The Return of Guthrum Mane. Part 2

The hill moved.

Pebbles at first and then as cracks in the earth and stone appeared the tree tilted, its top bending and then breaking off to leave the stumps and increasingly exposed roots.

The hill moved again and stood up.

The stump rose up and clung on to the earth beneath it as if in defiance. Thick roots which had pushed and fought their way into the bedrock now held them close to form a strange crown and cloak of grey and green.

Guthrum opened his eyes and looked around, he had been asleep for so long and the world was not the one he remembered. The stones had sheltered him when he had pulled himself away from the ruin of Orc’s Drift to sleep and heal.The taste of dwarf and elf and human washed away in the haze of battle. The Vile Rune Orcs who had paid him to fight broken and their Chieftain Fangor Gripe cut by burning elf blade. 

The sound of roaring dwarfs as the F’yar Guard turned and their king was torn from the sky and plummeted with his Wyvern into the uncaring earth.

He remembered to the roar of the dwarf lord Borinn as the crossbow bolts buried themselves deep into his flesh and the heavy bite of his axe. 

The wounds had been deep and his sleep had been deeper as the seasons turned and he became as stone.

The world had ended and the stones had protected him and carried him through the cataclysm to a new world.

'Old world, new world, matters not. Still stone, still food’ he muttered to the stones and went off in search of food.