Belenos, Rhûn Darkmoon, and AelKennyr Rhiano
Fafnir instinctively ducks as a large body passes over head; a foul, swirling, windstorm of debris and ash and sulfurous odor sweeps across the woods, as if to herald the presence of such a hideous creature only moments before the creature can be spotted beyond the edge the woods, in the sky. He pulls on Nasi's hand as he ducks down, only daring to stand again as the creature's flight takes it out of line of sight. That is when the earth shakes beneath their feet, giving a groan and a shudder. He turns his head, eyes wide and round in disbelief, his face draining of all color. Insanely, irrationally, he looks out, over at the winter garden and starts toward the exposed beds. No, no, he thinks, you can't have our vegetables. You took our kin, our friends, our way of life. Not our vegetables, by the Maker's hammer.
Suraumo's pulse races in fierce exultation as he lurches awkwardly forward. He roars in malicious joy at he glimpses the look of utter astonishment flash across the dwarves' faces before they are enveloped in fire; the skin charring, their shock and horror becoming set as their gruesome death masks. The old dragon snaps them up even as they still burn, greedily gobbling them down before bounding in his awkward three legged hop further into the settlement, roaring his pleasure as his fire-breath precedes him in a fiery vanguard.
Nasi readily follows the urgings of Fafnir's hand to duck into cover as he stares aghast at the dragon. It's form loomed high above him forcing him to crane his neck to take in its full size. The wings before they were folded and tucked to the creature's side spread, from end to end, the width of the clearing. The stench was overwhelming. He was torn from his morbid fascination with the dragon by movement at his side, and he turned to see Fafnir, his face white but determined as he stares protectively at the garden just beyond the forest. "No!" he hisses, his hand tightening its grip on the other's, "No! They are just vegetables. You life isn't worth a few wilted cabbages!" He turns and nods towards the settlement, and his voice is low and sorrowful as he continues, "It.. it is not interested in vegetables. The foul creature has other prey in mind."
Wishing he could stop his ears against the screams and roars, blot from his vision the image of the afternoon's patrol as one by one the dragon took them all, still he stared in fascinated horror as the dragon disappeared into what remained of Gamilfûn.
The screaming begins, mingling with the mad roars. Nothing that sounds like fierce-some warriors, nothing that sounds like it should be born of this world. Fafnir stands there beside Nasi, his face slack, his eyes empty, his hand tightly grasping the other's. Another mountain has erupted in the entrance of the settlement, but this one of sinew and muscles, scales and wings, jaws and fire. This is how it ends, he thinks, his mind almost unable to comprehend the sounds, the smells, the sight. "It ends in fire," he says softly, unaware he has even spoken. On and on the screaming continues, long after the last of the patrol has been devoured. On and on, the dying echoes in his ears, and still he stands, besides Nasi, squeezing the other's hand tighter and tighter.
Suraumo turns to dart after a fleeing dwarf, but his roar of triumph becomes a snarl of rage and pain as he collides heavily with a fallen pillar that was lying unseen on his blind side. There is a loud pop as the bones of his shoulder hit the fallen masonry, and his breath hisses over his rotten and broken teeth as waves of pain surge though his injured leg. For a moment he stands, head down, panting his pain in long rasping breaths, and then gingerly he flexes the leg. To his surprise, although it is still excruciatingly painful, there is no longer that rasping of bone against bone, and the joint again moves as it should. With a satisfied huff of cinders from his snout Suraumo looks around for more prey. There had been few enough dwarves here when he entered, and those who are not already lying blackened and still, or whimpering pitifully as they try to crawl to safety have fled rapidly down the small corridors that labyrinthed the settlement.
Suraumo snuffles half heartedly at one of the corridors, nosing it with his nose horn, but this is not the crumbling stuff of the Dark Skins' lair, and it did not give beneath the scrapings of his horn. He roars his frustration down the corridor, sending jet after jet of flame after his roar, but it was no use. He cannot not reach the dwarves even if he manages to kill them. He dares not risk renewing the injury to his shoulder by attempting to crash his way deeper into the settlement.
