[Intro][Bowed tagelharpa states the three-note motif over slow floor-tom strikes; low male vocal enters after two bars.]

[Verse 1][Male Vocal: Narrator]
Under the rafters where ravens fed,
Two cups were lifted, one oath was said.
Odin wore winter in one pale eye,
Loki wore sparks from a stolen sky.
Blood on the bowl and breath on the blade,
Names cut in iron, debts being made.
No chain was forged and no wolf had cried,
When the red-haired brother stood at his side.

[Pre-Chorus][Male Vocal: Narrator]
The ash tree groaned, the horn slept low,
A root took frost where no root should grow.

[Chorus][Gang Vocals]
Blood-Brother at the High Seat, hear the old boards moan,
Gold on the table, cold under the throne.
Blood-Brother at the High Seat, laughing by the flame,
One hand writes a friendship, one hand fears the name.

[Verse 2][Male Vocal: Narrator]
Loki brought counsel with teeth in its grin,
Truth in the riddle and salt on the skin.
He named what was rotten beneath painted shields,
He counted the dead in tomorrow’s fields.
Odin kept listening, still as a spear,
Hunting the shape of a year inside fear.
The mead turned bitter, the torches bent,
As if every ember knew where it went.

[Pre-Chorus][Male Vocal: Narrator]
Three faint heartbeats under the floor,
Not yet a warning, not yet a war.

[Chorus][Gang Vocals]
Blood-Brother at the High Seat, hear the old boards moan,
Gold on the table, cold under the throne.
Blood-Brother at the High Seat, laughing by the flame,
One hand writes a friendship, one hand fears the name.

[Guitar Solo][A sharp minor lead answers the tagelharpa motif in short phrases.]

[Bridge][Male Vocal: Narrator]
Before the wolf had learned his chain,
Before the serpent tasted rain,
Before Hel’s cheek was split by frost,
The hall was warm—and already lost.

[Breakdown][Gang Vocals]
Oath in the cup.
Ash in the cup.
Laugh in the cup.
Blood in the cup.

[Build-up][Male Vocal: Narrator]
Ravens beat the rafters black,
Every wingbeat turning back.
Odin hears what none can see,
Children breathing under the tree.

[Final Chorus][Gang Vocals]
Blood-Brother at the High Seat, hear the old boards moan,
Gold on the table, cold under the throne.
Blood-Brother at the High Seat, laughing by the flame,
One hand writes a friendship, one hand fears the name.
Blood-Brother at the High Seat, before the oath is torn,
A father fears the children not yet born.

[Outro][Gang shouts repeat the hook while drums slow into single strikes.]
Blood-Brother.
High Seat.
Cold throne.
One name.
