The Last Winter
The frost clung to everything in Skardalen like a shroud that refused to lift. I remember the stories my grandmother used to tell, of how this valley once bloomed with wildflowers in summer, rivers teeming with salmon, and fields heavy with barley. But that was before the gods turned their backs on us, or so the elders say. Now, the ground was a perpetual grave of ice, cracking under my boots as I trudged back from the edge of the forest, my bow slung over one shoulder and a scrawny hare dangling from my belt. It was all I’d managed to snare that day, its fur matted and thin, as if even the animals were giving up.
My name is Eira Halvorsdottir, and at twenty-one winters, I’d become the one who kept what little life remained flickering in our village. My hands were callused from setting traps and fletching arrows, my left forearm marked by a jagged scar from a wolf snare that had snapped shut on me years ago, a reminder that the wild didn’t forgive mistakes. I kept my ash-blonde hair braided back tight against the wind, out of my way, and my grey-blue eyes, storm eyes, my sister called them, scanned the horizon for threats or prey. I wasn’t built like the sturdy farmers of old sagas; I was lean and wiry, honed by hunger and the endless hunt, wrapped in practical layers of leather and fur that smelled of smoke and pine.
The village sprawled before me like a dying beast, half-buried under drifts of snow that never melted. Longhouses sagged under the weight, their thatched roofs collapsed in places, patched with whatever scraps we could scavenge. Smoke curled lazily from peat fires in the hearths, the only warmth we could muster from the boggy earth we’d dug up before it froze solid. The wells were iced over again; I’d have to chip through later with my axe. Children huddled near the central fire pit, their faces pinched and pale, while the elders muttered prayers to Odin, Thor, anyone who might listen. But the gods hadn’t listened in generations.
I pushed open the door to our longhouse, the hinges groaning like old bones. Inside, the air was thick with the scent of burning peat and unwashed bodies. My sister, Ingrid, sat by the fire, her small frame bundled in furs that swallowed her. She was only fourteen, with hair like mine but eyes softer, more hopeful. She looked up as I entered, her smile faint but genuine.
“Eira! Did you find anything?”
I knelt beside her, pulling the hare from my belt and laying it on the stone hearth. “Enough for broth tonight. It’ll stretch with the roots we have left.”
Her eyes lingered on the scar on my arm as I skinned the animal with quick, practiced strokes. She always did that, worried over me like I was the fragile one. But Ingrid was the reason I pushed on. Our parents had been taken by the cold two winters back, and watching her grow thinner each day twisted something deep in my gut. I was stubborn, they said in the village, sharp-tongued when the elders droned on about fate. But loyalty? That ran through me like blood. I’d protect her, protect all of them, even if it meant spitting in the face of the gods I no longer trusted.
The evening brought the village together in the great hall, what was left of it. We gathered around the central hearth, flames crackling weakly as we shared what meager food we had. The air hummed with whispers, old sagas passed down to ward off the despair. Elder Gunnar, his beard white as the snow outside and his voice raspy from years of chanting, leaned forward on his staff.
“Listen well, kin of Skardalen,” he began, his eyes gleaming in the firelight. “The gods have not forsaken us without cause. Long ago, our ancestors forgot the old sacrifices, the blood offerings to honor the Allfather and his kin. They grew proud, turning to their own ways, and so the punishment came: the eternal winter, a frost that bites deeper each year.”
Murmurs rippled through the crowd. I bit my tongue, my anger simmering like coals under ash. Suspicious of gods? Aye, that was me. What kind of divine mercy let children starve while the Aesir feasted in Valhalla? But I held my peace, for now.
Gunnar continued, his tale weaving into the familiar legend that haunted our nights. “But there’s more to our curse than forgotten rites. Beneath Vargfell, the sacred mountain, lies the Wolf, the last get of Fenrir himself. You know the saga: Fenrir, the great wolf who would devour the sun at Ragnarök, bound by the gods with chains forged of impossible things. Yet Odin, in his wisdom, postponed the end of days. He chained Fenrir’s bloodline to the Runestone of Winter, a relic of ice and rune-magic that imprisons the chaos-beasts of old, the Jötunn, the serpents, the monsters that would unravel the world.”
He paused, the fire popping as if in emphasis. “The Wolf guards it now, bound as warden. His chains hold back the thaw, but at a price: our endless cold. The frost is the bleed of his power, seeping into Midgard. Without him, Ragnarök comes early, fire and flood consuming all. With him... we endure this half-life.”
The hall fell silent, save for the wind howling outside like a lament. I glanced at Ingrid, her face pale, and felt that grief and anger rise again, controlled but burning. The gods’ choices had doomed us, collateral in their grand games. And now, the offerings. Every few moons, when the hunger grew too sharp, we sent one of our own to the mountain as tribute, hoping to appease the Wolf or the gods or whatever force kept the ice at bay. It was madness, but desperation bred such things.
Elder Gunnar cleared his throat. “The aurora dances bright tonight—a sign. We must choose the next offering before the moon wanes.”
Whispers turned to arguments, eyes darting. No one wanted to volunteer, and drawing lots felt like cowardice. I couldn’t bear it, couldn’t watch Ingrid’s name pulled from the helm, her frail body sent into the blizzard.
“I’ll go,” I said, my voice cutting through the din like an arrow. Stubborn, loyal, sharp-tongued. All of it surged in that moment. “I volunteer. Let it be me.”
Gasps echoed, but no one argued. Ingrid clutched my arm, tears freezing on her lashes, but I hugged her fierce, whispering promises I’d return with answers, with hope. The elders nodded gravely, and that was that.
As the gathering broke, I stepped out into the night, the cold slapping my face like a warning. The aurora shimmered overhead, ribbons of green and purple twisting like veins of gods’ blood spilled across the sky. I adjusted my furs, checked my knife and bow, and began the long walk toward Vargfell. Alone in the snow, with only my anger to warm me, I wondered if the Wolf was truly the monster—or if the real beasts sat on thrones in Asgard.
