The Weird of the White Wolf - Michael Moorcock [6]
“Forget Klant,” she said, “think of the power you might have—the power of true creation!”
“Lady, I claim this castle for Klant. That is what I came to do and that is what I do now. If I leave here alive, I shall be judged the conqueror and you must comply.”
She hardly heard him. She was thinking of various plans to convince him that her cause was superior to his. Perhaps she could still seduce him? Or use some drug to bewitch him? No, he was too strong for either, she must think of some other stratagem.
She felt her breasts heaving involuntarily as she looked at him. She would have preferred to have seduced him. It had always been as much her reward as the heroes who had earlier won over the dangers of Kaneloon. And then, she thought, she knew what to say.
“Think, Earl Aubec,” she whispered. “Think—new lands for your queen's Empire!”
He frowned.
“Why not extend the Empire's boundaries farther?” she continued. “Why not make new territories?”
She watched him anxiously as he took off his helm and scratched his heavy, bald head. “You have made a point at last,” he said dubiously.
“Think of the honours you would receive in Klant if you succeeded in winning not merely Kaneloon—but that which lies beyond!”
Now he rubbed is chin. “Aye,” he said, “Aye ...” His great brows frowned deeply.
“New plains, new mountains, new seas—new populations, even—whole cities full of people fresh-sprung and yet with the memory of generations of ancestors behind them! All this can be done by you, Earl of Malador—for Queen Eloarde and Lormyr!”
He smiled faintly, his imagination fired at last. “Aye! If I can defeat such dangers here—then I can do the same out there! It will be the greatest adventure in history! My name will become a legend—Malador, Master of Chaos!”
She gave him a tender look, though she had half-cheated him.
He swung his sword up on to his shoulder. “I'll try this, lady.”
She and he stood together at the window, watching the Chaos-stuff whispering and rolling for eternity before them. To her it had never been wholly familiar, for it changed all the time. Now its tossing colours were predominantly red and black. Tendrils of mauve and orange spiralled out of this and writhed away.
Weird shapes flitted about in it, their outlines never clear, never quite recognisable.
He said to her: “The Lords of Chaos rule this territory. What will they have to say?”
“They can say nothing, do little. Even they have to obey the Law of the Cosmic Balance which ordains that if man can stand against Chaos, then it shall be his to order and make Lawful. Thus the Earth grows, slowly.”
“How do I enter it?”
She took the opportunity to grasp his heavily muscled arm and point through the window. “See there—a causeway leads down from this tower to the cliff.” She glanced at him sharply. “Do you see it?”
“Ah—yes—I had not, but now I do. Yes, a causeway.”
Standing behind him, she smiled a little to herself. “I will remove the barrier,” she said.
He straightened his helm on his head. “For Klant and Eloarde and only those do I embark upon this adventure.”
She moved towards the wall and raised the window. He did not look at her as he strode down the causeway into the multicoloured mist.
As she watched him disappear, she smiled to herself. How easy it was to beguile the strongest man by pretending to go his way! He might add lands to his Empire, but he might find their populations unwilling to accept Eloarde as their Empress. In fact, if Aubec did his work well, then he would be creating more of a threat to Klant than ever Kaneloon had been.
Yet she admired him, she was attracted to him, perhaps, because he was not so accessible, a little more than she had