John Kennon
"You see, back when Death was new, Lodril traveled all across the world to help his people with That Which Now Was. And in his travels he came to a troubled land where men, on dying, rose and simply stood, as if they knew not where to go or what to do. And he waved his hands before these dead men, shook and shouted at them, and tried to get them to follow him to somewhere better, but they were senseless, and could not hear him, and they simply swayed in the lingering grey light.
Now of course Lodril could have shouted loud enough to break the world and got their attention that way, but he wasn't in that sort of mood, and though they were not his people he felt sorry for them, and because they deserved better he set out to find what the problem was.
And so Lodril found a place teeming with these confused dead men, all swaying in a great crowd. And they were looking straight ahead to a stark place with dark pillars, amid which Little Gods in ornate robes were bickering and waving their staves and crying out in sonorous voices, while all around them birds flew and shrieked, wolves howled, dark horses reared and great toads called to each other like rolling drums, and there were a great number of other beasts besides. And amid all this cacophony the dead stood still and unmoving, as if deaf. Lodril pushed his way carefully through the crowd (so as not to break the Dead) and approached the Little Gods, and eventually got the attention of one who seemed to be taking a rest from their incessant debate.
"Who are you, Little God?" he called above the din of the beasts, to which the answer came in a high-pitched and nasal voice, "We are the Conveyors of the Dead, Keepers of Secrets and Masters of Mysteries which you could not possibly understand, oh Earth-Bound One!"
"Riiight," Lodril replied, scratching his rump. "And what are you all arguing about?"
The Little God lofted his unbalanced jewelled staff high as if it was a great blade, and shrilly called out, "We debate the Forms of the Dead, that all must obey on their passing! That which We decide here will bind all men for ever more! None can be privy to our Wise Council!"
"I see," Lodril belched. "And what's with all the animals?"
The Little God raised his arms to the dark heavens, teaming with flocks of birds, and cried, "Psychopomps !"
Lodril pulled himself up to his full height, his shadow engulfing the Little God, and said darkly, "What did you just call me ?"
The Little God paled even further and quickly explained, "I mean no insult! I and my brethren debate over which animal should serve as Guide and Warden for the Dead, to wake the Dead from their reverie and bring them where They must go. Until we have decided upon the most noble, fearsome and doleful of beasts, fit for this dread responsibility, the Dead will remain as they are!" The Little God turned to point at a particularly scrawny steed. "Consider the Pale Horse! How dread in aspect! How bleak in bearing! How .."
But Lodril had already left. The Little God shrugged and returned to the debate.
Their argument continued with no agreement till the darkest hour of night, when a dreadful noise echoed across the plain, clear even above the shrieks and bleats and croaks and calls of all the animals there gathered. The Little Gods stopped their bickering and glanced about in confusion, and long moments passed till the terrible cry called out a second time, so loudly that all the animals were shocked into silence and stillness.
A long eternity seemed to pass, and then a third time the fearsome bray was
heard, so jarring that even the Dead turned to learn its source, and the Little
Gods all nodded and stroked their beards and said that this beast must indeed be
the one they sought, whatever it might be.
And there amid the throng was Lodril, leading a simple pack animal through the attentive Dead, its cry so full of anguish and sorrow that no man could ignore it.
"Sure, you can borrow mine," he said.
And that's how Donkey came to carry the Death rune."