'It is true,' she said, when Hawkmoon had finished. The dreams seem the reality, and the reality seems the dream. Can you explain that, Master Fank?'
Fank sniffed, rubbing at his nose. There are many versions of reality, my lady. Some would say that our dreams reflect events in other planes. There is a great disruption taking place, but I do not think it was caused by the experiments of Kalan and Taragorm. As far as their work goes, I think the damage has been largely repaired. I think they were able to exploit this larger disruption for a while. Possibly they exacerbated the condition, but that is all. Their efforts were puny. They could not have caused all this. I suspect a vaster conflict. I suspect that there are forces at work so huge and terrifying that the Runestaff has been called from this individual plane to serve in a war of which we have received only a hint. A great war in which the destiny of the planes will be fixed for a period of time most would consider Eternity. I speak of something I know little about, my friends. I have only heard the phrase "The Conjunction of the Million Spheres", spoken by a dying philosopher, in the mountains of Asiacommunista. Means the phrase anything to you?'
The phrase was familiar to Hawkmoon, yet he was sure he had not heard it before, even in his strange dreams. He told Fank that.
'I had hoped ye'd know more, Duke Dorian. But I believe that phrase to have considerable significance to us all. Now I learn that ye seek lost children, while I seek the Runestaff. What of the word 'Tanelorn"? Means that anything?'
'A city,' said Hawkmoon. The name of a city.'
'Aye. That is what I heard. Yet I have found no city of that name anywhere in this world. It must lie in some other. Would we find the Runestaff there? Would we find your children there?"
'In Tanelorn?'
'In Tanelorn.'
Chapter Two
On The Silver Bridge
Fank had elected to remain at Castle Brass and so Hawkmoon and Yisselda climbed into the cushioned cabin of the great ornithopter. Ahead, in his small, open cockpit, the pilot began to manipulate the controls.
Count Brass and Fank stood outside the door of the castle watching as the heavy metallic wings began to beat and the strange motors of the ancient craft murmured, whispered and crooned. There came a fluttering of enamelled silver feathers, a lurch, a wind which set Count Brass's red hair pouring back from his head and caused Orland Fank to hang on to his bonnet; then the ornithopter began to rise.
Count Brass raised a hand in farewell. The machine banked a little as it rose over the red and yellow roofs of the town, then it wheeled once, turned to avoid a cloud of wild, giant flamingos which blossomed suddenly from one of the lagoons to the west, gained height and speed with each beat of its clashing wings, and soon it seemed to Hawkmoon and Yisselda that they were entirely surrounded by the cold, lovely blue of the winter sky.
Since their conversation with Orland Fank, Hawkmoon had been in a thoughtful mood and Yisselda, respecting this mood, had made no attempt to talk to him. Now he turned to her, smiling gently.
‘There are still wise men in Londra,’ he said. 'Queen Flana's court has attracted many scholars, many philosophers. Perhaps some will be able to help us.'
'You know of Tanelorn?' she said. The city Fank mentioned.'
'Only the name. I feel I should know much. I feel that I have been there, at least once, possibly many times, yet you and I both know that I have not.’
'In your dreams? Have you been there in your dreams, Dorian?'
He shrugged. 'Sometimes it seems to me that I have been everywhere in my dreams - in every age of the Earth - even beyond the Earth and to other worlds. I am convinced of one thing; that there are a thousand other Earths, even a thousand other galaxies - and that events in our world are mirrored in all the rest; that the same destinies are played out in subtly different ways. But whether those destinies are controlled by ourselves or by other, superhuman, forces, I do not know. Are there such things as Gods, Yisselda?'
'Men make Gods. Bowgentle once offered the opinion that the mind of Man is so powerful that it can make "real" anything he desperately needs to be real.'
'And perhaps those other worlds are real because, at some time in our history, enough people needed them. Could that be how alternative worlds are created?'
She shrugged. 'It is not something you and I are likely to prove, no matter how much information we are given.'
