The Worm Ouroboros · Chapter 11 (2/3)

“You’re pleasant,” Corund said. “But your fusty jibes move me not a whit. It were a simple part indeed to take thine offer when all wise counsels bid me use my power and crush you.”

“Thou’dst kill me soon with thy mouth,” said Brandoch Daha. “In sum, thou art a brave man when it comes to roaring and swearing: a big bubber of wine, as men say to drink drunk is an ordinary matter with thee every day in the week; but I fear thou durst not fight.”

“Doth not thy nose swell at that?” said Spitfire.

But Corund shrugged his shoulders. “A footra for your baits!” he answered. “I am scarce bounden to do such a kindness to you of Demonland as lay down mine advantage and fight alone, against a sworder. Your old foxes are seldom taken in springes.”

“I thought so,” said Lord Brandoch Daha. “Surely the frog will have hair sooner than any of you Witchlanders shall dare to stand me.”

So ended the second parley before Eshgrar Ogo. The same day Corund essayed again to storm the hold, and grievous was the battle and hard put to it were they of Demonland to hold the walls. Yet in the end were Corund’s men thrown back with great slaughter. And night fell, and they returned to their tents.

“Mine invention,” said Gro, when on the next day they took counsel together, “hath yet some contrivance in her purse which shall do us good, if it fall but out to our mind. But I doubt much it will dislike thee.”

“Well, say it out, and I’ll give thee my censure on’t,” said Corund.

Gro spake: “It hath been shown we may not have down this tree by hewing above ground. Let’s dig about the roots. And first give them a seven-night’s space for reckoning up their chances, that they may see morning and evening from the burg thine armies set down to invest them. Then, when their hopes are something sobered by that sight, and want of action hath trained their minds to sad reflection, call them to parley, going straight beneath the wall; and this time shalt thou address thyself only to the common sort, offering them all generous and free conditions thou canst think on. There’s little they can ask that we’d not blithely grant them if they’ll but yield us up their captains.”

“It mislikes me,” answered Corund. “Yet it may serve. But thou shalt be my spokesman herein. For never yet went I cap in hand to ask favour of the common muck o’ the world, nor I will not do it now.”

“O but thou must,” said Gro. “Of thee they will receive in good faith what in me they would account but practice.”

“That’s true enough,” said Corund. “But I cannot stomach it. Withal, I am too rough spoken.”

Gro smiled. “He that hath need of a dog,” he said, “calleth him ‘Sir Dog.’ Come, come, I’ll school thee to it. Is it not a smaller thing than months of tedious hardship in this frozen desert? Bethink thee too what honour it were to thee to ride home to Carcë with Juss and Spitfire and Brandoch Daha bounden in a string.”

Not without much persuasion was Corund won to this. Yet at the last he consented. For seven days and seven nights his armies sat before the burg without sign; and on the eighth day he bade the Demons to a parley, and when that was granted went with his sons and twenty men-at-arms up the great rib of rock between the lakes, and stood below the east wall of the burg. Bitter chill was the air that day. Powdery snow light-fallen blew in little wisps along the ground, and the rocks were slippery with an invisible coat of ice. Lord Gro, being troubled with an ague, excused himself from that faring and kept his tent.

Corund stood beneath the walls with his folk about him. “I have matter of import,” he cried, “and ’tis needful it be heard both by the highest and the lowest amongst you. Ere I begin, summon them all to this part of the walls: a lookout is enow to shield you of the other parts from any sudden onslaught, which besides I swear to you is clean without my purpose.” So when they were thick on the wall above him, he began to say, “Soldiers of Demonland, against you had I never quarrel. Behold how in this Impland I have made freedom flourish as a flower. I have strook off the heads of Philpritz Faz, and Illarosh, and Lurmesh, and Gandassa, and Fax Fay Faz, that were the lords and governors here aforetime, abounding in all the bloody and crying sins, oppression, gluttony, idleness, cruelty, and extortion. And of my clemency I delivered all their possessions unto their subjects to hold and order after their own will alone, who before did put on patience and endured with much heartburning the tyranny of these Fazes, until by me they found a remedy for their more freedom. In like manner, not against you do I war, O men of Demonland; but against the tyrants that enforced you for their private gain to suffer hardship and death in this remote country: namely, against Juss and Spitfire that came hither in quest of their cursed brother whom the might of the great King hath happily removed. And against Brandoch Daha am I come, of insolence untamed, who liveth a chambering idle life eating and drinking and exercising tyranny, while the pleasant lands of Krothering and Failze and Stropardon, and the dwellers in the isles, Sorbey, Morvey, Strufey, Dalney, and Kenarvey, and they of Westmark and all the western parts of Demonland groan and wax lean to feed his luxury. To your hurt only have these three led you, as cattle to the slaughter. Deliver them to me, that I may chastise them, and I, that am great viceroy of Impland, will make you free and grant you lordships: a lordship for every man of you in this my realm of Impland.”

