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  Stormbringer

  ( Elric Saga - 6 )

  Michael Moorcock

  Moorcock is off at full throttle. Every scene has ironic meaning. A couple of minor stories, and we're into the lush, manic rush to Armageddon that is STORMBRINGER! Still the greatest plot on the planet, build and build until the final, cataclysmic - and said to be the best in all fantasy fiction - ending, which is completely stunning. Long before Pullman won the Whitbread Moorcock was offering this mad, bad and thoroughly humane fantasy to the world. He remains a giant.

  Stormbringer

  BY MICHAEL MOORCOCK

  Book Sixth of the Elric Saga

  Prologue

  There came a time when there was great movement upon the Earth and above it, when the destiny of Men and Gods was hammered out upon the forge of Fate, when monstrous wars were brewed and mighty deeds were designed. And there rose up in this time, which was called the Age of the Young Kingdoms, heroes. Greatest of these heroes was a doom-driven adventurer who bore a crooning rune blade that he loathed.

  His name was Brie of Melnibone, king of ruins, lord of a scattered race that had once ruled the ancient world. Elric, sorcerer and swordsman, slayer of kin, despoiler of his home land, white-faced albino, last of his line.

  Elric, who had come to Karlaak by the Weeping Waste and had married a wife in whom he found some peace, some surcease from the torment in him.

  And Elric, who had within him a greater destiny than he knew, now dwelt in Karlaak with Zarozinia, his wife, and his sleep was troubled, his dream dark, one brooding night in the Month of the Anemone..

  BOOK ONE

  Dead God's Homecoming

  In which, at long last, Eric's fate begins to be revealed to him as the forces of Law and Chaos gather strength for the final battle which will decide the future of Elric's world...

  One

  Above the rolling earth great clouds tumbled down and bolts of lightning charged groundwards to slash the midnight black, split trees in twain and sear through roofs that cracked and broke.

  The dark mass of forest trembled with the shock and out of it crept six hunched, unhuman figures who paused to stare beyond the low hills towards the outline of a city. It was a city of squat walls and slender spires, of graceful towers and domes; and it had a name which the leader of the creatures knew. Karlaak by the Weeping Waste it was called.

  Not of natural origin, the storm was ominous. It groaned around the city of Karlaak as the creatures skulked past the open gates and made their way through shadows towards the elegant palace where Elric slept. The leader raised an axe of black iron in its clawed hand. The group came to a stealthy halt and regarded the sprawling palace which lay on a hill Surrounded by languorously-scented gardens. The earth shook as lightning lashed it and thunder prowled across the turbulent sky.

  «Chaos has aided us in this matter, » the leader grunted.

  «Sec-already the guards fall in magic slumber and our entrance is thus made simple. The Lords of Chaos are good to their servants.»

  He spoke the truth. Some supernatural force had been at work and the warriors guarding Elric's palace had dropped to tee ground, their snores echoing the thunder. The servants of Chaos crept past the prone guards, into the main courtyard and from there into the darkened palace. Unerringly they climbed twisting staircases, moved softly along gloomy corridors, to arrive at length outside the room where Elric and his wife lay in uneasy sleep.

  As the leader laid a hand upon the door, a voice cried out from within the room: «What's this? What things of hell disrupt my rest?»

  «He sees list» sharply whispered one of the creatures.

  «No, » the leader said, »he sleeps-but such a sorcerer as this Elric is not so easily lulled into a stupor. We had best make speed and do our work, for if he wakes it will be the harder! »

  He twisted the handle and eased the door open, his axe half raised. Beyond the bed, heaped with tumbled furs and silks, lightning gashed the night again, showing the white face of the albino close to that of his dark-haired wife.

  Even as they entered, he rose stiffly in the bed and his crimson eyes opened, staring out at them. For a moment the eyes were glazed and then the albino forced himself awake, shouting: «Begone, you creatures of my dreams! »

  The leader cursed and leaped forward, but he had been instructed not to slay this man. He raised the axe threateningly.

