These were fearfully hideous looking warriors with distorted, disease-racked faces—some with half the flesh missing from their bones. All of them grinned the familiar grins of the decomposing dead.
Out came our swords and we were at once in battle, our effectiveness impaired by the fact that Groot not only was a passenger but was now unarmed. Neither were our spirits improved by the awful giggling noises which escaped the lips of our attackers whenever our swords struck them.
Round and round us they galloped, making it impossible for us to progress, while I racked my memory for a spell to hamper them. Groot it was who succeeded, with:
“Brothers! Why do you not pursue von Bek? He will destroy you if he succeeds. See—there he is now, almost at the forest!”
As they turned lustreless eyes in the direction he pointed, he murmured to me: “I find that the dead are in the main a dull-witted breed.”
The riders ceased their giggling and began to confer amongst themselves, whereupon we were again spurring our horses towards the blue-green haze. Behind us we could see an army stretching the length of the horizon and above them the blackness which now crept towards the sun. Soon it would be blotted from view.
A coldness came from the east now, like a wind yet with no power. It was more reminiscent, I thought, of a vacuum which threatened to suck us in. We shivered as we laboured on, the Hell-creatures once more in pursuit.
“Duke Arioch spreads his wings,” said Groot of the black cloud. “He has put his entire army at Klosterheim’s disposal.”
Dead flesh stank in our nostrils; dead hands reached out for us. And more came up behind the first riders: running things, half-ape, half-man, in knotted leather with spears and hardwood clubs, their teeth like tusks. And behind them came thin-faced, long-bodied warriors with waving grey hair, in green-and-white livery and no armour. These carried great two-handed blades and guided their thick-bodied mounts with their thighs. And to one side of them were demons, all horns and warts, on demon-horses, and there were women with filed teeth, and women with the snouts of pigs, and apparitions whose flesh ran liquid on their bodies, and there were lizards bearing monkey-riders, and ostriches carrying lepers in arms, and hooded things which cawed at us—and still we galloped, barely in front of them, while Sedenko set up a wailing and a crying out to God, the Tsar and Saint Sophia for their aid and Groot was pale, exhausted, no longer able to maintain his poise.
The gabbling, squeaking and giggling din filled our ears. It alone might have driven us mad, just as the smell brought us close to fainting. Our horses were tiring. I saw Sedenko stumble once and almost dislodge the magus. It seemed to me that Philander Groot was as frightened as I was, that he had spent all his resources. Yet now he had no option but to run with us in the faint hope that the forest might offer at least some temporary sanctuary.
We were not far enough ahead of our pursuers. Little by little they caught up with us again and began to surround us.
“O God, have mercy on me. I repent! I repent!” shouted Sedenko, even as he slashed with his sword at a demon and took off its head. “I confess that I am a sinner and a rogue!” Another head went clear of a body. Blood spattered the Kazak’s face. He was weeping, pale with fear, scarcely conscious, I guessed, that he prayed even as he killed. “Mother of God, take me to thy bosom!”
The stinking press grew tighter and tighter. Yet not a single sword had cut at us. Not one blow had landed on us. I realized that Klosterheim had ordered that we be taken alive. His nature was such that he would be gratified only if he could supervise our deaths.
“The grimoire!” cried Sedenko to me. “There must be something in the grimoire!”
I drew out first one and then another. I called out words of power. I chanted the spell which had previously commanded Duke Arioch’s forces. But nothing affected those Hell-creatures now. It spoke much for Arioch’s growing strength and for Lucifer’s waning authority. I flung the grimoires at laughing, hideous faces. I flung my maps at Klosterheim even as his horse parted the ranks and he rode slowly, stiff-backed, towards us, a little smile upon his thin lips, a slight swagger to his shoulders. He reached out a hand and caught the map-case, emptying it onto the ground. He shrugged. “Now you are mine, von Bek,” he said.
It was then that Philander Groot quietly dismounted and placed himself between me and my old enemy.
“Klosterheim,” he said in a quiet, small voice which nonetheless carried enormous weight, “thou art the personification of intellectual poverty.”
