Beyond the Phœnix Read online

  Beyond the Phoenix

  By HENRY KUTTNER

  A tale of Elak of Atlantis, and an evil priest who was more than human and who worshipped a foul god—a tale of perilous sorcery and thrilling action

  1. A King Dies

  And the torchlight touched the pale hair

    Where silver clouded gold,

  And the frame of his face was made of cords,

  And a young lord turned among the lords

    And said: “The King is old.”

  —G. K. Chesterton.

  “I won’t kill you quickly,” said Lycon, a fierce grin of satisfaction on his round face. “No. I’ve suffered your insults too long. I must bring an offering each day to the altar of your stinking god, eh? An ear for that!”

  He brought down his sword in a vicious sweep.

  “Good! Now your nose, Xandar—you’ve sniffed out too many victims with it already. Thus——” Again steel flashed.

  “And an eye, Xandar—see? I remove it with the point. Very carefully. For a copper coin I’d make you eat it.”

  “Drunken little fool,” Elak said, coming over to the table. “Leave that roasted pig alone. It won’t be fit to eat after you’ve finished carving it.”

  Lycon looked down at the succulent brown carcass on the great wooden platter. “I’ve not hurt it,” he said sullenly.

  “You’ll be having us swinging by our necks if you keep yelling threats against Xandar. I don’t like him any more than you do. But—under the king—he rules Sarhaddon.”

  This, unhappily, was true. Since the two adventurers had come to Sarhaddon, a little-known city in western Atlantis, they had risen high in the service of King Phrygior, eventually attaining posts in his personal bodyguard. But they had more than once incurred the dislike of the high priest, Xandar, perhaps because they were outlanders who had come from the seaport city of Poseidonia. At any rate, Xandar disliked the two, and took pains to make this clear. It was within his power to levy tribute from any citizen, and therefore Lycon’s purse was usually empty. He stole as much as was safe from Elak, but the latter had lately become suspicious.

  “I don’t like this,” Elak said now, his dark wolf-face set in harsh lines. “We’re supposed to be with the king now. Always, when he’s asleep, his men guard him. Yet the captain sends us down here to the kitchen to wait for—eh? A message, he said.”

  “This is as good a place as any,” Lycon observed, draining a huge drinking-horn. “What foul mead! Twelve cups and I can still walk. It was not like this in Poseidonia.”

  Elak turned away in disgust. He went to a mullioned window and stared down at the lights of the city, spreading over Sarhaddon Valley. Gaunt granite cliffs rose all about them, and a silver tracery near by marked the course of Syra River. It flowed under the castle, to disappear, so the tales went, into the Gates of the Phœnix, a place in which Elak did not believe, but in which every other inhabitant of the city did. He knew, of course, the traditional death-ceremony of the kings. Their bodies were placed aboard a royal barge, and set adrift on Syra—and returned, as the tavern stories went—to the land of their fathers beyond the Phœnix Gates.

  Elak grunted softly and touched the hilt of a slim rapier that hung at his side.

  “I’m going back,” he said. “Wait if you want. I’ve a feeling——”

  Without finishing, he hurried into the hall and up a winding stone stairway, followed by Lycon, who was gulping mead from a horn as he came. The staircase was a long one, for King Phrygior slept in a high tower that rose above the gray stone battlements of the castle. And the sound of furious battle came to Elak and made him whip out his rapier, snarling a bitter oath.

  “Curse Lokar for a traitor!” he whispered, blade ready as he bounded up. Behind him the drinking-horn dropped from Lycon’s hand and went clashing and ringing down; but the noise it made could not be heard above the tumult in the king’s apartments. Elak gained the anteroom and stood for a moment staring.

  At his side and below him the deep well of the tower dropped down, bounded by the winding staircase. Yet, somehow, it seemed to Elak that as he stared into the room a dozen feet away he was looking into the abyss of a pit even deeper—a bottomless well that stretched beyond infinity. A blackness lay beyond the threshold, almost tangible in its tenebrous intensity. It was as though a jet curtain had been stretched across the doorway, barring entry.

  Yet from beyond came the sound of battle, and abruptly the king’s voice in a shout of agony.

