There it lay for centuries until it was found by Ulf Leg Lopper.
When Trandill returned to Norway he was a changed man: secretive, cunning and selfish. He constantly taunted Erlendur and one evening, in a drunken rage, he attacked him. Erlendur killed him with a lucky blow.
Erlendur was going to take the ring, but Gandalf laid claim to it. That evening he put it on. At once he felt different: stronger, powerful, and also greedy.
Later that evening a Sami sorceress from the North knocked at the door of Gandalf’s house seeking shelter. She saw that Gandalf was wearing the ring. She was overcome with terror and tried to leave into the night, but Gandalf stopped her. He demanded to know what she had seen.
She said that the ring had a terrible power. It would consume all who owned it, until a man so powerful wore it that he would rule the world and destroy everything good in it. The world would be plunged into eternal darkness.
Gandalf was concerned. He could feel the effect that the ring was having on him, but he was not yet in its power. He took off the ring at once and told the sorceress that he would destroy it. She said that the only way the ring could be destroyed was as Andvari had prophesied; it must be thrown into the mouth of Hel.
‘Tell me, woman, where is Hel?’
‘It is a mountain in the land of fire and ice,’ the sorceress replied.
‘I know where she means,’ said Erlendur. ‘Trandill told me of it. It is Hekla, a great volcano near his farm at Stong.’
So Gandalf decided never to wear the ring again and to keep it safe for Trandill’s sons. He told Isildur to take the ring to Hekla in Iceland and throw it into the volcano.
That night Isildur had a dream that he was leading a glorious raiding party through England and he won a hoard of gold. He woke up before it was light and put on the ring. Immediately he felt taller, stronger, invincible. And he was determined to earn an even greater fortune overseas.
He went to Gandalf and demanded that the earl give him a ship and permit him to lead a raiding party to England. Gandalf saw he was wearing the ring and ordered him to take it off. Isildur felt a surge of anger shoot through him. He took up an axe and was just about to split Gandalf’s skull when Erlendur grabbed him from behind.
As they struggled, Erlendur shouted: ‘Stop, Isildur. You don’t know what you are doing! It is the ring! You will make me have to kill you just like I killed your father!’
Isildur felt a burst of strength course through his veins and he threw Erlendur off him. He raised his axe high above the defenceless Erlendur. But when he looked down on his cousin and his friend with whom he had shared so many adventures that summer, he stopped himself. He threw down the axe and pulled the ring off his finger. He replaced the ring in its box and left for Iceland immediately.
He returned home to Iceland with the ring and his treasure. Gaukur had taken over the management of the farm at Stong, and was betrothed to a woman named Ingileif. When Asgrimur heard that Isildur had returned he travelled to Stong to meet his foster-brother. Isildur told his brother and his foster-brother about his adventures in Norway and the Baltic. Then he told them all about Andvari’s Ring, and Earl Gandalf’s instruction that he toss it into Hekla. He described the immense sense of power he had felt when he put on the ring, and the constant temptation to try it on again. He said that he intended to take the ring up the mountain the very next day and he asked Gaukur and Asgrimur to accompany him to make sure that he went through with the quest.
Hekla had a fearsome reputation and no one had climbed it before. But the three men were brave and undaunted, so early the next morning they set off for the volcano. On the second day, they were most of the way up the mountain when Asgrimur slipped down a gully and broke his leg. He could not continue further, but he agreed to wait until the brothers returned from the summit.
He waited until nearly midnight before he heard the sound of footsteps scrambling down the mountain. But there was only one man, Gaukur. He told Asgrimur what had happened. He and his brother were standing by the crater at the top of the mountain. Isildur took the ring from its box and was about to toss it into the crater, but he seemed unable to do so. He said that the ring was very heavy. Gaukur urged him to throw it, but Isildur became angry and put the ring on his finger. Then he turned and before Gaukur could grab him, he leaped into the crater.
