The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save For Sacnoth
a.k.a. The Fortress of Doom
From The Sword of Welleran and Other Stories
Lord Dunsany
In a wood older than record, a foster brother of the hills, stood
the village of Allathurion; and there was peace between the people
of that village and all the folk who walked in the dark ways of the
wood, whether they were human or of the tribes of the beasts or of
the race of the fairies and the elves and the little sacred spirits
of trees and streams. Moreover, the village people had peace among
themselves and between them and their lord, Lorendiac. In front of
the village was a wide and grassy space, and beyond this the great
wood again, but at the back the trees came right up to the houses,
which, with their great beams and wooden framework and thatched
roofs, green with moss, seemed almost to be a part of the forest.
Now in the time I tell of, there was trouble in Allathurion, for of
an evening fell dreams were wont to come slipping through the tree
trunks and into the peaceful village; and they assumed dominion of
men's minds and led them in watches of the night through the cindery
plains of Hell. Then the magician of that village made spells
against those fell dreams; yet still the dreams came flitting
through the trees as soon as the dark had fallen, and led men's
minds by night into terrible places and caused them to praise Satan
openly with their lips.
And men grew afraid of sleep in Allathurion. And they grew worn and
pale, some through the want of rest, and others from fear of the
things they saw on the cindery plains of Hell.
Then the magician of the village went up into the tower of his
house, and all night long those whom fear kept awake could see his
window high up in the night glowing softly alone. The next day, when
the twilight was far gone and night was gathering fast, the magician
went away to the forest's edge, and uttered there the spell that he
had made. And the spell was a compulsive, terrible thing, having a
power over evil dreams and over spirits of ill; for it was a verse
of forty lines in many languages, both living and dead, and had in
it the word wherewith the people of the plains are wont to curse
their camels, and the shout wherewith the whalers of the north lure
the whales shoreward to be killed, and a word that causes elephants
to trumpet; and every one of the forty lines closed with a rhyme for
'wasp'.
And still the dreams came flitting through the forest, and led men's
souls into the plains of Hell. Then the magician knew that the
dreams were from Gaznak. Therefore he gathered the people of the
village, and told them that he had uttered his mightiest spell--a
spell having power over all that were human or of the tribes of the
beasts; and that since it had not availed the dreams must come from
Gaznak, the greatest magician among the spaces of the stars. And he
read to the people out of the Book of Magicians, which tells the
comings of the comet and foretells his coming again. And he told
them how Gaznak rides upon the comet, and how he visits Earth once
in every two hundred and thirty years, and makes for himself a vast,
invincible fortress and sends out dreams to feed on the minds of
men, and may never be vanquished but by the sword Sacnoth.
And a cold fear fell on the hearts of the villagers when they found
that their magician had failed them.
Then spake Leothric, son of the Lord Lorendiac, and twenty years old
was he: 'Good Master, what of the sword Sacnoth?'
And the village magician answered: 'Fair Lord, no such sword as yet
is wrought, for it lies as yet in the hide of Tharagavverug,
protecting his spine.'
Then said Leothric: 'Who is Tharagavverug, and where may he be
encountered?'
And the magician of Allathurion answered: 'He is the dragon-crocodile
who haunts the Northern marshes and ravages the homesteads
by their marge. And the hide of his back is of steel, and his under
parts are of iron; but along the midst of his back, over his spine,
there lies a narrow strip of unearthly steel. This strip of steel is
Sacnoth, and it may be neither cleft nor molten, and there is
nothing in the world that may avail to break it, nor even leave a
scratch upon its surface. It is of the length of a good sword, and
of the breadth thereof. Shouldst thou prevail against Tharagavverug,
his hide may be melted away from Sacnoth in a furnace; but there is
only one thing that may sharpen Sacnoth's edge, and this is one of
Tharagavverug's own steel eyes; and the other eye thou must fasten
to Sacnoth's hilt, and it will watch for thee. But it is a hard task
to vanquish Tharagavverug, for no sword can pierce his hide; his
back cannot be broken, and he can neither burn nor drown. In one way
only can Tharagavverug die, and that is by starving.'
Then sorrow fell upon Leothric, but the magician spoke on:
'If a man drive Tharagavverug away from his food with a stick for
three days, he will starve on the third day at sunset. And though he
is not vulnerable, yet in one spot he may take hurt, for his nose is
only of lead. A sword would merely lay bare the uncleavable bronze
beneath, but if his nose be smitten constantly with a stick he will
always recoil from the pain, and thus may Tharagavverug, to left and
right, be driven away from his food.'
Then Leothric said: 'What is Tharagavverug's food?'
And the magician of Allathurion said: 'His food is men.'
But Leothric went straightway thence, and cut a great staff from a
hazel tree, and slept early that evening. But the next morning,
awaking from troubled dreams, he arose before the dawn, and, taking
with him provisions for five days, set out through the forest
northwards towards the marshes. For some hours he moved through the
gloom of the forest, and when he emerged from it the sun was above
the horizon shining on pools of water in the waste land. Presently
he saw the claw-marks of Tharagavverug deep in the soil, and the
track of his tail between them like a furrow in a field. Then
Leothric followed the tracks till he heard the bronze heart of
Tharagavverug before him, booming like a bell.
And Tharagavverug, it being the hour when he took the first meal of
the day, was moving towards a village with his heart tolling. And
all the people of the village were come out to meet him, as it was
their wont to do; for they abode not the suspense of awaiting
Tharagavverug and of hearing him sniffing brazenly as he went from
door to door, pondering slowly in his metal mind what habitant he
should choose. And none dared to flee, for in the days when the
villagers fled from Tharagavverug, he, having chosen his victim,
would track him tirelessly, like a doom. Nothing availed them
against Tharagavverug. Once they climbed the trees when he came, but
Tharagavverug went up to one, arching his back and leaning over
slightly, and rasped against the trunk until it fell. And when
Leothric came near, Tharagavverug saw him out of one of his small
steel eyes and came towards him leisurely, and the echoes of his
heart swirled up through his open mouth. And Leothric stepped
sideways from his onset, and came between him and the village and
smote him on the nose, and the blow of the stick made a dint in the
soft lead. And Tharagavverug swung clumsily away, uttering one
fearful cry like the sound of a great church bell that had become
possessed of a soul that fluttered upward from the tombs at night--an
evil soul, giving the bell a voice. Then he attacked Leothric,
snarling, and again Leothric leapt aside, and smote him on the nose
with his stick. Tharagavverug uttered like a bell howling. And
whenever the dragon-crocodile attacked him, or turned towards the
village, Leothric smote him again.
