The West Is Dying

by David C. Smith

  BORGO PRESS BOOKS BY DAVID C. SMITH

  THE FALL OF THE FIRST WORLD

  1. The West Is Dying

  2. Sorrowing Vengeance

  3. The Passing of the Gods

  MAGICIANS

  1. Magicians

  2. The Eyes of Night

  ORON & TALES OF ATTLUMA

  1. Oron

  2. The Shadow of Sorcery

  3. Reign, Sorcery!

  4. Deathwolf

  5. Death in Asakad and Other Stories

  COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

  Copyright © 1983, 2012 by David C. Smith

  “Preface” Copyright © 2012 by Fred C. Adams, Jr., Ph.D.

  Originally published under the title, The Master of Evil

  Published by Wildside Press LLC

  www.wildsidebooks.com

  DEDICATION

  With love,

  for

  my PARENTS, who gave me values

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I owe many thanks to John Betancourt and Rob Reginald for publishing this revised edition through the Borgo Press imprint of Wildside Press. Certainly I owe Janine M. Smith gracious thanks for all of the work she put into producing the two maps that appear in this trilogy; she is my wife, I dearly love her, and she is my friend as well. Dr. Fred Adams, of course, I thank for his warm and erudite Preface. And I thank him as well as Joe Bonadonna, Tim Cole, Ted C. Rypel, Charles Saunders, David M. Stanley, and the others who have championed this trilogy over the years. Friends, here it is again!

  The verse by Michael Fantina in Part Three, Chapter Twenty-One, appears through permission of the author.

  MAJOR CHARACTERS

  The Athadian Ruling Family, in Athad, Capital of the Empire:

  Queen YTA, widow of King Evaris

  Prince ELAD, her eldest son

  Prince General CYRODIAN of the Imperial Army, her second son

  Prince DURSORIS, her third son

  Princess ORAIN, wife of Cyrodian

  Prince GALVUS, son of Cyrodian and Orain

  Others in the West:

  Count ADRED, a young Athadian aristocrat

  Lord ABGARTHIS, elderly adviser to the crown

  Lord BUMATHIS, a Councilor on the Priton Nobility in Athad

  Governor JAKOVAS of Kendia, in the city of Sulos

  Colonel LUTOUK, of the Fourth Regiment, Third Legion West, in Sulos

  Count MANTHO, an aristocrat of Kendia

  Governor OVALUS of Elpet

  RHIA, a rebel in Bessara

  Lord SOLOK, a liberal sympathizer in Bessara

  Governor SULEN of Abustad

  Lord UMOTHET, a Councilor on the Priton Nobility in Athad

  Lord UTHIS, magistrate of the city of Bessara

  Captain UVARS, of the Fifth Company, First Regiment, First Legion West in Athad

  In Emaria:

  King NUTATHARIS, of Emaria

  EROMEDEUS, adviser to Nutatharis

  General KUSTOS, of the Emarian Army

  Sir JORS, adviser to Nutatharis

  In Gaegosh:

  OGODIS, the Imbur of Gaegosh

  Princess SALIA, his daughter

  The Salukadian Ruling Family, in Ilbukar:

  HUAGRIM ko-Ghen, Chief of Salukadia

  AGORS, his elder son

  NIHIM, his younger son

  Others in the East:

  THAMERON, a young priest in the Holy City of Erusabad

  ANDOPARAS, Metropolitan of the Temple of Bithitu in Erusabad

  ASSIA, a prostitute

  Governor DUSAR of Athadian Erusabad

  GUBURUS, a sorcerer

  HAPAD, friend to Thameron

  IBRO, a taverner and whoremaster

  MUTHULIS, Chief Priest of the Temple of Bithitu in Erusabad

  Lord SIROM, Acting Governor of Athadian Erusabad

  Lord THOMO, King Elad’s emissary to Salukadian-held Erusabad

  General THYTAGORAS, commander of the Tenth Legion East in Athadian Erusabad

  TYRUS, father to Assia

  PREFACE

  by Fred C. Adams, Jr., Ph.D., Department of English, Pennsylvania State University

  Authors who are also omnivorous readers bring a uniquely rich context to fiction. David C. Smith is one of these authors.

