Sailor on the Seas of Fate - Michael Moorcock [30]
"This world? You think it different from our own?"
"If only because of the sun's strange color. Do you not think so, too? You, with your Melnibonéan knowledge of such things, must believe it."
"I have dreamed of such things," Elric admitted, but he would say no more.
"Most of the pirates thought as I—they were from all the ages of the Young Kingdoms. That much I discovered. Some were from the earliest years of the era, some from our own time—and some were from the future. Adventurers, most of them, who, at some stage in their lives, sought a legendary land of great riches which lay on the other side of an ancient gateway, rising from the middle of the ocean; but they found themselves trapped here, unable to sail back through this mysterious gate. Others had been involved in sea-fights, thought themselves drowned and woken up on the shores of the island. Many, I suppose, had once had reasonable virtues, but there is little to support life on the island and they had become wolves, living off one another or any ship unfortunate enough to pass, inadvertently, through this gate of theirs."
Elric recalled part of his dream. "Did any call it the 'Crimson Gate'?"
"Several did, aye."
"And yet the theory is unlikely, if you'll forgive my skepticism," Elric said. "As one who has passed through the Shade Gate to Ameeron ..."
"You know of other worlds, then?"
"I've never heard of this one. And I am versed in such matters. That is why I doubt the reasoning. And yet, there was the dream...."
"Dream?"
"Oh, it was nothing. I am used to such dreams and give them no significance."
"The theory cannot seem surprising to a Melnibonéan, Elric!" Smiorgan grinned again. "It's I who should be skeptical, not you."
And Elric replied, half to himself: "Perhaps I fear the implications more." He lifted his head, and with the shaft of a broken spear, began to poke at the fire. "Certain ancient sorcerers of Melniboné proposed that an infinite number of worlds coexist with our own. Indeed, my dreams, of late, have hinted as much!" He forced himself to smile. "But I cannot afford to believe such things. Thus, I reject them."
"Wait for the dawn," said Smiorgan Baldhead. "The color of the sun shall prove the theory."
"Perhaps it will prove only that we both dream," said Elric. The smell of death was strong in his nostrils. He pushed aside those corpses nearest to the fire and settled himself to sleep.
Smiorgan Baldhead had begun to sing a strong yet lilting song in his own dialect, which Elric could scarcely follow.
"Do you sing of your victory over your enemies?" the albino asked.
Smiorgan paused for a moment, half-amused. "No, Sir Elric, I sing to keep the shades at bay. After all, these fellows' ghosts must still be lurking nearby, in the dark, so little time has passed since they died."
"Fear not," Elric told him. "Their souls are already eaten."
But Smiorgan sang on, and his voice was louder, his song more intense, than ever it had been before.
Just before he fell asleep, Elric thought he heard a horse whinny, and he meant to ask Smiorgan if any of the pirates had been mounted, but he fell asleep before he could do so.
III
* * *
Recalling little of his voyage on the Dark Ship, Elric would never know how he came to reach the world in which he now found himself. In later years he would recall most of these experiences as dreams, and indeed they seemed dreamlike even as they occurred.
He slept uneasily, and in the morning the clouds were heavier, shining with that strange, leaden light, though the sun itself was obscured. Smiorgan Baldhead of the Purple Towns was pointing upward, already on his feet, speaking with quiet triumph:
"Will that evidence suffice to convince you, Elric of Melniboné?"
"I am convinced of a quality about the light—possibly about this terrain—which makes the sun appear blue," Elric replied. He glanced with distaste around him