Lortober 2022 day 17 - Reverse
Warning: This story contains violence, blood and character death.
RP styled story between Outpost’s and Nix’s starter wolves.
Skyndi: Outpost
Yrsa: Nix
Word count: 1937
Icerun in the middle of winter was supposed to be white and cold.
She couldn't feel the cold any longer, only the warm gush of blood as the one truly good thing her life had ever granted her slowly slipped away from her.
Frodr wouldn't last much longer.
Neither would she, but... she wasn't wounded. Not with anything more than the scratches and bruises that had become ever-present since the Plaguebeasts had started their advance in earnest, at least.
No, she wouldn't last because Icerun was no longer white. It was brown, and red (redredred, why won't the bleeding stop) and black. Brown like the mud of churned ground, red like the blood of wolves that had died in vain, black like the tar that ate away at living things until all that remained was the stain of Chaos.
It wouldn't be long until the Beasts reached the plateau they had fled to; her, Frodr and a pitiful band of stragglers and survivors.
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Yrsa stopped next to her mate to catch her breath. The sword in her mouth was dripping with blood and tar after the numerous plaguebeasts she had slain.
The battle against Chaos was gruesome.
Could it be even called a battle? A slaughter would be more accurate.
It all happened so quickly. The fortress wall had fallen, their home had burned to the ground, their friends….
She shook her head, trying to rid herself of unnecessary thoughts.
Thinking will get you killed.
In times of battle one needs to act.
Fayrn was spirit wandering with Midnight, surveilling them from the sky above. He’d let them know when the beasts came closer.
It wouldn’t be safe here for long, but maybe long enough to regroup and form a battle plan.
She scanned the plateau they had retreated to and her eyes landed on a young female next to a badly injured wolf. Judging from the red stain in the snow beneath them, the injured one would not be long for this world.
She felt her heart ache at the sight.
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Sensing eyes upon them, Skyndi couldn’t help but growl and try to put herself between the watcher and Frodr, hackles rising despite the fact that the Lupin’s gaze did not carry any ill will; rather the opposite. It felt heavy with sympathy and grief and pity and normally Skyndi wouldn’t have hesitated to exploit that, to see what she could wring out from anyone who had the time for pity in an apocalypse, but with Frodr-
With Frodr…
With Frodr slowly bleeding out beneath her, none of that mattered any more.
The world was ending, and it had seen fit to remove the one good thing in it before it was even done collapsing, in what seemed like a triumphant act of spite from Chaos itself.
So all Skyndi could really think of was that this stranger had no place here, in Frodr’s final moments. Had no business looking at him when he was brought so low, had no right to remember him as this broken, pitiful thing, slowly bleeding out.
Frodr didn’t deserve to be remembered that way, not by someone who had never known how good he was, how resourceful and clever, how his careful planning had been the only thing to get them this far.
So Skyndi did her best to shield his bulk with her much smaller mass and growled at the stranger:
“What.”
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Yrsa flinched at the harsh tone of the kit. The smaller wolf glared at her with anger, frustration and pain. Such deep pain. It was a look that she had seen before, albeit never aimed at herself, but she knew it nonetheless. Having spent her early years at a military camp she was familiar with the sight of someone losing a loved one.
Yrsa watched the smaller female try her best to look as large and intimidating as possible, standing between the dying wolf and everyone else. She did not look particularly strong, no obvious armor or weapon as far as Yrsa could see. Probably not used to battle, but she looked ready to fight just about anything at this point.
What? What indeed…
What could a stranger offer in times of sorrow? Compassionate words would just sound like hollow lies. Perhaps leaving them alone at this moment was the best she could....
Wait…weapons…! Yes, that was something she could do.
Yrsa put her dirty sword down next to her mate and instead grabbed her spare that Fayrn carried at his side. She slowly approached the unknown wolf, placing the sword in front of her in the snow.
“May I say the Warrior’s Praise for them?”
The Warrior’s Praise, a final sermon dedicated to the bravest wolves that died in battle.
A prayer for their souls to run across heaven with Orrin in the afterlife, forever strong and healthy. A prayer that their name will be remembered by all wolves in Loria forevermore and that the soldiers of Icerun shall swing their blades in remembrance of their greatness.
It was a prayer her parents had taught her when she was young, a prayer only generals were allowed to say. Back then she had unwillingly learned it because she was expected to become a general herself, although she hated the idea. Now that the world was turning upside down, she felt glad to be able to offer it to mourning wolves. All lives lost during this horrible time were worth remembering.