  The yin and yang of fantasy worlds demands a delicate balance to prevent the narrative from either slipping into the abyss of literary self-indulgence, on one hand, or tumbling into a morass of clichés on the other. The problem is simple: how to maintain what Samuel Taylor Coleridge called the reader’s “willing suspension of disbelief” while portraying events in a milieu that challenges the underpinnings of reality. Hence, the balance; quotidian aspects of a world must exist as a platform for the fantastic.

  In many ways, other-world science fiction shares this circumstance with fantasy.

  Writers have essentially two options in either case:

  1. Show a snapshot of the world, restricting the reader’s field of vision to a limited setting or two that conform to those features, geographical, zoological, meteorological, or otherwise, that make the world unusual; or

  2. Show the whole world in all of its detail and integrate the extraordinary elements into everyday events.

  Examples of the latter from both camps include Frank Herbert’s Dune and Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy, both of which provide the panorama of life, not just a snapshot. In the science fiction or fantasy short story, the snapshot is not only acceptable but also often necessary; however, in novel-length work, it can lead to formulaic mediocrity.

  At the risk of stating the obvious, fantasy fiction is simply literature that portrays events in a world in which magic works and, often, in which magic is acknowledged as part of life. Fiction hinges largely on conflict rising from one of three configurations:

  1. An extraordinary character inserted into an ordinary circumstance;

  2. An ordinary character inserted into an extraordinary circumstance; or

  3. An extraordinary character inserted into an extraordinary circumstance.

  Substitute “fantastic” for “extraordinary” and you have the choices open to the fantasy fictioneer. Fantasy novels may involve any of these three, but of the three, those most often successful involve the first or the second and include an element of the ordinary. The ordinary becomes the foil for the extraordinary, highlighting, for example, the full force and power of magic exercised by a master sorcerer against ordinary people who have no magic to wield, or the deadly menace of a vampire, lycanthrope, demon, or other creature outside the realm of everyday human experience.

  In addition, fantasy fiction shares with Gothic fiction the element of the extreme. My definition of Gothic fiction is as follows: literature that portrays the inability of society’s institutions to protect the individual in extreme circumstances. I chose the word “extreme” because of its association with the phrase in extremis, at the point of death. My definition of Gothic substitutes “extreme” for “extraordinary,” and the configurations hold their validity. In much fantasy fiction, the protagonist or a group of ordinary characters (in the context of their given milieu) are threatened with literal death or an analogous living death (such as the undead humans whose physical bodies comprise the structure of the battle towers of the vampires in Brian Lumley’s Necroscope series). Often, in fantasy fiction, bureaucracy, government, organized religion, and other societal institutions are incapable of dealing with the fantastic/extreme forces brought to bear on ordinary people. It is up to other forces to bring life back into balance.

  The author’s challenge is that simple balancing act I mentioned earlier: the quotidian aspects of a world must balance the fantastic’s impact. The analogy of yin and yang is perhaps too obvious, as is
that of Jung’s Animus and Shadow in human psychology, yet they serve to show that while good and evil may be a theme of a fantasy novel and a driving force in its plot, the true interest in a fantasy novel lies in the equilibrium between the quotidian and the fantastic and what happens when the two are thrown out of balance by gods, men, or Fate.

  Thus, the framing of a world for a fantasy novel demands attention to detail not always required of other genres. Detective stories, war stories, spy stories, love stories are usually set in the here and now, or at least the recent past, which negates the need to explain how people obtain life’s necessities and how society generally works. The private eye lives in an apartment, eats in a diner, and interacts with municipal bureaucracy, and the reader nods his head in understanding. Not so the character in a fantasy novel; this is another world (or in prehistory novels, another era), and explanations are demanded by the reader. Does our protagonist sleep under the stars? In a yurt? In a hut? Does he or she forage for food? Grow it? Buy it? If so, with what medium of exchange? Does our protagonist pay tax or tribute to his human ruler? And how are such details managed? The well-written fantasy novel provides this milieu in sufficient detail to allow the reader to grasp the quotidian so that when the fantastic element arrives, it is appreciated fully for its contrast.

