Once in the Archipelago, there were no sword-swinging Vikings. Not a single plow ran through the untamed hills, although the occasional dragon claws did. The waves rocked without lumbering boats.
Do not fear, gentle readers, for humans did appear. Eventually.
Odin had bestowed the Archipelago to the dragons. They called their leader Green, for his scales gleamed like blades of spring grass shooting out of a melted glacier. Odin will not let us remember the dragon's real name. I will tell you why shortly.
Green had three beloved fledglings: brave Ivor, the oldest sharp-toothed flier whose brown scales blended in with the untamed woods; gentle Eos, his golden-scaled favorite who tended flowers; and solemn Gris, a large-snouted reptile whose lucid eyes saw tragedy. Ivor flew like a bird with spiked wings and Gris tended to the ground; the crueler reptiles nicknamed her "Grouse." They left the flightless Eos alone because Green adored her. Father and daughter would amble the desolate cliffs, Eos spreading dandelion scenes among volcanic ash.
It came one day that the Norns, weavers of fate, had a message for Odin: the child who survived Ragnorak and would restore order would be born of Thunder and Fire, of Thor and a dragon princess. Odin was too wise to call such a feat impossible; he made things possible. With a shaggy cloak and pointed hat to cover a missing eye, he traveled via Bifrost to confer with Green on Midgard.
"It's not possible," Green said. Dragons do not speak, but Green could; to a human the voice would echo like thunder bouncing off a dozen mountains. Odin merely heard abrasiveness.
"I make things possible," Odin replied. "Will you give me your daughter Eos?"
Dragons do not sip tea or brandy; instead, Odin and Green gathered herbs.
"I will not," Green said. "She is a fledgling who cannot travel off this island."
"All the more reason to bring her to Asgard," Odin replied. "Freya will tend to her education, and she will not miss the sensation of wings sweeping off her feet."
This made Green consider. He loved Eos, but too much pity gathered around her. She slipped from a clifftop or attempted to catch up with Ivor. Ivor would laugh, ignorant and brash in his youth. Gris foretold that Eos's desire to fly would undo her.
"She could learn from the Norns," Odin added in a whisper. "Know your fate and how to ease its burdens. You dragons would always find favor with the gods."
Green had made his decision. He placed the shredded herbs on the ground.
"I cannot accept a price for my daughter. But if you will give Eos what she desires, I will give her to Asgard."
Odin nodded. Green let out a low, humming warble that always caught his fledgling's pointed ears. Eos stumbled towards, wings burdened with weeds and dead branches. The magic draped through the mossy sticks. She collapsed.
"Odin!" Green exclaimed, seeing the man's pointed hat throb. "What is happening to her?" His claw shot forward.
"I am making her a goddess," Odin replied, as if turning a dragon into a Vanir maiden was a normal as scratching one's nose. "Please don't do that; you may take my magic."
Eos did not like the surprise transformation. She squawked and squirmed and squiggled. Scales smoothed into skin. Horns softened into fine blond hair. Only her eyes, glittering like the Nadder fledglings, reflected reptile agony.
The other dragons paid no mind; they were used to Eos squawking. Gris screeched a warning from the other side of the island. No one paid heed to her either.
"Stop it!" Green roared. His front paw clenched. "You're hurting her!"
It stopped. Eos's new form settled. Odin took off his cloak and covered the unconscious, trembling body. He brushed off the sticks and leaves.
"I will give her what she desires," he said softly. "She will not miss being a dragon."
Green has his front paw clenched. It shook with a tiny bead of magic. He could not forget his daughter's agony. That was why he swallowed the bead, let it infect his system. For that reason, he gained a new name: Green Death.
They say that if one drinks dragon's blood then he will know infinite languages and wisdom. That is true if you were to drink Ivor or Gris's blood, for Eos has been changed. It is also true that disaster happens if a dragon tastes a god's magic. Odin should have known better.
