18
Dvalinn gasped for air. The fall had knocked the wind out of him. After regaining his breath, he got up and took his bearings.
He was on solid ground, on shore.
Erlandr ran past him toward the water, which was beating and frothing as it surged onto land. Dvalinn rubbed his head, which was beating, too. Or was it his heart that was beating and his mouth that was frothing? He had no time to arrive at the answer because reality provided it for him. He buckled over and vomited a mixture of ale and saltwater.
When he refocused, he saw the boat nearby—or, more precisely, its skeletal remains, which had been discarded by the sea.
He walked forward.
Erlandr was pulling Drudge out of the water. Kaspar and Agata were wading up to their shoulders in it, disappearing and reappearing under the weight of the incoming waves, salvaging whatever supplies they could.
Dvalinn helped Erlandr pull Drudge to safety. When he was on his back they took turns pounding on his chest with their fists until he coughed out the sea and opened his eyes.
Kaspar and Agata gathered around them.
"We grabbed what we could, but there wasn't much left," Agata said.
"Good," Dvalinn said. He probably sounded absent because he was still coming to his senses, but that was hardly surprising. The fall had knocked him hard. It must have been a great gust of wind that had sent them hurtling into the rocks jutting out of the sea. He concentrated on the most important facts. The boat was badly damaged but they were all safe. Most importantly, they had arrived.
"So," Drudge said, sitting up and rubbing his reddened eyes, "this is the new world. This is Vinland."
"I don't see any vines," said Kaspar.
Dvalinn didn't see any vines, either. In fact, his first impression of this land was not something that he'd seen at all but something that he felt. Ever since regaining consciousness on the shore, he'd felt overwhelmed by the immensity of the surroundings he couldn't see but that he knew were there. The new world, as Drudge had called, was big, bigger than Iceland, bigger than Greenland, and bigger even than the western mainland. Here, even Dvalinn felt small.
But it was something altogether different that kept gnawing at him, something that he had seen. Immediately after opening his eyes, he'd craned his neck to the left and—where now was but a scattering of boulders cushioned by the dark, sandy ground—he'd seen a figure: a figure the size of a child, dressed in purple, with green skin. And he would have discounted the sighting as a result of his confused state were it not for Erlandr, whose eyes now met his and in whose retinas he could still see, emblazoned, the same green-skinned little man.