The Queen of the Swords

  'How was it destroyed?' Corum asked him as the Ghanh flew higher and closer.

  'That part I forget.'

  'If we spread out, we shall have a better chance,' Corum said, backing away from the gorge's edge. 'Quickly.'

  'If you'll forgive the suggestion, friend Corum,' Jhary said as he, too, stepped backwards. 'I think your netherworld allies would be of use to us here.'

  'Those allies are now the black birds we fought on the mountain. Could they defeat the Ghanh. . .?'

  'I suggest you discover that now.'

  Corum flung up the eye-patch and peered again into the netherworld. There they were - a score of black, brooding birds, each with the mark of the barbed Vadhagh lance in its breast. But they saw Corum and they recognized him. One of them opened its beak and screeched in a tone so hopeless that Corum felt almost sympathetic to it.

  'Can you understand me?' he said.

  He heard Rhalina's voice. 'It is almost upon us, Corum!'

  'We - understand - master. Have you - a prize - for us?' said one of the birds.

  Corum shuddered. 'Aye, if you can take it.'

  The Hand of Kwll reached into that murky cavern and it beckoned to the birds. With a dreadful rustling sound they took to the air.

  And they flew into the world in which Corum and his companions stood awaiting the Ghanh.

  'There,' said Corum. 'There is your prize.'

  The black birds flung their wounded, dead-alive bodies higher into the sky and began to wheel as the Ghanh swam over the edge of the gorge and opened its jaws, giving a piercing scream as it saw the four mortals.

  'Run!' Corum shouted.

  They took to their heels, scattering, running through the deep drifts of blood-dust as the Ghanh screamed again and hesitated, deciding which human to deal with first.

  Corum choked on the stink of the creature as the wind of its breath touched him. He darted a look backward. He remembered how cowardly the birds had been, how they had taken long to make up their minds to attack him before. Would they have the courage - even though it meant their release from limbo - to attack the Ghanh?

  But now the birds were spearing downwards again at an incredible speed. The Ghanh had not known they were there and it screamed in surprise as their beaks drove into its soft head. It snapped at them and seized two bodies in its jaws. Yet, though half-eaten by the creature, the beaks continued to peck, for the living-dead could not be slain again.

  The Ghanh's wings beat close to the ground and a huge cloud of blood-dust rose all around it. Through this dust Corum and the others could see the fray. The Ghanh leapt and twisted and snapped and screamed, but the black birds' beaks pecked relentlessly at its skull. The Ghanh reared and fell on its back. It twisted its wings so that it was rolled in them, trying to protect its head, and in this peculiar manner tumbled hither and thither across the dust. The black birds flapped into the air then descended again, trying to perch on the cocoon as it writhed about, still pecking. Streams of green blood poured from the Ghanh now and the blood-dust stuck to it so that it was all begrimed and tattered.

  Then, quite suddenly, it had rolled over the edge of the abyss. The companions ran forward to see what had

  happened, the disturbed dust stinging their eyes and clogging their lungs. They saw the Ghanh falling. They saw its wings open and slow its descent, but it did not have the power to do more than drift back towards the floor of the pit as the black birds pecked and pecked at its exposed skull. The yellow mist swallowed them all.

  Corum waited, but nothing emerged from the mist again.

  'Does that mean that you have no more allies in the netherworld, Corum?' Jhary asked. 'For the birds did not take their prey with them. . .'

  Corum nodded. 'I wonder the same.' He lifted the eyepatch again and saw that the strange, cold cave was bare. 'Aye - no allies there.'

  'So an impasse has been created. The birds have not killed the Ghanh and they have not themselves been destroyed,' Jhary-a-Conel said. 'Still, at least that danger has been averted. Let's press on.'

  The black clouds had ceased to stream across the sky but had instead stopped in their tracks and cut out the sunlight. Beneath this dark shroud they stumbled onward.

  Corum noticed that Jhary had been brooding deeply since the birds had driven off the Ghanh and at last he said: 'What is it that bothers you, Jhary-a-Conel?'

