Sleuths, Spies and Sorcerers

This alliterative title covers three episodes concerning Andrew Marr’s Paperback Heroes on BBC4. Last week we had Sleuths, this week we had Sorcerers (which is repeated tonight on the same channel), and next week it will be Spies.

Within the limited time of an hour, Andrew Marr attempts to deconstruct these popular genres; you know those books that never seem to win prizes, that the literary snobs decry and dismiss, those books that sell in their millions.

Sleuths was patchy, giving over many minutes to the genius of Agatha Christie, leaving less time for other practitioners. We had the John Dickson Carr’s locked room mysteries, Ian Rankins’ Rebus, Chandler’s Marlowe, Dashiell Hammett’s The Continental Op and Sam Spade to name a few. Interviewees comprised Val McDermid, Ian Rankin, and Anthony Horowitz, among others.

The psychology of the sleuths was examined, and the times they lived in obviously affected them. A long time ago, a reviewer of John D. McDonald said the author didn’t need to write The Great American Novel (a holy grail for American authors at one time), since he was doing that in his installments of Travis McGee and his other crime novels. That’s more or less the conclusion Marr makes concerning the crime writers, whether of the past or the present: they reflect the society from which they sprang, a rich trove to delve into for future archaeologists and historians.

Logically, Spies should have been next but for some reason Sorcerers followed. Here we entered the realms of fantasy.  While fantasy has been around throughout the ages, in many cultures, Marr suggests that its modern popularity probably stemmed from the publication of The Lord of the Rings books. One of the prime attractions of fantasy is the world-building that is required; that means multifarious aspects of life in the fictional world, all logically fitting.

Besides Tolkien, Marr touched upon George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire sequence of  novels, now filmed as Game of Thrones. Apparently, Martin was inspired to write the series when visiting Hadrian’s Wall and studying medieval English history and also the Wars of the Roses. The books contain ambivalent characters, people who are not wholly good or completely bad, as in life, perhaps, with conflict caused by ideology, greed, lust and a thirst for power. Other fantasists mentioned include Ursula K. Le Guin (Earthsea series), C.S. Lewis (Chronicles of Narnia), J.K. Rowling (the Harry Potter phenomenon) Alan Garner (The Weirdstone of Brisingamen), Philip Pullman (His Dark Materials trilogy), Neil Gaiman (American Gods), and of course Terry Pratchett (Discworld novels et al).

This episode seemed more coherent and covered a wide range within the genre.

As with Sleuths, however, there are bound to be many favourite authors omitted from this genre. It is now impossible to read all books within any single genre (nor would that be a good literary diet anyway), because there is so much choice.

Next, Spies. I can guess that certain names will crop up, among them Deighton, Le Carré, and Fleming, but who else? I’ll be tuning in to find out.

Besides being about books and authors, this series touches upon several genres I enjoy to read and write: Spanish Eye (Sleuths), Wings of the Overlord (Sorcerers), and ThePrague Papers (Spies).

5,000 readers can’t be bad

I’ve just seen this year’s Public Lending Right statement and it makes interesting reading. Not so much for the payments, which are most welcome, but mainly for the numbers of people who have read my books. I’ve said it before, we write to be read, not to attain riches.

This year’s figures are based on the British Library collecting loans data from a changing sample of UK public library authorities. This year’s payments are based on loans data collected from 36 library authorities across the UK during the year July 2014 – June 2015.

It was good to see that paperback Write a western in 30 Days and fantasy hardback Wings of the Overlord are now in libraries and have been borrowed. This is the first time they have shown up since being published.

 

The other loans are exclusively for my Robert Hale westerns:

The Magnificent Mendozas – 100

The $300 Man – 975

Old Guns – 1638

Blind Justice at Wedlock - 816

Last Chance Saloon – 785

Death at Bethesda Falls – 581

That’s a total of 4895 readers (unless some borrowed a book more than once!)

Of course that is only the tip of the readership iceberg; one must assume that libraries not in this year’s sample will also have loaned these books. That’s gratifying to a writer, to know that my books have been read by in excess of 5,000 readers. 

My latest western, The Magnificent Mendozas was only registered in 2014; it’s nice to know that my first book, Death at Bethesda Falls is still finding readers.

Now, if only libraries would stock my crime and suspense books!

