm! Join those two boats, over there!” Horus ordered briefly taking control and Gilda’s eyes turned that odd silver and gold combination once more. Releasing his control over Gilda, she could only guess Horus’ first word was a spell of some sort.
“Hi-nehm.” she said pointing the crook and the frail at two longboats and to her shock she watched as they slowly lit up with hieroglyphs before merging together into a restored version of themselves.
“Needs a sail if you ask me, but I think we can work with what we have…” Horus muttered. “Maybe a few dashes of paint, eyes on its bow to keep the demons away. My eyes are very powerful protection glyphs you know…”
“Yeah yeah… Will you stop talking about yourself for a minute and actually-”
“Find you a river, or tell you how to split the earth?” Horus stated cutting Gilda off. “Well now! I can’t do everything for you. Otherwise, how will you learn?” he asked and Gilda was forced to concede his point.
“You do realize we are on an island, and therefore there would no point to a river geologically speaking right?”
“So? Continents are islands aren’t they, and yet they have rivers…” Horus replied.
“Yeah, much larger islands. This place is puny really,” Gilda argued in return growing quite fed up with Horus’ attitude. Horus, in turn, was sorta fed up with hers as well.
“Must you complain about everything?” he asked. “Now, go ahead and fly around this place. You have wings remember, use them!” Horus remarked. Gilda wanted to scream. Having a God in her head making snide remarks, useful as they were at times was going to get old really quickly she decided. Especially when that god was quite arrogant and talked about nothing but himself at times.
“You know I can hear you right?” Horus commented as Gilda flew over the island, past some rocky cragged hills and over a ruined village that had been partially submerged by powerful floodwaters. “If you’re thinking on insulting me, you might want to keep your thoughts to yourself. Just sayin’.” Horus remarked.
Ignoring him, Gilda continued to explore the island. Eventually, she did stumble across a tiny river that seemed to trickle down into the earth itself presumably into some underwater cavern somewhere.
“Well, that wasn’t so hard now was it?” Horus remarked. “Granted, getting that boat over here might require a bit of effort but you’re a strong enough griffon so I presume pulling something isn’t that hard for you is it?”
Gilda grumpily grabbed or possibly stole a bit of rope and tied it to one end of the longboat, wrapping it tightly around the dragon figurehead. Gilda smiled slightly in a sad manner as she looked upon the figurehead noting how much it looked like Twilight before giving the rope a sharp tug gently pulling the longboat forwards. Inch by inch, minute by minute she slowly pulled the longboat up to the river. While she did this, she noticed a familiar chariot with a familiar figure made of flame commanding it.
“Oh, it’s Sól,” Horus commented. “Haven’t seen her in ages, not since the last godly basketball game. Won with quite a free throw, I might add. So she got to be the sun goddess for the next few thousand years.”
Pulling to a halt up alongside Gilda making sure to diminish her flames as she did so Sól then stepped out of her chariot. Striding over to Gilda she waved her hand over the griffon, and Gilda then felt the magic of the Æsir flowing through her as her veins began to glow a burning yellow.
“Any particular reason why you’re doing this?” Horus had to ask. “My magic is perfectly strong enough for Gilda as it is!” he commented briefly taking control again. Gilda was really beginning to hate that.
“Way I figure it,” Sól commented. “A member of my family did this to Gilda, so I must help make it right. Besides, the mists of Niflheim are very treacherous, and as that is where you are presumably going I figure you must have the power to light the way.”
“Seems fair enough I suppose…” Horus agreed his silver eye glimmering dangerously in the sunlight. “I’d just rather you didn’t fill my host with too much magic and blow her up!”
Gilda’s jaw dropped at this possibility.
“Relax Horus, I know what I’m doing… This old fogey as you call me hasn’t been alive this long by being stupid!” Sól returned cheerfully and Gilda cackled at the remark and Horus’ annoyance at being caught. “Probably going to face Hel from Odin after this, but I owe Twilight a grave debt for helping me with my husband. I intend to repay that in full. If that means helping her mate, then so be it…”
“I’M NOT HER MATE!!!” Gilda screeched stamping her foot with wings flared out in anger again as both Horus and Sól laughed their asses off.