So all day long Leothric drove the monster with a stick, and he drove
him farther and farther from his prey, with his heart tolling
angrily and his voice crying out for pain.
Towards evening Tharagavverug ceased to snap at Leothric, but ran
before him to avoid the stick, for his nose was sore and shining;
and in the gloaming the villagers came out and danced to cymbal and
psaltery. When Tharagavverug heard the cymbal and psaltery, hunger
and anger came upon him, and he felt as some lord might feel who was
held by force from the banquet in his own castle and heard the
creaking spit go round and round and the good meat crackling on it.
And all that night he attacked Leothric fiercely, and oft-times
nearly caught him in the darkness; for his gleaming eyes of steel
could see as well by night as by day. And Leothric gave ground
slowly till the dawn, and when the light came they were near the
village again; yet not so near to it as they had been when they
encountered, for Leothric drove Tharagavverug farther in the day
than Tharagavverug had forced him back in the night. Then Leothric
drove him again with his stick till the hour came when it was the
custom of the dragon-crocodile to find his man. One third of his man
he would eat at the time he found him, and the rest at noon and
evening. But when the hour came for finding his man a great
fierceness came on Tharagavverug, and he grabbed rapidly at
Leothric, but could not seize him, and for a long while neither of
them would retire. But at last the pain of the stick on his leaden
nose overcame the hunger of the dragon-crocodile, and he turned from
it howling. From that moment Tharagavverug weakened. All that day
Leothric drove him with his stick, and at night both held their
ground; and when the dawn of the third day was come the heart of
Tharagavverug beat slower and fainter. It was as though a tired man
was ringing a bell. Once Tharagavverug nearly seized a frog, but
Leothric snatched it away just in time. Towards noon the
dragon-crocodile lay still for a long while, and Leothric stood near
him and leaned on his trusty stick. He was very tired and sleepless,
but had more leisure now for eating his provisions. With
Tharagavverug the end was coming fast, and in the afternoon his
breath came hoarsely, rasping in his throat. It was as the sound of
many huntsmen blowing blasts on horns, and towards evening his breath
came faster but fainter, like the sound of a hunt going furious to
the distance and dying away, and he made desperate rushes towards
the village; but Leothric still leapt about him, battering his
leaden nose. Scarce audible now at all was the sound of his heart:
it was like a church bell tolling beyond hills for the death of some
one unknown and far away. Then the sun set and flamed in the village
windows, and a chill went over the world, and in some small garden a
woman sang; and Tharagavverug lifted up his head and starved, and
his life went from his invulnerable body, and Leothric lay down
beside him and slept. And later in the starlight the villagers came
out and carried Leothric, sleeping, to the village, all praising him
in whispers as they went. They laid him down upon a couch in a
house, and danced outside in silence, without psaltery or cymbal.
And the next day, rejoicing, to Allathurion they hauled the
dragon-crocodile. And Leothric went with them, holding his battered
staff; and a tall, broad man, who was smith of Allathurion, made a
great furnace, and melted Tharagavverug away till only Sacnoth was
left, gleaming among the ashes. Then he took one of the small eyes
that had been chiselled out, and filed an edge on Sacnoth, and
gradually the steel eye wore away facet by facet, but ere it was
quite gone it had sharpened redoubtably Sacnoth. But the other eye
they set in the butt of the hilt, and it gleamed there bluely.
And that night Leothric arose in the dark and took the sword, and
went westwards to find Gaznak; and he went through the dark forest
till the dawn, and all the morning and till the afternoon. But in
the afternoon he came into the open and saw in the midst of The
Land Where No Man Goeth the fortress of Gaznak, mountainous before
him, little more than a mile away.
And Leothric saw that the land was marsh and desolate. And the
fortress went up all white out of it, with many buttresses, and was
broad below but narrowed higher up, and was full of gleaming
windows with the light upon them. And near the top of it a few white
clouds were floating, but above them some of its pinnacles
reappeared. Then Leothric advanced into the marshes, and the eye of
Tharagavverug looked out warily from the hilt of Sacnoth; for
Tharagavverug had known the marshes well, and the sword nudged
Leothric to the right or pulled him to the left away from the
dangerous places, and so brought him safely to the fortress walls.
And in the wall stood doors like precipices of steel, all studded
with boulders of iron, and above every window were terrible
gargoyles of stone; and the name of the fortress shone on the wall,
writ large in letters of brass: 'The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save
For Sacnoth.'
Then Leothric drew and revealed Sacnoth, and all the gargoyles
grinned, and the grin went flickering from face to face right up
into the cloud-abiding gables.
And when Sacnoth was revealed and all the gargoyles grinned, it was
like the moonlight emerging from a cloud to look for the first time
upon a field of blood, and passing swiftly over the wet faces of the
slain that lie together in the horrible night. Then Leothric
advanced towards a door, and it was mightier than the marble quarry,
Sacremona, from which of old men cut enormous slabs to build the
Abbey of the Holy Tears. Day after day they wrenched out the very
ribs of the hill until the Abbey was builded, and it was more
beautiful than anything in stone. Then the priests blessed
Sacremona, and it had rest, and no more stone was ever taken from it
to build the houses of men. And the hill stood looking southwards
lonely in the sunlight, defaced by that mighty scar. So vast was
the door of steel. And the name of the door was The Porte Resonant,
the Way of Egress for War.
Then Leothric smote upon the Porte Resonant with Sacnoth, and the
echo of Sacnoth went ringing through the halls, and all the dragons
in the fortress barked. And when the baying of the remotest dragon
had faintly joined in the tumult, a window opened far up among the
clouds below the twilit gables, and a woman screamed, and far away
in Hell her father heard her and knew that her doom was come.
And Leothric went on smiting terribly with Sacnoth, and the grey
steel of the Porte Resonant, the Way of Egress for War, that was
tempered to resist the swords of the world, came away in ringing
slices.
