Strange Adventures is back with another Edmond Hamilton serial, “The Fire Princess” (Weird Tales, August September October 1938). In honor of our upcoming volume of strange adventures and weird Westerns, I have been looking at adventure fiction with a weird bent. If you are like me, you prefer your tales of deserts, jungles, the sea, polar regions and other far and exiting locales with a dash of the strange. And by that I mean, Monsters.
Part One
“The Fire Princess” only has one monster in it, a race of dead aliens called “The Ancient Ones” but Hamilton doesn’t disappoint. We’ll get to them soon enough. The tale is set during a time when the countries of Europe and America are trying to influence as much territory in Asia as possible. Because of this, our main characters, the outsiders anyway, are all spies. Gary Martin, our hero, is an American working in Asia as a paleontologist. He’s not looking for dinosaurs but secrets. He has earned a six month break but his boss, William Cray, hooks him with a juicy mission: to find a princess of a lost race named Shirani and stop her invasion plans. The legends swirling around the country is she will gather the Asian races and march on the world.
Of course, Martin isn’t alone. He is headed for the ring of volcanoes that hides the lost Tibetan kingdom of Koom from the world. He is accompanied by his companion, Uluk, a Mongol and two Chinese servants. They come across Joan Laird, an Englishwoman looking for her lost father. They also end up with a Russian named Boris Borchoff. The party is surrounded by Tibetans, as Joan reveals she is a British spy and Uluk is actually Japan’s master-spy, Major Okara. (Doesn’t say much for Gary Martin’s spy skills, does it?)
The rivals evade the Tibetans and head for Koom, ready to betray each other as soon as possible. To get to Koom, they must enter a long volcanic tunnel, careful of the river of flowing fire beside them. Okara and Borchoff get ahead of the American and the woman. Arriving at the other end, Gary and Joan are surrounded by Koomian soldiers. The other two have been taken captive. It is forbidden to enter Koom, so all should be immediately executed but Shirani, the golden haired queen who leads her men, takes a fancy for Gary, making her betrothed, Jhulun, jealous. The prisoners are to betaken to the city. The people of Koom are not Tibetan but white.
This first segment did not get an illustration. The next two have Virgil Finlay illos. John V. Batadonis wrote in “The Eyrie”: “Woe is me! No Finlay illustrations!” He went on to say the story was good and he could imagine which scene would have made a good Finlay illo. One reader, Kenneth Moor, complained that there was no warning this story was a serial. The TOC does not list it as Part 1. I suspect these defects came from a crunch in the publishing schedule.
Part Two
We meet Dridim, the high priest of the Ancient Ones. He argues with his queen about using the magic of the Ancient Ones. He holds the keys and has kept her from taking the Place of Power. The prisoners are housed together in the city. Gary is occasionally allowed to spend time with Shirani, during which he tries to talk her out of her ideas on conquest. Martin is obviously falling for the spirited queen. During these visits he also learns more about the Place of Power, the secret temple where aliens have left a weapon that can cause world-wide earthquakes. Shirani plans to use this devise before she invades the outside world.
The four outsiders finally agree on their mission when they learn of this. They don’t really believe in the tale of the aliens but they all know that Shirani must die. To accomplish this, they have two daggers that Okara got from Jhulun, who has become very jealous of Gary and works against the queen. They make a rope out of torn rugs and climb out the window (leaving Joan behind, of course!) before the three men set off to kill the princess of fire. Boris gives his life in a struggle with the guards. Okara and Martin enter the bed chamber, using Jhulun’s information, and Gary goes in alone to do the deed. He fails. He can’t plunge a dagger into Shirani’s chest because he loves her. Okara comes in when he realizes Gary has failed. The Japanese tries to finish the job but is wounded by the guards and taken back to his cell.
Shirani takes Gary to the chamber of the Ancient Ones. He sees the dead aliens lying on large blocks of stone.
This weird cavern was a vast mortuary. Ranged in it were rows and rows of enormous, rectangular blocks of black stone, each of them perfectly squared and over six feet in height. And upon the flat top of each great block lay stretched a motionless body. They were not human bodies–glimpsed imperfectly as they were by the feeble glow of the little lamp, Gary could see that these dead creatures had never remotely akin to humanity. Their bodies were dimly like the human in shape, with two long lower limbs, two folded arms, and a bulbous head. But they were of huge size, must have stood ten feet in height, in life. And they appeared to be of dark mineral flesh.
