Monsters of Norse Mythology
Page 6
Now, indeed, the gnomes gaped in amazement, watching him drive a hole into a boulder-sized lump of iron and insert a shaft of wood that seemed as long as a mast. Wielding this enormous sledge, he seemed to the dwarfs like Thor descended, swinging his divine hammer.
Siegfried laid his blade on the anvil and beat it smooth. Using a pair of iron tongs, he lifted the blade off the anvil and held it in the fire until it glowed red-hot—kept holding it there until it turned into a bolt of quivering white fire. Then he plunged the white-hot blade into a bucket of melted snow. Steam hissed from the bucket, a great gout of steam, filling the chamber, and drifting out through crannies of rock, frightening folk in the valley below who thought that the old dead volcano was about to erupt.
The blade was star-blue again when Siegfried drew it out of the bucket. The lad respected the skill of the Smith Dwarfs and had done everything according to their instructions. Only now in the last instance did he reject their advice. For after they had pronounced the blade well-tempered and ready to be fitted with a hilt and receive its final exquisite honing, Siegfried surprised them by refusing to let the iron, bowl-shaped hilt be filigreed with silver, as they wished, or coated in gold leaf. He demanded that it be covered with melted lead. They argued with him, pointing out that a lead-covered hilt would be heavy, awkward, throwing off the entire balance of the sword.
He listened, smiling, but insisted on his own way. He himself regretted the balance of the sword being flawed by its leaden hilt, but he thought he had a good reason for doing as he had done.
For he had watched the smiths melting lead in small iron ladles as they made molds for gold work, and had studied the way the heavy metal turned to liquid, how it ran and spread. Watching it, he had felt an idea quicken. He had turned the idea over and over, examining it on all sides, then decided that the hilt be coated with lead.
By the time he left the smithy, all the dwarfs loved him. They made him promise to return for a week each year and swing his great mallet and make the mountain rumble.
The cave that held the stolen hoard opened onto a cliff overhanging a gray elbow of North Sea. Whales sounded here. Seals swarmed the beaches. Migrating reindeer passed. Wolves hunted the reindeer. South-ranging polar bears hunted the seals and walrus. Fafnir hunted them all.
Only nine days had passed since the night of the Hunters’ Moon, and yellow leaves still hung on the trees. But snow was deepening on the slopes. Clad in the pelt of a white wolf so that he might not be visible against the snow, Siegfried prowled about the treasure cave, studying Fafnir’s habits.
After shuffling many ideas and discarding them, Siegfried finally came up with a plan. “I don’t really like it,” he said to himself. “It offers one chance in a thousand, maybe less. But I can’t seem to think of anything better.”
He had observed that Fafnir left the cave in the early afternoon and went down to the sea to hunt. On his way down, he flew through a narrow pass between two peaks. It was Siegfried’s plan to conceal himself halfway down the slope on a ledge that jutted from the mountain, and when the dragon passed over him, to leap up, stabbing his sword upward, to pierce a spot under the jawbone where a great artery pulsed.
“It’s a very vulnerable spot in humans,” Siegfried said to himself. “You can fell the biggest, strongest man by pressing there with your thumb. But I’m not at all sure that it’s a practical way to approach a dragon. Oh well, if it doesn’t work I’ll be meeting my father soon. Or will I? They say that dead heroes dine in Odin’s hall, so he’ll be there all right. He was a genuine hero—had a string of victories before he was put out of action. But I wonder whether being killed by a dragon will qualify me for Valhalla. Death by dragon is a decent way to go, of course, but a lifetime record of no victories and one defeat isn’t too impressive. Enough of this. If I have only one chance in a thousand, that makes it a rare chance, doesn’t it? So let me take it in good heart.”
And, seeing the shadow of wings print themselves on the snow, he crouched, preparing to leap.
But the dragon, spotting movement on the ledge, spat a bit of fire, just enough to melt the snow and start a cascade of water tumbling down the mountain. Whatever he had seen, thought Fafnir, would be killed by the fall, and he could examine it when he landed.
