Doom-Quest of Ara-Karn 1 The Former King

by Adam Corby

  ‘An entire bandar-nest he slew all by his own hand with the marvelous weapon that throws death. He had told none of us about this magic, surely provided by none but the gods. So when he stood before the charging bandar and threw aside his only spear—’ here Garin was interrupted by cries of astonishment from his listeners; he grinned, and nodded back at them. ‘Yes, that is the truth: his only spear, the one the chief had lent him. Ask chief Gundoen himself, if you do not trust my tongue. He stood unmoving while the bandar charged him. We thought that he was mad and sought death, but he was cleverer than we. He raised the little bow, which seemed the plaything of a child, and the great bandar fell dead at his feet.’

  Garin paused to wet his throat with beer, while the tribespeople turned to one another, evincing much astonishment at the tale. Many called out to the chief for corroboration, but Gundoen only concealed his face with his ale-bowl and did not answer them.

  ‘Then he came to us,’ continued Garin. ‘And he said, “I am going back to their lair. This waiting for them takes too long for me.” He left to us the task of skinning the great beast. Again we thought him mad, for we thought it had only been luck, or an illness of the bull, or else the shadow of God. And such miracles do not happen twice to any man. We followed him, though, to see what he would do.

  ‘First he climbed into a tall tree above the brambles of the bandar-nest and settled himself in the crotch of a large branch. He fitted a death-bird to his bow and sent it down among the bandar. Again and again he fired; and the slim shafts went deep into the bodies of bulls, cows, and calves alike. At first there was no response at all, except that some of the bulls snorted angrily, and some of the calves cried. Then one by one they began to fall. And before you could have counted three score, every single bandar in the lair lay dead!’

  Again was he interrupted by shouts of disbelief. ‘It is all true,’ he laughed delightedly. ‘Ask the chief, I tell you: he saw it as well as I.

  ‘But the greatest wonder was when he saved the chief’s life. We did not even know it at the time, and he himself said naught. But later we knew that it was true.’ So he told them of the battle with the Korlas, and of Gundoen’s wild charge, and how he had been saved from sure death only by the slim shaft that had entered the Korla’s back. ‘And now we know that the shaft was one of the arrows of Ara-Karn.’

  Here was a wonder as great as the pelts, and the folk turned to the chief, clamoring to know if this was true, and if indeed he owed his very life to the stranger.

  Gundoen looked up from his bowl with red-rimmed eyes. ‘I did not ask him to save me,’ he said sullenly. ‘But it is true enough, I suppose.’ Across the square of the tables, the stranger smiled very nicely, which was the last thing he should have done if he wished to gain the chief’s good favor at that moment. Gundoen took yet another beer and shouted angrily at Alli for the way she had served it.

  After the feasting the serving wenches cleared away the long tables, leaving only the stained bowls for the beer, which still flowed freely. Those accomplished at music beat a tune on the wooden drums and blew their flutes, and the rest of the feasters clapped in time to the music. Between the tables went the dancers: Borna with her brown hips flashing, El-Star with his great belly bobbing, and Alli with her slanting eyes shining. The onlookers cheered, clapped, and chanted. They stamped their feet upon the hard sand. The roar grew tremendous.

  In the midst of all this revelry and unseen by any save perhaps Hertha-Toll the Sorrowful, the chief rose unsteadily to his feet. His face was flushed with beer, but still his brows were drawn down.

  Yet he smiled his lips in an effort to dissemble it.

  Drunkenly he made his way around the tables until he came to where the stranger sat. He tapped Ara-Karn on the shoulder, none too gently.

  ‘Stranger, I would have a word with you,’ the chief said. He had tried to whisper, but the great chest of Gundoen was ill-made for silence, and despite all the noise, those who sat nearby heard him clearly. They stopped their clapping to hear what the chief had in mind.

  ‘Stranger,’ said Gundoen, ‘this dancing is well enough, but it does me nothing to watch. Good shows need a good fight. Now I am used to wrestle with someone at such feasts as these. I will not hide it from you that I am a great wrestler – perhaps even almost as good at wrestling as you are at hunting. But I promise I will not hurt you if it can be helped. Well do I know the debt you put upon me when you in your greatness saved the little life of Gundoen. Will you not wrestle with Gundoen?’

