Knock knock knock. Hildigunn's knuckle raps at the door, her figure tense, a grudging pride in her mien. Hostile towards us – towards me, the cruel judge and lyncher of her master. Knock knock knock.

“Will you give me a fucking break? It's the middle of the fucking night!” hisses the irritated voice of Eyolf Sólhrafn.

“It's me, Eyolf,” speaks Hildigunn. “Open up, quickly.”

Footsteps inside the room. The door is opened by a middle-aged woman scantily dressed, the unlaced gown failing to cover her ample bosom. At her side, Eyolf emerges, in the nude, a vexed scowl on his face. A man on the bed behind them, tactfully hiding his face.

“Oh, it's you, pearl. And... you,” he beams at Hildigunn and scowls at Hakon. He is ignoring me deliberately, as if I were one with the shadows of the room. “What?”

“A woman - complications in childbirth. They're asking for you.”

His expression suddenly turns sharp, alert, diligent, and he nods, signalling Hildigunn to gather his leech-craft tools. 

“Fun's over, boys and girls, duty calls!” he blows a kiss to his bedmates while pulling on his trousers and a long light-blue gown, and girding his waist in the belt with runes and pouches on the way out.

Thinking I can't hear him – or hoping I can - he spits out in Hildigunn's ear between gritted teeth: 

“I suppose … wants to tag along,” 

gesturing with his chin towards me, as if not even bringing himself to say he, and then whispers something to her.

Through the cracked door of the poor peasants' home, I see the woman struggling in the pains of birth. Waxen-cheeked, sweated-brow, swollen-eyed with cry, the mask of exhausted resignation on her face. I sense anxiety. Danger. A danger I cannot dispel. Out of my hands, out of my competence. I can only stand and watch, observing like a sentinel, critical like a judge, but ultimately powerless.

She been like this all day! The babe ain't set head-down, he say, the husband wrings his hands. My wife's gon' die...

I see the seiðmaðr laying beside her, giving her concoctions to drink, caressing her... he is whispering in her ear, rubbing her nether parts with oils and massaging her belly... he is placing charms upon her, uttering incantations... and when she is ready, he incites her to push, through her screams I hear him chant, in a low but soft voice, soothing, energizing, determined, assuring, again and again... I see the child emerging, I see the seiðmaðr take the tiny thing in his arms, cut the cord that is wrapped around its neck. He is holding it to his chest, rubbing it gently. It is breathing.

It is done. The child is born alive. The mother – saved.

Hildigunn opens the door to let me and Hakon inside. Stifling room of half-darkness, damp smell, sweat, blood. I look at the seiðmaðr, pools of sudor on his robes and drops glistening on his brow - the tiny child in his cradling arms, presenting it to the father. Your daughter, says he. The peasant falls to his knees, teary-eyed, kissing the seiðmaðr's feet in boundless gratitude. They let the newborn rest at the woman's breast.

He made the babe turn in the womb! is on everyone's lips... he kissed her and touched her like a lover, women whisper in awe... he brought the child back to life! dazzled voices repeat, it's magic!... magic... magic!

A legend is forming from their lips. A miracle born under my skeptic glare! A miracle, or true skill. And he... the seiðmaðr I knew to be a cheat: that pretentious, arrogant, self-absorbed pretender seems to have vanished completely. In his stead, there is now a man who laughs and cries with the peasant crowd – which is growing larger as rumours of his miracle spread - a word of comfort and brace for each of them, answering their eager questions.

How can you, a man, have such knowledge of the womanly body? they inquire. He tilts his head mysteriously, coyly, his steel-coloured eyes glimmering in the distant dusk light:

“Ah, what is man, what is woman? The same pain and glee in their breast, the same toils in their brow. The same kiss, the same embrace, the same rapture in their passionate sighs... For what is the body if not the vessel of the spirit? To love both man and woman – to feel both man and woman – makes one whole! - experience to the fullest what it means to be human!”

Who are you, Eyolf Sólhrafn? I try to see him through their eyes as they watch him enchanted - a priest, a teacher, a leader, a miracle-worker... And then - he answers me, as if reading my mind:

“I am both man and woman, both human and beast, both beast and god. I laugh and love and live utterly devoid of fear in my heart, because I know... I am deathless! Because I am one with the world. And yet... I am nothing that you are not. We are all pieces of the whole - the same potential that shines in me lies in all of you! Man and woman, old and young, rich and poor, ill and sound! You need only find this potential... recognize it, absorb it, embrace it!”

And as he speaks, he seems... transfigured. Or, perhaps, only now his true self. The people embrace him and kiss him, in reverence.

How can one revel in human presence like he does! It is incomprehensible to me who always found man repulsive; I can often grasp their thoughts, but I can't feel what they feel. But Eyolf loves it, feeds on it, draws his energy from this closeness and communion and washes that energy upon his audience a dozen times brighter, filtered through his individuality! How can he love humanity with all its flaws when I despise it? how can he want to change it when I force away from it? how can he want to help it when I'd let it drown in its filth?

May it be that I was wrong about him...? Do illusions define his act or is it the essence beneath them?

Hildigunn paces next to me:

“It's what he does, you know – he heals, body and soul. And yet, you choose to close your eyes to a dozen saved lives and see only the tricks. It's his vocation you want to stifle... It's the people you want to rob of the greatest of healers. Respectfully, Yngvar Eindride,” she turns to me and meets my eyes, daring, vehement, spiteful: “he's more of a hero than any of you drengir.”

She admires him, in all honesty. She believes in him, heartfelt. As do they all - but she, Hildigunn, is loyal to him although she knows his faults and his deceit. Because she's seen him at his best...

“When King Olaf forbids our faith, Hildigunn, no wise-man and woman in this kingdom will be left to practice their vocation. And Eyolf Sólhrafn will share the fate of his patron, the Jarl of Hladir: his head thrown at King Olaf's feet by one of his so-called devotees.” She bites the inside of her cheek. “If you don't want this fate to befall your master, make sure he gives the skeptics no more reason to slander him, make sure he stays true to our course so that King Olaf's world never comes to replace our own.”

I signal Hakon to take the seiðmaðr back to the house, but Hildigunn interrupts:

“He isn't coming. He wants me to tell you he's spending the night here. To stay with the child.”

I ignore her and motion to near him nonetheless, but the woman puts herself between us and the seiðmaðr, a smirk on her face as she fixes me with bold eyes:

“Just get the fuck out of my face, Yngvar Eindride. His words, not mine. …Respectfully.”