In the clearing near the base of Mount Steinefni, Josh stared up at the large boulder, twice his size in length and width, blocking the cavern’s entrance. The rocky surface mocked him with how innocuous it appeared, as if it didn’t block the secret passage to where the Wish Maiden had hidden herself. Instead of feeling satisfaction, though, his heart was heavy with trepidation. Doubts filled his head as he raised his hand to push aside the stone, causing it to tremble in the faint chill of the morning air. Josh glared at the traitorous limb. He’d never hesitated the entire journey, regardless of where it took him in his six winters of searching, but now that victory was right before him he was a coward? Fuck no.
The old hag’s words echoed in his head, reminding him just why he was acting like a young pup and not a young adult half-wolf wekufe of nearly a hundred winters. The Wish Maiden always demands a high price from those who desire her power.
He shifted his weight, reassuring himself with the sound of the gold medallion clinking against the rest of his belongings in the bag strapped across his shoulders. Josh’s search for the Wish Maiden had gone on even longer due to him having to find something that was so valuable that she wouldn’t be able to refuse granting a wish from a half-breed. So when he learned about the Odinalvora Medallion, he knew nothing else would suffice.
Josh swallowed heavily and stared back at the boulder. Well, better shit or get off the pot. With the supernatural strength granted to him by the blood of the wolf wekufe in his veins, he pushed the large rock aside easily.
Dank, fetid air reached his nose, causing him to retch. He nearly doubled over, his powerful sense of smell almost his undoing. Spitting onto the ground a few times, he took a deep breath and took a few steps in.
If it weren’t for the fact that he had seen the sacred texts detailing the historical accounts of the Wish Maiden himself in the royal library at Al-Harrelson, he would’ve easily believed that the old hag was taking him for a fool. How could any creature, human or otherwise, take refuge in such a foul place like this? Even to escape the greed of mankind, this seemed too much.
Josh took a few steps in, nearly falling to his knees. He hastily covered his mouth and nose with the long blue sleeve of his furred shirt, trying to block as much of the air that he could to protect himself from the death and decay that floated in it. After a few more steps, a tingle of magic ran up his spine. Reflexively baring his fangs as the magic of the seidr raised his hackles, he silently cursed. If nothing else, that proved he was in the right place.
Baring his teeth, he forced himself to keep going. After a few minutes, the air finally grew tolerable enough that he could drop his sleeve. He could still taste the rot and decay in the air, but the slight scratch at the back of his throat was much more tolerable. By now his eyes had adjusted to the dark, but with his keen senses the yellow-green glow that the moss on the wall emitted was more than enough light.
Josh continued his descent, the slight slope of the dirt below him pounding against his bare feet. Along the walls, small statuettes had been placed in little alcoves that had naturally formed. They were even with the average human’s chest, but compared to Josh’s height they only came to his belly. The statuettes were similar to what Josh had seen growing up and traveling to various human settlements when younger. Used to ensure that the area was receiving the blessings of the Sun Goddess, they featured her sitting on her knees, her open hands cupped together to hold a candle that would be burning, with the runes for sanctification carved into her open hands. Her eyes were closed, a serene smile on her face.
If he had to guess, he would’ve said the statuettes were carved out of granite, as that was what he had seen at the temple of Al-Harrelson, but the smell of the moss overpowering the rock made it impossible to tell. From what he could see, it was nowhere near the craftsmanship of what was at the temple (to say nothing of how they compared to the famed rock carvers of the Tlayan rock wekufe clan, but they were just humans after all), but he could still clearly see what it was. Even despite it being covered with moss.
While the candles were long gone, their only presence being that Josh knowing that they most likely used to be there, goosebumps still rose on his skin whenever he would walk too close to any one, their magic so potent that it affected him despite their age. That, combined with the eerie yellow-green glow the moss cast on them, made Josh’s hackles rise despite himself.
