Tales From Cornwall: A History Of The Hubelaires

4. The Thirty And One

Four of the Cornwall Tales appeared in WEIRD TALES In 1929 and 1930, and the readers regretfully decided that this was all there would be of them. I myself did not get to read any of these four until 1939, when I first managed to borrow a good-size collection of old issues of WT, prior to the dates of my own familiarity with the magazine, which began with the October 1931 issue (although I had managed to get some back issues, as far as January 1931). So it was with both surprise and pleasure that we all saw this story in the second issue of MARVEL SCIENCE STORIES in 1938. One more would make its initial appearance in a magazine a few years later, but I'll save comment on that one when we come to it The next story in the book will be the one that appeared first in WEIRD TALES: The Battle of the Toads.

Cecil, Overlord of Walling in Armorica, mused by the fire The blind Singer of Songs, sang the sagas of ancient times, waited long for praise and then, disquiet, left the banquet hall guided by his dog. The Juggler merrily tossed his golden balls into the air till they seemed like a glistening cascade but still the Overlord mused, unseeing. The wise Homunculus crouched at his feet uttering words of wisdom and telling tales of Gobi and the buried city of Angkor. But nothing could rouse Cecil from his meditations.

At last he struck the silver bell with a hammer of gold. A serving man answered his call.

"Send me Lady Angelica and Prince Gustro," he commanded and then, once again, sat silent with chin in hand, waiting.

Soon the two came to his summons. The Lady Angelica was his only child, as fair and wise as any lady in all Walling. Prince Gustro some day would be her husband and help her rule the Hubelaires. Meanwhile he had perfected himself in the use of the broadsword, the lute, hunting with the falcon, and the study of books. He was six feet tall and twenty years old and had in him the makings of a man.

The three sat around the fire, two waiting to hear the one talk, the one waiting till he knew just how to say what had to be said. At last Cecil spoke.

"No doubt you know what is on my mind. For years I have tried to give happiness, peace, and prosperity to the Hubelaires in our land of Walling. We were well situated in a valley surrounded by lofty forests and around them high mountains. Only one pass connected us with the great, cruel, and almost unknown world. In springtime, summer, and fall we sent our caravans of mules laden with grain, olives, and wine out into that world and from it we brought salt, weapons, and bales of woolen and silken goods for our needs. No one tried to molest us, for we had nothing they coveted. Perhaps years of safety made us soft, sleepy,and unprepared for danger."

"But danger has come. We should have realized there were things in that outer world we knew not and therefore could not even dream of. This spring our caravan, winding over the mountains, found, at the boundaries of the dark forest, a castle blocking their way. Their mules were not birds and could not fly over; they were not moles and could not burrow under. And the lads with the mules were not warriors and could not break their way through. So they came back, unmolested, tis true, but with their goods unbartered and unsold."

"I do not think that castle was built by magic. I have looked at it and it seems nothing but stone and mortar. And it is not held by an army of warriors, for all we hear is that one man occupies it. But what a man! Half again as tall as our finest lads and skilled in the use of weapons. I tried him out. One at a time I sent to him John of the flying axe, and Herman who had no equal with the two-handed sword, and Rubin who could split a willow wand at two hundred paces with his steel-tipped arrow. These three men lie, worm food, in the ravine below the castle. Meantime our country is strangulated so far as trade is concerned. We have cattle in the meadow, wood in the forest, and grain in the bins; but we have no salt, no clothes to cover us in the winter, no finery for our women, or weapons for our warriors. We will never have these while this giant in his castle blocks our caravans.".

"We can capture the castle and kill the Giant!" cried Prince Gustro with the impetusity of youth.

"How?" asked the Overlord. "Did I tell you that the path is narrow? You know that. On one side the mountains tower as lofty as the eagle's flight and as smooth as a woman's skin. On the other side is the Valley of the Daemons and no one has ever fallen into it and come back alive. The only path that leads through the castle is scarcely wide enough for one man or a man-led mule. If I could send an army 'twould be different; but only one man at a time can enter and there is no man able to combat this Giant successfully.

