by Terry Jones
So Sven the Strong leapt to its side, and grabbed it by the collar and read the name there and then called out, ‘Al-Kwasarmi! O, Magician! Call your dog home!’ and with that the spell-hound turned a somersault where it crouched, and then another, and soon it was spinning like a Catherine Wheel. And then it rolled along the deck and off across the waves and disappeared over the most distant horizon.
Erik picked himself up and the others crowded round him. But no sooner was he on his feet than they heard the most terrible roaring sound that any of them had ever heard and Erik turned to Sven and said, ‘You have saved my life, but I fear it is too late … for by that roaring it sounds to me as if we have already reached the Edge of the World …’
AT THE EDGE OF THE WORLD
1. THE ARRiVAL
AS SOON AS ERIK had said these words, they all turned and saw a blackness in the sky, and all the time the roaring got louder and louder. And the sea started running faster and faster, until it was running like some vast river towards the edge of an unimaginable waterfall.
‘To the oars!’ cried Erik, and his men seized their oars and rowed with all their might, but it made not a scrap of difference.
‘We shall be swept over the edge without any doubt!’ thought each man to himself.
Then Ragnar Forkbeard shouted out to Thorkhild, ‘Thorkhild! What lies beyond the Edge of the World?’ But Thorkhild just bent his head to his oar and shrugged. So Ragnar Forkbeard called out to Erik, ‘Erik! What lies beyond the Edge of the World?’ But Erik just bent his head to his oar and shrugged. Then Ragnar Forkbeard turned to the rest and yelled above the roaring of the waters, ‘Does anyone know what lies beyond the Edge of the World?’ But they all just bent their heads to their oars and shrugged. Then Ragnar Forkbeard yelled out with all his strength, for the roaring of the waters was growing louder every second, ‘Then why are we so afraid? Since we don’t know what there is to be afraid of!’
At this Thorkhild turned to Ragnar Forkbeard and said, ‘That is often the very thing that people are most afraid of, Ragnar Forkbeard.’ And he too put his head down and rowed. But Ragnar Forkbeard cried out, ‘Throw me that rope!’
‘What use will that be?’ said Sven the Strong, and would not move from his oar.
So Ragnar Forkbeard leapt across the ship and seized the rope himself.
‘What are you doing, Ragnar Forkbeard’ cried Erik. ‘We need everyone to bend his back to his oar!’ But Ragnar Forkbeard did not reply … he tied a loop in the rope, and threw it strong and true so that it landed round a rock that was sticking up in the sea like a dragon’s tooth. And immediately the rope went taut and the ship stopped, while the waters swirled past towards the Edge of the World.
When everyone realised what had happened, they put up their oars and hung their heads, and Erik said, ‘Look at us! We were all so filled with the fear of the unknown that we did not look for ourselves, and we did not see that rock that sticks up out of the sea like a dragon’s tooth. Ragnar Forkbeard alone kept his head!’
‘But we are not saved yet!’ replied Ragnar Forkbeard. ‘We cannot stay here tied to this rock for the rest of our lives!’
‘What shall we do?’ cried the rest of Erik’s men, while the sea hurtled past the boat, tearing and buffeting the wooden vessel.
‘We will do the only thing we can,’ replied Erik. ‘We shall pay a visit to the Edge of the World!’
2. THE WATERFALL OF SEAS
WHEN ERIK SAID THIS, his men looked at each other in disbelief. ‘Has our leader gone mad?’ they asked. But Erik spoke again, ‘Since we cannot row against the sea, let us go wherever it takes us.’ But some of his men fell on their knees and begged him to let them stay where they were. ‘Who knows?’ they said, ‘somebody may rescue us before we die …’
‘No,’ said Erik, ‘I will not stay here, tied to this rock that sticks up out of the sea like a dragon’s tooth, a moment longer! Besides, I’d like to see the Edge of the World so I can tell my wife about it when I get home.’ And some of his men fell on their faces, they were so terrified. ‘Put us out on the rock that sticks out of the sea like a dragon’s tooth,’ they cried. ‘We would rather take our chance there – such as it is – than go to the Edge of the World!’
