The Dreamthief's Daughter

Chapter Fifteen Where the Multiverse Begins

Tanelorn was a triumphant stain of warm life upon the endless ash. I wondered how long she would be trapped in this dead realm, conquered by Law, all traces of Chaos thoroughly extinguished. Eventually Miggea's spell would fade and the city must return to her natural place. My feelings were mixed as Moonglum and I rode through the low gates to be greeted by our friends. We told them we believed Tanelorn no longer to be in danger. But the dangers to other places to which we'd given our love and loyalty were considerable. Mu Ooria was still threatened, perhaps conquered by now. And my Germany was still in the grip of a mad tyrant. It was hard to retain one's focus when so many issues remained unresolved.

With deep anxiety I dismounted outside Brut of Lashmar's house and gave my reins to his ostler. I hoped Fromental and his strange band would be successful, but I doubted it. Gaynor was playing a far more ambitious game than I had guessed. It was never wise, as we of Melnibone had discovered to our cost, to set Law against Chaos in the hope of achieving one's mortal ends.

No creature, human or Melnibonean, could ever command or contain the kind of power the gods commanded. To become involved in their struggles in this way was certain destruction. Part of me cared little if these inferior beings lived or died, but another part of me understood that there was a common bond, a common threat, and that my fate was closely bound up with the fate of the race which had founded the Young Kingdoms. I also understood that commonality was not a matter of race, but of intellect and disposition, that while my own culture was so alien to these humans, yet as an individual I made more friendships with them than I did with my own kind.

Melnibone's isolation and arrogance created within me a perpetual conflict. Like the multiverse itself, my mind was rarely at rest. I felt torn constantly between the opposing forces which bound reality, the eternal paradoxes of life and death, of war and peace. Yet if peace was all I sought, then why had I never settled in beguiling Tanelorn, where I had friends, books, music and memories? Why did I lust sometimes for the next conflict and the next? For the dreaming violence, the bitter oblivion of the battlefield?

We were greeted by Brut, ill-at-ease but glad to see us. "How long must we suffer this damned enchantment?"

"Miggea's power's defeated. Or at least contained. It should not be long before you see your familiar surroundings once more." Brut's question seemed a minor problem, given Gaynor's growing power.

We stayed long enough at Brut's to refresh ourselves, then Oona came back, hard-faced and speaking little. "We must begin this at once," was all she would say. We went with somewhat mixed feelings to the Tower of the Hand, that queer red building whose battlements resembled a palm held outward in a gesture of peace. Where my body still lay in conjured slumber.

Acknowledged by the guard, we entered the low doorway and began to climb a steep staircase which let onto a warren of corridors. Oona led the way, her step light and sure. I came behind, a little less speedily, and Moonglum brought up the rear. He had the air of a man who had seen far too much sorcery and was not looking forward to witnessing any more. He was babbling about our need to leave Tanelorn as soon as possible, to get back on our original course, to put all this behind us and return to the solid realities of the Young Kingdoms, whose sorcery, by and large, was of human proportions.

Oona was grim. "There will be precious few solid realities if Gaynor brings Arioch to the Stones of Morn." Again she fell into an unresponsive silence. I had heard her and Fromental refer earlier to the Stones of Morn but had no clear idea what they were.

At the end of a narrow passage we found another guarded door. I stopped to draw breath while Moonglum exchanged a conventional word or two with the man on duty.

Pretending to have trouble with the door lock, I continued to hesitate. I felt Moonglum's hand on my arm. Oona smiled at me with diffident encouragement.

I pushed open the door.

The long body of a Melnibonean noble lay before me. Aside from its colorless skin, it could have been one of a hundred ancestors. The refined features were in contrast to the vulgarity of the costume. The hands were longer and more slender than von Bek's, the bones of the face more sharply defined, the ears tapering slightly, the mouth sensitive, sardonic. The clothing was that of a barbarian from the South; that alone identified it as mine. For some time I had chosen not to wear my traditional costume. Even the milky hair, pinned at the nape of the neck, was a barbarian fashion. The figure lay dressed just as it had fallen. Nobody had wished, Oona said, to disturb anything, in case I should awaken suddenly. The knee-length boots of doeskin, the baroque silver breastplate, the checkered jerkin of blue and white, scarlet leggings, heavy green cloak. Even the empty scabbard lay beside him. A far better scabbard than the rough-and-ready thing I had made for Ravenbrand.

Though the figure was mine and familiar to the half of me which was Elric, I observed it with a certain detachment, until suddenly I was filled with a surge of emotion and, darting forward, kneeled beside the bed, mutely grasping the limp, corpselike hand, unable to express the feeling of intense sympathy which consumed me. I was weeping for my own tormented soul.

I tried to pull myself together, embarrassed by my unseemly response. I took Ravenbrand and placed it in the cold hand. I began to rise, to say something to my friends, when suddenly the sleeping man's other hand closed on my own and kept me firmly where I was. He was still, as far as I could tell, in a deep, enchanted slumber. Yet there was no denying the power of his grip.

As I struggled to free myself, my eyelids grew heavier and what remained of my energy seeped away. I wanted only to sleep. This feeling was unnatural. I could not afford to sleep. What enchantment had Gaynor left behind for me?

I could not see that it mattered now whether I continued or whether I rested. It seemed perfectly logical, in the circumstances, to lie down beside the bed and join my other self in a much-needed slumber. I heard Moonglum's anxious voice in the deep distance. I heard Oona say something about our safety and the Stones of Morn.

And then I slept.

I was naked.

I stood with my feet planted in blackness. Filling the horizon ahead was a tall silver tree, its roots twisting about itself, the tips of its branches lost in the distance. I had never seen anything so delicate, so intricate. I stood outside existence and looked upon all the branches of all the branches of the multiverse, constantly growing, constantly dying. Like a piece of the most intricate filigree, that silver tree, the complexity so great that it was impossible to see and understand the whole. I knew that what I looked upon was immeasurable, infinite. And what if this were only one of many such trees? I began to move towards it until I could no longer see the tree itself, but only the nearest branches, on which figures moved, back and forth, walking between the worlds.

At last I was standing on a branch, and I felt the comfort of familiarity. I had no memory, either as Elric or Ulric, of these roads. Instead I had a sense of connection with countless other selves with endless pain, with indescribable joy, and I felt that I was walking home.

One branch met a wider branch and then wider still and I met more and more people walking, like me, on the silver roads between the worlds, seeking, like me, some desperate goal, some lost reality. Our greetings were brief. Few lasting friendships were ever made on the silver roads.

After walking awhile, I began to notice a certain familiarity about those I passed. In some it was striking, in others subtle. Every one of these solitary men and women was myself. Thousands upon thousands of versions of myself. As if I were drawing in the vast single personality that was the sum of our parts, swiftly losing my own identity to the greater whole, performing some mysterious dance or ritual, making patterns which would ultimately determine the fate of all.

In this second journey, my dream quest did not take me to Oona's cottage on the borderland. It took me step by step towards a number of circular branches curving around one upon the other, evidently in an agitated condition.

Using the disciplines I had learned in the art of sorcery, I made myself advance.

The silver threads broadened to ribbons and then to wide roads so complicated in their design that it was impossible to guess which direction they would take. All seemed ultimately to return to wherever I happened to pause. I was glad, therefore, to find a fellow traveler, but a little astonished to look on a face that bore no resemblance to my own yet which was familiar.

As happens in dreams, I felt no special surprise at meeting Prince Lobkowitz here. The distinguished older man, who used the nom de guerre of Herr El, gravely shook hands with me, as if we had met on a country road. He seemed comfortable in his natural environment. I remember the warmth and firmness of his grip, his reassuring presence.

-My dear Count! Lobkowitz seemed casually delighted - I was told I might run across you out here. Are you familiar with these crossroads?

-Not at all, Prince Lobkowitz. And I'll admit I don't seek to become familiar with them. I am merely trying to get home. I have, as I'm sure you're aware, many reasons for returning to Germany.

-But you cannot return, can you, without the sword? -The sword is in better hands than mine now. I shall not have any particular need of it, I suspect, in my fight against Hitlerism, which is why I wish to return home.

Lobkowitz's sad, wise eyes took on an ironic glint. -I think we are all wishing that, my lord. Here, on the moonbeam roads, we occasionally encounter this phenomenon, where branches appear to curve in on themselves, swallow themselves, reproduce themselves in peculiar ways and grow increasingly complex and dysfunctional. The theory goes that such places are a kind of cancer, where Law and Chaos are no longer in equilibrium but maintain form in their mutually destructive conflict. They can be dangerous to us-their paradoxes are perverse, unnatural and have age not wisdom. They only lead towards further confusion.

-But my path takes me this way. How can I avoid it? -You can't-but I can help you, if you wish. Quite naturally, I accepted his offer and he fell in beside me, staring up at the lattice of silvery roads all around us and remarking on their beauty. I asked him if these were the Grey Fees. He shook his head.

-These are roads we ourselves make between the realms. Just as generations tread footpaths across familiar countryside until those footpaths turn to highways, so do our desires and inventions create familiar paths through the multiverse. You could say we create a linear way of traveling through nonlineari-ty, that our roads are entirely imaginary, that any form we believe we see is simply an illusion or a partial vision of the whole. The human psyche organizes Time, for instance, to make it navigably linear. They say human intelligence and human dreams are the true creators of what we see. I have great faith in the benign power of dreams and am myself partial to that notion-that in effect we create ourselves and our surroundings. Another of the paradoxes which bring us closer to an understanding of our con-dition.

The maze of roads had tangled all around us now and I knew a slight sense of alarm.

-Then what does this nest of silver threads represent?

-Linearity turned in on itself? Law gone mad? Chaos unchecked? At this stage it scarcely matters. Or perhaps these shapes are like blossoms on a tree, creating in turn whole new dimensions? I believe some call this junction The Chrysanthemum and avoid it.

-Why so?

-Because you become truly lost, truly cut off from any familiar reality. Or perhaps if they are cancers ... ?

-Does no one know their true origin or function?

-Who can? They could be all of those things or none of those things.

-So we could be trapped. Is that what you're saying?

-I did not insist on it as a certainty. Here the philosophical idea can turn out to be a concrete reality. And vice versa ...

Lobkowitz smiled a thin smile.

-Here it is best to have only informed theories-realities and certainties are unreliable at best. It is harder to be betrayed by a theory. They say that if you would understand the multiverse, you must change from the conceptual state to the perceptual-from manipulation to understanding, and from understanding to action.

I was taught something similar as a young student of sorcery. Yet I feared to let this silvery tangle of roads absorb me. The Austrian seemed almost amused.

-What were you hoping to find here?

I laughed. -Myself, I said.

-Look. Lobkowitz pointed. A small straight branch led out of the tangle into glinting blackness. -Would you go this way?

-Where does it lead?

-Where you have the will and the courage to go. Whatever you have the will and the courage to make.

I had hoped for rather more specific advice, but understood why it was not possible in a multiverse so malleable, so susceptible to mortal demands and so treacherously unstable. Nonetheless I had an uneasy feeling I had become trapped in some peculiar parable.

These dreams I dreamed as both von Bek and Elric. They were profound dreams, hard to recollect. Elric's dreams were the deepest and he would come to remember them only as nightmares amongst other, equally disturbing, nightmares. The kind that made him wake screaming in the night. That drove him to more and more desperate adventuring as he sought to escape the faintest memory of them.

Now, however, links with von Bek seemed increasingly tenuous as I stepped onto the new straight road. "You ultimately need to reach the Isle of Morn." Prince Lobkowitz wished me good-bye and turned back towards the dense tangle of paths.

I drew further away and looked over my shoulder. "Morn?" I could no longer see the mysterious Prince Lobkowitz, Herr El. The great complex now resembled an impeccably carved ivory chrysanthemum, so perfect it was possible to imagine it made by a mortal craftsman. I understood why it had acquired the name. Were there people who actually mapped these routes? Who could make identical journeys over and over again?

Why had Lobkowitz set me on this path to risk the danger he had described? Why had he, too, mentioned Morn? For a moment it occurred to me to wonder if he had deceived me, but I put the thought aside. I must trust the few I had learned to trust or I would be truly lost.

My road joined with another and another until I was again on a main branch of the multiverse, approaching a place where a silvery bough had turned upwards and then down to form a rough arch.

I had no choice but to go under this and find myself staring upwards into a glowing cauldron of white fire, which turned suddenly to shower me with flames the color of bone and pewter, absorbing me even as they fell and I fell with them-down for a thousand years, falling, falling for a thousand years. When I looked down I saw a vast field of ivory and silver flowers-of roses and chrysanthemums, marigolds and magnolias-each one representing a different universe.

I feared that I would be drawn into one of the densely woven universes, but gradually they began to form a simple field of white in which two spots of ruby red glowed, until I realized I was staring into my own gigantic image and then instantly I was staring up at the anxious faces of Moonglum and my daughter, Oona. I turned my head. On the floor beside me was the sleeping body of Ulric von Bek. But there had been a fundamental change. Everything was most definitely not what it had been . . .

As von Bek, however isolated I was from Elric and while he would scarcely remember me once this dream was ended, I could not rid myself of him. I remain both men. His story continues within me. I shall never be free of him. I have no reason to believe I was singled out for this fate and every reason to think it a mere accident, for if I've learned nothing else from my experiences, it is that luck has far more to do with one's fortune than any kind of judgment and that to believe oneself in control of the multiverse is to suffer the greatest delusion of all.

Since then I have heard of others who carry the identities of a thousand souls within them, but at that moment I was horrified by the notion. A simple Saxon landowner, I was bound by supernatural ties to the soul of a nonhuman creature separated from me by untold distances of time and space. Even as I looked on his face, I saw my own face looking back at me. It felt for a moment as if I stared down an endless corridor of mirrors-thousands upon thousands of selves reflected back at me. I rose with some difficulty from where I had fallen. I had the impression everything had happened simultaneously. Moonglum was overjoyed by his friend's restoration, and Oona took her father's hand as he stared with disbelieving eyes at the scene before him.

Only I retained a conscious memory of the journey through the moonbeam roads.

Elric looked at me. "I believe I have you to thank, sir, for waking me from that enchanted slumber?"

"I think the Lady Oona is to be thanked by both of us," I said. "She has her mother's skills if not her inclinations."

He frowned. "Ah, yes. I remember something." Then a shudder ran through him. "My sword-?"

"Gaynor has Stormbringer, still," said Moonglum quickly. "But your-this gentleman-has brought you another."

"I remember." Elric frowned. He looked down at Ravenbrand, which I had placed in his grasp. "Fragments. Gaynor won my sword, then I fell asleep, then I dreamed I found Gaynor and lost him again." He became agitated. "And he threatens-he threatens ... No, Tanelorn is safe. Miggea's imprisoned. The Stones of Morn! Other friends are in danger. Arioch-my Lord Arioch-where is he?"

"Your Duke of Hell was here," said Moonglum. "In this realm. But we did not know it. Perhaps Gaynor went with him."

Elric clutched his head, groaning. "The sorcery is too much, even for me. No mortal can sustain sanity or life if exposed to it for long. Oh! I remember! The dream! The cottage! Those white faces. Caverns. The young woman ..."

"You remember enough, Father," she said quietly. He looked up at her again. Startled. Baffled. Alarmed.

"Probably more than enough," I suggested. I was beginning to yearn for some natural, dreamless sleep.

Oona said quietly, "All is not over. Nor will it be until we have succeeded in getting rid of Gaynor. His strategy isn't clear. He still attacks on two fronts and becomes increasingly reckless-careless of all life, including his own."

"Where shall we seek him?" Elric made a careful inspection of the runesword. He seemed suspicious of it, yet the blade itself was clearly the one he was familiar with.

"Oh, there's no doubt," she said, "about where to find him. This Gaynor? He'll choose one of two places of power-Bek or Morn. How to fight him is the problem. If you are ready, Father, we should return as soon as we can to Mu Ooria, where there's still a great deal of work for us."

"How do you propose to get there?" I asked her. "I doubt if King Straasha can be prevailed upon to help me twice."

She smiled. "There are less dramatic means of travel. Besides, I think Miggea's spell has lifted. Now only she is trapped in the barren world she created for herself. Without human aid, there she stays. But while we can journey fairly easily between the worlds, Master Moonglum cannot. You must wait here, Moonglum, in Tanelorn, until Elric returns."

Moonglum seemed partially relieved at this news but he grumbled. "I've chosen to travel with you, Elric-to Hell, if necessary."

Elric stretched out his long, pale hand and placed it on Moonglum's shoulder. "It will not be necessary yet, old friend."

Moonglum took this well, but he was clearly saddened. "I'll wait a few weeks," he said. "And if you don't return by then, I might head back towards Elwher. I, too, have unfinished business. If I'm not here when you return, you'll find me there."

We left the little redheaded outlander in that room. He preferred, he said, to stay there until we had gone. He wished us luck. He was sure our paths would cross again.

Oona led us out of the Tower of the Hand into cheering streets and gentle sunlight. There, all around the city's walls, were familiar gentle green hills. Tanelorn had returned to her natural position in the multiverse.

Oona led us swiftly through the twittens and lanes of Tanelorn's most ancient districts until we entered a low house which had, by its condition, been abandoned years earlier. The upper floors were ruined but the basement was in good repair, its main room guarded by an iron-bound door which Oona, after checking that we weren't observed, opened with a surprisingly small key.

There seemed to be nothing especially valuable on the other side of the door. The room was furnished with a bed, working and cooking facilities, a desk, chair and several shelves of books and scrolls. It had the neat, well-used air of a nun's cell.

I didn't question her. This was one of her smaller surprises, after all.

Only when Elric was physically nearby did I not strongly sense his mind. The albino seemed more ill at ease than anyone else, and I had no clear idea why. I think I assumed a sophistication in him. After all, my experience of the inventive twentieth century was not his. Indeed, he was often awkward in my presence, avoiding my eye and rarely addressing me directly. Clearly I made him deeply uncomfortable and would have left him, if I could. He had something of the air of a somnambulist. I began to wonder if he thought he dreamed all that was happening.

Perhaps he did dream? Perhaps he dreamed us all?

Now Oona crossed to the far wall and pushed back a tapestry hanging to reveal another door.

"Where does this lead?" I asked.

"It depends." She was smiling a little grimly.

"Upon what?"

"On whether Law or Chaos has control of certain realms."

"And how do you know?"

"You find out," she said, "by going through."

Elric was impatient. "Then let's go through," he said. "I've a mind to confront Cousin Gaynor on a number of issues." His hand was on the hilt of Ravenbrand. I admired his wild courage. We might have the same blood and some of the same dilemmas, but we were temperamentally very different. He sought oblivion in action, while I sought it in philosophy. I was reluctant to take decisions, whereas for Elric decisions were everything. He took them, as he took risks, habitually.

If he'd lived a prosaic life, with prosaic considerations, then prosaic things would chiefly have happened to him. But he was in no way prosaic, this wolfish whiteface, who relied on sorcery for his very sustenance.

Would I have been like him in his circumstances? I doubted it. But I had not known a childhood of sorcerous schooling and overbearing tradition. I had not, as a youth, stared into the most profound horror, and learned the skills of the dragonmasters, learned how magically I could manipulate the world. I knew everything about his past, of course, for his memories remained my memories, while he recalled nothing at all of me. In some ways I envied him his lack of consciousness.