Klosterheim sneered. “Yet here I am, Philander Groot, in the ascendant, while all you can hope for is a merciful death. Perhaps you would argue that there is no justice. I would argue that the strong make their own justice, through action and through the gathering of power to themselves.”
“You have been granted power, Johannes Klosterheim, because Duke Arioch finds it worth his while to grant it. But when you have no further use, Johannes Klosterheim, you will be discarded.”
“I command all this!” Klosterheim swept his hand to indicate the endless ranks of the damned. “Lucifer Himself trembles. See! We have reached the borders of Heaven itself. When we have done with you, we shall march upon the Holy City, if we so decide. We lay siege to the feeble, decadent old God residing there. We lay siege to His idiot Son. Duke Arioch uses me, it is true, but he uses me as Lucifer uses von Bek. For my courage. For my mortal courage!”
“In von Bek it is courage,” said Philander Groot. “In you, Johannes Klosterheim, it is madness.”
“Madness? To seek power and to hold it? No!”
“Despair leads to many forms of thought,” said the magus. “and many kinds of action. Despair drives some to greater sanity, towards an analysis of the world as it is and what it might be. Others it drives to deep and dangerous insanity, towards an imposition of their own desires upon reality. I sympathize with your despair, Johannes Klosterheim, because it has no solace, in the end. Your despair is the worst there is to know. And yet men often look upon the likes of you and envy you, as you doubtless envy Duke Arioch, as Duke Arioch doubtless envies his master Lucifer, whom he would betray, and perhaps as Lucifer envied God. And what does God envy, I wonder? Perhaps he envies the simple mortal who is content with his lot and envies nobody.”
“I’ll not listen to this drivel,” said Klosterheim. “You become boring, Philander Groot. I shall kill you all the sooner if you bore me!”
Philander Groot had straightened his back. He seemed far more relaxed now. He struck one of his old poses and tweaked for a moment at his moustache. “Fa! This is crude, even for you, Johannes Klosterheim. If you demand entertainment in others, you should at least be prepared to offer some yourself!”
All around us the Forces of Hell were snuffling and snorting, growling and drooling. They were so hungry for our deaths.
“Is this—” Groot continued, waving a fastidious hand at the demons and the misshapen living-dead, “is this all you can offer? Mere sensation? Terror is the easiest of all human passions to arouse. Did you know?”
Klosterheim was not cowed by the magus. He shrugged. “But you will admit that terror is most effective in winning one’s goals. By far the most economical of emotions, eh, philosopher?”
“I suppose that we are temperamentally opposed,” said Philander Groot, for all the world as if he played host to a guest at dinner, “and that we shall never quite understand the other’s motives or ambitions.”
He reached up into the air and appeared to pull on something, an invisible cord. Then in his hand there was a ball of blazing gold. The gold flared brighter and brighter until his whole body seemed to burn with it. His calm, somewhat bored face continued to look out at us as the hordes of Hell fell back, muttering and dismayed. He moved one of his hands and a swath of fire spread across the nearest group of demons. Instantly they began to burn, howling and stamping and beating at their bodies. Another movement and several score more monsters were afire.
Klosterheim staggered bac
kwards, shielding his face from the heat. “What? You have tricked me. Kill him!”
Philander Groot spoke to me in a conversational tone. “I shall be dead within moments, I think. I would advise both of you to flee while you can.”
“Come with us!” I said.
“No. I am content.”
I looked westward and there was the blue-green haze, my goal.
“Here!” I threw him the flask containing the last of Lucifer’s elixir. He took it with a nod of gratitude and put the rim to his lips.
“Sedenko!” I shouted to my companion. Then I lashed at my horse and was away.
“Oh, you must kill them now!” I heard Klosterheim shout.
We broke out onto the grass again. I looked back. Everything was shadow save for the golden fire which seared through the ranks of the damned. Sedenko was white. He was clutching at his back, even as he rode. He seemed to be weeping.
