WARNING! UNLIKE MOST OTHER CHAPTERS OF THIS FIC, THIS ONE DOES CONTAIN SOME GORE! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
Her short meeting with the Aquastrians had been fruitful. Their water-working was reaching its full strength, driving the whole sea and its fury towards the northwestern coast of Tarandroland. The seaponies and mermares had the same skill with the sea as her pegasi had with the sky. As she returned, Luna hovered in the strong winds. Above her, the sky was a roiling grey and black of clouds. None of her beloved skylights were there. Behind her was the coast, that should have been white with ice and snow but was just as dark as the sky. Below her, the black Tarandrian sea was in uproar. Huge waves rolled towards the coast, each one higher than the one before it. Higher, higher they rose above the sea. Luna flew towards the shore.
Here something else moved in the water. Within her sharp sight was scores of turso. The hydra were driven by the magic of the Sampo to swim south, towards the bay of Sarvvik, but swimming was hard. Some, who had shaken off the magical rage, were fleeing deeper, out to sea. Turso didn’t enjoy deep waters, but those who didn’t faced a greater danger. Several of them have been driven ashore, and many of the were stuck. While not as dangerously stranded as a whale would be in the same situation, they were battered and wounded by the strong waves, which had crashed them into the shallows. Rocks tore their blubbery hides. They struck out against each other in panic, slashing each other’s necks and tails. They were tired and bleeding, and screamed out their anger, and they had started to give up. Luna wondered how many of them would be able to get back into the water when the waves and currents calmed down. Their bellowing frightened her, because she found part of her happy for their horrible predicament, when she really felt she should feel ashamed.
Still, there were others who pressed on south, trying to keep away from shore, and fighting the strong currents that confounded them. Luna considered blasting them with lightning or telekinetic force, but she was herself getting tired, and it was getting late. She flew towards Sarvvik. She hadn’t been this tired since she had returned from the moon, she realized. She hoped she wasn’t too tired for the nidhogg.
“A thousand curses on all pony princesses!” Mr Moccus shouted, as he skittered over the rigging. “A thousand poxes and plagues on all equine monarchs!” He then repeated himself in a number of languages, ending up in a snorting cadence that the older crew members recognized as his ancient native language.
As if the situation wasn’t dire enough, this caused the crew to hunker down and work harder. Like all actual ships in Sarvvik’s harbour, The Crimson Kraken was in the middle of the bay, trying to keep away from shore in general and the harbour in particular. The re-directed waves from the Aquastrian magics had hit the harbour with much less force, but laying at anchor too far into the bay would still have been dangerous.
A number of drift anchors and a wind conjured by a bunch of pegasi kept the pirate ship from running ashore, but the whole craft was groaning with the forces of the water, and she had already been shaken by her magically speeded journey. She had started to take in water, and every pump was being worked at full speed.
An Equestrian schooner got too close to the actual harbour, and smashed into a pier. This collapsed the pier, and the ship started to sink. The skeleton crew did their best to escape and the non-pegasi tried to save anypony who couldn’t fly. With no one even trying to control it, the ship turned over and got stuck between one pier and another.
“That could have been us!” Gerda groaned as she worked the pumps.
“It better not be!” Jorges groaned back.
“I should have let her sunk us and hanged us!” Mr Moccus screamed. “Work harder! Save the ship!” he added.
“Contradiction much?” mumbled Gerda.
“If it’s any consolation - hey!”
Jorges observation was interrupted as something slammed into the ship. The crew pumping was doing so under deck, and had little idea what had happened.
“Carcass at starboard!” shouted Mr Moccus. “Turn to port!”
The helmsmare did her best. The ship turned away from the dead turso drifting into the harbor. It was followed by a few others, to the terror of the people trying to keep the ships afloat
“So, if we don’t capsize, we get the plague!” Gerda muttered.
“We should have gone to Tropical Island instead!” Jorges laughed.
After the waves died down, and the ships could lay at anchor normally, the whole crew pointedly chose to man the walls instead of clearing up the turso corpses. Except their not-captain, who hid in his cabin to fume and get drunk.
“Here they come!” the pegasus watchmare bellowed. “Enemy at the outer perimeters!”
Her message was shouted down to the reindeer guards in the watchtowers, and soldiers started to move. Hundreds, thousands of ungulates had been sitting restlessly, endlessly checking their gear, or just walking in circles. The news were a relief. The walls were filled with them, manning war machines, picking up missile weapons, preparing spells or just screaming encouragement. Pegasi and what few other fliers the city had rose, circling the air just outside the walls, hastily raised from torn-down houses and winter-beached ships, timber from every factory yard and chopped down trees around Sarvvik.
