Richard the Odd
Level: Roachling
Rank Points: 12
Registered: 07-18-2016
IP: Logged
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Heroine's Saga (A very long tribute piece) (+2)
Hello all,
I had the good fortune to blunder across Heroine's Quest a while back and, thanks to its lasting impression and the fact that I have a lot of bus trips to pass the time on, I penned this Norse saga-esque(ish) account of pretty much the entire quest.
I have rather too much time on my hands.
If you'd like to read then beware, beastly huge spoiler warning, I'm basically about to reveal a good 90% of the game, if you haven't finished it yet then be off with you till you're finished.
In the fullness of time I plan to record an audio version and twist that into a video for YouTube, all being well. I'll return when I do.
Thanks to Crystal Shard for making this quality game and thanks to whoever's reading this if you read the entire thing. Hope you like it.
Heroine's Saga
By Richard Paul
The wrath of winter slackens not for spring,
Snow falls unceasing to blanket in bleakness.
Fimbulwinter, Ragnarok heralding,
Foisting despair and fostering weakness.
Yet ere all fortitude falls to the freeze,
A traveller tackles the treacherous tracks,
Her high hope, a hailed heroine to be,
And answers a call to halt winter's attack.
At once peril pursues her, the two pates,
And half-brain between them, of Thrivaldi,
Chief of Trolls, who watches unsubtle and waits
For the moment for malice to be meet.
When it comes, he causes a cascade,
Snow charges to smother the shield-maiden.
He leaves aloof for the looming dawn's light,
Supposing the sun sets humans in stone.
The wanderer wakes, wasted and weakened,
Found in the frost, she fares fairer 'midst friends;
Volund the smith saw her made safe and tended,
The stranger's first test – starvation to mend.
By spear, by sagacity, by sugared tongue,
By one or by one other she obtains
Food enough to see fatal famine undone,
Succour sufficient for starvation to wane.
Within the walls she walks whilst awake,
Nought much she needs, nor is needed that night.
Fornsigtuna's jovial, joyous it japes
Till dawn delivers directions and deeds.
Come morning the maiden is met by Jarl's men,
They ask her attend their master ere all.
She goes and is greeted by good Jarl Ylfing,
Sage Aurvandel too hails her in the hall.
The task is taken up, the bold heart true;
At once the otherworldly oracles,
The Norns, who've woven the world's ways like wool,
Reveal and regale, rhetorical.
The suffocating surfeit of winter
Is numinous-called by a Jotunn King,
Fettered in his fortress, he finally stirs
To make manifest Midgard's unmaking.
Horrors heed him, harrying to herald
The fate that Fimbulwinter must foretell,
The calamity that comes after the cold,
The Gods' twilight, the last tale to tell.
Only one obstructs obliteration,
She who harkens, she who fain hight heroine;
Lest she save all, all shall soon be shorn,
Lest she end this ‘Egther’, tis everything's end.
Her first forays to the forest turn violent,
Brigands abound, bellicose and brutal.
Vargs vile and feral sniff out her scent,
They press and they pain her, but perish all.
Resting through the night and recovering,
She is sent a subtle summons in her sleep.
A vision of fury and of fighting,
Twixt a Vikingr and foul Thrivaldi.
With the morn she moves southward with all speed,
Searching for Sigurd who she saw while asleep.
The warrior who fared foul 'gainst Thrivaldi,
Left wounded and fading in the white wastes.
A vordr helps her find fallen Sigurd,
She helps him home where he's hurriedly hale.
To Munarvagir, small but not meagre,
Steadfast it stays, though by winter assailed.
The people persevere through perils and pains,
And through the ordinary strife of life.
Not a one wilts as the world seems to wane,
Not one retreats though ruination grows rife.
In gratitude, Sigurd's saviour is gifted
With the finest fare and a room given free.
Though with sleep her window shutters are shifted,
Her possessions are purloined by a thief.
Enraged, she entertains no en-treatment
To forget and forgo a fitting hunt;
She would crack the thieves' concealment
And render a response, beastly and blunt.
The trail terminates in a dark room
With subtle strangeness in how it is set.
Her cunning uncovers its concealed clues
Till by the ladder to the Thieves' lair she's met.
Here, strangely, our tale has two tellings
Of what was done down in the thieves' den:
One says when she came, she came conquering,
One says the thieves tested her, and she joined them.