With an air of impatience, Elric flung himself through the door and I followed. Oona closed the door behind us.

The three of us stood in a pleasant sunken garden. The kind of place one might seek rest and contemplation and exactly what one would have expected to find on the other side of that door. A comforting domesticity. The garden was surrounded by a high wall which was surrounded in turn by tall buildings, all of which had the effect of making it seem smaller than it was. Herbs and flowers, all sweet-scented, were laid out in formal beds. Peacocks and ornamental roosters strutted between the shrubs. At the center was a pool with a fountain. The fountain was ornate, of some dark, gleaming rock, and its sound added to the garden's sense of tranquillity.

Although pleasant, the scene was an anticlimax. We had expected something much more dramatic. Elric hesitated. He looked around him, suspiciously. I think he was trying to find something to kill.

Oona was relieved. She had clearly expected some less attractive scene. The garden had no exterior gate. The only way to get in or out was through the door we had just used.

"What now?" Elric glanced impatiently about. "Where do we go?"

"From Tanelorn to Mu Ooria and from Mu Ooria to Tanelorn," she said, "the way is always by water."

Elric dipped his hand into the ornamental pool. "By water? How? There's no room for a ship on this, madam." He stared with interest at the unusual fish swimming there, as if he expected to find some secret in the pool.

Smiling, Oona reached down with her curved bow and drew it gently across the surface, describing a circle. The circle remained visible. Within, the water became gradually more agitated, full of color and lilting ripples. Suddenly it began to funnel upwards, red and shining, like a fresh wound, a pillar of pulsing ruby light. The color was reflected in our three pale faces, giving our skin the appearance of bone stained with old blood.

Elric grinned his wolf's grin-the red light dancing in his eyes. "Is this the way?" he asked Oona.

She nodded.

Without a word or any further hesitation, the Melnibonean flattened his body against the pillar. For a moment he jerked, like a frog on an electric fence, and then was absorbed.

I didn't move quite so readily and Oona laughed at me, taking my hand and stepping forward, leading me into the yielding, fiery light.

I felt something tugging at my body, pulling me away from her. I tried to hold on, but lost my grip. I was swimming through roaring, fluttering flames, down into a scarlet abyss which threatened to drown me in all the spilled blood of the multiverse. Fire which did not burn, but licked at the secret places of the soul. Fire which revealed gibbering faces, like the faces of the damned in Hell. Obscenely tortured bodies, a writhing ballet of torment. But I was not burned.

The fire had the quality of water, for I could swim through it easily. I hadn't drawn a single breath and felt no need for air. I was reminded of the thick, sluggish waters of the Heavy Sea which lay beyond Melnibone.

As I swam, I looked about for the others, but they had disappeared. Had this been a plan on the part of Elric and Oona to get rid of me now that I'd served my turn?

Behind me I had the sense of a malignant, monstrous presence. I swam faster than ever, even as the creature gathered speed. When I glanced back, seeking a glimpse of what pursued me, all I could see was a huge, shadowy white bulk, like the body of a shark seen through twilight seas. It seemed to carry the weight of the ages. It moved as in great pain. I heard it utter a peculiar groan. I felt something brush by me and then fall away back into the depths, as if it had attempted to attack me and failed.

I swam on through forests of identical ruby pillars. I swam between banks of blue flame and over fields of emerald and pearl. And I still had no need to draw breath, no need to defend myself.

I swam through cities in flames. I swam over battles between whole peoples and I swam over the destruction of worlds. I swam through tranquil woods and flowering fields and then, quite unexpectedly, I was inhaling liquid.

I coughed, flung myself upwards, and emerged into blazing blackness.

From somewhere in the darkness I heard an exultant voice. Oona was speaking to my doppelganger. "Welcome, Father," she said. "Welcome to Mu Ooria. Welcome to your destiny."

Chapter Sixteen The Greater Blasphemy

The other two were waiting for me as I waded to shore. It was bitterly cold. In that weird phosphorescent light from the lake, I saw the by now familiar outlines of Mu Ooria, but they seemed more ragged than before. Every so often a column of pale fire would rise for a moment, flutter into fragments and subside. While I had no idea of the cause, there was an ominous quality to the fire which made me fear the worst. I heard distant sounds, like the thin striking of a clock, pnin, pnin, pnin, a roar like a landslide, then laughter in the darkness. A crash. A panting noise, like the ardor of coupling dogs. The echo of what might have been a scream. A sense that something terrible was taking place, something obscene.

I did my best to keep my fears to myself. "On the evidence," I said, "Gaynor has been successful in his ambitions here."

As was his unconscious habit when disturbed, Elric put his hand on the pommel of Ravenbrand. "Then we had best go to see him at once."

I was beginning to understand that my near-twin was incautious by nature. What would seem insanity to an ordinary man was for Elric the logical course of action.

Oona smiled at this. "Perhaps we should first find out what his strength is. Remember, Father, that your sorcery could be limited here. Even the sword might lack her normal powers."

Elric shrugged at this but seemed willing to trust her judgment. After all, we were here largely at her volition and she knew far more about this world than either of us.

Making no effort to hide himself, Elric began to stride towards the city, following the curve of the shoreline. We could only continue in his wake.

Soon the signs of Gaynor's ambitions could be seen everywhere in that haunted, unsteady darkness. More than once we stumbled over the prone body of a giant black cat which had previously hunted this territory. Twice we found what were Off-Moo remains-crumpled corpses, hacked cartilage, but no bones. Did the Off-Moo have bones, in the conventional sense? We found one of their long, conical headdresses and still could not tell if they fitted the shape of the head or exaggerated it. We found signs of fires made from Off-Moo artifacts. We found the bodies of troogs and savages everywhere. Evidently some had fought amongst themselves for whatever prizes they discovered in Mu Ooria. I guessed there was little here they would value, which would make their destructiveness all the more frenzied.

How had they defeated the Off-Moo, who had been so well and cleverly protected? The dormant Off-Moo, those who had resembled statues and who guarded their borders, had clearly been caught unawares. They had never had a chance to wake. The Off-Moo's ability to direct deadly stalactites against their enemies had somehow been impaired. Initially knowing nothing of the Off-Moo, Gaynor had somehow learned much since I last visited their city.

Signs of savage, mindless cruel destruction were everywhere.

What had become of the Off-Moo? Had they fled? Were they in hiding in the city? Had they all been killed? Or captured? It was hard for me to remember that Gaynor had gathered supernatural allies since I had last visited this realm.

We saw a few silhouettes moving in the ruins. They had the shambling walk of the troogs or the swagger of the half-blind savages who fought beside them.

As we drew nearer to them, even Elric began to keep to the shadows, watching to see what they were doing. But it was clear they were doing very little, save sifting through the ruins for the loot they had hoped to find. I couldn't imagine what possessions of the Off-Moo would be valuable to these semi-brutes. Where was Gaynor's main army?

We were coming close to the great plaza of the city. Everywhere the mysterious towers of the Off-Moo burned with that strange fluttering white fire. What I had mistaken for their screaming was the noise the towers made as they burned. The sound of a mortal voice.

Where the towers burned, neither the conquerors nor the conquered were in evidence.

We decided we would have to capture one of the savages and interrogate him. Oona cocked her head, listening. She walked rapidly towards a burning tower and peered in.

Seconds later a dark shape appeared in the doorway. Its own robes flickered as the fire flickered and its eyes glittered. I saw no welcome in them.

Oona exchanged a few words with the figure. Cautiously he came out of the tower and glided towards us. It was hard to tell from the long, stony face if we were recognized or not. The Off-Moo spoke slowly, in Greek:

"Gaynor did this to us. He feared we would try to stop him in his ambitions. And he feared rightly. But he has made exceptional alliances with certain of the Lords of the Higher Worlds and so gained the knowledge of how to defeat us and with what."

"How many of you has he killed?" Elric spoke with the direct bluntness of a professional soldier.

"That remains to be seen, sir. I am Scholar Crina. I was not here when Gaynor attacked. When I returned I found our city much as you find it now. My departing colleagues were able to inform me that the weight of barbarians overwhelmed them. But before that something else occurred."

"Where are the barbarians now?" I asked. I was shivering, still soaked through. "Do you know?"

"They marched away," was all he would say.

"Where's this Gaynor?" Elric asked brusquely. "Presumably his will is what it always was?"

"He has done what he needed to do here."

"And what was that?"

"He has stolen our Great Staff and now marches against the Grey Fees."

"Impossible," said Oona. "The staff is useless in his blood-soaked hands. It could as easily destroy him as aid him. No one would take such a risk. Nobody would be so foolish as to chance such destruction."

"No one except Gaynor," said Elric.

"What does he expect to gain from invading the Grey Fees?" I asked.

Scholar Crina answered that question. "Enormous power. Power over the forces of creation themselves. This was what he first offered us, if we would help him. Naturally we refused him."

"The gods would never allow it."

Scholar Crina seemed amused. "No sane being would. But there is a theory that the Lords of the Higher Worlds themselves are no longer entirely sane, as disturbing changes take place throughout the multiverse. A conjunction comes. All the realms will realign within the great field of Time. New destinies will be decided. New realities. Yours is not the only story. There are others. Other lives. Other dreams. All lead to the same great supernatural moment. Nothing is as certain as it was. Even loyalties to Law and Chaos are no longer permanent. Look at Gaynor. He employs both Law and Chaos in his attempt to make himself the ruler of worlds. Once such things were impossible for mortals. But now, it seems, even mortal power increases and becomes less stable."

"Gaynor does not mean to destroy himself," said Oona. "He no doubt believes he is invulnerable now that he bears your Great Staff."

"He claims to be king of the world. And it is true that his possession of our Great Staff gives him the confidence to march upon the Grey Fees. But to what end? What can he hope to achieve, save complete destruction of the multiverse?"

"He reminds me of a certain dictator in my own country," I said mildly. "His madness, his poor grasp on reality seems to be what drives him. His addiction to power is so great, he will destroy whole realms in order to satisfy his craving."

Scholar Crina lowered his eyes. "He has no ordinary sense of self-interest. Those are the most dangerous people of all to gain control of a civilization."

"Echoes," said Oona thoughtfully to herself. "On how many planes, do you think, is a version of this story being played out? We believe we have volition, but we can do little to change the consequences or the direction of our actions, because those consequences and actions are taking place, with minuscule differences expanding to vast differences, on countless levels of the multiverse."

Elric showed no interest in her philosophy. "If Gaynor can be stopped on this plane," he said, "then presumably his defeat will be echoed, as his victories are?"

She smiled at him. "Well, Father, if anyone was best fitted to change his own destiny, then it is you."

Neither Elric nor I knew exactly what she meant, but I shared his sense of determination.

"Gaynor's power was too great for us," said Scholar Crina.

"But your Staff," said Oona. "How could he have taken that from you?"

"The Staff itself appears to have allowed it," said Scholar Crina simply. "We have always known it had volition. That is how it came to us."

They were referring to the malleable artifact-bowl, child, staff-I had witnessed the Off-Moo manipulating in that first ceremony. Or had they been the manipulators? Were they perhaps the manipulated? I remembered how it had changed shape. At whose volition?

"Does it always take the form of a staff?" I asked him. I recalled all the shapes it had made.

"We know it as the Runestaff," he said. "But it takes several forms. It is a staff and a cup and a stone and is one of the great regulators of our realities."

"Is that what my people know as the Grail?" I remembered von Eschenbach and some of our own family legends. "Were you its guardians?"

"In this realm," he said. "And in this realm we have failed."

"You mean various versions of the Grail inhabit other realms?"

Scholar Crina was regretful. "Only one Great Staff exists," he said. "It represents the Balance itself. Some say it is the Balance. Its influence extends far beyond any realm in which it is kept."

"My family was once said to guard the Grail," I told him. "But it was removed from our keeping. Presumably we also failed in our trust."

"The Runestaff has the power to change form and to move on its own volition," Scholar Crina told me. "Some say it can take the shape of a child. Why should it not, since it can presumably assume any form it likes? In this way it preserves and defends itself. And thus preserves those who respect and defend it. It is not always obvious what form it has taken."

"In what form does Gaynor possess it?" Oona wanted to know.

"The form of a cup," he said. "Of a fine drinking vessel. With that and the two swords he now carries, he has more power to change the destiny of worlds than any other mortal before him. And because the gods themselves hardly understand what is happening, he could succeed. For it is well known that a mortal will eventually bring about the destruction of the gods."

I paid little attention to this last. It had the smack of legend and superstition about it, yet at the same time a frisson of recognition went through my body. I tried to recall where I had heard a similar story, one which was couched in the mythology of my own age and people, the story of the Holy Grail and its ability to cure the world's pain. That legend also had a mortal changing the destiny of his world. I checked myself. I felt as if I was receiving an overdose of Wagner. My own tastes were for the clearer waters of Mozart or Liszt, whose appeal was as much to the intellect as to the emotions. Was that what I recognized? Had I somehow found myself in a very complicated Wagnerian opera? I shuddered at the thought. Yet even the momentous events of the Ring Cycle were as nothing compared to what I had already witnessed.

I turned to Oona. "You said something of my particular relationship with the Grail. What did you mean?"

"Not everyone is privileged to serve it," she said.

Her manner was grim. She did not seem optimistic. I think she had not expected Gaynor to get this far.

A strange stink filled the air. A mixture of a thousand different odors, none of them pleasant. The smell of evil.

I still could not see how Gaynor had so thoroughly defeated the Off-Moo and said as much to the scholar.

"You do not yet know," he said, "if Gaynor has defeated us. The game, after all, is not over."

I kept my own counsel, but as far as I could see this aspect of the game at least was well and truly won.

Elric wanted to know where Gaynor was, whether it was possible to catch up with him on foot.

"He moves towards the Grey Fees with his army. He believes he can take the power of the multiverse for himself. It is a delusion. But his delusion will destroy us all, unless someone challenges him." Scholar Crina seemed to glance inquiringly at me.

But it was Prince Elric who answered. "I have been insulted and humiliated by that creature. I have been deceived. Whatever power he now has, he will not escape my vengeance."

"You think not?" Oona stooped to run her hand through the sleek fur of one of the big cats, then drew it away again quickly, as if she did not wish to contemplate what had happened to the animal. Was it dead, or enchanted?

"Dream or no dream," said Elric quietly, "he shall be punished for what he has done."

I would not have believed another. Elric, however, was beginning to convince me that we might yet, somehow, defeat an entity who had become probably the greatest single force for evil in the multiverse. As often happened between us, Elric replied to my unvoiced ideas. "Melniboneans believe that fate cannot be altered. That each of us has a settled destiny. That to break free of it-or attempt to break free of it-is an act of blasphemy. A blasphemy I am prepared to commit. To prevent, perhaps, a greater blasphemy."

He had the air of a man who wrestled with his own soul as well as his conscience and background. I had the impression that he might have spoken more, had he been able to put into words the huge conflicts taking place within him.

We spent little time in Mu Ooria. The flames were already beginning to die down and serious damage had been done. We found no more Off-Moo. No sign of them. No piece of writing. No clue. They had fled in defeat. I was disappointed in them. They had no doubt become decadent, overconfident of their ability to resist attack, relying, as Byzantium had done for so many decades, on their ancient reputation. I had assumed them to be both courageous and resourceful. Perhaps they had been once. Now, it seemed, they had no capacity to resist Gaynor or anyone else who chose to take their wealth and secrets.

"There is only one possible course of action," said Prince Elric.

"Pursue Gaynor?" I asked.

"And hope to defeat him before he can reach the Grey Fees."

"He is almost there," said Scholar Crina. "He and his army must even now be close to the borderland." For the first time he appeared to show some kind of emotion. "The end for us," he said. He lowered his cowled head. "The end for everyone. The end of everything."

Oona was impatient with this. "Well, gentlemen, unless you welcome the end as thoroughly as Scholar Crina, who seems to derive some form of gloomy satisfaction from the situation, I suggest we rest for a while, eat well and then continue our pursuit."

"There's no time," said Elric, almost to himself. "We must eat on the move. And we must begin soon, for we have no mounts and must pursue Gaynor on foot."

"And when we catch up with him?" I said. "What will we do?"

"Punish him," said Elric simply. "Take back the sword he has stolen." He touched his hilt. He stroked it with his long fingers. He was beginning to grin. I found his humor alarming. "Use his own methods against him. Kill him."

A kind of lust smoldered in the Melnibonean. He was longing for a bloodletting and did not much care how it was achieved. I began to fear for the safety of myself and his daughter. Scholar Crina sensed it, too. When I looked for him again, he was slipping back into the burning building. He seemed untroubled by the flames.

Wrapping my damp clothing about me and feeling the need for movement, I trudged towards the outskirts of the city, my companions behind me. I was convinced that I was likely to die in this adventure. I consoled myself that if Elric and Oona had not helped me escape the concentration camp, I would be dead by now anyway. At least I had had the chance to observe the suprareality that constituted the interlinked worlds of the multi-verse.

We had retreated to the outer reaches of the city when suddenly the ground underfoot began to shudder. Pieces of stone whistled from above and crashed to the cavern's floor. Did an earthquake grip Mu Ooria? The rumbling staccato sound which followed the shock had the quality of mocking laughter.

I glanced a question to Oona, who shook her head. Elric, also, was baffled.

Another shock. More falling rock. As if a giant strode in our wake.

If I had not known better, I would have guessed that high explosives were being set off. I had experienced similar sensations and sounds when visiting the site of a new railway tunnel with my engineer brother, who had died while digging a trench three days after the outbreak of war.

I peered into the distance, between those vast columns of rock. It was impossible to see very far into that cavern or guess its dimensions. But now, far away, I caught glimpses of a flickering, raging fire. The phosphor from the lake had combined to form a whirlwind.

Several of these slender tornadoes were approaching us. Shrieking whirlwinds of whistling white light touched the ruins of the city and swirled them into new, even crazier patterns. Something about those thin twisters suggested they were sentient, or that they were at least controlled by a thinking creature.

We knew enough to run, seeking some kind of ditch or fissure into which we could climb in the hope that the tornadoes would bounce over us like their earthly counterparts, but it was a faint enough hope.

It was clear now what force Gaynor had used against our friends. Some fresh supernatural alliance, no doubt, brought him the strength of the ishass. Wind demons. Even in my earthly mythology I had heard of them. They figured largely in the folktales of desert peoples, usually as ifrits.

"Can they be harnessed by the likes of Gaynor?" Oona was asking Elric.

"Clearly," replied the albino laconically as he ran. I brought up the rear, gasping for breath and unable to voice any of the questions rushing through my mind.

Oona signaled to us. She stopped and pointed. Ahead was the even darker mouth of a small cave. Hearing the advance of the ishass and not daring to look, without hesitation we squeezed into the hole, which was barely large enough to contain all three of us. The closeness of our bodies was a comfort to me. I felt as if the three of us had returned to some safe, defendable womb. Outside the shrieks and crashing grew louder and louder as the whirlwinds passed directly over us. Then came a lull. More twisters could be heard far away, but their sound was distant.

"This is a powerful force," Elric mused. "It requires enormous skill to summon it. Important bargains. I do not believe even your cousin, Count Ulric, with all his cleverness, could physically contain it. These demons are famous in the netherworlds. They are called the Ten Sons, the ishass. This means he keeps his alliances with Chaos, for the ishass will not serve Law and Law, save at its most unstable, would never employ them."

