{"product_id":"bran-mak-morn-the-last-king-isbn-9780345461544","title":"Bran Mak Morn: The Last King","description":"\u003cb\u003eFrom Robert E. Howard’s fertile imagination sprang some of fiction’s greatest heroes,  including Conan the Cimmerian, King Kull, and Solomon Kane. But of all Howard’s characters,  none embodied his creator’s brooding temperament more than Bran Mak Morn, the last  king of a doomed race.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e In ages past, the Picts ruled all of Europe. But the descendants  of those proud conquerors have sunk into barbarism . . . all save one, Bran Mak Morn,  whose bloodline remains unbroken. Threatened by the Celts and the Romans, the Pictish  tribes rally under his banner to fight for their very survival, while Bran fights  to restore the glory of his race. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Lavishly illustrated by award-winning artist  Gary Gianni, this collection gathers together all of Howard’s published stories and  poems featuring Bran Mak Morn–including the eerie masterpiece “Worms of the Earth”  and “Kings of the Night,” in which sorcery summons Kull the conqueror from out of  the depths of time to stand with Bran against the Roman invaders. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Also included  are previously unpublished stories and fragments, reproductions of manuscripts bearing  Howard’s handwritten revisions, and much, much more.  \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Special Bonus: a newly discovered  adventure by Howard, presented here for the very first time.“Howard’s writing seems so highly charged with energy that it nearly gives off sparks.”\u003cbr\u003e–STEPHEN KING\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Howard was a true storyteller–one of the first, and certainly among the best, you’ll find in heroic fantasy. If you’ve never read him before, you’re in for a real treat.”\u003cbr\u003e–CHARLES DE LINT, award-winning author of Forests of the Heart\u003cb\u003eRobert E. Howard\u003c\/b\u003e is one of the most prolific short story writers in American history, and has created such beloved characters as Conan the Barbarian, Kull of Atlantis, Soloman Kane, Bran Mak Morn, El Borak, and Dark Agnès de Chastillon. He tragically passed away in 1936.Chapter 1\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMen of the Shadows\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e From the dim red dawn of Creation From the fogs of timeless Time Came we, the first great nation, First on the upward climb.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSavage, untaught, unknowing, Groping through primitive night, Yet faintly catching the glowing, The hint of the coming Light.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eRanging o’er lands untraveled, Sailing o’er seas unknown Mazed by world-puzzles unraveled, Building our land-marks of stone.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eVaguely grasping at glory, Gazing beyond our ken Mutely the ages’ story Rearing on plain and fen.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSee, how the Lost Fire smolders, We are one with the eons’ must. Nations have trod our shoulders, Trampling us into the dust.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe, the first of the races, Linking the Old and New – Look, where the sea-cloud spaces Mingle with ocean-blue.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSo we have mingled with ages, And the world-wind our ashes stirs, Vanished are we from Time’s pages, Our memory? Wind in the firs.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eStonehenge of long-gone glory Sombre and lone in the night, Murmur the age-old story How we kindled the first of the Light.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSpeak night-winds, of man’s creation, Whisper o’er crag and fen, The tale of the first great nation, The last of the Stone Age men.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSword met sword with clash and slither.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Ailla! A-a-ailla!” rising on a steep pitch of sound from a hundred  savage throats.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOn all sides they swarmed upon us, a hundred to thirty. Back to back  we stood, shields lapped, blades at guard. Those blades were red, but  corselets and helmets, too, were red. One advantage we possessed, we  were armored and our foes were not. Yet they flung themselves naked to  the fray with as fierce a valor as if they were clad in steel.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThen for a moment they drew off and stood at a distance, gasping  curses, blood from sword thrusts making strange patterns on their woad  painted skins.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThirty men! Thirty, the remnant of the troop of five hundred that had  marched so arrogantly from Hadrian’s Wall. Zeus, what a plan! Five  hundred men, sent forth to hew a way through a land that swarmed with  barbarians of another age. Marching over heather hills by day, hacking  a crimson trail through blood-frenzied hordes, close camp at night,  with snarling, gibbering beings that stole past the sentries to slay  with silent dagger. Battle, bloodshed, carnage.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd word would go to the emperor in his fine palace, among his nobles  and his women, that another expedition had disappeared among the hazy  mountains of the mystic North.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI glanced at the men who were my comrades. There were Romans from  Latinia and native-born Romans. There were Britons, Germans, and a  flame-haired Hibernian. I looked at the wolves in human guise that  ringed us round. Dwarfish, hairy men they were, bowed and gnarled of  limb, long and mighty of arm, with great mops of coarse hair topping  foreheads that slanted like apes’. Small unblinking black eyes glinted  malevolent spite, like a snake’s eyes. Scarce any clothing they wore,  and they bore small round shields, long spears and short swords with  oval shaped blades. While scarce one of them topped five feet in  height, their incredibly broad shoulders denoted massive strength. And  they were as quick as cats.