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thydungeon · 4 years

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“Break”

In the fall of 2018, Stoic Studio held a short story fan fiction contest because they were publishing a compilation for The Banner Saga.

I really loved this game, but for whatever reason I didn’t play the second and third games until a week-long stretch in 2018 when Emily was out of the country. I stayed up until 5 am to finish the third game!

But then I saw the contest and I thought, “oh my god, this is perfect!”

They didn’t pick my story, and I have never been sadder about any personal creation of mine. I spent a lot of time on the story and had a lot of help editing from Russell and Emily, overcoming elements of some fairly old-timey fears. Obviously, the hard truth is that I’m not that good of a writer, but I struggled for a long time with whether or not to really regret a series of design decisions. That is, I wrote the story that I wanted to, the way I wanted to, but I wonder if the following needed to be true:

Why did I write a story that features only varl and literally no humans (read: no women)? Why did I write a story that covers the scope of only violence, something I’ve never been comfortable writing? Why did I write a story with only original characters, so out of the way of the games? Why did I make the first 270 words in the style of an emotionless recounting of strategic and tactical failures? Why did I develop only one character, with essentially no emotional arc?

Regardless, I do like the piece. I think I wrote it reasonably well given the above handicaps (that, again, I chose because I wanted them). And now, reading it two years later, it’s pretty clear it’s “about” switching roles at my old job in the US; the feeling of losing your position and drifting away from people is/was a common theme in a lot of things I’ve written, so go figure lol

Since Russell is the only person who ever read this with the full context (having played the games), here are some background details:

1. The game takes place in a Norse/Nordic setting. The antagonist is a Jormungandr figure, all the main characters have Germanic-sounding names, it’s Viking age tech, and the world is snowy.

2. Varl are like giant human-oxen hybrids; there are only so many of them because each one was literally created by a real, physical god who has since disappeared. Hence, the number of varl will never increase, only decrease (this doesn’t appear to have any kind of Krogan Effect, in case you’re wondering). The process of creation is apparently quite unpleasant and is one of the reasons they fear (and I mean really fear) fire. They share the world with humans, but generally do not intermingle.

3. Dredge are rock-like humanoids who communicate with vibrations and live underground. They fought a tremendous war (the “Second Great War”) against a combined human-varl alliance. Certain dredge who are very powerful are called Sundr and have English names that reference an attribute (canon Sundr include “Bellower” and “Raze”). I don’t remember if they are physiologically different from other dredge or just the classic video game “hero” unit.

4. Per the Wiki, “varl who are close knit enough to be family refer to each other as kendr.”

5. This is stretching my memory, but I believe the title is a play on the basic combat mechanic in the game series - your units can choose to attack an opponent’s armor or health. If you attack their health, your attack damage subtracts the opponent’s armor amount before dealing any health damage, but health damage reduces the opponent’s ability to do damage back. Get it? Breaking their armor? The story is about a breakout as well. Also, it wouldn’t be an early period (2015-2018) piece if it wasn’t about burnout, i.e. breaking down.

As for why I never posted this on Tumblr, it’s because, honestly, I thought Tumblr had a character limit on text posts?

Grofheim burns.

The largest city in the north, the varl capital, lies in ruins after an avalanche of dredge like none had seen before. A few weeks earlier, a handful of reports from northern patrols suggested a massing of dredge in the abandoned, half-sunken city of Skrymirstead; further warbands detailed a sturdy garrison increasing in size with each sighting. A dozen leaders forged north with a host of five thousand to meet them but limped home a mess of several hundred. Survivors spoke of organized dredge armies moving like appendages of the Sundr. Concentrated force separated our army amid a blizzard and obliterated them.

Eager to see the army for ourselves, we awaited their arrival at the city's gate facing the Valkajokull. To our surprise, the dredge struck first from the south, having passed between the Varlsmarch and King’s Barrow hills, and only then advanced from Skrymirstead, placing a hammer against an anvil with Grofheim in between. In the days of old, we expected battles like these to slow to the crawl of a months-long siege, but this generation of dredge attacked with unique urgency. We saw Sundr everywhere: Driver, Rampage, Dread, others we remembered from ages past. The walls collapsed on the eighth day of battle, and dredge poured into the city. After only two weeks of fighting within the walls, their advance was nigh-unstoppable, and we had lost entire sectors of the city, guard towers and homes alike reduced to rubble. By the end of the third week, our encirclement was almost complete and only slivers of light in an ocean of dredge gave us hope for survival.

