The Enchantress of World's End

The Scene: Shai, and the Dungeons Thereof; The Cavern of a Thousand Perils; The Half world of Faerie; Dzimdazou’s Deep.

New Characters: Hawkmen, Merfolk, Gnomes, and the Denizens of several Worlds and Planes; The Oldest of All Dragons, a Kindly Cockatrice, and a Lovesick Lady Sphinx.

15. MEETING IN THE MOUNTAINS

Erigon yelled, Xarda shrieked, the Illusionist swore! To their left, a cliffy wall of mountains blocked the world away: before them the winged monster loomed, a weird black mass etched with moonsilver.

With remarkable presence of mind, Prince Erigon kicked the pedals. Istrobian’s flying kayak skidded around in a tight half-circle, narrowly missing the monster, which hovered motionlessly on out-stretched wings.

“It’s not moving!” and “It’s the Bazonga!” exlaimed Sarda and the Illusionist, in virtually the same breath. They blinked and looked again. It was indeed the dear Bird! She floated listlessly, drifting a little in the thrust and ebb of the air-currents. Her lens-eyes were dull and lifeless, her hinged back gaped open. The old magician hailed her, but the ungainly sentient vehicle made no response.

“Look at the dent in her crest,” said the girl knight breathlessly. “Just in front of her top-knot! I do believe she has done herself an injury. Could she have flown into the cliff for some reason?”

The old magician said: “It is not at all unlikely, my child. These are the Vanishing Mountains, which form the border between the Country of the Death Dwarves and Chx, unless my sense of geography fails me.”

“You said Vanishing Mountains?” repeated the Prince of Valardus. “A curious term.”

“But singularly apt in this instance,” said the illusionist. “Sometimes they are here and at other times they are not. Please do not ask me to explain it all now! I must get aboard the dear Bird and explore the extent of her injuries. Dear me, I will never forgive myself is she has … can you bring the kayak closer to her flank and hold the craft steady while I climb into the cockpit?”

“I guess so,” said Erigon dubiously. He fiddled with the pedals; Istrobian’s flying kayak inched closer to the lifeless bronze shape until it nuzzled her sides. The magician gingerly stood up and fumbled about in order to get a firm grip on the edge of the Bazoriga’s cockpit. Xarda watched, her green eyes bright with nervousness.

“Oh, magister, let me! I am young and agile—”

“But completely untutored in crystalloid lifeforms,” he said curtly. “You wouldn’t know what to look for. No talking now!” The kayak wobbled drunkenly as the old magician climbed from it into the bronze vehicle. When the magician was safely ensconced in the cockpit Erigon released, with a whoosh of relief, the breath he had been holding.

“I shall have to climb out on her neck to examine her skullcase,” the Illusionist announced. “If she did indeed run into the mountain wall, the collision may have jarred a few of her electrodes loose, or broken a connection.” Xarda bit her lip and gripped Prince Erigon’s hand tightly as the old man got out on the neck of the Bazonga, to sit astride it as one sits on a tree-branch. Reaching forward, he grasped the Bird’s bronze top-knot and pulled himself up the neck. The Bazonga bobbed as his weight shifted, and her beak dipped earthwards. Fumblingly he snapped the catches, opened her skullcase, and peered within.

The brilliance of the Falling Moon was nearly as bright as a flashlight would have been. A moment or two later, he called back to them that the sentient crystalloid which served as the creature’s brain seemed not to have been harmed, nestled snugly in its velvet padding, but three of the copper wire electrodes which connected the crystal brain to the flying and sensory apparatus were indeed out of their sockets. Probing within the skull cavity, and cursing under his breath as he tried to recall the color code with which the proper terminal connections had originally been marked, he carefully inserted the electrodes one by one.

It seemed to take forever. When it was over and the mood of suspense broke, only then did the girl knight of Jemmerdy realize she had been holding onto Prince Erigon’s hand for dear life. She snatched her hand away, crimsoning with embarrassment: the engaging young Valardian, however, seemed to have rather enjoyed their fleeting moment of closeness. He grinned at her; she flashed him a disdainful glance and looked away, furious at her momentary display of unfeminine weakness.

It took a few minutes for the dear Bird to recover herself. When she was herself again, she was surprised and pleased to see them again and shyly made the Prince’s acquaintance. Privately, she too thought him remarkably good-looking—for a True Man, that is.

“It was like taking a little nap,” the garrulous Bird marveled to herself. “Everything was so cozy and dreamy again—just like being snugly nested back in the bowels of Old Earth (if I may be forgiven so unladylike a phrase!), with all my brother and sister crystalloids beside me, warm and snuggy in the pre-Diluvian strata. Now I know what you human beings experience when you ‘go to sleep’, as you so quaintly term it! Why, it’s rather pleasant and comfy, after all …”

The magister, seated stiffly in the cockpit once again, ground his teeth together and swore under his breath by the Twelfth Mystery of Pesh, the Black Vortex, and the Magneto-gravitic Nexus.

“If you are quite done,” he snapped, “we are more than a little concerned to find out just what has been happening! How did you get here? What have you done with Ganelon Silvermane?”

“Oh, pish-tush, you old fussbudget,” sang the Bird carelessly. “Why, he’s right back there, where I left him only a moment before!” With a casual flip of her wing, she indicated an area of broken slabs on the first slopes of the Vanishing Mountains.

“D-do you mean there . . . where all the Death Dwarf corpses are?” asked Xarda fearfully. The Bird admitted that was where she had deposited the young giant, before flying back to fetch to safety the rest of them.

“But I see you have managed to rescue yourselves! And this nice young Prince,” she added in a coyly flirtatious manner, which the old magician found faintly sickening. For the nine-hundredth tune, he wondered why “that senile old idiot”* had seen fit to give his creation the psychic orientation of a talkative old aunt, when he had electrically educated the intelligent crystalloid.

* Meaning Miomivir Chastovix, the wizard who built the Bazonga.

They brought the kayak and the Bazonga bird down to the surface; Erigon hopped out to investigate the situation at first hand. He returned a while later to say that Ganelon’s corpse was not to be seen, but that the evidence suggested the giant had fought a terrific battle against the Death Dwarves, slaying many.

“Could he have wandered off, injured perhaps, or dazed?” inquired the old magician. Prince Erigon shook his head unhappily.

“I really don’t believe so,” he said regretfully. “I would say the surviving Dwarves finally overpowered him and carried him off to their lairs. This seems to be what happened, from the fact that the dwarf corpses have been plundered of their weapons, which Ganelon Silvermane would not have done. He might have armed himself with a sword, club, axe or two, but not a dozen or more.”

The knightrix of Jemmerdy swallowed a painful lump and measured the moonlit distances with grimly resolute eyes.

“If he’s captive somewhere in Dwarfland, then we must go after him,” she said determinedly. “By my halidom, ‘tis the very least we owe the great lout!”

The Illusionist agreed anxiously: he had become very fond of the youthful Construct by now, and would have deeply regretted losing him. They took to the air again, Xarda and Erigon in the flying kayak and the old magician riding in the Bazonga’s cockpit. The night was half done; by dawn they had traversed the Country of the Death Dwarves from north to south, from east to west. Nowhere, in all this realm of sterile mountains and bleakly barren plains, had the Illusionist managed to detect the distinctive spectrum of Ganelon’s Auric radiation.

“Isn’t it true that the little abominations lair in caverns and holes in the ground?” asked Xarda when the search had ended at dawn, in failure. The Illusionist nodded wearily.

“Quite true, but solid matter is completely transparent on the Astral plane. Ganelon’s Aura would be perfectly visible to Third Eye vision, even were he penned in subterranean regions. No, we shall have to give up on Dwarf country.”

“What then?” inquired Erigon, trying unsuccessfully to stifle a yawn.

“The Land of Red Magic,” said the Illusionist. “The little monsters who attacked Ganelon must have come from those tribes over which the Red Enchantress has gained dominance.”

“That means we must begin our search for the boy all over again, in the next kingdom!” groaned the knightrix. “And I can hardly keep my eyes open, after so busy and eventful a night.”

