{"sf1_id":1722326,"sf2_id":"rn6zx7nv","title":"Ragnarok - XXVI","author":"Rob MacWolf","words":1696,"posted_at":"2021-05-26T20:39:00.000Z","tags":["Epic","Iambic pentameter","Poetry","blank verse"],"url":"https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/1722326-ragnarok-xxvi","original_url":"https://sofurry.com/s/rn6zx7nv","image_url":"https://cdn.sofurryfiles.com/submissions/thumbnails/1e/92/1e92bcce-72da-4c53-a51b-fa584d3d437f","description":"#27 of Ragnarok\n\nThe final confrontation draws to a close.","content":"The Sulfur Carrier had dug its claws\n\nInto the cliff face, on either side of\n\nThe shallow crevice where the Old Man stood\n\nAt bay. The rock walls were collapsing in.\n\nWhen he had thrust his spear into the breach\n\nTo wedge it open, it had buckled and snapped.\n\nThough Varr stood on the Sulfur Carrier's foot\n\nHacking with all his might, with Klau's black sword,\n\nIt paid him not the slightest mind, and grinned.\n\nBut even as it, grinning, stooped to slay\n\nIt hesitated, like a man who hears\n\nAfar a voice that calls and words that hit\n\nHis mind in just the shape to light the clouds\n\nAnd show him all the storm-shapes of his sins.\n\nVarr snatched a disbelieving breath, then clawed\n\nA desperate swift path up the lava skin,\n\nA gambit only half formed in his mind,\n\nA hope only half entertained, that his\n\nEnormous foe would pause just long enough\n\nFor him to play it. The sword dragged at first\n\nHis left hand, then his right, as he hauled it\n\nAbove the backward ankles, to the hips.\n\nAnd as he scrambled up the backward spine,\n\nBoiling with noxious fumes, scalding his hands\n\nAnd knees, the Sulfur Carrier stirred not\n\nFrom absentmindedness. Its beacon eyes,\n\nThe color of old, cold, red, bloated stars,\n\nWere fixed on something deep within itself,\n\nAnd trembling, as if in oceans of pain.\n\nVarr skidded from the shoulders down the slope\n\nHe gripped a twisted horn just quick enough\n\nTo save him falling over the blunt face.\n\nHe planted firm his feet and bared his teeth.\n\nAnd still the Sulfur Carrier stirred not.\n\nSaid Varr, \"Here ends your wanton ruinage.\n\nHere for my brothers fallen is revenge,\n\nFor here there is a man, behold, he stands!\n\nFor here there is a sword, behold, he holds!\n\nFor here there is his will, behold, unbent\n\nBefore the hollow shadow of your fume!\n\nHere there is prophecy, that this black blade\n\nWill strike the blow that slays you. Here there is\n\nYour death, foul death! Its name is Last-to-Flee!\"\n\nAnd even as he plunged the sword between\n\nThe twisted, rocky horns upon its brow\n\nA shudder wracked it, and within it deep\n\nA keening rose, like rust-anointed wheels\n\nOf train cars stirred to motion in the night\n\nAs slow as glaciers. Still it did not move.\n\nVarr struck again, the sword sunk deeper as,\n\nChips of metallic horn scattered before\n\nHis seeking point. Its horned skull was thick\n\nBut Varr stabbed on, encouraged, for he knew\n\nWithout the knowing how his knowing came,\n\nPerhaps he heard it written on the wind,\n\nThat somewhere it had suffered a defeat.-\n\n-For somewhere in the darkness it had fled\n\nBattered and bleeding, bruises on its soul.-\n\n-Somewhere in the trackless in between\n\nShane slumped, chest heaving, foe vanished away.\n\nHis victory drunkenness began to fade.\n\nAround him all was emptiness and naught.\n\nNo stars, no worlds, no images, no guide.\n\nHe cursed his foolishness; if he had tried\n\nTo grapple it, to clutch upon its heel\n\nHe could at least have let it drag him back\n\nBeyond the formless void. But then, if he\n\nHad let his rage partake of strategy,\n\nIt would have been reduced, and he could not\n\nHave beaten it. He shook his head, and winced\n\nAt the sore stiffness of his neck. He stretched\n\nTo loosen it, and stopped. A light drifted\n\nBefore his face, like snowflakes when the air\n\nIs warm, melting before they touch the ground\n\nAnd clump together. It alighted on\n\nHis glove, folded its wings, and gently flashed.\n\nShane started to his feet. The firefly,\n\nOffended, drifted round his shoulders. He\n\nPaid it no mind, for toward him coming was\n\nA globe of fireflies. If all the stars\n\nThat cover heaven's face so it may sleep\n\nWere gathered in a thin balloon of silk,\n\nSo that, as they expanded, it blew up:\n\nA globe diaphanous and floating on\n\nThe pressure of its own light, growing still,\n\nBut each light pulling all the others with.\n\nAs if the universe were nothing but\n\nA paper lantern, lit with firework bang,\n\nFor somewhere, someone said there should be light.\n\nAnd in the midst of firefly crowd there came\n\nA figure, walking on the empty night,\n\nLike stained-glass madonnas on tiptoe. She\n\nWas limping, for one leg was wounded. She\n\nWas childlike, standing just to Shane's shoulder\n\nAs long as he slumped on his knees, but Shane\n\nHad never seen a wiser face. \"Oh Shane,\"\n\nShe laid a hand upon his cheek, she felt\n\nLike the warmth of a single candle's flame,\n\n\"Why do you slump in apathy? Your fight\n\nAwaits you. The great bell is rung, the foe\n\nExults that he escapes you. To your feet!\n\nFor somewhere there is champion's work to do.\"\n\nShane did not meet her eyes. \"Though sore It lied,\n\nThe Sulfur Carrier's lies were built of truths.