  Impulse rather than reason sent Elak forward, plunging across the threshold, breaking through the dark veil. For a brief instant the chill of polar lands clawed at his flesh, and he was blind. Then Elak was in the midst of a shambles, his sight restored, and as he saw from the corner of his eye the black curtain behind him had disappeared completely.

  * * *

  The room was a wreck. Priceless tapestries had been torn down and lay in sword-ripped tatters, smeared with blood. Not a piece of furniture was upright. Above the familiar smell of incense rose the acrid odor of sweat and blood, and at Elak’s feet a man lay with his throat torn open, rags of cartilage protruding from the ghastly wound. A dozen corpses were here—few men survived. One of these was Lokar, captain of the guard, who was just swinging his sword down in a stroke that would have decapitated Phrygior, who was clawing at an overturned table in a desperate endeavor to regain his feet.

  Elak moved with lightning speed. His rapier, sword-arm and body formed one incredibly swift thrust of movement, and Lokar shouted and let go his sword, which clashed harshly on the stones as it fell. The giant soldier whirled, clutching an impaled wrist from which red spurted. He saw Elak, and bellowed wordless rage.

  Ignoring his wounded arm, Lokar sprang for Elak. And Elak made a motion of giving ground, his rapier hanging loose. At the last moment the adventurer leaned forward, bracing one foot on the flagging, and whipped around the rapier-point with flashing, deadly speed. Lokar saw the danger too late. The slender blade ground into his eye, burst through the thin shell of bone, and sheathed itself in the man’s brain.

  “Look out—’ware, Elak!” Lycon shouted from the doorway. Elak swung about, teeth bared. One living enemy faced him—an unarmed man. Yet, inexplicably, Elak felt an icy shudder crawl down his spine at sight of this man—Xandar the priest.

  He was a hunchback—yet no dwarf. His body, though warped and twisted hideously, was gigantic, and great muscles surged beneath the swarthy skin. Above the flattened, hairless head rose the hump, its horror strangely enhanced by the rich gold cloth that draped it. One side of the creature’s face was a mangled, featureless slab of scar tissue, remnant of some long-past battle. The red lips, singularly shapely on the left side, widened into a shocking lipless hole on the other.

  The monster roared, “Ho, you fool! Back! Swiftly!”

  “I serve the king, not you, gargoyle,” Elak grunted, and lifted his weapon. At his feet Phrygior stirred, his white beard all slobbered and bespattered with blood. And now Elak saw a dagger’s hilt embedded in the king’s bare breast, center of a widening crimson stain.

  Again the priest bellowed, “Back! Back!”

  And Elak, moving forward on cat-like feet, hesitated. An indefinable warning tingled within his brain. He paused, staring at Xandar.

  Was it illusion? The monster’s warped body seemed to be growing larger, impossibly increasing in bulk till it seemed to tower within the room. Elak shook his head, cursing. What madness was this? He tried to peer at Xandar, and found himself blinking through a dark, hazy mist that slowly grew thicker. Wavering in the dimness stood the shapeless pillar that was Xandar, now shrinking, now swelling to Elak’s warped vision. Whence the fog had sprung he did not know, but the subtle evil of it t
ore at the fortress of his mind with warning fingers. There was danger here—deadly danger. Strong in his nostrils was a sickly-sweet smell, musky, somehow reminiscent of the odor of growing things—but not things that grew in any healthy manner. Rather the disgusting miasma of life that sprang from foul corruption, fungi and lichen bursting from spores and feeding on rotten carcasses. . . .

  He heard Lycon’s hoarse breathing behind him, and the sound brought back his courage. Xandar was a vague shadow—but at that shadow Elak lunged, rapier leveled. He felt himself smothered suddenly by a blacker darkness, and found his breath stopped by the horrible, miasmic stench. Then there was the familiar feeling of flesh ripping under his steel, the grinding jar of metal clashing on bone, rippling up the rapier to his hand. From the priest burst a bellow of agony.

  And the shout changed to words—a frantic cry in syllables Elak did not recognize, though their unearthly sound made him wonder. Grinning harshly, he once more sent steel arrowing through the shadow—vainly, this time.

