Chapter Text
There are legends about these woods.
Tales of countless young women being stolen from their homes, taken by a terrible monster, never to be heard from again. A horrible merciless fiend that terrorized these forests for centuries untold. A nightmarish creature, insatiable in it’s appetite, capable of tearing through flesh with it’s bare hands.
A wendigo.
But Eia Madaerie was more than just a mindless beast. She was a massive, brawny, and terrifying creature, the type that no sane creature would ever think to pick a fight with, but she was no brute. She was cunning, elegant, and majestic. Creatures coming face to face with her for the first time would marvel at her unexpected beauty just as often as they would cower in fear of her awesome might. But the denizens of the forest hated her all the same.
As intelligent and wise as they often grew to be, there was truth to those old legends. In their youth, wendigo are little more than hungry, ferocious, and savage animals. Not until they reach adulthood do they grow out of their barbaric frenzied ways.
But those of her kind rarely lived to sexual maturity. The wendigo had been all but eradicated by the archfey. The guardians of the forests were sure to put an end to the beasts on sight, and the Eternal Hollow was no exception.
Every moment of her early life had been a struggle for survival, and her body was covered in a half century’s worth of battle scars. Most gruesome of all was a deep gash on her belly, left by the most powerful being in the Eternal Hollow.
↞✶↠
Brinia Alistora was a dryad, the protector of these forests and everything in them. Everything from the trees above and soils below, to the villages between them and everyone and everything that lived inside them, this was her domain, and it was under her protection.
These woods were home to all sorts of misfit creatures with nowhere to call their own, outcasts from a society that sought to oppress them. There were common creatures of course, elves, dwarves, orcs, and gnomes. But just as many exotic creatures called this place home as well, slimes, gargoyles, genies, minxes, sphinxes, seafolk, humans and pseudo-giants. If it still existed it could be found here in the Eternal Hollow. There was only one notable exception, the one race you almost surely wouldn’t find here were the hobgoblins.
The Eternal Hollow housed the village of Thorn, the largest settlement outside of the kingdom of Najistaire. Najistaire was a continent spanning kingdom, a hobgoblin empire, where the ruling race saw all others as inferior beings, treating them as little more than slaves, livestock, and objects to be owned.
But Brinia was not like any of those creatures, Brinia had a place in the world, she had a place where she belonged, and it was here. She was born here, a spirit, an incarnation of the forest.
She was known across her realm as Brinia, the Guardian Spirit of the Eternal Hollow.
She was beautiful too, everyone in the village knew Brinia. She had a head of beautiful golden hair, her eyes were a deep forest green, she stood at just over six feet tall, and she carried around a wondrous artifact, a powerful staff capable of shaking the entire forest.
Her staff was imbued by the magic of the faerie, dryad’s were fey after all, and only an archfey like herself could access the magic of the staff. She was the only creature in the Eternal Hollow who could wield the Hollow’s Heart
Creatures fled to these endless woods to escape from the horrors of life as slaves to the neighboring military kingdom. The power Brinia wielded, the magic of the Hollow’s Heart, was the only thing that could protect the entire forest from being conquered by the looming might of the hobgoblin empire.
But Brinia didn’t realize that these woods belonged to the wendigo just as much as they belonged to her.
↞✶↠
A fully grown wendigo was driven by something much worse than their hunger. They were driven by the desire to breed. The adolescent creatures were terrifying monsters who walked on four legs, stalking and devouring any creature that crossed their path. Grown wendigo were far more horrifying. They were cunning beings who walked on two legs, looming over lesser creatures. They killed for fun, searching for maidens to tear away from their homes, dragging them screaming all the way back to their den, where they can rape and breed with them, forcing the helpless women to carry and give birth to their children before they moved on to their next victim.
Eia Madaerie was looking for her next victim, but she didn’t think of the women she took as victims. She was a misunderstood creature, only doing what it took to ensure her kind survived. The women were taken against their will, but they were never killed or mistreated, at least not maliciously. As long as they bowed to her authority, there was no reason for harm to come upon them.
The women were never heard from again, not because they were helplessly brutalized, raped, and devoured, but because they were kept. Like other wendigo, Eia kept a small harem of women in her possession, and each of them played a part in a complex web of roles enforced upon them. In a way, the wendigo’s harem is their family, and Eia was no exception.