  The stranger looked upon the chief.

  Throughout the entire feast, Ara-Karn had spoken no words. Those about him had showered him with questions, but he had made as if he had not heard them and turned his dark side to them. When one man had not accepted that, and had shaken his shoulder to gain his attention, then Ara-Karn had turned such a sudden look at him that the man’s words trailed away, and he was abashed.

  Thereafter the stranger had but picked at his food and drunk his beer sparingly. Even here in the midst of joy and revelry, much of it in his own honor, Ara-Karn had become morose and withdrawn; whereas before, when most of the tribe had feared or hated him, he had but smiled. And now the only time he seemed pleased was when the chief had raised his head sourly to look upon his rival. When the food had been cleared and the dancing begun, the stranger had looked upon the joyous scene with dull dark eyes, resting his head upon his fist as if bored.

  But now, at the chief’s words, the strange green flecks returned to the eyes of Ara-Karn. He smiled again and straightened with interest.

  ‘These things of yours’ – he gestured disparagingly at the dancers, among whom was the chief’s favorite concubine – ‘do not impress me much. What can the crude entertainment of so many filthy, drunken savages mean to such as me? I have seen better things done by children. Yet perhaps this wrestling might divert me, a little.’

  Gundoen bowed, his face the color of blood. ‘I will try to hold your attention,’ he said in a low voice.

  The men and women sitting near Ara-Karn heard these words and straightaway told them to their neighbors, who spread them in turn around the tables. It was well known that the chief rarely allowed his wrestling foes to live, and then only by a special effort; and most of those who had lived were maimed by the combat. Too, they had all been mighty warriors almost as large in girth and thigh as Gundoen himself. And the stranger had a tracker’s build.

  By the time the combatants had toasted each other, gazing into each other’s eyes over the rims of their bowls, the drums had ceased, the flutes had paused, and the dancers had stopped their feet. And the entire scene was silent with tense expectation, save only for the low murmurings of men already seeking wagers on the chief.

  VIII

  Sinew and Bone

  THE TWO COMBATANTS STOOD at opposite corners of the square, being prepared by their attendants.

  The long tables had been pulled back, and the sand swept clean. Where the tables had been were now the people of the tribe, squatting on their haunches, legs tucked under buttocks, elbows rubbing elbows. The wealthy men – the greater of the hunters, warriors, and a few fishermen – sat in the first rings, sipping ale, making comments on the fighters’ physiques and making bets. Behind them were the rest of the men, weaker or older – those whose limbs had withered with the passing years like grass stalks under Her summer stare. The women sat yet further back, rising now and again to tend to the children or the passing of the ale-kegs. In the farthest background were the children, naked brown babes and scrawny boys with dirt on their hardened limbs. They were back among the huts surrounding the square, and some, too small to see over the heads of their elders, clambered up onto the thatched roofs to get a clear view. A rough square was empty in the center of the sandy clearing. At one side of the square the coal-mounds of the cook-fires gave off dense heat and a dull light, reflecting off the naked bodies of the two combatants.

  Many attendants had the chief: friends and old comrades, and m
en who knew a winner. They rubbed the chief’s massive, wooden-hard limbs with fat and oils, and joked with him in low tones. Gundoen chuckled occasionally at their sallies, offering one or two of his own. His gloom had vanished as soon as the stranger had agreed to the wrestling. Alli smiled to see her lord himself again; but Hertha-Toll looked at the stranger with worry on her face.

  Ara-Karn had for attendants only the faithful Kuln-Holn, who had never assisted at such a thing before and could only glance at the chief now and again with a look of profound unease, and Garin, who had said he did not like to see any man go into battle without a friend. These two stripped Ara-Karn of his tunic, his rings, and his sandals, and bound his long square mane in a cord fillet, so that it would not fall into his eyes.

  ‘It is too long,’ said Kul-Dro, Garin’s father. He lay propped against a keg, breathing with difficulty. He could eat and drink and walk about now, but still his chest was covered with blue bruises where the chief had broken his ribs. ‘Gundoen will pull your hair, stranger, so beware. Men’s necks have been broken when the chief has snapped back their heads with his hands in their hair.’