  And the darkness lifted, faded as though a veil had been withdrawn. Elak stood staring in the center of the room, gasping with amazement. He whirled.

  “Lycon! Did he get past you?”

  The little man shook his head, glancing at his heavy sword. “Ishtar, no! I’d have split him from pate to groin——”

  “There must be a hidden passage in the wall,” Elak said, and dropped beside the king. Phrygior’s bearded lips parted to swallow the wine Elak forced between them. Eyes cold as gray stone looked into the adventurer’s—and a blazing spark leaped into them.

  “The priest! Kill him!”

  “He’s gone,” Elak said. “The others—”

  * * *

  Phrygior looked down, touched with weak fingers the dagger-hilt in his breast. He said hoarsely, “Leave it. To unsheathe it now would kill me in a moment. First I must——” He fumbled toward the wine-flask. “Esarra—my daughter—summon her.”

  Elak made a quick gesture. “Get the princess, Lycon. I’ll guard the king.”

  “No need—now. Xandar has—accomplished his design.” Elak held the flask to Phrygior’s lips while the dying man drank deeply, and soon, strengthened, he began again.

  “The priest has plotted against me for long, Elak. Some of his dogs were in my guard, and tonight they killed the ones who remained faithful. He has long desired the throne—and Esarra. But he dared not defy the Phœnix—the god of Sarhaddon’s kings. Thus he sought aid—more wine, Elak. My blood drains fast. . . .

  “So. Baal-Yagoth—you know not the name. Few remember, yet ages and ages ago when the gods dwelt on earth, Baal-Yagoth was the power of evil, the embodiment of dark lust. He sought to establish his dominion over the world, but in a great battle Assurah, the Phœnix, overthrew him, imprisoned him in the land of the gods . . . and now Assurah sleeps, and Xandar has called Baal-Yagoth out of the dark lands to rule Sarhaddon. Only a man crazed with venom and hatred would have dared, for the black god can have no power on earth till a human willingly opens up his soul and brain for Baal-Yagoth’s dwelling-place. Within Xandar dwells his god.”

  Now Elak remembered what had happened when he had attacked the priest.

  The king drank more wine. “My strength goes fast. Unless Esarra arrives speedily——” He stiffened in a spasm of agony. “Elak! I cannot wait! Your arm——”

  Elak extended his hand, and Phrygior seized it. From his own wrist he took a bracelet of black stone, on which were carved symbols Elak did not recognize. But on the largest lozenge was the outline of a phœnix, eagle-shaped, rubies and gold aping the mythical bird’s coloring. Swiftly the king snapped the bracelet on Elak’s sinewy arm. It felt curiously cold.

  Phrygior touched the phœnix with grotesque, archaic gestures. He murmured a phrase—and his grim face, already shadowed with death, lightened. “Only the Phœnix may unloose the sacred bracelet from your wrist now,” he said quietly. “You must go to Assurah—beyond the Gates of the Phœnix. Listen well, Elak, for my strength ebbs.

  “At the foot of this tower a tapestry is on the wall, with a dragon battling a basilisk. Touch the basilisk’s eyes thrice. Once press the dragon’s eyes. A door will open, and you must go through it with your companion, taking Esarra so she will not fall into Xandar’s hands. A barge has long waited at the end of the passage you’ll find—waited for my corpse. I would have you—take me with you. Esarra will guide you. She is of the Phœnix blood——”

  Quite suddenly the indomitable will that had kept Phrygior alive failed. He gave a convulsive shudder, arching his back in agony, while froth bubbled on the white beard. Then he fell back and so died, scarcely an instant before Esarra and Lycon crossed the threshold.

  The girl flew to her father’s side, while Elak arose, eyeing Lycon’s reddened sword. The small adventurer nodded briefly.

  “More of Xandar’s dogs. I killed ’em. The girl helped, too—her dagger drew blood as often as my sword. What now?”

  There was little time to explain. A few words told Esarra how matters stood, and she hastened down the stairway, while Elak followed, bearing the corpse of the king. After him Lycon descended warily.

