[Intro][A stone rolls in a wooden bowl while frame drums mark a slow twelve-beat circle.]

[Verse 1: Móði, Höðr and Váli, male dramatic ensemble]
[Móði, rough male tenor]
The pouch lies open; the blind man is gone.
Your footprints lead from the tree at dawn.
What did you loose from the tree?
[Höðr, dark male baritone]
I freed nothing. Search my sleeve.
I took no piece. Believe or disbelieve.
[Váli, firm male baritone]
Let each man speak before stones decide.
[Narrator, low male baritone]
One smooth grey weight passed from side to side.

[Refrain: Male ensemble, ritual unison]
The Law of the First Stone
Makes every hand a throne.
The first one cast may carry a name;
The second is easier, the third is a game.
Before a new people has shelter or home,
It learns who may throw the first stone.

[Verse 2: Móði and Balder, male confrontation]
[Móði, rough male tenor]
Deceived or not, he released the dart.
A dangerous hand keeps a dangerous heart.
[Balder, warm male tenor]
Do not turn my pain into a gate
That welcomes old punishment, calling it fate.
I own what I suffered; it is not your blade.
No law grows clean by the woond that it trades.
[Narrator, low male baritone]
The stone crossed one palm, then halted there;
Dust held its breath in the open square.

[Refrain: Male ensemble, ritual unison]
The Law of the First Stone
Makes every hand a throne.
The first one cast may carry a name;
The second is easier, the third is a game.
Before a new people has shelter or home,
It learns who may throw the first stone.

[Instrumental Break][Tagelharpa circles a two-note figure as stones pass from hand to hand.]

[Verse 3: Narrator and Odin Root Voice]
Vah-lee held judgement as once he held fate,
Born for revenge before learning to wait.
He saw the pyre and blood on the snow,
How quickly an answer becomes all we know.
Vee-tharr stood still with Odin's old calm;
The root voice pulsed through the scar in his palm.
[Odin Root Voice, deep distorted male bass]
Order begins when the guilty are known.
[Narrator]
The whisper grew heavy inside the stone.

[Bridge: Höðr, dark male baritone]
Will Balder sleep better? Will Loki return?
Will one blade grow greener if I burn?
Punish me only if punishment mends,
Not because hunger for blame never ends.

[Breakdown: Balder and male ensemble, sparse]
[Balder, warm male tenor]
No one throws first.
[Male ensemble]
No guilt disappears.
The stone stays a stone.
The circle stays here.

[Final Refrain: Male ensemble, solemn unison]
The Law of the First Stone
Was written, then left alone.
The first one spared did not wash away blame,
But mercy made harder the rules of the game.
Before the new people had shelter or home,
They refused to throw the first stone.

[Outro: Odin Root Voice, distant whisper]
Under the root,
Under the loam,
A father still asks
For the first stone.
