Fantasy fiction; Imaginary wars and battles -- Fiction
Corund stood beneath the walls with his folk about him. “I have
matter of import,” he cried, “and ’tis needful it be heard both by
the highest and the lowest amongst you. Ere I begin, summon them all
to this part of the walls: a look-out is enow to shield you of the
other parts from any sudden onslaught, which besides I swear to you is
clean without my purpose.” So when they were thick on the wall above
him, he began to say, “Soldiers of Demonland, against you had I never
quarrel. Behold how in this Impland I have made freedom flourish as a
flower. I have strook off the heads of Philpritz Faz, and Illarosh,
and Lurmesh, and Gandassa, and Fax Fay Faz, that were the lords and
governors here aforetime, abounding in all the bloody and crying sins,
oppression, gluttony, idleness, cruelty, and extortion. And of my
clemency I delivered all their possessions unto their subjects to hold
and order after their own will alone, who before did put on patience
and endured with much heart-burning the tyranny of these Fazes, until
by me they found a remedy for their more freedom. In like manner, not
against you do I war, O men of Demonland; but against the tyrants that
enforced you for their private gain to suffer hardship and death in
this remote country: namely, against Juss and Spitfire that came hither
in quest of their cursed brother whom the might of the great King hath
happily removed. And against Brandoch Daha am I come, of insolence
untamed, who liveth a chambering idle life eating and drinking and
exercising tyranny, while the pleasant lands of Krothering and Failze
and Stropardon, and the dwellers in the isles, Sorbey, Morvey, Strufey,
Dalney, and Kenarvey, and they of Westmark and all the western parts
of Demonland groan and wax lean to feed his luxury. To your hurt only
have these three led you, as cattle to the slaughter. Deliver them to
me, that I may chastise them, and I, that am great viceroy of Impland,
will make you free and grant you lordships: a lordship for every man of
you in this my realm of Impland.”
While Corund spake, the Lord Brandoch Daha went among the soldiers
bidding them hold their peace and not murmur against Corund. But those
that were most hot for action he sent about an errand preparing what he
had in mind. So that when the Lord Corund ceased from his declaiming,
all was ready to hand, and with one voice the soldiers of Lord Juss
that stood upon the wall cried out and said, “This is thy word, O
Corund, and this our answer,” and therewith flung down upon him from
pots and buckets and every kind of vessel a deluge of slops and offal
and all filth that came to hand. A bucketful took Corund in the mouth,
befouling all his great beard, so that he gave back spitting. And he
and his, standing close beneath the wall, and little expecting so
sudden and ill an answer, fared shamefully, being all well soused and
bemerded with filth and lye.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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