A Vision of Hell. Brian Stableford

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      Borgo Press Books by Brian Stableford

      Alien Abduction: The Wiltshire Revelations

      Asgard’s Conquerors (Asgard #2)

      Asgard’s Heart (Asgard #3)

      Asgard’s Secret (Asgard #1)

      Balance of Power (Daedalus Mission #5)

      The Best of Both Worlds and Other Ambiguous Tales

      Beyond the Colors of Darkness and Other Exotica

      Changelings and Other Metaphoric Tales

      The City of the Sun (Daedalus Mission #4)

      Complications and Other Science Fiction Stories

      The Cosmic Perspective and Other Black Comedies Critical Threshold (Daedalus Mission #2)

      The Cthulhu Encryption: A Romance of Piracy

      The Cure for Love and Other Tales of the Biotech Revolution

      The Dragon Man

      The Eleventh Hour

      The Face of Heaven (Realms of Tartarus #1)

      The Fenris Device (Hooded Swan #5)

      Firefly: A Novel of the Far Future

      Les Fleurs du Mal: A Tale of the Biotech Revolution

      The Florians (Daedalus Mission #1)

      The Gardens of Tantalus and Other Delusions

      The Gates of Eden

      A Glimpse of Infinity (Realms of Tartarus #3)

      The Golden Fleece and Other Tales of the Biotech Revolution

      The Great Chain of Being and Other Tales of the Biotech Revolution

      Halycon Drift (Hooded Swan #1)

      The Haunted Bookshop and Other Apparitions

      In the Flesh and Other Tales of the Biotech Revolution

      The Innsmouth Heritage and Other Sequels

      Journey to the Core of Creation: A Romance of Evolution

      Kiss the Goat: A Twenty-First-Century Ghost Story

      The Legacy of Erich Zann and Other Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos

      Luscinia: A Romance of Nightingales and Roses

      The Mad Trist: A Romance of Bibliomania

      The Mind-Riders

      The Moment of Truth

      Nature’s Shift: A Tale of the Biotech Revolution

      An Oasis of Horror: Decadent Tales and Contes Cruels

      The Paradise Game (Hooded Swan #4)

      The Paradox of the Sets (Daedalus Mission #6)

      The Plurality of Worlds: A Sixteenth-Century Space Opera

      Prelude to Eternity: A Romance of the First Time Machine

      Promised Land (Hooded Swan #3)

      The Quintessence of August: A Romance of Possession

      The Return of the Djinn and Other Black Melodramas

      Rhapsody in Black (Hooded Swan #2)

      Salome and Other Decadent Fantasies

      Streaking: A Novel of Probability

      Swan Song (Hooded Swan #6)

      The Tree of Life and Other Tales of the Biotech Revolution

      The Undead: A Tale of the Biotech Revolution

      Valdemar’s Daughter: A Romance of Mesmerism

      A Vision of Hell (Realms of Tartarus #2)

      War Games

      Wildeblood’s Empire (Daedalus Mission #3)

      The World Beyond: A Sequel to S. Fowler Wright’s The World Below

      Writing Fantasy and Science Fiction

      Xeno’s Paradox: A Tale of the Biotech Revolution

      Year Zero

      Yesterday Never Dies: A Romance of Metempsychosis

      Zombies Don’t Cry: A Tale of the Biotech Revolution

      Copyright Information

      Copyright © 1977, 2012 by Brian Stableford

      Published by Wildside Press LLC

      www.wildsidebooks.com

      Acknowledgments

      I am greatly obliged to Heather Datta for her great kindness and consummate efficiency in scanning the text of the first edition of this novel, thus enabling me to get it back into print.

      CHAPTER 1

      Camlak was not unduly sensitive to time. It passed by without dragging his consciousness. It flowed over him in an easy stream. The silence was profound. The Ahrima had gone, but the fires they had left burning were still filling the air with heavy smoke and the stark smell of ashes. There would be a while yet before the fire yielded to the gentle smell of decay and carrion that would bring the scavengers in from the fields, and from the wild land beyond Clauster Ridge.

      The Old Man of Stalhelm was hurt, but not badly—at least, not so far as bone and flesh and blood were concerned. The arm which he had broken in the fight with the harrowhound had shattered for a second time, and he knew that this time there would be no mending it. From now on he was a three-limb. But that was little enough. It would not have taken him out of the fight, and saved his life. A blow on the head had done that, without inflicting any lasting damage. His clothing was covered in blood—dry by now—and no doubt he had looked dead enough to the marauders, lying as he was within the star-shadow of the earthen wall, with the mutilated bodies of the honest dead all around him. It was, of course, their blood. Blood they had spilled on to him, so that chance might rule in favor of his continued existence. The principal hurt which he had sustained was the pain of the question: why?

      He was three times lucky.

      First, he had fallen from a light, glancing blow, and sheer exhaustion had sucked him to the ground and hugged him into the crack between earth and earth-wall. Somehow, he had found the strength to suppress his courage. How? The Ahrima were already over the wall and involved in the simple business of slaughter. It was natural that he should have fought with indomitable fury, without any such self-control, or even self-awareness. He should have bounced back from the blow. But he had not. He had sagged, had contained his instincts, had vanished into the black clothes of unconsciousness.

      Then, somehow the Ahrima had failed to find him. Or failed to find him alive. The one who had felled him must have been felled in his turn, at the right moment. At precisely the right moment. He must have died very swiftly, spilling his blood with such profligacy that he seemed to have exploded. A combination of chances: a neat riposte of fortune. Too neat.

      Lastly, Ermold must have been already dead. The Men Without Souls from Walgo had taken the mask and joined the Ahrima in the assault on Stalhelm. A victory not so much for cowardice as for Ermold’s hatred. He had come to kill instead of being slaughtered by the horde. He would die anyway, but he had come to kill first. Had he survived the storming of the wall, he would surely have come to take Camlak’s head. A gesture to underline the purpose of it all. For old time’s sake. Chance had forbidden him that satisfaction.

      Why?

      Camlak hurt inside his head. There was a fever in his brain. A fog. He tried to reach down into the depths where his Gray Soul lived, but the way was blocked. Honest pain would have cut through the miasma like a hot spear. No man was denied the company of his Gray Soul in the moment before death, or the moment of bodily crisis. So Camlak believed,