Of the truth behind the legend there was never any doubt. They just never expected to bear witness to the day those old stories would come alive once more, it had been so long. Yet there was no denying the true nature of those inhuman cries in the distance.
Out of the mist they came, an unnatural red light burning in their eye sockets, pale skin stretched tight over their withered, skeletal frames. Everything about them spoke of their anguish, yet they moved with purpose, a terrible hunger for the life they once had driving them onwards. Each bore the weapon they’d been buried with and were clad in the remains of their armour – rotting leather for most but rusted chainmail for a select few.
Those unearthly cries brought forth the men of Threkeld, roused from their work by instincts honed in battle. Armed with their round shields and axe, spear or sword, they rallied to their Jarl in defence of their homes. But even the most hardened of the Viking warriors were ill prepared for the dread nature of their foes, and it was with some panic they scrambled to form a shield wall in readiness for the coming battle.
“Draugar!” Jarl Bjarke called out to the advancing undead. “Why are you not at rest in your barrows? What brings you to the realm of the living?”
The lead draugr came to a stop, his undead horde lining up beside him. The stench of death and decay was heavy on the air, causing the men to gag.
“Our barrows are cold and lonely. We wish only to return to the lives we once knew, to dine in the warmth of your hall once again.”
“My hall is no place for the dead. Return to your graves, and seek entry to Valhalla where the fallen are welcome.”
“Do you not recognise us as people of this town? We died for you! And in return you would deny us entry to our home? If you will not allow us back to our hearths then you leave us no choice but to take them by force.”
The draugar charged.
“Hold the shield wall!” Bjarke cried. “Fight well, and tonight we dine with our ancestors and the All Father!”
The men braced themselves but they were only mortal, and their strength proved no match for the monsters. Many fell, the undead warriors dealing them a quick death before they had chance to regain their feet. Those that remained standing fared little better. The afternoon rang with the clash of steel, but no matter how skilled the human fighters, too many succumbed to the unnatural strength of their adversaries.
Only Bjarke succeeded in felling two of his opponents, but no matter how often he hacked and slashed their decaying flesh, no mortal weapons could stop them. He backed away before they could rise and renew their assault, only to find himself facing the lead draugr. He barely managed to raise his shield in time to block the monster’s sword, but such was the force of the blow, it rent his shield in two and shattered the bones of his arm, sending him crashing to the floor. The draugr laughed and raised his sword again to dispatch the human leader, but one of the men loyal to his Jarl charged the monster, earning Bjarke a temporary reprieve.
He grasped a warrior’s leg with his good arm as the man stumbled by, looking into the two wide eyes staring down at him. In truth the man was really no more than a boy, and his first experience of real battle was an unfair one, against an enemy that would not die. His fear was plain to see.
“You, boy!” Bjarke gasped through the pain of his broken arm. “You know of Varg?”
The boy nodded in response, his eyes growing wider.
“Bring him here, or all is lost. He’s the only one with the strength to defeat these things.”
The boy knew the local legend as well as any of his elders, and he was reluctant to face a man who the stories had painted every bit as terrifying as the undead horde.
“Go, now!” Bjarke grunted, spurring the boy into action. His duty done, he embraced the beckoning darkness.
***
Varg heard the boy approaching long before he appeared.
“Bjarke expects me to help him?” he grunted. “After he condemned me to this life of loneliness?”
“You have to,” the boy pleaded, aware he was speaking on behalf of the town. The weight of responsibility pressed heavily on him, knowing their very lives hung in the balance. “The draugar have returned! They say only you can defeat them.”
“The draugar are Threkeld’s problem. I am not a dog for Bjarke to call on when he pleases. Tell him to find some other fool to do his bidding.”
Young and frightened though he was, the boy was angered by Varg’s response. “Can you not hear them dying out there? There is no other.”
A feral look came over the exiled warrior then, causing the boy to back away. The young Viking’s nerve failed him and he fled, before he witnessed the return of another legend.
Varg watched him go with a grim pleasure. Let Threkeld suffer: it was no more than they deserved after the way they’d treated him. But then his gaze fell on his old sword and shield. It had been too long since he’d been allowed to raid with his comrades, too long since he’d lost himself in the savage joy of battle. He was loathe to help Bjarke but the fight was calling him, and he found he couldn’t resist.
***
A cloud of black descended on Threkeld as Varg approached, carrion crows come to take advantage of the feast men had left them. Dead eyes stared sightlessly at the beaks pecking and pulling away chunks of their earthly remains. Blood leaked into the soil, both of freemen and thralls, worlds apart in life but equal in death. Most lay dead and dying as the draugar turned to pillaging the town, and some of the monsters even joined the crows in their feast. Only those who’d fled would live to see the night.
