It wasn’t uncommon for battleborn to try to breed with fireborn. Many thought that such a union would produce a race of superior beings, great warriors capable of wielding magic. It was well known that fireborn couldn’t bear children, but it didn’t sway some from trying anyway.
Freya sighed as she began spreading the incense over the corpse, crushing the brittle sprigs and sprinkling them on his face, torso, and legs.
The caretakers stood silently behind her, heads bowed as if in prayer.
"Gods of the earth, gods of the sky," she began, speaking with the weighty reverence she’d heard from the High Aesir many times, "gods of the sea, and gods of the beasts and men, heed these words from a humble servant as one speaking from the flames." She traced a line on Raynar's forehead, marking him with the rune of death. "Accept this warrior into the Immortal Halls. Do not bar his way, but welcome him as a son of Norvaask, a strong and honorable warrior. May he serve your wishes in death as valiantly as he served in life."
Dusting off her hands, she set the fireweed aside and took a draft of flame spirits. The clear liquid burned as it washed down her throat, and immediately smoke began to leak from her mouth and nose. It was an uncomfortable feeling, one that she doubted she’d ever grow accustomed to, but she bore it stoically as she peered at the corpse before her. Raising her right hand, she summoned a ball of fire.
-5 Magic Points.
Within seconds the room was alight with an orange radiance that cast back the lingering shadows.
"May the Life-giving Flame guide your path, noble battleborn," Freya intoned, careful to keep the fire away from the combustible incense. "May its light be a beacon to you in the hereafter, a guide as your soul wages eternal war." With her left hand, she plucked a single golden hair from Raynar's head, then fed it to the flames. "Let our words be heard," she concluded. "For one day, all will return to the cold."
"All will return to the cold," the caretakers repeated solemnly.
Freya took a step back to observe the prescribed moment of silence, releasing her fireball and letting it dissipate. She wasn’t in charge of the cremation. That would be performed tomorrow in front of all the highborn. The flame spirits still boiled in her stomach, and the smell of decay was making her nauseous. If she didn’t eventually burn away the excess potion, it would consume her from the inside out.
I'll cast another fireball when I leave this place, she thought, rubbing her arms for warmth. It's as cold as the Ice Barrens down here.
The low temperature wasn’t enough to prevent Raynar's body from decomposing. When they transported him from off the tundra, he’d been frozen solid, his flesh as hard as stone. In the days that followed, he’d gradually thawed out, making him stink like rotting meat.
As Freya stood, counting the seconds until she could leave, she noticed something strange about the wound on his belly. The torn flesh seemed to ripple faintly, like a hand moving slowly beneath a blanket. She frowned and took a step closer, at first thinking that she must be imagining things. Then, she saw it again, a subtle movement beneath the fleshy surface. Her stomach convulsed, and for an instant she thought that there might be maggots making a nest of his innards.
Not maggots, she thought in revulsion. What in the frozen Hel?
The skin parted and a tentacle slithered out, pitch black and covered in slime.
Freya leapt back and screamed as Raynar's eyes snapped open, revealing a hazy glow the color of pure amethyst. He lifted his head and spat out the iron ore, sending it and the coins clattering to the ground. Another tentacle emerged from the back of his throat, waving in the air as if searching for fresh blood. Three more sprouted from his guts, twisting and wriggling like eels made from living darkness.
The caretakers began shouting, demanding to know what was going on. Freya ignored them. She was too focused on the monster in front of her—the draugr.
Raynar lurched to a sitting position, spilling oily black fluid from his stomach cavity, and turned his dead-eyed gaze to Freya. His jaw worked silently around the tentacle as he slid off the slab and began shambling toward her, his hands outstretched as if to grab for her neck.
She shoved the caretakers out of the way and turned to flee, then suddenly remembered that she still had flame spirits churning within her. Cursing herself for a fool, she faced the threat head on and began to draft. Flames burst into her open palms, radiating with a heat so intense that it singed her sleeves.
Flaming Grasp
-10 Magic Points.