While these were heavily covered in moss, obscuring anything that was not extremely well-defined, he had seen enough of these that he knew what they were for. They were here to bless and sanctify the area, cleansing it of foul spirits and ill omens with the light of the Sun Goddess. Due to the magic, the runes carved into her hands burned through the moss, the negative space emphasizing them even more strongly. Despite himself, his eyes snagged on one when he realized that the runes carved in her hands were different than the ones he’d seen carved into vertical slabs of rock around the various temples of Al-Harrelson.
While the standard words of protection and defense had been carved into the rock – Hafnafa, Reykjalk, and others – there were two additions. Mignalvor and Tlakalvor. Seal and Confine. He wrinkled his brow as he tried to puzzle it out.
The words being in Old Tungalag was nothing new. Few, if any, humans spoke it casually after the First Age, and as a result humans believed it was the language of magic. Josh knew better though, as it was no more magical than Tungahljod, the common tongue he had learned to converse with humans while hunting down evil wekufe.
It was the actual words used that confused him. What would the humans have needed to seal here? The idea of there being a monster sealed down here as well made him grin, the expression bloodthirsty.
But seeing all the religious iconography was making Josh feel confused. He knew all the local human settlements, especially Al-Harrelson, emphasized having their temples and worship areas high up in elevation, and at the very least under the open sky. Why would they be here, deep in the cavern system?
He brushed the feeling aside. What did he care about some dumb human rituals? As long as they didn’t impede his progress on getting to the Wish Maiden and being granted his wish, nothing else mattered.
He stepped past the occasional bone remnant, uncaring when his feet landed on one and broke it. It was only human bones, after all.
As he walked, drops of water falling from the stalactites fell. Drip. Drip. Drip. Josh groaned to himself, his ears twitching as he tried to ignore the awful sound. Each drop echoed through the hall, echoed through his eardrums and piercing into his brain. Drip. Drip. Drip. Josh held back a scream, wishing not for the first time that he could tear his own ears off (though not for the same reason).
Finally, as the ground began to even out, he got far enough away that he could no longer hear the accursed dripping noise. The ground began to even out, and Josh tempered his patience. This was only the first room of three, and the last one would be the one that held the Wish Maiden.
He entered the first room. His gaze was immediately drawn to the statue in the middle of the room.
Surrounded by nine walls, there was a rock statue of a young woman in the center of the room, atop a short pedestal. She was sitting on her knees, an obvious mirror of the statuettes of the Sun Goddess by whoever had carved it. Instead of her hands in her lap, cupping a flame, they were raised up and cupping a large teardrop-shaped jewel that hung from her neck.
Josh fought back a blush when the necklace drew attention to her large breasts. He quickly averted his eyes, then scolded himself when he reminded himself it was just a statue. He returned his gaze back on her, unable to stop himself from drinking in her features.
Desires involving him drowning his face in her breasts, his large hands swallowing her thin waist, filled him. He adjusted himself, reminding himself what he was here for. Idiot, you’re here for the wish! Stop acting like the fucking statue is a bitch in heat!
With great effort, he pulled his attention from her great assets to the rest of her.
Her face was set in a kind and serene expression, the skill of the carver even showing off her long lashes. Her long hair was bound into three braids that joined into one at the base of her neck, just like the Sun Goddess. It made sense, though, as all followers of the Sun Goddess who worked the temple and were in training wore that hairstyle.
Her dress was at first glance typical of the seidreinna, but as he continued to peruse her features more and more differences arose. The long sleeves and high collar were the same, yes, but there was a clear delineation between the fabric that made up the shoulder area and where her chest began. The second delineation occurred right below her waist, where another layer of fabric began, and then a third layer appeared at her knees, the hem covering her feet.
Overall, it depicted a young woman who was kind, demure, and sweet. Josh didn’t give two fucks about her personality, as long as she gave him his wish, but he supposed that that was why she had to hide in the cave. He gave a derisive snort. Too sensitive for the world around her.
His disdain cleared his mind, allowing him to shake off the lust that had caused him to fixate on a mere statue. Now he was able to look at the statue more objectively.
