Battle Through the Nine Realms - Chapter 57 - Watching a Master Work (Patreon)

Einar and Bior stood as close as Arngrim would allow them, the rune crafter holding the flame crystal in his closed left fist.

A thin metal rod, which Arngrim had never explained what it was made of, touched the rune he had carved and inlaid with metal on the stone.  

Fire, alive and dancing, seemed to swirl around the older man’s hand as it shook. The tip of the sharp metal tool, now a beacon of red energy, traced the rune. The flames around his hand, like a chorus of stars, began to intensify, and the gold and silver turned orange, pulsing with a power that Bior and Einar could almost taste, even standing a few steps away.

Einar stared intently as he could almost see the flow of wyrd moving the power within the flame crystal through Arngrim’s body.  His Mysticism stat had increased by two in the last week since he started the training the wind mage had shown him.  Odin’s gift was helping him grow faster than it seemed possible, and already, his body and mind were getting sharper in a way that many would call unfair if they knew.

The rune erupted in a dazzling burst of light, blinding him and when his vision returned, the flames that had been covering Arngrim’s left hand were gone.

A soft groan came from the rune crafter as he opened his clenched fist, depositing some black ash onto the stone counter.

“That was… incredible,” Bior muttered softly.  “To see that kind of power… Arn, you really are gifted.”

His goat laugh was much softer as the evidence of how tired he was couldn’t be hidden.

“This is like finding my first love again.  I forgot how great it is to work with amazing items and get to feel their power moving through me and into the rune.  I can do one more item today, but then I will be done until tomorrow.”

Einar watched as his friend picked up the metal object called a confulex.  It had runes already inscribed in it, so tiny it was hard to believe, and wyrd could be sensed coming through Arngrim’s hand, through the metal object and into the rune.

A faint blue light glowed for a minute as the runes lit up and then settled down.

“What did that do?”

Turning to look at the Jarl, Arngrim wiped some sweat off his forehead and grinned.

“If one is only putting a single element into a rune, they don’t need to use one of those.  It resets the rune to a place where it can accept another element.  Each quality has limits and so a basic can only hold one while an intermediate can hold two, but most would never attempt as they don’t know how or possess the wyrd to do so.”

Holding up the metal piece, three branches running in opposite directions about two inches, Arngrim tapped the one that had a blackened tip now on it.

“I used the power of this, and now only the other two can be used.  Most don’t know the runes to carve or what they do.  Each one must be attuned to the element.”

He pointed at the black ash on the table and winked at the jarl.

“What was in that fire stone could have powered a dozen basic runes easily.  Maybe four or five intermediate runes could have been formed from it.  Yet that was just about perfect for the advanced rune we are creating.”

“Which is why each of the rune sizes is different, because the elemental items are different sizes,” Einar said.

“Was that a question or statement?” Arngrim asked as he turned and grinned at his Viking friend.

“Both?” 

Laughing, the rune crafter nodded and turned the stone over, pointing to the larger rune on the back.

“Here, you see the difference in size between the fire symbol I etched and the lighting one.  They will contain the power of the element and need that much room to house everything.”

Arngrim made a fist and held it up.

“Legends say a legendary rune is the size of a man’s fist.  It is required to be that big because of all the power contained within and the number of runes that are on it.”

Bior nodded in amazement at the lesson he was learning during all this.

“Now, since I have spent a good amount of wyrd on the fire crystal, I will use the ice ball and add it to the rune, waiting until tomorrow to finish with the lightning.  Once I am done, we will be ready to find an etcher who can do such a thing.”

Einar and Arngrim turned to look at Bior, who realized it was his turn to talk.

“I have one.  He will be loyal and do as I ask.  Without sharing what he sees or touches.”

“Is that because he is loyal or the promise of the rune we offered him?”

Laughing at Arngrim’s question, Bior shrugged.  

“Both, if I am honest.”

Nodding, the rune crafter turned and began to prepare for the second element, turning the rock around and propping it up on a few pieces of stone so that the smaller symbol could be accessed.

Both men continued to stare in awe as they watched Arngrim repeat the process, a tiny blizzard swirling around his left hand as the power of the ice element flowed through his body.

***

Chewing the food he had been picking at slowly, Einar watched as Arngrim leaned against the wall, staring upward at the stone table he had been working on a few hours ago.

“What are you thinking?”

Snorting, the rune crafter shook his head and smirked.

“A younger me was just wondering what something like that would go for.  If you sold that, without getting jailed or killed for having it, you could make between 1000 or 2000 gold, maybe even up to three thousand if you got bidders.”

Choking on the bite of food at the back of his throat, Einar felt his eyes watering when he heard that sum of money spoken about so casually.

