The first leg of the journey

 A cool breeze tugged at Sosirs fur, bringing dreary misty rain with it. Gray clouds overhead complemented the weather. A slight homesickness was awakened by this, but he felt very much alive and at comfort.

After his toppling of the copperheaded tyrant he had no longer been welcome at the burrows of either Norn tribes he had lived with. Neither did he care to of course,after learning of their unnatural genesis and their willingness in pawnhood. At heart, he decided, they were like Ettins.

Traveling unwelcomed through the otherwise pleasant meadow woods had been an ordeal, luckily he had been taken in by a family of bruin Norns and had healed his wounds with their help and time. From them he had learned of lo and dir, the two main directions of the ringed, inverted world. After repaying their kindness with repairs to their pithouse he had traveled dirward, where the meadowland changed gradually to heather, and beyond that peat bogged moorland.

Here he had found respite. The high lands were windswept, and to his joy he saw once again the stilted deer and plump grouse he knew from his native pine home. In solitude he had fed on oatberry mash, tangy berries from the moor and foraged eggs. Days of wandering, climbing and resting in the cold nights strengthened him once more, and within the span of a week wanderlust had brought him from one edge of the ring to the other.

Steep, sometimes metallic cliffs bordered both edges. Wandering along these he had seen Ettin sized doors, closed to his kind by strange mechanisms. The journey from one side to the other had taken him a day's worth of walking. As the cold moorlands had held little challenge to his that far, he took again to the dir. Despite the moisture and cooling air he had found these lands easy, and wondered why he had not yet found softer nornir settled there.

As he went on towards the distantly rising terrain he had seen empty hovels and cairns by the path. He had thought little of it, though now he had found half eaten critters along the way he had cause to be wary. The cool smells of the moor, of the distant mountains and the earthy smells of the mud and rain now were sometimes interspersed with less pleasant ones. Heavy, raw smells often faintly made their way to him, and sometimes brought a savage, beastly smell with them. The stink of wet fur accompanied these, something that would not quite add up somehow.

He was close enough to the mountains that they obscured a good part of the ring ahead of him. It still confused Sosir somewhat, how looking up would show him the way ahead. The night had fallen again, here in the shadows of the mountains the night was far darker than he had gotten used to. All through the day the savage smells had increased, and the only cairn which he had seen that day had made him shudder, for it was stained a dark and rusty red. He had clambered in a crevice of a hills peak to spend the night when he heard the source of the raw and frightening smells. The heavy tones of grendel voices rolled through the hills. Knowing by their volume they were clearly in their element, not worried if they would be heard. The rough voices chattered boastfully of awful deeds to each other. He counted at least 4 voices and assumed there to be more in that band, and again noted the smell of wet, matted fur to his puzzlement.

He slept light and uncomfortable after they had passed by.

The crack of dawn brought a watery light over the peaks and hills, which stood like islands in the fog. Sosir had eaten oatberry cakes and dried eggs from his woven bag before the day started, and continued his search for either adventure or a worthy place to call home. He had found the tracks of the grendels and followed them. These were his ancestral enemies, he had seen and experienced their horrid nature. He had to see them for himself. Roughly the trails found their way dirward towards the mountains, and before noon he had found where the monsters had gone.

A large pass into the mountains was shouldered by a great building. Stacked rock walls radiated outward like tentacles from the fortress, blocking the way forward into the pass. Roughly hewn blocks the size of his chest made up the walls of the primitive castle. Sosir perched himself in a coppice and waited. Small bands of grendels walked to and from the fortress during the day as he waited, bringing with them slain critters and once even a captured norn. A clear daylight view of the grendels showed the source of the unexpected wet, filthy fur stench, as the beasts were furred with greasy, tawny hair where the scaly black skin did not show through. 

