At the far edge of our backyard, a narrow river drifted past. The day's heat had already bled away; in the stillness of night the damp scent of grass and earth hung in the air. A light breeze skimmed the water. Now and then a waterbird startled, its wings grazing the surface and scattering a run of pinprick gleams…
Festoon lights from the neighbor's party trembled on the fence—faulty wiring, maybe—winking a thin glow that, mirrored by the dark water, looked like shattered constellations drifting downstream… From across the bank came the crackle of a grill and the laughter of boys. The whole town was celebrating the summer solstice: every house with its own ritual—glasses raised, someone tuning a guitar, kids chasing each other down the street—stitching a quick, bright music into an ordinary summer night…
In the center of our lawn sat an old copper mirror. Tonight was the full moon, and the white light fell straight upon it. It was like an eye—quietly watching everything here…
Mother moved slowly. She kept lifting her gaze to the sky, as if waiting for a particular hour to turn. When a raven settled on the tree beside us, she finally bent and drew a small ash-wood box from the chest at her side. I leaned in, cupping the box to study it. It was not large, and years of handling had fretted it with fine cracks. Something inside gave a dull, heavy knock. On the lid, a gilded Yggdrasil shone back a faint gold in the moonlight.
"Give it here," Mother said, and took the box back. I held my breath while she eased the lid open. Inside lay a weight swaddled in linen and bound with a three-colored cord. She drew a long breath; after a low, steady chant, she undid the cord—nine knots, one by one. Then she peeled back the tight linen, layer after careful layer, until at last a golden cup stood revealed.
Moonlight struck the wall of the cup and came off it in a soft but undeniable glow. I held my breath and studied the massed runes that covered the bowl—old rivers braided together, or branches crossing and re-crossing in a dense wood. In the river wind and the moonlight they seemed to breathe. My chest cinched tight, as if some old song in the world had turned over in its sleep to murmur to me.
Mother set the cup into my palms. It was heavier than I'd imagined; the chill of it was stone-cold, as if centuries had condensed into weight and gone to ground in my hands. I sobered at once. I shut my eyes and drew a long breath. The night air was cool; a shiver took me.
"This is the relic our ancestors carried when they crossed the strait," Mother said. Her voice was low and slow, edged with the tremor of memory. "It saw our land burned by zealots, our shrines and halls cast down, our people driven out and scattered. It kept them alive—unnamed, unbowed—until they could lift spear and banner again to meet what would come and reclaim what was lost. Remember, Eliza: it is not only a cup. It bears our blood-remembering. It is the duty you carry, the charge of your life."
She bent and poured clear spring water from a silver ewer. The pale stream rang against the inner wall and the sound was bright, shockingly loud on such a night. She handed me the brimming cup.
"Pour it over the mirror."
I cradled the gold and, with my heart drumming, followed her instruction. The cup tilted; water slid down its side and fell onto the tarnished face of the copper. At first—only a scatter of beads, like dew shaken onto a leaf. Then, as the flow thickened, the mirror flinched like a lake disturbed. Rings unfurled. Moonlight, caught in the metal, split into fine filaments that refracted and crossed and crossed again—like a grate of moving light.
Mother's voice dropped, solemn and awed. "Prick your finger. If you would look on fate, you must pay a price. Blood is the only key. It lets the Three Mothers—the goddesses of destiny—see your true heart. Remember, Eliza. Put aside your softness and your dreams. Attend to what is about to be shown."
My throat tightened; sweat filmed my palm. I was still afraid, but some other current bore me forward. I held out my left thumb and touched a silver needle to the skin. A brief, clean pain. Bright blood gathered and fell straight onto the water.
"Begin the verses," Mother said, grave and steady.
I exhaled, pinched the stinging cut, and drew the old words out of their long silence:
Frá auðn til skǫpunar,
Frá ofan til handan,
Frá Yggdrasili til burðar þúsund heima,
Frá upphafi til engra enda.