  He looked across at the chief, as if he might wish that he were doing battle again. Then he looked back at Ara-Karn. Garin and Kuln-Holn were rubbing the grease over his limbs now. ‘The grease will make it harder for him to gain a handhold,’ he grunted. ‘It will prevent your skin from being torn, and also hold in your sweat. There are good herbs in the pot. Fight well, stranger, and save your life. Gundoen will get no honor from this. Does he think you are a mere foreign barge-robber now? You are the Hero of the Hunt; and if you live and are whole, you will gain much esteem.’ The warrior looked at him as if Kul-Dro might have wanted Ara-Karn even to gain the victory; but that he knew was too much to hope.

  He counseled the stranger of Gundoen’s ways in battle: his favorite tricks, and what to be wary of. Ara-Karn listened, his dark eyes glimmering green. He held his head eagerly, as if his melancholy too had been dispelled at the prospect of this battle.

  When all the preparations had been made, they spat on their palms and slapped Ara-Karn on the back for luck. Then the stranger stepped forward into the square.

  Gundoen awaited him there.

  The chief’s body shone in the sunlight on one side and glowed redly from the coal-light on the other. It seemed more massive now than ever, as if he were not a man but some bull bandar. His great muscles swelled, and his chest was like a huge boulder made smooth by the waves. He strutted on his short gnarled legs, which bowed outward about the knees. The long horned toes gripped the sand powerfully.

  They came up to each other wordlessly.

  Gundoen grinned, drunkenly and maliciously, the glow of triumph already in his eyes. Ara-Karn eyed the chief carefully, solemnly. Their eyes met, locked, flashed. The stranger was the taller by more than a head, but tallness was no edge in wrestling. And his arms seemed almost womanly compared to the chief’s.

  The drummers beat the hollowed carved logs, once, twice, thrice.

  They gripped hands in the customary fashion, Ara-Karn as the challenged gripping with his left hand Gundoen’s right. Their fingers strained and interlocked, each striving to crush the bones of the other, to give more pain than he got. Their other hands remained free: these were the weapon-hands.

  The drummers beat the hollowed carved logs, once, twice, thrice. Once more they beat – and the wrestlers began to move.

  They circled each other, locked hands straining. Now the chief seemed not so drunk as before. His movements were swift, sure, dangerous. He sought to crush the bones of Ara-Karn’s hand in his grip; his left forearm swelled and hardened. The long lines of veins and tendons burst forth. More than one opponent of the chief in the past had grown faint under this mighty pressure.

  Ara-Karn chuckled softly, sweat beading on his greased forehead.

  Along the rings bets were placed and called. Words of encouragement, shouts and jests crossed the sandy square. Kuln-Holn looked away from the combatants, where Ara-Karn seemed so ill-matched to face the chief. But the sight of the crowd, rendered half-mad by glory, ale, and blood-lust, only sickened him the more. He looked about for Hertha-Toll, to see how the wise woman was; but the chief’s wife had already gone up into the darkness of the great hall. He began drawing images in the sand before him, trying not to hear that all the odds favored the chief by heavy margins. He drew designs that were like the patterns of hearth-ash, smoke, or dusky clouds. The sight of them filled him with terror; hastily he rubbed them clear.

  And in the center of it all, the naked wrestlers danced.

  Already the sweat was pouring forth from their shoulders. The sunlight and coal-light shone on it, and the men seemed like living statues poured from liquid metals. They darted toward one another and pulled back. The weapon-hands snaked forth, seeking a hold or striking off an attempted one. Their feet performed complex steps, sometimes on the point of tripping, sometimes firmly anchored in the sand.

  Now suddenly Gundoen had got the hold he had been seeking. He reached forth with his weapon-hand and gripped Ara-Karn’s leg just above the knee. He pulled, he heaved. By sheer bull-like strength, he lifted Ara-Karn’s body.

  The crowd gasped.

  Ara-Karn did not resist this move, which was the chief’s favorite. Instead he gave instantly with the pressure, pushing his body against Gundoen’s and pulling sharply with his shield-hand. Their hips struck together, and the chief, instead of falling with his full weight upon the stranger, spun past him, and, turning in midair, flipped onto the ground on his back. He landed with the sound of a tree falling on a stone, and the stranger fell on top of him.