The first wave of nidhoggs, lean and hungry and running on whatever ice-wyrms have instead of adrenalin, was met by a series of sharpened stakes, spike-covered logs and rare stretches of barbed wire. The first wave of the first wave ran straight into them, impaling themselves, screaming and tearing themselves apart. Blood spilled on the the snow, already gray from dirt and ashes from the walls, and their frantic struggle tore up the ground. From the walls, Princess Celestia nodded, and two pegasus trumpeteers tooted a short signal.
The flying soldiers swept down the panicking, stuck nidhoggs and the other nidhoggs halted by them, and dropped a score of makeshift fire bombs, oil jars, pots of pitch and actual grenades. Fire and explosions covered the icewyrms, and even if it didn’t do that much actual damage, nidhoggs have a strong fear of fire. In their panic, they started using their innate ice-breath, and succeeded mostly in freezing other nidhoggs, although they started to put out the fires. The wave stopped, wavered, started turning back…
...but the nidhoggs behind them didn’t. They evaded their wounded and panicked kin, and followed the line of stakes and logs, looking for a way in. They found one, two, three open channels, just a few nidhoggs wide, and slithered like a river of shining white scaly muscle towards the walls, towards the target their installed hate told them to attack.
“READY! AIM! FIRE!” shouted Skiold the Bold, and so did the commanders in the other breaches. Around each breach was a gaggle of war machines - mostly ballistae shooting giant spears, but catapults throwing boulders and big balls of burning pitch, batteries of rockets, and some actual cannon, most of them loaded with chainshot. Hastily built, scavenged from ships or from the few defences kept by reindeer fortresses, making the walls groan with their weight, despite the walls being extra reinforced, each mass of artillery fired en masse towards the enemy.
The amassed icewyrms were impossible to miss. Impaled and set a fire, torn and blown apart, the whole phalanx of berserking nidhoggs were put to a dead halt, as the whole front was slain and many behind them wounded. The nidhoggs started to mill about outside the perimeter. Some fled away from the city, some started to dig under the stakes which blocked their path, but the second wave followed the attempts of the first, and charged the breaches in the defenses. They slithered around their fleeing, dying and dead kin, still driven by a force they didn’t understand to crush those walls, to devour them and the houses within, killing any flesh-things infesting them.
“RELOAD! HURRY HURRY RELOAD!” shouted Skiold, while the people under his command ferverishly tried to do so. Then, as he saw the nidhoggs coming closer to the walls, he changed his tune.
“FIRE! ANYTHING READY! FIRE!”
A second volley, half-hearted like their fellow volleys up and down those makeshift walls, slammed into the new wave of nidhoggs. It was less effective, and the survivors pushed onwards, spreading out along the walls, now closer to them. The artillerists went back to reloading, and the ones who hadn’t been finished for the last volley was about to fire, when their commander signed them not to. Signed, and shouted.
“HOLD! WAIT FOR THE…. mines!”
All along the walls was a series of explosions and flashes of fire. The spreading nidhoggs had reached a series of mines, spikebombs and firetraps. The carnage was massive. Many nidhoggs who could still move turned on the spot and tried to retreat, but found that it was almost as hard to crawl over the stakes this way as the other way. The burrowing nidhoggs found their tunnels collapsing, and surfaces where they could. The nidhoggs who more carefully followed through the breaches was hit with another volley from the war machines, and become severely discouraged, if they weren’t slain.
A pegasus landed in front of Ukko, who were squinting at the battlefield.
“Report!” he barked.
“Amazing!” the pegasus said. “More than half of them are down or fleeing!”
“That means almost half of them are still fighting,” he sneered.
“Then where should we strike next?” said the pegasus.
“Where we planned,” said Ukko, still squinting. “Tell Skinfaxi the situation.”
The pegasus saluted and flew off towards Celestia. “Sourpuss!” he muttered to himself.
Heikko the Humongous came running, bouncing over and around soldiers and engineers. His pelt was covered in soot, and he was grinning like a fool.
“Third breach is out of powder!” he said.
“Why didn’t you send a messenger?” said Ukko. “You’re leading third breach, Heikko!”
“Because I’m not leading third breach, I was relieved,” he said happily. “I thought you’d have other things to do for me!”
“Relieved?” said Ukko. “I haven’t given any orders! By whom?”
“Hrimfaxi,” said Ukko. “Did you know she can shoot death-rays from that horn?”
Ukko opened his mouth half-way, then shut it and started squinting again.
“So, what are you looking at?” said Heikko and started gnawing on a potato, looking at the chaos beyond the walls.
