Huginn's Yule

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© 2019 Chloe Tzang. All rights reserved. The author asserts her right to be identified as the author of this story. This story or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a review.

And here's that little note from Chloe And before I start, I know, I know, a long intro (again, and it is) but this story really needs some background and a bit of an explanation. Please forgive me... But before I get into that, there's a warning here for those looking for a quick stroke story. This is a "First-Time" story, and there is indeed one long "loss of virginity" sex scene, but it's a long way into the story, and it's the only sex scene in the story, and the story's about 18 Literotica pages (63k words). Honestly, it is more story than sex, it's not a short stroke story, but I really do hope you enjoy it all the same. Okay, and now, that said...the real intro.

First up, this little tale is dedicated to the author of "The Longships", Frans G. Bengtsson, who I hope is sitting in Valhalla at the right hand of Odin, sword or battleaxe at his side, drinking ale from his horn and laughing as he reads my little homage.

And, well, why? It's the 2019 Winter Holidays competition on Literotica, and what were the Winter Holidays before they were renamed due to political correctness? That's right! Christmas. And what was Christmas (at least in northern Europe) before Christianity hijacked the winter solstice festival? Yule. And what was Yule? It's a mid-winter (winter solstice) festival historically observed by the Germanic peoples, with probable far earlier origins, which was later Christianized. Many present-day Christmas customs and traditions such as the Yule log, Yule goat, Yule boar, Yule singing, and others all stem from those old pre-Christian traditions. The word is attested in an explicitly pre-Christian context primarily in Old Norse. Words with an etymological equivalent to Yule are still used in the Nordic countries and in Estonia to describe Christmas, and Yule's roots lie deep in the past, possibly far back into the Stone Age, but have survived into the present.

So for this year's Christmas, oops, sorry, Yule, oops, sorry, Winter Holidays, competition, I thought I'd write a little stand-alone story set in the middle of the Dark Ages, circa 540-580AD, when Yule was that explicitly pre-Christian festival of the Germanic peoples of Northern Europe. The Dark Ages are a period not too many people know much about, apart from some vague ideas gained from popular culture and movies, so I'm going to give you a little historical background here, both on China and on Northern Europe at the time this story is set in (and there's a much longer note on this at the end), just to give you some context to the story. And okay, I'm no expert at all, and this is so high level that it's the view from outer space, but it's a period I love reading about.

Many people romanticize the Dark Ages, thinking of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, the Song of Roland, and Charlemagne (altho Charlemagne was more at the tail end of the Dark Ages, as the lights of civilization began once more to shine), the Welsh stories of the Mabinogion, the Irish myths and legends such as those of the great Cuchulain and the Ulster Cycle of Irish mythology, or the Fianna, or the Volsungasaga, whose core is a story from the Rhineland. Forget it. Although the blood and guts may well be real, the romanticism is a real stretch. The early decades of the 6th Century (501-600 AD), the time in which this story is set, were during the Volkerwanderung period, when the Western Roman Empire had fallen, and the tribes of the Eurasian steppe, and the Germanic tribes of northern Europe, were on the move, a wild a time as the world has ever seen.

There's a revisionist view that the Dark Ages weren't actually so bad. Well, love to see those revisionists go back in time. They would, to be blunt, be totally fucked. Let me quote here, from Poul Anderson, who was somewhat of an expert on this era and a couple of whose novelized versions of the sagas I've used as source material (I used some of the actual sagas as well, I have a few of them -- there's a brief list of my source material at the end): This was "...the midnight of the Dark Ages. Slaughter, slavery, robbery, rape, torture, heathen rites bloody or obscene, were parts of daily life... Love, loyalty, honesty beyond the most niggling technicalities, were only for one's kindred, chieftain, and closest friends. The rest of mankind were foemen or prey. And often anger or treachery broke what bonds there had been...

Yep, well, that was western Europe circa 500-600 AD, and it seems accurate enough to me to describe a period when a man could only go to the outhouse with four friends to guard him while he was doing his business, lest someone take him out with a spear through the back. Makes concerns about running out of toilet paper seem a little trivial doesn't it.

