Epigraph

Brothers shall fight | and fell each other,

And sisters' sons | shall kinship stain;

Hard is it on earth, | with mighty whoredom;

Axe-time, sword-time, | shields are sundered,

Wind-time, wolf-time, | ere the world falls;

Nor ever shall men | each other spare.

—The Poetic Edda, Völuspá, Prophecy of the Seeress

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