Anderson, Poul - Broken Sword

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THE BROKEN SWORD

Poul Anderson

The author of this extraordinarily imaginative fantasy novel, Poul Anderson, is a tall,

curly-headed, owlishly bespectacled and very youthful-looking man in his middle forties.

Anderson was born in 1926 in Bristol, Pennsylvania, of Danish parentage, which

explains his unusual first name. Poul himself pronounces it to sound about halfway

between "pole" and "powl"-but I have never met anyone except Poul himself who can

quite pronounce it.

His father was an engineer, and as engineers go wherever they are needed, Poul was

raised literally all over the place: in Bristol first, then in Port Arthur, Texas, as well as in

Washington, D.C., Copenhagen, Denmark, and on a farm in Minnesota. He now lives in

Orinda, California, with his wife, Karen and their teenage daughter, Astrid.

Anderson began writing while he was a student at the University of Minnesota, and

he sold his first stories while still an undergraduate. This early success may have

suggested that instead of becoming a scientist he was actually meant to be one of those

very rare people, a born writer. Anyway, as Poul himself tells the story:

"At the University of Minnesota, I majored in physics, graduating with honors in

1948. But apart from a little assisting here and there, I have not worked in the field. What

happened was that writing, which had been a hobby for a long time, began to pay off

while I was in college with some sales to Astounding Science Fiction. I decided to take a

year off, living by the typewriter ... "

That "year off" has been going on now for twenty-two years; for, although he

returned to college to follow up his B.S. in physics with some graduate work in

mathematics and philosophy, Poul Anderson has been a writer first, last, and (let's hope)

always.

His first book, an admirable science fiction novel titled Brain Wave, was published

by Ballantine Books in May, 1954. It's a measure of the high esteem his friends in the

science fiction world hold for Poul Anderson and his books that only five years after this

first book was published, Anderson was hailed as Guest of Honour at the fifth World

Science Fiction Convention, held at Detroit in 1959.

To a very large degree, most of Andersen's work has been in science fiction. In the

last sixteen years he has published something like thirty-eight books in the field, by my

count. He has won recognition for his swashbuckling and imaginative novels-such as The

High Crusade (favourably reviewed for the Book-of-the-Month Club)-and for his

intelligent and carefully-plotted short stories, three of which have won him Hugo Awards

as the best story of the year.

But Anderson refuses to be typed as "a science fiction writer." He has turned to other

fields and won considerable respect in them. In historical fiction, an area rather neglected

in recent years, Anderson has published two adventure novels-The Golden Slave and

Rogue Sword-and has written a third, a vast epic of heroic action in the age of the

Vikings, which has yet to find a publisher.

He has also written children's books (such as The Fox, the Dog, and the Griffin,

retold from an old Danish fairy tale), and book-length nonfiction (for example, Is There

Life on Other Worlds?). He is also the author of three mystery novels: Murder in Black

Letter, Murder Bound, and Perish by the Sword, which won him Macmillan's first annual

Cock Robin Award in 1959,

But, even taking all his versatility into account, I believe it honestly could be said

that Poul Anderson's real love is the romantic adventure fantasy laid in the ancient world.

He is one of the early members of the Hyborian Legion, a loosely organized but devout

club of enthusiasts of the famous Conan stories of the late Robert E. Howard; Anderson's

translations of saga verse from the Old Norse have appeared in the Legion's fascinating

magazine, Amra, almost from its founding.

He also belongs to one of the smallest and most exclusive writer's clubs on earth

today-S.A.G.A., otherwise known as The Swordsmen and Sorcerers' Guild of America,

Ltd.-whose membership is strictly limited to the authors of the Sword and Sorcery genre

of fantasy. (So exclusive is S.A.G.A., by the way, that it has only eight members: Poul

Anderson, Lin Carter, L. Sprague de Camp, John Jakes, Fritz Leiber, Michael Moorcock,

Andre Norton, and Jack Vance).

