Elric of Melnibone - Michael Moorcock [52]
‘I know nothing of that, either. It is not one of the Books of Phum. I fear, Comrade Elric, that we shall have to venture to the City of Ameeron and ask your questions of the inhabitants there.’
‘There is a city upon this plane?’
‘Aye—a city. I stayed but a short time in it, preferring the wilderness. But with a friend, it might be possible to bear the place a little longer.’
‘Why is Ameeron unsuited to your taste?’
‘Its citizens are not happy, indeed, they are a most depressed and depressing group, for they are all, you see, exiles or refugees or travelers between the worlds who lost their way and never found it again. No one lives in Ameeron by choice.’
‘A veritable City of the Damned.’
‘As the poet might remark, aye.’ Rackhir offered Elric a sardonic wink. ‘But I sometimes think all cities are that.’
‘What is the nature of this plane where are, as far as I can tell, no planets, no moon, no sun. It has something of the air of a great cavern.’
‘There is, indeed, a theory that it is a sphere buried in an infinity of rock. Others say that it lies in the future of our own Earth—a future where the universe has died. I heard a thousand theories during the short space of time I spend in the City of Ameeron. All, it seemed to me, were of equal value. All, it seemed to me, could be correct. Why not? There are some who believe that everything is a Lie. Conversely, everything could be the Truth.’
It was Elric’s turn to remark ironically: ‘You are a philosopher, then, as well as an archer, friend Rackhir of Phum?’
Rackhir laughed. ‘If you like! It is such thinking that weakened my loyalty to Chaos and led me to this pass. I have heard that there is a city called Tanelorn which may sometimes be found on the shifting shores of the Sighing Desert. If I ever return to our own world, Comrade Elric, I shall seek that city, for I have heard that peace may be found there—that such debates as the nature of Truth are considered meaningless. That men are content merely to exist in Tanelorn.’
‘I envy those who dwell in Tanelorn,’ said Elric.
Rackhir sniffed. ‘Aye. But it would probably prove a disappointment, if found. Legends are best left as legends and attempts to make them real are rarely successful. Come—yonder lies Ameeron and that, sad to say, is more typical of most cities one comes across—on any plane.’
The two tall men, both outcasts in their different ways, began to trudge through the gloom of that desolate wasteland.
2
In the City of Ameeron
* * *
THE CITY OF AMEERON came in sight and Elric had never seen such a place before. Ameeron made Dhoz-Kam seem like the cleanest and most well-run settlement there could be. The city lay below the plain of rocks, in a shallow valley over which hung perpetual smoke: a filthy, tattered cloak meant to hide the place from the sight of men and gods.
The buildings were mostly in a state of semi-ruin or else were wholly ruined and shacks and tents erected in their place. The mixture of architectural styles—some familiar, some most alien—was such that Elric was hard put to see one building which resembled another. There were shanties and castles, cottages, towers and forts, plain, square villas and wooden huts heavy with carved ornamentation. Others seemed merely piles of rock with a jagged opening at one end for a door. But none looked well—could not have looked well in that landscape under that perpetually gloomy sky.
Here and there red fires sputtered, adding to the smoke, and the smell as Elric and Rackhir reached the outskirts was rich with a great variety of stinks.
‘Arrogance, rather than pride, is the paramount quality of most of Ameeron’s residents,’ said Rackhir, wrinkling his hawklike nose. ‘Where they have any qualities of character left at all.’
Elric trudged through filth. Shadows scuttled amongst the close-packed buildings. ‘Is there an inn, perhaps, where we can enquire after the Tunnel Under the Marsh and its whereabouts?’
‘No inn. By and large the inhabitants keep themselves to themselves...’
‘A city square where folk meet?’
‘This city has no centre.