Elric in the Dream Realms - Michael Moorcock [48]
“Very well.” She paused at the edge of the grove, where the earth grew dustier and formed a territory between oasis and desert that was a little of both and was neither. She studied the cracked earth as if the cracks were the outlines of a singularly complicated map, a geometry which only she could understand.
“We have made rules,” she said. Her voice was distant, almost as if she spoke to herself. “And codified what we have discovered over the centuries. And yet we are still subject to the most unimaginable hazards …”
“Wait, madam. Are you suggesting that Alnac Kreb, by some wizardry known only to your guild, entered the world of the Holy Girl’s dreams and there suffered adventures such as you or I might suffer in this material world?”
“Well put.” She turned with a strange smile on her lips. “Aye. And his substance went into that world and was absorbed by it, strengthening the substance of her dreams …”
“The dreams he hoped to steal.”
“He hoped to steal only one. The one which imprisons her in that perpetual slumber.”
“And then he would sell it, you say, at your Dream Market?”
“Perhaps.” She was clearly unwilling to discuss this aspect of the matter.
“Where is that market held?”
“In a realm beyond this one, in a place where only those of our profession, or those who attend upon us, may travel.”
“You’d take me there?” Elric spoke from curiosity.
Her glance was a mixture of amusement and caution. “Possibly. But first we must be successful. We must steal a dream so that we may trade it there. Know you, Elric, I have every desire to inform you of all you wish to learn, but there are many things hard to explain to one who has not studied with our guild. They can only be demonstrated or experienced. I am not a native of your world, nor are most dreamthieves from this sphere. We are wanderers—nomads, you might say—between many times and many places. We have learned that a dream in one realm can be an undeniable reality in another, while what is utterly prosaic in that realm can elsewhere be the stuff of the most fantastic nightmare.”
“Is all creation so malleable?” Elric asked with a shudder. “What we create must ever be, lest it die,” she said, her tone one of ironical finality.
“The struggle between Law and Chaos echoes that struggle within ourselves between unbridled emotion and too much caution, I suppose,” Elric mused, aware that she did not wish to pursue this particular conversation.
With her foot Oone traced the cracks in the red earth. “To learn more you must become an apprentice dreamthief …”
“Willingly,” said Elric. “I’m sufficiently curious now, madam. You spoke of your laws. What are they?”
“Some are instructive, some are descriptive. First I’ll tell you that we have determined every Dream Realm shall have seven aspects, which we have named. By naming and describing we hope to shape that which has no shape and control that which few can begin to control. By such impositions we have learned to survive in worlds where others would be destroyed within minutes. Yet even when we perform such impositions, even that which our own wills define can become transmuted beyond our control. If you would accompany me and aid me in this adventure you must know that I have determined we shall pass through seven lands. The first land we call Sadanor, or the Land of Dreams-in-Common. The second land is Marador, which we call the Land of Old Desires, while the third is Paranor, the Land of Lost Beliefs. The fourth land is known to dreamthieves as Celador, which is the Land of Forgotten Love. The fifth is Imador, the Land of New Ambition, and the sixth is Falador, the Land of Madness …”
“Fanciful names indeed, madam. The Guild of Dreamthieves has a penchant for poetry, I think. And the seventh? What is that named?”
She paused before she replied. Her wonderful eyes peered into his, as if exploring the recesses of his own skull. “That has no name,” she said quietly, “save any name the inhabitants shall give it. But there, if anywhere, you will find the Fortress