14 Damage.
She hurled the spell at the draugr, hitting it square in the chest.
The force of the impact sent it reeling, tentacles writhing as they smoldered and popped. The flames multiplied, completely enveloping Raynar's body even as it struggled to renew its attack. Soon, it was a walking inferno, a horror beyond recognition.
Fireweed Combustion
1d12 Damage per second.
The caretakers cursed, covering their ancient faces from the heat. Even Freya staggered back in terror as the draugr thrashed about, trying desperately to remain standing.
After a few seconds, the monster sank to the floor, the flames guttering out on charred, blackened flesh. The tentacles crumbled to ash as the draugr collapsed, its purple eyes fading to nothing. Soon, the corpse was burning softly on the stones like a dying campfire, destroying all evidence.
Freya took a deep, shuddering breath to calm herself and immediately fell into a fit of coughing.
Frosts take me, she thought, covering her mouth to block out the foul smoke. That thing, that creature, was real! Gods... Jarl was right.
The caretakers, both coughing as well, blindly staggered to their feet. Of course, neither had seen the draugr. One of them turned a skeletal face toward Freya, expression tight with outrage. "What... have you... done?"
Chapter 20
Unlikely Allies
“If not for their reliance on the lowborn and their need for the battleborn to keep order, they would have enslaved the world long ago.”
—Memoir, Rune Plate 5
Jarl's back itched. It was by far the worst part of his injury.
Gritting his teeth, he tried his best to ignore the maddening sensation, but his work made it almost impossible. Weeding the mud fields was a tiresome job that required a full range of motion. His spade did most of the work, but he still needed to bend and twist to pull the weeds from the muck, actions that tugged painfully at the wounds on his back.
The Freeze was coming, which meant the mud fields would be closed until the Melt. This, in turn, meant that the hundreds of lowborn mud farmers who worked the fields needed to prepare for frostfall, harvesting the last of the crops and clearing out any remaining weeds.
Jarl hoped that his lashings wouldn’t split open. They’d only recently scabbed over, and they were still quite tender. One wrong move, and he would bleed through his shirt and need to have salve spread over them again. That would mean another day of being idle.
To Jarl, that was essentially the same thing as imprisonment.
Halvard hadn’t been gentle when he flogged him. Although Jarl suspected the war leader could have killed him if he wanted to, he still carried out the punishment as custom demanded. When it was over, Jarl was bleeding from ten long gashes that ran from shoulder to rump, and he had to be carried like an invalid to his home in the Dregs. His mother had wept when she saw him, her eyes filling with tears as they deposited him on her doorstep, but she immediately began taking care of him. She cleaned his lashings and bound them to the best of her ability, making him a special bed near the hearth and singing to him while stroking his hair.
Even after days of Jarl lying uselessly around the longhouse, Myrna didn’t inquire about her son’s injuries. It was as if she could sense his shame and didn’t want to bring up any painful memories. She merely went about her business as if nothing were amiss, cooking meals and working at the mill every morning.
That left him alone with his mute grandmother, but h
e didn’t mind. He didn’t feel much like talking to anyone.
The whole debacle with the Clan Lord had hurt Jarl’s reputation among the highborn, but the worst damage was to his pride. He’d failed. Norvaask was poised to attack Jotungard with all its strength and the draugr would be allowed to roam the tundra, growing in number. Hjalmar will be disappointed, he thought, shaking his head regretfully. Perhaps the Old Man can succeed where I failed... but I doubt it.
During his time of healing, his mother had reminisced about days long gone. She spoke fondly of Horik, his father, and the games they’d played together when Jarl was a child. She pointedly avoided bringing up Freya, though, as she knew that would cast a pall over their conversations. Her words conjured fond memories in Jarl’s mind, and that helped to keep the darkness at bay—at least for a little while.
Despite the severity of his wounds, Jarl had recovered in a matter of days, enough to move unaided around the longhouse. Being a battleborn, it seemed, had its advantages. It wasn’t long after that he decided he was well enough to go back to work.
The mud fields would help keep him from going insane from boredom.
