The Paradise War Read online

  “Thus says the king: there is even now an enemy raging outside our walls who seeks to destroy us—a craven who dares not challenge us on the field of honor, but only by stealth, treachery, and deception. And now that we are weak in the strength of our arms this enemy raises siege against us. We are made to endure the indignity of his taunts and the insult of his vile presence before our gates.

  “I ask you, Wise Leaders, what is this snow which falls unceasingly from the wounded sky? What is this battering wind which all night long worries us with its howl? What is this ravening cold which every day sinks its teeth deeper into the land?

  “And what is this grief which taints the water we drink and turns the bread bitter in our mouths? What is this wrath poured out upon us like scalding oil? What is this terror which grips our hearts and makes our blood run cold?

  “Hear me now, Keen of Judgment, and answer if you can: What has silenced the Men of Song? What causes fair Modornn to tremble? What is this abomination among the peaks of Cethness? What drives the boar from the glens and causes the deer to fly from the forests? What is it that vexes heaven and steals the birds from the skies?

  “While you are yet deliberating, consider this: Who stretches forth his hand over our realm in conquest? Who wastes our land? Who makes the tears of our people flow more freely than rushing streams? Who raises the outrage of war against us?”

  Tegid paused to give his listeners time to ponder all he had said. When he continued, he asked, “Do you yet wonder? Does no one dare to speak the name aloud? Very well, I will say the hateful words. It is Nudd, Lord of Uffern and Annwn, Prince of the Pit, who is answerable for all these afflictions. It is Lord Nudd who has slain our kinsmen and makes of our bright realm a wasteland most wretched. It is Nudd the Accursed who turns our women into widows and our warriors into food for worms. It is Nudd, King of Eternal Night, who directs the demon king against us.

  “I tell you the truth, Companions of the Heart, unless we make bold to end Lord Nudd’s reign, the outrages practiced against Prydain must soon be known in Llogres and Caledon also. Then will the Three Blessed Realms be united—in misery, not in harmony; in distress, not in peace. And Albion, fairest island that is in the world, will writhe beneath the hateful torment of Nudd’s Coranyid.”

  As these words concluded, brows furrowed and frowns deepened on the faces of his listeners. Meldryn’s chieftains peered at one another in despair. At length, Tegid broke the brittle silence. “You have heard. You have pondered. You have considered. Now it is time to share out the treasure of your wise counsel. Your king is waiting.”

  Prince Meldron, in deference to his rank, was the first to speak. “Father and king, it has ever been our way to repay wound for wound, and grief for grief. Or have you forgotten this along with your ability to speak?” The prince could not resist twisting the knife in his father’s heart. “Yet it is worth remembering. I say, let us collect the blood debt which is owed to us. Let us assemble our warriors—and any who will ride with us—and make war on Nudd. Let us take up our weapons and banish him from our lands.”

  Several of the chieftains, Paladyr the Champion among them, slapped their hands against their thighs and raised their voices in acclaim. The king listened without enthusiasm and motioned for Tegid to step close.

  After a brief consultation, Tegid turned and said, “The king has heard you, Meldron. It is in his mind that this evil will not be driven from our realm by force of arms alone. For there is a sickness at the heart of this matter that must be remedied before the land will be healed.”

  “There is no affliction wrought by enemies that cannot be remedied by the sword,” boasted the prince.

  Tegid listened patiently to the king’s reply and then spoke it out. “Thus says the king: Think you that the tribulation which has befallen us will succumb to the edge of a sword? I tell you that Lord Nudd is not afraid of your spears or swords. He fears one thing only: the True King in his stronghold. The foul lord is bound by one thing only: the Song of Albion.”

  “As to that,” the prince replied haughtily, “I know nothing. It seems to me that this trouble which has come upon us is but the meddling of bards.” He turned the accusation toward Tegid. “None of this would have happened if you and your kind had held to your own domain.”

  Tegid bristled at this. “Do you suggest that the bards of Albion had anything to do with encouraging this horror?”

  The prince did not deign to answer but neither did he back down.

