• Published 16th Sep 2011
  • 14,564 Views, 1,179 Comments

Under The Northern Lights - CoastalSarv



Luna and Twilight travel to the northern land of the reindeer on a diplomatic mission

  • ...
11
 1,179
 14,564

Fifty-one

Wiglek chanted and sang, his voice cracked and high, a galder, crowing like a cockerel. Grim horse-shapes of ice gathered around him in the wind, neighing bloodthirstily.

“I CALL UPON THE VOICE OF THE WIND-WALKERS, SPITEBRINGERS! BY THE FEUDS I BROUGHT IN YOUR NAME, TURN FRIENDS TO FOES!” he finally shouted.

Meanwhile, Twilight had shut her eyes and was silently concentrating on her own magic. A violet shape formed in the air in front of her, like a flat, faceted gem with a thousand glittering facets.

“I knew he would try this,” she mumbled. “Here goes everything…”

As the high neighs struck the crystal, they shattered into a thousand and more fragments of magic, spread out over the landscape and dissolved.

“HA!” the lich gloated. “MORTAL MAGIC CANNOT MATCH THE POWER OF THE ANCIENT ONES! YOUR PUNY SHIELD SHATTERED BLOCKING ME! THIS IS TOO PRECIOUS!”

Twilight blinked and fearfully looked around her. Both reindeer and Skoll had winced, but nothing had happened. Then, suddenly, the hooves of the dead stopped. The holdraugr stopped and looked at each other. Then, they suddenly fell upon each other, first chopping and stabbing, then gouging, bucking, biting…

Wiglek was seemingly speechless.

“I DIDN’T TRY BLOCKING YOUR MAGIC, WIGLEK!” Twilight shouted. “I DIVERTED IT! AND YOU’RE NOT THE FIRST AND NOT THE BIGGEST SOURCE OF DISHARMONIC MAGIC I’VE DEALT WITH. STOP THIS! YOU’LL JUST RUN OUT OF POWER!”

Spike shuddered as he saw the undead warriors tear off pieces of each other and swallow them.

“They’re frozen meat, how can they eat?!”he said, his teeth chattering.

“Nodeer knows!” said one of the reindeer. “Everything eaten by a holdraugr turns to spirit, somehow, and disappears!”

“So if he summons more spirits, there will be no corpses to animate,” said Twilight Sparkle.

“I wish you’d be more smug saying that,” said Spike.

“This cannot be over…” said Twilight.

“HA! THAT’S NOT ALL THE POWER OF THE WINDIGO GAVE ME! I CALL UPON… THE WAR ACKJA OF THE SPITE-SPIRITS! ICE STORM, FROST TORNADO!”
The storm around Wiglek intensified.

“Down into the ice tunnels!” Twilight called. “Hurry! I’ll turn up a forcefield to protect the retreat!” Actions followed words, and a blue hemisphere formed over her and her friends.

“FOOLS! I’M NOT STRIKING AT YOU! HEAR ME, HATEMONGERS, WRATHDRINKERS! BRING YOUR SCREAMS TO IMMORTAL EARS! STORM OF DISHARMONY…

...AWAKE KARHU-AKKA! HEAR ME HEAR ME!”

“Oh no!” whispered Twilight. “Oh no!”

Somewhere, somehow, an eye the size of a valley opened like a crack in the ice and drowsily gazed out into the outer darkness.

“YOU DON’T WANT TO DO THAT!” someone shouted.

Someone also smacked the back of Wiglek’s ice-golem as they shouted, and while Svipp didn’t feel pain, he did transfer such sensations to his rider.

“WHAT - WHO - oh you!” he said.

Behind him stood Vigg, Saga and Tuva. The latter had used a spear on Svipp to bring his attention.

“You don’t want to do that, Wiglek!” shouted Saga.

“I’VE TOLD YOU, I CARE NOT WHAT HAPPENS TO POATSULA - OR THE WORLD - OR MYSELF!”