  * * *

  The tower’s floor seemed deserted, though from not far away came the clash of ringing steel and the shouts of men. The great tapestry stretched across one wall. Elak saw that the eyes of the basilisk and the dragon were gems, and he pressed these as Phrygior had commanded. With scarcely a sound one of the stone flags lifted, revealing a staircase leading down to blackness.

  Lycon snatched a flambeau from its socket and led the way, while Elak, after a futile attempt to close the secret trapdoor, followed the girl. He eyed her curiously as her profile was from time to time outlined against the torchlight. A beauty, he thought. The regal cast of her face was softened by its warm humanity, and brown curls clung damply to her pale forehead. The slender, delicate curves of her body were scarcely hidden by the silken night-dress, ripped in more than one place so that ivory flesh shone through.

  Behind him Elak heard the pound of footsteps; he called a warning, and the three hastened their pace. The stairs gave way to a corridor, stone-walled and dank, and this in turn opened into a low-roofed, broad chamber. A narrow ledge ran around its base; below the ledge was water, blackly ominous. A barge floated in the huge pool.

  Elak had but a glimpse of dark silks and velvets, a jewel-studded canopy that was a fitting covering for a king’s corpse. He leaped aboard the barge, put down his burden, and whirled, rapier out. A hasty glance around showed that the cavern had but one other opening—metal gates, corroded and green with verdigris, that descended from the roof to below the water’s surface. Then from the tunnel-mouth burst the pursuers—Xandar’s men, swords red, baying like hounds as they ran.

  “Lycon! To me!” Elak shouted, but the little man did not answer. The tall adventurer bounded back to the ledge, spitting the foremost attacker through the throat, and deftly wrenching the rapier free as the man fell to splash into the water. He caught sight of Lycon and Esarra working desperately at a great bar of metal—a lever—that hung from the roof. Then Elak forgot all else in a red blaze of battle.

  Three men he slew, and was himself wounded in the shoulder, while a flung blade missed his jugular by an inch and sliced his cheek. There was a grinding roar of hidden machinery, and Elak heard a frantic shout from Lycon. He turned to see the barge plunging away on the breast of a descending torrent.

  Ignoring the men who were now pressing in to the kill, Elak leaped. A spear screamed past his head as he jumped, and he saw it thud into the barge’s side. Ironically, that weapon saved him. He fell short, and his clutching fingers found the haft of the spear. For a second it held, and then Lycon’s hands were on his wrists, tugging him to safety.

  Above the barge rose the gaunt gray stones of the castle. Already the swift current had carried the craft beyond the door, and the three were safe from pursuit. It was, however, impossible to land, for there were neither poles nor
oars. They drifted into a steadily deepening gorge, with the roar of the Syra rising into a thundering madness in their ears.

  2. The Opening of the Gates

  No growth of moor or coppice,

    No heather-flower or vine,

  But bloomless buds of poppies,

    Green grapes of Proserpine,

  Pale beds of blowing rushes,

  Where no leaf blooms or blushes

  Save this whereout she crushes

    For dead men deadly wine.

  —Swinburne.

  The river raced into the heart of the mountains that surrounded Sarhaddon, till the blue sky was a brilliant narrow path above, jaggedly outlined by the towering scarps. The three on the barge could do nothing; it was impossible to talk below a shout. Nevertheless Elak explained to his companions what had happened.

  “Ishtar!” Lycon screamed above the torrent’s roar. “I never trusted that devil Xandar! Did you kill him, do you think?”

  Elak shook his head. “Got his arm, I think. That’s all.” Reminded of his own arm, he began to dress it, while Esarra went to stand in the barge’s prow, peering ahead into the mists beneath a pale, shading hand. It was her cry that brought the others.

  “The Gates! The Phœnix Gates!”

  Slowly they came into view through the clouds of spray, swimming into half-vividness and then fading again into fog, but growing ever closer—gates that towered up from the torrent, up and up for a hundred feet, constructed of metal that had never been stained or corroded by the unceasing drive of the water. Silvery-white they were, shot with pale bluish gleams. On their center was a Phœnix, huge as three men’s height, red as the fiery heart of a ruby, yellow as the golden rivers that wash Cathay. Crest proudly raised, the stupendous effigy seemed to stare down upon Syra River—at the three on the barge. And the current drove the craft remorselessly toward the gates.