Suraumo snarls his disgust as he turns, and he roots around among the debris, finding and gobbling the dwarves that have fallen, taking particular delight when his teeth find a living victim and cut off the screams mid-cry as they crunch down hard. Still, if he had not hit that pillar, there would have been more. Hating the weakness his blind eye causes, hating his injured foot, hating his age, hating, hating, again he roars out his rage, bits of grit falling from the ceiling as his roars shake the very rock above and below him. Finally, snarling and hissing, he turns towards the ruined exit.
Nasi had stood spellbound in horrified fascination, tears rolling silently down his cheeks as he watched and listened to the death of his people. "It ends in fire." Fafnir's words galvanizes him. How could he cower here in the woods and not lift a hand to stop this? Despite all this time of discontent and feeling he did not belong, yet those were HIS people in there. "No it does not!" His voice is hoarse and fierce as he stands to his full height and straightens his shoulders . "I will NOT let this happen!" Releasing Fafnir's hand, he slips his bow from this shoulders and strings it swiftly. He turns to look at the other dwarf a moment, and on impulse grabs him by both shoulders and kisses him swiftly but passionately before releasing him. "Stay under cover," he says brusquely as he draws an arrow from his quiver and steps forward.
He has no weapon. Fafnir looks about the floor of the woods, but no hand erupts from the ground holding a magic axe. The Smith does not appear in a whirlwind of forge fire to smite this foul, haggard, rank and rotting mount of putrid flesh, this dragon. No, there was only Nasi. Nasi, who grabs him up and kisses him. One lone dwarf armed with a bow and arrow meant for deer, not nightmares made flesh. "No," he says, surprised at the firmness of his own voice, and he steps up to put an arm on Nasi's shoulder, squeezing tight. "No," he says again, leaning in to whisper in Nasi's ear. "Draw your bow for two." Then he raises his gaze to fasten his eyes, narrowed with hatred upon the twisted creation of hate and ambition. "And with your arrow, show we are dwarves not cattle."
Suraumo glares balefully at the world outside. There is a silence on the surrounding forest. All seems peaceful here. New green growth abounds. As he snakes his head around, taking in the well worn path to the settlement, he sees the kitchen gardens, unnoticed for they were on his blind side on his arrival, hay stacked for livestock: all the accouterments of Spring and new life surround him. Suraumo resents it as he had never resented anything in his life before, for despite his recent successes he feels old. Old, weak and failing. Standing there in the late afternoon Spring sunshine he knows the easy kills will become fewer and fewer. He knows that unless fortune favours him with a swift death, his is to be an end of hollow stomach and bones rotting in the wind.
Rage, hate, resentment, all bubbles forth in a roar that shivers the very trees of the forest as blindly he jets forth stream after stream of fire, whipping his head viciously from side to side in an attempt to destroy as much of this joyous new life as he can. He takes malicious glee in seeing the hay bales go up in flame, the carefully tended kitchen garden follows suit and then even the very forest succumbs to his ire.
Nasi had stood watching the foul creature as it emerged from the settlement. Brazenly it had stood, surveying its surroundings like a conquerer. Now as he stands, Fafnir at his side and his whispered words in his ear, Nasi finds something deep inside that he has not known is there. His hand steady, he raises his bow, the mighty muscles of his arm bunching tightly as he draws it back to full draw. He follows the rhythmic swing of the dragon's head and takes careful aim. Careful not to jerk his hand he releases the arrow smoothly and watches it fly. He drops his hands to his side. He knows he does not have time for another. This one must count or they will die. Time seems to slow and for him there is nothing but the arc of the arrow as it drives to his target. He can almost see the feathers of the fletch flutter with the wind of its passage, so acute is his focus on the arrow.
Suraumo is engulfed in his rage, in his self-pity and his determination to destroy as much as he can before he himself is robbed of his power to do so, he did not notice the two small figures emerge from the forest. So blinded by hate is he that he does not see the danger until a chance glint of afternoon sun flickers upon the arrow. Still, such is his anger and his age he is slow to stop the swing of his head, slow to see death as it found him, for the arrow, so carefully aimed and timed, finds its mark in the soft gelatinous orb of his eyeball. Sent true and straight from one of the most powerful dwarven arms that has ever drawn a bow, the arrow continues through the fragile resistance of his eye, through the eye socket of his skull and buries itself deep within his brain.
