Chapter 1:
A/N – TW, this will probably be one of my most graphic pieces that I've written. While I won't be writing smut, I will be describing a lot of violence and using language that will bring to life the gravity of Ymir's experiences before she went to the Paths. I will mark chapters that are specifically graphic with a TW before the chapter begins, to help you guys read at your own discretion. Thank you! I hope you enjoy this fanfic!
The Legend of Ymir
Ymir's grief began the moment of her first breath.
Wheat fields rolled and swayed with the breeze, filling the air with the aroma of a crop ready for harvest. The rippling reeds glistened in the light of a burnt orange sun balancing between the thick line of smoke hued clouds on the horizon.
Earthen huts dotted the landscape, silhouettes flickering with the light of cooking fires, swarmed with workers returning from the fields.
This was the time of day the people gathered, growing fires were encircled by boisterous men, young and old, drinking away the day's labor. Children danced and laughed, chasing after livestock, and causing occasional trouble. Women carried swelling vats of liquor between campfires, pouring the bitter drink freely as they chatted and sang amongst one another.
The village glowed at night, radiating an excitement that mounted each day as the harvest approached.
With the harvest came plenty. Plenty food. Plenty wealth. Plenty happiness. Profits and prospects unending. They would be rich once again. Their stomachs full and ready for the winter months, before the spring arrived, and they repeated the cycle once again.
This was the life of the blessed.
For the cursed, a different cycle marked their seasons.
Those who didn't own fields, livestock, or vineyards, cursed the day the air began to thaw. The day the planting season began, the impoverished gathered in the village, auctioned off for barely the bread and water that sustained them.
Fathers sold themselves, their wives, and children, into indentured bondage. They were little more than slaves, toiling from morning to midnight at their masters' desire.
Some didn't return home at the end of the planting season. There were stories of daughter's defiled, and sons who died before the harvest arrived, broken by the hardship of their labor. Such stories were whispered in the fading light of the evening, around the fires where the people gathered, where the sun could not hear them, and cast the same curse upon their families.
Such curses had fallen tenfold on Ymir, the girl who's name itself was a byword in her native tongue.
Ymir, meaning cursed above all men.
"Blonde one, bring me another drink."
"Yes, my lord."
Ymir had been one of the indentured since the day she'd been able to walk. There was only one family who had been willing to take her in and provide for her; a distant relative to her mother, who had died by her father's hand for saving her infant daughter from sacrifice to the gods.
"Child, take this food to my husband."
"Yes, my lady."
Each day her existence was confined to the tasks at hand; her vocabulary limited to the pleasantries her servanthood afforded her.
"Yes, my lady."
But as the child did her mistress' bidding in silence, she was given the opportunity to see the world for as it was. She watched the men lust after their friend's wives, children harbor hatred in their hearts for petty faults, elders seeking revenge for the sins of decades past. Ymir was raised by the misdeeds of her people, learning quickly from their faults, and gleaning what tidbits of morality she could scope from her lowly estate.
"Little one—"
"Oh please, Timald, my son. Can't you see the girl's had enough?"
Her master's mother was the one of the only ones who she could claim was virtuous in her household. The elderly woman cared for her son's children, and occasionally looked out for Ymir when she was especially worn out.
"Vera, she's a slave." Her mistress responded, cuddling closer to Timald as she dared to correct her elders. "This is why she's here," She laughed, her drunkenly rosy cheeks contrasting against the light of the fire
"Letha didn't die for the child so you could abuse her daughter." Vera held her ground, nodding to Ymir towards the mudbrick house in a gesture for her to go inside. "Besides, I need help with my weaving. I'll make sure her time is not wasted."
"Hmph." Her mistress crossed her arms over her chest, turning to whine to her husband as the two went inside the house.
Vera shooed squabbling children out of the torchlit house before she waddled to her weaving, her age-arched back turned towards the servant as she sat down with a grunt.
"I meant what I said, you'll help me with my weaving."
Ymir's empty eyes traced the floor as she sat beside the woman.
"Yes, ma'am."
"You should be thankful you're not still stuck out there at that fire. Thelea has been getting jealous of you lately, she's working you extra hard."