The primitive gates on the crude fort were bound out of thick beams and spiked with bone and horn shards. The fenced battlements on top were no less effective. The walls were stained from the top town with a dark, rusty red bordering on black. Small windows graced the face of the ominous building, and lights flickering inside taught him which rooms the grendels used and which windows were connected. In turn this told him where he would find a safe entrance. 

As dusk creeped past his lookout the frequency of the grendel groups lessened. When the light grew dim enough for him to trust his dark fur to camouflage him, he set out towards the dark keep. He had remembered the path through the heather and brambles from above and sat still and listened once he had reached the bottom of the cyclopean walls. Faint whimpering from far above and little more told him the inhabitants were at rest , and he had crossed the field unseen. Snaking his way past spikes and dessicated brambles he inched up the wall. His ascent hastened once he was past them, and the rough blocks gave him ample foothold. He climbed around a large stone plate, a strong but clear weakness in the wall, for it took a keystone place in the wall.

He stepped carefully through the darkened window. Feeling relief when his straining muscles finally found respite after the climb. The stink of grendels was not as strong as he had expected, but a melancholic reek assailed his nose. A deep smell of gore, combined with that of Nornir, filth and a weeping sound painted a clear picture his eyes could not quite yet see in the dark. 

Both the floor and walls were damp, and the nighttime chill blew in through the small window. His eyesight quickly adjusted as he stuck close to the edge of the uneven and cramped room. A few Nornir had been bound and gagged, and those that had awakened looked to him with hopeful eyes despite their dirty fur and visible injuries. Sosir had them cut loose quickly and had soon surmised these fallow and bruin would be of little use against the warrior grendels. They explained the new sacrificial habit their captor had taken on, and the toil that had taken on the local Nornir. Before they took to the window he was also told of other captives in the burg.

The rudimentary door of rope and branch was dismantled quietly. An unlit corridor, moist, reeking and no bigger than the room before opened to him. Meats and meals in various stages of conservation and decomposition were stored there, though Sosirs only point of interest was a ladder leading upwards. Silently and carefully he climbed up it. Weak beams of light filtered through the hatch above, and the vile bestial stench of his natural enemies battered his senses. Very carefully he pushed up the lid, gnashing his teeth fighting his instinctive urges to rush in with blind and violent intentions. As he peeked into the balmy darkness deep snoring echoed around the chamber. Dying embers in a simple hearth were the sole source of the light that lit his way across the irregularly shaped hall. A sloping tunnel led him to the battlements and the open night skies.

His hopes for fresh air were crushed with a new breath, for though the raw, savage smell of grendels was greatly lessened an almost solid wall of rotting odors hit his lungs. He fought and lost to his need to cough. Noises over on the crude parapet told him his coughing fit had given him away. Still barking and wheezing he charged at the stumbling sounds and rammed a large furred, greasy form straight in the gut. The sentinel had expected a norn to attempt escape, rather than a bull-headed charge and was caught completely off guard. They both fell down, but the grendel rolled through the bone and branch parapet many yards down. Sosir had forgotten him before the unfortunate sentinel had met with the ground and impaling spikes below.

A choked murmur near the center of the roof took Sosirs attention. Circling around the large, rotting sacrificial heap he found a large form bound to the stones. Its scent was unknown to him, but distantly familiar. It was difficult to distinguish in the cloud-cast darkness, but he could see it was bound with a heavy yoke. The hunched over giant kept quiet and held his binds towards him in expectation. As he was cutting the heavy ropes, something stirred atop of the pile of bone and gore. Sosir hastened his sawing as he heard a crunch. A great blackened mass shifted its bulk, crushing bones. He felt his heart racing, his palms growing slippery with sweat on the flint shard, but the yoke fell back.