  It was such a move as none of the tribesmen had seen before, performed with superb skill. They roared their approval. ‘Ara-Karn!’ some cried: but the most roared out the shout of the chief in anger and encouragement, and that they might not lose their bets: ‘Gundoen! Gundoen! Gundoen!’ And these cries easily swallowed the few for the stranger.

  The two men grappled and rolled in the sand, dangerously close to the mounds of embers. Arms, legs, hands, and heads whirled; the dust rose in dank clouds about them, clinging to their sweating, greased bodies.

  Gundoen was getting the better of it now: his greater bulk and more compact limbs were overcoming the stranger. Yet he looked up moment to moment at the mounds of the dying cook-fires. They were coming very near to them; the heat made the grease on their bodies melt and run, and made their hair wet with sweat.

  Ara-Karn turned suddenly toward the fires. They rolled desperately into the coals for a moment, bodies black against red heat. Gundoen screamed in pain and leaped out of the coals, rolling on the sand. Ara-Karn leaped after him, chuckling horribly.

  The combatants rose to their feet and faced each other once more. Their bodies were piebald: here painted yellow where the dust had caked, there a crimson or purple where the coals had left their patchwork of burns. The madness was in the chief’s eyes, a battle-madness broken only by death – his enemy’s or his own. Ara-Karn smiled calmly and spat the dirt from his mouth. They paused thus, panting, their bodies wracked by heaving sighs of near exhaustion. Then they came at each other again, and the earth shook at the meeting of their bodies.

  The rule that they must clasp each other’s shield-hands was gone, vanished with the first fall; now there were no rules. Scratching, gouging, biting were frowned upon – but not forbidden. It was a hard land of hard people who had no sympathy save for survivors. He who lived won; the loser usually died. The crowd roared, coughed, and gulped their ale.

  They hurled each other about the square. From one end to the other they grappled, made stances, threw each other to the earth. Their hands gripped and clawed at the most tender parts, scraping the red weals of the burns, clawing at the underbuttocks. They spat and snarled like beasts of the wood, the stranger no less than the chief. Time and again the chief seemed on the point of victory, but each time Ara-Karn eluded him by some strange unheard-of move.


  Then, with screams from the people and a frantic rushing of bodies to either side, the wrestlers burst from the square.

  They did not cease battling at this. Their limbs flailed and twisted regardless. They had no thought of a good show, or of combat rules, or of the safety of any spectators. Their only thought was maiming, crushing, bone-bending death – each other’s death. They pushed and rolled and fell through the strong hunters, the men, the graybeards, the women. The naked brown babes squealed with delight as they grappled past them. They fought down from the level of the square onto the steep village lane, leading down through the log huts, down unto the bay.

  The people scrambled to their feet and followed, clustering in eddying mobs around the rolling, writhing bodies. The shouts were deafening, incoherent, and now there were as many screams of ‘Ara-Karn!’ as of ‘Gundoen!’

  Down the street they rolled. Here was not the smoothly swept sand; their bodies were hurled against flat stones, sharp rocks, and the wooden ramparts of the huts. Massive bruises of bluish purple formed next to the red open burn-weals, on their backs, their arms, their thighs. Flesh was torn like rotten rags, dirt was clotted with human blood, sweat, and spittle.

  Past the last of the huts they went battling. At times they broke and stood, and hurled each other’s bodies about; more often they rolled, and grappled, and clawed. There was no intention on the part of either one of them to continue to tumble so, but the path was so steep that they had no choice but to tumble. They might have given pause for a rest and drink of water, and they might have returned to the clean sandy square. But they did not. They would not stop until the thing was done, and one of them lay broken and writhing in the dirt.

  The crowd followed them. Sometimes one of them would be caught between the wrestlers and a hut; then he had best look to his life. Enna-Born was caught thus and did not move quickly enough. His head slammed into the side of a hut, and he did not move for two passes. And when he did wake, he was never the same, being addled in the skull. The others, seeing him fall, gave no heed; they followed, screaming, the bodies of the chief and Ara-Karn.