Forgotten Stories
of
Fantastic Sword-fighters:
John Maddox Roberts’
(writing as Mark Ramsay)
Draco Falcon (Part 1 of 4)

by Andy Beau

The Draco Falcon four-book swashbuckling historical series was written by John Maddox Roberts (1947-), using the pseudonym of Mark Ramsay, and published in 1982-3. Roberts is probably recognized by many readers of this site as the author of eight Conan novels for Tor publishing from the mid '80s to the mid '90s. He has also written at least 45 science fiction novels, historical novels, and contemporary mysteries, as well as other books. Like Barry Sadler, who wrote the Casca series, Roberts served in the U. S. Army’s Green Berets and in Vietnam during 1967-70. But unlike Sadler, not at the same time. At that time he developed a lifelong interest in making and using armor and bladed weapons, which gives him an edge (pun intended!) in weapons descriptions and fighting techniques.

In the first book, The Falcon Strikes, fifteen year old Draco de Montfalcon sails with his nobleman father and others to fight in the Crusades. As they sail past the island of Cyprus, they are attacked by Cyprian pirates. The ships are grappled together, and bloody combat erupts during the midst of a wild lightning storm.

The lightning had one beneficial effect, at least. Men avoided the mast (where Falcon was) while it was decorated with the demonic blue fire. Slowly, the (lightning) writhed down the mast toward Falcon. Just before it could touch his head, it blinked out. But it was just an exchange of one death for another, for now three Cyprians closed in on (Falcon), their weapons streaming blood and rainwater and their mail sparkling with static discharge from the overloaded atmosphere. Abruptly, a hulking shape arose behind them and (Falcon’s father) was swinging his greatsword two-handed and roaring the Montfalcon battlecry, “Strike, Falcons! Strike, Falcons!” The sword sheared flesh and iron with the fury of his fear for his son.

Shortly thereafter, a lightning bolt glanced off Falcon’s body, causing him to black out, but not before turning a patch of his black hair above his eye white and searing a white scar from there down his cheek to his jaw, chest, and finally down his stomach and leg to his foot, leaving a white streak of flesh and body hair where it ran. After landing in Outremer, the name the Europeans gave to the lands of the Crusades, Falcon grows to become nineteen and old enough to be knighted. However, just prior to his knighting, he discovers the deadly treachery by four high-ranking Crusaders which leads to the death of hundreds of Crusaders and the torturing of his father. Falcon is captured and forced to become a slave rower aboard a Saracen ship for two years. He then becomes a student for some years of a Saracen commander named Suleiman the Wise (not to be confused with the real life 16th century Ottoman emperor Suleiman the Magnificent) and receives Suleiman’s sword, Three Moons. The sword is a large falchion, a sword with a curved single-edged blade that becomes larger toward its tip. It also has a crescent moon-shaped crosspiece and pommel. Hence the sword’s name, Three (Crescent) Moons. This weapon is strikingly different from the standard Crusader double-edged straight sword. After leaving Suleiman, Falcon is now about thirty and travels back to Europe, vowing to kill the four men who betrayed him and the other Crusaders. Falcon appropriately renames his Saracen sword Nemesis, after the Greek goddess of vengeance. Each of the four books deals with separate encounters with each of the four traitors.

After arriving in southern France with his man-at-arms, Wulf, he encounters Marie de Cleves, the mistress of a small castle, whose father has been captured by the Saracens while on Crusade. Falcon reluctantly declines Marie's offer to defend her castle because she has no funds to pay for his small growing army. Soon after, however, Falcon discovers that Thibaut’s military leader is none other than Valdemar, one of the four traitors he has vowed to kill. He quickly hires on as Marie’s military leader to defend her lands from Thibaut, seeing this as a chance to extract his vengeance. With many of the noblemen away on Crusade being captured or killed, their knights returned home as knights-errant (knights without a master), roaming Europe as hired soldiers, something unheard of before the Crusades. Such is Falcon and many others. Falcon organizes his own private army, which is loyal only to himself instead of a nobleman--again, something new during the time of the Crusades.