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Skyndi felt as if all the air had been punched out of her. Her head swam with what she would have suspected was a concussion, had she not known that she was fine-
Frodr throwing himself in front of the blow that would have crushed her skull, his ribs breaking and his flank rupturing in the most Creator-damned sound she had ever heard, and she was fine, fine, FINE but he was not, he was not but he still somehow ran, still made sure they made it to the plateau, because he loved her and she had never ever thought that she wouldn’t want his love but now he was broken and she was fine and she desperately wished he had never met her.
She didn’t have a concussion.
The dizziness and ringing in her ears was- was something else.
Distantly, she heard a voice say:
“You can… do that?”
She only belatedly realised it was her own because the words ripped into her throat like knives.
It was relief that she was feeling, wasn’t it?
It felt… silly. She had never taken great stock in faith, in prayer, hadn’t disbelieved in the Creators and the Spiritwolves, but hadn’t believed it was something that concerned her, either. Hadn’t believed that they really cared about or interfered with lowly mortal lives.
However, like this, at the end of the world, with Frodr bleeding out and his breaths coming in shorter and shorter… like this, she was just relieved that there was something that could be done for him, even if he was beyond saving.
That he might be remembered, might be honoured.
“Please,” she croaked out, “if you can, then please, he-” and here she stumbled, her throat constricting because she wanted to give this strange General all the reasons he deserved to be honoured and remembered despite not being a warrior but no words could ever be enough for that.
“His name is Frodr. I would- he- …please.”
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Yrsa hurriedly grabbed the sword and sat down next to the smaller female. She gently placed her paw on the unknown female’s shoulder, motioning for her to lean on Yrsa and steady herself. Only in times like these would she feel thankful of her large frame. She nodded to the unknown wolf beside her, trying her best to look reassuring.
She then stuck the sword down into the snow next to the injured Frodr, placed her paws on each side of the sword hilt and began her prayer.
“Orrin, great father of Icerun, hear our prayer.
For our brother Frodr’s sword is laid to rest today.
We ask that you welcome him with open paws
and let him join Your Pack in the Heavens.
His kin left on the earth below,
shall remember his courage and honor his name.”
Yrsa raised her left front leg and then swung it down towards the sword, her armguard striking the metal and making it cling like a bell.
“When the swords sing on the battlefield,
we shall remember him.”
she struck the sword again.
“When the snow falls on Iceruns’ mountains,
we shall remember him.”
“When the a new day dawns over Loria,
we shall remember him.”
“To time eternal,
we shall remember him.”
“Orrin, great father of Icerun, let our brother’s soul shine brightly,
as it runs across the night sky
together with You and the ancestors in the Northern Lights.
Forever strong,
forever free,
forevermore.
Praise be the Warrior!
Praise be Frodr!”
As she struck the sword a final time Yrsa raised her head towards the sky, took a deep breath, and howled. Her clear voice echoed out into the cold winter day.
She howled for all the lives lost that day.
For this brave wolf in front of her.
For all the friends that she had lost herself.
For all the wolves she hoped would one day welcome her into the afterlife when she joined them in Orrin’s hall. During this moment she let herself feel the fatigue of her body, the aching pain in her heart, the dark thoughts that welled up inside her mind. All the things that she had kept locked away deep within her during the battle came flooding back all at once and she felt her eyes cloud with tears.
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Skyndi knew of the prayer, but she had never been present during one. She hadn’t expected that the ringing of the sword would feel as if it was resonating inside of her, that it would grasp her and lift her up and make her feel strong even while she was breaking.
And oh, if not for the prayer holding her together, then she would be falling apart into shattered pieces.
It was as if Frodr had only been waiting for this, this last blessing and absolution.
With the first ring, his breaths weakened further.
With the second, they stuttered.
With the third, they stopped.
With the fourth, the blood that had been steadily pulsing out onto the snow slowed.
With the fifth, it stopped.
Skyndi threw her head back and joined the howl.
She howled because it was the only thing she could do, because with each strike vibrating within her it had grown until it reached everything. Every single part of her heart and soul that she had ever tried to bury and suppress and forget and set it all ringing, singing, screaming until she had to let it out.
She couldn’t possibly contain it, and so she howled.
She howled her sorrow and her guilt and her love.
She howled for everything she’d never cried for.
She howled for every wrong she’d ever done, and every right she’d fought so hard to choose.
She howled for Frodr and hoped Orrin heard her, because he deserved everything and Skyndi didn’t care if she was damned to Chaos if only Orrin would take his soul and hold him close and keep him safe, the way she never could.
(What would you do if you had the chance to try again?)
