The inn was full of men, overcrowded and loud as always during this time of the day. Therefore many faces were turned to the door when it swung open and a man stumbled inside. It was Gunnar, who bore the by-name Red; and it was not for his hair or beard he was called like that, but because of his face, which was the colour of a face of a newborn infant. He sat heavily on the first free stool and winked at the innkeeper. "Ale, quickly!" and wiped his sweaty face on his sleeve. After the ale was served, he guzzled it down in one draught never minding the streams escaping the corner of his mouth and soiling his already dirty shirt.
This spectacle caused laughter of the crowd that took interest on Gunnar´s strange acting. "Why, you look redder than usual," cried out a voice, "like you just seen a witch!" Another burst of laughter accompanied the call.
"I´ve seen her, alright," replied Gunnar. "You´d better watch your tongue, Hrafn Haeringr, or she´ll come and ´stow a curse on your swineherd," he addressed the man who earlier jibed at him, but Hrafn only laughed again.
Gunnar turned to the others. "I´ve seen a woman on a horse as big as this inn, and she was big as well and she was wearing a black cloke. And then the wind blew her cloke aside and I saw her belly big and round ´cause she was all nekid and heavy with child. Her hair was black and long, her eyes was red and then she looked at me and I swear, fire was in them eyes."
"I bet you fell asleep under the sun and just dreamed about nekid women on big horses," said a sturdy man and was immediately accompanied by another burst of mirth. "Mayhap you should go home and get some riding by your woman, on all four, so you´d not get such weird dreams," he added.
"I was as awake as I´m now, Jórkell Agmundson," the red-faced man snapped back. "And I tell you, ´twas no dream. I saw her and she was no woman as should be. She was a witch, or a giantess, or both for all I know," he said and put the corbel to his lips to get a gulp. He grunted in disappointment when he noticed it was empty and called for more. The inn went strangely quiet.
Gunnar didn´t laugh even once while he told his story, he looked dead serious. Maybe he wasn´t dreaming after all?... thought the men. But what would a giantess or a witch be doing in this part of the world? This could mean only bad things were going to happen.
They never found out.
aaaaa
The lights of a small homestead flickered into the night when a dark clad figure on a big grey horse stopped in front of its gates. Her garb opened at the front and her bulging belly shone white in the darkness. The pregnant woman slid heavily from the horseback and pulled the cloak tight around her. Then she packed the harness of her steed and opened the wooden gate that marked the entrance onto the farm grounds. From thin air she materialized a sturdy staff with a rounded end and some clothes to cover her nakedness. Maybe they´d let her stay here during the night, if she offered to read runes of the future in exchange. She would be able to do that now. She silenced the barking hounds with a single movement of her hand, and she entered and took the path she thought would lead her to the main house. She stopped still when she realized there was a figure crouching above a well, frozen in mid-movement. It was a young girl fetching water, and she was trembling visibly upon the unexpected intruder.
"I wish you good evening, child. I am seeking lodging for the night, may I offer your house some of my services?" and the visitor stomped her staff, the sign of her profession, on the ground.
The girl straightened up. "Good evening to you as well, lady. I do not wish to offend you, but mayhap it would be better to continue your journey. They do not look with favour upon witches in this house." Her voice trembled and she held her look cast down.
"Very well," the stranger said and turned when the same trembling voice stopped her. "Wait, lady. Maybe...maybe I could help you." The woman stopped and waited.
"If you wouldn´t be displeased to sleep in the barn, lady, you could take there your horse as well. The hay is fresh- I change it every day- and I´d bring you water and bread."
The woman nodded and stepped forward. "Wait..." the girl called after her, but she interrupted her: "I know where the stables are. I will meet you there," and continued her way. A faint smile flickered on her face. This was one brave of a girl. She was clearly afraid yet willing to give her a hand. She not only defied her fear of the unexpected visitor, but probably defied the master of the house as well, letting a dubious creature take rest on the farm ground.
