Myrna looked past the river and wondered about the soft mossy grass that lay beyond the rushing water. She had traveled as northwest as she ever had been before, the lands past the river were forbidden to enter by those of Eirinn. The reasons for this have changed over time and rulers but the one known by Myrna was that evil lay beyond. The inhabitants of this land were sinners looking to tempt the Eirinnans into a life of treachery and depravity. They had rejected the God Lysander who had created them and in doing so were cursed to lead a life with little satisfaction, riddled by plagues, famine, murder, and darkness.
To Myrna the other side of this river did not look so dark, the land appeared fertile, and she spotted a fruit-bearing tree to the east that made her mouth water. Her eyes were fixed on the olive colored fruit as her stomach pained for food. The fruit certainly could not have been ripe as it was only a fortnight into the sprouting season in Eirinn.
Her fear of what was beyond held her from crossing the rushing waters. King Padraig had taught her well to fear, as he had taught his whole kingdom. Eirinn was fully surrounded by mountains and water while being covered in a persistent thin layer of fog known to the regular folks as the mist. In the old faith the mist was said to be magic, a blessing from the primitives as a form of protection. Some of the older folk still believe that when mist thickened danger was certain as the primitives were blanketing them with extra protection.
King Padraig did not fear the mist or the tales of the primitive ones, the mist could not protect the people, he was their protector. At the siege of Eskiean he had allowed all people to take shelter in the House of the Blessed, the house Myrna called her home, as he rode on horseback alone to fight the Eskiean people. The attack from those who lived west of the Valley of Vik was the only battle in which Myrna had been alive. She had only lived through four seasons of rain at this time and the chill was lifting from the land meaning another was to come soon.
She had cried when her father rode off, surely the depraved Eskieans would slaughter her father. They had rejected the true god Lysander, they lacked morality and affection, they could kill with no remorse. This is what she had been told and this was the first time she had felt true fear in her chest.
Padraig had left at dawn and by the time orange was back in the sky he had not yet returned. Babes cried in their mothers’ arms, daughters hushed the younger children, the young boys had ceased their regular chaos, and fathers had finished the ration of six barrels of wine given to the people in the House of the Blessed by the king. The old folk of Eirinn spoke in hushed whispers of the imminent danger of the foreboding thickening mist.
Men shouted from the towers of the House of the Blessed and the spirit of the people hesitantly lifted. Myrna would not belief the shouts of a victory until she could see her father again. She had ran from the great room where she was safest out into the courtyard and climbed the wall of the house until she could see smoke rising from the bushes of the elderfruit that lay several yards west.
She saw her father who was riding heroically back into his kingdom led by his peoples’ cheers to the east. He lifted a matted and bloodied sack to his left as the cheers grew louder. He had carried the head of an Eskiean back to his people as a sign of his victory. He had fought the depraved alone and lived to relay the story back to his indebted subjects.
Padraig was a hero, a mythical one, the people would then sing songs of him to hush their dour children to sleep. Myrna would not fear the unknown as long as her father would be able to protect her from evil. She had not felt fear since the day King Padraig became the greatest warrior in all of Eirinn history.
Myrna had felt fear now however, as the mist started to thicken around her. She could no longer see the fruit hanging from the tree to the east. Her stomach grumbled and her lips started to crack as she had not taken a drink since she fled. Her eyes were starting to deceive her as she perceived the mist around to take the shape of an Eirinnan. It seemed to dance and twirl and beckoned her closer to the rushing water and sharp rocks that lay within the river.
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