I saw Philander Groot move. I saw fire spring between us and the Hell-horde. The stink of that army gave way to purer air and there was softness ahead of us.
As we reached the forest and entered the first clumps of trees, Sedenko fell forward on his horse’s neck. His breathing was ragged. Small sounds came from his lips.
I saw that he had a gash in his back which stretched from his shoulders to his hip. He continued to weep. “They have killed me. Oh, by all that is holy, they have killed me, captain.”
The golden fire was out now. The black army was on the move again. Then it stopped.
I knew that it would not come into the Forest at the Edge of Heaven, but that it would be waiting for me should I ever emerge again.
I jumped from my weary horse and went to tend to Sedenko. I supported his body as it slid from its saddle. Blood flowed over my arms and my chest. He looked up at me and his face was now innocent and pleading. “Am I truly damned, captain? Am I bound for Hell?”
I could not reply.
When he was dead I raised myself to my feet and I looked about me. Everything was still. A loneliness had come upon my soul.
There was darkness everywhere now but in the forest. And even here there were wisps of grey, as if evil crept in.
I lifted my head to the sky and I shook my fist. “Oh, I reject you. I reject your Heaven and I reject your Hell. Do as you wish with me, but know that your desires are petty and your ambitions have no meaning!”
I addressed no one. I addressed the universe. I addressed a void.
Chapter XVI
A SILENCE HAD fallen over the world.
The plain now seemed filled from end to end by Klosterheim’s army, a frozen, waiting gathering. The forest itself was like the forest I had first entered when I discovered Lucifer’s castle. No animals, no birds, nothing moving; only the sweet scent of the flowers and the grass.
I gathered leaves and wild tulips and covered Sedenko’s body with them. I did not have the strength to bury him. I left his horse to guard him and mounted my own beast, striking due west into the depths of the blue-green forest. My mind and my body both were consumed by a curious numbness. Perhaps they were incapable of accepting any more terror or grief.
I knew, too, that I had changed as much since I had left Lucifer’s castle as I had since I had left Bek on the road to Magdeburg. The changes were subtle. There had been no strong sense of revelation. My bitterness was of a different order. I blamed nobody, not even God, for the woes of the world. Neither did I blame myself too hard for past crimes. However, I was determined to follow a path that was entirely my own. Should I ever return to the world I had left, I would not serve Protestant or Catholic. I would use my soldier’s skills to protect myself and mine, if need be, but I would not volunteer to go a-warring. I mourned for Sedenko and for Philander Groot and I told myself that should I have the chance to avenge their deaths, I would probably take it, though I felt no special anger, now, towards the wretched Johannes Klosterheim, who daily increased his own terror as he increased his power.
The ground began to rise upwards, almost following the curve I thought I had detected from a distance. And now, away from the influence of Klosterheim’s forces, I heard a wren’s voice, then the sound of blackbirds and magpies. Small animals moved in the undergrowth. All was natural again.
I rode for many hours before I realized that night did not fall in this forest. The sky was cloudless and still and the sun was benign. And eventually I heard the sound of children laughing as I breasted a rise and looked down into a little glade, with a thatched cottage and a few outbuildings, a cow and a plough-horse. Three little boys were playing in the yard and at the door stood a grey-haired woman with a straight back and clear, youthful skin. Even from that distance I saw her eyes. They were as blue-green as the forest and they were steady. She smiled and gestured.
I rode down slowly, savouring this scene of peace.
“I must warn you,” said I, “that a great army out of Hell besieges your forest.”
“I know,” said the woman. “What are you called, man?”
“I am called Ulrich von Bek and I am upon a Quest. I seek the Holy Grail so that the World’s Pain might be cured and Lucifer taken back into the Kingdom of Heaven.”
“Ah,” said she, “at last you are here, Ulrich von Bek. I have it for you.”
I dismounted. I was astonished. “You have what, lady?”
“I have what you would call the Grail. It is a cup. It is what you seek, I think.”
“Lady, I cannot believe you. I think that up to now I never did truly believe that I would find the Grail, and never so easily as to be offered it by one such as you.”
