The Northlandic Kingdom
Year 1007
The Escorts
I do not want to do this, Lucia thought as she led the snaking burial procession down the dark, fog-filled streets of autumnal Bergendal. Many who grieved the death of her mother, Queen Maud, reverently followed her in the midnight light parade, their hushed voices sounding like ghost whispers behind her. Others showed their respect by lining up on the sides of the streets, watching as she passed with her torch held high. Her blond hair gleamed in the light of the flames and unmercifully lit up her tear-streaked face.
Why did my mother have to die?
She felt utterly alone.
Lucia’s father, King Olav, had forced her to lead the town’s people through the city’s filthy, narrow streets, and now Lucia was doing her best to ignore the looks—unadulterated glances of pity—whenever her eyes met one of her subordinates. All she really wanted was to be left alone, not have everyone see her in this state of raw mourning.
She shivered as the biting wind gusted against her all too thin, white silk tunic. It was not the traditional dress usually worn during such a procession, but since her mother had converted to Christianity, where white symbolized purity, Lucia wanted to honor her in this way. Lucia’s father had forbidden her to wear the dress, just like he had forbidden her to wear the wreath on her head. But evergreens represented everlasting life in Christianity, and even though Lucia did not share her mother’s beliefs in this new, white god, or in his glorious heaven, she did believe her mother would forever live in Valhalla with the Norse deities.
Wearing this outfit also sent a strong message to her father, and the message was this: I am the only living being with sacred Aesira blood running through my veins, and when I am crowned queen on my eighteenth birthday come December, I will bow to no one’s rules.
As Lucia climbed the long road toward the castle, citizens whispered sorrowfully about the tragic news they had heard earlier that day from the town crier’s lips. “The Queen of The Northlandic Kingdom is dead!” he had said, weeping as he had broadcast the tragedy from farm to farm, house to house, door to door. “The Sun Queen is dead!”
Finally, at the top of the hill, Lucia stopped in the castle courtyard in front of the unlit kindling and log pyramid structure. Lifting her gaze, she saw her father standing in the southern tower’s window, looking down on her. He nodded once.
She squeezed her torch in through one of the openings between the stacked wood, causing it to catch fire. Watching as it came to life, the flames crackling wild and free, the heat felt like a blanket of fire on her freezing skin. She wanted to lose herself in the blaze, let it burn away all the pain on the inside. And maybe that was the solution: throwing herself into it. Ending her life. If she died, too, she would be with her mother again and all the hurt would instantly go away. All the sorrow would be swallowed up in joy.
Without really thinking, she reached her arm out to touch the flames. The blaze soon turned hot against her palm and she winced. Suddenly, she felt a hand on her shoulder, pulling her back.
“Let us retire,” Nora, her mother’s old handmaiden, said with a curtsy, her kind eyes lowering to the ground. Nora had been Queen Maud’s handmaiden since before Lucia was born, and Lucia could not imagine a life without her. Nora was like a nurturing grandmother, always caring, always loving Lucia, even when she deserved it least. Her nearly silver hair was usually kept in a loose braid, and the deep grooves in her face stood as proof of all the happy and sad moments she had experienced in her lifetime.
The pull of the fire vanished, and Lucia nodded. Taking Nora’s arm in hers, she pressed back the tears that were threatening to well up again, and headed inside.
* * *
The next morning, news came that one family’s longhouse had set fire by a torch from the light procession. The flames had passed too close to the straw thatch roof, lighting it and mercilessly burning their humble home to the ground.
“The Queen is cursed,” the ill-fated family had declared, spreading the rumor like a raging inferno. Neighbor to neighbor it was whispered that Queen Maud’s spirit had been rejected from Valhalla, because she had been sympathetic to the new, Christian faith. In her anger, they said, she had burned the family’s house down and would continue to haunt Bergendal until a proper Norse burial had been performed. She needed an escort to usher her to Valhalla, and until that happened, no one was safe.
“Did you hear what they are saying, Lucia? Did you?” Olav barged into her room red-faced with the guard who had delivered the gossip. “They say your mother is cursed. Cursed! How dare they?” His hands flailed as he spoke. “No one grieves the loss of Maud more than I, and no one will be allowed to tarnish her memory!” He clenched his large hands into tight fists like he always did when he was angry.
“What about me? I grieve her,” Lucia said.
He slowly swiveled toward her, his hazel eyes alight with rage. “What did you say to me?”
“You said no one grieves the loss of Mother more than you. I grieve her, too,” she said, glaring at him. She was done being the obedient daughter, constantly yielding to her father’s whims.
