and possession of al thys lande of Daemonlande, and doe nowe purpose to
dele with thayr castels villages riches cattell howssys and peopell in
my waye on al thys estren seaborde within L miells compas with rapes
and murtheres and burnyngs and all harsche dyscypline according to
your Majesties wille. And do stande with mine armie befoare Owleswyk,
bluddie Spitfyer’s notable great castel and forteres that alone yet
liveth in this lande of your daungerous grivious and malitious arche
enymies, and the same Spitfire being att my cominge fledde into the
mowntaynes all do submytt and become your Majesties vassalls. But I
wyll nat conclud nor determyn of peace no not with man weoman nor
chyld of them but kyll them al, havinge always befoare my minde the
satisfactioun of your Princely Pleasure.
“Lest I be too large I leve here to tel you of many rare and remarcable
occurants and observacions whych never the less I laye by in my mynde
to aquent you with agaynst my coming home or by further writinge. Laxus
bearing a kings name do puffe himself up alledging he wan the sefight
but I shall satisfy your Majestie to the contrary. Gro followeth
the wars in as goode sort as his lean spare bodey will wel beare. Of
Gallandus I nedes must saye he do meddyl too much in my counsailles,
still desyring me do thus and thus but I will nat. Heretofore in the
like unrespective manner he hath now and then used mee which I have
swolewed but will not no more. Who if hee go about to calumniate me in
any thinge I praye you Lorde let mee know it though I despise baithe
him and all such. And in acknowledgement of Your highe favors unto
meward do kiss your Majesties hand.
“Most humbly and reverently untoe my Lorde the Kynge, undir my seal.
CORSUS.”
• • • • •
The King put up the writing in his bosom. “Bring me Corsus’s cup,” said
he.
They did so, and the King said, “Fill it with Thramnian wine. Drop me
an emerald in it to spawn luck i’ the cup, and drink him fortune and
wisdom in victory.”
Prezmyra, that had watched the King till now as a mother watches her
child in the crisis of a fever, rose up radiant in her seat, crying,
“Victory!” And all they fell a-shouting and smiting on the boards till
the roof-beams shook with their great shouting, while the King drank
first and passed on the cup that all might drink in turn.
But Gorice the King sat dark among them as a cliff of serpentine that
frowns above dancing surges of a springtide summer sea.
When the women left the banquet hall the Lady Prezmyra came to the King
and said, “Your brow is too dark, Lord, if indeed this news is all good
that lights your heart and mind from withinward.”
The King answered and said, “Madam, it is very good news. Yet remember
that hard it is to lift a full cup without spilling.”
• • • • •
Now was summer worn and harvest brought in, and on the twenty-seventh
day after these tidings afore-writ came another ship of Witchland out
of the west sailing over the teeming deep, and rowed on a full tide up
Druima and through the Ergaspian Mere, and so anchored below Carcë an
hour before supper time. That was a calm clear sunshine evening, and
King Gorice rode home from his hunting at that instant when the ship
made fast by the water-gate. And there was the Lord Gro aboard of her;
and the face of him as he came up out of the ship and stood to greet
the King was the colour of quick-lime a-slaking.
The King looked narrowly at him, then greeting him with much outward
show of carelessness and pleasure made him go with him to the King’s
own lodgings. There the King made Gro drink a great stoup of red wine,
and said to him, “I am all of a muck sweat from the hunting. Go in with
me to my baths and tell me all while I bathe me before supper. Princes
of all men be in greatest danger, for that men dare not acquaint them
with their own peril. Thou look’st prodigious. Know that shouldst thou
proclaim to me all my fleet and army in Demonland brought to sheer
destruction, that should not dull my stomach for the feast to-night.
Witchland is not so poor I might not pay back such a loss thrice and
four times and yet have money in my purse.”
So speaking, the King was come with Gro into his great bath chamber,
walled and floored with green serpentine, with dolphins carved in the
same stone to belch water into the baths that were lined with white
marble and sunken in the floor, both wide and deep, the hot bath on
the left and the cold bath, many times greater, on the right as they
entered the chamber. The King dismissed all his attendants, and made
Gro sit on a bench piled with cushions above the hot bath, and drink
more wine. And the King stripped off his jerkin of black cowhide and
his hose and his shirt of white Beshtrian wool and went down into the
steaming bath. Gro looked with wonder on the mighty limbs of Gorice the
King, so lean and yet so strong to behold, as if he were built all of
iron; and a great marvel it was how the King, when he had put off his
raiment and royal apparel and went down stark naked into the bath, yet
seemed to have put off not one whit of his kingliness and the majesty
and dread which belonged to him.
