[ IP ] Golden Sword

Evils walked among the marshes. You could see them prowling just at the edges of town and the marshes proper, ever waiting, ever hungry. Or that's what the elders preached to the young ones, to the adults. Hence why every summer solstice, they chose someone to walk into the marshes, a sacrifice to keep the village safe. 
 
 Egil never believed a word of it. Nothing more than petty politics, his father said. A way for the elders to get rid of people they had feuds with, both major and petty. His father was soon proven right, as he was sent into the marsh not long after. He did n't come back. They never did. 
 
 And so, angry, bitter and vocal, Egil was n't surprised that the Elders chose him years later. He never stopped questioning their decisions, never shied away from letting himself be heard. And now he paid the price in blood. If he did not walk, it would be his wife, or his daughter, or his son. He would not let them suffer that fate. To walk until something or another killed him. Be it the ghouls that lurked in the shadows, or be swallowed by the mud. 
 
 Yet he walked on unmolested. His path led him through solid ground graced by tall grasses, the scent of sweet stew wafting around him rather than the smell of rotting wood. He walked to further through the mist, coming to a large island, surrounded by the brush. He pushed onward, some part out of curiosity, another out of defiance, moving through the milk thick mist. 
 
 He did n't know how long he had walked through that mist. He came upon a clearing that seemed to be free of cursed mists, grasses tall, and a golden sword stabbed into a stone, nearly hidden from his view by a broken trunk. He took a step forward, hearing a familiar crunch underfoot. It was n't wood, rather it sounded like -- 
 
 `` What on --'' Egil asked to the air as he looked down. Bone. It was brittle bones in the grasses. Some human others misshapen, covered in moss. The wind whipped through the clearing making him shiver something fierce. 
 
 `` Hello o dearest bearer of mine.'' Egil heard. Barely above whisper, he mistook it for the wind. 
 
 Egil whipped his head to and fro looking for the source of the voice, which had broken into joyful laughter. Egil almost broken into a smile, it made him think to the first time he made his wife laugh, all those years ago. How dare this thing, use her! 
 
 `` Be gone, devil! I'll not fall for your tricks!'' He screamed to the heavens. 
 
 `` Oh bearer of mine, there are no tricks. And no need to shout to the birds, I am here before you.'' Egil looked down to the sword bewildered. `` Yes oh bearer of mine. Me.'' 
 
 `` An evil trapped in a sword. So the elders spoke true of something after all.'' 
 
 `` Evil? Me? Hardly, oh bearer of mine. I'm no more evil than you.'' 
 
 `` Said the talking sword in the middle of a misty swamp.'' 
 
 `` Sit? I've been terribly lonely for a long while, oh bearer of mine. I would n't mind some company, would you?'' 
 
 ``... No, I suppose I would n't.'' Egil sat down among the bones next to the sword. It was hard to get comfortable, both physically and mentally, due in no small part to the bones littered about. `` So tell me sword, what are you?'' He would humor the sword, it would be a nice diversion from his death by exile. 
 
 `` Not a what, but who. I am the Lady of this Wood. But... it is a long story oh bearer of mine. Do you have the time for it?'' 
 
 `` Nothing but, I'm afraid.'' 
 
 If Egil did n't know any better, he could have sworn he heard a smile.