  “So that you will know,” the bard snapped, “so that everyone will know the truth, I will speak plainly. Know you this: the Cythrawl is loosed upon the world.” At the name of the Ancient Evil, all gathered before Meldryn’s hearth shivered within themselves. “Ollathir, Chief of Bards, faced the Beast of the Pit and was slain, but not before binding it with strong enchantments. Thus bound, the Cythrawl has summoned its servant Nudd to harrow and destroy what it could not possess. That is how this tribulation has come upon us.”

  Prince Meldron scowled and thrust out his chin. “It is the blather of bards in my ears.” He flicked an ear with his fingers. “What do I care how this happened? I care only about reclaiming what is mine!”

  “Well said, lord,” replied Paladyr loudly. “We have shown that we can kill the Coranyid. Let us send the ogham spear to all the clans throughout the Three Realms and summon all kings and their war bands to a great hosting against Nudd and his Demon Horde.”

  This plan was heartily approved by Meldryn’s chiefs, who, contrary to Tegid’s best efforts, would not believe the enormity of the evil facing them, nor credit the cause. For, despite all the hardship we had endured, and all we had seen of the enemy, they still trusted only to the weapons in their hands.

  With the king’s consent, Tegid dismissed the gathering and everyone withdrew, talking loudly of the great hosting and the glorious war which would be waged. They still thought that trouble could be averted by swordstrike and spearthrust; they still thought Sollen would soon end and Gyd come again of its own.

  After they had gone, the king rose slowly from his council chair and stood before the hearth, gazing into the fire’s crimson depths, as if searching for the face of his enemy. After a long moment, he departed to his inner room. I saw his face illumined in the firelight as he turned, and it seemed to me the face of a dying man: eyes bright and hard, the flesh of his face stretched tight on the skull, the skin papery and pale. It was the face of a man who watches his life drain rapidly away but is powerless to prevent it.

  I approached the hearth and sat down on a speckled oxhide near the fire. Tegid noticed my worried expression. “The king is tired. He needs rest.”

  “You did not tell them about the Phantarch. Why?”

  Tegid prodded the coals with an iron. “You saw how they were. They would not have heard me.”

  “Perhaps not. Even so, they had a right to know.”

  “Then you tell them!” he shouted in a voice as raw as an open wound. “You have the Chief Bard’s awen; you tell them. Perhaps they will listen to you.” He threw the iron down.

  Anger flashed quick and hot through me. “Stop it, Tegid! You say I have received Ollathir’s awen, and maybe I have. But I did not ask for it. In truth, I do not remember it!”

  “Then it is lost! It is rich mead spilled out upon dry sand. It is wasted and that is the end of it.” And with that, Tegid rose and stormed from the council chamber, and I saw no more of him that night nor all the next day.

  Two days after the king’s council, I took my turn at watch on the wall. I was dismayed to see that there were yet more demons gathered outside our gates. I gazed out into the snow-swirled gloom and saw many hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Coranyid surging around the foundation of the fortress like a restless, angry sea. They grimaced obscenely at us, defecating and breaking wind in crude defiance of our hurled rocks. The din they made with their hideous shrieks was appalling. The stink rising up from their squalor and filth was worse. I retched before I could sto
p myself, involuntarily adding to the reek.

  “There are more each day,” a warrior named Hwy confirmed. “No matter how many we kill, there are always more.”

  It was true, and I soon learned why.

  “What is that?” I asked, pointing to a red glow among a cluster of rocks swarming with Coranyid.

  “It is their fire,” the warrior replied. “They warm themselves at it.”

  I wondered at this. Where did demons find fuel to feed a fire? Why would Creatures of the Pit require warmth? They seemed immune to cold. They neither ate, nor drank, nor slept—nor required any other human comfort. Why did they need a fire?

  The question persisted, so I walked along the rampart to the end of the wall for a better view between the towering rocks. I saw that, indeed, the enemy had made a huge fire. What is more, they had set an enormous cauldron to boil on the flames. The steam from this cauldron flew away in ragged wisps on the blustering wind. Scores of demons labored at the fire, stoking it, banking it. But what was its purpose?

