Sigmund watched the flowing water of the stream, thinking only of Magnhild’s revelation to him. Freya—the Bairn who scared him most—had done a reading for her. She would mother three boys. They would be his boys, he knew. When he asked Astrid to read the runes for him two nights ago, he had had Magnhild in mind. He wanted a reason for her to choose him, to mark him with a silver chain. It would keep other women away from him if she claimed him. He didn’t want any of the other women.

               “You’re moody today,” his brother, Aelric said, tossing a stalk of grass into the stream. The sparking water carried it away from the place where they stood on the bank. Behind them the goats were grazing, but the sun was descending, and they would need to move towards home soon.

               “Astrid read the runestones for me,” he said, watching his brother’s face.

               Aelric raised an eyebrow at his admission. “Did you ask her? Or did she use her witch magic on you without your consent?”

               “She’s not a witch, Aelric,” Sigmund said. Aelric and their father did not approve of Astrid’s choice. Sigmund knew better. He knew Astrid did not have a choice in the matter once the spirits decided they wanted her.

               “Oh, I know she’s not a witch,” Aelric sighed. “But she’s not a woman either.” Sigmund eyed him scornfully. “She’ll be like Freya and Sif, don’t you think?”

               “She’ll never be like that, Aelric. It’s Astrid! She’s not cunning and dark and proud.”

               Aelric pulled another stalk from the ground, twirled it between his fingers before tossing it into the stream too. “I supposed you’re right,” he said begrudgingly. “So, why did you ask?” he said, turning his gaze on his brother.

               “I asked because I wanted to know,” Sigmund said. He studied Aelric’s face, watching his doubts dance in his eyes. “Don’t you?”

               “It doesn’t matter,” he said definitively. He crossed his arms. “Boys or girls, it makes no difference. Someday some woman will hang a chain around my neck either way.”

               Sigmund narrowed his eyes. There was something Aelric wasn’t saying. “But if you knew you could make boys, then you could have whatever woman you wanted. They’d all be after you. You could have your pick.”

               Aelric’s eyes grew even harder, his frown deepening. The goats bleated but neither of the men turned to look at the heard. Sigmund put his hands on his hips, lifting his chin in a defiant posture as he waited for Aelric’s argument.

               “You know why they all want boys so bad?” Aelric asked, and when Sigmund didn’t reply, he continued. “They want boys so they can keep making girls. So they can keep turning girls into witches.”

               “They aren’t witches!” Sigmund snapped.

               The goats were moving further from the stream. The sound of their bleating grew softer. “Come on,” said Sigmund, hastening to catch up with the herd.

               The brothers moved across the fields, skirting the woods and the long-abandoned houses that that been stripped of every useful item when the survivors of the Freezing had emerged from the long winter of the disaster. Few were stable, and more collapsed every year. There was one in particular that drew Sigmund’s eye as they moved past. It was the place where young women sometimes brought a young man to see if she could get a boy from him before she hung her chain around his neck. Magnhild had wanted to take him there. She said the wild magic that inhabited the walls of the old house could make boys. Sigmund declined, not wanting to go anywhere near the wild magic. He said he would ask his sister about it instead. And she had told him exactly what he had hoped to hear.

               He and Astrid had gone out of the house, walking up to the hill that overlooked the goat pen and the barn. The moon was full. She lost the color in her eyes and her hair as she cast the rune stones into the grass. The wild magic tingled around him, like static pricking his every part. The hair on his arms and legs stood, and a shiver went through him as he watched the wild magic burn the runes on the stones. The runes glowed red hot before cooling to the deepest black. He recognized one, but not the other three. Other men, older men, had told him of the rune—the man. It was the important one to look for in a casting, they said. If you could make boys, it would show up on one of the stones.

               He wet his lips, waiting for Astrid’s reading. She smiled briefly, but it seemed a sad smile. “You can make boys, Sigmund,” she said heavily.

               His brother’s question drew him out of his memories. “Did you know Lodvik went there, with his woman?” Aelric said, nodding in the direction of the house.

               “Which one?” Sigmund asked. Their cousin had several women who wished to put a chain around his neck, but they were all young, and their mothers had not consented.

               “Eylaug,” Aelric said. His voice was cold.

               Eylaug’s sister, Ama, was a Bairn. Everyone was always wary of a younger sister, waiting for her to be called as well. “Are you sure?” Sigmund asked. “She’s only fifteen years.” Sigmund shrugged. “Did it work?”

               “He said she has a babe in her belly,” Aelric said.

               A cold dread crept up from his stomach. “That seems…”

               “Wrong?” Aelric interrupted. “These women…they don’t care! They only care about boys, and who can make them. If it turns out that Lodvik didn’t make a boy, you think she’ll want him then?”

               Sigmund shook his head, not wanting Aelric’s sourness about women to infect him. “It won’t matter. There are so many others. Someone will chain him,” he said.

               Aelric scoffed, but didn’t say any more. Sigmund wondered why he’d become this jaded, this disinterested and dismissive. “It’s not the women who do this, Aelric,” he reminded his brother. “It’s the spirits.”

               Aelric ground his teeth, grimacing at his brother’s words. “The spirits are women, Sigmund. Didn’t Astrid tell you that?”

               They walked the goats back to the pen in silence.

               In the house, Astrid was spooning soup from the pot into bowls and passing them to Asmund and Ulfarr, the two youngest brothers. Josurr, the middle brother, was pouring ale into the mugs laid out for each family member. Their father, Karl, was already seated at the table. Their mother was nowhere to be seen.

               “Where’s Madir?” Sigmund asked, his thoughts drifting to Magnhild.

               His father lifted his eyes, a lazy smile parting his lips as he gazed at his oldest son. “She’s with Ranog,” he said. The smile grew wider. “Negotiating.”

               Sigmund’s heart fluttered and his eyes went to the gold chain hanging from his father’s neck. He reasoned that Magnhild must have told her mother about him.

               Aelric punched him playfully on the arm. “You think you’ll get what you want?” He was jovial, but given his earlier surliness over the same topic, Sigmund imagined he was putting on an act for their father.

               Astrid came to the table with the final two bowls. “I did not expect her to be this long,” she said.

               Her comment made Karl frown. The boys all took seats at the table silently, sensing his displeasure. Astrid did not sit. Sigmund watched the color melt from her hair as it began to dance. The fear that always crept over him when Astrid used the wild magic made a slow crawl through his gut. His fingers tingled.

               “None of your witchcraft in my house!” Karl scolded, looking momentarily stern. It soon faded into an ashy gray fear as he realized what he had done.

               But Astrid was not like the other Bairns. She did not hold herself higher than any man, least of all her father. Yet, she did not let go of the wild magic either. “You should ask Leif to make a new chain, Padir.” Her voice was deep, like roots, like a well. “You will need it.” She sat, and the color came back into her hair and her eyes. She lifted her bowl to her lips, sipping the broth.

               Sigmund ate slowly, thinking about Magnhild. Thinking about their boys.