I felt guilty for judging the Off-Moo. No mortal creature could stand against such power. It would be like trying to confront an American twister with courage and moral integrity as your only weapons. And the Off-Moo, for all their sophistication, had nothing which would defend them against these ishass.

The wind demons were passing close by now. Yelping and shrieking and yapping like wild dogs, bringing ancient stones crashing down, uprooting columns which had taken a million years to grow. My fear took second place to my sense of outrage. What purpose could there be to such wild destruction? And why had Gaynor bothered to unleash the Ten Sons again upon a clearly defeated city? What was it in some mortals that gave them satisfaction in destruction? What terrible need did they satisfy by destroying the work and beauty of the centuries? Did they think they cleansed the world of something?

Only long after they passed, and we climbed out of our cramped little cave, did it occur to me that perhaps Gaynor did not command the Ten Sons. Perhaps they had escaped his control and now contented themselves with wreaking wholesale mayhem upon that once peaceful world? Or was this their reward for aiding him? They destroyed indiscriminately, not even sparing the few savages left rooting in the ruins who came into their path. They were caught up, arms and legs desperately flailing, swallowed, stripped of clothing and flesh, which was flung in all directions, their bones scattered. The bones fell like rain on a rooftop.

The Ten Sons were ahead of us now, forming a ragged line which could be followed easily. We came in their wake, stumbling along the wide path they had created and wondering what could lie before us that would be any more terrifying than what we had already witnessed.

Oona was frowning, She had had an idea, she said. "Perhaps they hurry to join Gaynor's army? Perhaps he has already reached the Grey Fees and summons them to his service once more. Does he think he can conquer Creation with a few wind demons?"

"I would imagine," I said, "that he has planned rather more thoroughly. What we can be sure of, I think, is that his power is the greatest granted to any human being before him."

"I think he will be hard to defeat," mused the Lord of Melnibone. "It's as well there are three of us. I am not sure I could do it alone."

We moved farther away from the city and into darkness which we illuminated with the barbarians' fallen brands. We had little chance of catching Gaynor's army quickly, but at least we were now safe from the Ten Sons, who leaped head of us, tiny now, glimpsed rarely amongst the massive tall stones which formed in this area a series of arches, like a huge rose arbor. We were grateful to them. They brought light to that aching distance. They gave us a clue to Gaynor's whereabouts. But it would be some time before we were able to get closer to them.

And, when we did, I was not at all sure we wouldn't be instantly killed. I had every reason to suspect Elric's determined optimism had much to do with his knowledge of sorcery but not a great deal to do with the vast numbers of soldiers Gaynor commanded, not to mention his evident supernatural allies.

We were lucky to come across the slaughtered corpse of a troog. The huge half-human still had its crude pouch on a belt about its misshapen waist. The pouch was full of miscellaneous and generally useless loot salvaged from Mu Ooria. But there was also food. Two solid loaves of bread, a couple of pots of preserved meats and bottles of pickled vegetables. He had also found from somewhere a leather bottle of wine. We had to pry it from his gigantic, scabby hand. An unpleasant task, but worth it in the end, for the wine was of good quality. I had a feeling it had originally belonged to one of Fromental's col- . leagues, perhaps even his friend the talking beast. This led me to wondering about the Frenchman's fate. I hoped he and his strange companions had been successful in finding the Tanelorn they sought.

We moved rapidly and eventually caught our first sight of Gaynor's terrible army.

In the far distance a band of grey formed a kind of horizon. Were we nearing the beginning of the mysterious Fees?

I turned inquiringly to Oona.

"The Forbidden Marches," she confirmed. "And beyond them, the Grey Fees."

Chapter Seventeen Careless Angels

"Some peoples believe," said Oona conversationally, "that each of us has a guardian angel who discreetly looks after our interests, perhaps in the way we care for and protect a pet. The pet is barely conscious of what we do for it, just as we are hardly conscious of our guardian angel. And just as some pet animals have conscientious owners, others have bad owners. Therefore, though we are all assigned such an angel, the unlucky ones have careless angels."

We lay upon a broad terrace looking down into a valley that had probably never seen light before. It was illuminated by the marching twisters, the Ten Sons, which formed a loose line of whirling, shrieking light. They were clearly disciplined by something as they followed behind the brands of the blind cannibals with Gaynor. The torches were not for them, but for Gaynor and his Nazis, whose horses were equally blind. Every so often a vast shadow would be thrown upon a wall of ancient, fleshy rock. The gigantic troogs, the sightless savages, the Nazis in the remains of their black and silver uniforms. A foul alliance indeed. Beasts and men. Half-men and half-beasts. Shambling and lolloping, trudging and dancing, striding and riding. Some of them stumbling. Ironically, while they had learned to adapt themselves to the dark, they were often blinded by the light. A ragged army. An ugly army. A monstrous army, marching relentlessly towards the Grey Fees.

"Could be," I said, "that we're already deserted by our angels. Have you ever witnessed such grotesquerie?" I indicated Gaynor's army.

"Rarely," said Oona. Her sweet, beautiful face, framed by her long white hair, looked up at me with sardonic intelligence. For a moment I felt an extraordinary sensation as she glanced away. I believe I was falling in love with her. And already, of course, I was debating the morality of this.

Oona was not my daughter. She was Elric's. But at what point did a being conscious of its place in the multiverse choose to ignore the relationship it had in common with a million other beings? I could easily see the drawbacks of being fully conscious. Perhaps, years before, in his early sorcerous training Elric had been given the choice of being knowing or unknowing and had chosen to become unconscious of the multiverse. Otherwise he might never have been able to act at all.

What can it be like to be conscious that every action one performs has a consequence throughout time and space? One would become very circumspect about the company one kept. About the things one did or said. One could be frozen into complete inaction. Or returned to a state of absolute ignorance as the mind refused all information.

Or it could make one entirely reckless, willing, like Elric, to risk everything. For if one risked and lost, the reward was, after all, complete oblivion. And oblivion was what that poor, tortured soul longed for so frequently. This quality made him an unreliable ally. Not all of us sought or found oblivion in battle. Something in me still looked forward to a restoration of the tranquillity of my old estate, a return to the quiet pleasures of rural life. Not that the prospect seemed especially close at this particular moment.

Elric frowned to himself. He seemed to be calculating something. I looked at him nervously, hoping he would not decide on one of his reckless moves. We three could not stand alone against those strange forces.

Cautiously, using all the cover available, we gradually drew closer to Gaynor's horrible army. The wind demons seemed positioned to protect the flanks and rear. I could not guess how my cousin controlled them.

"How do you know these sentient tornadoes?" I whispered. "Have you encountered them before?"

"Not all ten," he said. He was impatient with my interruption. "I once summoned their father. They all command different aspects of the elements, these wind-beings. They are protective of their separate domains. They know strong rivalries. And they can be fickle. This is not work for the sharnah, makers of gales, but for the h'Haarshann, builders of whirlwinds."

I fell silent again. My instinct was to turn, to go back, to find the falls, the way through to Hameln. I would rather risk the horrors of a Nazi concentration camp than confront any more supernatural threats.

The marching army stopped. They pitched camp. Perhaps Gaynor needed to consider his next action? The Ten Sons became guardians of that vast horde by forming a rough circle around it. I studied the blazing whiteness as best I could, trying to see what really constituted the Ten Sons, but my vision began to blur immediately. I found it impossible to look at the wind demons for more than a few seconds.

I wondered if I tied a piece of gauze about my face it would be easier to make out whatever fundamental shape lay at the core of the Ten Sons. But perhaps I was deceiving myself. Perhaps there was no fundamental shape.

Elric murmured, "First the Ten, then my lady M."

He was speaking in rhyme. Indeed, even his breathing had a rhythmic quality I had not previously noticed. His movements took on a balletic air. He was scarcely aware of either Oona or myself. His eyes had a distant glaze.

I frowned and moved forward to touch him on the shoulder and ask him if he was all right, but Oona lifted a finger to her lips and motioned me away. She gave her father an expectant look, then, when she glanced back at me, she seemed to have a proud, proprietorial gleam in her eyes, as if to say "Wait. My father is a genius. Watch."

I had known him as intimately as it is possible to know another human being, from deep within, soul sharing soul. I had considerable respect and great sympathy for him. But only now did it occur to me that he might be a genius.

Elric warned us to speak softly, if we spoke at all. The Ten Sons had acute hearing.

All at once Elric was moving, climbing down the rocks nearby and, perhaps in answer to my unspoken question, muttering, "Oldfather. Oldfather needs a little fresh blood."

He disappeared for a moment. I heard a musical sound. Soft, menacing. I saw him below, walking cautiously towards Gaynor's camp. Ravenbrand was unscabbarded in his right hand.

Time passed. The camp slept. I continued to watch. Waiting for Elric to return. Oona, however, curled up and told me to wake her if I became sleepy.

Eventually I heard a noise below and saw the familiar outline. Elric was dragging something behind him. Something which grunted and groaned as it bumped over the rocky floor.

Next I saw him on the other side, still below me. Here the rocks formed a small natural amphitheater at the center of which Elric dumped his prize. It wriggled for a moment until he kicked it. I saw his face then. His eyes were glassy, blazing rubies. They looked into a world I could not begin to imagine. They looked into Hell itself. And his mouth was moving, his sword describing complicated geometries in the air, his whole body beginning to turn in ritual movements, a ghostly dance.

Oona awakened and lay beside me, watching Elric as he cut through the material binding his victim. I recognized the terrified human being. One of the Nazis who had originally come here with Gaynor. He was snarling like a trapped dog, but there was stark horror in his eyes and he could not control his trembling. He tried to strike out at Elric. Ravenbrand licked him. He pulled back his bleeding hand. Ravenbrand licked him again. His face carried a thin line of blood. And again. The ragged shirt covering his chest fell away to reveal another line from neck to navel.

The Nazi was whimpering, trying to find escape, allies, God, anything. The sword tasted him. Savored him. Relished his blood drop by drop. And while he played with the sniveling wretch, Elric crooned a haunting wordless song. The cadences rose and fell. I was astonished that they issued from a mortal throat. All the time they grew in intensity and bit by bit the Nazi died, pieces of his flesh falling away as he watched. The sword continued its delicate, terrible work.

Oona craned to see, fascinated. In this she was her father's child. She had the look of a cat. I, however, was forced to turn away more than once. Forced by the sound of that voice, rising and falling, growing stronger and stronger, by the sight of Elric himself, his wild, crimson eyes raised towards the upper darkness, his mouth open in something between a melody and a scream, his white flesh glinting and his great black runesword turning a human being to slivers before his own eyes.

The Nazi was still fully conscious, such was Elric's appalling artistry. The man still wore his black SS boots. He knelt before my doppelganger and tears mingled with the blood from his eyes as Elric's blade teased them out until they hung by a few strands of muscle on his own cheeks.

Most of the time Elric's voice drowned the hideous screaming of the Nazi, his pleadings to spare him or kill him, and I was thankful for that.

Sword and man acted in unison-two intelligences in an unholy pact. I had never felt this of Ravenbrand before. Elric's use of the blade seemed to have awakened an evil in the very iron. Red runes slithered up and down its length, pulsing like veins. The sword seemed to relish the subtle, disgusting wounds which it now inflicted upon the Nazi's bloody flesh. It was without doubt the most loathsome sight I had ever seen.

Again I turned away. Then I heard Oona gasp and I looked back.

Another shape formed itself around the Nazi's tormented body. It twisted in and out, growing like something organic. Gradually, snakelike, it swallowed Elric's victim, then became increasingly agitated, and gouted up out of what remained of the corpse. Gushing towards the cavern's roof. Swirling like a cloud overhead. A cloud in which tiny strands of lightning seemed to flash and writhe, taking on the color of the Nazi's blood as the man squealed like a bled pig, realizing that there were worse fates than the one he had just endured. He finally gave himself up to the cloud.

I heard Elric's voice above all the other sounds. "Father of Winds. Father of Dust. Father of Air. Father of Thunder. H'Haarshann Oldfather. Oldest of fathers. H'Haarshann Oldfather, father of the first." I knew the language he spoke, because I knew all such things now, and I knew that he was delivering the wretched mortal up to the one he summoned.

"Oldfather! Oldfather! I bring you what the lord of the h'Haarshann demands. I bring thee the exotic meat thou craveth."

The cloud grunted. It was satisfied. It uttered a kind of soft whistle.

Now the scarlet lightning began to dance and skip again, forming a shape. I thought I saw the wizened face of a vindictive old man, long strands of lank hair hanging to his shrunken shoulders. A toothless mouth smacking lips as the last of the sacrifice was absorbed. Then the mouth grinned.

"You know how to feed an old friend, Prince Elric." The voice was a sighing breeze, a gale, a fluttering wind.

"As you have fed before, h'Haarshann Oldfather." My near-twin had sheathed the bloody black blade and now stood with arms outstretched in an attitude of respect. "As you will feed again, while I live. That is our bargain. Made with my ancestors a million years since."

"Ahaaaa ..." A deep sigh. "So few remember. I have a mind to grant you my aid in return for that exquisite moment. What is it that you desire of me?"

"Someone has summoned your sons to this plane. They have misbehaved themselves. They have done great damage."

"It is in their nature. It is what they must do. They are so young, my ten sons. They are the ten great h'Haarshann that stride the worlds."

"That is so, Oldfather." Elric glanced down at the remains of the Nazi. As a hawk takes every part of the bird save the feathers, so Oldfather had taken the mortal, leaving nothing but the blood-soaked remains of his SS uniform. "They have been brought by my enemies from their place amongst the worlds. To threaten the lives of me and mine."

Oldfather quivered. "But without you I cannot know the exquisite taste of flesh. And my Ten Sons have business about the worlds, to breathe my will upon them."

"That is so, great Oldfather."

"None is left save you, sweet mortal. None who knows what Oldfather likes to eat."

At that moment Elric looked up. His eyes met mine. The sardonic mockery in his expression made me turn my head in disgust. I knew that Elric of Melnibone only resembled a man, that his blood was of an older, crueler kind than mine. In my own world such savage and sadistic sacrifice was only performed by the mentally ill. For Elric and his kind, those practices were a way of life, refined to an art and enjoyed as spectacle. In Melnibone praise was given to the victim who died with style and who best entertained his audience with his dying. What Elric had just done caused him no troubled conscience. The actions had been necessary and were natural to him.

Oldfather seemed to be debating the value of the sacrifice.

"Would you feast again, noble Oldfather?" Elric's voice was soft, coaxing. There was no threat in it, but Oldfather was remembering the taste of mortal flesh and was already yearning for more.

"I will see to my sons," said the apparition. "They, too, have eaten well."

The whirling scarlet fire swelled until it resembled circling cloud, sweeping up towards the cavern's faraway roof and then down into the darkness until it had disappeared, leaving the faintest of pink, dissipating light.

I looked towards Gaynor's camp. They had become aware of something. I saw troogs peering in our direction. One of them ran towards the center of the camp where Gaynor had pitched an ostentatious tent, its guy ropes secured by pegs hammered into the living rock.

I guessed the Nazi's death to have been pointless after all. Oldfather had gone. The ten whirling inverted cones of phosphorescent light still guarded the camp. Elric's filthy ritual had done nothing but attract the attention of Gaynor's horde.

A party of troogs lumbered in our direction. They had not seen us, but it would not take them long to find where we were. I looked around for some way of escape. Only Oona had a weapon. My sword was in the hands of my doppelganger. I was not sure I would feel quite the same emotions towards the blade in the future. If I had a future to contemplate.

The troogs were beginning to climb the rocks towards us. They could smell us.

I looked around for something to throw. The rocks were the only weapons available to me.

Glancing back, I saw that Elric had sunk to his knees totally exhausted. I wondered if I could get to the sword before the troogs reached us. If I could ever handle that blade again.

Oona nocked an arrow to her bow and took aim.

She looked once or twice over her shoulder, unable to believe that Elric had failed, that Oldfather had taken his offering and left without giving us any of the help he had seemed to promise.

I caught a glimpse of something not far from the grey horizon. A scarlet flash which began to speed towards us, coming faster and faster and making a mighty thrum, as if someone plucked the strings of an enormous guitar whose sound was amplified through all creation.

Elric scrambled up to join us. He was grinning. He panted like a wolf. He had a look of wild lust in his eyes. A look of triumph, of hunger.

He said nothing to us but looked to where the scarlet cloud was approaching. To where the Ten Sons danced at the edges of Gaynor's camp.

Then he lifted his head, raised the black runesword in a victorious gesture and began to sing.

I knew the song. I knew Elric. I had been Elric. I knew what it meant. I knew what it said. But I could not know its effect. I do not believe I ever, in all my life of concert-going, heard such extraordinary beauty. If there was menace in it, if there was triumph in it, if there was cruel exultation in it, still, it was beautiful. I felt I heard an angel sing. More than one tune, many harmonies, were all carried on that strange voice. It brought tears to my eyes. It brought grief and mourning. I was mourning the death of the man I had seen killed. I was hearing the voice of a grief which had never filled the world before.

For a moment Elric's song stopped the troogs in their tracks.

I looked at Oona. She was weeping. She understood something in her father which mystified me and perhaps, therefore, him as well.

The song swelled and I realized Ravenbrand had joined with Elric. An almost tangible sound. I felt it embracing me. I felt the complexity of it, a thousand different sensations passing through my blood and nerves all at the same time. Something in me was strengthened by that song, but physically it weakened me, and I could barely stand.

Then another song joined in, from far away, near the grey horizon. I saw shreds of scarlet light radiating from a hidden source. Fingers of scarlet, like ropes, twisting around the rocky columns, reaching across the ranks of that vast army. A gigantic hand was stretching through the cavern. The hand of God. Or the hand of Satan. The flaming hand made a fist and that fist drew in each of the Ten Sons, who whirled and buzzed in sudden fury, resisting Oldfather's discipline. The white fire scattered and raced, but the hand extended to enfold it.

All the while Gaynor's camp was in uproar. I saw a figure emerge from his tent and mount one of the blind horses. I heard bugles sounding, drums beating. Confusion reigned as partially clothed men tried to control their mounts. The blind cannibals milled around gathering their weapons. Only the troogs were wide awake. Many of them were running back into the darkness, away from the Grey Fees, while the red hand of Oldfather gathered in his wild, squealing sons. The destruction they caused as they sought to avoid him brought more rocks crashing to the cavern floor, more stones whirling into the air.

A sea of brands moved chaotically in all directions as Gaynor demanded more light.

We could see him now, on his great albino horse, its blind red eyes rolling as it snorted and scented, its ears frantic as it tried to catch the source of the sounds. Yet Gaynor controlled the stallion with one hand and his knees. The other hand held the ivory sword- the sword Miggea's magic had made. He spurred in our direction, though I doubted he had any clear idea of what was happening. His main object was to turn the fleeing troogs and savages back to the camp. His men followed on their own horses, lashing out at the foot soldiers, yelling at them and causing further panic. Two of the Nazis rode up behind the troogs who were preparing to attack us.

They had no common language. The Nazis bellowed. The troogs bellowed back.

Elric suddenly rose from cover and began running at tremendous speed down the slope towards the Nazis.