Shortly after the dredge breached the city walls, Jorundr and many of the remaining varl had rallied to a fortress in the center of the city. Harald, captain of the city patrols, and I, his right-hand man, joined them with a fraction of the varl we had led previously for years; all others had fallen either at the wall or in the ensuing crush. At the top of one of the fortress towers, we pored over a map resting on a rickety table. Wooden figurines shaped like varl and dredge littered the map’s surface. We used to play chess with the little pieces.

Light filtered into the spacious room from all sides, but it illuminated nothing of renown. A couple of spears leaned against the wall, and a handful of varl were resting, drinking water and munching on dwindling provisions. We looked a sorry lot, even more bruised and unwashed than the typical varl cohort. Harald could no longer grip his shield due to a mangled left arm, so we fastened them together, hoping the banded wood would hold. Fiery debris had caught me at the wall, covering my face in cuts. Outside, we could see the dredge burning heaps of fallen varl, challenging us to come out and avenge our dead.

I ran my finger across the map from our location to one of the gates. A few hours’ march stood between us and the world beyond the city walls. “We have less than five days holding out here. By that point, we’ll be surrounded, and they’ll start breaking us apart group by group. The fortress will hold for maybe two more days after that. What’s the plan, Harald?” I lifted my finger from the map and found myself biting the nail of my thumb unconsciously. The sharp taste of iron-flavored blood crusted underneath snapped me back into the moment.

Harald moved a pair of dredge pieces between us and the gate. “From what we gather, the dredge that breached the southern gate destroyed everything from Skyhorn west through the Varlsmarch, but they are now less than full strength.” He moved several other pieces above us on the map. “Jorundr did not move any troops from the northern wall to fend off the surprise attack in the south, so the dredge advance from Skrymirstead was not a total disaster. Still, that group is reportedly much larger, so a breakout that way is not possible.”

“Eamonn and his whole clan stayed at the western tower,” I said, pointing to an ornately decorated tower on the map. “Heard a rumor that Roland and his folks battled back to the wall, actually. Either group is probably a heap of bones by now, though.” Looking over the map, I realized that every painstaking detail on it had been rendered worthless by the dredge.

“I do not blame them,” said Harald. “From all of our experience, dredge grant no quarter, and some varl may be looking for revenge after hearing what happened in the blizzard.”

“I heard it might have been an accident,” said Ismail, one of the younger guards and a fixture of Harald’s patrols. “The leaders out in the wastes forgot to put out a watch as they slept, and the dredge caught them unawares, daylight and all.”

“With dredge, there is no such thing as an accident,” said Harald. “Whatever happened out there does not bode well for us here.” His eyes dimmed and I could see the truth beginning to settle.

“I know Jorundr’s been quiet about where the dredge are coming from, but what have you heard?” I asked. “Did some idiot kick over a hornet’s nest?”

“We only saw the dredge near Skrymirstead and nobody saw them coming from the east,” replied Harald. “It is no coincidence; something is driving them, and it must be more than memories of the second war.”

“We have a dozen ideas what it might be, but nothing with real evidence,” added Ismail. “Jorundr has been tight-lipped about it, but I think it’s because he doesn’t actually know. I’ve heard everything from new leadership among the dredge, a misunderstanding at the border, to some faening scheme by the Valka.”

“No need to gossip on my account, just curious,” I said, turning back to the map. “What’s left for us here?”

“It all depends on how many dredge are out there and if you want to be hopeful,” said Ismail. “Me, personally...I would rather not.”

“The southern walls have been entirely leveled, but that may work to our advantage,” said Harald. “If we can cut a path through the dredge between here and there, we can escape with no bottleneck to hinder our advance. But numbers are not on our side.”

“It’s always possible there is relief on the way, maybe runners found their way to pockets of varl beyond the city,” suggested Ismail. “Can’t change how many dredge are here, but it helps if there are more of us.”