I cannot say how Eos's education passed with the years, or if Thor ever attempted to court her. He found favor with Jotun maids, even having a child with one of them, but Eos's limp blond hair and speckled eyes never caught his heart. I do not mean to speak badly of Thor, for the really horrible thing he did was much worse than ignoring his intended, and he had good qualities. Mjollnir had chosen him for a reason.
Eos lived with Freya; they spent their time tended the Asgard gardens. The frail maiden soon became famous for having saved a dying bird. She had grasped the feathered creature in her hand, squinted her eyes, and changed it into a rabbit. Unlike brusque Oden, Eos took care to comfort the bird as feathers turned to fur and whiskers grew from a large, twitching nose. The rabbit had continued to lay eggs, and for that reason we use decorated eggs to celebrate rebirth.
Odin had visited Green one last time. By then less flowers sprouted on the volcanic cliffs. Gris flopped with many eggs, and Ivor started to regret the way he had treated his missing sister. It was a cloudy day that glazed the mountainside.
The magic that Green had swallowed had made his body grow into the island, so that he could barely lumber away. His wings had become tattered, unable to grow with the monstrous body.
"Where is my daughter?" Green asked, words garbled. Instead of clean echoes, his timber sounded like waves sloshing against a hollow cliff. "Is she well?"
"She is fine," Odin said. "Thor does not find liking in her. I have tried to convince her to go to him, but she is not interested. Stubborn waif."
"I should never have given her to you." Green's voice became harsh. His eyes rolled with white flakes.
"The Norns decreed it so, and I have held up my part of the bargain." Odin's tone became harder. "She merely desired a companion and as many flowers as she wanted. Such qualities are not becoming in a Viking woman. And you have taken something from me, Green."
"You took something from me; she will never fly."
Odin then made a great mistake: he retorted. "She wouldn't have flown anyway, not with the way you were hovering over her."
The great god's single eye could see many things, but he could not see Green's blood-lust and grief. Twenty curved fangs clamped on his left shoulder, biting hard. Odin screamed and struggled. Blood spattered on the rocks. Yellow energy surged from the mangled flesh. Green sucked it up like his teeth had become pointed straws.
This was how Green obtained most of Odin's magic, including the abilities that the god had repressed out of respect for his demure wife Frigga. Gris with the solemn eyes saw, and for the first time she voiced genuine concerns.
"Fly!" She screeched to the winged reptiles above. "Fly away! Father has gone mad!"
The dragons did not believe her, of course, except for Ivor. He knew his sister too well. His pointed ears heard terror instead of gloom. As the dragons stared down in amazement, the brown dragon swooped down and scooped her in his claws. He staggered with her weight.
"Leave me behind," she panted. "We will not make it."
"You are my sister, my only family!" he responded. "I do not flee to save my own skin."
Storms raged above and below. Ivor and Gris never forgot that day, struggling against the strong winds and the reality that their father had gone insane. Green roared and emitted hypnotic screeches, luring the curious dragons inward. Ivor could move his ears so that they flapped shut; alone he and Gris fled the island. Their shadows dragged behind them on the turbulent waves.
When all the dragons in the area had arrived, some struggling against the hypnosis, Green turned his attention to Odin. But he had attracted further attention; a streak of rainbow shot out and encased the one-eyed god. Before Green's frothing jaws, Heimdall has rescued the unconscious Odin.
Thor, as Odin's firstborn and legitimate son, assumed the throne as his father slept. Thor did not believe in negotiation; he saw the deep shoulder gouges and the dragon's madness. Heimdall warned him that Green could now absorb any Vanir's magical potential and forbade him from fighting the dragon itself. Bargaining would have to happen, Heimdall insisted. He had not sacrificed an eye for wisdom, but he knew when direct combat would not work.
Thor's thoughts turned to Eos, the blond waif who planted flowers. He stormed Freya's hut and demanded to see his intended. Eos asked what the interruption was about and paled when she heard what Green had done.
"You need to talk to him," Thor said. "I don't negotiate, I fight. Perhaps you can tell him to give up Odin's magic and accept punishment."
