by John Norman
Accounts of what matters then occurred, and the order in which these matters occurred, tend to vary amongst the chroniclers. Whereas this is regrettable, it is also quite understandable, as it is a commonplace that when a complex event occurs suddenly, precipitately, in a crowded area, and is hastily resolved, that even eyewitnesses tend to produce conflicting reports of what occurred. Doubtless they are startled, and perhaps confused; much happens quickly; it is soon done; perspectives differ; some vantages are superior to others; what one notes may depend in part on one’s expectations; and memory, too, tends to be fallible, particularly in the case of such events, where so much happens so quickly; too, one must remember that the hall was doubtless poorly lit.
I have elected to follow here, in the main, the account of Orban, of the house of Orix, as reported in the second chronicle of Armenion, as revised by Teminius. I have selected it not because I regard it as that likely to be most accurate, but rather because, as I do not know which account is the most accurate, it is the most restrained.
I apologize for the account, but it must be remembered that the times were other than ours.
Six men, it may be recalled, hurried toward the table, these retainers of Rolof, his champion, and five others, these coming from the giant’s right.
The mighty blade, which might have felled a small tree, or cut the head from a horse, with one blow, like a live, leaping thing, rising up, a flat, edged living wind, a flash under the torches, caught the men doubled on one another, they not anticipating the attack, they having foolishly thought it was they who were the aggressors, the first two stopping, suddenly, startled, others stumbling against one another, the men falling amongst themselves, none set, none in the guard position, caught the first two men to the right, cutting upward through the armpit of the first, slashing away the arm and upper torso and neck and head, and flighting thence, in the same arc, to cleave away the upper skull of the second man, the blade turning then, in its back stroke, to cut away the hand and split the ribs of a third man. The other three, half fallen, looked up, wildly, and one amongst them was cleaved at the side of the head, the stroke, downward, at the right eye, ceasing its dividing stroke only at the last of three sheared ribs. Two others turned to flee but another stroke cut both feet from under one, and he hobbled on stumps to the table of Rolof, beneath which he fell, and the last was caught against that very table itself, the table of Rolof, where he fell before his lord, the table itself splintered then in twain, the body, half cut in two, folded in upon itself, descending, sliding, in the collapsed planks. The giant scarcely noted the horrified eyes of Rolof behind the table, when his arena sense, alert to the tiniest of sounds, was that the movement of a foot in the dust, brought him full about to see men of lord Valdemar advancing toward him.
“Stop!” cried Urta.
The giant laughed, to see more meat for his sword, and men hesitated.
“Stop!” again cried Urta, the namer of kings.
“Kill him!” cried Valdemar, and his champion edged forward, but one blow of the long blade smote through a shield, flinging the arm, caught in the device’s straps, across the hall.
The man to his right was blinded by the blood, and in a moment, unseeing, screaming, thrust his hand downward, into his own guts, where it was caught, tangled, and in his terror, with two hands, clutching, in madness and pain, disemboweled himself.
Other men of Valdemar drew back, four others.
The giant looked about himself, crouching down, like an animal, turning with feral, almost inhuman quickness.
“Kill him!” called Rolof, as though to the hall itself.
The giant’s eyes were bright.
There was blood on his hands and furs.
“It is Genserix,” said a man.
“It is more terrible than Genserix,” said another.
“Kill him!” cried Valdemar to his reluctant liegemen.
The blood on the blade had run sidewise in narrow channels, these streamlets consequent upon the motion of the article.
It was this quickness apparently, this seeming capacity to move with unnatural speed, which was one of the first things to have struck, or caught, even enflamed, the imaginations of many men of the time, doubtless rude, simple men, sword-wielders, spearmen and such. There is much agreement on this quickness, it seems, as one of the giant’s properties. And yet, as certain chronicles have it, the field diaries of Lucian, for example, the speeds with which he moved tended, even in battle, to shift and vary deceptively, distractively, startling foes, disturbing their anticipations, necessitating costly adjustments, a thousandth of a second sometimes the difference of an inch or more in the reach and thrust of a blade. Such things cannot be taught, not in their fullness of subtlety, not in their diverse pacings, their delicate temporal modalities, their seemingly instantaneous sensings, not in their odd admixture of violence and sensitivity, brutality and refinement. They are bred into warriors, generation by generation, over thousands of years, much as hunting and killing, generation by generation, over thousands of years, is bred into the lion, the vi-cat, the wolf. Sometimes, it is said, he seemed somnolent, slow to act, silent like rock, massive like stone, and then again, sometimes without warning, it seemed that great body could explode, bomblike, destructive to all within its compass. Sometimes he seemed slow, awkward, inarticulate. Certainly he was illiterate, like many of his time. But it seems, too, he was not unintelligent. There is much evidence that he could be patient, reflective and thoughtful. We know little in detail of such things, however, his plans and long thoughts, as he muchly kept his own counsel. Few people claimed to know him well. There is universal agreement, however, that his anger was not a light thing. It could arise suddenly, unpredictably, stormlike. It could seldom be assuaged without blood. Doubtless this was his greatest weakness. Certainly, politically, it was his most grievous flaw. To be sure, his concept of statecraft in any event was rudimentary, being founded on little more, as was common with his sorts of peoples in those times, than simple virtues, such as the keeping of pledged words. He was not equally at home in the saddle and on a throne. But this was not unusual, too, for many leaders of his time. We know little of the deeper currents within him, or if there were such. He is said, once in the darkness of the woods, thinking himself alone, to have howled, as though in great pain. Men never saw him cry. Little is known of his inner life, or if he, in effect, had one. It is speculated that men in his time were less self-aware, less self-conscious, than men in our time, that they were simpler, and more like animals, than we. One does not know, of course. Too, on such matters it is difficult to speculate.