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey came with a rush. Short savage sword clashed on short Roman  sword. It was fighting at very close quarters, for the savages were  better adapted to such battling and the Romans trained their soldiers  in the use of the short blade. There the Roman shield was at  disadvantage, for it was too heavy to be shifted swiftly and the  savages crouched, thrusting upward.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBack to back we stood, and as a man fell, we closed the ranks again.  On, on they pushed, until their snarling faces were close to ours, and  their rank, beast-like breath was in our nostrils. Like men of steel we  held the formation. The heather, the hills, time itself, faded. A man  ceased to be a man and became a mere fighting automaton. The haze of  battle erased mind and soul. Swing, thrust. A blade shattering on  shield; a bestial face snarling through the battle-fog. Smite! The face  vanishing, for another face equally bestial.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYears of Roman culture slipped away like sea-fog before the sun. I was  again a savage; a primal man of the forest and seas. A primal man,  facing a tribe of another age, fierce in tribal hate, fierce with the  slaughter-lust. How I cursed the shortness of the Roman sword I  wielded. A spear crashed against my breast-plate; a sword shattered on  my helmet crest, beating me to the ground. Up I reeled, slaying the  smiter with a fierce up-slashing thrust. Then I stopped short, sword  raised. Over all the heather was silence. No more foes stood before me.  In a silent, gory band they lay, still grasping their swords, hacked  and hewn faces still set in snarls of hate. And of the thirty that had  faced them, there remained five. Two Romans, a Briton, the Irishman,  and I. The Roman sword and the Roman armor had triumphed and incredible  as it seemed, we had slain nearly four times our own number.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd there was but one thing we might do. Hew our way back over the  trail we had come, seek to gain through countless leagues of ferocious  land. On every hand great mountains reared. Snow crowned their summits  and the land was not warm. How far north we were, we had no idea. The  march was but a hazy memory into whose crimson fogs days and nights  faded in a red panorama. All we knew was some days agone the remnants  of the Roman army had been scattered among the peaks by a terrific  tempest, on whose mighty wings the savages had assailed us by hordes.  And the war horns had droned through the vales and crags for days, and  the half-hundred of us who had held together had battled every step of  the way, beset by yelling foemen who seemed to swarm from thin air. Now  silence reigned and there was no sign of the tribesmen. South we  headed, going like hunted things.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut before we set out, I found upon the battle-field that which  thrilled me with a fierce joy. Grasped in the hand of a tribesman was a  long, two handed sword. A Norse sword, by the hand of Thor! How the  savages came by it, I know not. Possibly some yellow haired viking had  gone down among them, battle-song on bearded lips, sword swinging. But  at least the sword was there.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSo fiercely had the savage clinched the hilt that I was forced to chop  off his hand to gain the sword.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWith it in my grasp, I felt bolder. Short swords and shields might  suffice for men of middle height; but they were feeble arms for a  warrior who towered more than five inches above six feet.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOver the mountains we went, clinging to narrow cliff edges, scaling  steep crags. Like so many insects we crawled along the face of a  sky-towering precipice, of such gigantic proportions that it seemed to  dwarf men into mere nothingness. Up over its brow we climbed, nearly  beaten down by the high mountain wind that roared with the voice of  giants. And there we found they who waited for us. The Briton went down  with a spear through him, reeled up, clutched him that wielded it, and  over the cliff they tumbled together, to fall for a thousand feet. A  wild, short flurry of fury, a whirl of swords and the battle was over.  Four tribesmen lay still at our feet, and one of the Romans crouched,  seeking to stem the blood that leaped from the stump of a severed arm.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOver the cliff we shoved those we had slain and we did up the Roman’s  arm with leather strips, binding them tight, so that the arm ceased to  bleed. Then once more we took up our way.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOn, on; crags reeled above us; gorse slopes tilted crazily. The sun  towered above the swaying peaks and sloped westward. Then as we  crouched upon a crag, hidden by great boulders, a band of tribesmen  passed beneath, walking upon a narrow trail that skirted precipices and  wound around mountain shoulders. And as they passed beneath us, the  Irishman gave a shout of wild joy, and bounding from the cliff, fell  among them. With yells like wolves they rushed upon him, and his red  hair gleamed above their black. The first to reach him went down with a  cleft head, and the second screeched as his arm left his shoulder. With  a wild battle-yell, he drove his sword through a hairy breast, plucked  it forth and smote off a head. Then they swarmed over him like wolves  over a lion, and an instant later his head went up on a spear. The face  still seemed to wear the battle-joy.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey passed on, never suspecting our presence, and again we pressed  on. Night fell and the moon rose, making the peaks rear up like vague  ghosts, throwing strange shadows among the valleys. As we went we found  signs of the march, and of the retreat. There a Roman lying at the foot  of a precipice, a smashed heap, perhaps a long spear through him; there  a headless body, there a bodyless head. Shattered helmets, broken  swords told the mute tale of fiercely contested battles.