A Whalekiller is lost during the aborted heist of a Dragon's hoard, but the Monster is left sightless.
Spoilers for Wolves upon the Coast follow, of course. 950 words.
HEY, NOW HEAR
What the sword and twisted bone of
The Whalekilers – The Wyrm-Unsighters
Did in days gone by,
What deeds made their power.
KNUT the wise, first to run;
BILL, hillock-climber;
PICTIDÓTTIR, Dragon-emblinder,
DUGSON, forburnt Serpent-excecator;
FLED the grasping monks
Of St. Olham;
FOUND the barrow
Of Kindee’s sleeping WYRM;
TOOK a single coin from Its TROVE,
To wake It,
And CLAIMED both its eyes,
But not before It did Dugson IMMOLATE.
Prior:
Pictidóttir’s theft deferred,
Knut’s sermon-nap interrupted,
Dugson innocent of his forthcoming fate,
Monks a-fluster.
God-hating soil-eaters suspected of the coffer’s ravaging,
The abbot’s upbringers, forsworn.
His old master, impalpable and bloody,
Revenging,
The monks believed.
Wolves’ howls distant, too,
Certainly the schemes of these Druids.
(How would the monks afford their wines, their slaves, their calfskins?)
A question of Pictidóttir’s honor and “wise” owner (a voice silenced),
Knut answers not but asks,
“You are not eunuchs?”
The brother exasperated, “No! Our stones remain!
“The Council of Carthage prevents us from taking wives
“But men have needs
“And who would complete the women’s labors here?”
Preparations to defend Olham’s treasure proceed,
And the Whalekillers depart,
Sailing southward to the empty hamlet,
Once Olham’s fish supplier.
Odd seafoam and rotted remains,
Seabirds’ nests and shell-filled hut husks,
“Let us leave here,
Before the night brings what it brings.”
In the rain,
The Sundrgammr finds Ruislip’s end,
A channel crossed to view the island opposite:
A single barrow,
Huge,
Trees cleared around.
The Whalekillers return to Ruislip’s shore,
To camp (Dyndur be damned)
Away from any restless dead.
The middle-night watch interrupted
By four bumbling monks,
Chasing druids, they say,
Begging food,
Speaking of the village Killucan’s
Obligations to the monastery:
Fish, from the river
Not the sea.
The tribute should be amended,
The brothers agreed,
To beef.
Conversation turns to
The seashells of Scanntra
Blamed on mare-men.
“Are they the Druids’ accomplices?”
“That is a good question.”
Not divulging the barrow,
The Whalekillers speak of treasure,
Murky tales heard:
The treasure-sleeper may never be harmed ... by the mundane;
A small, locked book, the hag’s torture chamber;
A rat-king’s tail, vibrating concordantly with nature;
A dusty wine remolding;
One cenobite added a concern to the list:
“Some die in the service of copying codices:
A great honor or a great heresy.”
At dawn the monks besought
Conveyance to Killucan,
But were bade to walk,
As the Whalekillers shove off to their
Fate
Across the strait.
The ground near the hummock
Rumbles,
No trees grow atop.
A mouth, stoned arch,
Faces away from the sea,
Opening into the barrow.
A lantern’s shine
Into the darkness,
Reflects:
Coin and scale,
A slumbering, snoring beast,
Larger than any cow,
More legs than a spider.
“A Dragon” mouthed.
“You should plunder Its fortune,”
Dugson
Tells Pictidóttir.
A plan is formed.
“Steal Dragon’s treasure,” she scrapes in the mud.
The Pictdam strips down:
Handing her creaking leathers to Dugson,
Her coin to Knut,
Her bow to Bill.
The rowers return to the karvi,
Bill climbs the knoll in the rain,
Knut and Dugson stand in the barrowmouth,
The snore’s breeze pushing their hair.
Pictidóttir steps inside.
The Wyrm sleeps atop Its mound:
Coin to fill two knarrs;
Ingots gold and silver;
A golden torus burdensome to two oxen;
A dozen hauberkes and byrnies, scorched;
A bone blade, twisted and toothed.
The Silent clutches the Druid’s necklace,
And filches a single coin
–WHO DARE TOUCH WHAT IS MINE?!--
Knut bolts
Bill hunkers
Pictidóttir sidesteps
And
Dugson transfixes.
All the Wyrm’s legs move,
A blur,
Just missing the Pictdam,
Its jaws piercing the whalerider’s maile.
“I will take out this Dragon’s eye!”
And he does.
Bill leaps from the hill
Planting axeblade in the mud,
And flees for the vessel.
Knut runs onto the sand,
Demanding
The boat be dragged to water.
Pictidóttir drops the coin,
Grabs the bone blade,
Swings at the Wyrm’s haunch,
The wicked, toothy weapon,
Striking nothing, revealing a woman.
The dragon shrieks at Its
Exoculation,
Bathes Dugson in flame,
His head and chest
Cremated.
Knut aboard the boat,
“Wait!”
To anxious rowers,
Bill staggers headlong
Across the sand.
I will kill this Dragon,
Pictidóttir thinks, to the gods,
Her breast swells,
Pride like she’s never known,
Wyrmclaws scarcely felt.
The squirming weapon planted in the Wyrm’s last
Eye.
Fire boiling rain to steam,
She sprints
But,
Even blind It knows her,
And with many legs,
Talons strike again.
She leaves the bony blade
And scurries, angled,
Flames licking but the relic.
Bill aboard,
The rowers stroke,
“Wait!” hisses Knut, less wise.
The rowers stroke,
Knut strikes Bergr’s skull,
And the tide pushes the Sundrgammr
Beachward.
Wyrmward.
Pictidóttir splashing, across the gunnels
“ROW!”
The unsighted Dragon scuttling
“ROW!”
The black Wyrm into the surf
“ROW!”
The water scalding behind
“ROW!”
The mad beast thrashing,
Covered by the waves.
It did not,
Could not,
Follow across the channel.
The Pictdam laying amidship,
Just breathing,
Tears veiled by raindrops.
Hours later:
The Sundrgammr atop Ruislip’s sands,
The wreck of a fishing vessel
On the cape’s far side,
Hamlet smoke in the distance,
Seen through a break in the rain.
“We need the Dragon to guard
Our treasure
Until we get a bigger boat.”
“We must honor Dugson!”
“A contest of strength in his memory!”
Pictidóttir heaves a stone across the sand.
Bill heaves a stone across the sand.
Knut heaves a stone
Its weight judged lackluster,
And he heaves again,
Clearing the others’ tosses.
Bergr watches, skull throbbing,
He should have honored
The Wyrm-killed, too.
The Pictdam spends the day
Scratching a boulder
In the runes of her people.
“With two strikes,
Dugson and Pictidóttir
Put out a black Wyrm’s eyes.”
A glorious, costly deed.
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| Ruislip's End Found |
