THE FABLE OF THE HAG
(Written by
@Agritum originally as the prologue to a WoF Sidestory RP)
North-Central Norway
Some time in the early 20th Century
An old woman lived in a dark forest, where winters were cold, and summers were rainy and grim. Her humble wooden abode, which her husband had built in their youth as the passion and hope of their teenage spirits flowed in their bodies, had since decayed after the kindly old man had gone for shopping in the noisy town next door, and fell from a flight of stairs. The woman of the forest, an herbalist, never smiled anymore.
The old woman had stopped being jovial, but she kept stalking the woods for herbs and lichens, which she would sell to the young wives of the noisy town. She did not dabble in love potions, or entrancing alchemy, but vital medicines and liquors, for which the hurried women of the noisy town always thanked her. But even then, the woman never smiled.
One night, a crying, meek figure in a cloak knocked on her door.
"Please, spare her the orphanage" was the teared whisper.
The old woman grimaced. The cloaked woman handed her a bundle. A newborn baby, the blanket she was wrapped in carefully covering its left eye. She gently moved the texture aside, and felt her heart sink. Emptyness. The cloaked woman fled, crying.
The herbalist clutched the small child close to her.
.-- --- .-. .-.. -.. / --- -. / ..-. .. .-. .
The seasons passed, and the baby girl grew. She sprouted long and silky hair, dark as burnt oak, and her lone eye gleamed brightly in its reddish shade. The Hag took her to long walks, and as soon as she could speak, she taught her about the old gods of Heathenry, the gift of sorcery that Freiya had destined to womanfolk, the courage of Wotan, who gave his eye to the cosmic darkness, to acquire its wisdom.
"
Mormor, can we see the feast of reindeers on Yuletide?" the young girl chirped one day. It was the thing the Hag most feared, for her unsightly face could be deemed weird, and upset the citizens of the noisy town. But the night of the feast, the girl's lone eye watched the holiday celebrations with all the wonder a small child could muster. "
Mormor, thank you!" she chirped.
The Hag smiled again, after decades.
The girl grew, and dabbled in the complexities of witchcraft. "The body of man, my beloved, is paltry when it faces the wisdom of the many branches of Yggdrasil. It is with wisdom, and not eyes, that one sees its branches. Thus, Wotan felt pride, for he had bargained the lowly, wordly eye, for the perception of the True World. And it was that, which set him above others."
The girl learned, and practised the rites. Her potential was high, the Hag expected, and her art was refined. The Hag rewarded her, and let her be a normal girl, as much as she could. She lived in the noisy town, away from the dark forest of her
Mormor, and meddled with the mundanes.
But the world of industry was darker than any forest, and after many months away from the Hag, the girl came back, and her words were fierce. "
Mormor, why do we sit back while the Norsemen are endangered? My mates sent me this book, for which the author is in jail! And there is much conspiracy against our kind, and our roots!"
The Hag scoffed at the book. "If this man has fought battles in his life, it was against mere worms. How many valiants have succumbed, for a chieftain who wasn't worth his title? "
The girl was silent, but they drifted apart. She started to come less and less to the hut in the woods, and whenever she did, sweet words for her
Mormor came no more.
"You said my eye puts me above others,
Mormor! Then why must I sit in this forest, hearing you wax on the virtues of medical herbs, while, while….while our race succumbs? Should warriors wait out like cowards, as the end of the world comes, and the fight against the treachery of Loki and his spawns starts?"
The Hag looked away from her. "If this is what you have become, I think that Loki's treachery has hit us first."
The Hag weeped all night after she left, and her smile was sealed, for the second time in her life.
.-- --- .-. .-.. -.. / --- -. / ..-. .. .-. .
June 10th, 1940
The Forests of Narvik
Minni took a deep breath, and pushed away anything happy she remembered about that hut in the woods. Empty, empty words, honey-coated promises that had never done anything to benefit her life. She gazed down at the vivid red armband she donned, and the pitch black Odal rune over it, and the hut before her. The night was silent.
She smiled, for she didn't belong to that woman anymore.
"When the sword arm falters, the longboat's wood creaks, and the hall of the gods decays, the passing of the chieftain has come. Your life was long, deserved, but it faltered in its end. Walhalla will not open the gates for you, my teacher..."
Her finger flicked. The shine of gas mask visors in the surrounding woods glistened in the moonlight. Fire erupted from the trees, chemical one, as armored men inundated the hut of the Hag with the heat of their flamethrowers. Minni watched, unfliching, as a flinching, half-carbonized shadow screamed and shook, as the weight of the burning wooden structure pinned her down.
Minni gave her back to the scene.
"...but I hope Hel will take pity in you"
And before you ask, no, we're not going to Norway. Yet. A raid on the Vermork
is planned, eventually, but it's not where we're going next. This was to serve as the prologue to a short(ish) side-RP to World on Fire, set during WW2, focusing on a group of of Soviet espers. Sort of a psionic Dirty Dozen, but with a lot more psychic women. And Marxism. Though whether the characters would all be Loyal to the Party was another matter...
This little sidestory is, honestly, simply here because one of the other sidestory authors has asked to be given time to give his sidestories a once-over. It has been quite a while since they were written, after all.
