The Witch's Heart

by Genevieve Gornichec

  Angrboda pushed her stew bowl away and laced her fingers on the table. “Please, my friend, listen to me. I’ve seen much, but I haven’t seen your fate. Or my own. I saw the deaths of the gods and my sons and many more—but not ours.”

  Skadi shook her head. “We’re safe, sure, until Surt’s flames consume us.”

  Angrboda took a deep breath. The flaming sword of the fire giant Surt, who was fated to kill Frey in that final battle, would engulf all the worlds in flame.

  And just like that, it would end: the final act of Ragnarok.

  “You know I’ve been working on that,” Angrboda said. She hadn’t gotten much further with her shield spell, but she still had two more years to work on it, by her reckoning. Two years before Fimbulwinter ended.

  Two years to talk Skadi out of this madness.

  Skadi shook her head again. “There’s nothing that can stop it, Angrboda. There’s no power in the cosmos that can escape what’s coming. You’ve said so yourself.” She rose from the bench. “I don’t wish to fight about this. My mind is made up.”

  Angrboda rose with her and ground out, “You’ll be killed along with everyone else. You know I’ve been working on a plan, a spell, to keep Hel safe. And it can keep you safe, too. You don’t have to fight—”

  “I want to fight.”

  “Then you will die,” Angrboda said coldly.

  “Then at least I can say I fought,” Skadi said, suddenly shouting, “and at least in death, I’ll be free from the pain of my father’s loss and all my failures.”

  “You don’t believe I can protect you from this?” The witch balled her fists, angry tears springing to her eyes. “You don’t believe in me?”

  Skadi stared her down: first incredulous, then with a swelling fury.

  “You’re an absolute fool,” she said in a low voice, “to assume that this has anything to do with you. You cannot be angry with me for wishing to be selfish in this one thing. This is not about you or your feelings, however intent you are on twisting it. Because the truth is that I’ve done all for you, for the gods, for my family. I must do this for myself.”

  And with that, Skadi stormed out of the cave and into the snow, letting the door slam shut behind her, leaving Angrboda standing dumbfounded in her wake.

  The she-wolf looked up from her goat leg and commented, You are a fool, you know.

  Angrboda couldn’t argue with that.

  * * *

  • • •

  With Skadi gone, there was nothing for Angrboda to do but work on her spell. Some days she could lean over the fire and it wouldn’t even singe her hair; other days, when she couldn’t concentrate hard enough to protect so much as her fingertips, she felt herself inching ever closer to the void.

  She couldn’t help it. Looking inward, grasping inward, ultimately led her to that place—that expanse of power that dwelled before her as if she were looking down into a deep, dark well, with eons of primordial energy humming beneath the surface.

  Waiting.

  For her.

  It was the same dangerous power she’d tapped into in order to gain knowledge of Ragnarok, but it had never been something she chose, never been within her control. To access this power willingly—to accept it, to embrace it—scared her beyond belief. But she had a sinking feeling that, in the end, she wouldn’t have a choice.

  Once she took that plunge, she knew she would not resurface.

  But she kept practicing anyway. It wasn’t good enough to assume that tapping into the power of the void was the answer—if she got only one shot at it and it didn’t work, then all was lost. She would rather rely mostly on herself and use the void as a last recourse.

  Her spell was improving every day, to the point where she was certain she’d be able to protect her entire body from being burned.

  And that’s how, some weeks after Skadi stormed out on her, she found herself standing on her chair, barefoot and clad in her thinnest linen gown, looking at her center hearth. She’d taken down the cauldron to give her more space, but now she was having second thoughts as she stared into the fire.

  It must be done. One way or another, I’ll have to do this sometime.

  She took a deep breath, summoned every ounce of strength she had into her spell, and stepped into the hearth.

  The flames lapped at the hem of her dress, as harmless as calm waves on the shore. Her skin remained unscathed, though the embers were uncomfortable under her feet. And all the while the dark place called to her—it would be so easy to reach out and tap into it. But she ignored the urge and kept her concentration locked on maintaining the barrier around herself.

