Elric_ The Stealer of Souls - Michael Moorcock [157]
“Is it the enemy, my lord?” he said as Elric clambered into his place. Elric stared hard towards the horizon, making out a kind of dazzling blackness that from time to time sent up sprawling gouts of stuff into the air where it hung for some moments before sinking back into the main mass. Smoky, hard to define, it crept gradually nearer, crawling over the sea towards them.
“It’s the enemy,” said Elric quietly.
He remained for some while in the lookout’s cradle, studying the Chaos-stuff as it flung itself about in the distance, like some amorphous monster in its death-agonies. But these were not death-agonies. Chaos was far from dead.
From this vantage point, Elric also had a clear view of the fleet as it formed itself into its respective squadrons, making up a black wedge nearly a mile across at its longest point and nearly two miles deep. His own ship was a short distance in front of the rest, well in sight of the squadron commanders. Elric shouted down to Kargan whom he saw passing the mast: “Stand by to move ahead, Kargan!”
The sea-lord nodded without pausing in his stride. He was fully aware of the battle-plan, as they all were for they had discussed it long enough. The leading squadron, under the command of Elric, was comprised of their heaviest warships which would smash into the centre of the enemy fleet and seek to break its order, aiming particularly at whichever ship Jagreen Lern now used. If Jagreen Lern could be slain or captured, their victory would be more likely.
Now the dark stuff was closer and Elric could just make out the sails of the first vessels, spread out one behind the other. Then, as they came even closer, he was aware that to each side of this leading formation were great glinting shapes that dwarfed even the huge battlecraft of Jagreen Lern.
The Chaos Ships.
Elric recognized them, now, from his own knowledge of occult lore. These were the ships said normally to sail the deeps of the oceans, taking on drowned sailors as crews, captained by creatures that had never been human. It was a fleet from the deepest, gloomiest parts of the vast underwater domain which had, since the beginning of time, been disputed territory—disputed between water elementals under their king Straasha, and the Lords of Chaos, who claimed the sea-depths as their main territory on Earth, by right. Legends said that at one time Chaos had ruled the sea and Law the land. This, perhaps, explained the fear of the sea that many human beings had to this day, and the pull the sea had for others.
But the fact was that, although the elementals had succeeded in winning the shallower portions of the sea, the Chaos Lords had retained the deeper parts by means of this, their fleet of the dead. The ships themselves were not of earthly manufacture, neither were their captains originally from Earth, but their crews had once been human, and were now indestructible in any ordinary sense.
As they approached, Elric was soon in no doubt that they were, indeed, those ships. The Sign of Chaos flashed on their sails, eight amber arrows radiating from a central hub—signifying the boast of Chaos, that it contained all possibilities whereas Law was supposed, in time, to destroy possibility and result in eternal stagnation. The Sign of Law was a single arrow pointing upwards, symbolizing dynamic growth.
Elric knew that in reality Chaos was the harbinger of stagnation, for though it changed constantly, it never progressed. But, in his heart, he still felt a yearning for this state, for his past loyalties to the Lords of Chaos had suited him better to wild destruction than to stable progress.
But now Chaos must make war on Chaos; Elric must turn against those he had once been loyal to, using weapons formed by Chaotic forces to defeat those selfsame forces in these ironic times.
He clambered from the cradle and began to shin down the mast, leaping the last few feet to land on the deck as Dyvim Slorm came up. Quickly he told his cousin what he had seen.
Dyvim Slorm was astounded. “But the fleet of the dead never comes to the surface—save for