Berserker's Planet

by Fred Saberhagen

  The murmuring voices rose up wildly now, in rumor and speculation. What did the High Priest mean? Could Thorun actually be coming, to duel against a mortal man?

  It made no sense to Thomas, and he did not like it in the least. Still, looking at the clever and experienced Andreas, very much in control, he decided that boldness had its limits. He bowed once more to the High Priest, and said: "Sir, a word with you alone, if I may."

  "No more words, for you or from you," said Andreas softly. He turned his head slightly in a listening gesture, and smiled again.

  Beyond the gateway through which Andreas had come the gravel crunched again, in the rhythm of a single long-striding pair of feet. Incredibly heavy the tread must be, to make the gravel sound like that. Above the low wall in that direction the top of a head came into view, a mat of wild dark hair, while the feet must be moving at ground level three meters lower. No man was that tall. With an unfamiliar weakness in his knees Thomas believed for a moment that his own cynicism had undone him after all. The naive pious ones had been right all along. The dead of the Tournament, dismembered and buried and burnt along the way, would shortly walk before him, laughing as they followed-

  The figure now appearing in the gateway before Thomas, bending to pass through.

  Thorun.

  XIII

  His head of wild dark hair was bound up by a golden band. His fur cloak, vast as it was, barely covered his mountainous shoulders. His marvelous sword, nearly as long as Thomas's spear, was girdled to his waist. All as the legends had it. His face, though…

  Thorun did not seem to be looking at anything. He stared over Andreas's head, and over Thomas's, and through the still-open outer gate (where the limping maul-slave stood and gaped as if he thought those eyes were fixed on. him) and brooded with his terrible unblinking eyes upon the world outside. Once he had come to a halt Thorun did not move, did not shift his position or stir a finger, any more than would a statue.

  Andreas said nothing more, or, if he did so, Thomas did not hear. Rather the High Priest bowed himself out of the way, silently and obsequiously, though with some amusement still visible, out of the way of the mighty figure of the god.

  The eyes had moved now, though the head had not, and Thorun was looking at Thomas. The eyes had literally some kind of glow inside them, like those of an animal seen at nighttime by reflected light. This glow was red and orange. Glancing quickly around, Thomas saw that the eyes were on him alone, for no one any longer stood near him. Against one wall of the square he saw Leros prostrate in deep reverence, as were a number of others on walls and ground.

  Scores of men were watching now, men in white robes and gray rags. Those who had been in the middle of the square were scrambling away, reaching for high perches, getting out of the way. Awe was in every face. Almost. Only Farley would not interrupt his contemplation of the sky.

  Thorun now came stepping forward. Though his movements were limber and seemed natural enough, even graceful, for some reason the impression of watching a statue persisted. Perhaps it was the face, which was utterly inhuman, though the form of each individual feature was correct. Neither was the face godlike-unless gods were less than men, unless they were not, in fact, alive.

  But Thorun's strides were very long and purposeful. Thomas, seeing the long sword coming endlessly out of its scabbard as the god approached, got himself into motion just in time. The man launched himself backward out of the arc of the sword, and it made a soft and mournful sighing as it passed in a stroke that would have cut a man in half as readily as a weed. The war god's bearded lips opened at last and bellowed forth a deafening battle-cry. It was a strange and terrible sound, as inhuman as the glowing, unblinking eyes and the dead face.

  Getting his spear unlimbered just in time, Thomas mechanically held it out to parry Thorun's next stroke. When the god's sword struck he felt a numbing jolt up both his arms, and his armored spear was nearly torn out of his grasp. It was like some nightmare of being a child again, and facing a grown warrior in combat. The watchers cheered. Whoever or whatever Thorun was, his strength was well beyond that of any man.

  Thorun advanced methodically, unhurriedly. Backing and circling, Thomas knew that he must now plan and fight the finest battle of his life.