The child said nothing, she knew better than to participate in conversation with her superiors. Picking up a clump of wool, she twisted the animal hair between her fingers, methodically making string and handing it to Vera to weave into her tapestry.
"Apparently one of the hunters came to Timald. He wanted to take you as his wife, and Thelea got angry because her oldest daughter just became of age, and the Hunter couldn't be convinced to have her over you."
Ymir wasn't startled by the hag's gossip, she knew Timald would never marry her to a hunter. She had no dowry, no connections worth pawning her off to the village men. She was the best asset to her master in the home. She was a body to do labor for his ever-whining bride, that was all she deserved, and she was grateful.
"That witch said she'd work you to death for stealing a proposal from her daughter." The woman clicked her tongue, shaking her head with a chiding look in her eyes as she grabbed more thread from Ymir and continued her work. "I always warned my son that woman was cursed. As soon as her cousin, your mother, was killed, and I noticed that Thelea had trouble getting pregnant, I knew I was right. It's a wonder the sun doesn't burn you both alive every morning you walk outside. You both have earned its rage."
What had she done to earn the sun's rage?
"Child, you know you need to twist the thread tighter. Tsk tsk."
"Yes, my Lady."
"Hmph, yes that's better. The tighter the thread the better the weaving. We can't have wisps of fluff peeking out between the stitches."
Ymir nodded slowly, taking care to twist the wool as tightly as she could muster.
With another grunt she concluded the servants' work was acceptable, and Vera continued her gossiping.
"Thelea sent Amina to go mind the hunter's fire this evening to try and change his mind. What a foolish woman! Her daughter is going to get defiled before her first year of womanhood, and she won't even be married—"
The drunken laughter of the foolish woman at the campfire outside startled the two, her flirtatious chides wafting in through the open windows.
"…No, Timald, please! Mind your manners…"
Vera scoffed, mumbling a curse under her breath to the sun.
"I love Amina, and Thelea's other children, but that woman is a sickness."
"Yes, my lady."
"Thank you, child."
They sat in silence for a moment, the only sounds were of the loom moving back and forth, and the occasional mumbles and coughs of a grouchy older woman.
Despite her rough edges, Ymir liked Vera.
It had been Vera who had raised her up until the age of five when she began attending to Thelea. She knew the older woman hadn't been blessed with daughters, and often she'd wondered if that was why it was Vera who came to her rescue when she was especially worn out and exhausted from her daughter-in-law's constant beck and call. She never asked though, and she never referred to Vera as her mother.
She never would.
Even Vera, the woman who raised her never called her by her name. No one did. To speak her name, especially in the daylight was dangerous.
Ever since her birth mother saved her from sacrifice, stealing her off the altar of the Sun, Ymir had been regarded as cursed. The child didn't even remember her given name, and she didn't ask. She was the embodiment of malfortune, the one cursed above all men.
"Alright enough is enough." Vera shook her head as she stood. "I can't listen to this woman's shrill voice any longer. If an old woman can't even focus on her weaving, what's left for her in this world?"
Thelea chose that moment to drunkenly stumble in the house, brazenly glaring at her mother-in-law in her intoxicated state as Timald crashed in behind her.
"Y-you!" Timald stuttered, pointing to Ymir. "Prepare my room. I want the cere-cremonial spices burning in there now!"
Thelea giggled wildly as Ymir nodded and did as she was told, grabbing a spare lamp as quickly as she could.
"Cinnamon for passion, and—and… what other one, Thelea?"
"Ginger! For fertility!"
Timald grimaced at the notion of his wife conceiving yet again, but nodded, nonetheless. "Ginger! Now!
"Yes, my lord."
Hurriedly shaving the cinnamon and ginger into the oil of the lamp, Ymir muttered an obligatory blessing over the lamp that she was accustomed to doing when these occasions arose.
"Faster!" Thelea taunted, stumbling over to drunkenly smack the child in the back of the head laughing hysterically as Ymir winced in pain.
"It's ready," the servant bowed, pretending her head didn't hurt.