“Well, we can safely nap while en route,” said the magician. “We do require sleep, for we must be sharp, alert and have all our wits about us when we confront Zelmarine in the very fortress of her power …”

“How can we do that, though?” countered Prince Erigon. “You can safely snooze in your quaint vehicle, who flies herself … but Istrobian’s flying kayak is a bird of a different feather, if you will permit me the lame jest.”

“Tether the kayak to the Bird’s tail with the sentient rope, then join us in the cockpit for a snooze,” suggested the Illusionist, practically. “Our search has ended here at the westernmost corner of Dwarfland, facing on the Voormish desert; we have, I should say, three or four hours of flight before reaching the vicinity of Shai, the Red Queen’s capitol. Luckily, the dear Bird requires no rest, and can fly herself while we yield to the demands of nature.”

The plan made excellent sense. By this time, Prince Erigon was falling asleep. Securing the kayak to the peacock tail of the Bazonga, he clambered into the rear seat of the cockpit, snuggled down in his cloak, and fell sound asleep in an instant. Xarda and the old magician were not far behind him, entering the embrace of Morpheus.

The Bazonga regarded them fondly in her rear-vision mirror; then, flying smoothly so as not to jolt her sleeping passengers into wakefulness, she cruised up into the middle air and pointed her beak in the direction of the Land of Red Magic*

Or in what she thought was the direction, that is.

For in all her circlings and searchings, the poor Bird had become turned about, so she was headed directly north.

The Land of Red Magic, of course, lay due east. But the Bazonga had flown over Horx and eastern Ldand and was well beyond Yombok, before she had the slightest inkling of the fact that she was flying in exactly the wrong direction.

16. THE MIND-PROBE

Stripped and bound to the gleaming metal table under strong lights, Ganelon Silvermane lay helpless. Over him brooded the hunched form of the Mentalist, Varesco, his fierce blue robes exchanged for laboratory whites. Atop the bare skull of the Mind Worshipper sat a peculiar helmet of glittering metal parts, connected by flashing glassy tubes and winking bulbs, a device which augmented and channeled the focused mental power of the wearer.

Already, the Ningevite had inserted his mentality into the surface layers of the giant’s sleeping mind. He watched, if that’s the word I want, the ebb and flicker of surface thoughts. These were chiefly concerned with people whom Varesco did not know—with names like “master”, “Xarda” and “the Bird.” Riffling through these thoughts, the residue left by a suddenly anaesthetized consciousness, the Mind Worshipper found nothing of particular interest. He began to probe deeper.

To the unique telepathic sense of the Mentalist, the mind of a being such as Ganelon Silvermane resembles a sphere composed of innumerable layers. Beneath the surface flow of thoughts and memories lie the centers of consciousness and of will, character and personality. Within these, yet deeper down, lies the Unconscious itself, the home of powerful instinctive drives and hungers. Deeper yet, at the very core of the human mind, are found the innermost citadels of identity where lie vast, seldom-tapped reservoirs ~of dormant strengths, vitalities, and the secret recesses of the soul.

Varesco hated the giant with every iota of his warped and withered self. Hated him for being young, strong and handsome, in a craggy, heavy-jawed way (handsomer than sallow, lank-jawed Varesco, at any rate!); -hated him for being brave and gallant, generous, faithful and good. In brief, for being everything that Varesco was not, had never been, and never would be. This hatred was deep and instinctive: Varesco himself was conscious only that he resented the young giant for catching the eye of Zelmarine, for whom the Mentalist had long ago conceived a helpless, overwhelming passion.

Sliding down into the centers of consciousness, Varesco inserted tendrils of thought deep into the centers of Ganelon’s being. It was now completely within his power to destroy the youth he loathed with a hatred that was completely visceral. One savage slashing of those tendrils, and Silvermane would be reduced to a slobbering cretin, a mindless vegetable hulk, or a roaring maniac. A deeper thrust, to sever the connections of the soul, and the giant would be a cooling, lifeless cadaver.

But Varesco was not insane, despite his cruelty and rabid fervors. He was, in truth, very sane; sane enough to realize that should he once give way to the urge to rip and destroy the mind of Silvermane, his own death would soon follow. The Enchantress desired Silvermane with every particle of her being. She would not hesitate to destroy Varesco, ‘should he murder the object of her passion.

Entering the region of the instinctive drives, Varesco traced cricuits and nodes with practiced skill. Silvermane’s sexuality, he discovered, did not lie in the dominion of the greater or lesser perversions. It was, quite simply, dormant. At the sexual level, Silvermane was less than twelve years old—prepubescent—although on the physical level he was fully mature, and his emotional and intellectual growth was not far behind.

Below the centers of instinct, Varesco was surprised to discover nine centers previously unmapped by the Mentalists of Ning. He had no idea of their role in the makeup of the giant: they were mysterious, unheard-of. Curious as to their purpose, he inserted a probe. The nodes and circuits in this deep region were intensely peculiar; he could trace them with ease, but knew not what impulses they were designed to carry. He probed on, increasingly enthralled.

Phadia knew where the mind laboratory was located, of course, as he knew every nook and cranny of the palace of red glass. The bright, inquisitive boy had long ago explored the palace from top to bottom on one pretext or another, reasoning that the more he knew of his captors and this place, the better he would be prepared for the moment when a chance to strike for escape and freedom came. He had always known it “would someday come”, and had long prepared himself for it.

He went to Varesco’s suite simply because he could think of nothing else to do. If discovered, he could always pretend to be carrying a message, or could wheedle his way past the friendly, indulgent guards who had long since made a pet of him. He was a familiar fixture in the palace of Red Magic, knew all of the palace guards by first name and built a relationship of joking flirtation with most of them. He trusted this to get him out of trouble, should he be caught.

Varesco’s suite was never locked. Few doors in the Palace of Red Magic were ever locked, because Zelmarine was always suspicious of what might be brewing behind locked doors, and her courtiers quickly learned to disarm her suspicions early on. Thus, the boy found it easy to steal within, gliding stealthily from room to darkened room, until he entered the laboratory itself.

The room was scrupulously clean and brilliantly lit by tall standards, which supported fiercely luminous globes. The walls and floor were covered with tiles, immaculately white. Long marble benches supported ranks of flasks, trays of stoppered tubes, and other chemical apparatus. Banks of curious instruments loomed in the corners of the room: meters whirled, dials ticked, lights flickered on and off. The remnants of a forgotten age of science lingered, it would seem, among the savants of Ning.

Directly in the center of the room, Ganelon Silvermane lay strapped to a reclining table, his nude bronze torso gleaming with perspiration. Over him, with his back turned to the door where Phadia lurked, Varesco stood bending over the giant. His peculiar helm caught the boy’s fascinated eye. Obviously, the Mind Probe was in progress. Phadia, his heart hammering against the cage of his ribs, crept forward on furtive feet.

He wondered if he were in time …

Or too late?

Clenching his teeth, the boy glided across the laboratory. For a weapon, he dug into the pocket sewn on the inner lining of his tunic and found a long steel hairpin which ended in a cluster of twinkling gems.

Something alerted Varesco, perhaps the scrape of sandal-leather against the tiles. He started to straighten up, but it was too late. Phadia struck like a darting serpent, and the steel needle entered the nape of his neck and transfixed his brain.

Ganelon bunked slowly awake to find slender arms wound around his neck and a weeping boy clinging to his chest, cheek pillowed upon his heart. For a moment the bronze giant did not know where he was; then, turning his head about, he saw Varesco lying on his back in a pool of blood. The sour, sallow face, usually tight and thin-lipped, was for once relaxed and at peace.

“It’s all right, Phadia,” said Ganelon gently. “It’s all over now.”

The boy raised his head and looked at Ganelon, lips trembling with astonishment. He wiped his tear-stained cheeks and rubbed his eyes. “I thought you were … dead!”

Ganelon grinned, sat up, snapping his bonds as if they were bits of rotten twine. “Outside of a skull-splitting headache,” he said, “I am unharmed.”