Lady Angelica smiled as she whispered. "We may conquer him through chicanery. For example: I have seen this hall filled with warriors and fair ladies almost put into endless sleep by gazing at the golden balls flying through the air and back into the clever hands of the Juggler. And the blind Singer of Songs can make anyone forget all except the music of his lays. Do not forget our Homunculus is very wise."

Cecil shook his head. "Not thus will the question be answered. This mad Giant wants only one thing, and that means, in the lastward, everything so far as as our land and people are concerned. Perhaps you have guessed. I will tell you his demand ere you ask the question. Our Lady's hand in marriage, and this, when I die, to rule Walling and the Hubelaires."

Lady Angelica looked at Prince Gustro. He saw her shake her head ever so slightly.

"Better to eat our grain and olives and drink our wine," he said. "Better that our men wear bearskins and our women cover themselves with the hides of deer. 'Twould be best to have them wear shoes of wood than pantofles of unicorn skin brought from Araby. It were a sweeter fate for them to perfume their bodies with crushed violets and mayflowers from the forest than to be scented with perfumes from the trees of the Spice Island in the East. This price is too heavy. Let us live like our fathers and our father's fathers, even climb trees like the monkey folk, rather than have such a ruler. Besides, I love the Lady Angelica."

The Lady smiled her thanks. "I am still thinking of the use of intelligence overcoming brawn. Have we no wisdom in Walling, besides the fair, faint dreams of a weak woman?"

"I will send for the Homunculus," her father replied. "He may know the answer to that question."

The little man came in. A man not born of woman, but grown for seven years in a glass bottle, during all of which time he read books held before him by wise men and was nourished with drops of wine and tiny balls of asphodel paste. He listened to the problem gravely, though at times he seemed asleep. At last he uttered one word: "Synthesis"

The Overlord picked him up and placed him on one knee.

"Have pity on us, Wise Man. We are only simple folk and know but little. What is the meaning of this strange word?"

"I know not," was the peculiar answer. "Tis a word that comes to me out of the past. It has a sweet sound and surely must refer to something mystical. I recall now! It was when I was in the glass bottle that a wise man came and held before my eyes an illuminated parchment on which was written in letters of gold this word and its meaning! Synthesis. All things are one and one thing is all."

"Which makes it all the harder for us to understand," signed the Overlord.

Lady Angelica rose from her seat and came where her father sat. She sank on the bearskin at his feet and took the little hand of the dwarf in hers.

"Tell me, my dear Homunculus, what wise man twas who thus showed you this word and its meaning on the illuminated parchment?"

"He was a very wise ancient who lives alone in a large cave, by a babbling brook. Yearly those living near him take bread, meat, and wine, leaving them at the mouth of the cave, but none dares enter it and thus for years he has never been seen. Perhaps he is still alive and takes the food, but if he lies sightless and thoughtless on his stone bed then the birds and little beasts eat the food, thinking it should not be wasted."

"I have heard of this hermit;" exclaimed Cecil, "and when I was a boy went to the woods where the cave is but dared not enter. We will find out whether he is alive or dead. Gustro, order horses so we four can visit him. Three horses for us and an ambling pad for our little friend so naught of harm will befall him."

The four came to the cave and entered it. A light burned at the far end and there was the wise man, very old, with naught but his eyes telling of the intelligence that never ages. On the table before him in a tangled confusion were glasses, earthenware, crucibles, one each of astrolabe and alembic, and an hourglass through which ran silver sands. This was arranged with cunning machinery so that every day it tilted around and once more allowed the sands to tell of the passing of the twenty and four hours. There were books covered with mildewed leather, locked with iron padlocks and spider webs. Hung from the celling was a representation of the sun with all the planets revolving eternally around that fair orb, but the pitted moon alternated with light and shadow.

The wise man read from a book written in a long dead language, and, now and then, he ate a crust of bread or sipped wine from a ram's horn, but never did he stop reading. When Cecil touched him on the shoulder to attract his attention he simply murmured, "By the Seven Sacred Caterpillars! Let me finish this page, for what a pity were I to die without knowing what this man wrote some thousands of years ago in Angkor."

At last he finished the page and sat blinking at them with his wise eyes sunk deep into a mummy face while his body shook with the decrepitude of age.

"What is the meaning of the word, synthesis’?" Lord Cecil asked him.

