All that I can hold
A short story inspired by Norse Mythology
The bowl is unremarkable: a mix of copper and bronze, it is cracked in a few places around its rim. It is about the size of my hands, so when I grip it, my first two fingers almost caress each other.
The bowl is empty, but one can detect that it once held something. Something dark. Something corrosive. The base of the bowl is stained a harsh dark hue, with some of the metal threatening to weaken.
Now at this moment, a drop of a dark liquid falls, making contact with the bowl. It splashes around the base and gives off a faint hissing sound. The bowl is generally cool to the touch, owing to the chilled atmosphere within the place, with even condensation sometimes forming on the outer surface of the bowl. But the moments when the liquid falls into the bowl are like surges in temperature, and my palms sting with it.
Sometimes, the drop contains too much liquid, and the bowl is too full. I am caught unprepared. The drop falls to the bowl, breaking the surface tension of the liquid housed inside, and it tips. The faint traces and minute drops on the edge of the bowl almost drip down. I am careful and attentive, however, ensuring that it doesn’t happen.
Momentarily balancing the bowl on one hand, I droop down to pick up the scrap cloth at my feet. They once belonged to young boys but are worn no more. Every time I lay my eyes on them, horrifying images flash in my mind’s eye, to the point that it feels like routine, as much as I hate to admit it.
As I droop, I also catch his eyes, lying on the rock, just beneath my bowl, right in the path of the liquid. Those eyes are bloodshot, owing to a lack of sleep and torture. The pupils silently trace my head and then fall slowly on the cloth I pick up. The mouth is perpetually open, the beard overgrown, letting out a scream long silenced.
Regaining balance and composure, I wipe the edges of the bowl with the cloth and drop it near my legs again. I trace his pupils’ journey with the cloth and notice the small lump in his sweaty throat move the length of his neck as he gulps away the thirst. I cannot afford to move away from this place, not for food, not for water.
A small splash of the liquid above the rim of the bowl alerts me to the fact that the bowl is full. The liquid ebbs like some unholy mixture and threatens to spill over with the contact of just one additional drop. I look down and note that the face knows this.
The eyes are desperate and horror-stricken. He knows what I must do, and I know the consequences, the taxation of my act. I turn around to one corner of the cave and spot a place of pure darkness. Though one’s eyes may be initially fooled into assuming it a shadow, closer inspection will reveal that it is a drain, and the darkness is but the splashes of the selfsame liquid.
Every time I do this, I have a faint hope that I will be fast. Fast enough to rush to the drain, empty the bowl without injuring myself, and fast enough to run back to him before another drop falls from the ceiling, from the gaping mouth of the serpent entwined above.
That futile hope is essential for my duty. I look down at those eyes that mesmerized me in my younger years, and those (without doubt) mesmerized the gods, too. I signal that I am embarking on the task, and even though there’s a slight fear in them, his eyes nod their assent.
I turn sharply and walk to the drain. All the while, my eyes rest on him, monitoring for yet another drop from the serpent. When I reach the drain, I clasp the bowl with another cloth, one which belonged to another boy long long ago. I pour the contents out, and the process takes a few seconds because of the content’s volume. In the liminal time during the pouring, I'm unable to refrain myself from looking back at him, to make sure he’s okay. I catch his eyes, and they are extremely grateful. But something drags my attention away, something dangerous and sinister.
I spot a drop of poison falling from the ceiling of the cave, the serpent’s fangs almost dripping. It is ultimately foolish of me to think that I can somehow stop this drop, stop it from harming him and unleashing agony in his mortal being.
But hope, majorly futile ones, are what make a person. I drop the contents in haste, not ensuring my safety. A bit of the poison gets on my uncovered hand due to its swift, jerking motion, and it burns like a flame lit on my skin.
Not heeding the pain, however, I rush to him to somehow prevent it this one time. This single time. But it will not be so. The gods deigned that he was supposed to be punished in this way, and I am foolish for thinking I can somehow thwart their plans.
And yet, what is love but looking after one another, even in the face of Odin or Thor? What is love if not for the pains and the sprain of holding the bowl above his head? What is love if not for the futile hope of saving him pain one single time?
The drop is faster than I am, and it splashes on his forehead, some parts of it dripping down to his eyes. I cannot decipher his face for the next few minutes, however, as I'm unable to get close to him due to what happens next.
He shrieks and screams, his body twisting in ways unimaginable due to the pain of the poison. He cannot break loose, however. Tied to the rock, he has to suffer the fate for all eternity.
