The Three who Weave

The cavern was thick with the scent of damp soil, the roots of Yggdrasil stretching like veins through the dark. Urd sat closest to the loom, her hair white as frost, her hands steady as stone. She touched each thread with reverence, whispering of what had already passed.

Her voice was low, like water running beneath ice. “This is the past,” she said. “It cannot be undone. Every silence, every wound, every word spoken in shadow—these are the stones upon which you stand.”

The loom hummed with memory. Threads glowed faintly, carrying echoes of laughter, grief, and cruelty. Urd’s eyes did not soften. She was the keeper of what had been, and her truth was immovable.

Beside her, Verdandi’s fingers moved quickly, restless, weaving strands that shimmered with tension. Her hair was dark, her eyes alive with the pulse of the present. She spoke as she worked, her voice sharp, immediate.

“This is the now,” she murmured. “It binds you in its grip. Every choice, every breath, every defiance—it is the thread you hold in your hand.”

The loom quivered under her touch. Threads tightened, vibrating with urgency. Verdandi’s gaze was piercing, as if she saw not only the moment but the weight it carried. “You are bound by cruelty named truth,” she said. “And yet you stand. That is the present’s demand.”

Her weaving was relentless, each strand a reminder that the present is not passive—it is a blade, cutting as it binds.

At the far end sat Skuld, her eyes sharp as blades, her hair black as night. She did not weave with gentleness but with force, pulling threads taut until they sang with inevitability.

Her voice rang like iron striking stone. “This is the future,” she declared. “It will claim you, whether you resist or not. Every silence carried forward, every truth spoken, every fracture—it becomes the pattern yet to come.”

The loom trembled beneath her hands. Threads stretched into shadow, their ends vanishing into the unknown. Skuld’s gaze was unyielding. “You will vanish if you are erased. You will endure if you are named. The choice is not yours alone, but the thread will remember.”

Her words were not promise but warning. The future was a net, and she was its keeper.

Together, the three voices wove a tapestry that filled the cavern with its hum. Past, present, future—each strand bound to the next, each voice echoing through the roots of Yggdrasil.

They were not cruel, nor kind. They were necessity given form. To stand before them was to feel the weight of all that had been, all that was, all that would be.

And still, the loom sang—a song of threads unbroken, destinies bound, inevitabilities carried forward. The Norns wove on, their pale faces lit by the shimmer of fate, their hands moving with unyielding precision.

In the cavern beneath Yggdrasil, time itself was their tapestry. And no one who entered left unchanged.