  The man adjusted his wide hat on his head and pursed his lips. 'It occurred to me that if the Ghanh was not slain but instead returned to its lair - and if the Ghanh is, as King Noreg-Dan says, a favourite pet of Queen Xiombarg's - then fairly soon now (if not already) Queen Xiombarg will become aware of our presence here. Doubtless if she becomes aware of us then she will decide to act to punish us for what we did to her pet. . .'

  Corum removed his helmet and ran his gauntleted hand over his hair. He looked at the others who had stopped to listen to Jhary.

  'It is true,' said the King Without a Country with a sigh. 'We must expect to have Queen Xiombarg upon us very soon - or, at the very least, some more of her minions if she is still not aware that her brother's destroyer is in her Realm and thinks only that we are upstart mortals. . .'

  Rhalina had been ahead of the rest. She hardly listened to the conversation but instead pointed just in front of her. 'Look! Look!' she cried.

  They ran towards her and saw that she pointed at a place on the edge of the abyss - a square-cut notch carved from the rock and larger than a man's body. They clustered around it and saw that a stairway led down and down into the distant mist. But the stairway was scarcely more than a foot across and it went straight beside the massive wall of the cliff until it disappeared into the mist a mile below. If one missed one's footing for an instant, then one would be plunged into the abyss.

  Corum stood staring at the stairway. Had it just appeared? Was it a trick of Queen Xiombarg's? Would the steps suddenly vanish when they were half-way down - if they ever managed to get half-way down?

  But the alternative was to continue to trudge along the edge and perhaps, ultimately, find themselves back at the White River (for Corum was beginning to suspect that the Blood Plain was circular, containing the Lake of Voices and the mountains, and that the abyss extended all around it).

  With a sigh Corum gradually lowered himself to the first step and, on weakened legs, his back against the smooth rock, began to descend.

  The four little figures inched their way down the slippery steps until the top of the abyss itself was lost in gloom, while the bottom was still shrouded by the yellow mist. There was a frightening silence as they moved. They dare not speak - dare not do anything which would break their concentration as they lowered themselves from step to step with the abyss seeming sometimes to draw them into its depths as their vertigo increased. All were shivering, for the rock chilled them, all were sure that after a few more steps they would lose their footing and plunge down into the yellow mist.

  And then they began to hear it. It echoed from the mist. A grunting and wheezing and a snorting and a cackling which increased as they descended.

  Corum stopped and looked back at the others who lay against the rock and listened with him. Rhalina was closest to him, then Jhary and finally the King Without a Country.

  It was Noreg-Dan who spoke first. 'I know the sound,' he said. 'I have heard it before.'

  'What is it?' Rhalina whispered.

  'It is the noise which Xiombarg's beasts make. I spoke of the Ghanh which led the Chaos Pack. Well, those noises are the noises made by the Chaos Pack. We should have guessed what lay beyond the yellow mist. . .'

  Corum felt a great coldness grip him. He peered downwards to where the unseen Beasts of the Abyss awaited their coming.

  Chapter Four

  The Chariots of Chaos

  'What shall we do?' Rhalina whispered. 'What can we do against them?'

  Corum said nothing. Carefully keeping his balance he drew his sword, steadying himself with his six-fingered, jewelled hand.

&nb
sp; While the Ghanh lived and fought the black birds, there could be no help from the netherworld.

  'Do you hear that now?' Jhary said. 'That odd creaking. . . ?'

  Corum nodded. With the creaking was a rumbling sound and is was vaguely familiar. It mingled with the snorts and the grunts and the bellows issuing from the yellow mist.

  'There is nought for it,' he said at length. 'We must go on and hope that we reach the floor of the abyss soon. At least there we shall be less exposed and able to stand and fight whatever - whatever it is that makes the noise.'

  They continued their cautious descent, eyes wary for the first signs of the Beasts.

  Corum's foot had touched the floor of the abyss before he quite realized it. He had been climbing downwards for so long that he had become used to lying flat against the rock and feeling with his foot for each new step. Now there were no more steps and he could see the ground, uneven, covered in boulders, stretching away into the yellow mist, but he could see nothing that lived.

  The others joined him as he peered forward. The grunts and the cackles continued and an appalling stink greeted their nostrils, but the source of the sounds and the stink was not yet visible. The creaking and the rumbling also continued.