Then Leothric, holding Sacnoth in his hand, went in through the hole
that he had hewn in the door, and came into the unlit, cavernous
hall.
An elephant fled trumpeting. And Leothric stood still, holding
Sacnoth. When the sound of the feet of the elephant had died away in
the remoter corridors, nothing more stirred, and the cavernous hall
was still.
Presently the darkness of the distant halls became musical with the
sound of bells, all coming nearer and nearer.
Still Leothric waited in the dark, and the bells rang louder and
louder, echoing through the halls, and there appeared a procession
of men on camels riding two by two from the interior of the
fortress, and they were armed with scimitars of Assyrian make and
were all clad with mail, and chain-mail hung from their helmets
about their faces, and flapped as the camels moved. And they all
halted before Leothric in the cavernous hall, and the camel bells
clanged and stopped. And the leader said to Leothric:
'The Lord Gaznak has desired to see you die before him. Be pleased
to come with us, and we can discourse by the way of the manner in
which the Lord Gaznak has desired to see you die.'
And as he said this he unwound a chain of iron that was coiled upon
his saddle, and Leothric answered:
'I would fain go with you, for I am come to slay Gaznak.'
Then all the camel-guard of Gaznak laughed hideously, disturbing the
vampires that were asleep in the measureless vault of the roof. And
the leader said:
'The Lord Gaznak is immortal, save for Sacnoth, and weareth armour
that is proof even against Sacnoth himself, and hath a sword the
second most terrible in the world.'
Then Leothric said: 'I am the Lord of the sword Sacnoth.'
And he advanced towards the camel-guard of Gaznak, and Sacnoth
lifted up and down in his hand as though stirred by an exultant
pulse. Then the camel-guard of Gaznak fled, and the riders leaned
forward and smote their camels with whips, and they went away with a
great clamour of bells through colonnades and corridors and vaulted
halls, and scattered into the inner darknesses of the fortress. When
the last sound of them had died away, Leothric was in doubt which
way to go, for the camel-guard was dispersed in many directions, so
he went straight on till he came to a great stairway in the midst of
the hall. Then Leothric set his foot in the middle of a wide step,
and climbed steadily up the stairway for five minutes. Little light
was there in the great hall through which Leothric ascended, for it
only entered through arrow slits here and there, and in the world
outside evening was waning fast. The stairway led up to two folding
doors, and they stood a little ajar, and through the crack Leothric
entered and tried to continue straight on, but could get no farther,
for the whole room seemed to be full of festoons of ropes which
swung from wall to wall and were looped and draped from the ceiling.
The whole chamber was thick and black with them. They were soft and
light to the touch, like fine silk, but Leothric was unable to break
any one of them, and though they swung away from him as he pressed
forward, yet by the time he had gone three yards they were all about
him like a heavy cloak. Then Leothric stepped back and drew Sacnoth,
and Sacnoth divided the ropes without a sound, and without a sound
the severed pieces fell to the floor. Leothric went forward slowly,
moving Sacnoth in front of him up and down as he went. When he was
come into the middle of the chamber, suddenly, as he parted with
Sacnoth a great hammock of strands, he saw a spider before him that
was larger than a ram, and the spider looked at him with eyes that
were little, but in which there was much sin, and said:
'Who are you that spoil the labour of years all done to the honour
of Satan?'
And Leothric answered: 'I am Leothric, son of Lorendiac.'
And the spider said: 'I will make a rope at once to hang you with.'
Then Leothric parted another bunch of strands, and came nearer to
the spider as he sat making his rope, and the spider, looking up
from his work, said: 'What is that sword which is able to sever my
ropes?'
And Leothric said: 'It is Sacnoth.'
Thereat the black hair that hung over the face of the spider parted
to left and right, and the spider frowned; then the hair fell back
into its place, and hid everything except the sin of the little eyes
which went on gleaming lustfully in the dark. But before Leothric
could reach him, he climbed away with his hands, going up by one of
his ropes to a lofty rafter, and there sat, growling. But clearing
his way with Sacnoth, Leothric passed through the chamber, and came
to the farther door; and the door being shut, and the handle far up
out of his reach, he hewed his way through it with Sacnoth in the
same way as he had through the Porte Resonant, the Way of Egress for
War. And so Leothric came into a well-lit chamber, where Queens and
Princes were banqueting together, all at a great table; and
thousands of candles were glowing all about, and their light shone
in the wine that the Princes drank and on the huge gold candelabra,
and the royal faces were irradiant with the glow, and the white
table-cloth and the silver plates and the jewels in the hair of the
Queens, each jewel having a historian all to itself, who wrote no
other chronicles all his days. Between the table and the door there
stood two hundred footmen in two rows of one hundred facing one
another. Nobody looked at Leothric as he entered through the hole in
the door, but one of the Princes asked a question of a footman, and
the question was passed from mouth to mouth by all the hundred
footmen till it came to the last one nearest Leothric; and he said
to Leothric, without looking at him:
'What do you seek here?'
And Leothric answered: 'I seek to slay Gaznak.'
And footman to footman repeated all the way to the table: 'He seeks
to slay Gaznak.'
And another question came down the line of footmen: 'What is your
name?'
And the line that stood opposite took his answer back.
Then one of the Princes said: 'Take him away where we shall not hear
his screams.'
And footman repeated it to footman till it came to the last two, and
they advanced to seize Leothric.
Then Leothric showed to them his sword, saying, 'This is Sacnoth,'
and both of them said to the man nearest: 'It is Sacnoth;' then
screamed and fled away.
And two by two, all up the double line, footman to footman repeated,
'It is Sacnoth,' then screamed and fled, till the last two gave the
message to the table, and all the rest had gone. Hurriedly then
arose the Queens and Princes, and fled out of the chamber. And the
goodly table, when they were all gone, looked small and disorderly
and awry. And to Leothric, pondering in the desolate chamber by what
door he should pass onwards, there came from far away the sounds of
music, and he knew that it was the magical musicians playing to
Gaznak while he slept.
