Michael Moorcock - Elric 8 - The Fortress of the Pearl

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And when Elric had told his three lies to Cymoril, his betrothed, and had set his ambitious cousin Yyrkoon as Regent on the Ru
And when Elric had told his three lies to Cymoril, his betrothed,
and had set his ambitious cousin Yyrkoon as Regent on the Ruby
Throne of Melniboné, and when he had taken leave of Rackhir the
Red Archer, he set off into lands unknown, to seek knowledge which
he believed would help him rule Melniboné as she had never been
ruled before.
But Elric had not reckoned with a destiny already determining that
he should learn and experience certain things which would have a
profound effect upon him. Even before he encountered the blind
captain and the Ship Which Sailed the Seas of Fate, he was to find
his life, his soul and all his idealism in jeopardy.
In Ufych-Sormeer he was delayed over a matter involving a
misunderstanding between four unworldly wizards who amiably and
inadvertently threatened the destruction of the Young Kingdoms
before they had served the Balance's ultimate purpose; and in
Filkhar he experienced an affair of the heart which he would never
again speak about; he was learning, at some cost, the power and
the pain of bearing the Black Sword.
But it was in the desert city of Quarzhasaat that he began the
adventure which was to help set the course of his weird for years
to come. . .
The Chronicle of the Black Sword
PART ONE
Is there a madman with a brain To turn the stuff of nightmare sane
And demons crush and Chaos tame, Who'll leave his realm, forsake
his bride And, tossed by contradictory tides, Give up his pride
for pain?
The Chronicle of the Black Sword
1
A Doomed Lord Dying
It was in lonely Quarzhasaat, destination of many caravans but
terminus of few, that Elric, hereditary Emperor of Melniboné, last
of a bloodline more than ten thousand years old, sometime conjuror
of terrible resource, lay ready for death. The drugs and herbs
which usually sustained him had been used in the final days of his
long journey across the southern edge of the Sighing Desert and he
had been able to acquire no replacements for them in this fortress
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And when Elric had told his three lies to Cymoril, his betrothed, and had set his ambitious cousin Yyrkoon as Regent on the Ru
city which was more famous for its treasure than for its
sufficiency of hie.
Slowly and feebly the albino prince stretched his bone-coloured
fingers to the light and brought to vividness the bloody jewel in
the Ring of Kings, the last traditional symbol of his ancient
responsibilities; then he let the hand fall. It was as if he had
briefly hoped the Actorios would revive him, but the stone was
useless while he lacked energy to command its powers. Besides, he
had no great desire to summon demons here. His own folly had
brought him to Quarzhasaat; he owed her citizens no vengeance.
They, indeed, had cause to hate him, had they but known his
origins.
Once Quarzhasaat had ruled a land of rivers and lovely valleys,
its forests verdant, its plains abundant with crops, but that had
been before the casting of certain incautious spells in a war with
threatening Melniboné more than two thousand years earlier.
Quarzhasaat's empire had been lost to both sides. It had been
engulfed by a vast mass of sand which swept over it like a tide,
leaving only the capital and her traditions which in time became
the prime reason for her continuing existence. Because Quarzhasaat
had always stood there, she must be sustained, her citizens
believed, at any cost throughout eternity. Though she had no
purpose or function, still her masters felt a heavy obligation to
continue her existence by whichever means they found expedient.
Fourteen times had armies attempted to cross the Sighing Desert to
loot fabulous Quarzhasaat. Fourteen times had the desert itself
defeated them.
Meanwhile the city's chief obsessions (some would say her chief
industry) were the elaborate intrigues amongst her rulers. A
republic, albeit in name only, and hub of a vast inland empire,
albeit entirely covered by sand, Quarzhasaat was ruled by her
Council of Seven, whimsically known as the Six and One Other, who
controlled the greater part of the city's wealth and most of her
affairs. Certain other potent men and women, who chose not to
serve in this septocracy, wielded considerable influence while
displaying none of the trappings of power. One of these, Elric had
learned, was Narfis, Baroness of Kuwai'r, who dwelled in a simple
yet beautiful villa at the city's southern extreme and gave most
of her attention to her notorious rival, the old Duke Ral, patron
of Quarzhasaat's finest artists, whose own palace on the northern
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And when Elric had told his three lies to Cymoril, his betrothed, and had set his ambitious cousin Yyrkoon as Regent on the Ru
heights was as unostentatious as it was lovely. These two, Elric
was told, had elected three members each to the Council, while the
seventh, always nameless and simply called the Sexocrat (who ruled
the Six), maintained a balance, able to sway any vote one way or
the other. The ear of the Sexocrat was most profoundly desired by
all the many rivals in the city, even by Baroness Narfis and Duke
Ral.