So when he had plunged awhile in the swirling waters of the bath, and
soaped himself from head to foot and plunged again, the King lay back
luxuriously in the water and said to Gro, “Tell me of Corsus and his
sons, and of Laxus and Gallandus, and of all my men west over seas,
as thou shouldest tell of those whose life or death in our conceit
importeth as much as that of a scarab fly. Speak and fear not, keeping
nothing back nor glozing over nothing. Only that should make me
dreadful to thee if thou shouldst practise to deceive me.”
Gro spake and said, “My Lord the King, you have letters, I think, from
Corsus that have told you how we came to Demonland, and how we gat a
victory over Volle in the sea-fight, and landed at Grunda, and fought
two battles against Vizz and overthrew him in the last, and he is dead.”
“Didst thou see these letters?” asked the King.
Gro answered, “Ay.”
“Is it a true tale they tell me?”
Gro answered, “Mainly true, O King, though somewhat now and then he
windeth truth to his turn, swelling overmuch his own achievement. As
at Grunda, where he maketh too great the Demons’ army, that by a just
computation were fewer than us, and the battle was not ours nor theirs,
for while our left held them by the sea they stormed our camp on the
right. And well I think ’twas to enveagle us into country that should
be likelier to his purpose that Vizz fell back toward Owlswick in the
night. But as touching the battle of Crossby Outsikes Corsus braggeth
not too much. That was greatly fought and greatly devised by him, who
also slew Vizz with his own hands in the thick of the battle, and made
a great victory over them and scattered all their strength, coming upon
them at unawares and taking them upon advantage.”
So saying Gro stretched forth his delicate white fingers to the goblet
at his side and drank. “And now, O King,” said he, leaning forward over
his knees and running his fingers through the black perfumed curls
above his ears, “I am to tell you the uprising of those discontents
that infected all our fortunes and confounded us all. Now came
Gallandus with some few men down from Breakingdale, leaving his main
force of fourteen hundred men or so to hold the Stile as was agreed
upon aforetime. Now Gallandus had advertisement of Spitfire come out of
the west country where he was sojourning when we came into Demonland,
disporting himself in the mountains with hunting of the bears that do
there inhabit, but now come hot-foot eastward and agathering of men at
Galing. And on Gallandus’s urgent asking, was held a council of war
three days after Crossby Outsikes, wherein Gallandus set forth his
counsel that we should fare north to Galing and disperse them.
“All thought well of this counsel, save Corsus. But he took it mighty
ill, being stubborn set to carry out his predetermined purpose, which
was to follow up this victory of Crossby Outsikes by so many cruel
murthers, rapes, and burnings, up and down the country side in Upper
and Lower Tivarandardale and down by Onwardlithe and the southern
seaboard, as should show those vermin he was their master whom they did
require, and the scourge in your hand, O King, that must scourge them
to the bare bone.
“To which Gallandus making answer that the preparations at Galing did
argue something to be done and not afar off, and that ‘This were a
pretty matter, if Owlswick and Drepaby shall be able to enforce us cast
our eyes over our shoulders while those before us’ (meaning in Galing)
‘strike us in the brains’; Corsus answereth most unhandsomely, ‘I will
not satisfy myself with this intelligence until I find it more soundly
seconded.’ Nor would he listen, but said that this was his mind, and
all we should abide by it or an ill thing should else befall us: that
this south-eastern corner of the land being gained with great terror
and cruelty the neck of the wars in Demonland should then be broken,
and all the others whether in Galing or otherwhere could not choose
but die like dogs; that ’twas pure folly, because of the hardness and
naughty ways of the country, to set upon Galing; and that he would
quickly show Gallandus he was lord there. So was the council broke up
in great discontent. And Gallandus abode before Owlswick, which as thou
knowest, O King, is a mighty strong place, seated on an arm of the land
that runneth out into the sea beside the harbour, and a paven way goeth
thereto that is covered with the sea save at low tide of a spring-tide.