Whichever is right, her gear she regains,
The cut-purses all cowed or else comrades;
Formidable mettle she has displayed,
The bedrock of a heroine's high fame.
As darkness dithers, determined she drives,
Pitting her power 'gainst shadowed perils.
'Gainst dreadful trolls and restless dead she vies
As cold assaults her, but she confounds all.
Elsewhile, to the east of Fornsigtuna,
Eager young eyes behold a prize in a tree,
A sword for one whose honour has no peer,
Beheld by the hopeful eyes of young Heime.
He is the son of Volund the stout smith,
Whose hands wrought Balmung, the blade in the bark.
To one day wield the weapon is his wish,
Oft he looks on it, but now heeds not the dark.
As he starts to set off for home and safety,
A wretched shape shambles up to waylay him.
It is the two-headed troll Thrivaldi
Who requires the boy for a bargain grim.
The meagre morning reaches Munarvagir,
The shield-maiden sets out once more,
Wending her way north and west to Fornsigtuna,
Where she finds Heime’s absence felt most sore.
She seeks out the Smith and his wife Hervor
Who is furiously afraid for her son.
She swears to seek out Heime and not stall
Nor detour till he’s home, and this fright is done.
Her searching first finds Heime’s wooden weapon,
At once she asks Sage Aurvandel for aid.
The wooden sword forms a focus and a strong
Trail is shown to where Heime was taken.
If she fain to save the blacksmith’s stripling
Then to a different world she must wander;
To and through Svartalfheim’s dark depths delving,
It makes wits wane, though this does not daunt her.
She seeks answers from any and all around
And soon learns of a ring of standing stones
Through which the roads to other realms are found,
So long as the right ritual is shown.
From various folk, snippets she snatches
Of what must be wrought to open the way,
Her labours are long but all lore she catches,
Hopeful her heroism can carry the day.
She touches each rune-stone as required,
Walking only widdershins as is meet,
Lastly she offers the mead that’s desired
And thus once more the three Norns does she greet.
They demand she justify her decision,
They forbid any frivolous foray,
She makes plain her mission’s fine precision
And no more ‘neath Midgard’s sun does she stay.
Brightness is banished, the snow is no more,
Stark and serpentine run Svartalfheim’s caves,
With hazards and harriers there in store,
Every corner could lead to an evil grave.
Bands of warlike Duergar delay her steps,
Swaggering Svartalf sorcerers strike at her,
Trolls run rampant here with no sun to detest,
These and worse through the stony caves do stir.
Yet hers, past doubt, is a heroine’s heart,
Hers is valour befitting a Valkyrie.
She overcomes all through her warring arts,
Till the steps of Nidavellir she sees.
This is the city of the Svartalfar,
From mad magics and machinery wrought;
One with a meatless mind will not make it far,
Nor any folk much fond of gravity.
She is given goodly welcome by most,
Humans are few here though visitors are not.
But there is not time to trade tails and boast,
For Heime is here, the trail is hot.
To a stark, secluded section she sneaks,
There she finds the blacksmith's boy behind stone bars,
Guarded by one great in praise for gallantry
Hight Skrymir, most stalwart of Svartalfar.
To overcome so awful an obstacle
Is a true test of her strength and skill,
But her might, be it martial or mental
Sees the battle won, hers was the greater will.
Defeated in duty, Skrymir departs,
Heime, hale and glad of heart is set free,
The boy is in awe of his saviour's art,
But now they must speed to the stones and not tarry.
The ancient magic moves them to Midgard,
To face the Fimbulwinter's foulest fare,
A blizzard blasts them, their way home is barred,
Lest they escape, doom and death shall find them there.
But she has not strived and suffered so much,
Nor sworn an oath to make safe Volund's son,
To yield to cold's calamitous clutch,
They'd defy disaster ere the day was done.
With straightforward sense, a path they soon see,
Through the blizzard she bears the boy on her back.
On she walks, though wounded-sore and weary,
Her fortitude falters 'gainst winter's attack.
At last she falls face first in the fell freeze,
Her strength is spent, her senses are scattered,
But this is not the end, for the smith sees
Her and Heime both, and bears them both home.
Once more she wakes, warm and well accompanied
In Fornsigtuna's guildhall, she's met with joy
From all, and all talk in town is of how she
Braved the blackest pit to save the blacksmith's boy.
She walked hence through winter, fame and glory to win,
Though steered by fate, her own prowess has proved
That she deserves to be hailed 'Heroine',
Though all's not ended, the true threat's not yet removed.
