Deviation Actions
Literature Text
Chapter 9: The Scroll
Jack, Anna, Luna and Merida all hurried towards the beacon in the sky, hoping to make it before it fizzled out. Jack looked up into the starry sky for the beacon. His heart sank into his stomach as the light started to flicker.
“Oh, no...”, he said as he was running. “Guys, we gotta hurry!”
“Everyone, on Merida's back!”, Luna called out.
She grabbed Jack and Anna's hands with either of hers, and they shouted in surprise as she tossed them into the air, and they miraculously landed sitting forward on the back of Merida's bear body. Luna ran up a fallen log, and flipped her near-amazon body off the end of it, through the air, and onto Merida's back right behind them.
Jack looked up towards the beacon again. He could barely see it, except for the faint light it was giving off. “Come on, Merida, full speed!”, he urged. Merida nodded, and took a deep breath through her snout, sending a puff of fog into the cold night air. As if with a sudden burst of power, she nearly doubled her speed, and almost effortlessly swerved through, over and under the trees and logs strung through the woods.
Jack looked up again and saw, with great relief, that the beacon was still flickering in and out. They were within fifty feet of it, and closing in fast. They were gonna make it!
“Alright, almost there, Merida, WHOO!”, he cried.
“We're gonna make it!”, Luna cheered.
Then from out of nowhere, Merida's legs were swept right out from under her, and she, Jack, Luna and Anna all went tumbling to the ground.
“What was that?!”, Anna panicked, getting up quickly.
Jack quickly got up, gripping at the short sting that ripped through his arm. He looked back toward the beacon...it was gone.
He was hit with a sudden wave of disappointment, and that quickly changed to gloom, then anger, then fury in a heartbeat. He swung his fist, and took a chunk out of the tree next to him with a blast of ice.
He ran is fingers through his hair and gripped his head in frustration with both hands. “We HAD it! We were almost there...!”
Everyone stood up as something ripped through the bushes, drawing all their attention to one spot. They all stood still, Jack silently materializing a sword and shield out of ice, Merida standing with her claws ejected, Luna with a ball of sunlight swirling in her hand, and Anna with both arms ignited.
Something suddenly dragged Anna down by one of her braids, and off into the bushes, screaming for help. Luna lunged with a growl in the same direction, and after a few moments of struggling, crashed back into view, wrestling a mutant Nightmare. Her arms and legs almost effortlessly holding up against the nightmare's eight spindles. She managed to snap off four of them with her bare hands, and pinned it to the ground on its back with the other four. Its vortex of fangs lurched out at her face, spitting venom all over her from its gums.
Luna wiped the purple slime from her eyes, and glared down at the thing with a scowl.
“Time to cool down, you freak!”, she shouted.
She gripped the Nightmare's throat with both hands, and pried it open with her thumbs, slicing down toward the heart at the base of it's throat with her nails. Purple blood splurged everywhere as she did this with an almost frightening level of fury and hunger. Everybody backed up as she opened up the heart chamber, and almost roared a blast of ice from her throat, and froze the monster from the inside. It tensed up, its body turned solid and transparent blue, and shattered into shards of ice under Luna's weight.
Everyone was silent, as Luna breathed slowly, trying to calm herself down. She collapsed onto her hands. The grass around them seemed to cling to her fingers, and feed a golden light up her arms, into her head, and then down through the rest of her body. She took a deep breath as the light passed through her, and sighed with a smile, and then got back to her feet. She looked around, ans everyone took another step back, not sure what to think.
She cleared her throat, and put a hand on the back of her head, sheepishly.“Sorry you guys had to see that, I... I just have uh...anger issues.”
“You're telling us.”, Anna said. Jack and Merida gave her scornful looks. “Sorry.”
“No, it's fine.”, Luna said, quickly. “It's nothing I haven't been dealing with my whole life. I've mostly got a lid on it, except for big outbursts like....well, that.”, she said, gesturing to the now melting pile of ice shards that used to be the Nightmare.
“Well, at least it's a good thing to have in a fight.”, Anna shrugged. “You know, it's kinda funny. My sister Elsa-well you probably already knew she was my sister, anyway, she actually has a problem like that. Only, when she does it, everything gets covered in...wait, Elsa.” She gasped. “That thing, we were trying to stop from happening, it didn't involve Elsa, did it?” she asked Luna, becoming panicked.
“Actually...yeah.”, Luna said, almost apologetically. “Her and Hiccup.”
“And what exactly happened to them?”, Anna asked, her voice slightly raised. Her hair was starting to glow a low bright red.