Uninterested in Quarzhasaat's ornate politics as he was in his
own, Elric's reason for being here was curiosity and the fact that
Quarzhasaat was clearly the only haven in a great wasteland lying
north of the nameless mountains dividing the Sighing Desert from
the Weeping Waste.
Moving his exhausted bones on the thin straw of his pallet, Elric
wondered sardonically if he would be buried here without the
people ever knowing that the hereditary ruler of their nation's
greatest enemies had died amongst them. He wondered if this had
after all been the fate his gods had in store for him: nothing as
grandiose as he had dreamed of and yet it had its attractions.
When he had left Filkhar in haste and some confusion, he had taken
the first ship out of Raschil and it had brought him to Jadmar,
where he had chosen wilfully to trust an old Ilmioran drunkard who
had sold him a map showing fabled Tanelorn. As the albino had half-
guessed, the map proved a deception, leading him far from any kind
of human habitation. He had considered crossing the mountains to
make for Karlaak by the Weeping Waste but on consulting his own
map, of more reliable Melnibonéan manufacture, he had discovered
Quarzhasaat to be significantly closer. Riding north on a steed
already half-dead from heat and starvation, he had found only
dried river-beds and exhausted oases, for in his wisdom he had
chosen to cross the desert in a time of drought. He had failed to
find fabled Tanelorn and, it seemed, would not even catch sight of
a city which, in his people's histories, was almost as fabulous.
As was usual for them, Melnibonéan chroniclers showed only a
passing interest in defeated rivals, but Elric remembered that
Quarzhasaat's own sorcery was said to have contributed to her
extinction as a threat to her half-human enemies: A misplaced
rune, he understood, uttered by Fophean Dals, the Sorcerer Duke,
ancestor to the present Duke Ral, in a spell meant to flood the
Melnibonéan army with sand and build a bulwark about the entire
nation. Elric was still to discover how this accident was
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And when Elric had told his three lies to Cymoril, his betrothed, and had set his ambitious cousin Yyrkoon as Regent on the Ru
explained in Quarzhasaat now. Had they created myths and legends
to rationalise the city's ill-luck entirely as a result of evil
emanating from the Dragon Isle?
Elric reflected how his own obsession with myth had brought him to
almost inevitable destruction. "In my miscalculations," he
murmured, turning dull crimson eyes again towards the Actorios, "I
have shown that I share something in common with these people's
ancestors." Some forty miles from his dead horse, Elric had been
discovered by a boy out searching for the jewels and precious
artefacts occasionally flung up by those sandstorms which
constantly came and went over this part of the desert and were
partially responsible for the city's survival as well as for the
astonishing height of Quarzhasaat's magnificent walls. They were
also the origin of the desert's melancholy name.
In better health Elric would have relished the city's monumental
beauty. It was a beauty derived from an aesthetic refined over
centuries and bearing no signs of outside influence. Though so
many of the curving ziggurats and palaces were of gigantic
proportions there was nothing vulgar or ugly about them; they had
an airy quality, a peculiar lightness of style which made them
seem, in their terra-cotta reds and glittering silver granite,
their whitewashed stucco, their rich blues and greens, as if they
had been magicked out of the very air. Their luscious gardens
filled marvellously complex terraces, their fountains and water-
courses, drawn from deep-sunk wells, gave tranquil sound and
wonderful perfume to her old cobbled ways and wide tree-lined
avenues, yet all this water, which might have been diverted to
growing crops, was used to maintain the appearance of Quarzhasaat
as she had been at the height of her imperial power and was more
valuable than jewels, its use rationed and its theft punishable by
the severest of laws.
Elric's own lodgings were in no way magnificent, consisting as
they did of a truckle bed, straw-strewn flagstones, a single high
window, a plain earthenware jug and a basin containing a little
brackish water which had cost him his last emerald. Water permits
were not available to foreigners and the only water on general
sale was Quarzhasaat's single most expensive commodity. Elric's
water had almost certainly been stolen from a public fountain. The
statutory penalties for such thefts were rarely discussed, even in
private.