“Now look who’s being optimistic,” I grumbled. “If they got past the forts without any trouble, then that means we’re the only varl for days in any direction. From here, we’ll have to write our own stories.”

“So then getting away is our only real choice,” said Ismail.

“If we all make a break that way to the south, they will pursue,” I said, moving varl pieces down the map and dredge pieces in pursuit. “And we won’t make three days out of Grofheim before they catch us. Some of us must split off to hold or divert them. If not, we’re faened as soon we’re free of the city. The only question is how many and where we put them.”

Harald knew this but remained quiet. He had a way of settling his gaze into an intensity that bordered almost on horror. I never thought to say anything about it after years and years, but over time I understood it as his way of focusing. We all knew that the number of varl who escaped Grofheim would be however many would fight the rest of the war. Vognir’s entourage, the varl in Strand, and any others scattered across the mountains would not be guaranteed to join in time, if ever.

“We estimate there are four thousand of us remaining in the city that can be readied to evacuate at once,” began Harald. “A tenth of that number should be the maximum committed to a diversion.”

“Do you think that’ll be enough?” Ismail asked. My instinct was that we needed a thousand, but I always used more force than necessary to get the job done. Either way, I was happy to let Harald make the assessment. He was always better with strategy.

“We need to make sure we have a force worth carrying into human lands,” said Harald. “We do not know what Jorundr has planned long-term, but we have to give him the best chance to... win.” He almost said ‘survive.’

“Fair enough, then. We hardly ever know what’s on his mind, but that’s never stopped us before. Who’s going?” I asked. Around the room, everybody stopped and looked at me and Harald like awaiting a death sentence. Varl lead long lives, but we are seldom fearless as we pretend before the moment of truth. It is the best trick we play on humans.

Harald looked at me and lowered the shield still wrapped around his arm. For the first time, I noticed the streaks of grey among black in his hair and beard, the weariness in his posture, the chips in his horns, and his tired, deep eyes. His teal tunic rested on top of bandage after bandage; it was caked with blood and pockmarked with cuts and tears.

“As good a time to go as any, right?” I joked to the room. No one said anything.

“Could you give us a minute?” Harald said to the others in the room. They quietly filed out. “I’m sorry to have announced it in front of the others, but at this point, I may be a liability with this,” continued Harald, gesturing to his arm and shield. “I trust you to handle this task. It may be the most important of our lives.”

“Harald, I understand,” I replied, smiling through. “I’ll take the remaining guards we have and hunt for volunteers. Do you need to speak to the other clans to set the plan in stone? Wouldn’t want to ruffle any feathers before we get rolling.”

“I did before I came up here,” said Harald, smiling back. I started to leave but turned back at the door.

“Harald...are we really leaving Grofheim?”

It was a ridiculous question, but it nagged me, and I needed to hear him to make it real: to leave our home, to abandon it to destruction. I was loath to leave everything behind forever: my home, our monuments, the legacy of centuries of varl.

“There is no other way,” replied Harald. “If we were going to stop them, it would have been before they reached the city.”

“We were so sure we would beat them in Skrymirstead and, failing that, here at the walls. What went wrong? The second war took years and years, we were there.”

Harald shrugged. I knew it was futile to ask, but I had become so used to him having an answer. “We will find out once we... regroup.”

I slung a hammer high on my shoulder. “Nothing to do, then. I’ll get your four hundred in the next two hours. In the meantime, I look forward to your plan for our friend down there.” I gestured to the window, where far below at the head of the black sea was a tall dredge dressed in red robes, holding a glaive in each hand. The varl in his vicinity either stood dazed in his presence or routed in cowardice. Harald peered below at the Sundr and I could feel the stress rising in him.

“This is it, this is how it happens,” he muttered, still facing down below. I never knew if he meant for me to hear it.

I went to my makeshift quarters to pick up any remaining equipment. Sitting down on the bed, I dusted off my clothes and shook off stiff boots. The beautiful release of sleep had only found me once in seven days and I longed to just rest for a moment.

After floating down the river of a dream, I opened my eyes and sat up. As I slowly remembered the broken state of my body, I felt my left horn, jagged from days of shrapnel and glancing blows. I traced a line from the tip down to a matrix of scabs dotting everything from my left eye down to my right jaw.

