DS vs. Cyrion (rehash)

[wombat1138]

Still playing with HTML columns/colors because they're fun. This is largely based on bad_penny's original comparison between DS14 and Tanith Lee's story "A Lynx With Lions". The latter has been reprinted several times in its own right, but afaik its first appearance was as pp132-161 in Lee's book Cyrion, NYC: Daw 1982, so I'm using the pagination from there.

Mostly what I've done is color-code the different sections and type in enough additional material from Lee to show how the original scene flowed together before being recycled, aside from the underlying plot device. Some of the overlaps are relatively piecemeal but still describe the same specific action with many of the same specific words. I can't decide whether it's overly persnickety to mark all of the individual small bits of shared vocabulary, vs. the entire lines that frame them.

Cyrion p150 [the pact's description]: But this time it was the male demon, trapped in Karuil's body, who answered. In the dry borrowed voice, he said, "Unless Ysemid's own hand removes the jewel, and with his own hand the jewel is given into our keeping, the safeguards remain in place, and we remain his slaves, and must follow every commandment he sets on us. Which he enjoys, being vicious. He loves to play, cat with rat. It is this way with certain men, uncleanly brutishness." p158 [the pact's fulfillment]: Somewhere in the fume of sand between the two men, there lit two coals of icy fire, two stars-- the torchglare on two brilliant eyes. And then a blade almost as bright came up with a wave of sand. A sword of fire, and it burned. Ysemid found he had not completed the emasculating stroke. Stupidly perplexed, he peered down to seek the reason for failure. And saw his own hand, severed just above the wrist and lying, bleeding and lost, under the edge of Cyrion's sword. Before the scream could find its way through Ysemid's throat, a ringed fist hammered upward into his jaw. Ysemid's teeth met in his tongue like an agonizing vise. He slumped over into a roaring tawny darkness. The next pain began far away, the awful pain in his earlobe-- Cyrion, having taken Ysemid's severed hand in his own, had clamped its fingers, tonglike, on the sapphire and ripped the amulet free. With a wicked twist, utilizing the gold wires that had formerly bound it to Ysemid's ear, Cyrion bound it to the disinherited fingers. The operation had needed seconds. Now, gaining his feet without effort, Cyrion flung the bloody hand and its gem into the sand before Karuil-Ysem. Who bowed before it, predatory, and next quite motionless. From all sides the men of the People were running forward. Their wailing and the grin of their blades filled the night. Cyrion, his voice dry and eroded, shouted at Karuil. "Plucked from him by his own hand, and given you by his own hand. Pick it up, damn you, and use it."

Draco Sinister Chapter 12 [the pact's description]: The demon stopped laughing, and looked straight at her. "In the original bargain, Slytherin promised us a Magid heir of his own blood, and that is what we will take. Unless the Snake Lord can be persuaded to offer up the sword to us willingly with his own hand, in which case we will take him instead. "With his own hand?" Narcissa echoed faintly. The demon nodded. Chapter 14 [Slytherin bitch-slaps Hermione]: He hit her. His ringed fist hammered up into her jaw and her teeth met in her lip in a burst of agony. She gasped and through the haze of pain that darkened her vision, she saw Harry throw himself forward, the ropes that bound him to the pillar dragging themselves out to their fullest extension, but it still wasn't far enough for him to reach Slytherin. Chapter 14 [the pact's fulfillment] Draco brought the sword down, a wave of brilliant green fire. The blade struck against the Snake Lord's wrist, neatly severing his hand. He shrieked aloud as fire poured from his wounded arm, an indescribable shriek of rage and horror, and his severed hand tumbled at Draco´s feet. Beyond disgust, beyond anything but a terrible sort of exultation, Draco seized the mutilated hand of the Snake Lord, clamped the fingers tong-like around the hilt of his sword, and flung them together into the pentagram inked on the floor. He threw his head back then, and, his voice furious and carrying, shouted at the invisible forces of Hell. "There you go! Your half of the bargain! Given to you by his own hand, the hand of the Snake Lord himself! Take it, damn you, and use it!"