Anyway, everyone is playing for big stakes now. This is Michael Moorcock telling this story. Starting to sound like stock fantasy? Have some faith here. Here, a deal with the Devil is struck and Ulrich von Bek agrees to go off on a quest for the Holy Grail. The Prince of Darkness informs him if he wasn’t already damned he would not have been able to enter his castle. The War Hound meets the Devil and finds out he belongs to Lucifer, as well. The War Hound is soon enthralled by the witch, Sabrina and immediately falls in love with her. Don’t worry, it’s not long before there is a confrontation and some supernatural elements are introduced. Things are moving slow for a Michael Moorcock novel at this point. Beyond the fringes of the Thuringian Forest he comes upon a deserted castle and spends an idyllic vacation for ten days or so. Von Bek, known as the War Hound, roams the countryside of war-torn Germany, seemingly immune to death, destruction, plague, and pox. Sometimes that means doing cruel and terrible things. A fighter and leader of soldiers in the religious war that nearly destroyed Central Europe, von Bek has left all faith behind for reason and the pragmatism necessary to survive.
What follows is some background information as we learn Ulrich von Bek, lately Commander of Infantry, has deserted his men due to some of them contracting the plague. Michael Moorcock sets the scene in first person with a grey and dismal world ravaged by war : It was in that year when the fashion in cruelty demanded not only the crucifixion of peasant children, but a similar fate for their pets, that I first met Lucifer and was transported into Hell for the Prince of Darkness wished to strike a bargain with me.
In some ways the book was not what I expected.
I had been saving The War Hound and the World’s Pain for many years. Having a book you’ve yet to read by one of your favorite sword-and-sorcery authors is to possess a great treasure.
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