Ravenbrand was still in his right hand. The sword howled with triumphant glee as it sliced into the neck of the first SS man. Elric dragged the corpse from its saddle and took the Nazi's place, spurring the blind horse directly at the other Nazi, who was already trying to flee the way he had come. Too late.

Elric swung Ravenbrand sideways, using the sword's wonderful balance to carry the weight of a blow which neatly took the Nazi's head from its shoulders as if it had been a cabbage on a stalk. He reached down to gather up the horse's reins and then rode back, scattering troogs as he came towards us.

"Here's a mount for one of you," he said. "The other must get their own."

I held the horse for Oona. She shook her head, grinning. "I can't ride," she said. "I've never had to learn." She replaced the arrow in her quiver. The troogs had given up any idea of attacking us.

I got into the saddle. It was a good, responsive horse. I told her to climb behind me, but she laughed. "I have my own ways of traveling," she said. "Though I thank you for the courtesy."

Gaynor had seen something and was charging towards us, his men at his back, Klosterheim by his side.

I looked forward at last to confronting him man-to-man.

Elric turned his horse, signaling that we should ride back the way we had come. He leaned down in his saddle and picked up one of the guttering brands. He handed it to me, then sought another for himself. The horses were excited. They wanted to gallop. I knew it would be dangerous in this darkness, but my cousin was gaining on us. He had become a far more expert rider in this bizarre landscape than I could hope to be.

I looked around for Oona. She had vanished.

Elric yelled for me to follow. I had no choice.

I cried out for him to stop, to wait for his daughter, but he laughed when he heard me and signaled me on.

He did not fear for her. I could only trust him.

We plunged into the booming darkness as the Ten Sons whirled their last ahead of us. All had been taken up in that one great red fist and were buzzing and whirring like wasps as the fingers molded and molded, turning the powerful, white light into something resembling a ball and hurling it upwards, higher and higher, until a moon hung overhead. Then it became a star. A point of light. And then it was gone.

A grumbling growl from the red cloud and Oldfather, too, vanished. Only Elric and myself remained, urging our horses into the blackness towards Mu Ooria, while Gaynor and his men, howling for our blood, came thundering behind us.

We followed the rough road the Ten Sons had carved, leaping broken columns, weaving between piles of rubble. Had I not known otherwise, I would have sworn the horses were sighted,

they were so surefooted. Perhaps they had developed some of the qualities of bats. In a moment of humor I wished they had developed bat wings.

I was distracted by something white moving ahead of me along the broad road. The white hare raced as fast as it was possible to go. Towards the distant towers of Mu Ooria. I refused to let myself believe the obvious. I told myself that the white hare had found us again, that it had followed us from Tanelorn, when Miggea's hunt had chased it into our territory.

But Elric was grinning as he pursued it. For a moment I thought he was hunting it, but he kept behind it. He was following the beast.

Behind us came Gaynor, shouting like an angry ape, his own voice echoing in that mysterious helm, his cloak swirling about him like an agitated ocean, his horse's red eyes glaring sightlessly forward. He held up the ivory sword like a flag. The ragged remains of his SS guard were close behind him. Only Klosterheim, gaunt and hollow-eyed as ever, showed no emotion. At one moment, even that far away, I caught his grim, sardonic eye. In his own dark way, he was enjoying his master's discomfort.

"There's more to do yet," said Elric.

He looked back at the furious Gaynor and laughed.

For the first time I began to believe that perhaps he was not mad. At least, not in the way I had thought. His daughter thought him a genius. Presumably she believed him greater than most other sorcerers. His reckless courage might have been madness in another, but not in him. He could command power as no other mortal being could. And what was more, as I had witnessed, his alliances went back through generations upon generations, blood upon blood, when his own ancient people had been young and the world was not entirely formed.

For all his predatory skills, Elric was not by nature a predator. That differentiated him from his own people. Perhaps this was the bond all three of us shared.

"Fool!" Elric cried, dropping back to let my cousin gain on him. "Did you think I would allow an amateur sorcerer to invade the Grey Fees? I am Elric, last Emperor of Melnibone, and I accept no insult from a mere man-beast. Everything you believe you have gained I will take from you. Everything you believe you have destroyed will be restored. Every victory will become defeat."

"And I am Gaynor, who has mastered the Lords of Law and Chaos! You cannot defeat me!"

"You are deluded," shouted my doppelganger almost merrily. "I care not what a man-beast calls itself. You have known a lucky moment. You should have made better use of it while you had it."

Elric turned his back on Gaynor and urged his horse to a faster pace. I was barely able to keep up with him but was astonished at the agility of my mount. It sensed all obstacles ahead. Our brands guttered in a sudden current and threatened to go out altogether, but the horses galloped on. Gaynor was fast catching up with us, following the light we made. When the torches flared back

to life, I caught a sudden glimpse of Oona. The dreamthief's daughter was standing to one side, gesturing to us. Elric extinguished his torch and gestured for me to do the same.

We heard Gaynor and his men galloping behind us. We saw the ragged light of their torches. They were almost on us and I was not sure Elric still had enough energy to engage so many. Without a sword, I would be killed or captured immediately.

I saw the faintest circle of light ahead. I could still hear Gaynor and his Nazi band. They were closer. Then, quite suddenly, the sound dropped away, distant, faint, and the light ahead grew a little brighter. We were riding down a kind of natural tunnel, following the swift-footed white hare. The roof of the tunnel reflected the light. It was mottled, like a book's marbling, like mother-of-pearl. The noise of Gaynor and his army was gone completely.

We had not come this way. I realized that Elric-or the white hare-did not intend to return to Mu Ooria, at least not immediately. After a while, the Prince of Melnibone lit his torch again. I lit my own. We were reaching the end of the tunnel.

The tunnel led downwards, opening into a great circular cavern which had clearly once been inhabited by human beings.

Rotting remains of clothing and old utensils suggested that the occupants had been killed while away from their home. It looked as if a whole tribe had lived here. Everything spoke of sudden disaster. But Elric was not interested in the previous tenants. He lifted his torch to inspect the cavern, seemed satisfied enough and dismounted.

I heard a movement behind me and looked back. Oona stood there, leaning upon her bow staff. I did not ask what magic had brought her here. Or what magic she had used to bring us here. I did not believe I needed to ask or to know.

Leaving the brands burning in the wall holes clearly designed for the purpose, Elric signaled for me to dismount and follow him back to the entrance of the tunnel. He wanted to be certain Gaynor had not found us. We moved cautiously, expecting to see our pursuers, but we had evaded them. Outside it was pitch-black. I heard Elric sniff. I felt his hand tugging me to go with him.

We moved through utter darkness, but Elric was surefooted, using his ears as well as his nose. I was again struck by our differences. He was Melnibonean. His senses were far sharper than my own.

When he was entirely satisfied that Gaynor and his men had ridden on, with no idea of where we had hidden ourselves, he led me back to the tunnel and into the huge cave, where Oona was already busying herself with a fire and the food we had taken from the troog.

We ate sparingly. Elric sat some distance away. Frowning, wolfish. Clearly deep in thought, he did not wish to be disturbed. Oona and I exchanged a few words. She reassured me. We were not merely hiding, she said. We needed a place such as this. More sorcery was required. She was not sure how long her father could continue to find energy, from whatever source, to carry on. There was too much to be done, she murmured. She was careful to make sure that her father could not hear us.

When we had finished, Elric signed for us to get up and go outside. When he was sure Gaynor was no longer in the region, he told me to bring the horses. The three of us set off into the darkness, following a small, slow-burning taper which Elric held to guide us. We rode for miles over the rocky cavern floor until he stopped. Another cautious pause, then he took out one of our brands and lit it. This part of the underground world had not seen the movement of Gaynor's army. It was as still, as untouched, as it had always been. But where a group of stalagmites formed what looked like a circle of Off-Moo heads bent in prayer, I saw a body.

One of the big black cats the troogs feared, which Gaynor had somehow enchanted.

The thing was huge. Elric went up to it and attempted to lift it. Oona joined him, and then I. We were just able to get the beast off the floor of the cavern.

"We must take it back with us," the Melnibonean said. "We'll use the horses."

The horses were not happy being so close to one of the panthers, let alone being used to transport it. We managed to make a sling and, with many minor pitfalls, finally succeeded in getting the huge body back to our hiding place.

Oona and I were exhausted, but Elric was filled with an edgy excitement. He anticipated what he had to do with some pleasure.

"Why have we brought this beast here?" I ventured.

His answer was dismissive.

"A further Summoning," he said. "But first we shall need an appropriate sacrifice."

I looked at Oona.

Did he intend to kill one of us?

Chapter Eighteen Old Debts and New Dreams

Oona nodded briefly and ran from the cave. Elric let her go. He paid no attention to me. I wondered if i this was because he did not wish to improve his relationship with one whom he might soon need to kill. Ironic, I thought, if my own sword drank my soul.

After a time, he got up, took a horse, and began to walk back towards the entrance.

"Do you wish me to stay here?" I asked him.

"As you please," he said.

So I followed him. My curiosity was far stronger than any fear that he might turn on me.

He had mounted and urged the horse forward through the darkness. Happily my own beast was inclined to follow its companion. By this means, I kept pace with the Melnibonean.

At last the lights of Gaynor's camp could be seen again. It was still in confusion. We heard shouts and curses. Elric dismounted, handed me his reins and told me to wait. Then he made his way cautiously down towards the camp.

Fires had been extinguished and it was by no means as easy to see as it had been. But soon I began to hear shouts and the wild, pleading cries, and I knew that Elric was replenishing his energy.

Some while later, his white face suddenly appeared from the darkness. His glittering, ruby eyes had a hot, satisfied look, and his lips were partly open as he panted like a well-fed wolf. I could see the blood on his lips.

Blood caked the black blade he held in his right hand. I knew it had taken a score of souls to satisfy both flesh and iron.

We rode back in silence and were not followed. I had the impression that Gaynor and his men were still riding the vast caverns of Mu Ooria, perhaps believing the last Lord of Melnibone to have returned to the ruined city.

Elric said nothing as he led the way through the blackness. He hunched over his saddle, still breathing slowly, a sated predator. As close as we were, both in mind and blood, I found myself shuddering at this obscenity. Too much of my own blood was human, not enough Melnibonean, for me to relish the sight of my kinsman or ancestor or whatever he was absorbing the souls he had stolen.

But what black souls they had been! I heard myself saying. Did they not serve some better purpose now? Did they not deserve to die in this perverse and terrible way, given the crimes they had already committed, the blasphemies they had performed?

It was not in my civilized Christian soul to rejoice. I could only mourn the destruction of so many in such an ungodly cause.

Once I thought I had lost Elric and lit my taper. Then I saw the creature's demonic face, his glaring red eyes, his disgusted mouth telling me to put the light out. He was irritated by me in the way a man might be irritated by a badly trained dog. I saw nothing human in that face. I had been stupid, nonetheless. Gaynor must even now be returning from the city, having failed to find us. A tiny light in this blackness would be seen for miles.

Only when we had found the tunnel again did Elric allow me to light my way.

Oona had clearly been sleeping when we returned. She darted a mysterious, concerned look at her father and another at me. I could say nothing to her. I could tell her nothing. A vampiric symbiosis existed between man and blade. Who could tell which fed the other? I guessed she was already familiar with these characteristics. Her mother would have told her, if she had not observed them for herself by now.

Elric stumbled to the center of the cave where we had arranged the huge bulk of the black cat. He pressed his head against the body, against the thing's gigantic skull. He muttered and busied himself. Oona could not answer my unspoken question. She watched in fascination as her father walked around the great beast, muttering, making passages in the air with his hand, as if trying to remember a spell.

Perhaps he was doing exactly that.

After a while he looked up, directly into our faces. "I shall need your help in this." He spoke almost impatiently, in self-disgust. He must have been surprised by his own continuing weakness. Perhaps the kind of sorcery he had already performed drained him more than he expected.

I knew I had no choice in the matter. "What do you want?"

"Nothing yet. I'll tell you when it's time." His expression, when he looked at his daughter, was almost pitying. I'm not sure if I imagined it, but I thought she moved a little closer to me for comfort.

Elric seemed to be in pain. Every muscle on his body appeared independently alive for a moment. Then he subsided into sweating stillness. His eyes glared up into worlds and creatures far beyond my understanding. The words, as I heard them, meant little, even though another part of me knew their meaning all too well.

One word had special resonance: Meerclar-Meerclar- Meerclar-he repeated it over and over. A name. It meant more than that. It meant a friend. A bond. Something resembling affection. Old blood. Ancient ties ... And more. It meant bargains. Bargains struck to last for eternity. Bargains struck in blood and souls. Bargains between one unhuman creature and another.

Meerclar! The word was louder, sharper.

MEERCLAR! His face blazed like burning ivory. His eyes were living coals. His long, wild hair seethed about him like a living thing. One hand held Ravenbrand on high. The other clutched at the air, describing geometries which existed in a thousand dimensions.

MEERCLAR! GREAT LORD OF FANG AND CLAW!

MEERCLAR! YOUR CHILDREN SUFFER. AID THEM,

MEERCLAR! AID THEM IN THE NAME OF OUR ANCIENT COMPACT!

MEERCLAR!

The vocal cords strained and twisted to pronounce the name. His body pitched and shook like a ship in a typhoon. He was hardly in control of it. Yet all the while he spoke and kept his grip on the Black Sword.

A yowl from somewhere. A deep animal stink. The thrumming of breath. A swish, as of a feline tail.

MEERCLAR! SEKHMET'S FAVORITE SON! BORN OF OUR UNION. BORN OF THE COMING TOGETHER OF LIFE AND DEATH. MEERCLAR, LORD OF THE CATS, HONOR OUR COVENANT!

The body of the huge panther in the center of the cavern twitched and stretched. A massive puff rolled from its chest. The whiskers straightened. But the eyes did not open and soon the cat was prone again, as if something had sought to animate it and failed.

MEERCLAR!

He summoned that most conservative of creatures, that least tractable of elementals, Meerclar, Son of Sekhmet, the archetype of all cats.

My doppelganger howled like a gale. His voice rose and fell in a series of shrieks and groans which shook the walls of our cave and must surely be heard outside, where Gaynor searched for us.

I realized Oona had vanished. Had Elric taken his own daughter for a sacrifice? I would have believed anything at that moment.

The horses, already frightened, began to buck and whinny, retreating as far as they could from a dark shadow forming near the distant wall. A shadow that moved back and forth, like a pacing beast. A shadow that lifted a great head, gave voice, quintes-sentially feline, and began to harmonize with Elric.

A great black figure, tall and broad, but standing on two legs and looking down at us as it materialized, uttered a huge, growling purr and dropped to all fours. The eyes bore an intelligence older than Elric's. The handsome, wedge-shaped head was fierce with jutting whiskers, fangs and glowing yellow and black eyes. The monstrous tail lashed and threatened to destroy the remains of the abandoned living quarters. The huge claws flexed and withdrew, flexed and withdrew. I wondered if this mighty supernatural cat had eaten. For all my own natural affinity with the species, I was nervous. I knew that cats had little sense of regret or of consequence, and this one might eat us casually, without malice or even hunger.

This was Meerclar, Lord of the Cats. His image flickered a little, in and out of the various realities he inhabited. I had become used to witnessing this phenomenon in creatures which lived in more than one of time's dimensions.

I feared for Oona. She was nowhere to be seen. Lord Meerclar had the air of a cat which had recently feasted.

Had Oona not told me earlier that one of the great panthers was her avatar in this world? But what was the white hare?

How many avatars could a dreamthief possess?

How many lives?

Elric addressed Lord Meerclar. The great elemental's deep voice rumbled in response as Elric recounted what had happened. How Lord Meerclar's own kin had been entranced and put into a slumber that must ultimately kill them as they starved.

At this the mighty cat began to show some agitation. It paced on all fours, tail lashing, breath grumbling. Then it sat, in thought, claws flexing.

In the far corner, the terrified horses no longer snorted and dilated their eyes. They stood frozen, perhaps certain that they must soon become Lord Meerclar's prey.

I was scarcely more active. I watched as Elric reversed the sword. He placed his two hands on the hilt and stood with his legs wide apart staring up into the cat elemental's huge face, still speaking in those same strange tones.

I was shocked, therefore, when I felt something warm and damp upon my neck. Turning, I looked straight into the muzzle of the panther, which I had assumed was dead. The big cat narrowed his eyes and a vast purr vibrated from his chest. I felt his spittle on my face, felt the heat of him against my body.

In an extraordinary gesture of submission, the great panther crossed to Meerclar and Elric, laid his head between his paws, and looked up into Meerclar's face.

A mighty purr escaped the Lord of the Cats, as of profound satisfaction, and the panther rose, stretched, turned and trotted from the chamber. The beast looked as if it had just risen from a quick nap.

Oona was still nowhere to be seen. I had an impulse to follow the panther. Meerclar then stretched his huge muscles, his eyes narrowed, and he said something in his own language which I could not hear.

Elric was showing signs of considerable strain. His limbs shook. He could barely stand up. His eyes had begun to take on a glazed look. His face was harrowed. I moved towards him, to help him, but he saw me and signed me back.

The huge yellow eyes turned on me. They regarded me with dispassionate curiosity. I knew what it must be like to be a mouse in such a situation. All I could do was make a courteous bow and retreat.

This seemed to satisfy Lord Meerclar, who returned his attention to Elric. He was purring again, his pleasure the result of whatever it was Elric had done. He praised my doppelganger. He expressed a kind of gratitude. Something seemed to embrace the Melnibonean. And then the Lord of the Cats became smoke.

And vanished.

"Where is Oona?" I wanted to know. Elric tried to speak. His eyes lost focus. I caught him as he fell, the great iron sword clattering to the floor. I thought the spell-making had taken too much. I thought it had killed him.

But I found a pulse. I checked his eyes. He was in a swoon, perhaps a supernatural trance brought about by his contact with the elementals. He was breathing heavily, as if drugged. I had seen men in alcoholic stupor, and others who had imbibed the famous Mickey Finn, who seemed more lively. However, I was convinced he would not die immediately.

I considered going out of the cave again and seeking Oona, but common sense told me she was better able to look after herself. And if, as I suspected, she could change her shape-to that, specifically, of a white hare-she was out there somewhere. Unless she had, indeed, been given as hostage to Meerclar. He might regard her, after all, as one of his own. And he might have demanded that she return home with him.

A noise came from the tunnel. At first I assumed the panther had made it. Then I identified it more clearly. The sound of horses' hooves, the clatter of harness and weaponry, of metal and leather. Warriors riding towards us. Could they be the original inhabitants, come to reclaim their own quarters? It did not seem likely.

We had no other way out of the cave and the man who might have saved us lay in an exhausted slumber on the rocky floor. Oona, who could have defended us with her bow, was also gone. I had no weapon.

I knelt beside Elric, trying to wake him, but he would not stir. His breathing was long, like that of a hibernating animal, and I could not see his eyes. He was completely unconscious.

I reached reluctantly towards the Raven Blade, still lying near his right hand. Even as the tips of my fingers touched that strange, living iron, light came brawling into the cave. A mounted man with a brand. Another behind him. And another.

Our own horses whinnied and pranced in recognition. The other horses snorted and stamped on the floor of the cave. A coarse voice said something in German.

