Inheritance

Part 2. Chapter 41: Forbidden Treasure

The new tribe members would look up at him like lost children who were discovering their purpose.

They were completely mesmerized by their promised destinies.

And as time passed, Fjorn had gathered what he deemed was a big enough army to take Maribel if he thought through his attack plan well enough.

He was now sixteen-years-old, and he set out to conquer Maribel with two-thousand fairies in tow.

"Fjorn, this plan requires sacrificing hundreds of fairies..." Anjaika said when he related the plan to her.

"It must be done." Was all Fjorn said in response. "This is my destiny. We must offer them up on the border of Maribel while we go around and attack this town behind the border. The humans will think we are a poorly organized band of savages like usual, and they will never expect the surprise attack we intend to launch."

The now pregnant Anjaika had nothing to say in response to this. She merely rolled over under their blankets and turned her face away from him.

Fjorn's plan ended up working remarkably well.

He had seized the town on the border like he had intended and only had to sacrifice a few hundred loyal, but foolish, fairies to do so.

He had absorbed many new human recruits into his army, and, combined with his powerful magic, he was a force to be reckoned with.

Before he knew it, he had achieved his dream far faster than he imagined.

He sat on the Maribel throne with his pregnant wife by his side at age seventeen.

He couldn't be happier.

I have what was promised to me.

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Five years past, and many thought Fjorn had become complacent upon the throne. His army of fairies and humans alike wanted him to march upon enemy territory like he had promised and create the world of the strong.

However, Fjorn had become possessed with the old woman that the soothsayer had told him about. I need her in order to create the world of the strong.

He could tell no one of her. If he did, they would surely repulse him and reject him as their king.

Old women are not objects of infatuation like young women are. They are to be adhered to and respected like the fairy goddesses. Fjorn tried to convince himself as he rubbed his temples.

That didn't stop his head from envisioning what she might look like, however. Nor did it stop his non-stop pacing in the castle halls or his throbbing headaches.

It was hot inside his head. So hot that he felt the need to leave the castle one day and go exploring in the pine woods behind it.

He walked until he was dizzy with hunger and his magic had to fill his body with energy because he had not eaten."

The magic in his body reached out and told him where to go to find what he desired.

He headed deeper into the woods until he found a creature with yellow skin, black, twisted horns, and four uncanny, black eyes hiding within an oncoming snowstorm.

"I know what you search for." The creature's voice was strong; it echoed.

Fjorn was silent and waited for him to tell him what he was searching for.

"You want the woman. You will have her, fear not. It is not just that you must love her. You must own her. Let me tell you how this is so." The creature said.

Fjorn was enraptured. Especially when the creature placed a picture of what the woman looked like in his head.

She wasn't pretty, but it didn't matter.

He could tell she was strong.

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Fjorn let the humans keep their convents and religion when he had first overthrown their king. His reasons were simple; he wanted to respect the humans who were strong who had come under his rule. The fairy goddesses had respect for all those who were strong, after all, and tolerance of foreign gods and goddesses was always preached within the oral tales.

He also wanted to keep them happy and under control by letting them keep a piece of their culture. But that changed as time went on and he could think of nothing else but the old woman.

Fairies and humans alike were stunned when a fifty-year-old Fjorn threw aside this moral guideline his religion had laid out.

He began burning all convents across Maribel in search of something which he refused to tell anyone else about.

I must have her. I must have her. He thought to himself as he watched countless convents go up in black flames.

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