“Fare thee well, Gilda Grimfeathers, and may the Gods be with you…” Sól said before returning to the skies once more. Needless to say, Gilda hoped those Gods were of the Egyptian variety.
Eventually, the raft found itself crashing up against a shoreline, and from that shoreline on came a large temple. Gilda nervously swallowed as she looked up at the temple walls, carved in pure obsidian. “...Wow, someone likes their black. Emo much?” she remarked with a small chuckle.
“I’d avoid you disrespecting Anubis’ hall,” Horus muttered. “Ra knows the dog gets all huffy as it is these days with Osiris gone. This used to be his hall, you know? Before one day, he suddenly just… vanished for lack of a better word, leaving the young -by god standards anyways- Anubis to tend to Ammit the Devourer and the Scales.”
“...Yeah, I’d suppose I’d be more than a little cheesed off if my boss suddenly decided to go on vacation without warning and just leave me his job of all things.” Gilda said as the two strode forwards into the hall, green flames suddenly igniting without warning on either side of them in twin braziers.
“It’s… more complicated than that,” Horus said trying not to meet Gilda’s eyes. “It wasn’t like you said, Osiris didn’t suddenly just decide he was tired of his job and wanted to pass it on to someone else. It was… well, one day he was here going about his business on the throne, judging where souls went and if Ammit should devour them and the next? Gone, no traces left behind.”
Gilda studied her ‘host’s’ tone. He sounded… was that sadness she heard in his tone? No, it couldn’t possibly have been. The Horus she knew was cocky beyond belief, arrogant even. This one was like a completely different person… er, bird. But then again, spending the time around him as she had been, it had given her new perspective on certain gods and how they worked.
“Who was he to you?” Gilda asked knowing she was probably treading on dangerous waters. “I mean… who was he to you? Brother, friend? Something more?”
“The stories conflict. Gods you see, well… we end up repeating familiar cycles in different bodies. It’s like we cannot learn any better. Once, Osiris was a loving father. The next cycle he was a brother for me to fight alongside, my best friend. Our bodies, or at least some of our memories are… recycled I’d guess you’d call it for the next generation,” Horus explained. “Now, I don’t know if it’s like this for the other pantheons out there, though it would certainly explain a lot with the ones like the Aztecs’... But for us? The way we’re set up, it’s almost impossible for us to learn something, retain it for the next lifetime, and then go on and use that knowledge. Take me and Set, or Seth or whatever you want to call him. If we could learn from our conflicts we could probably change for the better, move on and be unstoppable.”
“But-”
“I’m getting there,” Horus said holding up a talon. “Now, yes, you can wonder why I remember some bits and not others. There’s like a mental ‘block’ on certain parts of my memory. Hurts to even think about my past incarnations. I suspect it’s there for a reason. Think about it,” he continued looking Gilda dead in the eye. “If you could remember everyone who you ever were, it would drive you insane would it not?”
Gilda could only nod and whisper out a faint: “...I… I suppose…”
“Now imagine what it would be like for us Gods, who are eclectic beyond comprehension and at times utterly indescribable. I’m talking about you know who, that big guy. Him. Different religion, yes but you get my point yes? What if He had other incarnations, what if He remembered them?”
“...Now we’re just delving into the metaphysical,” Gilda muttered. “But then again, aren’t all Gods in a way part of the metaphysical?”
“...Yeah, let’s not even go there,” Horus said as the halls became pitch black, illuminated only by hieroglyphs. Gilda found herself reaching out towards one of them. Horus shouted out a warning. “Wait, don’t!”
Gilda looked anyways. She saw a burned scarred land, suddenly becoming filled with life as glowing figures -utterly indescribable- strode over the land. She suddenly felt a tug and was pulled back into the Hall. “What… What was that?” Gilda asked taking a deep shuddering breath.
