Articles6

The Vengeance Sword of the Norman-Gael
by Damon C. Sasser

I lately sold a tale to Oriental Stories in which I have created the most somber character I have yet attempted.
The story is called “Hawks of Outremer” and I got $120 for it. The character is Cormac Fitzgeoffrey . . . One of
the main things I like about Farnsworth Wright’s magazines is you don’t have to make your characters such
utter saints. I took Cormac Fitzgeoffrey into the East on a Crusade and am considering writing a series of tales
about him.
                                                                                                              – undated letter to Harold Preece

                                                     I. A Ruthless Fighter,
                                                 Born to the Game of War

Cormac Fitzgeoffrey, Robert E. Howard’s hero of the Crusades, waded knee deep through blood in the
pages of Oriental Stories and into near oblivion. The two Cormac Fitzgeoffrey stories, first published in
1931, languished in pulp purgatory until “Hawks of Outremer” was published in the Robert E. Howard
Omnibus (Orbit, 1977). Then, in 1979, Donald M. Grant published a volume titled Hawks of Outremer that
contained the three Fitzgeoffrey tales: “Hawks of Outremer” (first published in the Spring 1931 issue of
Oriental Stories), “The Blood of Belshazzar” (first published in the Fall 1931 issue of Oriental Stories) and
"The Slave-Princess” (an unfinished manuscript completed by Richard Tierney).
These stories are fast-paced historical adventures set in the mysterious world of the East. This type a yarn
was a favorite of Howard, who shows influence of Harold Lamb, Talbot Munday and Sir Walter Scott. But
being Howard, he put his own special spin on his Eastern adventure tales, putting him in a league of his
own when it came to headlong, fast-paced historical stories.
Ironically, another of my favorite Howard characters, Turlogh O’Brien, is still waiting to be published in a
book collection (either hardback or paperback). Perhaps this is due to the fact the O’Brien tales have been
published numerous times in paperback anthologies and Bran Mak Morn collections.
Like O’Brien, it is the inherently lethal aspect that makes Cormac so interesting to me. To put it simply, the
man is a walking killing machine. Sheathed in chain-mail and armor from head to toe, brandishing a huge
sword and a shield with a skull emblazoned on it, Cormac is a formidable foe ready to deal death at a
moment’s notice.
It has been written that there is a little of Howard in every one of his characters. If this is so, then Cormac
Fitzgeoffrey must surely reflect his most somber side. The moody Norman-Gael is an enigma, even among
the stable of Howard’s cast of heroes, casting a dark shadow as he moves through these tales.
The trio of tales featuring Howard’s brooding Norman-Gael are action-packed, giving the reader a strong
dose of violence, betrayal and intrigue . . .

                                                        II. Hawks of Outremer

“Hawks of Outremer” is easily the best of the Cormac Fitzgeoffrey stories that gives us our first look at the
grim Norman-Gael. It is well paced, with a strong plot, interesting characters we care about and has a very
satisfying, reflective conclusion.
Early in the story, Howard gives us a description of Cormac's mixed and volatile heritage:

Son of a woman of the O’Briens and a renegade Norman knight, Geoffrey the Bastard, in whose veins it is said
coursed the blood of William the Conqueror, Cormac had seldom known an hour’s peace or ease in all his thirty
years of violent life. He was born in a feud-torn land blood drenched land, and raised in a heritage of hate and
savagery.”

As with all of Howard’s heroes, Cormac is larger than life. Standing one inch over six feet tall, he makes an
imposing figure:

Fitzgeoffrey was clean shaven and the various scars that shown on his dark, grim face, lent his already
formidable features a truly sinister aspect. When he took off his plain visorless helmet and thrust back his mail
coif, his square-cut black hair that topped his low broad forehead contrasted strongly with his cold blue eyes.

In Hawks, Cormac meets an old friend, Sir Rupert de Vaile, in a tavern and brings him up to date on his
recent adventures and escapes from death. One of the stories Cormac weaves is about how his brother
Shane is killed by a Norse reaver. He tells of how took his revenge and the sword that killed his brother,
something Sir Rupert finds strange, to say the least:

And you wear such a sword? Exclaimed Sir Rupert in Horror. No good will come of that evil blade, Cormac!”
“Why not,” asked the big warrior, impatiently. “It is a good blade – I wiped out the stain of my brother’s blood
when I slew his slayer. By Satan, but that sea-king was a grand sight in his coat of mail with silvered scales. His
silvered helmet was strong too – ax, helmet and skull shatter together.”

Soon Sir Rupert tells Cormac that his friend, Sieur Gerard has been killed by Ali-El-Yar in a dispute over a
harem girl Gerard purportedly loved. Sieur attempted to get help from another Westerner, Baron Conrad
Von Gonler, who refused to come to his aid. Cormac, mad with blood-lust, swears to avenge Gerard and
goes riding off on his big black stallion to wreck his own special kind of havoc:

. . . And suddenly Cormac, with a bitter curse, rose in his stirrups, snatched is battle-ax, from his saddle bow,
and hurled it with all his mighty strength.
The men-at-arms on the towers cried out and the dancing girls screamed. Von Gonler though himself to be out
of the reach of Norman-Irish vengeance. The heavy ax hissed as it clove the air and dashed out Baron Conrad’s
brains.