  She didn’t know how long she stood there before she opened her eyes and saw Skadi standing in the doorway, staring at her in utmost awe.

  Angrboda gasped in surprise and toppled sideways out of the hearth—and found herself free-falling one second and in Skadi’s arms the next. They stared at each other for a long moment before Skadi set her upright and stepped away, looking embarrassed.

  A beat of silence passed.

  “I didn’t hear the door open,” Angrboda said, awkwardly shaking the ashes off the hem of her dress.

  “I knocked. Sorry. I needed to clear my head,” Skadi said, sitting down on a bench and staring into the fire. “I was afraid if I came back here too soon, it would be the end of our friendship for good.”

  “I understand.” Angrboda sat down on the bed and regarded her.

  “That was incredible, what you were doing just now. Is this—what you’ve been working on all this time? Your spell to save Hel?”

  “Yes.” Angrboda shifted. “I—I’m glad you came back. So I could tell you that I was wrong. What I said to you before. I’m sorry.”

  Skadi’s head whipped around to face her, brows raised high over pale blue eyes. She seemed at a loss for words for a moment before sighing and coming over to sit next to Angrboda on the bed. “At least you admit it. Although, you know, sometimes I wish I had never met you. You exasperate me so.”

  Angrboda had nothing to say to that. A silence passed between them once more, but this one was less tense.

  “I have something I’ve been meaning to tell you,” said Skadi at last, and when Angrboda turned to look at her questioningly, she saw that Skadi’s expression was resolute. “It was I who placed the snake above your husband’s head after they bound him.”

  Angrboda didn’t even bother to correct the “husband” part before the visions of Loki’s torture surfaced once again in her mind, and her eyes widened. She hadn’t seen who’d hung the snake, just that it was there. “Why would you do this?”

  Skadi turned to the fire. “I wanted to see him suffer. Not just because he’s always making trouble. Not just because he killed Baldur. Not just as a painful distraction so he wouldn’t have the wit to escape his punishment. I wanted to see him suffer because I saw you suffer so much because of him.”

  Angrboda had nothing to say to this, and found herself staring into the fire as well.

  “I told him, ‘This is for Angrboda, and for your children,’ ” Skadi continued. “Then he spoke, for the first time since he was caught. He whispered to me, so no one else could hear, that it can’t be for you because you would never add to his suffering this way. And I told him, ‘That’s why I must.’ ”

  A long silence followed, during which Angrboda realized that while she was certainly overthinking her relationship with Skadi, she was definitely not misreading the signs. Skadi’s confession had just proven that.

  “Thank you,” Angrboda said quietly, and turned to her.

  “Huh?” Skadi blinked at her, arching an eyebrow. “For subjecting your former husband to bodily torture on your behalf without your approval?”

  Angrboda took Skadi’s hands. “For everything. For nearly shooting me with an arrow all those ages ago, and then sharing your dinner
, and then making me furniture. You made me useful by trading my potions. I was desolate indeed when we first met, but you cared for me then.”

  Skadi’s voice was very soft. “I care for you still.”

  “I know,” said Angrboda.

  “Do you?” Skadi asked, struggling to read the witch’s expression. She must’ve seen something there that emboldened her, for she moved closer and said, “Loki may have loved you, if he could, but all he ever brought you was pain. You know it. We both know it. I wished to be more for you, Angrboda. So much more. I loved you then. I love you now. I will love you until I die. And even after, whatever comes then, I will love you still, even though you’re a fool and you’ve used me the same way that Loki has used you. But I suppose that makes me a fool as well.”

  “We’re both fools.” Angrboda’s heart swelled in her chest. “Things could have been so different . . .”

  “Things can still be different,” Skadi said fiercely, leaning in close, squeezing her hands.

  “But the ending remains the same,” Angrboda whispered back.

