28
" It had happened to me once, long ago. I had been named Osbert by my father, who was called Uhtred, but when my elder brother, also Uhtred, was slaughtered by the Danes my father had renamed me. It is always thus in our family. The eldest son carries on the name. My stepmother, a foolish woman, even had me baptized a second time because, she said, the angels who guard the gates of heaven would not know me by my new name, and so I was dipped in the water barrel, but Christianity washed off me, thank Christ, and I discovered the old gods and have worshiped them ever since. "
― Bernard Cornwell , The Pagan Lord (The Saxon Stories, #7)
31
" So Urðr, Verðandi and Skuld would decide our fate. They are not kindly women, indeed they are monstrous and malevolent hags, and Skuld’s shears are sharp. When those blades cut, they cause tears that feed the well of Urðr that lies beside the world tree, and the well gives the water that keeps Yggdrasil alive, and if Yggdrasil dies, then the world dies, and so the well must be kept filled, and for that there must be tears. We cry so that the world can live. "
― Bernard Cornwell , The Pagan Lord (The Saxon Stories, #7)