Reflections in the Far-North

[satin 7600]

Spoiler

 

 

 

HERMAÐUR had ventured far. He had travelled to every nation, every city, every palace. He had been to every coast, seen every village. His warning, he reckoned, could not be spread more thoroughly.

 

In truth, he had been a little disappointed. Knowledge had a habit of sullying the imagined image of a thing. Far-away nations, cultures, peoples - like Aaun, like Vikela, the Azdrazi even - now, they all seemed as grubby as the lowliest fishing village. They were all mired in their politics, their proclaimed greatness. Even things supposedly ‘holy’, like the Scrolls, now just seemed variations of what they proclaimed to be sinful. Or they just baffled the mind, and pretended that obscurity leant things sincerity. 

 

The Far-North was better. Hermaður understood that now, gazing at the snowy hillsides with the collections of pine trees, their scent cleansing the mind and restoring clarity to the Knight:

This is where you belong.

 

And he embraced that truth. He could feel a wind blowing from the South, and beyond the mountains, he saw the Eclipse lowering itself down the mountainside. The Night-Eternal would continue. He did not especially love the sun, but he feared what its devourment portended: the coming of Dragons. Heat, and fire, was obviously anathema to a man such as himself, a warrior of the North, pacted with the Witches. He feared the coming age. He feared it greatly. The North would need protecting.

 

. . .Perhaps Aptrgǫngu-Maðr is the answer.

 

But he banished that thought as soon as it came. The Witches had revelled at its return. They had built shrines to it, and he had spread the word, warning of its coming, but he could not love it as they did. They were undead; the scent of rot and decay on the Beast’s breath could not sicken them as it did him. He had mourned, watching as the animals had fled from the North in the wake of its return. He had seen flocks of birds change course upon hitting the snowy realm - like some sort of invisible barrier barred them. Even though he knew no such thing existed. Even though he knew it was simple fear that kept them at bay. 

 

It might have kept him at bay, too, did he not know that his duty extended beyond fear. That was what separated the bestial from the sane: 

 

Duty. Purpose. 

 

The Witches held a pact over his life, and he could not abandon them. It was only by their hand that he had lived. That man, the green-eye’d War-Priest of Haense, had questioned him sharply, but he did not understand the North. He did not understand that there were vows and promises that were sharper than even a Thanhic blade. He did not understand the nature of the Far-North, and even if he had told him, he would not have understood. None of the Southerners could. 

 

It is not something that can be told, Hermaður decided, sitting on his horse and watching as a singular snowflake landed on the tip of his finger. It is something that must be experienced.

 

But his love of the North was not incompatible with the South. He saw that now. The Witches were bound to devour the realms of men: it was simply their nature, to hunger, to feast. He himself had almost fallen to their insatiable gluttony.

 

They wanted to eat the South. He wanted to blanket it in snow. And why not? It was a beautiful thing, the Far-North. Holy beyond measure. And casting a Winter over all the realm did not necessarily mean the deaths of those living within it. Truth be told, Hermaður did not particularly want to end mankind. He held no grudge against them, no hatred. They had not disgusted so much as disappointed him, but that was alright. He had measured them by too great a scale. They were not Northern. They did not live by the North, and therefore fell short.

 

Only one thing had yet managed to disgust him: The Beast of Skjoldier. And it had clearly disgusted the rest of the North, too, who had fled at its coming. So he hated and despised it, and despised the Witches, too, though for different reasons. Unchangeable reasons. 

 

But for now, he would remain in his pact with them. It was what the North demanded. So he turned his steed, stroking its shivering mane and murmuring soft words. 

 

Not much further now.