The Sandals of Darkness...

Ah, is this merely a dream?

What terror and uncertainty can prowl the mists and darkness. How frail the mind. How weak the spirit.

How so terribly mundane is this flesh and bone, these mortal remains that mingle with the clay.

Come, you Furies, show me the tempest and tumult. Come you sweet Muses, sing me your song that I may slumber.

And let slumber take me…take me into your velvet cloak…where purple mists and regal realms hold sway and give solace to dreams and precious memories…

What lurks there, unseen?

What preys there, unbidden?

And does the rest lay silent…

There I look, and I see myself as a stranger. See myself as a wanderer above a sea of fog who takes himself unto the feasting hall of the Earth Mother.

“Alas, me,” she says, “for that I have no shoes ‘pon my feet and my toes are chilled by this frosty night.”

            I think to myself and rub my chin and decide that I will get for her the Sandals of Darkness, worn by Kyger Litor herself, and that I will call to my Brothers to seek their advice.

            “Raise an army and march into Hell!” hails Humakt.

            “Fill your lungs with air and fight the Troll Mother for that is all you need,” boasted Storm Bull.

            “Why bother with gifts, just take the Queen with force and make her your own,” cackled Vadrus.

            “I will go with you,” offered Brother Yinkin.

            But I took not their advice nor offer of aid and instead took myself and my own into the World Mountain and made my way down the spiral staircase that led to Hell and would take what Fate had for me.

            There I saw two Uz, who sat upon an ebony mead bench, and I could not hear their words, so I stole carefully and listened as they spoke on the Troll Mother and how she lived in a deep cavern, beneath the Dark Mountain. So that was where I took myself and entered the cavern to see Kyger Litor lying upon a couch, deep in sleep and I thought how sly and cunning it would be if I could sneak up to her and remove her sandals without her even waking.

            So I took myself across her chamber, but as I did so she woke from her slumber and bellowed to me,

            “Ho there, Wind, why do you steal across mine bedchamber?”

            “Mistress,” I said, “I have come to take your sandals and I intend on making a gift of them to the Earth so that she will lie with me.”

            “My sandals are my own, and I would not let you take them!”

            “Perhaps I can sing a song for you? A song contrite enough that you would give them to me out of sorrow?”

            And so I sung, but still she refused to let me take the slippers

            “Or perhaps I can tell you a story of warriors and bravery, if that suits your taste better?”

            But she would not listen to that either and so we came to blows and the two of us gave each other many a good bash until we were so exhausted and fatigued that neither of us had the willing to continue this parley.

“Mistress,” I said, “Mistress, then let us find another way around this issue.”

            “What do you propose?” She thundered.

            “I tell you what,” I began, as a plan formed in my mind, “I will give you a gift of Storm if you will give me the gift of Darkness? What say you to that?”

            She answered not, but stood there, listening.

            “I will give to you the ability to control the spirits of the Wind if you give to me your Sandals?”

            “The Winds, you say? You will give me your skill at controlling the Winds?”

            “I promise and pledge to give you the ability to take the spirits and use the winds as you see fit!”

            She thought on this and could not see through my sleight and finally she gave in and let me take her slippers and in return I gave her my magic with the spirits of the Wind (as had been my oath), though I did not surrender my divine abilities!

            Being thus pleased I took myself from out the depths of Hell and made my way back to the Earth and gifted the Sandals of Darkness to Ernalda.

            The Good Earth was most pleased to receive such a gift, but she had taken to warming her feet by the hearth, and so she had no need for them.

            “We thank you for the kind gift,” she said, “and we bid you to wear them for us and, when you wear them, to think of us.”

            Thus did I make my promise, and thus did I take dominion over the Shadows.