The giant looked about himself.
The warriors of Valdemar had drawn back.
The giant went back to the table and, with the great blade, cut another piece of meat.
Yata ran to him and knelt before him, her head down, her hands lifted, and he put the meat in her small hands, her tiny fingers clutching it, warm juice running between her fingers.
She looked up at her master.
He looked about.
At the tables a young man had risen.
The giant pointed to the young man and Yata hurried to him, and placed the meat before him. His eyes shone. Yata then drew back from the table, knelt, put her head to the dirt, and then turned, on her knees, lifting her head a little, to face the giant.
How next would she be commanded?
The young man had scarcely glanced at the lovely young slave before him, though she would doubtless have brought a high price in many markets.
Mightier things were afoot.
She was only a female, and a slave.
“I have at this time no rings to give,” said the giant.
“I would not serve for rings,” said the young man.
“What is your name?” said the giant.
“Vandar,” said the young man.
“It is a good name,” said the giant.
“I am ready!” said the young man. “Summon me to your side!�
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“At my side is danger,” said the giant.
“I would rather die at the side of one such as you than live elsewhere,” said the man.
“Do not move,” said a man.
“The night is cold, and the stars are indifferent,” said the young man. “I answer only to myself.”
“Cease your obscure rantings,” said a man.
“Milord!” cried the young man to the giant.
“Remain where you are!” said the giant.
The young man cried out in misery.
“Can you not see?” asked a man. “He stands alone.”
“At this time one such as he must stand alone,” said another.
“He who cannot stand alone deserves to have none stand with him,” said another.
“He has brought to the hall the pelt of a white vi-cat,” said Ulrich.
“No, no!” cried Valdemar, looking about himself. “Kill him! Kill him!”
One of his men turned to him. “We follow you, my liege,” he said.
Valdemar did not move.
Then his men drew away from him.
“You are no longer first among the Tiri,” said a man.
“No!” cried Valdemar.
Valdemar drew his blade, and cried out, and he, then followed instantly by several men, those of the Tiri in the hall, rush toward the giant.
“No!” cried Urta. “Only the lord, or his champion, may challenge!”
But none gave ear to the plaint of the King Namer.
The giant struck about him with the great sword.
A shield was cut in twain. Men were struck to the side, buffeted. The mighty sword flashed again, and sparks, like flaming snow, bright from three blades, exploded in the hall. Men pressed forward.
“Stop!” cried the King Namer.
“Stop!” cried others.
The giant, looking about himself, backed away. The fire pit was behind him, long, some eighteen feet in length, some five feet in width, a foot deep with glowing coals. The two supports on which the spit had been mounted were still in place. The spit itself, one end pointed for insertion in the meat, the other end bent to a handle that the device might be turned, that spit on which the boar had been roasted, lay to one side, on a wooden rack. The giant felt the heat behind him.
Valdemar lunged forward, his charge turned by the great blade, and the noble, screaming, losing his footing, fell into the pit. Otto forced the retainers back with a terrible blow, and spun about, turning to Valdemar, who, screaming, twisted in the coals, rose up wildly, slipped, fell, climbed again to his feet, and began to wade, frenziedly, stumbling, to the edge of the pit, but the giant turned about and plunged after him, wading into the coals, and seized Valdemar at the edge of the pit, by the collar of his furs, and threw him back, on his back, into the coals. Two men plunged after the giant, but he cut them down with one stroke, over the body of Valdemar, which he forced down, deeper, with one foot, into the coals. He then, to the horror of the liegemen, who hesitated, aware they could not reach him with their smaller blades, not having time to circle the pit, raised his blade above his head, holding it there with two hands, as he had, earlier, over the roast boar.
“No!” cried one of the liegemen, raising his hand.
“Strike!” cried Valdemar.
The sword was poised.
The liegemen cast their weapons to the floor of the hall.
“Strike!” screamed Valdemar.
But the giant stepped back from the body, through the coals, ascending the far side of the pit.
Valdemar’s liegemen drew him swiftly from the coals, covering his own body with theirs, to smother flames.
