A Curse Carved in Bone

Freya’s prophesied future as the shield maiden imposes on her a destiny she’s desperate to avoid. With its promise of death and destruction at her hands, the prophecy is a curse. It upends her life; makes her a target of powerful men who want to exploit her; and even shapes her identity and sense of self, making her believe she’s “destined to be a monster” (310). The mythology of Freya’s world depicts fate and free will as opposing forces, but the novel challenges this dichotomy, suggesting instead that the influences of fate and free will are inextricable from one another. Freya’s struggle for self-determination, symbolized by the metaphorical image of weaving her own fate, forces her to confront the limits of what she can control.

Freya and Bjorn exist in a world in which nearly everyone’s future is pre-determined. Though they are among a tiny minority, known as the Unfated, who theoretically have the power to change their destiny, Saga explains to Freya that even the Unfated rarely succeed in doing so. They, along with the fated majority, are taught to believe in destiny and to see prophecy as the Allfather’s infallible guidance. Though both Freya and Bjorn long to control their own lives and avert the devastation they believe Saga’s visions predict, they also recognize that free will means taking responsibility for the consequences of their actions. For Freya, the potential consequences of making the wrong choice can be paralyzing:

What I wouldn’t give to be fated. For higher powers to have already determined the course of my life, so all that I said, all that I did, and all that I ever wanted could be blamed upon them. But the two drops of god’s blood in my veins, one from Hlin and one from Hel, meant I was accountable for everything I left in my wake. Failures and successes. Nightmares and dreams. Love and hate (7).

Freya realizes that good intentions are not enough. She cannot predict the consequences of her actions, and she is responsible for the harm she does along with the good. While fate and free will are conceptual opposites, they inevitably overlap in the real world, meaning Freya can never be sure whether her actions will bring about what she hopes for. Her efforts to avert a prophesied event may, in fact, bring it closer. Even when she learns the prophecy of her “ leaving a field of dead in [her] wake” is false (284), she knows the choice to attack Harald at Grindill might still make it a reality.

Despite these tensions, Freya and Bjorn accept the responsibility, as Unfated, to change the future. Freya is committed to weaving her own future, but time and again her efforts fail, thwarted by chance; by what she perceives as fate; by her own flaws and nature; by the other Unfated; and by the blood oath. She tells Saga: “Every time I try to escape, something happens to stop me, […] I can’t seem to evade my fate, either through death or a different life” (128). Freya’s vow to never again use Hel’s magic, a power she feels no one should possess, is an assertion of her free will. Nevertheless, her characteristic emotional impulsivity and sense of obligation to protect the innocent lead her to break her promise. In fact, this human tendency to act in predictable ways is what allows the Norns to foresee the future so accurately. Freya’s blood oath, along with other runic spells, is an additional obstacle to exercising free will. All these factors prompt Freya to question how much control free will truly gives her. Ultimately, she realizes free will is not about controlling the world around her or the outcomes of her choices, but about having the freedom to choose, again and again, how she will move forward and face each new challenge.