Moving now to China in approximately 500AD, there were then two large states, Northern Wei, and Southern Qi (in the south), with smaller states around the periphery. To the north of Wei, stretching across the steppe, was the Khanate of Rouran (possibly the Avars, who would be part of that great westwards migration from the steppe into Europe, which would include the Avars, the Magyars, the Bulgars, and a host of other tribes, including of course the Huns, known to the Chinese as the Xiongnu, although that's not conclusive, and nothing about this period is). Northern Wei ruled northern China outright from 386 to 534 AD, and also saw the establishment of Buddhism in China.

Founded by nomadic tribesmen, the Xianbei (who became Sinicized over time), from the northern steppes, the empire of Northern Wei was carved out as the Jin Dynasty collapsed in the "War of the Eight Princes", followed by the "Uprising of the Five Barbarians." The Xianbei held together their empire through the strength of the sword and bow, as did the Mongols and other nomadic invaders before and after. War with the southern dynasty was endemic through this period, and towards the end of the dynasty that ruled Northern Wei, there was significant internal dissension resulting in a split into Eastern Wei and Western Wei. Neither Eastern Wei nor Western Wei was long lived, with successor states Northern Qi established in 550, and Northern Zhou established in 557, replacing both Eastern and Western Wei.

Incidentally, the Legend of Mulan originated from the Northern Wei era, in which Mulan, disguised as a man, takes her aged father's place in the Wei army to defend China from Rouran invaders. Also as a footnote, the original Shaolin Temple was built by the Northern Wei Emperor, Xiaowen, in 477 AD. This then is the milieu from which the heroine of my story emerges.

Now, returning to Northern Europe, one of the things I've always enjoyed about the Norse sagas (and I've read a few) is their dark, stoic and sometimes perverse wit. No matter how ghastly the circumstances, those old Vikings always manage the dry understatement. Although this story is set three hundred years earlier, at approximately the time of Hrolf Kraki's Saga and of Hadding's Saga, and a bit before Beowulf, I've also used a few lines from the more recent sagas here and there in my story, ripped straight from the sagas themselves, and they're so good, how could I not reuse them. Here's a good example, and one of the ones that just stuck in my memory, and that I reused a couple of times within this story in different versions. Hope you like my versions.

Two foes clash and when they draw apart one finds that his upper lip has been cut away.

To his foe, he says, "I was never beautiful, but you have made no improvement."

I mean, honest to god, how can you not admire an attitude like that? That's my kind of guy! Actually, I guess it is, coz my husband has that kind of humor. Fortunately, he also has his upper lip. LOL. Altho he does have a few scars, but hey, I love 'em. They add character, that's what I say!

Now, one last little (okay, not so little) aside. The title of this story. "Huginn's Yule." It's a kenning, and a kenning is a compound expression in Old English and Old Norse poetry with a metaphorical meaning, e.g. oar-steed = ship, the whales-way = the sea. Other well-known kennings include "battle sweat" for blood; "raven harvest" for corpse; and "sleep of the sword" for death.

Those of you who are not aficionados of the Vikings and the Anglo Saxons and the old Norse gods may not know of Huginn. The head of the Norse pantheon was Odin, and I'm sure you've heard of him. Now Odin was known in Old English as Wōden, in Old Saxon as Wōdan, and in Old High German as Wuotan, and, well, Wednesday. Wōden's day. (Tuesday is "Tiw's day" from the Old English Tiw (Norse Týr), Thursday is Thor's Day, and Friday is the day of the Anglo-Saxon goddess Fríge. The other weekday names we use have Latin origins). Anyhow, just an aside, but whether one realizes it or not, there's a lot of old history embedded in our language, and don't get me started on Chinese influences on English.

Now, returning to "Huginn's Yule"; in Old Norse texts, Odin is depicted as one-eyed and long-bearded, frequently wielding a spear named Gungnir, and wearing a cloak and a broad hat. He's often accompanied by his animal companions, the wolves Geri and Freki and the ravens Huginn and Muninn, as well as the flying, eight-legged horse named Sleipnir.

Switching to Yule, in Old Norse poetry, the word "Yule" is often employed as a synonym for 'feast', such as in the kenning huginns jól (Old Norse "Huginn's Yule" - "a raven's feast"). Odin is often called the "raven-god" (Hrafnaguð or Hrafnáss), the "raven-tempter" (Hrafnfreistuðr), or "the priest of the raven sacrifice" (Hrafnblóts Goði; a poetic way of describing fallen warriors as "sacrifices" to the ravens and other carrion birds, with Odin as a decider of who lives and who dies in battle). Sometimes kennings use "Huginn" as a substitute for "raven."