From the waist down she looked almost like a monstrous rabbit, but from her hips on up was the body of a massive and muscular woman, her face hidden behind the skull of a deer, the wendigo’s antlers protruding from the where the dead animal’s own antlers once did.
Her large digitigrade feet landed hard on the soft forest floor, they were the legs of a giant hare, capable of pouncing on her prey with the speed of a mighty gazelle, the claws on her toes capable of tearing through flesh just as quickly. But the daggers on her hands were even more mortifying, her fingers long and slender, covered in deep black fur, claws like knives capable of ripping through skin and guts like they were jelly.
Eia stretched her hand before her and gazed lovingly at the shining silver rings that adorned nine of her ten strong fingers. The glowed in the moonlight, small silver strings of magic trailing from each ring before fading into the night.
She was a ferocious and powerful creature, but she was fully capable of love and affection.
“Hold still Izona, you’re only making it worse.” The large woman lowered herself to one knee on the forest floor, leaning over a much smaller woman. She was holding one knee close to her chest, a large open gash across her thigh.
Izona was flustered, a clear look of embarrassment painted over her face. “It’s one measly scratch, I’ll be fine.”
Eia sternly wrapped her fingers around Izona’s wrist, pulling her arms from the wound to get a closer look. It was clear to see that her first bride was desperate to stay by the wendigo’s side, but Eia saw no use in bringing a shrunken pseudo-giant out hunting if the girl couldn’t keep herself from getting hurt. “You’ve lost your edge Izona… Go home.”
Izona opened her mouth to protest before promptly realizing how little difference it would make, her Master was never one to negotiate with her slaves. “I… Yes Master…”
Eia helped her five foot tall bride to her feet, giving the miniature pseudo-giant a loving pat on the back. “If you can find her on your way back, see if Arleena will escort you to the post.”
Izona’s voice quivered in fear, she knew exactly which post she was talking about. “A-are you sure, Master?”
Eia let out a low growl, annoyed at her bride’s reluctance. “You won’t be going outside and getting hurt once you’ve been pumped. Now return to your sisters.”
The wendigo gave her thrall a firm push, sending her on her way back home before continuing her hunt. She should have just brought Arleena along with her instead, at least the wraith was strong enough to keep herself from getting injured while hunting. Eia’s undead bride had undoubtedly gotten more hunting done tonight than even the wendigo herself.
She had been too soft on Izona, favoring her handmaiden for the job even though she was clearly unsuited for the task. If she couldn’t do the job she was given, she was going to return to the waiting chamber and join her pregnant sisters, maybe giving birth to a few children would toughen her up.
Eia stared at her hands for a few moments, gazing at the index finger of her right hand. Each of her brides had a collar around their neck that looked just like the rings around her fingers, and she had room for one more ring.
↞✶↠
Eia was careful about where she chose to hunt, get too close to a small village or a trepid family of gnomes out in the forest somewhere and she was bound to send the lesser creatures fleeing in terror. If she wasn't cautious, she'd end up attracting the attention of the dryad.
Of course the dryad wasn't all that scary. Without her magic staff, Brinia was little more than a spring of healing. With the staff however, was a completely different story. Much like a wendigo's brides, the Hollow's Heart gravitated towards it's Master. The druidic artifacts often attached themselves to the most powerful faerie they could find, which in the case of the Eternal Hollow, was Brinia.
But it was the staff that brought out the potential in the dryad, not the other way around. Without the magic weapon, Brinia's turn as the guardian of these woods would quickly come to an end.
Eia didn't much care to have that happen. Brinia was a threat to her own power for sure, but she was a manageable threat. The dryad may have left scars on the wendigo in her times as a frenzied hellhound, but as an adult Eia had been untouchable. Even so, leading the archfey back to her brides would just be inviting trouble. Plus, the forest sprite served as a convenient wall preventing the neighboring hobgoblin empire from trampling over the entire forest and turning everyone and everything in it to dust.
Including my brides.
Brinia had yet to cross that line. The faerie druid had put down a few of Eia's young in the past, but that was just the way of life for wendigo kits. There was a reason that they didn't form maternal bonds. They either learn not to pick fights they can't win, or they die trying.
