Online:The Founding of Shor's Stand

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Book Information The Founding of Shor's Stand
ID	8451
Collection	Solstice Summations

The Founding of Shor's Stand

by Ingorhild, Village Historian

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It was the time of darkness, snow, and hunger. A time when the foxes shivered in their burrows and the bears slept. The wind was harsh. Food was scarce. This was when Thane Haefrid gazed into the dry bottom of her tankard and saw a new home for her people. An island of sun and warmth. An island where his people could sleep with full stomachs and feast with gladness in their hearts.

Fourteen from the village left in search of this mysterious island. They knew the journey would be long and difficult. It is not in the Nord spirit to bend to the whims of fear. When doubt overcame them, Thane Haefrid spoke of what awaited at the end of their journey. When monsters of the sea beset them, Njor the Brave fought them off. And when a storm surged to bring down their ship, Vyrlytt lashed barrels together and saved them all. When their progress halted, a great whale rose from the water and showed them the route.

Overhead, the cloudless skies of the sea turned to the dark cover of night. But the night grew long and stretched far past the usual cycle of sun and moon. This is when Vyrlytt looked up and saw scales patterning the space where stars should shine. A giant serpent stretched above them, blotting out all light and keeping their new home in eternal darkness. The Nords let out a great wail and cry of lament as they huddled together in the darkness. Nothing they knew of could clear the scales from the sky.

When all peered into the darkness and saw barren lands, Njor the Brave, with his eyes honed by the hawk and his mind as sharp as claws, looked and saw a glimmer of light. He rose and followed far from his companions. In that stillness and black silence, Njor dreamed of the fox. He saw its tail curve back into a bow and its whiskers lengthen to arrows. In the pitch of night, he drew the bow string back and fired a shot from Sovngarde into the snake's heart.

When the brightness of morning woke the thirteen remaining members of Thane Haefrid's ship cheered and sought to congratulate Njor. Their search was in vain, for nothing remained of the hunter but the glowing bow of Shor. So it was that a feast in Shor's honor decorates our village's founding. So it is that we feast on cheese and mead to honor Njor and his bravery, as well as Thane Haefrid's vision. So it is that we come together as a village, remembering Vyrkytt's cleverness that kept the founders together in the sea.

(Other so-called historians say that Thane Haefrid commanded a fleet of ships, not just one. And that they used the ships to construct the first longhouses in the village. Nonsense! This is the story I was told and I believe it completely.)