Hervor advises the Heroine to head
North and east, where lies entranced in sleep-endless
Brynhild the Valkyrie, who bears the vengeance
Of Odin One-Eye, to answer an offence.
Brynhild took a mortal man for a mate,
A forbidden thing; for thus she is ta'en
From the waking world, for thus she must wait
Amidst an encircling prison of flame.
Her mortal lover meanwhile was made
To forget each fair and fine memory
Of love and lover both, thus lonely she stays
If he remembered, he would have her freed.
The Heroine seeks out the sleeping Brynhild,
Yet the forest roads are rendered fouler;
Giants now gather, Egther's ranks to fill
For the final fight in the world’s final hours.
Three different breeds now roam the roadways,
One is the grey, shambling and stony-skinned
Bergrissi, what they snatch they squeeze and slay;
Bold and mickle of brawn, still their brains are dim.
Smouldering too stand the sons of Muspell,
Creatures formed all of freakish fell fire.
To know them is to know the world's coming knell,
One day they shall make of the world a pyre.
Lastly come the lordly race of Jotunn,
The Ice giants are enticed to Egther's side
To champion the cause of destruction,
To fight so fiercely that Midgard must die.
Formidable, but not invincible,
None who challenge the Heroine can kill her.
What presumes itself indestructible
May form a fine crows' feast, dead on the dirt.
She reaches the Valkyrie and raging flames,
She compels the circle to admit her,
She shakes Brynhild free of her sleeping bane,
The fallen Valkyrie once more does stir.
From her, the Heroine hears the whole tale,
The evil history and hopes of Egther,
Foremost she discovers a dread detail,
Two treasures to take, Ragnarok to earn.
It is the Eyes of Thiassi he's sought,
Only these could end his ensnaring hex,
The eyes would unleash him, then would be wrought
The final frey, all creation to vex.
And yet, to end the threat, Thiassi's eyes
Must crack the gate of great Gastropnir Keep.
Fimbulwinter wont falter till Egther dies,
Lest he falls, all shall soon be slaughtered like sheep.
She learns that one eye lies in Munarvagir,
Kept as safe as may be by stout Sigurd.
The second is secured in Fornsigtuna,
By Volund it was initially interred.
It was when Thrivaldi took his firstborn,
So to trade the boy for Thiassi's eye,
He thought it wise his watchfulness be shorn,
That with Aurvandel it would better bide.
Both guardians do not gladly give voice
To the matter, let alone make a gift
Of their charges, each demand the people's choice
As the price for each powerful eye to lift.
Four citizens from each burg must vouch for her,
Four must believe past doubt she can prevail,
That she shall become Midgard's saviour,
That by her hand, Egther's harm shall fail.
First she fain prove her grit to each guardian,
Sage Aurvandel first, who has for her a quest:
To drive from Fornsigtuna's gate, back to its den,
A haugbui, this is the Heroine's test.
At night she sets forth and soon she sees it,
A shadowed spectre, shrieking and striking,
The battle is bitter but she beats it,
Quick as a flash the frightful foe flees, shrieking.
The Heroine hunts it back to its Earth-hole,
Where chill-struck cadavers clamour to clout her,
They trouble her not, not one is even whole,
Once hewn, the haugbui once more flees her.
The lore of this lifeless thing she has read
And she's equipped to end its existence,
She has glimpsed its grave, to it she was led,
Now she could deal it death without resistance.
She digs through snow and sod, till she strikes bone,
These remains she roasts till they're rendered ash.
She bears these to the lake and there they're blown
Away, and in this way her foe's dispatched.
Aurvandel's trust she then attains, and also
A draught of the Eitur, dread-doom to dispel.
Next, to Sigurd, she must find a way to show
Her merit and her might and her mettle.
Fortunately she may have found a way,
As her conversing with the captive Brynhild
Suggested Sigurd himself as her swain,
His ransacked mind needs must now be refilled.
A roundabout path this shall prove to be,
For tis Odin's own will she must overcome.
Back to Svartalfheim and Skrymir her path leads,
With new challenges to be countered and won.
The way to the sunless realm of the Svartalfar
Now lies afore her as an open door.
She may peruse as she pleases this world-bizarre
And discover what darkness is therein stored.
Investigations and inquiries
Alluded to, perhaps, an antidote.
Skrymir, also an artful alchemist
May well have perfected a potion of note.