"I will try," Eos said. "Take me to the Bifrost."
"You must talk to him as a dragon; if you appear as Vanir, he will kill you."
Eos's normally honey-soft eyes darkened. She wore a simple linen shift stained with grass clipping. "He is my father; he would never hurt me. And no, I must remain in this form. Odin deemed it so."
"Odin is in Sleep because of your father," Thor said with more harshness than intended. "Green apparently started to fight because of you."
"That is not my fault; I did not choose to come to Asgard. Your father took me from my home to lie with you, Thor. Shouldn't that be your first concern?"
Thor's bearded chin quivered. He wiped at it rather than strike with his hammer. "You're not attractive as Vanir, not to my liking. I don't like frail women."
"No, you like Jotun." A harsh edge came to Eos's tone. "You are willing to be with their maidens."
Freya saw the sky crack, lightning come into Mjollnir's hand.
"You must become a dragon again!" Thor spun his hammer. "I am of Odin's blood, and I will make it happen!"
Freya intervened. She did not speak, for Thor valued actions over words. Her hands shot forward with energy and caught Eos at the same time that the lightning did. The girl's eyes widened with pain and her body throbbed.
"Thor, you have no right!" Freya shouted. "She won't change back even if Odin himself reversed the enchantment!" She should have spoken sooner, for the golden energy had encased Eos and trapped her.
"What's happening?" Thor stopped the lightning.
Eos hung loosely. Her body dissipated like mist from a lakeside in the morning. Freya cried and reached for thin air.
"Thor, what have you done?" She whispered. "No, what have we done?"
Odin was not amused when he awoke. His beard quivered and Thor cowered under the one-eyed glare. By destroying Eos's Vanir body, he had sent her soul to Midgard, the worst place possible for a mother destined to bear a special child. The Norns when they had heard of Odin had spun a thread on their loom so that dragon-hating men appeared on the Archipelago for the first time. Mortals fought the dragon with vicious glee.
Eos's soul had bonded with a dying mortal woman, saving her life but confining the waif to a dragon-slaying life. Green perhaps sensed that his daughter numbered among the hammer-throwers, for he confined his massive girth to a mountain and sent other reptiles to steal food.
"And can we go to the Archipelago?" Odin had roared. "NO! None of us can go for fear of the Green Death absorbing us! You have endangered our future in a fit of temper and arrogance!"
"I am not afraid!" Thor had retorted. "I will go find her."
"YOU. WILL. NOT! You must actually use your head for once; she will have no memories of you, and can only leave Midgard with death. And NO, you may not murder her a second time!"
Thor winced.
Odin paused as he saw Loki linger in the mead hall's doorway, listening. "During my sleep I had vision; only a dragon of Green's kin may defeat him, a fledgling of Gris's."
"That's going to be simple," Loki scoffed. "I may not be able to find the Norns, but even I know that Gris cannot bear children any more than Ivor can."
That was true; whether by knowing of Odin's vision or simply knowing that they had escaped, Green had cursed Gris and Ivor to have stillborn hatchlings. Thor's bearded face reddened as he registered Loki's words.
"I make things possible," Odin said. "In sleep I blessed Gris with a hatchling faster than his grandfather, slicker and darker-scaled, appealing to the eye, intelligent and quick-witted, and able to bond with the dragon-slayers. He will hatch with no heartbeat; you must find Gris, bring her Rainbow Isle where Heimdall waits, and bring the baby back to life."
"How?" Thor asked.
"Trust Mjollnir. If you want to atone for Eos's disintegration, you will let the hammer strike the egg at the right time."
"That's what Thor is best at doing," Loki called. "Letting the hammer strike."
Thor growled.
"Peace, Loki."
"I will have no peace until I know where my children are, Father."
"Heluth is quite safe in the Underworld; none may harm her."
Loki's dark eyes turned even darker. "But who will care for her? Who will ease her into womanhood? At least if she were with me-"
"Heluth has a dark destiny, Loki, like you do. We have strayed too far from that path to have further deviations."