“You do care about your son!” shouted Vigg.

“You said you cared about Sampo!” shouted Saga.

Tuva whacked the mokkurkalfe again.

“MY SON IS LONG DEAD!” shouted Wiglek

“His memory ISN’T!” shouted Saga.

Wiglek suddenly halted. The storm actually slowed a bit.

“What?!” he said.

“The only thing left of Sampo is his memory,” said Saga. “He’s the greatest hero Poatsula has known. Everyone has heard of him! No one has greater honor!”

“And you think my actions would tarnish his memory?! Like they haven’t before?! I know what everydeer thought about me!” Wiglek spat.

“No, but you are about to kill everyone who remembers,” said Saga. “If you call upon Karhu-Akka, Poatsula will die. Even if a few reindeer survive, I dunno, among the caribou of Equestria or as mercenaries in Saddle Arabia or something, our culture will die. And nodeer else cares! Vigg - Vigg told me, tell him, what they think in Equestria of Sampo!”

“They think he is fictional!” Vigg shouted. “They think he’s made up, tell stories which never happened!”

“Yeah!” said Saga. “And something made up, per definition…”

“Never… never existed…” Wiglek murmured.

Saga couldn’t hear him over the wind but saw his pose.

“Vigg told me what you told him! That you took Sampo from his father! That your first wish using the Sampo was to have a son like the one your sister-in-law was expecting, because you were so lonely and jealous… so you found a little baby fawn in the forest… but she miscarried!”

Wiglek shook his head and sobbed.

“I threw it away! That cursed thing! I never wanted to hurt my brother again, so I abandoned all that power… and I vowed to make my son… to a least give him the kingdom he deserved…”

“So when there was a disaster, you lead your son to the Sampo so that he could use it and save the country! But the Sampo was still cursed, so that easy solution didn’t work… and that lead to your son’s death!”

“I could have saved him but I didn’t… I thought I’d join him in the summer lands but I couldn’t die--- waiting in the ice, the same scene again and again in my head… my only child dying…”

“If you do this now, you’ll have taken his birth, his death, and then his memory! It will be as if he had never existed! Do you really want that? Is your revenge worth it? Is it?!”

Vigg had clambered up on Svipp. He put a hoof to the ancient walking corpse.

“Is it, Wiglek?” said he and looked Wiglek straight in his ghost-fire filled eye.

“No…” Wiglek whispered. “No. It isn’t.”

He gave up a high-pitched wail, and the spirits flew up and away, and the storm was replaced with the gray winds of winter-haunted Jökulväkt. And the one eye against cosmos Karhu-Akka had opened shut and she sighed like an earthquake. And Wiglek lay insensate as a perfectly normal corpse, and he didn’t move when Vigg shook him, or Saga and Tuva pulled him down from his mount, or when Twilight poked him with his magic.


“Where’s Vigg?” said Twilight, looking up from the old spearshaft she had been half-heartedly studying.

“He’s still sitting by Wiglek’s… body,” said Spike. “I gave him some coffee, but I don’t know if he’ll drink it.”

“He should rest,” said Twilight. They had all went down into the tunnels. Most of the other reindeer were asleep, and so were most of the few skoll who had stayed. The others had gone back to their camp to spread word that Jökulgast was no more, either finally dead or at least defeated. Everyone who needed it had been patched up, but no one had been really hungry. Saga slept next to Twilight. Tuva had went back to her wounded sister. A few were standing guard, in case some monster or spirit was still about.

“You should rest,” said Spike. “You look like - sorry for the bad word - like manure.”

“I feel like manure,” said Twilight. “But that drink seems to be still working, and I just can’t relax until it’s out of my system. At least - well maybe - I can get something out of this…” She gestured to the old junk in front of her - weapons, skis, blankets.

“Get what?” said Spike. “Are we going to put on a fair about their history and culture to save the reindeer, or what?”