Tacitly, they both dropped this line of thought, contenting themselves with the magnificence of the views which passed below them as they peered through the portholes of the cabin. Steadily the ornithopter headed northward to the coasts, at length passing over the tinkling towers of Parye, the Crystal City, now restored in all its finery. The sunlight was reflected and transformed into rainbow colours by the scores of prisms, the spires of Parye, created by means of that city's timeless and cryptic technologies. They observed whole buildings, gilded and ancient, wholly enclosed in vast, apparently solid eight-, ten-, and twelve-sided crystal structures.
Half blinded, they fell back from the portholes, still able to see the sky all around them filled with soft, pulsating colours, still able to hear the gentle, musical ringing of the glass ornaments which the citizens of Parye used to decorate their quartz-paved streets. Even the warlords of the Dark Empire had let Parye stand; even those insane and bloody-handed destroyers had held the Crystal City in awe - and now she was fully restored to all her great beauty and it was said that the children of Parye were born blind, that it was often three years before their eyes were capable of accepting the everyday visions granted to those who habitually dwelled therein.
Parye behind them, they now entered grey cloud and the pilot, kept warm by the heater in his cockpit and the thick flying garments he wore, sought clearer sky above the cloud, found none, and dropped lower until they were barely two hundred feet from the flat, dull winter fields of the country lying inland from Karlye. A light drizzle was falling and, as the drizzle turned to driving rain, the sun began to set, so that they came to Karlye at dusk, seeing the warm lights welcoming them from the windows of the city's cobblestone buildings. They circled over Karlye's quaintly designed roof tops of dark red and light grey slates, dropping, at length, into the bowl of the circular, grass-sown, landing field around which the city was built. For an ornithopter (never the most comfortable of flying machines) the vessel landed smoothly, with Hawkmoon and Yisselda clinging firmly to the straps provided until the bumping had stopped and the pilot, his transparent visor streaming with moisture, turned to indicate to them that they might leave. The rain beat heavily now upon the cabin's canopy and Hawkmoon and Yisselda dressed themselves in thick capes which covered them to their feet. Across the landing field men came running, bodies bent into the wind, and behind them was a hand-drawn carriage. Hawkmoon waited until the carriage had been positioned as close as possible to the ornithopter, then he drew open the oddly shaped door and helped Yisselda to cross the sodden ground to the vehicle. They climbed in, and with a rather exaggerated lurch, the carriage moved towards the buildings on the far side of the field.
'We'll lodge in Karlye tonight,' said Hawkmoon, 'and leave early in the morning for the Silver Bridge.'
Count Brass's agents in Karlye had already secured rooms for the Duke of Koln and Yisselda of Brass; these were situated not far from the landing field, in a small but extremely comfortable inn which was one of the few buildings to have survived the conquerings of the Dark Empire. Yisselda remembered that she had stayed here with her father when she was a child and at first she felt a simple delight until her own childhood reminded her of her lost Yarmila, and then her brow became clouded. Hawkmoon, realizing what had happened, put his arm around her shoulders to comfort her when, after eating a good supper, they went upstairs to bed.
The day had tired them and neither was of a disposition to stay awake talking, for there was little left to talk about, so they slept.
But Hawkmoon's sleep was almost immediately populated by his all too familiar dreams -
faces and images jostling for his attention - eyes imploring him, hands beseeching him, as if a whole world, perhaps a whole universe, cried out for his attention and his aid.
And he was Corum - alien Corum of the Vadhagh - riding against the foul Fhoi Myore, the Cold Folk from Limbo ...
And he was Elric - Last Prince of Melnibone - a shouting battleblade in his right hand, his left upon the pommel of an oddly wrought saddle, the saddle on the back of a huge reptilian monster whose saliva turned to fire wherever it dripped...
And he was Erekose — poor Erekose - leading the Eldren to victory over his own human people - And he was Urlik Skarsol prince of the Southern Ice, crying out in despair at his fate,•which was to bear the Black Sword.,.
TANELORN...
Oh, where was Tanelorn ...?
