The Worm Ouroboros by Eric Rücker Eddison (english readers txt) 📕

that it was for thys cruel facte sake that King Goriyse was eat by

divels on the Moruna with al hys hoste, one man onely cumming home

again to tell of these thynges bifallen.’ Now mark: ‘From Morna Moruna

I behelde sowthawaye two grete mowntaynes standing over Bavvinane as

two Queenes in bewty seted in the skye by estimacion xx legues fro

hence above meny more ise robed mowntaines supereminente. The wyche as

I lernyd was Coshtre Belourne the one and the othere Koshtre Pivrarca.

And I veuyed them continuallie unto the going downe of the sun, and

that was the fayrest sighte and the most bewtifullest and gallant

marvaille that mine eyen bath sene. Therewith talkid I with the smaule

thynges that dwell there in the ruines and in the busschis growing

round abowte as it ys my wonte, and amongst them one of those byrdes

cawld martlettes that have feete so litle that they seime to have

none. And thys litle martlette sittynge in a frambousier or raspis

busche tolde mee that none may come alive unto Coschtra Beloorn, for

the mantycores of the mowntaines will certeynely ete his brains ere he

come thither. And were he so fortunate as scape these mantycores, yet

cowlde bee never climbe up the gret cragges of yce and rocke on

Koschtre Beloorn, for none is so stronge as to scale them but by art

magicall, and such is the vertue of that mowntayne that no magick

avayleth there, but onlie strength and wisdome alone, and as I seye

these woulde not avayl to climbe those cliffes and yce ryvers.’”

“What be these mantichores of the mountains that eat men’s brains?”

asked the Lady Mevrian.

“This book is so excellent well writ,” said her brother, “that thine

answer appeareth on this same page: ‘The beeste Mantichora, whych is

as muche as to saye devorer of menne, rennith as I herde tell, on the

skirt of the mowntaynes below the snow feldes. These be monstrous

bestes, ghastlie and ful of horrour, enemies to mankinde, of a red

coloure, with ij rowes of huge grete tethe in their mouthes. It hath

the head of a man, his eyen like a ghoot, and the bodie of a lyon

lancing owt sharpe pnckles fro behinde. And hys tayl is the tail of a

scorpioun. And is more delyverer to goo than is fowle to flee. And hys

voys is as the roaryng of x lyons.’”

“These beasts,” said Spitfire, “were alone enough to draw me thither.

I shall bring thee home a small one, madam, to keep chained in the

court.”

“That should dash me from thy friendship for ever, cousin,” said

Mevrian, stroking the feathery ears of her little marmoset that

cuddled in her lap. “That which feedeth on brains were overnourished

in Demonland, and belike would overrun the whole countryside.”

“Send it to Witchland,” said Zigg. “Where when it bath eat up Gro and

Corund it may sup lightly on the King, and then most fortunately

starve for lack of its proper nutriment.”

Juss stood up from his seat. “Thou and I and Spitfire,” said he to

Brandoch Daha, “must to work roundly and gather strength, for ‘tis

already midsummer. You, Vizz, Volle, and Zigg, must have the warding

of our homes whiles we be gone. We cannot be less than two thousand

swords on this faring.”

“How many ships, Volle,” asked Lord Brandoch Daha, “canst thou give

us, busked and boun, ere this moon wane?”

“There be fourteen afloat,” said Volle. “Besides these, ten keels lie

on the slips at Lookinghaven, and nine more bath Spitfire but now laid

down on the beach before his house at Owlswick.”

“Thirty and three in sum,” said Spitfire. “You see we have not

twiddled our thumbs whilst ye were gone.”

Juss paced back and forth with great strides, his brow clouded and his

jaw clenched. In a while he said, “Laxus bath forty sail, dragons of

war. I am not so idle-headed as fare without an army into Impland, but

certain it is that if our ill-willers would move war against us we

stand in apparent weakness, here or abroad, to throw back their

onset.”

Volle said, “Of these nineteen ships a-building no more than two can

take the water before a month be past, and but seven more ere six

months’ time, push we never so mightily the work.”

“The season weareth, and my brother wasteth in duress. We must sail

ere another moon grow old,” said Juss.

Volle said, “Then with sixteen sail thou sailest, O Juss; and then

thou leavest us not one ship at home till more be finished and

launched.”

“How can we leave you so?” cried Spitfire.

But Brandoch Daha looked towards his lady sister, met her glance, and

was satisfied. “The choice lieth fair before us,” said he. “If we will

eat the egg, little need to debate whether the shell must go.”

Mevrian rose from her seat laughing, and said, “Then let the council

rise, my lords.” And her eyes grew serious, and she said, “Shall they

make rhymes upon us that we of Demonland, whom men repute and hold the

mightiest lords in all the world, hung sheepishly back from this high

needful enterprise lest, our greatest captains being abroad, our

enemies might haply take us at home at disadvantage? It shall not be

said of the women of Demonland that they upheld such counsels.”

Of the landing of Lord Juss and his companions

in outer Impland and their meeting with

Zeldornius, Helteranius, and Jalcanaius Fostus;

and of the tidings told by Mivarsh, and the

dealings of the three great captains on the hills

of Salapanta.