Health Points: 20 out of 26
Afflictions: Flogged Back. Disadvantage to Strength and Agility rolls.
Health Points capped until fully healed. Too much movement can result in Bleeding.
"I'm telling you, she kissed me!" Dag insisted, forcefully driving his spade into the muck. The others scoffed, their good-natured banter pulling Jarl out of his reverie.
"Come on, Dag," Fisk challenged. "The only way Gyda would have kissed you is if it was too dark to see! Either that, or she was too drunk to tell you apart from her pillow."
This prompted the others to burst out laughing, and Dag threw a shovelful of mud at his gap-toothed friend. "You never believe me," he complained.
"We never believe you because you look like a troll," Arvid replied, chuckling.
"I do not," Dag grumbled, scratching his flat nose with a grubby finger.
Jarl smiled faintly as he continued to work, his back protesting with every movement. He’d been rather quiet since coming back to the fields, but fortunately, his friends didn’t push him to talk. They’d all heard about what happened, of course. His actions and his subsequent flogging were the talk of the entire clanhold. However, the four of them knew Jarl better than anyone else in the world, so they knew when not to broach a subject. Only Erik had gotten him to open up. He’d come the day after Jarl was brought home.
"I'm so sorry, Jarl," he’d said, pale-faced and emotional. "I didn't mean for you to get hurt. I was just worried about you, and so I told Freya you left. I'm... I'm sorry. I shouldn't have..."
"It's all right," Jarl replied tiredly. "It wasn't your fault. They would have flogged me regardless, whether Freya had found me or not. They can't stand the idea of a lowborn rising above his station."
They’d talked for hours that day, and Jarl told him everything about his adventure on the tundra. When he mentioned Hjalmar and the draugr, Erik listened quietly, his expression betraying nothing. Afterward, Erik told him that he believed his story, but Jarl could see the skepticism in his eyes. That was the hardest part. He couldn’t even get his best friend to believe his tale.
He was a complete and utter failure.
Erik stayed close as Jarl worked in the fields, glancing over with concern any time he dug out a particularly stubborn weed. It was like he was fragile, a man made of clay. Everyone regarded him like he might break at any moment, which was ironic considering how much his stats had improved since levelling up.
"We'll have our pick of all the women, soon enough," Fisk said with a grin. "With all the battleborn leaving, they're going to be looking for men like us to comfort them." He shot a glance at Dag, then added, "Well, maybe not you, troll face."
"Shut up," Dag growled, flinging more mud in his direction.
"I wish I could be there to watch the fighting," Arvid remarked wistfully. "I'm sure it’ll be a legendary battle."
"I wonder what’ll happen," Fisk said. "Do you actually think we’ll be able to defeat Jotungard?"
"Of course!" Arvid replied. "With the Shieldbreaker, we'll be unstoppable! And I hear Sten Haig will be leading the attack. We'll crush their battleborn, execute their highborn, and take their lowborn as thrall."
"This place is going to be a lot more crowded when that happens," Dag muttered.
"That's kind of the point," Arvid said, rolling his eyes. "With Jotungard gone, we'll be the most powerful clanhold on Njordrassil. Frosts, maybe the Clan Lord will keep going until everyone’s been conquered. Could you imagine that?”
"Ivar Haig doesn't seem like much of a Thane to me," Fisk said. "Talk around the mjöl hall is that he's a broken man, now that his son is dead. He's nothing like Rorik of Wulfgard."
"Rorik of Wulgard’s just a myth," Dag put in. "Just like frost giants and draugr—"
He abruptly cut off and everyone fell silent, all eyes turning furtively to Jarl.
Jarl stabbed his spade into the mud and looked at each of his friends in turn, staring at them until they glanced away. "I know you all think I'm crazy," he snarled, "but I know what I saw. I wasn't lying when I told the Clan Lord about the draugr, and I'd tell him again if he'd listen to me."
"We don't think you're crazy," Arvid said sheepishly. "We're just... unsure about some of the details of your story."
"You have to admit that it does sound a little far-fetched," Fisk agreed.