Then Leothric, walking towards the distant music, passed out by the
door opposite to the one through which he had cloven his entrance,
and so passed into a chamber vast as the other, in which were many
women, weirdly beautiful. And they all asked him of his quest, and
when they heard that it was to slay Gaznak, they all besought him to
tarry among them, saying that Gaznak was immortal, save for Sacnoth,
and also that they had need of a knight to protect them from the
wolves that rushed round and round the wainscot all the night and
sometimes broke in upon them through the mouldering oak. Perhaps
Leothric had been tempted to tarry had they been human women, for
theirs was a strange beauty, but he perceived that instead of eyes
they had little flames that flickered in their sockets, and knew
them to be the fevered dreams of Gaznak. Therefore he said:
'I have a business with Gaznak and with Sacnoth,' and passed on
through the chamber.
And at the name of Sacnoth those women screamed, and the flames of
their eyes sank low and dwindled to sparks.
And Leothric left them, and, hewing with Sacnoth, passed through the
farther door.
Outside he felt the night air on his face, and found that he stood
upon a narrow way between two abysses. To left and right of him, as
far as he could see, the walls of the fortress ended in a profound
precipice, though the roof still stretched above him; and before him
lay the two abysses full of stars, for they cut their way through
the whole Earth and revealed the under sky; and threading its course
between them went the way, and it sloped upward and its sides were
sheer. And beyond the abysses, where the way led up to the farther
chambers of the fortress, Leothric heard the musicians playing their
magical tune. So he stepped on to the way, which was scarcely a
stride in width, and moved along it holding Sacnoth naked. And to
and fro beneath him in each abyss whirred the wings of vampires
passing up and down, all giving praise to Satan as they flew.
Presently he perceived the dragon Thok lying upon the way,
pretending to sleep, and his tail hung down into one of the abysses.
And Leothric went towards him, and when he was quite close Thok
rushed at Leothric.
And he smote deep with Sacnoth, and Thok tumbled into the abyss,
screaming, and his limbs made a whirring in the darkness as he fell,
and he fell till his scream sounded no louder than a whistle and
then could be heard no more. Once or twice Leothric saw a star blink
for an instant and reappear again, and this momentary eclipse of a
few stars was all that remained in the world of the body of Thok.
And Lunk, the brother of Thok, who had lain a little behind him, saw
that this must be Sacnoth and fled lumbering away. And all the while
that he walked between the abysses, the mighty vault of the roof of
the fortress still stretched over Leothric's head, all filled with
gloom. Now, when the further side of the abyss came into view,
Leothric saw a chamber that opened with innumerable arches upon the
twin abysses, and the pillars of the arches went away into the
distance and vanished in the gloom to left and right.
Far down the dim precipice on which the pillars stood he could see
windows small and closely barred, and between the bars there showed
at moments, and disappeared again, things that I shall not speak of.
There was no light here except for the great Southern stars that
shone below the abysses, and here and there in the chamber through
the arches lights that moved furtively without the sound of
footfall.
Then Leothric stepped from the way, and entered the great chamber.
Even to himself he seemed but a tiny dwarf as he walked under one of
those colossal arches.
The last faint light of evening flickered through a window painted
in sombre colours commemorating the achievements of Satan upon
Earth. High up in the wall the window stood, and the streaming
lights of candles lower down moved stealthily away.
Other light there was none, save for a faint blue glow from the
steel eye of Tharagavverug that peered restlessly about it from the
hilt of Sacnoth. Heavily in the chamber hung the clammy odour of a
large and deadly beast.
Leothric moved forward slowly with the blade of Sacnoth in
front of him feeling for a foe, and the eye in the hilt of it looking
out behind.
Nothing stirred.
If anything lurked behind the pillars of the colonnade that held
aloft the roof, it neither breathed nor moved.
The music of the magical musicians sounded from very near.
Suddenly the great doors on the far side of the chamber opened to
left and right. For some moments Leothric saw nothing move, and
waited clutching Sacnoth. Then Wong Bongerok came towards him,
breathing.
This was the last and faithfullest guard of Gaznak, and came from
slobbering just now his master's hand.
More as a child than a dragon was Gaznak wont to treat him, giving
him often in his fingers tender pieces of man all smoking from his
table.
Long and low was Wong Bongerok, and subtle about the eyes, and he
came breathing malice against Leothric out of his faithful breast,
and behind him roared the armoury of his tail, as when sailors drag
the cable of the anchor all rattling down the deck.
And well Wong Bongerok knew that he now faced Sacnoth, for it had
been his wont to prophesy quietly to himself for many years as he
lay curled at the feet of Gaznak.
And Leothric stepped forward into the blast of his breath, and
lifted Sacnoth to strike.
But when Sacnoth was lifted up, the eye of Tharagavverug in the butt
of the hilt beheld the dragon and perceived his subtlety.
For he opened his mouth wide, and revealed to Leothric the ranks of
his sabre teeth, and his leather gums flapped upwards. But while
Leothric made to smite at his head, he shot forward scorpion-wise
over his head the length of his armoured tail. All this the eye
perceived in the hilt of Sacnoth, who smote suddenly sideways. Not
with the edge smote Sacnoth, for, had he done so, the severed end of
the tail had still come hurtling on, as some pine tree that the
avalanche has hurled point foremost from the cliff right through the
broad breast of some mountaineer. So had Leothric been transfixed;
but Sacnoth smote sideways with the flat of his blade, and sent the
tail whizzing over Leothric's left shoulder; and it rasped upon his
armour as it went, and left a groove upon it. Sideways then at
Leothric smote the foiled tail of Wong Bongerok, and Sacnoth parried,
and the tail went shrieking up the blade and over Leothric's head.
Then Leothric and Wong Bongerok fought sword to tooth, and the
sword smote as only Sacnoth can, and the evil faithful life of Wong
Bongerok the dragon went out through the wide wound.
Then Leothric walked on past that dead monster, and the armoured
body still quivered a little. And for a while it was like all the
ploughshares in a county working together in one field behind tired
and struggling horses; then the quivering ceased, and Wong Bongerok
lay still to rust.
And Leothric went on to the open gates, and Sacnoth dripped quietly
along the floor.