She led her steed to an unoccupied spot in the stables, who, untroubled by human sorrows, immediately started to chew on the hay. The woman didn´t have to wait long either. She just sank on a bed of straw next to him when the door creaked and the girl stepped in, holding a flickering lantern in one hand, in the other a cloth bundle and a jug.
"Are you a servant-girl?" asked the witch when she sated her thirst and hunger. "Nay, my lady. My name is Jofríd Hámmundsdottir. I am the youngest of a house of many daughters and few sons. The servants are already all asleep." Jofríd held her sight decently cast down, but at the time she couldn´t help stealing a glance at woman´s rounded belly. She jumped with shock when the witch laughed out loudly. "You don´t have to be afraid of me, Jofríd. I won´t put a curse on you or bewitch you in any way. You can look at my face."
And she did. The face she looked at wasn´t like any face she saw before. She saw proud and noble brow, high cheekbones, a stern nose and a pointed chin, divided by red lips that were curved in a mischievous grin. She couldn´t decide if she thought it beautiful or not. Then she looked in her eyes. And behold what eyes they were! What tremendous force, and knowledge, and sorrow lay hidden in them! In one moment they were like pools of clear water with amber coloured jewels set in the middle, and in the other they were like fiery furnaces with blazing embers and Jofríd could look no longer. This woman was no simple witch.
"Why you are still awake at this hour?" she asked and Jofríd squirmed nervously.
"I am to be married shortly," she said.
"And you cannot sleep because you are excited to lay finally in your beloveds´ arms? Or are you afraid of the wedding night not knowing what´s expecting you?"
"Nay, I am not afraid of the marital bed. As I told you, I have many sisters who like to share tidbits of their life with their youngest sibling. I am afraid of my husband to be. I am to become his second wife and mother to three children. This would be all right for me, for I am the youngest daughter and therefore cannot expect to marry a young man from a wealthy house. Our estate is not a rich one and the entire dowry was already spent on my older sisters. But he...my betrothed...he is known to like mead and ale more than befits and then he gets violent. They say...they say his wife didn´t die by accident when she got kicked by a horse ran wild, unless the horse wore boots instead of hoofs. Ah!" With that said she hid her face in her hands and sat there without saying more. When she looked up again, however, there were no tears on her face, just a weary, resigned look.
"I beg your pardon, lady, this was unseemly of me. I cannot flee what I cannot change. I am not the first and won´t be the last woman being mishandled by her husband and master. Whatever fate the powers to be weaved for me, I will accept it and bear it."
"You are a brave woman. You have courage not many men posses," the woman said and grinned. "You are braver than I am, to be sure. I cannot accept doom just like that. I always struggle, albeit often to no avail."
"Is it the reason why you are on the road in your current state?" Jofríd asked. She tentatively reached out and touched the swollen belly. "It´s due soon, ain´t it?" she asked.
The pregnant woman smiled. "No, not yet for five moons.
"But...my married sisters, they looked like this just before they went to labour..."
"Yes, I believe you, nevertheless..." the woman looked in her eyes.
"Jofríd, you know already that I am not an ordinary woman, don´t you?"
She nodded shyly.
The witch pulled gently the reins of her horse, who neighed and shaking his mane, nuzzled her softly behind the ear. "This is his father, Svadilfari. I am carrying his foal."
Jofríd looked at her with wide eyes, but said nothing. It wasn't a mortals´ place to bequest the deeds of gods, as she now took the stranger for one of the immortals.
But the curiosity got the better of her. She asked: "Are you a goddess?"
The woman shook her head. "No. I am quite good playing gods, but only quite. I never get acknowledged as their equal."
"But you dwell among gods?" Jofríd seemed to be fascinated, she was looking at the woman with a straight gaze, with due awe but now without a trace of fear. Hers were the eyes of a clear winter sky, thought the witch, innocent and cool, yet embracing the world within. She delved deeper into them and she saw then, what then norns held for this child. It was a whole new world, indeed. She closed her own eyes and opened them again.