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOn through the night we staggered, halting only at dawn, when we hid  ourselves among the boulders and ventured forth again only when night  had fallen. Groups of tribesmen passed close but we remained  undiscovered, though at times we could have touched them as they went.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDawn was breaking when we came upon a different land, a land that was  merely a great plateau. Mountains towered on every hand, except to the  south where the level land seemed to run for a long way. So I believed  that we had left the mountains and had come upon the foot hills that  stretched away to finally merge upon the fertile plains of the south.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSo we came upon a lake and halted there. There was no sign of a foe,  no smoke in the sky. But as we stood there, the Roman who had but one  arm pitched forward on his face without a sound and there was a  throwing spear through him.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe scanned the lake. No boats rippled its surface. No foe showed among  the scant reeds near its bank. We turned, gazing across the heather.  And without a sound the Roman crumpled and fell forward, a short spear  standing between his shoulders.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSword bared, and mazed, I searched the silent slopes for sign of a  foe. The heath stretched bare from mountain to mountains and nowhere  was the heather tall enough to hide a man, not even a Caledonian. No  ripple stirred the lake – what caused that reed to sway when the others  were motionless? I bent forward, peering into the water. Beside the  reed a bubble rose to the surface. I bent nearer, wondering – a bestial  face leered up at me, just below the surface of the lake! An instant’s  astoundment – then my frantic-swung sword split that hairy face,  checking just in time the spear that leaped for my breast. The waters  of the lake boiled in turmoil and presently there floated to the  surface the form of the savage, the sheaf of throwing spears still in  his belt, his ape-like hand still grasping the hollow reed through  which he had breathed. Then I knew why so many Romans had been  strangely slain by the shores of the lakes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI flung away my shield, discarded all accoutrements except my sword,  dagger and armor. A certain ferocious exultation thrilled me. I was one  man, amid a savage land, amid a savage people who thirsted for my  blood. By Thor and Woden, I would teach them how a Norseman passed!  With each passing moment I became less of the cultured Roman. All dross  of education and civilization slipped from me, leaving only the  primitive man, only the primordial soul, red taloned, ferocious.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd a slow, deep rage began to rise in me, coupled with a vast Nordic  contempt for my foes. I was in good mood to go berserk. Thor knows I  had had fighting in plenty along the march and along the retreat, but  the fighting soul of the Norse was a-stir in me, that has mystic depths  deeper than the North Sea. I was no Roman. I was a Norseman, a hairy  chested, yellow bearded barbarian. And I strode the heath as arrogantly  as if I trod the deck of my own galley. Picts, what were they? Stunted  dwarfs whose day had passed. It was strange what a terrific hate began  to consume me. And yet not so strange, for the further I receded in  savagery, the more primitive my impulses became, and the fiercer flamed  the intolerant hatred of the stranger, that first impulse of the primal  tribesman. But there was a deeper, more sinister reason at the back of  my mind, though I knew it not. For the Picts were men of another age,  in very truth, the last of the Stone Age peoples, whom the Celts and  Nordics had driven before them when they came down from the North. And  somewhere in my mind lurked a nebulous memory of fierce, merciless  warfare, waged in a darker age.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd there was a certain awe, too, not for their fighting qualities,  but for the sorcery which all peoples firmly believed the Picts to  possess. I had seen their cromlechs all over Britain, and I had seen  the great rampart they had built not far from Corinium. I knew that the  Celtic Druids hated them with a hate that was surprizing, even in  priests. Not even the Druids could, or would tell just how the Stone  Age men reared those immense barriers of stone, or for what reason, and  the mind of the ordinary man fell back upon that explanation which has  served for ages – witch-craft. More, the Picts themselves believed  firmly that they were warlocks and perhaps that had something to do  with it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd I fell to wondering just why we five hundred men had been ordered  out on that wild raid. Some had said to seize a certain Pictish priest,  some that we sought word of the Pictish chief, one Bran Mak Morn. But  none knew except the officer in command and his head rode a Pictish  spear somewhere out in that sea of mountain and heather. I wished that  I could meet that same Bran Mak Morn. ’Twas said that he was unmatched  in warfare, either with army or singly. But never had we seen a warrior  who seemed so much in command as to justify the idea that he was the  chief. For the savages fought like wolves, though with a certain rude  discipline.Featuring a newly discovered, never-before-published story! Creator of Conan; Fully illustrated by Gary Gianni; [quote]--Stephen King","brand":"Random House Worlds","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46301270966501,"sku":"NP9780345461544","price":18.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780345461544.jpg?v=1767723016","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/bran-mak-morn-the-last-king-isbn-9780345461544","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}