THE TWELVE DAYS OF YULE IN ASGARD – Day 3

12/23/09 – report on journey led as a pathworking for the trance class

I settled myself and began to beat the drum. It was hard to focus with the group around me and noises from the other parts of the house, but soon the trees of my own mountainside were before me. I led the group down the trail and through the green shadow of the forest to the Midgard that lies within, and we all congregated at the Worldtree.

I asked them all to call their totems, helpers, and allies in animal form, and we trekked across the plain to the place where Bifrost intersects, arching upward toward the top of the Tree and passing through the surface to the worlds below. We changed to appropriate animal forms, those of our allies or another, and made our way up and over the arch to the gates of Asgard. As usual, I took the shape of a raven, and my ally and I flew.

To my surprise, Heimdall was waiting for us in the form of a large, snowy white ram (though another member of the group saw him as a seal). He told me that the party this night was at Skadhi’s, and we should take the road through Asgard. Passing the homes of the gods, unusually quiet, tonight, we came to a small gate on the other side of Asgard that I had never seen before, and went through.

Before us rose the mountains of northeast Jotunheim, rugged, with rock poking through the snow. Here and there stands of fir trees rose black against the pale snowfields. The wind was bitter, the night sky blazing with stars. The way was clear, for the snow had been trodden down by many feet, paws, hooves, and the like.

Presently we could hear the sounds of animals, and saw the palisade of Thrymheim rising against the sky, the peaked roof of the hall behind it. The gates were open, and torchlight streamed through. But before we reached it, a pack of wolves came racing out to bar the way. This didn’t happen last time either, but then, I was alone. The leader, a silvergray male, came forward to sniff everyone before giving his approval and letting us pass.

Inside there was a central fire, and in different parts of the large yard, piles of food of every kind—skinned and disjointed carcasses for the carnivores, piles of hay and troughs of grain for the herbivores, nuts and potatoes and carrots. There was even a pond with open water within which we could see fish swim. And each feeding station was thronged with animals. A pale form passed among them, sometimes in the shape of a white wolf-bitch and sometimes in Skadhi’s human shape, tall and fair. She made us welcome and encouraged us to eat whatever was appropriate to our forms. As a raven, I had a little of everything.

In one corner I saw a big red-brown bear I identified as Thor, licking honeycomb off his paws. With him were a large, very dark brown female who I think was Jordh, and a silvery male with one eye (though I suspect he may have shifted forms throughout the evening). Freyja was there in mountain lion form. I’m not sure about the others, but I think that they were all there. It was a little hard to tell, because they were mingling with animals from all over Utgard. Sleipnir, tonight shining pale grey, was eating with the carnivores.

We ate our fill, and then it was time to return, retracing our steps through Asgard and over the Bridge and back through the forest to my living room once more.