Two other bodies were drawn, too, slashed, half dismembered, from the coals, one leg hanging by a muscle to a trunk, furs blackened, and, at the sides, burned away.
A grayish smoke, like haze, hung over the coals.
There was an ugly, sweet odor of burned flesh, of skin, of muscle and fat, in the hall.
The left side of Valdemar’s face was gone, burned away.
The giant came about the pit, and stood over Valdemar, looking down at him.
Valdemar’s men drew back.
Valdemar looked up, unblinking, staring, his right eyelid burned away.
“You are Otung,” he whispered.
“I do not know,” said the giant.
The giant wiped on his furred thigh the long blade.
“Aii!” cried a man.
Too, at the same time, the slave had screamed, but the giant had already slipped to the side.
The blow of Rolof’s sword rang on the thick iron spit, it lying on its rack.
Sparks sprang upward.
“A felon’s stroke!” cried a man.
“Pig!” cried another.
The giant rolled beneath the spit, the long blade lost, and another blow struck down, again ringing, showering sparks, from the spit.
“No longer are you first among the Gri!” cried an angered retainer.
Rolof snarled, and put his foot on the blade of the great sword, holding his own blade ready.
“Pig!” cried a man.
The noble of the Gri was flanked by two cohorts.
The giant now crouched behind the heavy iron spit, it on its rack, a foot above the ground, its metal now twice scarred from the blade of Rolof.
Before him was the noble, and his two fellows, and three blades.
He did not take his eyes from the steel. The giant’s eyes were terrible. From his throat there came a rumbling, growling noise.
“Sheath your weapon!” called Urta to Rolof.
“I sheath my weapon for no man,” said Rolof. “I am king!”
The huge hands of the giant felt for, and closed upon, the long, thick, weighty, still-warm spit on its rack.
Before him were Rolof, and two of the Gri, behind him, glowing, bright with heat, deep with coals, was the fire pit. Its heat was fierce upon his back and legs.
The hands of the giant were upon the spit. The spit had held the weight, unbending, of the great boar, which, ungutted, had weighed better than four hundred pounds. Two men had turned the spit in its mounts. Rolof raised his sword.
With a cry of rage the giant rose up. The spit, like a snake, striking, was not even lifted from the rack, but shattered free, bursting, scattering wood.
The man to the giant’s right had no time even to scream, for the spit, a yard from its end, caught him beneath the left ear, breaking the neck, half tearing the head from the body. Rolof and his fellow were struck to the side by the same blow, and fell, rolling, to the floor. The giant kicked aside the remnants of the rack. Rolof scrambled back. The man to the giant’s left was struck on the return of the spit, and his arm, the elbow smashed, running with blood, hung like rope to the side. He put up his left hand to fend the next blow, but the crook in the spit’s handle, tearing back through the fingers, struck him in the throat, crushing it back, breaking cartilage, inches. Rolof reached for his lost blade. The giant lifted and plunged the portion of the spit handle, two feet long, parallel to its shaft, down twice, once through the jaw and mouth of the man, then on his back, breaking teeth and bone, and driving through tissue, and, then, more carefully, through the forehead, until it stopped, inches deep, in the dirt floor of the hall. Rolof now had his sword in hand but backed away from the giant, who was now regarding him eagerly, terribly, who now held the huge spit, drawn free, its length well beyond the reach of even the great blade, holding it as one might have held the peasant’s weapon, one hand at the center, the other below, the long staff.
Suddenly Rolof cried out, flung down his weapon, and fled toward the entrance of the hall.
The giant pursued him, in fury, the spit, its pointed end forward, lifted over his head in both hands.
Rolof fled up the stairs, toward the wooden door of the hall.
But of course the two beams, barring the door, the hall having been entered, were now in place, secure in their brackets.
Rolof turned a
bout, suddenly, wildly, at the door, knowing he had no time to lift the two beams from the braces.
He stood there, for a moment, on the level before the door, his back to the door.
“No!” he cried.
“Aii!” cried men.
Women screamed.
The giant worked the spit free of the door, through which the point had penetrated, emerging on the other side, and then he carried the spit, on which the body of Rolof was impaled down the stairs, and to the side of the fire pit.
The hall was silent.
He stood near the fire pit, the spit still in the body of Rolof, who, toward the lower end of the spit, had slipped toward its point, and lay on the floor, near the coals, one side of the body illuminated by their light.
One of the liegemen of the Tiri looked up, from his knees, where he knelt beside a seared body.
“Lord Valdemar is dead,” said the man.
“He died as first among the Tiri,” said another.
“Yes,” said another.
The giant, with his foot, thrust the body of Rolof from the spit, and cast the spit aside.
He then, from near the fire pit, retrieved the great sword.
He then looked about the hall, from face to face, Ulrich, Gundar, Hartnar, Gelerich, Astarax, the others.
He then turned to face Urta, the King Namer.
“Who is king?” asked the giant.
“You are king,” said Urta.
“Let us eat,” said the giant. “I am hungry.”
CHAPTER 33