“Where did you… never mind…” Ukko sighed. “The fires. They are putting them out too quickly. It’s the smarter nidhoggs that have survived. The old ones.”
“Potatoes, they just happen,” said Heikko and swallowed the last piece. “And I’d say they are using up their ice breath, very quickly. Means they won’t have any when it comes to the fun part!” He licked his muzzle, and suddenly his battleaxe was in his muzzle.
“Not yet, Heikko,” Ukko muttered.
Heikko giggled and shook his head.
“Do-don’t you know, how hard it i-is…” - he chuckled, axe now in hoof - “how hard it is for a berserk to wait and wait and wait.. U-u-until he is allowed… to RAGE?”
Ukko looked at his giggling companion. Then he smiled.
“Yes I know, friend, but there isn’t much time left now - wait!”
“FIRE!” shouted Luna. From her horn came a massive ray of force. It slammed into a nidhogg and smacked it all over the group that was entering the breach, nidhogg who had been unharmed and still more angry than afraid. Had been. Now they were smacked by boulders and impaled by spears - the ballistae were out of actual ammunition, and that anger was slowly being replaced by fear.
“YAAAAH!” Luna shouted, raising over her position on the wall, and grabbed the nidhogg by the tail, twirling him like a flail, smacking around the few nidhogg still standing, then throwing him into the hesitating horde behind, like a giant once-living chainshot. The crew at the breach cheered.
“Nice shot, Your Highness!” said the griffon pirate who manned the ballista next to her.
“Thanks - Gerda, isn’t it?” said Luna. “You perform admirably yourself.” She took off her helmet and wiped sweat of her brow with a telekinetically lifted powder rag.
“Well, I’ve handled this one lots of times on the Kraken,” she said as she started to help reload the ballista.
“It doesn’t matter how good a shot any of us are, if we don’t get more ammunition!” groused Jorge. The peryton moved with slow, jerky movement, handling the spears with his muzzle and hooves in a fumbling way.
“His shadow magic is running out, and he isn’t the only one getting tired,” Luna thought. “You’re right, but when should be able to hold out. Hold out, and HOLD YOUR FIRE!”
Everyone stopped.
“KEEP LOADING BUT HOLD YOUR FIRE!” Luna shouted. “BE PREPARED FOR THE MOAT!”
The shout went out down the wall - it was caught by the other breach captains, and fire was held.
The nidhoggs who were still interested in fighting, an interest diminished minute by minute, slithered past the now detonated mines (though a few still untouched fired off and stopped an ice-wyrm or two), past the dying fires, over the snow covered in soot and blood and grease and splinters.
And then the earth collapsed below them, and they found themselves in water - not that deep if you were the size of a nidhogg, but nidhoggs still avoid water. They became shocked and stressed, and shocked and stressed nidhogg use their innate breath weapons instinctively. The nidhoggs who had any magic left in their strange lungs snorted blasts of void-cold air, and deep froze the water surrounding them. This trapped some of them under the water, and they struggled to get up, to get out, to get away from the walls.
“ARCHERS PREPARE! SPEARDEER PREPARE! FOR POATSULA!” Ukko shouted, and the shout went up and down the walls, reaching his sub-commanders.
Celestia signed to her trumpeteers again, and they blew again. The flying soldiers lifted, and this time they flew north and gathered at the northmost group of nidhoggs trapped in the moat. Then, they dived, following the wall, and dropped their cargo. This time there were less bombs, and more rocks, blocks of ice, logs, scrap iron, anything that could be used as a projectile. Celestia lead the charge in her golden armor, and when her telekinetically held load of rocks was gone, she blasted the ice-wyrms with her magic.
“FOR EQUESTRIA!” she shouted, and all over ponies shouted with her.
The nidhoggs started to tear themselves up from the ice, fleeing away from the rain of missiles and burning alicorn-light, down south along the barricades. It was not that difficult, but it was painful, and it was tiring. Some of them couldn’t get loose, or just lay down, cowering. Others turned straight away from the wall and braved the outer barricades, struggling over them to get back to the wilderness. A few charged the walls, trying to get over them, more in fear than in anger.
At the northernmost breach, a scowling Mustikka jumped up on a cannon and shouted orders to any soldier nearby.
“ARCHERS FIRE! SPEARDEER FIRE!”
Along the wall, reindeer soldiers let javelins, arrows and anything you could throw rain down on the nidhogg, in a wave going from the north to the south, and then from the south. Most of them were common workers and slum dwellers from the army gathered by the temple of Hrimfaxi, but they were marbled with soldiers from nobledeer household and Russ yeomares. Their aim wasn’t great, and their weapons could barely scratch the nidhoggs, but the enemy was already demoralized, and fled in the direction they were herded, towards the bay that gave Sarvvik its name.
