Winifred Hodge Rose
“Tell us a story, Granny!”
“Which one do you want to hear?”
“The one about Idunn…”
“Which one? When the Giant snatches her? When she falls down to Hel?”
“No, the one where Loki wants to steal her apples.”
“You know that every day, Idunn gives one golden apple to each of the Gods and Goddesses in Asgard. She keeps the apples in a beautiful wooden casket, carved with leaves and blossoms. If the Aesir and Vanir don’t eat one of those apples each day, they will grow old and die.”
“That’s what happened when the Giant stole Idunn and her apples! The Aesir got older and older and older….”
“That’s right. Well, Loki started thinking about those apples. He wanted to steal them all. Who knows what he wanted to do with them, but….”
“He wanted to stay young himself, and watch all the others grow old around him!”
“He wanted to sell them to the Giants!”
“No, he wanted to give them all to Freya so she’d love him!”
“Quiet down, children! So, Loki went to Idunn and spoke sweet words to her. ‘Idunn,’ he said, ‘it’s a lot of work for you every day: walking to your trees, picking all those apples, carrying the heavy casket with the fruit. You do all that for us, but no one ever offers to help you. Tomorrow I’ll come along with you, and help you out. I care about you, even if nobody else does!’
“But Idunn had been very sorry the last time she had listened to Loki, when he lured her out of Asgard so the Giant could snatch her. She had learned her lesson and wasn’t about to trust Loki again.
“ ‘Loki, if anyone besides myself ever tries to pluck a golden apple, the trees will die and never bear again. That’s why I tell no one where they grow, and never allow anyone to come with me. Even my husband Bragi doesn’t know where the trees are. If he did, he’d make a song about it, and then everyone would know!’ Idunn turned and walked away.
“Loki’s a stubborn fellow, as you know, so he tried to follow Idunn as she set out before dawn the next morning to gather her apples. Idunn saw him, though, and she’s so quiet and gentle, she can move like a shadow in moonlight. Loki lost sight of her in the forest. Morning after morning he tried to follow her, and always she slipped away from him.
“Finally he decided to try something different. He stopped following Idunn for a long time, until she thought he had given up his plan. She no longer watched out for him. Then, Loki turned himself into….a fly! Did you know he could do that?”
“Yes, he did that before, when he stole Freya’s necklace!”
“And he stung the Dwarves, when they were forging the Gods’ treasures!”
“That’s right. Well, Loki the little tiny fly buzzed along behind Idunn, and she never knew he was there. She saw no need to move like the Moon’s shadow through the trees. Instead, she danced and sang in the dawning light, and Loki had no trouble following her. After awhile, Idunn stopped, and when Loki caught up with her, he saw a strange sight: a big circle of twiggy things poking up out of the ground. The earth around them was lumpy and rough, as though it had been churned. Idunn leaped over the twigs and landed in the middle of the ring. Facing the rising sun, she bent down and traced an Ing-rune on the ground with her knife. Who knows what the Ing-rune looks like?”
“I do!” Proudly, Harald traced the diamond shape on the ground between his feet.
“Good! So, Idunn cut the rune, then she stood inside it and began to spin around on her toes, faster and faster. Astonished, Loki watched her as she drilled herself into the earth! After a few moments, the ring of twiglets began to move, too, turning round and round, churning up the earth as they went. Afraid to cross that moving ring, Loki took back his man-form, stooped where he stood, drew an Ing-rune around himself, and began to spin. He spun until he was dizzy, but nothing happened.
“ ‘This isn’t working,’ he said. ‘I’ll have to find someone who knows how to move through the earth, and make her take me down to follow Idunn.’”
“I know! I know who can do that!” shouted Ingrid.
“Who?”
“The old Volva, the one Odin called to speak wyrd for him. She rose up out of the earth, and sank down again.”
“Very good, Ingrid! But you know, that old Volva is tough, very tough. Even Odin had a hard time getting her to tell him what she knew. I don’t think Loki would want to tussle with her! So, he thought of someone else: Old Toad, the oldest toad in the world, who lives under the bearberry bush near Frigg’s Hall, Fensalir.
“Loki had quite a walk to get there, but he wasn’t about to give up. As soon as he neared Fensalir, he dropped on his belly—he didn’t want Asgard’s queen to see what he was up to. There was the bearberry bush, and there was Old Toad, glurping and glumping in the dappled shade and mud underneath it.
“ ‘Aha!’ Loki snatched up the toad before she knew what was what, and held her in front of his face, legs dangling. ‘You’re going to show me how to sink down into the earth, Toad!’ he snarled.
“Old Toad looked at him and burped loudly. But she didn’t say anything.
“ ‘See that tree over there? I’ll throw you against it and squash you,’ threatened Loki.
“Well, toads aren’t very good fighters, and Old Toad wanted to go on being the oldest toad in the world. So, grumpily, she muttered ‘Alright.’”
“Loki set off through the woods at a fast pace, holding the poor toad around her neck with her legs dangling down. Finally they reached the twiggy ring again; it was still spinning slowly around. Up close now, Loki saw that the twigs were really root-ends, growing upwards from the earth rather than downwards into it.
“ ‘Very strange!’ he thought. He stepped into the Ing-rune he had drawn earlier and told the toad, ‘Alright, let’s go!’
