Elric Swords and Roses - Michael Moorcock [35]
“Hark, hark, the dogs do bark,” warbles Wheldrake, still with his mug of breakfast porter in his hand as he leans upon his saddle and admires the grandeur of it all. “To tell you the truth of the matter, Prince Elric, I was growing a little bored with Putney. Though there was some talk of moving to Barnes.”
“They are unsavoury places, then?” says Elric, happy to make ordinary conversation as they ride. “Full of sour magic and so forth?”
“Worse,” says Wheldrake, “they are South of the River. I believe now I was writing too much. There is little else to do in Putney. Crisis is the true source of creativity, I think. And one thing, sir, that Putney promises is that you shall be free from Crisis.”
Listening politely, as one does when a friend discusses the more abstruse or sticky points of their particular creed, Elric let the poet’s words act as a lullaby to his still-tortured senses. It was clear that the venom’s effect did not lessen with increasing use. But now, he knew, if their gypsy guides proved treacherous he would be able to kill them without much effort. He was a little contemptuous of local opinion. These ruffians might have terrorized the farmers of these parts, but they were clearly no match for trained fighters. And he knew he could rely on the Rose in any engagement, though Wheldrake would be next to useless. There was an air of awkwardness about him which made it clear that his use of a sword was more likely to confuse than threaten any opponent.
From time to time he shared glances with his friends, but it was clear neither had any idea of an alternative. Since the ones they sought had searched for the Gypsy Nation there could be no reason for not at least discovering what exactly the Gypsy Nation was.
Elric watched as the Rose, to release some of her anxiety no doubt, suddenly let her horse have free rein and went galloping along the narrow track beside the chasm while stones and tufts of clay and turf went tumbling down into the darkness and the roar of the unseen river. Then, one by one, the gypsies followed, galloping their horses with daredevil skill in the Rose’s wake, yelling and hallooing, jumping up in their saddles, leaping and diving, as if all this were completely natural to them, and now Elric laughed joyously to see their joy, and Wheldrake clapped and hooted like a boy at the circus. And then they had come to the great wall of garbage, higher than anything Elric had seen earlier, where more gypsies waited at a passage they had made through the waste and they greeted their fellows with all manner of heartiness, while Elric, Wheldrake and the Rose were subjected to the same off-hand contempt with which they treated all non-gypsies.
“They wish to join our free-roaming band,” said the tall man in red and white. “As I told them, we never reject a recruit.” And he guffawed as he accepted a somewhat overripe peach from one of the other gypsies’ bags. “There’s precious little to forage as usual. It’s always thus at the end of the season, and at the beginning.” He cocked his head suddenly. “But the season comes. Soon. We shall go to meet it.”
Elric himself thought he felt the ground shivering slightly and heard something like a distant piping, a far-off drum, a drone. Was their god slithering along his causeway from one lair to the next? Were he and his companions to be sacrifices for that god? Was that what the gypsies found amusing?
“Which season?” asked the Rose, almost urgently, her long fingers combing at her curls.
“The Season of our Passing. Indeed, the Seasons of our Passing,” said a woman spitting plum stones to the ashy filth of the ground. Then she had mounted her horse and was leading them through the passage, out onto the fleshy hardness of the great causeway, which trembled and shook as if