Forgotten Stories
of
Fantastic Sword-fighters:
David C. Smith’s
Oron (Part 1 of 4)

by Andy Beau

David C. Smith (1952 - ) had five novels published in the late 1970s to early 1980s that occur on the island-continent of Attluma. Four of them concern the adventures of the warrior Oron. According to the series, Attluma was an island-continent that eventually sank into the ocean, giving rise to the legend of Atlantis. However, unlike many Atlantis stories, the sinking of the island-continent does not occur in this series. Also, Attluma does not contain a civilization brimming with super-science. Attluma could be considered a miniature version of Conan’s world, since it has many of the same types of countries, peoples, and cultures.

The first of the four Oron books is titled, simply, Oron. Years before the beginning of this book, Oron, who belonged to a tribe of barbarians, killed his father and was exiled from the tribe. In exile, he joined bands of bandits and raiders, rising to high leadership in that collection of ruffians. As this story begins, Oron, about 30, is a soldier in the army of Amrik, the general of the army of the country of Salasal. The book opens immediately after a fierce battle, won by Amrik against the army of a rebellious city. Oron is walking among the dead and wounded on the battlefield.

They lay everywhere, the hardened, dying men littering the landscape, smothering in blood-drenched mud -- men fallen on the field of battle, groaning for their pain, shrieking in agony as the black vultures winged low to tear at their living flesh, as the gnawing insects wormed into their open wounds. All over the wide, low plain they lay scattered and contorted, singly or in heaps, their scattered, torn bodies in cruor-caked and shattered armor. They stared up at the drizzling skies with eyes fogged and unseeing. The rain filled up the sockets of their open eyes and mouths, beat at the hardened gore and mud. The rain ran in rivulets down stilled swords thrust into the earth. Here was a lull in the battle, Oron and Nevgan walked amongst (their) fallen comrades, mercifully slashing throats and breaking open brains.

Because of his prowess in battle, Amrik assigns Oron as one of his personnel guard. Amrik is actually plotting to overthrow the ruling king of Salasal and enlists Oron’s aid. However, Oron sees the methods Amrik uses in overthrowing the king--poisonings and surprise knifings in the night--as a dishonorable way to wage a battle. He leaves the service of Amrik and eventually gathers his own army and begins winning land from the ruthless rulers in the area.

Here is Amrik and his army battling Dasagak, a despotic ruler of a small city-state, and his army.

Dasagak’s troops marched onto the small plain before the city. Dasagak himself rode to the fore, waving his sword and yelling loud oaths….Oron cursed and surveyed his lines, then lowered his arm. Bellowing, he led the charge down the field, his men behind him whooping and howling. Dasagak cried out and galloped ahead. In the center of the plain the armies met with cries and shrieks, the clattering of metal and the whinnying of horses. Oron, amidst swinging weapons and spraying blood, looked about madly for Dasagak. A mace struck his shield, and in rage Oron hit back and split someone’s skull. Through the tumult and dimming light, Oron saw Dasagak a distance away, vainly shouting commands and swinging his blade fiercely. Then a madman with an axe tried to wound Oron’s horse; but he mis-stepped, and Oron swung and sheared off the fool’s arm and trampled him under. “Oron!’ It was Dasagak, shouting through the violent press. Oron saw him, and kicked his horse and swore to reach him. Dasagak grinned bitterly, lurched his mount forward and kicked away swordsmen and axe-handlers. Both Dasagak and Oron killed the lone warrior riding between them and then they clashed. Dasagak swung, and Oron ducked the blow, parrying with a shower of sparks. Both men were drooling into their beards and staring with old venom. Oron twisted to ward off Dasagak’s lunging thrusts. And Dasagak howled in rage that he could not force Oron’s guard. The slaughter around them had waned….Oron tightened his lips and snarled. Dasagak reined away, then kicked forward again. Oron lurched, measured with a glance. Blades clanged close. And Dasagak cried out like a smitten bull and drew away a mangled hand. Then Oron dug his sword deep into Dasagak’s armor, and (Dasagak) toppled from his bucking horse to the red earth. Cheers rang in Oron’s ears. Breathing heavily, the conqueror raised his stained blade and waved it, and answered his men with a throaty cry of victory.

Having set up a small kingdom himself, it was only natural that he and Amrik would eventually battle. Oron wins and leaves Amrik deformed but still in control of only his city-state. After Oron helps the princess of a neighboring kingdom retain her rule from a scheming royal he marries her and Oron becomes the king of a realm larger than his own. He soon becomes despondent and bored, missing the adventure and excitement of his earlier days.

Meanwhile, Amrik strikes up a bargain with a demon from Hell to provide him the means to eventually conquer the entire continent, and beyond. Many believe that every thousand years a battle is fought between the forces of Hell, represented by Kossuth, and the forces of humanity, represented by a special warrior the gods have chosen to protect humanity and defeat Kossuth. The victor controls the Earth for a thousand years, either Kossuth or humanity. In the past, Kossuth has won and has ruthlessly subjugated humanity; other times humanity has won and defeated the forces of evil. This is now the time of Kossuth’s return!

