The Sword of Morning Star

by Richard Meade

  “Vincio said all this—”

  “And was right. Wherefore he died. At the King’s command—and Albrecht’s poisonous urging—the palace guard went nearly all to Wolfsheim. Then, knowing your obedience, you were summoned in the night, when only a remnant of those who remained could be laid hands on. Thus defenseless, you and Vincio were easy geese for plucking; poor, fat-rumped Gustav shall be easier.”

  There was such authority in the old man’s voice that it was impossible to disbelieve him, and Helmut turned his face away.

  “Bitter news,” said Sandivar. “And bitterer still to come.”

  “Say,” managed Helmut after a moment.

  Back to the map went Sandivar, lynx eyes glowing. “For generations have the barbarians sought passage across the Gray Lands, to feast on the defenseless riches of the unwarlike South. And for generations have the Emperors of the Gray Lands staved them off, as I have said, while the New Learning bloomed in the Lands of Light. But suppose now that Boorn should have a king and the Gray Lands an emperor who would make common cause with the Dark tribes against the South. Then cataclysm truly is unloosed upon the world, and all light dies, pinched out by barbarism like a candle flame by rough fingers. All hope dies…”

  “Albrecht would not do that!” Helmut cried. “He would not admit barbarians to our borders! Nor would any king of Boorn.”

  One of Sandivar’s gray brows went up. “You think not?” Then he let out a gusty breath. “Aye, these developments we shall have to wait to see; perhaps my art is not so keen as I deem it.” He came to Helmut and put a big hand gently on the boy’s blond head and touseled the hair. “Meanwhile, here is nothing but a child, and a wounded one at that. Sigrieth’s princelings grow old early; but such serious matters are not fit fare so soon after supper. Come, it is time now to feed Waddle.”

  “Waddle?” Helmut blinked, but he arose as Sandivar beckoned.

  “My good friend, pet, guard, and means of transportation; high time the two of you met, for much will you see of one another in days to come.” From one corner of the room he took a tremendous basin full of heads and guts of fish and carried it to the door. Helmut followed him outside.

  The tower was solidly based on a hillock not more than fifty meters across that rose directly from the rank, marshy water of the fens. Sundown was coming now, and the sky was oyster-colored, streaked with nacreous yellow. All around, so far as the eye could see, stretched the swamps and wetlands, devoid of life except for circling birds of prey and mewing gulls. Then Sandivar gave a strange call, formless and throaty. “There,” he said, after a moment, pointing. “See?”

  Helmut’s eyes followed his long arm. Approaching the island, a large dark blotch in the water made a long, v-shaped ripple. It came closer, gained the shallows; and all at once, fur wet-plastered and dripping, it rose to its feet and became a huge brown bear with a head as large as a firkin. Helmut gave a cry of astonishment and alarm, as the creature galloped toward them with a peculiar rolling gait, making odd grunting sounds deep in its chest.

  “Be not afraid,” said Sandivar. “Well he knows that you are under my protection. Hello, Waddle. Hast had pleasant romps in the mainland forests today?”

  The huge wet creature, with tongue lolling, fawned on him like a dog as Sandivar scratched him between the ears. But now and again, when the bear’s black lips curled with pleasure, Helmut caught a glimpse of great ivory daggers in that cavernous mouth; and the animal’s claws were long and sharp. He held back a little until Sandivar said, “Come; now you may do it.” Then, the old man pushed him forward, and that great muzzle sniffed at him questioningly, and, urged on by Sandivar, Helmut gingerly put out his one remaining hand and first barely touched, then massaged the coarse, wet fur. The bear grunted and licked his arm. Helmut laughed with pleasure.

  “A good sound, that,” Sandivar murmured. “The laughter of a boy; of Sigrieth’s son.” Then, strangely grave, he said, “Let us hope it will be heard often in years to come. Now, Waddle—” And he put down the basin of fish offal, and the bear plunged its muzzle therein greedily and with much vulgar noise.