"Tis a dream of mine which only now I find the waking meaning of."

"Tell the dream," the Overlord commanded.

"Tis but a dream. Suppose there were thirty wise men, learned in all wisdom obtained from reading of ancient books on alchemy, magic, histories, and philosophy. These men know of animals and of jewels such as margarites and chrysoberyl; of all plants such as dittany, which cures wounds, and madragora, which compelleth sleep. Why should anyone want to sleep when there is so much to read and profit by the reading? But these men are old and some day will die. I would take these thirty old men and one young man and have them drink a wine I learned to distill years ago. Then by synthesis there would be only one body — that of the young man — but in his brain would be all the subtle and ancient wisdom of the thirty savants. Thus we could do, century after century, so no wisdom would be lost to the world."

Lady Angelica leaned over his shoulder. "Have you kept this wine you made?” she asked.

"Yes, and now I am working on its opposite, for why place thirty bodies into one unless you know the art of then separating that body back into the original thirty? But it is hard. For any fool can pour the wine from thirty bottles into one jar, but only a wise man can separate the wines and restore them to their original bottles."

"Have you tried this wine of synthetic magic?" asked Cecil.

"Yes, I took a crow and a canary bird and had them drink of it and now in yonder wicker cage a yellow crow sits and nightly fills cave with song as though it came from the lutes and citherns of faerie-land."

"Now that is my thought," cried the Lady Angelica. "We will take the best and bravest of our warriors and the Singer of Songs pupil and the Juggler of Golden Balls and the Sleep-maker, thirty men in all, and they and I will drink of this synthetic wine and thus the thirty will pass into my body. Then I will go and visit the Giant in his castle and there in the banquet hall I will drink of the other wine and there will be thirty to fight against the enemy of our people. They will overcome and slay him. Then I will drink again of the synthetic wine and in my body carry the thirty conquerors back to Walling. Once there, I will again drink of the second potion and the thirty men will leave my body, liberated by the magical wine. Some may be dead and others wounded but I will be sale and the Giant killed. Have you enough of it? Enough of both kinds?"

The old man looked troubled. "I have a flagon of the synthetic wine. Divided it would make sixty-two doses. Of the other, which changes the synthesized back into their original bodies, only enough for one large dose and a very few drops more"

"Try those drops on the yellow bird," Cecil commanded.

The old man poured from a golden bottle, graven with a worm that eternally renewed his youth by swallowing his tail, a few drops of a colorless liquid and offered it to the bird in the wicker cage. The bird drank greedily and of a sudden there were two birds, a black crow and a yellow canary and, ere the canary could pipe a song, the crow pounced on it-and killed it.

"It worked!" croaked the old man. "It worked!"

"Can you make more of the second elixir?" asked Prince Gustro. "What I do once I can do twice," proudly declared the ancient.

"Then start at once and make more. While you are doing it we will take the golden bottle and the flagon and see what can be done to save the Hubelaires, though this is an adventure that I think little of, for tis fraught with much danger for my daughter." Thus spake the Overlord.

With the elixirs in a safe place they rode away from the old man's cave. But Prince Gustro took the Overlord aside and said, "I ask a favor. Allow me to be one of those thirty men."

Cecil shook his head. "No. And once again and forever, no! In the doing of this I stand to lose the apple of my eye. If she comes not back to me I may die of grief, and then you, and you alone, will be left to care for the House of the Hubelaires. If a man has but two arrows and shoots one into the air, then he were wise to keep the other in his quiver against the day of need. "

The Lady Angelica laughed as she suspected the reason of their whispering. "I will come back," she said gaily, "for the old man is very wise and did you not see the yellow bird divide into two and the crow kill the canary?"

But the Homunculus, held in Lord Cecil's arms, started to cry.

"What wouldst thou?" asked the kindly Overlord.

"I would be back in my bottle again," sobbed the little one; and he cried until he went to sleep, soothed by the rocking canter of the war horse.