He got off the table, reached over and brushed the long blond curls back from the boy’s face, tousling his hair affectionately. He said nothing.

“Did I … did I do right?” the boy asked.

He nodded somberly. “You did just fine. Where do they keep Grrff?”

Grrff did not seem particularly surprised to see the big bronze man and the slender boy. He grinned, wrinkling up his muzzle, yellow eyes glistening with lively spirits. While Ganelon broke his fetters with a twist of his mighty hands, the Tigerman hugged the boy till he gasped. Then he turned to clap Ganelon’s bare shoulder with one huge paw.

“Ho, big man!” he roared. “How many guards did you have to kill to get down here to set Grrff free?”

“Five or six,” grunted Silvermane, hefting a severely dented copper bar. “C’mon, the whole palace is on our heels.”

“Which way?”

“The crypts beneath the dungeons. This way!”

They ran down a spiral stab-case, feet pounding, the boy breathlessly pattering after them. It was a remarkable sight: the huge, burly-shouldered, furry Tigerman with his lashing tail, the slim effeminate boy in the skimpy abbreviated lavender silk tunic, his long bare legs slender and girlish, and—Silvermane, his bronze hide gleaming, as bare as the day he was born.

“Hah!” snorted the Tigerman. “I see time was of the essence.” He winked at Ganelon’s bare hide. The silver-haired giant flushed.

“No tune to look for my harness,” he grunted unhappily. “Quang stuck his nose in the door and ran off squeaking to sound the alarm. So I escaped like this!”

“How do we get past the metal men?” huffed Grrff a few moments later.

“We turn them off,” said Ganelon. “Phadia told me how.”

The door loomed before them, a slab of crimson metal set flush with the stone wall. The Omega Triskelion was blazoned huge across the double leaves of the portal, black enamel on scarlet metal.

Before the door, metal men were ranked. Motionless as so many empty suits of armor they stood, their arms thrust out before them, terminating in hooks, claws, scythes, power drills, hammers and axes. As the three escapees came pelting down the stair towards them, suddenly they became animate, clanking to attack position. The drill-arms started up with a whirring sound.

“If you know how to do it, you’d better do it now,” rumbled Grrff, eyeing the Automatons warily.

Ganelon stepped forward until the hook-arm of the foremost Automaton almost touched his naked chest.

“Turn yourselves off!” he roared.

The metal men collapsed on all sides, leg-joints clattering, like a cast of wooden puppets whose strings are simultaneously cut. Snatching up Phadia in his arms, Ganelon wove through the mound of lifeless metal, grasped the handle of the door and jerked. It came open with a groan of rusty metal, revealing a yawning blackness.

“Does anybody know where we’re going?” asked Grrff, as they lingered for a moment at the mouth of the Cavern.

“Does anybody care?” grunted Ganelon, as he stepped across the threshold—

17. THE CAVERN OF A THOUSAND PERILS

The moment they stepped across the threshold, the doorway dwindled and vanished far behind them. Huddled against Ganelon’s breast, the boy gasped and cowered.

They had taken one step only. Since the hyperspatial tube collapsed space in upon itself, that one step might have been the equivalent of a hundred miles, or a thousand. Or a million! It was enormously risky: they had no idea of where they were, or of where the next step might take them. To the Isles of Quadquoph, or the far side of the Moon, or Beta Draconis! Presumably, when powerful and cunning sorcerers like the Illusionist or Zelmarine used the labyrinth, they had some knowledge of how to get to where they wanted to be.

Ganelon stood motionless, straining every nerve. Beneath his bare soles he felt gritty cavern floor, naked stone, wet and sandy. His nostrils, however, reported the heady odor of jungle orchids and decaying leaves, while the wind that blew upon his nakedness was sharp dry and chill as Arctic winds. He could see nothing at all: impenetrable blackness veiled his sight.

“I’m af-f-fraid!” the boy whimpered, burying his face in against Ganelon’s breast.

“Hush!” said the giant fondly. “Don’t you think we all are? Grrff!”

“Right beside you, big man,” said that worthy, “and beginning to wish he had stayed behind to take his chances with the Red Magic legionnaires.”

“We’d better go carefully, from here on in,” counseled the giant. “Half a step difference between us could separate us by thousands of miles. Hold onto me and take a step when I do.” The big furry paw fastened itself to his upper arm. “Together now! One—big— step—”

Seawater, bluely-green, closed around them. Instinctively, all three hyperspatial travelers held their breaths. Pale sand squelched underfoot, strewn with glimmering moony pearls and human skulls, mossy with sea-growths. In the distance the elfin-slim coral towers of a marine city leaned against the tides, flashing with huge gems. Mounted on enormous, goggle-eyed sea-horses, a troop of sea-folk sped towards them, waving tridents angrily. They were male and female, naked with green hair like seaweed floating out behind them; minute, pearly scales glittered with highlights on smooth thigh, breast, shoulders.

They took another big step—

Jagged peaks zoomed above them, standing against wind-torn cloud-wracks like tall chimneys. Each was crowned with a huge nest. Scrawny female figures with flying hair and beaked faces shrieked and gobbled down at them, waving long skinny arms which terminated in hooked claws. A loud halloo came down the wind: gaunt man-birds, black wings spread, came soaring down, angry eyes flashing, beaks snapping. They staggered to keep their footing in the winds which streamed about them, drying the sea-bottom .wetness in moments. Grrff tried to say something but the wind snatched his words away.

They took another wide step—

Forest greenery closed in about them, leaves dark green and silvery where floods of moonlight poured through ragged branches. Gnarled, ancient trees grew all about; green aisles ran in all directions, thick with red and yellow mushrooms. Small, stunted figures ran squeaking to hide behind knotted roots and to peer out at the strangers. The gnomes had huge noses, tiny squinting eyes, and thick, bedraggled beards like moss. Some puffed on huge meerschaum pipes, others clutched quaint musical instruments they had been tootling on mere moments before. They squeaked and peered, waving tiny fists in a threatening manner. Suddenly hooves drummed through the forest still: a huge manlike figure, but faceless, black as tarnished silver, crowned with slender needles of ice, rode through the underbrush to rein before them. He was mounted upon a milk-white Unicorn whose arched, noble neck, blazing ruby eyes and long, spiral-fluted horn of purest gold flashed before them like something from a fantastic dream. The black-silver man with no face gestured towards them with a long sceptre of crystal or ice. They took another step—

Flames roared up, gold and crimson. Hot, scorching winds smote them, stinking of sulphur and brimstone. Beneath their feet, stone glowed hotly, threaded with sluggish, crawling rivulets of bubbling lava. Huge, lumpish figures rose amid the seething flames, peering out at them with astonishment, heavy jaws hanging wide, blunt tusks gleaming. The fire-ogres had armored skins like crocodiles, horns grew at brow and temple, elbow, knee and shoulder. Their heavy, splay-feet were those of monstrous lizards. One ogre burst bellowing through the curtain of flames, whirling a whistling club around his head broken from a stalagmite. He howled, gushing steam from his mouth, and loped towards them.

They took another step—

Parched and dry, the desert sands stretched from horizon to horizon under seven burning suns of metallic indigo, canary yellow, olive green, grayish purple, and three other colors for which the dazed, bewildered travellers had no names. Stone colossi marched across the desert, hundred-foot-high figures of manlike marble, but headless, who walked with a grating, gritty sound of stone rubbing against stone. From whence they came and to what unthinkable destination the stone monsters were bound was equally unknown. With each step the ponderous giants took, the desert drummed and sand jumped. A black shadow, edged with penumbra of seven colors, fell over them. They stared up wildly to see a vast stone foot coming down— and took another step themselves.

They stood on ice, slick as glass. Above the immense glacier, northern lights flickered, forming an undulating, ghostly luminous banner. Frost sprinkled them from head to foot: their three breaths steamed before them like white plumes. A distant yelping echoed across the plain of ice. In a moment, a slithering horde of white reptiles with vicious red eyes and long alligator tails came swarming into view around icy pinnacles of glimmering green. The ice-dwelling reptiles were yer-xels; Ganelon had fought them before on Mount Droom so he knew that, wherever they were, at least they were back to Gondwane. Hissing like so many teakettles, the white lizards cames squirming towards them, claws skittering on the ice.