  My questions were answered at once. As I stood looking on, a cluster of Coranyid gyrating before the gate suddenly rushed forward, attempting to scale the gate timbers. The alert watchmen hurled rocks down upon them, crushing and killing three instantly and injuring two others. The injured ones were also killed as they attempted to drag their mangled bodies away. It was over in but a moment. The others retreated, wailing horribly, and leaving five dead behind.

  No sooner had the would-be attackers scurried out of range, than a dozen more rushed forward. But instead of throwing themselves upon the gate as the first had done, these scampered to the crumpled corpses of their wretched dead, seized them, and dragged them away. A curious thing to do, I thought. And then I saw where they took the bodies and what they did with them. I watched, and the marrow froze in my bones.

  I turned at once and ran to find Tegid.

  32

  THE CAULDRON

  Follow me, Tegid. There is something you must see.”

  I had found the bard alone, sitting before the fire in the king’s council chamber, cutting the ogham letters into the shaft of a spear Prince Meldron and the battle chiefs intended to use to summon the kings of Albion to the hosting. We both knew it to be a vain gesture. There would be no summons, no hosting, and no glorious battle. Meldryn Mawr’s chieftains could not even agree on who should take the spear; as to how they meant to pass through the swarming Coranyid at our gates and survive the bitter Sollen journey, they had no idea at all.

  “There is nothing I care to see,” Tegid growled.

  “You should see this,” I told him.

  “Can it not wait?”

  “No.”

  “Oh, very well,” he said irritably, casting the spear aside. It clattered on the flagstones of the empty room. He rose, brushing wood shavings from his breecs. “Show me this thing which cannot wait.”

  Despite his complaining, he was not greatly upset at leaving his futile task. He followed me readily. We passed from the chamber into the hall, threading carefully among scores of sleeping people, pausing at the door of the hall to wrap our cloaks tightly around us. Opening the door a crack, I pushed aside the oxhide and stepped out into the storm. Blown across the snow-filled yard, the wind tearing at our clothing, we climbed the steps to the rampart behind the wall. There I pointed to the red fireglow flickering against the rocks. Shreds of sulphurous smoke, torn by the wind, scumbled across the snow, staining it a filthy yellow. “Do you see that?” I said.

  “They have made a fire,” he replied.

  “Yes. Why, O Keen of Knowledge, have they made a fire?”

  Tegid made to answer, then cocked his head to one side. “Why, indeed?”

  “Exactly.” I motioned for him to follow me further and led him along the wall to the place where the vessel could be seen. “And there?” I pointed into snow-churned gloom.

  “A cauldron,” responded Tegid with mounting interest.

  “Yes, it is a cauldron. Now watch this,” I told him and directed his attention to the gate.

  We stood looking on for a short while, the cold wind whipping at us. We did not have long to wait, as there soon came another attempt on the gate. These assaults had been regular occurrences for several days and were growing more and more frequent. Four demons were killed this time; they died hideously, screaming and thrashing in the snow. This time, however, the broken bodies were snatched up and carried away by other demons. Tegid admitted that this was curious, but failed to see the significance.

  “Wait a moment,” I advised, “and keep watching.”

  The broken bodies of the four slain Coranyid were borne away to the enormous fire, where they were heaved over the rim of the great iron kettle; the corpses were tumbled in one by one, and the fire leapt higher. “They eat them!” observed Tegid with a shiver of disgust.

  “No, they do not eat their dead. Watch.”

  A swell-bellied hunchback with a face like a rat leapt upon the rim of the steaming vessel and thrust a long black paddle into the seething depths. The bloated creature made a few stirring motions, then stopped and withdrew the paddle.

  “What—” began Tegid.

  “Watch,” I said, not taking my eyes from the fire-wreathed kettle.

  The words were no sooner out of my mouth than one of the corpses began to rise from the cauldron: first a hand and an arm, and then the head, shoulders, and torso. The arms moved, and the head. The undead thing clambered to the rim of the vessel, ignoring the flames licking round its gleaming shins, and then sprang to the ground to rejoin the writhing masses of his monstrous companions.