  «Silence-your guards cannot aid you! »

  Elric jumped from the bed and grasped the thing's wrist, his face close to the fanged muzzle. Because of his animism he was physically weak and required magic to give him strength. But so quickly did he move, that he had wrested the axe from the creature's hand and smashed the shaft between its eyes. Snarling, it fell back, but its comrades jumped forward. There were five of them, huge muscles moving beneath their furred skins.

  Elric clove the skull of the first as others grappled with him. His body was spattered with the thing's blood and brains and he gasped in disgust at the fetid stuff. He managed to wrench his arm away and bring the axe up and down into the collarbone of another. But then he felt his legs gripped and he fell, confused but still battling. Then there came a great blow on head and pain blazed through him. He made an effort to rise, failed and fell back insensible.

  Thunder and lightning still disturbed the night when, with throbbing head, he awoke and got slowly to his feet using a bedpost as support He stared dazedly around him.

  Zarozinia was gone. The only other figure in the room was the stiff corpse of the beast he had killed. His black-haired girl-wife had been abducted.

  Shaking, he went to the door and flung it open, calling for his guards, but none answered him.

  His runesword Stormbringer hung in the city's armoury and would take time to get his throat tight with pain and he ran down the corridors and stairways, dazed with anxiety, trying to grasp the implications of his wife's disappearance.

  Above the palace, thunder still crashed, eddying about in the noisy night. The palace seemed deserted and he had the sodden feeling that he was completely alone, not he had been abandoned. But as he ran out into the main courtyard and saw the insensible guards he realised at once that their number could not be natural. Realisation was coming even as he ran through the gardens, through the gates and down to the city, but there was no sign of his wife's abductors.

  Where had they gone?

  He raised his eyes to the shouting sky, his white face stark and twisted with frustrated anger. There was no sense to it. Why had they taken her? He had enemies, he knew, but none who could summon such supernatural help. Who, apart from himself, could work this mighty sorcery that made the skies themselves shake and a city sleep?

  To the house of Lord Voashoon, Chief Senator, of Karlaak, old father of Zarozinia, Elric ran panting like a wolf. He banged with his fists upon the door, yelling at the astonished servants within.

  «Open! It is Elric. Hurry! «

  The doors gaped back and he was through them. Lord Voashoon came stumbling down the stair into the chamber, his face heavy with sleep.

  «What is if Elric?..»

  «Summon your warriors. Zarozinia has been abducted. Those who took her were demons and may be far from here by now-but we must search in case they escaped by land.»

  Lord Voashoon's face became instantly alert and he shouted terse orders to his servants between listening to Elric’s explanation of what had happened.

  «And I must have entrance into the armoury, » Elric concluded. «I must have Stormbringer! «

  «But you renounced the blade for fear of its evil power over you! « Lord Voashoon reminded him quietly.

  Elric replied impatiently. «Aye-but I renounced the blade tar Zarozinia's sake, too. I must have Stormb
ringer if I am to bring her back. The logic is simple. Quickly, give me the key.»

  In silence Lord Voashoon fetched the key and led Elric to the armoury where the weapons and armour of his ancestors was held, unused for centuries. Through the dusty place strode Elric to a dark alcove that seemed to contain something which lived.

  He heard a soft moaning come from the great black battle blade as he reached out a slim-fingered white hand to take it. It was heavy, yet perfectly balanced, a two-handed broadsword of prodigious size, with its wide crosspiece and its blade smooth and broad, stretching for over five feet from the hilt. Near the hilt, mystic runes were engraved and even Brie did not know what they fully signified.

  «Again I must make use of you, Stormbringer, » he said as he buckled the sheath about his waist, »and I must conclude that we are too closely linked now for less than death to separate us.»

  With that he was striding from the armoury and back to the courtyard where mounted guards were already sitting nervous steeds, awaiting his instructions.

  Standing before them, he drew Stormbringer so that the sword's strange, black radiance flickered around him, his white face, as pallid as bleached bone, staring out of it at the horsemen.