Viz:

Spanish Eye

Catalyst

Blood of the Dragon Trees

Sudden Vengeance

Libraries can’t stock The Prague Papers, The Tehran Text, Catacomb or Cataclysm as these are currently only in e-book format.

New paperbacks and hardbacks should be registered with PLR before 30 June this year to be included in the 2017 sample: www.plr.uk.com.

Saturday Fiction – ‘a strong element of authenticity…’

It’s really satisfying when a book reviewer ‘gets it’. We all want readers to enjoy our books; obviously, we cannot appeal to all tastes, but occasionally the story connects with a reader.

Just such a reader is Nigel Robert Wilson, reviewing Wings of the Overlord in the British Fantasy Society website in June this year. The full review is here

I’d like to quote a snippet from the review:

… Such twists and turns in the presentation of the plot expand the telling of the tale and there are many duly woven into the pattern to enrich and excite the reader. The journey through the Sonalume Mountains has a strong element of authenticity to it, concentrating on the treacherous ice and snow coupled to an intense bitter cold. This seems to derive from an actual experience that must have been quite wretched at the time.

The final denouement by which our now familiar heroes, at great personal risk and cost overthrow the hideous king, Yip nef-Dom … is recounted intensely and is quite a page-turner. The body count is high and contains images of great cruelty.

This is quite clearly the first volume of what is intended to be an entire sequence of stories about the world of Floreskand, a very cultivated creation. Enough links have been established within this tale onto which further adventures, deeds and characters can be connected at later times. It is a well-worked story involving swords and sorcery which will have a very direct appeal to those who admire heroism, but who also like to wade through buckets of blood and gore combined with a dash of mystical sentiment added to provide a degree of sweetness to finish off the feast.

Thank you, Mr Wilson!

And, yes, I was able to call upon some experience when writing about the ice-bound Sonalume Mountains. Here’s an excerpt:

First Dloin of Darous. And it dawned with the sky filled by mares’ tails, drawn out and wispy.
“Winds to mandunron,” said Ulran and rolled up his blanket.
       Breakfast consisted of an apple and a square of honey-loaf each.
       They must have spent a warm night, Fhord realised, as her hair was barely damp, the hoar-frost having thawed. Alomar’s drooping moustache looked bedraggled: the warrior and innman still shaved themselves each morn with their honed poniards.
       But the intense cold and knifelike winds soon froze every breath from their mouths upon their furs and facial hair.
       They descended the snow-scree, plunging legs knee-deep at times, jarring those selfsame knees repeatedly till they constantly gave way when weight was applied.
       At last they came to the hog’s-back, winding towards Glacier Peak, the spine of the formation about a half-mark in width.
       Ulran led with Fhord, Rakcra and Alomar following in that order.
       Winds pummelled and battered them as they walked. Heads down, they constantly watched their feet and, blinking against the flurries of upswept snow, braced as frequent but unexpected gusts lambasted them.
       And yet on they trod, never halting in case they baulked and lost balance and were pitched over the side: there was a steep slope on each side of the narrow crest, falling off to dizzying grey depths.
       Snow-glare inflamed Fhord’s eyes, and her lips were becoming dry and cracked with the insidious cold. She knew she must close her eyes before she was blinded and jeopardised their mission.
       She only hoped her faculties were not reluctant in answering. Eyes shut, she concentrated on listening beyond her own footsteps and the haunting wind-whistle, reaching out for the crisp crunch of Ulran’s foot-falls. And as she did so she threw out mental feelers, and was rewarded before fear forced her to open her eyes: vaguely, she detected the bulk of the innman, just ahead.
       Rakcra too was in a bad way and stumbled on two separate occasions. Before panic hurled him off the hog’s-back, Alomar was there, steadying, his big hands lifting the Devastator up, urging him on.
       But the incident had instilled Alomar with the feathering of alarm. “Ulran!” he called. “Ulran!” And as the innman stopped and turned, with Fhord following suit, Alomar added, “Can we rope together? It may prove safer!”
       Ulran agreed whilst inwardly wondering why he had let such an elementary precaution slip his mind.
       To make matters worse, the snow was not firm, so every footstep could precipitate a fall. Ulran slipped once, near the end of the spine, but neatly corrected his balance and went on. Nobody else felt as much as a tug on the line.
       They reached a crescent shape of stagnant ice, earthy material and boulders: the dead ice at the snout of the glacier. The terminal moraine gaped where a small runnel showed. A stream of melt-water gushed down into the depths to Ulran’s left.
       “Keep to the right,” urged the innman as they joined him.
       The sun had reached zenith.
       Snakelike, the glacier wound down towards them, its source firn hidden from view high up near the peak. Up each side showed irregular bands of discoloration of the lateral moraines, formed by rock debris on the glacier’s surface. Down the centre, the medial moraine, over which melt-water streamed and glistened. The left-hand side was impassable, scattered with jagged ice-pinnacles and loosely packed snow that crumbled at the touch of a breeze. Across the immense breadth of the glacier too were great gaping cracks – crevasses.
       Ulran hoped they could cross the glacier further up, near the source, and thus skirt the peak. He mentally shook himself: his head felt bloated, eyes puffy. They had been standing here at the snout of the glacier too long: time to move!
       The right-hand side of the glacier was negotiable but proved difficult.
       Twice they came upon gullies about three marks deep, which they descended then climbed the opposite side, using swords to cut foot-holds.
       Wind howled intermittently; the sound whistled about their ears. Eyebrows and other facial hair were matted white by now, numbing lips and foreheads.
       Heads bowed, they trudged higher till Ulran halted on the lip of an ice and rock overhang, under which the glacier had cut its ancient path. From here he swung his sword, pointing higher along the glacier’s length, where it widened further up.
       “Ice-fall,” the innman said, sneezing. “Beyond that, I believe the glacier spreads out a bit.”
       Fhord thought the innman’s voice sounded nasal, half-choked. Ulran seemed to blink more than usual too. A hot clammy fear clutched the base of her spine and sweat collected there, damp and uncomfortable.
       At the foot of the ice-fall was a labyrinth of deep clefts and ice-pinnacles, with crevasses intersecting. Above this, the glacier steepened, like an ice-wall. A few pinnacles jutted out from this wall, casting long shadows.
       Without any warning, one of these pinnacles broke away from the shoulder of the glacier and plunged down the ice-fall. Fhord was speechless. At least the size of a Lornwater mansion, the pinnacle crashed down, tearing with it huge ice-columns from the fall itself. The thunderous sound was awesome.
       Stopped in their tracks as the plumes of snow and ice-particles billowed above the ice-fall’s base, they exchanged glances.
       “I don’t like it,” murmured Alomar. “That could have set up a chain-reac–”
       At that instant a shattering, tumultuous roar reached them, unmistakably coming from above, to their right.
       Fhord saw billows of powdery snow in the air above the next slope.
       “Avalanche!” yelled Ulran, walking towards it.
       Fhord stumbled after him. “No – don’t –!”
       “We must swim through it, come on!” Ulran called over his shoulder.
       Then huge powdery airborne blasts roared down into the innman, cutting him off from sight.
       Snow rode over Ulran’s head. He tried swimming against the deluge, using breast-stroke, dog-paddle, anything to stay on top. Pounding filled his ears. He couldn’t breathe. His eyes ached with constant buffeting and he couldn’t see.
       Alomar, who had been ten paces behind Ulran when the avalanche hit, was as swiftly engulfed, his world abruptly dark and cold. He reached out blindly and hit a rock, grazing his hands to no avail. He tumbled backwards, head over heels and felt the line snap. And behind him, Fhord was swamped also. The time under the black cold weight stretched to a lifetime as she tumbled upon her nightmarish descent.
       Rakcra had been beside Fhord when the sight of the avalanche stunned him into immobility; he was hurled pell-mell down the track they had painstakingly made. The snow not only obliterated their tracks, but also him.
       A sudden, eerie silence settled as the last remnants of the avalanche tumbled down over the hog’s-back, down to the mauve depths.
       Ulran was buried up to his waist. As he craned his neck round to look down the mountainside, he proceeded to use his hands to dig his way free.
       Fifty marks below, Alomar was shaking snow off himself and his shield. Miraculously, his helmet was just visible a couple of paces away: the crestless dome glinted in the after-morning sunlight.
       The rest of the mountain was devoid of life.

***

Wings of the Overlord – hardback

Knox Robinson publishing here

Amazon COM here

Amazon UK here

Writing - beginnings change

Recently I was tagged by a FaceBook friend to produce 7 lines from page 7 of my Work In Progress, To Be King.  I managed that, but it set me to thinking, as you do.