Blood is often referred to as "Huginn's sea" (Huginn's vör) or "Huginn's drink" (Huginn's drekka). The warrior in battle is "the reddener of Huginn's claws" (fetrjóðr Huginn's) or "the reddener of Huginn's bill" (munnrjóðr Huginn's). Countless kennings express this concept: to cite two more, the warrior is the "feeder of the raven" (hrafngrennir) and the "fattener of the battle-starling" (folkstara feitir). But the gift of a dead man also went to Odin, due to his role as the ruler of the dead in Valhalla and the common practice of symbolically sacrificing an enemy host to Odin before a battle.

Thus, the association between the raven and Odin was only natural for the Norse, and a battle was "Huginn's feast" (Huginn's jól), for there, the dead warriors lie, food for the ravens. Thus, also, the name of this story, "Huginn's Yule," and that's the context within which it's used. So now you know what to expect. LOL. Keep in the mind the era, also. So yeah, blood, guts and violence, as well as sex.

Anyhow, as I always do with every story I write, I loved writing this, and writing a Chinese princess and swordswoman into a Northern European semi-Viking/Saxon setting is just an ongoing little fantasy of mine ("Blood Sacrifice" in "Sex and Sorcery 4", available on Amazon, was my first attempt at something like this, but with a Danish warrior and his retinue rescuing a Chinese heroine in north-western China, on the western frontier where the Tocharians then lived). Anyhow, shameless plug, but if you enjoy this and "One Night in Xanadu," you'll definitely enjoy "Blood Sacrifice." Alas, "Blood Sacrifice" is only available as a Kindle e-book on Amazon as part of the "Sex and Sorcery 4" anthology, but well worth that couple of bucks. Even more shameless plug.

Now, all of that said, and seeing as you've made it this far, I REALLY do hope you enjoy, and "HAPPY CHRISTMAS" - or maybe it should be "Happy Yule," because there's nothing Christmasy about THIS story... oh no there isn't, and you have been warned. Don't say I didn't tell you LOL... Chloe

Once upon a century

Wistful oceans calm and red

Ardent caresses laid to rest

For my dreams I hold my life

For wishes I behold my night

The truth at the end of time

Losing faith makes a crime

I wish for this night-time

To last for a lifetime

The darkness around me

Shores of a solar sea

Oh how I wish to go down with the sun

Sleeping

Weeping

With you

"Sleeping Sun", Nightwish

Professor Poul Anderson, Director of Archeology, University of Cambridge, shook his salt-and-peppered head as he looked at the pitted sword, protected in the clear glass container sitting in the center of the table in the portacabin, and he hadn't even taken his coat off. He'd come straight to the dig from the train station, driven a rental car from Norwich, and okay, his specialization was Scandinavia and Anglo-Saxon England, although he was more than familiar with the Celtic and Romano-Celtic period, as well as the early Middle Ages, but this curved blade from the dig didn't ring any bells. None at all, although the curve seemed familiar, but no, he couldn't place it.

"I'm sorry," he said, "I still can't place this. Run this by me again. Where the hell did this come from, exactly?"

"Down in the number four traverse trench," Dr. Greta Kett said. "At the stern of the ship, laid out on a woman right beside the King, and we think the guy must be Thorstein himself. Thorstein's Mound, well, the old tales are right now and then I guess, and we're deciphering the runes on some stones now, but one of them was above his head, and it definitely says "Thorstein King, the Young Wolf." He was laid out, armor, helm, sword, shield, gold and silver, jewelry, weapons, human and horse and cattle sacrifices, grave goods, all the usual stuff.

This is bigger and better than Sutton Hoo, you know that, but I think we all knew that when we found the ship intact, but it's a little earlier, late-5th century from all the preliminary dates, tail end of the Saxon conquest. Way better than Sutton Hoo, better than any other Saxon or Viking ship burial we know of. The peat preserved the wood, and the ship's almost intact, everything's intact, including the bodies, the clothes, everything. Just, everything. It's just amazing."

She was almost jumping up and down now, bouncing on her toes. "This sword, it was in a woman's hands, she was in armor, chain mail, shield, helm, bow and arrows, lying beside the King, except we're absolutely sure she was buried a couple of decades before him. He was added later, she was lying there with this in her hands, laid out, and we've just got the test results back from the lab, you're going to love this."

