Elric to Rescue Tanelorn - Michael Moorcock [30]
There is only one answer which occurs to me. Some Being of a higher order wishes it—it is part of the pattern. It is, in its very disruption, a necessary part of the pattern.
Now, the Earth is peaceful. The silent air carries only the sounds of quiet laughter, the murmur of conversation, the small noises of small animals. We and the Earth are at peace.
But how long can it last? Oh, how long can it last?
TO RESCUE TANELORN…
The Age of the Young Kingdoms, which came after the Age of the Bright Empire, was an age of heroes. There were many of these and Elric of Melniboné, of course, was chief among them. But there were others and many of the hero tales of that Age centre upon a mysterious city, which some doubt really existed. This city was named Tanelorn…
—John Carnell, SCIENCE FANTASY No. 56, December 1962
TO RESCUE TANELORN…
(1962)
BEYOND THE TALL and ominous glass-green forest of Troos, well to the north and unheard of in Bakshaan, Elwher or any other city of the Young Kingdoms, on the shifting shores of the Sighing Desert lay Tanelorn, a lonely, long-ago city, loved by those it sheltered.
Tanelorn had a peculiar nature in that it welcomed and held the wanderer. To its peaceful streets and low houses came the gaunt, the savage, the brutalized, the tormented, and in Tanelorn they found rest.
Now, most of these troubled travelers who dwelt in peaceful Tanelorn had thrown off earlier allegiances to the Lords of Chaos who, as gods, took more than a mild interest in the affairs of men. It happened, therefore, that these same lords grew to resent the unlikely city of Tanelorn and, not for the first time, decided to act against it.
They instructed one of their number (more they could not, then, send) Lord Narjhan, to journey to Nadsokor, the City of Beggars, which had an old grudge against Tanelorn, and raise an army that would attack undefended Tanelorn and destroy it and its inhabitants. So he did this, arming his ragged army and promising them many things.
Then, like a ferocious tide, did the beggar rabble set off to tear down Tanelorn and slay its residents. A great torrent of men and women in rags, on crutches, blind, maimed, but moving steadily, ominously, implacably northwards towards the Sighing Desert.
In Tanelorn dwelt the Red Archer, Rackhir, from the Eastlands beyond the Sighing Desert, beyond the Weeping Waste. Rackhir had been born a Warrior Priest, a servant of the Lords of Chaos, but had forsaken this life for the quieter pursuits of thievery and learning. A man with harsh features slashed from the bone of his skull, strong, fleshless nose, deep eye-cavities, a thin mouth and a thin beard. He wore a red skull-cap, decorated with a hawk’s feather, a red jerkin, tight-fitting and belted at the waist, red breeks and red boots. It was as if all the blood in him had transferred itself to his gear and left him drained. He was happy, however, in Tanelorn, the city which made all such men happy, and felt he would die there if men died there. He did not know if they did.
One day he saw Brut of Lashmar, a great, blond-headed noble of shamed name, ride wearily, yet urgently, through the low wall-gate of the city of peace. Brut’s silver harness and trappings were begrimed, his yellow cloak torn and his broad-brimmed hat battered. A small crowd collected around him as he rode into the city square and halted. Then he gave his news.
“Beggars from Nadsokor, many thousands, move against our Tanelorn,” he said, “and they are led by Narjhan of Chaos.”
Now, all the men in there were soldiers of some kind, good ones for the most part, and they were confident warriors, but few in number. A horde of beggars, led by such a being as Narjhan, could destroy Tanelorn, they knew.
“Should we, then, leave Tanelorn?” said Uroch of Nieva, a young, wasted man who had been a drunkard.
“We owe this city too much to desert her,” Rackhir said. “We should defend her—for her sake and ours. There will never be such a city again.”
Brut leaned forward