But her brides were a different manner, those were precious to her, and she was going to protect them. Fiercely. A wendigo could have ten of them, but each and every one of them were as beloved as the last.
Even if you wanted no part in your Master's affection, once a wendigo claimed you, you were Hers. Forever.
Eia managed to take down a pretty large stag just before nightfall. It would have been nice to have Izona or Arleena here with her to tie up the kill and wrestle it back home so that the wendigo could continue her hunt, but this would have to do for tonight.
Arleena undoubtedly brought home more than this, I should have brought her with me.
She had just finished binding her prey up to drag it back home when she suddenly felt a sudden stinging pain in her right hand. A rather terrible torrent of it at that, one of her brides was in immense pain. Normally Eia was able to tell which of them was hurting based on what ring the sensation came from, but when the pain was this strong it was impossible to tell. It was like her entire hand was burning alive.
Either someone is giving birth, or one of my brides is dying.
When one of her slaves was hurting, the connection between the bride and her respective ring informed their Master without fail, but the magical signal was often delayed when the distance to her mates was greater.
Noriza could be giving birth and she very well might have missed it.
↞✶↠
Eia's den mother, Cerilla, was waiting for her Master outside when she arrived.
When a wendigo's harem eventually got big enough, she would often need to designate one of her brides as her den mother. It was the den mother's responsibility to be in charge of her sisters while her Master was away.
And the hobgoblin was clearly the most suited for the job.
From the moment she saw her handler approaching, the den mother was on her knees, waiting for her Master’s acknowledgement before even gazing up to see her.
“Speak. How is Noriza feeling?”
Cerilla met her Master’s gaze, tilting her head up at the massive woman before her. “Noriza is well. She’s still in the waiting chamber, the baby could be coming any day now.”
“Is she? I was concerned I had missed the birth.” The wendigo mused at the rings on her right hand, the silver bands on each of them glowing. “Labor pains?”
“Last I had checked no, not yet.” The hobgoblin looked bewildered, unsure of what her Master was referring to.
“Rise. Has Izona been taken to the breeding chamber?” Eia walked past the hobgoblin woman without looking down at her, dropping her catch from the day onto the forest floor and beginning to head into her den. If not Noriza, then who?
“She returned with Arleena not too long ago.” Cerilla bit her bottom lip in annoyance, impatiently answering her Master’s questions, very obviously having something important to bring to her attention as she followed the wendigo inside. “Are you sure it wise to send Izona to the breeding post? You’ll need to replace her as handmaiden, and Noriza is very much still pregnant.”
“Noriza is always pregnant, that’s her role. As for a handmaiden, I will have Arleena take Izona’s place. Now did she help her sister to the breeding post or not?”
“About that, Master. Something happened today.”
“What happened that is so important that it simply can’t wait until you’ve answered my questions.”
“It’s Arleena. She’s hurt.”
Eia turned to face her den mother, making eye contact with her for the first time. “How hurt?”
“Izona brought her back in a hurry, Master, she’s hideously injured. She looks awful, Master… we might...” Cerilla stopped in her tracks, swallowing nervously, her eyes darting across the room towards one of the other chambers. “We might lose her…”
The wendigo remembered the terrible pain she had received earlier, her gaze instantly drawn back to the rings on her right hand, directly to her ring finger. Arleena’s ring.
f*ck.
“What happened?! How’d she get hurt?!” Eia stomped toward the inner chambers in a rage. She’s my strongest gatherer, what sort of creature could possibly contend with Arleena and win?
“It was the dryad.”
Eia stopped just outside of the recovery chamber, turning back to face her den mother.
That bitch.
Alistora finally crossed the f*cking line.
“Tend to your sister. Do whatever you can to help her, make sure she’s still alive when I return.” Eia turned around, starting back into the forest. That bitch is going to pay for this with her life.
“I’ll come with you!” Cerilla quickly followed after her, directly on the wendigo’s heel.
Eia turned around and growled at the den mother, glaring down at the smaller creature. “You will stay here and fulfill your role.”
The hobgoblin shrunk in place, looking up at her Master’s enraged eyes beating down upon her. “I just don’t want you to get hurt… Master…”
“What is your role, Cerilla?” Eia asked impatiently, reaching out with her left hand and brushing it against the girl’s hair, her claws threatening to slice through her.
