Episode 1 or How I Became A Stoner
"Am I dead?"
Grillain's first thoughts were not coherent. She was flying. Or rather she was sitting on something that flew. Warm musky feathers tickled her legs.
*You have been saved from purgatory warrior. Odin has decreed you be given the chance to prove yourself.*
Oh yes, the battle. The shining spear, buried in her chest. Then nothing. Was this a second chance?
*Not in the home you remember. Odin has directed I take you to another realm. You will face dangerous creatures you are not familiar with there. In order to gain Odin's regard, you must slay the Forsaken and drive their creatures from the face of Valheim, making it safe once more for Odin's Chosen.*
Grillain felt strange. This creature's physical voice was the cry of a hawk or a crow, but its thoughts were so much sweeter to her, almost musical. Was it magic? Was not the practice of magic forbidden by her father? Only the Shaman could conduct magical rituals.
*Do you not recognize the messenger of Odin? Am I not the same Valkyrie that gathered you from the claws of death to cradle your soul and protect it? I who choose who lives and who dies, have you forgotten me so soon, Grillain?*
No! No she had not forgotten. She was just confused. She concentrated on her gratitude. The harsh cries calmed. Where were they? How long had they traveled?
*Look yon below you. There is your new home.*
And below, spread beyond the dark wings of the Valkyrie lay mist shrouded forests. It was familiar, very much like her home. When she looked upward it was hard to concentrate. The clouds seemed to shroud her eyesight in confusion. She dragged her view to the ground which approached rapidly now. Yet, she was not afraid. Even as the ground rushed to meet them.
Once more she awoke. Her thoughts now were not confused, or her awareness fuzzy. She felt hard stone beneath her, the cool of morning air around her. She lifted herself from the ground. In front of her, perched on a cracked stone inscribed with runic writing was the Valkyrie. It spread its wings to gain her attention. It's appearance shifted, moving between woman and crow with no rhyme or reason. Fearlessly Grillain stood before it.
*Your first task to prove yourself is to slay the Forsaken Eikthyr. Read this stone to find the location of your first Prey.*
The Valkyries nails scraped the greenery covering the runes. Then it was lifting itself back into the sky, blending with the light.
*Fight and survive warrior!*
As the Valkyrie vanished, Grillain realized the sky held another vision. The branch of a tree so big it could only be the World Tree. It's solid surface was sprinkled with all kinds of glittering lines and tufts of greenery. She felt awed in its presence. Odin had looked upon her with favor, granting her a great task. But who were these Forsaken?
The dawn rays warmed her face as Grillain knelt next to the rock and tugged the greenery away. As her fingers found the runes, they glowed an eerie red. She snatched her fingers away and stared at them, but the light did not cling to them, so she put her hand back to the rock. In her head, a mental map drew itself. Her eyes widened in surprise. She instinctively knew where to find this first monstrous beast. A stag with antlers of bone, flaming eyes and a thunderclap for an attack. The visual in her mind of this prey was intimidating, but with the right weapon…
A stiff breeze reminded Grillain she was clad in little but the thin skins that covered her most naked of parts. First, she would have to survive. And she knew how to do that. Fire. Shelter. Food. She gathered wood and stone swiftly, finding many loose branches. She was frustrated at not finding the stones she wanted and forayed further and further from the summoning circle. Until she had a home, she could not stray far from this place. It was all she knew.
A patch of open ground that barely justified itself as a meadow provided her first opportunity to build something that would give her shelter. She laid down the wood and created a rough hut. Of sorts. The roof did not meet. There was no chimney. Her stomach growled and soft cramps in her gut drove her out of the meager shelter to find something to eat.
The first handful of red berries was sweet and delicious. She stuffed herself on them until she could eat no more. Then she continued to search for stones. For she could make no campfire without enough rocks to make at least a ring for the wood! As the afternoon waned, her search became a bit desperate. She just couldn't see them and she needed to make an axe or she could not cut trees to get enough wood for a proper home. No stones for a fire meant she could not eat meat without getting sick. That is if she could even kill something. As fiercely strong as she was she doubted she could pit her bare hands against a boar! And she heard them out there in the wilderness, squealing.
The darkness fell and she continued her search, up against a hillside now. Her hands finally falling upon a small pile of flat stones. Enough for a fire at the very least. She perhaps could stretch this to an axe.
The chill of the night assaulted her, making her skin and bones ache as she made her way back to her chosen spot, but what she found a short ways from the rocky hillside made her stop thinking about the cold. In the dark she crashed against a structure. She knew it was not a tree because the planks were flat and there was a doorway. In the cold, hungry, and focused, she did not question how it got there. It would need repair. She sat inside, stuffing herself on more berries and then carefully sliding a sturdy flat stone with an edge into a forked piece of wood, she tied it tightly together with vines until she was sure it wouldn't fall apart.
