Ulrika watched as two stunningly beautiful women paused in their queer posturing, looked at Ulrika, and then, straightening, walked toward her—tall women, long-limbed and robust in full skirts and colorful blouses, thick blond tresses draped over generous bosoms. Ulrika knew who they were: "victory women," or "shield maidens." In the local dialect, they were Valkyries, handmaidens of Odin who singled out those heroes slain in battle to take them to sit in the great Val Hall and drink mead for eternity.
As the two approached, stepping over severed limbs, bending to touch cold foreheads, murmuring, chanting softly, moving among the fallen dead to whisper—what?—their images shifted and changed until Ulrika realized they were not young and robust at all, but old women, their heads crowned with white braids, their aged bodies draped in belted tunics and long skirts, coarse shawls around bony shoulders. Despite advanced years, however, they walked with erect spines, straight shoulders. Years had aged them, she thought, but pride had kept them strong.
When the first came near, Ulrika saw that around the crown of her head lay a handsome circlet of twisted silver, twined and curled with silver leaves and stems, coming together on the old woman's forehead to support a tiny silver owl resting on two silver oak leaves, a pale moonstone between the leaves, like an egg, as if the owl were waiting to hatch it.
The two women paused to give her close scrutiny. When the second of the two saw the Cross of Odin on Ulrika's breast, she pointed and murmured, while the other pursed her wrinkled lips. Milky blue eyes peered at Ulrika from beneath white brows. "Are you lost, daughter?"
It was a dialect Ulrika understood. "I am looking for—" Ulrika could barely breathe.
"You should not be here," the woman said gently, "among the dead."
"I need to find—"
The old woman had sharply chiseled cheekbones and jaw, a thin aquiline nose, making Ulrika think that in her youth she must have been a very striking woman. But now the young flesh was gone, leaving her with bone and sinew, but an air of strength all the same. She reached out and laid a hand on Ulrika's arm. "You are weary. Come, daughter. Away from all this death."
"I am looking for my father. He is Wulf, the son of Arminius."
The old woman shook her head in sadness. "Wulf is dead. His family all perished. Come now, you must eat and rest."
"Dead! No, you are mistaken. I am searching for him. He cannot be dead."
But the women turned to lead the way, lifting their skirts as they stepped over corpses, allowing Ulrika a glimpse of leather boots lined with fur. She fell wordlessly into step behind them, carrying her travel packs, her burdens, her pain as she walked with one sandaled foot and one bare foot over ground that was soaked with blood.
At the edge of the meadow they approached an area of blackened earth where the Romans had set fire as they had retreated with captives and weapons looted from the dead. Nearby, Ulrika knew, the legionaries would have given their own slain a decent burial, in mass graves with prayers and offerings to the gods.
As she followed the two old women over scorched ground where not a blade of grass had survived, she realized that they had entered what was left of a village. All that remained after the Roman fires were the charred foundations of what had once been sturdy log halls. Ulrika's eyes stung with smoke as she passed places where embers still glowed, and straw and wood smoldered. Trees that had once been magnificent pines and oaks were now stunted and black, twisted and grotesque. The stench was overwhelming.
The old woman with the silver circlet around her head stopped in front of what appeared to be a pile of grass and twigs but which turned out to be a crude shelter. "Inside is food and drink."
Ulrika bent to enter the hut, finding darkness inside. But when her eyes adjusted, she saw a bare, earthen floor with fur pelts, waterskins, woven baskets holding vegetables and fruit.
She gratefully accepted what she suspected was the last of their food, and so although she was ravenous, she ate sparingly, and then drank from the proffered waterskin.
"Who are you?" she asked of the two women who sat watching her.
"We are the caretakers of a sacred grove. We have been so for countless generations, ever since the Goddess Freya wept her red-gold tears among the ancient oaks. You must sleep now," the old woman said, "while we return to the task of burying our sons and husbands."
"Yes," Ulrika said wearily, laying back on a blanket made of thick bear skin. "I am so very tired ..."
She did not know how long she slept, but when she awoke it was dark and the two caretakers of the sacred grove were lighting torches and stirring something in a hot cooking pot. As Ulrika struggled to sit up—every bone and muscle ached—the one with the owl and moonstone circlet came to her side. "Here," she said with a smile. "Mushroom broth. It will give you strength."
Ulrika rubbed her eyes as, once again, the two elderly women seemed to grow young. In the flickering torchlight, their wrinkled skin became smooth, their milky eyes turned luminous, their white hair was miraculously black.
"Why did you come here?" the one with the moonstone asked. So far, her companion had yet to speak.
Ulrika blinked. They were old again. "I came to warn my father's people of the coming invasion. But I was too late."
Ancient eyes filled with wisdom settled on Ulrika's face and stayed there for a long moment while outside, night birds called and the wind whistled. Finally, the caretaker of the grove said, "That is not why you came here. That was not your purpose. You were brought here for a different destiny, daughter." She pointed to the wooden cross that hung about Ulrika's neck. "You wear the sacred symbol of Odin. You are the servant of the gods, you are doing their bidding."
"Why would they choose me to be their servant?"
"Because, daughter, you have inherited a special gift." She paused. "You do have a special gift, do you not?"
The old woman waited, while her companion sat in watchful silence.
The bowl of broth stopped at Ulrika's lips. She lowered it to her lap and said, "What special gift?"
A long bony arm reached out, and for an instant Ulrika glimpsed smooth skin and strong muscles. The old woman touched Ulrika's forehead and whispered, "It is called the Divining."
The smoke from the sputtering torch seemed to grow stronger. Ulrika's head swam for a moment, and then she said, "Do you mean my visions? But it is an illness."
The woman shook her head, casting platinum highlights off her white hair. "It is a gift, daughter. You are afraid of the visions. You must not be. You must embrace them because they came from the gods and are therefore sacred."
"How do you know this?"
"You say you are the daughter of Wulf. The Divining is in his bloodline."
"But my visions make no sense. Nor can I command them. They are like random dreams that come and go and are beyond interpretation. What sort of gift is that?"
"You will learn to control them and read them."
"To what purpose? I have no wish to know the future."
"That is not the purpose of your visions."
"Then what?" Ulrika set the bowl aside. "What good do such nonsensical visions do for me?"