Unable to look up at her Master anymore, Cerilla’s gaze nervously drifted downward, towards the soft forest floor. “I’m the den mother.”
Eia’s hand drifted downwards with her slave, putting one finger under the girl’s chin and forcing her eyes back upwards her Master. “Yes you are, and what are you expected to do?”
Cerilla bit her lip even harder, her pointed hobgoblin teeth digging into her skin as she looked back up at the wendigo. “To look after my sisters while you’re away...”
Cerilla couldn’t see it, but Eia was smiling behind that mask as she moved her hand from beneath the hobgoblin’s chin, resting it atop her head and patting her gently. “And you’re the best den mother I could ever ask for. Now, be a good girl and do as you’re told. Your Master will be home soon… I promise.”
The den mother melted at her Master’s words, her nervous frown quickly turning into a proud grin, having so many things she wished to say, but unable to find the words to say any of them. “Yes Master…”
Good girl. I’ve trained you well.
Eia stomped her way past the prey she’d brought home once again, leaving her bride to watch her Master head back out into the night, watching intently until the wendigo was out of sight. “Come on dryad…”
↞✶↠
Eia ran.
Her head and her heart filled with an insatiable rage, she ran as fast as she could toward the village. Toward that bitch.
As the village grew nearer, the wendigo let out a ferocious howl. It was a sound like no other, a scream that pierced through the silence of the night, a terrible otherworldly shriek. The fearsome blood curdling screech was louder than any other sound in the forest, a telltale sign that the beast was approaching. The wendigo was approaching.
It was unlike her to announce her presence like this, she had always been careful to never draw the archfey directly towards her, coveting the safety of her brides first and foremost.
But Eia had no plan to sneak into the village and kidnap a new victim in the middle of the night.
She wasn’t here to claim a new bride. She came for blood. Brinia’s blood.
There were screams all around her. Mortified creatures running from their homes, fleeing in terror from the coming onslaught of the giant monster. The screams of horror in the streets were sure to bring the forest’s guardian directly to her, if the monstrous roar of the nightmarish fiend hadn’t already done so.
Which it had.
Eia hardly had time to notice the dryad descending on her from the rooftops above, slamming the holy weapon down upon the wendigo’s head and slamming her into the ground where she stood. Not only did Brinia have the magic of the forest in her belt, but her punches packed a severe wallop.
She stumbled to her feet, just barely dodging out of the way of what would have been a fatal charged stab to her jugular. Brinia grunted in annoyance, having hoped to get the jump on the beast and land a killing blow early with a sneak attack.
The wendigo licked her lips, slashing at the dryad, slamming her terrible horrible claws into her staff, forcing the shorter woman to block.
Holding the staff above her to block the strike, Brinia lowered herself towards the ground, and in a single split second she had let go of the staff, lunging forward between the wendigo’s legs as the beast tumbled forward. She was more nimble than Eia could hope to be.
Before the wendigo could turn to face her, Brinia had leapt off the ground, quickly scaling the monster’s back. The forest spirit grabbed at the base of each of Eia’s antlers, pulling the creature’s head back.
Eia was simply elated . The force of her neck swinging backwards sent her reality spinning, her mask flinging from her face onto the ground. Suddenly, Eia and Brinia were intimately close, their faces mere inches from each other. They glared deeply into each other's eyes.
There were emotions on both of those faces that only the two of them could hope to understand.
While the beast was bent over backwards, Brinia clung to the wendigo’s antlers, using them to swing her body into the monster’s back, wrapping her legs tight around Eia’s torso.
The dryad let go of her opponent’s antlers, reaching her hands out from beneath the beast’s armpits. She forced her staff towards herself, bringing the wendigo’s arms with it, pulling the weapon against Eia’s throat like a chokehold. Eia could literally feel her opponent breathing down her neck, the dryad’s face close enough to her neck for her to feel the warm air leaving her lips. Eia struggled against the pull of the staff for a few moments, before letting go, relenting control over the implement long enough for the archfey to pull her into a chokehold.
Then she lurched forward, landing on all fours. The druid had succeeded in gaining the upper hand, but Eia wasn’t about to let her win so easily. She grinned, using the force of all four of her limbs to quickly propel her directly towards the wall of a nearby building.