"Yes, sometimes I do. But I am my own master, I do as I like and often I spend my time walking in mortal lands and through other places."
Then she stroked her belly. "I don´t think I´ll be able to stay in this body for much longer. He is getting too big of a burden to carry in this frail form of a woman."
Jofríd regarded her for a while and then asked. "Are you going to change back to a mare?"
The woman smiled. "You are very clever, my child. Indeed, I am going to change back to a mare, for it is how I received the seed of his father as well. And after all is done I´ll let them call me a mare and won´t struggle for once. But now I am weary. I shall rest, and you should do the same, Jofríd."
The girl nodded and stood up. "Very well, my lady. I will bring you food in the morning to break your fast ere you leave."
"Don´t bother," she answered. "I won´t need anything more than you see here- water and some fresh hay. But let me tell you this before you go: we shall meet once again, but you won´t know me for I won´t be the same." Then she kneeled, seized Jofríd´s hands and pulled her down as well, opposite her.
"Listen to me, child. Great events lie in time to come and thou shall be part of them. Thou will bear many children and among them daughters, and they will bear daughters on their own, and they´ll have daughters as well. And when times get dire and all hope fails, a woman of thy line will rise and do deeds greater than a mighty warrior would dare to do. She takes her people to a new world where she will be their mother and their master and they will live there in freedom and will prosper and breed into wealth for many years to come. Thou shall never forget this, although thou will know suffering and pain as well. Bear it silently, bear it proudly, for thou will be the grandmother of a great house and a sire of a great leader woman. So have decided the norns, so I have spoken," the witch stopped and sag exhausted on her heels. Droplets of sweat garnished her brow and she breathed deeply.
Jofríd kneeled without moving and looked awed. After a while she asked. "Who are you, lady, are you a völva?" because she knew she was prophesized.
The woman smiled. "I am a völva, I am of the Jötnar, I am of the Aesir."
"Please tell me your name, so I can put it on the shrine with our dísir."
The witch shook her head. "Don´t. I will tell you my name, but promise me you will never worship it. I am not the one for worshiping. Do this to Freya, do this to Frigg, do this to the dísir; but never do this to me. Worshiping one means to bind him and I do not wish to be bound, do you understand me?"
Jofríd nodded. "I do, my lady. If it is your wish, I will not worship you then, but I will never forget you." She stood up and bowed. "Sleep well, my lady."
"Jofríd."
The girl turned and looked at the reclining woman. For a shortest of the moment she thought the woman´s eyes were green and twinkling like a mountain lake heavy with sunshine, and her jaw was harder and more angular, and her black hair seemed to cast red shadows, but it had to be only some mirage because the woman looked like just she had before.
"My name is Loki Laufeysdottir."
aaaaa
Jofríd went to sleep, but couldn´t rest quietly. She thought about the goddess in the stables. It was her wish to stay there, yet it felt like blasphemy to let her sleep there among the horses. Ere the first rays of sun touched the dawning sky, she was the first awake among the servants and family members alike. She sneaked into the pantry to take another piece of bread, and she would stop by the well to fetch some water. She didn´t even reach the stables when she knew she wouldn´t find her there. Indeed, behind the rotten fence that just so barred the furious and barking hounds from breaking away, on the dirt road leading to east and north, she saw two horses. One of them was a great imposing steed of grey colour and was beating the dust with his hooves, as if he couldn´t wait to run into the wild. The other one was a smaller, white mare with a heavy belly. It was the mare who halted the both of them. She turned and looked straight into Jofríd´s eyes, then neighed and broke into swift trot, followed by her mate.
Jofríd was smiling and crying at the same. In her mind she heard Loki´s words: "We will meet again, but I will not look the same. There will be sorrow and pain in thy life, yet never forget that thou will be the grandmother of a great woman leader who will take thy people to a new world."