The original beginning of the WIP is actually now Chapter 2! The point of this post is to highlight that while writing a novel you do not have to feel that you must stick with the beginning you created. There may not be anything wrong with it, but it is always possible a better alternative may present itself as the story evolves. And of course it’s all subjective anyway. Be flexible.

Here is a snippet from the original beginning.

As you will observe, it is fantasy, set in mythical Floreskand, being the second chronicle after Wings of the Overlord:

CHAPTER 2: Contenders

“To see what is right and not to do it is to want of courage.”

– Dialogues of Meshanel

 
Lord Tanellor draped his once-magnificent scarlet cloak on top of the overseer’s bloodied mutilated body, and then raised himself into an upright position. He glanced to the crest of the steep, striated Oxor Rift. Through a thin miasma of blue dust, the sun flared dazzlingly, casting various shades of mauve and purple for a brief instant, and then it dropped out of sight behind the jagged rock ridge. He ran the back of a hairy hand across his creased brow, tired and sickened by the senseless death that surrounded him. Death in war he could understand, and even condone, but this, this made his blood boil. Negligence killed these men. And, by his insistence that the miners worked longer shifts during the Kcarran carnival, Saurosen had murdered them as surely as if he’d struck them down himself.

            A few marks away, the towering broad-shouldered Aurelan Crossis busied himself counting corpses. Beyond, Bayuan Aco, the sergeant of the palace guard and ten of his men hauled bodies from the gaping maw of the mine. At the entrance shrine, the Daughter of Arqitor prayed intermittently and also offered a pitcher of water to the men.

            “What’s the tally now?” he asked in a weary voice.

            Aurelan did not raise his flinty grey eyes from his grisly task. He jotted figures in his dog-eared tally book. His voice boomed, a deep bass: “Seventy-four.”

            “So many?” he whispered, in despair. “I fear there are more to be recovered yet.”

            Aurelan shut his book. “Sadly, these are not just numbers in a tally book. I know these men. Two of them even have brothers in my palace guard.” He eyed Tanellor. “Lord, we do not have the time to dig out any more.” Aurelan then stepped over the corpses and moved to Lord Tanellor’s side. His hair was short, cropped, and coppery, the lobe was missing from his right ear, the mouth a cruel line in a pitted face. An old scar ran along the left side of his neck, one of many tokens from his fighting days, Tanellor surmised.

***

And so on…

As a beginning, I think it worked, thrusting the reader into a situation that raised a number of questions. I haven’t shown Tanellor arriving with his men, or the actual explosion. It is colourful, intense with imagery, and reveals tragedy and character. But I felt that here was a missed opportunity; I wanted to study the miners before the tragedy; and I perceived that by doing so there would ultimately prove to be a link to the arcane Underpeople my co-author alluded to frequently… So, the new added beginning starts thus:

Chapter 1: Dust

“Everything in the past died yesterday;

everything in the future was born today.”

- The Tanlin, 204.10

Caged purblind birds sang, their high-pitched tones echoing through the maze of the Oxor cobalt mine tunnels. A mixture of tree trunk and hartwood props groaned as they supported the rocky ceilings.

            “The king can’t deny us our festival,” growled Rujon Sos. His words echoed in this small underground amphitheatre that joined several tunnels. His bare muscular torso gleamed with a sweaty sheen. Though this section only accommodated twelve miners, all of whom now stopped hammering at the rock walls, there were six other dark shadowy entrances to tunnels where more men hacked at the rock and sweated, their implements echoing along the passageways.

            “Like the rest of us, you’re just a miner, a vassal of King Saurosen,” snapped Dasse Wenn, his rat’s nest of a beard dust-covered. His beefy features twisted in distaste, grey eyes full of hate. Sos suspected that Dasse was a weasel – albeit a short brawny weasel – and regularly reported to the king’s minister anything that might earn him a few base coins.

            Saurosen IV had persistently deprived his people of their little pleasures; and now he had banned their annual Carnival. Considering these festivities had taken place without fail annually for 1062 years, commemorating the crowning of Lornwater’s first King, Kcarran, Sos thought the people had taken the edict commendably well, though he doubted if they’d abide by it, merely paying lip-service. He couldn’t comprehend why Dasse was so passive about the king’s contempt for his people.