But Erik only laughed out loud. ‘Don’t worry!’ he said, ‘You can shiver where you are on your own benches, for I plan to take a look at the Edge of the World alone and then return to tell you all about it.’
So saying he launched the small rowing boat, fastening its stern to the prow of Golden Dragon by a long, long rope. Then he jumped in and turned to wave goodbye, but as he did so, Sven the Strong jumped down beside him.
‘I cannot let you go all alone to see such a wonderful sight as the Edge of the World! I’ll come with you and be your witness!’ said Sven the Strong. And so the sea carried the little boat with Erik and Sven the Strong towards the Edge of the World.
‘Take care the rope doesn’t break!’ shouted Thorkhild. But they could not hear a word, for the roaring of the water and the rushing of the sea was so loud in their ears.
The ocean current pulled the boat this way and that way, and Sven sat in front, peering through the spray, while Erik slowly paid out the rope that held them back.
‘The spray and the mist are so thick,’ called out Sven the Strong, ‘that I shall not be able to tell when we reach the Edge of the World!’ But Erik kept on paying out the line, and the roaring got louder and louder, and the little boat pulled at its rope harder and harder … and they knew they must be getting closer and closer to the Edge of the World.
Then suddenly they came through the spray and the mist, and the most amazing sight greeted their eyes. There was the sea stretching out on either side of them, but suddenly plunging vertically downwards, like a vast waterfall that stretched from one horizon to the other.
In front of them the sky stretched on down and down below them until it merged into blackness, and there they saw stars at their feet, and below the stars nothing but a blackness that never ended. Erik payed out a little more rope and the little boat strained against the headlong waters, and inched its nose over the edge. Sven the Strong leaned over the prow and peered down.
‘What do you see?’ cried Erik. But Sven the Strong did not reply. He pulled himself back into the boat and turned to Erik and he was as white as a sheet.
‘Hold the rope!’ shouted Erik, ‘I want to see for myself.’ But Sven the Strong stopped him.
‘Don’t,’ he said, ‘what good can it do?’
‘But I must look – now we’ve come so far!’ shouted Erik above the thundering waters.
‘When I looked over, I felt my strength draining away from me,’ replied Sven the Strong. ‘It was being sucked down over that fearful edge as fast as these waters plunge into the dark.’
‘Take the rope!’ cried Erik. ‘I must look for myself.’ And he thrust the rope into Sven’s hands and leaned over the prow and peered down over the Edge of the World. There was the void. Nothing but blackness below them, and oceans plunging straight down into it – until they were lost to sight. And just as Sven had said, Erik too felt his strength draining away, tumbling with the pell-mell sea into the abyss. Erik’s heart began to pound and his mind began to reel. ‘Nothing,’ he thought, ‘could be so immense, so deep and so empty!’
Just then Sven the Strong gave a cry, ‘My strength has gone!’ he shouted, ‘I cannot hold on!’ And as he said the words, the rope slipped through his hands and the little rowing boat with the two men in it shot out into the black abyss, thrown by the force of the water. Erik gripped the sides with all his might, and Sven clung on for dear life, but the oars flew up and then plummeted down, down, slowly down into the blackness below and were gone forever. And Erik watched them … fascinated … as if he were more concerned for their fate than for his own.
But at that moment the boat itself began to fall, and the two men clung on desperately. Then, with a wrench, it reached the end of the rope that Erik had tied to the stern. And his
knot held and the sternpost creaked, but that too held. And the rope tore and many strands broke loose and ravelled up under the strain, but that too held and the boat fell back and dangled there over the abyss, with the wall of falling ocean crashing down upon it and the two men, scarcely able to breathe, unable to see and almost battered senseless.
Then quite suddenly all went quiet. Erik shook the water from his face, and opened his eyes. It was dark, and yet behind him the wall of water continued to fall. Then gently he nudged Sven the Strong and said, ‘See what has happened to us!’
‘Where are we?’ cried Sven.
‘Don’t you see what’s happened?’ cried Erik. ‘We’ve gone right through the Waterfall of Seas and have come out the other side. We are under the lip of the Edge of the World!’
