The Dawn Breaker Saga

Dur­ing The Cleans­ing [1], the Host of Val­hal­la [2] came to the Black City of the East and its for­mi­da­ble iron citadel. Up­on its walls the host met city’s red witch and the ter­ri­ble weapon she wield­ed, the Spear of Dawn. Un­able to best her, the clans with­drew. But, The Cleans­ing would not be stayed nor slowed. The host con­tin­ued west while this wart was be­sieged by a small con­tin­gent of young war­riors.

A mid­dling gen­er­al among them, War­ren Chief­s­son, felt for­tune’s wind blow­ing. He and his loy­al com­pan­ions fol­lowed it north in­to a fog shroud­ed land [3]. Alight­ing on their ears, whis­pers of the Norns and their well, “Uroar­brun­nr”. Cer­tain to af­ford the an­swer to over­com­ing Dawn.

The com­pan­ions en­coun­tered many per­ils and dis­trac­tion­s. Stone pil­lars speak­ing bab­ble [4]. Ru­ins old­er than the gods [5]. Wretch­ed crones guard­ing gem stone springs [6]. Tegel, haunt of blood lords and manor of mad­ness [7]. Al­ways the fog, sap­ping their will. No Norns, no well.

The wind even­tu­al­ly led them to a cliff side cave near a great fall­s. Shout­ing in “How may I de­feat Dawn” War­ren re­ceived naught but his echo in re­ply. Again, he shout­ed to no ef­fec­t. For the third try, the whole of the com­pan­ions joined in. The ca­coph­o­ny of echoes enough to wake the King un­der the Moun­tain.

Roused by their pas­sion The Or­a­cle of Echo Cave [8] re­ver­ber­at­ed from the bow­els of the earth, “Go quick­ly to Mentzar’s Tow­er of the Great Wall. Ar­rive nee dawn and find what you seek.” War­ren sped away. Aban­don­ing his com­pan­ions to die bat­tling the Echo Cave Guardian that was al­so roused.

As night beat down the day it was clear War­ren would fail and all his ef­forts were for naugh­t. In the pale glow of Full Ni­dav­el­lir [9] War­ren de­mand­ed the gods fa­vor. In re­sponse an old man ap­peared. War­ren as­sumed this was sly Odin [10] in dis­guise but was in fact Lo­ki [11]. This beard­ed stranger of­fered as­sis­tance that War­ren ac­cept­ed with­out thought as to price. Smil­ing to him­self, the old man limped away in­to the fog­gy night, croak­ing out. “Look to the skies, look to the skies.”

A tremen­dous wind near­ly knocked War­ren down. When he re­cov­ered the great Ea­gle perched over him. It spake, “I am Moth­er [12], climb in­to my talon.” And thus War­ren was car­ried away to the East and the Tow­er of Mentzar. Where the first rays of the day il­lu­mi­nat­ed a pas­sage lead­ing be­low. War­ren nev­er spoke of what per­ils he faced be­neath that tow­er. On­ly that he pulled a mighty sword, Dawn Break­er, from the maw of a ter­ri­ble wolf.

See­ing Dawn Break­er, his brethren were con­vinced to fol­low War­ren in a new as­sault of the black city. Sun­der­ing the Spear of Dawn and slay­ing the en­e­mies lord in a sin­gle blow. The black cow­ards rout­ed and were cut down. Their vile city pil­laged and put to the torch.

Dur­ing the en­su­ing vic­to­ry feast, War­ren and his broth­ers bick­ered over di­vi­sion of spoil­s. They wish­ing to fol­low tra­di­tion, he claim­ing a chief’s share. Some say an old, beard­ed man goad­ed War­ren. Oth­ers that War­ren sim­ply achieved suc­cess be­yond his wis­dom. Re­gard­less why, War­ren drew Dawn Break­er and cow­ard­ly slew his youngest and weak­est broth­er.

There­after the Kin-S­lay­er hunt­ed the rest of his broth­ers killing many of his clan. Be­fore the Troll Bloods [13] trapped the fool­ish child. He and those who fol­lowed him were cursed, pre­vent­ed from re­turn­ing to Hy­bo­ria [14], and ex­iled from Val­hal­la [15].

Thus ends the Saga of Dawn Break­er