«You look to the East, Elric.» Moonglum murmured. «You look back towards something irremediable.»
Elric put his long-fingered hand on his friend»s shoulder. «Where else is there to look, Moonglum, when the world lies beneath the heel of Chaos? What would you have me do? Look forward to days of hope and laughter, to an old age lived in peace, with children playing around my feet?» He laughed softly. It was not a laugh that Moonglum liked to hear.
«Sepiriz spoke of help from the White Lords. It must come soon. We must wait patiently.» Moonglum turned to squint into the glowering and motionless sun and then, his face set in an introspective look, cast his eyes down to the rubble on which he stood.
Elric was silent for a moment, watching the waves. Then he shrugged. «Why complain? It does me no good. I cannot act on my own volition. Whatever fate is before its cannot be changed. I pray that the men who follow us will make use of their ability to control their own destinies. I have no such ability.» He touched his jaw bone with his fingers and then looked at the hand, noting nails, knuckles, muscles and veins standing out on the pale skin. He ran this hand through the silky strands of his white hair, drew a long breath and let it out in a sigh. «Logic! The world cries for logic. I have none, yet here I am, formed as a man with mind, heart and vitals, yet formed by a chance coming together of certain elements. The world needs logic. Yet all the logic in the world is worm as much as one lucky guess. Men take pains to weave a web of careful thoughts-yet others thoughtlessly weave a random pattern and achieve the same result. So much for the thoughts of the sage.»
«Ah, » Moonglum winked with attempted levity, «thus speaks the wild adventurer, the cynic. But we are not all wild and cynical, Elric. Other men tread other paths-and reach other conclusions than yours.»
«I tread one that’s pre-ordained. Come, lets to the Dragon Caves and see what Dyvim Slorm has done to rouse our reptilian friends.»
They stumbled together down the ruins and walked the shattered canyons that had once been the lovely streets of Imrryr. out of the city and along a grassy track not wound through the gorse, disturbing a flock of large ravens that fled into the air, cawing, all save one, the king, who balanced himself on a bush, his cloak of ruffled feathers drawn up in dignity, his black eyes regarding them with wary contempt.
Down through sharp rocks to the gaping entrance of the Dragon Caves, down the steep steps into torch-Ht darkness with its damp warmth and smell of scaly reptilian bodies. Into the first cave where the great recumbent forms of the sleeping dragons lay, their folded leathery wings rising into the shadows, their green and black scales glowing faintly, their clawed feet folded and their slender snouts curled back, even in sleep, to display the long, ivory teeth that seemed like so many white stalactites. Their dilating red nostrils groaned in torpid slumber. The smell of their hides and their breath was unmistakable, rousing in Moonglum some memory inherited from his ancestors, some shadowy impression of a time when these dragons and their masters swept across a world they ruled, their inflammable venom dripping from their fangs and heedlessly setting fire to the countryside across which they flew. Elric, used to it, hardly noticed the smell, but passed on through the first cave and the second until he found Dyvim Slorm, striding about with a torch in one hand and a scroll in the other, swearing to himself.
He looked up as he heard their booted feet approach. He spread out his arms and shouted, his voice echoing through the caverns, «Nothing! Not a stir, not an eyelid flickering! There is no way of rousing them. They'll not wake until they have slept their necessary number of years. Oh, that we had not used them on the last two occasions, for we have greater need of them today! »
«Neither you nor I had the knowledge we have now. Regret is useless since it can achieve nothing.» Elric stared around him at the huge, shadowy forms. Here, slightly apart from the rest, lay the leader-dragon, one he recognised and felt affection for: Flamefang, the eldest, who was five thousand years old and still young for a dragon. But Flamefang, like the rest, slept on.
He went up to the beast and stroked its metal-like scales, ran his hand down the ivory smoothness of its great front fangs, felt its warm breath on his body and smiled. Beside him, on his hip, he heard Stormbringer murmur. He patted the blade. «Here's one soul you cannot have. The dragons are indestructible. They will survive, even though all the world collapses into nothing.»
Dyvim Slorm said from another part of tile cavern: «I can't think of further action to take for the meantime, Brie. Let's go back to the tower of D'a'rputna and refresh ourselves.»
Elric nodded assent and, together, the three men returned through the caverns and ascended the steps into the sunlight.
«So, » Dyvim Slorm remarked, «still no nightfall. The sun has remained in that position for thirteen days, ever since we left the Camp of Chaos and made our perilous way to Melnibone. How much power must Chaos wield if it can top the sun in its course?»
«Chaos might not have done this for all we know, » Moonglum pointed out. «Though it's likely, of course, that if did. Time has stopped. Time waits… But waits for what? More confusion, further disorder? Or the influence of the great balance which will restore order and take vengeance against those forces who have gone against its will? Or does Time wait for us - three mortal men adrift, cut off from what is happening to all other men, waiting on Time as it waits on us?»
«Perhaps the sun waits on us, » Brie agreed. «For is it not our destiny to prepare the world for its fresh course? It makes me feel a little more than a mere pawn if that's the case. What if we do nothing? Will the sun remain where it is forever?»
They paused in their progress for a moment and stood staring up at the pulsating red disc which flooded the streets with scarlet light, at the black clouds which fled across the sky before it. Where were the clouds going? Where did they come from? They seemed instilled with purpose. It was possible that they were not even clouds at all, but spirits of Chaos bent on dark errands.
Elric grunted to himself, aware of the uselessness of such speculation. He led the way back to the tower of D'a'rputaa where years before he had sought his love, his cousin Cymoril, and later lost her to the ravening thirst of the blade by his side.
The tower had survived the flames, though the colours that had once adorned it were blackened by fire. Here he left his friends and went to his own room to fling himself, fully clad upon the soft Melnibonean bed and, almost immediately, fall asleep.
Two
Elric slept and Elric dreamed and, though he was aware of the unreality of his visions, Ilis attempts to rouse himself to wakefulness were entirely futile. Soon he ceased trying and merely let his dream form itself and draw him into its bright landscapes...
He saw Imrryr as it fwd been many centuries ago. Imrryr, the sathe city he had known before he led the raid on it and caused its destruction. The same, yet with a different, brighter appearance as if it were newly-built. As well, the colours of the surrounding countryside were richer, the sun darker orange, the sky deep blue and sultry. Since then, he realised, the very tints of the world had faded with the planet's ageing...
People and beasts moved in the shining streets; tall, eldritch Melniboneans, men and women walking with grace, like proud tigers; hard-faced slaves with hopeless, stoic eyes, long-legged horses of a type now extinct, small mastodons drawing gaudy cars. Clearly on the breeze came the mysterious scents of the place, the muted sounds of activity-all hushed, for the Melniboneans hated noise as much as they loved harmony. Heavy silk banners flapped from the scintillating towers of Milestone, jade, ivory, crystal and polished red granite. And Elric moved in his sleep and ached to be there amongst his own ancestors, the golden folk who had dominated the old world.