By the open gates through which Wong Bongerok had entered, Leothric
came into a corridor echoing with music. This was the first place
from which Leothric could see anything above his head, for hitherto
the roof had ascended to mountainous heights and had stretched
indistinct in the gloom. But along the narrow corridor hung huge
bells low and near to his head, and the width of each brazen bell
was from wall to wall, and they were one behind the other. And as he
passed under each the bell uttered, and its voice was mournful and
deep, like to the voice of a bell speaking to a man for the last
time when he is newly dead. Each bell uttered once as Leothric came
under it, and their voices sounded solemnly and wide apart at
ceremonious intervals. For if he walked slow, these bells came
closer together, and when he walked swiftly they moved farther
apart. And the echoes of each bell tolling above his head went on
before him whispering to the others. Once when he stopped they all
jangled angrily till he went on again.
Between these slow and boding notes came the sound of the magical
musicians. They were playing a dirge now very mournfully.
And at last Leothric came to the end of the Corridor of the Bells,
and beheld there a small black door. And all the corridor behind him
was full of the echoes of the tolling, and they all muttered to one
another about the ceremony; and the dirge of the musicians came
floating slowly through them like a procession of foreign elaborate
guests, and all of them boded ill to Leothric.
The black door opened at once to the hand of Leothric, and he found
himself in the open air in a wide court paved with marble. High over
it shone the moon, summoned there by the hand of Gaznak.
There Gaznak slept, and around him sat his magical musicians, all
playing upon strings. And, even sleeping, Gaznak was clad in armour,
and only his wrists and face and neck were bare.
But the marvel of that place was the dreams of Gaznak; for beyond
the wide court slept a dark abyss, and into the abyss there poured a
white cascade of marble stairways, and widened out below into
terraces and balconies with fair white statues on them, and
descended again in a wide stairway, and came to lower terraces in
the dark, where swart uncertain shapes went to and fro. All these
were the dreams of Gaznak, and issued from his mind, and, becoming
gleaming marble, passed over the edge of the abyss as the musicians
played. And all the while out of the mind of Gaznak, lulled by that
strange music, went spires and pinnacles beautiful and slender, ever
ascending skywards. And the marble dreams moved slow in time to the
music. When the bells tolled and the musicians played their dirge,
ugly gargoyles came out suddenly all over the spires and pinnacles,
and great shadows passed swiftly down the steps and terraces, and
there was hurried whispering in the abyss.
When Leothric stepped from the black door, Gaznak opened his eyes.
He looked neither to left nor right, but stood up at once facing
Leothric.
Then the magicians played a deathspell on their strings, and there
arose a humming along the blade of Sacnoth as he turned the spell
aside. When Leothric dropped not down, and they heard the humming of
Sacnoth, the magicians arose and fled, all wailing, as they went,
upon their strings.
Then Gaznak drew out screaming from its sheath the sword that was
the mightiest in the world except for Sacnoth, and slowly walked
towards Leothric; and he smiled as he walked, although his own
dreams had foretold his doom. And when Leothric and Gaznak came
together, each looked at each, and neither spoke a word; but they
smote both at once, and their swords met, and each sword knew the
other and from whence he came. And whenever the sword of Gaznak
smote on the blade of Sacnoth it rebounded gleaming, as hail from
off slated roofs; but whenever it fell upon the armour of Leothric,
it stripped it off in sheets. And upon Gaznak's armour Sacnoth fell
oft and furiously, but ever he came back snarling, leaving no mark
behind, and as Gaznak fought he held his left hand hovering close
over his head. Presently Leothric smote fair and fiercely at his
enemy's neck, but Gaznak, clutching his own head by the hair, lifted
it high aloft, and Sacnoth went cleaving through an empty space.
Then Gaznak replaced his head upon his neck, and all the while
fought nimbly with his sword; and again and again Leothric swept
with Sacnoth at Gaznak's bearded neck, and ever the left hand of
Gaznak was quicker than the stroke, and the head went up and the
sword rushed vainly under it.
And the ringing fight went on till Leothric's armour lay all round
him on the floor and the marble was splashed with his blood, and the
sword of Gaznak was notched like a saw from meeting the blade of
Sacnoth. Still Gaznak stood unwounded and smiling still.
At last Leothric looked at the throat of Gaznak and aimed with
Sacnoth, and again Gaznak lifted his head by the hair; but not at
his throat flew Sacnoth, for Leothric struck instead at the lifted
hand, and through the wrist of it went Sacnoth whirring, as a scythe
goes through the stem of a single flower.
And bleeding, the severed hand fell to the floor; and at once blood
spurted from the shoulders of Gaznak and dripped from the fallen
head, and the tall pinnacles went down into the earth, and the wide
fair terraces all rolled away, and the court was gone like the dew,
and a wind came and the colonnades drifted thence, and all the
colossal halls of Gaznak fell. And the abysses closed up suddenly as
the mouth of a man who, having told a tale, will for ever speak no
more.
Then Leothric looked around him in the marshes where the night mist
was passing away, and there was no fortress nor sound of dragon or
mortal, only beside him lay an old man, wizened and evil and dead,
whose head and hand were severed from his body.
And gradually over the wide lands the dawn was coming up, and ever
growing in beauty as it came, like to the peal of an organ played by
a master's hand, growing louder and lovelier as the soul of the
master warms, and at last giving praise with all its mighty voice.
Then the birds sang, and Leothric went homeward, and left the
marshes and came to the dark wood, and the light of the dawn
ascending lit him upon his way. And into Allathurion he came ere
noon, and with him brought the evil wizened head, and the people
rejoiced, and their nights of trouble ceased.
* * * * * * *
This is the tale of the vanquishing of The Fortress Unvanquishable,
Save For Sacnoth, and of its passing away, as it is told and
believed by those who love the mystic days of old.
Others have said, and vainly claim to prove, that a fever came to
Allathurion, and went away; and that this same fever drove Leothric
into the marshes by night, and made him dream there and act
violently with a sword.
And others again say that there hath been no town of Allathurion,
and that Leothric never lived.
Peace to them. The gardener hath gathered up this autumn's leaves.
Who shall see them again, or who wot of them? And who shall say what
hath befallen in the days of long ago?
