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Eivor drank the new potion Valka made for her and lay down, slipping into dreams. A tunnel of clouds, darker than before, opened on a frozen landscape. A raven, one of Odin's twofamiliars, flew over hills of snow-covered pines. From the sky reached the branching roots of Yggdrasil. Havi stepped from the stone tower holding the gate into Jotunheim.
Havi:Jotunheim... I have not set foot in this realm in some time. I must find the witch Angrboda. She knows all that happens here.
Havi left the tower and came upon Ægir's Hall, inside which were Ægir's daughters. If Havi stopped to speak with them, they told him their father was in Útgarðar trying to figure out what happened to a cauldron he had sent to Suttungr that never arrived there. Elsewhere in the hall, he found a note.
A Warning to Travelers in the Iron Wood
Take warning, you who would walk the Iron Wood. Near the place where the root of the mother-tree reaches from the sky. I saw the shadow of a house fall across my path. The shadow of no house I could see.
There I heard sounds I wish never to hear again. Screams of such terror as to bring ice to my soul.
Do not pass that way. The Mistress is there.
Havi left the hall and traveled through the forest toward the place where a large knot of Yggrasil's roots reached the ground.
Havi:These woods whisper with Jotnar magic. Not everything is as it seems.
Havi reached the Heart of the Wood but found no house.
Havi:Angrboda's home was right here when last I visited. It may still be.
Looking around the area, Havi eventually passed two trees with posts set before them. Between the trees, Angrboda's house could be seen build into the root.
Havi:Illusions. But any obstacle can be overcome, if looked at the right way. The witch's house. There you are.
Ascending the stairs to the house, Havi could hear two people arguing.
Angrboda:You are reckless Hyrrokin. Midgard is no crucible for your experiments.
Hyrrokin:No, indeed. It is as a great barn, swollen with vermin, bulging at the gables.
Angrboda:You underestimate the humans. You always did. When the end comes, they will outlive us.
Hyrrokin:They are mindless ravagers, who will destroy us and inherit the Nine Realms. I cannot allow that.
Angrboda:They are capable of more than you know, and I will not help you bring about their ruin.
Hyrrokin:Then you are a fool!
Havi entered Angrboda's home, and she and another Jotun turned to look at him.
Angrboda:Please, enter. Do not trouble to knock or announce yourself.
Havi:Angrboda. I have traveled far to find you.
Angrboda:And you are brave to darken my door alone. Where is my lover, the dark fox that slinks between my sheets?
Havi:Loki has stayed in Asgard, to help rebuild the damage from a recent attack.
Angrboda:How generous... and entirely unlike him. You used to be much better at lying.
Havi:I am not Loki's keeper. I have come to understand Jotnar magic, your method for moving hugr (mind) from one body to another.
Havi:Our parting was bitter. He has made many enemies among the gods.
Angrboda:My Loki. He's an acquired taste. One that can soon turn sour.
Havi:I am not Loki's keeper. I have come to understand Jotnar magic, your method for moving hugr (mind) from one body to another.
Havi:I am not Loki's keeper. I have come to understand Jotnar magic, your method for moving hugr (mind) from one body to another.
Angrboda:Hyrrokin! You have long outstayed your welcome.
Hyrrokin:Then I will take my leave. But remember what I said, Angrboda. You will see things my way in time.
Angrboda and Havi watched Hyrrokin leave.
Havi:Who was your visitor?
Angrboda:She's powerful, and cruel, and none of your concern.
Havi:The Mead she spoke of. Where can I find it?
Havi:You were discussing the humans in Midgard.
Angrboda:Were we? Why would Jotnar concern ourselves with such lower beings?
Havi:Because you think them hardy and ambitious.
Angrboda:You know much, Far-Seer. But not enough to save you.
Havi:The Mead she spoke of. Where can I find it?
Havi:The Mead she spoke of. Where can I find it?
Angrboda:A slip of the tongue. Forget what you heard.
Angrboda turned back to her cauldron.
Havi:Do not play games with me, witch. You would sell any truth for the right price.
Angrboda smirked.
Angrboda:If one had the means to pay it. There is a root called hag's claw. It grows at the bottom of a waterfall to the south, at the forest's edge. Bring me three roots from the place where the red moss thrives. Then we will speak of the Mead.
Havi:I will hold you to it.
Havi explored Angrboda's home and found a note.
Angrboda's Notes
How they scream when I work on them, the ones that visit me. Cries no physical pain could ever evoke. If only I could console them: the white heat will cleanse you, the burning scour you clean. And what is left is purity.
What torture it is to see oneself stripped of illusion. To know your depths and heights, to know yourself squalid, insignificant, wretched.
The truth is hard to bear. But I will make them face it. They will all see in the end.
Havi left Angrboda's home and headed southwest to the area where the Leyna Falls was said to be. Along the road he fought or evaded some boars clad in heavy armor, then found a great stone circle upon the ground, half encircled by engraved pillars of rock.
Havi:The waterfall should be nearby, but I see no sign of it. If I look about, I may yet find a way to see the unseen.
Havi walked up the stairs on the south side of the circle and approached the tallest of the pillars. From his new vantage point between the stones forming an arch, he saw a basin open in the stone circle below and a waterfall flow into the abyss.