And we drew great store of provisions thither against a siege if such
should befall us. But Corsus with his main forces went south about
the country, murthering and ravishing, on his way to the new house of
Goldry Bluszco at Drepaby, giving out that from henceforth should folk
speak no more of Drepaby Mire and Drepaby Combust that the Ghouls did
burn, but both should shortly be burnt alike as two cinders.”
“Ay,” said the King, coming out of the bath, “and did he burn it so?”
Gro answered, “He did, O King.”
The King lifted his arms above his head and plunged head foremost into
the great cold swimming bath. Coming forth anon, he took a towel to
dry himself, and holding an end of it in either hand came and stood by
Gro, the towel rushing back and forth behind his shoulders, and said,
“Proceed, tell me more.”
“Lord,” said Gro, “so it was that they in Owlswick gave up the place at
last unto Gallandus, and Corsus came back from the burning of Drepaby
Mire. All the folk in that part of Demonland had he brought to misery
in her most sharp condition. But now was he to find by sour experience
what that neglect had bred him when he went not north to Galing as
Gallandus had counselled him to do.
“For now was word of Spitfire marching out from Galing with an hundred
and ten score foot and two hundred and fifty horse. Upon which tidings
we placed ourselves in very warlike fashion and moved north to meet
them, and on the last morn of August fell in with their army in a place
called the Rapes of Brima in the open parts of Lower Tivarandardale.
All we were blithe at heart, for we held them at an advantage both in
numbers (for we were more than three thousand four hundred fighting
men, whereof were four hundred a-horseback), and in the goodness of our
fighting stead, being perched on the edge of a little valley looking
down on Spitfire and his folk. There we abode for a time, watching what
he would do, till Corsus grew weary of this and said, ‘We are more than
they. I will march north and then east across the head of the valley
and so cut them off, that they escape not north again to Galing after
the battle when they are worsted by us.’
“Now Gallandus nay-said this strongly, willing him to stand and abide
their onset; for being mountaineers they must certainly choose at
length, if we kept quiet, to attack us up the slope, and that were
mightily to our advantage. But Corsus, that still grew from day to day
more hard to deal with, would not hear him, and at last sticked not to
accuse him before them all (which was most false) that he did practise
to gain the command for himself, and had caused Corsus to be set upon
to have him and his sons murthered as they went from his lodging the
night before.
“And Corsus gave order for the march across their front as I have told
it you, O King; which indeed was the counsel of a madman. For Spitfire,
when he saw our column crossing the dale-head on his right, gave order
for the charge, took us i’ the flank, cut us in two, and in two hours
had our army smashed like an egg that is dropped from a watch-tower on
pavement of hard granite. Never saw I so evil a destruction wrought on
a great army. Hardly and in evil case we won back to Owlswick with but
seventeen hundred men, and of them some hundreds wounded sore. And if
two hundred fell o’ the other side, ’tis a wonder and past expectation,
so great was Spitfire’s victory upon us at the Rapes of Brima. And now
was our woe worsened by fugitives coming from the north, telling how
Zigg had fallen upon the small force that was left to hold the Stile
and clean o’erwhelmed them. So were we now shut up in Owlswick and
close besieged by Spitfire and his army, who but for the devilish folly
of Corsus, had ne’er made head against us.
“An ill night was that, O my Lord the King, in Owlswick by the sea.
Corsus was drunk, and both his sons, guzzling down goblet upon goblet
of the wine from Spitfire’s cellars in Owlswick. Till at last he was
fallen spewing on the floor betwixt the tables, and Gallandus standing
amongst us all, galled to the quick after this shame and ruin of our
fortunes, cried out and said, ‘Soldiers of Witchland, I am aweary of
this Corsus: a rioter, a lecher, a surfeiter, a brawler, a spiller of
armies, our own not our enemies’, who must bring us all to hell and we
take not order to prevent him.’ And he said, ‘I will go home again to
Witchland, and have no more share nor part in this shame.’ But all they
cried, ‘To the devil with Corsus! Be thou our general.’”
Gro was silent a minute. “O King,” he said at last, “if so it be that
the malice of the Gods and mine unfortune have brought me to that
case that I am part guilty of that which came about, blame me not
overmuch. Little I thought any word of mine should help Corsus and
the going forward of his bad enterprise. When all they called still
upon Gallandus, saying, ‘Ha, ha, Gallandus! weed out the weeds, lest
the best corn fester! Be thou our general,’ he took me aside to speak
with him; because he said he would take further judgement of me before
he would consent in so great a matter. And I, seeing deadly danger in
these disorders, and thinking that there only lay our safety if he
should have command who was both a soldier and whose mind was bent to
high attempts and noble enterprises, did egg him forward to accept
it. So that he, albeit unwilling, said yea to them at last. Which all
applauded; and Corsus said nought against it, being too sleepy-sodden
as we thought with drunkenness to speak or move.