His screams and convulsions send shock waves all around him, and for a second, it seems that the boulder itself would shatter into pieces. The shockwaves manifest as earthquakes and travel around the area.
I take shelter in one of the corners, with my head in my lap, waiting for it to end. I don't blame him. It is foolish to blame myself. And inconceivable to blame the gods.
Once he has finished, the whole cave appears shaken: debris and shattered pieces everywhere, and a lot of crumbled stones, splinters that pierce the skin of my foot as I walk back to him.
I look at his face, burnt at the forehead and around the eyes, just like my hands. They will heal over time, only to be burnt time and again.
Yet I still go to him, still hold my bowl, despite the burnt hands, and wait for the next drop. And the drop after that.
While the gods see him as a trickster and a murderer, the giants see him as a valuable ally, and some whispers of Odin’s prescience puts him at the head of a great war in the coming apocalypse, in Ragnarok, I see him only as the man I once fell in love with, the same love which had kept me waiting all these years with a bowl in my hand.
This is what was written, this is what was fated to be, for all eternity. Because what is love if not going back?
Despite the blisters near his eyes and on his forehead, he tilts his head as I approach. Our eyes meet. Most times, the periods after his wounds are spent in silence, him writhing silently in agony, while I shame myself about not getting to him faster, not being more prepared. But something is different now.
Tears begin to flow from his eyes, the pain they're causing evidenced by his wincing. But they are not tears of pain, but of something else. Something divine, yet something also human.
“I love you,” he says and means it. His voice is raspy but clear. It comes in short bursts due to the aching thirst. The words serve as a salve to an unopened wound. He continues: “I love you. And I truly don’t deserve you. If someone were to calculate the net total of the deeds I have done in this life, my misdeeds will surely outweigh the good ones.”
He stopped here to ruminate, to catch a breath. He continued: “and yet, instead of being punished for my misdeeds, by some divine luck or intervention, I got you. To have you is the greatest gift of all, greater than all of the humans, greater than the mead of the Gods and surely greater than Odin’s vast knowledge for which he sacrificed himself.”
Silent tears well up in my eyes. My hands shiver. He looks at me with such kindness.
“Sigyn, as the gods called on all the living beings for the return of Baldur, which plan I thwarted — so too I say this as all living beings as my witness and judge: this punishment that the gods deem so appropriate for me is not a punishment at all — because it means that I spend all eternity with you, my love.”
“I love you too, my dear,” I say, holding the bowl on his head, into which the serpent’s venom drips for all eternity, granting me the continued company of my beloved.
Author’s Note:
This piece is based on one story in Norse Mythology: Loki being punished for indirectly causing Baldur’s death and his part in sabotaging the gods’ plan to bring back the former from the underworld. Loki has always been a trickster, messing up the gods’ business occasionally, but he was also family: he was Odin’s brother-in-arms and was like a brother to Thor. He also helped them on many occasions as he harmed them.
But his final act of mischief, causing Baldur’s death, crossed the threshold for the gods. This was unforgivable. Add to this the fact that he sabotaged their plan to bring Baldur back from the dead.
Having had enough of his troubles, the gods hunt him down and imprison him in a cave, bound eternally to a boulder (bound with the entrails of his children) — while they placed a snake on the ceiling of the cave, its mouth open, dripping venom on him.
Still, the gods allow his wife to stand by him with a bowl, which she uses to catch the snake’s venom. But every once in a while, the bowl becomes full, and she leaves to empty it. The venom that falls on Loki in this small duration causes him so much agony that he writhes and shakes his body so much that it induces earthquakes in the human realm, Midgard.
(I always love reading how the people of ancient times came up with causes for natural phenomena — earthquakes, lightning, rain, winter, etc.)
In the myth, Loki’s wife, Sigyn, remains silent and without a prominent role. I wanted to write a piece with her as the main character. The psychology and actions of the character intrigue me, and this piece is a result of my efforts to understand her psyche.
I have always been fascinated by marginalized figures, largely silent in the epics and myths. Characters that don’t have great roles to play, those who are confined mostly to the background — the roster includes Sigyn, Cassandra, and Penthesilea, in Greek Mythology.
I hope to give them voices someday, just like I have to Sigyn.
Links for further reading:
Loki Bound: An excellent and concise recollection of the myth.
Death of Baldur: Explains the tragic death of Baldur and Loki’s involvement.
Sigyn: About Sigyn, but a very short piece.