Had he not been there, at least once? Did he not recall a sense of absolute peace of mind, of wholeness of spirit, of the happiness which only those who have suffered profoundly may feltl?
TANELORN ...
'Too long have I born my burden - too long have I paid the price of Erekose's great crime. ..' It was his voice which spoke, but it was not his lips which formed the words - they were other lips, unhuman lips ... I must have rest - 1 must have rest...'
And now there came a face - a face of ineffable evil, but it was not a confident face - a dark face - was it desperate? Was it his face? Was this his face, too?
AH, I SUFFER!
This way and that, the familiar armies marched. Familiar swords rose and fell. Familiar faces screamed and perished, and blood flowed from body after body - a familiar flowing...
TANELORN - have I not earned the peace of Tanelorn?
Not yet, Champion. Not yet.
It is unjust that I, alone, should suffer so!
You do not suffer alone. Mankind suffers with you.,
It is unjust.
Then make justice!
I cannot. I am only a man.
You are the Champion. You are the Eternal Champion.
1 am a man!
You are a man. You are the Champion Eternal.
I am only a man!
You are only the Champion.
1 am Elric! I am Urlik! I am Erekose! I am Corum! I am too many. I am too many!
You are one.
And now, in his dreams (if dreams they were), Hawkmoon felt, for a brief instant, a sense of peace, an understanding too profound for words. He was one. He was one...
But then it was gone and he was many again. And he yelled in his bed and he begged for peace.
And Yisselda was clinging to his threshing body. And Yisselda was weeping. And light fell on his face from the window. It was dawn.
'Dorian. Dorian. Dorian.'
‘Yisselda.'
He drew a deep breath. 'Oh, Yisselda.' And he was grateful that at least she had not been taken from him, for he had no other consolation but her in all the world, in all the many worlds he experienced while he slept; so he held her close to him in his strong warrior's arms, and he wept for a little while, and she wept with him. Then they rose from the bed and dressed themselves and in silence they left the inn without breakfasting, mounting the good horses which waited for them. They rode away from Karlye, along the coast road, through the rain which swept from the grey, turbulent sea, until they came to the Silver Bridge which spanned thirty miles of water between the mainland and the isle of Granbretan.
The Silver Bridge was not as Hawkmoon had seen it, all those many years before. Its tall pylons, obscured now by mist, by rain, and, at their tops, by cloud, no longer bore motifs of warfare and Dark Empire glories; instead they were decorated with designs supplied by all the cities of the continent which the Dark Empire warlords had once pillaged - a great variety of designs, celebrating the harmony of Nature. The vast causeway still measured a quarter of a mile wide, but previously, when Hawkmoon had crossed it, it had carried war-machines, the loot of a hundred great campaigns, the beast-warriors of the Dark Empire. Now trading caravans came and went along its two main roads; travellers from Normandia, from Italia, Slavia, Rolance, Scandia, from the Bulgar Mountains, from the great German city-states, from Pesht and from Ulm, from Wien, from Krahkov and even from distant, mysterious Muskovia. There were waggons drawn by horses, by oxen, by elephants, even. There were trains of camels, mules and donkeys. There were carts propelled by mechanical devices, often faulty, often faltering, whose principles were understood by only a handful of clever men and women (and most of them could understand only in the abstract) but which had worked for a thousand years or more; there were men on horseback and there were men who had walked hundreds of miles to cross the wonder that was the Silver Bridge. Clothing was often outlandish, some of it dull, patched, dusty, some of it vulgar in its magnificence. Furs, leather, silks, plaids, the skins of strange beasts, the feathers of rare birds, decorated the heads and backs of the travellers, and some who were clad in the greatest finery suffered the most in the chill rain which soaked through the subtly dyed fabrics and quickly found the unadorned flesh beneath. Hawkmoon and Yisselda travelled in heavy, warm gear that was plain, bereft of any decoration, but their steeds were sturdy and carried them without tiring, and soon they had joined the throng heading westward towards a land once feared by all but now transformed, under Queen Flana, into a centre of art and trade and learning and just government. There would have been several quicker ways of reaching Londra, but Hawkmoon's desire was strong to reach the city by the same means he had first left it.