  «You go to chase demons this night Search the countryside, scour forest and plain for those who have done this thing to our princess! Though it's likely that her abductors used supernatural means to make their escape, we cannot be sure. So search-and search well! »

  All through the raging night they searched but could find no trace of either the creatures or Elric's wife. And when dawn came, a smear of blood in the morning sky, his men returned to Karlaak where Elric awaited them, now filled with the nigromantic vitality which his sword supplied.

  «Lord Elric shall we retrace our trail and see if daylight yields a clue?» cried one.

  «He does not hear you, » another murmured as Elric gave no sign.

  But then Elric turned his pain-racked head and he said bleakly, «Search no more. I have had time to mediate and must seek my wife with the aid of sorcery. Disperse. You can do nothing further.»

  Then he left them and went back towards his palace, knowing that there was still one way of learning where Zarozinia had been taken. It was a method which he ill-liked, yet it would have to be employed.

  Curtly, upon returning, Elric ordered everyone from his dumber, barred the door and stared down at the dead thing to congealed blood was still on him, but the axe with which he had stain it had been taken away by his comrades.

  Elric prepared the body, stretching out its limbs on the floor. He drew the shutters of the windows so that no light filtered into the room, and lit a brazier in one corner. It swayed on its chains as an oil-soaked rushes flared. He went to a mail chest by the window and took out a pouch. From this he removed a bunch of dried herbs and with a hasty gesture flung them on the brazier so that it gave off a sickly odour and the room began to fill with smoke. Then he stood over the corpse, his body rigid, and began to sing an incantation in the old language of his forefathers, the sorcerer emperors of Melnibone. The song seemed scarcely akin to human speech, riling and falling from a deep groan to a high-pitched shriek.

  The brazier spread flaring red light over Elric's face and grotesque shadows skipped about the room. On the floor the dead corpse began to stir, its ruined head moving from side to ride. Elric drew his runesword and placed it before him, his two hands on the hilt «Arise, soulless one!» he commanded.

  Slowly, with jerky movements, the creature raised itself stiffly upright and pointed a clawed finger at Elric, its glazed eyes staring as if beyond him.

  «An his,» it whispered, «was pre-ordained. Think not that you can escape your fate, Elric of Melnibone. You have tampered with my corpse and I am a creature of Chaos. My masters will avenge me.»

  «How?»

  «Your destiny is already laid down. You will know soon enough.»

  «Tell me, dead one, why did you come to abduct my wife? Who sent you hither? Where has my wife been taken?»

  «Three questions, Lord Elric, requiring three answers. You know that the dead who have been raised by sorcery can answer nothing directly.»

  «Aye - that I know. So answer as you can.»

  «Then listen well for I may recite only once my reed and then must return to the nether-regions where my being may peacefully rot to nothing. Listen;

  «Beyond the ocean brews a baffle;

  Beyond the battle blood shall fall.

  If Elrics kinsman ventures with him

  Bearing a twin of that he bears

  To a place where man-forsaken.

  Dwells the one who should not live,

  Then a bargain shall be entered;

  Bine's wife shall be restored.»

  With this, the dung fell to the floor and did not stir thereafter.

  Elric went to the window and opened the shutters. Used as he was to enigmatic verse-omens, this one was difficult to unravel. As daylight entered the room, the rushes spluttered and the smoke faded. Beyond the ocean… There were many oceans.

  He resheathed his runesword and climbed on to the disordered bed to lie down and contemplate the reed. At last, after long minutes of this contemplation, he remembered something he had heard from a traveller who had come to Karlaak from Tarkesh a nation of an Western Continent, beyond the Pale Sea.