“So for that night we went to bed. But in the morn, O King, was a great
clamour betimes in the main court in Owlswick. And I, running forth in
my shirt in the misty gray of dawn, beheld Corsus standing forth in
a gallery before Gallandus’s lodgings that were in an upper chamber.
He was naked to the waist, his hairy breast and arms to the armpits
clotted and adrip with blood, and in his hands two bloody daggers. He
cried in a great voice, ‘Treason in the camp, but I have scotched it.
He that will have Gallandus to his general, come up and I shall mix his
blood with his and make them familiar.’”
By then had the King drawn on his silken hose, and a clean silken
shirt, and was about lacing his black doublet trimmed with diamonds.
“Thou tellest me,” said he, “two faults committed by Corsus. That
first he lost me a battle and nigh half his men, and next did murther
Gallandus in a spleen against him when he would have amended this.”
“Killing Gallandus in his sleep,” said Gro, “and sending him from the
shade into the house of darkness.”
“Well,” said the King, “there be two days in every month when whatever
is begun will never reach completion. And I think it was on such a day
he did execute his purpose upon Gallandus.”
“The whole camp,” said Lord Gro, “is up in a mutiny against him, being
marvellously offended at the murther of so worthy a man in arms. Yet
durst they not openly go against him; for his veterans guard his
person, and he hath let slice the guts out of some dozen or more that
were foremost in murmuring at him, so that the rest are afeared to
make open rebellion. I tell you, O King, your army of Demonland is
in great danger and peril. Spitfire sitteth down before Owlswick in
mickle strength, and there is no expectation that we shall hold out
long without supply of men. There is danger too lest Corsus do some
desperate act. I see not how, with so mutinous an army as his, he can
dare to attempt anything at all. Yet hath he his ears filled with the
continual sound of reputation, and the contempt which will be spread
to the disgrace of him if he repair not soon his fault on the Rapes
of Brima. It is thought that the Demons have no ships, and Laxus
commandeth the sea. Yet hard it is to make any going between betwixt
the fleet and Owlswick, and there be many goodly harbours and places
for building of ships in Demonland. If they can stop our relieving of
Corsus, and prevent Laxus with a fleet at spring, may be we shall be
driven to a great calamity.”
“How camest thou off?” said the King.
“O King,” answered Lord Gro, “after this murther in Owlswick I did
daily fear a fig or a knife, so for mine own health and Witchland’s
devised all the ways I could to come away. And gat at last to the fleet
by stealth and there took rede with Laxus, who is most hot upon Corsus
for this ill deed of his, whereby all our hopes may end in smoke, and
prayed me come to you for him as for myself and for all true hearts
of Witchland that do seek your greatness, O King, and not decay, that
you might send them succour ere all be shent. For surely in Corsus
some wild distraction hath overturned his old condition and spilt the
goodness you once did know in him. His luck hath gone from him, and he
is now one that would fall on his back and break his nose. I pray you
strike, ere Fate strike first and strike us into the hazard.”
“Tush!” said the King. “Do not lift me before I fall. ’Tis supper time.
Attend me to the banquet.”
By now was Gorice the King in full festival attire, with his doublet
of black tiffany slashed with black velvet and broidered o’er with
diamonds, black velvet hose cross-gartered with silver-spangled bands
of silk, and a great black bear-skin mantle and collar of ponderous
gold. The Iron crown was on his head. He took down from his chamber
wall, as they went by, a sword hafted of blue steel with a pommel of
bloodstone carved like a dead man’s skull. This he bare naked in his
hand, and they came into the banquet hall.
They that were there rose to their feet in silence, gazing expectant on
the King where he stood between the pillars of the door with that sharp
sword held on high, and the jewelled crab of Witchland ablaze above his
brow. But most they marked his eyes. Surely the light in the eyes of
the King under his beetle brows was like a light from the under-skies
shed upward from the pit of hell.