\n\nWhen weighed against this fathomless abyss\n\nWhat weight has any world, or all the worlds?\n\nWhat light is infinite enough to bloom\n\nEnough to outshine so much darkness? If\n\nI were to win, and that is if indeed,\n\nWhat would that do but delay day of wrath?\n\nAll worlds will end. All heroes must go down\n\nTo death, and death, and death beyond again.\n\nAnd even glory is forgotten quite.\n\nWhat matters that my Barbara I loved?\n\nWhat matters that I love Varr Last-to-Flee?\n\nWhat matters any love or any hate\n\nOf anyone? They flare up, and they shine,\n\nAnd then they are no more. Darkness falls.\n\nThe night that comes is evermore the same,\n\nAnd no light kindled is that is not snuffed.\"\n\nShe took his chin, in tiny fingers strong\n\nBeyond his expectation, and turned him\n\nTo look into her eyes. In them shone\n\nAll million firefly lights that round them spun.\n\n\"There is one light, at least, that does not dim,\n\nThat of defiance. If the dark is strong,\n\nAnd quite inevitable, it has not\n\nThe power to compel us to comply.\n\nAnd look: one light already you have saved!\n\nIf forever within this endless void\n\nMy lonely light I shall send out, for no\n\nEye ever to see it, that is enough.\n\nBehold! The darkness flees before my face!\n\nHow much more will it flee a Champion?\"\n\nShe closed his eyes and kissed his cheek. Her kiss\n\nBurned on his skin like cold breeze on hot brow.\n\nWhen opened he his eyes, she was not there\n\nBut a long sweeping path of fireflies\n\nPointed the way toward the world he sought-\n\n-Where Varr struggled to pierce a stony brow.\n\nWhere the Old Man watched trapped and wounded sore.\n\nWhere sudden stunned and disbelieving hope\u0026nbsp;\n\nWatched breathless as the world hung by a thread.\n\nYet just when Varr was hauling on the blade,\n\nTo pull it forth, to thrust it down again,\n\nThe Sulfur-burning eyes suddenly blazed\n\nAs does a pilot light at rush of gas.\n\nIt shuddered like a ship striking a reef,\n\nAnd on its head Varr stumbled to his knees.\n\nIt twitched and frantically it pawed its face,\n\nAs does a man bedeviled by a fly.\n\nAround Varr came a hail of twisted claws,\n\nBeneath him its thick brow bucked, and he grasped\n\nAt the black sword a half-moment too late.\n\nThe Sulfur Carrier stood shivering,\n\nIts shoulder glancing over, empty eyes\n\nTwitching from the horizon to its feet,\n\nThe black sword wedged and helpless in its horns.\n\nAnd then it grinned with disbelieving glee.\n\nAll in a rush, it stooped upon the crack\n\nClawing at the rough rock edges. Ripping\n\nGreat handfuls of the living stone away\n\nLike a possessed bulldozer, drunk with hate.\n\nThe Old Man shrank as through the rock came claws,\n\nAnd flaming shark-teeth belching miasma.\n\nBut then, as does the very first report\n\nOf firework cluster launched into the night\n\nTurn every head, hush every murmer, though\n\nNothing there is as yet that can be glimpsed\n\nStill toward the echo they all stare, so did\n\nA man from off the precipice where late\n\nThe stairs had stood leap out into the air\n\nSudden as lightning. With one upraised fist\n\nHe bore down like a meteor upon\n\nThe hilt of the black sword, hammer on nail.\n\nThere was a mighty crack, like a great tree\n\nBowed down before high gale too suddenly.\n\nThe Sulfur Carrier's jaw went slack, its eyes\n\nWent dark like burnt-out lightbulbs. First it seemed\n\nTo only sway, and then its sway became\n\nA full collapse, falling upon its back.\n\nAnd as it fell, crumbling into a heap\n\nOf jagged stones, for just a moment rose\n\nA shape of smoke and vapor, sinister\n\nBut impotent. The morning breeze awoke\n\nAnd lifted the smoke shadow. With a hiss\n\nIt dissolved into nothing on the wind.\n\nAll was still. Then coughing, from the edge\n\nShane dragged himself from under the small scree\n\nWith gritted teeth and bruised shoulders. Like\n\nA dog long locked within a car's back seat\n\nLet out at last, quite unaware that he\n\nHas journeyed anywhere, stops short, alert,\n\nBlinking in all directions unsure if\n\nHe should be wary, awed, or both at once.\n\nShane pulled himself upright, slowly at first,\n\nToo tired to realize his victory,\n\nThen froze for half a heartbeat. In a flash\n\nHe scrambled from the slide of stones and ran\n\nTo where Varr lay. Slashed, crushed, barely alive,\n\n\u0026nbsp;His wounds welling with sulfur-smelling blood.\n\n\"Hail, Champion,\" Varr whispered as Shane knelt\n\nBeside him, carefully lifted his head.\n\n\"And I was right, you see. We all were right.\n\nKlau's sword, it struck the blow. I was the Last\n\nTo Flee. And you it is that in the end\n\nHave slain him? It is well. Now I must go.\n\nThink not on me with sorrow, but envy.\n\nI was promised vengeance, glory, and war,\n\nAnd death in battle. All these have I had.\n\nWhen you remember me, do not be sad,\n\nBlood brother.\" More he might have said, but his\n\nEyes barely open suddenly went dim.\n\nShane knelt, in quiet, tearless weeping, on\n\nThe field of his triumph in the dawn\n\nAlone, as silent the Old Man looked on.\n\n  \n  \n\n","series":{"name":"Ragnarok","previous":"https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/1722065-ragnarok-xxv.json","next":"https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/1722655-ragnarok-xxvii.json"}}