  The traveller had told him how there was trouble brewing between an land of Dharijor and the other nations of the west Dharijor had contravened treaties she had signed with her neighbouring kingdoms and had signed a new one with the Theocrat of Pan Tang. Pan Tang was an unholy island dominated by its dark aristocracy of warrior-wizards. It was from here not Bine's old enemy, Theleb K'aarna, had come. Its capital of Hwamgaarl was called the City of Screaming Statues and until recently its residents had had little contact with the folk of the outside world. Jagreen Lern was an new Theocrat and an ambitious man. His alliance with Dharijor could only mean may he sought more power over the nations of the Young Kingdoms. The traveller had said dial strife was sure to break out at any moment since there was ample evidence that Dharijor and Pan Tang had entered a war alliance.

  Now, as his memory improved, Elric related his information with an news he had had recently that Queen Yishana of Jharkor, a neighbouring kingdom to Dharijor, had recruited the aid of Dyvim Slorm and his Imrryrian mercenaries. And Dyvim Slorm was Elric's only kinsman. This meant that Jharkor must be preparing for battle against Dharijor. The two facts were too closely linked with the prophecy to be ignored.

  Even as he thought upon it, he was gathering his clothes together and preparing for a journey. There was nothing for it but to go to Jharkor and speedily, for there he was sure to meet his kinsman. And there, also, there would soon be a battle if all the evidence were true.

  Yet the prospect of the journey, which would take many days, caused a cold ache to grow in his heart as he thought of the weeks to come in which he would not know how his wife fared.

  «No time for that, » he told himself as he laced up his black quilted jacket. «Action is all that's required of me now - and speedy action.»

  He held the sheathed runeblade before him, staring beyond it into space. «I swear by Arioch that those who have done this, wherever they be man or immortal, shall suffer from their deed. Hear me, Arioch! That is my oath! «

  But his words found no answer and he sensed that Arioch, his patron demon, had either not heard him or else heard his oath and was unmoved.

  Then he was striding from the death-heavy chamber, yelling for his horse.

  Two

  Where the Signing Desert gave way to the borders of Ilmiora, between the coasts of the Eastern continent and the lands of Tarkesh, Dharijor and Shazar, there lay the Pale Sea.

  It was a cold sea, a morose and chilling sea, but ships preferred to cross from Ilmiora to Dharijor by means of it, rather than chance the weirder dangers of the Straits of Chaos which were lashed by eternal storms and inhabited by malevolent sea-creatures.
>
  On the deck of an Ilmioran schooner, Elric of Melnibone stood wrapped in his cloak, shivering and staring gloomily at the cloud-covered sky.

  The captain, a stocky man with blue, humorous eyes, came struggling along the deck towards him. He had a cup of hot wine in his hands. He steadied himself by clinging to a piece of rigging and gave the cup to Elric.

  «Thanks, » said the albino gratefully. He sipped the wine. «How soon before we make the port of Banarva, captain?»

  The captain pulled the collar of his leather jerkin about his unshaven face. «We're sailing slow, but we should sight the Tarkesh peninsula well before sunset, » Banarva was in Tarkesh' one of its chief trading posts. The captain leaned on the rail. «I wonder how long these waters will be free for ships now that war's broken out between the kingdoms of the west. Both Dharijor and Pan Tang have been notorious in the past for their piratical activities. They'll soon extend them under the guise of war, I'll warrant.»

  Elric nodded vaguely, his mind on other things than the prospect of piracy.

  Disembarking in the chilly evening at the port of Banarva, Elric soon saw ample evidence that war darkened the lands of the Young Kingdoms. There were rumours rife, talk of nothing but battles gained and warriors lost. From the confined gossip, he could get no dear impression of how the war went, save that the decisive battle was yet to be fought.

  Loquacious Banarvans told him that all over the Western Continent men were marching. From Myyrrhn, he heard, the winged men were flying. From Jharkor, the White Leopards, Queen Yishana's personal guard, ran towards Dharijor, while Dyvim Slonn and his mercenaries pressed northwards to meet them.

  Dharijor was the strongest nation of the west and Pan Tang was a formidable ally, more for her people's occult knowledge than for her numbers. Next in power to Dharijor came Jharkor, who, with her allies Tarkesh, Myyrrhn and Shazar, was still not as strong as those who threatened the security of the Young Kingdoms.