  Thomas began to fight his finest battle but before long was forced to realize that it was hopeless. His own most violent attacks were knocked aside with effortless ease, while Thorun's sword strokes came with such murderous power and precision that he knew he could not parry or avoid them for long. Already the battering of sword on spear had made his arms grow numb and weary. He was gripping his spear in both hands like a quarterstaff and retreating steadily, meanwhile trying to discover some workable strategy, to spy out some weakness in the defense of his monstrous opponent. Whether that opponent was god or man or something else entirely was a question that did not bother Thomas in the least just now.

  At last, with a good deceptive move followed by a superb thrust, Thomas got his spear-point home into Thorun's tunic of heavy fur, only to feel it rebound from some hard layer of armor underneath. A moment of sudden hope burned out as quickly as it had come. Around him the watchers gasped in astonishment at his seeming success, then relaxed with a collective sigh as the world, that had tilted for a moment, settled back. Thorun was unconquerable.

  Thomas, however, retained a spark of hope. If he could hit home once with the spear, then he might be able to hit home again. If the fur-clad chest and belly were invulnerable, where should he try to strike?

  How about the face? No. He could stand a little farther off-and it would be less nearly suicidal-if he tried instead for the legs. Thomas observed that the joints of Thorun's exposed and seemingly unarmored knees were not covered with unbroken skin like that on human legs, but instead showed fine and smoothly shifting cracks, as if they were the legs of a well-made puppet. The opening in the knee-joint presented a very small and moving target, but no more difficult a one than the insects on the wing Thomas had sometimes hit in practice.

  No better plan having suggested itself, Thomas feinted high, low, high again, and then put all his power and skill into a low thrust. His eyes and arms did not fail him. The sharp point of the spear found the small opening just as it was narrowing slightly with the straightening of Thorun's leg.

  There came a grinding vibration down the spear's shaft, and an audible snap of metal. Thorun lurched but did not fall. With the slamming of a door, a silence fell over the arena. The tip of Thomas's spearhead came away bright, where its point had been broken off.

  The silence that had fallen when Thorun nearly lost his footing still held; Thorun's knee was now frozen in a half-bent position. The ruler of the world was wounded, and nothing could be heard but the scraping dragging of his crippled foot as he continued to advance. He advanced more slowly than before but as implacably as ever. Thomas, in retreat again, glimpsed Andreas standing atop a wall. The High Priest's face was dark as a thundercloud, and one of his hands was half extended like a claw, as if he wanted to interfere now but did not dare.

  The limping god came in range again of his human opponent. Once more Thorun's great sword became a gleaming blur of speed, hammering on with untiring violence, driving Thomas back and back, around and around the little space. Thomas, meaning to strike again at the wounded knee, feinted high and low and high again, and then was nearly killed, was knocked off his feet, by the impact of the sword against his spear. Thorun was not to be fooled twice by the same tactic.

  Thomas rolled over desperately. Thorun, lurching with grotesque speed, was almost upon him. Thomas got his feet under him and got away barely in time. Leap in and grab, Thomas? Never, against this foe. As well leap in and wrestle an ice-born glacier-beast-or one of the glaciers themselves.

  Somehow Thomas had managed to retain his spear, and he was still blocking the sword with its steel-armored shaft, but he could no longer gather energy to launch a thrust. Still the sword drove him back and back, and around and around. Now
the watching white-robes had once more found their voices.

  The end could not be held off any longer, Thomas thought. Weary and off balance, he raised his arms in desperation to catch yet another swordsweep against his indestructible spear. Again the impact knocked him from his feet. The world seemed to turn slowly, slowly around him as he spun in the air and fell, giving him time to wonder whether there was a real Thorun to be confronted after he had been slain by this limping imposter.

  Thomas came down hard and for a moment could not move. He had lost his grip on his spear at last. The weapon lay only a handsbreadth from his fingers in the dust of the square, but grasping it again was one of the hardest greatest achievements of Thomas's life.