My fingers closed on the sword's familiar hilt. The torchlight half blinded me, but I climbed to my feet, using the sword to help me. I looked up and recognized the armored outline. Gaynor, of course, had found us. No doubt he or one of his men had seen my foolish light or the panther leaving the cave entrance and investigated.

Gaynor's unhappy laughter boomed in his helm. "This will make a splendid tomb for the pair of you. A shame you will lie here unknown and forgotten for the rest of eternity."

He was a splendid figure in his silvery armor, a black sword on his left hip and the mysterious ivory sword on his right. He had a glow about him that I could only believe was supernatural. His flesh had a look of exaggerated health. He swaggered in the joy of it all and mocked the feeble thing I was.

Or had been.

My anger outweighed my fear. I reached and drew Ravenbrand to me. I held my old sword in my two hands. I felt its familiar balance, coupled with an unfamiliar power. I snarled at him. As I gripped the sword, some of that filthy, stolen vitality coursed into me. It filled my veins with dark energy. It filled them with evil strength. Now I was laughing, also. Laughing back at my cousin Paul Gaynor von Minct and relishing his doom.

Part of me was troubled by how I was behaving, but something of Elric was in me now and the sword responded to that.

"Greetings, Gaynor," I found myself saying. "I thank you for your courtesy in saving me the trouble of tracking you down. Now I shall kill you."

Gaynor laughed in turn as he saw the prone Melnibonean. I suppose I must have looked a little odd, dressed in my tattered twentieth-century clothes, holding the great iron battle blade in two hands. But his laughter wasn't as confident as it might have been and Klosterheim, beside him, was not at all amused. He had not expected to find two of us.

"Well, cousin," Gaynor said, leaning on his pommel, "you've come to prefer the darkness to the light, I see. Selective ignorance was always a trait of your side of the family, eh?"

I ignored this. "You have done a great deal of killing since we last met, Prince Gaynor. You appear to have slaughtered an entire race.

"Oh, the Off-Moo! Who's to tell, cousin? Who's to tell? They suffered the delusion common to all isolated peoples. They decided that because they had never been conquered, they were invulnerable. The British have the same delusion in your world, do they not?"

I was not here to discuss imperial delusions or the philosophy of isolationism. I was here to kill him. A completely unfamiliar bloodlust was rising in me. I felt it take me in its grip. Not a pleasant sensation for one of my basic disposition. Was it a response to Gaynor's threats? Or was the sword transferring to me what it had earlier transferred to Elric?

I trembled with the excess energy which pulsed through me. Now came unexpected desires of all kinds, all forming one single directive in my mind-kill Gaynor and any who rode with him. I anticipated the sweet slicing of the sword into flesh, the impact of the bone as it shattered under sharpened steel which slipped through muscles and sinew as smoothly as a spoon through soup, leaving red ruin behind. I anticipated the relish I would know as a human life was taken to feed my own greedy soul. I licked my lips. I regarded Gaynor's followers as so much food and Gaynor himself the tastiest choice of all. I could feel my own hot breath panting in my throat, the saliva, blood as salt, on my tongue and I had begun to scent at the men and beasts before me, recognizing each individual by their specific smell. I could smell their blood, their flesh, their sweat. I could even smell the tears as I took my first Nazi and he wept briefly for his mortal soul as I sucked it from him.

The yelling in the cave, the stamp of the horses and the clash of metal, echoed everywhere. It was impossible to tell where all my enemies were. I killed two before I realized it and their souls went to strengthen me, so that I moved with even greater speed, the sword writhing and turning in my hands like a living creature, killing, killing, killing. Killing, while I laughed my wolf's laugh and dedicated my victims to eternal service with Duke Arioch of Chaos.

Gaynor, typically, had thrown his men to the front. Within the confines of that cavern I could not easily reach either him or Klosterheim. I had to hack my way through men and horses.

I saw my cousin pull something from within his clothing. A golden staff, raging with fiery light, as if all the life of all the worlds was contained within. He held it before him as one might hold a weapon and then, from his scabbard, he drew Stormbringer, the blade he had stolen from my doppelganger, brother to the Raven Sword I now held.

It did not alarm me. I leaped and sliced and was almost upon my cousin as he took in his reins, cursing at me, the Runestaff returned to his shirt, the black blade howling. I knew that the blade could not be resheathed until it had taken souls. That was the bargain one always made with such a sword.

Urging his men forward, the Knight of the Balance turned his great pale horse back into the tunnel and yelled for Klosterheim to follow. But I was between him and Klosterheim, who was grappling at his horse's reins. I swung my sword upwards, trying to get through his guard. Every time I struck, the Raven Sword was countered by Stormbringer. By now both swords were howling like wolves and shrieking as they clashed, their red runes rippling up and down the black iron like static electricity. And that hideous strength still flowed into my veins.

Gaynor was neither laughing nor cursing. He was screaming.

Something happened to him every time the two swords crossed.

He began to blaze with an eerie crimson fire. The fire burned only briefly, and when it went out, Gaynor looked even more drawn.

Metal met metal with a terrible clang and every time the same fire raged through Gaynor.

I did not understand what was happening, but I pressed my advantage.

Then, to my astonishment, my cousin let go of the Black Sword and his left hand reached for the ivory blade, scabbarded on his opposite hip.

For some reason this amused me. I swung a further arc of iron and he bent backwards, barely avoiding it. The ivory sword met the black and for a moment it was as if I had hit a wall at sixty miles an hour. I was instantly stopped. The Black Sword continued to moan and its remaining energy still passed into me, but the white sword had countered it. I swung again. Gaynor, untri-umphant but clearly glad enough to survive, spurred his horse into the darkness of the passage, Klosterheim and the remains of his band fast behind him.

I was suddenly too weak to continue after them. My own legs buckled. I was paying the price for all that unexpected power.

I tried to keep my senses, knowing that Gaynor would immediately take advantage of me if he knew that I, like Elric, had collapsed.

I could do nothing to save myself.

I stumbled deeper into the cavern, now a charnel house of dead horses and human corpses, and tried to reach Elric, to revive him, to warn him of what was happening.

My pale hand reached out towards his white, unresponsive face, and then I was absorbed by darkness, vulnerable to anything that now desired my life.

I heard my name being called. I guessed it was Gaynor, returning to have his revenge upon me.

I took a fresh grip on the sword, but the energy no longer filled me. I had paid my price for what it had given me. It had paid its price to me.

I remember thinking, sardonically, that the account was now fully closed.

But I looked up into Oona's face, not Gaynor's. Had any time passed? I could still smell the blood and torn flesh, the ordure of savage battling. I could feel cold iron against my hand. But I was too weak to rise. She lifted me. She gave me water and some kind of drug which set my veins to shaking before I drew a long, deep breath and was able to get to my feet.

"Gaynor?"

"Already witnessing the destruction of his army," she said. She had an air of satisfaction. I had the impression her lips were bloody. Then she licked them, like a cat, and they were clean.

"How so? The Off-Moo?"

"Meerclar's children," she said. "All the panthers were revived. They wasted no time hunting down their favorite prey. The troogs are dead or fled and most of the savages have gone back to their old territories. Gaynor can no longer protect them against their traditional enemies. They would be going to their instant doom if they followed him into the Grey Fees."

"So he cannot conquer the Grey Fees?"

"He believes he has the power to do it without his army. For he has the white sword and he has the cup. These he believes contain the power of Law, and he believes the power of Law will give him the Grey Fees."

"Even I know that's madness!" I began to walk unsteadily to where the Melnibonean was still lying. Now, however, he had the air of a man experiencing ordinary sleep. "What can we do to stop him?"

"There's a chance," she said quietly, "that he cannot be stopped. Just by introducing those two great objects of power into the Grey Fees he could unbalance the entire multiverse, sending it spinning to its eternal destruction and all living, feeling creatures with it."

"One man?" I said. "One mortal?"

"Whatever happens," she said, "it is predicted that the fate of the multiverse shall depend upon the actions of one mortal man. That encourages Gaynor. He thinks he is the mortal chosen for that honor."

"Why should he not be?"

"Because another has already been chosen," she said.

"Do you know who it is?"

"Yes."

I waited, but she said no more. She leaned over her father, testing for his pulse, checking his eyes, just as I had earlier. She shook her head. "Exhausted," she said. "Nothing else. Too much sorcery, even for him." She rolled up a cloak and put it under his head. It was a strange, rather touching gesture. All around us was death and destruction. Spilled blood was everywhere, yet Elric's daughter behaved almost as if she kissed a child good night in its own bed.

She picked up Stormbringer and resheathed it for him. Only then did I realize I still held Ravenbrand in my hand. Oona had found Elric's sword where Gaynor had hurled it when it turned on him and instead of giving him strength, burned up what remained of his energy.

"Well," I said, "at least we have the stolen sword back."

Oona nodded reflectively. "Yes," she said, "Gaynor must change his plans."

"Why didn't Stormbringer feed off him earlier?"

"By betraying Miggea, he also lost her help. He seemed to think he would be able to keep it, in spite of her being a prisoner. She has to be able to exert her will in order to aid him, and he ensured that she could not."

I heard a mumble and looked to where Elric lay. He stirred. His lips formed words, tiny sounds. Troubled sounds. The sounds of a distant nightmare.

Oona laid her cool hand upon her father's forehead. The Melnibonean immediately breathed more regularly and his body no longer twitched and trembled.

When, eventually, he opened his eyes, they were full of wise intelligence.

"At last," he said. "The tide can be turned." His hand went to the handle of his runesword and caressed it. I had the feeling she had somehow communicated everything that had happened to him. Or did he get it telepathically from me?

"Perhaps it can be, Father." Oona looked around her, as if seeing the signs of battle for the first time. "But I fear it will take more resources than we can summon now."

The Prince of Melnibone began to rise. I offered him my arm. He hesitated, then took it with an expression of profound irony on his face.

"So now we are both whole men again," he said.

I was impatient with this. "I need to know what unique qualities that staff or cup or whatever it is and that white sword have.

Why are we fighting for possession of them? What do they represent to Gaynor?"

Elric and Oona stared at me in some surprise. They had concealed nothing deliberately from me. They had simply not thought to tell me.

"They exist in your own legends," said Oona. "Your family protected them on your plane. That is your traditional duty. According to your legends the Grail is a cup with magical properties, which can restore life and can only be beheld in its true, pure form by a knight of equally true and pure soul. The sword is the traditional sword which bestows great nobility upon its wielder, if used in a noble cause. It has been called many names. It was lost and Gaynor sought it. Klosterheim got it from Bek. Miggea told him that if he bore both the black sword and the white and took them, together with the Grail, into the Grey Fees, he would be able to set his will upon existence. He could re-create the multi-verse."

I found this incredible. "He believed such nonsense?"

Oona hesitated. Then she said: "He believed it."

I thought for a moment. I was a twentieth-century man. How could I give any credibility to such mythical tomfoolery? Perhaps all I was doing was dreaming after hearing some overblown piece of Sturm und Drang. Was I trapped in the story of Parsifal, The Flying Dutchman and Gotterdammerung all at the same time? Of course it was impossible to pursue such logic. Not only had I been party to Elric's past, his entire experience of the sorcerous realms, but I recollected everything I had seen since escaping from the Nazi concentration camp. From the moment my sword clove the cliff of Hameln, I had accepted the laws of wizardry.

I began to laugh. Not the mad laughter I'd offered Gaynor, but natural, good-humored self-mockery.

"And why should he not have done?" I said. "Why should he not believe anything he chooses?"

Chapter Nineteen Beyond the Grey Fees

We must follow Gaynor," said Oona. "Somehow we must stop him."

"His soldiers are scattered or destroyed," I said. "What harm can he do?"

"A great deal," she said. "He still has a sword and the Grail."

Elric confirmed this. "If we are swift, we could stop him reaching the Grey Fees. If we do that, we shall all be free of his ambitions. But the Fees are malleable-subject to human will, it's said. If that will is complemented with Gaynor's new power ..."

Oona was striding for the tunnel. She disappeared into the shadows. "Follow me," she said. "I'll find him."

We mounted wearily, Elric and I. Each of us had a black runesword at his belt. For the first time since this affair started, there was real hope we could capture Gaynor before he did further damage. Perhaps I was stupid to believe that the ownership of a sword conferred a sense of self-respect upon me, but I now felt Elric's equal. Not just the sword, but what I had done with it made me proud to ride beside the gloomy Prince of Ruins in pursuit of a kinsman still capable of destroying the fundamental matter of existence.

That I should feel self-respect as a result of killing almost half-a-score of my fellow human beings was a mark of what I had become since my capture by the Nazis. I, who in common with most of my family, abhorred war and was disgusted by mankind's willingness to kill their own so readily, in such numbers and with such abandon, was now as thoroughly blooded as any of the Nazis we fought here in the world of Mu Ooria. And the strongest thing I felt was satisfaction. I looked forward to killing the rest.

In a way the Nazis' rejection of traditional humanism led to their appalling fates. It is one thing to mock the subtle infrastruc-tures of a civil society, to claim they serve no purpose, but quite another to tear them down. Only when they were gone did we realize how much our safety and sanity and civic well-being depended on them. This fascist lesson is learned over and over again, even into modern times.

Emerging from the tunnel with guttering torches we saw ahead of us one of the panthers awakened by Elric's sorcery. The beast turned bright knowing eyes on us. It was leading us through the caverns, searching, I was certain, for my cousin Gaynor.

Was the panther Oona? Or was the beast mentally controlled by my doppelganger's daughter? Mystified, we could do nothing save trust the beast as it padded ahead of us, occasionally looking back to make sure we followed.

I was half expecting another ambush from a furious Gaynor. My cousin would be considering his revenge on us already. But I soon realized he would no longer be flinging an army into the Grey Fees. His army had been destroyed.

As if to demonstrate this destruction, the panther led us straight through Gaynor's camp. The big cats had done their work swiftly and efficiently. Ruined troog bodies lay everywhere, most with their throats torn out. The savages had also been attacked, but clearly a great many of them had fled back to their own territories. I doubted if Gaynor would be able to raise another army from their ranks.

A weird howling came from behind us, as if jackals mourned their own kind, and then, from around a huge stalagmite rode Gaynor. Klosterheim and the remains of his men followed him, though not with enthusiasm. Gaynor whirled the great ivory runesword around his head, bearing down on us with single-minded hatred. I could not tell if the sounds came from him or the blade.

Elric and I acted as one.

Our swords were in our hands. Their murmuring became a shrill whine modifying to a full-throated howl which made the white blade's sound seem feeble.

Gaynor had become used to unchallenged power. He seemed surprised by this resistance, in spite of his recent experience. He tugged on his reins, bringing his horse to a skidding turn and urged his men towards us.

Once again I felt the battle frenzy in my veins. I felt it threatening to take over my entire being. Beside me Elric was laughing as he spurred towards the leading rider. The howling of his sword changed, first to triumph as it bit into its victim's breast, then to a satiated murmur as it drank the man's soul.

My own black battle blade twisted in my hand, thrusting forward before I could react, taking the next rider in the head, shearing off half his skull in the process. And again the sword drank, uttering a thirsty croon as the Nazi's life essence poured into it and mixed with mine. Those who lived by the sword, I thought. . . The idea took on an entirely new meaning. I saw Klosterheim and urged my horse towards him. Elric and Gaynor were fighting on horseback, sword against sword. Two more of Gaynor's men came at me. I swung the heavy sword-it moved like a pendulum-and took the first rider in the side, the second, as I swung back behind me, in the thigh. As the first died, I finished the second. Their soulless remains slumped like so much butcher's meat in their saddles. I found myself laughing at this. I turned again and met the crazed ruby blaze of Elric's own eyes, my eyes, glaring back at me.

Gaynor jumped his horse over a pile of bodies and turned, the Runestaff held in his gauntleted hand. "You cannot kill me while I hold this. You are fools to try. And while I hold this-I hold the key to all Creation!"

Elric and I did not have horses capable of jumping so high. We were forced to ride around the pile of corpses while Klosterheim and the three remaining Nazis interposed themselves between us and our quarry.

"I'm no longer Knight of the Balance," Gaynor raved, "I am Creator of All Existence!" Lifting the white sword and the Runestaff over his head, he spurred his horse, galloping off into the misty blackness, leaving his followers to slow our pursuit.

I took no pleasure in that killing. Only Klosterheim escaped, disappearing soundlessly amongst the great pillars. I made to go after him, but Elric stopped me. "Gaynor must be our only prey." He pointed. "Let her guide us. She can follow his scent."

The panther padded on without pause and our tireless blind horses trotted behind it.

Once I thought I heard Gaynor's laughter, the galloping of hooves, and then I saw a blaze of golden light as if the Grail signaled its own abduction. The pearly grey of the horizon grew wider and taller ahead of us until its light spread like a gentle blanket of mist over the whole vast forest of stone. The air had grown noticeably cooler and there was a clean quality to it I could not identify. For a while that featureless grey field filled me with utter terror. I looked upon endless nothingness. The finale of the multiverse. Limbo.

The calmness of it frightened me. But the fear began to disappear and was replaced by an equally strong sense of reconciliation, of peace. I had been here before, after all. None of these emotions affected the course of our actions, however, for the blind horses bore us relentlessly on. The panther continued to lead us and gradually, without any dramatic event, we found ourselves slowly absorbed into the gentle grey mist.

The mist had a substantial quality to it. I could not rid myself of the sense that Gaynor and Klosterheim might rush on us suddenly from ambush. Even when, for a few brief moments, the air ahead of us was filled with the brilliant scarlet and green of huge, delicate amaryllis blooms and creamy iris, I did not drop my guard.

"What was that?" I asked Elric.

The sorcerer offered me a crooked smile. "I don't know. Someone's sudden thought?"

Had those shapes been formed spontaneously by the strange, rich mist? I felt the stuff could create recognizable shapes at any moment. While I had expected something more spectacular from the legendary Grey Fees, I was relieved that it was not the roiling tangled strands of Chaos others had led me to expect. I had the feeling I would only have to concentrate to see my own most bizarre imaginings made concrete. I scarcely dared think of Gaynor and Klosterheim for fear of conjuring them into being!

The sound of our horses, of our harness, of our very breathing, seemed amplified by the mist. The panther's outline was half-hidden by it, but remained just in view, a shadow. Whether we rode on rock or hard earth was impossible to tell now, for the pewter-colored fog engulfed the horses to their bellies, washing around them like quicksilver.

The ground beneath us became softer, a turf, and the sounds were more muffled. A silence was gradually dominating us. The tension was still considerable. I spoke briefly to Elric. My voice seemed to be snatched away, deadened.

"We've lost him, eh? He's escaped into the Fees. And that, I understand, is a disaster."

When he replied I was not sure if he spoke or if I read his mind. "It makes the task more difficult."

Everything was becoming less certain, less defined, no doubt a quality of the Grey Fees. It was supposed to be, after all, the unformed fundamental stuff of the multiverse. But no matter how obscured, the panther remained in sight. Our path remained constant. Gaynor remained a threat.

The panther stopped without warning. It lifted its handsome face, sniffing, listening, one paw raised. The tail lashed. The eyes narrowed. Something perturbed the great, black cat. It hesitated.

Elric dismounted, wading chest-high through the mist to where the panther stood. The mist thickened and I lost sight of him for a moment. When I next saw him he was talking to a human figure. I thought at first we had found Gaynor.

