Anthology of Speculative Fiction, Volume One

by Short Story Anthology

  He fumbled his way aft between the benches. Huddled figures cursed him wearily as he stepped on them. The ship shook herself, rolled along the edge of a boiling black trough, and slid down into it; for an instant, the white teeth of combers grinned above her rail, and Cappen waited for an end to all things. Then she mounted them again, somehow, and wallowed toward another valley.

  King Svearek had the steering oar and was trying to hold the longboat into the wind. He had stood there since sundown, huge and untiring, legs braced and the bucking wood cradled in his arms. More than human he seemed, there under the icicle loom of the stern-post, his gray hair and beard rigid with ice. Beneath the horned helmet, the strong moody face turned right and left, peering into the darkness. Cappen felt smaller than usual when he approached the steersman.

  He leaned close to the king, shouting against the blast of winter: "My lord, did I not see firelight?"

  "Aye. I spied it an hour ago," grunted the king. "Been trying to steer us a little closer to it."

  Cappen nodded, too sick and weary to feel reproved. "What is it?"

  "Some island--there are many in this stretch of water--now shut up!"

  Cappen crouched down under the rail and waited.

  The lonely red gleam seemed nearer when he looked again. Svearek's tones were lifting in a roar that hammered through the gale from end to end of the ship: "Hither! Come hither to me, all men not working!"

  Slowly, they groped to him, great shadowy forms in wool and leather, bulking over Cappen like storm-gods. Svearek nodded toward the flickering glow. "One of the islands, somebody must be living there. I cannot bring the ship closer for fear of surf, but one of ye should be able to take the boat thither and fetch us fire and dry wood. Who will go?"

  They peered overside, and the uneasy movement that ran among them came from more than the roll and pitch of the deck underfoot.

  Beorna the Bold spoke at last, it was hardly to be heard in the noisy dark: "I never knew of men living hereabouts. It must be a lair of trolls."

  "Aye, so ... aye, they'd but eat the man we sent ... out oars, let's away from here though it cost our lives ..." The frightened mumble was low under the jeering wind.

  Svearek's face drew into a snarl. "Are ye men or puling babes? Hack yer way through them, if they be trolls, but bring me fire!"

  "Even a she-troll is stronger than fifty men, my king," cried Torbek. "Well ye know that, when the monster woman broke through our guards three years ago and bore off Hildigund."

  "Enough!" It was a scream in Svearek's throat. "I'll have yer craven heads for this, all of ye, if ye gang not to the isle!"

  They looked at each other, the big men of Norren, and their shoulders hunched bear-like. It was Beorna who spoke it for them: "No, that ye will not. We are free housecarls, who will fight for a leader--but not for a madman."

  Cappen drew back against the rail, trying to make himself small.

  "All gods turn their faces from ye!" It was more than weariness and despair which glared in Svearek's eyes, there was something of death in them. "I'll go myself, then!"

  "No, my king. That we will not find ourselves in."

  "I am the king!"

  "And we are yer housecarls, sworn to defend ye--even from yerself. Ye shall not go."

  The ship rolled again, so violently that they were all thrown to starboard. Cappen landed on Torbek, who reached up to shove him aside and then closed one huge fist on his tunic.

  "Here's our man!"

  "Hi!" yelled Cappen.

  Torbek hauled him roughly back to his feet. "Ye cannot row or bail yer fair share," he growled, "nor do ye know the rigging or any skill of a sailor--'tis time ye made yerself useful!"

  "Aye, aye--let little Cappen go--mayhap he can sing the trolls to sleep--" The laughter was hard and barking, edged with fear, and they all hemmed him in.

  "My lord!" bleated the minstrel. "I am your guest--"

  Svearek laughed unpleasantly, half crazily. "Sing them a song," he howled. "Make a fine roun--whatever ye call it--to the troll-wife's beauty. And bring us some fire, little man, bring us a flame less hot than the love in yer breast for yer lady!"

  Teeth grinned through matted beards. Someone hauled on the rope from which the ship's small boat trailed, dragging it close. "Go, ye scut!" A horny hand sent Cappen stumbling to the rail.

  He cried out once again. An ax lifted above his head. Someone handed him his own slim sword, and for a wild moment he thought of fighting. Useless--too many of them. He buckled on the sword and spat at the men. The wind tossed it back in his face, and they raved with laughter.