"Go put it in the room, then leave us!" Timald commanded, abruptly turning to his mother. "Both of you!"
Vera meekly obeyed her son. "Yes, Timald. I will go fetch Amena and prepare the children for bed."
"Leave Amena be!" Thelea commanded, drinking in her newfound authority as much as the sensation of her drinks. "She's busy performing her duties!"
Astonishment graced the aged mother's brow.
"But Thelea, if no one goes to get her—"
"So be it! She's a waste of a daughter for being beat by this—" Timald's wife gestured to Ymir who was returning from placing the ceremonial lamp. "—This curse!"
Ymir bowed low, ignoring the customary insults and gesturing to her Master that their room was ready.
"Come, woman." Timald roughly grabbed his wife by the waist, prodding her towards their next activity. "Let's go."
Vera gestured to Ymir; a grim look painted over her wrinkled features as she opened the door and left the house, welcomed to a sight of a dying fire and a tumbled vat of discarded alcohol.
"Clean up this mess." Vera commanded, sitting down where her son had been perched. "This old woman has had enough."
Ymir did as she was told, collecting pieces of broken pottery and discarded food and throwing it in the cookfire.
"Would you like me to get Amena?" Ymir dared to speak, looking past their home to the cookfires lining the dirt road. Recognizing the girl sitting beside an older man at a cookfire a few houses past theirs, she looked back at Vera, waiting for her next command.
"If Thelea wants to rain more curses upon her household, so be it!" Vera raged, beating her chest with an enclosed palm before pointing at the moon. "I hope the sun takes my breath with it into the sky as it rises in the morning."
The child grimaced, wishing for once the woman's stubbornness would balk to sense, though she knew it wouldn't.
"Gather the other children. May they be spared from their mother's foolishness."
"Yes, my lady."
Ymir abandoned the fire and searched behind the house for Thelea's two younger sons. The boys had already fallen asleep, huddled together close to the sparse vegetable gardens that were planted outside the house.
Ymir smiled, stopping a moment to admire the boys cuddling in the dirt with their thumbs in their mouths. She had always favored caring for the children. They were too young to realize the gravity of her existence, and occasionally when their mother's back was turned, they treated her with genuine grace and kindness. She knew someday their view of her would change, but for now…
Taking the youngest in her arms, she caressed the face of the older boy, named for his father.
"Time to go inside, Timald…" She whispered softly, gently smiling at him as he woke.
"Where's Amena?" Timald asked, his characteristically curious eyes bolting open as soon as he realized he'd dozed off. "We were waiting for her."
"She's at the cookfire still." Ymir offered the child her hand, pulling him up. "She will be home soon."
The toddler in her arms whined, putting his tiny fists in her face as he stretched. "Shh, Damen. Go back to sleep," she cooed, letting him cuddle against the warmth of her chest.
They turned the corner around the house where Vera waited, accepting Damen in her open arms.
"Come, little Timald." Vera smiled once again; her brashness seemingly dissipated at the sight of her son's heir. "You're going to sleep well tonight, aren't you?"
Damen stared at Ymir over his grandmother's shoulder, one thumb in his mouth as he waved goodnight to her, his sleepy eyes only half open.
Vera escorted the two inside, her stoicism returning momentarily as she addressed the servant.
"Rekindle the fire, then come inside. It's too late for women to be out alone," she warned, before adding on one final detail. "And don't go for Amena. I mean it."
"Yes, ma'am." Ymir nodded as Vera disappeared behind the door of the house, coddling little Timald as she went.
Doing exactly as she was told, the servant didn't allow herself the time to ponder the fate of her mistress' daughter.
By leaving her outside, she knew all too well that Amena was being abandoned by both her mother and her grandmother to the unsavory desires of the hunters at the fire. There were stories of girl's never recovering from such encounters with the men at this hour. Not to mention they were then defiled before marriage and ostracized by the village. But Ymir had been commanded to succumb to passivity.
Dumping fresh logs over the smoldering coals, she refused to look in Amena's direction.
This wasn't her choice. She chided herself, images flashing in her mind of what could happen.
She didn't have a choice. She never had a choice.
It was the sun who cursed them.