  Many fantasy novels are set on our planet in an earlier era (“prehistory” fantasy à la Robert E. Howard’s Conan stories set in the Hyborian Age). The level of technology is either manual or, at best, mechanical at a rudimentary level. This removes the need to explain most flora and fauna and other items that we would regard as everyday fare, allowing the fantasy author, like the authors of detective fiction, Westerns, and love stories, to proceed with an essentially plot- and character-driven narrative.

  Smith’s The Fall of the First World trilogy opens, not a drapery or a window, but a gateway to his prehistory milieu.

  An inordinate emphasis on the mystical aspects of an invented world often leads to novels that fail. Details that less sensitive authors would ignore as mundane become the skeleton on which the flesh is hung and joins it to stand unified. One of Smith’s greatest strengths as a novelist is his broad personal context, an awareness of history, politics, religion, economy, sociology, mythology, civilization, war and weapons, art, music, and more. With it, he weaves the whole cloth of an invented world that is credible at the same time it is fantastic.

  “Invention” implies discovery on the author’s part, and the fusion of motifs and details, large and small in the writing process, leads to such discovery.

  One criticism I have read of the trilogy is its portrayal of Athadian bureaucracy, particularly the social network described in The West Is Dying, in which one must register with the bureaucracy to receive a welfare-like stipend. Some believe that Smith included such a detail unrealistically, trying to force comparisons between the First World and its 20th century welfare state counterpart. I would point out that Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire tells us that Roman bureaucracy not only existed but was highly efficient before the Fall. And as for the social network, what else might the bread of “bread and circuses” represent? And not only ancient Rome, but also the Byzantine Empire likewise exerted much of its control through a well-established bureaucratic establishment.

  An anecdote: almost forty years ago, I proofread the manuscript of Smith’s first novel, Oron, before he sent it to the publisher. I took exception to a battle scene in which soldiers retreated from the battlefield to eat a meal in the middle of the encounter as unrealistic. Smith responded with sources detailing the practice as a regular one in ancient times when battles lasted sometimes for days and mid-battle meals were a necessity. QED and touché. When Smith includes such a detail, it is well-considered and a certainty based on the broad context of his reading.

  Other items from contemporary society find their counterparts in the First World, as well, and reveal what outcomes arise from a totality of circumstance that often resonates with our own. The complaint to Elad from his nephew that the state’s coinage has become diluted, silver increasingly alloyed with tin, hearkens to the advent of “sandwich” coins in the American economy, of money’s value becoming increasingly symbolic and decreasingly substantial, thus producing a detrimental impact on the economy. One square of a very large quilt, yet part of the patchwork that covers all, such a motif contributes to the gestalt of the novel, a setting that not only invites but sustains the “willing suspension of disbelief” for the reader.

  Another strength that omnivorous reading invests in an author is the protection against clichés. Without the context of broad reading, many authors consciously or not fill their stories with stylized characters and motifs: the cobalt-eyed, steel-thewed barbarian warrior, always the last man standing on a journey to retrieve, rescue, or avenge; the clever protagonist who uses wiles and trickery to overcome forces both physical and magical and survive; the beautiful woman in peril.

  Thousands of years before these became staples of fantasy fiction, the quest motif, the Trickster, and the damsel in distress, respectively, were archetypes celebrated in the myths of all cultures. Carl Gustav Jung in Man and His Symbols tells us that these archetypes are present in the subconscious of all humans; artists draw on them and audiences subconsciously recognize them, as C. Hugh Holman puts it, with “illogical but strong responses.” Yes, they work, but the difference between ordinary writing and artistry lies in the conscious recognition of archetypes and their judicious use to prevent them from descending into two-dimensional characters, trite metaphors, and shopworn allegories. If one has not read the myths of many cultures, or for that matter, Jung, how can he or she knowingly employ archetypal elements without crossing the border into cliché?