It was clearly the Wish Maiden, as it wouldn’t make sense for it to be anyone else. But what was so significant about the jewel around her neck? It was clearly important, as everything in her pose emphasized it.
He looked at the nine walls around him, trying to see if they held any hints. He didn’t want any surprises, lest they prevent him from getting his wish. While normally he wouldn’t care so much about stupid pictures, he hadn’t spent all this time for nothing.
He growled in frustration when the mosaics were worse than useless. They were just depictions of the humans’ history. While there were a few small mosaics showing the events of the First Age when humans had been created, most of the focus was on the Second, when Gafgufa relinquished his divinity as the child of the sun to come down to earth to teach humans how to defend themselves from wekufe through spiritual power, leading to the Great War. Nothing about the Wish Maiden.
Grumbling under his breath, Josh kicked the remnants of the rotting door that led further down. Ignoring the dust that his kick had caused to fly into the air, he descended down the hall. After about fifteen minutes of descending, though, he halted in his tracks. The stench of snake reached his nose, and he cursed. With all the stomping around I did, there’s no way it hasn’t sensed me by now.
Why was the scent fresh, though? Meaning that the snake was alive and was here, recently if not now. How the fuck would that work? The boulder blocked the only entrance to the cave, and it’d clearly been undisturbed for so long that the moss was growing moss, so there was no way it could’ve left.
That only meant it wasn’t just a normal snake, but a snake wekufe. He growled to himself. He’d swallowed so much fucking pride to ask that damn old hag for all the information he could get about the Wish Maiden, for anything that wasn’t written down in the sacred texts she’d shared, but she hadn’t told him about this?
His trail of thought was cut short when he heard the sound of scales scraping against the rocky ground and walls. Tensing, he focused keenly on trying to figure out how large the creature was. The scraping echoed again, and his ears moved widely as he tried to calculate. Takes a couple of seconds…. this amount of rocks are disturbed… Holy fuck this monster’s big! He gave a bloodthirsty grin. This is gonna be a great fight!
He shrugged his shoulders, loosening his arms and wrists to prepare himself. Any second now…
The enormous head of the snake revealed itself from the corner, the brown scales almost black in the dim light. Its bright yellow-green eyes flashed, their intensity so huge they nearly glowed. It continued forward, a long forked tongue flicking out of its mouth.
“Intruder,” it hissed, moving forward. “A foul creature like you dares to enter my domain? And,” it said, pausing as it stared at Josh, “not just any creature, but a half-breed?”
Josh let out a growl, but it quickly died when he spotted the empty depression in the center of its head. It wasn’t just any snake wekufe, but an Uktena! One of the strongest types of reptile wekufe, Utkenas were an ancient race. The empty depression on its head normally held a large clear crystal, where its power of clairvoyance was focused. But without it, it was just the same as any of the more powerful snake wekufe. Tension filled his body as the reptile moved closer, almost blocking the entire hallway with its massive body.
The snake darted forward. Josh threw himself to the side, barely missing the snapping fangs. His eyes went wide as the large head, nearly the size of his torso, moved faster than its size should allow.
He quickly jumped up, rebounding against the wall to land on the snake’s body. This thing is bigger than I thought! While there was no doubt in his mind that he could handle it, there was very little room for him to maneuver in the cramped corridor. He ran down its length, trying to enter the upcoming room where he’d have more space.
The Uktena turned, looking at him with disdain in his eyes. The sides of its head scraped against the walls as it nearly touched the ceiling. “A half-blood like you should’ve been drowned at birth!”
“Like I haven’t heard that before!” Josh yelled back. He ignored the ensuing struggle as it tried to turn around in the hall and continued to run until he reached its tail, leaping onto the ground when he entered the second room.
He took the time to take in his surroundings while he had the chance. The walls on this room were bare, with the exception of runes that were the human writing of the Second Age. Josh did a double take at their age. While he knew the story of the Wish Maiden was old, he didn’t realize that it was that old. In front of each wall was a near life-size statue of the various local wekufe leaders who had been part of the Great War between humans and wekufe and allied with the humans.
