Sword & Sorcery Favorites You Might Have Missed II

The last session seemed popular so here are more of the stories I enjoyed. When I look at the Fox story in this list is reminds how many really good short stories are lost because they aren’t collected. Janet Fox’s work strikes me this way. I’m sure she wrote enough to fill one good volume of tales but the commercial side of things makes this unlikely to happen.

This time I am reaching even further back. “Black Lotus ” by Robert Bloch (1935) originally appeared in Unusual Stories, Winter 1935. The plot follows Genghir the Dreamer, a sultan who is addicted to his pleasures but eventually even narcotics can’t do it for him anymore. He sends his dwindling servants out to find him the Black Lotus, which is condemned by knowledgeable scribes.

Genghir has three dreams: one that foretells what will comes, one that tells what might have been and the third is the reality. In the first dream Genghir experiences his death and the rotting of his body. In the second, he experiences all-powering pain, and in the last he fights with the black lotus, cleaving it with a knife. In reality, he has slit his own throat.

This story appeared in the minor Pulp Unusual Stories (which like its sister Marvel Tales was a short-lived amateur magazine). “Black Lotus” is one of Bloch’s first stories, written when he was only sixteen (1933-34?). You can see the influence of Dunsany and I think William Beckford’s Vathek (1782). Not Sword & Sorcery in the Howard vein but it was included in L. Sprague de Camp’s The Fantastic Swordsmen (1967).

Bloch recounts his early days in the introduction of Wolfshead (Bantam, 1979) by Robert E. Howard, alluding to his critical remarks about the author: ‘…For my youthfully intemperate remarks were directed at Howard’s Conan series which I deemed inferior to his other work. It was my feeling that his talent was best employed in tales such as ‘The Valley of the Worm’ …” So I guess it’s no surprise he never went onto pastiching Conan.

Another old story revived and finished in the 1960s, “Riders Beyond the Sunrise” by Robert E. Howard and Lin Carter (1967) originally appeared in King Kull 1967. The story begins when Farsunian adventurer Felnar and the Valusian countess Lala-ah elope, breaking Valusia’s law about foreigners marrying Valusians without the king’s permission. Fenar adds insult to injury by sending a message that calls Kull a barbarian and threatens to beat him and dress him in women’s clothes. Kull is enraged and calls up the Red Slayers to ride with him in pursuit. One of the riders is Kelkor, a venerable soldier who is denied command because he is a Lemurian.

They cross the Zarfhaanian border, following the lovers to Talunia, where Kull and Brule search for them alone. An old woman, for a bribe of gold, sends Kull into a dark house. He finds the lovers escaping out of the window. The pursuit continues to Grondar, the weird country to the east. There Kull meets four hundred horsemen who let him pass for no one ever returns from beyond the sunrise.

The pursuers come to the River Stagus, where a ferryman takes Kull alone across to the other side. There he meets up with Felnar and the countess. The woman disappears in a puff of smoke and Felnar turns out to be Thulsa Doom. Doom attacks with a magical sword that sucks Kull’s vitality from him. He is slowly losing when Kelkor shouts to him, use his sword against him. Kull disarms Doom and fights him with his sword, sucking the power from Thulsa Doom. He finishes him with a stab to the chest. Kelkor swam the river to help his king. For this, Kull makes him commander of the Red Slayers, even though he is a Lemurian.

 This version of this tale is mostly written by Howard by evidence of the fragment Howard left though it was entirely Carter’s idea to make Felnar/Fenar Thulsa Doom. Carter’s edit includes giving a bag of gold to the old crone for her help (Howard implies she is in on the trick) and to remove references to Charon as the ferryman. In Howard’s version the river is filled with poisonous snakes and unswimmable. In Carter’s version, only Kull crosses on the ferry. Only the Lancer King Kull features this story. All later Kull collections only contain Howard’s fragment. Carter included the tale in his DAW collection Lost Worlds (1980).

“She-Bear” by Janet Fox (Fantastic, January 1974) is the second story of Arcana, a swordswoman who has claimed the enchanted blade of King Aethrid. With her blind demon horse she enters a camp of men for shelter then has to kill a man who wants to rape her. Arcana learns the men are camped because a troll attacked their village. This monster is Arcana’s goal.

The next morning she has to face the dead man’s brother who challenges her with a blood debt. Arcana defeats the man, named Harl, but can’t kill him. This makes him her thrall and the duo leave to find the troll.

After a few days travel, they come to the village of Harl’s people. The troll shows up and the fight is on. The spell that will release the demon from the horse’s body doesn’t work and it’s a sword fight.

The battle goes well, with Ao the enchanted blade killing the monster. The horse, who fought as well, is badly injured and Arcana must think quickly to save the terrible spirit trapped inside the animal.

Janet Fox’s fiction always delights me. She writes about strong women, but they are never a PSA for equal rights. They are flesh and blood, living heroes. She doesn’t ignore the struggles of women, especially in a brutal culture, but uses it to fuel her storytelling.

The Demoness” by Tanith Lee originally appeared in Year’s Best Fantasy 2, 1976. The quest begins with Alondor coming to the enchanted tower to kill the demon who slayed his pledge-brother, Golbrant. He lies with her but is able to pull away before his soul is devoured. He can not bring himself to kill her because she is a woman. He leaves but the vampire desires nothing more than him and a long pursuit begins, with Alondor ever fleeing, the demoness ever pursuing.

In the end Alondor meets Siandra, a woman strong enough to hold him. When the vampire comes for him, Sian kills her, causing her body to shatter into dust. Each particle of that dust is aware, yearning for Alondor for all eternity.

Lee’s tale is poetic at the same time that it is bare bones, giving little information about countries, names, politics, etc. instead focusing on the emotional journal of victim and victimizer. The effect is oddly Dunsanian, though Lee does it all in a style her own. Lin Carter in his intro waxes on about Lee for she had only published her second novel at the time. Today we all know her amazing fiction and Carter’s prophecy that she would become a major talent was entirely justified.

“Last Quest” by Andrew J. Offutt (Swords Against Darkness II, 1977) starts when Haj the Llorcan goes on a quest to rescue the Princess Shariya from her grandfather, the Wizard of Bluemist Marsh. He takes a small group of men with him including his blood-brother Hyrum. At the marsh they encounter giant lizards called sand-dragons. These do not attack because Haj’s force is so big, but when Hyrum’s fiancée Salithe shows up they are forced to battle.

Using a special whistle Haj summons the winged folk who take Haj, Hyrum and Salithe to the edge of the swamp. There the whistle allows Haj to summon male giant spiders who will be their guides and mounts to the wizard’s castle. A female spider shows up and charms one of the male spiders to his death. Hyrum and Salithe both die horribly in the high bows of the trees. Haj hurries on alone and arrives at the castle to find the sorcerer dead. His love, Shariya, begs him to flee but he doesn’t and he discovers a terrible secret, too late.

Offutt writes in his intro to the story: “…The writer of the story that follows worked over it more than any he’s written, surely, cutting, revising, biting his lip, fearful lest some say he palmed off on me a second-rate effort because he could get away with it.” This special attention to the quality of his story gives the tale a weird, clipped cadence along with a pseudo-Medieval flavor that is quite different. Once you are used to it, it’s alright. Offutt need not have worried. The tale is quite good because of its black sense of doom which is not typical of most S&S. (It’s not a feel good tale.)

Well, there are tons more great stories out there. I’ll keep looking. Feel free to let me know which are your favorites.