I have never heard Belthruum speak with such hatred before, but its not directed at the elf, but to his ancestors.

“Do you know why your kin are called this” Belthruum rested in his stoney chair, and the elf gave up trying to stand with his shaking knees.

“No, but I can guess it has to do with what I feel when I hear that ‘oath’” The elf looked up straining his neck at the old Jotun.

“Inddddeeeeeddd” he droned. “This is all I can tell you, Long ago when your kin were more than just Huemen with long lives and even longer ears, your ancestors committed such an horrible atrocity that it has seeped into your very blood. The shame of your ancestors, the regret and guilt of their actions was so strong that it is felt in your kin to this very day.” The Elder looked up the elf with a mix of rage, disgust and pity that I have only seen the Fae able to make.

The elf put the pieces together. “So that is why I feel that way and why the other species react differently to it, but why, what did we do that was so terrible?”

“I cannot tell you exactly, Something so sickening, so demented, so perverse that even the Demons recoiled in horror and disgust. Our kin all the others in the world hunted down your species to the very last. Until a small group was found, these elves did not beg for forgiveness, they did not revel in their perversions like their other kin but they pleaded, ‘spare the new borns, spare those that were to young to even understand what it means to live.’” Belthruum hummed but continued. “Of course, our kin would do no such thing, their crimes called for their species extinction, but we felt in them such guilt, such shame and such remorse, that it we had no choice but to, not even the those of the Frost could bring themselves to slay them. So the elves took their own lives and stripped their children of their kin’s gifts leaving them nothing more but longer lived mortals.”

Silence filled the air, Belthruum had already taught me all this and more, but there was a weight to it now that was not there before. The White Clothed Man was shakings and tears streamed down his face.

“But what does it mean? Please I need to understand.” he sobbed. Belthruum just sat in silence before making a decision.

“No” the land rumbled “Your kind have broken the Oath, never again shall those of your blood understand it nor live under it again.”

The Elf looked up “Then at least tell me why none of you Jotuns react so strongly to it and speak it with such ease!” Belthruum sat for a moment once more in thought. We sat for so long in silence that the birds returned, but the other villagers knew better than to return until the sun rose the next day, for this was a matter for the Guardians and the Shamans.

And the Jotun of Earth finally spoke “We can still speak the Oath, We can still live under its promise. For we have lived by it and upheld it and enforced it since the World began”. Belthruum rose from his chair of stone and left, walking towards the mountain.

I was shocked, I had not seen the Elder move from the Great Hall since he chose me as his apprentice and spoke with such weight as if he was there to witness the end of the last true elves.

All was silence as I watched his large figure disappear into the peaks of Stoonghier and the sun set. I left the Elf to his sorrow he still hadn’t moved since Belthruum spoke. But the Elf’s revelation was no surprise to me. Belthruum had taught me all this before and so much more, It was why I never ask the Elf’s name, why I never acknowledge he was an Elf and only as The White Clothed Man. For when I do, for when any of the Jotun do, it fills us with such rage that only the trained can control.

On the way home, I realized that in my rage I had crushed the wooden carving of the Rok I was making. There was still a wing that looked untouched, so I carved it off and poked a hole through the large end of the ring and tied a string through it, It would make a fine enough necklace.

I stop in front of a cottage, large enough for someone of elder’s size to fit into (I made sure of that when I built it). I looked at the garden in the front of it filled with fruits and plants that nations would war over just to get a taste. The door burst open and a little blue figure with a red top launches towards my stomach.

“SSELLVIIIII” Valkava squealed as she hugged me tight. “Guess what I grew today!” she took my hand and dragged me over to a corner of the garden to a 3 black stemmed plant with gnarling roots and thorns.

“Hmmmmm. What is this” I think im beginning to pick up Belthruum’s bad habits.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

“It’s a Cerberus Root, Mom’s favorite, I wanted to surprise her with some Cerroot juice when they finish bringing all our stuff here!” she was beaming with pride

“I’m sure she’ll love it, I can’t wait for some myself” I ruffle her red hair, a rare trait among the Jotuns.

“why is it taking them so long to get everything” she wines while cutting off roots to plant more.

“Because no one ever just moves their home, we are like trees or rocks, we never move our home from where we sprout.” I repeat the same thing my father told me when he didn’t want to make the move. “here something that’ll cheer you up”. I pull the wodden wing necklace from my puoch and and give it to her.

