ruck him
like a blow. But he thrust the Terrible Head into his wallet, and flew
away without looking behind. Then the two Dreadful Sisters who were left
wakened, and rose in the air like great birds; and though they could not
see him because of his Cap of Darkness, they flew after him up the wind,
following by the scent through the clouds, like hounds hunting in a
wood. They came so close that he could hear the clatter of their golden
wings, and their shrieks to each other: "_here, here,_" "_no, there;
this way he went,_" as they chased him. But the Shoes of Swiftness flew
too fast for them, and at last their cries and the rattle of their wings
died away as he crossed the great river that runs round the world.

Now when the horrible creatures were far in the distance, and the boy
found himself on the right side of the river, he flew straight eastward,
trying to seek his own country. But as he looked down from the air he
saw a very strange sight--a beautiful girl chained to a stake at the
high-water mark of the sea. The girl was so frightened or so tired that
she was only prevented from falling by the iron chain about her waist,
and there she hung, as if she were dead. The boy was very sorry for her
and flew down and stood beside her. When he spoke she raised her head
and looked round, but his voice only seemed to frighten her. Then he
remembered that he was wearing the Cap of Darkness, and that she could
only hear him, not see him. So he took it off, and there he stood before
her, the handsomest young man she had ever seen in all her life, with
short curly yellow hair, and blue eyes, and a laughing face. And he
thought her the most beautiful girl in the world. So first with one blow
of the Sword of Sharpness he cut the iron chain that bound her, and then
he asked her what she did there, and why men treated her so cruelly. And
she told him that she was the daughter of the King of that country, and
that she was tied there to be eaten by a monstrous beast out of the sea;
for the beast came and devoured a girl every day. Now the lot had fallen
on her; and as she was just saying this a long fierce head of a cruel
sea creature rose out of the waves and snapped at the girl. But the
beast had been too greedy and too hurried, so he missed his aim the
first time. Before he could rise and bite again the boy had whipped the
Terrible Head out of his wallet and held it up. And when the sea beast
leaped out once more its eyes fell on t