They took another step—

Dim green gloom closed about them now; a stone roof soared far above, supported by pillars that looked like stalagmites, and probably were. The cavern was unthinkably immense, cool and dim and echoing. But, at least, it seemed uninhabited. Still holding Phadia cuddled against his breast, Ganelon staggered. The sudden transitions from hot to cold, wet to dry, left him numb and feeling somehow pummeled.

They peered about them, cautiously. Nearby a great mound of boulders like a rocky hill loomed up, dim and glittering with lots of sharp rocky ridges. Beyond arched the cavern wall, gleaming with eerie phosphorescence. Underfoot, gems crunched. At first the three mistook them for pebbles, but then Grrff stopped, bent down, scooped up a pawful and let them trickle through his digits. A glinting cataract of chatoyants, beryls, garnets, amethysts and alexandrites.

“A duke’s ransom!” he hurled, eyes following the dazzling stream.

Ganelon wearily set the boy down, cautioning him not to stray. Phadia knelt and gathered up a handful of coins. They were old and tarnished—coins of copper, silver, gold, electrum, platinum, and metals blue, green, black, for which he had no name. Some were round, others square or oval; some bore portraits either profile or full-face; the inscriptions were in languages he could not read. The floor of the cavern was completely covered with coins and gems, as far as the eye could reach. And it was an awfully large cavern.

Ganelon turned and looked behind him. Their last step had carried them through a stone archway whose keystone bore the Omega Triskelion symbol. They were out of the labyrinth and safe for a while, it seemed.

He sat down on a rounded boulder, smooth with lichens, to catch his breath.

“I guess we’re safe here,” he said moodily. Something had happened to him under the Mind Probe, but the whirl of events had moved so swiftly that he had not yet had leisure time to evaluate it.

“Hmph! But where is here?” gruffed the Tigerman, looking about him skeptically.

Stretched out on his tummy, kicking his heels in the air, small chin resting on folded hands, Phadia peered drowsily into the glitter of heaped gems. Their lights sent a flicker of enchantment across his pretty, girlish face.

“Maybe this is dragon treasure,” he suggested dreamily, “and we’re in a dragon’s cave!’*

Grrff snorted, twitching his whiskers.

“Nonsense, cub! Fairy-tale-stuff! There are no dragons left in Gondwane …”

This isn’t Gondwane, said a huge voice, making them all jump. It was a deep, grumbly voice with a lot of hissing in it: sort of the kind of voice thunder might make if it tried to hiss at the same time. None of them had ever heard a voice remotely like it before, and the alarming thing was they could not see whom it was that had spoken.

Then the big, dim, sharply-ridged hill in front of them opened one huge eye, like a bright green full moon and winked at them!

This is a Dragon’s cave, said the voice again. And this time they saw that it did come from the hill. Only it wasn’t a hill, it was—

And I’m the dragon, said the Dragon.

18. THE OLDEST ONE

Phadia jumped to his feet and tried to stuff the fingers of both hands into his mouth, eyes wide and unbelieving. Ganelon hefted the bent copper bar wherewith he had fought his way from Varesco’s laboratory to the prison-yard, and wished for his Silver Sword. And, as for GrrfiE, the burly Tigerman growled deep in his chest, hackles rising on his nape, razory black claws bared, eyes glowing sulphurously through the dim greenish gloom.

The craggy hill in front of them opened a second great moon-eye with which to observe them interestedly. The monster was big as a house, big as a blockfull of houses, but it did not seem to be interested in dinner; at least, not at the moment. Some gigantic prehistoric monster, some huge lizard, some sentient saurian strayed here from Earth’s forgotten prime? Whatever it was, they had little hopes of fighting it.

Manlings, here in my lair? it murmured in that hissy, thunderthroated voice. How -wondrous strange! Has been a thousand ages, aye, and more, since last Dzimdazoul had manlings as his guests … put up thy copper club, Silverhair! Dzimdazoul hath ever been that friendly with thy kind, to win him place within thy legendry.

They began to relax, joint by joint, nerve by nerve. Something behind or underneath the words themselves stole fright from them, bit by bit. They began to stare at the great Dragon, open-mouthed with amazed and wide-eyed wonderment, as the enormous friendly creature regarded them with luminous, unwinking, philosophical and faintly humorous gaze.

They could see Dzimdazoul more clearly now, their eyes having adjusted to the dim green gloom. He had a broad head with prominent brow-ridges that curved above the great moon-like eyes, and a long, wrinkled, scaly snout with large nostrils from which exhaled a whiff of sulphurous steam as he breathed. When he grinned, as he did in a manner meant to be friendly, he exposed fangs longer than a man’s arms. The size of him, the scaly length, was preposterous—mythical!

The dragonish breed had long-since vanished from Gondwane by their age, lingering only in legend and in a few remnants of the race, dwarfed and mute, which lurked in crypts and caverns much like this one. But this was one of the Old Dragons, the great dragons of the Prime, and huger than any living thing had any right to be.

Curiously enough, it was little Phadia who was the first to lose his fear of Dzimdazoul. Smiling with shy wonder, he crept forward and seated himself timidly on one of the Dragon’s paws which were stretched out before him. The Dragon regarded the boy with friendly inquisitiveness, cocking his great head first on one side, then the other, like some enormous dog. A man-child, is it? he hissed affably. “Yes, sir,” said the boy in a very small voice. The Dragon chuckled—an unnerving sound like several avalanches rumbling down a very tall mountain.

Hath more courage, the lad, than either of yon great burly louts, Dzimdazoul chuckled. Or be it common-sense? Aye, you’ve nought to fear from old Dzimdazoul, little men! I was a friend to your kind when your first ancestors came furtively out of the forests; clad in hair, were ye then, not unlike yonder cat-man there, with wee small tails, and ye chattered like the monkeys ye had been, not long before.

Ganelon blinked. His master had taught him about the theory of evolution, so he had some notion of the age of the Earth and of the human race. What the great reptile had said in its lazy, hissing rumble was purely incredible.

“Are you … can you be … that old, great one?” he asked dazedly. The Dragon grinned, wrinkling his leathery old snout. Then his green moon-eyes grew dreamy, as if he looked back down the long interminable ages since Creation.

I am the First Dragon, he said sleepily; I am the Old One, the oldest of the Old Things … the Demiurge made me first, after the Earth itself; ‘twas Deos-Ptah, or somesuch like that, was his name . . . laldabaoth came later, then all the other Gods who have ruled Old Earth from my time to thine. Do Zul and Rashemba rule thy world still, or be it young Galendil now? . . . / have slept the last million years away, here in mine cozy Deep, and be somewhat out of touch with Time! Ah, well, no matter …

Can I in truth be as old as that, you ask, Silverhair? … I am the oldest, the most ancient, of all living things. I remember the wars of Troy and the drowning of Atlantis. I watched the little brown men as they built the pyramids … I knew Aristotle and Charlemagne, and once I saw Alexander from a distance, riding down the long, long road to India. Already was I past the middle of my youth when the first nomad hunters strayed into the uncharted wilderness that was prehistoric Europe; and when I was very, very young, I saw Father Adam driven out of Paradise by a stern and beautiful angel with a sword of flame! Oh, I am very old; I am older than the Moon; I am nearly as old as Old Earth itself … and I am older by far than the race of man. I have forgotten more things than man has ever learned, because I am older than man. I remember things even the mountains have forgot.

Very little of what the Old Dragon said meant anything to any of them, for the realms and kings of Earth’s youth had long since faded from man’s memory, before ever Gondwane was formed out of the coming-together of the drifting continents. But Ganelon understood a little of it, just enough to feel awe. He spoke up and asked the Dragon just how old he was.

The great eyes twinkled at him humorously.

