“I tasted the dragon’s heart.”
The sword
Fafnir
The birds speaking
Sigurd is raised for a deed: Fafnir, once a man, now a dragon on a hoard. The sword is mended from shards. The heart is cooked; Sigurd burns his thumb, tastes, and the language of birds becomes his. They warn him. He is still woven into a betrayal involving a potion of forgetfulness and a woman who will not be a footnote.
The dragon’s gold teaches that some victories are contaminated at the source. Understanding the warning is not the same as being free of the story.
Inspect
INTERPRETATION
Sigurd is competence meeting fate without cynicism. The heart-taste is sudden insight: therapy, a dream, a confession. The curse is acting as if insight were immunity. Von Franz: the treasure is often the thing that will unmake the naive hero.
The shadow
Fafnir, who was once a man. Gold that costs more than it gives, and a warning understood and not heeded.
Four lookings
Campbell
Which dragon in your life was once a person, including you?
von Franz
Whose warning have you understood and still not heeded?
Hillman
What gold are you guarding that costs more than it gives the soul?
Coelho
What bird already told you, and you called it coincidence?