Misc. Scribblings

The knife pierced sallow skin and she let her blood pool on the bronze plate. Bottles of ink stood ignored on the table as she dipped the quill into the blood.

Her hand moved with quick, manic movements as though separate from the rest of her which trembled with the foresight's feverish heat.

Her handmaiden fled the chamber to fetch the priest and when they returned the seer lay sprawled on the floor.

"Thiliadis!" The maid dropped beside the seer, placing a hand to slender neck. "She's dead, lord."

Aphedirion waved her to silence as he read the words which were only now drying.

"Where the Sun rises, so shall the Elf-foe. The six princes will tremble at his name. A son of the Cunning One. And bringer of doom."

The Elf-foe would come from the East then, and those savages who dwelt there.

It had long been foretold, but never so soon. Already the Year of the Hare was coming to a close. In mere months the Year of the Fox would begin.

"Hush your weeping, woman! Fetch Laugnir, I need his warriors." He barked at the maid.

Dark.

Bloody cold too.

Rik sat and his head struck something hard.

"Dyarr's teats!"

Rik groaned.

Was he in a box?

Memory came back to him.

A troll?

He'd won but he was hurt.

Hurt bad.

Pushing he moved the stone aside and stood up.

In a burial chamber.

"What did that ******* wizard do?!"

They were kicking the kenku, who in mimicry of a woman's voice was crying for them. It was a painfully good copy, and that voice alone would have been enough for Pence to get involved. The fact they were the Empress' men were just an added bonus.

"Oi, leave him alone." He shouted as he walked towards them.

A six foot copper skinned dragon-man is usually enough for people to walk away.

But the soldiers were drunk on power and cheap ale.

They had weapons.

They had the numbers.

They had shit for brains.

"Clear off, scaly! Or I'll make you into a handbag for my wife." The dumbest one said.

"This doesn't concern you, reptile!"

Pence smiled, revealing rows of gleaming fangs. One of the more sensible, or more sober, soldiers was sidling away from his fellows.

It's always good to have a survivor to tell the story, Pence thought.

"You know, hatred of those different to you always strikes me as daft." Pence said, conservationally.

The kenku took advantage of the distraction and crawled clear.

"But it's especially stupid to be nasty to someone who can breathe acid."

He blasted a cloud of burning vapour at them, drawing his sword so he could finish the survivors off.

"Piss off." Taru growled. "I'm not gonna die."

On the fourth day it landed and walked towards him.

"Yer wasting your time. I'm too dumb to lay down and die."

On the fifth day it landed on the supine form, cawed and lowered its sharp beak.

There was a flash of steel.

"I did warn you." Taru mumbled as he started to pluck the bird.

Raw buzzard? He'd eaten worse.

It was unlike him not to visit.

Their custom was for him to visit upon the full moon. They would eat and talk all evening before he returned to his home.

She set out to search for her son and crossed the hills and fjords, but there was no sign.

Coming to the place men called Heorot she saw why.

Hanging above the door of the hall was an arm torn from its body.

She knew the arm.

At its end was the hand she had held when teaching him to walk. The hand that had clung to her after the sounds of men's revelry had pained him as a child.

The hand of her only son.

Displayed like some gory trophy.

"Grendel!" She roared in pain and fury.

And inside the hall the skald fell quiet, and all the men froze for a deep terror seized them at that awful bellow.