“Oh, the Grail is a simple thing. And it has a simple function, really, Ulrich von Bek.”
My legs were weak. I felt faint. I had not realized how exhausted I had become.
The woman signed to one of the boys to take my horse. She put her arm about my waist. She was extremely strong.
She led me into the cool peace of her parlour and sat me down upon a bench. She brought me milk. She gave me bread with honey on it. She took off my helmet and she stroked my head and murmured soothingly to me so that I wept.
I wept for an hour. And when I had finished I looked up at the lady and I said: “All that I love is threatened or is lost forever.”
“So it must seem,” she said.
“My friends are dead. My true love is in Satan’s thrall, as am I. And I cannot trust my Master to keep His bond.”
“Lucifer cannot be trusted,” she agreed.
“He offered to return my soul,” I told her.
“Aye. It is the only thing He can offer, Ulrich von Bek, which has any value to a mortal. He can offer power and knowledge, but they are worthless if the price is one’s soul. Many have come to me, at the Forest at the Edge of Heaven. Many soldiers and many philosophers.”
“Seeking the Grail?”
“Aye.”
“And you have shown it to them?”
“To some, yes, I have shown it.”
“And they have taken it forth into the world?”
“One or two have taken it forth, aye.”
“So it is all a trick. There is no special power to the Grail.”
“I did not tell you that, Ulrich von Bek.” She was almost chiding. She poured me more milk from a pitcher. She spread honey on the good bread. “But most of them expected magic. Most expected at very least some heavenly music. Most were so pure, Ulrich von Bek, and so innocent, that they could not bear the truth.”
“What? The Grail, surely, is not a deception of Satan’s. If so, the implications of what I have been doing …”
She laughed. “You expect worse, for your experience has led you to expect worse. Oh, I have seen great-hearted men and women kneeling in worship of the cup. I have seen them pray for days, awaiting its message, some sign. I have seen them ride from here in disappointment, claiming that they have been offered a false Grail. I have even been threatened with death, by that same Klosterheim who now commands Hell’s armies.”
br /> “Klosterheim has been here? When?”
“Many years since. I treated him no differently. But he expected too much. So he got nothing. And he went away. He stabbed me here”—she indicated her left breast—”with his sword.”
“And yet he did not kill you, plainly.”
“Of course not. He was not strong enough.”
“He has strength with him now.”
“That he has! But he has refused to learn,” she said, “and it is a great shame. He had character, Johannes Klosterheim, and I liked him, for all that he was naïve. He refused to learn what Lucifer refused to learn. Yet I believe you have learned it, Ulrich von Bek.”
“All I have learned, lady, is to accept the world’s attributes as they are. I have learned, I suppose, an acceptance of my own self, an acceptance of Man’s ability to create not sensations and marvels but cities and farms which order the world, which bring us justice and sanity.”
“Aha,” she said. “Is that all you have learned, then, young man? Is that all?”
“I think so,” I said. “The marvelous is of necessity a lie, a distortion. At best it is a metaphor which leads to the truth. I think that I know what causes the World’s Pain, lady. Or at least I think I know what contributes to that Pain.”
“And what would that be, Ulrich von Bek?”
“By telling a single lie to oneself or to another, by denying a single fact of the world as it has been created, one adds to the World’s Pain. And pain, lady, creates pain. And one must not seek to become saint or sinner, God or Devil. One must seek to become human and to love the fact of one’s humanity.”
I became embarrassed. “That is all I have learned, lady.”
“It is all that Heaven demands,” she said.
I looked out through her window. “Is there such a place as Heaven?”
“I think so,” she said. “Come, we shall walk together, Ulrich von Bek.”
I was much refreshed. She took my hand and led me from the cottage and through the forest behind it until we stood upon a precipice, whence issued the blue-green haze. I felt a sudden soaring of the mind and senses, such as I had never before experienced. I felt a joy and a peace, previously unknown. I wanted to plunge from that place and into the cool haze, to give myself up to whatever it was I felt. But the woman tugged at my hand and I had to turn my back on Heaven.