I really do not know! I have forgotten long ago; but very much older than you would think reasonable. I remember Julius Caesar and Hannibal, and I once saw Semiramis riding in a procession full of dancing girls and feather-fans. I can remember what Salisbury Plain looked like before Stonehenge. I watched the fall of Babylon and the burning of Persepolis, and I once discussed the circumference of the world with Ptolemy. I remember the first ship and the first city. I think I can remember the discovery of fire, but I’m not quite certain whether it was a caveman named Og who discovered it, or another named Ak; Og had blue eyes and yellow hair, as I recall; he was probably a Cro-Magnon……

The voice of the Old Dragon lulled them into a dreamy daze; curled up on Dzimdazoul’s paw, Phadia was fast asleep, his thumb tucked into his mouth, worn out from the excitements of the day. Ganelon and Grrff sat on the cavern floor, listening as the Old Dragon talked of things long ago and far away, another world, another age. Grrff understood little of what the great creature said, but listened anyway, enthralled.

I remember before the poles changed; I remember Ultima Thule. And I knew Hercules, or rather, one of the forty wandering heroes whose various exploits got mixed up in the story of Hercules. I saw the Crusades; I knew Roland, yes, and Oliver; I watched the Ice Age come and go…….I saw the first dog, while the Northern Lights glimmered overhead and the ice lay deep across Europe.

I used to spend my winters in the palace of Prester John. I saw the Huns come riding out of Asia, and the Mongols, and the Turks; the Tartars, too. I remember the death of the last mastodon and of the last wooly mammoth.

And I remember Siegfried.

“How is it, Grandfather, that you have lived so long?” asked Ganelon sleepily.

I was the first living thing which the Demiurge made, after the creation of the world itself—Theos-Pater, was that his name?—I think he loved me for that I was his first; at any rate, he let me live longer than any other thing. In the Beginning there were only Behemoth and Leviathan and I. Leviathan lived in the sea; Behemoth roamed the great plains; and I resided in the caverns underneath the world……. they died young, my mighty brothers. There was not enough in the world for them to eat, so Dyaus-Ptah, or whatever his name was, took their lives away from them. But I was his first living creature, and he could not bear to take my life back; so he arranged it that I fed only on gems and precious minerals, whereof the world hath a great plenty … then, I think, he just forgot about me, and laldabaoth never knew I was even there … later on, of course, I found my way Here.

“Where is ‘here’?” murmured Silvermane, sleepily. “This isn’t Gondwane, is it?” The Old Dragon shook his heavy head ponderously.

This is the Halfworld: some call it Faerie. ‘Tis a midregion outside of the world, yet part of it in a certain sense. And connected with many other worlds as well. Here death cannot ever come, because we are outside of Time and beyond the reach of Change. Here Arthur sleeps, and Charlemagne and Barbarossa, and Ogier; and here Merlin dreams the world away, lonely in Brociliande—

The deep, hissing, thunderous voice slowed to a halt. The Old Dragon peered down at them with huge, curious, wise eyes; they were asleep, all three. The Tigerman slept on his back, his paws lifted before his furry chest. He snored, a kind of purring sound.

Sleep, now, little ones … I had forgotten how easily you manlings weary … sleep! No harm can come to you here, and I will watch over your rest, said the Old Dragon.

19. ON THE PURPLE PLAIN

Aboard the Bazonga the Illusionist and his party were also fast asleep, worn out from the long night’s travels and adventures. Not daring to disturb the slumbering humans, the Bird flew on into the north, although by now the poor befuddled creature was beginning to suspect that she was doing something wrong.

Poy was behind them, and Cham. The Sea of Glass glimmered beneath her keel, that vast expanse of sand which once had been a desert or the bottom of a vanished sea, before an exploding contraterrene meteorite had fused it to one sparkling flatness of crystal. The Bird circled low, peering down curiously, admiring her reflection in it.

The Sun came up; still the same Sun of our own day, but older now, redder and cooler, a dimming star-candle, guttering towards extinction. A billion years, more or less, and Old Earth’s last and final dawn would break …

It was the sunlight in his eyes that roused the old magician from his sleep. He woke, and stretched, and scratched himself and spat over the side. He looked around him, rheumy-eyed, wishing he were back in his own soft bed at Nerelon, with Fryx to bring him his morning cocoa—

Beneath them an illimitable plain of thick purple grasses rolled to the horizon.

He jumped, cursed in three extinct languages and one ultra-terrestrial one, and clutching the edge of the cockpit, stared down with horror.

The Bird winked at him in her rear-vision mirror.

” ‘Awake! for morning in the—’ “

“You mechanistic imbecile! You moronic vehicle, you—! You sub-cretinous contraption—what, have, you, DONE?” he fumed, waving a futile gloved fist.

She blinked owlishly, and somehow, into her immobile cast-bronze countenance there stole a woebegone expression.

“I knew it! I just knew it! If anything goes wrong beautiful Bazonga … the only Bazonga in all the wide world, but do they care? Not a sniff, not a pinch, not a whisper!—” she wailed in a hollow voice.

Xarda jerked awake and stared about, blank-eyed, one small fist going for her second-best sword, salvaged from then* luggage, back at the inn.

“Wha? Where? Have at thee, varlet’ Caitiff rogue—* she broke off and stared at the magician, wide-eyed. “Where are the enemy?”

The magician cocked a thumb in the direction of the Bazonga. The Bird assumed an injured expression (somehow, don’t ask me how) and uttered a loud sniff.

“That’s the enemy,” the magician snarled. “At least, she seems to be working for the wrong side! Look where she’s taken us”—and he gestured below. Xarda looked over the side at league upon league of long violet grass.

“Isn’t this—?”

“The Purple Plain!” the Illusionist said, scathingly. “We’re way north of Yombok, even. Scores of leagues from where we wanted to be! It isn’t possible that Ganelon could have gotten this far on his own. I am convinced the poor boy was taken captive by the Dwarves, who turned him over to the tender mercies of the Red Enchantress. She’s been trying to get her hands on him since last year, when she tried to buy him from the Hegemon of Zermish.”

The Bird hung her head, snuffling to herself, a woebegone expression in her eyes.

“—Blame everything on me,” she whined. “Go on! — Do. I don’t care; I just don’t care . . .”

The Illusionist, fuming, brought his tirade to a halt. Grumbling and grexing under Ms breath, he glared at the shamefaced Bazona.

“Stop whimpering,” he grouched. “Can’t be helped now. We’ll just have to turn around and go back to … now what’s the matter?” he demanded suspiciously, as the Bird looked even sorrier.

“Well, you see … I wan’t really watching while I flew … it was dark and all … night, you know! … and I’m … well … uh …”

“What? You’re what?”

“I’m not at all sure which way is ‘back,’” she confessed in a very small, frightened voice.

Xarda and the Illusionist stared at each other blankly. Then they turned and looked south. Endless leagues of grass, the dim glitter of the Glass Sea, and the dull, lumpy ridges of anonymous mountains was all they could see.

“Well, the Land of Red Magic could be that way …” began Xarda, tentatively.

“Sure. Or that way, or even that way,” grumbled the old magician wearily. “I knew I shouldn’t have gone to sleep and left this mindless, scatter-brained creature to her own devices!”

“No use crying over spilt water over the dam,” said Xarda, getting her cliches somewhat mixed. “What’s to be done about it, that’s the question.”

Prince Erigon, from the back seat, cleared his throat politely.

“I say, maybe we could ask for directions?” “From whom?” asked the Illusionist, gloomily. “Well, there’s a city over there, east of us …” “There is? Where?” The Illusionist craned around to look. Sure enough, some two or three miles away, built right in the very midst of the interminable grassy plains, stood the towers and ramparts of a curiously futuristic metropolis, all made of bright metal that sparkled prettily in the morning sun.

“I say, that’s odd. The maps show no city anywhere around here. The Purple Plain forms a natural barrier between the many countries of Greater Zuavia and the upper borders of Northern YamaYamaLand; there’s nothing on the Plains themselves, except for wandering herds of Indigons and an occasional Youk. At least, there’s not supposed to be …”

“Maybe that was so, the last time you were in these parts, magister,” said Xarda practically. “But there’s certainly something there now.”