Anderson, his wife and daughter also belong to a most unusual organization called

The Society for Creative Anachronism, Inc., a rather enormous group of people interested

in Medievalism who regularly hold tournaments and revels in antique costume. The

Society began first on the West Coast, but interest has since spread all across the country.

The original group organized "The Kingdom of the West," and has since issued charters

to a group of interested co-Medievalists in the New York/New Jersey area (known as

"The East Kingdom"); and a new kingdom, called most appropriately "The Middle

Kingdom" has since begun functioning in the Midwest, centering around Chicago.

These tournaments, by the way, are serious and very beautiful. Of course, the

contestants do not fight with weapons of edged steel, but their wooden weapons are

strong, heavy and most carefully made, and can lay the unwary or unskilled flat-and very

often do; therefore, those who wish to fight in a Society tourney must sign a waiver of

liabilities in case of injury. While Society members may adopt various titles of nobility

(within certain limits) knighthood itself must be earned in combat on the field of honour.

And in the Kingdom of the West, Poul Anderson is known as Sir Bdla of Eastmarch.

Members may also register coats-of-arms with Society heralds: Sir Bela, for instance,

bears the arms azure, two suns or in pale, with saltier argent.

Despite his deep and sincere enthusiasm for the genre, Poul Anderson has not written

very extensively in the adult fantasy field. This is probably due to the fact that magazine

editors and publishing houses have come to think of him by now as primarily a science

fiction writer, as much as it is due to the even more unfortunate fact that until very, very

recently there was little chance if any of getting an original fantasy novel into print in this

country. The astounding success of Professor Tolkien's The Lard of the Rings, and the

more recent establishment of Ballantine's Adult Fantasy Series may correct this long-

standing prejudice against the genre.

But Anderson has produced two brilliant, delightfully swashbuckling fantasy novels-

the earliest being the book you presently hold in your hands. The Broken Sword was first

published in 1954, the same year as Andersen's first science fiction novel, Brain Wave.

His only other book-length venture into the imaginary world of fantasy-an excellent

novel called Three Hearts and Three Lions-was serialized in The Magazine of Fantasy

and Science Fiction in 1953; issued in hardcover form by Doubleday in 1961; and done

in paperback by Avon Books in the same year. It has recently been reprinted, and thus it

is readily available in one or another of these editions.

The Broken Sword, however, is obscure-all but unknown. It was published at the

very beginning of Anderson's career by a rather small publishing house, Abelard-

Schuman. In the sixteen years since that small printing first appeared, it has never been

republished; and until now it has somehow persistently been overlooked by the paperback

editors. But novels as superlatively imaginative and entertaining as The Broken Sword

have a way of lingering in the minds of their readers. I have been unable to get the

fabulous world of Val-gard and Skafloc out of my mind since I first read this book; and I

have been trying to bring the novel to the attention of publishers for years. I feel very

happy that, in my capacity as Editorial Consultant to Ballantine's Adult Fantasy Series, I

am at last able to make myself heard with some authority. Poul. Anderson has rewritten

and revised The Broken Sword for this first paperback edition. It's difficult to improve a

book as good as this one, but he has learned quite a lot about the art of writing in the last

sixteen years, and his repolishing has added new luster to one of the best fantasies of

recent decades.

Incidentally, readers of Professor Tolkien will be amused and possibly even startled

to discover in these pages a couple of their old friends from Middle-earth, the dwarves

Durin-Anderson calls him "Dyrin"-and Dvalin. I hasten to reassure you that this does not

imply that Anderson has "borrowed" from the Tolkien trilogy. That would be an

impossibility in fact-unless Poul Anderson had access to a time machine-for when

Anderson wrote The Broken Sword, the first volume of Lord of the Rings had yet to be

printed, even in Great Britain. Indeed, The Broken Sword appeared in print almost

simultaneously with that first volume, for The Fellowship of the Ring was published in

Great Britain by George Alien and Unwin in 1954.