In a surprise night attack on Marie’s castle by Valdemar’s forces, Falcon jumps out of Marie’s bed and races to the battle, only grabbing his sword, Nemesis, and forgoing his clothing. Naked, Falcon leads his men outside the burning castle gate to engage the enemy.

A horseman tried to ride Falcon down, swinging an ax at his unprotected head. Nemesis took the hand off at the wrist and Falcon grabbed the armored bicep as the man sagged forward in shock and hauled him from the saddle. He got a scorched foot into a stirrup and heaved himself into the saddle. It was an awkward move for a man grasping a sword, but he managed it and went riding wildly among the enemy, whooping and shouting. “Valdemar! Valdemar! Where are you, you German pig? Show yourself!” A lancer rode at him, and he halved the man with a horizontal slash. The lance had not even come close. In the uncertain light of the flames, Falcon could not use his customary artistic cuts, and Nemesis wreaked truly awesome carnage in wild sweeps that sheared through armor as if it were cloth. Soon, men were avoiding the incredible naked horseman and Falcon heard some shouting that he was not a man but a night goblin come to defend (Marie’s castle).

Later, Falcon wages an exciting trial-by-combat joust against Valdemar. Falcon is not allowed to use his “heathen” Saracen sword in a contest such as this that is judged by God. He then borrows a “Christian” sword, Moorslayer, from a Spanish knight in his army. In one scene, the two combatants charge each other on horseback, swords held high. This is a description of the use of a knight’s long sword that probably came from Roberts’ own personal experiences with swords and armor mentioned above.

Falcon raised his shield and rode for the German knight. Each held his sword far back for the overhand swing. The knightly long sword was useless for thrusting, and it was difficult to wield in short cuts or chops. A weighty, massive weapon, it was swung in great circles pivoting at the user’s shoulder. It was the terrible momentum built up by this long sweep, backed by the muscle of a powerful warrior, that made the long sword such a deadly weapon, and it was against this weapon that a knight’s protective equipment was designed. An unarmored man or one without a helmet or one whose shield was not at least rimmed with iron stood little chance.

The conclusion of the book deals with an action-filled, detailed siege of Thibaut’s castle. Valdemar escapes at the last moment, but is chased down by Falcon. At the end, Valdemar reveals a secret to Falcon that leaves him “thunderstruck, his world reeling about him”.

In the book, the sub-story of Falcon’s experiences in Outremer are told as brief flashbacks in his disturbing dreams that occur to Falcon while in France. His life’s experiences have shown him the hypocrisy of some of the men who claim to be knights and Christians but who are really thieves and killers who do not live up to their knightly code. He’s also seen the hypocrisy of some of the churchmen who also don’t follow their beliefs, but are collaborators with the false knights in their schemes. It seems to be a similar setting to Conan’s world in this respect. And like Conan, Falcon has his own internal moral code of honorable behavior.

Based on the amount of sex and violence in these stories compared to his TOR Conan tales, if both sets of stories were movies, Roberts’ TOR Conan stories would probably be rated PG-13, and the Falcon stories an R. For more information about how this came about and other interesting comments by Roberts himself, read his interview here at SwordAndSorcery.org.

The other stories in the series, in order, are: The Black Pope, The Bloody Cross, and The King’s Treasure. I’ll review these in future columns.

Used copies of this book and the others in the series can be obtained from Amazon.com, Abebooks.com, and other used-book web sites.

About the Author

Andy Beau has lived in San Diego, CA since he was 16. There were no computer degrees in the 1960s, so he graduated with a degree in math and worked in the computer programming field from 1969 until 2003, when he retired early at 57. Prior to these articles all of his writing has been technical--the composition of user manuals--and there wasn't much call for analysis of plot and character development in that. Andy's been a fan of sword and sorcery tales since college in 1966. This has lead him to other fantasy adventure genres: lost race, supernatural thrillers, Lovecraftian horror, and more. He shares his long-term love for and knowledge of sword and sorcery with his readers in these columns. SwordAndSorcery.org is proud to have him.