Before the ancient old dragon even realises he is struck, he is already dead upon his feet. Yet his head still continues the swing it had been on, the maw still spewing flame even as Suraumo, mighty veteran of the War of Wrath, begins to topple, felled by a single arrow shot by a stonemason shooting for two.
With a crash that shakes the ground, Suraumo finally collapses, his jaws still parted from his final roar of defiance, but silent now, the fearsome fire of his breath eternally stilled.
No time for thinking, no time for celebration, for as the mighty and dreadful creation of a bent and twisted Vala dies, it spreads death one last time. Time slows, and between each beat of his heart, he sees the head of the dragon swivel, jaws open, red, fiery death sweeping in an arc, heading for him...
Heading for Nasi. Galvanized by that thought alone, he spins around to face the stonemason, planting both hands on Nasi's chest. He throws the whole of his body's weight against the shove he gives the other dwarf, screaming at the top of his lungs, "NO! MAKER, NO! NOT NASI!!!"
He shoves and he pushes, and yet he stands there, his body a pitiful shield again the ribbon of flames and death, no long moving as though through quicksand, but rushing toward Fafnir, like the kiss of an eager lover. Like the kiss he may never know again.
Nasi is rooted to the spot in disbelief as he sees his arrow, against all odds, find its mark. Stunned, he stands blinking incredulously, blind to the threat of the dragon's death throes until Fafnir grabs him, screaming, shoving, urging him to do, what? Blinking he looks first at Fafnir's urgent face, and then beyond to the wall of flame bearing down on them. With a gasp of "By the Maker, no!" he bodily grabs the other dwarf, to drag him to cover. He takes a step backwards as he is about to turn to flee, but the heel of his boot catches on a root, and borne by his own momentum, and the force of Fafnir's shove, scrabbling to regain his balance, he falls to the ground. Fafnir, still held firmly in his grip, falls with him.
As he lands, Nasi feels a sharp stab of pain as his head strikes one of the many hidden rocks among the pine needles that carpet for the forest floor. Struggle as he may against it, darkness swirls around him, snippets of words said that day, flash through his mind. "It ends in fire."..."I will NOT let this happen!"..."Show we are dwarves, not cattle."
No, it does not end with fire. It ends with darkness, he thinks almost drunkenly, as the darkness finally overcomes him.
Suraumo's pulse races in fierce exultation as he lurches awkwardly forward. He roars in malicious joy at he glimpses the look of utter astonishment flash across the dwarves' faces before they are enveloped in fire; the skin charring, their shock and horror becoming set as their gruesome death masks. The old dragon snaps them up even as they still burn, greedily gobbling them down before bounding in his awkward three legged hop further into the settlement, roaring his pleasure as his fire-breath precedes him in a fiery vanguard.
Nasi readily follows the urgings of Fafnir's hand to duck into cover as he stares aghast at the dragon. It's form loomed high above him forcing him to crane his neck to take in its full size. The wings before they were folded and tucked to the creature's side spread, from end to end, the width of the clearing. The stench was overwhelming. He was torn from his morbid fascination with the dragon by movement at his side, and he turned to see Fafnir, his face white but determined as he stares protectively at the garden just beyond the forest. "No!" he hisses, his hand tightening its grip on the other's, "No! They are just vegetables. You life isn't worth a few wilted cabbages!" He turns and nods towards the settlement, and his voice is low and sorrowful as he continues, "It.. it is not interested in vegetables. The foul creature has other prey in mind."
Wishing he could stop his ears against the screams and roars, blot from his vision the image of the afternoon's patrol as one by one the dragon took them all, still he stared in fascinated horror as the dragon disappeared into what remained of Gamilfûn.