“Stretch your arms up over your head and spin around,’ Old Toad instructed him.
“Loki did so, holding the toad up above his head, and as he spun, the soil turned loose and crumbly around him and he sank down into it. In a moment, he felt his toes pull free of the ground on the other side, then the rest of his body. As his hands, last of all, emerged from the ground, Old Toad gave a mighty squiggle and sprang loose, tunneling back up through the ground and escaping Loki.
“But Loki was too amazed to notice. There he was, with his toes in the air and his head on the ground. Right in front of him was the ring of trees whose roots were sticking up above the ground on the other side, where he had entered.
“What beautiful trees those are, children! Their trunks are silver, their leaves emerald, and their blossoms white as light. Their roots reach up to Sun and Moon in Asgard, for in the trees’ upside-down place there are no sun and moon to feed their leaves with light. There is only a fine mist, golden in the daytime and silver at night. The leaves take water from the mist, while the roots on the other side of the ground soak up light from Moon and Sun.
“There are as many trees as a moon of nights, and the apples take exactly one moon to grow from blossom to ripe fruit. So there is always one tree ready to harvest when Idunn comes each morning. Each tree grows exactly as many apples as the number of Gods and Goddesses. Moon the Measurer feeds their roots, and he knows how to count!
“As Loki watched the trees circle slowly by him in their dance, he saw that Idunn had already plucked one of the trees bare of apples. The one next to that had tiny buds on it, and the one next to it, fatter buds. Then came trees with glorious white blossoms, and fallen blossoms, and tiny fruits. The trees on the other side of the circle had larger fruits, and then he saw that the last tree, next to the one bare of fruit, held heavy golden apples, almost ripe.
“In the middle of the ring of trees, Idunn had laid aside her full casket. With her arms spread out and long hair flying, she was spinning around while the trees turned and turned about her, dancing the morning in that misty place.”
“Was she making magic?” asked Greta, eyes wide.
“What do you think, little one?”
“Yes, I think she was,” Greta murmured shyly.
“Well, you’re right about that! Loki rubbed his hands together gleefully, ready to raid the almost-ripe tree. But….what was this?! Loki was no longer resting with his head on the ground, as he had emerged with the toad. He had floated upward, falling into the sky! His head was above the trees and he was falling farther and farther up, shouting for help, but no one came.
“Finally Idunn looked up. Loki was the size of a rabbit in the misty sky, flailing his arms and legs about like a puppet on a string. Idunn smiled and went on spinning. When he was out of sight, she picked up her casket of apples, moved back through the earth, and returned to Asgard to feed her friends.”
“But what happened to Loki?”
“Well, Loki—that Laufey’s son, you know he always lands on his feet. Falling down or falling up, it makes no difference: he knows how to land. A long time later, a very long time, he wandered back to Asgard, weary, footsore, and strangely quiet about where he’d been. He never told anyone about how to find Idunn’s trees.”
“Is that the end of the story?”
“Yes, it is, but did you know this? As long as you’re upside down, like Idunn’s trees, you won’t grow any older!”
“Aha!” came the cries. At once there was a forest of legs wavering and teetering in the air.
The Tale-Teller clapped her hands. “Enough, now. Run along home, your parents are waiting.” She shooed them away.
Starting back towards her home, she saw that young Harald was still upside-down, and turning bright red. Laughing, she picked him up by the heels and dropped him head-first onto her haystack. Harald somersaulted off and trotted down the path, as the storyteller stepped smiling through her doorway, whispering ‘Hail, Saga,’ as she entered.
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This story was first published in Lina: The Journal of Frigga’s Web, sometime during the mid 1990s. It was republished in Idunna: A Journal of Northern Tradition, #67, Spring 2006. Revised June 2020.
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Bonus Item: The Tale of the Terrible Toad
(This poem might, or might not, have anything to do with Old Toad’s backstory….)
Oh, I’m a terrible Toad, I am,
And Trouble’s my middle name.
I gulp the flies and swallow the worms,
And never will take the blame.
**
Some folks, they say, are kindly and sweet –
Oh, smell them as they go by!
But I – I’ll tangle right under your feet,
And tumble you down with a cry.
**
And when you’re down, I’ll jump on your middle,
And croak for all I’m worth.
I’ll dance and I’ll flip and twiddle my fiddle,
And rumble right down to the earth.
**
“But why?” you ask, with widening eyes;
“I don’t understand your game.”
And I’ll stare in your face and say with a sigh,
“Cause Trouble’s my middle name.”
**
The Well of Wyrd, I’m much afeard,
Has registered certain facts:
My mom and my dad, their eyes all bleared,
Had come to blows with an axe.
**
“What,” they’d cried, “shall we name this tad,
This wriggly little woggle?”
And one said this, and one said that,
Till at last they settled on Trouble.
**
So that’s my name, laid right in the Well;
I reckon it’s there to stay.
I croak and I rumble and belch and bellow,
And everyone runs away.
**
Oh, I’m a terrible Toad, I am,
And Trouble’s my middle name.
I gulp the flies and swallow the worms,
And never will take the blame.
– Winifred Hodge Rose
Note: This story is now available as a color hardcover book, and as a B&W paperback book, illustrated with photos and drawings. Here is a webpage with more information and links:
https://heathensoullore.net/idunns-trees-a-new-tale-of-the-norse-goddess-idunn/