"Tell me, for chrissakes, Greta. Doesn't look like any Saxon or Germanic or Romano-British sword I've ever seen, not even Celtic."

"It's not. It's a Japanese sword from the Kofun period, Yamoto made, we've done a metallurgical analysis, run every test we can come up with, and that's absolutely one hundred percent. It's from Yamoto, no uncertainty at all about that, and it's an early curved blade, cutting style. We think it's the earliest kotō period katana ever found, early 5th century. We've asked the Japanese to send someone who's an expert in them to help."

"Holy Jesus, you're not joking, are you, Greta? A Japanese katana dated to the period, in a late 6th Century ship-burial mound? In Norfolk?"

"It gets better, Poul." Greta was just about beside herself, and Poul had never seen her like this.

"How does it get better than this. This is already the biggest archeological find in England, since, well, Sutton Hoo. And throw a Japanese sword into the mix, and Jesus..."

"Add in a Eurasian steppe nomad composite bow, we think Xianbei from the initial analysis, and some Chinese-style armor, light cavalry chain mail. Bright brilliant armor, it's called, and I know that doesn't mean anything to you, but it was the best armor made in Northern Wei, which was the Empire that ruled Northern China in the 4th, 5th and early 6th Centuries. We've run samples through multiple lab tests as well, this isn't something I want to be wrong on, and its Chinese origin, same period, definitely made in Northern Wei, and this set is just about the best quality of its type ever found, and it was made specifically for a woman, the woman that was wearing it, and the woman..." Greta smiled.

"The woman..."

"For Christ's sake, just tell me, Greta."

"She's Chinese. She looks Chinese, and yes, she's that well preserved by the peat. We've run a dozen test series through six different labs. She was born around 520, northern China, and we've done some searches against DNA samples taken from burials in Northern Wei from the period. She's closely related to some of the samples the Chinese have on record."

"Spell out closely related, Greta."

"Royal Family of Northern Wei. The Chinese have excavated quite a number of Northern Wei royal burials. She's related to the royal family of Northern Wei for sure, Tuoba Clan, we need to do some more tests to pinpoint more closely, but you don't get much closer, we think she's as close as a cousin to the ruling line, so she must have been someone important. She died approximately 590, which is when we've dated the ship and the mound to, plus or minus a couple of years, and we're going to narrow that down, we've got a lot to work with. The King, he died thirty years later, and all the evidence says they buried her first, in the ship, built the barrow for her, and added him in after, and you know what's even more interesting?"

"Jesus Christ, Greta. Just bloody well tell me."

"He's her son. DNA analysis says he's half-chinese, half-Dane from southern Sweden."

"Any more surprises?"

"Yes." Greta stood there, smiling.

"Good God, woman. Just tell me!"

"We've found something written, a chest of bones, sheep and cow scapulas, and there's writing carved on them, and each bone is numbered, sequentially. It's all written in Chinese characters. The bones have been dated to 580 through 590, and they're associated with the site. There's no doubt about that. We've run every test we can think of to confirm these aren't fakes, and they're not. This is the genuine thing, Poul, and this is huge. We're going to be studying this site for the rest of our lives, it's that big.

We've contacted the Chinese Embassy, asked for assistance in translating, they arranged for a team from Beijing, they took one look at the images and analysis we sent and they dropped everything. Their A-team, their best people, they're flying here now. It's an old script, but the guy we brought in two days ago to take a first look, he says it's definitely from the period. He won't leave, he hasn't slept since he arrived. He's sitting there with them now, says it's some kind of autobiography of a Chinese princess as far as he can tell, and he's half out of his mind... we think it was written by the woman in the barrow."

"Holy fuck!"

"Yeah, you got that right."

"Vesheill!" The great cry rang out from thrice two hundred house-carls, the great wooden cups and the horns filled with the foaming Yuletide Ale raised high, then drained to the dregs in a roaring wave of voices and laughter, and I, I sat to the side and a little behind my son, Thorstein, the King, at the High Table, and his chief men and such of his younger brothers as were men, they too sat at the High Table. The servant girls moved with alacrity with their jugs, from which the cups and horns were refilled, and busy indeed was the refilling, for the ale was good indeed, so all said, and all called for more, so that the servant girls were kept running.