Glen Cook - An Empire Unacquainted with Defeat

Night Shade Books
San Francisco
An Empire Unacquainted with Defeat 2009 by Glen Cook
This edition of An Empire Unacquainted with Defeat
2009 by Night Shade Books
Jacket art 2008 by Raymond Swanland
Jacket design by Claudia Noble
Interior layout and design by Jeremy Lassen
All rights reserved
Digital Edition
ISBN: 978-1-59780-140-9 (Trade Hardcover)
ISBN: 978-1-59780-141-6 (Limited Edition)
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"Soldier of an Empire Unacquainted with Defeat" first appeared in The Berkley Showcase, Volume 2, Berkley Books, August 1980, Victoria Schochet & John Silbersack, editors. 1980 by Glen Cook.
"The Nights of Dreadful Silence" first appeared in Fantastic Stories, September, 1973. 1973 by Ultimate Publishing Co., Inc.
"Finding Svale's Daughter" appears here for the first time.
"Ghost Stalk" first appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, May 1978. 1978 by Mercury Press, Inc.
"Filed Teeth" first appeared in Dragons of Darkness, Ace Books, November 1981, Orson Scott Card, editor. 1981 by Glen Cook.
"Castle of Tears" first appeared in Whispers, October 1979. 1979 by Stuart David Schiff.
"Call for the Dead" first appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, July 1980. 1980 by Mercury Press, Inc.
"Severed Heads" first appeared in Sword & Sorceress I, DAW Books, 1984, Marion Zimmer Bradley, editor. 1984 by Glen Cook.
"Silverheels" first appeared in slightly different form in Witchcraft & Sorcery, May 1971. 1971 by Fantasy Publishing Co., Inc.
"Hell's Forge" appears here for the first time.

The world of the Dread Empire, from the beginning, was conceived as the stage for numerous, often unrelated stories. The earliest were intended to center on the characters Bragi Ragnarson, Mocker, and Haroun bin Yousif. Most of those stories have never been published. Some were quite amusing. Like the novelette about the sorcerers' convention inspired by the insanity witnessed at my first science fiction convention, the St. Louis Con Worldcon of 1969. There were a whole string of stories, back to back, that, in time, would have filled several volumes set before the events chronicled in The Fire in His Hands and, mainly, between With Mercy Toward None and A Shadow of All Night Falling. Only a minority of those got written and fewer saw publication. Of those actually written only a handful can be located anymore. See below.

The Dread Empire world grew fast, over a decade, going through several reincarnations, before A Shadow of All Night Falling actually found a publisher capable of surviving long enough to get it into the bookstores. It was accepted twice in the earlier 1970s. The first publisher went bankrupt. The second suffered a devastating fire in its production and storage facilities. Its business response was to turn back all non-bestseller titles scheduled for the next two years.

In 1980, when the first books appeared, the Dread Empire series was expected to consist of fourteen volumes, the central feature of which would be one vast mega-novel, in multiple volumes, spanning the lives of Bragi Ragnarson and Haroun bin Yousif. Seven of those titles did see print. Two more, Wake the Cruel Storm and The Wrath of Kings, were started but never finished. The former, following on from An Ill Fate Marshalling, was 85% complete. The manuscript and all associated developmental materials have disappeared, presumably appropriated by a visitor to my home who just had to know what would happen next. There are no viable suspects in this or several other disappearances of rare artifacts from my earliest writing career.

About 15% of The Wrath of Kings survives, fragments of draft material that happened to be outside my filing cabinets, lost in the mess of the house, whenever the rest of the material disappeared. A few of the short pieces, some of which appear here for the first time, survived by hiding in my agent's files and came home to Papa when the passing of the head of the agency caused it to shut down. Among these was a novelette entitled "The Funeral," which would be the capstoneor headstonefor the entire series. I'd completely forgotten having written it till I came on it while putting this collection together.

The published stories are presented here as they appeared in print, less typographical errors, however tempted I was to make improvements. Bad grammar, run-on sentences, squirrelly punctuation and all. Much of the latter not having been my fault but that of a couple of editors whose relationship with proper punctuation was somewhere beyond the second cousin twice removed state. Only "Silverheels" received even cosmetic revisions. I felt it important to show any evolution that might have occurred.

The following novella was the longest of the published short fiction pieces in the Dread Empire world setting. It is a sidelight involving none of the characters from the several novels.
Possibly the best received of all my short fiction, this garnered numerous excellent reviews, was on the Locus recommended reading list, and was chosen one of the five best novellas of 1980 in the Locus Readers' Poll.
The world of the Dread Empire is, of course, the most important character of the series. It is always there, always on stage, always a stage, but never to be taken for granted.

His name was Tain and he was a man to beware. The lacquered armor of the Dread Empire rode in the packs on his mule.

The pass was narrow, treacherous, and, therefore, little used. The crumbled slate lay loose and deep, clacking underfoot with the ivory-on-ivory sound of punji counters in the senyo game. More threatened momentary avalanche off the precarious slopes. A cautious man, Tain walked. He led the roan gelding. His mule's tether he had knotted to the roan's saddle.

An end to the shale walk came. Tain breathed deeply, relieved. His muscles ached with the strain of maintaining his footing.

A flint-tipped arrow shaved the gray over his right ear.

The black longsword leapt into his right hand, the equally dark shortsword into his left. He vanished among the rocks before the bowstring's echoes died.

Silence.

Not a bird chirped. Not one chipmunk scurried across the slope, pursuing the arcane business of that gentle breed. High above, one lone eagle floated majestically against an intense blue backdrop of cloudless sky. Its shadow skittered down the ragged mountainside like some frenetic daytime ghost. The only scent on the breeze was that of old and brittle stone.

A man's scream butchered the stillness.

Tain wiped his shortsword on his victim's greasy furs. The dark blade's polish appeared oily. It glinted sullen indigoes and purples when the sun hit right.

Similar blades had taught half a world the meaning of fear.

A voice called a name. Another responded with an apparent, "Shut up!" Tain couldn't be sure. The languages of the mountain tribes were mysteries to him.

He remained kneeling, allowing trained senses to roam. A fly landed on the dead man's face. It made nervous patrols in ever-smaller circles till it started exploring the corpse's mouth.

Tain moved.

The next one died without a sound. The third celebrated his passing by plunging downhill in a clatter of pebbles.