Title: The Jaws that Thirst
Author: bookworm
Rating: uhhh. G I think perhaps edging into PG?
Warnings: a big nasty dragon? uh, elements of mind control & suggestions of eating people (*points at DRAGON*)
Disclaimer: I promise all characters will be returned to their owners (mostly) intact
Summary: Five mistakes she will make, and they will be her death.
AN:
So I was asked for more of my Silmarillion/How to Train Your Dragon crossover. I ...do not think this was QUITE what the requester meant but this is where the muses went! So yes, this is set in the same universe where Maglor washes ashore on Berk, and the dragons of HTTYD are survivors of the great Wyrms of Tolkien's epic. Previous fic not needed to be read before this one to understand it beyond that. *goes back to poking at her Peter Pan/Rise of the Guardian fic*
The Green Death, they will call her, these pitiful worms that she sends her subjects to raid. The Queen, Great Lady, her own lesser kin name her (they have other names for her too, that they whisper to their hatchlings where they think she cannot hear – Tyrant, Deceiver, Oppressor…in the quietest of whispers, those who remember the Old Tales name her Anfauglir – The Jaws that Thirst, and she smiles her terrible smile). In her youth she was great and glorious, last spawn of the great urulóki of Angband, the only one of her clutch to survive the long years (the others were weak, unworthy – food). In her dreams she can still faintly recall them, days of glorious slaughter, when the armies of men and elves and dwarves fell screaming beneath her flames. That time is long past now, and most of her kin are dead. But she, she was not so foolish. They went after treasure and were slain by the great heroes of the Age, but not her, oh no. While the others laid waste to the lands about them she flew north, into the cold and the ice, and making herself a nest, she slept, and in sleeping, grew. Great and glorious was her youth, but greater still she is now, of a terrible size, and her flames are hotter than any now living. She chose her nest well, in the place where the molten heart of the world came oozing to the surface. While the rest of the world grew cold in the grip of the Ice Wars, she slumbered in warmth and dreamt of her hoard, and her mind grew to match her body.
Long she slept and deep her dreams, and she slumbered through the rise and fall of nations. And slow but insidious her dreams spread out from her in a web of deadly enchantment around her nest, waiting for a careless wanderer to rouse her. Oh, pity the careless fools, drawn to rumors of treasure only to find death waiting! A great hoard she has indeed, made of the bones and armor of the greedy. Long she slept and great her hunger grew, barely sated by the careless flies she trapped in her web. Slow and terrible is a dragon's cunning, and when tied to hunger, it is a fearsome thing. Carefully she threw out her web of dreams, and one day she snared a treasure indeed.
Fast and sleek they are, greatest of the dragons of this Age – black as night, swift and sure – and proud they grew, these who escaped thraldom. Diminished from their former might they may have been, but they are the survivors. So sure of themselves they grew that they became careless, unheeding of old tales of terror that slumbered beneath the ice, and flew too close. Too close, and before they knew it they were ensnared – too close, and they learnt the horror of the might of the Dragon-Spell, that binds their wills to Her. She sates her hunger on their Wing, and bids them bring their comrades to her. Filled with horror but unable to fight, they do, and soon she has a flock of slaves to sate her endless hunger. Of the first Wing that falls to her, many fall to despair and regret (if only they had not come so close, if only they were stronger, if only, if only…), and eventually, only one is left – the youngest, and she prizes him, binding him to her tight and tight, using him to scout her raids and to take out the weapons the humans build to stop them. And then one day he vanishes. Oh, how she rages, but although favourite he may be he is still only one, and she has many, and so she forgets him (This is her first mistake).
Five mistakes she will make, and they will be her death.
One day she thinks she smells him, but she is hungry, and there is one of her slaves who thinks to escape with only the smallest of tributes. She eats him instead, and in the doing, she sees her favourite, hiding in the shadows… with…no! Humans! He dares! Enraged, she reaches for him with teeth and flame and ignores how he seems to slip her mental net (This is her second mistake). Alas, even with humans on his back (weak fool, to allow the humans so close, as if no more than one of their mindless beasts of burden) he is swift and escapes her, and her rage is such that her slaves will have to work twice as hard to appease her hunger, for she slakes that rage on them instead. She is forced to let him go, and in her rage she dismisses him entirely (This is her third mistake). She drives her slaves harder, and they tremble in their nests. And then the Vikings come.
The Vikings have come looking before, and she has delighted in trapping them in her mazes, and their bones and armor have lined her nest. For any of her lesser kin, they would be (have been) deadly foes, with minds set on battle and weapons honed as sharp as the heroes of old, but to her they are gnats and flies. With them comes her once-favourite, and she laughs as he falls easily again to her, mind distracted and spirit wounded – easy prey. For the first time in an Age of the world she shifts herself from her nest, and the Vikings fall back before her. Anfauglir, they called her, and she laughs and her smile is full of teeth – the first to bear that name was weak, but she, she will destroy them and slake her thirst on their blood at last. Oh, but it has been long and long since she was able to wreck such destruction! Her teeth are as blades and her scales are harder than the strongest steel, and the viking weapons are as toys to her hide - no weak spot has she. Laughing, her fire destroys their ships and her jaws catch those who are foolish enough to run. When the Viking youngsters come flying in a-dragon-back she mocks them, these foolish ones, and toys with them as they seek to stop her. When she spots the scrawniest of them tugging at the straps of her once-favourite, she carelessly sinks the ship and thinks them dead (this is her fourth mistake).
When he takes to the air, his human rider secure on his back and mocks her, she shrieks with rage, and forgets all the old cautions about heroes (this is her fifth mistake, and it will be her death). She cannot hold his mind, somehow protected as he is by his rider (how, how,how!), and his swift wings carry him out of range of both her jaws and her flame. Raging she follows him into the sky, but the darkness is now his ally, and he is simply too swift. Taunting, he drops, and she follows, but as she opens her mouth to blast him to ashes he turns and throws his own flame at her (no! not inside, the one place not protected by her armor!), and her world dissolves into flame.
So she ends, the last of the great Dragons, and her lesser kin are finally free.
Translations & Tolkien-isms:
urulóki = fire drakes, those of the dragons who could breathe fire (eg Ancalagon, Glaurung or Smaug, as opposed to the cold drakes, who could not) - and we know from how Gandalf speaks of Smaug, that although Smaug was the greatest of those still known to be alive, that there were lesser dragons around, hence my theory on Her sleeping through this period and the escape & diminishing of the HTTYD dragons
Angband- the fortress of Morgoth, the Dark Enemy of the World, who bred the first dragons, and Sauron's boss
Anfauglir= The Jaws Of Thirst, the title initally given to the great werewolf Carcharoth, after he had swallowed the Silmaril, which was literally burning him up inside, making him drink to try and extinguish the fire
Dragon-Spell- this is Tolkien cannon! Glarung could do all sorts of interesting and not-nice things to your brain (see: Nienor, Turin) if he caught your eye, and even Smaug is implied to have some sort of ability in this regard