“Then I leave at once for Moon.”
2
THE CITY CALLED MOON
AND SO I left the Scarlet Fjord, climbing up into the black, igneous cliffs that brooded eternally beneath the dark, twilight sky. I had a map with me, some provisions and my sword. My bulky furs keeping out the worst of the cold, I moved through the mountains as rapidly as was possible.
I slept little, with the result that I could barely keep my eyes open and the whorls of obsidian, the frozen cascades of basalt, the oddly shaped pumice visible in all directions took on the appearance of leering faces, of menacing figures of giants and monsters, until I felt surrounded by the creatures of nightmare and I gripped my sword tighter but continued, doggedly, to move on. And at last I saw the ice plains ahead and the clouds thinned out to reveal the red sphere of the sun, the faint stars gleaming behind it.
I welcomed that sight. If I had thought the ice gloomy and bleak when I first found myself in this world, it had been nothing compared with the mood of the mountains which surrounded Earth’s last, dark sea. I trudged over the smooth, glassy rock of the pass and I saw the mountain ahead of me.
As the Lady of the Chalice had said, it stood alone, directly before me, on the edge of the ice plain.
I staggered as sleep tried to overcome me. I forced my feet to plod the last half-mile to the base of the mountain where ancient steps had been carved. And on the first of those steps I succumbed to sleep, not knowing for what new task my energies would be needed.
* * *
I awoke only barely refreshed and began to climb the steps until I came at length to what had evidently once been the mouth of a natural cave. But that cave mouth had been sealed with molten rock. The length and breadth was filled with a flow of red-and-yellow obsidian.
I had expected to find a door which I should be able to force, but there was no means of opening this!
I turned and looked back over the mountains. The brown clouds clung to them, increasing their enigmatic appearance. They seemed to share the joke which the Lady of the Chalice had played upon me.
“Damn you!” I yelled.
“Damn you,” they replied. “Damn you.” And those echoes damned me a hundred times before they died.
Snarling with frustrated anger I drew the Black Sword. Its black radiance spilled out against the obsidian flow. Fiercely I attacked that which sealed the cavern’s entrance. The blade bit deep into the rock and pieces of it flew in all directions.
Astonished, I struck again. And again a huge piece of the glassy stone fell away as if blasted.
Again the Black Sword crashed against the rock. And this time, with a rumble, it collapsed completely, revealing a dark chamber. I stepped over the rubble, sheathing the sword. I peered about me, but could see nothing. From my belt I took the torch Bladrak had given me just before I left. I depressed the stud in the handle and a faint light blossomed.
There was the machine the Lady of the Chalice had told me I should find…
But she had not told me I should also find the pilot.
He sat in the air-chariot and he stared at me in silence, grinning as if in anticipation of my fate. He was long and thin and dressed in the silver armour of those who now served Belphig. He lounged awkwardly in the seat and I guessed he had lounged in the same attitude for centuries, for it was a fleshless skull that grinned at me and fleshless hands that gripped the side of the chariot. I guessed that he had been left there as a warning, perhaps, of the lethal rays of the chariot’s engine. With an oath I knocked the skull from the neck and dragged the bones out of the car, hurling them across the cavern floor.
The Lady of the Chalice had told me that I should find the controls simple enough. She had been right. There were no instruments as such that I recognised, merely a crystal rod rising from the floor. By squeezing the rod in my hand I could activate the engine. By pushing the rod forward I could move ahead, by pushing it back I could slow my speed and stop, by pulling it back at an angle I could gain height and by pushing it forward at an angle I could lose height. Similarly the crystal rod could be moved from side to side.
I was anxious to leave the former pilot behind. I got into the chariot and squeezed the rod. Immediately the whole chariot began to glow with a pink luminosity so that it resembled flesh. A throb came from below my feet and I guessed that the engine was there. I licked my dry lips and pushed the lever very slightly forward. The air-chariot began to move towards the entrance of the cave. I took it into the air a few feet to avoid the rubble and then we were in the open air again and I discovered that quite small movements of my hand would control the craft. I inspected my map and took a bearing from the compass embedded in the top of the lever, then I increased speed and headed for the city called Moon.
* * *
The obsidian mountains had disappeared and now there was only ice—seemingly infinite ice that streamed past me as I flew. Occasionally the flat plain was broken by frozen drifts and spires but for the most part nothing relieved that cold, desolate landscape.
I began to doubt that the Lady of the Chalice had been right when she had mentioned the engine’s poisonous radiations, but soon I realised that my vision had dimmed slightly, that I felt lethargic and my bones ached.
I was driving the air-chariot at its maximum speed, but there was no clear means of judging how fast that was. The cold air bit at my flesh and frost rimed my beard and my thick coat was blown about as the white breath was whipped from my mouth.
The discomfort increased. It also seemed to me that I was leaving the sun far behind, that the world was growing darker.
Soon the sun was close to the horizon and the stars blazed more brightly in the sky. But by this time I had fallen back against the support of my seat and nausea shook my body.
I was dying, I was sure. At one stage I was forced to slow my speed and vomit over the side of the craft. I wanted to stop altogether, to get away from the source of my discomfort, but I knew that to leave the aircraft would be to ensure my death. I increased speed again.