  Over the side! The boat rose to meet him, he landed in a heap on drenched planks and looked up into the shadowy faces of the northmen. There was a sob in his throat as he found the seat and took out the oars.

  An awkward pull sent him spinning from the ship, and then the night had swallowed it and he was alone. Numbly, he bent to the task. Unless he wanted to drown, there was no place to go but the island.

  He was too weary and ill to be much afraid, and such fear as he had was all of the sea. It could rise over him, gulp him down, the gray horses would gallop over him and the long weeds would wrap him when he rolled dead against some skerry. The soft vales of Caronne and the roses in Croy's gardens seemed like a dream. There was only the roar and boom of the northern sea, hiss of sleet and spindrift, crazed scream of wind, he was alone as man had ever been and he would go down to the sharks alone.

  The boat wallowed, but rode the waves better than the longship. He grew dully aware that the storm was pushing him toward the island. It was becoming visible, a deeper blackness harsh against the night.

  He could not row much in the restless water, he shipped the oars and waited for the gale to capsize him and fill his mouth with the sea. And when it gurgled in his throat, what would his last thought be? Should he dwell on the lovely image of Ydris in Seilles, she of the long bright hair and the singing voice? But then there had been the tomboy laughter of dark Falkny, he could not neglect her. And there were memories of Elvanna in her castle by the lake, and Sirann of the Hundred Rings, and beauteous Vardry, and hawk-proud Lona, and-- No, he could not do justice to any of them in the little time that remained. What a pity it was!

  No, wait, that unforgettable night in Nienne, the beauty which had whispered in his ear and drawn him close, the hair which had fallen like a silken tent about his cheeks ... ah, that had been the summit of his life, he would go down into darkness with her name on his lips ... But hell! What _had_ her name been, now?

  Cappen Varra, minstrel of Croy, clung to the bench and sighed.

  The great hollow voice of surf lifted about him, waves sheeted across the gunwale and the boat danced in madness. Cappen groaned, huddling into the circle of his own arms and shaking with cold. Swiftly, now, the end of all sunlight and laughter, the dark and lonely road which all men must tread. _O Ilwarra of Syr, Aedra in Tholis, could I but kiss you once more--_

  Stones grated under the keel. It was a shock like a sword going through him. Cappen looked unbelievingly up. The boat had drifted to land--he was alive!

  It was like the sun in his breast. Weariness fell from him, and he leaped overside, not feeling the chill of the shallows. With a grunt, he heaved the boat up on the narrow strand and knotted the painter to a fang-like jut of reef.

  Then he looked about him. The island was small, utterly bare, a savage loom of rock rising out of the sea that growled at its feet and streamed off its shoulders. He had come into a little cliff-walled bay, somewhat sheltered from the wind. He was here!

  For a moment he stood, running through all he had learned about the trolls which infested these northlands. Hideous and soulless dwellers underground, they knew not old age; a sword could hew them asunder, but before it reached their deep-seated life, their unhuman strength had plucked a man apart. Then they ate him--

  Small wonder the northmen feared them. Cappen threw back his head and laughed. He had once done a service for a migh
ty wizard in the south, and his reward hung about his neck, a small silver amulet. The wizard had told him that no supernatural being could harm anyone who carried a piece of silver.

  The northmen said that a troll was powerless against a man who was not afraid; but, of course, only to see one was to feel the heart turn to ice. They did not know the value of silver, it seemed--odd that they shouldn't, but they did not. Because Cappen Varra did, he had no reason to be afraid; therefore he was doubly safe, and it was but a matter of talking the troll into giving him some fire. If indeed there was a troll here, and not some harmless fisherman.

  He whistled gaily, wrung some of the water from his cloak and ruddy hair, and started along the beach. In the sleety gloom, he could just see a hewn-out path winding up one of the cliffs and he set his feet on it.

  At the top of the path, the wind ripped his whistling from his lips. He hunched his back against it and walked faster, swearing as he stumbled on hidden rocks. The ice-sheathed ground was slippery underfoot, and the cold bit like a knife.

  Rounding a crag, he saw redness glow in the face of a steep bluff. A cave mouth, a fire within--he hastened his steps, hungering for warmth, until he stood in the entrance.