The Lord of Cities
I came one day upon a road that wandered so aimlessly that it was
suited to my mood, so I followed it, and it led me presently among
deep woods. Somewhere in the midst of them Autumn held his court,
sitting wreathed with gorgeous garlands; and it was the day before
his annual festival of the Dance of Leaves, the courtly festival
upon which hungry Winter rushes mob-like, and there arise the
furious cries of the North Wind triumphing, and all the splendour
and grace of the woods is gone, and Autumn flees away, discrowned
and forgotten, and never again returns. Other Autumns arise, other
Autumns, and fall before other Winters. A road led away to the left,
but my road went straight on. The road to the left had a trodden
appearance; there were wheel tracks on it, and it seemed the correct
way to take. It looked as if no one could have any business with the
road that led straight on and up the hill. Therefore I went straight
on and up the hill; and here and there on the road grew blades of
grass undisturbed in the repose and hush that the road had earned
from going up and down the world; for you can go by this road, as
you can go by all roads, to London, to Lincoln, to the North of
Scotland, to the West of Wales, and to Wrellisford where roads end.
Presently the woods ended, and I came to the open fields and at the
same moment to the top of the hill, and saw the high places of
Somerset and the downs of Wilts spread out along the horizon.
Suddenly I saw underneath me the village of Wrellisford, with no
sound in its street but the voice of the Wrellis roaring as he
tumbled over a weir above the village. So I followed my road down
over the crest of the hill, and the road became more languid as I
descended, and less and less concerned with the cares of a highway.
Here a spring broke out in the middle of it, and here another. The
road never heeded. A stream ran right across it, still it straggled
on. Suddenly it gave up the minimum property that a road should
possess, and, renouncing its connection with High Streets, its
lineage of Piccadilly, shrank to one side and became an
unpretentious footpath. Then it led me to the old bridge over the
stream, and thus I came to Wrellisford, and found after travelling
in many lands a village with no wheel tracks in its street. On the
other side of the bridge, my friend the road struggled a few yards
up a grassy slope, and there ceased. Over all the village hung a
great stillness, with the roar of the Wrellis cutting right across
it, and there came occasionally the bark of a dog that kept watch
over the broken stillness and over the sanctity of that untravelled
road. That terrible and wasting fever that, unlike so many plagues,
comes not from the East but from the West, the fever of hurry, had
not come here--only the Wrellis hurried on his eternal quest, but it
was a calm and placid hurry that gave one time for song. It was in
the early afternoon, and nobody was about. Either they worked beyond
the mysterious valley that nursed Wrellisford and hid it from the
world, or else they secluded themselves within their old-time houses
that were roofed with tiles of stone. I sat down upon the old stone
bridge and watched the Wrellis, who seemed to me to be the only
traveller that came from far away into this village where roads end,
and passed on beyond it. And yet the Wrellis comes singing out of
eternity, and tarries for a very little while in the village where
roads end, and passes on into eternity again; and so surely do all
that dwell in Wrellisford. I wondered as I leaned upon the bridge in
what place the Wrellis would first find the sea, whether as he
wound idly through meadows on his long quest he would suddenly
behold him, and, leaping down over some rocky cliff, take to him at
once the message of the hills. Or whether, widening slowly into some
grand and tidal estuary, he would take his waste of waters to
the sea and the might of the river should meet with the might of the
waves, like to two Emperors clad in gleaming mail meeting midway
between two hosts of war; and the little Wrellis would become a
haven for returning ships and a setting-out place for adventurous
men.
A little beyond the bridge there stood an old mill with a ruined
roof, and a small branch of the Wrellis rushed through its emptiness
shouting, like a boy playing alone in a corridor of some desolate
house. The mill-wheel was gone, but there lay there still great bars
and wheels and cogs, the bones of some dead industry. I know not
what industry was once lord in that house, I know not what retinue
of workers mourns him now; I only know who is lord there today in
all those empty chambers. For as soon as I entered, I saw a whole
wall draped with his marvellous black tapestry, without price
because inimitable and too delicate to pass from hand to hand among
merchants. I looked at the wonderful complexity of its infinite
threads, my finger sank into it for more than an inch without
feeling the touch; so black it was and so carefully wrought,
sombrely covering the whole of the wall, that it might have been
worked to commemorate the deaths of all that ever lived there, as
indeed it was. I looked through a hole in the wall into an inner
chamber where a worn-out driving band went among many wheels, and
there this priceless inimitable stuff not merely clothed the walls
but hung from bars and ceiling in beautiful draperies, in marvellous
festoons. Nothing was ugly in this desolate house, for the busy
artist's soul of its present lord had beautified everything in its
desolation. It was the unmistakable work of the spider, in whose
house I was, and the house was utterly desolate but for him, and
silent but for the roar of the Wrellis and the shout of the little
stream. Then I turned homewards; and as I went up and over the hill
and lost the sight of the village, I saw the road whiten and harden
and gradually broaden out till the tracks of wheels appeared; and it
went afar to take the young men of Wrellisford into the wide ways of
the earth--to the new West and the mysterious East, and into the
troubled South.
And that night, when the house was still and sleep
was far off, hushing hamlets and giving ease to cities, my fancy
wandered up that aimless road and came suddenly to Wrellisford. And
it seemed to me that the travelling of so many people for so many
years between Wrellisford and John o' Groat's, talking to one
another as they went or muttering alone, had given the road a voice.
And it seemed to me that night that the road spoke to the river by
Wrellisford bridge, speaking with the voice of many pilgrims. And
the road said to the river: 'I rest here. How is it with you?'
And the river, who is always speaking, said: 'I rest nowhere from
doing the Work of the World. I carry the murmur of inner lands to
the sea, and to the abysses voices of the hills.'
'It is I,' said the road, 'that do the Work of the World, and take
from city to city the rumour of each. There is nothing higher than
Man and the making of cities. What do you do for Man?'
And the river said: 'Beauty and song are higher than Man. I carry
the news seaward of the first song of the thrush after the furious
retreat of winter northward, and the first timid anemone learns from
me that she is safe and that spring has truly come. Oh but the song
of all the birds in spring is more beautiful than Man, and the first
coming of the hyacinth more delectable than his face! When spring is
fallen upon the days of summer, I carry away with mournful joy at
night petal by petal the rhododendron's bloom. No lit procession of
purple kings is nigh so fair as that. No beautiful death of
well-beloved men hath such a glory of forlornness. And I bear far
away the pink and white petals of the apple-blossom's youth when the
laborious time comes for his work in the world and for the bearing
of apples. And I am robed each day and every night anew with the
beauty of heaven, and I make lovely visions of the trees. But Man!