It was time to take stock of everything before our final rush to the city walls. My boots were finally dry after a week trudging through snow; my armor had hardly any straps left to tighten, but I kept reinforcing it with bits and pieces of metal I scavenged; daggers and knives picked up along the way found homes in my belt. I still held onto a hammer I had picked up on the fourth day of fighting. The head had delicate twists and turns carved throughout, and the rune-covered haft was smooth from centuries of use. It sang every time it stung rock and crushed everything it touched.

Down in the courtyard, my remaining guards stood at attention, tired and injured but still eager to make their mark. Another couple hundred from across the city stood nearby, joining. I felt good knowing I would run with so many familiar faces, but I couldn’t shake the feeling of leading them all to a shallow grave.

Nevertheless, we moved over to one of the few gates in the area free of dredge; this exit was where we would perform our illusion. The dredge knew we were cornered and they would be expecting a breakout and a sacrificial diversion. The switch was simple: the initial attack would in fact be the vanguard making the escape. The diversionary force would be disguised as trying to escape, conspicuously filtering out from the side. Some of the worst mistakes we made during the second war had come from believing our enemies were incapable of strategy. Our lives now hinged on whether we had learned the lesson.

Harald emerged from inside the fort, shield still locked to his arm, spear resting on his shoulder. He had patched up the remaining cuts and bruises on his body and looked ready for battle (or as ready as he would ever be). Beyond the gate, we could see figures in the distance, working their way through houses.

“Where are we meeting you when this is all over?” I asked, forcing optimism to my voice.

“The old capital, across Burra Pass,” replied Harald. “A week away if we make haste. Once we break out, Jorundr will send scouts in all directions for help.”

“Look forward to seeing you there,” I said. “Are you ready? Four hundred of yours first, then four hundred of mine.”

“If all goes well, we should have a couple thousand outside the city by the time the dredge realize the game.” Harald gritted his teeth. “Not enough down the line without the menders or humans, but this gives us hope.”

“And the Sundr?”

“You’ll have to take your chances with them,” said Harald, shaking his head. “We cannot use the same tactics as when we had true armies during the wars. We had our hands full even then.”

“Captain, we’re made of flesh and bone.” I slumped while standing for the first time all week. Harald always had an answer, but was this the best he could offer me?

“I know... reports from across the city tell us that every Sundr we can name is here. My gut tells me if you see them, you should just run.”

I forced my face into agreement, but I couldn’t let it go. “How did this happen?”

Harald blinked and his mouth settled into a frown. “We will have more time to ask questions in Einartoft. For now, we just have to escape.”

His tone was final. He seemed prepared for, even unbothered by, our impending departure. Was this all he had to say after spending a hundred years together? Did it not trouble him that those years were spent defending a city now burning to the ground? But I looked into his unmoving eyes and realized my irritation was only immaturity. He knew every bit as much as I did that the world we had built was being undone. We had been colored and shaped by a duty to our home, a duty that we had chosen, a duty that was now sunsetting. Perhaps that spoke enough for both of us.

I felt the questions inside me slowly trickle to a halt. I stared at him, trying to force myself to remember the look of his calm, unshaken face. I could see the determination, the readiness to face our final hours. Varl are seldom fearless as we pretend before the moment of truth. It is the best trick we play on humans, but, finally, this was no trick. I realized I had been staring at him for perhaps a whole minute.

Thus ended my last interaction with Harald in Grofheim. I have a painting of him in my memory of that last scene before I turned to leave. It was in that moment that I knew Grofheim was gone.

The first gate opened and Harald’s four hundred varl rushed out. They pushed away from the gate, plowing through an initial wall of dredge. Once they cleared the first group, I could see a few grunts begin to give chase before the Sundr called them back to the fortress. We then clattered our way out through the side entrance. As expected, the wave of dredge charged in our direction, a contingent ten times our size, howling and humming as they slammed into us.

I swung wildly and tossed aside a dredge grunt. Another swing, another grunt. A third swing buried my hammer into the shield of a stoneguard, but a timely blow from a guardsman freed it again. With simultaneous strikes, we felled the stoneguard and pushed onward. As we nearly broke free of the circle, I could see the lone dredge from before, taller than any of us and shrouded in crimson robes: Dread. It planted both of its glaives into the ground and began shaking violently. We had heard stories of its powers, and I was hesitant to witness them firsthand. But then, I thought, if I could do it, perhaps end the battle immediately and save the lives of those around me--and slay a dredge legend... Stonesingers can be interrupted, one heavy strike would work.

