Erekose seemed to awaken from a trance. He looked at Corum over his bloody scythe, shook his great black head, and then placed his right arm in Corum's, his sword in his left hand. Elric linked his left arm in Corum's right arm and drew his own strange sword.
And then Corum felt a power flow into his weary flesh and he almost laughed with delight at the sense of pleasure which filled him. Elric, himself, was laughing and even Erekose smiled. They had combined. They had become the Three Who Are One and they moved as one, laughed as one, fought as one.
Although Corum did not fight, he felt as if he fought He felt that he had a sword in each hand and that he guided those hands.
The tiger-beasts fell back before the shrieking runeswords. They sought to escape this strange new power. They flapped wildly about the room.
Corum laughed in triumph. "Let us finish them!" And he knew they cried the same thing. No longer were their swords useless against the winged tiger-men. Instead they were invincible. Blood poured down as wounded beasts sought to escape, but none did escape.
As if weakened by the power released within it, the Vanishing Tower began to tremble. The floor tilted. Voilodion Ghagnasdiak's voice screamed from somewhere, "The tower! The tower! This will destroy the tower!"
Corum could hardly keep his balance on the blood-slippery floor.
And then Jhary-a-Conel had entered the room, an expression of faint disgust on his face as he regarded the slaughter. "It is true. The sorcery we have worked today must have its effect. Whiskers-to me!"
And then Corum realized that the creature which had clung to Voilodion Ghagnasdiak's face was the little black-and-white cat. Once again it had been the cause of their salvation. It flew to Jhary's shoulder and settled there, staring about with wide, green eyes.
Elric broke away from the other two and dashed into the other room to peer through the window slit Corum heard him cry, "We are in Limbo!"
Slowly Corum broke his own link with Erekose. He did not have the energy to see what Elric meant, but he guessed that the tower was in that tuneless, spaceless place where once he had been in the sky ship. And it was swaying even more crazily now. He looked at the crumpled figure of the dwarf, who had his hands to his face. Through the fingers welled fountains of blood.
Jhary went past Corum into the other room and spoke to Elric. As he returned Corum heard him say, "Come, friend Elric, help me seek my hat."
"At such a time you look for a-hat?"
"Aye." Jhary winked at Corum and stroked his cat. "Prince Corum-Lord Erekose-will you come with me, too?"
They went past the weeping dwarf, down the narrow tunnel, until they came to a flight of stairs. The stairs led toward a cellar. The tower quaked. With a lighted brand held aloft Jhary led them down the steps.
When a slab of masonry dislodged itself from the roof and fell at Elric's feet he said quietly, "I would prefer to seek a means of escape from the tower. If it falls now we shall be buried."
"Trust me, Prince Elric."
They came at length to a circular room with a huge metal door set in it.
"Voilodion's vault. Here you will find all the things you seek," said Jhary. "And I, I hope, will find my hat. The hat was specially made and is the only one which properly matches my other clothes…"
"How do we open a door like that?" Erekose sheathed his sword in an angry gesture. Then he drew it out again and put the point to the door. "It is made of steel, surely."
Jhary's voice was almost amused again. "If you linked arms again, my friends."
Corum offered Jhary an amused glance in spite of the danger.
"I will show you how the door may be opened," said Jhary.
And so they linked arms again and again the vast, exquisite sense of strength flowed through them and again they laughed to each other, feeling true fulfillment now that they were combined. Perhaps this was their destiny. Perhaps when they ceased to be individual heroes they would become the one thing again and then they would experience happiness. It offered them hope, this thought.
Jhary said quietly, "And now, Prince Corum, if you would strike with your foot once upon the door…"
Corum swung his foot and kicked at the solid steel and watched as the door fell down without resistance. He did not like to break the link with his fellow heroes. He could see how they could live as a single entity and know satisfaction. But he was forced to in order to enter the vault.
The tower shook and seemed to fall sideways and the four of them tumbled into Voilodion's vault to land amongst treasure.
Corum picked himself up. Elric was inspecting a golden throne. Erekose had picked up a battle-axe too big for even him to wield.
Here were the things Voilodion had stolen from all his victims as his tower had traveled through the planes.
Corum wondered if ever such a museum had existed before. He went from object to object inspecting them and marveling. Meanwhile Jhary handed something to Elric and spoke with him. Corum heard Elric say to Jhary, "How can you know all this?"
Jhary made some vague reply and then bent with a cry of pleasure. He picked up his hat and began to slap at the dust which covered it. Then he saw another thing and picked that up. A goblet. "Take it," he told Corum. "It will prove useful, I think."
Jhary walked over to a corner and removed a small sack, placing it on his shoulder. There was a jewel chest nearby and he delved through this until he discovered a ring. This he handed to Erekose. "This is your reward, Erekose, for helping to free me from my captor." He spoke grandly but self-mockingly.
Even Erekose smiled then. "I have the feeling you need no help young man."
"You are mistaken, friend Erekose. I doubt if I have ever been in greater peril." He took a lingering look around the room and then lost his footing as the floor tilted once more.
"We should take steps to leave," said Elric, the bundle of metal under his arm.
"Exactly." Jhary moved rapidly across the vault. "The last thing. In his pride Voilodion showed me his possessions, but he did not know the value of all of them."
Corum frowned. "What do you mean?"
"He killed the traveler who brought this with him. The traveler was right in assuming he had the means to stop the tower from vanishing, but he did not have time to use it before Voilodion slew him." Jhary displayed the object. It was a small baton of a dull ocher color. It hardly seemed valuable. "Here it is. The Runestaff. Hawkmoon had this with him when I traveled with him to the Dark Empire."
The Second Chapter
TO TANELORN
"What is the Runestaff?" Corum asked.
"I remember one description-but I am poor at naming and explaining things…"
Elric almost smiled. "That has not escaped my attention."
Corum looked closely at the staff, unable to believe it had any special significance.
"It is an object," said Jhary, "which can exist only under a certain set of special and physical laws. In order to continue to exist, it must exert a field in which it can contain itself. That field must accord with those laws-the same laws under which we best survive."
Large slabs of masonry fell from the roof.
Erekose growled. "The tower is breaking up!"
Corum saw that Jhary was passing his hand in a stroking motion over the dull ocher staff, tracing out a pattern. "Please gather near me, my friends."
As the three closed in, the roof of the tower fell. Corum saw great blocks of stone descend to crush him and then he was staring at a blue sky breathing cool air and the ground was firm beneath his feet. Yet from only a few inches on all sides of them there was blackness-the total blackness of Limbo. "Do not step outside this small area," Jhary said, "or you will be doomed." He frowned. "Let the Runestaff seek what we seek."