“I...don't really think I should tell you, I mean...your hair's starting to catch fire.”, Luna said, nervously.
Anna grabbed Luna by the collar, and brought her eyes down to her level.“Tell me where my sister is!”, she demanded. A small flame poofed out of the end of both her braids, and made their way up towards her scalp.
“Please...”, she pleaded. “She's all I have left!” Her voice was quivering, and her eyes were beginning to water, despite the immense heat beating on her face.
Luna saw this sadness, and decided it was better Anna knew the truth.“They're at the North Pole.”, she answered. Anna let her collar go, and stepped back, her hair quickly going out, and a new redness appearing in her cheeks as she blushed at her own outburst. She wiped a stray tear from her eye.
“The North Pole?”, Jack asked when it felt like enough time had passed to speak again. “Why? What would Pitch want with them there? And why would he only stop with them, why not try to capture all of us?” He was more talking out loud to himself than to anyone else. He had subconsciously began to pace. “How did he even take over the Pole in the first place?”
“Ye know, I saw wha' Violet's capable of from th' other side b'fore I saved ye from the fire.”, Merida chimed in. “I wouldn't be surprised if she had somethin' te do with it.”
“Man, why do bad guys always capture the guy who usually has the answers?”, Jack grumbled. He turned to Luna. “Wait, you know why they got captured, don't you?”
“Well...yeah.”, Luna replied. “But I already told you, there's certain stuff I can't tell you. There's rules for this sort of thing.”
“Well, what can you tell us?”, Jack asked desperately. “Come on, you gotta give us something.”
Luna bit her bottom lip in thought for a moment, and then her eyebrows lifted as an idea came to her.
“Wait! I am allowed to tell you about the prophecy!”, she said.
“You're kidding me, there's a prophecy for this too?”, Anna asked, incredulously.
Luna nodded.“Prophecy of the Chosen Four.”, she answered.
“North said something about a prophecy when he gave Hiccup and I our pendants.”, Jack recalled. “But I never actually saw it anywhere.”
“That's cause there's only so many places where it was actually written down.”, Luna replied. She reached back into her hair, and pulled out a piece of old-timely paper rolled up into a scroll. “And I happen to have one of 'em.” She tossed the scroll to Jack, who fumbled with it, and finally caught it on both hands.
He looked between Luna and the scroll, almost impressed. “How'd you get this?”
“North.”, Luna answered. “He gave it to me, right before...anyway, that's not important right now. What is important, is that you see what's inside that scroll.”
Jack grabbed the free end of the scroll, and let the heavy end drop down. It was a four-foot length of paper. He skimmed over it, but he couldn't understand a word of what was written.
“What is this written in?”, he asked aloud.
Luna shrugged. “You tell me. I've been trying everything I know, but I haven't figured out a word of it.”
Jack took the paper over to Merida. “Can you read this?”, he asked her.
“I guess I can try.”, Merida shrugged. She looked at the paper, and her eyebrows flew up in surprise. She squinted at it, humming to herself. She turned it sideways. And again, and then completely upside down. Everyone held their breath as it looked like she'd figured something out. She then said; “Yep...I have no idea.”
Everyone groaned in disappointment. Anna walked over to Merida, and read over her shoulder. She furrowed her brows in confusion, and turned Merida's hands so the scroll was right side up again.
“Hey, I can read this!”, she said suddenly.
“You can?”, Luna asked, surprised.
“It's an ancient rune language.”, Anna explained. “My parents taught it to me growing up. May I?”
“Here ye go.”, Merida replied, gladly handing the scroll over to her.
“What's it say?”, Jack asked.
“Hang on, it's kind of hard to read in just moonlight.”Anna replied. She looked down at her hands. “Oh, duh. Wait, this paper can't burn right? Since it's magic and everything?”
“Should be fine.”, Luna shrugged.
“Great.”, Anna said with a smile. She snapped her fingers, and a small flame appeared in her palm, which she brought up to shed light on the scroll. She read over it in her head, focusing on every word of it. Her eyes became wider and wider as she quickly read from top to bottom. She froze with her eyes stuck on the last line.
“Anna?”, Jack asked after a few seconds. He walked up behind her. “Anna!”, he shouted, shaking her shoulder.
Her arm dropped, still holding onto the scroll. “This is bad.”, she said simply.
“Why? What does it say?”, Jack asked.
Anna turned around to face them. Her face read nothing but a mix of shock and horror. “It says...”, she began, unable to put it into words. “It says Elsa's going to kill me.”