As I neared, I swung back my hammer, twisted my hips, and stretched to meet him, hammer to Sundr. But before I could make contact, a vibration knocked me onto my back and everything around me disappeared.

I found myself floating in calm darkness for a moment before a great wall of flame surrounded me and began to close in. Memories of creation flooded my mind as the flames licked my clothes, but this was different, a perversion. The wall came closer and closer until every part of me was engulfed in flames. Links of chainmail resting on my skin branded themselves into flesh, while the skin itself peeled away and the nerve endings frayed into nothingness. An eternity passed. I saw my skeleton blackening in the deepest fires of the universe, and when the last bone disappeared into ashes, I felt suspended in nothingness. My voice was gone and the only thing I could feel was my mind trying to claw its way back to something tangible.

The hollowness subsided, and I found myself in the physical world, staring up at a sky of clouds and sun blurred together. The world was eerily quiet for that moment. The loud clanging and screams of battle gave way to dull thuds like the sound at a butcher’s. I looked back at Dread and saw it walking away with one glaive resting on a shoulder, the other at its side. It seemed so calm and pleased with its work, not even giving me a second glance.

As my senses sharpened, I saw peril everywhere. My companions were in the state of illusion that had captured me, now lying on the ground with vacant eyes while dredge bludgeoned them to death. I turned and saw one varl after another dying, eyes locked in a gaze into nothingness, not reacting to hammers crushing bone and rupturing viscera and muscle. We existed only like wheat waiting for the scythe. We weren’t even fighting. We weren’t anything.

The feeling of a weapon bearing down on me finally snapped me into action. I could almost see surprise in the grunt’s eyes as I batted away its strike. One swing from my hammer shattered its stone armor and a follow-up caved in its chest. As the light faded from its eyes, I took satisfaction in ensuring its final emotion was shock.

I turned and crushed another dredge, hammerhead vibrating from the point of contact down to my trembling hands. Rage boiled within me and I was ready to charge at Dread, ready to even the score. But my tunnel vision subsided and I realized the true danger to our mission. The Sundr was already leaving and there were plenty of other dredge to handle. The glory of battling a Sundr beckoned, but I knew I owed it to those around me to struggle a different way. I had to escape.

The situation was collapsing. The longer we lingered, the more enemies swarmed to fence us in. Before Dread arrived, we had been close to breaking free and dispersing, but now, we found ourselves surrounded. Neither vigor nor ferocity would save us. I spotted a solitary varl, covered in cuts and missing an arm, waving a red banner, trying to rally us to an alleyway. This was enough of a plan to survive: no glorious final stand, no victory of arms. Along with a few others snapped out of Dread’s illusion, I followed the banner and we began hacking through the crowd of dredge. The already injured varl was cut down as I arrived, but the rest of us barreled down the alleyway as the buildings on both sides began to collapse, supports chewed away by fire. I hated the thought of deserting those I led into the fray, but I decided I would see Harald again; I owed it to my kendr.

By the time we cleared the alley, only a couple dozen of us remained. I could still hear fighting from the other side of the rubble and the awful warping noise of Dread’s glaives. Thoughts of fire continued to race around in my head, but I was able to quell the fear. With the Sundr and its dredge on the other side of the fallen buildings, I assessed our state. So much for our plan: the diversion scattered and smeared into the streets. I could only hope Harald and the others had made their escape. I rallied those with me, a few brothers in arms for years, other newly made friends, mostly strangers in a dire situation, and we started moving toward the city gate to escape. At least there were no other Sundr in the vicinity, and the dredge we did see were not very interested in fighting us, some even running away on our approach. After we felt a safe distance from the violence, we rested in an empty temple dedicated to Hadrborg. It had already been in disrepair by the time the dredge attacked, but I felt the sadness of leaving behind yet another place that harkened to a golden age: lost glory, faded away.

