Andrew Offutt - The Sign of the Moonbow

“But… where,” Brian wanted to know, “is here? ”

“A plane of existence where at least one island does not exist,” the woman said, idly fingering the dark-bordered hem of the tunic made for her in Daneira; it was an almost yellow green. “Remember the isle that was suddenly not there and thereby told Bas we had been dragged here by Thulsa Doom, in his attempts to escape us.” She looked with malice on the undying mage. He sat moveless, an unwilling but helpless slave of the Chains of Danu; a slave of Cormac mac Art.

“A place where a Norseman named Thorleif, son of Hordi, once slew Wulfhere,” Cormac said.

“Hmp! That I refuse to believe! I could slay such as Thorleif all day and still have time for Daneiran maidens the whole night through!”

“They are so far astern now that not even their isle is in view,” Brian said from the tiller, where he was nervously, proudly in training-so long as the sea remained gentle. Nor was his statement made without some small wistfulness. He stared asea, his hair like a cloud about his head and his flaxen eyebrows all but invisible in the sunlight.

“An it be true what Thorleif avowed,” Bas said, “rejoice, Wulfhere. For else it’s two of ye there’d be in this plane-which is now our abode for good or ill!”

“Blood of the gods! Bas-think ye I be here-I mean… that there be two of me here?”

“Ha! An intolerable world then, two of ye, son of an Eirrish raiser of pigs!”

“Wulfhere old friend and drinker with Britons, much as hate’s upon me to tell ye of it and spoil your insults, my father was after being of the descendants of High-king Niall the Great, one of the ua-Neill of Connacht. It was no pigs my father raised. Nor in truth was he a farmer at all.”

“Nonsense, by Thor’s red beard! All the Eirrish raise pigs! Why, pork is surely the national dish and pigs’ bladders the only toy of the young!”

Samaire’s voice came in weary practicality, a whisper that forced them to fall silent in order to hear. “Truly there might be… another Samaire here, and another Cormac, and Brian, and you too, Bas?”

“Aye-but, Behl be praised, only one Thulsa Doom!”

“And only one Wulfhere,” Cormac said, “Behl be thanked nigh equally, if Thorleif did indeed kill you-him. Who could abide two of ye, with your ever-itchy beard and your babbling?”

“Ye look thirsty, Wolf of Eirrin. Could I be aiding ye into the water that ye might quench your pigfarmer’s thirst? Simple matter to hold ye by your heels-”

Samaire slapped her high-booted leg. “An ye two put not an end to your constant childness, it’s a mother ye’ll make me feel yet, the hapless dam of two bickersome boys!”

Wulfhere contritely ducked his head-in the manner, indeed, of a chastened boy. Cormac seemed not to notice her words. He’d gone all thoughtful, and gazed contemplatively at the skull-faced abomination sitting with back to mast. The Gael fingered the Moonbow on his chest.

“Thulsa Doom! It is my bidding ye obey, and naught else.

“Aye.” There was only resignation in that word from lipless mouth.

“I want information of ye, monster!”

The red points in the eyesockets of Thulsa Doom’s death’s-head stared at Cormac mac Art. But they were without their usual fire of malice, for Thulsa Doom’s mind was no longer his own.

“Ye’ll provide information, an I demand it.”

The mage’s voice bore no semblance of happiness, though his hissing malevolence was also missing. “Aye. I will tell you what I can.”

“Be there escape from this dimension of yours, a way back to-our own world?”

“I am trapped here. You are as well, as you came through with me though totally by accident. We cannot return.”

That felt like a blow to the stomach, and Cormac heard gasps from the others. He tried, hopefully but with his voice bordering on the desultory. “And if we order ye to return us, blackheart?”

“I cannot. The slip-through, the ‘gateway’ I have so long used is destroyed. Never have I been so sorely held fast as ye held me, with swords, and with that man of Behl striving with his powers. I strove more mightily than ever I have before. Thus by accident I tore the slip-through, and brought through all with me-even these ships. And thus destroyed the link between this dimension and that other. I know. I strove to go back there , with you here. I could not; no means exists.” The mage broke off and stared straight ahead.

“More,” Samaire urged.

“Thulsa Doom!” the Gael snapped. “Heard ye not Samaire?”

This time the wizard’s words emerged bitterly, defiantly. “She does not wear the chain linked in the Beyond to this one!”

“ I do. Speak. Add to what ye’ve said.”

“You cannot return,” Thulsa Doom said at once, “because I cannot. Nor could I guarantee it if your coming through had not destroyed the means of transference, for it was all by accident and my desperate striving to break the hold of swords and the druid. Be assured that I brought you not here by design, Cormac mac Art who was my greatest enemy!”

Cormac’s half-smile was grim. “For once, monster, I’m believing ye. Well then, we must make the most of it. This dimension does differ from ours?”

“Aye. It is the same, but some things have not happened here. Others have happened here that have not, will not in the other plane that was your home. There is a, a fork, a branching, in history. Both nature’s forces and sorcery had do with that branching, long ago. Now there are two worlds, lying parallel and each invisible to the other. This one became my escape… for here I did not survive death, so long ago. Most things are the same. That would not have remained so, for-” the sorcerer broke off.

“For what , mage? Answer!”

“-for I would have taken possession of this world, and ruled it,” Thulsa Doom said. “From Rome.”

“Rome!” Brian echoed.

“Aye.”

“In this world… Rome fell not? Rome still rules… even Britain?”

“No no. All those things-are the same; all major matters are the same. No-it was my plan, my hope, to rid your world of yourself, and this one-and then to rule this plane. Rome would be the best capital-for I would have replaced the leader of those who called themselves first ‘Friends’ and now are known as ‘Christians.’ Their chief priest or bishop is in Rome-from there he seeks to rule, but of course does not. I will-would have done. The Pope whose image I would wear would never die, would rule forever, and soon all would believe in his faith and his claim of direct descent from him chosen by their god.”

“A lovely plan,” Cormac mac Art said quietly. “An undying dead man… ruling a world devoted to the Dead God, Iosa Chriost!”

“That island that was there but not here,” Brian said apprehensively, for he was more interested in the immediate and the personal than the inconceivable: unending world rule. “It is now… here? It is gone?”

Into the silence, Cormac said, “Answer questions from us all.”

“It is not here,” Thulsa Doom said. “It was never here.”

“Nev-oh gods! Eirrin… be it here? ”

“Aye. Eirrin exists. Britain exists. Norge and Dane-land exist. Rome left the shores of Britain some eighty years ago. Al-ric, king of the Visigoths, took and sacked Rome in the four-hundred and tenth year of the era of the Christians. It is the same. The August date was the same. Eirrin’s kingdoms are the same.”

All eyes aboard Quester were fixed on the mage now, all ears drinking in his dull-voiced reluctant replies as if they were ale and all were dying of thirst. The sea rippled alongside the ship, and gurgled in its wake.