She stood at the precipice read to jump and yet, she hesitated.
The view up there was stunning. She took a breath of icy wind, tinged with eternal green and mystic blue. As a final look at life she couldn’t asked for anything more. She pulled her fur wrap closer around her shoulders as she dug her bare feet into the stone and peered down the thousand foot drop.
Her clan was suffering. Gefjun seemed to have abandoned them. For the past 5 seasons their crops had failed, their flocks had been killed by roaming dogs, and their cattle had mostly starved to death. Something had to be done.
So she did something about it. She volunteered to sacrifice herself to Gefjun.
After the initial shock, her clan had many suggestions on the best way to go about it. One of her uncles suggested being tied to a plough horse and being drug through the fields. Her favorite aunt suggested a traditional blood sacrifice. She had another idea.
She decided to climb to the highest place she could find. She wanted to be close to all of the elements: earth, wind, fire and water, by climbing up high she could be sure that the solitude would bring her close to all of them.
It took a heartbeat of time to turn her cloak into tinder and to light it with her flint. Her toes curled on the edge.
Then she jumped.