“So there is,” the old magician mused. “Well, I haven’t been up north for ten thou-… for quite a few years, I mean. I suppose somebody could have built a city here, during the interim. Heaven knows a lot of people have been rendered homeless by the Ximchak Barbarians, further north … still, it does seem odd!”

“Well. Let’s go over and take a look at it. From the air, I mean,” said Xarda, getting bored from inaction. “We don’t have to land if the people look unfriendly or dangerous. What do you say?”

The Illusionist scratched his chin with the tip of one forefinger, eddying the lavender vapors that perennially masked his features from view. “I don’t know,” he said thoughtfully. “Everytime we land in a strange city, seems like we get into trouble. Look at Chx. Horx, too, for that matter; of course that was before we met you, my dear, but still …”

“If you hadn’t landed in Horx, and if Ganelon hadn’t gotten into trouble trying to help me, I’d be a slave of the Holy Horxites right now,” she said, with a touch of reproof. “So forgive me if I can’t quite regard your experiences in Horx as an unqualified disaster—”

“Of course, my dear, I didn’t mean—”

“Are we going to float here all day, while you silly humans just talk?” squawked the Bazonga bird restively. Now that they were no longer angry at her foolish flying in the wrong direction, it had not taken the ebullient vehicle long to recover her usual good spirits.

“Oh, all right, let’s go,” sighed the magician. “Might as well have a look at the place. Can’t do any harm, I suppose.”

“Tally-ho, yoicks, yoicks!” sang the Bird, happily speeding up. She curved about, Istrobian’s flying kayak wobbling behind her like an aerial caboose, and flew east towards the strange metal city that Prince Erigon had noticed.

The nearer they got to it, the more curious it looked to them. The City was all metal—streets, towers, buildings, and everything else. And it was a lot smaller and more compact than it had looked from further off: instead of dwindling into scattered suburbs and farms at the edges, like most cities, it just stopped at a certain distance from its center. This termination was very clearly marked; in fact the city was a perfect disk, evenly trimmed around the outer perimeter. The streets that radiated out from its center like spokes from the hub of a wheel, stopped completely at the edges of the disk, ending in purple grass. There were no roads leading to it. It looked as if some playful or mischievous deity had just picked it up from somewhere and plunked it down here in the middle of nowhere, for a joke.

They flew over it, dipping and swerving to avoid the spires, while the three adventurers peered over the sides of their craft curiously. There seemed to be hardly any people out on the streets, although it was well into mid-morning by this time; you almost would have thought the city uninhabited, if that hadn’t been obviously unlikely. Somebody had to keep the city in good repair, and all that metal polished!

Then somebody noticed them. At least, a searchlight went on in the upper tiers of the enormous center-most building. The light was a peculiar throbbing green, and it swung around to bathe them in its beam. This was pretty odd, since it was a bright, clear day.

Then the Bazonga began squawking excitedly and angrily. At the same time she began to lose altitude in a steep, headlong nose dive.

“Stop! Whoa! What are you doing, you crazy Bird?” demanded the Illusionist, bracing himself against the forward edge of the cockpit to avoid falling out.

“Nothing: it’s not me!” the Bird wailed. “Something’s pulling me down—”

The ungainly winged vehicle hurtled groundward helplessly in the grip of some strange force. It looked as if the Bazonga would crash into the side of the central structure, but just in time an enormous trapdoor opened in the flanks of the curious structure, and the bird vehicle and her passengers were swallowed up.

The huge trapdoor closed with a metallic clang.

The odd green searchlight turned itself off.

About ten minutes later, the whole City rose up from the surface of the plain on a whooshing air-cushion and began moving away in an easterly direction, picking up speed until it was skimming along over the purple grasses at a pretty good clip.

The City moved along in one piece, because it was built as one unit. Which was very odd, because cities just aren’t built that way.

But, then, it wasn’t really a City at all.

20. THE ARMORY OF TIME

They woke deeply refreshed and somehow inwardly cleansed and renewed. It was the air of this place, thought Ganelon, lazily stretching: it was filled with magic. Dragon Magic. The oldest magic in the world, save only for that older, mightier magic whereby the very world was made.

He looked about, but neither Grrff nor the boy were visible. He must have slept longer than either of his companions, thought he. Rising, he was surprised to find a black leather war-harness, scarlet loincloth, girdle, boots and cloak, all laid out neatly beside the place where he had been sleeping. They were the exact duplicates of the clothes he had been wearing and had abandoned when he had fled from the Land of Red Magic. Dragon Magic!, he thought to himself, with a grim smile. Gratefully, he climbed into the familiar harness and buckled the straps and trappings about his mighty torso.

He came out of the cave into a green glade, dreaming in a sunlit haze and filled with birdsong. There, by the edge of a fresh, bubbling pool, the Karjixian Tigerman lay stretched out. The furry fellow had obviously just taken a dip and was sleepily drying his coat in the sun. He looked up as Ganelon came near, noticed the war-harness, and nodded towards a pile of belongings heaped beside him.

“Grrff too!” he rumbled complacently. Sitting up, he poked through the bundle until he found his weapon, which he lifted for Silvermane to see. It was a ygdraxel, the traditional weapon of the Tigermen. Ganelon grunted and nodded. Grrff lay back with a yawn.

“Grandfather Dragon is the most thoughtful of hosts,” said the Tigerman. “There’s breakfast over there on that rock.”

Ganelon drank from the small cascade that poured down over the rocks to join the pool; the water was crisp, cold, deliciously pure. Then he ambled over to study the array of eatables. Hot-cakes and syrup steamed amidst melting glick butter; sausages still sizzled in a hot pan; fresh, foaming milk stood in a tall frosted tumbler.

“Where’s the lad?” he asked, sitting down to eat Grrff nodded over in one direction. “With the Old Dragon,” he mumbled, “the cub’s fascinated by ‘im.” Ganelon started to say something else, then saw that the Karjixian was settling into a doze, and returned his full attention to the superb breakfast.

A while later he found the Old One stretched out before the mouth of his cave, enjoying the dim gold sun of Faerie. He was so enormous that parts of him were lost in the forest that grew up almost to the cave’s mouth. Ridges and hillocks of his vast length appeared here and there, rising out of the forest like far hills. By daylight his scales, each as huge as a knight’s shield, were dark, deep green and sparkling.

Phadia sat on the broad flat nose of the Dragon, leaning back against his nostril-ridges, staring up into the great, sleepy, amused eyes of the Old One. They were chatting, and as Ganelon approached he could hear the lad’s bright, clear tones over the subterranean rumble of the Dragon’s voice. The giant grinned to himself. The lad was completely in awe of the ponderous old creature, yet thoroughly unafraid of him. Just to look upon a Dragon sent a creepy thrill up the boy’s spine, for Dragons were to a child of his era every bit as awful, grand and mysterious as they would be to you or I. They looked up at his approach.

Good-morrow, Silverhazr, the Dragon greeted him affably. Slept you well in my Deep?

“That’s the name of his cave, you know,” the boy said pertly. ” ‘Dzimdazoul’s Deep.’ There used to be myths about it, the cave I mean; but that was three hundred million years ago!”

“I slept—”

“Did you bathe in the pool?” the boy chattered on. ‘I did! I was up this morning before either of you. I’ve been all over—except in the Armory. ‘The Armory of Time’, that’s what he calls it. There are all kinds of magic weapons there, left behind by the famous heroes. Grandfather Dragon has promised to show them to me! You and Grrff can come along if you like.”

Ganelon was interested, of course: fighting was, after all, his profession.

“All right,” he said. “Let me go wake up Grrff.”

They came into an immense gallery, cathedral-like in its reverent hush, its ghostly gleams and echoes, its shadowy and timeless serenity. Above them, a forest of slender pillars soared to join Gothic arches far overhead; the dim glory of Faerie smote through splendid windows of gules and emerald and purple glass.