He mentions the fabled mead of poetry,
The mead of the mind which Odin purloined
This mead would mend Sigurd's mind and memories,
This would help earn the eye, along with his joy.
She challenges Skrymir to a fitting contest,
Her Eitur is wagered against the mead.
The Heroine faces three twisted tests
Not a one is at all as it does seem.
A contest of speed, another of appetite
Or are they indeed? ?Sthgif demood yeht era ro!
Cunning is needed/Selur tsum eb detsiwt
Improvisation else devastation.
Finally, inevitably, fighting,
The fight that cannot be fought forever.
Though significance lies in the striving
Her valour sees her vouchsafed victory.
The wager is won, her reward most worthy,
A prize snatched by Odin from sly Suttung,
Hers had become the mead of poetry,
To mend meddled memories in a mind stung.
In Munarvagir once more, she seeks Sigurd,
At her urging, he drinks the deity's draught.
To his brain, Brynhild's visage is returned,
He makes for her flaming cage, forthright and fast.
The fire fades when he finds his forgotten love,
Their curses are cast out; they can now be free.
His home and his heart he does gladly devove,
Beside her beloved is where she longs to be.
Fortunate proves her freedom, for a force
Of vulgar trolls and giants have gathered.
They come for carnage, Munarvagir their course,
To snatch the eye, and see all which stands burn.
The Heroine, the Valkyrie, the hero,
The healer, the shop keeper, the street girl,
These six stalwarts sally forth to smite the foe
And thwart fool-Thrivaldi, Egther's house-churl.
It is he who has led his force of louts here,
It is he who stands back whilst they battle,
It is he whose confidence fast fades for fear,
As his soldiers are smote and the sacking turns ill.
The heroine claims for herself a Jotunn head,
The others dispatch their own opponents.
Egther's assault is ended, his nose is bled
And with one more wound is wintry despair rent.
The quest must continue with the coming morn,
The Heroine must still prove herself to most;
In high honour she must be swiftly adorned,
Of her daring and deeds must all have cause to boast.
Jarl Ylfing she chances upon in Jarnvidir,
Ensnared and enraptured by a Huldra.
The tree-troll tries to entrance the trespasser
But stares in a mirror and thus snares herself.
Returned to the rightful rule of his realm
The Jarl speaks of how he'd set out to search,
But fell lost, and amidst the pines and elms
Was bewitched by the beast whose back is birch.
He tells his rescuer to name her reward,
Selfless she asks him to set loose the sneak
Hight Kraka, who sought to steal from the Lord
Instead imprisoned she sits, her future bleak.
The Jarl grants this boon and the girl goes free,
The Heroine hordes more trust and friendship
Through these meritorious trials and deeds
The eyes she needs draw nearer to her grip.
Liff and Lithrasir, Life and Life-Eager;
Should Ragnarok see Midgard ruined and razed,
In Hoddmimi's Holt these two shall endure,
So the Norns wove, so shall be the lovers' fate.
One from Fornsigtuna, one Munarvagir,
Once before they met, at once each heart was hooked,
Though twixt cold and creatures, they could not court for fear,
Thus ardently for assistance they looked.
Happily the Heroine agreed to aid;
Simply this started, strangely it ended,
First a lover's letter to Liff she conveyed
Liff's hope through Lithrasir's letter is tended.
He asks the Heroine find flowers in the frost,
And then to lay them before Lithrasir;
For this task, two of the nine worlds must be crossed,
And from stone must be set free Thor's prisoner.
Fimbulwinter leaves flora forsaken,
All that may be found arrived from Asgard,
Held by Eitri, a Svartalf salesman,
Trading tales and trinkets from the worlds.
Flowers that may withstand winter's withering
Are a part of his piecemeal collection.
In trade he requests she track down his missing
Friend Alvis, who earned Thor's terrible vexation.
He sought for Thrud, Thor's daughter, to be his bride,
Ere the wedding, Thor delayed him till daybreak.
Thus as a stone statue the Svartalf must bide
Till the Heroine comes, his curse to break.
By the light of the moon, she finds the stone
He has become, and through the Eitur she ends
His imprisonment, flesh freed, his will his own,
Ere sun stops him, to the rune-stone circle he wends.
The flowers are gladly given as reward,
And gifted to Lithrasir, who would walk
Now, with an escort, to the snow-clad sward
To meet Liff, their love in each heart now locked.
There they both meet and there they both embrace,
Winter is at once cast out of the holt,
All is made green and gartered in spring's grace.