            “We must withdraw our labour, teach Saurosen a lesson!” Sos’s strident voice echoed through the smalt mine. The tunnel to his left went quiet, save for the chirping of songbirds.

            “The king doesn’t take lessons from minions like us!” Dasse said in a guttural tone.

            Everywhere glimmered with a blue-tinged buttery glow as the candles flickered. Most candles were placed on rock ledges, but a handful of miners wore cloth caps with wax candles fastened to their brims. Each man simply wore a breach-cloth and thick, boiled leather boots, as the temperature deep in the mine was so intense that any clothing would become sopping wet and prove cumbersome and heavy.

            “You miss the point, Dasse,” snapped Sos. “Hear that silence? Most of our shift has downed tools already.”

            “The overseer and his men won’t stand for it. He’ll send for Lord Tanellor, who will bring troops, and they will force those fools back into the mine. We should have no part in that!” Dasse coughed on fetid air that was tainted a faint blue. “The vent shafts are next to useless!” His thin lips curled back in a sneer, revealing buck teeth. “I don’t fancy my head on a spike, Rujon Sos.”

            “That’s often the fate of Saurosen’s spies!” Sos riposted, rubbing a hand over the stubble on his square jaw.

            The others audibly gasped.

            “You’ll regret those words, Rujon Sos!

            “I have witnesses, Dasse. If you’re threatening me…”

            Dasse laughed, arms gesturing. “I’d rather work down here than die. Saurosen can have all the smaltglass goblets he wants, so long as I have a full pewter one in the Pick and Shovel when our shift’s done!”

            “That’s defeatist talk.” Sos ground his teeth together, turned and, gripping his hammer and chisel, scanned the ten other miners. “What say you all?”

            Only murmurs reached him, the whites of the fearful eyes of his fellow miners gleaming. He knew the majority agreed with him; but they also knew that Dasse wasn’t to be trusted.

            He jabbed his chisel at the nearest wooden prop. “Look, at this cankered wood, it’s not fit. We’re working in a death-trap. Lord Tanellor’s begged and pleaded for new material, but Saurosen won’t countenance it!”

            “He’s always been mean with his money, that one,” said a miner on Sos’s right.

            “Aye, and with his favours, as well,” said another.

            “What favours?” another demanded, derisively.

            Sos nodded, and persisted. “Despots like Saurosen can’t be allowed–”

            “Allowed?” Abruptly, he was barged by Dasse, shoved to the rock-strewn floor. He felt a stinging sensation across his cheek and brow and stared up into the hate-filled visage of Dasse. His hand came away covered in blood. Dasse brandished his chisel, sitting astride him.

            Sos twisted and heaved before Dasse could deliver another blow, thrusting Dasse off him. Most of the others shouted encouragement to Sos, though not all, he noticed.

            He scrambled to his feet, gripping his hammer; his chisel was discarded somewhere.

Now he felt his back starting to sting: his left shoulder-blade, which broke his fall.

            The pair circled one another. The first heavy impact had loosened Dasse’s long jet-black hair and it now trailed over his massive shoulders.

            “Sweet Arqitor, stop!” called one man.

            “Stop it before someone gets hurt!” another shouted, but neither Sos nor Dasse listened.

            Suddenly, Dasse rushed him, shrieking unintelligibly, wielding his chisel.

            Sos side-stepped smartly, and then slammed his hammer into the side of Dasse’s shoulder as he passed, and swiftly leaped onto the man’s back as he tumbled against a pit-prop.

            The wooden post groaned and the rock above crumbled, small pebbles skittering to the ground.

            “Stop it, both of you!” a man shrieked. “You’ll bring the whole mine down on us! Daughters of Arqitor preserve us!”

            Snatching, grasping, clawing, the pair rolled, hands slipping on sweaty skin, slicing with hammer and chisel, crying out in shrill tones as the tools sank into flesh. Then, within seconds, they both rolled against a small open conduit that collapsed at their pressure and it created a wide entrance that sloped down into blackness.