The explanation is simply that Anderson, being of Scandinavian ancestry and well-

read in languages like Old Norse, drew upon many of the same sources that Tolkien

himself used-such as the Icelandic sagas. As for Durin and Dvalin, Anderson probably

got them from the same place Tolkien did, the famous "Catalogue of Dwarves" in the

first book of The Elder Edda (Voluspo, stanzas 10-15, et seq.). At any rate, you will find

in this novel many of the same imaginative elements that appear in The Lord of the

Rings: trolls, dwarves, elves, dragons, and the "broken sword" itself, an old literary motif

Tolkien revived in his handling of Aragorn's great sword, Anduril.

Poul Anderson can thus be seen as one of that great Fellowship of fantasy writers

whose imaginations have been thrilled and excited by "The Northern Thing": a

Fellowship which includes William Morris, E. R. Eddison, Fletcher Pratt, C. S. Lewis,

and Tolkien himself.

As you will see once you have read this novel, Poul Anderson is very much at home

in even so splendid a company.

-Lin Carter, Editorial Consultant:

The Ballantine Adult Fantasy Series

Hollis, Long Island, New York

FOREWORD

Late in the year of Our Lord 1018, Sighvat Thordarson fared through Gotaland on an

errand for King Olaf of Norway. Most folk thereabouts still worshipped in the old way.

The wife at one lonely steading would not let him and his friends spend the night because

an Aljarblot was being readied. Any well-brought-up man in those days could make a

stave at any time; and Sighvat was a skald. Quoth he:

"That Odin be not angered, keep off!" the woman said. "We're heathen here and

holding a holy eve, you wretch!" The carline who unchristianly cast me from this garth

gave out that they would offer at evening to the elves.

So the tale goes in Snorri Sturlason's Heimskringla. Elsewhere we read that the

dragon heads were removed from warships when they neared home, lest the elves take

offence. In such ways we see these beings for what they were in the beginning: gods.

Of course, by the time men in the North started writing books, the elves had

dwindled to mere tutelaries, like the Greek dryads or the kami of some river in Japan. The

Eddas put various of them in Asgard as attendants of the Aisir. But the word is used for

two different races, who hold two of the Nine Worlds. Alfheim belongs to the tall, fair

"light elves." Though we are not altogether sure of it, most likely Svartalfheim, whose

name means "home of the dark elves," is where the dwarfs live. It is interesting to note

how much more important the latter are in what stories have come down to us.

Later folklore diminished the elves further, making them nothing but sprites,

shrinking their very size, and forgetting their kinship with the still potent dwarfs.

Nevertheless a ghost of Alfheim haunted the Middle Ages and Renaissance-the realm of

Faerie, whose inhabitants were of human stature but unearthly in their loveliness and

magical skills.

In our day, J. R. R. Tolkien has restored the elves to something of what they

formerly were, in his enchanting Ring cycle. However, he chose to make them not just

beautiful and learned; they are wise, grave, honourable, kindly, embodiments of good

will toward all things alive. In short, his elves belong more to the country of Gloriana

than to that house in heathen Gotaland. Needless to say, there is nothing wrong with this.

In fact, it was necessary to Professor Tolkien's purpose.

But twenty-odd years ago, a young fellow who bore the same name as myself harked

further back-the whole way to the ninth century-and saw elves and gods alike as having

quite another nature. It was, in Europe at least, a raw era. Cruelty, rapacity, and

licentiousness ran free. The horrors that the vikings brought to Britain and France were

no worse than those Charlemagne had already visited on the Saxons or those the First

Crusade would perpetrate in Jerusalem; they could not be. Twentieth century civilization

has doubtless fallen from humanistic grace, but it has a long way to go before it strikes

that absolute bottom which (God help us) may after all be the norm in history.

Since men tend to see their gods and demigods in their own image, this writer

therefore showed elves and Aisir as amoral-when crossed, altogether ruthless. It squared

with what we can read about them in Edda and saga.

