Chapter Text
Grendel was “born”, as it were, smack between the soil and the rock in a dark cavern where nobody can see. His mum had been screaming, constantly, ever since. A real bother she never taught him anything, not how to understand what she’s always going on about, or that there are things beyond the soil and the rock. It took a while before the thought to leave the cave emerged, but once it did Grendel found that topsoil and grass and trees in fact abounded, and better still there were goats to eat. He would bring one back to mum, and she’d be too occupied with that to scream, so from there they got on just fine. Still he was bitter. He had only his own thoughts, and unlike mum he found no solace in hearing his own screams echo around the cave.
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Many goats later, Grendel’s so sick of sitting on bones and twiddling his claws that he decides to go further out the other way. That means up the side of the mountain, up past the cave and around, down, to somewhere new. It all takes so long he sees the sun rise for the first time. He glares at it, lowering heavy lashes over wide pupils to dull its effect, and decides to make a concentrated effort to avoid running into it from here on out. But he has made it down to the other side, so he takes the time to clamber past some new trees, new grass, and some… decently fatter goats. Much fatter. And in larger numbers too. He swipes one up in seconds, careful to snap the neck so it doesn't make that awful vibrating sound. Food in hand he finds a tree to settle down in and set to eating. Quick work as it was, he’s pleased to find another goat wandering past, and takes that one much the same. The journey has been so long, and the new gaze of the sun so taxing, that the day passes in that fashion, napping and snacking as long as supplies last.
When the moon comes he is rested and fed, and he feels confident that if he gets one more goat then mum won’t be a problem once he gets home. So he takes care scaling back down his tree, listening, listening, for the telltale noise. Perhaps he’s taken too many too soon, all is quiet. He prods onward, large oblong ears perked and widened to catch the sound. The first vibration he catches though, is different. More varied, with ups and downs to it that make Grendel’s rough fists close around the necks he imagines it must be coming from. He’s so used to screaming, anything else sounds quite wrong. But it is interesting, so he creeps closer, all claws to the ground now as he catches light flickering off the distant trees. He does not yet know that what he hears are words, not the vague concepts he alone holds in his mind but things that mean something. They come from a grouping of fleshy, decidedly un-goat-like creatures. He crouches in the bramble, seeing the flickering light at the center of their gathering dance across their skin. Their spindly limbs and patchy hair amuse him greatly, and the nuances of their voices now seem more enticing in their foreignness. He feels the pull of it all on his insides, like he too might sit in that light and speak this soft exotic magic.
Invigorated and eager, with great palms he pushes up from the earth. The moon above and the orange glow ahead gild him in light, and soon the many creatures’ eyes are upon him. Grendel first smells and then hears the fear that spreads through them all. The noise of one in particular rings clear, its face is half covered in long fur with a gap before resuming at the top of the head. Its clothes are shiny, its voice is deep and bellowing, and in its hands it holds something that gleams with danger where it catches the light.
Grendel rears back reflexively, stumbling away, but the noise only seems to further incense the hoard, and all at one the creatures charge. Their many arms flail many sharp warnings his way, and Grendel runs. His claws grasp for purchase in the earth to propel him along faster, and he can hear the ragged, throaty yells of the hoard grow fainter behind him, spurring him on faster still. With this new distance comes perspective, and elation breaks from his throat in a breathless yawp- this is what he was missing in the darkness of his cave; The raw power that would have otherwise lain untested, his first glorious flight on newfound wings- a tree root viciously throws him to the ground. Grendel tumbles flat onto the cold grass, and as quickly as he regains his footing he sees the distant light bearing down upon him. With a pained growl and a dull ache in his hind leg, he takes off again, the clang of metal upon earth loud in his ears. No longer fast enough to be reckless, he turns a yellow eye over his shaking shoulder, and catches the steely glint of the metal just as it slices past his fur and slices beneath his skin.
He remembers only that his blood sloughs out a viscous dark green before the haze of deep primal instinct- straight from mum- takes over where his legs once faltered, and carries him roaring home across the mountains where his new enemies cannot follow him.