Ultimately, Cormac gets his hard won revenge and comes face-to face with Saladin, the commander of the
Muslim armies during the Third Crusade.

                                            III. The Blood of Belshazzar

In “The Blood of Belshazzar”, Cormac matches wits with a motley crew of outlaws after a cursed
jewel that ultimately ends up causing the demise of whoever possesses it. The story is set in a bandit
stronghold ruled by a most unsavory character named Skol Abhhur the Butcher.
The set-piece of the story is a fight between Cormac and a gang of bandits who mistakenly believe he has
the jewel:

Cormac snarled in disgusted irritation. He should have anticipated that. No time to escape now; he braced
himself and met the charge. A Kurd, rushing in headlong, was impaled on the Norman’s long blade, and a giant
Circassian, hurling his full weight on his kite shaped shield, rebounded as from an iron tower. Cormac
thundered his battle cry, “Cloigeand abu,” (Gaelic: “the skull to victory.”) in a deep toned roar that drowned the
howls of the Moslems; he freed his blade and swung the heavy weapon in a crashing arc. Swords shivered to
singing sparks and the warriors gave back.

In the end, Cormac winds up with the gem (of course!), not deterred in the least bit by its dark and bloody
past.
The only drawback to this tale is the astounding cast of characters it has. One needs a program to keep up
with who’s who. Likewise the amount of intrigue and murderous double-dealing going on would fill a
novelette. In fact, this tale is too short to fit everything in Howard packs into it. It would have been a really
fine story if he had fleshed it out more, giving more wordage to the mysterious Blood of Belshazzar.

                                                   IV. The Slave-Princess

"The Slave-Princess“ was completed by Richard Tierney from an untitled manuscript (which was two-thirds
finished) and a synopsis. The original versions of these were first published in The Howard Reader #8 (Joe
Marek, August 2003). For the sake of continuity, I’m going to discuss the version completed by Tierney.
The story opens with Cormac rescuing a slave girl named Zuleika from the clutches of a rampaging Turk,
part of a band sacking the city:

Now he strode ponderously toward them, growling a warning to the warrior, whose eyes burned with a feral
light. The Turkoman spat a curse and leaped like a lean wolf, trusting fiercely. A mail-clad arm brushed the
spear aside; almost with the same motion Cormac caught the Turkoman’s throat in a vice-like grip, and his
clenched right smashed like an iron hammer into his victim’s temple. The tribesman’s skull caved in like a
gourd beneath that mailed fist, and Cormac let the twitching corpse fall carelessly at his feet.

After saving the girl’s life, Cormac turns to leave, then something about her causes him to take her back to
the castle-stronghold of Siueur Amory, a fellow Irish outlaw.
Cormac tells Amory that the slave-girl looks like a princess named Zalda, daughter of Abdullah bin Kherman,
who was kidnapped three years earlier prior to her wedding to an outlaw warlord named Sulyman Bey.
Cormac wants to use Zuleika’s resemblance to the princess in a scheme to sell her to Bey.
So Cormac rides to Bey’s fortress and convinces him to return to the Amory’s castle and pay a ransom for
his long lost bride.
Meanwhile, Amory has fallen in love with Zuleika and is having second thoughts about the deal. After
expressing this to Cormac, the two engage in a fight to the death, which is interrupted by a fire started by
one of Bey’s henchmen who snuck into the castle and opened the way for Bey’s men to gain access.
A fierce fight is ensuing with Bey’s men when bin Kherman, who has learned of the mysterious slave-
girl/princess, arrives on the scene with his army of warriors and joins the fray.
A plot twist at the end reveals Zuleika is actually the long lost princess Zalda. Bey tries to reclaim his bride,
but Cormac kills him and fights his way through his men, riding out the castle gate with horsemen in hot
pursuit.
Bin Kherman, spares Amory when he professes his love for her, but offers not such pardon for Cormac,
who he has sworn to kill on sight.
One can assume that after his escape, Cormac rides off for new adventures, including the sack of the city
of Shahazar and its treasures (this is referenced in another Howard adventure, “The Sowers of the
Thunder”, which takes place 50 years after Cormac’s adventures in the East).
Completing another author’s unfinished manuscript is a thankless task, to say the least. But Tierney has
done a yeoman’s job here, picking up where Howard left off and faithfully following his synopsis.

                                                      V. A Rider in the East

Other than an appearance of “Hawks of Outremer” in a British paperback titled Robert E. Howard’s World of
Heroes (Robinson, 1989), both “Hawks of Outremer” and “The Blood of Belshazzar” have been out of print
until 2004 when Wildside Press published them in their hard cover, Gates of Empire. Lord of Samarcand and
Other Adventure Tales of the Old Orient (Bison, 2005) has “The Slave Princess" unfinished draft and
synopsis, as well as “Hawks of Outremer” and “The Blood of Belshazzar.” Of course, copies of Grant’s
Hawks of Outremer do pop up from time to time on eBay and various online used book dealers, albeit at a
premium price.
It’s hard to say if Howard would have returned to Cormac Fitzgeoffrey if he had lived or simply created
another hero to take his place. Needless to say, the three tales of the hard-bitten, vengeful Norman-Gael
he did leave us will have to suffice when are in the mood for gory, sword swinging, action-packed stories of
the Crusades.

Copyright 2004 Damon C. Sasser

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