Eia couldn’t see the forest nymph’s face, but the look Brinia gave when she realized that her mount was going to send them soaring straight through a brick wall was one of pure shock and awe. She grunted loudly, unlocking her legs' iron grip around the fiend’s torso and letting go of the staff, hoping to leap to the ground in time to avoid being slammed head first into a building.
But as soon as she let go, the monster slid to a halt, bucking the smaller woman off of her and sending her crashing into the wall ahead of her, taking great pleasure in finally seeing the shocked look on Brinia’s face.
She tumbled to the ground, slamming into the soft soil floor of the street beneath her, struggling to catch her breath. The skull mask the wendigo had been wearing rattled against the groundbeside her, as she watched the beast quickly approach her.
In the blink of an eye, the monster was upon her, Eia slammed one knee down on top of the girl’s chest, grabbing her throat with one hand and pinning the poor creature to the ground beneath her.
In a moment of desperation, Brinia made her last move. She held out her hand, calling on the magic of the staff and sending the mythical artifact soaring through the air straight towards her grasp.
The staff crackled and pulsed with magical energy, delivering itself into the waiting hand of her opponent.
Eia glared down at her prey, her eyes filled with bloodthirsty rage. She held the weapon of her enemy, pressing it against her enemies throat.
The dryad gazed up at her in awe and horror. Brinia had worked so hard to defend the Eternal Hollow from the forces that threatened to tear it down.
Maybe it was someone else’s turn.
Brinia closed her eyes, letting the Wendigo take her.
In that final moment before taking her life, Eia stopped, setting the staff back down on the ground, and taking a good look at the helpless dryad beneath her.
Eia took her beautiful blonde hair into her hand, and began to twirl her single unadorned finger in Brinia’s hair. After a few moments, the dryad opened her eyes once again, staring helplessly at the creature atop of her, but before she could speak, Eia retracted her menacing claws for the first time, and sent her fist crashing into the dryad’s skull, knocking her unconscious.
Eia’s heart was racing. The thrill of the hunt had overtaken her, and in the heat of the struggle she had let her face be revealed to the enemy. Alistora had seen a part of the wendigo that Eia had always concealed, and in doing so she became more than just prey. The intimacy that the two combatants shared in those few instants had stirred emotions in her. The druid had gotten so close to her in just a few short seconds. When the mask came off the encounter was no longer the mindless attack of a hungry monster, it was a fit of passion.
The battle had caused quite a disturbance, and a crowd was beginning to form around the aftermath of the attack as villagers were drawn to the commotion. Her ferocious roar was sure to scatter the faint of heart, but the longer she stayed the more likely it was for a few of the more brave souls to come charging into their certain death.
Eia reached down beside the unconscious quarry and retrieved her mask, now deeply cracked by the intensity of the guardian’s vicious surprise attack. Eia once again veiled her true self from the world around her, the image of her face now fundamentally changed in the eyes of those who witnessed it. She put up a good fight, but in the end Eia came out on top, not unscathed, but victorious. The onlookers would see nothing more than a crack in Eia’s mask, a permanent reminder that the wendigo had defeated the dryad, but she had let the dryad see past that.
Eia knew she needed to leave before she gave herself away, but still she found herself staring down at her prize, fixated on the archfey.
What had Alistora thought when she saw what was behind the mask? What thoughts must have been going through her head? What happens to her now?
Brinia had gazed directly into her eyes. In those final few moments she must have realized that she hadn’t been fighting a monster, she had been fighting a person. Eia Madaerie was a person, just like everyone else in this village, just like Alistora herself. The dryad didn’t realize it, but she and the wendigo were a lot more alike than she had thought. More than Alistora ever could have known.
Eia once again gripped the staff in her hand, feeling the unbridled power of the magical weapon. She held the Hollow’s Heart in one hand, pointing it at Brinia Alistora. With her own powerful archfey magic, she commanded the full power of her trophy’s former staff. In an instant, magical restraints sprouted from the ground beneath the sleeping dryad, binding her in vines.
Having subdued her adversary, the wendigo stood. She lifted the lesser archfey over her shoulder, and with the dryad in hand, she began her triumphant journey back home.
The dryad didn’t realize that this place belonged to the wendigo just as much as it had belonged to her.
These woods were just as much Eia’s as they were Brinia’s.
No.
These woods belong to me now.
And so does Brinia Alistora.
