Odin was the first to arrive. He was as old as time itself, and you would know as much by simply looking at his face, his hands, stained and wrinkled by the many days and the many battles they had seen.

She opened the door and one glance at his eye was all it took to be certain he had come for an apple. Yet, he would never ask for it. It was not in his nature to ask for things. He claimed them. Or take them. Things—dead and alive—were meant to be his without doubt or permission.

Odin would never asked for anything to be given to him. He was stubborn that way. And that’s how he got old. How all the gods got old. He could have asked Father Time not to pay him—Asgard—a visit, and Father Time would have obliged his request out of kinship. Instead, Odin...

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