Siegfried felt himself caught in the cascade, hurtling down. His boyhood in the Rhine, however, had taught him to ride an icy waterfall like a spawning salmon. He landed unhurt on the beach, and, seeing Fafnir drop toward him, dived into the sea and sped. away.
Having seen how fast Siegfried could swim, Fafnir did not follow him into the water, but hovered on great leathery wings, spitting fire until he saw the water beginning to steam. Siegfried, feeling the heat, dived deep, then lanced down, down.… The water was very cold at this depth but he felt it warming and knew that the dragon was still skimming the surface, blowing flame.
Indeed, Fafnir was hovering over the spot where he had last seen Siegfried. He dipped down and blew another puff of flame, and watched the water boil. Fish bobbed to the surface and floated belly-up. Fafnir kept spitting fire, thinking, “I’ll boil ’em all, including that pesky little would-be hero. I’ll turn this whole damned bay into a chowder and lap it up at my leisure.”
Siegfried, inching along the sea bottom, felt the frigid depths heating up. “I’ll have to surface,” he thought, “and let him catch me, or he’ll kill every living thing in here and stink up the whole Northland. Well, if he swallows me he swallows my sword, and that may give him a monster bellyache.”
And he began to swim up toward the surface. But he felt the water sway as a huge darkness passed him, and saw that a whale, made uneasy by the warming water, was preparing to broach. Swimming as fast as he could, Siegfried cut through the murk, reached the whale, and scrambled up its slippery side. He perched on its head as it ploughed toward the surface.
The whale broached. Siegfried clung desperately as it rose in the air and arched, falling toward the water again. He slid along its head until he was lying over the blowhole. The whale splashed down, bobbed up, and spouted. It shot out a jet of water with terrific force. Siegfried rode the spouting column, up, up—and saw the dragon rising after him, jaws wide, ready to catch him as he fell and swallow him whole.
The lad drew his sword, turned in the air, and fell toward the gaping jaws. He cocked his arm and hurled his sword hiltfirst; he saw it enter Fafnir’s maw.
And now, the fire inside the dragon’s gullet melted the hilt. The hot lead spilled down the monster’s throat and began to scorch its entrails. Screaming with pain, writhing in the air, threshing, Fafnir folded his wings and dropped into the water, trying to quench the agony that flamed in his guts. But the hot lead spread, scorching liver, lungs, intestines …
Siegfried hit the water and swam toward the beach—very fast, for Fafnir followed close. On the beach, the dragon faced Siegfried and slithered toward him. Belching smoke, the beast spat out the sword. Siegfried snatched up the charred blade and flung himself to the sand as Fafnir lashed his spiked tail, trying to crush him where he stood.
Siegfried swung his sword and sheared off the dragon’s tail. Black blood gushed out. The lad leaped aside so that the blood would not splatter him, and swung his sword again. The blade sheared through the armored hide, through fat, muscle, tendons, and thick bone, making the great lizard head seem to leap off its shoulders. But the head, falling, retained enough murderous vitality to snap once more, biting off Siegfried’s hand at the wrist.
Moving faster than thought, using his sword as a wedge, Siegfried forced the dead jaws open and plunged the bleeding stump of his wrist into the fiery gullet. He felt unbelievable pain as the fire seared his raw stump. But he knew that the flame was sealing the arteries, cleaning the wound, and preventing him from bleeding to death. Nevertheless, the agony almost made him swoon. But a sweetness of triumph swept over him, giving him strength enough to bear the pain.
“I’ll go back to the smithy,” he thought, “and have t
he dwarfs make me a new hand, cunningly sinewed with copper wire. They will welcome such a task and do it well. Then I’ll test their work by using the hand to finish what I have to do here.”
Regnir waited impatiently while Siegfried visited the smithy. For the gnome was in debt now to the young hero, and had found that the most agreeable way to pay a debt was to kill the creditor. And, since he had promised Siegfried half his treasure as a reward for meeting the dragon, he could not rest while Siegfried was still alive.
He did not waste time while waiting. He went to his garden and picked certain herbs. Now these herbs could be used as spices or poison according to the way Regnir prepared them and what spells he muttered while grinding and mixing. He brewed a poison that hissed and bubbled and began to eat its way through the thick stone crock. Regnir poured cold cow’s milk in and the poison stopped bubbling, but still frothed about its edges.
