Elric in the Dream Realms - Michael Moorcock [66]
“And perhaps anyway we would not find him here, as we found the Sorcerer Adventurers, in the Land of Lost Beliefs,” said the albino quietly.
“True,” she said.
Then Elric took her in his arms for a moment and they remained, embracing, for a few seconds, until they were ready to continue forward, seeking the Celador Gate.
Later, as Elric helped his ally across another natural bridge, below which flowed a river of dull brown stuff, Oone said to him, “This is no ordinary adventure for me, Prince Elric. That is why I needed you to come with me.”
A little puzzled as to why she should, after all, say something which they had both taken for granted, Elric did not reply.
When the snout-faced women attacked them, with nets and spikes, it did not take them long to cut their way free and drive the cowardly creatures off, and neither were they greatly inconvenienced by the vulpine things which loped on their hind-legs and had claws like birds. They even joked together as they despatched packs of snapping beasts which resembled nothing so much as horses the size of dogs and spoke a few words of a human tongue, though without any sense of the meaning.
Now at last they were reaching the borders of Paranor and saw looming ahead of them two enormous towers of carved rock, with little balconies and windows and terraces and crenelations, all covered in old ivy and climbing brambles bearing light yellow fruit.
“It is the Celador Gate,” said Oone. She seemed reluctant to approach it. Her hand on the hilt of her sword, her other arm linked with Elric’s, she stopped and drew a deep, slow breath. “It is the land of forests.”
“You called it the Land of Forgotten Love,” said Elric.
“Aye. That’s the dreamthieves’ name.” She laughed a little sardonically.
Elric, uncertain of her mood and not wishing to intrude upon her, held back also, looking from her to the gate and back again.
She reached a hand to his bone-white features. Her own skin was golden, still full of enormous vitality. She stared into his face. Then, with a sigh, she turned away and stepped towards the gate, taking his hand and pulling him after her.
They passed between the towers and here Elric’s nostrils immediately were filled with the rich smells of leaf and turf. All around them were massive oak-trees and elms and birches and every other kind of tree, yet all of them, though they formed a canopy, grew not beneath the light of the open sky but were nurtured by the oddly glowing rocks in the cavern ceilings. Elric had thought it impossible for trees to grow underground and he marveled at the health, the very ordinariness, of everything.
It was therefore with some astonishment that he observed a creature emerge from the wood and plant itself firmly on the path along which they must move.
“Halt! I must know your business!” His face was covered in brown fur and his teeth were so prominent, his ears so large, his eyes so large and doelike, he resembled nothing so much as an overgrown rabbit, though he was armoured solidly in battered brass, with a brass cap upon his head and his weapons, a sword and spear of workmanlike steel, were also bound in brass.
“We seek merely to pass through this land without doing harm or being harmed,” said Oone.
The rabbit-warrior shook his head. “Too vague,” he said, and suddenly he hefted his spear and plunged the point deep into the bole of an oak. The oak tree screamed. “That’s what he told me. And many more of these.”
“The trees were travelers?” said Elric. “Your name, sir?”
“I am Elric of Melniboné and, like my lady Oone here, I mean you no disturbance. We travel on to Imador.”
“I know no ‘Elric’ or ‘Oone.’ I am the Count of Magnes Doar and I hold this land as my own. By my conquest. By my ancient right. You must go back through the gate.”
“We cannot,” said Oone. “To retreat would mean our destruction.”
“To proceed, madam, would mean the same thing. What? Shall you camp at the gates for ever?”
“No, sir,” she said. She put