By this time their eyes were becoming accustomed to the dark, and they could see that they were in a cave that ran like a tunnel in both directions as far as they could see, with the falling water making one wall.
‘Look!’ said Erik to Sven the Strong. ‘Do you see what I see?’
And Sven the Strong looked.
‘Do you see? There inside is a pool!’ cried Erik. And Sven looked and looked and then he too could see that the cavern opened up behind them, and there within it was a great lake.
‘Now!’ said Erik, ‘we have our way before us!’
‘I don’t understand,’ replied Sven the Strong.
‘I mean,’ said Erik, ‘that we must set Golden Dragon afloat upon that lake. For since we can go neither backwards nor forwards in the world above, we shall explore the underworld here. Who knows what we may find? Or where this water will lead us?’
Sven the Strong went silent for a moment. Then he closed his eyes and shook his head, and said, ‘We can’t!’
‘We can’t do anything else!’ replied Erik.
‘But how can we get back to Golden Dragon?’ asked Sven the Strong.
‘We must climb back up the rope over the Edge of the World,’ said Erik.
3. THE DRAGON’S TOOTH
SVEN THE STRONG felt sick in the pit of his stomach, for he dreaded to look again into the black abyss that lay beyond the Edge of the World, but he said to Erik, ‘Let me try first.’ And without more words, he took hold of the rope that still ran from the rowing boat back up through the Waterfall of Seas to Golden Dragon. But Erik pulled him back. Then he tied another line around Sven’s waist and held the other end himself.
‘Good luck, Sven,’ said Erik.
So Sven the Strong began to climb the ravelling rope back up over the Edge of the World.
But once he was back in the pounding waterfall, he could not see and he could not breathe, and the weight of the water falling upon him was more than any man could bear, and his hands began to slip, and his lungs filled with water so that he could not even shout as suddenly he fell back down, and Erik only just saw his body hurtle past in the deluge, and only just had time to brace himself before the rope went taut, and he too felt the force of the Waterfall of Seas dragging him down.
Erik got a foothold behind a ledge of rock and pulled and strained with all his might, until at last he pulled the limp body of Sven the Strong out of the pitching water. At first he thought his comrade was dead, but shortly Sven moaned and stirred, and opened his eyes.
‘If you could not climb up through the Waterfall of Seas and back over the Edge of the World,’ said Erik, ‘no man could.’
‘Then we shall never see our comrades nor Golden Dragon again,’ said Sven, and he put his head in his hands.
But Erik said ‘Ssh!’ and he stood with his head on one side. ‘Do you hear what I hear?’
Sven the Strong joined him and he too listened.
‘What do you hear?’ whispered Erik.
‘Nothing,’ said Sven, ‘except the breaking of the waves far far away.’
‘But that’s it!’ cried Erik. ‘There are no waves down here!’ And at that moment he stopped in his tracks and pointed up at the roof of the cavern. And when Sven the Strong looked he saw a narrow shaft going straight up through the solid rock and at the very top, a pin-prick of light, and down the shaft came the distant sound of waves breaking on a rock.
Then Sven the Strong lifted Erik to the cave’s roof, and Erik put his back up against one side of the shaft and his feet against the other, and in this way began to climb the narrow shaft towards the pin-prick of light.
As he got higher and higher, he did not dare to look below, for the shaft went straight down, and if he slipped he would surely be dashed to pieces on the rocks below. But he kept his eyes fixed on that point of light above him, which was getting bigger all the time. The shaft was smooth and straight and had neither foothold nor handhold, and once his foot slipped, and once he thought he was too exhausted and weak to carry on, but eventually he placed his hand into the hole of light, and pulled himself out into the day.
And then he could hardly believe his eyes, for he found himself gazing out from the very pinnacle of the very rock that stuck out of the sea like a dragon’s tooth, to which Ragnar Forkbeard had tied their ship. And there was Golden Dragon herself, still pulling on the rope that secured her.
‘Of course!’ cried Erik. ‘A dragon’s tooth is sharp and long but it is also always hollow! This rock is indeed a true dragon’s tooth!’