Egther's end of things endures one more jolt.
Next comes Snorri, Jarl Ylfing's scoundrel Captain,
Stalwart yet scandalous, scheming yet stout,
To prove herself to him, she must obtain
Victory 'gainst him in an archery bout.
Snorri makes for a masterful marksman,
But tis far from the Heroine's forte
Her wits must work well to win 'gainst the Captain,
But this they do, and thus more trust she gains.
Next there is a man from Munarvagir,
Ancient in age, not long left ere Nifelheim.
Yet now his old days down dark paths are steered,
So he'll stay, lest his cat return alive.
Tis simple to say: what challenge? What purpose?
Feeble foolishness in the Heroine's quest;
Why would she waste time with a wayward puss
Whilst the days stay dark and filled with distress?
But what manner of mortal would malign
The dwindling days of a troubled old man?
What Heroine has no heart to be kind
And seeing sadness, not suffer it to stand?
The cat she corners, not far into the forest,
It bolts to a branch too flimsy to follow,
But the lure of salt-herring it shan't resist
Thus she catches it and stops the man's sorrow.
Kindness she also shows to the rancid rodent
Ratatosk, the squirrel of deadliest doom,
Peerless in malice, misshapen, cruel and bent,
At least to itself, to others 'tis a goon.
Time after time it scampers towards her,
Looking to do mischief to out-Loki Loki,
But bearing above all belligerent bluster,
Its feeble schemes fail and soon it flees.
Later, near the lake she finds him lamenting,
Resigned now to his ridiculousness,
She aids through counsel, his aims amending,
Doom becomes bloom, planting supplants vileness.
Next our tale turns to the arch-thief Regin,
A Svartalf in man's shape who found sanctuary
In Munarvagir, made to dwell therein
When his kin-slaying brother forced him to flee.
Fafnir, his brother, a foul, faithless fool,
Slew their own father, all for a treasure.
Regin attempted to avenge this cruel
Act, but lacked the strength to make Fafnir's end sure.
Safe from the sun, he seeks the Heroine's aid,
To do what he did not, avenge his father,
To strike down his snake-brother, and once slain
Return forthwith with his father's treasure.
Fafnir was the first she met in Nidavellir,
His pride was past question, but his evil not so,
He marks Regin as their kin's murderer,
And offers like quest, the brother to lay low.
Uncertain she is of the truth of things,
She cannot unleash either's guts on a guess.
Yet the truth is ta'en in a cave shining,
The cause of revenge must soon be put to rest.
A chest she uncovers, tis Regin's rare prize,
At once Fafnir comes to the cave he's claimed
He commands her: give o'er the chest, else he'll prise
It from her, after a death of peerless pain.
She who has striven through Svartalfheim
Is not intimidated by this irritant.
In lindworm's shape he strikes, but she'll not die,
Instead she destroys the damned deviant.
Regin rejoices when comes her return,
Jubilant he thanks her for bringing justice,
And provides a princely gift for all she's done,
A statute which shifts to a steed, sure and swift.
Next there comes Sigrun, a steadfast shop keeper,
Who mourns her slain husband who hight Helgi,
Who fell in battle with her own brother
Who himself, across from him, is interred.
As chance, or the Norns' narrative, would have it,
A trade with Eitri procured a power,
Through an artefact, the dead to admit
For some meaningful moments, back to Midgard.
With Sigrun's permission, she searches his grave,
And draws forth the spirit of Helgi to her,
To be once more with his wife is what he craves,
To bid proper goodbye and heal her hurts.
Through his skull, the Heroine sees him to Sigrun,
Then leaves the two be, perchance to find peace.
When next she sees her, much pain is undone,
Sigrun's grief is greatly, and gently, eased.
Last in the list of the Heroine's helps
Is ailing Arngrim; abandoned, alone.
A proud adventurer not long ago,
Till sickness sentenced him to die all too slow.
The Heroine visits him oft in her quests,
Their talks taught her much and lessened his plight,
Even so, he seemed certain to suffer the rest
Of time entombed amidst Nifelheim's blights.
And yet a gift to grant the Gods' own health
Comes un-hoped for to him from the Heroine.
An apple of Idunn, exceeding all wealth,
By the Norns, as her reward was given.
Yet Arngrim has need of it whilst she has none,
For she is at the height of her hardiness.
He eats and sickness is shorn, despair shunned,
By the Aesir's power, his body is blessed.
