The Lay of King Rafn: Second Stanza

The Joke of Trinmjurir

In the days that followed the betrayal and death of good king Shorri, the people of Mungard fractured into many different factions, as suited the people there, who were all of different types. The warrior-leader Trinmjurir set spreading virulent lies about the king, telling all who would listen that the betrayal was on Shorri’s part, and they had all been saved by his murder.

So Trinmjurir returned to his people, a tribe called Haalfen, and met them in good cheer. They greeted the liar warrior as a king and friend, and honored him with feasts and festivals for many days. Trinmjurir would lead his people to many great victories in battle, furthering his own legend as his riches grew. They traveled far and settled themselves in a corner of the land and called it Haalfheim.

Trinmjurir and his friend Akur bent the truth about Good King Shorri, and made the fantastic tales of their victories together even more fantastatic so that as time went on, the tales of Trinmjurir and Akur became so great that the people likened them unto gods and forgot to honor their forebears, as tradition would command.

King Rafn saw all of this, as he frequently flew overhead, and devised a most cunning plan. He set down by a bright young Haalf man named Welot, and knowing he could compel him, he said, “why do your people honor these liars and usurpers? Have you forgotten your forebears who love you? Have you forgotten your Haalfen honor?”

“Nay, never!” Welot admonished, rising to his feet. “You are right, clever bird. I will bring this to the people, that truth be told among them!”

So Welot gathered 3,333 followers and compelled them with his righteous words to join him reviving the old and proper ways.

Now, as Welot gathered men to follow him, King Rafn, wise as was, set into motion the other part of his trap. He went to gather two old friends of Good King Shorri, warrior-queens honorable and true of nations far from Mungard. Their names were Baeta and Mefjalr, both of whom Good King Shorri knew to be of good character and thus didn’t invite to his doomed feast.

“Hark,” King Rafn said to them, “a chance has presented itself to at last avenge good king Shorri. I have in my service a most honorable man of the tribe of Haalfen. I will use him to drive Trinmjurir into a rage, to attack his own kind, and that is when we trap him.”

Baeta and Mefjalr agreed, and thus a plan was made.

In this time, Trinmjunir became increasingly agitated that Welot and his followers would not pay him his tax, nor would they scrape and bow before him. Baeta became so bold as to appear personally in Haalfheim and ingratiate herself among Welot’s people. Together they held that Trinmjunir was nobody special, simply another of the Haalfen people, and that any could hold such station. They also began to spread around the truth of the betrayal of Good King Shorri. At the urging of King Rafn, Welot’s people gathered around Trinmjurir’s mead-hall and bade him to appear and tell the truth to the people of his kingdom.

As Trinmjurnir prepared to command the execution of Welot’s people, Baeta knocked on the door of his mead-hall, and issued a challenge to single combat.

King Rafn entered the meadhall through a window with Mefjalr, and they disguised themselves among Trinmjurnir’s bodyguard.

“Good king,” said King Rafn in his disguise, “you must not accept! Surely this is a trap, and her people will attack you.”

“But I cannot allow her to go on!” Trinmjurnir cried, “They must be stopped! But if I kill them all I will appear a cruel and unworthy leader.”

“Invite her in to discuss terms,” King Rafn suggested, “you will both be unarmed. We can hide ourselves in the room, and when Queen Baeta comes in the room, we shall jump out and attack her. Once their leaders are dead, the rabble will eventually settle down.”

“Aye,” said King Trinmjurnir, “your plan is wise.”

So King Trinmjurnir bade Queen Baeta enter unarmed to discuss peace. When he lead Queen Baeta into the hall, Mefjalr threw off her disguise and attacked Trinmjurnir. Baeta then cut apart the king’s body and made from it a hearty meal for herself, which she consumed with much vigor and enthusiasm.

From Trinmjurnir’s skin, Queen Baeta fashioned for herself a suit to appear as if the God-King himself, and went out to address the gathered crowds of Welot’s and Trinmjurir’s people. Wearing Trinmjurir’s skin, and using a trick of Royalty to imitate his voice, Baeta spoke of the lies of Trinmjurir, and called out all of his followers for faithless sycophants. Then, with a word of Royalty, she cursed them, twisting them into foul, ugly creatures and sending them away from Haalfen forever, they took for themselves the name Orcjalfen, and keep that name into the current age.

Baeta tortured Trinmjurnir in her belly for a time, then grew sick, so she wandered to a fetid land of dust and ash where she at last shat him out a weak and ugly shadow of his former self, and she gave him the name of Mjaalkat, and the good people of Haalfen saw him as a twisted and ugly thing, and bade him never return to their beautiful shores. All who lived in Royalty cursed and spurned him, and for his betrayal he lived forevermore in the cursed land where Baeta rejected him.

Baeta returned to Welot’s folk, who chose to leave Haalfheim and find a land for their own. They named their new tribe the Forandralfen, and they made a home for themselves in the land of Resdaajenheim, and Baeta taught them many secrets, and King Rafn perched in the high boughs of a tree and laughed at his good joke.