Chapter 10 - An Awakening

"You've got to be kidding me!" say in exasperation, yanking my hand away from Skuld, but she continues on, unbothered by my outburst. "I'm just a regular person...I'm a freaking data analyst for crying out loud!" She ignores me, staff stabbing the ground in thuds as we near her home.

We reach Skuld's block house at last, and she stalks inside the entrance. I sigh, ducking my head as I follow her into the dwelling. To my relief, I see that Cluck Norris has unexpectedly survived the night and is pecking at some spilled grain on the dirt floor. The grain appears to be courtesy of Sorcha, who sits in a squat and watches him fondly, elbows propped on her knees and chin in her hands. I smile at the sight.

"What is a...Day Tah anall lyst?" Skuld asks distractedly, rummaging again through her wares like a mad scientist. "Hah!" she exclaims after she uncorks a bottle and sniffs it. She quickly puts together a mixture in a bowl and mashes it with her pestle.

A few of the other young girls are seated around the fire, which seems to be perpetually burning since yesterday. They are sewing swaths of white linen together, into what appear to be robes.

"It's uh...what I did for a living before I came here. Definitely not someone with any sort of awakening powers."

Skuld pauses in her rummaging to give me a questioning look over her shoulder. Just then, Iona ducks into the entrance, with another rooster in her arms. This one has mostly black plumage with some grey spots, and does not look happy to be here.

"I brough' the chickn', mistress Skuld," she says to Skuld.

"Ah, yes, thank you, Iona." Apparently Cluck Norris has grown on Skuld too, since he's still alive. Skuld takes a deep inhale from her mixture and grabs the chicken from Iona's arms. "Alright my girls, it's time to show me what you have learned."

"What's..." I start, as Skuld brandishes a dagger with one hand, "going on..."and slashes the throat of the chicken in the other, the blood splattering into the fire and sizzling in the flames. My eyes go wide as this all happens in the span of a few seconds. She drops the chicken's body and then falls onto her knees in front of the fire, starting to sway.

The girls, however, don't skip a beat, setting aside their sewing to start the chant we learned yesterday. How is no one reacting to this???? Iona takes up the drum and beats the heartbeat-like rhythm. Skuld starts to sway more on her knees, in time with the beat. Her head sinks towards her chest, her ice blond hair drifting in front of her face.

The chanting gets louder. Skuld's breathing quickens and her shoulders start to rise and fall with the beats of the drum. The air in the room is emotionally charged, feeding more into the girl's chant and Skuld's trance-like state. The fire continues to crackle and Muninn screeches from the beams in the ceiling, as if he's taking part in the ritual. I stand there, in awe of how in the span of minutes we've transformed this place into a ceremony. Skuld starts to rise and arch her back, breathing heavily with her head facing the ceiling. Her eyes are rolled towards the back of her head, the whites of them only visible, giving her a haunting look that makes my skin crawl. Suddenly, she throws her arms out to each side, and the girls silence their chanting.

A few moments pass, and all we can hear are the flames and Skuld's heavy breathing.

"Otherworlder," says a deep voice I've never heard before from Skuld, yet there's no doubt it's coming from her lips. It's resonant and ancient, and goosebumps alight on my flesh in response. The energy in the room shifts once again, the temperature suddenly plummeting several degrees. Dizziness finds me, and causes me to sway on my own feet. The fire becomes several fires at once, like I'm looking through a kaleidoscope, and I start to feel as if I'm in a dream.

"Y..yes??" I answer, wondering who I'm actually talking to now.

"You wish to know why you have been brought here," the entity in Skuld says. Her eyes are still only white, her back arched and her arms draped out behind her.

"I mean...yes."

Skulds body slowly rises from her backbend and rights herself in response. The movement is eery, and although I still cannot see her pupils, her white eyes look at me in interest. Not creepy at all.

"I see your path....it is woven before me in a great tapestry..." she says while one palm is open, and the other strokes along an invisible piece of fabric. Her pointer finger traces a woven pattern I cannot see, and stops suddenly at a certain point. "But your future threads are inter-tangled deeply with the threads of your past and present, those woven by my sisters." Her sisters? "Your greatest challenge ahead will lie in your ability to untangle them, so you may truly live. Otherwise, my child, you will surely drown."

I blink rapidly and shake my head at this revelation. "I don't...I don't understand."

"Your journey will seem long and never ending. Your heart will become weary. And you shall be no stranger to pain." Great. That's not ominous at all. "Your fate is not easy, child, but how grand it is..." the deity sighs, admiring this invisible tapestry I cannot see. It must be a long one as her gaze continues off into the distance. "Such a beautiful piece. Our finest work. But I'm afraid that only you can finish it...as there are sections that not even us Norns can access. A peculiarity for us, really," she says with a grin.

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Norns? But I press on. Who knows how long I have to talk to this entity.

"And how do I do that?" I ask.

"You must be willing to change. Willing to trek where you have not stepped before. Willing to understand that you may no longer be able to recognize yourself in time."

So, be willing to adapt in order to survive in a new world. Makes sense. But I still have more questions, one in particular rising above the rest.

"Why me?"

The deity inside Skuld only smiles and laughs a deep, menacing laugh that vibrates through my bones.

"It is not us that chose you child, but your own soul." What is that supposed to mean? "It lives on..." the deity tilts her head to the side, as if considering. "It wanders. Such a curious little thing."

"So my soul is what brought me here?" I ask, incredulous.