The screaming begins, mingling with the mad roars. Nothing that sounds like fierce-some warriors, nothing that sounds like it should be born of this world. Fafnir stands there beside Nasi, his face slack, his eyes empty, his hand tightly grasping the other's. Another mountain has erupted in the entrance of the settlement, but this one of sinew and muscles, scales and wings, jaws and fire. This is how it ends, he thinks, his mind almost unable to comprehend the sounds, the smells, the sight. "It ends in fire," he says softly, unaware he has even spoken. On and on the screaming continues, long after the last of the patrol has been devoured. On and on, the dying echoes in his ears, and still he stands, besides Nasi, squeezing the other's hand tighter and tighter.
Suraumo turns to dart after a fleeing dwarf, but his roar of triumph becomes a snarl of rage and pain as he collides heavily with a fallen pillar that was lying unseen on his blind side. There is a loud pop as the bones of his shoulder hit the fallen masonry, and his breath hisses over his rotten and broken teeth as waves of pain surge though his injured leg. For a moment he stands, head down, panting his pain in long rasping breaths, and then gingerly he flexes the leg. To his surprise, although it is still excruciatingly painful, there is no longer that rasping of bone against bone, and the joint again moves as it should. With a satisfied huff of cinders from his snout Suraumo looks around for more prey. There had been few enough dwarves here when he entered, and those who are not already lying blackened and still, or whimpering pitifully as they try to crawl to safety have fled rapidly down the small corridors that labyrinthed the settlement.
Suraumo snuffles half heartedly at one of the corridors, nosing it with his nose horn, but this is not the crumbling stuff of the Dark Skins' lair, and it did not give beneath the scrapings of his horn. He roars his frustration down the corridor, sending jet after jet of flame after his roar, but it was no use. He cannot not reach the dwarves even if he manages to kill them. He dares not risk renewing the injury to his shoulder by attempting to crash his way deeper into the settlement.
Suraumo snarls his disgust as he turns, and he roots around among the debris, finding and gobbling the dwarves that have fallen, taking particular delight when his teeth find a living victim and cut off the screams mid-cry as they crunch down hard. Still, if he had not hit that pillar, there would have been more. Hating the weakness his blind eye causes, hating his injured foot, hating his age, hating, hating, again he roars out his rage, bits of grit falling from the ceiling as his roars shake the very rock above and below him. Finally, snarling and hissing, he turns towards the ruined exit.
Nasi had stood spellbound in horrified fascination, tears rolling silently down his cheeks as he watched and listened to the death of his people. "It ends in fire." Fafnir's words galvanizes him. How could he cower here in the woods and not lift a hand to stop this? Despite all this time of discontent and feeling he did not belong, yet those were HIS people in there. "No it does not!" His voice is hoarse and fierce as he stands to his full height and straightens his shoulders . "I will NOT let this happen!" Releasing Fafnir's hand, he slips his bow from this shoulders and strings it swiftly. He turns to look at the other dwarf a moment, and on impulse grabs him by both shoulders and kisses him swiftly but passionately before releasing him. "Stay under cover," he says brusquely as he draws an arrow from his quiver and steps forward.
He has no weapon. Fafnir looks about the floor of the woods, but no hand erupts from the ground holding a magic axe. The Smith does not appear in a whirlwind of forge fire to smite this foul, haggard, rank and rotting mount of putrid flesh, this dragon. No, there was only Nasi. Nasi, who grabs him up and kisses him. One lone dwarf armed with a bow and arrow meant for deer, not nightmares made flesh. "No," he says, surprised at the firmness of his own voice, and he steps up to put an arm on Nasi's shoulder, squeezing tight. "No," he says again, leaning in to whisper in Nasi's ear. "Draw your bow for two." Then he raises his gaze to fasten his eyes, narrowed with hatred upon the twisted creation of hate and ambition. "And with your arrow, show we are dwarves not cattle."
Suraumo glares balefully at the world outside. There is a silence on the surrounding forest. All seems peaceful here. New green growth abounds. As he snakes his head around, taking in the well worn path to the settlement, he sees the kitchen gardens, unnoticed for they were on his blind side on his arrival, hay stacked for livestock: all the accouterments of Spring and new life surround him. Suraumo resents it as he had never resented anything in his life before, for despite his recent successes he feels old. Old, weak and failing. Standing there in the late afternoon Spring sunshine he knows the easy kills will become fewer and fewer. He knows that unless fortune favours him with a swift death, his is to be an end of hollow stomach and bones rotting in the wind.