“Did you make this yourself? Hehe I love it!” she puts it on and drags me to the back corner of the garden. “Here, I wanted to grow your favorites but its too warm in the village, but with your magic they’ll bear fruit within the week.”

The plant was blue and shriveled, It was a FrostBite bush, they grew on the tops of the mountains and produced a fruit that no other species could eat without dying of frostbite.

I went down on one knee and leaned closer to the root and closed my eyes, I started just like the Elder taught me. I took a deep breath until my lungs were full, and then took another, I reached down to pull the strength from my very blood and bones, and then a reach deeper, to the origins of our flesh, the Earth. This is as far deep as Belthruum could reach, but I reached deeper. For our people were still not young when our flesh was made with stone. I drew strength from the origin of the earth itself, the Frost, and the Glaciers. A storm of ice and snow rages withing my lungs but I temper it, calm it, and let it flow gently out of my mouth and onto the roots of the plant. I Breathe on it My icy breath licks the ground and where it touches everything is frozen solid. Valkava laughs and dances around the frozen ground and I go inside to make dinner. That night I lay in bed and think about how much my life has changed.

Twenty Winter Solstices ago the day I reached my 30th winter on the day of life’s celebration, the Elder visited our farm and declared me his apprentice. I was shocked, for two reasons. For one the Elder had chosen me to be raised as a Guardian and second, HE MOVED! In all my 30 years of life and visiting the main hall I had never once seen that old man so much as get up from the lump of stone he called a chair, not during the rain, during solstice feasts, not even when there was a nasty storm that blew away a part of the Grand Hall. Days later I asked some of the other children that lived near the Grand Hall what it looked like they said “It was amazing and terrifying, it was like if Stoonghier itself got up and started walking. All of the sudden he spoke ‘Once again It is time to uphold the Oath.’ and then got up.” I wondered what that meant, until the day the Elder taught me what it meant to be a Guardian.

Belthruum taught me the story of the Oath. Long ago when the world was new, the mountains young and the oceans shallow, an Oath was made. It was taken up by every species that could comprehend it; Every god, mortal and even those in between or outside, even the Fae. Our kin swore to uphold it and swore to enforce it. We have kept the Oaths to this very day.

He made sure that I understood what that meant, so he had me swear the oath, the full oath, not just the first 2 verses. I felt nothing special but that was just the first part. He taught me the breath of the earth, how to reach down and tap into the well of power and strength of the Jotun all the way to the earth. But I learned to breathe and reach down deeper and further back than any Jotun Guardian could since as long as our people could remember. I learned the Breath of The Frost, since then I have heard the whispers, of our ancestors, of the Fae, of the ice and snow. I have learned much, too much. Secrets of the Ice and snow, secrets the even Fae dare not speak, secrets of long buried beneath the earth, and those imprisoned under the mighty eternal glaciers. It has driven me mad in my dreams.

I drift off into sleep into the dreams of the glaciers and have the most familiar dream. I see and hear nothing, but I feel a lonely coldness, I am but a round ball of ice with two long spikes at each end, spinning and twirling into the abyss. I feel it as rocks crash into me over and over until for no one know how long, I’m covered in broken pieces and they stick to me, building up like a shell, until the shell of broken rocks reaches the peaks of my long and thick spikes, and I am now a ball of earth with Ice in the middle and at the two ends of the earth. I hurtle through the abyss until I feel a warmth I have never felt before, A great being of fire young and proud. The two of us intertwine in a dance so wonderful, that we dance on for eternity. I don’t know how long we danced, but then I see on the top of the earth, where the ice spikes are, I see a being hewn from the very Ice itself stand up, my vision changes and now I see through the eyes of the being of ice. I look down at the sharp black claws at the ends of my fingers, my skin is the same color as the glaciers, I investigate the still ocean and see my reflection. A young Jotun with icey blue skin, dark blue hair and eyes glowing Cyan as bright as the sun itself and I hear a maiden's voice, full of youth and with such warmth that seeps into my bones

“Its time to wake up My Love”

I jolt awake breathing heavily, my bones are burning in a sweltering heat that I felt in my dreams my heart quickly pumps icy blood through my body to cool it off, I lay there steaming, remembering being that spikey ball of ice in that dream, but I care not. I only feel an intense longing, that feeling draws my eyes to the sky and to the sun, and see a blinding light from beyond the horizon reaching into the sun and the blazing orange light engulfs the sky. Mesmerized by the fading lights in the sky, I whisper a name “Solinya?”