The Iron Dream (11 page)

founded, could not remain standing in the face of such an historic moment.

For his part, Feric himself could hardly comprehend the enormity of what he had done. In his hand was the Steel Commander, the Great Truncheon of Held, and it had no more weight than a wooden wand; it seemed bome

'triumphantly aloft by a power which seemed to surge down its shaft, through its handle, and throughout Feric's body, a power both symbolic and actual. In him were the genes of the royal house of Heldon; that much penetrated his astonishment with instant crystal clarity. The royal stock had been scattered centuries ago; it was not unreasonable that the royal genotype might emerge once more from the general Helder gene pool. The fact that he held the Great Truncheon aloft proved beyond question that exactly this had occurred;

Slowly, gathering his wits about him, Feric rose to his 74

feet holding the great gleaming truncheon high over his head; the light of the bonfire behind him bathed him in fiery orange glory and cast shimmering highlights up and down the length of his mighty steel shaft.

Before him, Stopa kneeled, his countenance displaying a submissiveness of noble and cosmic profundity. "My life is yours to do with as you will, lord," he muttered humbly, without raising his eyes.

The full import of what had occurred finally permeated Feric's being. Fate had moved him to Ulmgam, fate had thrown him in with Bogel so that he would take a later roadsteamer and encounter these noble barbarians; destiny had moved through time and space to place the Great Truncheon of Held in his hand. The meaning was clear: he was the rightful ruler of all Heldon; the proof of this he held in his hand for all to see. It now remained to secure the power necessary to bring him to his rightful station.

This was his fate, his duty, his destiny: to grasp all Heldon in his hand as he grasped the Steel Commander, to use it as a weapon to drive all mutants and Doms from the land, and then to reclaim the last habitable inch of soil on earth for the true human genotype. This was his sacred mission. He could not and would not fail.

Backed by the glow of the bonfire, in the midst of the Emerald Wood, the ancestral heartland of Heldon, Feric Jaggar held the sceptre of Heldon triumphantly aloft in the firelight and stood before his kneeling minions. There was no doubt whatever, in his mind or theirs, that they were his fanatic followers now, loyal unto death.

Feric lowered the Great Truncheon to waist level; holding the great gleaming steel shaft out before him, he approached the kneeling Stag Stopa. "Arise," he said.

Stopa looked up at the great shining headpiece of the truncheon which Feric held before his face, a headball carved in the likeness of a hero's fist, with a swastika signet ring on the third finger. He started to obey Feric's command, hesitated, then touched his lips to the swastika on the head of the Great Truncheon. Only then did he rise to his feet.

Deeply moved by this spontaneous gesture of fealty, Feric allowed first Bogel and then each Avenger in turn, to kiss the swastika emblem on the tip of his heroic weapon. One by one, the men completed this act of submission, and rose to their feet, the Avengers holding 75

their torches proudly erect, their eyes glowing like red-hot coals in the firelight.

When all stood manfully before him, Peric spoke. "Will you follow me without question, with total fanatic loyalty to the cause of Heldon and genetic purity, to your deaths if so ordered?"

The reply was a great massed roar of approval. They were magnificent lads, fit material for the storm troop that was needed.

"Very well then," Ferie declared, "you are Black Avengers no more. I baptize you anew with a name whose nobility you must earn; see to it that you do nothing to betray it."

Feric pointed the headpiece of the Great Truncheon squarely at his men; the steel fist with its black swastika in a spot of white encircled by red glowed like a rising sun in the firelight.

"You are now Knights of the Swastika!" Feric shouted.

He shot his free arm straight out at eye level before him in the ancient royal salute. "Hail Heldon!" he cried. "Hail the Swastika! Hail Victory!"

Almost at once, Feric was looking out over a forest of outstretched arms, and the newly baptized storm troops were spontaneously roaring: "Hail Jaggar! Hail Jaggarl Hail Jaggar!"

Feric's body stiffened with pride and resolution as he stood there deep in the ancestral heartland, a figure of resolute nobility, larger somehow than life, a hero transcendent, outlined in fire.

