The leader laughed as he watched, taking no part in the torture itself.
"Oh, your spirits will remember me as they mingle with the Shefanhow demons in the Pits of the Dog!" he chuckled. "Oh, they will remember the Earl of the Denledhyssi, Glandyth-a-Krae, the Doom of the Shefanhow!"
Corum found it difficult to work out what these words meant. Shefanhow could be a corruption of the Vadhagh word Sefano, which roughly meant "fiend". But why did these Mabden call themselves "Denledhyssi"-a corruption, almost certainly, of Doniedyssi meaning "murderers"? Were they proud that they were killers? And was Shefanhow a term used in general to describe their enemies? And were, as seemed unquestionably the case, their enemies other Mabden?
Corum shook his head in puzzlement. He understood the motives and behavior of less developed animals better than he understood the Mabden. He found it difficult to retain a clinical interest in their customs and was becoming quickly disturbed by them. He turned his horse into the depths of the forest and rode away.
The only explanation he could find, at present, was that the Mabden species had undergone a process of evolution and devolution more rapid than most. It was possible that these were the mad remnants of the race. If so, then that was why they turned on their own kind, as rabid foxes did.
A greater sense of urgency filled him now and he rode as fast as his horse could gallop, heading for Castle Crachah. Princess Lorim, living in closer proximity to Mabden herds, might be able to give him clearer answers to his questions.
The Fourth Chapter
THE BANE OF BEAUTY: THE DOOM OF TRUTH
Save for dead fires and some litter, Prince Corum saw no further signs of Mabden before he breasted the high green hills that enclosed Valley Crachah and searched with his eyes for the castle of Princess Lorim.
The valley was full of poplars, elms, and birch and looked peaceful in the gentle light of the early afternoon. But where was the castle, he wondered.
Corum drew his map again from within his byrnie and consulted it. The castle should be almost in the center of the valley, surrounded by six rings of poplars and two outer rings of elms. He looked again.
Yes, there were the rings of poplars and elms. And near the center, no castle, just a cloud of mist.
But there should be uo mist on such a day. It could only be smoke.
Prince Corum rode rapidly down the hill.
He rode until he reached the first of the rings of trees and he peered through the other rings but could, as yet, see nothing. He sniffed the smoke.
He passed through more rings of trees and now the smoke stung his eyes and throat and he could see a few black shapes in it.
He passed through the final ring of poplars and he began to choke as the smoke filled his lungs and his watering eyes made out the shapes. Sharp crags, tumbled rocks, blistered metal, burned beams.
Prince Corum saw a ruin. It was without a doubt the ruin of Castle Crachah. A smoldering rum. Fire had brought Castle Crachah down. Fire had eaten her folk, for now Corum, as he rode his snorting horse around the perimeter of the ruins, made out blackened skeletons. And beyond the ruins were signs of battle. A broken Mabden chariot. Some Mabden corpses. An old Vadhagh woman, chopped into several pieces.
Even now the crows and the ravens were beginning to sidle in, risking the smoke.
Prince Corum began to understand what sorrow must be. He thought that the emotion he felt was that.
He called out once, in the hope that some inhabitant of Castle Crachah lived, but there was no reply. Slowly, Prince Corum turned away.
He rode toward the East. Toward Castle Sam.
He rode steadily for a week, and the sense of sorrow remained and was joined by another nagging emotion. Prince Corum began to think it must be a feeling of trepidation.
Castle Sam lay in the middle of a dense elder forest and was reached by a pathway down which the weary Prince in the Scarlet Robe and his weary horse moved. Small animals scampered away from them and a thin ram fell from a brooding sky. No smoke rose here. And when Corum came to the castle he saw that it was no longer burning. Its black stones were cold, and the crows and ravens had already picked the corpses clean and gone away in search of other carrion.
And then tears came to Corum's eyes for the first time and he dismounted from his dusty horse and clambered over the stones and the bones and sat down and looked about him.
For several hours Prince Corum sat thus until a sound came from his throat. It was a sound he had not heard before and he could not name it. It was a thin sound that could not express what was within his stunned mind. He had never known Prince Opash, though his father had spoken of him with great affection. He had never known the family and retainers who had dwelt in Castle Sarn. But he wept for them until at length, exhausted, he stretched out upon the broken slab of stone and fell into a gloomy slumber.
The rain continued to fall on Corum's scarlet coat. It fell on the ruins and it washed the bones. The red horse sought the shelter of the elder trees and lay down. For a while it chewed the grass and watched its prone master. Then it, too, slept.
When he eventually awoke and clambered back over the ruins to where his horse still lay, Corum's mind was incapable of speculation. He knew now that this destruction must be Mabden work, for it was not the custom of the Nhadragh to burn the castles of their enemies. Besides, the Nhadragh and the Vadhagh had been at peace for centuries. Both had forgotten how to make war.
It had occurred to Corum that the Mabden might have been inspired to their destruction by the Nhadragh, but even this was unlikely. There was an ancient code of war to which both races had, no matter how fierce the fighting, always adhered. And with the decline in their numbers, there had been no Deed for the Nhadragh to expand their territories or for the Vadhagh to defend theirs.
His face thin with weariness and strain, coated with dust and streaked with tears, Prince Corum aroused his horse and mounted him, riding on toward the North, where Castle Gal lay. He hoped a little. He hoped that the Mabden herds moved only in the South and the East, that the North would still be free of then: encroachments, as the West was.
A day later, as he stopped to water his horse at a small lake, he looked across the gorse moor and saw more smoke curling. He took out his map and consulted it. No castle was marked there.
He hesitated. Was the smoke coming from another Mabden camp? If so, they might have Vadhagh prisoners whom Corum should attempt to rescue. He decided to ride toward the source of the smoke.
The smoke came from several sources. This was, indeed, a Mabden camp, but it was a permanent camp, not unlike the smaller settlements of the Nhadragh, though much cruder. A collection of stone huts built close to the ground, with thatched roofs and chimneys of slate from which the smoke came.
Around this camp were fields that had evidently contained crops, though there were no crops now, and others which had a few cows grazing in them.
For some reason Corum did not feel wary of this camp as he had felt wary of the Mabden caravan, but he nonetheless approached it cautiously, stopping his horse a hundred yards away and studying the camp for signs of life.
He waited an hour and saw none.
He moved his horse in closer until he was less than fifty yards away from the nearest single-story building.
Still no Mabden emerged from any of the low doorways.
Corum cleared his throat.