“The very beginnings of time, where we gods walked the earth in our purest of forms. If you had spent any longer gazing into that… I shudder to think what might have happened,” Horus said. “Come along now, best not to dwell in this place for too long.”
“This place?” Gilda asked. “What is… this place?”
“All of Egypt’s history, thousands upon thousands of years. The Greeks and Norse like to think they’re ancient? We came first, before they were even babes in the womb.” Horus said and not for the first time it set in upon Gilda on just how truly ancient Egypt was. Centuries passed and all but in the blink of an eye. The golden ages of Egypt, then the fall. The rise of the House of Life, the greatest of sorcerers. Gilda had to stop and blink just for a brief moment when she saw a man dressed in robes, staff in hand with a serpent by his side in a great hall. Her eyes widened. Was that… No, it couldn’t have been.
“Yes, that was exactly who you thought it was,” Horus confirmed with a nod. “Moses as you call him. The only foreigner to defeat the House in a duel. Come now, long ways to go yet. Hopefully, Anubis can be reasoned with…”
“What, we can’t just explain why we’re here?” Gilda asked. “I mean, surely your word will go a long way…”
“Maybe, maybe not. Like it or not, your Twilight is dead. And despite the circumstances of her demise, bringing her up from the land of the dead would go against the natural order. And Anubis does love his order…”
“Wonderful…”
“You must understand, the natural order is paramount. There was once this fellow in Greece, Sisyphus. Chained up their death god under his bed just so he could cheat death. As a consequence… disaster. Nobody died, not even in wars. Can you imagine the entire cycle of life and death set off just so? Even bringing one person… er, dragon back from the dead may have dire repercussions.”
Gilda said nothing.
“Just something to think about,” Horus said before his eyes narrowed. “He’s here.”
And the shadows began to gather, as a massive jackal rose up out of the floor...
A rushing of nearly blinding color met Gilda’s eyes as soon as she descended into a sea of magic, as if she burst through a cloud cover and soon she was on a river of pure broiling lava. The boat was eyeing things left and right even as it was battered by the waves and at several points was nearly sent spiraling into a craggy outcropping of rock. Gilda held back her lunch that was threatening to make a very ghastly return, purple lightning crashing in the ‘sky’ above.
“Yeah, this is the Duat for you,” Horus observed appearing alongside her in a faint golden glow. At some points, he was a man, another a falcon and at others a mix of the other. It gave Gilda headaches just looking at her. “Constantly chaotic. Course, it’s not supposed to be like this for us.”
“H… How so?” Gilda dared to ask as she was sent smashing into the side of the boat by the tumultuous power behind the river.
“Well, you’re only supposed to enter the Duat in an allotted number of ways, you see?” Horus explained manning the helm cursing slightly at how uncooperative the boat seemed to be. “This is like us just smashing through a door without asking and so we don’t get a proper greeting if you will.”
“...You couldn’t have told me sooner?” Gilda asked and Horus turned back to look at her with his mismatched eyes burrowing into her soul.
“You want to save Twilight or not?” Horus asked. “Look, time is not on our side here. I’d almost ask if we could bargain with Khonsu over a game of Senet for a couple more days here but I’m not so sure that’s a risk we should take. His deals, they always have a sort of price if you lose one of his gambles.”
“...Something tells me I’d really rather not know, to be frank…” Gilda muttered to herself as she regained her balance.
“Try losing your soul and becoming a vegetable,” Horus muttered sourly. He sounded bitter, almost like he knew what it was… No, Gilda decided against pressing the matter even as she fought back a shudder. “That’s a common price if you lose something to him. Oh well, no risk no reward right?” Horus asked brightening back up.
Then a shout of “LOOK OUT!” as several massive rocks came collapsing down from the ceiling and Gilda went for her crook and frail reacting almost as if on instinct.
“Ha-di!” She bellowed with each rock glowing golden before shattering in explosions sending rubble flying everywhere.
“Good, you learn quickly!” Horus appraised even as a massive pillar fell down from a higher level shaken free by the constant earthquakes. Again Gilda reacted.