Rísandi seiðr ok list hlaða nú tímann,
Endlaust afl sýnir nú sannleik ok lygi.
Þá er ek syng hin fornu kvæði,
Galdraðr ljómi vekr nú storminn.
Glóðir neista skulu dreifa orðum mínum,
Kastið brennandi logum at kalla fram nýja dǫgun.
Lindin, árnar ok höfin hlýða mér nú;
Fjǫllin ok jǫrðin reisa aptr hrygg minn ok bein mín.
Skakið rykit af sál minni ok líkama mínum.
Nú stend ek milli þeirra heima,
ok ákalla ek yðr—
hinar þrjár mæður vísdóms ok ǫrlaga.
Hlýðið nú, ok mælið við mik.
Þá er ek lít í þennan brunn ǫrlaganna,
mun ek sjá hið sanna sjálf mitt, svá sem ek mega verða.
Nú opna kraftar ljóssins augu mín;
Að boði mínu sendi gæfa mér sannleik lífs míns.
From The Void To Genesis,
From Above To Beyond,
From Yggdrasil To The Birth Of A Thousand Worlds,From The Beginning To No Ends.
Rising Magic And Craft Now Charge The Time,Endless Power Now Reflects The Truth And Lies.
Once I Sing Those Timeless Songs,Enchanted The Aura Now Arises The Storm.
Cinders Of Sparks Shall Spread My Words,
Cast The Blazing Flames To Conjure The New Dawn.
The Fountain, Rivers, And The Oceans Now Obey To Me;The Mountains And The Earth Rebuild My Spine And Bones.
Shake Off The Dust From My Soul And Vessel.
Now I Stand Between Those Worlds,And I Invoke Thee—The Three Mothers Of Wisdom And Destiny.
Please Listen, And Speak To Me.
When I Look Into This Well Of Fortune,
I Shall See My Real Self As I Might Become.
Now, The Powers Of Light Open My Eyes;
By My Command, Fortune Send Me The Truth Of My Life. —English Version
The mirror bucked under the working. The swell of water drew into knife-edged striations, and then the whole pool began to turn—spiraling into the center of the copper, where a faint mist lifted.
"Go," Mother urged.
I leaned into the vapor, eyes fixed on the dimming, brightening reflections. The future broke open.
I saw a stone circle, vast and desolate beneath a blood moon. Everything around it burned—flame, tar, ash. It felt like a ledge between heaven and earth, long since stripped of sanctity and light. The altar stone had shattered; its gilded carvings were cold. The runes, once inlaid, now seeped like wounds—black vapor and blood working out through the cracks.
Around the circle, a host of shadows rose and walked toward the stones. Their faces were empty; what I saw were pupils black as the cold of the far night.
At first I thought they were only ghosts thrown by the altar fire. Then I saw the order of their ranks—
twelve to the left, twelve to the right, twin arcs bending around the broken slab.
Twenty-four figures drifted between light and shadow. Each wore, just above the crown, a small, almost-not-there drift of stardust. As they stepped into the glow, their forms grew solid—
not specters at all, but bodies. Every face was bloodless. Weariness and grief had emptied them.
In the left arc a handsome youth, hair slicked with oil, stared past the smoke toward the ruined altar. Dark tears gathered and ran from his eyes…
Beside him a broad-shouldered man in red flexed a fist—as if remembering how—his old bandage stained a deep yellow with sweat, his gaze roving, nodding at nothing in the air.
A soldier with his cap-brim pulled low clicked his heels on the cold ground. He opened his mouth and roared; pus and blood spattered his lips, but he kept barking orders, as if correcting a drill gone wrong.
An old man clutched a book so tight his fingers had sunk into the cover. He muttered; kind and reasonable one moment, flaring into fury the next, as if listening to a voice only he could hear.
A middle-aged man took a fine pocket watch from his suit, pacing to its steady tick. He glanced around, laughed, raved, then fell like a drunk, rigid and flat.