The slapdash flying squad repeated their run, starting further south this time, pelting the fleeing nidhoggs with old furniture, sandbags, empty barrels and more ice and rocks.
Celestia had reached the middle breach when she saw a nidhogg that had crawled up on the wall and was almost over. It was riddled with javelins and arrows, since close up the soldiers couldn’t miss, and it had barely any ice-breath left. However, they were now running from its teeth and it was barely acknowledging the missiles stuck in its hide.
Celestia was almost about to swoop down when suddenly a small, grey-brown figure bounced off a cannon, then the outer wall, and then landed on the head of the beast. Somehow holding onto the scales, slippery with blood and snow, it raised an axe in its hooves. Above the rumble and scream of the nidhoggs, and the shouts and clattering hooves of the defenders, rose a thunderous laughter.
Celestia was still tempted to sweep back and lend a hoof, but Heikko the Humongous laughed like he was watching a star-filled comedy at a Manehattan theatre as he rode the nidhogg, smacking its head with the axe repeatedly. The nidhogg pulled back, its head swaying in panic, and then slammed down in the mud outside the walls. Heikko slid off its back and landed on another nidhogg that was trying to raise out of the moat, waving his axe and whooping with joy. A small swarm of cheering reindeer warriors, does and stags, joined him.
Celestia shivered, but followed the plan and returned north with her followers for another strafing run, leaving the reindeer berserk to what he found a pleasure.
When most of the nidhoggs fleeing south down the walls had passed the middle breach, it meant the ones at the front of the horde had reached the bay. Their fear of water kicked in, and they started to mill around, some turning backwards, with others fleeing out the wilderness.
“OPEN THE GATES! FIRECASTERS READY! OPEN THE GATE!” Ukko bellowed. With a massive groan an equally massive set of rickety gates was pressed open by straining bovines - urox, Equestrian forces cattle and a few bison volunteers from the Tatanka Confederation.
Most were wearing urox anti-nidhogg battle armor, beset with spikes and blades. Most had a simple yet dangerous firecaster strapped to their backs. On the urox, it was operated by neckstraps, but the Equestrian cattle were ridden by pigs, goats and other smaller soldiers operating the explosive weapon.
They charged south towards the hesitating nidhoggs, bellowing as they picked up speed, any riders braying and grunting enthusiastically as they did their best to not fall off. They mostly managed to leap over rubble, dead and wounded nidhoggs and smoking wreckage as they connected with the enemy.
A cloud of other soldiers followed the bovine force at a distance, waving various sharp implements and hollering. Some of them leapt in to help any fallen cows and bulls up and back in order, and in one case put out an exploding fire tank. Others charged forward to protect the flanks of the heavy infantry.
When they neared the enemy, they used their firecasters in a few bursts, setting fire to the nidhoggs furthest back. They shied away and started to flee; those that didn’t was tackled by several bulls at full speed at once. Their icebreaths were mostly exhausted, and when they tried to bite their enemies they met the spikes and sharp blades. Several of the armored bulls and cows were slammed to the ground, though, while any riders fell off.
When the other soldiers charged in they started throwing javelins and rocks. Seeing that the stubborn nidhoggs had no ice breath left, they followed with direct attacks with spears, horns and hooves. Most nidhoggs started to flee south or across the stakes into the wilderness, with only a few stayed, and they were soon either set ablaze, wounded by charging heavy infantry, or swarmed by lighter forces.
It would have been a final victory, if not for one thing: a nidhogg covered in burning gunk charged blindly into the wall, and in its panicking ignored every attempt to drive it off. It tore down the wall somewhere between the middle and southern breach, and while dying, it set the wall afire. The fire spread only slowly, since the wood was damp. However, many enthusiastic soldiers had left the walls to join the fighting, and the few deer who tried to help concentrated on getting any wounded out of the way.
Soon, a large stretch of the wall was burning. While it was a fair distance to the city proper, there was still a wind blowing towards it, and the wall was still needed. Ukko and his companions realized too late what was happening, and had to struggle to gather their soldiers to gather at the fire. Luna and Celestia were doing the final phase of chasing the nidhoggs into the wilderness and down into the bay, and the flying troops followed them. As it was, it was civilians from the city carrying buckets of snow and water who had to fight the fire - as well as a certain unicorn.
Twilight’s head and horn throbbed as she let another big scoop of dirty slush and water from the moat rain down over the burning wall. The smoldering wood hissed and sent up clouds of steam and smoke. She leaned forward in her wheelchair as sweat moistened her fur.
