[Intro][Tagelharpa plays the three-note motif slowly, with long spaces between notes; final male narrator enters softly after the motif.]

[Verse 1][Male Vocal: Narrator]
After the last horn, the ash settled gray,
Not like a banner, not like a day.
Gold had gone quiet, the benches were charred,
Names once made holy lay broken and scarred.
No one was laughing where oath-cups had shone,
No one sat proud on the high wooden throne.
Only the wind moved through rafters and bone,
Counting what fear had made of its own.

[Pre-Chorus][Male Vocal: Narrator]
Cold on the cup, salt on the stair,
A hand was missing from every prayer.

[Chorus][Gang Vocals]
After the Last Horn, who will name the cost?
Children were taken and kingdoms were lost.
After the Last Horn, hear the small truth ring:
A frightened crown makes a cruel king.

[Verse 2][Male Vocal: Narrator]
Hel kept the dead with a steadier hand,
Jörmungandr sank from the splintered land.
Fenrir lay breathing where red rivers ran,
Not beast and not child, but what fear began.
Loki said nothing; the smoke took his face,
Grief is a language no victory can place.
Týr’s empty sleeve moved once in the breeze,
Like a white little flag by the blackened trees.

[Pre-Chorus][Male Vocal: Narrator]
Root under ember, scale under foam,
Every exile remembers home.

[Chorus][Gang Vocals]
After the Last Horn, who will name the cost?
Children were taken and kingdoms were lost.
After the Last Horn, hear the small truth ring:
A frightened crown makes a cruel king.

[Instrumental Break][Cello carries the melody while guitars hold low sustained chords.]

[Bridge][Male Vocal: Narrator]
If there is a hall when the next fires rise,
Let it have room for the feared and despised.
If there is a throne, let it learn to bend,
Or prophecy only begins again.

[Breakdown][Gang Vocals]
No more cradle under iron.
No more law inside a lie.
No more child made into omen.
No more future forced to die.

[Build-up][Male Vocal: Narrator]
The motif returns, but softer now,
Not as a warning, not as a vow.
A thread lies torn in the morning mud,
Pale where it is not dark with blood.

[Final Chorus][Gang Vocals]
After the Last Horn, who will name the cost?
Children were taken and kingdoms were lost.
After the Last Horn, hear the small truth ring:
A frightened crown makes a cruel king.
After the Last Horn, leave the old lie worn,
Do not fear the child before the child is born.

[Outro][Male Vocal: Narrator]
Under new leaves where the cold roots run,
Half a face warms in a patient sun.
Far in the deep, one scale turns bright,
And a wolf exhales the end of night.