Yet all things must come to their natural end, and in due course, the young man found he had exhausted the cosmic supply of water in which to play. But despite his promise, he was not yet ready to return home.

He desired one last great plunge, but that would require finding a new medium in which to move.

First he tried sand. Then he tried soil. He readily dismissed both, for they offered neither water’s buoyancy nor its flow.

If the earth was of no use, then he would try elsewhere. Above him swelled the sky, its fleecy clouds so like the froth of his beloved whitecapped sea.

The young man’s questing heart kindled with joy. For what else was the firmament but a boundless ocean of air?

He would, he determined, swim through the sky.

Lacking the wings of the glorious Mansa Devi, he searched for ways to ascend. He tried to scale the sky, to catch hold of a cloud, to barter for passage with a bat in flight. For centuries, he only fell back down.

At last, weary and feeling the pull of his age-old promise, the young man nearly gave up. Thunderheads blustered above him, darkening the heavens from brightest day to a semblance of deepest night. Their needles of rain stabbed down as Lord Indra seethed upon his throne in the clouds.

Then a single ray of Lord Surya’s golden light burst through the gloom. Where it grazed the walls of rain, Lord Indra’s meghdhanush appeared. In its arc of seven bold colors, the young man found his answer.

But Lord Indra never brought out his bow for long. The young man scampered up its vast curve.

He climbed and climbed, often backsliding, for the meghdhanush was far more slippery than it looked, until finally he arrived at its peak. Aglow with triumph, he prepared to dive into the ether.

Suddenly Lord Indra shook the massive bow, and bolts of thunder shot through the air. “Who dares lay a hand on my meghdhanush?” he bellowed.

In his fury, he slammed the bow down, down, down until it smashed into the kingdom of Nagalok far below. Down, down, down, too, tumbled the young man.

And so, he swam through the sky.

Where the bow struck the soil, it shattered, all seven colors fragmenting into crystals: rubies, carnelians, topazes, emeralds, sapphires, lapis lazuli, and amethysts, and many others besides. Lord Indra retrieved his bow and resumed his business, heedless of the jewels sparkling behind him. They in turn sank deep within the crust of our world, where they multiplied into the limitless riches that bless us today.

Some claim the boy sprouted cloud-wings and swam on into eternity, for he was never seen again, but his gift of the gems will scarce be forgotten.

—FROM THE NAGA PURANA:

A FLORILEGIUM OF FOLKTALES,

PROPERTY OF THE OFFICIAL ROYAL

LIBRARY AT BHOGAVATI

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