The following describes the doom Kossuth plans to wreak upon humanity while sitting in his ebon citadel.

(Kossuth) sat sipping fiery nectar, and as night came down, the brilliant stars shone forth in the dark, endless sky. Kossuth put away his nectar and bade his inhuman menials leave him. They went out, scampering, scruffling, barking and mewling and laughing, going down into the lower recesses of the citadel. Kossuth arose, walked to a window, and stared out, his yellow eyes glowing, his figure black in the black shadows of the unlighted chamber. He looked upon those stars which had marked him and which were more ancient than he….He spoke slowly, urgently, in a sibilant voice as low and melancholy as the breathing of the cosmos….’Aye, the time shall come! The time when I look out to see a black sun in a lightless sky -- the mark of the bright sun gone from here for a thousand years, its glow a haze and a miasma, weak against the dark. And the people of all the lands shall go mad and become beasts, lower than beasts; they shall die and become servants to the true dead and the long undead. They will die and live the life of the unliving, and their memories shall be things of horror to them, and they will weep dry tears and yearn for the days when their bones were clothed with flesh and muscle. And they shall go mad and mindless, with no brains in their skulls. And their lipless mouths shall kiss in never-ending kisses of dust and ageless mortality. And I, I shall walk a rotted and unblossoming earth, hand-in-hand with free and beautiful corpses! And monsters will reign on old thrones as high kings, and prettied tapestries will moulder and fall away, and the bronze and gold and silver will lose their luster, …and hungry plants will roam the world, sucking animal carcasses into their maws…And I shall lord it over the hierarchy of evil and discord…for a thousand years.’

Because of his prior defeat and subsequent maiming at the hands of Oron, Amrik chooses to begin conquering the lands that eventually lead him into battle against Oron. Kossuth lends Amrik evil sorcery to defeat the armies in these lands. Oron is told that he is this savior from the gods, who will save humanity from Hell’s evil prince, Kossuth. He sees himself as a warrior who makes his own destiny, without the control or help of the gods. Eventually, Kossuth steals the soul of Oron’s wife, the queen, and keeps it in his special black fortress located in a lake near Amrik’s ruling city. Oron brings a small group of soldiers with him to rescue the queen’s soul and, hopefully, defeat the demon Kossuth. The battle in the demon’s fortress takes some surprising twists and turns from the commonly expected sword-and-sorcery endings.

As with all the books I review in this column, I recommend this book for readers craving action and excitement, sword and sorcery style. The demon, Kossuth, is one of the most evil opponents you can find in the genre. An added bonus is the great cover (Oron, looking like a bearded Conan, is standing over his dead enemy in a battlefield, scowling, partially armored, and carrying a five-foot long battleaxe) as well as the full-page interior illustrations, artwork painted by Clyde Caldwell, who later became a well-known artist for some of the books from TSR.

In the next Oron novel, Mosutha’s Magic, Smith explains the history behind the Oron series. He wrote this first full-length novel,Oron, while in college in 1973 at the age of twenty-one. He’d written short stories prior to this but nothing this long. He felt that “Flawed though it is (and as I (Smith) suppose, it must be, written by a neophyte twenty-one-year-old with more ambition than experience), I felt that Oron was a solid story, and I was fully confident that it would be accepted immediately for publication by some farseeing, revolutionary-minded editor. Wrong.” He would get many rejection slips, often with the comment that the “barbarian fantasy” market had dried up (and this was in the mid-1970s!). He couldn’t find a publisher for it until five years later. Zebra Books published it and the four other Attluma novels, starting in 1978.

Smith also published a 6-book series of Red Sonja novels with Richard Tierney in the early 80s. For about ten years, beginning in the mid-70s, Zebra Books printed several anthologies of forgotten Robert E. Howard non-sword-and-sorcery tales (horrors, swashbucklers, etc.), and Lin Carter’s four Weird Tales in book format, among other books of pulp-era stories and their modern equivalents.

The 5 books in the Attluma series are divided into 4 about Oron and 1 about another warrior from four hundred years after. Zebra Books got confused with this arrangement, as is shown in the following list of books, shown in publishing chronology. The series numbers (ex. ‘#3’) are on the Zebra Books covers incorrectly.

Oron - June 1978

The Sorcerer’s Shadow - September 1978

Mosutha’s Magic - Oron #3 - 1982

The Valley Of Ogrum - Oron #4 - 1982

The Ghost Army - Oron #5 - 1983.

As can be seen, Zebra Books thought The Sorcerer’s Shadow was part of the Oron series and thus considered it the #2 book, thereby mis-numbering the subsequent Oron books. So, there isn’t an actual book with “Oron #2” printed on the cover. I’ll review the other four Oron books in future columns.

These books can be found on Abebooks.com and other used book web sites for a few dollars.

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.