The walls were of clean smooth stone, polished marble for the most part, and to these walls there were affixed many swords … swords almost beyond the numbering. Old they were, and well-used, their handgrips stained with the sweat, and the blood of heroes, the long gleaming blades bearing many dints. Above the each of these swords was set its name and history, in characters of lapis set in red-gold. And they were very famous names.

All the swords of all the heroes that ever were or will be are hung here, said the Old Dragon softly. Here were they left behind by the heroes of olden myth and legend, who came trooping through the dim ways of Faerie on their way to their Reward. This wall here, below an old and shining banner called the Oriflamme, bears the charmed weapons of the heroes of France.

The Twelve Peers, they were called, and here at their head is bright Joyeuse, that was borne by their Emperor, Charlemagne . . . three years went into the fashioning thereof, and after him it passed to the strong hand of William of Orange. And here, beneath it, hangs proud Durandal. Vulcan, the smith of the gods, forged it for Hector the Trojan in the fires of Tartarus. When that Prince of Troy fell it was taken from his hand by Penthesilea, Queen of the Amazons., from whom it passed down the generations to her descendant, Almontes, till Roland wrested it away. His dearest friend in all the world was Oliver, and here by Durandal hangs Hautclear: once Closamont the Roman Emperor bore it on the field, but it was more bravely borne by gallant Oliver. Here hang the blades of all the other Peers: Almace that was the Bishop Turpin’s sword, and Flamberge that was Renaud de Montau-ban’s, Sauvagine the Relentless, Murgles, and bright Gloreuse that cut through the nine swords made by Ansias, and Galas, and Munifican … and that world-famous sword, Curtana the Short, that was made by the giant-smith, Brumadant, who forged it twenty times, and twenty times he tempered it in the blood of dragons; ‘twas the great sword of Ogier the Dane, who won it from Caraheut, the King of the Saracens. And here, hung in a row beneath them, are the swords of their enemies, the Moors, Tartars and the Saracens: this is Preciuse, once owned by Baligant of Araby, and Tranchera, the magic sword of Agricane, the King of Tartary. Here is hung the thrice-enchanted Balisardo: the sorceress Falerina fashioned it wherewith to slay Roland, but she failed …

They stared at the nicked and worn old blades that yet shone with the fierce, thirsty luster of sharp steel, and the names of forgotten heroes and dusty, ancient wars echoed once again in the hushed stillness. Mer-veilleuse the Wonderful was there, the sword of Doon de Mayence, Sanglamore and Fusberta, and the Green Sword that had been Amadis of Gaul’s. They passed on to where beneath a blue, faded banner stitched with thirteen crowns of tarnished gold, swords flashed and gleamed and glittered.

These are the swords of the mightiest of the heroes of Britain, whispered the Old Dragon. And there, higher than them all, hangs that most famous sword in the •world, deathless Excalibur, that was made in Avalon for the hand of Arthur the King. See, see, its shining splendors the long ages have not dimmed! There near it hangs his other sword as well, Clarent, Sword of Miracles … the Sword in the Stone! And there below are hung in shining ranks Aroundight, the sword of Lance” lot, and Morddure that wise Merlin made, forging its fierce steel in the fires of Mount Aetna, tempering it seven times in the bitter Styx … and many another famous sword of England hang nearby: great Ascalon, St. George of Merrie England’s sword, and bright Mor-glay that once Sir Bevis of Hampton bore; Corrouge, Sir Otuel’s fair blade, and many more.

The swords of the heroes of the North they looked upon: Skofmmg, that the sea god’s daughter got from the dwarves and gave to Hrolf Kraki, the King of the Danes, and Goldhilt, that was young Hjalti’s once; and Egil’s Drangvandil, that had been borne to wars aforetime by Skallagrim, and Lovi, the charmed longsword of Bjarki, and Laevatein, made with runes of power. Tyrfing, the invincible sword of the Visigoths, that was forged for the hero Angantyr, and Aettartangi, the famous sword of Grettir the Strong; Gram and Nothung, aye, and Rithil; Regjn made it and it cut out Fafnir’s heart.

One wall blazed with intolerable brightness, dazzling as the noon sun, and the swords thereon were huger than mortal men might ever bear. Shielding his eyes against the furious light that shone therefrom, Ganelon asked their host of these.

These are the swords that were borne once by the very gods themselves . . . that mighty brand with edges jagged as a thunderbolt is Chrysaor the Terrible, which Zeus wielded in his war against the Titans … and there is Fragarach the Answerer, the sword that Lugh the Sun god bore back from the Land of the Living … and the swords called Great Fury and Little Fury, that were Manannan mac Lir’s . . . and Bal-mung, which Odin gave to Sigurd the Volsung; and Odin’s own grim brand, Brimir, that the giants made … and Prey’s sword, Hundinsbana, Hofud, the god Heimdall’s sword … and beyond them, the awful and wonderful Asidevata that was first borne by Shiva, then by Vishnu, and then by Indra … and Orna, sword of Tethra, that the god Ogma took in battle … They saw rare and fabulous swords: Philippan, the sword of Marc Anthony, Nagelring, the sword Dietrich of Berne got from the dwarf Alpris, Zulfiqar, the sword called Cleaver of Vertebrae which the angel Gabriel gave to Mohammed the Prophet; Dhami the Trenchant, the sword of Antar, hero of India, and Miming, made by Wayland Smith, the greatest of all makers-of swords. Most were of clean bright steel, but not all: the famous Sword of Sharpness wherewith Sir Jack slew the giants Cormoran, Galligantus and Blunderbore had for its blade a razory-thin shaft of pure diamond, pale as ice; and the sword of Amadis, which they had already seen, was green as emerald; and Crocea Mors, which Julius Caesar used against Cassibelaunus when he invaded Britain, was as yellow as saffron. Strangest of all, it may be, was Hrunting, the sword of Unferth: the blade thereof was brass, dyed with drops of poison and tempered in blood; with it, in later years, Beowulf the Great slew the Ogress.

They came to one wide wall at the end of the tremendous hall. These are the swords renowned in tale and story, said Dzimdazoul. Their names can mean little or naught to you . . . but here are hung forever immortal Anduril and Sacnoth, Randir and Rhindon, Glamdring and Llyr, and the Sword of Welleran … Graywand and Cat’s Claw, Orcrist, Broadcleaver that was Osbert’s sword, black, murderous Dyrnwyn, and the twin swords, Stormbringer and Mournblade … Frostfire_t Shadowmaker, Caliburn, and Sting.

He blinked fondly at Ganelon, who stood staring at the brilliant glitter of enchanted steel. With a nod of his massive head, the old dragon indicated one array of gleaming blades.

Here I shall someday hang your own sword, the Silver Sword, he said, great eyes twinkling. Here with Azlon, Zingazar, and Sarkozan.

As in a dream, they passed slowly out of that mighty, shadow-thronged hall, into the sun. Behind them, the famous swords, the enchanted swords, slept on through eternity to dream of old, fabulous wars, and the hands that held them once, long ago.

21. DRAGON’S DEEP

Time passed them by in the Halfworld with an air of dreamlike unreality; never afterwards were they able to figure out precisely how long they were the guests of Dzimdazoul.* I find it difficult to make any sense out of this, myself: Dzimdazoul had told them that here in the Halfworld, which lies outside of the world, they were beyond the reach of Tune and Change. Anyway, although there were dawns and daylight, noons and nightfalls, there was no sense of time elapsing at all … nothing but a dreamlike, everlasting Now.

* Later on, when he had a chance to compare adventures with the old magician, Ganelon became even more confused than before on this question of how much time had elapsed. It seemed to him that at least ten to twelve days had transpired between the time he flew out of Chx, and the time he left Faerie. But according to the Illusionist, only a day and a half had passed. Ganelon was never able,to resolve this curious discrepancy in later years, but the Commentators on this second book of the Epic agreed by consensus that the hyperspatial tube probably collapsed time, as it did space. Maybe so, but the time equivalencies still do not balance out, even if Ganelon and his friends spent only a second or two in the Halfworld of Faerie. I think myself that, by going backwards in the labyrinth, instead of continuing forward, they actually came out several days before they had gone in.