And he amused himself with a bit of rationalization in the grand old Unknown

Worlds manner. It seemed only natural that the dwellers in Faerie would be

technologically advanced beyond their human contemporaries. Assume, if you will, that

there really were races once which could do magic-that is, mentally control external

phenomena by some means as yet unknown to our science. (But see the recent work and

speculation on "parapsychology.") Assume that they could live indefinitely, change their

shapes, and so on. Such an alien metabolism might have its own penalties, in an inability

to endure the glare and actinic light of the sun or in disastrous electrochemical reactions

induced by contact with iron. Why should these handicapped immortals not compensate

by discovering nonferrous metals and the properties of their alloys? Might the elven ships

sail "on the wings of the wind" because of having virtually frictionless hulls? Though the

kind of castle we generally think of today did not exist in the Europe of King Alfred, the

Faerie people could have been building them for a long while. In the same way, other

apparent anachronisms would be simply the achievements of races older than man. But

an aristocratic warrior culture, particularly with the conservatism induced by long lives,

would not be likely to develop science very far. We should not look for gunpowder or

steam engines in the ruins of Faerie.

The Broken Sword was slow to find a publisher, who gave it only a single printing.

Now, thanks to Lin Carter and Ballantine Books-and to Professor Tolkien, whose noble

work is what has made popular the entire genre of heroic fantasy-it can be brought back.

Yet this chance holds for me a dilemma. I am not being affected in referring to the

author as someone else. He was. A generation lies between us. I would not myself write

anything so headlong, so prolix, and so unrelievedly savage. My vein is more that of

Three Hearts and Three Lions. This young, in many ways naive lad who bore my name

could, all unwittingly, give readers a wrong impression of my work and me. At the same

time, I don't feel free to tamper with what he has done. If nothing else, that would be

unfair to those who have heard of his book and think they are buying it.

Well, I've compromised. First, there is this new foreword to explain the situation.

Second, without changing the story, I did allow myself a number of textual emendations.

I like to think that the author would have been glad to take the advice of a man more

experienced-also in techniques of medieval combat! I did not rewrite end to end; as said,

that appeared unethical. Hence the style is not mine. But I have trimmed away a lot of

adjectives and other wordbrush, corrected certain errors and inconsistencies, and

substituted one Person (in one brief though important scene) for another who didn't really

belong there.

Thus what you have here-is in fact The Broken Sword as originally conceived and

written. It has simply been made more readable. I hope you enjoy it.

As for what became of those who were still alive at the end of the book, and the

sword, and Faerie itself-which obviously no longer exists on Earth-that is another tale,

which may someday be told.

-Poul Anderson

who in the Society for Creative Anachronism is known as Sir Bela of Eastmarch

There was a man called Orm the Strong, a son of Ketil Asmundsson who was a

yeoman in the north of Jutland. The folk of Ketil had dwelt there as long as men

remembered, and held broad acres. The wife of Ketil was Asgard, who was a leman-child

of Ragnar Hairybreeks. Thus Orm came of good stock, but as he was the fifth living son

of his father he could look for no great inheritance.

Orm was a seafarer and spent most of his summers in viking. When he was still

young, Ketil died. The oldest brother, Asmund, took over running the farm. This lasted

until Orm, in his twentieth winter, went to him and said:

"Now you have been sitting here in Himmerland with the use of what is ours for

some years. The rest of us want a share. Yet if we divide the grounds five ways, not to

speak of dowering our sisters, we will sink to smallholders and none will remember us

after we are dead."

"That is true," answered Asmund. "Best we work together."

"I will not be fifth man at the rudder," said Orm, "and so I make you this offer. Give

me three ships with their gear and food stocks, and give whatever weapons are needed by

those who will follow me, and I will find my own land and quit all claim on this."

Asmund was well pleased, the more so when two of the brothers said they would go

with Orm. Ere spring he had bought the longships and outfitted them, and found many of

the younger and poorer men of the neighbourhood who would be glad to fare westward.