"I hit my head once when I slipped on a patch of ice," Dag said, wincing and rubbing at his forehead. "For a week, I could have sworn that the hogs in my family's pens were talking to me!"
"They probably were talking to you, Dag," Fisk murmured. "You're one of 'em, after all."
Dag glared at him, but didn’t respond.
"Let's give Jarl a break," Erik interjected. "This is his first day back, and he's still recovering."
"No!" Jarl snapped, more sharply than he intended.
Erik dropped his gaze, appearing stricken.
Jarl grunted and forcibly softened his expression. "I'm sorry," he said. "Thanks for your concern, but I'm fine. I'm just... frustrated that after everything, I'm right back where I started. Nothing’s changed."
"You've changed," Arvid said, prompting nods from the others. "You’ve levelled up, right? And you seem different—older, maybe. Like you've seen things. Frosts, maybe you did see a draugr. How would we know? None of us have even left the clanhold before."
“Yeah,” Fisk said. “You’re a battleborn now! So what if the Clan Lord won’t officially recognize you? You’ve gotten farther than any lowborn in living memory!”
"Did you really kill a raider on the Frozen Terrace?" The question came from Dag.
"Yeah," Jarl replied. “That’s how I levelled up in the first place.”
"How’d you do it?"
Jarl shrugged. "I was just trying to get home. He fell onto a stall and tried to kill me, so I used a scythe to defend myself. It was just dumb luck. He was already wounded, so my Critical Hit brought him down below 0 Health Points. I stabbed him in the neck, took his axe, and ran.” He said it calmly, without any embellishment, yet all of their eyes went wide.
Fisk let out a low whistle. "Frosts, Jarl. You’re a cold-blooded killer."
"Yeah," Arvid said with a wry smile. "Remind me to never get on your bad side."
Again, Jarl shrugged. "It doesn't matter now. I'm a mud farmer, and I'll always be a mud farmer. I'll probably never get to hold an axe again."
"Is that such a bad thing?" Erik asked gently. "We're all mud farmers here. Being a battleborn doesn’t magically make you better than us."
The mild rebuke stung. "It's not about being better than you," Jarl said, avoiding his best friend’s gaze. "You're my brothers—all of you. I'll never forget where I came from. But I can't help but think that I'm meant for more than this." He gestured vaguely at the surrounding mud fields and heaved a heavy sigh. "Like I said, it d
oesn't matter anymore. It's over. I'm done trying to convince the world about things they'll never believe."
A silence settled over them as the Fjondar sluggishly lapped at the shore. They resumed their work, digging with their spades and depositing clumps of weeds into woven baskets.
After a moment, Fisk began chuckling to himself. "At least you got some good stories out of all this. Next time you're in a mjöl hall, talk about how you killed a raider and show everyone your scars. I'm sure you’ll be popular with the ladies."
They continued weeding, returning to amiable topics of conversation as they worked their way through the sprawling fields. Jarl went back to brooding, his own dark thoughts consuming him.
More than an hour passed, and soon, they were coming to the edge of the mud fields. They’d cleared away the majority of the weeds and fungi that had sprouted since the last harvest, leaving the fields clean and ready for the Freeze. As they came to the end of their work, Dag’s uncertain voice drew everyone’s attention.
"Uh... Jarl?"
Jarl looked up to the terrace above the mud fields. There, he saw Freya waiting with her hands clasped in front of her, crimson-slashed robes sharply contrasting the dismal browns of the Dregs. A leather satchel was slung over one shoulder and she wore thick travelling boots. As always, she had a mild look of disdain upon her face, her nose turned up as if to look down on the world around her. This was emphasized by the fact that she carried enough jewelry to feed a lowborn family for a year.
Tension filled the air as soon as their eyes met.
"What are you doing here?" he asked, coldly gazing up at his sister.
His friends shifted uncomfortably and turned their attention to their muddy boots.
Freya hesitated, and for an instant, she appeared less self-assured. "I've come to speak with you. It's a matter of some importance. Can we talk in private?"
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