The Worm Ouroboros - E. R. Eddison (best books to read non fiction txt) 📗

him as a stag at bay, he feared not to assay a second time, and this time unaided and alone, what no man else hath so much as once performed and lived. And well he knew that that which was summoned by him out of the deep must spill and blast him utterly if he should slip one whit, as slip he did in former days, but his disciple succoured him. Behold now with what loud striking of thunder, unconquered by any earthly power, he hath his parting: with this Carcë black and smoking in ruin for his monument, these lords of Witchland and hundreds besides of our soldiers and of the Witches for his funeral bake-meats, and spirits weeping in the night for his chief mourners.”

So came they again to the camp. And in due time the moon set and the clouds departed and the quiet stars pursued their eternal way until night’s decline; as if this night had been but as other nights: this night which had beheld the power and glory that was Witchland by such a hammer-stroke of destiny smitten in pieces.

XXXIII Queen Sophonisba in Galing

Of the entertainment given by Lord Juss in Demonland to Queen Sophonisba, fosterling of the gods, and of that circumstance which, beyond all the wonders fair and lovely to behold shown her in that country, made her most to marvel: wherein is a rare example how in a fortunate world, out of all expectation, in the spring of the year, cometh a new birth.

Now the returning months brought the season of the year when Queen Sophonisba should come according to her promise to guest with Lord Juss in Galing. And so it was that in the hush of a windless April dawn the Zimiamvian caravel that bare the Queen to Demonland rowed up the firth to Lookinghaven.

All the east was a bower for the golden dawn. Kartadza, sharp-outlined as if cut in bronze, still hid the sun; and in the great shadow of the mountain the haven and the low hills and the groves of holm-oak and strawberry tree slumbered in a deep obscurity of blues and purples, against which the avenues of pink almond blossom and the white marble quays were bodied forth in pale wakening beauty, imaged as in a looking-glass in that tranquillity of the sea. Westward across the firth all the land was aglow with the opening day. Snow lingered still on the higher summits. Cloudless, bathing in the golden light, they stood against the blue: Dina, the Forks of Nantreganon, Pike o’ Shards, and all the peaks of the Thornback range and Neverdale. Morning laughed on their high ridges and kissed the woods that clung about their lower limbs: billowy woods, where rich hues of brown and purple told of every twig on all their myriad branches thick and afire with buds. White mists lay like coverlets on the water-meadows where Tivarandardale opens to the sea. On the shores of Bothrey and Scaramsey, and on the mainland near the great bluff of Thremnir’s Heugh and a little south of Owlswick, clear spaces among the birchwoods showed golden yellow: daffodils abloom in the spring.

They rowed in to the northernmost berth and made fast the caravel. The sweetness of the almond trees was the sweetness of spring in the air, and spring was in the face of that Queen as she came with her attendants up the shining steps, her little martlets circling about her or perching on her shoulders: she to whom the Gods of old gave youth everlasting, and peace everlasting in Koshtra Belorn.

Lord Juss and his brethren were on the quay to meet her, and the Lord Brandoch Daha. They bowed in turn, kissing her hands and bidding her welcome to Demonland. But she said, “Not to Demonland alone, my lords, but to the world again. And toward which of all earth’s harbours should I steer, and toward which land if not to this land of yours, who have by your victories brought peace and joy to all the world? Surely peace slept not more softly on the Moruna in old days before the names of Gorice and Witchland were heard in that country, than she shall sleep for us on this new earth and Demonland, now that those names are drowned forever under the whirlpools of oblivion and darkness.”

Juss said, “O Queen Sophonisba, desire not that the names of great men dead should be forgot forever. So should these wars that we last year brought to so mighty a conclusion to make us undisputed lords of the earth go down to oblivion with them that fought against us. But the fame of these things shall be on the lips and in the songs of men from one generation to another, so long as the world shall endure.”

They took horse and rode up from the harbour to the upper road, and so through open pastures on to Havershaw Tongue. Lambs frisked on the dewy meadows beside the road; blackbirds flew from bush to bush; larks trilled in the sightless sky; and as they came down through the woods to Beckfoot wood-pigeons cooed in the trees, and squirrels peeped with beady eyes. The Queen spoke little. These and all shy things of the woods and field held her in thrall, charming her to a silence that was broken only now and then by a little exclamation of joy. The Lord Juss, who himself also loved these things, watched her delight.

Now they wound up the steep ascent from Beckfoot, and rode into Galing by the Lion Gate. The avenue of Irish yews was lined by soldiers of the bodyguards of Juss, Goldry, and Spitfire, and Brandoch Daha. These, in honour of their great masters and of the Queen, lifted their spears aloft, while trumpeters blew three fanfares on silver trumpets. Then to an accompaniment of lutes and theorbos and citherns moving above the pulse of muffled drums, a choir of