Elric in the Dream Realms - Michael Moorcock [147]
ELRIK: “Flamefang! Go! Aid my people! Go! Help them drive off the barbarians if you can!”
BARBARIANS: “KILL!”
“Kill them all!”
“Above us! Look to your lives!”
Flamefang swoops down on the barbarians and their fleet, his fiery venom destroying everything it touches.
BARBARIANS: “He circles again!”
“Fly, brothers! To the ships while we can!”
“The monster comes too late to save their precious city, anyway!”
Meanwhile, back on the balcony of the Tower of Kings, Elrik confronts Black Armour…
ELRIK: “You! One thing I can do—and that is kill the one who has betrayed everything Melniboné stood for!”
So fierce is Elrik’s attack that he drives the black-armoured figure back into the throne room where Arisand still watches, her face full of nervous glee.
Black Armour pauses at the throne.
BLACK ARMOUR: “You are more powerful than I guessed.”
He flings the sword at Elrik’s feet.
BLACK ARMOUR: “There. The sword is yours. Kill me if you will …”
ELRIK (thinks): “I know this trick—and yet…”
He stoops to pick up the sword.
ELRIK (thinks): “I have no choice but to take the risk and kill this foul being who has brought my sister and my kingdom to disgrace!”
His hand reaches towards the sword.
Elrik’s hand closes on the grip. He is astonished. The sword does not harm him.
ELRIK: “The sword. It does not harm me!”
BLACK ARMOUR: “What??”
Black Armour’s head whirls to where Arisand still stands.
BLACK ARMOUR: “Arioch! You swore only I could handle the sword!”
Arisand smiles quietly, her great eyes full of malice and a kind of triumph.
ARISAND: “No, mortal—I swore only that one of your blood could handle the sword.”
Then Elrik lunges forward, driving the sword towards the heart of Black Armour.
ARISAND: “But fear not. It suits my plan to save you before this vessel dies …”
We see a ghostly human form pulled out of the armoured figure by Arisand, who shows enormous, supernatural strength as she does so.
Just as Elrik plunges the blade deep into the armour. To terrible effect.
As the ghostly form escapes, a great scream comes from the black helmet.
ELRIK: “There, usurper! Die as you deserve!”
He lets his grip on the sword fall away as he stands listening in astonishment.
ELRIK: “That scream! It was a woman’s scream. What’s this? More sorcery?”
The figure in black armour collapses, the black blade still sticking into the breastplate where its heart should be.
Unnoticed, Arisand opens a path to the moonbeam roads, all of which are ghostly.
Leading her ghostly charge, she steps out onto one of the roads. Elrik kneels beside the fallen figure, pulling off the helmet.
ELRIK: “Let’s see the face of this filthy creature!”
Arisand and the other figure disappear out onto the moonbeam roads.
Elrik pulls off the helmet.
There is the sweet face of his sister. Her eyes are full of tears and she is clearly dying.
ELRIK: “Asrid! My sister! This cannot be!”
ASRID: “The sword takes my soul, brother. I was possessed by a demon. It was not I did those terrible deeds … Aaah. My soul! My soul!”
ELRIK (in rage and agony): “No! No!!!”
ELRIK: “I have killed my beloved sister! I have murdered my kin!”
Dyvim Karm comes running up the steps into the throne room.
DYVIM KARM: “My lord Elrik! The barbarians have fired the city. They have broken their oath to you!”
Elrik is in tears. He pulls the sword from his sister’s body. She is dead.
ELRIK: “I have killed my sister. What care I if oaths are made and broken? They are meaningless sounds in the empty void …”
DYVIM KARM: “Imrryr burns, my lord. There are women and children in those buildings.”
Elrik looks up, his eyes full of grief.
ELRIK: “I want this black blade gone. I wish it banished forever from this realm. Where are the Fire Elders? They said they would come when I held the Black Sword!”
ELRIK: “Well here it is! Now, Fire Elders, keep your word! Abolish this filthy thing to where no mortal hand can ever find it again!”
Dyvim Karm backs away in awe as the Fire