“Doesn’t matter,” said Regnir to himself. “It looks creamy this way. He’ll be very hot from the forge fires—and still scorched here and there, no doubt, by dragon-fire—and will gratefully gulp down what I offer. And it will eat big holes in his belly, and he’ll be dead before he can take a second swallow.”
Indeed, as Siegfried approached the bone house he saw Regnir waiting before the door, holding a big stone crock.
“Greetings, young hero!” cried Regnir. “All praise for your great victory!”
“Thank you,” said Siegfried.
“You have come to collect your fee, no doubt,” said Regnir. “But before we talk business let’s have a cool drink together.”
And he offered the crock.
Siegfried did not take it. “Look,” he said, “see my new hand?”
“Very fine,” muttered Regnir. “Splendid piece of work. Here, drink the milk before it gets warm.”
“You drink first,” said Siegfried.
“No, no, no!” cried Regnir. “You’re the guest. You must drink first.”
“But you’re older,” said Siegfried gently. “And worthy of special consideration. And those who raised me taught me absolute courtesy. Drink!”
Regnir drew back his arm, preparing to hurl the poison at Siegfried’s face, knowing that even a spatter would strip flesh from bone. But Siegfried’s new iron hand shot out, gripped Regnir’s neck and squeezed. The gnome’s face bloated, grew purple; his eyes bulged, his mouth opened. Siegfried took the crock from his hand, then, tilting Regnir’s face up, he poured the brew into his mouth—and sprang back as the gnome shriveled, blackened, fell to a mound of fuming dust.
Siegfried did not linger at the bone house. He climbed to the cave and helped himself to the hoard of gold—which he did not keep, but took back to the Rhine and returned to its original hiding place.
The Rhine-maidens began singing when they saw him come. They hadn’t sung a note all the time he was gone. Now they blazed with joy and didn’t want him to waste time with the hoard.
“Don’t put it back,” cried Arla. “Keep it. You won it. It’s yours.”
“No,” said Siegfried. “What care I for this weight of metal? Let’s stuff it back in its hole where it belongs. You are the true Rhine treasure, my golden girls! And I’ve come back to marry you.”
“One at a time or all three?” they chorused.
“Both,” he said.
Screaming with glee, they flung themselves on him and whirled him into a dance. It was Midsummer Eve and a yellow moon hung low. They danced until the sun paled and the stars dwindled and the dawn birds sang. And they were so wrapped in love and pleasure that any thief who might have happened by that night would have been able to steal the gold without any trouble at all.
And Urd and Loki were chuckling as they watched from above. For Siegfried with his courage, his wild innocence, and his carelessness of gain was, without knowing it, plaiting strands in their fatal web.
Thus, despite his joy that Midsummer Eve, Siegfried could not stay with the Rhine-maidens. For he had taken the cursed ring from Regnir and now wore it on his own finger, and felt other perils beckon.
All this happened long ago, long, long ago—before we began to doubt magic and diminish heroes. So long ago that it seems like a fading dream, or one of Loki’s lies trying to come true.
About the Author
Bernard Evslin (1922–1993) was a bestselling and award-winning author known for his works on Greek and other cultural mythologies. The New York Times called him “one of the most widely published authors of classical mythology in the world.” He was born in New Rochelle, New York, and attended Rutgers University. After several years working as a playwright, screenwriter, and documentary producer, he began publishing novels and short stories in the late 1960s. During his long career, Evslin published more than seventy books—over thirty of which were for young adults. His bestseller Heroes, Gods and Monsters of the Greek Myths has been translated into ten different languages and has sold more than ten million copies worldwide. He won the National Education Association Award in 1961, and in 1986 his book Hercules received the Washington Irving Children’s Book Choice Award. Evslin died in Kauai, Hawaii, at the age of seventy-seven.
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
copyright © 1989 by Bernard Evslin
cover design by Olivera, Omar & Andrea Worthington
ISBN: 978-1-4976-6701-3
This edition published in 2011 by Open Road Integrated Media
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BERNARD EVSLIN
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