* * *
And then I saw it ahead. It was a huge white mountain, pitted with great craters, rising out of the ice. I recognised it, of course, for it was the moon itself. How many thousands of years had passed since it had crashed into the Earth? A dim memory came back to me. I was sure I had witnessed this sight before. A name, an impression of despair. What was the name?
It had gone.
With the last of my strength I brought the air-chariot to a skidding halt on the ice and pulled my aching body from it.
Then I began to crawl across the ice towards the towering mountain that had once been Earth’s satellite.
The farther from the air-chariot I crawled the more my strength began to return. By the time I had reached the curved side of the mountain I felt greatly recovered. I could see now that even the mountain was covered with a thin layer of ice in some parts, but not enough to obscure its outlines. Above me I could see a light gleaming and wondered if this was an entrance to the city the Silver Warriors had been forced to desert when they joined Belphig in his war against us. There was nothing for it but to begin to climb. The ice and the rock were rough enough to make climbing fairly easy but I was forced to rest several times and had by no means regained my full strength when I neared the top and saw fierce light suddenly burst out from the centre of a crater and a dozen riders, mounted on seal-beasts, framed against it.
I had been seen. Perhaps Belphig had even been prepared for my coming.
I slid down the walls of the crater, put my back against the rock, drew out the Black Sword in both hands and awaited the riders.
They charged me with the long, barbed harpoons I had last seen when we had hunted the sea-stag. One of them would rip me from chin to stomach if it pierced my armour.
But the Black Sword itself seemed to be lending me energy. With a single movement I swung it so that I sheared through the head of every harpoon. They clattered to the rock and the useless shafts thudded i
nto the stone as the astonished riders pulled their beasts up short. I plunged the blade into the throat of the nearest seal-beast and it coughed and collapsed, tumbling its rider forward so that I could bring the sword crashing down to shear into his back as he fell.
The laughter began to bubble from my lips now.
I jeered at them as I slew them. They milled in confusion, drawing axes and swords from their scabbards, shouting to each other. An axe struck my mailed shoulder but did not cut through the links. I killed my antagonist with a stroke that cut his face in half and the impetus of my swing clove the body of the man beside him.
They tried to press in, to hamper my movements so that they could cut me down. But the Black Sword would not let them.
It moved so rapidly that it opened their ranks every time they managed to close them. A hand, still clutching a sword, flew away into the shadows. A head dropped to the ground. A body spilled entrails over the high saddle. Everywhere the Black Sword swept it left red ruin in its wake.
And at last they were all dead, save for a few seal-beasts that lumbered back towards the source of the bright light.
I followed them, still laughing.
Instead of exhausting me, the slaughter seemed to have filled me with extra power. I felt light-headed and light-footed, too. I raced after the seal-beasts, blinking in the light, and saw them moving down a long metal ramp which curved into the bowels of the fallen sphere.
More cautiously now I began to move down the ramp. I was just in time, for two doors began to move across the opening and met. I prayed that I had not entered a trap.
Down and down I went until I could see a floor below me. It seemed made of molten silver and it rippled like water, but as I reached it and set a wary foot upon it it felt solid enough.
From out of a doorway in the far wall three more men came running. They, too, were dressed in the bulbous armour of Rowernarc, but they carried the double-bladed halberds I had until now only seen in the hands of the Silver Warriors.
These men were more skilled with the weapons. They spread out and began to swing the things around their heads. I watched them all warily, seeking an opening.
Then one released his and it whistled through the air at me. I flung up my sword to block it and just managed to hurl it aside as the next halberd flew—and then the next. I dodged one and was caught a glancing blow by the other. I was flung to the ground, the Black Sword leaving my hand and skidding across that floor of rippling silver.
Weaponless I rose to my feet as Belphig’s men drew their swords. They were grinning. They knew I was doomed.
I looked for the sword but it was too far away to reach in time. I backed away from the warriors and my foot struck something. I glanced down. It was the haft of one of the fallen halberds. They saw it at the same time and began to run towards me. I picked up the halberd, knocked one swordsman in the face with the butt and rammed the spike into another’s throat. Then I burst through them and ran for the sword.
But they closed with me before I could reach it. I turned again, blocking a thrust with the shaft and then reversing the movement to bring the axe blade down onto the helm of the second man. He staggered, dazed, and I skidded across the floor to the sword.
It settled into my hands and began to moan like a savage hound that needs to kill.
I let it kill. I split my first assailant from skull to midriff and I chopped the body of the second man in two.
Then I shuddered as the battle-fever began to leave me. Sheathing the sword again I ran towards the entrance through which the warriors had come.
I was in a long, twisting corridor. It was more like a tube, for it was completely round and the floor curved steeply upwards on both sides. Down this I ran and emerged at length into a spherical chamber. I had a feeling that these passages had not originally been used by human beings but had possibly carried traffic or liquids of some kind. Steps led up to the domed roof of the chamber. I climbed them and emerged in a circular room which had a roof like frosted glass. I peered through the glass and realised that it formed the floor of the chamber above me. But I could see no means of reaching that chamber. Then I thought I saw something move in the room above. I drew my sword.