  The killing machine paused in its limping progress, as if uncertain whether the fight was already won. Then with its crablike motion it came forward once again. Thomas got himself up on one knee, his spear leveled. Another sudden cessation of noise made him aware of how the watchers had been yelling for his death. Thorun's glowing but lifeless eyes were judging him. What was the wargod waiting for? Thomas struggled back to his feet, knowing that the next swordstroke, or the one after that, would surely be the last. Then with the edge of his vision he saw a gray-clad figure approaching him from one side. It moved with a limp, as if in sacriligious mockery of wounded Thorun's gait. The slave's leaden maul was lifting casually to dash out Thomas's brains.

  Thomas had been ready to meet death, but by all the gods, this was too much! He was not yet down and helpless! He turned, meaning to spear the slave through, while Thorun, lackwit, continued to hesitate.

  Muscles ready for a killing lunge, Thomas for the first time looked closely into the slave's face, and was momentarily paralyzed by what he saw. And gray-clad Giles the Treacherous stepped sideways with smooth unlimping speed, and with all his warrior's strength let fly with the massive maul against Thorun's already damaged knee.

  Metal cracked. The bright arc of Thorun's next swordstroke, already underway, went tilting awkwardly and curved well wide of Giles and Thomas both. Metallic snapping sounds prolonged themselves. Slowly, but without dignity, the monster sat down, its left knee bent at a wrong angle. It came to rest in a sitting position with its torso bolt upright, staring at its enemies with a face that had not changed, but had suddenly become absurd:

  "Thomas!" cried Giles. He leaped back just in time from the next stroke that Thorun, still sitting, aimed at him. "Get him between us, Thomas. Finish him!"

  For the first time uttering a war-cry of his own, a hoarse and wordless yell, Thomas moved quickly to accomplish the encirclement. His peripheral vision told him that no one in the watching throng was moving to interfere. They were in pandemonium, their white robes swirling with disordered motion and their voices straining in excited noise. There was Leros, standing with arms folded in apparent calm, barely out of the way of the fight and watching it in utter concentration. Thomas glimpsed Andreas standing on a wall. The High Priest was waving his arms and seemed to be shouting orders, but the insane excitement was now such that no man's voice could be heard.

  Even crippled as he was Thorun came near to being a match for his opposition. Neither spear nor maul could beat down the huge sword in his untiring arm, and he turned his seated body with marvelous speed to face first one foreman and then the other.

  Catching the eye of Giles, Thomas roared: "Together! Now!" and they rushed at Thorun from opposite sides simultaneously. The sword came at Thomas, and he managed to parry it yet again only because Thorun, in his sitting position, could not get his whole body behind a swing. Even so Thomas thought for a moment that his own forearm had been broken in the clash. But meanwhile Giles had got in close, swinging like a piledriver, and landed his maul full force on the back of Thorun's neck.

  The blow would have exploded the head of any mortal man. Thorun's wild hair flew, his great head jerked, his torso swayed a little, his swordarm hesitated. Now Thomas's blunted spearpoint smashed into his right eye, which went out like a candle, with a tiny crunch that came through the spear like breaking glass. Now the maul came down again, this time on the swordhand. Thorun did not drop his sword, but now it stood out at a different angle from his fist.

  The giant died slowly, piecemeal, indifferent rather than brave, emitting neither cries not blood. There was only a step-by-step loss of function under the terrible punishment of spear and hammer, a progressive revelation of Thorun's vincibility, a bit-by-bit reduction of his body to little more than shattered metal and glass and fur.

  Even when the huge body was hopelessly beaten, when the god's battered face had been humiliatingly pounded down into the earth beside the fountain, the sword arm was still trying to fight, lashing out with murderous, random blows. A spear thrust loosened its fingers and the giant sword fell from the hand with a dull little sound. The arm, its broken digits clutching spasmodically on emptiness, was still waving when Thomas and Giles looked at each other, rested their weapons, and then turned together to salute the watchers who ringed them in.

  The noise of the crowd died away into an exhausted silence, a silence that seemed to Thomas to go on for a very long time. Andreas was no longer to be seen, he noted, and a few others had also vanished. Most were still watching, as if hypnotized, the helpless, stubborn movements of Thorun's arm. Thomas went to kick the huge sword out of its reach.

