Fire and Ice

Before earth or sky there is only a world of ice, a world of fire, and the yawning gap between them. Where heat meets frost, the melting drops come alive as Ymir, the first giant, fed by the cow Audhumla — whose salt-licking uncovers Buri, grandfather of the gods. Odin and his brothers kill Ymir and build the world from his body: flesh into earth, blood into sea, skull into sky. From two driftwood trees they make the first humans, Ask and Embla, and wall their world of Midgard against the giants who remember.