“Where now?” asked Ismail. In the chaos of the breakout, I hadn’t realized he was with us. In fact, I was so sure he escaped with Harald. Selfishly, I was glad to have his shield and spear, but I also wished he were far away and safe.

“It’s another hour to the gate,” I replied. “We’ll need to run. There’s nothing left here for us.”

“Do you think Jorundr and the others escaped? Harald?”

“We can ask questions in Einartoft.” I don’t know how much I believed it now that I was peddling Harald’s words.

As we advanced toward the gate, we got an eerie feeling. The only sounds we could hear were the far-off city buildings crumbling in flames. There was no fighting. Was every other varl in the city already dead? Had the dredge caught Harald and ended all hope? In the long stretch between the final row of houses and the city gate, we saw a crowd of dredge gathered. It was small enough for us to directly engage but large enough that I knew most of us would not survive. And yet, beyond the dredge was a field of corpses, mostly dredge, and only a handful of varl--Harald and the others had broken through!

I exchanged glances with my surviving varl. This was no time for subtlety, and we were in no mood for anything of the sort so close to freedom. We charged.

In the ensuing chaos, I swung my hammer with the feeling that I was gliding into the end of days, with no caution left to spare. With swing after swing, I felt the vibration and resistance resonate throughout my body.

Chance blows may have broken a rib or two, but I felt immersed in my own world. By the time I stopped feeling the weight of the hammerhead against stone, I looked around and realized that I was entirely alone for the first time. Everybody was dead. I never saw Ismail go, or Stefan, or Jorgen, or Thorvald. We had so long to live and I had missed the opportunity to say good-bye all the same. We can ask questions in Einartoft. My final, anti-climactic words to them. The final event of my life in Grofheim. Over in minutes.

Looking up, I saw that the way out was laid bare. Slowly, I realized the only thing left was for me to leave. The gate loomed over me, silent. It struck me as a cruel joke that everything around it had been obliterated, but the gate itself was left unscathed. I had defended it after all.

Not a moment after I took my first step into the snow a mace swung down at me. My forearm flung up by reflex and I felt muscles bruise and bones crack. I stumbled backward and fell into the snow onto my knees. I looked up and saw a lone grunt before me and another figure in the distance. My hands reached furiously in the cold white, reaching and reaching before I saw I had dropped the hammer behind the grunt.

I inched away from the grunt, feeling the desperation and panic of one nearing his end. I could neither find the hammer nor even see it, but I remembered the knives and daggers on my belt and I hurled one at the grunt. A miss. I scrambled for a second knife and didn’t even aim. A thud. A scream, the kind I had heard a hundred times before. The figure in the distance began running toward us, and I rose and charged the grunt. Exhaustion permeated every fiber in my body. Muscle memory drove me to dodge the grunt’s clumsy swings. It was holding onto its side, clutching the embedded knife, as desperate to end the fight as I was. Finally, it committed too far on a downward swing and missed. I held down its mace with my boot and drove my remaining dagger into its face. It crumbled to the ground in a heap without even a whimper. One long exhale later, I gave the grunt’s head a forceful kick, yanking free the blade.

I hastily placed the dagger back into my belt and found my hammer a few steps away. Just as I turned to leave, a whizzing rock smacked one of my horns. I was stunned for a moment. When I recovered, the figure was close enough to see: a smaller dredge with a sling, something I had never seen before. With no shield for defense, I braced for another attack, but it never came. Instead, the dredge dropped the sling and ran to the dead grunt, cradling the body and touching it forehead to forehead, letting out a painful drone.

I knew what I had done. We always knew. Something in me wanted to stay at the gate forever, to die defending something like the grunt had. But I couldn’t bear to look at him and I couldn’t bear to look at her.

At last, I was clear of the city. I was alone. As I walked, the hills leading away from the city gave way to a snowy and steep incline. My legs forced me forward, following the trail Harald and the others had made as they fled, but each step up the hill resounded in my head. The ringing in my ears became unbearable. I turned around to look one final time and my heart cracked at the sight of the rising pillars of flame. Years and years walking the streets, patrolling the walls, drinking myself to sleep, growing camaraderie, watching the world go by. How could I forget what I had seen? How could I let it go? What future was waiting for us? But to live--to Einartoft!

#fiction #The Banner Saga #2 years later

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