  Eyes began now to turn toward Leros, who was the senior priest still in attendance. Obviously in the grip of powerful emotions, he took two steps forward and stretched forth an arm toward the fallen giant; but Leros was still too overcome to speak, and the fist of his outstretched arm clenched tightly, his arm dropped back to his side.

  It was left to Giles to break the silence at last. Gesturing at the wrecked giant, he shouted out: "This creature is not your beloved Thorun. It cannot be! Andreas and his Inner Circle have deceived you all!"

  The roar that went up from the crowd in response had much of agreement in it. But one voice cried out to Giles: "Who are you, that have interfered and done this? Agent of the Brotherhood! Spy!"

  Giles raised a hand and got silence in which to make his answer. "Very well, say I am a spy, an agent, anything you like. But what I have shown you here is nothing but the truth. Call me what you will. But will you call me a god, to defeat another god in combat? And what god could I be, to conquer Thorun?" He raised his face to the bright sky, and made a holy sign. "Great Thorun, avenge yourself upon the blasphemers who have put forth this deception!" And he gestured again to where ruined Thorun still moved one arm in a parody of battle.

  Several men with their daggers drawn-there were no larger weapons in evidence among the crowd-came to surround Giles. They took away his maul and stood guard over him, but at a word from Leros did no more. Giles made no protest or resistance, but stood proudly with his arms folded. Leros, after gazing a little while longer in continued shock at what remained of Thorun, summoned two or three other leaders who were present to withdraw with him to a corner of the square. There they at once plunged into earnest talk. Most of the other spectators, marveling and arguing, began to crowd around the fallen figure that had been their god.

  Giles the Treacherous, looking at Thomas, suddenly flashed him a smile of surprising brightness for a man in his doubtful situation. "Lord Thomas," Giles hailed him, "it seems that you are now the champion of gods as well as men."

  "Well. You don't claim a share of the prize, whatever it may prove to be?" Thomas moved closer to Giles, with whom he felt a kinship.

  "I? Never. You have won the championship fairly and I have no claim to make."

  Thomas nodded, satisfied on this point. But he had other worries. Standing next to Giles, he looked around him restlessly. He had the feeling that as champion of the Tournament, and acknowledged victor over the imitation Thorun, he should be doing something, asserting authority somehow. Probably he should go to join the talk around Leros and make the priests listen to him. But what would he tell them? He realized now that he had not the fainte
st idea of what was really going on. He was more likely to find out, he thought, if he stayed with Giles, who might well need some help in return soon and be willing to bargain. Anyway, Thomas felt much more at home talking with another fighting man than he did with the priests.

  "Why are you here, and how?" he asked the shorter man. "It is in my memory that I saw you die."

  Giles's smile had faded to a mere twist of the lip. "You saw Jud thrust at me, and me go plunging down a hillside."

  "You were not even wounded?"

  "I was not. You see, I had persuaded Jud that all I wanted was a chance to get out of the Tournament and away. He was something of a cynic, and so believed me. Also he was glad of the chance to take an uncontested victory, and went along with the plan I had hatched. He had only to hold back his thrusts a little, as I did.

  "His sword only took a few threads from my jacket before I went over the edge. I had marked beforehand that the slave carrying the maul was of my size and coloring, which suggested the whole plan to me. When the slave came down to make sure I was dead I was waiting in the bushes and did the office for him instead. I took his rags and his rope belt and his maul, and put them on together with his limp, before dragging him uphill to be buried in my good clothes. The rest of you had started on ahead by then, as I had expected.

  "I was seldom in your camp after that. My companion slave was dumb, and so lackwit he did not notice the transformation-or perhaps he was shrewd enough to ignore intrigue when he became aware of it. None of the rest of you ever looked at me with open eyes, once I had put on gray rags-not until you looked at me just now, when you thought I was coming for you with the maul."

  Thomas shook his head in wonderment. "A fearful risk you took."

  "Not so great a risk as having to face you, or Kelsumba perhaps, or Farley, in open combat. I had made up my mind that that risk was too high."