YOU KNOW HOW IT IS supposed to end, Churchwarden. Let me tell you how it all began.
Ginnungagap was the great emptiness before there was the world, flanked by two inhospitable realms. There was Muspelheim, crossed by endless rivers of boiling poison and vast lakes of fire; and Niflheim, where icy volcanoes spewed forth frozen mists and arctic waters. Sparks and smoke met layers of rime and frost in the yawning void and from them came the first being.
A Jötunn, Ymir, appeared in the melting ice. From his sweat, the first Jötnar were born. Ymir fed on the milk of the primeval cow Auðumbla, also born of the meltwater. She licked the blocks of salty ice, releasing Búri, who was large, powerful, and beautiful to behold.
In time, Búri’s son Borr had three sons: the gods Óðinn, Vili, and Vé. The three sons of Borr had no use for Ymir and his growing family of cruel and brutish giants, so they attacked and killed him. So much blood flowed from the body that it drowned all the other giants except for two—Bergelmir and his wife escaped. They stole away in a hollowed-out tree trunk, a makeshift boat floating on the sea of gore to safety, to a land they named Jötunheim, home of the giants.
From Ymir’s body, the brothers made the world of humans: his blood, the seas and lakes, his flesh, the earth, his bones, the mountains and his teeth the rocks. From his skull, they made the dome of the sky, setting a dwarf at each of the four corners to hold it high above the earth. They protected the world from the Jötnar with a wall made from Ymir’s eyebrows. Next, they caused time to exist and placed the orbs of the sun and moon in chariots which were to circle around the sky.
Finally, the three brothers built their own realm. Ásgarð, a mighty stronghold, with green plains and shining palaces high over Miðgarð. They built the rainbow bridge Bifröst to link the realms. The Æsir, the guardians of men, crossed over the bridge and settled in Ásgarð.
Óðinn Alfaður is oldest and greatest of them all. That was our golden age. And then this, the beginning of the end. The Völuspá tells it well:
| In their dwellings at peace | | | they played at tables, |
| Of gold no lack | | | did the gods then know,— |
| Till thither came | | | up giant-maids three, |
| Huge of might, | | | out of Jötunheim. |
| Thence come the maidens | | | mighty in wisdom, |
| Three from the dwelling | | | down ’neath the tree; |
| Urth is one named, | | | Verthandi the next,— |
| On the wood they scored,— | | | and Skuld the third. |
| Laws they made there, | | | and life allotted |
| To the sons of men, | | | and set their fates |
Of course, I am grateful to the Norns. I would have missed the zeitgeist if it hadn’t been for them. I hadn’t realised that soldiers were marching in my name. I hadn’t realised that my forests were disappearing. I had become time’s ghost. They showed me how to turn back the clock. How to reclaim what was mine from the White Christ. I found Willehad of Bremen, the one that got away.
But the Norns don’t like inconsistencies. Eventually their idle suggestions become inescapable realities. It would soon be time to Ragnarok’n’roll all over again.
Except…
Every maid has a sire, every lineage has a father. I’d killed Ymir, but there was another one that got away.
Bergelmir, his grandson.
The first lord of Jötunheim.
The begetter of Norns.
I was looking for those who murdered me. I didn’t say when.
You know what they say, Churchwarden. In for a penny, in for a pound. I can’t very well be the All Father with another progenitor out there, seeding chaos. Still, no need to get my hands dirty—it really is amazing how quickly woodworm will ruin an untreated canoe…