Two birch trees bent to the earth They tied his limbs to the wood Released the trunks to the sky And tore my world where I stood
Verse 1
slow, heavy doom metal riff enters, crawling and ominous
The Drevlians sent their best men Sailing in on a boastful tide Said, "Your Prince Igor is dead, Now become our Prince Mal's bride."
I smiled and I bowed my head I told them their honor was deep I promised a feast for their grace And gave them a bed for their sleep.
Pre-Chorus
tempo quickens slightly, drums start a militant march
You think a widow is weak You think a mother just weeps But my grief is an open trench And it's twenty meters deep.
EXPLOSION - tempo shifts instantly to 180 bpm, blast beats, blackened death metal shrieks
Chorus
overlapping guttural roars and soaring cleans
FOUR FOLDS OF VENGEANCE! First in the earth, buried alive in your pride! You came for a crown, Now the dirt is your only bride! You tore him apart! Now I'll tear down your line! FOUR FOLDS OF VENGEANCE! The mourning is yours, the fury is mine!
Verse 2
relentless, driving double-kick drums
You sent your nobility next The greatest men of your lands I offered a bath for their dust And locked the doors with my hands. I listened to the wood catch fire I listened to the desperate pleas I watched the bathhouse burn to ash And felt my heart finally freeze.
Pre-Chorus
driving rhythm
You wrote to me of your power In your arrogant Drevlian texts But you drank the mead from my cup While I sharpened the Kyivan axe.
Chorus
even more aggressive
FOUR FOLDS OF VENGEANCE! Third in the blood, five thousand dead at the feast! You drank to my husband's ghost And woke up the Kyivan beast! You tore him apart! Now I'll tear down your line! FOUR FOLDS OF VENGEANCE! The slaughter is yours, the victory mine!
Bridge
sudden drop to dead silence. A single, slow war drum. Spoken word, icy and completely devoid of emotion
A year of siege. Your city of Iskorosten starves. You beg for mercy. You ask for my terms. I ask only for a token of peace. Three pigeons. Three sparrows. From every house in your city. A small tax. You gave them to me so willingly. You thought you had survived the widow.
Build - acoustic instruments return, twisted and dissonant. Whispered vocals layer over each other
Tie the sulfur to their feet. Light the embers in the dark. Let the birds fly home to their nests. Let the thatch catch the spark.
EXPLOSION - maximum sonic chaos, wall of sound
Final Chorus
absolute blackened fury
FOUR FOLDS OF VENGEANCE! Fourth in the ash, Iskorosten burns to the ground! Every roof, every home, every street Not a single survivor found! You wanted my kingdom? I'll give you a grave in the dirt! FOUR FOLDS OF VENGEANCE! Now everyone knows how it hurts!
Outro
tempo halves to a crushing, slow doom metal crawl
Centuries later they'll pray to me Paint a halo of gold on my head Call me Equal-to-the-Apostles A Saint for the words that I said.
But before I found your God Before the holy water rained...
Final line - acapella, cold and spoken
I was the fire in the birds. I was the fury unchained.
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The history
945–946 AD · Kiev and Iskorosten (modern Korosten, Ukraine)
Source: Russian Primary Chronicle, entries for 945–946.
Named figures
Olga of KievPrincess regent of Kievan Rus’ for her three-year-old son Sviatoslav; widow of Igor
The Drevlian envoysTwo successive marriage delegations from Prince Mal, both killed; subjects of the first two folds of vengeance
Mal of the DrevliansDrevlian prince who hoped to marry Olga and absorb the Kievan succession
What this song renders
After Igor’s death, Mal of the Drevlians sent envoys proposing that Olga marry him — a politically reasonable bid to legitimise his control over the Kievan inheritance. According to the Primary Chronicle, Olga received the first delegation with apparent honour, had them carried in their boat to a great pit she had dug, and ordered them buried alive. She invited a second, more distinguished delegation, asked them to bathe before the audience, and burned the bathhouse with them inside.
The third stage was the funeral feast. Olga went to Drevlian territory in apparent reconciliation, held a great memorial banquet for Igor, got the Drevlians thoroughly drunk, and ordered her retinue to kill them. The Primary Chronicle says five thousand Drevlian nobles died.
The fourth stage is the famous sparrows-and-sulphur scene at Iskorosten. Olga besieged the city, accepted a token tribute of three sparrows and three pigeons per household, tied burning sulphur to each bird, and released them. The birds returned to their nests under the eaves and burned the city to the ground. The fourth stage is the most folkloric of the four; it appears nowhere outside the Primary Chronicle tradition.
Verdict
The campaign of revenge is documented; it ended Drevlian independence and consolidated Olga’s position. The four specific stages are from the Primary Chronicle, which is itself a twelfth-century compilation of earlier oral tradition. Treat the methods as folklore and the political outcome as historical.