Duke Elric - Michael Moorcock [4]
I should again like to mention the work of the series editor, John Davey, and the great help we received from Savoy Books of Manchester, who have preserved much of the archive material reprinted here. No substantial edition of these books could exist without their contributions. Much hard work, not least by Betsy Mitchell and her team at Del Rey, has been done to ensure that these are the fullest editions possible. And then, of course, there's Michael Chabon, a writer of the first class, whose work I have been reading since The Mysteries of Pittsburgh. It's an enormous honour to be introduced by a man whose talent is immeasurable and who is doing so much to break down the flimsy but enduring walls between the worlds of literary and popular fiction. Thank you.
Michael Moorcock
The Old Circle Squared
Lost Pines, Texas
March 2008
THE SAILOR ON THE SEAS OF FATE
Introduction to the Audiorealms Version of
THE SAILOR ON THE SEAS OF FATE
(2005)
THERE IS A subject discussed frequently by Melnibone's philosophers concerning the number of worlds in the universe and how many universes make up the multiverse. (“Planes” is a more common word they employ, since they do not have the notion of worlds as globes.)
Some believe these can be visited in dreams and reached by the moonbeam roads that run between the worlds. Thus they have developed their sophisticated method of the dream couches, where certain privileged aristocrats lie to dream the dreams of years, centuries, even millennia, in a few hours.
Elric, who had in his youth learned his sorcerous skills on the dream couches of Imrryr, no longer remembered his experience of the moonbeam roads, so the nature of the universe was again a mystery to him, though sometimes a memory would return as a nightmare that would bring him screaming back to wakefulness.
After the events already recorded, Elric determined to explore the lands that surrounded his own, deeming it a matter of common sense to understand the nature of those who, realistically, were planning the destruction of his world and his family with it.
In fact, it is likely the young albino was moved as much by curiosity as moral purpose. Yet who of us at his age is entirely sure of the reason for their actions? Let us accept the reasons he gave and concern ourselves instead with other matters.
Elric had one recurring dream that disturbed his nights. He dreamed he returned to a Melnibone made even stranger and more bizarre under his cousin Yyrkoon's rule. Almost nothing was entirely familiar to him. The great towers of Imrryr were warped and twisted into a troubling architecture that seemed to reflect the mental states of those gone entirely mad. Unnatural beasts prowled the serpentine streets, and gigantic, demonic creatures lolled in the city squares. The palaces had grown huge, to accommodate those newcomers, and Melniboneans were dwarfed to the size of ants in comparison.
Where Elric's kinfolk had once lived now dwelled creatures of cryptic biology, with carapaces encrusted with carbuncular jewels and organs that throbbed upon the surface of their bodies, with vast, multi-faceted eyes that seemed blind and yet looked into worlds no other could see, with a multitude of arms and legs and other limbs whose function was impossible to guess. Bizarre creatures of Chaos ran through corridors that had become labyrinths, and in the rewrought chambers of the towers Melniboneans driven mad by their exposure to these new demons feasted on unnatural food and pleasured themselves in even stranger ways. Cries of horror and pain were the perpetual music filling this Melnibone.
In this dream, Elric made his way to the great throne chamber where Yyrkoon, gaunt and crazed, enjoyed intercourse with his demonic allies and lived in a state of perpetual celebration. Clearly he took no delight in Elric's arrival.
“Where is your sister?” demanded the albino. “Where is my betrothed?”
And Yyrkoon at last, reluctantly, sent for her. The woman