“Khe-fa!” she screeched even as a massive fist of golden energy slammed into the pillar shattering it in two with what remained falling into the lava below.
“...I take that back. You learn very quickly,” Horus mused with a small hint of pride in his tone. “I’ll make a godling out of you yet!”
“Yeah, well don’t let it go to your head, okay?” Gilda remarked. “I’m using this magic to save Twilight and that’s all got it? Hardly interested in becoming the next ruler of Egypt. I have no interest in Ma’at or whatever.”
“You are a stubborn one, you know that right?” Horus remarked. “I like that in my hosts, they don’t give in to my demands so easily. Trust me if you were a weaker sort I could very well easily use you as a puppet to carry out my whims.”
“I’m flattered,” Gilda deadpanned. “You think you could try hiding being a pretentious dick any time soon?” she asked.
“Hmm, thinking on it,” Horus remarked. “It’s not really an appealing thought. Personally, I like the way I am. It’s gotten me this far in life I should think, so why the hell should I change now?”
“...Might win you more friendliness from me, so there is that…” Gilda trailed off in thought and Horus sighed to himself.
“Look, it’s not so easy for us to just change our lives as it is for creatures like you,” he said with what Gilda could have sworn to be a hint of sadness if she didn’t know any better. “We’re long-lived, we end up repeating cycles time and again. Me and Seth, we keep on reincarnating and in new relations every time. Once he was my dearly beloved uncle, and another time he was my father. And every time we end up against another. Patterns, cycles. That’s the way of life of a God.”
Gilda if she didn’t know better felt… what was that? Pity? No, surely it couldn’t have been. That was completely ridiculous. The Gods had been no friends to her as of late so why should she be feeling any form of pity towards them? No, Gods just used mortals as their playthings like some sort of cosmic horror story and that was an end to it.
Still, she had to admit what Horus was saying made a certain amount of sense. When studying Egypt’s stories she did admit there were certain discrepancies. Stories that seemingly conflicted with one another. And this certainly explained a lot.
Argh, thinking about this just gave Gilda one massive headache she would really have rather avoided. Floating over a lava fall and descending down into a deeper section of the duat she looked to her left swearing she saw something move in the darkness. She wanted to brush it off as something from her imagination, the paranoia getting the better of her and all that but she simply could not. She blamed her recent experiences for that. Turning back to Horus she raised an eyebrow, her eyes briefly flicking to the shoreline. She’d seen something, she knew that much. Almost canine in nature but she couldn’t make out the full features thanks to how dark it really was down here.
“So, say we run into something unfriendly down here,” Gilda asked. “Aside from my magic, how do we intend to deal with it?”
“My knowledge of magic is… crude to suffice to say. It basically amounts to little more than: ‘Hit enemy with a sword until he's dead. If he rises hit him again. Repeat as necessary.’ That’s it really.”
“Comforting.” Gilda deadpanned.
“Hey, it worked against Seth didn’t it?” Horus asked.
“...And how long did that take?”
“Oh, about seven odd years or so,” Horus admitted looking almost sheepish in Gilda’s eyes if you were to ask her. If a God could even be that way. “But in any case, I doubt we’ll run into too much trouble down here. Anubis is the forgiving sort really. Well, mostly. And hey, I’m here to explain things!”
“Again, comforting.” Gilda deadpanned.
“You’re a real downer, you know that right?” Horus asked as the boat continued gently along its way through the underworld river rowed along by invisible oars. “His Hall of Judgement isn’t so bad. Could use with some color, and a name change I admit. But it does its job well!”
“Don’t you get your heart eaten out by Ammit if you’re found unworthy?” Gilda asked and Horus simply stroked her head feathers.
“Eh, I doubt that’ll happen in your case. Sure, you used Twilight as a tool but then you dived into the Land of the Dead to save her! It all evens out really!” Horus chirped patting her on the back.
“...Geez, thanks for the guilt trip. Pretty sure I deserve it, but thanks for that,” Gilda murmured to herself with a small flinch.
