'Very true,' I said. I glanced at the hideous old 'huntsman's clock' over the mantel and asked him if he would excuse me. It was time I turned in.
Gaynor began to try to charm his way out of what he now understood to be an insult, but his remark about me was no more offensive than most of his and Klosterheim's conversation. There was a certain coarseness about him I hadn't noticed in the past. No doubt he had the scent of his new pack on him. It was how he intended to survive.
'But we still have business,' said Klosterheim.
Gaynor turned towards the fire.
'Business? You're here on business?' I pretended to be surprised.
Gaynor said quietly, not turning to look at me, 'Berlin made a decision. About these special German relics.'
'Berlin? Do you mean Hitler and Co.?'
'They are fascinated by such things, cousin.'
'They are symbols of our old German power,' said Klosterheim brusquely. 'They represent what so many German aristocrats have lost-the vital blood of a brave and warlike people.'
'And why would you want to take my sword from me?'
'For safekeeping, cousin.' Gaynor stepped forward before Klosterheim could reply. 'So that it's not stolen by Bolsheviks, for instance. Or otherwise harmed. A state treasure, as I'm sure you will agree. Your name will be credited of course, in any exhibition. And there would be some financial recompense, I'm sure.'
'I know nothing of the so-called Grail. But what would happen if I refused to give up the sword?'
'It would make you, of course, an enemy of the state.' Gaynor had the decency to glance down at his well- polished boots. 'And therefore an enemy of the Nazi Party and all it stands for.'
'An enemy of the Nazi Party?' I spoke thoughtfully. 'Only a fool would antagonize Hitler and expect to survive, eh?'
'Very true, cousin.'
'Well,' I said, as I left the room, 'the Beks have rarely been fools. I'd better sleep on the problem.'
'I'm sure your dreams will be inspired,' said Gaynor rather cryptically.
But Klosterheim was more direct. 'We have put sentimentality behind us in modern Germany and are making our own traditions, Herr Count. That sword is no more yours than it is mine. The sword is Germany's, a symbol of our ancient power and valor. Of our blood. You cannot betray your blood.'
I looked at the inbred mountaineer and the Slavic Aryan before me. I looked at my own bone-white hand, the pale nails and faintly darker veins. 'Our blood? My blood. Who invented the myth of blood?'
'Myths are simply old truths disguised as stories,' said Klosterheim. 'That is the secret of Wagner's success.'
'It can't be his music. Swords, bowls and tormented souls. Did you say the sword was one of a pair? Does the owner of the sister sword seek to own the set?'
Gaynor spoke from behind Klosterheim.
'The other sword, cousin, when last heard of, was in Jerusalem.'
I suppose I could not help smiling as I made my way to bed, yet that sense of foreboding soon returned and by the time I put my head on my pillow I was already wondering how I could save my sword and myself from Hitler. Then, in a strange hypnagogic moment between waking and sleeping, I heard a voice say: 'Naturally I accept paradox. Paradox is the stuff of the multiverse. The essence of humanity. We are sustained by paradox.' It sounded like my own voice. Yet it carried an authority, a confidence and a power I had never known.
I thought at first someone was in the room, but then I had fallen back into slumber and found my nostrils suddenly filled with a remarkable stink. It was pungent, almost tangible, but not unpleasant. Acrid, dry. The smell of snakes, perhaps? Or lizards? Massive lizards. Creatures which flew as a squadron under the control of mortals and rained fiery venom down upon their enemies. An enemy that was not bound by any rules save to win at all costs, by whatever it chose to do and be.
Deep blue patterns like gigantic butterfly wings. It was a dream of flying, but unlike any I had heard of. I was seated in a great black saddle which appeared to have been carved from a single piece of ebony yet which fitted my body perfectly and from which radiated a kind of membrane blending with the living creature. I leaned forward to place my hand on a scaly skin that was hot to the touch, suggesting an alien metabolism, and something reared up in front of me, all rustle and clatter and jingling of harness, casting a vast shadow. The monstrous head of what I first took to be a dinosaur and then realized was a dragon, absolutely dwarfing me, its mouth carrying a bit of intricately decorated gold whose tasseled decorations were as long as my body and which threatened to sweep against me when the head turned and a vast, glowing yellow eye regarded me with an intelligence that was inconceivably ancient, drawing on experience of worlds which had never known mankind. And yet, was I foolish to read affection there?
Emerald green. The subtle language of color and gesture.
Flamefang.
Was it my voice which spoke that name?
That vibrant stink filled my lungs. There was a hint of smoke wreathing the beast's huge nostrils and something like acid boiled between its long teeth. This beast's metabolism was extraordinary. Even as I dreamed I recalled stories of spontaneous combustion and would not have been surprised if my steed had suddenly burst into flames beneath the saddle. There was a sensual movement of huge bones and muscles and sinews, of scraping scales, a booming rush as the dragon's wings beat against gravity and all the laws of common sense and then, with another thrust which thrilled my whole body, we were airborne. The world fell away. It seemed so natural to fly. Another thrust and we had reached the clouds. It felt strangely familiar to be riding on the back of a monster, yet guiding her with all the gentle fluid ease of a Viennese riding master. A gentle touch above the ear with the staff, a fingertip movement of the reins.
While my left hand held the traditional dragon goad, the other gripped Ravenbrand, pulsing with a horrible darkness and perpetually running with blood, the runes in her blade glowing a brilliant scarlet. And I heard that voice again. My own voice.
Arioch! Arioch! Blood and souls for my Lord Arioch!
Such barbaric splendor, such splendid savagery, such ancient, sophisticated knowledge. But all offering a vocabulary of image, word and idea utterly alien to the Enlightenment humanist that was Ulric von Bek. Here were ideals of courage and battle prowess which whispered in my ear like enticing obscenities, thoroughly at odds with my training and traditions. Cruel, unthinkable ideas taken for granted. Here was a power greater than any modern human being could ever know. The power to transform reality.
The power of sorcery in a war fought without machines, yet more terrifying, more all-encompassing than the Great War which had recently passed.
Arioch! Arioch!
I could not know who Arioch was, but something in my bones conjured a strong sense of subtle, alluring evil, an evil so sophisticated it could even believe itself to be virtuous. This was some of the scent I had smelled on Gaynor and Klosterheim, but nothing like the wholesome beast stink of my dragon, her massive, sinuous multicolored wings beating a leisurely course across the sky. Her scales clashed faintly and her spiky crests folded back against her spine. My modern eye marveled at these natural aerodynamics which enabled such a creature to exist. Her heat was almost uncomfortable and every so often a droplet of venom would form on her lips and flash to earth, burning stone, trees, even setting water ablaze for a short while. What strange twist of fate had made us allies? Allies we were. Bonded in the same way that ordinary men are bonded to ordinary animals, almost telepathic, a deep empathetic heartbeat that made our blood one, our souls' fates united. When at the dawn of time had we come together to form this complementary union?
Now man and beast climbed higher and higher into the chilly upper air, steam wafting from the dragon's head and body, her tail and wings growing faintly sluggish as we reached our maximum altitude and looked down on a world laid out like a map. I felt an indescribable mixture of horror and ecstasy. This was how I imagined the dreams of opium or hashish eaters. Without end. Without meaning. A burning world. A martial world. A world which could have been my own, my twentieth-century world, but which I knew was not. Armies and flags. Armies and flags. And in their wake, the piled corpses of innocents. In the name of whom the flags are raised and the armies sent to war. To fight to the death to defend the virtues of the dead.