“No, no… I’m just looking for clues who lies where. Buried, I mean. I guess somewhere within these tunnels, or the ice around them, lies Sampo’s tomb, and the other Sampo is buried with him. It would be the most logical thing to do.”

“So you’re now counting on the undead mad sorcerer who is on the run from some Neighponese comic book to be logical?” said Spike. “Are we looking under the streetlamp for our keys again?”

“Now - I mean, yes, I guess so…” Twilight laughed wearily. “Wait, Neighponese comic book?”

“You know, he rides a giant robot and shout out the names of his attacks?” said Spike. “No? Nevermind.”

“We can try ask Wiglek later, but he doesn’t seem to respond to much of anything, and we don’t know how long he will be out,” said Twilight.

“If he even remembers,” said Spike. “The guys said he seemed to think Vigg was Sampo, on and off. What’s up with that?”

“They must look similar…” said Twilight.

“That similar?” said Spike incredulously.

“Maybe reindeer reincarnate?” said Twilight. “Or maybe - y’now, there are a lot of ponies who look very similar, maybe it’s the same here. I mean, I think I’ve seen our mailmare in places where she couldn’t be, and it turns out it was somepony else…”

“Yeah, but you’re not her father!” said Spike. “Mother. Whatever…”

“I’ve mentioned it in my letter to Luna,” said Twilight. “We’ll see what she says.”

“He did kick off a blanket Vigg put on him,” said Spike. “Then he was back to not moving anywhere or saying anything.”

“He did?” said Twilight. “That’s strange…”

“Yeah, a bit silly, I guess he cannot really feel cold…” said Spike.

“No, I meant the kick… of course!” Twilight shook her head.

“What?” said Spike.

“If you had been stuck under a mountain for a thousand years, you’d be a bit claustrophobic as well,” said Twilight. “Enough that you didn’t want to be under anything.”


Vigg sat next to the walking corpse that currently was still. He could still see the churning black within it, the dark force helping it to move around, binding the spirit to the bones.

He could also see three dots of light moving within.

“Your son, your brother and your dog,” muttered Vigg.

When the liche stopped moving his whole body had become seemingly solid, and when they carried him, flesh had been torn by its own weight.

“Listen,” Vigg tried again, talking close to Wiglek’s ear, “remember that story you told me about Svipp? The dog, I mean? I… uh… I kinda wanted to tell you a story in return, about our first dog. Or, well, the first one we got after I was born. Because she was kinda similar. She also, she also liked to eat blankets.”

He swallowed.

“I, I supposed I feel a little because… because my father died, and we’re still here, so I understand a little because I know how it is to lose someone who matters so much to you, so much in the whole world…”

He looked at the cooling cup of coffee Spike had brought.

“Oh! I wrote a paper… I guess you might not know what that is, but it’s like a test of, well, lore and wisdom. It was all about Sampo. I wish you could read it, to see that what I say is true, that he is such a great hero, still…”

He stretched for the cup and stopped, then pulled back his hoof.

“It even had a bibliography,” he said. “I don’t know if they had invented the bibliography when you were still… around, but it is the sign of a true scholar...now…”

He leaned closer to the lich.

“Look, we really need your help, the help to find Sampo, to use it with the least, least risk. So we really need you to rise again, because you’re the only one who can do it, everydeer is counting on you. And… if nothing else, I promise that if you do, I can return a favor. I can.. I can come visit you, while you wait for whatever you need to do, and we could just talk. I could listen to you and you could listen to me, right?”

He sat up.

“Right? Hello? Anything?”

A flame lit in the empty eyesocket.

“I… I would very much like to do that, Prince Vigg,” said Wiglek, and tenderly rose on undead feet.


They walked down icy corridors, and through dark frosty tunnels. Starstones lit the way. Besides Twilight, Spike, Vigg and Saga were Vidar, Tuva, two of their fellow Grazers, Jarnsaxa and a smaller, older Skoll that she said was her great-aunt, and Kvalhissir.