Rage, hate, resentment, all bubbles forth in a roar that shivers the very trees of the forest as blindly he jets forth stream after stream of fire, whipping his head viciously from side to side in an attempt to destroy as much of this joyous new life as he can. He takes malicious glee in seeing the hay bales go up in flame, the carefully tended kitchen garden follows suit and then even the very forest succumbs to his ire.
Nasi had stood watching the foul creature as it emerged from the settlement. Brazenly it had stood, surveying its surroundings like a conquerer. Now as he stands, Fafnir at his side and his whispered words in his ear, Nasi finds something deep inside that he has not known is there. His hand steady, he raises his bow, the mighty muscles of his arm bunching tightly as he draws it back to full draw. He follows the rhythmic swing of the dragon's head and takes careful aim. Careful not to jerk his hand he releases the arrow smoothly and watches it fly. He drops his hands to his side. He knows he does not have time for another. This one must count or they will die. Time seems to slow and for him there is nothing but the arc of the arrow as it drives to his target. He can almost see the feathers of the fletch flutter with the wind of its passage, so acute is his focus on the arrow.
Suraumo is engulfed in his rage, in his self-pity and his determination to destroy as much as he can before he himself is robbed of his power to do so, he did not notice the two small figures emerge from the forest. So blinded by hate is he that he does not see the danger until a chance glint of afternoon sun flickers upon the arrow. Still, such is his anger and his age he is slow to stop the swing of his head, slow to see death as it found him, for the arrow, so carefully aimed and timed, finds its mark in the soft gelatinous orb of his eyeball. Sent true and straight from one of the most powerful dwarven arms that has ever drawn a bow, the arrow continues through the fragile resistance of his eye, through the eye socket of his skull and buries itself deep within his brain.
Before the ancient old dragon even realises he is struck, he is already dead upon his feet. Yet his head still continues the swing it had been on, the maw still spewing flame even as Suraumo, mighty veteran of the War of Wrath, begins to topple, felled by a single arrow shot by a stonemason shooting for two.
With a crash that shakes the ground, Suraumo finally collapses, his jaws still parted from his final roar of defiance, but silent now, the fearsome fire of his breath eternally stilled.
No time for thinking, no time for celebration, for as the mighty and dreadful creation of a bent and twisted Vala dies, it spreads death one last time. Time slows, and between each beat of his heart, he sees the head of the dragon swivel, jaws open, red, fiery death sweeping in an arc, heading for him...
Heading for Nasi. Galvanized by that thought alone, he spins around to face the stonemason, planting both hands on Nasi's chest. He throws the whole of his body's weight against the shove he gives the other dwarf, screaming at the top of his lungs, "NO! MAKER, NO! NOT NASI!!!"
He shoves and he pushes, and yet he stands there, his body a pitiful shield again the ribbon of flames and death, no long moving as though through quicksand, but rushing toward Fafnir, like the kiss of an eager lover. Like the kiss he may never know again.
Nasi is rooted to the spot in disbelief as he sees his arrow, against all odds, find its mark. Stunned, he stands blinking incredulously, blind to the threat of the dragon's death throes until Fafnir grabs him, screaming, shoving, urging him to do, what? Blinking he looks first at Fafnir's urgent face, and then beyond to the wall of flame bearing down on them. With a gasp of "By the Maker, no!" he bodily grabs the other dwarf, to drag him to cover. He takes a step backwards as he is about to turn to flee, but the heel of his boot catches on a root, and borne by his own momentum, and the force of Fafnir's shove, scrabbling to regain his balance, he falls to the ground. Fafnir, still held firmly in his grip, falls with him.
As he lands, Nasi feels a sharp stab of pain as his head strikes one of the many hidden rocks among the pine needles that carpet for the forest floor. Struggle as he may against it, darkness swirls around him, snippets of words said that day, flash through his mind. "It ends in fire."..."I will NOT let this happen!"..."Show we are dwarves, not cattle."
No, it does not end with fire. It ends with darkness, he thinks almost drunkenly, as the darkness finally overcomes him.
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