"Yes, child. You will learn what you are capable of in due time. Stay with the Seeress. She will guide you...and beware of what consequences may come if you hold on too tightly to the past..." the once deep, resonant voice starts to fade, as if it's drifting away.

"Wait! I have more questions!"

"In due time..." the deity only echoes again, and a wave of dizziness hits me so heavily that I fall to my knees. Everything goes dark.

"Ach, mistress Beatrix! Are you al'right love?" Iona is looking at me from above, concern showing in her kind, brown eyes. I'm...lying on my back? That's odd...I don't remember getting here.

"Skuld..the entity! Is it still here?" I sit up suddenly, then instantly regret doing so as my head swims.

"The entity? I dinnae know what you mean, love," Iona's eyebrows furrow further in worry.

"The being that spoke to me through Skuld. She was...possessed? By something," I say in frustration. Once my eyes can see straight again I look over my shoulder to where she should be, only Skuld is nowhere in sight.

"We dinnae see yeh talking dear...yeh were on yer knees, in a trance. Just like mistress Skuld was," Iona says carefully.

"Wait...you didn't see us talking?" I ask, desperation starting to creep in my voice.

"No dear...we dinnae hear any talkin'," Iona says, that look of concern deepening even further. How is that possible?

"You were practicing Seidr," Skuld says, stepping into the room again. She looks perfectly normal, even refreshed, as if she was not drugged on some mysterious psychoactive substance and possessed from some mysterious entity just minutes ago. It was just a few minutes ago, right? Munnin is perched on her shoulder and grooming his feathers. "You were speaking with one of the Norns, the weavers of our destiny. Likely the goddess Skuld herself, whom I am named after. She who weaves the future."

"I was practicing Seidr? But I don't even know how..."

"Like I said, you have awakened far sooner than I expected," Skuld says, taking a small skin from her stash of potions, uncorking it and handing it to me. "Drink this. It will help with the dizziness."

"Thank you. So the dizzy spells I've been getting...are they related to Seidr?" I ask before bringing the skin to my lips. It smells like chamomile, nettle and mint, and is slightly sweet once I down it. It's a lot more tolerable than the last concoction she gave me. I feel my head start to clear with each moment.

"Yes. It will ease in time."

I look at the small potion skin in my hands. "You inhaled something before the ritual. What was it?"

"Hennbane. I use it to get me closer to the gods during Siedr rituals."

"I didn't inhale it. So how was I able to speak to the goddess?" I ask.

'Hennbane is not for the faint of heart, my little flame," Skuld says, and caresses my chin. "You are no where near ready for it. Yet," she says as she bops my nose with her pointer finger, accenting the last word. That wicked grin of hers returns. "As for being able to converse with the Norn, I'd say it was fate. An awakening of your abilities."

"You keep saying that like I should know what it means," I say, maybe a little tartly.

"You and I were fated to meet little flame, so that I may guide you in this part of your journey. You seem to be naturally attuned for the craft, the Norns must have woven it this way. From now on, you will train with me every day in the ways of Seidr."

At a loss for words, I simply nod. Well, I guess I found a way to be useful. Froðe's clan respects Skuld and believes in the outcomes of her rituals, so if I can find a way to learn her ways, I might find my way to survive in this world. Hopefully avoiding use of the Hennbane, if possible.

"Yeh look tired dear, perhaps yeh should rest a bit," Iona says.

Skuld nods. "Your first ritual. And you conversed with a god!" she stabs her staff for emphasis. "I'll escort you back to the tavern."

"Oh, it's fine. I can walk back."

"I'm not worried about your ability to walk back, little flame," Skuld says as she reaches her hand out to me to help me up. "I'm worried about the men in this clan. You have not earned their respect or their fear yet." I take her hand gratefully and get back to my feet. "Me, on the other hand," she flashes a wild grin, "they are terrified of."

We get about 10 feet outside Skuld's house before we find Torsten waiting. He's got an extra shield in one hand, and two wooden swords tucked under his arm.

"Are yeh done w' her', Skuld?" he asks.

"She needs rest, she just completed a Seidr ritual with me for the first time."

"Froðe ask'd meh to train 'er," Torsten says. "So we start now, lass. I dinnae have all day."

Skuld narrows her eyes at Torsten.

"It's aright," I say, "I actually asked for this. I want to learn."

"Did you now?" Skuld eyes me and strokes her chin, in thought. "Interesting."

I bid her farewell before joining Torsten. He tosses me one of the wooden swords, and motions for me to follow him with a jerk of his copper head. We head towards the riverbank. Once we get there, I see that there a couple logs that have been set aside on the bank. They are about 8 feet long each. Torsten stabs one of the wooden swords into the bank and drops the shield before approaching one. Not sure of his plan, I do the same.

"Before yeh can learn to wield a sword lass, yeh must build yer strength and endurance," he says. He then proceeds to squat, and deadlifts the log in front of him, which has to be about 350 pounds or more. My mouth drops open. But of course he does not stop there. After the log reaches his hips, Torsten squats again, grunts and lifts the log to his hip hinge before rolling it up his body. Once it reaches his chest, he deftly pushes his elbows underneath to rack it, and uses a leg drive to press the massive thing over his head. The veins in his arms bulge as he holds it for a few seconds, then drops the massive log in front of him. It hits the ground in a loud thud, sending sand and rocks flying.

"Al'right," he says, breathing heavily, bracing himself with his palms on his knees. "Yer turn, lass."