  “The ending doesn’t matter. What matters is how we get there. To face what’s ahead with as much dignity as we can muster and make the most of the time we have left.” And with that, Skadi reached up and took Angrboda’s face in her hands and kissed her with ages’ worth of longing. And Angrboda put her hands on the other woman’s shoulders and returned the kiss.

  “Grant a dead woman’s last wish,” Skadi whispered when they finally pulled apart, placing a trembling hand on either side of the witch’s face, “and let me share your bed, truly share it, this night and every night until the end.”

  And Angrboda did.

  * * *

  • • •

  The months that passed afterward seemed almost like a daydream, but they both knew it to be the calm before the storm, the bowstring pulled taut before the release. Soon another year was gone, and then another, and this time passed more quickly than any other in Angrboda’s life, for she did not know that she was capable of experiencing such happiness. Skadi came and went to barter her potions, but she left less and less as the winter wore on. Angrboda was glad of this; she did not want to waste a single moment, for moments were truly finite now. The she-wolf had grown so tired of seeing their affection that she mostly stayed outside unless the weather was worse than usual.

  And in the dead of winter, pressed together under the wool and furs, limbs intertwined, the giantesses spoke of all the things that came before and tried to forget what was to come.

  “I miss them,” Angrboda whispered one night, turning Hel’s figurine over in her hands as the child had once done. She’d tried several times to reach out to her sons, but to no avail. And every time she’d tried to visit Hel again, Modgud had stopped her. Hel had even chained up her guard dog, Garm, right at the gate to keep her mother away.

  It was clear to Angrboda that Hel wasn’t going to listen to her, wasn’t going to come to her when Ragnarok began. And if she couldn’t find Hel, the spell she’d been working on for so many years would all be for nothing.

  Skadi sensed her distress and pushed a lock of Angrboda’s hair behind her ear, fingers lightly grazing the scar at the witch’s temple; she always sobered at the sight of it, but less now that she could press her lips against it as she pleased, as if just one more kiss could make it disappear.

  Oh, how Angrboda wished.

  “I do, too, and I didn’t think I liked children until I met yours. Sometimes I wish I’d had some of my own. Sometimes it scares me to think that I’m leaving nothing behind in these worlds. That I will be forgotten, like I had never existed at all.”

  Angrboda had heard similar words from Loki before, but for some reason hearing such a thing from Skadi ignited something within her.

  “Forgotten?” Angrboda sat up in bed—ignoring the burst of cold air against her bare chest—and stared down at her, aghast. “You? The woman who showed up to Asgard clad in chain mail, armed with all manner of weapons, demanding justice for her father? Forgotten?”

  Skadi didn’t seem convinced, so Angrboda leaned down and cupped her chin. She looked so beautiful, Angrboda thought, with her white-blond hair out of its usual braids, flowing over the pillows like the silk she’d once brought Angrboda. Skadi’s hair was thick, but much softer than it looked.

  “The people die,” Loki had observed one night long ago. “The stories continue, in poetry and song. Stories of their deeds. Of their gods.”

  “You will be remembered for all you are and all you’ve done,” Angrboda whispered, touching her nose against Skadi’s, brushing a lock of silvery hair away from her face. “Your bravery. Your pride. Your conviction. I don’t see how anyone could ever forget you.”

  “If stories are all I’ll leave behind when I’m gone,” Skadi whispered back, “what happens when there’s no one left to remember them? It seems to me we’ll all be forgotten in the end.”

  Angrboda pulled away, looming over her. “Baldur is to survive Ragnarok somehow. Do you think he’ll ever forget how you wanted to marry him? I would’ve paid my weight in silver to see that exchange.”

  “You’ve ruined the moment,” Skadi complained. “He was too young for me, anyway. He was just the prettiest and, I suspected, the least awful of the Aesir. That’s why he was my first choice when they offered me a husband.” She grabbed the nearest pillow and whacked Angrboda with it, her voice rising. “And don’t forget, that entire incident was the same one in which your former husband tied his testicles to a goat to make me laugh and seal the gods’ deal with me.”

