Elric to Rescue Tanelorn - Michael Moorcock [37]
“But non-being involves non-thought, non-will, non-action,” Lamsar said. “Surely you would not submit yourself to such a fate?”
“There is no such thing as self. I am the only reasoning thing in creation—I am almost pure reason. A little more effort and I shall be what I desire to be—the one truth in this non-existent universe. That requires first ridding myself of anything extraneous around me—such as yourselves—and then making the final plunge into the only reality.”
“What is that?”
“The state of absolute nothingness where there is nothing to disturb the order of things because there is no order of things.”
“Scarcely a constructive ambition,” Rackhir said.
“Construction is a meaningless word—like all words, like all so-called existence. Everything means nothing—that is the only truth.”
“But what of this realm? Barren as it is, it still has light and firm rock. You have not succeeded in reasoning that out of existence,” Lamsar said.
“That will cease when I cease,” the man said slowly, “just as you will cease to be. Then there can be nothing but nothing and Law will reign unchallenged.”
“But Law cannot reign—it will not exist either, according to your logic.”
“You are wrong—nothingness is the Law. Nothingness is the object of Law. Law is the way to its ultimate state, the state of non-being.”
“Well,” said Lamsar musingly, “then you had better tell us where we may find the next gate.”
“There is no gate.”
“If there were, where would we find it?” Rackhir said.
“If a gate existed, and it does not, it would have been inside the mountain, close to what was once called the Sea of Peace.”
“And where was that?” Rackhir asked, conscious now of their terrible predicament. There were no landmarks, no sun, no stars—nothing by which they could determine direction.
“Close to the Mountain of Severity.”
“Which way do you go?” Lamsar enquired of the man.
“Out—beyond—to nowhere.”
“And where, if you succeed in your object, will we be consigned?”
“To some other nowhere. I cannot truthfully answer. But since you have never existed in reality, therefore you can go on to no non-reality. Only I am real—and I do not exist.”
“We are getting nowhere,” said Rackhir with a smirk which changed to a frown.
“It is only my mind which holds the non-reality at bay,” the man said, “and I must concentrate or else it will all come flooding back and I shall have to start from the beginning again. In the beginning, there was everything—Chaos. I created nothing.”
With resignation, Rackhir strung his bow, fitted an arrow to the string and aimed at the frowning man.
“You wish for non-being?” he said.
“I have told you so.” Rackhir’s arrow pierced his heart, his body faded, became solid and slumped to the grass as mountains, forests and rivers appeared around them. It was still a peaceful, well-ordered realm and Rackhir and Lamsar, as they strode on in search of the Mountain of Severity, savoured it. There seemed to be no animal life here and they talked, in puzzled terms, about the man they had been forced to kill, until, at length, they reached a great smooth pyramid which seemed, though it was of natural origin, to have been carved into this form. They walked around its base until they discovered an opening.
There could be no doubt that this was the Mountain of Severity, and a calm ocean lay some distance away. They went into the opening and emerged into a delicate landscape. They were now through the last gateway and in the Domain of the Grey Lords.
There were trees like stiffened spider-webs.
Here and there were blue pools, shallow, with shining water and graceful rocks balanced in them and around their shores. Above them and beyond them the light hills swept away towards a pastel yellow horizon which was tinted with red, orange and blue, deep blue.
They felt overlarge, clumsy, like crude, gross giants treading on the fine, short grass. They felt as if they were destroying the sanctity of the place.
Then they saw a girl come walking towards them.
She stopped as they came closer to her. She was dressed in loose black robes which