***

And so on…

One of a variety of hooks a writer can employ for the reader is conflict. In this case I created conflict between Sos and Dasse, which will worsen until they become trapped after the explosion. The scene also contains action, to move the story faster. I touched upon affairs pertaining to Lornwater, its citizens and their ruler, King Saurosen IV. Here, too, a little further in, I could introduce Tanellor and hint at other happenings and intrigues. All before Tanellor walks among the dead (now Chapter 2).

Significantly, these events begin on the same day as the beginning of Wings of the Overlord. It is a parallel separate storyline (as Wings is a self-contained tale that has links and threads to be developed later, some in To Be King, others in subsequent books).

Writers spend a lot of time on the beginning of their novels. It makes sense, to draw in the reader. Beginnings are fretted over more than any other part of a novel – more than the ending, even; because that beginning has been there to tinker with for the duration of the book.

My advice is: ‘…beginnings and endings are very important. But don’t fret over them too much – at least until the book is written. Then you can decide how you want to shape the beginning and ending.’ – Write a Western in 30 Days (p142).

 
As you can see here, an original beginning was eventually replaced (but not discarded). Now that I have the shape of the book planned and I’m 68,000 words into it, it is unlikely that I will alter it again; but it’s always a possibility.

Wings of the Overlord – by Morton Faulkner, hardback (paperback due in December)

 

Amazon COM here

Amazon UK here

Write a Western in 30 Days – by Nik Morton, paperback and e-book

Amazon COM here

Amazon UK here

Some other posts on writing beginnings:

http://nik-writealot.blogspot.com.es/2015/01/writing-beginnings.html

http://nik-writealot.blogspot.com.es/2013/09/beginning-hook_16.html

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Saturday fiction – ‘Thunderstorm’ – an excerpt

Today, here’s an excerpt from ‘Chapter Eleven – Trial’, from Wings of the Overlord, book one of the Chronicles of Floreskand, a fantasy quest novel co-authored with Gordon Faulkner, both of us writing under the name Morton Faulkner. There’s a small glossary at the end for unfamiliar words appropriate to Floreskand. [Book two is a work in progress, To Be King.] The character descriptions have occurred earlier...

This scene attempts to incorporate weather (not for the first time in this quest, I might add), thus providing action and drama. Weather can often be used as a ‘character’ in a novel; certainly, it provides added conflict, and helps define other people:

A great bank of silvery cloud mass loomed, casting a shadow upon the grassland ahead.