What is Man? In the ancient parliament of the elder hills, when the
grey ones speak together, they say nought of Man, but concern
themselves only with their brethren the stars. Or when they wrap
themselves in purple cloaks at evening, they lament some old
irreparable wrong, or, uttering some mountain hymn, all mourn the
set of sun.'
'Your beauty,' said the road, 'and the beauty of the sky, and of the
rhododendron blossom and of spring, live only in the mind of Man,
and except in the mind of Man the mountains have no voices. Nothing
is beautiful that has not been seen by Man's eye. Or if your
rhododendron blossom was beautiful for a moment, it soon withered
and was drowned, and spring soon passes away; beauty can only live
on in the mind of Man. I bring thought into the mind of Man swiftly
from distant places every day. I know the Telegraph--I know him
well; he and I have walked for hundreds of miles together. There is
no work in the world except for Man and the making of his cities. I
take wares to and fro from city to city.'
'My little stream in the field there,' said the river, 'used to make
wares in that house for awhile once.'
'Ah,' said the road, 'I remember, but I brought cheaper ones from
distant cities. Nothing is of any importance but making cities for
Man.'
'I know so little about him,' said the river, 'but I have a great
deal of work to do--I have all this water to send down to the sea;
and then tomorrow or next day all the leaves of Autumn will be
coming this way. It will be very beautiful. The sea is a very, very
wonderful place. I know all about it; I have heard shepherd boys
singing of it, and sometimes before a storm the gulls come up. It is
a place all blue and shining and full of pearls, and has in it coral
islands and isles of spice, and storms and galleons and the bones of
Drake. The sea is much greater than Man. When I come to the sea, he
will know that I have worked well for him. But I must hurry, for I
have much to do. This bridge delays me a little; some day I will
carry it away.'
'Oh, you must not do that,' said the road.
'Oh, not for a long time,' said the river. 'Some centuries
perhaps--and I have much to do besides. There is my song to sing, for
instance, and that alone is more beautiful than any noise that Man
makes.'
'All work is for Man,' said the road, 'and for the building of
cities. There is no beauty or romance or mystery in the sea except
for the men that sail abroad upon it, and for those that stay at
home and dream of them. As for your song, it rings night and
morning, year in, year out, in the ears of men that are born in
Wrellisford; at night it is part of their dreams, at morning it is
the voice of day, and so it becomes part of their souls. But the
song is not beautiful in itself. I take these men with your song in
their souls up over the edge of the valley and a long way off
beyond, and I am a strong and dusty road up there, and they go with
your song in their souls and turn it into music and gladden cities.
But nothing is the Work of the World except work for Man.'
'I wish I was quite sure about the Work of the World,' said the
stream; 'I wish I knew for certain for whom we work. I feel almost
sure that it is for the sea. He is very great and beautiful. I think
that there can be no greater master than the sea. I think that some
day he may be so full of romance and mystery and sound of sheep
bells and murmur of mist-hidden hills, which we streams shall have
brought him, that there will be no more music or beauty left in the
world, and all the world will end; and perhaps the streams shall
gather at the last, we all together, to the sea. Or perhaps the sea
will give us at the last unto each one his own again, giving back
all that he has garnered in the years--the little petals of the
apple-blossom and the mourned ones of the rhododendron, and our old
visions of the trees and sky; so many memories have left the hills.
But who may say? For who knows the tides of the sea?'
'Be sure that it is all for Man,' said the road. 'For Man and the
making of cities.'
Something had come near on utterly silent feet.
'Peace, peace!' it said. 'You disturb the queenly night, who, having
come into this valley, is a guest in my dark halls. Let us have an
end to this discussion.'
It was the spider who spoke.
'The Work of the World is the making of cities and palaces. But it
is not for Man. What is Man? He only prepares my cities for me, and
mellows them. All his works are ugly, his richest tapestries are
coarse and clumsy. He is a noisy idler. He only protects me from
mine enemy the wind; and the beautiful work in my cities, the
curving outlines and the delicate weavings, is all mine. Ten years
to a hundred it takes to build a city, for five or six hundred more
it mellows, and is prepared for me; then I inhabit it, and hide away
all that is ugly, and draw beautiful lines about it to and fro.
There is nothing so beautiful as cities and palaces; they are the
loveliest places in the world, because they are the stillest, and so
most like the stars. They are noisy at first, for a little, before I
come to them; they have ugly corners not yet rounded off, and coarse
tapestries, and then they become ready for me and my exquisite work,
and are quite silent and beautiful. And there I entertain the regal
nights when they come there jewelled with stars, and all their train
of silence, and regale them with costly dust. Already nods, in a
city that I wot of, a lonely sentinel whose lords are dead, who
grows too old and sleepy to drive away the gathering silence that
infests the streets; tomorrow I go to see if he be still at his
post. For me Babylon was built, and rocky Tyre; and still men build
my cities! All the Work of the World is the making of cities, and
all of them I inherit.'
The Doom of La Traviata
Evening stole up out of mysterious lands and came down on the
streets of Paris, and the things of the day withdrew themselves and
hid away, and the beautiful city was strangely altered, and with it
the hearts of men. And with lights and music, and in silence and in
the dark, the other life arose, the life that knows the night, and
dark cats crept from the houses and moved to silent places, and dim
streets became haunted with dusk shapes. At this hour in a mean
house, near to the Moulin Rouge, La Traviata died; and her death was
brought to her by her own sins, and not by the years of God. But the
soul of La Traviata drifted blindly about the streets where she had
sinned till it struck against the wall of Notre Dame de Paris.
