by Adam Corby
‘O Hertha,’ he muttered, ‘Hertha, you too were lovely once. Why did you change? – and why was your belly cursed?’
* * *
The city burned on between the mountains. Behind the bulky figure of the chief, Kuln-Holn the Pious One clambered uncertainly up the pile. Darker than shadows were the two of them, soot-stained against the flaring city.
‘Gundoen,’ Kuln-Holn called plaintively. ‘Gundoen, where is Ara-Karn?’
The chief did not move at first, so Kuln-Holn must repeat his question. Then the chief’s head rose and he looked around. Their eyes met, and for the first time in the lives of these men, so different in their ways, a look of fellowship, sympathy – of understanding, even – passed between them. Gundoen’s eyes were worried also. He shook his head and reared one massive, sweat- and blood-streaked arm. He pointed behind Kuln-Holn into the center of the flames.
‘He is – there.’
Anxiously Kuln-Holn mounted the ashy slope, fast as his weary legs might bear him. Before him the city blazed. The narrowing rocky cliffs roofed over with smoke reminded him of a dream he once had had, an ill dream of captivity and fruitless sufferings. Great fragile flakes of ash fell over him, burnt bitter raindrops. He came to the limits of the city, where the flames rose; for a moment the very spirit within Kuln-Holn quailed, and he desired greatly to turn back among the tents. But thither had his master gone, and there too must Kuln-Holn be. Kuln-Holn wrapped his cloak over his body to above his mouth and struggled up.
Through his shoes he felt the heat of the stone-paved thoroughfare. He cast his eyes about. There was no movement save for the flames: they rose up all about him, great blinding veils. Hot winds swirled about, clawing him. Dizzily he went forward, choking on the fumes. He ran alongside streams of boiling water. His eyes were burning, baked too dry now to weep. How was it that anything might abide alive in this?
‘Master!’ he cried, his voice lost in the cloak. ‘Master!’
Only the flames answered him. Half blinded, he thought he saw a thing ahead of him, dark and tall and steadfast. He made out a rider on horseback. ‘Master!’ Kuln-Holn wailed, but the rider was only an ancient statue of Elna in a square, headless and scarred.
Darkness found the eyes of Kuln-Holn. His woolen cloak was smoldering in his nose. He went on fiercely. So many streets – had he lost his way? Behind him a roof fell crashing into the tempest of flame where once a happy family had dwelt. Kuln-Holn ran at the sound. Now he knew he could not turn back but must win the far side of the city. That or perish here.
‘Goddess, dear Lady,’ he groaned, ‘aid me, please help me!’
The Governor-General’s palace reared blazing before him. Kuln-Holn staggered by. The fire opened before him, and Kuln-Holn crawled through, his hands blistering on the stones’ heat. He fell and, gasping, terror-borne, rose.
Far away overhead it seemed to him he saw a figure – a little upright thing upon the high framing of the Gates, there where it spanned like a bridgeway the gap between the mountains.
In the barracks room it was dark, and Kuln-Holn could at first see little. Wearily he mounted the time-hollowed stone steps, coming at last to a narrow wooden doorway a little open. Kuln-Holn pulled aside the door and ventured forth.
Through the Pass the cool winds streamed soothingly, flowing like the potions of Hertha-Toll upon the tortured body of the Pious One. Swiftly the airs ran, so high above the earth, yet for all that sweet. Upon either hand the deep Pass gaped for him. Dizzily he ventured forth across the narrow stone walkway and neared the upright figure.
‘Lord,’ he said, ‘all the warriors feast below in the honor you have brought them. They fought, but now make merry. You should behold the treasure they have got! Now surely all the tribes may be wealthy and at peace. We may be content now. Lord, is it not so?’
There was no answer from the other. Slowly and strangely the head came round.
The gusting winds tore at the long hair, concealing and unmasking the face of Ara-Karn. That was black with soot. Sparks glowed still in his cloak and tunic; even his beard was singed and smoking. In his hand he lightly held his dagger, and Kuln-Holn thought of the sacrifice they had made below. On the stones beside his master’s feet lay the sword, dark still with the priestess’ life. He stood with his legs wide-planted, the toes of his boots just over the edge of the stone, his arms held somewhat out. Below him the huge Gates were outflung to embrace the burning city; the fire leapt high in maddened dance. As a man returned from a long fruitless hunt in the snowy gloom of Winter, whose eyebrows and beard are thick with rime, will stand over the hearth-fire gratefully and happily and warm his chill hands a little: so stood Ara-Karn, and held his arms out somewhat. The lurid gleams lighted up his frontward half like red gold in a smith’s brick-pit: all but his eyes.
He looked toward his prophet, but Kuln-Holn knew not if he saw him. His eyes, open as a statue’s, were flat and pale, like little cups of greenish milk. There was no joy or anger, hatred or longing in those eyes: only curiosity, and a monstrous wonder, as it were to say, So.
‘Lord,’ said Kuln-Holn haltingly, ‘now the merchants who have robbed us are punished, and the city of the wicked laid to naught. The tribes are one. Wealth beyond my telling is ours. Is this not all you were bidden to? What is yet to do?’
The face of Ara-Karn returned to the burning city. The flames leapt and danced and roared as though to pay him, their liberator, tribute. He said, so faintly Kuln-Holn could scarcely hear him, ‘And how does it please you, Kuln-Holn, to see what you have wrought?’