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And when Elric had told his three lies to Cymoril, his betrothed, and had set his ambitious cousin Yyrkoon as Regent on the Ru
Elric required rare herbs to sustain his deficient blood, but
their cost, even had they been available, would have proven far
beyond his present means which had been reduced to a few gold
coins; a fortune in Karlaak but of virtually no worth in a city
where gold was so common it was used to line the city's aqueducts
and sewers. His expeditions into the streets had been exhausting
and depressing.
Once a day the boy, who had found Elric in the desert and brought
him to this room, paid the albino a visit, staring at him as if at
a curious insect or captured rodent. The boy's name was Anigh and,
though he spoke the Melnibonéan-derived lingua franca of the Young
Kingdoms, his accent was so thick it was sometimes impossible to
understand all he said.
Once more Elric tried to lift his arm only to let it fall. That
morning he had reconciled himself to the fact that he would never
again see his beloved Cymoril and would never sit upon the Ruby
Throne. He knew regret, but it was of a distant kind, for his
illness made him oddly euphoric.
"I had hoped to sell you."
Elric peered, blinking, into the shadows of the room on the far
side of a single ray of sunlight. He recognized the voice but
could make out little more than a silhouette near the door.
"But now it seems all I have to offer in next week's market will
be your corpse and your remaining possessions." It was Anigh,
almost as depressed as Elric at the prospect of his prize's death.
"You are still a rarity, of course. Your features are those of our
ancient enemies but whiter than bone and those eyes I have never
seen before in a man."
"I'm sorry to disappoint your expectations." Elric rose weakly on
his elbow. He had deemed it imprudent to reveal his origins but
instead had said he was a mercenary from Nadsokor, the Beggar
City, which sheltered all manner of freakish inhabitants.
"Then I had hoped you might be a wizard and reward me with some
bit of arcane lore which would set me on the path to becoming a
wealthy man and perhaps a member of the Six. Or you might have
been a desert spirit who could confer on me some useful power. But
I have wasted my waters, it seems. You are merely an impoverished
mercenary. Have you no wealth left at all? Some curio which might
prove of value, for instance?" And the boy's eyes went towards a
bundle which, long and slender, rested against the wall near
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And when Elric had told his three lies to Cymoril, his betrothed, and had set his ambitious cousin Yyrkoon as Regent on the Ru
Elric's head.
"That's no treasure, lad," Elric informed him grimly. "He who
possesses it could be said to bear a curse impossible to
exorcise." He smiled at the thought of the boy trying to find a
buyer for the Black Sword which, wrapped in a torn cassock of red
silk, occasionally gave out a murmur, like a senile old man
attempting to recall the power of speech.
"It's a weapon, is it not?" said Anigh, his thin, tanned features
making his vivid blue eyes seem large.
"Aye," Elric agreed. "A sword."
"An antique?" The boy reached under his striped brown djellabah
and picked at the scab on his shoulder.
"That's a fair description." Elric was amused but found even this
brief conversation tiring.
"How old?" Now Anigh took a step forward so that he was entirely
illuminated by the ray of sunlight. He had the perfect look of a
creature adapted to dwell amongst the tawny rocks and the dusky
sands of the Sighing Desert.
"Perhaps ten thousand years." Elric found that the boy's startled
expression helped him forget, momentarily, his almost certain
fate. "But probably more than that..."
"Then it's a rarity, indeed! Rarities are prized by Quarzhasaat's
lords and ladies. There are those amongst the Six, even, who
collect such things. His honour the Master of Unicht Shlur, for
instance, has the armour of a whole Ilmioran army, each piece
arranged on the mummified corpses of the original warriors. And my
Lady Talith possesses a collection of war-instruments numbering
several thousands, each one different. Let me take that, Sir
Mercenary, and I'll discover a buyer. Then I'll seek the herbs you
need."
"Whereupon I'll be fit enough for you to sell me, eh?" Elric's
amusement increased.
Anigh's face became exquisitely innocent. "Oh, no, sir. Then you
will be strong enough to resist me. I shall merely take a
commission on your first engagement."
Elric felt affection for the boy. He paused, gathering strength
before he spoke again. "You expect I'll interest an employer, here
in Quarzhasaat?"
"Naturally," Anigh grinned. "You could become a bodyguard to one
of the Six, perhaps, or at least one of their supporters. Your
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And when Elric had told his three lies to Cymoril, his betrothed, and had set his ambitious cousin Yyrkoon as Regent on the Ru
unusual appearance makes you immediately employable! I have
already told you what great rivals and plotters our masters are."