"She is my daughter. Just like Eos was Green's daughter. Taking her away didn't do you any good, did it?"
"Are you threatening?"
Loki withdrew. "No. Of course not."
"Thor, prepare to leave for Bifrost. Show me that you can do more with that hammer than use it to hurt people."
The blond-haired god looked down in shame. "I swear that I will not disappoint you, Father."
Gris lingered on Rainbow Isle, a southern volcanic mass of cliffs and caves. Her solemn eyes tinged with grief. Seven broods, all with stillborn. This brood only held one egg, her largest and last hope. It loomed as high as a mound of lichen but glittered like Green's eyes once had.
"I want to hope," she told the glittering egg.
Ivor was confined to an even more distant isle; he failed raising a dragon army against his father. The insane Green Death could not kill his beloved brave son, but he could clip the brown wings. Ivor walked the paces of the island like a chained dog; no man could moor on the collapsing cliffs.
Thor arrived on a curve of rainbow; he wore a red cape and shining silver armor. His head was bowed. Gris returned the bow and swept her tail as if it were a bridal train.
"Good day to you, son of Odin."
"Good day, daughter of Green."
"Sister to Ivor," she corrected him. "Can you save my baby? I hear no heartbeat, but I know he is growing. He will be special."
Thor looked into the solemn eyes and absorbed their sadness. They reminded him of Eos, frail Eos whose arms were always scratched with rose thorns. He regretted having not done his duty, having not fulfilled destiny.
"I will try," he promised. "Mjollnir, can I trust you?"
The hammer responded by spinning automatically. The skies darkened, and lightning shot from the rainbow curve into the blunt end. Then the sparks danced in a stream toward the egg, illuminating the scrunched up baby inside. Gris leaned closer and got her snout scorched.
"Careful!" Thor warned. "My hammer has a mind of its own."
Cracks filling the air; eggshell burst. Thor dodged the sharp-edged missiles and shielded Gris. The rainbow caught bits of the shell and lodged them in the earth; they became prisms, reflecting the colored hues on the ground like a pool of mixed paints. The clouds around Rainbow Isle prevent us from seeing them unless the sun pierces the cover with its beam. For that reason we have rainbows, a reason to smile
The lightning sputtered out. A tiny blue dragon waddled on its feet, yawning. It chirped on seeing Gris.
"My baby!" she exclaimed; for the first time her tone held no gloom or terror. "My little offspring."
"Unholy offspring," Thor muttered, looking at his hammer. "A child of fire and thunder, lightning and death. Could this be-"
No. Odin's voice rang through the clearing. This is one of your children, Thor, but not Eos's. Eos will die with child on Midgard, and you will know what to do when she reappears in Valhalla.
Gris nuzzled the baby's pointed snout and licked it. She pressed her ear to his tiny chest, to hear the fluttering heartbeat. Sorrow returned to her voice.
"Odin, when my baby can fly, Green will take him, I know it, and I won't be able to stop the screeches from coming. Even if I were to lock Fury in a cave and bury him, he would find a way out. I've seen it with others' babies."
I'm sorry, Gris. I guarantee that Green will not kill him. A mortal will free Night Fury, your fledgling, and together they will defeat your father.
"That's impossible; the mortals hate us dragons." Gris held back a wail.
I make things possible. Your baby will come back to you fully grown, and he will know you though he will not be able to speak as you do.
"Father and his prophecies," Thor muttered. "More trouble than they're worth."
Destiny is not a thread to be snapped lightly; make a wrong stitch and all of life will unravel.
Thor blushed; he had forgotten that Odin could hear him. Gris, as if already accepting her fledgling's fate, used her wings to wrap him to her chest. The black and blue baby struggled but soon slept against her drumming heart.
"Night Fury," she murmured. "My only Fury. Please stay to the skies and out of sight, mortal or no."
The baby twitched in its sleep, and although Thor knew that babies understood nothing, he could swear that Night Fury's ears had heard its mother's words.