Havi:This land hides its secrets well, but no secret is safe from me.
Behind him on the tallest pillar with smaller stairs leading to it, he found runes etched into the stone.
After some wandering, he wondered where the remaining roots might grow.
Havi:Where are those cursed roots?
Havi found the third root.
Havi:That will be enough for Angrboda. I should find my way out.
He made his way out of the cave and made his way back toward the Heart of the Wood. Fresh air did not spare him from the smell of the roots and the cave.
Havi:The reek from this root turns my stomach.
Havi entered Angrboda's home again.
Havi:I have done as you asked. Now where is my wisdom?
Angrboda took the roots and put them in her cauldron.
Angrboda:Give it a moment to brew.
While he waited, Havi looked around the house at the various plants gathered. Movement caught his attention from the corner of his eye, though when he looked there was nothing there. Angrboda poured a ladleful of potion into a bowl and handed it to Havi.
Angrboda:There. An elixir to ready your spirit.
Havi:How will this bring me the Mead?
Angrboda:It will open your mind to the secrets of the world.
With a slightly incredulous look, Havi drank the elixir.
Angrboda:While we wait, let us speak of Asgard. How fared your defenses after the last attack?
Havi's vision swam.
Havi's vision swam.
Havi's vision swam.
Havi:We, uh... we have been weakened... by treachery. Without time to rebuild, we... we may not withstand another attack.
Havi turned from Angrboda and shook his head, confused.
Havi:Wait, I... I did not mean to say that. I feel... strange.
Angrboda:Hag's claw has a way of untying the tongue. Now, you have said you want the Mead, but how badly? How much would you sacrifice to be freed of fate's shackles? Would you give your tongue, your hand, your sight?
Havi was at the mercy of the hag's claw.
Havi was at the mercy of the hag's claw.
Havi was at the mercy of the hag's claw.
Havi:I would... I would give all that... and more.
Suddenly, Loki emerged from behind a crate.
Loki:I would like to see that.
Havi:Loki! What trickery is this?
Havi's vision continued to sway, and Angrboda grabbed him from behind, holding a knife to his throat.
Angrboda:I have sapped your strength, Havi. And I will take your life if your answers displease me.
Loki:Did you think I would not come for you, after what you did to my son?
Angrboda:Our son. Fenrir. A name I think you have heard before.
Havi was compelled to reveal the truth.
Havi was compelled to reveal the truth.
Havi was compelled to reveal the truth.
Havi:Y-yes. In the final reckoning, the wolf Fenrir will be my doom.
Loki:Now you know, now you can no longer deceive, tell me... what will you do with him?
Havi could only give one response.
Havi could only give one response.
Havi could only give one response.
Havi:I want to kill him! But I cannot. I swore an oath to you, Loki, and I will not break it. I will not take his life.
Loki and Angrboda shared a look, and Angrboda took the knife from Havi's neck, releasing him. Under the effects of the hag's claw, Havi struggled to stand on his own, stumbling.
Havi:Fenrir will be imprisoned until the day of the prophecy, when we will meet upon the field of battle. As we are fated to.
Loki:Then we will bind you until that day. As you mean to bind our son.
Havi's eyes rolled back and he fell to the floor, unconscious. Loki and Angrboda stood over him as they plotted a fitting revenge.
Angrboda:An eye for an eye.
Later, Havi awoke to find himself hanging high over the ground from a tendril of Yggdrasil's roots. With the root wrapped around his neck, he struggled to breath. On a ledge nearby, Hyrrokin studied him, grinning.
Hyrrokin:I see she let you live. You must have done something right.
Hyrrokin laughed while Havi could only choke on the root around his neck.
Hyrrokin:Let me help you down from there.
She raised a hand and clenched her fist and a green glow spread along the roots, causing them to retract. Realizing he was about to fall off the tree, Havi panicked.
Havi:No! Wait!
The roots released Havi and he fell screaming, sliding down the long, steep slope of a glacier until he reached the ground, where Hyrrokin waited.
Havi:You could have let me down gently.
Hyrrokin:That would presume I cared for your comfort.
Havi:Then why release me at all?
Hyrrokin:For the same reason you are in Jotunheim. You seek the Mead, and I can help you get it.
Havi:I assume there is a price?
Hyrrokin:I want a small sample for myself. The rest is yours. Fair?
Havi:Do I have a choice?
Hyrrokin:Of course you do not. The Mead is kept by Suttungr and his daughter Gunlodr in the vault at their home in Utgard. The vault is opened only on occasion of a great feast when Suttungr shares the bounty of his cellar.
Havi:And it would be a poor host who did not throw a feast for a distinguished visitor... say, the High One of Asgard.
The root Angrboda asks for, hag's claw, resembles the mandrake root, which is hallucinogenic and narcotic and has long been associated with witchcraft.
The name of the memory is an indirect reference to a passage in Gylfaginning, the opening poem from Snorri Sturluson's 13th century text Prose Edda. In stanzas 12-14, it says that an unnamed witch raised Fenrir in Járnviðr, or the "Iron Woods", a forest east of Midgard populated by trolls, giants, and wolves.
