“Why do you walk alone?” I asked the old woman.

“Because I’m free.” She walked past me.

“Won’t it be better to have a house, a place to call home?” I followed her.

“Would you think the bird will cut its winds for a piece of bread?” She smiled at me. It was a terrible smile and a grand smile all at once.

I didn’t know what she meant. Not at first. But I know now.

Völva

In Norse tradition, a völva, sometimes anglicized vala, is a female shaman and seer, who is also a recurring motif in Norse mythology, as shown in the following extract from the Snorra Edda, also known as the Young  Edda, an Old Norse textbook written in Iceland during the early 13th Century.

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