THE APPLE(RESPECT)

27 SIGYN C lay pots, metal vials, and bowls of Freyja alone knew what all came crashing onto the floor as Frigg swept her arm over her work table. Sigyn’s sister wailed and leaned against that table. After blowing out a slow breath, Sigyn moved to Frigg’s side and set a hand on her shoulder. Very few people ever saw a vӧlva lose her composure. The respect their titles carried demanded they hold themselves above others, above petty human emotions. Frigg turned toward her, and Sigyn embraced her older sister. “Naught I try helps him.” Sigyn held Frigg at arm’s length so she could see her face. Their father had had a long life—longer than most jarls could hope for. It was the way of things. But now that Frigg could no longer stave off the inevitable, she seemed to take it harder than she should have. Or maybe Sigyn would have felt the loss more poignantly had she not been pushed aside and cast out by nearly everyone she’d ever known. “Perhaps no brew can help him.” Sigyn squeezed her arms. “If it is his urd, he will die.” Frigg scoffed. “I didn’t think you believed in urd.” Sigyn shrugged. “You do, vӧlva. That’s really all that matters here. Not that I think that’s all that weighs upon your mind this afternoon. You’ve hardly left this room since Father agreed to have you wed. For all your plans to sway Odin, you never actually expected to get him, least of all like this. You went hunting for a bear and, on finding one, only then realized you have not armed yourself for such prey.” “Odin isn’t prey.” “And yet you pursued him as such. Had you slept with him, could you truly have swayed his mind with your trench? Or is that all vӧlvur bombast meant to discourage men from raping your kind?” Frigg’s face fell, touched by a hint of fear that tugged at Sigyn’s heart. She had not expected that. “You don’t know. You’re a virgin, aren’t you?” Frigg turned from her then, leaned back on the table, shoulders slumping. Damn. She never had learnt to mind her tongue. “Don’t fret over it, all right. In fact, forget such things. You spoke with this man. Tell me of him.” “Angry … He is so angry.” Frigg turned to look at her now. “Consumed with it, like his insides were caught aflame. A fire rises in him, one fit to consume Midgard.” “Is that your vision?” Frigg sighed. “It was difficult to make sense of it. But I saw myself as his wife, side by side, ruling over a great city like the ones in tales of ancient times. And there was fresh water, greenery, plants—like summer. A summer that didn’t end. I think Odin won’t be a mere jarl—I think he will be a king. And there was war, yes, famine, flame.” Sigyn tapped her finger against her lip. What was she to say to something like that? Frigg seemed so convinced of herself, it almost made it hard to doubt her. So had she seen a vision of her future with Odin? And why was Sigyn even here, forcing her to talk of it? The decision definitely had naught to do with a masochistic need to see Frigg , of all people, find a marriage while Sigyn remained alone. “The Ás tribes have not had a king in a long time, but even if they raised one, what has that to do with summer?” Frigg considered for a moment, her eyes latched onto Sigyn’s face. “What if theWorld could change? The Vanir are said to live in islands of spring—of warmth that does not wither and fade after a few moons. What if somehow Midgard could share such a destiny?” Sigyn shook her head, then rubbed the bridge of her nose. Now they had devolved into true vӧlvur pomposity. Breathe in the smoke of a few strange plants and call the hallucinations visions. If that’s all it took, she could be a vӧlva herself. But these women convinced themselves what they saw was truth —albeit not always literal truth. It could be a metaphor. And since no one could really disprove a metaphor, a vӧlva’s visions could hardly be disputed. All very convenient. But Frigg clearly would not allow herself to be easily dissuaded about this. Sigyn sat on the cold stone floor. “This Realm has been covered by the mists of Niflheim for as long as anyone remembers. These stories about a time before the mist—they’re probably just stories. Who wouldn’t dream of a better World? No matter what world we live in, people will look around and imagine it could be or could have been better.” If Frigg thought some rage-mad jarl could change all of Midgard, she was thinking with her heart over her brain. And Sigyn was beginning to think Frigg did have feelings for Odin. Perhaps those feelings had been born of Frigg’s visions—a self-fulfilling prophecy of her love for him. And though Sigyn had not met him, he didn’t sound fit to be king of aught. “What if I could be a queen?” What if she could? She’d be like to spend the rest of her life watching for knives in her back. Frigg eyed her, as she sometimes did, clearly trying not to reveal what was going on in her mind. Sigyn knew well enough, though, even if Frigg would never admit it. She knew because her own thoughts had gone there—that Sigyn herself might prove a better heir to Jarl Hadding. She was younger, more beautiful, and not a vӧlva. She’d have been a decent match for a marriage alliance—if any man would have had her. Frigg, though, had had her first visions as a child. Visions damned a girl, forced her to look into the darkness and allow it to seep inside in the name of cultivating seid, in service to a tribe that would fear her. The tribe’s old vӧlva had taken Frigg away—and no father, not even a jarl, could deny a vӧlva her chosen quarry. And thus began the slow poisoning, the transmogrifying a girl into a witch, who, in moments of weakness, clung to shreds of a life that might have been. Sigyn tapped a finger against her lip. “Do you believe Odin has such ambitions?” “I don’t know, perhaps. Whether he has them or not, I believe he carries a weighty urd.” Frigg paused a moment, then sighed. “Father is … not long for this world. All my potions have only staved off the inevitable. I will need a strong husband if I am to hold leadership of this tribe. And that is to say naught of the numerous threats we face from without. The Skalduns, the Godwulfs, and the Vanir-damned Sviarlanders. And those are only the nearest threat. Were Father to have refused Odin, then we’d have made enemies of the Wodanar as well.” There. Frigg had accepted their father’s death, at least in some part of her mind. But Odin had sent his man here unbidden, offered marriage before Frigg or Hadding had finished sowing those seeds. And even Frigg realized that for the man’s actions to line up serendipitously with her plans—and her vision—ought to raise a few doubts. More than a few. “And you want me to find out where Odin’s true intentions lie. If he already plans to strive for kingship, and if his offer for your hand holds any ulterior motive.” Her sister sighed, looked back at the empty table. “You have a way of uncovering the truth of things, yes. But, Sigyn …” She turned, serious as ever. “Tread with care. Our whole tribe hangs in the balance.” For a heartbeat, Frigg’s calm trembled, her poise threatened as it so rarely was. Sigyn had seen her sister’s tears when her mother died, but she was so afraid to show anyone her true feelings. Was that vӧlva training? Was that need to hide herself something that had been beaten into her sister? Sigyn remembered running through the town square, laughing, chasing after a smiling Frigg, but that was so many years ago. Before the visions and the training and the loss. “Don’t worry,” Sigyn whispered. “I’ll figure it out.”