Then he waved to his men and they could scarcely believe their eyes, but they wasted no time before they got him back on board, and Erik wasted no time before he told them what he and Sven the Strong had discovered.
‘But how are we to get Golden Dragon onto that lake beneath the sea?’ asked Ragnar Forkbeard.
‘The same way that Sven the Strong and I got there,’ replied Erik. ‘We must take Golden Dragon herself over the Edge of the World and through the Waterfall of Seas!’
As soon as Erik had said this, a great debate broke out. Some said it was impossible, while some said it was madness. Some said it might work while some said it wouldn’t, but at length Erik called them all to be quiet.
‘We have no choice!’ he said, and he began to organise the fearful task, securing both prow and stern of Golden Dragon to the rock with all the rope they had. Then they laid the mast along her and threw the sail over it like a tent. ‘That may keep some of the water out,’ said Erik, ‘for if Golden Dragon were to fill up with water, I doubt whether these ropes could support her weight.’
Then, with many a fearful prayer to the gods of sea and boats and men, they began to pay out the ropes that held Golden Dragon to the rock.
‘But remember!’ Erik shouted, above the roaring waters, ‘Do not look into the abyss! We shall need all our strength to hold onto our ship!’
And so Erik and his men let their ship Golden Dragon be dragged through the mist and spray until they came out of it and hung there on the Edge of the World. And the waters raged and pulled at their ship, and the timbers creaked and the ropes sighed, and the men hung onto them with all their might.
‘We must look over the Edge of the World,’ they murmured one to the other. ‘It would be a crime to come so far and not to see such a wonderful thing …’ But even as they murmured they heard Erik’s voice: ‘Let go of the ropes!’ And at his command Golden Dragon shot out from the Edge of the World, hurled by the force of the waters, and seemed to hang in mid-air over the great abyss, before the ropes went taut and the ship went crashing back into the wall of falling water. And there was not one man amongst them, who then had time to so much as think of looking over the side and down into the abyss.
As the ship hit the wall of water, there was a dreadful crack, which they all heard even above the deafening roar, and they all knew what it meant … one rope had snapped. Golden Dragon lurched and the men were hurled to one end as the water ripped under the covering sail and smashed through the boat, sending oars, and shields and provisions flying. And for a moment Golden Dragon seemed to dangle there in the full force of the deluge, and the men clung on for dear life, knowing neither where they were nor
what was happening. And then suddenly the ship swung again, as if kicked by the water, and they were in darkness, and the noise abated. And they opened their eyes, and found they were lying on their side in the caverns beneath the Edge of the World, with Sven the Strong laughing at their frightened faces …
THE SECRET LAKE
1. THE FOURTEENTH ORB
WHEN THEY HAD RECOVERED from their desperate plunge through the Waterfall of Seas, Erik and his men dragged their ship, Golden Dragon, through the cavern beneath the Edge of the World, to the Secret Lake that Erik and Sven the Strong had discovered. They lit the few torches that they had managed to keep dry, and set off to explore that nether world of darkness and echoes.
Erik and his men shivered, as their ship slid on under a sky of stone. And the splashing of their oars was echoed in a thousand caves and passages and came back like laughter.
All at once, they saw a light glowing in the water beneath them – deep in the lake.
‘What can it be?’ they wondered, as the light grew bigger and brighter, until the whole of the Secret Lake was shining with it. And then they gasped in amazement, for by the brightness of that light they could now see the roof of the cavern above them was not just bare rock, but was covered in wonderful patterns of blue and gold and silver.
Then Ragnar Forkbeard shouted out, ‘Look!’ And they all looked into the bright lake and saw a dark shape rising up from the depths. ‘Is it some terrible monster of the deep?’ asked Erik’s men one to the other.
But before they had time to be afraid, the thing had bobbed up onto the surface, and they could see it was not a monster of the deep. It was like a huge orange. And it sat there floating on the water.
Erik and his men rowed right round it, but they could make nothing of it. It was simply a perfectly smooth orange ball, twice as high as the mainmast of Golden Dragon.