“Can’t leave the moose out of this,” he said when Tuva protested that he was still hurt.

Wiglek lead the way, his spike-tipped leg clattered against the floor, echoing in the otherwise silent underworld.

Several times he stopped, and with a deft kick opened doors in the walls, or deactivated trapdoors or giant blocks of ice falling from the roof.

“How had you time to do this?” said Twilight. “You haven’t been free that long?!”

“I don’t need to sleep, I had good help, and when you’ve been inactive for centuries you want to move,” said Wiglek. “Besides, the Skoll had already built some of it, years ago.”

“Why didn’t you dig yourself out from the glacier?” said Twilight

“You cannot summon ice elementals underground and it is difficult to do any invocations when you cannot speak or move more than half an inch,” said Wiglek. “We’re almost there!”

They entered a chamber dug from the compacted snow turned into ice. It was circular and lit by eerie lights. On the rune-covered walls hung swords and banners, shields and axes. Against the walls lay a heap of more arms, armor, frozen heads and bones, banners and saddle blankets, a grotesque wall of trophies.

In the middle of the room was a dais of ice, carved with runes and images. On it lay the frozen body of a sarv. His fur was white, and he wore a helmet and a backplate made from nidhogg bones and black iron.

“He really looks like you, Vigg!” Spike gasped.

“He does,” said Twilight. “Amazing!”

Wiglek nodded. He had went up to the dais, and tenderly patted the corpse.

“Hello, my boy,” he whispered. “I’m sorry to disturb you, but again, people need your help…”

“What would you have done, Jökulgast, had a digging Skoll found this place?” said Jarnsaxa. She sniffed the haphazard heap of trophies, especially a helmet-clad Skoll head.

“There are more curses in this room than in the rest of Poatsula, greylegs,” said Wiglek smugly. “I have merely temporarily dispelled them. He tapped his good foreleg to the ground and the head growled and snapped at her. Jarnsaxa yelped.

“Excuse me, mister Wiglek,” said Kvalhissir, “but where is the thing we came for? I see no… mill, or whatever. Is the Sampo really buried in this heap of… trash?”

“Sampo is no mill, foolish troll,” said Wiglek. “I see my kinsmen understand better.”

The six reindeer were standing in the doorway, huddled. They all stared, like hypnotized, at Sampo’s corpse.

“It’s… it’s so big!” Tuva finally got out. “How can it… fit? All the arms?”

“Sampo is the Sampo?” said Spike. “That’s why he’s called that?”

“He got his name for a reason… but that’s not it,” said Wiglek. “No, you can say he is named after his... mother. But the Sampo is no mill or cauldron or chalice, no mere... magical thingamajig. It is a fundamental part of reality which exists as a spirit construct. To use it, manifest it, you must meld with it. Once you have, if you ever let it go, you can never do so again… and it will take a piece of you with it. My son did not give it up as he died, and it is left within his mortal remains.”

Twilight activated the spell that mimicked the Sight and took a long look at the dead hero.

“Oh my… I understand now…”

“No you don’t, sorceress,” said Wiglek matter-of-factly. “I certainly don’t understand the Sampo. I doubt even your mistress does. Äitsi might do, but he never used it, he just put the curse on it.”

“The curse - what is it?” said Twilight. “I’ve heard of it, but…”

“It will twist your words, even your thoughts, as long as they are wants and wishes,” said Wiglek.

“Like stealing what you wish for, right,” said Twilight.

Wiglek nodded and looked at his son.

“And since Äitsi has a… wicked sense of humor, the only way to get what you want is usually to give it a laugh instead. Like how my son… at the cost of his life, won the greatest battle this land has seen, without anyone fighting.”

“What did he wish for then?” said Spike.

“Isn’t that obvious?” said Saga, having recovered from the sight of Sampo. “All the snow in Poatsula!”

Author's Note:

Three months. Again. Three bloody months!

Happy Hearth's Warming, btw.