hadn’t stood on end.
“Ha, ha! Tough luck! I win! You lose!” called out Brimir triumphantly.
Hulda’s cheeks burned red. “Hair doesn’t count.”
“Ha, ha! Sure it does. Sour grapes!”
“I wished I could get much higher than you,” shouted Hulda.
But Hulda had forgotten that she had an amazingly beautiful wishing stone. As soon as she had spoken the stone changed into an ordinary gray pebble and Hulda shot far up into the sky. Brimir managed to grab hold of her belt as they zoomed even higher at a tremendous speed.
“Cheater! I won, I’m the best!” cried Brimir.
“No, let me go! I won!”
Brimir bit Hulda’s foot hard and she tore out a large chunk of his hair. And that’s how they fought in the sky, propelled by the power of the wishing stone, higher and higher.
“Traitor!” shouted Brimir. “You destroyed the wishing stone.”
“Idiot! I could make any wish I wanted.”
Brimir and Hulda were now dangerously high in the sky. If a gust of wind hadn’t blown them sideways they would certainly have flown far out into space and been lost, or made a hole in the ozone layer and been burned by the sun. The gust of wind blew them a very long way. They were blown over the high mountains and the narrow gorges, and finally far out to sea. But Brimir and Hulda did not see any of this because they were quarreling and squabbling, screaming and scratching, punching and pummelling. It was not until much later that they looked down and noticed that they couldn’t see the island anymore. Below them was nothing but an endless ocean with whales and sharks, and in the distance a glint of unknown mountains, valleys, and clouds.
“Now see what you’ve done,” cried Brimir. “We’ve been blown off into the blue.”
“Blue? Where is this blue anyhow?”
“Oh, shut up, Hulda!”
“Oh, shut up yourself, Brimir, you jerk,” said Hulda. “You just had to go and grab me.”
“And I had to go and give you the wishing stone.”
The children became silent as they were blown even further along. They were blown so far from the nailed sun that it became a red spot above the ocean in the west.
“Look!” said Brimir suddenly.
“What,” said Hulda irritably.
“The sun is setting.”
“So what.”
“I’d forgotten how beautiful the sunset is,” said Brimir.
Hulda said nothing, but Brimir noticed how she watched the sun set, how it was reflected in her eyes. The power of the butterfly powder only works in sunlight, however, and they had now been blown over to the other side of the planet. It was pitch-black there because the sun could only shine on one side of the planet at a time. Underneath the darkness lay a land with forests and lakes.
“Oh, no! We’re falling!” shouted Brimir.
“Oh, I don’t want to die,” wailed Hulda.
They were falling fast. The wind whistled through their hair. The land approached with growing speed. They were now lower than the eager eagle, lower than the soaring swans, lower than the gliding gannets. They were now so low that they landed on the ground with a crash.
Wind-cold Wolf-trees
In a dark forest a weak sound could be heard from under the bushes.
“Hulda! Hulda! Are you all right?” Brimir felt his way with his hands. “Hulda, where are you?”
“I’m here, Brimir.”
Her voice echoed in the gloom. When his eyes had gotten used to the darkness he could see where Hulda was hanging from a tree.
“Shall I help you down?” asked Brimir.
“I can manage by myself. Leave me alone!”
A great cracking sound could be heard as Hulda tumbled from the tree. Brimir hovered anxiously over her.
“Are you okay?”
“Leave me alone. It was the easiest way to get down.”
Brimir was silent, but he saw that Hulda had hurt herself. They were in a forest, but the trees were bare and leafless. The wind whistled through the naked branches. The sky was full of clouds.
“What shall we do?” asked Brimir. “We’re lost.”
“We? Are you going to