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

O King, and of all Witchland.”

The King listened with unmoved countenance, his shaven lip set

somewhat in a sneer, his eyes half closed like the eyes of a cat

couched sphinx-like in the sun. But no sun shone in that council

chamber. The leaden pall hung darker without, even as morning grew

toward noon. “My Lord the King,” said Heming, “send me. To overslip

their guards i’ the night, ‘tis not a thing beyond invention. That

done, I’d gather you some small head of men, enough to serve this

turn, if I must rake the seven kingdoms to find ‘em.”

While Heming spoke, the door opened and the Duke Corsus entered the

chamber. An ill sight was he, flabbier of cheek and duller of eye than

was his wont. His face was bloodless, his great paunch seemed

shrunken, and his shoulders yet more hunched since yesterday. His gait

was uncertain, and his hand shook as he moved the chair from the board

and took his seat before the King. The King looked on him awhile in

silence, and under that gaze beads of sweat stood on Corsus’s brow and

his under-lip twitched.

“We need thy counsel, O Corsus,” said the King. “Thus it is: since our

ill-faced stars gave victory to the Demon rebels in yesterday’s

battle, Juss and his brethren front us with four thousand men, whiles

I have not two thousand soldiers unhurt in Carcë. Corinius accounteth

us too weak to risk a sally but and if we might contrive some

diversion from without. And that (after yesterday) is not to be

thought on. Hither and to Melikaphkhaz did we draw all our powers, and

the subject allies not for our love but for fear sake and for lust of

gain flocked to our standard. These caterpillars drop off now. Yet if

we fight not, then is our strength in arms clean spent, and our

enemies need but to sit before Carcë till we be starved. ‘Tis a point

of great difficulty and knotty to solve.”

“Difficult indeed, O my Lord the King,” said Corsus. His glance

shifted round the board, avoiding the steady gaze bent on him from

beneath the eaves of King Gorice’s brow, and resting at last on the

jewelled splendour of the crown of Witchland on the King’s head. “O

King,” he said, “you demand my rede, and I shall not say nor counsel

you nothing but that good and well shall come thereof, as much as yet

may be in this pass we stand in. For now is our greatness turned in

woe, dolour, and heaviness. And easy it is to be after-witted.”

He paused, and his under-jaw wobbled and twitched. “Speak on,” said

the King. “Thou stutterest forth nothings by fits and girds, as an

ague taketh a goose. Let me know thy rede.”

Corsus said, “You will not take it, I know, O King. For we of

Witchland have ever been ruled by the rock rather than by the rudder.

I had liever be silent. Silence was never written down.”

“Thou wouldst, and thou wouldst not!” said the King. “Whence gottest

thou this look of a dish of whey with blood spit in it? Speak, or

thou’lt anger me.”

“Then blame me not, O King,” said Corsus. “Thus it seemeth to me, that

the hour hath struck whenas we of Witchland must needs look calamity

in the eye and acknowledge we have thrown our last, and lost all. The

Demons, as we have seen to our undoing, be unconquerable in war. Yet

are their minds pranked with many silly phantasies of honour and

courtesy which may preserve us the poor dregs yet unspilt from the cup

of our fortune, if we but leave unseasonable pride and see where our

advantage lieth.”

“Chat, chat, chat!” said the King. “Perdition catch me if I can find a

meaning in it! What dost thou bid me do?”

Corsus met the King’s eye at last. He braced himself as if to meet a

blow. “Throw not your cloak in the fire because your house is burning,

O King. Surrender all to Juss at his discretion. And trust me the

foolish softness of these Demons will leave us freedom and the

wherewithal to live at ease.”

The King was leaned a little forward as Corsus, somewhat drythroated

but gathering heart as he spake, blurted forth his counsel of defeat.

No man among them looked on Corsus, but all on the King, and for a

minute’s space was no sound save the sound of breathing in that

chamber. Then a puff of hot air blew a window to with a thud, and the

King without moving his head rolled his awful glance forth and back

over his council slowly, fixing each in his turn. And the King said,

“Unto which of you is this counsel acceptable? Let him speak and

instruct us.”

All did sit mum like beasts. The King spake again, saying, “It is

well. Were there of my council such another vermin, so sottish, so

louse-hearted, as this one hath proclaimed himself, I had been

persuaded Witchland was a sleepy pear, corrupted in her inward parts.

And that were so, I had given order straightway for the sally; and,

for his chastening and your dishonour, this Corsus should have led

you. And so an end, ere the imposthume of our shame brake forth too

foul before earth and heaven.”

“I admire not, Lord, that you do strike at me,” said Corsus. “Yet I

pray you think how many Kings in Carcë have heaped with injurious

indignities them that were so hardy as give them wholesome counsel

afore their fall. Though your majesty were a half-god or a Fury out of

the pit, you could not by further resisting deliver us out of this net

wherein the Demons have gotten us caught and tied. You can keep geese

no longer, O King. Will you rend me because I bid you be content to

keep goslings?”