His eyes flared, and then he picked up a vase and flung it against the wall, causing it to shatter into a thousand pieces. Her heart leapt into her throat, and she shrunk where she sat on her bed.
But he did not stop there. Next, he grabbed the goblets on the longtable and cast them to the floor, followed by another vase and anything else he could get hold of. She cupped her hands over her ears, the crashing sounds so loud it frightened her. Has he gone mad?
Olav had never been a loving father, and had even broken her arm in a fit of rage when she was just eight. She had hated him ever since and now with her mother gone, who would be there to protect her from his rage? She thought about Soren, her betrothed, and although she did not know him well and felt somewhat uncomfortable in his presence, she was looking forward to marrying him. Anything would be better than this.
“Father, stop…please…” she said.
Olav stormed toward her and slapped her across the cheek. His angry hand stung, and she wanted to scream at him for hurting her, but she knew better than to stand up for herself or to let emotion show on her face. It would only infuriate him more.
“The problem with you is that you think you are so important. As the future queen of the Northlandic Kingdom, you need to set your own needs aside and set the needs of your people first. Stop feeling sorry for yourself!” He ran his long fingers through his salt and pepper hair.
Lucia’s tears fell onto her silk bed sheets. “I…I am sorry, Father.” But as the words fell out of her lips, they tasted like dust and mold. Was she truly sorry? No. She had only said it because she felt guilty and because everyone, her included, would surrender his or her will to the king’s. However, now that she would be queen, she would no longer need to submit anything to him.
And she would not be silenced anymore.
“I am queen now! Get out of my chamber!” she yelled, slamming her delicate fist into the bed, puffing out her chest.
Olav stood speechless for a while, probably wondering how his daughter had the audacity to command him, the king. But then as they glared at each other, Lucia witnessed as her father’s shocked and livid expression melted into a pensive one. Had he, in his grief-stricken state, not until this moment, realized he was to become her inferior? Surely, he must have remembered, although his blank stare suggested otherwise. Queen Maud had Aesira blood—the blood of the gods—running through her veins. Lucia shared that same blood, but King Olav did not. It was her fate to be queen, a fate the Norse gods had spun for her, a fate not even her father with all his might could usurp.
“You are an enigma, Lucia. One moment you are as sweet and innocent as a bird, and the next, you are like a vicious dragon, spewing fire. You need to work on your temperament before you become Queen.” He stormed out of her chamber.
When I am queen, I will keep the temperament I prefer.
* * *
Olav summoned Lucia to the throne room later that afternoon. Even though she did not want to go, she forced herself out of bed, knowing the consequences would be severe if she rebelled against her father’s commands. She was not queen yet, and so it would be wise to try and keep the peace—at least until her coronation day.
Swollen-eyed and with a numb chest, she dressed in a black linen dress and went to meet her father.
Arriving in the throne room, passing by the guards, she saw her father speaking with her Aunt Vilda and an elderly woman. They were standing at the bottom of the throne stairwell. It was the very place her mother had fallen.
Do not think about Mother. Do not think about Mother.
Beams of dust-filled light shone in through the stained-glass windows, illuminating three murals on the opposite wall. She knew the murals well, but studied them anyway in hopes it would distract her.
The first mural depicted the universe as a giant ash tree, Yggdrasil, and its nine realms: Asgard, Alvheim, Vanaheim, Midgard, Muspelheim, Svartalvheim, Nivlheim, Jotunheim, and Helheim. Its branches extended high into the heavens and stood on three roots that extended into Urd’s well, Mime’s well and into the spring, Kverg. Three giantess Norns from Jotunheim sat spinning the threads of fate of humans and gods in front of the well of fate, Urd.
The fierce dragon, Dreadbiter, slinked below the tree and fed off dead mortals that fell his way. Sol and Mani graced the sky, one pulling the sun, one the moon, across the heavens in their chariots. The rainbow bridge Bifrost connected Asgard to Midgard, allowing the gods to access the land of the humans when they desired.
“It must be a Norse burial, with a human sacrifice, or Allfather Odin will release his wrath on Midgard,” she heard the elderly woman say. “Queen Maud needs help finding her way to Valhalla.”
Mother! Mother! Tears welled up in her eyes at the mention of her name.