His spirits improved as he looked at the quivering hawsers supporting the main causeway, at the intricate workmanship of the silversmiths who had fashioned decorations many inches thick to cover the strong steel of the pylons which had been built not only to bear millions of tons in weight but also to withstand the perpetual pounding of the waves, the pressure of the deepest currents so far beneath the surface. Here was a monument to what man could achieve, both useful and beautiful, without need of supernatural agencies of any sort. All his life he had despised that sad and insecure philosophy which argued that man, alone, was not great enough to achieve marvels, that he must be controlled by some superhuman force (gods, more sophisticated intelligences from somewhere beyond the Solar System) to have achieved what he had achieved. Only those frightened of the power within their own minds could have need of such views, thought Hawkmoon, noticing that the sky was clearing and a little sunlight was beginning to touch the silver hawsers and make them glint more brightly than before. He drew in a deep breath of the ozone-laden air, smiling as gulls wheeled about the upper levels of the pylons, pointing out the sails of a ship just before it passed under the bridge and beyond their view, commenting on the beauty of a particular bas-relief, the originality of a particular piece of silver-work. Both he and Yisselda became calmer as they took an interest in all the sights and they spoke of the pleasure they would experience if Londra were half as beautiful as this reborn bridge.
And then it seemed to Hawkmoon that a silence fell upon the Silver Bridge, that the clatter of the waggons and the hooves of the beasts disappeared, that the crying of the gulls ceased, that the sound of the waves went away, and he turned to mention this to Yisselda and she had gone. And he looked about him and he realized, in dawning terror, that he was quite alone on the bridge.
There was a thin cry from very far away - a cry which might have been Yisselda calling to him - then that, too, was gone.
And Hawkmoon made to wheel his horse about, to ride back the way he had come in the hope that, if he moved swiftly, he could rejoin Yisselda.
But Hawkmoon's horse refused to be handled. It was snorting. It stamped at the metal of the bridge. It whinneyed.
And Hawkmoon, betrayed, screamed a single, agonized word.
'NO!'
Chapter Three
In The Mist
‘No!'
It was another voice - a booming, pain-racked voice, far louder than Hawkmoon's, louder than thunder.
And the bridge swayed and t
he horse reared and Hawkmoon was thrown heavily to the metal causeway. He tried to rise; he tried to crawl back to where he was sure he would find Yisselda.
'Yisselda!' he cried.
'Yisselda!'
And wicked laughter sounded behind him.
He turned his head, lying spreadeagled on the swaying bridge. He saw his horse, its eyes rolling, tumble over, slide to the edge, to be pinned against a rail, its legs kicking at the air.
Now Hawkmoon tried to reach for the sword beneath his cloak, but he could not free it. It was pinned beneath him.
The laughter came again, but its pitch and its tone changed; it was less confident. Then the voice gave out its bellowing echo:
'No!'
Hawkmoon knew a terrible fear, a fear greater than anything he had previously confronted. His impulse was to crawl away from the source of that fear, but he forced himself to turn his head again and look at the face.
The face filled his whole horizon, glaring out of the mist which swirled around the swaying bridge. The dark face of his dreams, its eyes were filled with glaring menace, with a complicated terror of its own, and the huge lips formed the word which was a challenge, a command, a plea:
'No!'
Then Hawkmoon climbed to his feet and stood with his legs apart, balancing himself, staring back at the face, staring by virtue of an effort of will which astonished him.
"Who are you?' said Hawkmoon. His voice was thin, the mist seemed to absorb the words. 'Who are you? Who are you?'
'No!'
The face was apparently without a body. It was beautiful and sinister and of a dark, indeterminate colour. The lips were a glowing unhealthy red; the eyes were perhaps black, perhaps blue, perhaps brown, and there was a kind of gold in the pupils.