Corinius smote the table with his fist. “O monstrous vermin!” he

cried, “because thou wast scalded, must all we be afeared of cold

water?”

But the King stood up in his majesty, and Corsus shrank beneath the

flame of his royal anger. And the King spake and said, “The council is

up, my lords. For thee, Corsus, I dismiss thee from my council. Thou

art to thank my clemency that I take not thy head for this. It were

for thy better safety, which well I know thou prizest dearer than mine

honour, that thou show not in my path till these perilous days be

overpast.” And unto Corinius he said, “On thy head it lieth that the

Demons storm not the hold, as haply their hot pride may incense them

to attempt. Expect me not at supper. I lie in the Iron Tower tonight,

and let none disturb me there at peril of his head. You of my council

must attend me here four hours ere tomorrow’s noon. Look to it well,

Corinius, that nought shalt thou do nor in any wise adventure our

forces against the Demons till thou receive my further bidding, save

only to hold Carcë against any assault if need be. For this thy life

shall answer. For the Demons, they were wisest praise a fair day at

night. If mine enemy uproot a boulder above my dwelling, so I be

mighty enow of mine hands I may, even in the nick of time that it

tottereth to leap and crush mine house, o’erset it on him and pash him

to a mummy.”

So speaking, the King moved resolute with a great strong step toward

the door. There paused he, his hand upon the silver latch, and looking

tigerishly on Corsus, “Be advised,” he said, “thou. Cross not my path

again. Nor, while I think on’t, send me not thy daughter again, as

last year thou didst. Apt to the sport she is, and well enow she

served my turn aforetime. But the King of Witchland suppeth not twice

of the same dish, nor lacketh he fresh wenches if he need them.”

Whereat all they laughed. But Corsus’s face grew red as blood.

On such wise brake up the council. Corinius with the sons of Corund

and of Corsus went upon the walls ordering all in obedience to the

word of Gorice the King. But that old Duke Corsus betook him to his

chamber in the north gallery. Nor might he abide even a small while at

ease, but sate now in his carven chair, now on the windowsill, now on

his broad-canopied bed, and now walked the chamber floor twisting his

hands and gnawing his lip. And if he were distraught in mind, small

wonder it were, set as he was betwixt hawk and buzzard, the King’s

wrath menacing him in Carcë and the hosts of Demonland without.

So wore the day till suppertime. And at supper was Corsus, to their

much amaze, sitting in his place, and the ladies Zenambria and Sriva

with him. He drank deep, and when supper was done he filled a goblet

saying, “My lord the king of Demonland and ye other Witches, good it

is that we, who stand as now we stand with one foot in the jaws of

destruction, should bear with one another. Neither should any hide his

thought from other, but say openly, even as I this morning before the

face of our Lord the King, his thought and counsel. Wherefore without

shame do I confess me ill-advised to-day, when I urged the King to

make peace with Demonland. I wax old, and old men will oft embrace

timorous counsels which, if there be wisdom and valiancy left in them,

they soon renounce when the stress is overpast and they have leisure

to afterthink them with a sad mind. And clear as day it is that the

King was right, both in his chastening of my faint courage and in his

bidding thee, O King Corinius, stand to thy watch and do nought till

this night be worn. For went he not to the Iron Tower? And to what end

else spendeth he the night in yonder chamber of dread than to do

sorcery or his magic art, as aforetime he did, and in such wise blast

these Demons to perdition even in the springtide of their fortunes?

At no point of time hath Witchland greater need of our wishes than at

this coming midnight, and I pray you, my lords, let us meet a little

before in this hall that we with one heart and mind may drink fair

fortune to the King’s enchantery.”

With such pleasant words and sympathetical insinuations, working at a

season when the winecup had caused to unfold some gayness in their

hearts that were fordone with the hard scapes and chances of

disastrous war, was Corsus grown to friendship again with the lords of

Witchland. So, when the guard was set and all made sure for the night,

they came together in the great banquet hall, whereas more than three

years ago the Prince La Fireez had feasted and after fought against

them of Witchland. But now was he drowned among the shifting tides in

the Straits of Melikaphkhaz. And the Lord Corund, that fought that

night in such valiant wise, now in that same hall, armed from throat

to foot as becometh a great soldier dead, lay in state, crowned on his

brow with the amethystine crown of Impland. The spacious sidebenches

were untenanted and void their high seats, and the crossbench was

removed to make place for Corund’s bier. The lords of Witchland sate

at a small table below the dais: Corinius in the seat of honour at the

end nearest the door, and over against him Corsus, and on Corinius’s

left