The second mural depicted Ragnarok, Midgard’s final battle, when most men, darkelves, dwarves, and gods would be consumed by the gulf of non-existence. The sweltering red, fiery orange and charcoal black battle scene appeared to burn on the wall. Pained faces of nameless warriors battled the armies of the Empress of Darkness, Eiess. The three-year winter had beckoned in the wolf Skoll, who had devoured the sun, and his brother Hati, who had devoured the moon. In the corner a cock crowed, signaling that the final battle of Ragnarok had arrived.
“Maud wanted a Christian burial,” Olav said. “But I agree, Odin and Thor will not be pleased if we worship this crucified god of hers. Her dying wish, though, was to be buried outside the Bergendal Stave Church, and that wish, I will honor.”
“Olav, you must realize Maud is dead now, and you must be strong for her,” Vilda said, her fat-laden arms jiggling as she moved them. “She was wrong in thinking this new, feeble religion is true. You know that. I know that. All of Midgard knows that!”
Lucia wiped the tears from her face, carefully studying the third mural, hoping that would magically make her forget her mother was no more.
She is dead. She is dead. She is dead.
The mural depicted the new world as it would appear after Ragnarok. Only a few living beings remained and stood by a waterfall, drinking from a fresh, flowing spring. One of them, her father had said, was the Great Sentinor.
On several occasions, Olav had told Lucia that she was the Great Sentinor fated to lead the battle of Ragnarok. I am not her, she had always thought, every time he had mentioned it, and she certainly did not believe it now.
“In case you have not noticed, the new faith is gaining many followers, Olav,” the elderly woman said. “I have even heard the Christian Bishop claim we are children of this God. The curse of Odin will fall on all of Midgard if you let these blasphemers continue, and if you bury Maud in Christian soil, you will be sending a very strong message that this type of worship is condoned by you as their King!”
Vilda was panting as usual, her heavy chest moving with every breath. “And Olav, you do not want to be known as the King who failed in leading his people, and brought the wrath of the gods upon Midgard, do you?”
Did my mother die because she betrayed Allfather Odin? Lucia wondered.
“Lucia, come here,” Olav commanded.
Lucia dragged her feet over to the bottom of the stairwell. At the top stood two golden thrones: one for her father and one for her mother.
She had not entered the throne room since her mother had fallen, and standing here now, the memories started to come back to her. Maud had called Lucia into her chamber a few days after the accident. Lucia hardly recognized her mother with purple lips, and a pallid, sweaty face.
“I want to prepare you for the next phase in your life,” Maud had said solemnly, resting in her bed, her hands caressing her swollen, pregnant belly. “As future queen of the Northlandic Kingdom, you have a great responsibility. The Aesira Jewel will soon be in your hands, and you must protect it with your life.” Maud had closed her eyes and moaned.
The Aesira Jewel? “Are you all right, Mother?” Lucia had asked. “Should I go get someone for you?”
“Not now, my love. Do you remember me speaking to you about your twin sister?” Maud had asked.
“Yes.” Lucia remembered her mother telling her about her twin and how she had died at birth.
“Her name means light, just like your name does.” Maud had grabbed Lucia’s hand. “I had a disturbing vision about you, Lucia. Great forces are seeking you. You will be given a choice that will have eternal consequences for you and your family. You must follow Christ, Lucia.”
“What do you mean?” Lucia had asked. Her mother had not made much sense, and she definitely did not want to follow this White Christ if this was his way of rewarding his followers. She thought her mother’s new religion was bizarre and weak. Who could worship only one God? And she thought it was strange to believe that even a god could be all-knowing or good all the time. Lucia’s faith had many gods, more gods than she could even keep track of.
“A choice must be made by you, and you alone,” her mother had said. “That choice, Lucia, is whether to do what is right, even when you think and know you have been wronged, or to deceive and selfishly take what is not yours.”
“I will choose what is right,” Lucia had assured her. “You look unwell. Let me get Father.”
“You choose your path, Lucia. Soren is not meant for you, but for another.” Maud had closed her eyes again and moaned. “Just remember…no matter what you choose, I will never love you any less.” Her breathing had become labored. “And remember, after Ragnarok, a new world will be born, and all the others will vanish. This is…the future.” Suddenly, Maud had begun to scream. She had grabbed her stomach as her body started contracting.
“Mother! Mother!” Lucia had yelled, a rush of terror surging through her.
Everything after that had been a blur, from when she had run to get her father, to when she had arrived back at the Queen’s Chamber and seen blood everywhere. Her father had shoved her back outside and left her alone to deal with her mother’s screams reverberating in the cold corridor.
“I want to talk to my mother!” Lucia had begged. “I need to tell her something. What is happening? Please tell me.”