While Corund spake, the Lord Brandoch Daha went among the soldiers bidding them hold their peace and not murmur against Corund. But those that were most hot for action he sent about an errand preparing what he had in mind. So that when the Lord Corund ceased from his declaiming, all was ready to hand, and with one voice the soldiers of Lord Juss that stood upon the wall cried out and said, “This is thy word, O Corund, and this our answer,” and therewith flung down upon him from pots and buckets and every kind of vessel a deluge of slops and offal and all filth that came to hand. A bucketful took Corund in the mouth, befouling all his great beard, so that he gave back spitting. And he and his, standing close beneath the wall, and little expecting so sudden and ill an answer, fared shamefully, being all well soused and bemerded with filth and lye.

Therewith went up great shouts of laughter from the walls. But Corund cried out, “O filth of Demonland, this is my latest word with you. And though ’twere ten years I must besiege this hold, yet will I take it over your heads. And very ill to do with shall ye find me in the end, and very puissant, proud, mighty, cruel, and bloody in my conquest.”

“What, lads?” said Lord Brandoch Daha, standing on the battlements, “have we not fed this beast with pig-wash enow, but he must still be snuffing and snouking at our gate? Give me another pailful.”

So the Witches returned to their tents with great shame. So hot was Corund in anger against the Demons, that he stayed not to eat nor drink at his coming down from Eshgrar Ogo, but straight gathered force and made an assault upon the burg, the mightiest he had yet essayed; and his picked men of Witchland were in that assault, and he himself to lead them. Thrice by main fury they won up into the hold, but all were slain who set foot therein, and Corund’s young son Dormanes wounded to the death. And at even they drew off from the battle. There fell in that fight an hundred and fourscore Demons, and of the Imps five hundred, and of the Witches three hundred and ninety and nine. And many were hurt of either side.

Wrath sat like thunder on Corund’s brow at suppertime. He ate his meat savagely, thrusting great gobbets in his mouth, crunching the bones like a beast, taking deep draughts of wine with every mouthful, which yet dispelled not his black mood. Over against him Gro sat silent, shivering now and then for all that he kept his ermine cloak about him and the brazier stood at his elbow. He made but a poor meal, drinking mulled wine in little sips and dipping little pieces of bread in it.

So wore without speech that cheerless and unkindly meal, until the Lord Corund, looking suddenly across the board at Gro and catching his eye studying him, said, “That was a bright star of thine and then shined clear upon thee when thou tookest this bout of shivering fits and so wentest not with me to be soused with muck before the burg.”

“Who would have dreamed,” answered Gro, “of their using so base and shameful a part?”

“Not thou, I’ll swear,” said Corund, looking evilly upon him and marking, as he thought, a twinkling light in Gro’s eyes. Gro shivered again, sipped his wine, and shifted his glance uneasily under that unfriendly stare.

Corund drank awhile in silence, then flushing suddenly a darker red, said, leaning heavily across the board at him, “Dost know why I said ‘not thou’?”

“ ’Twas scarce needful, to thy friend,” said Gro.

“I said it,” said Corund, “because I know thou didst look for another thing when thou didst skulk shamming here.”

“Another thing?”

“Sit not there like some prim-mouthed miss feigning an innocence all know well thou hast not,” said Corund, “or I’ll kill thee. Thou plottedst my death with the Demons. And because thyself hast no shred of honour in thy soul, thou hadst not the wit to perceive that their nobility would shrink from such a betrayal as thy hopes entertained.”

Gro said, “This is a jest I cannot laugh at; or else ’tis madman’s brabble.”