Two evenings later a concourse of brave men met in the banquet hall. There were great silent men, skilled in the use of mace, byrnies and baldricks, who could slay with the sword, spear, and double-bitted battle axe. The Juggler was there, the Singer of Songs, and the young Reader of Books, who was very wise. And with these was a man with sparkling eyes who could, by his glance, put men to sleep and then waken them with a snap of thumb and finger. And to this company was added the Overlord, Prince Gustro and the trembling Homunculus. On her throne sat the Lady Angelica, beautiful and very happy because of the great adventure she had a part in. In her hand was a golden goblet and each of the thirty men held a crystal glass. These thirty and one drinking vessels were filled with the wine of synthesis. Then the flagon, half empty, and the small golden bottle containing the colorless wine were hid by the Lady Angelica beneath her shimmering robe. Outside a ladie's horse, decked with diamond-studded harness, neighed uneasy in the moonlight.

Lord Cecil explained the adventure while all the thirty men sat very still and solemn, for they had never heard the like before. None feared a simple death, but this dissolution was something that made even the bravest wonder what the end would be. But when the time came and the command was given they one and all drained their crystal glasses, and even as the Lady drank her wine they drank with her to the last drop.

Then came a silence broken only by the shrill cry of a hoot owl, complaining to the moon, concerning the doings of the night folks in the dark forest. The little Homunculus hid his face in the shoulder of the Overlord, but Cecil and Prince Gustro looked ahead of them over the banquet table to see what was to be seen.

The thirty men seemed to shiver and then grew smaller in a mist that covered them; finally only empty places were left at the banquet table. None were left but the two men, the Lady Angelica and the shivering Homunculus. The lady laughed.

"It worked," she cried. "I look the same but feel different, for in me are the potential bodies of the thirty brave men who will overcome the Giant and bring peace and security to our land. And now I give you the kiss of hail and farewell and will adventure forth on my waiting horse." Kissing her father on the cheek, her lover on the mouth and the little one on the top of his curly-haired head she ran bravely out of the room. Through the stillness they could hear her horse's hooves, silver-shod, pounding on the stones of the courtyard.

"I am afraid," shivered the little one. "Because I have all wisdom I am afraid as to this adventure and its ending."

The Overlord tried to comfort him. "You are afraid because you are so very wise. Prince Gustro and I would like to fear, but we are too foolish to do so. Can I do anything to comfort you, little friend of mine?"

"I wish I were back in my bottle," sobbed the Homunculus, "but that cannot be, because the bottle was broken when I was taken from it, for the mouth of it was very narrow, and a bottle once broken cannot be made whole again." So all that night Cecil rocked him to sleep, singing to him lullabies while Gustro sat wakeful before the fire, biting his fingernails and wondering what the ending would be.

Late that night Lady Angelica arrived at the gate of the Giant's castle and blew her wreathed horn. The Giant.dropped the iron-studded drawbridge and peered curiously at the lady on the horse.

"I am the Lady Angelica," she said, "and I have come to be your bride if only you will free passage to our caravans so we can commerce with the great world outside. Then, when my father dies, you will be the Overlord of Walling, and perchance I will come to love you, for you are a line figure of a man and I have heard much of you."

The Giant towered over the head of her horse. Placing a hand around her waist he plucked her from the steed, carried her to his banquet hall and sat down at one end of the table. Laughing in a rather silly manner, he walked around the room lighting pine torches and tall candles till the whole room was illumined. He poured a large glass of wine for the Lady and a much larger glass himself. Seated at the other end of the table he cried: "It is all as I dreamed. But who would have thought that the noble Cecil and the brave Gustro would be so craven! Let's drink to our wedding, and then to the bridal chamber."

He drank his drink in one swallow. But Lady Angelica took from under her gown a golden flask and raising it, she cried, "I drink to you and future, whatever it is!" And she drained the golden flask and sat very still. A mist filled the room and swirled widdershams in thirty pillars around the long oak-plank table and when it cleared there were thirty men between the Giant and the Lady.

The Juggler threw his golden balls into the air; the man with the dazzling eyes looked hard at the Giant; the student opened a book and read backward the wise saying of dead gods; the young Singer of Songs plucked his harp and sang of wonderful deeds of brave men long since worm food. But the fighting men rushed forward and, on all sides, started the battle. The Giant jumped back, picked a mace from the wall and fought as never man had fought before. He had two objectives: to kill the men and then to reach the smiling Lady and strangle her with bare hands for the thing she had done to him. But ever between him and the Lady was a wall of men who, with steel, song and the magic of Hashing eyes, cascades of glittering balls and backward reading, formed a living wall that could be crushed and bent but never broken.

