He turned, still scowling, and stared daggers down at his paws. Her own brow furrowed, a slight frown pulling at the edges of her mouth. It's just a story, she repeated, her voice low and soft in her best attempt at comfort. Mythology. It's not real.

It was just a legend, one of countless, told and retold over hundreds of years, born of a long gone civilization's attempt to make sense of the world. Sometimes the details were lost in translation. Sometimes they were changed, outright, by scholars or storytellers for some reason or another. It was why some claimed Hati chased the moon and others claimed she chased the sun. It was why some thought Bragi was the god of poetry, the very medium named after him.

None of it was real. She just didn't know how to impress this fact upon a child who was probably still young enough to believe in Santa Claus.

Look... I don't know why I... saw, the things that I did. I was just confused, and a little scared, and I was probably just remembering something my... dad told me — like you. It wasn't real and neither is Hati or Skӧll or Ragnarok. The sun is a big ball of fire that's hundreds of millions of miles away from here. It can't be eaten, and when it does eventually burn out in like 10 billion years, you and I will definitely not be around to see it. Okay?