5

From the outset, Feric had determined that it would be neither wise nor appropriate for him to slink into Walder unannounced like any common traveler; when he entered the city it must be done with proper heralding and sufficient flourish. This'meant that first of all he must secure his position as unquestioned leader of the party, that secondly 76

changes in nomenclature and style must be made, and that finally his ragged troop of motorcyclists must be properly outfitted and drilled and decked out with new Party uniforms and colors of sufficient dash. Only then would he enter Walder at the head of the Knights of the Swastika.

Therefore, he had commanded Bogel to rent a meeting place of sufficient size and isolation and summon the Party notables thence. Bogel had rented an empty hunting lodge situated on the flattened crest of a small mountain within the Emerald Wood but close to its northern margin, perhaps two hours by roadsteamer from Walder, which lay on the rolling plain to the north. In order to reach the lodge, the Party leaders would have to traverse a long winding dirt road which climbed to the crest through thick groves and wild ravines, making their journey a matter of some psychological import. The lodge itself was a simple but impressive edifice: a long, low, one-story building of granite and mortar facing the rude courtyard where the dirt road ended, with a formal entrance trimmed with wood planking and set off with native trees and shrubbery. From this facade of the building, one looked down on an endless sea of woodland greenery, soothing to the eye, and comforting to the spirit.

Inside was a great common room flanked left and right by wings of sleeping cubicles sufficient to accommodate several-score men. This hunting lodge, empty in this season as it was, suited Feric's purpose ideally. It was close enough to the city to facilitate the necessary preparations while isolated enough to assure secrecy. Moreover, the very act of summoning these urban fellows to such a rustic setting served notice upon them as to the measure of unquestioning loyalty their new leader required of them.

Further, it deprived them of whatever psychological advantage they might have gained from meeting Feric on their home ground. Iron control must be established at the outset.

Feric chose to receive the Party leadership in the great hall itself. The walls of this chamber were naked stone and the floor was rough wooden planking. A ring of torches up near the base of the high vaulted stone ceiling augmented the afternoon light, and a hearty fire blazed in the great fireplace built into the west wall. The walls themselves were decorated with antlers, stags' heads, rifles, bows, spears, truncheons, and various other paraphernalia of the hunter's calling.

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In the center of the room was a large oaken table covered with a cloth of red velvet upon which the Great Truncheon of Held rested in all its gleaming splendor; rows of plain chain had been set up along the long sides of the table. Feric himself sat at the head of the table on a chair slightly higher than the others facing the entrance to the hall. Behind him, the doors to a rude balcony had been flung open, revealing a breathtaking view across the northern fringes of the Wood. and the rolling plain beyond, neatly divided up into a checkerboard of freehold farms; Walder itself shimmered like a spectral city on the bare edge of visibility.

A dozen Knights of the Swastika, still attired in their barbaric splendor, stood 'guard at strategic points around the room while Bogel, Stopa, and six more ex-Avengers met the roadsteamer in the courtyard. Feric himself had donned a brown hunter's tunic of exaggerated austerity which was sure to stand out from whatever the others might wear due to its utter lack of adornment.

All in all, it seemed to Feric that he had prepared a proper welcome.

As he had ordered, Stopa knocked loudly on the heavy wooden door, formally requesting entrance. Feric gave the order, and one of 'the Knights flanking the door opened it with a somewhat ragged flourish, albeit more or less in the spirit which he had been taught. Bogel and Stopa led in an altogether motley crew of middle-aged, somewhat pallid, and not a little threadbare creatures, a half dozen of them in all. The best that could be said of these nabobs of the Human Renaissance Party was that they were clearly examples of the pure human genotype and projected a certain aura of dogged if forlorn determination. Beside Stopa and the six sturdy, high-spirited ex-Avengers who brought up the rear of the group, the Party leadership cut a sony spectacle. As the men approached him, Feric felt a fleeting pang of annoyance at the caliber of the material he was expected to lead.

But his mood immediately brightened when Stopa, with perhaps too much of a comradely grin on his face, came to a halt at the foot of the table with a nice snapping of his bootheels together, shot out his arm in the ancient royal salute, and bellowed: "Hail Jaggar!" Instantly, the ex-Avengers all brought their bootheels together, saluted with suitable vigor, and echoed the salutation eighteen-78

fold. What they presently lacked in precision and dash they made up for in enthusiasm.

