Elric in the Dream Realms - Michael Moorcock [43]
“The Waued Nii,” said Raik Na Seem. “They are amongst the last at any gathering. They come from the very edge of the desert and they trade with Elwher, bringing that lapis lazuli and jade carving we all value so much. In the winter, when the storms grow too intense for them, they even raid across the plains and into the cities. Once, they boast, they looted Phum, but we believe it was some other, smaller place which they mistook for Phum.” This was clearly a joke the desert peoples enjoyed at the expense of the Waued Nii.
“I had a friend who was once of Phum,” said Elric. “His name was Rackhir and he sought Tanelorn.”
“Rackhir I know. A good bowman. He traveled with us for a few weeks last year.”
Elric was strangely pleased by this news. “He was well?”
“In excellent health.” Raik Na Seem was glad of a subject to draw his mind away from the fate of his daughter and his adoptive son. “He was a welcome guest and hunted for us when we went close to the Ragged Pillars, for there’s game there which we lack the skill to find. He spoke of his friend. A friend who has many thoughts and whose thoughts led him to many quandaries. That was you, no doubt. I remember now. He must have been joking. He said that you were a little on the pale side. He wondered what had become of you. He cared for you, I think.”
“And I for him. We had something in common. As I feel a bond with your folk and with Alnac Kreb.”
“You shared dangers together, I gather.”
“We had many strange experiences. He, however, was tired of the quest for such things and hoped to retire, to find peace. Know you where he went from here?”
“Aye. As you say, he was searching for legendary Tanelorn. When he had learned all he could from us, he bade us farewell and rode on to the West. We counseled him not to waste himself in pursuit of a myth, but he believed he knew enough to continue. Did you not wish to journey with your friend?”
“I have other duties which call me, though I, too, have sought Tanelorn.” He would have added more but thought better of it. Any further explanation would have led him into memories and problems he had no wish to contemplate at present. His main concern was for Alnac Kreb and the girl.
“Ah, yes. Now I recall. You are a king in your own country, of course. But a reluctant one, eh? The duties are hard for a young man. Much is expected of you and you bear upon your shoulders the weight of the past, the ideals and loyalties of an entire people. It is difficult to rule well, to make good judgments, to dispense justice fairly. We have no kings here amongst the Bauradim, merely a group of men and women elected to speak for the whole clan, and I think it is better to share those burdens. If all share the burden, if all are responsible for themselves, then no single individual has to carry a weight that is too much for them.”
“The reason I travel is to learn more of such means of administering justice,” said Elric. “But I will tell you this, Raik Na Seem, my people are as cruel as any in Quarzhasaat, and have more real power. We have a scanty notion of justice and the obligations of rule involve little more than inventing new terrors by which we may cow and control others. Power, I think, is a habit as terrible as the potion I must now sip in order to sustain myself. It feeds upon itself. It is a hungry beast, devouring those who would possess it and those who hate it—devouring even those who own it.”
“The hungry beast is not power itself,” said the old man. “Power is neither good nor evil. It is the use one makes of it which is good or evil. I know that Melniboné once ruled the world, or that part of it she could find and the part she did not destroy.”
“You seem to know more of my nation than my nation knows of you!” The albino smiled.
“It is said by our folk that we all came to the desert because we fled first Melniboné and then Quarzhasaat. Each was as cruel as the other, each as corrupting, and it did not matter to us which