  “You’re deflecting,” Angrboda shot back, snatching the pillow from her. “And you did laugh at him, need I remind you?”

  Skadi smirked. “Well, you know that since he was acting out something that already happened, that means—?”

  “That he’s tied his testicles to a goat more than once, yes. I knew what I was getting into when I agreed to be his wife—don’t worry.”

  “That was back when he’d do anything for a laugh. Back before . . .” Skadi suddenly looked guilty. “Before you died.”

  The thought sobered Angrboda, and she sank back onto her pillow, still clutching the wolf figurine. Skadi settled in beside her again and put a hand over hers to still it.

  “You’re worried,” she said. It wasn’t a question.

  “Hel hates me. I asked her to come find me when Ragnarok begins, but I doubt she’ll listen. I can protect her; I know it. My shield is stronger than ever. But . . .”

  “Is there someone she will listen to?”

  “No one who can reach her, anyway. You’d have to die, or . . .” Angrboda sat up again as a thought struck her. “Loki.”

  Skadi arched an eyebrow and propped her elbow on the pillow and her cheek on her palm, looking up at her lover with displeasure. “Must you speak his name in our bed?”

  “Loki goes to Hel,” Angrboda said excitedly. “In my vision, he goes there to muster the dead and then leads them to battle on the ship of nails. She won’t listen to me, but maybe he can convince her. He does have a way with words, after all.”

  “Hmm, except that he betrayed you and got you killed and got her and her brothers taken away from you and all of that . . .”

  “But he’s still her father. He was always her favorite, and she his,” Angrboda said begrudgingly. “I’d be willing to bet she’d hear him out.”

  “You’d be betting the start of the apocalypse. You’d have to free him to get him there, and you know what happens when he’s free.”

  “It’s worth a try, though, isn’t it?”

  Skadi looked at her in skeptical silence.

  “I don’t know how he’s freed, but it happens somehow, and the three winters are just about over. He’ll be loose one way or another, after all. It might as well be by me, for my own purposes. For our child.”

  “So yo
u’ve decided, then? You’re going to do it?”

  “It seems to me that it’s the only way.”

  “I just . . .” Skadi squeezed her eyes shut and dragged her arm out from underneath her, laid her head on the pillow. After a moment she let out a low sob, and tears began to stream down her face as her expression crumpled into despair.

  Angrboda had not seen her cry since the day she learned of her father’s death, and she lurched forward to drag Skadi’s head into her lap, petting her hair.

  “I want more time,” Skadi whispered. “I just want more time . . .”

  “Me, too.” Angrboda slid back down under the blankets and held her, felt the woman’s tears against the scar on her chest as she sobbed. Soon Angrboda was crying, too.

  “But at least we had this time,” she murmured against the top of Skadi’s head. “It’s been the happiest of my life, and I’m sorry to see it end. There’s no one else I would rather have weathered this winter with than you.”

  Skadi breathed deeply a few times to calm herself, then tightened her arms around the witch. When she was composed enough to speak, she said, “You should do it soon. Tonight, if you can. Get it over with. The three years are almost up and you don’t want someone else to get to him first.”

  Angrboda knew this was Skadi’s way of accepting her decision. “Where did they take him?”

  * * *

  • • •

  That night, after Skadi was fast asleep, Angrboda slipped away without leaving the safety of her lover’s embrace.

  If she hadn’t known exactly where to go, she would’ve missed the cave’s entrance entirely; it was barely visible in the cliff face save for the small ledge jutting out at its mouth and the treacherously narrow pathway leading up to it.

  But she followed that path through the rocks and up the cliff and entered, as silent as the grave, her loose hair and the nightdress she’d donned fluttering soundlessly around her. Down, down she walked into that darkness, not feeling the cold or the damp in this form despite her bare feet, but she knew the cave’s occupants must feel both, and she pitied them.