I turned my head, unable to bear it, and in the corner of my eye caught a girl in the right-hand arc—my age, my height. Curious, warm-breathed where the others felt spent and cold. She dressed with care; her coat pockets bulged and chimed with little things. She kept taking them out to share, and the others kept ignoring her—shoving her back. My breath stuttered. Some taut string inside me had been plucked hard.
I forced myself to look again.
A man with bleeding eyes beat his chest. He tossed a silver coin over and over, peering at where it fell—sometimes laughing, sometimes raging, smearing the ground with bloody fingerprints.
Another, a married man by his ring, performed a one-man play—whispering love to the air, then turning aside to caress nothing at all, humming a bar of lullaby.
A heavy man wearing a cross prayed off to the side, hands raised, reciting stories from scripture. Before I could puzzle him out, he lunged for the girl, fingers clawing at her narrow shoulder.
My stomach cramped. What was this? I had come to glimpse my fate—and nothing here looked like me. Fear went through me point to point. I pulled back from the mist and blurted, "Mother—are the Three Mothers showing me truth? None of this seems to be mine, it—"
She sighed, cut me off gently. "To look upon fate is not simple. Treat every change and omen with care. Even if it seems not yours, learn to feel it, to read it. Enough talk. Time is short. See it through."
She touched my shoulder, steadying me. Her eyes were kind; the string inside me eased a notch. I reset my breathing, faced the thinning veil, and looked again.
Somewhere in the vision another figure had appeared—a body the color of blood. It moved through the ring of people toward the center of the stones. No features that I could make out; clotted flesh, the stink of rot. She raised a hand and the earth began to tremble. Rock split. Black-violet smoke and dark red blood seeped up through the broken flags until a pool formed at the heart of the circle…
Then the twenty-four bowed together and began to count, low and in time. "One. Two. Three…"
With each number the pool grew hotter. Great bubbles rose and burst; blood-spatter flecked their clothes.
"Four… five… six… seven—"
At "eight" my throat seized, as if pinched shut. A hard chill ran up the back of my neck. I touched my skin—no wound, only breath coming ragged. Whatever it was, it had reached me. Whatever this vision was—however far from my face—it was tugging at a live nerve.
"Nine… ten…" The murmur did not stop. The stones shook. The sky cracked and red light pushed through the cloud. Black mist swarmed across the circle; the pool collapsed and fell. Something vast opened its eyes in the dark below.
My heart clenched. Cold bands bound my wrists and ankles and closed on my throat. Breath would not come; even bone felt chill.
When I thought I would be swallowed, the far rim of the vision rang with the iron sound of blades. A thread of gold-white light lifted on the horizon. A woman's voice—many voices braided into one—spoke at my ear, gentle and absolute:
"Fate shows you only a beginning, not an end."
⸻
The mist thinned and drifted away. I jerked upright, staring. It was still our riverbank. Still a soft summer night. Laughter crossing the fence from next door. Only I was shaking. Mother laid her hand on my shoulder, her palm warm as she smoothed the tremor out of me. Her gaze was intent, testing.
"What did you see?"
I could barely find my breath. After a long few beats, my voice came rough: "I… saw people standing in a stone circle soaked with blood—counting from one to twenty-four."
Mother's face went still. Candlelight by the mirror climbed and fell, printing a complicated expression across her eyes. She reached for a black cloth scribed with runes and drew it over the copper. When she spoke her voice was almost a whisper:
"Then from tonight on, you must learn to count backward. The Three Mothers have warned you. Walk carefully. Take up your life. Go on."
⸻
Night lay fully over the riverbank. A late wind came and stirred a hundred questions in me. The working still thrummed in my fingertips. I watched the water's faint sheen and could not get quiet. Mother soothed me, saying there was no need for panic. But I knew it—what I had seen was no simple mirage. It was the first bar struck in a hidden music, the opening measure of the long fight inside me and the road into the unknown. I do not yet know the bearings of the omen; but if it touches me, then the path ahead is already chosen. I will take it and go forward, without turning.