They roamed, wandered and explored. Grrff liked the forests best, remembering the jungles of his homeland. The woods were rilled with curious creatures, most of whom could talk and think was well as many men, if not better. He would come back from one of these rambles full of excited stories about unicorns, centaurs, dryads and gnomes, and elves. There were many elves in the woodlands; they were, of course, the virtual rulers of Faerie, although many old, retired gods lived here as well. Dzimdazoul patiently explained that it was into the Halfworld that most of the prehuman denizens of the Old Earth had strayed or fled or wandered eons ago, at the end of the Silver Age.

The seas were full of mermaids and tritons and oreads; gnomes and dwarves and trolls lived under the hills; the fairies dwelt mostly in Mommur, their ancient, immortal capitol, but there were troops and tribes of woods-elves that prefered the great green forests and made their camps therein.

Ganelon spent most of his time exploring the illimitable vastness of the Old Dragon’s cavern, or “deep” as he called it. There were many marvels there, some of which were from the Dawn of Time, and many of which had never before been seen by men. Besides Dzimdazoul, the caverns were the home of many other creatures, including an old minotaur, cranky from the gout, and an immense Piast which had come from Ireland before the first men came into Europe.

There was also a most amusing Cockatrice, who was a particular friend of the Dragon’s and who became an instant favorite of Phadia’s. This grouchy old creature, who was sort of like a reptilian rooster, lived in a small side-cave where hot sulphur bubbled up from fiery regions below: the Cockatrice, whose name was Hshenk, had formerly lived in ancient Persia. A relative of the famous Phoenix, he had inherited a tendency towards immortality on his mother’s side, and had lived long enough into the Age of Man to win a position of some importance in the mythology of Zoroaster, which was a matter of considerable pride to the grouchy old monster. He liked his sulphur-pit cave because it was always warm and dry, and he suffered from rheumatism, it seemed.

The Cockatrice taught Phadia checkers, or an ancient form of the game which had been popular with the antique Persians during the days of Sahm and Zal and Rustum. Anytime Ganelon wanted to find the lad, he would look first in Hshenk’s cave; nine times out of ten the boy would be there, lying on his stomach on some old Persian carpets, playing checkers with the Cockatrice.

Finding him there one day, Ganelon stood in the entrance to the warm cave, smiling a little at the scene. Phadia was wriggling on his rummy, kicking his heels in the air and giggling with both hands over his mouth, for he had just won another game from the old Cockatrice and the cranky old fellow was cussing a blue streak. Of course, his notion of swearing was to name half the devils in the Zoroastrian mythology, which meant nothing to Phadia, but it was funny to watch. When Hshenk got mad enough to cuss, his barbed tail curled up tight and his bright red coxcomb, which usually hung down floppily over one eye giving him a rakish air, stood stiffly erect and vibrated.

Between bursts of delighted giggling from Phadia, Silvermane could hear the creaky, shrill voice of the old Cockatrice, complaining furiously.

“Ahriman cook yer gizzard, lad, ye’ve done it again! Aeshma Daeva broil yer earlobes, you’ve done whupped me for the third time terday! Mitox and Ver-eno snatch ye bald, if I'll letcher win a fourth time … nosiree! Set ‘em up, set’em up, ye little rascal; I'll whup ye this time, Akatasha fry me if n I don’t!”

“Oh, Uncle Hshenk! You don’t really want to play another game,” protested the lad between giggles.

“Paromaiti burn me if I don’t! Set ‘em up, ye scalawag, and I'll teach ye to play real checkers! If it warn’t fer this cussed rheumatiz I’d of won ‘em all, by Zaurvan’s iron liver!”

Watching from the entrance to the cave, Ganelon studied the child with a fond eye. Even a few days away from the perfumed hothouse atmosphere of the Red Queen’s palace had brought a welcome change in little Phadia. For the last two days the boy had forgotten to put on any make-up (well, perhaps just a touch of eye-liner, but that was all), and right now he looked adorably boyish—like a real boy, that is. His blond curls were tousled and uncombed, he had a nice scratch on his knee, and his cheek was dirty with a smudge which he had carelessly wiped with the back of his hand. Ganelon regarded the boy with avuncular satisfaction: a little more of this sort of life and the stifling, constricting influence of his former life would really begin to fade, as the lad grew and changed in wholesome, boyish directions.

He hated to interrupt the happy scene, but it was time to go. He had determined that this very morning; wakening from a deep, restful sleep he had lain there looking up at the ceiling, wondering how the Illusionist Nerelon, the girl knight of Jemmerdy and Prince Erigon fared, and somehow he had known, right then and there, that this brief, pleasant respite from their adventurings was over. He said as much, as soon as Phadia and the Cockatrice looked up from their game and noticed him.

Phadia sighed, a little depressed, but made no complaints. He worshipped the great bronze giant and was used to doing what other people wanted him to do, without whining or complaining about it. Surprisingly, it was Hshenk who raised the loudest fuss about them leaving. The grouchy old fellow had become terribly attached to the little boy, but even he saw they couldn’t stay forever in Faerie: mortals could be happy here only for a time, and only to a certain extent.

“By Spenta Mainyu’s goldy crown, but I'll be sad to see ye go! This here place ain’t been half so lively in a million years, ‘afore ye folks come! Onegood thing about it: Til hafta go back to playin’ checkers wif th’ Old Dragon; and he let’s an ol’ feller win a game er two, oncet in a while! (Sniff!) Taint nothin’, boy—a cinder in me eye, likely. (Snuff!) Git along wif ye now! An’ may Holy Onnazd watch over ye lad, and yew too, big feller. Say goodbye to thet thar cat-feller fer me. (Snmff!) Carmaiti an’ Khashathra bless ‘e all.”

They had a little difficulty finding Grrff, who was up in the hills. And considerably more difficulty in persuading him to come down. It seems he had struck up a relationship with a friendly lady Sphinx who lived on a cliff-top nearby; half-human female and half-lioness, she was the nearest thing to a Tiger-woman the lonely Karjixian had met in quite a while. The love-smitten Xombolian was on the verge of proposing when Ganelon came climbing up to persuade him to come down. Their yowls of farewell set the canyons to ringing and Grrff came down slowly, grumpily, with many a languishing backwards look, refused to be consoled, and sulked for the next hour and a half.

The Old Dragon was coiled sleepily atop his mound of treasure, just where he had been when they had first encountered him.

I knew you would be going home soon, anxious to rejoin your friends, he said in his hissy, thunder-nimbly voice. I shall miss thee, manlings; aye, and mightily! So few come into Faerie in these sad, latter days …

There were presents for them all, of course: the new clothing and gear they had found beside them that first morning when they awoke, a broadsword for Ganelon, (but not an enchanted one), and a fine knife for Phadia, in a case of genuine dragonskin.* And the Old Dragon had packed a nice lunch. They made their farewells awkwardly and the boy cried.

* Dragons shed their scaly hide twice a millennium, you know, as snakes do a couple times a year. So the scabbard for Phadia’s knife was probably made from one of Dzundazoul’s own castings. (This is a speculation you will find in the Thirtieth Commentary; Bariche agrees it is more than likely correct, and even Nruntha was unable to refute it satisfactorily.)

Get along with you, now! Your friends are becoming worried as to what has happened, and you have much unfinished business to tend to. Through the archway, as before—but backwards this time, mind you! Two short steps back, then one big step to your left. Farewell, now, for a while. Mayhap we shall all meet again,another day!

His great, pebbly eyelids drooped sleepily, eclipsing the green moon-eyes as, hand in hand, they backed cautiously into the stone arch whose keystone was marked with the Omega Triskelion.

The dimly-lit half-circle that was the Dragon’s Deep when seen from the other side of the portal receded from them weirdly, dwindling to a remote point of greenish luminescence before it winked out, leaving them standing in pitch-black darkness. But the last glimpse they caught of him, the Old One was settling down for another million-year nap.

They left him sleeping. And stepped backward, to the left, and into the world again.