When the last of the great glaciers finally melted, the people of Fenris were struck by quakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, and raging storms.
The warriors of the Russ tribe could only stand helplessly aboard their longships, watching as the islands that had sustained them for countless years were torn apart by the trembling earth, dragged inch by inch into the abyss by towering waves.
Thousands of dragonships drifted upon the sea, but even this mighty fleet was but a drop in the endless oceans of Fenris.
Thengir gave Caelan the second-largest dragonship of the tribe. Alongside Russ and the wolves, there were even some children aboard.
That was Caelan's request: no matter how poor you are, never be poor in education. Even while fleeing for their lives, learning must not be forsaken.
Though the conditions were harsh, all they had to endure was the sea. Dorothy, after all, had once risked her life in the Underhive to teach a group of orphans.
Clack!
Caelan sat on the deck, tapping the ship's rail with a skull. "Today we'll continue with Tale of Norse Mythology part thirty-two, Loki's Chain of Tricks, Garm's Possession!"
"As the father and son ventured into Helheim…"
A mournful horn pierced through the roaring storm, echoing across the waves.
The warriors of the Russ tribe stood upon the high prows of their dragonships, their salt-drenched manes whipping violently in the gale.
Their shouts to nearby ships rolled through their throats like the howls of wolves.
"Waves! Huge waves!"
Even before the warning had fully broken through the wind, the horizon itself rose up into a towering black mountain, as though the world were about to capsize before their eyes.
The fleet looked vast, yet few ships could withstand a wave like that. Despair began to take root in every heart.
Thengir muttered, "Seems luck isn't with us this time."
From birth, the Fenrisians fought only to survive. Disasters like this came every year.
In the previous Season of Fire, Thengir had heard how the Tidal Blackrock tribe was wiped out by a tsunami, no survivors left behind.
And now, it was their turn. Thengir could only hope that the shamans aboard their largest ships could help hold the wave back, just enough to let the Russ tribe survive.
"Caelan, help them," Russ said softly. His voice mixed with the wailing wind, so faint it was nearly swallowed by the sea, but Caelan heard it.
"You didn't have to ask," Caelan replied. "But I'm not helping them, I'm helping us."
Russ smiled faintly. "Then help us."
Caelan stepped onto the sharp prow of the dragonship. Though his figure looked thin against the storm, when he slowly spread his arms, streams of blue psychic energy burst from him,
weaving through the furious sea and sky until they formed a massive blue dome over the fleet.
A hemispheric barrier, twenty kilometers wide, arced over them like a divine bowl from the dawn of creation, an absolute shield of protection.
The warriors of the Russ tribe were struck dumb. The shamans trembled as they fell to their knees, their beast-tooth necklaces clattering against their chests.
Even the strongest shamans could summon blizzards, heal wounds, or command storms,
but none, not even in legend, could command such vast, gentle power to blanket an entire sea!
"Stay within the barrier!" Russ shouted to the neighboring ships.
The warriors snapped back to their senses, spreading the warning from ship to ship. Not that anyone would be foolish enough to leave such protection.
Boom!
The colossal wave crashed against the psychic barrier. For an instant, the world exploded into a galaxy of shattered light, millions of tons of seawater bursting into liquid stars upon the blue dome.
But within the dome's embrace, the sea lay calm as glass. Even the smallest boat did not tremble.
The wave that could have obliterated the fleet could not pierce even a droplet through that gossamer-thin psychic veil.
The Russ warriors looked up at the furious ocean overhead, unable to enter the dome, as if witnessing a living myth unfold.
When the last of the waves exhausted themselves, the blue light began to fade like morning mist.
Psychic afterglow drifted like falling snow, refracting into rainbows across the clearing sky.
The fleet floated quietly on the suddenly tamed waters, no damage, no casualties. Yet no cheers erupted.
A strange, heavy silence hung over them. Even the loudest young warriors were speechless.
Their eyes all locked on the thin figure standing at the ship's prow, Caelan, his robes still shimmering with lingering psychic light, his body cocooned in the glow of a thousand stars.
There was only one word to describe him now: godlike.
The moment Caelan turned, countless burning gazes pinned him in place.
He knew that look far too well.
The same eyes that once worshiped Lorgar and the Emperor as gods.
A chill ran down his spine. An ancient phrase rose within him.
"I am not a god!" he shouted.
Russ added, "I can prove that, he's not a god."
Because gods don't raise mortal children.
Suddenly, the sea burst open, a vortex roaring like the world's end. From it erupted a sea beast over three hundred meters long, its surge tossing ships like toys.
The warriors of the Russ tribe tightened their grips on their weapons, only to realize the leviathan was already dead, belly-up, drifting lifelessly.
And before them, in the fleet's path, the ocean was filled with countless dead fish, forming a floating "land" of silver scales driven toward them by the current.
The disaster that could have destroyed the fleet had also slaughtered the sea's creatures.
…
Three months later, that apocalyptic "harvest" had kept the tribe busy for days. They no longer worried about food shortages for the Season of Fire, there was enough to last until its end, and more.
So many fish, in fact, that those they couldn't dry had to be thrown back into the sea, much to the warriors' frustration.
On Fenris, food in the freezing season could last a long time. But in Season of Fire, anything not dried turned to rot within days.
It was in this harsh rhythm that Fenrisian survival instincts were forged.
After a month of drifting, the world grew even more violent.
Scalding islands rose from the sea, vomiting fire skyward. Lava spilled down their slopes, while boiling waves battered their coasts.
