Wielding a Red Sword by Piers Anthony still remains one of my least favorite entries in Incarnations of Immortality. I mean, it's not that it's ever dull, but honestly, it's entire raison d' etre is to set up the eventual payoffs down the line, rather than give us something as interesting as the previous three books.
We start with Mym, "Pride of the Kingdom", a Brahmin stutterer on the run from his father and responsibilities of being the second born prince of the king. He joins a traveling circus (wearing a remarkably familiar snake ring that answers yes/no questions), shacks up with Luna's cousin Orb, and winds up being dragged back into his Kingdom as the circus tries to leave India. Seems Mym's brother died, leaving Mym the heir. Because we have to, Orb is payed off like a common whore, and Mym goes home, where Daddy dearest starts executing concubines until Mym agrees to marry Princess Rapture.
He and Rapture do wind up falling in love, but things happen, Mym happens to be the angriest person in the world when War flares up after a small break in fighting around the globe, Mym gets the Red Sword and becomes Mars, incarnation of War. (One should also mention Mars has a few Minor Incarnations [Slaughter, Conquest, Famine, and Pestilence] associated with him. Given Death is a separate Incarnation, and they never do explain how the minors work....)
Anyway....
Long story short, Satan sends a succubus to annoy Mym. Lila does her job, helping Rapture become an independent woman. Heaven forbid that Mym be without a subservient woman, so Lila sends him after Ligea, who's unfairly damned. Mym winds up trapped in Hell, so, being a rational man of War, he starts a revolt of the Damned.
Anyway, long story short, Mym winds up foiling Satan and having Ligea as wife and Lila as concubine.
It's all kind of silly, and really only seems to be written to explain where the heck Orlene came from.
But, it's readable.
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