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Oliver D. Bernuetz's Stories Back to my home page - back to stories Lodriland - The Drunken Twins Now you know, as do we all, that Lodril and Oria have had many, many children. Why those two can hardly be in the same room together without being all over each other. We also know that Lodril's not much better when he's in a room with someone other than Oria! And folks whisper that Oria's been known to wander as well so no one's ever certain for sure whose prats she's birthing. But never mind that Lodril and Oria are the best parents and they dearly love all their children. But even the best parents sometimes find their children trying at times. But Lodril and Oria's patience have never been tried so as they were by the drunken twins. This is their story. Way back when everything was shinier and less worn it was time again for Oria to give birth. She was in the birthing chamber with Nastess the Mid-wife who was just there to catch 'em as they came out. Those of her daughters who were old enough were there to so that they could learn the proper way of doing this when the time came. Meanwhile Lodril and his sons and and his and their buddies were in the room right outside waiting for the blessed event to occur with a vat of beer. Just to pass the time mind you. Well Oria rarely ever had any trouble birthing and this time was no exception. Easy as pie she just pops out those babies, first one, then another. Having more than one baby at a time was nothing new for Oria and Nastess was ready for whatever came out. Sure enough she caught 'em up, baby one and baby two. Two sons! Like pretty much every godlet those two let out a mighty bawl to let the world know that they was there. This was the sign for the mob outside to start toasting the lucky father and everyone starts dipping into Hordeum's bottomless beer vat. Nastess cleaned the babies up and wrapped 'em up a treat. Then she showed the proud mother the pair and Oria smiled at her beautiful babies and kissed them on the head. Then nothing else will do but each of the sisters has to kiss and fuss over their new brothers. And by the time each sister has had a chance to coo over the babies and pass them on the babies are starting to get mighty thirsty. Well before Oria nurses 'em she has to send Nastess out to show the proud papa his new sons and that's when the trouble starts. Nastess leaves the birthing chamber holding a baby in each arm to show Lodril. She steps outside to announce the birth and Lodril's son Hanish, later called the Stead-fast Spear, is a mite slow to move his feet out of the way. You don't get to be called Stead-fast for being quick on your feet after all. Well Nastess trips over Hanish's feet and lets go of both babies! The babies go flying through the air and nobody is quick enough to catch 'em. Kaplop! They both land smack dab into Hordeum's never empty beer vat! Well quick as a wink Lodril leaps across the room and fishes the babies out. But not before they both gets a mouthful. The babies start crying again and Lodril tears strips off both Hanish and Nastess. He keeps reaming 'em out as he holds the two dripping babies and the pair keep yelling louder and louder. Finally Lodril calms down enough to hand the babies back to Nastess. Hanish he sends out to clean up the stables his brothers all use to keep their animals in. That'd keep him busy for a while Lodril thought. Well Nastess gets the babies cleaned up and hustles 'em back in to their mother who's been wondering what all the ruckus is and where her babies are. She figures Nastess and Lodril can handle the pair so she hadn't been too worried. When Nastess finally hands the babies over to her and explains what had happened she was pretty mad too but she couldn't see that any harm had been done. So she sets the babies to nursing. (Oria never has any trouble producing milk). But after one tiny sip (godlets never have trouble latching on either) they spits her divine nipples out and refuse to nurse. This nobody had ever seen before! Oria tries again to get them to nurse and they refuse! Well no one was sure what to do so some of Oria's sisters and aunties are sent for and they all try to nurse the babies. (By this time Oria is mighty pissed). But though the babies try each divine nipple they refused to latch on to any of them either! And the babies bawled and bawled with all the power godlets can command. Well all the accumulated goddesses were stumped. There they were with two babies neither of whom who take milk. They'd tried divine milk and the babies had refused. They were too insulted at first to try animal milk but after listening to more crying they decided to try it too. Well they sent for every milk producing animal they could think of but the babies refused to drink from any of 'em. Well Lodril and his crowd were still outside the room drinking and celebrating and watching while first this crowd of goddesses comes and then all sorts of animals come. Eventually Lodril starts wondering whats going on, especially since the babies hardly ever stop crying. So he takes his beaker of beer and unthinkingly goes into the birthing chamber. Well, everyone is sent into such a flap when he does this and they run to and throe cackling like hens. And that and the crying babies is too much for Oria and she yells for everyone to just shut up! Which they do, except the babies, and telling the women to stop being so silly she explains to Lodril what's going on. And he wanders over to take a closer look at the bawling babies to see what was wrong with them. (You'd have to be a pretty poor father, which Lodril wasn't, if after having as many babies as he did you didn't know something about proper baby behavior. And these babies were definitely not behaving properly!) So Lodril goes over to the increasingly frazzled looking Nastess to eyeball the pair. Well when he gets over there and the pair smell what's in Lodril's beaker with their keen godly noses they start crying even louder and reaching for the beaker! Lodril is startled by this and he pulls the beaker away. Well this starts them screaming even louder, if that's possible, and Oria snaps and says, just give them some bloody beer then. So Lodril holds the beaker up to first one baby and then the other, and didn't the second one howl while his brother was drinking! Well those babies drank that beaker dry and Lodril had to send one of his daughters out to fetch more beer, and another beaker, before that pair were satisfied. Once they got their fill the pair let out mighty, beery belches and fell straight to sleep. Lodril and Oria looked at each other uneasily and hoped that this wasn't going to always be the way with the pair. But sure enough the pair, called Aggad and Pipskos never would take anything but beer. And you can imagine the problems that caused. After that they were always careful to keep a lid on Hordeum's beer vat whenever Nastess came out to show any babies to the crowd though.
Last updated February 20, 2017 Glorantha is a trademark of Chaosium, Inc. Gloranthan material on this page is copyright ©1997-2016 by Oliver D. Bernuetz or by the author specifically mentioned on an individual page. Glorantha is the creation of Greg Stafford, and is used with his permission. Email me at bernuetz@mymts.net
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