  "_Who comes?_"

  It was a hoarse bass cry that rang and boomed between walls of rock; there was ice and horror in it, for a moment Cappen's heart stumbled. Then he remembered the amulet and strode boldly inside.

  "Good evening, mother," he said cheerily.

  The cave widened out into a stony hugeness that gaped with tunnels leading further underground. The rough, soot-blackened walls were hung with plundered silks and cloth-of-gold, gone ragged with age and damp; the floor was strewn with stinking rushes, and gnawed bones were heaped in disorder. Cappen saw the skulls of men among them. In the center of the room, a great fire leaped and blazed, throwing billows of heat against him; some of its smoke went up a hole in the roof, the rest stung his eyes to watering and he sneezed.

  The troll-wife crouched on the floor, snarling at him. She was quite the most hideous thing Cappen had ever seen: nearly as tall as he, she was twice as broad and thick, and the knotted arms hung down past bowed knees till their clawed fingers brushed the ground. Her head was beast-like, almost split in half by the tusked mouth, the eyes wells of darkness, the nose an ell long; her hairless skin was green and cold, moving on her bones. A tattered shift covered some of her monstrousness, but she was still a nightmare.

  "Ho-ho, ho-ho!" Her laughter roared out, hungry and hollow as the surf around the island. Slowly, she shuffled closer. "So my dinner comes walking in to greet me, ho, ho, ho! Welcome, sweet flesh, welcome, good marrow-filled bones, come in and be warmed."

  "Why, thank you, good mother." Cappen shucked his cloak and grinning at her through the smoke. He felt his clothes steaming already. "I love you too."

  Over her shoulder, he suddenly saw the girl. She was huddled in a corner, wrapped in fear, but the eyes that watched him were as blue as the skies over Caronne. The ragged dress did not hide the gentle curves of her body, nor did the tear-streaked grime spoil the lilt of her face. "Why, 'tis springtime in here," cried Cappen, "and Primavera herself is strewing flowers of love."

  "What are you talking about, crazy man?" rumbled the troll-wife. She turned to the girl. "Heap the fire, Hildigund, and set up the roasting spit. Tonight I feast!"

  "Truly I see heaven in female form before me," said Cappen.

  The troll scratched her misshapen head.

  "You must surely be from far away, moonstruck man," she said.

  "Aye, from golden Croy am I wandered, drawn over dolorous seas and empty wild lands by the fame of loveliness waiting here; and now that I have seen you, my life is full." Cappen was looking at the girl as he spoke, but he hoped the troll might take it as aimed her way.

  "It will be fuller," grinned the monster. "Stuffed with hot coals while yet you live." She glanced back at the girl. "What, are you not working yet, you lazy tub of lard? Set up the spit, I said!"

  The girl shuddered back against a heap of wood. "No," she whispered. "I cannot--not ... not for a man."

  "Can and will, my girl," said the troll, picking up a bone to throw at her. The girl shrieked a little.

  "No, no, sweet mother. I would not be so ungallant as to have beauty toil for me." Cappen plucked at the troll's filthy dress. "It is not meet--in two senses. I only came to beg a little fire; yet will I bear away a greater fire within my heart."

  "Fire in your guts, you mean! No man ever left me save as picked bones."

  Cappen thought he heard a worried note in the animal growl. "Shall we have music for the feast?" he asked mildly. He unslung the case of his harp and took it out.

  The troll-wife waved her fists in the air and danced with rage. "Are you mad? I tell you, you are going to be eaten!"

  The minstrel plucked a string on his harp. "This wet air has played the devil with her tone," he murmured sadly.

  The troll-wife roared wordlessly and lunged at him. Hildigund covered her eyes. Cappen tuned his harp. A foot from his throat, the claws stopped.

  "Pray do not excite yourself, mother," said the bard. "I carry silver, you know."

  "What is that to me? If you think you have a charm which will turn me, know that there is none. I've no fear of your metal!"

  Cappen threw back his head and sang:

  "_A lovely lady full oft lies. The light that lies within her eyes And lies and lies, in no surprise. All her unkindness can devise To trouble hearts that seek the prize Which is herself, are angel lies--_"

  "_Aaaarrrgh!_" It was like thunder drowning him out. The troll-wife turned and went on all fours and poked up the fire with her nose.