In the first clear spell of weather that came, while the seas were still rough, Orm took his

ships out of the Limf jord, and that was the last which Asmund saw of him.

The crews rowed swiftly north until they had left behind them the moors and deep

woods under the high sky of Himmerland. Rounding the Skaw, they got a good wind and

raised sail. With sternposts now turned to the home country, they likewise put up the

dragon heads at the prows. It piped in the rigging, strokes foamed, seagulls mewed about

the yardarm. Orm in his gladness made a stave:

White-maned horses (hear their neighing!), grey and gaunt-flanked, gallop westward.

Wild with winter winds, they snort and buck when bearing burdens for me.

By starting thus early, he reached England ahead of most vikings and had rich

plundering. At the season's end he laid over in Ireland. Indeed, he never again left the

western isles, but spent his summers gathering booty and his winters trading some of that

wealth for more ships.

At last, though, he came to wish for a home of his own. He joined his small fleet to

the great one of Guthorm, whom the English called Guthrum. Following this lord ashore

as well as at sea, he gained much; but he also lost much when King Alfred won the day at

Ethandun. Orm and a number of his men were among those who cut their way out.

Afterward he heard how Guthrum and the other surrounded Danes had been given their

lives for taking baptism. Orm foresaw at least a measure of peace coming between his

folk and Alfred's. Then he would not have so free a pick of what was in England as he

still did.

Therefore he went into what would later be called the Danelaw, looking for his

home.

He found a green and fair freehold that reached back from a little bay where he could

keep his ships. The Englander who dwelt there was a man of wealth and of some might,

who would not sell. But Orm came back by night, ringed his house with men, and burned

it. The owner, his brothers, and most of his carles died. It was said that the man's mother,

who was a witch, got free-for the burners let any women, children, and thralls who

wished go out-and laid the curse on Orm that his eldest son should be fostered beyond the

world of men, while Orm should in turn foster a wolf that would one day rend him.

With many Danish folk already dwelling thereabouts, the Englander's remaining kin

now dared do naught else than accept weregild and land-price from Orm, thus making the

farm his in law. He raised a big new house and other buildings, and with the gold, the

followers, and the fame he had, was soon reckoned a great chief.

When he had sat there a year, he felt it were well if he took a wife. He rode with

many warriors to the English ealdorman Athelstane and asked for his daughter Ailfrida,

who was said to be the fairest maiden in the kingdom.

Athelstane hemmed and hawed, but Ailfrida said to Orm's face: "Never will I wed a

heathen dog, nor indeed can I. And while you can maybe take me by force, you will have

little joy of it-that I swear."

She was slim and tender, with soft ruddy-brown hair and bright grey eyes, while

Orm was a huge bulky man whose skin was reddened and mane nearly white from years

of sun and sea. But he felt she was somehow the stronger, so after thinking for a while he

said: "Now that I am in a land where folk worship the White Christ, it might be wise for

me to handsel peace with him as well as his people. In truth, most of the Danes have done

so. I will be baptized if you will wed me, Ailfrida."

"That is no reason," she cried.

"But think," said Orm slyly, "if you do not wed me I will not be christened, and then,

if we may trust the priests, my soul is lost. You will answer heavily to your God for

losing a human soul." He whispered to Athelstane, "Also, I will burn down this house and

throw you off the sea-cliffs."

"Aye, daughter, we dare not lose a human soul," said Athelstane very quickly.

Ailfrida did not hold out much longer, for Orm was not an ill-looking or ill-behaved

man in his way; besides, Athelstane's house could use so strong and wealthy an ally. Thus

Orm was christened, and soon afterward he wed Ailfrida and bore her home. They lived

together contentedly enough, if not always peacefully.