The place is real, so the powers that are housed there might be, too. As they return, Dridim, the high priest of the Ancient Ones, appears to defy Shirani again and she stabs him. She will have the key to the Place of Power. This is the scene that Virgil Finlay chose for the first illustration.
Part Three
Shirani now has the keys to the Place of Power, a wand that opens the final chamber. She takes a metal instruction manual for the destruction machine. The pair return to the surface. Shirani prepares the people by giving a rousing speech on their upcoming invasion. Jhulun openly challenges her choice of Gary as her mate since he is an outsider. He leaves, promising revenge. Later, Shirani realizes she should have killed him. Gary goes back to his cell and the three plot to stop Shirani, when and if, Gary gets a chance. Joan tells Gary that she loves him. He admits he only has eyes for Shirani.
Jhulun and six men come to take the prisoners. They would have succeeded in killing them and throwing their bodies into the lava except Okara sacrifices himself and calls the guards. All of the invaders are killed except Jhulun who escapes. Shirani makes him an outlaw, regretting not killing him.
The day of destruction arrives. Gary plans to take Shirani’s dagger from her belt and kill her before she can destroy the outside world. Shirani is smart enough to have him tied up and then brought along to the devise room. She begins the complex use of the machine pulling one of the seven rods that will release death across the world. Jhulhun appears (he was hiding in the alien chamber) and drags Shirani over the edge into the lava. Gary manages to break his bonds and reverse the machine. Except it doesn’t really work. The world is saved but Koom is doomed. He races back to Joan and they escape on horseback out the tunnel. All of the Koom valley is covered in a lake of lava. Joan reminds Gary she is in love with him. The American bids her good by, knowing he must get over his lost princess. Maybe someday…
Responses in “The Eyrie”
Caroline Herber of Chicago wrote: “The Fire Princess is one of those yarns relished with gusto and to be dreamed of many a time after. Tell me, do I detect a slight resemblance to that grand movie, Lost Horizons?” The film version of James Hilton’s 1933 novel came out in 1937. This could be one of Hamilton’s influence though I thought H. R. Haggard’s She (1887) and When the World Shook (1919) along with the works of A. Merritt are more likely. That downbeat ending is pure Merritt.
Kenneth Moor, despite his complaint about no warning on the serial, congratulated Hamilton thus: “…Hamilton’s descriptions are marvelous and one can really visualize the settings. That is the highest tribute that can be paid to any writer.” He correctly points out after this: “I notice that the British agent seems to be a rather incompetent young lady! No offense, Mr. Hamilton.” He is not wrong. The character of Joan Laird is largely a waste, supplying a counter romantic interest to the much more vibrant (and insane) Shirani. (I noted a similar lack in C. L. Moore and Henry Kuttner’s “Earth’s Last Citadel” last time.
The comments for the most part were positive but Misti Selkirk suggested that Ed stick to stories like “The Isle of the Sleeper” or “He That Hath Wings” and Harry Warner Jr. described the serial “…would be much better as a movie serial for ten-year olds.” Caroline Ferber again in a second letter, praised the excitement as lasting to the final moments but I have to disagree, since Virgil Finlay gave away the ending with his second illustration. You know Gary will not have make the ultimate decision of killing or not killing Shirani (the best conflict in the story) because Jhulun pulls her into the lava.
The last portion won the “Best in the Issue” accolade though my vote would have gone to Henry Kuttner’s “Beyond the Phoenix” or Clark Ashton Smith’s “The Maze of Maal Dweb”. This may have been an accumulated prize.
Conclusion
Well, I have to admit as a fan of Edmond Hamilton I am quite aware that Ed did not innovate with every story. He was a working SF/F writer, something pretty much nobody was back in the Pulp days. “The Fire Princess” has a very similar plot to “The Lake of Life” with some differences. But the two stories are pretty close. I am surprised Farnsworth Wright, the editor, didn’t insist on more ‘weirdness’. The Ancient Ones are far less active than the seal-like aliens in “The Lake of Life”. The Ancient Ones could have been more Lovecraftian. Hamilton just makes them mineral in nature, which is different but far from a good squidgy. He might have thrown in a spare shoggoth guardian as well. This lack again makes me feel he was trying to sell this story to Argosy, keeping the really good cosmic horror elements at bay. Failing to make that market, he flogged it off on Weird Tales yet again.
