[Intro]
[Bowed lyre traces five uneven pulses as wood creaks under strain.]

[Verse 1]
I drank from wells before your kings
Had forged their names on golden rings.
I held the eagle, fed the hart,
And stitched nine worlds through root and heart.
Now under fields of hardened white,
A red vein wakes without a light.
It does not warm the buried stone;
It eats the dark where seeds are sown.

[Chorus]
My roots beneath the snow burn red,
Through halls of gods and fields of dead.
The frost above lies smooth and slow;
No eye can see how deep flames go.
Hold to my bark while cold winds blow—
There is fire in the roots beneath the snow.

[Verse 2]
Níðhöggr turns within the deep,
No longer gnawing half-asleep.
The squirrel stops between two lies;
No message climbs, no answer flies.
The well of memory tastes of rust,
The runes lose edges under dust.
Each realm still hangs from branch and bough,
But all their weight is breaking now.

[Pre-Chorus]
I bend above the god-road’s span,
I hear the prayer of beast and man.
Their palms press hard against my hide;
They do not feel the fire inside.

[Chorus]
My roots beneath the snow burn red,
Through halls of gods and fields of dead.
The frost above lies smooth and slow;
No eye can see how deep flames go.
Hold to my bark while cold winds blow—
There is fire in the roots beneath the snow.

[Instrumental Break]
[Cellos and low guitars follow the five-beat pulse while bowed wood groans between phrases.]

[Bridge]
I cannot flee the soil I bind.
I cannot close what fate designed.
If one root breaks, a shoreline drowns;
If one limb falls, it carries towns.
The gods may arm, the wolves may run—
My rings already count the sun.

[Breakdown]
One root for Asgard—split by heat.
One root for Midgard—under feet.
One root where silent Hel-winds flow.
All three burn red beneath the snow.

[Final Chorus]
My roots beneath the snow burn red,
And every branch has heard the dead.
The frost above begins to glow;
At last the watching children know.
Hold to my bark, though down I go—
Carry one seed from beneath the snow.
When gods are ash and no horns blow,
Remember fire once fed the roots below.

[Outro]
My crown still carries moon and rain.
My roots still carry hidden pain.
Before the final branch is torn,
I keep one seed for what is born.