“Who could afford that, and why would—”

“Many could,” Arngrim replied, cutting off the incoming barrage of questions. “Bior could, Unnulf could, and King Erik would most likely kill you before paying for it.  Then there are those living in the inner wall who have amassed fortunes, hiding behind long family lines and purchasing runes from those within the guild willing to go behind the king’s back.”

Sighing, Arngrim picked up a bone from the chicken he had been eating and held it in the air near his face.

“There is so much potential in everything, even this bone.  It can be used as a tool, a weapon, or to help grow a plant if ground up and used as fertilizer.  Runes have power, and we don’t even use them like we once did.

“Vikings used to have beast runes, able to communicate with different creatures and have them as pets and allies.  Those days are gone since we stopped working with the druids and venturing into Vanaheim.

“Books locked up in the guild mention runes that allowed for communicating with the gods, rare but powerful and helpful for knowing the plans they had for us.  Nothing compared to the seer runes we use now.  While some do help with finding threads of fate, none are like the ones listed in our books of legends.

“Then there were some rumored to be able to turn a Viking invisible!” Arngrim exclaimed. “Countless creations all lost because of our lack of will to do what the All-Father expects of us.”

Dropping the bone on the plate, the older man sighed, and his shoulders sagged.

Slowly, Arngrim turned and looked at Einar, who just sat there, listening to every word he said.

“You are why I have hope,” he said quietly, snorting once after he did.

“The day I saw you carrying that pig carcass over your shoulder, knowing you had been dead not long before it, I knew something was different. Seeing how you acted differently, carried yourself, talked… it was like you were someone totally new.  No longer a young boy, acting childish and foolish.  Instead… instead I could see that Odin had given you wisdom and knowledge.  It came with a price of forgetting about things that, if we are honest, didn’t matter.  Who cares about knowing our land if it’s not worth fighting for?”

Pushing himself up, Arngrim rose to his feet, and a few joints popped as he stretched.

“Just know that what I’m about to say makes me feel like I’m trying to carry an impossible weight.”

Walking to the stone table, the rune crafter carefully picked up what he was working on and held it up near the lantern that they had turned on, light no longer coming in as it had earlier through the window.

“This… this is my gift to you and my god.  Together, my hope is that you will be able to bring about the victory we need and save our people.  If not…” Arngrim paused, a lump seemingly caught in his throat.  “I realize that all may be lost… across all the realms.”

Einar nodded, feeling that same weight and knowing the truth of it.  If he didn’t succeed, not only would Dawson and Martinez be lost, but there are now so many more that he cared about here.  It really wasn’t just a battle that impacted the Vikings.  It impacted planets and systems he never knew existed.

“I will carry the weight, and I appreciate your help in this task,” Einar said as he picked up a small piece of bread.  “Just remember me when Odin rewards you for all your help.”

Laughing, the bleating of a goat rang out around the room, and Arngrim didn’t stop till tears ran down his face.

“Something tells me I’ll get the better end of the deal just for being here to help you.”

***

Bior was sweating, as was Einar.

They watched lighting arch off Arngrim’s body, dancing along the stone table and threatening the two of them when they got closer.

The rune crafter’s body trembled from the power surging through him, the lightning stone so large he couldn’t close his fist.

Sweat was running down the man’s entire body, and some dripped to the stone floor as he continued to work. 

Minutes passed by so slowly that sometimes Einar had to remember to breathe, not sure if he would go blind from watching the dazzling display of electrical power.  

How does he contain all this? I can see it trying to burn him alive, and yet he is somehow transferring the power through his body and is not harmed.

Arngrim wouldn’t go into more detail about how the process worked, knowing that Einar might one day attempt something he shouldn’t, and the lessons he spent a lifetime learning required years to begin to become proficient in.  

“Runes aren’t something one just makes,” Arngrim had said once before when Einar asked if he could try.  The look on that man’s face now left doubt about how dangerous it was.

He had never believed him until this moment.  Yesterday seemed like a walk in the park, while today was like running uphill into a tornado while objects were thrown at you from the wind.

The stone pulsed with power, looking like it couldn’t take anymore, not just how brightly the symbols carved into it glowed, but the actual gray stone emitted light.

The rune crafter grunted as he fought to keep the course, his left hand shaking as the stone's power began to expire.

The room suddenly became a light so bright that Einar wondered if he had gone blind, worse than anything beyond staring at the sun for a period of time.  Even though the flash had been just for a second or two, it left spots in his eyes, and as he rubbed them, Einar could hear Bior cursing.

“Sorry,” Arngrim said with a gasp. “I should have warned you both.”

As his vision returned, Einar saw his friend leaning against the stone table, sweat pouring off his body. He was trembling and exhausted, yet when Arngrim turned toward him, the man had the biggest smile ever.

“I just have one thing left to do.  I’ll need a minute before I can seal everything.  Just know… this is the greatest rune I have ever created.”