[Intro]
[Male and female voices hum the descending motif over fingerpicked guitar.]

[Verse 1]
I carved your name on the inner shield,
Where flame and rain cannot make it yield.
The painted sun may turn to coal,
But hidden letters guard the whole.
No skald may stand when swords are through;
No hall may keep a song of you.
Still wood remembers every cut,
Though ash may seal the doorway shut.

[Chorus]
Even gods leave echoes when stone forgets their names;
A footstep stays in riverbeds, a hand survives in flames.
Bodies fall to silence, golden halls grow cold,
But what we gave to one another outlives what we could hold.
When the final tongue is quiet and the final story goes,
Even gods leave echoes in the places no one knows.

[Verse 2]
I wore a crown before your line
Had shaped one spear or poured one wine.
Yet crown and godhood weigh the same
When wolves have learned the bearer’s name.
I cannot leave my flesh unscarred;
I cannot keep the rainbow guard.
But every mortal oath I heard
Has changed the meaning of my word.

[Chorus]
Even gods leave echoes when stone forgets their names;
A footstep stays in riverbeds, a hand survives in flames.
Bodies fall to silence, golden halls grow cold,
But what we gave to one another outlives what we could hold.
When the final tongue is quiet and the final story goes,
Even gods leave echoes in the places no one knows.

[Verse 3]
The warrior raised his wooden sun;
The god raised iron, cracked and worn.
One lived for years, one lived for age;
Both walked toward the selfsame stage.
No promise said their side would win;
No rune erased the fear within.
They faced the plain not side by side,
But bound by what they would not hide.

[Bridge]
Memory is not a shield.
It cannot turn the spear.
It cannot cool the burning field
Or call the daylight near.
But erasure is a second death,
A colder, deeper snow.
So speak the names with living breath
Before the last winds blow.

[Choir]
Name the raven.
Name the tree.
Name the oath beside the sea.
Name the hand that chose to stay.
Name the light the wolves took away.

[Final Chorus]
Even gods leave echoes when their temples lose their names;
A footstep stays in riverbeds, an oath survives the flames.
Bodies fall to silence, every bright hall cold,
But what we gave to one another exceeds what we could hold.
When the final tongue is quiet and the final story goes,
Even gods leave echoes under ash and under snow.
Let fate erase the towers and the banners that we chose—
It cannot stop the echo once another heart has known.

[Outro]
They spoke each name without a cheer.
The battlefield was drawing near.
One voice was mortal, one divine.
Both entered darkness on the line.