Thence it rushed upwards, as the sea mist when it beats against a
cliff, and streamed away to Paradise, and was there judged. And it
seemed to me, as I watched from my place of dreaming, when La
Traviata came and stood before the seat of judgment, that clouds
came rushing up from the far Paradisal hills and gathered together
over the head of God, and became one black cloud; and the clouds
moved swiftly as shadows of the night when a lantern is swung in the
hand, and more and more clouds rushed up, and ever more and more,
and, as they gathered, the cloud a little above the head of God
became no larger, but only grew blacker and blacker. And the halos
of the saints settled lower upon their heads and narrowed and became
pale, and the singing of the choirs of the seraphim faltered and
sunk low, and the converse of the blessed suddenly ceased. Then a
stern look came into the face of God, so that the seraphim turned
away and left Him, and the saints. Then God commanded, and seven
great angels rose up slowly through the clouds that carpet Paradise,
and there was pity on their faces, and their eyes were closed. Then
God pronounced judgment, and the lights of Paradise went out, and
the azure crystal windows that look towards the world, and the
windows rouge and verd, became dark and colourless, and I saw no
more. Presently the seven great angels came out by one of Heaven's
gates and set their faces Hellwards, and four of them carried the
young soul of La Traviata, and one of them went on before and one of
them followed behind. These six trod with mighty strides the long and
dusty road that is named the Way of the Damned. But the seventh flew
above them all the way, and the light of the fires of Hell that was
hidden from the six by the dust of that dreadful road flared on the
feathers of his breast.
Presently the seven angels, as they swept Hellwards, uttered speech.
'She is very young,' they said; and 'She is very beautiful,' they
said; and they looked long at the soul of La Traviata, looking not
at the stains of sin, but at that portion of her soul wherewith she
had loved her sister a long while dead, who flitted now about an
orchard on one of Heaven's hills with a low sunlight ever on her
face, who communed daily with the saints when they passed that way
going to bless the dead from Heaven's utmost edge. And as they
looked long at the beauty of all that remained beautiful in her soul
they said: 'It is but a young soul;' and they would have taken her
to one of Heaven's hills, and would there have given her a cymbal
and a dulcimer, but they knew that the Paradisal gates were clamped
and barred against La Traviata. And they would have taken her to a
valley in the world where there were a great many flowers and a loud
sound of streams, where birds were singing always and church bells
rang on Sabbaths, only this they durst not do. So they swept onwards
nearer and nearer Hell. But when they were come quite close and the
glare was on their faces, and they saw the gates already divide and
prepare to open outwards, they said: 'Hell is a terrible city, and
she is tired of cities;' then suddenly they dropped her by the side
of the road, and wheeled and flew away. But into a great pink flower
that was horrible and lovely grew the soul of La Traviata; and it
had in it two eyes but no eyelids, and it stared constantly into the
faces of all the passers-by that went along the dusty road to Hell;
and the flower grew in the glare of the lights of Hell, and withered
but could not die; only, one petal turned back towards the heavenly
hills as an ivy leaf turns outwards to the day, and in the soft and
silvery light of Paradise it withered not nor faded, but heard at
times the commune of the saints coming murmuring from the distance,
and sometimes caught the scent of orchards wafted from the heavenly
hills, and felt a faint breeze cool it every evening at the hour
when the saints to Heaven's edge went forth to bless the dead.
But the Lord arose with His sword, and scattered His disobedient
angels as a thresher scatters chaff.
On The Dry Land
Over the marshes hung the gorgeous night with all his wandering
bands of nomad stars, and his whole host of still ones blinked and
watched.
Over the safe dry land to eastward, grey and cold, the first clear
pallor of dawn was coming up above the heads of the immortal gods.
Then, as they neared at last the safety of the dry land, Love looked
at the man whom he had led for so long through the marshes, and saw
that his hair was white, for it was shining in the pallor of the
dawn.
Then they stepped together on to the land, and the old man sat down
weary on the grass, for they had wandered in the marshes for many
years; and the light of the grey dawn widened above the heads of the
gods.
And Love said to the old man, 'I will leave you now.'
And the old man made no answer, but wept softly.
Then Love was grieved in his little careless heart, and he said:
'You must not be sorry that I go, nor yet regret me, nor care for me
at all.
'I am a very foolish child, and was never kind to you, nor friendly.
I never cared for your great thoughts, or for what was good in you,
but perplexed you by leading you up and down the perilous marshes.
And I was so heartless that, had you perished where I led you, it
would have been nought to me, and I only stayed with you because you
were good to play with.
'And I am cruel and altogether worthless and not such a one as any
should be sorry for when I go, or one to be regretted, or even cared
for at all.'
And still the old man spoke not, but wept softly; and Love grieved
bitterly in his kindly heart.
And Love said: 'Because I am so small my strength has been concealed
from you, and the evil that I have done. But my strength is great,
and I have used it unjustly. Often I pushed you from the causeway
through the marshes, and cared not if you drowned. Often I mocked
you, and caused others to mock you. And often I led you among those
that hated me, and laughed when they revenged themselves upon you.
'So weep not, for there is no kindness in my heart, but only murder
and foolishness, and I am no companion for one so wise as you, but
am so frivolous and silly that I laughed at your noble dreams and
hindered all your deeds. See now, you have found me out, and now you
will send me away, and here you will live at ease, and, undisturbed,
have noble dreams of the immortal gods.
'See now, here is dawn and safety, and _there_ is darkness and peril.'
Still the old man wept softly.
Then Love said: 'Is it thus with you?' and his voice was grave now
and quiet. 'Are you so troubled? Old friend of so many years, there
is grief in my heart for you. Old friend of perilous ventures, I
must leave you now. But I will send my brother soon to you--my
little brother Death. And he will come up out of the marshes to you,
and will not forsake you, but will be true to you as I have not been
true.'
And dawn grew brighter over the immortal gods, and the old man
smiled through his tears, which glistened wondrously in the
increasing light. But Love went down to the night and to the
marshes, looking backward over his shoulder as he went, and smiling
beautifully about his eyes. And in the marshes whereunto he went, in
the midst of the gorgeous night, and under the wandering bands of
nomad stars, rose shouts of laughter and the sounds of the dance.
And after a while, with his face towards the morning, Death out of
the marshes came up tall and beautiful, and with a faint smile
shadowy on his lips, and lifted in his arms the lonely man, being
gentle with him, and, murmuring with his low deep voice an ancient
song, carried him to the morning to the gods.
