The Bone-Singer's Oath

Prologue: The Blood-Snow

Norway, 872 CE

The ravens came first.

They circled above the battlefield, their cries sharp as the wind slicing through the fjords. Astrid Gormsdóttir knelt in the crimson-stained snow, her breath ragged, her left arm hanging useless where the Saxon axe had shattered bone. Around her, the bodies of her war-band lay strewn like broken toys—men and women who’d followed her across the whale-road to claim land in this accursed, fog-choked valley.

Skjaldmær, spat a voice.

She turned.

Eirik Jarnsson, the traitor jarl who’d sold their position to the Saxon warlord, stood over her. His beard was matted with frozen blood, his once-fine cloak torn. Behind him, six of his huscarls leveled spears.

You think yourself Odin’s chosen? Eirik sneered. A woman leading men? The Allfather laughs.

Astrid’s right hand found the hilt of Draumstafir—the sword she’d taken from a Frankish grave-mound, its blade etched with runes no living skald could read. It hummed faintly, as it always did before killing.

You mistake me, she said, rising. I serve Freya.

The fight lasted three breaths.

When the snow settled, Eirik’s head rolled toward the tree line. His men fled. But as Astrid limped toward the surviving ships, the wound in her side bloomed hot. She fell at the edge of a birch grove, Draumstafir still clenched in her fist.

The last thing she saw: a one-eyed raven perched on her sword, its beak parted in what might have been a smile.

Chapter 1: The Woman in the Ice

Lofoten Islands, Norway – Present Day

Dr. Linnea Vogt stared at the green-tinted MRI scan, her coffee forgotten.

This is impossible, she whispered.

On the screen, the 1,200-year-old skeleton from Burial Mound 9 glowed with eerie clarity. The pelvic structure was undeniably female. The femur markings suggested a lifetime of horseback riding. The skull showed a healed fracture consistent with a shield-bash.

But it was the artifacts that defied belief: a sword too large for most modern men to wield, its blade scored with spiral runes. A bronze pendant shaped like a raven clutching a spear. And the pièce de résistance—a silver arm ring etched with Skjaldmær: Shieldmaiden.

Well?” Dr. Henrik Møller, the museum’s director, leaned against her lab door. His smile didn’t reach his eyes. “Ready to admit your little ‘warrior queen’ is just some rich man’s wife playing dress-up?”

Linnea’s jaw tightened. Three years ago, when she’d first proposed that 10% of Viking warrior graves might belong to women, Henrik had laughed her out of his office. Now, with this discovery…

The sword alone proves—

Proves nothing. Women collected heirlooms.

With battle damage? With her bones showing—

Enough. Henrik straightened. The press conference is tomorrow. You’ll say the grave is inconclusive.’ Or I’ll hand the project to Lars.

The threat hung in the air. Lars Strom, her ex-fiancé, who’d stolen her research to land his BBC documentary deal.

That night, Linnea returned to the lab. The sword lay on the examination table, its runes shimmering under UV light. As she reached to adjust the lamp, her pendant—a replica of the raven clasp—brushed the blade.

A static charge snapped.

The MRI screen flickered. For a heartbeat, the skeleton’s image moved—head turning, jaw opening in a silent scream.

Linnea stumbled back. When she looked again, the screen was normal.

Stress, she told herself. Sleep deprivation.

But as she locked up, she could’ve sworn the sword’s tip was pointing northeast—toward the distant mainland fjords.

Chapter 2: The Bone-Song

The dream began with ravens.

Linnea stood in a snow-draped forest, her breath pluming white. Before her stood a woman in bloodied mail, hair the color of burnt copper whipping in the wind.

You see but do not listen, the woman said in Old Norse. Linnea, who’d memorized sagas since childhood, understood. “The bones remember. Sing with them.

She thrust Draumstafir into the snow. The ground split, revealing a massive longhouse with walls of human ribs.

Linnea woke gasping, her throat raw from screaming in a language she didn’t know.

Her phone buzzed. A text from her field assistant, Solveig:

Found something. Come to the mound.

Chapter 3: The Hidden Chamber

Burial Mound 9 was a half-excavated hillock overlooking the steel-gray sea. Solveig, a Saami woman with a nose ring and a distrust of deadlines, stood knee-deep in a new trench.

I was scanning for postholes, she said, handing Linnea a tablet. The ground-penetrating radar image showed a void beneath the burial chamber—and something metallic.

They dug for hours. At midnight, Linnea’s trowel struck stone.

A spiral staircase, choked with roots, led down to a circular room. The walls were carved with scenes of shieldmaidens riding wolves into battle. At the center stood a stone plinth. On it:

A mummified raven.

A drinking horn filled with black liquid.

And a harp made of human finger bones.

Solveig reached for the horn.

Don’t! Linnea grabbed her wrist. This is a nábrók—a necropoly. A place to talk to the dead.

Since when do you believe in ghost stories?

Since that sword started giving me nightmares.

A cold wind moaned through the chamber. The bone-harp’s strings quivered, producing a note that made Linnea’s teeth ache.

On the wall, carvings began to bleed—liquid iron trickling down to form runes:

Find the tree where the raven’s shadow dies. Bring the blade home.

Chapter 4: The Shadow of the Raven

They found the tree at dawn—a gnarled birch growing sideways from a cliff face. At its base, a depression in the moss matched Draumstafir’s blade.

Linnea hesitated.

Do it, Solveig urged.

The sword slid in with a click. The cliff shuddered. A slab of rock slid back, revealing a cave filled with…

Bodies.

Dozens of them, perfectly preserved in peat-stained armor. Women. All women.

Solveig shone her flashlight on the nearest face—a girl no older than 18, her braids still intact, a spear clutched to her chest.

Mass grave, Linnea breathed. They were murdered. Look at the skull fractures.

Not just murdered. Solveig pointed to their feet. Each corpse had been weighed down with stones carved with the same rune: ᚦ—Thurisaz. A curse.

Draumstafir hummed. Linnea’s pendant grew warm.

Behind them, a voice drawled: “Quite the tourist trap you’ve built, Dr. Vogt.

Lars.

He stood at the cave entrance, camera crew in tow. Imagine—feminist Vikings! The Patreon subscriptions alone…

Get out, Linnea snapped. This is a sacred—

Oh, spare me. Lars grabbed the nearest corpse’s spear. It’s bones and bullshit. But hey, let’s give the people what they—

The spear crumbled. The second it touched the cave floor, the walls began to shake.

Rocks fell. Solveig yanked Linnea back as the ceiling collapsed, burying Lars and his crew.

In the dust-choked silence, the bone-harp’s note sounded again—this time in triumph.

Epilogue: The Truth-Tellers

The press called it a tragedy. A “freak landslide” that killed six. Henrik tried to blame Linnea, but the cave’s live-streamed discovery had already gone viral.

Today, the site is a UNESCO sanctuary. Schoolchildren leave flowers by the stone that reads:

Here lie the silenced. Let their song be heard.

Linnea keeps Draumstafir above her desk. Some nights, when the northern lights dance, she swears it hums along.

As for Astrid?

If you stand in the birch grove at twilight, you might see a raven-haired woman walking the tree line, her shadow stretching long and hungry across the snow.

They say she’s waiting.

For the next battle.

For the next bone-singer.

For the world to remember.

To claim her legacy, one archaeologist must confront the past—and the men who buried it.