Prompt Post 4!
The first, second, and third posts are now shut down for prompting. All new prompts must be posted here. Any new prompts posted to Prompt Post 1, 2, and 3 will be deleted without warning.
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“Magic,” said Moana, reaching over to take hold of the oar again. She spun it, over, and with a flash of blue-white light it became a wooden club, edged with triangular teeth - shark teeth, Elsa vaguely recognised - that rested perfectly in her hand. “Is magic. Yours or mine, they’re all part of the greater pattern. I suspect the trolls here are a remnant, refugees from Lalotai. The Monkey Men certainly were,” she added; Elsa did not dare ask. “We have different names for it, but it is a sort of underworld, or otherworld, and there are portals from the surface that lead to it. The monsters there have slaughtered the good beings, while in our world demigods and heroes fight to destroy the monsters. Does that make sense?”
“Yes,” said Elsa softly.
“The gods, they are… huge.” Moana rested the club across her other hand, and in a flash it spread out into the oar again. “Powerful, and ancient, but they move slowly. So they choose humans, and make us into demigods, give us powers and items that channel those powers. We hold back the monsters, to protect people. And we help them find their way.”
Elsa shook her head, averting her eyes. “That’s not what I am,” she said. “Nobody chose me.”
“They’re quieter now,” Moana said. Elsa looked up again, to see that Moana’s smile had softened, her eyes hardened, the leader swelling forward in her expression. It was strange not to be the leader in the room. “They speak less. But they are there. In islands, mountains, in the deep water, in the moon. All over the world. I’ve never met a demigod who knew all of them; I don’t think one person can.”
“You think I am a demigod,” said Elsa simply. She should have seen it coming, she supposed; why else would Moana go to seek her out? And what she had said had mentioned humans, and demigods, and nothing in-between. “Or… becoming one.”
“Yes. Perhaps demigod is not the word that you would use,” Moana added. “But it is the word I know best.”
Elsa looked at her hands again. Even they looked so unlike Moana’s, slender and pale and with long, rounded nails. She had been on board ships, and knew how they were sailed, but it had not been her doing the sailing. Her hands were tools for writing, for holding, for her magic. They would not have the strength to guide a ship.
“So there are gods,” said Elsa, “and there are demigods chosen from among humans, for reasons that… may never be explained. And you think that’s what I am?”
This time, Moana just nodded.
Perhaps she should have felt dizzy again. But somehow the enormity of the idea was not weighty, not a pressure on her shoulders, but instead a huge wide vista that opened up around her. Ideas like immortality swirled around her, but she could not quite grasp them.
A warm touch on her hand bought her back to the moment, and she blinked and looked up properly. Moana was kneeling in front of her, and as Elsa sat struck dumb she twined their fingers together, firm and comforting.
“I know it is a lot,” she said. “I remember.”
“Did someone explain this to you? Like this?”
Moana shook her head, looking rueful. “No. I put some pieces together as I got older but didn’t look it. My strength grew, and I took some blows that should have injured me badly. And I never felt whole without that damn oar at my side. When my daughter was grown and able to lead our people, I went in search of Maui again, and found him fighting taniwha. When I went to his aid, I was cast into the water and… suddenly, I was a manta ray. I swam back up, leapt from the surface, and was a human again. And that was when I knew.”
It took a moment for Elsa to breathe it in. She was grateful beyond words for the hand in hers, holding her to the ground. “Then thank you,” she said. “For telling me.”
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