There was Friar Gransen, the leader of the mammufíll wekufe. The sculptor had the leader starting to walk up a stone, his trunk raised in the air. His four tusks were carved with runes detailing his various accolades. The rest of his mammoth body was covered in markings to show the fur of his kind, so detailed that even though he had only seen their kind once or twice he could see it.
Adjacent to him was the leader of the skjaldböku wekufe, Kalindor. Her beaked face formed a grim smile, and her robes covered her humanoid body. The large tortoiseshell on her back was covered in runes as well, her own accolades of the various scrolls she and her kind had worked tirelessly to preserve, and the lengthy sagas they had written.
The third was the most powerful of the villtur, the conjoined bodies of Prosedda and Presedda. The two-headed wekufe stood perched precariously on a rock. Prosedda was the female head, while Presedda was the male. Presedda’s head featured large ram horns.
Dust rained from the walls, bringing him back to his current situation. He perked his ears to listen for the snake’s return. He looked around, trying to find anything he could use as a weapon. While he had his claws, he wanted something that would work at a distance.
Where each of the nine walls met, there was a small alcove where a statuette, like the ones that lined the walls earlier, sat. Aha! He grabbed one of them, ignoring the warm heat of the residual spiritual power it held.
When the snake’s head breached the doorway, the curtain separating it long rotted away, he threw it.
The snake hissed in anger when the statuette made impact with its body, scorch marks evident on the scales on its snout from where the residual spiritual power had impacted it. Shards of rock fell to the ground, quickly blending in with the rest of the floor’s detritus.
Josh grabbed another, unable to prevent a slight hiss of his own from the power on his exposed palm. He quickly threw it, rock shards falling to the ground after the impact.
He quickly leaped to the next one, but before he could grab it the snake dove toward him, its mouth open wide. Josh leaped to the side, crouching atop Prosedda’s and Presedda’s statue. He felt air on his left arm, and looked to see that the snake had managed to tear his shirt, the rip in the blue fur exposing his creamy skin.
“Not fast enough,” Josh sneered. He leaped, aiming at the snake’s head that was nearly at the same height as him. He was rewarded with a few cuts in the snake’s skin, but as he watched with dismay from the ground across the room, they started to close up.
Fuck! I forgot how fast they heal! Last time he’d had to fight a creature this big, he’d had a pack, and they’d been able to wear the fucker down. But that was at least a century ago. He hated to admit it to himself, but if he tried it alone, Josh didn’t know if he’d be able to outlast the Utkena.
He leaped in the air, bouncing from wall to wall, as he tried to confuse the snake. “Must be demeaning for a snake like you to not even be mentioned as a footnote in the stories! I didn’t even know you’d be here!”
As he had hoped, the Utkena took the bait. “That’s impossible,” the snake hissed. “I am Örvar, the Great Horned Serpent. Perhaps your mother’s eggs were rotten when fertilized by a nasty human!”
Josh’s blood heated. “Don’t you dare talk about my mother,” he snapped, baring his fangs. “You’re not even fit to think about her.” Acid built in his throat. Any thoughts of plans left his mind, and he struck out in rage. He darted to the snake, running on its back to reach its heart and stab it with his claws.
He had only gone a few feet when the creature hissed. The next thing Josh knew, the ground beneath him rolled. He stumbled, trying to regain his footing, but the snake turned and pressed its body against his, pinning him to the wall.
What an amateur move! He swore, cursing himself for getting stuck like this. As the copper taste of blood filled his mouth, he felt sharp pain at the tip of his tongue. He tried to escape, but the pressure was too tight. The ridges of the runes on the wall pressed into his back. Being caught and accidentally biting my tongue. What am I, a dumb pup?
Josh looked up to see the snake pinning him with its eyes. “Must have been your father, then. How disappointed Jorgen must be to have a member of his pack sully the proud wolf wekufe bloodline.”
Jorgen? Who’s Jorgen? At the mention of the word pack, though, he couldn’t prevent a wince.