ON the thirty and first day after that council held in Krothering, the

fleet of Demonland put to sea from Lookinghaven: eleven dragons of war

and two great ships of burthen, bound for the uttermost seas of earth

in quest of the Lord Goldry Bluszco. Eighteen hundred Demons fared on

that expedition, and not a man among them that was not a complete

soldier. For five days they rowed southaway on a windless sea, and on

the sixth the sea-cliffs of Goblinland came out of the haze on their

starboard bow. They rowed south along the land, and on the tenth day

out from Lookinghaven passed under the Ness of Ozam, journeying thence

four days with a favouring wind over the open seas to Sibrion. But

now, when they had rounded that dark promontory and were about

steering east along the coast of Impland the More, and less than ten

days’ journey lay betwixt them and their haven in Muelva, a dismal

tempest suddenly surprised them. For forty days it swept them in hail

and sleet over wide-wallowing ocean, without a star, without a course;

till, on a fierce midnight of wind and darkness and roaring waters was

Juss’s and Spitfire’s ship and other four in her company driven on the

rocks on a lee shore and broken in pieces. Hardly, and after long

battling among great waves, those brethren won ashore, weary and hurt.

In the inhospitable light of a wet and windy dawn they mustered on the

beach such of their folk as had escaped out of the mouth of

destruction; and they were three hundred and thirty and three.

Spitfire, beholding these things, spake and said, “This land bath a

villanous look stirreth my remembrance, as but to behold verjuice

soureth the mouth of him who once tasted thereof. Rememberest thou

this land?”

Juss scanned the low long coastline that swept north and west to an

estuary, and beyond ran westwards till it was lost in the scud and

driving spray. Desolate birds flew above the welter of the surges. He

said, “Certainly this is Arlan Mouth, where least of all I had choosed

to come a-land with so small a head of men. Yet shalt thou prove here,

as it bath ever been, how all occasions are but steps for us to climb

fame by.”

“Our ship is lost,” cried Spitfire, “and the more part of our men, and

worst of all, Brandoch Daha that is worth ten thousand. Easilier shall

a little ant bib this ocean dry, than shall we in this taking perform

our enterprise.” And he cursed and blasphemed, saying, “Cursed be the

malice of the sea, which, having broke our power, now speweth us

ashore here to our mere undoing; and so bath done great succour to the

King of Witchland, and unto all the world beside great damage.”

But Juss answered him, “Think not that these contrary winds come of

fortune or by the influence of malignant and combustive stars. This

weather bloweth out of Carcë. Even as these very waves thou beholdest

have each his back-wash or undertow, so followeth after every sending

an undertow of evil hap, whereby, albeit in essence a less deadly

thing, many have been drowned and washed away who stood unremoved

against the main stroke of the breaker. So were we twice since that

day brought near to our bane: first, when our judgement being darkened

with a strange distraction we went up with Gaslark against Carce;

next, when this storm wrecked us here by Arlan Mouth. Though by mine

art I rebated the King’s sending, yet against the maleficial undertow

that followed it my charms avail not, nor the virtues of all sorcerous

herbs that grow.”

“Are these things so, and wilt thou yet be temperate?” said Spitfire.

“Content thee,” said Juss. “The sands run down. A certain time only

runneth this stream for our hurt; it must now have well nigh spent

itself, and it were too perilous for him to conjure a second time, as

last May he conjured in Carcë.”

“Who told thee that?” asked Spitfire.

“I do but conjecture it,” answered he, “from my studying of certain

prophetic writings touching the princes of that blood and line.

Whereby it appeareth (yet not clearly, but riddlewise) that if one

and the same King, essaying a second time in his own person an

enterprise in that kind, should fail, and the powers of darkness

destroy him, then is not his life spilt alone (as it fortuned

aforetime unto Gorice VII. at his first attempt), but there shall be

an end for ever of the whole house of Gorice which bath for so many

generations reigned in Carcë.”

“Well,” said Spitfire, “so stand we to our chance. Old muckhills will

bloom at last.”

Now for nineteen days fared those brethren and their company eastward

through Outer Impland: first across a country of winding sleepy rivers

and reedy lakes innumerable, then by rolling uplands and champaign

ground. At length, on an even, they came upon a heath running up

eastward to a range of tumbled hills. The hills were not lofty nor

steep, but rugged of outline and their surface rough with crags and

boulders, so that it was a maze of little eminences and valleys grown

upon by heather and fern and rank sad-coloured grass, with stunted

thorn trees and junipers harbouring in the clefts of the rocks. On the

watershed, as on an horse’s withers, looking west to the red October

sunset and south to the far line of the Didornian Sea, they came upon

a spy-fortalice, old and desolate, and one sitting in the gate. For

very joy their hearts melted within them, when they knew him for none

other than Brandoch Daha.

So they embraced him as one beyond hope risen from the grave. And he

said, “Through the Straits of Melikaphkhaz was I borne, and wrecked at

last on the lonely shore ten leagues southward from this spot, whither

I won alone, having lost my ship and