Revenge of the Rose (16 page)

 
          
Elric
nodded slowly in agreement. He stretched the blade before him then brought it
up flat against his heaving chest, placing his other hand near the tip of the
great broadsword on which runes flickered and glowed. “I have no choice,” he
said. “I would endure any danger rather than earn the fate my father has
promised me …”

 
          
And
with that he had screamed the name of his own patron Duke of Demons and had
hurled his howling battle-blade, and his body with it, out over the Chaos pit,
a wild, unlikely song upon his bloodless lips …

 
          
The
last thing Wheldrake saw of his friend were crimson eyes glaring with a kind of
terrible tranquility as the Sorcerer Emperor was pulled remorselessly down into
the flaming hub of that hellish abyss …

 
          
Of the Troll of the Church they sing the
rune
By the
Northern
Sea
in
the harvest moon;
And the fishers of
Zealand
hear him still
Scolding his wife in Ulshoi hill
.

 
          
And seaward over its groves of birch
Still looks the
tower
of
Kallundborg
church,
Where, first at its altar, a wedded pair,
Stood Helva of Nesvek and Esbern Snare!

 
          
—Wheldrake,
    
Norwegian Songs

 
          
Consequences
of Ill-Considered Dealings with the Supernatural; Something of the Discomforts
of Unholy Compacts
.

 
          
ELRIC
FELL THROUGH centuries of anguish, millennia of mortal misery and folly; he roared
his defiance as he fell, his sword like a beacon and a challenge in his grip,
down towards the luscious heart of Chaos while everywhere around him was
confusion and cacophony, swift images of faces, cities, whole worlds,
transmogrified and insane, warping and reshaping; for in unchecked Chaos
everything was in perpetual change.

 
          
He
was alone.

 
          
Very
suddenly everything was still. His feet touched stable ground, though it was
little more than a slab of rock floating in the flaming light of the quasi-infinite—universe
upon universe blending one into the other, each ripple a different colour in a
different spectrum, each facet a separate reality. It was as if he stood at the
centre of a crystal of unimaginable complexity and his eyes, refusing the
sights they were offered, somehow became blind to everything but the intense,
shifting light, whose colours he could not identify, whose odours were full of
hints of the familiar, whose voices offered every terror, every consolation and
yet were not mortal. Which set the albino prince to sobbing, conquered and
helpless as his strength drained from him, and his sword grew heavy in his
hand, an ordinary piece of iron, and a soft, humorous song sounded from
somewhere beyond the fires, becoming words:

 
          
“Thou
hast such courage, sweetest of my slaves! Impetuous Champion of the
Ever-Changing, where is thy father’s soul?”

 
          
“I
know not, Lord Arioch.” Elric felt his own soul freeze on the very point of
extermination, the imminent obliteration of everything he had ever been or
would be—less than a memory. And Arioch knew he did not lie. He took away the
chill. And Elric was soothed again …

 
          
He
had never before experienced such a sense of impatience in his patron Lord of
Hell. What emergency alarmed the gods?, he wondered.

 
          
“Mortal
morsel, thou art my darling and my dear one, pretty little sweetmeat …”

 
          
Elric,
familiar with the cadences of his patron’s moods, was both fascinated and
afraid. Much that was in him wished for the approval of his patron at all
costs. Much wished only to give itself up forever to the mercies of Duke
Arioch, whatever they might be, to suffer whatever agonies his lord decided,
such was the power of that godling’s presence, embracing him and coaxing him
and praising him and blessed always with the absolute power of life or death
over his eternal soul. Yet still, in the most profoundly secret part of his
mind Elric kept a resolution to himself, that one day he would rid his world of
gods entirely—should his life not be snuffed away the next second (such was his
patron’s present mood). Here, in his own true element, Arioch had his full
power and any pact he had ever made with a mortal was meaningless; this was his
own Dukedom and here he required no allies, honoured no bargains and demanded
instant compliance of all his slaves, mortal and supernatural, on pain of
instant extinction.

 
          
“Speak,
sweetmeat. What brought thee to my domain?”

 
          
“Mere
chance, I think, Lord Arioch. I fell …”

 
          
“Ah,
fell!” The word held considerable meaning, considerable understanding. “You
fell.
”

 
          
“Into
an abyss which only a Lord of the Higher Worlds could sink between the realms.”

 
          
“Yes.
You fell. IT WAS MASHABAK!”

 
          
Elric
knew mindless relief that the rage was directed away from him. And he, too,
understood what had occurred—that Gaynor the Damned had served Arioch’s arch
rival, Count Mashabak of Chaos …

 
          
“You
had servants in the Gypsy Nation, lord?”

 
          
“It
was mine, that near-limbo. A useful device that many sought to control. And
because he could not possess it for himself, Mashabak destroyed it …”

 
          
“Upon
a whim, lord?”

 
          
“Oh,
he served some creature’s petty ends, I believe …”

 
          
“It
was Gaynor, lord.”

 
          
“Ah,
Gaynor. He has become a politician, eh?”

 
          
Elric
grew aware of his patron’s brooding silence. After what might have been a year,
the Duke of Hell murmured, with better humour, “Very well, sweetmeat, go upon
thy way. But recollect that thou art mine and thy father’s soul is mine. Both
are mine. Both must be delivered up to me, for that is our ancient compact.”

