#traabyrn

Okay, this might’ve been weird of me, but you the moment you see a character and immediately recognize your own traits in it? The way it stands, the way it squints, miniscule microbehaviors that you do and have seen in yourself?

Well, for whatever reason, my brain did and so my trollhuntersona has been updated from trollhunter/changeling, to this thrall - Traabyrn.

Traabyrn came from a largely dysfunctional tribe with clan feuds spanning back generations. Her father was a changeling spy who specialized in building up alliances and breaking up those of his enemies, isolating and vilifying them until their own tribe turned against them. It was simple for Gunmar to take over their tribe, thralling most of her extended family members, while 2 of her siblings joined him and their father on the gummgumm’s side. Only her immediate family and possibly a few of her mother’s cousins escaped the raid, giving them time to escape the barbaric fate Gunmar had in store for them.

Years passed, all of them spent hiding and nursing their injured back to health. Her mother’s new mate had been grievously wounded, handicapping him and his best efforts to serve their little clan. While her mother had also suffered injuries, it was the effects of a slow moving poison that her father had been giving her for years that was breaking down her once strong, stone body. 

As the eldest, it fell on Traabyrn to lead the way, to fill the spaces for her family that her parents could not. It was a... taxing responsibility, one that often left her overwhelmed and exhausted, feeling too inadequate for the job. Soon the weight of her responsibility became too exhausting and she arranged for her family to be cared for by her other siblings while she obtained some time on her own for pondering, reflection, and maybe a bit of rest.

History would show that this was both a foolish and a lucky idea, for when she went out, Traa discovered that they’d once again been followed and found by the gummgumm scourge. Quickly, she reported back, sounding the alarm for everyone in the vicinity as she prepared herself for battle. With the help of her cousins and younger siblings, her mother and step-father escaped into the chasms while she held off the gummgumm scum. But it was not to last.

Exhaustion and strain from overworking in this time of trial had taken it’s toll on Traa’s body, leaving her too weak to defeat the gummgumms. With her small tribe still on the run, her knowledge of their condition, location, and destination, the gummgumms decided to take her prisoner and bring her to their king for interrogating. While held prisoner, Traa’s changeling father negotiated for her life, which was given on the condition that he convince her to become a gummgumm like her other two siblings.

Traa refused to speak with her father, knowing that every word he spoke dripped with poison more cunning and deadly than any draft of creepers’ sun. However, after days without food or drink, the imprisoned troll had one more visitor before her execution; the Dark Underlord himself. Despite her father’s best efforts, she had resisted willingly becoming a gummgumm, but even Gunmar could see how tired she was - not only from her imprisonment, but from the weight of pain and responsibility— An opportunity not to be wasted.

“I can see your pain,” he rumbled. “You’ve run so long, so far, that you can feel nothing but the tiredness around you.”

The blue-eyed troll blinked slowly and looked down at the ground. “Yes...”

“I can see the pains of burdens you were never meant to bear.”

Traa closed her eyes tiredly, bowing her head in acknowledgement, her will too weak for her to argue.

“I can ease your suffering,” the dark underlord murmured, taking a step forward, “ease your pain.”

Traa lifted her gaze. “How?”

Gunmar extended his arm, wisps of blue magic appearing as the Decimaar materialized in his hand. The young mare’s blue eyes widened before a look of tearful, crestfallen realization overtook her.

“You’re going to kill me,” she whispered, her very posture sinking as she spoke. “You’re going to end my suffering by ending me...”

Traa paused and bowed her head, gazing at the floor in front of where she sat. “Well... you have me at your mercy, Underlord, you might as well get it—”

There’s a snap of a blade through rope and the cords binding her to the prison pole fell from her wrists. Traa fell to her knees, eyes wide with shock as the dark stone bull strode out from behind her. She glanced down at her raw wrists, rubbing them gently.

“You spared me?” she asked, turning her attention back to the underlord. “Why? I have no information for you, no knowledge about where my family has gone or what they plan to do. You know this, so... why?”

“Did I not say I would ease your suffering?” Gunmar rumbled, his cold blue eye meeting her puzzled gaze. “You are dutiful to your cause and your tribe, a rarity among trolls now days. Kneel and I will grant you a life without pain or fatigue. A life that you will never have to shoulder the burden of such obligations without a just reward for one so dutiful.”

Traa looked down and rubbed her wrists in thought. Even when well rested, tiredness filled her bones, and even her kin had noticed the faint fractures in her hands that weakened her very grip, all from from pushing herself too hard to help the family. To live without pain, tiredness, or the trembling weakness that kept her from wielding even the lightest of tools...

Slowly she pushed herself up and knelt before the underlord. “I will,” she whispered and bowed her head before the Decimaar.

Gunmar rumbled and with a satisfied grin, extended the glowing blue blade. With a sharp and sudden gasp, Traa was suddenly enveloped by the weapon’s magics and in a fraction of a second, was in a place of impenetrable calm. Black and green armor encased her new coal colored body, and with new strength, the young troll rose, her now green eyes gazing up at Gunmar through the helm of a new thrall.

@chattylittleina

Looking down at the little human, Traa narrowed her green eyes at the thermos before taking it and giving it a deep sniff. The warm smell of hot chocolate wafted up from thermos, eliciting an approving rumble from the thrall.

"Grutega, Ina," she rumbled with a nod. "Is good not to be forgotten."

Traa tucked her chin and stroked the seam of her helmet as she thought.

"Was.... suspicious," she admitted with shrug. "Many say death lies in stone-born shadows. Others say stoneborns' made from souls of dead trolls pulled back from the void to serve under Gunmar. Uskagar one of those trolls—made from mother's heartstone, bear tusk-horns like her."

She looped her hand in a swinging motion around the side of her head, miming the curve of the female captain's mammoth-like horns.

"Terrifying to behold," she said firmly and then looked over, her eyes softening as she gazed into the distance. "But... though they be frightening, and thought bad luck of even, none is true. Though made from heartstone of other trolls, stoneborn is more like... whelp born from carving. Where heartstone is stone fleece joined to mother Gaeta to follow Gunmar and grown full size before all."

The life of a soldier is hard.

But even in the battlefield,

there is no safer place to be

“And Traa says—” There’s a grunt and a sharp snap as a single rock is dislodged, sending the thrall to the ground, the shaft of her spear snapping beneath her. She pushed herself to her knees before looking at each end of her spear and slapping them to the ground. “—Not Fryknae this!”

Traa had been at her post for hours and for whatever reason, she didn't have rations in her satchel. Maybe she forgot them, or maybe (more likely) they got pilfered and she didn't know find out until she went to get them. Either way, she had been standing there, cold, hungry, and almost ready to eat a goblin if she thought she could get it in her mouth without it sounding an alarm.

It's only by the grace of good fortune that Traa recognized Ina before she pounced. Humans smelled so good when you were hungry and Ina so small and tender, the thrall was sure she'd be able to devour her in the blink of an eye. But then she saw, or more accurately smelled the offering. It was staunchly sweet, like syrup, and it was hot. She could see the wafting steam coming up from the oversized cup.

Stowing her spear, Traa carefully took the cup and sniffed deeply. The warm felt so good in her claws, and the smell was so sweet she could almost taste it. Cautiously, she took a sip. It wasn't enough to turn over her tongue, so she took another. Finally she took a good mouthful and let it sit in her mouth before swallowing it.

"Mmmmmmmm," she hummed, feeling the warm trickle down into her chest. "Mmmmmmm.... Forgotten one likes sweet things..."

She had meant to say "forgot" but who was going to correct her English? Either way, she took another pull from her cup before offering the empty thing back to Ina.