"It is encouraging"-Elric paused for breath-"to know that I can
look forward to a life of worth and fulfillment here in
Quarzhasaat." He tried to stare directly into Anigh's brilliant
eyes, but the boy's head turned out of the sunlight so that only
part of his body was exposed. "However, I understood from you that
the herbs I described grew only in distant Kwan, days from here-in
the foothills of the Ragged Pillars. I will be dead before even a
fit messenger could be half-way to Kwan. Do you try to comfort me,
boy? Or are your motives less noble?"
"I told you, sir, where the herbs grew. But what if there are some
who have already gathered Kwan's harvest and returned?"
"You know of such an apothecary? But what would one charge me for
such valuable medicines? And why did you not mention this before?"
"Because I did not know if it before." Anigh seated himself in the
relative cool of the doorway. "I have made enquiries since our
last conversation. I am a humble boy, your worship, not a learned
man, nor yet an oracle. Yet I know how to banish my ignorance and
replace it with knowledge. I am ignorant, good sir, but not a
fool."
"I share your opinion of yourself, Master Anigh."
"Then shall I take the sword and find a buyer for you?" He came
again into the light, hand reaching towards the bundle.
Elric fell back, shaking his head and smiling a little. "I, too,
young Anigh, have much ignorance. But, unlike you, I think I might
also be a fool."
"Knowledge brings power," said Anigh. "Power shall take me into
the entourage of the Baroness Narfis, perhaps. I could become a
captain in her guard. Maybe a noble!"
"Oh, one day you'll surely be more than either." Elric drew in
stale air, his frame shuddering, his lungs enflamed. "Do what you
will, though I doubt the sword will go willingly."
"May I see it?"
"Aye." With painful awkward movements Elric rolled to the bed's
edge and plucked the wrappings free of the huge sword. Carved with
runes which seemed to flicker unsteadily upon the blade of black,
glowing metal, decorated with ancient and elaborate work, some of
mysterious design, some depicting dragons and demons intertwined
as if in battle, Stormbringer was clearly no mundane weapon.
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And when Elric had told his three lies to Cymoril, his betrothed, and had set his ambitious cousin Yyrkoon as Regent on the Ru
The boy gasped and drew back, almost as if regretting his
suggested bargain. "Is it alive?"
Elric contemplated his sword with a mixture of loathing and
something akin to sensuality. "Some would say it possessed both a
mind and a will. Others would claim it to be a demon in disguise.
Some believe it composed of the vestigial souls of all damned
mortals, trapped within as once, in legend, a great dragon was
said to dwell inside another pommel than that which the sword now
bears." To his own faint distaste, he found that he was taking a
certain pleasure in the boy's growing dismay. "Have you never
looked upon an artefact of Chaos before, Master Anigh? Or one who
is wedded to such a thing? Its slave, perhaps?" He let his long,
white hand descend into the dirty water and raised it to wet his
lips. His red eyes flickered like dying embers. "During my travels
I have heard this blade described as Arioch's own battlesword,
able to slice down the walls between the very Realms. Others, as
they die upon it, believe it to be a living creature. There is a
theory that it is but one member of an entire race, living in our
dimension but capable, should it desire, of summoning a million
brothers. Can you hear it speaking, Master Anigh? Will that voice
delight and charm the casual buyers in your market?" And a sound
came from the pale lips that was not a laugh yet contained a
desolate kind of humour.
Anigh withdrew hastily into the sunlight again. He cleared his
throat. "You called the thing by a name?"
"I called the sword Stormbringer but the peoples of the Young
Kingdoms sometimes have another name, both for myself and for the
blade. The name is Soulstealer. It has drunk many souls."
"You're a dreamthief!" Anigh's eyes remained on the blade. "Why
are you not employed?"
"I do not know the term and I do not know who would employ a
'dreamthief.'" Elric looked to the boy for further explanation.
But Anigh's gaze did not leave the sword. "Would it drink my soul,
master?"
"If I chose. To restore my energy for a while, all I would have to
do is let Stormbringer kill you and perhaps a few more and then
she'll pass her energy on to me. Then, doubtless, I could find a
steed and ride away from here, possibly to Kwan."
Now the Black Sword's voice grew more tuneful, as if approving of
this notion.
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And when Elric had told his three lies to Cymoril, his betrothed, and had set his ambitious cousin Yyrkoon as Regent on the Ru
"Oh, Gamek Idianit!" Anigh got to his feet, ready to flee if
necessary. "This is like that story on Mass'aboon's walls. This is
what those who brought about our isolation were said to wield.