 
          
“Go
where, patron?”

 
          
“Why,
to Ulshinir, of course, where the three sisters have escaped their captor. And
could be returning home.”

 
          
“To
Ulshinir, my lord?”

 
          
“Fear
not, thou shalt travel like a gentleman. I shall send thy slave after thee.”
The Lord of the Higher Worlds had his attention upon other affairs now. It was
not in the nature of a Duke of Chaos to dwell too long upon one matter, unless
it was of monumental importance.

 
          
The
fires went out.

 
          
Elric
still stood upon that spur of rock, but now it was attached to a substantial
hill, from which he could look down into a rugged valley, full of sparse grass
and limestone crags across which a thin powder of snow blew. The air was cold
and sharp and good to his senses and, though he was cold, he brushed vigorously
at his naked arms and face as if to rid them of the grime of hell. At his feet
something murmured. He looked down to see the runesword where he had dropped it
during his audience with Arioch. He wondered at the power of his patron, that
even Stormbringer felt compelled to acknowledge. He raised the blade almost
lovingly, cradling it like a child. “We have need of each other still, thee and
I.”

 
          
The
blade was sheathed, the terrain inspected again, and he thought he saw a thread
of smoke rising over the next hill. From there he might begin his search for
Ulshinir.

 
          
He
thanked chance that he had drawn on his boots before rushing in pursuit of the
Rose, for he needed them now, against the jagged stones and treacherous turf
down which he made his way. The cold was resisted with the expediency of dragon
venom, again painfully absorbed, and in less than an hour he was striding down
a narrow path to a stone cottage, thatched with peat and straw, which gave off
the smell of earth, warmth and a wholesome fecundity, and was the first of
several such dwellings, all as comfortably settled into the landscape as if
they had grown naturally from it.

 
          
In
answer to Elric’s polite knock upon the gnarled oak door, a fair-skinned young
woman opened it and smiled at him uncertainly, eyeing his appearance with a
curiosity she attempted to disguise. She blushed as she pointed along the road
to Ulshinir and told him it was less than three hours’ easy walking from there,
to the sea.

 
          
Gentle
hills and shallow dales, a white limestone road through the mellow greens,
coppers and purples of the grasses and heathers; Elric was glad to be walking.
He wished to clear his head, to consider Arioch’s demands, to wonder how Gaynor
had come to lose the mysterious three sisters. And he wondered what he must
find in Ulshinir.

 
          
And
he wondered if the Rose still lived.

 
          
Indeed,
he thought with some surprise, he cared if the Rose still lived. He was
curious, he assured himself, to hear more of her story.

 
          
Ulshinir
was a harbour town of steep-roofed houses and narrow spires, all with a
scattering of early snow. The smell of woodsmoke, drifting through the autumnal
air, somehow consoled him a little.

 
          
Within
his belt he still had tucked a few gold coins which Moonglum had long ago
insisted he carry and he hoped that gold was acceptable currency in Ulshinir.
The town certainly seemed of familiar appearance, very much like any town of
the Northern Young Kingdoms, and he guessed this plane was close to his own
part of the Sphere, at least, and possibly the realm. And this, too, gave him a
little comfort. The few citizens he encountered upon the cobbled streets found
his appearance strange, but they were friendly enough and were happy to point
the way to the inn. The inn was spare, in the manner of such places in his own
world, but warm and clean. He was glad of the nutty, full-bodied ale they
brought him, of the broth and the pie. He paid for his bed in advance and,
while his landlady was counting out considerable change in silver, he asked if
she had heard of other visitors to the town—three sisters, in fact.

 
          
“Dark
haired, pale beauties, with such wonderful eyes—not unlike your own in shape,
sir, though theirs were of such a dense blue as to be almost black. And
exquisite clothes and traps! There’s not a woman in Ulshinir who did not turn
out to get a glimpse of them. They took ship yesterday and their destination is
the subject of considerable dispute amongst us, as you can imagine.” She smiled
tolerantly at her own weakness. “Legend says they’re people from beyond our
Heavy
Sea
. Were you a friend, perhaps? Or a relative?”

 
          
“They
have a small thing that belonged to my father, that’s all,” said Elric
casually. “They inadvertently took it with them. I doubt they know they have
it! They had a boat, you say?”

 
          
“From
the harbour yonder.” She pointed through the window to the grey water enclosed
by two long quays, each terminated by a tall lighthouse. There were only
fishing boats moored there now. “The
Onna
Peerthon
, she was. She calls here regularly with a cargo of haberdashery
and needle-goods, usually, from Shamfird. Captain Gnarreh normally refuses
passengers, but the sisters offered him a price, we heard, that he would have
been a fool to refuse. But as to their destination …”

 
          
“Captain
Gnarreh will return?”

 
          
“Next
year, almost certainly.”

 
          
“And
what lies beyond your shores, lady?”

 
          
She
shook her head and laughed as if she had never heard such a joke before. “First
the island reefs and then the
Heavy
Sea
. Should anything exist on the other side of
the
Heavy
Sea
—should it have a far side, indeed—then we
have no knowledge of it. You are very ignorant, sir, if I may say so.”

 
          
“You
might say so, madam, and I apologize to you. I have been lately under some
little enchantment and my mind is clouded.”