Mordgud
by Elizabeth Vongvisith
She waits, outside the thickened oak
Dragged from Jarnvidur a thousand lives ago,
Carved into gates ramping into the haloed sky
By hands long dead, for a ruler long gone.
Beside a bridge of stone is where you’ll see Her --
Black armor, black hair, skin pale, well-armed,
Awaiting the call of Her mistress, that one
Whose slow-timed walk brings crumpled petals,
Withered vines, and life falling to naked bone.
She waits without speaking for long days
And watches as the masses file through the gloom
Towards the soft fields and forests that lie
Behind the dread gate She is charged to keep.
Gray eyes, fathomless as fog , ever scan
The marching, the limping, the dragging dead
Creeping or striding over the bridge, looking
For intruders, or for those who, having lost their way
Need a gentle hand to turn them on their path.
For though She is a warrior, She is not unkind
To the lost and forsaken, to those who gravitate
Into the smoky fading crowd, seeking home,
But discernment is Her duty, and so She watches
For Her lady’s people to come home at last.
All others must take the path up and out.
None ever manage to escape Her eye.
But once, the gates were breached, a stalker
Slipped inside, and in the barrows of the dead,
Made history and prophecy speak aloud.
She has not forgotten, and her face hardens
When you mention that one’s name, He who sits
On a throne high above the turning worlds.
She thirsts for vengeance, but does not forget
The command of the lady who She has always served
With such faith that even the guardian of Asgard
And its mighty walls, would be fair impressed.
If you should meet her, this silent figure armed
With sharpened steel and the flash of an eye,
The rare wit, and the stern refusal to speak
Of whence she came, her father’s name,
And Her secrets, remember well that you stand
In the presence of another of that wild blood,
Kin to the wolf and the witch, and yet
She does not rage; her blood runs colder,
Like that of her cousin who rules the realm.
She has honed Herself as keenly as a fine spear
Glinting in the noonday sun on a battle-blooded field.