An incredible, scarcely human cry went up from the Avengers: a low, incredulous moan that almost instantly guttered to silence. Stopa staggered backward a few steps, then dropped the remains of his weapon and sank to his knees, his eyes downcast, his head bowed before him. An instant later, the other Avengers followed his example and assumed this posture of homage, holding their flaming torches erect before them. Even Bogel, thoroughly dumb^
founded, could not remain standing in the face of such an historic moment.
For his part, Feric himself could hardly comprehend the enormity of what he had done. In his hand was the Steel Commander, the Great Truncheon of Held, and it had no more weight than a wooden wand; it seemed bome
'triumphantly aloft by a power which seemed to surge down its shaft, through its handle, and throughout Feric's body, a power both symbolic and actual. In him were the genes of the royal house of Heldon; that much penetrated his astonishment with instant crystal clarity. The royal stock had been scattered centuries ago; it was not unreasonable that the royal genotype might emerge once more from the general Helder gene pool. The fact that he held the Great Truncheon aloft proved beyond question that exactly this had occurred;
Slowly, gathering his wits about him, Feric rose to his 74
feet holding the great gleaming truncheon high over his head; the light of the bonfire behind him bathed him in fiery orange glory and cast shimmering highlights up and down the length of his mighty steel shaft.
Before him, Stopa kneeled, his countenance displaying a submissiveness of noble and cosmic profundity. "My life is yours to do with as you will, lord," he muttered humbly, without raising his eyes.
The full import of what had occurred finally permeated Feric's being. Fate had moved him to Ulmgam, fate had thrown him in with Bogel so that he would take a later roadsteamer and encounter these noble barbarians; destiny had moved through time and space to place the Great Truncheon of Held in his hand. The meaning was clear: he was the rightful ruler of all Heldon; the proof of this he held in his hand for all to see. It now remained to secure the power necessary to bring him to his rightful station.
This was his fate, his duty, his destiny: to grasp all Heldon in his hand as he grasped the Steel Commander, to use it as a weapon to drive all mutants and Doms from the land, and then to reclaim the last habitable inch of soil on earth for the true human genotype. This was his sacred mission. He could not and would not fail.
Backed by the glow of the bonfire, in the midst of the Emerald Wood, the ancestral heartland of Heldon, Feric Jaggar held the sceptre of Heldon triumphantly aloft in the firelight and stood before his kneeling minions. There was no doubt whatever, in his mind or theirs, that they were his fanatic followers now, loyal unto death.
Feric lowered the Great Truncheon to waist level; holding the great gleaming steel shaft out before him, he approached the kneeling Stag Stopa. "Arise," he said.
Stopa looked up at the great shining headpiece of the truncheon which Feric held before his face, a headball carved in the likeness of a hero's fist, with a swastika signet ring on the third finger. He started to obey Feric's command, hesitated, then touched his lips to the swastika on the head of the Great Truncheon. Only then did he rise to his feet.
Deeply moved by this spontaneous gesture of fealty, Feric allowed first Bogel and then each Avenger in turn, to kiss the swastika emblem on the tip of his heroic weapon. One by one, the men completed this act of submission, and rose to their feet, the Avengers holding 75
their torches proudly erect, their eyes glowing like red-hot coals in the firelight.
When all stood manfully before him, Peric spoke. "Will you follow me without question, with total fanatic loyalty to the cause of Heldon and genetic purity, to your deaths if so ordered?"
The reply was a great massed roar of approval. They were magnificent lads, fit material for the storm troop that was needed.
"Very well then," Ferie declared, "you are Black Avengers no more. I baptize you anew with a name whose nobility you must earn; see to it that you do nothing to betray it."
Feric pointed the headpiece of the Great Truncheon squarely at his men; the steel fist with its black swastika in a spot of white encircled by red glowed like a rising sun in the firelight.
"You are now Knights of the Swastika!" Feric shouted.
He shot his free arm straight out at eye level before him in the ancient royal salute. "Hail Heldon!" he cried. "Hail the Swastika! Hail Victory!"
Almost at once, Feric was looking out over a forest of outstretched arms, and the newly baptized storm troops were spontaneously roaring: "Hail Jaggar! Hail Jaggarl Hail Jaggar!"