Aye, the leaders bore identical swords to these. The teachers at
the school tell of it. I was there. Oh, what did they say!" And he
frowned deeply, an object lesson to anyone wishing to point a
moral concerning the benefits of attending at classes.
Elric regretted frightening the boy. "I am not disposed, young
Anigh, to maintain my own life at the expense of others who have
offered me no harm. That is partly the reason why I find myself in
this specific predicament. You saved my life, child. I would not
kill you."
"Oh, master. Thou art dangerous!" In his panic he spoke a tongue
more ancient than Melnibonéan, and Elric, who had learned such
things to aid his studies, recognised it.
"Where came you by that language, by that Opish?" the albino
asked.
Even in his terror the boy was surprised. "They call it the gutter
cant, here in Quarzhasaat. The thieves' secret. But I suppose it
is common enough to hear it in Nadsokor."
"Aye, indeed. In Nadsokor, true." Elric was again intrigued by
this minor turn of events. He reached towards the boy, to reassure
him.
The motion caused Anigh to jerk up his head and make a noise in
his throat. Clearly he set no store by Elric's attempt to regain
his confidence. Without further remark, he left the room, his bare
feet pattering down the long corridor and the steps into the
narrow street.
Convinced that Anigh was now gone for good, Elric knew a sudden
pang of sadness. He regretted only one thing now, that he would
never be reunited with Cymoril and return to Melniboné to keep his
promise to wed her. He understood that he had always been and
probably would always be reluctant to ascend the Ruby Throne
again, yet he knew it was his duty to do so. Had he deliberately
chosen this fate for himself, to avoid that responsibility?
Elric knew that though his blood was tainted by his strange
disease, it was still the blood of his ancestors and it would not
have been easy to deny his birthright or his destiny. He had hoped
he might, by his rule, turn Melniboné from the introverted, cruel
and decadent vestige of a hated empire into a reinvigorated nation
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And when Elric had told his three lies to Cymoril, his betrothed, and had set his ambitious cousin Yyrkoon as Regent on the Ru
capable of bringing peace and justice to the world, of presenting
an example of enlightenment which others might use to their own
advantage.
For a chance to return to Cymoril he would more than willingly
trade the Black Sword. Yet secretly he had little hope that this
was possible. The Black Sword was more than a source of
sustenance, a weapon against his enemies. The Black Sword bound
him to his race's ancient loyalties, to Chaos, and he could not
see Lord Arioch willingly allowing him to break that particular
bond. When he considered these matters, these hints at a greater
destiny, he found his mind growing confused and he preferred to
ignore the questions whenever possible.
"Well, perhaps in folly and in death, I shall break that bond and
thwart Melniboné's bad old friends."
The breath in his lungs seemed to grow thin and no longer burned.
Indeed, it felt cool. His blood moved more sluggishly in his veins
as he tried to rise and stagger to the rough wooden table where
his few provisions lay. But he could only stare at the stale
bread, the vinegary wine, the wizened pieces of dried meat whose
origins were best not speculated upon. He could not get up; he
could not summon the will to move. He had accepted his dying if
not with equanimity then at least with a degree of dignity.
Falling into a languorous reverie, he recalled his deciding to
leave Melniboné, his cousin Cymoril's trepidation, his ambitious
cousin Yyrkoon's secret glee, his pronouncements made to Rackhir
the Warrior Priest of Phum, who had also sought Tanelorn.
Elric wondered if Rackhir the Red Archer had been any more
successful in his quest or whether he lay somewhere in another
part of this vast desert, his scarlet costume reduced to rags by
the forever sighing wind, his flesh drying on his bones. Elric
hoped with all his heart that Rackhir had succeeded in discovering
the mythical city and the peace it promised. Then he found that
his longing for Cymoril was growing and he believed that he wept.
Earlier he had considered calling upon Arioch, his patron Duke of
Chaos, to save him, yet had continued to feel a deep reluctance
even to contemplate the possibility. He feared that by employing
Arioch's help once more he would lose far more than his life. Each
time that powerful supernatural agreed to help, it further
strengthened an agreement both implicit and mysterious. Not that
the debate was anything more than notional, Elric reflected
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AndwhenElrichadtoldhisthreeliestoCymoril,hisbetrothed,andhadsethisambitiouscousinYyrkoonasRegentontheRuAndwhenElrichadtoldhisthreeliestoCymoril,hisbetrothed,andhadsethisambitiouscousinYyrkoonasRegentontheRubyThroneofMelniboné,andwhenhehadtakenleaveofRackhirtheRedArcher,hesetoffintolandsunknown,tose...

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