  Corum saw them at last.

  'By Elric's Sword!' Jhary groaned. 'Those are the Chariots of Chaos. I should have guessed!'

  Monstrous lumbering chariots drawn by reptilian beasts were beginning to emerge from the mist. They were filled by a variety of creatures, some even mounted on others' backs. Each beast was a travesty of a human being - each was clad in armour and bore a weapon of some kind. Here were piglike, doglike, cowlike, froglike, horselike things, some more deformed than others - animals warped into parodies of humanity.

  'Did Chaos turn these beasts into what they now are?' Corum gasped.

  Jhary said: 'You are mistaken, Corum.'

  'What mean you?'

  The King Without a Country spoke up. 'These beasts,' he said, 'were once men. Many of them were my subjects who sided with Chaos because they saw that it was more powerful than Law. . .'

  'And that transformation was their reward?' Rhalina said in disgust.

  'They are probably not aware of the transformation,' Jhary told her quietly. 'They have degenerated too much to retain much memory of their former existences.'

  The black chariots creaked closer, bearing their grunting, shrieking, bellowing crews.

  There was nothing for it but to turn and run from the chariots, dashing over the uneven ground, swords in hand, coughing on the stink of the Chaos Pack and the clinging, yellow mist.

  The Chaos Pack howled in delight and whipped up their reptilian beasts and the chariots began to move faster. The ghastly, deformed army was enjoying the hunt.

  Weakened by their earlier adventures and their lack of food or drink, the four companions could not run swiftly and at last, behind a large boulder, they were forced to rest. The chariots rumbled on towards them, bringing the cacophony, the hellish once-human things, the nauseating smells.

  Corum hoped that the chariots would pass them by but the Chaos Pack could see more easily through the mist and the first chariot turned towards them. Corum began to climb the boulder to get above the chariot. He struck out with his fist as a pig-thing clambered after him. The fist sank into the creature's face and was held there while the thing drew its own brass-studded club and raised its arm to finish Corum. Corum stabbed with his sword and the pig-thing shuddered, fell back. Now the others were under attack. Rhalina defended herself well with her own sword. They stood around the base of the boulder on the opposite side to Corum while he defended their rear. A dog-thing leapt at him. It wore a helmet and a breastplate but its muzzle was full of long teeth which snapped at his arm. He swung the sword and broke that muzzle in a single, smashing blow. Hands which had turned into claws and paws grabbed at him, tore at his cloak, his boots. Swords stabbed and clubs struck the stone at his feet as a whole mass of the creatures began to climb towards him. He stamped on fingers, hacked off limbs, drove his sword through mouths and eyes and hearts and all the time was filled with a sickening panic which only made him fight harder.

  The babble of the Chaos Pack seemed to grow louder and louder in his ears. Their chariots kept appearing out of the mist until several hundred of the things surrounded the boulder.

  Then it came clear to Corum that the Pack did not intend, at this stage, to kill them. If they had wished to they could have slain him and his companions by now. Doubtless they planned to torture them in some way - or perhaps turn them into the same kind of creatures that they had become.

  Corum remembered the Mabden tortures with horror and he fought all the harder, hoping to drive some member of the Chaos Pack to kill him.

  But slowly the fearsome tide rolled in until so many corpses pressed about the base of the boulder that Corum's three friends were unable to move their arms and were trapped. Only Corum fought on, hacking at all who sought to take him and then something clambered over the rocks behind him and seized his legs, dragging him down to where Rhalina, Jhary and the King Without a Country stood, disarmed and bound.

  A creature with the lopsided face of a horse swaggered through the ranks of the Chaos Pack and curled its lips to reveal huge brown teeth. It gave a whinnying laugh and set its helmet jauntily on its head, its hairy thumbs hooked in the belt around its belly.

  'Should we save you for ourselves,' he said, 'or take you to our mistress? Queen Xiombarg might be interested in you. . .'

  'Why should she be interested in four mortal travellers?' Corum asked.

  The horse-thing grinned at him. 'Perhaps you are more than that? Perhaps you are agents of Law?'

  'You know that Law no longer rules here!'

