Elric_ The Stealer of Souls - Michael Moorcock [147]
The physician looked up. “These are no battle-made wounds. He’s been hurt sorely, but he’ll live. He should recover to perfect fitness given a month or so of rest.”
“He’ll have it,” Elric promised. He gripped the runesword at his belt and wondered what other tasks lay in store for them before the last great battle between Law and Chaos was joined.
Chaos would soon rule more than half the world, in spite of the powerful blow he had dealt it in forever sentencing the Dukes of Hell to their own plane; the more power that Jagreen Lern gathered, the more the threat from Chaos would increase.
He sighed and looked northwards.
Two days later they returned to the Isle of the Purple Towns, the fleet remaining in the largest harbour of Utkel since it was thought wise to have it at hand and not disperse it.
All that following night, Elric talked with the sea-lords, ordered messengers to Vilmir and Ilmiora and, towards morning, there came a polite knock on the door of the room.
Kargan got up to open it and stared in astonishment at the tall, black-faced man who stood there.
“Sepiriz!” Elric cried. “How did you come here?”
“On horseback,” smiled the giant, “and you know the power of the Nihrain steeds. I had come to warn you. We have, at last, managed to contact the White Lords but they can do little as yet. Somehow a path to their plane must be made through the barricades which Chaos has constructed against them. Jagreen Lern’s ships have vomited their contents on the Southern shores and his warriors swarm inland. There is nothing we can do now to stop his conquests there. Once consolidated, his earthly power increased, he will be able to summon more and more allies from Chaos.”
“Then where does my next task lie?” Elric asked softly.
“I am not sure yet. But that is not what I came for. Your blade’s sojourn with its brothers has strengthened it. You notice how swiftly it pours power into your body now?”
“True. Yet I seem ever more reliant upon that power.” He spoke flatly. “The power is stronger, but I am weaker, it seems.”
Sepiriz said gravely: “That power is evilly gained and evil in itself. The blade’s strength will continue to increase but as Chaos-begotten power fills your being, you will have to fight yet more strongly to control the force within you. That also will take strength. So, you see, you must use part of the strength to fight the strength itself.”
Elric sighed and grasped Sepiriz’s arm.
“Thanks for the warning, friend, but when I beat the Dukes of Hell, to whom I formerly pledged allegiance, I did not expect to escape with a mere scratch or a flesh-wound. Know this, Sepiriz,” he turned to the watching sea-lords, “and know this all of you.”
He drew the groaning runeblade from its scabbard and held it aloft so that it shone and flared in its awful power.
“This blade was forged by Chaos to conquer Chaos and that is my destiny, too. Though the world crumbles and turns to boiling gas, I shall live now. I swear by the Cosmic Balance that Law shall triumph and the New Age come to this Earth.”
Taken aback by this grim vow, the sea-lords glanced at one another and Sepiriz smiled.
“Let us hope so, Elric,” he said. “Let us hope so.”
This is the third novelette in the quartette dealing with Elric’s final influence in the great battle between Order and Chaos. Here, the forces of Order are almost beaten, but Elric, himself a part of Chaos, still hopefully fights on against impossible odds.
—John Carnell, SCIENCE FANTASY No. 63, February 1964
BOOK THREE
SAD GIANT’S SHIELD
Thirteen times thirteen, the steps to the sad giant’s lair;
And the Chaos Shield lies there.
Seven times seven are the elder trees
Twelve times twelve warriors he sees
But the Chaos Shield lies there.
And the hero fair will the sad giant dare
And a red sword wield for the sad giant’s shield
On a mournful victory day.
—The Chronicle of the Black Sword
CHAPTER ONE
ACROSS THE WHOLE world the shadow of anarchy had fallen. Neither god, nor man, nor that which ruled both could clearly read the future