I am the son of Pol ap Finnis of the western shores. I serve at the feet of the mad Dreamer poet, the trickster who here is a Doctor and the Hunter. My mother’s mother was a Northman’s dottr.
My family has traced that line all the way back to the travelers who came to Vinland. Most people call us raiders but history shows that, like the Celts to the south, we traded. Our landscape was fierce and we cultivated a fierce reputation but we also held great respect for the world.
We ever had a term describing when we were stealing things, NOT trading, and that was ‘viking’.
The process of fully taking in a part of another type of knowledge requires sacrifice and the All-Father knew this. He showed us by example. The same applies to other cultures. We can’t go a-viking on them and call it an honest haul.
We have to sacrifice and in this case, we are blessed that some of the descendants of those that our ancestors met and traded with and fought with so long ago are still alive.
It’s our duty as shield maidens and shield men to step up to the oldest of bonds, to the ones that were made BEFORE civilization came in and annihilated our ways, preserving our stories only as fun tales and ‘myths’.
It requires renewing relationships. It requires overcoming righteous suspicion and making amends for wrongs that are -not- our own. But we’re a fierce folk. We always have been.
And it’s always tempting to see the land as similar to our own. It’s a way to connect. But it’s -not- -our- land. To simply think it is is the cowards’ way and not ours.
Love it, because it’s beautiful, and because our ancestors loved it. Protect it because we bonded with the people who were here so long ago it’s barely an echo.