The giant took great strides forward, dragging Sosir with him by the arm. His muscles still ached, though he completely forgot once the mass started its erratic movement. An incredible choir of chirps erupted, sending deafening waves into the night. It moved very fast but uncoordinated, as if it had not quite regained control over itself. Sosir saw two great arms, or perhaps wings erupt from the form, and a rush of fear whipped him forward until they came to the battlements. Before they knew it the long yet hurried climb down had begun. The course rock scraped his fingers, and the careless and dark descent did not help, though he felt none of it. A shower of stone, dust and little feathers fell over them as the thing above peeked over the edge but it remained on the roof, chittering and chirping loudly from its perch.

Dawn creeped once more over the highlands. They had heard terrible screams from the fortress above when they fled. The freed Nornir joined them from their hiding place, shaken and tired. The giant, torsun, had been freed of his hempen gag. By daylight the old creature was far less fearsome, with his tired eyes and hunched shoulders. His face was almost obscured by the nose, the tusks yellowed and somewhat cracked. With a hum the Jotnar broke the silence. ‘We are safe, our injuries minor. Why do I feel you are still not quite content, Sosir?’

‘Because I am not, Torsun. The grendels in their granite home with their devil-deity will not be content either. However deserving some nornir I have met may be of difficult times, an evil like this I wish upon nobody.’

‘What can we do then?’ Torsuns voice was not as deep as a grendel’s, but his nose gave a typical timbre to the words. ‘My kind may be strong and large but I am not a fighter.’

Sosir said nothing for a while. He did not expect the tall creature to be one, but his plan did not need warriors either, just strength and daring.

‘Let us first take these frightened lot to the safety of the woodland borders, then we return to the fort to end that hungering reign.”

Torsun sighed with a tired feeling of responsibility to the little creatures. Jotnar like himself were a rarity he knew, but his instincts had been designed to take care of nornir and ettins while the makers were gone. His voice seemed to calm them, and himself somewhat.

‘We were created the last, yet live the longest. The creators had learned of past mistakes, and did not leave without making us to care for their creations. Machines maintain and rule the world around us in their absence, but Jotnar hold the knowledge and histories for life to flourish.’

Torsun did not add that few had nornir ever listened to his kind, and that most of his kin slept through the centuries in dissapointed seclusion. A trait that reduced their offspring with every passing generation.

As they had reached the borderland and set the Nornir on their way, Sosir had set Torsun on collecting fiber, and twisting a heavy rope from it. He himself had selected a strong sapling and had patiently cut it into a bare pole with a wedge on one end and a loop on the other. He was not quite certain what to make of the calm giant. Sosir was tall and strong compared to most Norn, and it seemed odd to him that one again half his length taller so clearly lacked the fire of spirit he valued so much. 

The journey back was uneventful, though somewhat tense due to the thought that they could be hunted. They met no patrols, however, and when they came again to the crude castle no lights burned through the gloom behind the windows. Together they again climbed the blasphemous outer walls, this time they were even more darkly encrusted and both unpleasantly sticky and slippery. The strong, stomach twisting smell suggested its origin clearly enough and neither adventurers spoke of it. As sosir found again the large sheet of rock that held the wall together they hoisted up their wooden fulcrum, eventually wedging it behind the keystone.

The pair shuffled to the far edge of the fortress, holding the rope that had been bound to the loop on the fulcrum. Neither felt very sure if there still was use to these deeds, not until they heard deafening shrikes and shrill chirping from above. They needed no words to agree then, and both tugged at the rope with their exceptional strength and determination. A snapping noise they heard responding out of the night, and for a moment their hearts fell until a heavy rumbling and after that impossibly loud crashing followed the snap. The world around them shook, dust filled their lungs and eyes but even then they saw an enormous mass attempt flight from its tumbling perch with enormous shapeless wings. 

It failed. The mass fell with panicked chittering onto the rolling castle remains, crumbled and hit the ground with crunching noises. The voracious deity disintegrated into flocks of little birds scattering in all directions. 

Torsun and Sosir looked at each other in uneasy relief. Perhaps the grendels remained, but the true evil had passed. They climbed down in silence, and continued the journey dirward into the pass.