  Meanwhile, the second demon had risen from the froth of the massive iron pot, and now scrambled over the rim. The head of the third corpse bobbed to the bubbling surface, mouth open, eyes wide and staring. It grasped the rim with its two horny hands and pulled itself out of the cauldron and fell sprawling onto the rocks outside the circle of flames. The last corpse emerged from the boiling liquid, and rejoined the loathsome horde.

  “Crochan-y-Aileni,” muttered Tegid darkly, “the Cauldron of Rebirth. This is how they preserve their numbers. We cannot kill them. We cannot stop them.” His voice rang hollow with resignation and defeat.

  “You said the Song would stop them,” I reminded him.

  “The Song is lost.”

  “Then we must find it.”

  Tegid scoffed. “A fool’s errand. It cannot be done.”

  I threw a hand toward the imposing vessel. “Only a fool would stay here and wait to be starved and overwhelmed by these fiends and their accursed pot. It seems to me, brother, we are fools either way.”

  The bard glowered at me, and I thought he might tip me over the wall. But then he glanced at the cauldron once more, and at the thousands of teeming Coranyid cavorting obscenely around its shimmering, fire-wrapped bulk. “What do you propose?”

  “I propose we find the Phantarch. Maybe he is not dead. We do not know that he is dead. We will not know for certain until we find him.”

  “Impossible,” grunted Tegid. “And futile.”

  “What have we to lose?”

  “Must I say it all again? No one, save the Penderwydd, knows where the Phantarch resides,” protested Tegid weakly. “Ollathir knew and—”

  “And Ollathir is dead,” I snapped. I had no more patience with Tegid’s pessimism. “So you keep saying. Well, I say someone knows where the Phantarch resides, because whoever killed him knew well enough where to find him.”

  Tegid, who had been about to object, jerked suddenly upright, his eyes narrow as he sifted the truth of my words.

  “It seems to me,” I continued, “that we have either to find out who killed the Phantarch or find out how they discovered him.”

  “It will be difficult.”

  “Difficult is not the same thing as impossible.”

  “Now you are talking like a bard.” Tegid allowed himself a fleeting smile.

  It was meant as a jest, but, even as he
spoke these words, I remembered my solemn vow to the Banfáith: It seems to me a task more befitting a bard, I had told her. Yet what may be done, that I will do.

  “It is a task for a bard,” I said. “I am no bard, Tegid; we both know it. And yet the Chief Bard’s awen was given to me.”

  The smile faded, and his face clouded with the despair that had dogged him since Sycharth. He said nothing.

  “Yes, to me, Tegid. It was given to me! It should have been you—I wish it had been you. I know I am no fit vessel. But the fact remains that I was there when Ollathir died, and I was the one who received the awen. That is the way of it.”

  Tegid’s mouth twitched unhappily, but he did not respond.

  “I am willing, but I do not know what to do. You do. You are a bard. Tell me, Tegid; tell me what I need to know. I remember nothing of what Ollathir told me. But I would like to remember. And, maybe if I could remember it, it would do us all some good.”

  Tegid was silent still, but I knew he was considering what I had said carefully. And I could sense that he was even now beginning to put his hurt and disappointment behind him. He stared hard at me—as if I were an untried horse and he a reluctant buyer trying to decide where he could trust me. Finally, he said, “Will you do whatever I tell you?”

  “What may be done, that I will do.”

  Tegid turned abruptly and said, “Follow me.”

  33

  HEART OF THE HEART

  We slipped out into the wind-lashed night, the light from the hall spilling like molten bronze upon the snow of the yard. We carried torches, fluttering in the gusting wind with the sound of rushing wings. Pulling a fold of my cloak across my face, I followed Tegid across the dark expanse of snow.

  On the walls above us I could see the torches of the watchers. I heard the shriek of the Coranyid as they swarmed without the walls and the shouts of the warriors as they hurled stones down upon the vile brood.