He said no word, but with a gesture beckoned Corinius. Corinius
stood up and came to the King, slowly, as a night-walker, obedient to
that dread gaze. His cloak of sky-blue silk was flung back from his
shoulders. His chest, broad as a bull’s, swelled beneath the shining
silver scales of his byrny, that was short-sleeved, leaving his strong
arms bare to view with golden rings about the wrists. Proudly he stood
before the King, his head firm planted above his mighty throat and
neck; his proud luxurious mouth, made for wine-cups and for ladies’
lips, firm set above the square shaven chin and jaw; the thick fair
curls of his hair bound with black bryony; the insolence that dwelt in
his dark blue eyes tamed for the while in face of that green bale-light
that rose and fell in the steadfast gaze of the King.
When they had so stood silent while men might count twenty breaths,
the King spake saying: “Corinius, receive the name of the kingdom of
Demonland which thy Lord and King give thee, and make homage to me
thereof.”
The breath of amazement went about the hall. Corinius kneeled. The
King gave him that sword which he held in his hand, bare for the
slaughter, saying, “With this sword, O Corinius, shalt thou wear out
this blemish and blot that until now rested upon thee in mine eye.
Corsus hath proved haggard. He hath made miss in Demonland. His sottish
folly hath shut him up in Owlswick and lost me half his force. His
jealousy, too maliciously and bloodily bent against my friends ’stead
of mine enemies, hath lost me a good captain. The wonderful disorder
and distresses of his army must, if thou amend it not, swing all our
fortune at one chop from bliss to bale. If this be rightly handled by
thee, one great stroke shall change every deal. Go thou, and prove thy
demerits.”
The Lord Corinius stood up, holding the sword point-downward in his
hand. His face flamed red as an autumn sky when leaden clouds break
apart on a sudden westward and the sun looks out between. “My Lord the
King,” said he, “give me where I may sit down: I will make where I may
lie down. Ere another moon shall wax again to the full I will set forth
from Tenemos. If I do not shortly remedy for you our fortunes which
this bloody fool hath laboured to ruinate, spit in my face, O King,
withhold from me the light of your countenance, and put spells upon me
shall destroy and blast me for ever.”
XIX: THREMNIR’S HEUGH
OF THE LORD SPITFIRE’S BESIEGING OF THE WITCHES IN HIS OWN CASTLE
OF OWLSWICK; AND HOW HE DID BATTLE AGAINST CORINIUS UNDER
THREMNIR’S HEUGH, AND THE MEN OF WITCHLAND WON THE DAY.
Lord Spitfire sat in his pavilion before Owlswick in mickle discontent.
A brazier of hot coals made a pleasant warmth within, and lights filled
the rich tent with splendour. From without came the noise of rain
steadily falling in the dark autumn night, splashing in the puddles,
pattering on the silken roof. Zigg sat by Spitfire on the bed, his
hawk-like countenance shadowed with an unwonted look of care. His sword
stood between his knees point downward on the floor. He tipped it
gently with either hand now to the left now to the right, watching with
pensive gaze the warm light shift and gleam in the ball of balas ruby
that made the pommel of the sword.
“Fell it out so accursedly?” said Spitfire. “All ten, thou saidst, on
Rammerick Strands?”
Zigg nodded assent.
“Where was he that he saved them not?” said Spitfire. “O, it was vilely
miscarried!”
Zigg answered, “’Twas a swift and secret landing in the dark a mile
east of the harbour. Thou must not blame him unheard.”
“What more remain to us?” said Spitfire. “Content: I’ll hear him.
What ships remain to us, is more to the purpose. Three by Northsands
Eres, below Elmerstead: five on Throwater: two by Lychness: two more
at Aurwath: six by my direction on Stropardon Firth: seven here on the
beach.”
“Besides four at the firth head in Westmark,” said Zigg. “And order is
ta’en for more in the Isles.”
“Twenty and nine,” said Spitfire, “and those in the Isles beside. And
not one afloat, nor can be ere spring. If Laxus smell them out and take
them as lightly as these he burned under Volle’s nose on Rammerick
Strands, we do but plough the desert building them.”
He rose to pace the tent. “Thou must raise me new forces for to break
into Owlswick. ’Fore heaven!” he said, “this vexes me to the guts, to
sit at mine own gate full two months like a beggar, whiles Corsus and
those two cubs his sons drink themselves drunk within, and play at
cock-shies with my treasures.”
“O’ the wrong side of the wall,” said Zigg, “the master-builder may
judge the excellence of his own building.”