‘Lord, I will not take Her work away from Her. I was no better than a knot in the handle of Her hammer. Yet surely it cannot be denied Her wrath is no little thing.’
The Warlord had no words to that. Then it was, an overbearing weariness came upon Kuln-Holn, and he curled up on the stones away from the edge and slept.
* * *
When he woke, there was a stiffness in his back. There was a foulness in his mouth as well, a taste like burning he thought he had forgotten. He looked up the twisting Pass.
Just a little of the pine trees could he see from here. The sky looked good to bring out the fish from their catch-holes. He wondered how Turin Tim did, and how much little Bart-Karan had grown. He turned back his head gently. He saw his master standing at the lip of the stone, his legs wide-planted, even as before.
Kuln-Holn rose. The ruins of the city below were dark now, and consumed. Only a few embers yet glowed in those rocky ash-fields that had once been Gerso, city of merchants, the northernmost fastness of the old Empire of Elna. Through the pale haze of smoke Kuln-Holn could see the treasure-mound much diminished, and the many tents, and the green valley beyond. A road cut the fields, and Kuln-Holn bethought himself of all those who had fled.
‘Lord,’ he said unthinkingly, ‘that thing that you did to the boy – was it right?’
Ara-Karn looked back, stooped, and picked up and sheathed his sword. So Kuln-Holn saw his face and was comforted, for it was again the face of a mortal man.
‘It is what I have done.’
So saying, the Warlord of the far North went across the warm stones toward the dark doorway, down to the army awaiting him.
Ara-Karn
battles the Empire of the South in
Canto Two:
The DIVINE QUEEN
The Tale Behind the Tale
The Doom-Quest of Ara-Karn I composed when quite young, and sold to the TimeScape imprint of Pocket Books. But since it was a long book, my editor, David Hartwell, asked that it be divided into three volumes. At the time I considered this to be a mistake: personally I love and prefer long tales, if they be good ones, and enjoy the prospect of a good long read when I heft a thick tome in my hand. But I agreed to David’s condition of publication because he knew his business, and I also saw opportunities for improving the tale by restructuring some chapters in the course of helping each volume to stand better on its own.
It took me a long time
to recast the second volume, and years to rework the third. The book was long overdue; what’s more, the first two volumes had not sold well, and David Hartwell had left Pocket Books. The new editorial staff looked over my reworked third volume (now almost as long as the entire tale had been when it was deemed too long to publish in one volume), and declared it was unpublishable. They were right: the thing had run away from me.
And so no one but my friends has ever read the full story, or learned the final fate of Ara-Karn.
Now some thirty years after the book was first accepted for publication (and with asotir’s assistance), I can offer a revised and expanded 30th anniversary edition.
The first two volumes – The Former King and The Divine Queen – I reproduce much as they were first published, correcting only some typos and grammatical errors that slipped past me. The unhappy third volume I have shortened somewhat, and reworked it into two parts, now titled The Iron Gate and Darkbridge.
To those who read the first volumes long ago, and have wondered in the years since, ‘What happened, and how did it all end up?’ I offer my apologies. Now at last, if you have found this, you can find out.
— Adam Corby
Spring 2009
Now Available
The City Had Fallen…
In the street below, the dark-haired giant Ara-Karn was sitting casually upon his stallion, regarding Ampeánor amusedly.
‘Come hither!’ Ampeánor croaked through mashed and horrible lips. No one in all the lush South, not even Allissál herself, would have recognized the Charan of Rukor in this blood-spattered, sweating, swearing, ferocious swordsman before whom even the fierce barbarians fell back in awe. ‘Come hither, Ara-Karn, and I will give you some of what I give your men!’
The giant on the stallion scowled momentarily, then laughed. He gestured with the iron hand, a casual, insolent gesture.
‘Take him alive,’ the giant said.
The barbarians climbed again those crimsoned, gut-strewn steps.
Allissál, my Queen, Ampeánor thought, my beloved – I have failed you… He leaned wearily against the broad, cool pillar, awaiting the men who would kill him.
— from Canto 2:
The Divine Queen
The Naked Damsel
The armored men parted and the damsel stepped forth.
‘Now,’ said King Arthur, ‘what has brought you here?’
‘This,’ she answered, and let fall the mantle to the floor. Beneath the furs the damsel stood naked, and wore nothing beside the black veil and a heavy sword belted over her slim waist.
‘What is this sword you wear?’ asked the King. ‘Maiden, to stand so naked with a sword ill beseems you.’
‘The Lady Lille of Avalon,’ she answered, ‘has made me this scabbard and Belt of the Strange Clasp, so that the sword may not be drawn but by the best knight in the world, of the greatest heart and strength of arms, untouched by treachery, tricks or villainy. And I have come to your court, O King, to see if I may find that knight here among you…’
— from The Killing Sword
Lady Agatha was alone
Her lord had gone to take the measure of his lands, and his voice calling to his hounds came from far-off through her window, till it was hidden in the wind.
And she heard a great wave breaking on the stones of the Irish land, washing to the Western Sea; and a cry went with it, from a stricken old woman in a hut beyond the hill.
And Lady Agatha heard a third voice calling; and that was Aengus’ voice.
She shut the window to stop the voice, but the room waxed so warm she had to open up again. His song went on and on. And the beat of the riders was everywhere; and Lady Agatha fell asleep at last.
And Master Aengus’ song went right into her sleep.
She knew now why the riders came. They came for her.
— from Blood by Moonlight