For a moment, the Party leaders looked round, apparently unsure of what was expected of them. Then Bogel saluted, and shouted "Hail Jaggar" in a clear voice of utter sincerity. Somewhat uncertainly and with absolute lack of spirit, the gaggle of clerklike men raggedly aped the salute and managed to utter the salutation. At this point, it was as much as could be expected.

Bogel made the introduction admirably short and simple: "Truemen, our new leader, Feric Jaggar."

"Greetings," Feric said. "You've just given the new Party salute, if none too smartly. No doubt you will soon develop the proper spirit. But we have more concrete matters to deal with today. Please be seated."

Bogel and Stopa took up seats at Feric's left and right hands respectively; the Party officials seated themselves below them, stealing glances at the Great Truncheon, wondering, no doubt, at the truth of Bogel's contention that the new leader he had found was capable of wielding it. In due course their doubts would be annihilated; for the present, Feric preferred the frankness of skepticism.

Bogel went through the motions of introducing the men formally, though of course Feric had been briefed on their histories and pedigrees long since. Otrig Haulman, a prosperous tavemkeeper, was the Party treasurer, somewhat devious, but totally dedicated to genetic purity, having proven his loyalty to the cause by backing it with his own coin. Tavus Marker, a commercial sloganeer, was the corresponding secretary, a thin, unhealthy-looking man, but a tireless worker nevertheless. Heermark Bluth and Barm Decker were a butcher and a minor police official respectively; they, along with Bogel, were the Party's chief orators. Manreed Parmerob, a teacher of history, was the present Party theoretician. Sigmark Dugel was chairman of the membership committee—a dubious distinction considering that the Party presently had no more than three hundred members. As a retired brigadier who maintained personal contacts in high military circles, Dugel would no doubt one day prove more useful. All in all, not exactly what one would call an elite group, but not entirely without potentialities.

Moreover, the presence of Stopa and the sturdy lads he commanded lent the proceedings a certain air of solidity that they might have otherwise lacked. Here were men 79

clearly capable of acting forcefully and with telling effect if need be, and obviously imbued with a sense of personal loyalty to Feric. Already he had brought a new dimension of practicality and martial spirit to this somewhat dreamy-eyed Party; their joining in the new Party salute and salutation had been acknowledgment enough of that fact.

"We have a great deal to accomplish quickly. Truemen," Feric began crisply. "I've been studying the Human Renaissance Party as it now stands, and there will have to be some drastic changes. To begin with, the name itself will have to go. In the mind of plain folk, it suggests some sort of tavern debating society, not a rigorous and resolute band of patriots. Something like "The Sons of the Swastika* would be much more to the point. Since the Time of Fire, the swastika has been the unequivocal symbol of racial purity. As such it epitomizes our cause in a manner that even the simplest bumpkin can readily understand.

Moreover, it will give us certain advantages in the area of practical propaganda, which will 'become apparent later."

"A stroke of genius!" Marker exclaimed. "Our cause and our Party name can both be expressed in a single visual symbol that will be readily understood even by illiterates. No other party will have such a powerful weapon in the fight for the public's attention."

Feric was impressed by the way Marker had understood the essence of his master stroke exactly and by the way it had envigored his countenance with fire and spirit. To discover this quality in a subordinate at this early stage was most promising.

The others, for their part, mumbled among each other diffidently, with the exception of the theorist Parmerob, who seemed considerably agitated. Finally, his annoyance burst into speech.

"The name Human Renaissance Party was chosen after considerable deliberation," he said petulantly. "It accurately represents the basic Party positions."

"Accuracy is not the same thing as force," Feric pointed out. "The name of the Party must shout what we stand for with the voice of a tergeant-major."

Parmerob grew even more indignant. "I formulated the name and the Party platform myself," he declared. "We stand for the purity of the true human genotype, the rigorous enforcement of the genetic purity laws, the complete annihilation of the anti-human Dominators, the exclusion of all mutants for all time from the sacred soil of 80