The axe was primitive but who would be there to see her use it? As she leaned back to take her first swing at a tree, a clear memory of her father invaded her mind. Tall, sturdy, with long dusty hair always flying everywhere. A giant of a man teaching a tiny little girl how to cut down a tree.
"Do not fear the axe Grillain. Vikings fear nothing. Make your strikes strong and sure. Make each one better than the previous one. This will be your task your whole life. To be a better axe wielder every time you pick one up."
He cared for the child that may or may not have been his. He showed her everything. From how to find food to how to shield bash an enemy before crushing their skull. As each axe stroke fell, Grillain increasingly dwelled upon the man she would certainly never see again. You might have thought it was raining by the time the tree fell as grateful tears washed her face clean. Grillain watched with satisfaction as the tree came down and down, and a moan of exasperation left her lips as the tree caught in the giant fork of another tree, lifting its end away from her grasp. It was hung up and she could not reach it.
Doggedly she dragged herself to the tree that held onto her wood and set the edge of her axe to it. If she could not reach the original tree, she'd make it all come down! A noise in the forest gave her pause. Not a bird, not the squeal of a boar or the bark of deer. It was a threatening growl. Something she surely did not wish to court. Ferociously, she began to swing.
It took twice as long to make this tree come down and as it did, she dodged its fall by mere inches. It ripped and tore its way through the heights, slamming into another tree, and that tree into another, and that tree into yet another. Grillain set her hands to her face as she thought the whole forest itself might come down around her ears! Instead she wound up with piles and piles of useful wood which she felt was only justice. The entire night had passed and she had endured the growls of those unidentified monsters somewhere near her.
She became aware that she did not feel tired. It was only when she got hungry that she felt weary and needed rest. Was this what death was? Here in one of the other realms, she was different somehow. As she got back into her almost good shelter she knew her axe was at its limit of usefulness. She would have to sharpen it to use it again or make another. She also had no fire. Dawn had come again and she realized she had survived one whole day in this new place.
There was no time to celebrate however. She set the stones in a circle in a pocket she had designed and lit the fire. She was gratified when the fire blazed up in happy comfort. Busily she set about repairing the walls after creating a rude workbench from her stock of wood. In her remaining time she wedged the axe on the workbench and chipped at the edge to sharpen it. Creating a door wasn't too hard and now she truly had safety. Solid walls around her reinforced the idea of safety. Fire, Shelter, Food. She had all three. Today would mean more searching, more chopping. Her mental map told her she had a long way to walk before she reached her first Prey. Today she would concentrate on fixing this shelter to become more permanent. She couldn't have just shelter, she had to have a home.
Over the next hours, she collected many pieces of wood, berries, and mushrooms. She grinned, knowing that her father used these mushrooms for more than just food. Fermented, they became a powerful vision inducer. Her father did enjoy visions, though she herself had never tried them. She had no idea how it felt. She laid them carefully in a box she had created. Raw, they were perfectly normal mushrooms. Late in the day she caught her first meat. An old boar had been too slow to get out of the way and she swiftly put it out of its misery. She hung the meat over the fire with satisfaction.
As the meat sizzled, she noticed the fire acting strangely. It would sputter and then seem to go out. Her heart fell as she saw this behavior. There was plenty of fuel and it wasn't raining. The fire was choking. Outside she noticed there were many trees all around the house. She cut down a few of them, hoping to open up the canopy. As each fell, she prayed it would not hit the ragged little shelter. Nothing worked. In exasperation, she tore out a part of the wall on the other side of the house where the sky was clearer and created a mini fireplace on that side. Laboriously she carried each piece of the fire over, using more of her precious stash of rocks which now dwindled to just 2. For just long enough, the fire blazed to cook two pieces of meat. She sighed with relief, but the fire decided that enough was enough and she was left with her disappointment and a cooling hearth for company.
The meat was good, if a touch tough and chewy. Old, crippled boar was not the easiest to eat, but it was food. With a determined sigh and a now full stomach, she cast herself once more into the wilds. Her stone axe was sharp, her eye keen. A little stream led her to a sloping rocky hill where she discovered more old, unused buildings. Where had the people gone?
Exiting the tree line laid out a picturesque moment that stole the very breath from her body. A long field of bumpy grass and a few shrubs splayed down to a shore near a vast body of water. The sun was sparkling off the water, throwing orange light across the dewy grass. Up above in the sky the branches of the World Tree were a glorious counterpoint to the simple pleasure of looking upon the calm, peaceful scene.
The quintessential Viking homeland. The pale land leading to the glorious ocean. Forests all around provided all the wood you could ever need and bulged with animals to hunt for meat, for skin, for antler and bone. A true base from which to strike out. To make a mighty weapon to hunt her first Prey. Her father would look down from Valhalla and cheer her accomplishments. Odin himself would be appeased as she conquered this land. If only she could find enough stone...
With a quick, confident step, she strode out across the field to claim her patch of land. Her home.