The Bane of the Black Sword - Michael Moorcock [1]
"We wish to destroy Nikorn's power," Pilarmo continued. "And if this means destroying Nikorn, then—" He shrugged and half-smiled, watching Elric's face.
"Common assassins are easily employed, particularly in Bakshaan," Elric pointed out softly.
"Uh—true," Pilarmo agreed. "But Nikorn employs a sorcerer—and a private army. The sorcerer protects him and his palace by means of magic. And a guard of desertmen serve to ensure that if magic fails, then natural methods can be used for the purpose. Assassins have attempted to eliminate the trader, but unfortunately, they were not lucky."
Elric laughed. "How disappointing, my friends. Still, assassins are the most dispensable members of the community—are they not? And their souls probably went to placate some demon who would otherwise have plagued more honest folk."
The merchants laughed half-heartedly and, at this, Moonglum grinned, enjoying himself from his seat in the shadows.
Elric poured wine for the other five. It was of a vintage which the law in Bakshaan forbade the populace from drinking. Too much drove the imbiber mad, yet Elric had already quaffed great quantities and showed no ill effects. He raised a cup of the yellow wine to his lips and drained it, breathing deeply and with satisfaction as the stuff entered his system. The others sipped theirs cautiously. The merchants were already regretting their haste in contacting the albino. They had a feeling that not only were the legends true—but they did not do justice to the strange-eyed man they wished to employ.
Elric poured more yellow wine into his goblet and his hand trembled slightly and his dry tongue moved over his lips quickly. His breathing increased as he allowed the beverage to trickle down his throat. He had taken more than enough to make other men into mewling idiots, but those few signs were the only indication that the wine had any effect upon him at all.
This was a wine for those who wished to dream of different and less tangible worlds. Elric drank it in the hope that he would, for a night or so, cease to dream.
Now he asked: "And who is this mighty sorcerer, Master Pilarmo?"
"His name is Theleb K'aarna," Pilarmo answered nervously.
Elric's scarlet eyes narrowed. "The sorcerer of Pan Tang?"
"Aye—he comes from that island."
Elric put his cup down upon the table and rose, fingering his blade of black iron, the runesword Stormbringer.
He said with conviction: "I will help you, gentlemen." He had made up his mind not to rob them, after all. A new and more important plan was forming in his brain.
"Theleb K'aarna," he thought. "So you have made Bakshaan your bolt-hole, eh?"
Theleb K'aarna tittered. It was an obscene sound, coming as it did from the throat of a sorcerer of no mean skill. It did not fit with his sombre, black-bearded countenance, his tall, scarlet-robed frame. It was not a sound suited to one of his extreme wisdom.
Theleb K'aarna tittered and stared with dreamy eyes at the woman who lolled on the couch beside him. He whispered clumsy words of endearment into her ear and she smiled indulgently, stroking his long, black hair as she would stroke the coat of a dog.
"You're a fool, for all your learning, Theleb K'aarna," she murmured, her hooded eyes staring beyond him at the bright green and orange tapestries which decorated the stone walls of her bed-chamber. She reflected lazily that a woman could not but help take advantage of any man who put himself so into her power.
"Yishana, you are a bitch," Theleb K'aarna breathed foolishly, "and all the learning in the world cannot combat love. I love you." He spoke simply, directly, not understanding the woman who lay beside him. He had seen into the black bowels of hell and had returned sane, he knew secrets which would turn any ordinary man's mind into quivering, jumbled jelly. But in certain arts he was as unversed as his youngest acolyte. The art of love was one of those. "I