“Get me closer!” she rasped and signaled to Saga. Saga didn’t dare disobey and pushed her closer over the rickety wooden battlements. They were really not suited to wheelchair use, but Twilight had insisted.
The smoke, luckily, blew away from them towards the city. Twilight squinted and lifted more snow from inside the wall this time, scraping up everything together with frozen turf and dirt and wooden splinters. It levitated and landed on the burning wall, already weakened by fire, which wavered and collapsed, falling outwards.
“BUCK!” Twilight shrieked hoarsely. “NO!” She gritted her teeth and started to lift the wall piece, feebly trying to fit it back together, and failing. Tears formed in her eyes, more from anger than from the smoke and steam.
“Twilight! Calm down!” shouted a voice from above. “We take over now!”
A white wing gently laid on her shoulder.
“Your highness!” peeped Saga, who was also crying.
“Easy, my little pony!” Celestia had landed right behind them. Her golden armor was smeared with grime and… blood. Above her Luna swept down and lifted a big scoop of snow and water, raining down over the remains of the fire.
Twilight relaxed, breathing heavily. She started to lift the wrecked wood again.
Saga dabbed her muzzle with a dirty rag.
“She has a nosebleed,” said Saga. “I don’t know how bad it is!”
“I’m fine, “ Twilight said. “I must fix the wall…”
“No, you don’t!” said Celestia.
“I tore it down, it was…” Twilight said.
“It was a result of you saving the rest of the wall,” said Celestia. “You have done well enough! We need you fresh and alive! As your commander, sovereign and teacher I order you to desist!”
Twilight started breathing more easily. Sobbed. Saga hugged her.
“Your highness, can you help me get her away from here?” she said.
“Surely,” said Celestia. She enveloped the wheelchair, Twilight and Saga in her glowing aura and levitated them down to the ground, following them on wing.
“Are we… winning?” said Twilight.
“The nidhoggs are flying… except those that are dead or dying,” said Celestia. She looked at Twilight.
“And if it makes you a bit happier, maybe a quarter have just fled more or less unharmed,” she continued.
“Doesn’t mean they will survive,” said Twilight.
“No,” said Saga. “But not all nidhoggs do in any case any normal winter. And now the city won’t be turned to ice or gobbled up or torn down. “
Twilight put a hoof to her forehead.
“I understand. I know.”
Celestia nuzzled her.
“Where is Spike?” she said.
“Spike is just a kid, so I told him to retreat to a shelter,” said Twilight.
“Good,” said Celestia. “I think you should go join him, in your current state.”
“He snuck out to see what was happening,” said Saga.
“He didn’t like what he saw,” said Twilight.
“I can understand…” said Celestia.
“No,” said Saga, “I don’t think so!”
Realising what she’d said, she put her hoof to her mouth.
Celestia looked at her closely, but not with anger.
“Nidhoggs are not like dragons, but still very much like dragons,” said Twilight. “It’s easier to tell yourself it’s just vicious beasts who are being slaughtered when they don’t look much like you.”
Saga nodded. “He took it hard. We left him with gramma when I helped Mistress Twilight out here to help, and then we saw the fire…”
Celestia nodded.
“Even better reason for you to join him now, and comfort him,” she said.
A dark shadow fell over them as Luna landed next to them.
“What’s the situation?” she asked. “King Ukko asks to see you, sister.”
“I’ll explain,” said Celestia. “Can you manage getting to the shelter?”
“I think so, your highness,” said Saga. “There’s a footbridge most of the way.”
“Good,” said Celestia. “Take care, Twilight. And you too, Saga.”
She turned to Luna.
“Let’s fly,” she said.
Luna nodded.
“See you later, Twilight Sparkle. Good work. Take care of her, Saga!”
“I will,” said Saga. Twilight nodded and sighed.
The two princesses took to the air.
Wiglek opened his eye. He gathered his monster-torn body together, stood up and whistled.
From the ice a shape formed, like a giant skoll.
“Svipp!” his dead tongue said without lungs. He turned around, fearfully.
The giant block of blue ice was still there, unharmed, though scratched by many claws. His son… no, not his son, but somedeer much like him, was still inside.
“I need to tell… need to fetch help. Need to be help!”
He turned to Svipp and nodded, and the mokkurkalfe took his master in his great ice-cave of a mouth.
“Run, Svipp!” he shouted. “Run for Sarvvik!”
And as the ice golem bounded in huge steps across the ice, the old liche shouted as a warcry, as if he had heard other cries in his heart:
“FOR MY BROTHER! FOR MY SON! FOR MY DOG!”