“No problem!” Horus chirped before his face fell as he saw what the boat was currently passing. Souls, gathered along the riverbanks drawn by Gilda’s glowing form.
“What’s… what’s going on?”
“Granddad used to do this, you know,” Horus whispered to her sadly. “Light the way as he changed night to day raising the sun and fighting off the forces of chaos. His forces, the great snake’s. As he traveled here, he brought light to these poor souls, the ones who never made it to the afterlife. He helped them remember what it was like… before. And now… he’s gone.”
Gilda reached out with a paw and placed it on Horus’ shoulder in comfort. “...I’m… I’m sorry.”
“Nothing to be sorry about Gilda Grimfeather,” Horus replied. “There is nothing you could do, and its times long since past.”
“No, that’s not right. They shouldn’t have to suffer like this. Ha-tep. N'dah.” she spoke. These words of the Divine, meaning ‘be at peace’ and ‘protect’ respectively used in conjunction created an effect. A small comforting light shone over the souls and their small campsite and for just a moment if only a brief one they danced and remembered times long since forgotten.
“Thank you…” Horus said though it was barely a whisper.
“...Don’t mention it,” Gilda said. “Ugh, this kindness. It’s probably going to be the death of me someday, I suspect!”
And once again Horus thought with a fond little smile the old Gilda had returned.
This would be an interesting journey he noted. And it was always nice to have a friend or two by one’s side as they braved uncertain odds. Made things all the more worth one’s while. It was a comfort even. Now he saw why Twilight never wanted to travel alone. In this world, it paid to have someone by your side, whether as a confidant or perhaps something… more. He did have to wonder what Twilight saw Gilda as when she was alive.
“You nodding off Hor?” Gilda asked.
“Me? Never!” Horus crowed. “Wits about you now, we’re passing through another cataract!”
Then the waves picked up again as the boat was once more bashed around by the powerful forces that seemingly had no end. Lightning flashed in the sky above as the winds picked up seemingly trying to force the two back. But Gilda had enough of this nonsense and with a burst of magical energy created a bubble around them protecting them from the waves and wind at least for a time.
“Not sure how long I can hold this creation,” Gilda warned. “We’d best get a move on before this magic expends itself! Already, I can feel cracks. N'dah!”
And sure enough, as she said this the battering waves were creating small cracks in the shield that surrounded their boat. “Oh, did I ever tell you about Prince Khaemwaset?” Horus said launching into one of his long rambles to seemingly calm Gilda and empower her magic. Fear did not lend itself well to casting spells you see. A calm state of mind was what was needed. “One of the first real Egyptologists you see! Restored tombs and buildings. Yes, he stole a book of Thoth, but he returned it after seeing what was to come as consequences!”
“Dare I ask?” Gilda remarked although there was a ghost of a smile on her face.
“Eh, married a beautiful woman only to see her kill his previous wife along with their kids, and then said woman turned out to be a withered corpse. All just a dream you see but it scared him straight! Thoth is not to be trifled with let me tell you!” Horus rambled. “Also one of the few people to brave the Afterlife, like yourself. He learned that a rich man’s funeral does not make up for any wicked deeds a man did in his life.”
“...Do all your myths have some sort of lesson?” Gilda asked.
“Well… Yes. After all, myths are stories and they do form the foundations and boundaries of fledgling societies…” Horus trailed off. “Is this not the case with Greece, whom I know griffins hail from?”
“Yes… Yes, that is quite true. Let me tell you a few stories about Zeus, okay?” Gilda began. “Oh, there was this one time this one idiot impersonated him. Ran through the streets on a chariot and such… Ended up with nobody ever wanting to populate that town again…”
“What the…?”
“Trust me, it’s quite a tale. It all begins with Zeus’ hatred of being humiliated or impersonated you must understand…” Gilda began as the boat continued on down that long wandering river...
Author's Note
One, sorry for the long wait. Life happened, along with my other pieces. Two, yes all the stories explained here do have a basis in myth. Trust me, well worth the reads.