“Lucia, Lucia, look at me, focus,” Astrid had said, coming out into the corridor.
But Lucia had not been able to focus. She had not even been able to breathe. The only thing she had been able to do was run, run to her room and throw herself on her bed. After what seemed an eternity, Nora had finally come to her.
She had sat up from clenching her tear-soaked silk pillow. “Is she all right?” She had seen the answer in Nora’s pained face.
“Lucia!” she heard her father yell, his voice bringing her back to the present. “Sorry,” she said. I just want to disappear into oblivion.
Olav clutched Lucia’s elbow and guided her over to the elderly woman. “This is Ada, the angel of death. She is the country’s most gifted burial sage. I have appointed her to arrange the funeral,” he said.
Lucia twisted out of her father's painful grip.
Ada was a sturdy old woman with one deep-set, beady eye. The old wench wore a black patch over the other eye, probably to conceal an injured or missing eyeball and she dressed in layers of black and red. Around her neck she wore a string of colorful glass beads and white bones, and she smelled of smoke.
Frightened, Lucia thought Ada might be a sorceress or a demon, or quite possibly both in the form of a woman’s body.
“You will follow Ada wherever she goes while she is here,” Olav said to Lucia in his usual stern voice.
Lucia curtsied out of politeness although she wanted nothing to do with this woman. Se just wanted to be left alone.
“It is a pleasure to meet you, the future queen of the Northlandic Kingdom.” Ada’s voice sounded as husky as a man’s. She shuffled over to Lucia, her crooked cane beating the floor. “Our first assignment together, Lucia, will be to select a volunteer to usher Maud into the next life.” She turned to Olav. “When can you have the handmaidens and servants gathered?”
“I will send for them immediately,” Olav said.
* * *
After the castle’s entourage arrived, Ada had the guards line them up in two rows. One row of sixty-four women mirrored the fifty-two men on the other side. All dressed in blue wool, Bergendal-crested, servant clothes, Lucia thought they looked more like soldiers. She wondered why her father had not returned with them, but then again, he had mentioned he needed to speak with the Christian Bishop.
Ada stood at the end of the ghastly silent, inward-facing rows and handed Lucia her cane. “I need a volunteer—one of Queen Maud’s handmaidens or servants to join her in the after life.” She walked down the center with her hands behind her back, looking like a ghoul in search of prey. “Surely, someone must have loved the queen enough to escort her back home.”
A cough echoed through the room.
Did no one love my mother? Lucia wondered.
“Surely one of you could grant the late queen this kindness when she has given so much to you.” Ada turned around at the end of the line and gestured to Queen Maud’s empty throne.
After a long pause, Astrid, one of the queen’s personal handmaidens, stepped forward. She curtsied.
Lucia gasped. No, not Astrid! Losing another loved one felt like salt on a raw wound, though she knew that her mother had adored the girl, and the handmaiden would make a great escort. Then, Lucia saw a second young maiden step forward from the line. She did not recognize her. She stood about a foot lower than Astrid.
“Ragnvei and I have decided to join our beloved Queen Maud in Valhalla.” Astrid adjusted her navy scarf over her dark blond, braided hair.
“Do you concede, Ragnvei?” Ada asked.
“Yes—uh, yes I do, Your Excellency,” Ragnvei said, lifting her gaze slightly, shaking her head ‘no’. Her curly ash-brown hair fell, as she grabbed the scarf off of her head and twisted it in her hands.
Lucia could not fail to recognize the look of fear in Ragnvei’s large blue eyes. Does she, or does she not want to be sacrificed?
“Princess Lucia, do you accept these two women to escort your mother, the Sun Queen, Maud of the Northlandic Kingdom, to Valhalla?” Ada asked.
Lucia hesitated. If Ragnvei did not truly want to do this, it could bring on another curse.
“Your Highness?” Ada pressed in a clipped tone of voice.
“Yes,” Lucia whispered.
“What?” Ada shouted.
“Yes,” Lucia said, louder.
“Then so be it!” Ada yelled. “You will both join Queen Maud in ushering her spirit to the halls of Valhalla!”
The group of previously petrified onlookers breathed with unencumbered relief.
Ada signaled for two guards to approach her. “Take these maidens to the queen’s guest chamber where they will stay until their sacrifice and burial,” Ada said. “Stand watch outside their door, and let no one in.” She turned to the others. “It is a great omen to us all to have two handmaidens usher the queen’s spirit. May all here today be witness to that these young women volunteered of their own choice to be sacrificed and buried with Queen Maud. And may the funeral preparations begin.”