       “Looks like a thunderstorm,” observed Rakcra.
       “It seems to be moving in our direction.”
       Sun shone brilliantly everywhere except where they were going. Darkness spanned the horizon; there was no way round it. The sight alone cast an indefinable fear into Fhord’s heart. Knowing that she was being premature and foolish, she nevertheless delved into her side-pouch and withdrew the storm-idols, and prayers traipsed over her lips. In the past, from the safety of her shuttered windows, she had peered through the wooden slats at the startling flashes of forked lightning, hurled down by the jealous Nikkonslor. But she had never actually weathered such a storm in the open. Yes, she realised, she was afraid. Greatly so.
       Rakcra reined in his whinnying horse. “Stay as outrider, Fhord, while I seek Solendoral and find out what he plans to do.” He squinted to manderon. “There’s no shelter anywhere – we may have to ride on through it, hoping for the best.” He swung his mount round and galloped down the crest into a small vale where the main body of the Hansenand montar rode, oblivious of the encroaching anvil-clouds.
       Musty, dry breezes gusted through Sarolee’s mane. An unhealthy taste filled the air, oppressive. Her palfrey baulked a couple of times but Fhord kept her cantering up and across the sloping bracken. Occasionally, she glanced back over her shoulder, anxious for word from Rakcra or Solendoral.
       At last a rider and horse hurried towards her, the man’s fur cloak billowing in the warm breeze. Fhord was almost wheezing on the close air now as she saw it was Alomar.
       “We’re to quicken the pace, lass. Solendoral says these summer hail storms can be deadly. If we stop moving, we’re lost!”
       Not for the first time on this expedition, her heart sank. “Hail? In summer?”
       “Freak weather hereabouts. Some say this is Nikkonslor’s peeving-ground. But I reckon it’s something to do with the weird cluster of mountains – the Sonalumes don’t seem to obey the natural laws as our so-called experts predict them. Give me a tried and tested stioner any time!”
       Fhord led her horse down the slope, joining the van with Alomar. “Did Ulran –?”
       “Yes – predicted it last night, he did – hence his advice this morn to carry fur cloaks. But what else can we do? There was no shelter at camp, and we’ve come across none since, either. Some of these slopes may shield part of the effects – if the hail falls slantwise. But if it comes down straight, then what?” Alomar grinned, his moustache long and unruly now.
       Fhord nodded and released her fur cloak, put it over her shoulders.
       “Close up!” came the shout from behind.
       Neither Fhord nor Alomar lessened their pace but after a time the rest of the montar, complete with trundling fire- and equipment-wagons, closed up to their rear.
       “Keep together!” shouted Solendoral as the horde began to ascend the shallow ridge directly in their path.
       Ahead, flat unrelieved ground of hedge and thicket with grass interspersed. Hardly a tree in sight, not a boulder cluster to be seen.
       “Keep it tight!”
       And so they rode full into the fury of the storm.
       The prospect was daunting as Fhord – still one of the front riders – entered into the deep shadow. The surrounding air-temperature abruptly dropped. The sun’s light and warmth were suddenly obliterated. She looked warily upwards and all was black, a great rolling mass of cloud, seething slowly on hidden winds.
       Then the torrential hail fell. Alomar’s words had readied her for it, but no preparation could have shown her what it would be like to experience.
       Each hailstone must have been the size of an eyeball. As Alomar had feared, the hail sluiced straight down, pounding upon their heads and shoulders and the backs of their necks. Horses whinnied continually and the great pounding persisted, reverberating through their bony frames, almost tearing the clothes from their backs.
       At least Ulran’s stionery had forewarned them. Upon entering the black shadow they all donned heavy protective cloaks and, if no helmets were to hand, hoods.
       The canvas roofs of the wagons boomed like massive drums, echoing thunder rolls from afar. The fire-wagon hissed and steamed and black smoke billowed around it.
       Bruised and slightly stunned by the storm’s vehemence, Fhord shoved a young Devastator by her side: “Use your shield over your head!” she shouted, pointing to others who had already done so. The rataplan of hail on wood and steel and canvas heightened. Some hide shields were rent with the hail’s force, but others held.
       Head down, Fhord rode on without a shield, riding unseeingly, her mind numb and unable to See ahead. Vision was impaired to fractions of marks as the hail fell in thick sheets.
       Many times Sarolee was jolted as another rider blindly led his horse off course. As for navigation, it was no real problem. The Hansenand, like all other hordes of the Kellan-Mesqa, had instinctive directional sense and would continue manderon.
       A shriek, from a woman just in front, momentarily halted Fhord. She realised that if she tarried, someone would collide with her from behind. But she couldn’t leave the woman to be trodden underfoot or perhaps drown.
       Bruised and weak from the constant pummelling, she gasped for air as the hail broke into water and drenched her to the skin. She gripped the reins tighter and peered through slitted eyes, bracing herself against the storm’s terrible oppressive fist.
       As she concentrated, she found she could perceive that little bit further through the slashing sheet of hail.
       Ahead, on a hard piece of ground – a small island midst the mud – where the hailstones bounced off with staccato sounds, she detected a slight movement, the patch of red – possibly a dress.
       With almost manic force, Fhord tore at the reins, brought Sarolee round slightly and headed the short distance to the patch of red.