The figure turned and came back with him. Oona carried her bow and her quiver over her shoulder. She might have been taking a casual stroll. Her grin was challenging and told me to ask no questions.

I still did not know if she was a sorceress, an illusionist, or if she merely controlled the movements of the panther or the hare. I had no clear idea of the magic involved. I was now perfectly prepared to accept that it was indeed magic that I witnessed. These people manipulated the multiverse in ways which were normal for them but which were totally mystifying to me. Once I realized that my own familiar twentieth century seemed a world of bizarre, chaotic mechanical invention to others, as mysterious to them as theirs was to me, that it still represented a terrifying conundrum to demigods able to manipulate worlds with their own mental powers, I began to accept for its own sake everything I experienced. I did not attempt, as some lunatic mapmaker might, to impose the grid of my own limited experience and imagination upon all this complexity. I had no wish, indeed, to make any mark on it. I preferred to explore and watch and feel. The only way to understand it at all was to experience it.

The pearly mist continued to swirl around us as I joined Oona and Elric. The Grey Fees I had crossed before had been more populous. She frowned, puzzled. "This is not," she said almost disapprovingly, "my natural element."

"Which way have they gone?" I asked. "Do you still have their scent, Lady Oona?"

"Too much of it," she said. She dropped to one knee and made a sweep with her left hand, as if clearing a window. Her gesture revealed a bright, sunny scene. "See!"

A scene I immediately recognized.

I gasped and moved forward, reaching towards that gap in the mist. I felt I'd been given my childhood back. But she restrained me. "I know," she said. "It is Bek. But I do not think it is your salvation, Count Ulric."

"What do you mean?"

She turned to her right and cleared another space in the mist.

All was red and black turmoil. Beast-headed men and man-headed beasts in bloody conflict. Churned mud almost as far as the eye could see. On the horizon the ragged outline of a tall-towered city. Towards it, in triumph, rode the figure of Prince Gaynor von Minct-the one who would come to be called Gaynor the Damned.

Elric craned forward this time. He recognized the city. It was as familiar to him as Bek was to me. Familiar to me, too, now that our memories and minds had bonded. Imrryr, the Dreaming City, capital of Melnibone, the Isle of the Dragon Lords. Flames fluttered like flags from the topmost windows of her towers.

I looked back. Bek was still there. The green, gentle hills, the thick, welcoming woods, the old stones of the fortified manor farm. But now I saw that there was barbed wire around the walls. Machine-gun emplacements at the gates. Guard dogs prowling the grounds. SS uniforms everywhere. A big Mercedes staff car drove into view, speeding down the road to my old home. The driver was Klosterheim.

"How-?" I began.

"Exactly," said Oona. "Too much spoor, as I said. He took two paths and there he is in two different worlds. He has learned more than most of us can ever know about existing in the timeless infinity of the multiverse. He still fights on at least two fronts. Which could be his weakness..."

"It seems to be his strength," said Elric with his usual dry irony. "He is breaking every rule. It's the secret of his power. But if those rules no longer have meaning .. ."

"He has won already?"

"Not everywhere," said Oona. But it was clear she had no idea what to do next.

Elric took the initiative.

"He is in two places-and we can be in two places. We have two swords now and sword can call to sword. I must follow Gaynor to Melnibone and you must follow him to Bek."

"How can you see these places?" I asked her. "How do you select them?"

"Because I desire it?" She lowered her eyes. "We are not told," she said. "What if the Grey Fees are created by the will and imaginations of mortals and immortals? What they most wish for and most fear are therefore created here. Created over and over again. Through the extraordinary power of human memory and desire."

"Created and re-created throughout eternity," mused Elric. He laid his gauntleted hand on the pommel of his runeblade. "Always a little different. Sometimes dramatically so. Memory and desire. Altered memories. Changing desires. The multiverse proliferates, growing like the veins in a leaf, the branches in a tree."

"What we must not forget," said Oona, "is that Gaynor has in his hands the power to create almost any desired reality. The power of the Grail, which is rightfully yours to protect but never directly use."

In spite of our bizarre circumstances, I found myself laughing. "Rightfully mine? I would have thought such power was rightfully Christ's or God's. If God exists. Or is He the Balance, the great mediator of our creativity?"

"That's the cause of much theological discussion," said Oona, "especially amongst dreamthieves. After all, they live by stolen dreams. In the Grey Fees, they say, all dreams come true. And all nightmares."

I felt helpless, staring around me in that void, my eyes constantly returning to those two scenes. They only reminded me of our quandary. They, too, could be an illusion-perhaps created by Oona herself, using the arts she had learned from her mother? I had no reason to trust her, or to believe she acted from altruism, but no reason not to either.

I felt a frustrated fury building in me. I wanted to draw my sword and cut through the mist, cut my way through to Bek, to my home, to the more peaceful past.

But there was a swastika flag flying over Bek. I knew that scene was no lie.

Elric was smiling his old, wan smile. "Difficult," he said, "to follow a man who travels in two directions at once. Reluctant as we are to accept this, I do not believe we can continue this adventure together, my friends. You two must follow him one way-I'll seek to stop him the other."

"Surely we weaken our power by doing that?" We knew we fought against the Lords of the Higher Worlds as well as Gaynor and Klosterheim.

"We weaken our power significantly," agreed Elric, "perhaps impossibly. But we have little choice. I shall go back to Imrryr to fight Gaynor there. You must go

to your own realm and do the same. He cannot have the Grail in two places at once. That is a certain impossibility. He will have it, therefore, where it will serve him best. Whoever finds it first must somehow warn the others."

"And where might such a place be?" I asked.

He shook his head. "Anywhere," he said.

Oona was less uncertain. "That is one of many things we do not know," she said. "There are two places he might go. Morn, whose stones he needs to harness the power of Chaos, or Bek."

Elric remounted his blind horse. The beast whinnied and snorted, stamping at the mist. He urged it forward, towards the scene of turmoil which opened to absorb him. He turned, drawing his great blade and saluted me. It was a farewell. It was a promise. He then rode into the battling beasts, his black sword blazing in his right hand as he urged the horse towards Imrryr.

With a touch of her staff Oona sent my horse racing back into the mist. The beast would have no trouble getting home. Taking my arm Oona led me forward until we stood smelling the summer grass of Bek, looking down at my ancient home and realizing, for the first time, that it had been turned into a fortress. Some kind of important SS operations center, I guessed.

We dropped to the ground. I prayed we had not been seen. SS people were everywhere. This was no ordinary establishment. It was thoroughly guarded, with machine-gun posts and heavy barbed wire. Two crude barbicans of wire surrounded the moat.

We crept down the hills away from Bek's towers. I was easily able to guide Oona through the dense undergrowth of our forest-land. I knew as many trails as the foxes or rabbits who inhabited these woods when Beks had cleared the land to build their first house. We had lived in harmony, for the most part, down all those centuries.

My home had become an obscenity, a shameful outrage. Once it had stood for everything Germans held to be of value-prudent social progress, tradition, culture, kindness, learning, love of the land-and now it stood for everything we had once loathed; intolerance, disrespect, intemperate power and harsh cruelty. I felt as if I and my entire family had been violated. I knew full well how Germany had already been violated. I knew the nature of that evil and I knew it had not been spawned from German soil alone, but from the soil of all those warring nations, the greed and fear of all those petty, self-serving politicians who had ignored the real desires of their voters, all those opposing political formulae, all those ordinary citizens who had failed to examine what their leaders told them, who had let themselves be led into war and ultimate damnation and who still followed leaders whose policies could only end in their destruction.

What was this will to death which seemed to have engulfed Europe? A universal guilt? Its utter failure to live up to its Christian ideals? A kind of madness in which sentiment was contrasted by action at every turn?

Night came at last. Nobody hunted us. Oona found some old newspapers in a ditch. Someone had slept on them. They were yellow, muddy. She read them carefully. And, when she had finished, she had a plan. "We must find Herr El," she said. "Prince Lobkowitz. If I am right, he's living quietly under an assumed name in Hensau. Time has passed here. We are several years further on than when you left Germany. Hensau is where he will be. Or was, the last time I was in 1940."

"What do you mean? You are a time traveler, too?"

"I once thought so, until I understood that time is a field, and the same event takes place over and over again within that field, all at the same time. How we select from that field gives us a sense of the multiverse's mortality. We are not really time-traveling but shifting from one reality to another.

"Time is relative. Time is subjective. Time alters its qualities.

It can be unstable. It can be too stable. Time varies from realm to realm. We can leave this realm and find ourselves in a similar one, only separated by centuries. By this same process people sometimes believe they have discovered time travel. We escaped from Hameln in 1935, I believe. Five years ago. It is now the summer of 1940 and your country is at war. She appears to have conquered most of Europe."

The old newspapers gave no idea of what events had led to the current situation, but "brave little Germany" was now fighting alone against a dozen aggressive nations bent on taking back what little they had not already looted. According to the Nazi press, Germany for her part was merely demanding the land she needed for her peoples to expand-a region she was calling Greater Germany. A bastion against the Communist Goliath. Some European nations were already described as "provinces" of Germany while others were included in the German "family." France had reached a compromise, while Italy under Mussolini was an ally. Poland, Denmark, Belgium, Holland. All defeated. I was horrified. Hitler had come to power promising the German people peace. We had yearned for it. Honest, tolerant people had voted for anyone who would restore civil order and avert the threat of war. Adolf Hitler had now taken us into a worse war than any previous one. I wondered if his admirers were cheering him quite so enthusiastically now. For all our self-destructive Prussian rhetoric, we were fundamentally a peaceful people. What mad dream had Hitler invented to induce my fellow Germans to march again?

At last I slept. Immediately my head was filled with dreams. With violent battle and bizarre apparitions. I was experiencing everything my doppelganger was experiencing. Only while awake could I keep him out of my mind, and even then it was difficult. I had no idea what he did, save that he had returned to Imrryr and from there gone underground. A scent of reptiles . . .

Awake again, I continued to read all I could. Most of what I read produced fresh questions. I could not believe how easily Hitler had come to power and why more people were not resisting, though the blanket of lies issued by the newspapers stopped many decent people from having a clear idea of how they could challenge the Nazi stranglehold. Otherwise, I had to piece together the picture for myself. It left many questions.

I learned most of the answers when we eventually found our way to Lobkowitz's apartment in Hensau, traveling at night for almost a week, scarcely daring the woodland trails, let alone the main roads. I was glad to sleep during daylight hours. It made my dreams a little easier. The newspapers, once read, were used to wrap around Ravenbrand. Our weapons seemed scarcely adequate to challenge the armaments of the Third Reich.

Everywhere we saw signs of a nation at war. Long trains carrying munitions, guns, soldiers. Convoys of trucks. Droning squadrons of bombers. Screaming fighters. Large movements of marching men. Sometimes we saw more sinister things. Cattle trucks full of wailing human beings. We had no idea at that time the scale of the murders Hitler practiced on his own people and the conquered citizens of Europe.

We traveled extremely cautiously, anxious not to draw the attention of even the most minor authority, but Oona risked stealing a dress from a clothesline. "The Gypsies will be blamed, I suppose."

Hensau, having no railway station and no main road, was relatively quiet. The usual Nazi flags flew everywhere and the SS had a barracks nearby, but the town was mostly free of military people. We could see why Lobkowitz had chosen it.

When we eventually stood before him, Oona in her rather flimsy stolen dress, we must have looked a wretched sight. We were half-starved. I was in rags. We bore incongruous weapons. I had not changed clothes for days and was desperately tired.

Lobkowitz laughed as he offered us drinks and told us to seat ourselves in his comfortable easy chairs. "I can get you out of Germany," he said. "Probably to Sweden. But that's about the limit of the help I can give you at present."

It emerged that he was running a kind of "underground railway" for those who had aroused Nazi displeasure. Most went to Sweden, while others went through Spain. He regretted, he said, that he had no magical powers. No way of opening the moonbeam roads to those who sought freedom. "The best I can promise them is America or Britain," he said. "Even the British Empire can't stand against the Luftwaffe much longer. I have soldier friends. Another few months and Britain will seek an armistice. I suspect she will fall. And with the capitulation of the Empire, Germans need not fear American involvement. It's the triumph of evil, my dears."

He apologized for making such melodramatic statements. "But these are melodramatic times.

"The irony," he continued, "is that what you seek is already at Bek."

"But Bek is too heavily guarded for us to attack her," said Oona.

"What is it that we seek?" I asked wearily. "A staff? A cup? Isn't there another one that will do?"

"These are unique objects," Prince Lobkowitz said. "They take different forms. They have some sort of will, though it is not conscious in the same way as ours. You call one object the Holy Grail. Your family was entrusted to guard it. Wolfram von Eschenbach speaks of such a trust. Your father, half-mad, had not easily accepted this story. When he lost the Grail, he felt obliged to get it back and in so doing he killed himself."

"Killed himself? Then Gaynor's accusations were true! I had no idea-"

"Clearly the family wished to avoid scandal," Prince Lobkowitz continued. "They said he died in the subsequent fire, but the truth is, Count von Bek, your father was wracked by guilt-every kind of guilt-for your mother's death, his own failings, his inability to shoulder the family responsibilities. Indeed, as you know, he found it difficult to communicate with his own children. But he was neither a coward nor one to escape the inevitable. He did his best and he died in the attempt."

"Why should he place such importance on the Grail?" I asked.

"Such objects have great power in Teutonic mythology, too,

which is why Hitler and his disciples are so greedy to possess them. They believe that with the Grail and Charlemagne's sword in their hands, they will have the supernatural means, as well as the military means, of defeating Britain. Britain is all that stands in the way of the triumph of the German Empire. The cup is more important than the sword, in this case. The sword is an arm. It has no independent life. There should, in truth, be two swords on either side of the cup for the magic to work at its fullest. Or so I'm told. What Gaynor thinks he will achieve, I do not entirely know, but Hitler and his friends are convinced that something monumental will happen. I've heard a rumor about a ritual called Blood-in-the-Bowl. Sounds like a fairy story, eh? Virgins and magic swords."

"We must try to get the Grail back," I said. "That is what we are here to do."

Lobkowitz spoke softly, almost by way of confirmation. "Your father feared Bek would perish once the Grail left your family's safekeeping. He feared the entire family would perish. You, of course, are his last remaining son."

This was not something I needed to be reminded of. The waste of my brothers' lives in the Great War still made me despair. "Did my father start the fire which killed him?"

"No. The fire was a result of the demon who volunteered his assistance in fulfilling your family trust. A reasonable thought, I suppose, in the circumstances. But your father was at best an amateur sorcerer. The creature was not properly contained with the pentagram. Rather than defend the Grail, it stole it!"

"The demon was Arioch?"

"The 'demon' was our friend Klosterheim, then in the service of Miggea of Law. She was drooling crazy and feeling her power wane. Klosterheim served Satan until Satan proved insufficiently committed to the cause of evil and sought a reconciliation with God through the medium of your Bek ancestors. Through your

namesake, as a matter of fact. Your ancestor was charged by Satan himself to find the Grail and keep it, until such time as God and Satan shall be reconciled."

"Fanciful old stories," I said. "They do not even have the authenticity of myth!"

"Stories our immediate ancestors chose to forget," said the Austrian quietly. "But you have more than one dark legend attached to your family name-even into recent times with the Mirenburg legend of Crimson Eyes."

"Another peasant fireside tale," I said. "The invention of the undereducated. You know that Uncle Bertie is now doing a perfectly respectable job in Washington."

"Actually, he's in Australia now. But I take your point. You must admit, my dear Count Ulric, that your family's history was never as uneventful as they pretended. More than one of your kinsmen or ancestors has reason to agree."

I shrugged. "If you will, Prince Lobkowitz. But that history has little to do with our current problems. We must find the Grail and the Sword but need your suggestions as to how we might get them back."

"Where else?" he said. "I have told you. Where the Grail has been for so many centuries. At Bek. That is why the place is so heavily fortified and guarded, why Klosterheim keeps permanent guard over the Grail chamber, as he calls it. You know it as your old armory."

That place had always possessed an atmosphere. I cursed myself. "We saw Klosterheim go to Bek. Are we too late? Has he removed the Grail?"

"I doubt he would wish to do that. I have it on the best authority that Hitler himself, together with Hess, Goring, Goebbels, Himmler and company, are all making plans to meet at Bek. They can hardly believe their luck, I'd guess. But they wish to ensure it! France has fallen and only Britain, already half-defeated, stands in their way. German planes have attacked British shipping, lured fighters into combat and weakened an already weak RAF. Before they invade by sea and land, they intend to destroy all main cities, especially London. They are preparing a vast aerial armada at this very moment. For all I know it is on its way. There is very little time. This meeting at Bek involves some ritual they believe will strengthen their hand even more and ensure that their invasion of Britain is completely successful."

I was disbelieving. "They are insane."

He nodded his head. "Oh, indeed. And something within them must understand that. But they have had total success so far. Perhaps they believe these spells are the reason for it. Clearly whatever supernatural aid they have called upon is not disappointing them. Yet it is unstable magic-in unstable hands. And it could result in the death of everything. Like Gaynor and the rest of their kind, their ignorance and disdain for reality will eventually destroy them. They relish the notion of Gotterdammerung. These people seek oblivion by any means. They are the worst kind of self-deceiving cowards and everything they build is a ramshackle sham. They have the taste of the worst Hollywood producers and the egos of the worst Hollywood actors. We have come to an ironic moment in history, I think, when actors and entertainers determine the fate of the real world. You can see how quickly the gap between action and affect widens . . . Of course they are expert illusionists, like Mussolini for instance, but illusion is all they offer-that and a vast amount of unearned power. The power to fake reality, the power to deceive the world and destroy it under the weight of so much

falsification. The less the world responds to their lies and fancies, the more rigorously do they enforce them."

I began to realize that Prince Lobkowitz, for all his practicality, was a discursive conversationalist. At length I interrupted him. "What must I do when I have the Grail?"

"Very little," he said. "It is yours to defend, after all. And circumstances will change. Perhaps you'll take it back to its home in what the East Franconians called the Grail Fields. You know them . by their corrupted name of the Grey Fees. Oh, yes, we've heard of them in Germany! There's a reference to them in Wolfram von Eschenbach, who cites Kyot de Provenzal. But your chances of getting to those Graalfelden again are also very slim."

I had the advantage, he said, of knowing Bek. The old armory,

where the Grail was held, where I had received my first lessons from von Asch.

"Guarded presumably by these SS men," I said. "So there isn't much chance of my strolling in calling 'I'm home,' saying I've just dropped in to pop up to the armory, then tuck the Holy Grail under my jacket and walk out whistling."

I was surprised by my host's response.

"Well," he said with evident embarrassment, "I did have something like that in mind, yes."

Chapter Twenty Traditional Values

Which was how I came to be wearing the full uniform of a Standartenfuhrer, a colonel in the SS, including near-regulation smoked glasses, sitting in the back of an open Mercedes staff car driven by a chauffeuse in the natty uniform of the NSDAP Women's Auxiliary (First Class) who, with her bow and arrows in the trunk, took the car out of its hidden garage into the dawn streets of Hensau and into some of the loveliest scenery in the whole of Germany-rolling, wooded hills and distant mountains, the pale gold of the sky, the sun a flash of scarlet on the horizon. I was filled with longing for those lost times, the years of my childhood when I had ridden alone across such scenery. The love of my land ran deep in my blood.