An opening suddenly appeared in the smooth ceiling. A perfectly round opening in the exact centre of the circle. Then a kind of clear tube descended until it was only a few feet above the floor of the lower chamber. There were handholds on the inside of the tube.
Still wary, I approached the tube and began to climb, the Black Sword balanced in my right hand. I poked my head over the top and there was a sparsely furnished room of great size. Walls and floor were of the same rippling silver. A white bed was there and various chairs and objects whose use I could not guess. And standing near the bed was a woman whose skin was silver, whose eyes were deep black and whose dress was blood-red. Her hair was nearly white and her beauty was ethereal. She smiled at me and she moved her lips, but I could not hear her.
I advanced across the transparent floor towards her and suddenly my face struck something cold and hard and I recoiled. I put out my hand and felt smoothness. I was separated from the Silver Queen by an invisible wall.
She gestured, trying to tell me something, but I could not understand her.
What kind of enchantment had Belphig put upon her? His scientific powers were either much greater than he had led me to suspect or else, more likely, he had borrowed them from the Silver Warriors whose ancestors, I now guessed, were the same scientists who had originally occupied the place I knew as the Scarlet Fjord.
Desperation now consumed me. I took the Black Sword and I struck a mighty blow against the invisible wall.
A dreadful shrieking filled the air. A shock ran the length of my body and I was hurled backward. My senses swam. I had grown to rely too much on the power of the Black Sword, I thought, as I collapsed into oblivion.
3
THE PHOENIX AND THE QUEEN
THERE WAS A chanting in my ears:
BLACK SWORD
BLACK SWORD
BLACK SWORD
THE BLADE OF THE SWORD HAS THE BLOOD OF THE SUN…
I opened my eyes and saw the stars in the dark sky. I turned my head, realising that I was in the air-chariot again.
At the wheel sat a man in silver armour.
This must be a dream. I was dreaming that the skeleton was piloting the chariot.
If not, then I was a prisoner of the Silver Warriors. I straightened my back and felt the pommel of my sword. I was not tied and I had not been disarmed.
The pilot in silver armour turned his head—and I saw that it was no man at all but the woman I had seen just before I lost consciousness. She had a sardonic look in her black eyes.
“I thank you for your valour in saving me,” she said.
I knew the voice.
“Your sword shattered the barrier. Now we return to the Scarlet Fjord so that I may tell my warriors I am free and they need do Belphig’s work no longer.”
“You are the Lady of the Chalice,” I said incredulously.
“That is what Bladrak’s people called me.”
“Then all my fighting was in vain. You were already free!”
She smiled. “No. What you saw was only a manifestation. I could not have appeared anywhere else but in that chamber—the chamber of the staff. Belphig did not realise that I had a means of communicating with his enemies.”
“But I saw the chalice at sea!”
“The image of the chalice could be projected to a few other places, true, but I could not transfer my own image there.”
I looked at her with deep suspicion. “And how came you by the Black Sword?”
“The folk of Moon have much wisdom, Sir Champion. We were great once. There was a prophecy that you would come again, awakening from your Frozen Keep. It seemed nothing but a legend, but I studied it for I needed to hope. I discovered a great deal.”
“And you promised to tell me everything you learned.”
/> “Aye, I did.”
“First, you could inform me what Belphig’s ambition is.”
“Belphig is a fool—though cunning. He knew of Moon and he found it eventually, having trekked for weeks across the ice with his men. Having forgotten that war existed, we trusted him. He learned many of our secrets and then, one day, imprisoned me as you found me. He then forced the Silver Warriors to serve him, as you know.”
“But why?”
The Silver Queen swayed in her seat and I realised that the rays from the craft’s engine were affecting us both.
“He—he had a scheme but it needed more labour than the warriors themselves could supply. Ultimately he desired to build a vessel that would travel through space. He wished to find a new sun that had not grown old. It was a stupid scheme. We have the knowledge for building such a ship, but we do not know how to power it or how long it would take to travel to another sun. Belphig would believe none of this. He felt that if he tortured me and my people long enough we would eventually reveal everything to him. He is insane.”
“Aye,” I said, “and his insanity has caused much grief on this already grieving planet.”
She moaned. “My eyes—I cannot see…”
I hauled her out of the seat and climbed in myself, grasping the crystal rod and keeping the craft on course.
“So you conjured up the Black Sword,” I said. “And the chalice of gold. And did you send those dreams to plague me?”
“I—I sent no—dreams…”
“I thought not. I do not believe you understand everything you have been doing, my lady. You used the legend and you used me. But I believe that the Black Sword—or whatever power controls it—has used us both. Do you know of Tanelorn?”
“I know where it is said to be.”
“Where is that?”
“At the centre of what we call the ‘multiverse’—the infinite matrices—universe upon universe, each divided from the other. But there is a centre, it is said—a hub about which these universes revolve. The hub is a planet, some think, and that planet is mirrored in many of the other worlds. This Earth is one version. The Earth you came from is another—and so on.