       Now the shape was distinct. But there was no movement. It was a girl-child, lying prone. All about her were puddles, splashing. By the– she held back, biting on an imprecation. The child was probably dead already, drowned if not crushed under the horse-hoofs.
       She reined in beside the still, pathetic figure, peered behind and could picture nobody about to collide. But she would have to be quick.
       Against her better judgement, she dismounted and, whilst restraining Sarolee with one hand, she reached down and grabbed at the belt of the girl’s dress.
       Sarolee chose that moment to buck as a stark tongue of lightning flashed overhead, ephemerally illuminating the scene.
       Puddles of mud glared whitely and a deep gash of red appeared on the girl’s temple as Fhord pulled her over. Mud covered her eyes, nose and mouth, but she noticed the child’s small pigeon-chest rose irregularly.
       Again, Sarolee whinnied and heaved against her rein, jerking Fhord. The cloth belt of the dress snapped and for a brief moment she feared she had lost sight of the girl and would never find her again, her efforts wasted. And time was mounting against them. Above the roar of the storm she could hear the trundle of wagons, getting close.
       “Steady, girl,” said a calming voice and Fhord swung round.
       Ulran, astride Versayr, was stroking Sarolee. “Quickly, Fhord, while I calm your horse!”
       Amazed that the innman’s voice could carry above the storm’s din, Fhord needed no urging. She immediately loped across the squelching mess to the girl.
       Her chest still heaved.
       Fhord thrust an arm under the girl’s back and legs. Stooping under the weight, she wheeled round, only in time to avoid the heavy hoofs of wagon horses and their groaning load.
       Fhord stumbled as the fire-wagon passed no more than a hand-span away, hissing and belching smoke and steam like some infernal monster from Below.
       She reached Sarolee a little breathless, but nowhere nearly as exhausted as she’d have thought. Her knees trembled, felt weak.
       “Throw her over your pommel!”
       Fhord hesitated, anxious not to be too rough.
       “Quick, Fhord – no time for niceties, the other wagons will be here any–”
       The groaning and creaking were close enough to hear even above the storm’s noise. With an almighty heave Fhord slung the girl over her pommel and leapt into the saddle after her.
       Ulran threw her the reins and together they galloped forward, just in front of a pair of wagons.
       The wagon-loads were becoming heavier and heavier as leakage poured into them. Inside, the women were bailing frantically to lighten the burden for the already beaten and exhausted horses, but everything was so sodden and weighty they must have felt they were fighting a losing battle. And all knew that to stop now in this quagmire would be fatal.
       “Keep moving!” barked Solendoral, his port-wine birthmark livid in a ghostly flash of lightning. His brow furrowed. That lightning had exposed a couple of men on foot to his right, off the track of gouged mud and puddles. He brought his horse round and was at that moment joined by Alomar.
       “Trouble?” queried the warrior.
       “Join me!” Solendoral shouted.
       Thunder cracked, hail bounced off the ground, wagons creaked and horses and people shrieked and called.
       They were almost upon the two before they knew it.
       It was an argument, two Devastators fighting with bloodied fists, no horses in sight.
       Solendoral recognised them immediately. “Rakcra! Etor!”
       Their leader’s voice penetrated even above the din. Both simultaneously broke their hold and backed off. Defiance shone in their eyes, but there too was respect for Solendoral.
       “You’ve lost your horses, I see!” barked Solendoral. As Rakcra made to speak, he added, “No, not now! You, Etor, up behind Courdour Alomar – quickly, man! Rakcra, here–” And he offered his arm and the youth leapt up behind his leader. “Later, we will hear both sides. But not now!” And both doubly laden horses rode on with the now retreating rearguard of Hansenand.
       The storm seemed to go on for all eternity then finally a glimpse of light could be seen ahead, dreamlike in its quality. Yellow-white, completely framed by darkness, it was like viewing the Sonalume Mountains through gauze.
       Wisps of steam rose and meandered. Fhord heard the song of a bird. Prisms of light dazzlingly refracted on drops of moisture in the air. Bright green grass beckoned, still, soft. Thick beams of godly light slanted through the last shreds of black-grey clouds at the rear of the ranmeron-marching anvil-heads.
       “We’re through!”
       Such was the cry of relief as each member of the party passed into the sunlight again.
       As Fhord emerged, with the girl moaning half-consciously, she looked back upon an uncanny sight.
       It looked as though the Hansenand were riding out of some hideous black tunnel. The sky ranmeronwards as far as she could see was the same silvery mass she’d discerned earlier, yet close by the black feathered into brown-grey and grey and thinned into circling moving wisps, forming a mysterious tunnel. The steam and gasses from the sodden ground swathed about the horses’ fetlocks, creating the impression that they rode on the air itself. They appeared like an avenging army of the gods, returning after some victory over the Black.

- Wings of the Overlord by Morton Faulkner, pp141-146

Glossary
Nikkonslor – great lord of night
Montar – part of a horde, a group of Devastators
Hansenand – a tribe of the Kellan-Mesqa, Devastators
Sonalumes – mountain range
Stionery – weather lore
Innman – inn keeper, Ulran being the most famous
Manderon – our north
Ranmeron – our south
 
Wings of the Overlord – hardback from Knox Robinson

 

A review: ‘… so descriptive you feel part of the story. A fantasy adventure that draws you into the quest…’

 
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