‘At least the ring is destroyed,’ said Asgrimur. ‘But at a very high price.’
In the years afterwards, Gaukur changed. He became vain and quarrelsome, cunning and greedy. But he was even stronger and braver in battle and had a fearsome reputation. Despite all this, his foster-brother Asgrimur remained steadfast in his loyalty. He frequently supported Gaukur in the various disputes Gaukur was involved in at the annual gathering of the Althing in Thingvellir.
Gaukur married Ingileif. She was a wise woman and beautiful. She had a strong temper, but she was usually quiet. She noticed the change in Gaukur and she did not like it. She also noticed that Gaukur spent much time at Steinastadir, the farm of his neighbour Ketil the Pale.
Ketil the Pale was a clever farmer, wise and peaceful and a gifted composer of poetry. He was popular with everyone, except perhaps his wife. Her name was Helga. She had fair hair and long limbs and was contemptuous of her husband, but admired Gaukur.
There was a marsh between the two farms, on Ketil the Pale’s land. It was waterlogged in winter, but in spring it produced very sweet grass. One spring Gaukur decided to graze his own cows on the land and chased Ketil the Pale’s cows away. Ketil the Pale protested, but Gaukur brushed him off. Ketil the Pale did nothing. Helga scolded her husband for being so weak.
After midsummer, when Gaukur was returning from the Althing at Thingvellir, he passed by Ketil the Pale’s farm. He came across a slave of Ketil the Pale who was slow to get out of his way. So Gaukur chopped off his head. Once again, Ketil the Pale did nothing.
Helga was again contemptuous of Ketil the Pale. She scolded him from morning until night, vowing never to share his bed again until he had demanded compensation from Gaukur.
So Ketil the Pale rode over to Stong to speak to Gaukur.
‘I have come to demand compensation for the unlawful killing of my slave,’ Ketil said.
Gaukur snorted. ‘His killing was perfectly lawful. He blocked the way back to my own farm and would not let me pass.’
‘That is not my understanding of what happened,’ said Ketil.
Gaukur laughed at him. ‘You understand very little, Ketil. Everyone knows that every ninth night you are the woman to the troll of Burfell.’
‘And they know that you could not sire anyone because you were gelded by the troll’s daughters,’ Ketil replied, for at that time Gaukur and Ingileif had no children.
Whereupon Gaukur picked up his axe and after a brief struggle chopped off Ketil the Pale’s leg. Ketil dropped down dead.
Afterwards Gaukur made even more visits to Ketil the Pale’s farm, where Helga was now the mistress. Ketil’s brother’s demanded compensation from Gaukur, but he refused to pay, and his foster-brother Asgrimur supported him loyally.
Ingileif was jealous, and determined to stop Gaukur. She spoke to Thordis, Asgrimur’s wife and told her a secret. Isildur had not jumped into the crater of Hekla while wearing the ring. He had been killed by Gaukur, who had taken the ring, and then pushed his brother into the crater. Gaukur had hidden the ring in a small cave watched over by a troll’s hound.
Thordis told her husband what Ingileif had said. Asgrimur did not believe her. But that night he had a dream. In his dream he was with a group of men in a great hall and an old Sami sorceress pointed to him. ‘Isildur tried and failed to destroy the ring and was killed in the process. Now it is up to you to find the ring and to take it to the mouth of Hel.’
Killing a man without reporting it was a great crime. Although Asgrimur was convinced by his dream, he had no proof with which to accuse Gaukur, and Gaukur was not the man to accuse without proof. So Asgrimur went to his neighbour Njall, a great and clever lawyer, to help him. Njall admitted that it would be impossible to prove anything at the Althing. But he suggested a trap.
So Asgrimur told Thordis who told Ingileif that Isildur had given him a helm in secret when he had returned from Norway. The helm belonged to Fafnir, the son of Hreidmar, and it was famous in legend. Asgrimur had hidden it in an old barn on a hill at the edge of his farm at Tongue.