Somehow we had gone from that pre-1914 idyll to the present horror in a few short bloody years. And now here I was riding in a car far too large for the winding roads and wearing the uniform which stood for everything I had learned to loathe. Ravenbrand was now carried in a modified guncase and lay at my feet on the car's floor. I could not help reflecting on this irony. I found myself in a future which few could have predicted in 1917. Now, in 1940, I remembered all the warnings that had been given since 1920.

Years of antiwar films, songs, novels and plays-years of analysis and oracular pronouncements. Too many, perhaps? Had the predictions actually created the situation they hoped most to avert?

Was anarchy so terrible, compared to the deadly discipline of fascism? As much democracy and social justice had emerged from chaos as from tyranny. Who had been able to predict the total madness that would come upon our world in the name of "order"?

For a while we followed the main auto route to Hamburg. We saw how busy the roads, raillines and waterways had become. We traveled for a short while on an excellent new Autobahn with several lanes of traffic moving in both directions, but Oona soon found the back roads to Bek again. We were only fifty kilometers from my home when we turned a sharp bend in a wooded lane and Oona stamped quickly on the brake to stop us crashing into another car, quite as ostentatious as our own, swathed in Nazi flags and insignia. A thoroughly vulgar vehicle, I thought. I guessed it to belong to some swaggering local dignitary.

We began to move again but then a high-ranking officer in a brown SA uniform emerged from the other side of the car and flagged us down.

We had no option. We slowed to a stop this time. We exchanged the ritual salute, borrowed, I believe, from the film Quo Vadis?, supposedly how Romans greeted a friend. Once again, Hollywood had added a vulgar gloss to politics.

Noting my uniform and its rank, the SA man was subservient, apologetic. "Forgive me, Hen Standartenfuhrer, this is, I regret, an emergency."

From out of the closed car now emerged an awkward, rather gangling figure in a typical comic-opera Nazi uniform favored by the higher ranks. To his credit, he seemed uncomfortable in it, pushing unfamiliar frogging about as he walked over to us, offering a jerky salute, which we returned. He was genuinely grateful. "Oh, God be thanked! You see, Captain Kirch! My instincts never let me down. You suggested no suitable car could come along this . road and get us to Bek on time-and voila! This angel suddenly materializes." His eyebrows appeared to be alive. His eyes, too,

were very busy and he had an intense, crooked smile on his puffy, square face. If it had not been for his uniform, I might have taken him for a typical customer of the Bar Jenny in Berlin. He beamed at me. Raving mad but relatively benign.

"I am Deputy Fuhrer Hess," he told me. "You will be well-remembered for this, Colonel."

I recalled that Rudolf Hess was one of Hitler's oldest henchmen. In accordance with the papers I carried, I let him know that I was Colonel Ulric von Minct and that I was at his service. It would be a privilege to offer him my car.

"An angel, an angel," he repeated as he climbed into the car and sat beside me. "It is the von Mincts, Colonel, who will save Germany." He hardly noticed the case containing the sword. He was too concerned with shouting urgent orders to his driver. "The flasks! The flasks! It would be a disaster if I did not have them!"

The SA man reached into the trunk of the car and carefully took out a large wicker basket which he transferred to our car. Hess was greatly relieved. "I am a vegan," he explained. "I have to travel everywhere with my own food. Alf-I mean our Fuhrer-" He glanced up at me, like a small boy caught in some forbidden act. Clearly he had been admonished before for making reference to the Nazi leader by his old nickname. "The Fuhrer is a vegetarian-but not strict enough, I fear, for me. He runs a very lax kitchen, from my point of view. So I have taken to carrying my own food when I travel."

The deputy Fuhrer saluted his driver. "Wait with the car," he instructed. "We'll send help from the first town we reach. Or from Bek, if we find nothing else." He sat back in the car beside me, a signal for Oona to put the Mercedes into gear and continue the journey. He was a mass of tics and peculiar movements of his hands. "Von Minct, you say? You must be related to our great Paul von Minct, who has achieved so much for the Reich."

"His cousin," I said. I found it very hard to be afraid of this man.

Hess insisted on shaking my hand.

"A great honor, sir," I said.

"Oh"-he removed his elaborate cap-"I'm one of the old fighters, you know. Still one of the lads." He was reassuring me. Sentimentally he continued, "I was with Hitler in Munich. In Stadelheim and everywhere-he and I are brothers. I am the only one he truly trusts and confides in. It was always so. I am his spiritual adviser, in many ways. If it were not for me, Colonel von Minct, I doubt if any of you would have heard of the Grail story- or understand what it could do for us!"

Confidingly he leaned towards me. "Hitler, they say, knows the heart of Germany. But I know her soul. That is what I have studied."

As the huge Mercedes bowled along familiar country roads, I continued to speak with the man whom many believed the most powerful man in Germany after the great dictator himself. If Hitler were killed today, Hess would assume the leadership.

For the most part his conversation was as banal as that of most Nazis, but laced through with a melange of supernatural beliefs and dietary ideas which marked him for a common lunatic. Because he understood me to have an affinity for the Grail and all the mysticism surrounding it, he was more forthcoming-about how he had read the Bek legends, how he had read books saying the Grail was the lost Holy Relic of the Teutonic Order. How the Bek sword was the lost sword of Roland, Champion of the Holy Roman Emperor, Charlemagne the Frank. The Franks and the Goths founded modern Europe, he said. The Norsemen were stern lawmakers, with no respect for the Old World's superstitions. Wherever their influence was felt, people became robust, masculine, vital, productive. Latin Christianity weakened them.

The destiny of the German nation, he told me, was to lift its brothers back to glory-to rid the world of all that wretchedly bad stock and replace it with a race of superbeings-superhealthy, superintelligent, superstrong, supereducated-the kind of breed which would populate the world with the best mankind could be, rather than the worst.

The more I listened to Hess, the more skeptical I became, the more convinced that he was a low-level lunatic with dull dreams and a psychological inability to consider any "truth" but that which he invented for himself.

However, as the man was so fundamentally amiable and clearly trusted me so completely, I had an opportunity to see what he knew of my father. Had he ever met old Count von Bek? I asked. The one who went mad and was burned alive. Killed himself, didn't he?

"Killed himself? Perhaps." Hess shuddered. "A terrible crime, suicide. Betrays us all. On a level with abortion, in my view. All life should be respected."

I had discovered quickly the trick of steering him gently back to the subject. "Count von Bek?"

"He lost the Grail, you see. He was entrusted with it. Father to child-son or daughter-down the centuries. 'Do you the Devil's work!' is their ancient motto. They were at the Crusades. The oldest blood in Germany-but tainted by decadence, madness, Latin marriages ...

"Legend had it that the von Beks always protected the Grail, until such a time when Satan was reconciled with God. All stupid Christian nonsense, I know, and a corruption of our old, muscular Nordic myths. Those myths made us successful conquerors. It has always been our destiny to conquer. To bring order to the whole world. The myth still retains its power." His eyes were focused on me now, burning into me. "The power of myth is the power of life and death, as we know-for we have restored the power of the Nordic myth. And again we are successful conquerors. We shall challenge that other Nordic race, our natural allies, the British, until they turn with us against the evil East and defeat the tyranny of communism. Together, we shall bring civilization to the whole planet!"

A typical sample of his droning, pseudophilosophical nonsense. It explained why the Nazi chiefs in their lunacy placed such value on the Grail and the Sword. These things represented a mystical authority. Only with them in harness with their political power were they confident they had secured their victories. Triumph over the admired British Empire would be a kind of epiphany. An armistice achieved, together they would restore the purity of blood and myth to its proper place in the order of things.

"We only have to complete the destruction of their air force and they will call for a truce."

"I am impressed by your logic, sir."

"Logic has nothing to do with it, Colonel. Logic and the so-called Enlightenment are Judeo-Christian inventions, deeply suspect by all right-thinking Aryans. Those Nazis who cling to their pro-Christian beliefs are working for the Judaic-Bolshevik cultural conspiracy. The British understand this as well as we do. The best kind of Americans are also on our side .. ."

I think that in all my adventures I have only shown real courage and self-discipline once: when I restrained myself from throwing the glamorous deputy Führer out of my car.

"How," I asked, "did old von Bek lose possession of the Grail?"

"As you no doubt know, he was an amateur scientist. One of those prehistoric gentleman scholars. He knew of the family's trust, to guard the Grail until we, its true inheritors, should come to claim it. But he was curious. He wanted to examine the Grail's properties. Which meant that first he had to master the laws of magic. Of necromancy. His studies drove him mad, but he continued with his examination of the Grail, and in doing so, he summoned a certain renegade Captain of Hell..."

"Klosterheim?"

"Just so. Who in turn brought the help of another renegade. One of the company of Law. The immortal, extremely unstable Miggea. Duchess of the Higher Worlds." Hess grinned. He was in the know. He swelled, full of his own secrets. He twitched with supernatural intelligence. "Alf-our Führer-told me to find Gaynor, who was already an adept, and offer to blend our strength with his. Gaynor agreed and, rather later than he'd promised, brought the object of power back to Bek. With it we shall control history-the war against Britain is already won."

In spite of my direct experience of realities he had only heard of, I still found him hard to follow, exhausting in the way mad people often are. Therefore I was deeply relieved when the car began its final drive towards the gates of Bek. Because the deputy Fuhrer was with us, our papers were never inspected. All I had to hope was that Gaynor did not recognize me. My hair was hidden under my military cap and I wore the dark glasses, which were an unofficial part of the uniform, to disguise my albinism.

Chatting easily with Hess I lifted the encased sword from the car. "For the ceremony," I told him. Hess was by far my best cover and I was determined to stick with him as long as I could. As I moved through my old home, however, it was difficult to restrain myself from exclaiming at what had been done to it.

I would rather Gaynor had destroyed it as he threatened. The house had been thoroughly violated. The place had been redecorated like a Fairbanks film set-all Nazi pomp and circumstance: gold-braided flags, Teutonic tapestries, Nordic plaques and heavy mirrors, freshly made stained glass in the old Gothic windows, one of which showed an idealized portrait of Hitler as a noble knight-errant and Goring as some sort of male Valkyrie. A Rheinejungen perhaps? Swastikas everywhere. It was as if Walt Disney, who so admired fascist discipline and had his own ideas for the ideal state, had been hired as Bek's interior designer. The Hitler gang's passion for the garish trappings of the operetta stage was demonstrated throughout. In so many ways Hitler was a typical Austrian.

I, of course, said none of this to Hess, who seemed rather impressed by the house, enjoying his reflected glory as every SS officer stopped to click his heels and give him the Nazi salute. I luckily stood in Hess's reflected glory and Oona in mine, and so we passed as if charmed through our enemy's defenses while the deputy Fuhrer spoke warmly of King Arthur, Parsifal, Charlemagne and all the other Teutonic heroes of legend who had borne magic swords.

By the time we reached the armory, deep within the castle's oldest keep, I was beginning to wish Hess would return to his earlier topic of Nordic veganism. All

in the repressed fear of my own imminent discovery and destruction!

The deputy Fuhrer asked me to hold his canisters of food while he took a large key from his jacket pocket. "The Fuhrer gave me the honor of holding his key," he said. "It is a privilege to be the first to enter and to greet him when he arrives!"

He inserted the key in the lock and turned it with some difficulty. I thought it wise of Hitler to have his friend go ahead of him like that. After all, the Führer could never be sure it was not an elaborate plot to end his life.

Thus, as members of Rudolf Hess's entourage, we passed into the high-ceilinged armory which had been spared redecoration and was lit by a high, circular window. A sunbeam pierced the dust and fell directly upon a kind of altar, square granite carved with the Celtic sun cross, which had recently been placed there.

Involuntarily, I moved towards this new object. How on earth had they carried such a weight of granite through our narrow corridors? I reached out to touch it. But Hess held me back. Clearly he thought I was eager for other reasons. "Not yet," he said.

As his eyes became used to the dim light, he looked around him in sudden puzzlement. "What's this-what are you men doing here before I ever crossed the threshold? Do you not realize who I am and why I should be here first?"

The shadowy group seemed unimpressed.

"This is blasphemy," said Hess. "Infamy. This is no place for ordinary soldiers. The magic is subtle. It requires subtle minds. Subtle hands."

Klosterheim, automatic in hand, came grinning into the sunlight. "I assure you, sir, we are nothing if not subtle. I will explain as soon as possible. But now, if you don't mind, Deputy Führer, I will continue to save your life-"

"Save my-?"

Klosterheim pointed his pistol at me. "This time my bullets will work," he said. "Good afternoon, Count Ulric. I had an idea you would be joining us here. You see! You're fulfilling your destiny whether you wish to or not."

Hess remained outraged. "You are making many mistakes, Captain. The Führer himself is involved with this project and will be arriving shortly. What will he think of a subordinate pointing a gun at his deputy and one of his top officers?"

"He will know what Prince Gaynor will tell him," said Klosterheim. He was careless of Hess's words. He hardly heard them. "Believe me, Deputy Fuhrer Hess, we are acting entirely in the interests of the Third Reich. Ever since he was denounced as a traitor and his property confiscated, we have been expecting this madman to make an attempt on the Führer's life-"

"This is nonsense!" I began. "You know it is a lie!"

"But is the rest a lie, Count?" His voice grew softer, more intimate. "Do you think we expected you to give up pursuit? Wasn't it obvious that you would make some attempt to reach this place? All we had to do was wait for you to bring us the Black Sword. Which I note you have kindly done."

Hess was inclined to trust to rank. This was my only hope of buying time. As he looked to me for confirmation I shouted in my best Nazi-bark: "Captain Klosterheim, you are overstepping the mark. While we applaud your vigilance in protecting the Fuhrer, we can assure you there is nothing in this room which offers him any danger."

"On the contrary," agreed Hess uncertainly. His eyes, never steady at the best of times, flickered from me to Klosterheim. He was impressed by Klosterheim's handpicked storm troopers. "But perhaps, given the circumstances, we should all step outside this room and settle any confusion?"

"Very well," said Klosterheim. "If you will lead the way, Count von Bek ..." And he gestured with his Walther.

"Von Bek?" Hess was startled. He looked hard at me and began to think.

I had no more time. I pulled the protective fabric away from my sword. Ravenbrand was all that could save me now.

Klosterheim's gun cracked. Two distinct shots.

He had the sense to know when to stop me.

The sword was only half out of the case as I felt sharp pains in my left side and began to stumble backwards under the impact of the bullets. I struggled to stay on my feet. I wanted to vomit but could not. I fell heavily against the mysterious granite altar and slipped to the flagstones. I tried to get back to my feet. My dark glasses fell off. My cap was kicked away from my head revealing my white hair. I looked up. Klosterheim was standing with his legs straddled over my body, the smoking PPK .38 still in his right hand. I do not think I have ever seen such an expression of gloating satisfaction on a human face.

"God in Heaven!" I could hear Hess gasping. He peered down at me, his eyes widening. "Impossible! It is the Bek monster! The bloodless creature they were said to keep in their tower. Is it dead?"

"He's not dead. Not yet, Your Excellency." Klosterheim stepped back. "We'll save him for later. We have an experiment to perform. A demonstration the Führer has requested."

"The Führer," began Hess, "surely would have told me if. . ."

The pointed toe of a boot kicked me efficiently in the side of my head and I lost consciousness.

Dimly, as was constant with me now, I had been sensing what was happening to my alter ego. Suddenly my nostrils were filled with a pungent, reptilian stink and looking up I stared into the familiar eyes of a huge dragon. All the wisdom of the world flickered in those eyes.

I spoke to the dragon in a low, affectionate voice that had no real words to it, that was more music than language, and the dragon responded in the same tones. A thrumming purr came out of its monstrous throat and from its nostrils a few wisps of steam. I knew the creature's name and it remembered me. I had been a child and had changed a great deal. But the dragon remembered me, even though my body was covered in cuts and I was helplessly bound. I smiled. I began to speak a name. Then the pain in my side swept through me like a swift tide and I gasped, going down again into blackness that engulfed me like a blessing.

Had Prince Lobkowitz set this trap for me? Was he now in league with Klosterheim, Gaynor and the Nazi hyena pack?

And did Elric's fate, in his world, mirror my own? Was he, too, dying in the ruins of his old home?

I was aware of pain, rough hands, but could not bring myself out of sleep. I woke up to the smell of oily smoke. I opened my eyes, thinking at first that the armory was on fire. But the old flambeaux brackets had been utilized and a flaming brand guttered in every holder, casting huge shifting shadows.

I felt the tight cloth of a gag in my mouth, my hands were bound in front of me and my feet were free. I was relieved that most of my Nazi uniform had been stripped off me. I wore only a shirt and trousers. My feet were bare. I had been prepared for some kind of special treatment. I moved and agony flooded through me. I felt the wadding of a crude dressing on my wounds. My captors were not famous for administering pain relief to their victims.

At that moment they were not interested in me and I was able to watch what was happening. I saw Hitler, a rather short man in a heavy leather military coat, standing next to the plump, frowning Goring. Nearby, SS Commander Himmler, with the prissy severity of a depraved tax inspector, was talking to Klosterheim. The two men had a similar quality about them I couldn't immediately identify. Members of Hitler's crack SS guard stood at key points in the hall, their machine guns at the ready. They looked like robots from Metropolis.

Gaynor was nowhere to be seen. Hess was talking intensely to a rather bored-looking SS general whose attention was everywhere but on him. Oona was not here. It could mean that she had become alerted to the danger in time. Were her weapons still in the car? Could she at least get the Grail out of Hitler's clutches?

I knew suddenly that I was dying. I had no hope of recovering unless Oona could save me. Even unbound I could not reach my sword, which now lay on the altar like some kind of trophy. While the Nazis were careful not to touch it, they peered at it as if it were a dangerous dormant snake, which might rear up to strike at any moment.

I guessed the sword to be my only hope of life and that a slim one. I was not Elric of Melnibone, after all, but a mere human being caught up in natural and supernatural events far beyond his understanding. And about to die.

From the dampness of the heavy dressing against my side I could tell that I was losing a great deal of blood. I could not tell if any vital organs were damaged, but it scarcely mattered. The Nazis were not about to send for a doctor. I could not imagine the nature of the "experiment" Klosterheim had in mind for me.

The group had the air of men waiting for something. Hitler, who seemed almost as twitchy as Hess, gave the impression of an impatient street vendor, forever on the lookout for trouble. He spoke in that affected German one associates with the Austrian lower middle class and even though he was the most powerful man in the world at that moment, there was a sense of weakness about him. I wondered if this were the banality of evil which my friend Father Cornelius, the Jesuit priest, used to talk about before he went to Africa.

I could hear very little of what was said and most of it sounded like nonsense. Hitler was laughing and slapping his leg with his gloves. The only thing I heard him say clearly was "The British will soon be begging for mercy. And we shall be generous, gentlemen. We will let them keep their institutions. They are ideal for our purposes. But first we must destroy London, eh?"

I was surprised that this was the object of their meeting. I had thought it to do with the "objects of power" Gaynor had brought with him from the Grey Fees.