“Dissembling cur,” said Corund, “be sure that I hold him not less guilty that holds the ladder than him that mounts the wall. It was thy design they should smite us at unawares when we went up to them with this proposal thou didst urge on me so hotly.”

Gro made as if to rise. “Sit down!” said Corund. “Answer me; didst not thou egg on the poor snipe Philpritz to that attempt on Juss?”

“He told me on’t,” said Gro.

“O, thou art cunning,” said Corund. “There too I see thy treachery. Had they fallen upon us, thou mightest have thrown thyself safely upon their mercy.”

“This is foolishness,” said Gro. “We were far stronger.”

“ ’Tis so,” said Corund. “When did I charge thee with wisdom and sober judgement? With treachery I know thou art soaked wet.”

“And thou art my friend!” said Gro.

Corund said in a while, “I have long known thee to be both a subtle and dissembling fox, and now I durst trust thee no more, for fear I should fall further into thy danger. I am resolved to murther thee.”

Gro fell back in his chair and flung out his arms. “I have been here before,” he said. “I have beheld it, in moonlight and in the barren glare of day, in fair weather and in hail and snow, with the great winds charging over the wastes. And I knew it was accursed. From Morna Moruna, ere I was born or thou, O Corund, or any of us, treason and cruelty blacker than night herself had birth, and brought death to their begetter and all his folk. From Morna Moruna bloweth this wind about the waste to blast our love and bring us destruction. Ay, kill me; I’ll not ward myself, not i’ the smallest.”

“ ’Tis small matter, Goblin,” said Corund, “whether thou shouldst or no. Thou art but a louse between my fingers, to kill or cast away as shall seem me good.”

“I was King Gaslark’s man,” said Gro, as if talking in a dream; “and between a man and a boy near fifteen years I served him true and costly. Yet it was my fortune in all that time and at the ending thereof only to get a beard on my chin and remorse at heart. To what scorned purpose must I plot against him? Pity of Witchland, of Witchland sliding as then into the pit of adverse luck, ’twas that made force upon me. And I served Witchland well: but fate ever fought o’ the other side. I it was that counselled King Gorice XI to draw out from the fight at Kartadza. Yet wanton Fortune trod down the scale for Demonland. I prayed him not wrastle with Goldry in the Foliot Isles. Thou didst back me. Nought but rebukes and threats of death gat I therefrom; but because my redes were set at nought, evil fell upon Witchland. I helped our Lord the King when he conjured and made a sending against the Demons. He loved me therefor and upheld me, but great envy was raised up against me in Carcë for that fact. Yet I bare up, for thy friendship and thy lady wife’s were as bright fires to warm me against all the frosts of their ill-will. And now, for love of thee, I fared with thee to Impland. And here by the Moruna where in old days I wandered in danger and in sorrow, it is fitting I behold at length the emptiness of all my days.”

Therewith Gro fell silent a minute, and then began to say: “O Corund, I’ll strip bare my soul to thee before thou kill me. It is most true that until now, sitting before Eshgrar Ogo, it hath been present to my heart how great an advantage we held against the Demons, and the glory of their defence, so little a strength against us so many, and the great glory of their flinging of us back, these things were a splendour to my soul beholding them. Such glamour hath ever shone to me all my life’s days when I behold great men battling still beneath the bludgeonings of adverse fortune that, howsoever they be mine enemies, it lieth not in my virtue to withhold from admiration of them and well nigh love. But never was I false to thee, nor much less ever thought, as thou most unkindly accusest me, to compass thy destruction.”

“Thou dost whine like a woman for thy life,” said Corund. “Cowardly hounds never stirred pity in me.” Yet he moved not, only looking dourly on Gro.

Gro plucked forth his own sword, and pushed it towards Corund hilt-foremost across the board. “Such words are worse than sword-thrusts betwixt us twain,” said he. “Thou shalt see how I’ll welcome death. The King will praise thee, when thou showest the cause. And it will be sweet news to Corinius and them that have held me in their hate, that thy love hath cast me off, and thou hast rid them of me at last.”

But Corund stirred not. After a space, he filled another cup, and drank, and sat on. And Gro sat motionless before him. At last Corund rose heavily from his seat, and pushing Gro’s sword back across the table, “Thou’dst best to bed,” said he. “But the night air’s o’er shrewd for thine ague. Sleep on my couch tonight.”