  Leaving him thus, Sandivar took Helmut’s hand; together they circled the tower. It was fifty meters high, with various levels indicated by watching slits and loopholes for crossbow-men, and of such great age that, outside, it was covered with moss and slime and its battlements were crumbling. But Helmut was still fascinated by the idea of the bear.

  “Can sorcerers speak with animals?” he asked.

  “Aye, anyone can speak with animals; but whether either party understands the other is a different matter.” Sandivar chuckled, then was serious. “No,” he said. “Not speak, as you and I would. But certain art do I have so that with some creatures there is communication. Mind you, not all, only some. There are certain animals that are so other from man in the workings of their mind that no communication is possible—or, at least, I can establish none. Such killing animals as stoats and weasels, that live only for the taste of blood; or wolves, that devour the wounded and helpless of their own kind… Perhaps there are other men, sorcerers, whose minds more conform to those of such creatures and who can speak with them in the way that I speak with bears and the wild boars of the forest, the birds of the air, and the harmless small creatures of the holes and hedges. Perhaps, even, over the years, the family of Wolfsheim has learned to communicate with wolves as they communicate with half-wolves. Certain it is that half-wolves and real wolves speak freely with one another…” He seemed warming up to his subject. “And then there are creatures, monsters which the world has known only since the Worldfire, so far either from human or animal that no one may communicate—the mroggs, for instance.” He stopped short in their leisurely circuit of the island and suddenly gripped Helmut’s left arm in his big hand. “Do you know of the mroggs?” All at once his face was stern, even forbidding.

  Blankly, Helmut shook his head.

  “No, you would not have them in the Gray Lands,” Sandivar said, releasing him. He turned to look out over the endless expanse of marsh. “They are native only to these wetlands.” His voice was full of revulsion. “Crawling, slimy, treacherous beasts. Shapeless, and yet rudely fashioned like men. Not of flesh and hungering ceaselessly for flesh. They say that in the beginning of the world, life began also in slime and mud; so did it all over again in the ancient Worldfire. You must beware of mroggs. They infest these marshes, and should you encounter one without myself or Waddle by to protect you, ill indeed would you fare.”

  “What are they? What do they look like?”

  “The seething, fermenting, decaying matter of these marshes given life. Imagine a creature of mud and slime and rotten leaves and all the other foulnesses of the bottom of the fens from which they rise; such a creature of a size that could engulf you in a swallow. Therefore—” he pointed to a trio of beached boats: it included the skin shallop and the dugout in which Albrecht’s men had abandoned Helmut. “Therefore, these are prohibited to you. I think not that, in any event, you will have, for a while, strength and dexterity to handle them. But even should you, never are you to take these out on the fens alone; I have not gone to so much trouble only to furnish a mrogg with a meal.”

  “Ugh,” Helmut said, his skin crawling as he looked out at the jungles of waving grass, the plains of brackish water. “You need have no worry.”

  “Hopefully when you reach full strength that may still be true.” They had come full circle to the tower door again. Waddle sat by it like a guard. “Now,” said Sandivar, “you have seen my small domain.” They entered; and he closed the door behind him.

  “You see,” he said, pouring more of the delicious drink which had so revived and strengthened the boy earlier, “it is well for mankind that sorcerers be banished to places so remote and their arts discredited. Aye, a dying breed are we, and that deserved; for it was the proliferation of our kind and the rivalry between us that caused the Worldfire. Moreover, the New Learning, when it is complete, will make both
broadsword and sorcerer unnecessary. Meanwhile, we few—there are not many of us scattered around the world, now—live in exile, and we are circumspect. Joined, all of us, in a society very secret and very strong, in which we are pledged, every one of us, never to use our art for evil or lend it to the politically ambitious. By certain means, we monitor each other to insure that all keep that faith, and were I to break my pledge, instantly would myself and everything appertaining to me vanish, atomize, in a way you cannot even imagine. But sometimes, and only in emergencies dire, dispensations are given, and I have begun certain negotiations among the members of our society… But enough for now.” He handed the boy the cup. “Drink. Then sleep.”

  The boy drank. Again the potion was delicious; but instead of invigorating him, it dragged him into drowsiness. He lay back on the bed. “I thought—” he began. “Some matter there was of—”

  “Of what?” asked Sandivar sharply.