  'But Law may wish to rule again - you may have been sent here from another Realm.'

  'Do you not recognize me!' cried King Noreg-Dan.

  The horse-thing scratched at its forelock and peered stupidly at the King Without a Country. 'Why should I recognize you?'

  'Because I recognize you. I see the traces of your original features. . .'

  'Be silent! I do not know what you mean!' The horse-thing half drew its dagger from its belt. 'Be silent!'

  'Because you cannot bear to remember!' shouted the King Without a Country. 'You were Polib-Bav, Count of Tern! You threw in your lot with Chaos even before my country fell. . .

  A look of fear came into the horse-thing's eyes. It shook its head and snorted. 'No!'

  'You are Polib-Bav and you were betrothed to my daughter - the girl whom your Chaos Pack - aaagh! I cannot bear to remember that horror!'

  'You remember nothing,' said Polib-Bav thickly. 'I say I am just what I am.'

  'What is your name?' Noreg-Dan said. 'What is your name, if it is not Polib-Bav, Count of Tern?'

  The horse-thing struck out at the king's face with its clumsy hand. 'What if I am? My loyalty is to Queen Xiombarg, not to you.'

  'I would not have you serve me,' sneered the king as blood welled on his upper lip. 'Oh, look what has become of you, Polib-Bav.'

  The horse-thing turned away. 'I live,' it said. 'I command this legion.'

  'A legion of pathetic monsters!' Jhary laughed.

  A cow-thing kicked at Jhary's groin with its hoof and the companion to champions groaned. But he lifted his head and laughed again. 'This degeneration is only the beginning. I have seen what mortals who serve Chaos become - foulness, nothingness - shapeless horrors!'

  Polib-Bav scratched its head and said more softly: 'What of that? The decision was made. It cannot be revoked. Queen Xiombarg promises us eternal life.'

  'It will be eternal,' Jhary said. 'But it will not be life. I have travelled to many planes during many ages and I have seen what Chaos comes to - barrenness. That alone is eternal, unless Law can save it.'

  'Faugh!' said the horse-thing. 'Put them in the chariot - in my chariot - and we shall carry them to Queen Xiombarg.'

  King Noreg-Dan tried to appeal ag
ain to Polib-Bav. 'You were once handsome, Count of Tern. My daughter loved you and you loved her. You were loyal to me in those days.'

  Polib-Bav turned away. 'And now I am loyal to Queen Xiombarg. This is her Realm now. Lord Shalod of Law has fled and shall never rule here again. His armies and his allies were destroyed, as you well know, on the Plain of Blood. . .' Polib-Bav pointed upwards. He accepted the four swords which a frog-thing handed him and tucked them under his arm. 'Into the chariot with them. We ride for Queen Xiombarg's palace.'

  As he was forced to enter Polib-Bav's chariot with the others Corum was in despair. His hands were tied behind his back with strong cords, he could see no way of escape. Once he was taken before Queen Xiombarg she would recognize him. She would destroy him as she would destroy the rest and all hope of saving Lywm-an-Esh would be gone. With King Lyr victorious, the forces of Chaos would begin to gather strength. Another Sword Ruler would be summoned and the Fifteen Planes would be wholly in the control of the Lords of Entropy.

  He lay at Polib-Bav's feet now, side by side with his friends, as the Chariots of Hell began to move along the floor of the abyss, wheels creaking and groaning, bumping over the loose rocks. And soon Corum had lost consciousness.

  He awoke blinking in stronger light. The mist was gone. He lifted his head and saw that a great cliff towered behind them. He guessed that they had left the abyss. They seemed to be moving through a sparse forest of sickly, leprous trees which had caught some blight. He moved his bruised head and stared into the face of Rhalina. She had been weeping but now she attempted to smile at him.

  'We left the abyss through a tunnel some hours back,' she told him. 'It must be a long way to Queen Xiombarg's palace. I wonder why they do not use swifter, more sorcerous means to go there?'

  'Chaos is whimsical,' said a voice behind her. It was Jhary-a-Conel's. 'And in a timeless world there is no need for swiftness in such matters.'

  'What has become of your little cat?' Corum murmured.