  Smith’s delicate use of particular motifs and allegorical elements keeps them sublimated specifically because he recognizes them as such and wields them with motive rather than clumsily inviting the reader to “spot the allegory” or “pin the cliché on the writer,” as one might in Literature 101. An example is the character Cyrodian, who at the outset looks like a clone, if not of Howard’s Conan, then of Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd, with his bulging biceps and mane of red hair. As the trilogy unfolds, Cyrodian reveals himself to be an increasingly complex character with aspirations for himself and his land that interlock with a personal philosophy, and to grow and change as situations unfold.

  Another of Smith’s strengths in The Fall of the First World is the philosophical diversity of his characters, characterization that covers an entire civilization that has grown large enough and endured long enough to diversify into differing belief systems. One recognizes Socrates and Plato, Bentham, Kierkegaard, Marx, and a host of other philosophers behind the personal beliefs of his primary characters. Beyond establishing the longevity required to produce such an array of beliefs, Smith’s technique provides an additional avenue for reader identification with like-minded characters. The reader may empathize or sympathize with a character revealed to share similar beliefs, and to more fully rejoice or reel when that character faces triumph or tragedy.

  This issue of philosophy becomes particularly important in The Fall of the First World when one considers the dichotomy between good and evil, a staple of fantasy fiction and mythology. Living and writing in an age of increasing moral relativism, Smith tells the reader, “Your evil may not be my evil.” The novel provides us with as great an array of behaviors and deeds as it does philosophies and shows that the more complex and diverse a society becomes, the more divergent a response an act may elicit, relative to a given character’s belief system. Donald Sydney-Fryer has observed that Smith’s characters in The Fall of the First World are “Shakespearean.” I would submit that their philosophical diversity contributes greatly to that quality.

  The Fall of the First World is, in many ways, Manichaean. Manichaeism, a religious philosophy from third century Persia, suggests that reality consists of two irreducible elements or opposing principles, good and evil. In
destructible, both coexist in perpetual opposition à la yin and yang or Jung’s Animus and Shadow, or in more recent times, the two sides of the Force in Star Wars (whose philosophic background George Lucas hired renowned mythologist Joseph Campbell to construct). Manichaean philosophy, put simply, suggests that evil must exist so that good may have a purpose. That purpose in The Fall of the First World is to maintain the equilibrium between the two and maintain order in the universe. With Manichaeism comes ethical dualism, which postulates that there is an irreducible difference between fact and value judgment.

  Author Charles Saunders has observed that the character Thameron’s splitting the jewel to release its power is analogous to science’s splitting the atom and unleashing its power. This power is not only physical but also political as that power is used to pursue one end over another and one person’s (or nation’s) good over another’s. Edith Hamilton, in her seminal work Mythology says, “Myths are early science, the result of men’s first trying to explain what they saw around them.” If so, then magic may be regarded as science yet unexplained as presented in prehistory fantasy. In an age in which science has become the deity of many and rationality has replaced religious faith, it makes perfect sense that the reading public would turn ever more fervently to fiction that portrays a universe that does not hinge on random, mechanistic happenstance but rather experiences purposeful and forceful guidance at the hands of deities or other forces redressing wrongs and restoring balance.

  Another aspect of mythology related to The Fall of the First World is its depiction of events that could ultimately follow the continuum from event to legend to myth. A contemporary example is Michael Crichton’s novel The Eaters of the Dead, which portrays events that could have experienced a similar transformation from happenstance into the myth of Beowulf. In The Fall of the First World, the seduction of Elad’s queen, Salia, and the consequent war is a fine example. It begins as a common enough act of betrayal but, retold over the ages, particularly with a cataclysm interrupting the continuity of its telling, it could very well have been elevated to become the basis for what we know as the story of Helen of Troy.