For years after, in the halls of Walling, the Singer of Songs told of that fight while the Hubelaires sat silent listening. No doubt, as the tale passed from one Singer, aged, to the next Singer, young, it became ornamented, embroidered and fabricated till it was somewhat different from what really happened that night. But even the bare truth-telling at first hand by the Lady Angelica was a great enough tale. For men fought, bled, and died in that hall. Finally the Giant, dying, broke through and almost reached the Lady, but the Song Man tripped him with his harp and the Wise Man threw his heavy tome in his face and the Juggler shattered his three golden balls against the Giant's forehead, and, at the lastward, the glittering eyes of the Sleep-Maker fastened on the dying ones of the Giant and sent him to his final slumber.

The Lady Angelica looked around her at the shattered hall and the thirty men who had done their part and she said softly. "These be brave men who have done what was necessary for the good of their country and the honor of the Hubelaires. I cannot forsake them or leave them hopeless," and she took the wine of synthesis and, drinking part, to every man she gave a drink, even to the dead men, whose lips she had to gently open and from whose gritted teeth she had to wipe the blood ere she could pour the wine into their breathless mouths. Then she went back to the table and, sitting there, she waited.

The mist again filled the room, covering the dead, the dying, and those who, though not fatally hurt, still panted from the fury of the battle. And when the mist cleared, only Lady Angelica was left there, for all the thirty had returned to her body through the magic of the synthetic wine

"I feel old and in many ways different," the Lady whispered "for my strength has gone from me and I am glad there is no mirror to show my whitened hair and bloodless cheeks; the men who have come back into me were dead or badly hurt, and I must get back to my horse before I fall into a faint and die."

She tried to walk out of the room but, stumbling, fell. On hands and knees she crawled to where her horse waited for her. She pulled herself into the saddle and with her girdle tied herself there, and then she told the horse to go home. But she lay across the saddle like a dead woman.

The horse took her safely back to the Overlord's castle. Ladies in waiting laid her on her bed, washed her withered limbs and covered her wasted body with coverlets of lamb's wool and wise physicians gave her healing quaffs. Finally she recovered sufficiently to tell her father and her lover the story of the battle of the thirty warriors and wise men against the Giant and how he was dead and their land safe.

"And now go to the old man and get the other elixir," she whispered, "and when it works have the dead buried with honor and the wounded gently and wisely cared for. Thus we will come to the end of the adventure and it will be one that the Singer of Songs will tell for many winter evenings to the Hubelaires of Walling."

"You stay with her, Gustro," commanded the Overlord, "and I will take the wise Homunculus in my arms and gallop to the cave and secure the elixir from the old savant. When I return we will have her drink it and once again she will be young and whole. Then I will have you two lovers marry, for I am not as young as I was and I want to live to see the throne secure and, the gods willing, grandchildren running around the castle."

Gustro sat down by his lady's bed, took her wasted hand in his warm one, and placed a kiss on her white lips with his red ones. "No matter what happens and no matter what the end of the adventure, I will always love you, Heart-of-mine," he whispered. And Lady Angelica smiled on him and went to sleep.

Through the Dark Forest, Cecil, Overlord of Walling, galloped with the little wise man in his arms. He flung himself from his war-horse and ran quickly into the cave.

"Have you finished the elixir?" he cried.

The ancient looked up, as though in doubt as to what the question was. He was breathing heavily and little drops of sweat rolled down his leathered face

"Oh yes, I remember now. The elixir that would save the lady and take from her the thirty bodies of the men we placed in her by virtue of our synthetic magical wine. I remember now! I have been working on it. In a few more minutes it will be finished."

Dropping forward on the oak table he died. In falling, his withered hand struck a golden flask and overturned it on the floor. Liquid amber ran over the dust of ages. A cockroach came and drank of it and suddenly died.

"I am afraid," moaned the little Homunculus. "I wish I were back in my bottle."

But Cecil, Overlord of Walling, did not know how to comfort him.