And through him, the Heroine has all she needs,
The trust and the friendship of enough to earn
The frightful eyes of fallen Thiassi,
The fate of Midgard, one way or t'other to turn.
Each guardian of each eye gives theirs to her,
And resting till nightfall, she's ready to raid
The terrible keep of the Jotunn Egther,
His cold, craven head to sever and claim.
But first Thrivaldi tries to thwart her once more,
Standing 'twixt her and grim Gastropnir keep,
She soon fells this foe in the manner of Thor
Snaring Alvis, stalling him whilst the sun creeps.
Too late they realize what's befallen,
They plead to their master for protection,
But the sun strikes them, nothing more is heard then,
Each frozen stone dome displaying dejection.
Every inch of Gastropnir is ghastly,
A dead dragon's head grins down from the gate
But the Heroine's heart falters not easily,
She'll fight to the finish, though the foe be great.
Once within, Egther emerges to greet her,
Massive and monstrous, master of the Ice.
Full of rage his hellish voice roars at her,
Swearing that she and the world shall die in a trice.
By force of will, he bids the floor shatter 'neath her,
Down she falls, and comes face to face with Fenrir,
He who'll eat the moon, he who maimed the war-wager,
Looks on her with a hungry, snarling leer.
As the beast is fettered, so too bound by fate,
The Heroine cannot kill it, no human can.
Yet her fate is not one foul stomach to sate
And her demise too is not there at hand.
When all is over, she ascends out the pit,
With Fenrir smashed into stupefied slumber,
Only one path lies open, she follows it,
And the strangest strangeness she discovers.
At the end of a long hall, herself she sees,
Stood before a portal, perplexed she pauses
Till her double delivers words which rally
Her own self's wits, consistency she causes.
She steps through the portal, to time not yet come,
To fallen Fornsigtuna, set afire
Ransacked by the war Ragnarok sees done,
It shall be should she lose, all lifeless and dire.
She takes from a tarrying troll two treasures,
An apple seed, more than it seems, and a key.
She deigns not dither in this future perverse
And passes through the portal, the past to please.
In Hoddmimi's Holt the Heroine emerges,
Yet young and unfinished the ground does look,
The stout stone gazebo's a work in progress,
In the river, a ruby she took lies unhooked.
She plants the apple seed where a tree shall be,
The one which shall sprout Idunn's apples of gold,
With all haste then, back to the present goes she,
Leaving the lush holt to grow peacefully old.
She returns to the icy hall she lately left
And sees once again herself, staring stunned.
Repeating precisely what was passed, then deft
She heads forth to see Egther fall, and all won.
She charges him as he casts calamities,
He scorns her striving and states he'll soon smite her,
Loosing mighty powers liberally,
Confident with each strike he shall kill her.
Yet think of everything each champion has shown,
One has walked worlds, hewn horrors, gained great glories,
One has simply schemed, sat upon his throne.
The valour he faces, Egther fails to see.
The fight is harder than any come afore,
Spells tear the air and the turgid hall trembles,
The Heroine gives all she has got and more,
One slip would end her, one trip, one stumble.
But the fight finishes with the fading fury
And failing breath of the Jotunn blackguard
The valiant Heroine knows victory,
Egther can but curse as his life departs.
The Norns proclaim this protectress the victor,
From Ragnarok is every realm made safe
And ended is the once-eternal winter;
Sadly, the stronghold swiftly turns unsafe.
The Saviour flees as fleet as her feet may fly,
As the evil keep crumbles and crashes.
Outside and safe, she observes with due pride
The cheerful conclusion of all her clashes.
In less than a week, the warmth wends its way
Back to the land, for spring, though late, has come.
All Jarnvidir's folk find good fare for a feast,
To honour the Heroine who saved them.
One by one, each person she paused to aid
Steps forward and tells their tale to all,
Time and again she has assailed dismay,
Had hopelessness hacked, in great ways and small.
Her rewards and recognition run rife,
Ever shall she be the land's exemplar.
But soon she must set off, to seek out new strife
And lengthen her legend in lands lain afar.
One final gift is given by Jarl Ylfing,
A flying vessel to ferry her hence,
So she sets off, in clouds disappearing,
And we can only wonder as to whence.
Tis clear of course that more stories she'll spawn,
Truly, not all from Jarnvidir I've told,
And none can now doubt that when comes her last dawn
She'll journey to Asgard's great halls of gold.
The End.
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Glad you liked it.