Baldur

End of Cully by Jack Egan Read by Darcy Smitenar

The Death of Baldur by Norse This is a LibriVox recording.

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The Death of Baldur by Norse There was one shadow which always fell over Asgard.

Sometimes in the long years the gods almost forgot it.

It lay so far off, like a dim cloud in a clear sky.

Idun had fallen into the dark valley of death, and when Brage, Heimdall, and Loki went to question her about the future she could answer them only with tears.

us, Frigg, but they are not very wise.

They need our care, even as our own dear Baldur needed our care when he was a very little child.

I shall go to the giant,

Memory, who guards the well of wisdom, and he shall give me a draught from the wonderful water.

How the frost giants hated Balduur, and how they struggled year after year to wrest the earth from him.

They hated the warmth Balduur brought with him, for it destroyed their power.

They hated the sweet flowers and the soft grass and the tiny leaves that everywhere peeped out when the winds whispered, Balduur is coming! Balduur is coming! But no sooner had Baldur turned away and said, Goodbye, dear earth, for a little time.

Remember, Baldur loves you and will come back again to you.

And then the world was in darkness and cold.

In those times the gods lived, Odin and Thor, Hoder and Baldur, Tyr and Heimdall, Vidar and Vali, as well as Loki, the doer of good and the doer of evil.

And the beautiful goddesses were living then, Frigga, Freya, Nanna, Iduna, and Sif.

But in the days when the sun and moon were destroyed, the gods were destroyed too.

All the gods, except Baldur, who had died before that time, Vidar and Vali, the sons of Odin, and Modi and Magni, the sons of Thor.

At that time too there were men and women in the world.

But before the sun and the moon were devoured, and before the gods were destroyed, terrible things happened in the world.

It was as Iduna saw it in her dreams.

I think he was just like Sigurd, who fought a dragon to rescue Brunhilde, and they even married Ragnar to their daughter, [laughs] Sigurd and Brunhilde's daughter.

So I think he was just a legend, and I think that he inspired a lot of people, and I'm sure that there were a lot of Vikings that claimed parentage from Odin and from Freyja and all the different gods, Baldr, [laughs] you know what I mean? But I think in this case he was a famous story before they sailed.

And when it comes to the snake pit, I consider England, the ruling families of England, to be the snake pit, to your point.

So maybe it was just somebody that they had on their team that they sent over there that was executed by these people in some devastating way, and they were like, "Oh, well, that guy was actually our father, and now we're gonna kill you all." [laughs]