The sea frothed into steam; sulfur clouds smothered the world in a haze of apocalypse.
But the Russ tribe was lucky. On the thirty-second day, they found a newborn island, still steaming.
It jutted from the waves like a black fang. Red-hot veins of lava still glowed beneath its basalt skin. The air stank of sulfur and salt.
It was vast, large enough to hold the whole tribe.
But the land still burned with the heat of creation. They would have to wait until it cooled before setting foot on it.
So they remained aboard their ships. Yet even this was a blessing; at least they would drift no more.
"Father, I have waited so long… why haven't you come for me?"
When Caelan awoke beneath the glaring morning sun, the voice from his dream still echoed in his mind, thick with resentment.
He muttered, "Now that sounds familiar."
When he first arrived on Fenris, he hadn't dreamed at all. Now, finally, a dream,
'Guess the lag's pretty bad this time, huh, Little Mag?'
He couldn't be sure it was Little Mag, though. He'd only ever heard the voice, never seen the speaker.
Still, someone calling him "Father" and making psychic calls? Only one person fit that profile.
"Awoo!"
The sea wind carried wolf howls. Caelan looked over the side. Russ was splashing joyously in the surf, droplets glittering like jewels in his wild mane.
A dozen great Fenrisian wolves watched eagerly from the deck as schools of fish burst from the waves like cannonballs, only to be caught in the nets cast by warriors.
Though their dried stores were ample, fresh catch was always welcome.
No one else dared swim.
Every creature on Fenris was deadly. Even the small "ripperfish," little more than giant pikes feeding on krill, could strip a man to bone in seconds.
But their fangs could not pierce Russ's skin, and so they became dinner.
Russ caught one mid-leap, the size of a man's arm, and hurled it in an arc of silver light,
before it even hit the deck, the wolves were already scrambling over one another to snatch it.
Sylvia lay lazily near the prow, her soft belly serving as Caelan's pillow. Her golden eyes shimmered with a mother's gentleness as she watched the wolves play.
When the hunt was done, Russ climbed back aboard, taking a roasted fish from Caelan.
"Thengir took the warriors ashore," he said between bites. "They're scouting for danger. We should be able to land tomorrow."
It had been over two months since they found the island. The lava had cooled, the surface looked stable, but Fenris's volatile nature demanded caution. Only after ensuring there were no hidden vents or fissures could the tribe settle.
That wisdom was born of generations of blood.
The island was barren, no plants, no animals. Before winter came, they'd still have to rely on fishing and preserve enough for the freeze.
Evening came, and still Thengir's scouts had not returned.
"They should've been back by now," someone murmured, but no one panicked. Maybe the terrain had delayed them.
Then Sylvia's ears twitched upright. A low growl rolled from her throat.
Russ's gaze sharpened. "Mother smells blood."
The warriors tensed. Blood meant danger, but how could there be danger on a newborn island?
"Could they have met another tribe?" someone asked.
Fenrisian tribes often fought to the death over habitable islands.
Caelan frowned. "If another tribe were nearby, we'd have seen their ships. Form a rescue party, move out!"
Over a hundred warriors armed with bone spears and axes followed Caelan's ship toward the island.
Sylvia and the wolves smelled the blood more strongly now, hackles rising, teeth bared.
The men advanced cautiously, torches flickering in the dark.
Suddenly, Russ hurled his axe into the shadows. The sound of splattering blood and cracking bone answered.
Warriors ran forward with torches, and froze.
The corpse was pale, covered in webbed veins of violet-blue. Its limbs bent at impossible angles, fingers tipped with clawed keratin. Its milky eyes, without pupils or irises, bulged like curdled pus.
No one recognized what it was, or how it had come to be here.
The island was newly born. No life should have existed here.
"Krakenspawns," Caelan said grimly. "Don't ask how, they're here. Sylvia, can you smell Thengir? We rescue the living first."
Sylvia crouched low. Caelan vaulted onto her back. Russ leapt onto Geri's.
"I'll take Russ and the wolves," Caelan ordered. "Everyone else, back to the ships! These things might attack the fleet!"
The wolves would bear no riders but them. The others obeyed and fell back.
Caelan gave Sylvia's mane a tap, she shot into the dark like a bolt, the pack thundering behind.
"What are Krakenspawns?" Russ asked.
"They were once Fenrisians, ancestors who built vast cities underground beneath Asaheim. But when the Age of Strife came, those shelters were abandoned. Those who stayed below devolved into these things."
Caelan frowned. "But they should only exist under Asaheim… how did they get here?"
They couldn't have swum, too afraid of light, and the sea's predators wouldn't let them live.
Couldn't have flown either. So where did they come from?
"Maybe," Russ said, "they've been here since the beginning?"
"Possible," Caelan nodded. "Then this island might be sitting atop a buried city."
"Come on then, monsters!" a voice roared ahead.
Flickering torches danced in the distance, Thengir's voice, mixing with the clash of steel and the wet hiss of the mutants.
Russ swung his arm wide, flinging a torch into the dark. It struck one of the creatures dead-on, setting it ablaze.
For a heartbeat, firelight revealed hundreds of Krakenspawn surrounding Thengir's warriors, fewer than half still standing.
Then the outer ring turned toward the new arrivals.
"Awoo!"
Russ and Geri charged, axe and fangs tearing into the horde.
The hunt had begun.
.....
If you enjoy the story, my p@treon is 30 chapters ahead.
[email protected]/DaoistJinzu