The scene reminded Varg of his last battle so long ago, and his calf began to throb with the memory. He’d been the last man standing that day as well, and he’d returned to Threkeld with pride, expecting a hero’s welcome. Instead he’d been met with fear and suspicion, and ultimately they’d driven him away, into exile.
The Viking felt his rage building, and it was more than just the battle rage rising in preparation for the fight soon to come. He owed these people nothing, and even if he could somehow emerge triumphant over so many draugar, what was the point when their town lay in ruins? It would be hard to rebuild with only a handful of survivors, and they might not even return. Perhaps they’d already sought refuge in a neighbouring town. So why was he about to risk his life for a Jarl he was no longer loyal to, and a lost cause?
The draugar hissed at the newcomer as he strode confidently through the narrow streets, but they were too lost in their hunger to rise from the corpses they crouched over. Yet there was one who would not suffer the living to walk the streets of the place they had claimed as their own. The same draugr who had appointed himself the leader of this accursed army stalked forth to meet the man foolish enough to challenge him.
Varg came to a stop as the draugr approached, stunned. The rotting face was little more than a skull, yet he was still able to recognise what remained of those features, and there was no mistaking the sword and shield the monster carried.
“Gunnarr?” he gasped.
“Brother,” the draugr hissed. “It is good to know you still remember me after these ten long years.”
“Your death still torments me to this day. I have never forgotten.”
“Indeed, since it was you who killed me.”
“I never meant to hurt you,” Varg said, his rage giving way to sadness.
“No? And yet now you return to kill me again. That is why you are here, yes? You were always desperate to be the hero. Well you’re too late, there is no one left to save. And now I will have the pleasure of killing you.”
Before Varg could answer, his brother attacked. Varg’s battle rage flooded through him once more, driving away any feelings of guilt, and his heart began to pound to the drums of war. To answer the call of battle, that was why he was truly here. And he responded eagerly, feeling more alive than he had in years as he blocked a savage thrust to his head and retaliated with a fierce cut to Gunnarr’s side, but the draugr also blocked the attack. They continued to trade blows but from the moment each was old enough to hold a sword they’d spent the years fighting, even if it had always been play before, and they knew each other too well. Yet their shields could only take so much, and it was Gunnarr’s which broke first, rotten as it was.
Varg pressed his advantage, driving his brother back with the force of his blows, but when his blade finally found its mark in the draugr’s flesh, Gunnarr only laughed. There should have at least been a flesh wound but there was no blood. This confused Varg’s warrior instincts long enough for Gunnarr to retaliate. He swung at Varg’s shield with all his might, succeeding in breaking it and evening the odds once more.
“Enough of this pretence at humanity, brother,” Gunnarr said, throwing his weapon aside. “We are so much more than them. Fight me in your true form, you who bears the mark of Fenrir.”
The old scar on Varg’s calf throbbed once more, as if in response to his brother’s words. Part of him was all too eager to give in to the dark power he’d been granted, and if mortal weapons couldn’t harm the draugar, it might be that very power which was needed to slay them. So Varg cast aside his own weapon and opened himself to the great wolf’s feral nature. The beast Fenrir’s mark had awoken within him responded instantly, an excited howl tearing through his throat as fur sprouted from his skin and his face elongated into a snout, teeth lengthening into the same deadly fangs which had ripped Gunnarr’s life from him once before. The werewolf snarled in defiance at his opponent and they began to circle each other in the wild dance of two great predators.
The draugr’s nails also grew into wicked claws, and the two monsters slashed at each other. Soon blood dripped from the werewolf’s body, but no matter how many cuts the draugr received, still he did not bleed.
Long their fight raged on until finally Varg ducked a vicious slash at his throat, retaliating with a pounce which sent them both crashing to the floor. He wrestled with his brother, obeying the instinct to sink his fangs into the rotting flesh of the draugr’s throat and tear it out. But still that unnatural unlife burned red in his brother’s eye sockets. The human in him realised what needed to be done, and with his great clawed hands he ripped the draugr’s head clean off. His brother screamed in anguish through the ruins of his throat until his skull tore from his spine, the red glow fading, his eye sockets empty and lifeless once more. Varg howled in triumph, tossing aside the head and bounding towards new prey. The draugar were no match for Fenrir’s might, and one by one they would all fall, back into the sleep of the dead.