  Cappen stepped softly around her and touched the girl. She looked up with a little whimper.

  "You are Svearek's only daughter, are you not?" he whispered.

  "Aye--" She bowed her head, a strengthless despair weighting it down. "The troll stole me away three winters agone. It has tickled her to have a princess for slave--but soon I will roast on her spit, even as ye, brave man--"

  "Ridiculous. So fair a lady is meant for another kind of, um, never mind! Has she treated you very ill?"

  "She beats me now and again--and I have been so lonely, naught here at all save the troll-wife and I--" The small work-roughened hands clutched desperately at his waist, and she buried her face against his breast.

  "Can ye save us?" she gasped. "I fear 'tis for naught ye ventured yer life, bravest of men. I fear we'll soon both sputter on the coals."

  Cappen said nothing. If she wanted to think he had come especially to rescue her, he would not be so ungallant to tell her otherwise.

  The troll-wife's mouth gashed in a grin as she walked through the fire to him. "There is a price," she said. "If you cannot tell me three things about myself which are true beyond disproving, not courage nor amulet nor the gods themselves may avail to keep that red head on your shoulders."

  Cappen clapped a hand to his sword. "Why, gladly," he said; this was a rule of magic he had learned long ago, that three truths were the needful armor to make any guardian charm work. "Imprimis, yours is the ugliest nose I ever saw poking up a fire. Secundus, I was never in a house I cared less to guest at. Tertius, ever among trolls you are little liked, being one of the worst."

  Hildigund moaned with terror as the monster swelled in rage. But there was no movement. Only the leaping flames and the eddying smoke stirred.

  Cappen's voice rang out, coldly: "Now the king lies on the sea, frozen and wet, and I am come to fetch a brand for his fire. And I had best also see his daughter home."

  The troll shook her head, suddenly chuckling. "No. The brand you may have, just to get you out of this cave, foulness; but the woman is in my thrall until a man sleeps with her--here--for a night. And if he does, I may have him to break my fast in the morning!"

  Cappen yawned mightily. "Thank you, mother. Your offer of a bed is most welcome to these tired bones, and I accept gratefully."
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  "You will die tomorrow!" she raved. The ground shook under the huge weight of her as she stamped. "Because of the three truths, I must let you go tonight; but tomorrow I may do what I will!"

  "Forget not my little friend, mother," said Cappen, and touched the cord of the amulet.

  "I tell you, silver has no use against me--"

  Cappen sprawled on the floor and rippled fingers across his harp. "_A lovely lady full oft lies--_"

  The troll-wife turned from him in a rage. Hildigund ladled up some broth, saying nothing, and Cappen ate it with pleasure, though it could have used more seasoning.

  After that he indited a sonnet to the princess, who regarded him wide-eyed. The troll came back from a tunnel after he finished, and said curtly: "This way." Cappen took the girl's hand and followed her into a pitchy, reeking dark.

  She plucked an arras aside to show a room which surprised him by being hung with tapestries, lit with candles, and furnished with a fine broad featherbed. "Sleep here tonight, if you dare," she growled. "And tomorrow I shall eat you--and you, worthless lazy she-trash, will have the hide flayed off your back!" She barked a laugh and left them.

  Hildigund fell weeping on the mattress. Cappen let her cry herself out while he undressed and got between the blankets. Drawing his sword, he laid it carefully in the middle of the bed.

  The girl looked at him through jumbled fair locks. "How can ye dare?" she whispered. "One breath of fear, one moment's doubt, and the troll is free to rend ye."

  "Exactly." Cappen yawned. "Doubtless she hopes that fear will come to me lying wakeful in the night. Wherefore 'tis but a question of going gently to sleep. O Svearek, Torbek, and Beorna, could you but see how I am resting now!"

  "But ... the three truths ye gave her ... how knew ye...?"

  "Oh, those. Well, see you, sweet lady, Primus and Secundus were my own thoughts, and who is to disprove them? Tertius was also clear, since you said there had been no company here in three years--yet are there many trolls in these lands, ergo even they cannot stomach our gentle hostess." Cappen watched her through heavy-lidded eyes.