  “In my dreams…” It took great effort for Helmut to focus wit enough to speak. “There was talk of Rage and Vengeance, of Death and Destruction… and it was said that I… that I…”

  But a kind of purple darkness was closing in on him now; and his voice trailed off.

  But he could still hear. And when Sandivar said: “Yes. Yes, there will be all that,” he knew it had not been just a fever dream. “In due time,” Sandivar said. “In due time, my princeling.” Then Helmut entered the purple darkness, was wrapped around with it, and knew no more.

  CHAPTER III

  It was some four months later that, at Sandivar’s behest, Helmut saddled the bear.

  Before dawn, the boy emerged from the tower, his good hand smoothing back his touseled hair and knuckling sleep from his eyes. Even so short a time as this had put an inch on his height, and where, once, he had been all skin and bones, now he was solid muscle. He wore the simple kirtle Sandivar had given him, and no other garment; but around his waist was buckled harness and short sword, the latter in a scabbard on the right so it could be quickly drawn across the body from the left.

  This was his favorite time of day on the marshes, glorious early morning, a sight of which Helmut never tired. Here the Jaal spread itself into league after league of shallows, reed-grown and grassy, and, not far distant, merged with the sea. Now the cool morning wind came sharp in the boy’s nostrils with the tang of salt; there were, too, the rich black muck of the fens and the heady perfume of a hundred different growing plants. Moreover, the sun was rising, making entrance on the horizon like a warrior so armored and helmed with gold that he gave off rays of splendor amidst the pomp and circumstance of his coming. These, reflected in the glassy surface of the water, just rippled by the sea breeze, shimmered in redoubled richness. And as Helmut watched, a flight of the great, snow-white herons of the marsh winged majestically between sea and sky, vanishing into that golden morning blaze like enormous moths into a gigantic flame.

  He could have stood thus all morning; but he had a task. Therefore, he gave voice to that strange and throaty call which, by now, he had learned from Sandivar. Immediately, the great bear, whose custom it was to keep guard during the night at the base of the tower, shambled into view. When he rubbed and nuzzled against the boy, his withers were as high as Helmut’s eyes.

  “Good morning, brave Waddle!” the boy laughed, scratching the bear between the ears. “Slept you well? Hopefully so, for it’s your master’s intention to take you on a long, sore journey. Now, sir, stand. Do you hear? Stand.” And with his one hand, he lifted the light, well-padded saddle Sandivar had devised for the beast and swung it into place on Waddle’s back.

  “A bear for a steed,” Helmut went on, talking to Waddle as, deftly, he caught the dangling girth with the stump of his right hand and then buckled it with his left. He had a certain dexterity with that stump, now; and it was plain to see that he had long since accustomed himself to the deformity, even, for the moment, forgotten it.

  Waddle stood patiently while the saddle was latched into place. “A bear for a steed,” Helmut repeated. “Whoever heard of such matter? Were I to tell this in the court of Marmorburg, surely all would laugh me out of—” He broke off, his pleasure with the morning gone at the thought of the great palace in Marmorburg, where he had spent his childhood. No news had he of the Kingdom of Boorn and the Empire of the Gray Lands for nearly four months, now: thus, Sandivar justified his going away for the first time since Helmut had been brought to the tower.

  “Some word,” he had told Helmut the night before, “of conditions in Boorn and in the Lands of Light must I gather. Waddle has a natural pacing gait and will take me quickly to where I must go; we shall be back in not above two days. Surely, for that much time, you can fend for yourself here, bearing in mind that you may not use the boats?”

  “Aye, sir,” Helmut had said. “Easily can I care for myself now. Someday—” he had waved the stump of his arm, “if a smith could put such a hook hereon as once I saw—”

  “Someday, a smith will indeed put something there,” Sandivar said obliquely, “but not a hook. No matter. I leave you here alone, then, my confidence reposing in you fully.”