No church was near; vikings had burned those that formerly were. At Ailfrida's wish,

Orm got a priest to come join the household, and for atonement of his sins planned to

build the priest a new church. But being a careful man with no wish to offend any of the

Powers, Orm continued offering to Thor in midwinter and to Frey in spring for peace and

good harvests, as well as to Odin and Asir for luck at sea.

All that winter he and the priest quarrelled about this, and in spring, not long before

Ailfrida's child was born, he lost his temper and kicked the priest out the door and bade

him begone, Ailfrida reproached her husband sharply for this, until he cried that he could

stand no more woman-chatter and would have to flee it. Thus he left with his ships earlier

than he had planned, and spent the summer harrying in Scotland and Ireland.

Scarce were his craft out of sight when Ailfrida was brought to her bed and gave

birth. The child was a fine big boy who after Orm's wish she called Valgard, a name old

in that family. But now there was no priest to christen the child, and the nearest church

lay a good two or three days' journey away. She sent a thrall thither at once.

Meanwhile she was proud and glad of her son, and sang to him as her mother had to

her-

Lullaby, my little bird, of all birds the very best!

Hear the gently lowing herd. Now the sun is in the west

and 'tis time that you should rest.

Lullaby, my little love, nodding sleepy on my breast.

See the evening star above rising from the hill's green crest.

Now 'tis time that you should rest.

Lullaby, my little one. You and I alike are blest.

God and Mary and their Son guard you, who are but their guest.

Now 'tis time that you should rest.

Imric the elf-earl rode out by night to see what had happened in the lands of men. It

was a cool spring dark with the moon nearly full, rime glittering on the grass and the stars

still hard and bright as in winter. The night was very quiet save for sigh of wind in

budding branches, and the world was all sliding shadows and cold white light. The hoofs

of Imric's horse were shod with an alloy of silver, and a high dear ringing went where

they struck.

He rode into a forest. Night lay heavy between the trees, but from afar he spied a

ruddy glimmer. When he came near, he saw it was firelight shining through cracks in a

hut of mud and wattles under a great gnarly oak from whose boughs Imric remembered

the Druids cutting mistletoe. He could sense that a witch lived here, so he dismounted

and rapped on the door.

A woman who seemed old and bent as the tree opened it and saw him where he

stood, the broken moonlight sheening off helm and byrnie and his horse, which was the

colour of mist, cropping the frosty grass behind him.

"Good evening, mother," said Imric.

"Let none of you elf-folk call me mother, who have borne tall sons to a man,"

grumbled the witch. But she let him in and hastened to pour him a horn of ale. Belike

what crofters dwelt nearby kept her in food and drink as payment for what small magics

she could do for them. Imric must stoop inside the hovel and clear away a litter of bones

and other trash ere he could sit on the single bench.

He looked at her through the strange slant eyes of the elves, all cloudy-blue without

whites or a readily seen pupil. There were little moon-flecks drifting in Imric's eyes, and

shadows of ancient knowledge, for he had dwelt long in the land. But he was ever

youthful, with the broad forehead and high cheekbones, the narrow jaw and straight thin-

chiselled nose of the elf lords. His hair floated silvery-gold, finer than spider silk, from

beneath his horned helmet down to the wide red-caped shoulders.

"Not often of late lifetimes have the elves gone forth among men," said the witch.

"Aye, we have been too busy in our war with the trolls," answered Imric in his voice

that was like a wind blowing through trees far away. "But now truce has been made, and I

am curious to find what has happened in the last hundred years."

"Much, and little of it good," said the witch. "The Danes have come from overseas,

killing, looting, burning, seizing for themselves much of eastern England and I know not

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THEBROKENSWORDPoulAndersonTheauthorofthisextraordinarilyimaginativefantasynovel,PoulAnderson,isatall,curly-headed,owlishlybespectacledandveryyouthful-lookingmaninhismiddleforties.Andersonwasbornin1926inBristol,Pennsylvania,ofDanishparentage,whichexplainshisunusualfirstname.Poulhimselfpronouncesitto...

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Anderson, Poul - Broken Sword

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