James Nicoll Reviews

1979’s Fires of Azeroth is the third volume in C. J. Cherryh’s Morgaine science fiction series, which thus far has four volumes.

Morgaine and her faithful companion Vanye fled from a doomed world through an other-dimensional gate, closing the gate in their wake… but not in time to avoid bringing calamity with them.

The qhal gates span time and space. This was terribly convenient until misuse sparked causal disaster. The great qhal civilization collapsed. When Union stumbled over a gate, they realized the risks inherent in the gates far outweighed the benefits. Hence the Union assigned Morgaine and her team the task of finding and closing every time-and-space-bridging qhal gate. Of that team, only Morgaine remains.

The being who wears the body of Vanye’s cousin Roh uses qhal science to transfer itself from body to body, greatly extending its life. Desperate to survive, this ancient has no regard for the greater good. Had Roh been left behind on Vanye’s home world, no problem. However, Roh fled from that world to the doomed world featured in Well of Shiuan. Rather than perish, Roh followed Morgaine and Vanye through a gate. To ensure that Morgaine and Vanye could not stop him, Roh brought a vast army of heavily armed refugees with him.

The people of this new world are ill-equipped to resist the violent brigands with whom Roh is allied. Furthermore, Morgaine is goal-oriented and her goal isn’t to protect hapless peasants, but to close gates. Therefore, all Morgaine does is warn locals to flee or perish.

The invaders are between Morgaine and the next gate she intends to close. Furthermore, Roh would be safer if Morgaine were dead, and would happily use his army to that end.

While Roh’s allies vastly outnumber Morgaine and the situation is dire, there is a little hope. The invaders are not a unified force; they are grudgingly cooperating factions led by ambitious warlords who would turn on each other if they saw an opportunity. The trick is to create that opportunity.

Morgaine is ruthless and armed with both knowledge and matchless super-scientific weapons. But Morgaine is just as vulnerable to a well-aimed arrow as any human. It falls to Vanye to somehow support his cold lady’s quest.

~oOo~

Horse lovers might want to avoid this volume.

Oddly, I didn’t see a UK edition of this. As well, Cherryh doesn’t seem well represented over at SF Gateway. Or represented at all. Is Cherryh systematically excluded from the UK market, the way Tanith Lee was from American markets?

Some sources call this book fantasy rather than science fiction. They are wrong. There is no sign of Andre Norton-esque magical gates, magic swords, and squabbling feudal domains. There are super-science gates, super-science swords, and (thanks to general social collapse) squabbling feudal domains. I am sure you see the stark differences.

This novel is, among other things, a testament to the foolishness of constructing coalitions from ambitious, untrustworthy rivals, each one looking for an angle to betray their allies in quest of short-term gain. These are not people who found successful states.

Readers might deduce from the fact that this is the third book in a four-book series that Morgaine does not die at this time. Consider, however, that not only is Cherryh perfectly happy with gloomy endings, body-hopping technology means that Morgaine’s knowledge and skills could be passed on without preserving Morgaine herself. Lots of reason for readers to be tense reading this volume.

A curious detail I didn’t note when I read this volume decades ago: why did the qhal worlds collapse to mediaeval levels of technology in particular? Is that just where collapsing qhal civilizations stop collapsing?

Perhaps Cherryh found it amusing to create a science fiction world, and then tell a story about it in the fashion of the fantasies popular at the time. For Vanye, his adventures are clearly a world-saving mythic adventure. Readers on the other hand will be well aware that this is science fiction. (OK, world-saving isn’t really accurate. Not for any particular world unfortunate enough to be visited by Morgaine.)

Although there’s a fourth book, I have yet to read it. This is because Fires seemed to be a perfectly good place to leave the story. Clearly, Cherryh disagreed. I look forward to discovering why.

Fires of Azeroth is available as part of an omnibus here (DAW), here (Barnes & Noble), here (Bookshop US), here (Chapters-Indigo), and here (Words Worth Books). I did not find Fires (either alone or as part of an omnibus) at Bookshop UK.