  “And shall be justified,” said Helmut. Now, remembering that, he tried to keep his eyes from the boats beached in their usual place. A secret little guilty thrill went through him. Then, because the breaking of one’s word was unfitting to a princeling and son of Sigrieth, he put that feeling from him; he had given Sandivar his promise. And yet—Four months had he lived here, and never once had he been beyond where he now stood: everything he looked upon was boringly familiar. But beyond the last reach of grass and reed which his eye could see, who knew what wonder awaited? Even the ocean. He had never seen the ocean. And that would be a sight for one’s eyes indeed—a lake of water so large that, like the sky and the concept of eternity, the mind stumbled over it.

  “But, no,” he said aloud, angrily and not knowing whether the anger was directed at himself or Sandivar. “No, I shall not.” Then, as he was fastening on the bear the leather headstraps with their reins, the tower door opened, and Sandivar emerged, saddlebags over his arm. These he strapped across the bear’s great rump.

  “Well done, Helmut,” he said, testing the saddle as he latched the bags in place. His voice had warmth in it, as if he were father speaking to son; and at the praise, Helmut felt a glow of pride. In this third of a year past, he had come to know Sandivar and to respect and love him. Such regard as he felt for Sandivar was of a kind heretofore reserved only for his own great father, Sigrieth, and, to lesser extent, for Vincio. It was Sandivar who soothed him when the nightmares came—and for the first month they had been frequent. It was Sandivar who tutored him patiently in the use of the shortsword he now wore, producing it from an old chest and handling it with an art that would have done credit to any warrior of the King’s Guard. It was Sandivar who also had worked patiently with him for hours every night with the books, so that his skill at the arts of reading and writing had miraculously enlarged, his head stuffed now with a world of glorious knowledge, of which he had never even dreamed in the court at Marmorburg. And Sandivar had taught him also something of the ways of beasts, for not only was Waddle the sorcerer’s bodyguard and steed, but every night and morning the island thronged with other animals, all come to report the happenings of the previous watches to the man. Sleek otters, and falcons and gulls and moorhens, and other bears; and in a way that Helmut still failed to understand, Sandivar held conference with them, took what they told him, gave instructions, and sent them on their way, but not before each had been introduced to Helmut in some fashion or other, so that he would cause them no alarm if they encountered each other in the future. All in all, it had, despite the tragedies that gave it origin, been one of the best and happiest periods of the boy’s life. So he owed Sandivar this much at least: obedience.

  Nevertheless, as if he were reading Helmut’s mind, Sandivar, gathering Waddle’s reins, let his eyes flicker to the boats. “You will remember the promise I have
required of you. That you go not off the island, and that you venture not out of the tower after darkness. Mroggs are about at all hours. They will, having had certain experience with me, not approach this place; aye, not even the bravest of them. But they are out there—” he swept an arm in a way that encompassed the fens, “and they have no awe of you. No princeling you, but only a morsel, like any other. Nor would you be any match for even the smallest and most timid among them.” He put his hand on Helmut’s shaggy blond head. “Have patience,” he said, in another tone. “Your term of imprisonment runs almost to its end. Soon you will, should you desire it, have action enough for even the blood of Sigrieth that runs in your veins. Now, keep in mind all I have said. Waddle—”

  At his command, the huge beast crouched. Like a man much younger, Sandivar mounted, and Waddle arose. “Farewell,” said the sorcerer, and the bear shambled to the water’s edge and splashed in. Sandivar turned in the saddle and waved as Waddle edged through the shallows; and Helmut returned the gesture. Then Waddle was swimming, with great strength, Sandivar’s legs crossed over his back to avoid wetting. Helmut stood and watched until they were only a dark blot on the glassy surface of the marsh and then were lost to sight behind reeds and cane. It was the first time he had been alone in four months, and he felt a strange melancholy as he turned and entered the tower.

  That night was an eerie one.

  Come sunset, he bolted the huge oaken door, as Sandivar had directed, and lit the flambeaux bracketed to the walls. In their murky, flickering light, he ate a simple meal, and then, as he had been assigned to do by Sandivar, read for a while in a book of great antiquity, one dealing with good and evil and vast wars between great armies using strange weapons—prelude to the Worldfire.