“That’s right,” Örvar jeered, “half-breeds don’t have a pack, do they. Must be awful.”
Emotion welled up in Josh, and he sneered, his eyes flashing with anger. “Fuck you!” he cried. “What good has your pure bloodline done for you?” he said, and stabbed at the snake’s skin with his claws. “Trapped in here for ages,” he dug in, “as the cavern’s guardian,” he kept pushing his fingers in deeper, “forgotten by everyone!” He ended his words by twisting his hands, pushing his claws in until he had reached his knuckles.
The Uktena arched in pain, letting out a high-pitched hiss. “Accept your defeat!” it spat. Its maw open wide, the snake dove for the young half-wolf pinned against the wall.
Josh stared at the incoming creature and then, at the last moment, moved to the side with all his might so that the snake hit the wall instead. His body shook with tremors as the vibrations hit him too, the air thick with rock dust.
The Uktena’s head wobbled as it tried to recover from the impact. Taking advantage of the moment, Josh jerked his hands out of the snake, causing it even more pain and blood to gush from the punctures. When the snake reared its body back, he jumped up, freeing himself and landing on the other side of the room.
He waited, then when the snake was darting for him again he jumped up and swiped at it. Josh’s eyes widened when he was jerked back. My hand’s stuck! Before he could do anything, the snake whipped its head, dislodging him in the process.
He let out a grunt upon impact with a statue, crushing it in the process. He stood up to realize that it wasn’t one of the three he had seen before. The rocky debris that was left behind reminded him of the scale in his bag. He palmed the medallion, reassured when the circular disk was whole. Thank fuck, he thought as he sighed in relief.
He looked up at the snake, getting to his feet. In the corner of his eye he saw the statue of Friar Gransen, its one eye narrowed in anger. Josh glanced back at the rocky debris around him, starting to put two and two together. He slowly moved towards the statue, keeping himself facing the snake. “I thought Utkenas were impressive,” he taunted, “but considering someone managed to steal your crystal without even killing you, that must mean you’re fairly pathetic!” Josh sneered. “You’re not stuck in here, you’re hiding from the shame!”
“The audacity of half-breed trash like you calling someone like me, weak!” Angered, its eyes flashing, the snake dove toward him.
At the last moment, Josh dodged, and the crumble of rocks shattering filled the room as the Uktena’s head smashed into the statue. Taking advantage of the snake’s head swaying, Josh jumped up onto the head and ran down its spine, his feet traversing the scaled surface with ease. He smirked when he saw the gouges made in the snake’s skin from the four tusks protruding from the statue from when the snake ran into it.
Before Örvar could regain its bearings, Josh sprinted and dove for its head. The depression in its head was where its crystal normally sat, and as a result the scales would be thinnest there, to allow maximum contact with the crystal. He latched onto the head quickly, and pierced the skin with both of his claws.
The snake screamed in agony. Other than pinning his ears to his head, Josh forced himself to ignore the bone-wrenching sound and focused on the attack, as the snake tried to shake him off. He continued to shove his fingers in deeper, deeper. He was rewarded with the snap of the snake’s skull splitting, but didn’t stop until his fingers were piercing the Utkena’s brain.
The snake shuddered once, twice, then went limp.
Josh kept his fingers in place until the stench of death filled the air. He pulled his fingers out and pushed away from the Utkena. When he landed on the floor, absentmindedly licking his fingers of the snake’s blood and brain matter, Josh stared at where he knew its heart was.
Should I eat it? It was his right, as he’d defeated the creature. But, as he’d seen time and time again growing up, only the alpha was allowed to eat the heart. And could he be an alpha, if he didn’t have a pack to lead?
Josh snarled at the snake, angrier now than he was before for the Utkena forcing him to think these things. He stared at the Uktena’s empty eyes, its words ringing in his ears.
Worthless.
Pack-less.
Alone.
“Fucker ain’t know shit,” he swore, kicking some of the loose rocks nearby at its head. “I don’t need a pack. I’m fine.”
Josh quickly jumped over the dead body, resolving to put the words behind him.