The door opened and Gaynor stood there. He was dressed all in black, with a great black cloak over his armored body. He had the look of a knight from one of those interminable historical films the Nazis loved to watch. A copper swastika was emblazoned on his breastplate and another on his helmet. He looked like a demonic Siegfried. His hands were clasped around the hilt of the great ivory runesword. He stepped aside with a dramatic gesture as two of his men bundled in a struggling woman.

My heart sank. Our last hope gone. They had Oona.

She was no longer dressed in the Nazi uniform but wore some kind of heavy, oat-colored dress that engulfed her from head to toe. It, too, had a vaguely medieval appearance. Its collar and cuffs were decorated with red and black swastikas. Her wonderful white hair was contained by a filet of silver and her eyes blazed like dark garnets from the pale beauty of her face. She was helpless, bound hand and foot. Her face was expressionless, her mouth set. When she saw me a look of horror came into her furious eyes. Her mouth opened in a silent scream. Then closed more firmly than ever. Only her eyes moved.

I wanted to comfort her, but there was no comfort.

It was clear we were meant to die.

After greeting the others, Gaynor announced with some triumph: "Thus the game I planned reaches its conclusion. Both of these treacherous creatures have been brought to book. Both are guilty of numerous crimes against the Reich. Their fate will be a noble one, however. Nobler than they deserve. The Grail and the Black Sword are now back in our keeping. And we have the sacrifice we need to begin the final sorcery." With a nicker of mockery in his smile, he glanced at Oona. His disgusting appetite was about to be satisfied. "And strike our bargain with the Higher Worlds."

He intended to kill us both-and in pursuit of the Nazis' obscene, half-crazed supernatural nonsense.

The firelight reflected in the eager faces of Hitler and his comrades as they admired the struggling girl. Hitler turned to Goring and made some leering remark to which his lackey responded with a fat chuckle. Only Hess seemed ill at ease. I had the feeling he preferred fanciful daydreams to the actuality of what was evidently to be a bloody ritual.

Goebbels and Himmler, on either side of their Führer, both had tight, chilling smiles on their faces. Himmler's little round eyeglasses positively glinted with hellish glee.

With the sword in one hand, Gaynor reached down and grasped Oona by her moon-colored hair. He dragged her towards the altar. "The chemical and the spiritual marriage of opposites," he announced, like a showman taking the stage. "My Fuhrer, gentlemen, I promised you I would return with the Grail and the Swords. Here is the white sword of Charlemagne-and there, unwittingly returned to its proper place by this wretched half-corpse"-he indicated me-"is the black sword of Hildebrand,

Theodoric's henchman. The sword called Son Slayer, with which he killed Hadubrand, his eldest child. The sword of good"-he lifted the ivory sword and pointed towards the altar-"and the sword of evil. Brought together, they will baptize the Grail with blood. Good and evil will mingle and become one. The blood will bring the Grail to life again and bestow its power upon us. Death will be banished. Our great bargain with Lord Arioch will be struck. We shall be immortal amongst immortals. All this King Clovis the Goth predicted upon his deathbed as he gave the Grail into the keeping of his steward, Dietrich von Bern, who in turn entrusted it to his brother-in-law Ermanerik, my ancestor. When the Grail is washed at last with innocent blood, virgin blood, the Nordic peoples will be united in a common bond and come together as one folk, to take their rightful place as rulers of the world."

Insane nonsense, a farrago of myths and folktales typical of the Nazi rationalizers and with scarcely any historical basis. But Hitler and his gang were entranced by the story. Their existence, after all, depended on myths and folktales. Their political platform might have been written by the Brothers Grimm. It was quite possible Gaynor had made up much of this ritual to impress them, for he had told me that Hitler was merely his means to a greater goal. If so, his strategy was proving effective. He was using their power to summon Arioch. Even the most gullible Nazis would not be able to absorb the actuality. Little comfort to me. Whether they were delusory or not, these ideas would not help me accept my coming fate-or avert Oona's bloody death!

Goring, grossly fat, uttered a nervous rumble of laughter. "We shall not rule the world, Colonel von Minct, until we defeat the Royal Air Force. We have the numbers. We have the ordnance. What we need now is the luck. A little magic would help."

"The luck has held. Because it is not mere luck, but the workings of destiny." This was Hitler muttering. "But there is no harm in ensuring our victory."

"It's always a help," said Goring dryly, "to have a god or two on your side. By this time next week, I assure you, Colonel, we'll be dining with the king at Buckingham Palace, with or without your supernatural aid."

Hitler seemed buoyed by his Reichsmarschall's confidence. "We shall be the first modern government to reinstitute the scientific use of the ancient laws of nature," he said. "What some insist on denigrating as 'magic.' It is our destiny to restore these marginalized disciplines and skills to the mainstream of German life."

"Exactly, my Führer!" Hess beamed, as if at an outstanding student. "The old science. The true science. The pre-Christian Teutonic science, untainted by any hint of southern decadence. A science which depends upon our beliefs and which can be manipulated by the power of the human will alone!"

All this I heard in the distance as my life began to ebb away from me.

"Nothing will convince me, Colonel von Minct," said Hitler with sudden coldness, as if taking charge of the situation, "until you demonstrate the power of the Grail. I need to know that you really have the Grail. If it is the actual Grail it will possess the power of which all legends speak."

"Of course, my Führer. The virgin blood shall bring the cup to life. Von Bek is dying even now. In a short while he will be thoroughly dead. With the Grail, I will restore him to life. So that you may kill him again at your pleasure."

Hitler waved this last away. A distasteful necessity. "We must know if it has the power to restore the dead to life. When this man is dead, we shall expose him to the Grail's influence. If it is the real thing, he will return to life. Immortal, perhaps. If its power can then be channeled to help our air fleet defeat the British, so much the better. But I will only believe that if its most famous property is displayed. And you have yet to produce the Grail, Colonel."

Gaynor laid the white sword beside the black sword, end to end, upon the stone altar.

"And the cup?" asked Goring, borrowing authority from his master.

"The Grail takes many forms," Gaynor told him. "It is not always a cup. Sometimes it is a staff."

Reichsmarschall Goring, in pale Luftwaffe blue and many trimmings, brandished his own elaborate mace of office. His was encrusted with precious stones and looked as if it had been made, with his uniform, by a theatrical costumier. "Like this one?"

"Very similar, Your Excellency."

For a few moments I lost consciousness. Bit by bit my spirit was leaving my body. I made every effort I could to hang on to life, in the hope I might find a way to help Oona. I knew I had only minutes left. I tried to speak, to demand that Gaynor spare Oona, to say that this ritual of virginal sacrifice was savage, bestial-but I would be talking to savage, bestial men, who embraced the monstrous cause. Death called to me. She seemed my only possible escape from all this horror. I never realized until then how easily one can come to long for death.

"You have still to produce the Grail, Colonel von Minct." Goring spoke precisely, mockingly. Plainly he thought this whole thing a nonsense. Yet neither he nor any other member of the hierarchy dare express skepticism to Hitler, who clearly wanted to believe. Hitler needed the confirmation of his own destiny. He had already presented himself as the new Frederick the Great, the new Barbarossa, the new Charlemagne, but his entire career had been based on threats, lies and manipulation. He no longer had any idea of his own reality, his own effect. But should these ancient objects of Teutonic power respond to him, it would prove that he was indeed the true mystical and practical savior of Germany. Something he did not always believe himself. All his actions were now determined by this need for affirmation.

Suddenly, as if he realized I was looking at him, Hitler turned his head. His eyes met mine for an instant. Staring, hypnotic eyes. Hideously weak. I had seen them in more than one obsessed lunatic. He dropped his gaze as if he were ashamed. In that moment I understood him to be a creature thoroughly out of its depth, fascinated by its own luck, its own rise from obscurity, its successful dalliance with oblivion.

I knew he could destroy the world.

Through a haze of death I saw them throw Oona onto the altar. Gaynor raised a sword in either hand.

The swords began to descend. She struggled, trying to fling herself off the granite block.

I remember thinking, as I lost consciousness again: Where is the Cup?

My mental turmoil was not made better by the knowledge that this scene, or a variant of it, was being played out on every plane of existence. A billion versions of myself, a billion versions of Oona, all dying horribly in violence at the same moment.

Dying so that a madman could destroy the multiverse.

Chapter Twenty-One Hidden Virtues

I had not expected to return to consciousness. Dimly I was aware of other forces struggling within me, of ! some commotion at the altar. For a moment I had the delusion I stood in the doorway of the armory, the Black Sword in my hand. And I called Gaynor's name. A challenge.

"Gaynor! You would slay my daughter! So no doubt you understand how much you have angered me."

I forced my head up. Gradually I opened my eyes.

Ravenbrand was howling. She was giving off her weird black radiance. Red runes formed agitated geometries within her blade. She hovered over Oona and refused to carry out Gaynor's actions. The runeblade shook and writhed in his hand, trying to wrench itself free. Stormbringer lusted to kill, but Ravenbrand could not kill certain people. The idea of harming Oona was repulsive. Its semisentient constitution did not permit it to harm an innocent. In this it differed from Elric's Stormbringer, which more closely matched the attitudes of Melniboneans.

Gaynor snarled. The light from the swords and torches painted the watching faces into Bosch grotesques. Those faces turned to look in astonishment at the man who stood in the ruined doorway-an identical black sword in his right hand, a sprawl of brown-shirted bodies behind him. The black blade ran with crimson. He wore torn armor and his own blood-soaked silks. He had the death heat in his wolf's eyes. He must have been through several battles single-handed, but Stormbringer was still in one bloody fist and his face betrayed the memory of a million deaths.

"Gaynor!" The voice was my own. "You run like a jackal and hide like a snake. Will you meet me here, in this holy place of power? Or will you scuttle as usual into the shadows?"

Slow footsteps, the weariness of centuries. My doppelganger entered the armory. For all his exhaustion he radiated a power, a glamour, which the charismatic creatures of the Nazi elite could not begin to match. Here was a true demigod. Here was what they pretended to be. And he was all they claimed, because he alone had paid a price not one of them could even conceive of paying. Had faced such horror, stood his ground against such terror, that nothing could move him.

Almost nothing.

Only a threat to one whom, with all his complex and contradictory emotions, he had given his love. Love most Melniboneans would never understand. With heavy, measured steps he made his way to the altar.

Gaynor attempted again to strike down with Ravenbrand at Oona's heart. The sword resisted him even more vigorously.

Gaynor screamed an oath, flung the screeching black sword at me, and seized the ivory blade in both hands. This time he would finish Oona.

The black blade did not reach its target. In fact it scarcely moved at all. It hovered in the air long enough for Oona to lift her bonds, cut through them, and scramble clear of Gaynor while making a grab at his belt. I was astonished at the blade's apparent sentience.

With a great deal of shouting and shuffling, Hitler and his people had already retreated behind their storm trooper guards. They trained a score of efficient modern machine guns at Elric as he made his way to the altar. He ignored all danger. He was oblivious to the Nazis, as one might be in a dream. There was a hard, savage grin on his handsome, alien features. Once certain that Oona was not in immediate danger, he turned his attention to Gaynor.

The ivory sword hummed and bucked as if it, too, would refuse to kill. I wondered if the swords were sentient or if something else checked them.

Gaynor displayed greater control over the so-called Charlemagne Sword. He stabbed again and again at the hobbled Oona, who had yet to cut her feet free. But the sword simply would not do what he wanted. Wild, mystical language began to pour from his twisted mouth as he summoned the aid of Chaos.

But no aid came.

He had not had time to fulfill his bargains.

Elric darted now, swift as a snake. His black blade firmly blocked the white.

"There is no pleasure in killing a coward," he said to Gaynor. "But I will do it as a duty if I must."

An arc of black and red. A crescent of silver. Elric's sword met the ivory

blade. The two swords screamed in unison in every kind of anguish.

The Black Sword arced again. There was a dull, flat note as it met Gaynor's weapon. The ivory blade began to crack and flake like rotten wood, disintegrating in Gaynor's hand.

Gaynor cursed and discarded it. The thing had always been something of a forgery, with an unclear provenance. Jumping away from the altar, he sought to grab a weapon from the wall. But the weapons had been there years too long and had virtually rusted together. He screamed at the storm troopers to kill Elric, but the guards could not fire without hitting Gaynor or Klosterheim, who leveled his pistol at Elric. The demonic swordsman murmured a single, smiling word.

Ravenbrand plunged towards Satan's ex-servant. Klosterheim gasped. He understood all too clearly what his fate would be if she reached him. He shrieked in Latin. Few of us could understand him. Certainly not the sword, which barely missed him.

Klosterheim flung himself to the ground and Gaynor did the same. At once the machine guns began their mad cacophony, with bullets and spent shells bouncing everywhere in that huge, stone room.

Elric laughed his familiar wild laugh, dodging their fire as if charmed, then ducking behind the altar to be certain that his daughter had not been hit.

She smiled briefly to reassure him and then raced from her cover to where I lay against the wall. Gaynor's razor-sharp Nazi dagger was in her hand. Quickly she reached out, cutting my bonds.

Suddenly Ravenbrand settled herself in my fist, deflecting bullets as the guards turned their attention on me, still surrounding their precious leaders. Hitler and his gang backed hastily toward the ruined main door.

Power surged through me. I too was laughing. With fearless amusement I advanced on Klosterheim. Elric already engaged Gaynor. Oona had only Gaynor's dagger for a weapon, but she ducked behind the altar as the bullets ricocheted around us. They hit only one of the soldiers, causing a yelp of terror from the ranks of the Nazi elite.

Hitler had relied on his luck. But now the luck was with us.

They stumbled through the gap Elric had carved in the door. They tried to cover the ragged hole. They began to move heavy furniture into it. They could not know what we would do next. They gained time to make a plan.

I made to follow, but Elric held me back. He pointed.

Gaynor and Klosterheim remained at the far end of the hall.

"We still have the Grail," cried Gaynor. In his black armor, almost a parody of Elric's own, he looked like a massive, leathery bird prancing in rage as the firelight flared and faded and his shadows joined the dance. "And we still have aid coming from the Lords of the Higher Worlds. Be careful, my cousins. They'll not be happy if their ally on this plane is unable to bring them through."

Elric snorted. "You think I fear the disapproval of gods and demigods? I am Elric of Melnibone-and my race is the equal of the gods!"

But it was not the equal of Klosterheim's automatic which barked twice more and caught Elric entirely by surprise. "What's this?" Frowning, he fell backwards.

I leaped forward but Oona's dagger had already caught Klosterheim directly in his heart. He looked about to vomit, bending double and trying to pull the Nazi blade free.

Gaynor pushed his dying ally aside and made for the low oaken door which led to von Asch's abandoned quarters. Klosterheim did not move. He was evidently dead.

I was too weak to catch Gaynor. He was through the door and barring it after him as I reached it. I put my shoulder to it and felt a jolt of pain.

I looked down at my side, expecting to see more blood. Only a ragged scar remained. How much time had actually passed? Or was time disrupted as a result of Gaynor's selfish interference? Was the multiverse already beginning to disintegrate around us?

"Friends," I heard Elric gasp. "Up. We must go up ..."

Oona tried to make a barrier in front of the ruined main door but the Nazis had done much of the work from their own side! We had no means of escape. By now Gaynor could be far ahead of us, taking the Grail back into the Grey Fees.

I continued pushing at the small door, but without success.

The miscellaneous furniture began to move in the main door. It looked like the Nazis had gathered their courage and were returning.

A crash came from the doorway. Hess stood there, waving his machine gunners forward. He was the only one of his kind with the guts to confront us. Now we had no chance at all of getting free.

I tried my shoulder against the other door, but I was still too weak. I called for Oona to help. She was supporting Elric. He was leaning on Gaynor's altar. Blood poured from his wounds and stained the dark granite.

Impatiently the Melnibonean straightened himself and took hold of his sword, telling me to stand aside. "This is becoming my habitual method of opening doors," he said. Though full of bravado, his voice was feeble.

He gathered his strength and let the sword carry the blow as he brought it down upon the door, splitting the ancient oak in two. The pieces fell aside to admit us. We scrambled across it and up the stairs in Gaynor's wake. Behind us I heard Hess shouting hysterically to his men.

The tower had not been used for years. As we carried Elric through we discovered that many of von Asch's possessions were still where he had left them. Trunks, cupboards, chairs and tables were covered in deep dust. Books and maps were long neglected. He had taken his swords and some clothes, but little else. We could see from marks in the dust which way Gaynor had gone. While Elric lay in a collapsed state against the wall, Oona and I dragged heavy furniture out of the rooms to block the narrow staircase. Oona glanced quickly through the books and papers, found something she wanted and put it in her pocket. Carrying Elric, we continued upwards until a short corridor led us out onto a broad quadrangle surrounded by narrow battlements broken by chimneys.

Miraculously, Gaynor was still there. He had expected to find help or easy escape. But there was a sheer drop on all sides.

I flung myself after the dark figure I saw ahead of me. It dodged around a buttress, a chimney breast, but I kept it in sight. Then suddenly Gaynor had turned. He was in horrible pain. His whole body vibrated and shook with a wild silvery light. He was growing in size. But as he grew, he dissipated. Like ripples in a pool, each one a slightly larger representation of its predecessor, Gaynor grew bigger and bigger, pulsing and expanding like a great chord of music, high into the sky, into the fabric of the multiverse. He fragmented and became whole at the same time!

I stumbled on, still trying to lay hands on him. I reached him, tried to hold him. Something electric tingled in my fingers, I was blinded for a moment, and then Gaynor was gone. Silence.

"We have lost both Gaynors," I said. I shook with violent anger mixed with fear.

Elric gasped and shook his head. "All of them, for the moment. He has fled in a thousand directions, playing his most dangerous card. Fragmenting into a multitude of versions, each one a slightly larger scale. He dissipates his essence throughout the multiverse, so that we cannot follow. He is at his most unstable. His most dangerous. Perhaps his most powerful. He exists everywhere and nowhere. The risk is that he can be everyone and no one. He spreads his essence thinly. But one thing we do know of him-he has failed to keep his bargain with Arioch. He was attempting to bring the Duke of Hell into this realm.

"If Gaynor hasn't driven himself completely insane, he will do one of two things. He will seek to escape the Duke of Hell, which would be foolish and probably impossible. Or he will go to seek a compromise with him. Which means he must find a place of convergence. Bek denied him, he needs another place of convergence through which he can admit his patron. There cannot be many others in this world."

"Morn," said Oona. "It will be on Morn." She held up the paper she had taken.

"A place of convergence?" I asked. "What is that?"

"Where many possibilities come together," she said. "Where the moonbeam roads meet. I know this realm well. He will go to the Stones of Morn and attempt to gather all his many selves back into a single whole."

That was all she could tell me before there came a hammering from within the tower.

"How can we possibly follow him?" I asked.

"I have brought friends," murmured Elric. "Gaynor sought to use them for his own ends. But he lacks our blood. It is how I followed him from Melnibone. Swords call to swords. Wings to wings."

Hess and his men were breaking down the door.

I looked over the battlements. The drop would kill us. There was nowhere left to go. We had no choice but to take a stand. Elric stumbled back towards the tower dragging his sword with both hands. As the door came down he swung the sword. It took the three leading storm troopers by surprise. They went down at once and the blade shrieked its glee. Elric's breath hissed as he absorbed the blade's strength. The stolen energy was quickly restoring him.

Reluctantly I joined him and together we took another five or six men before they retreated into the tower and began shooting at us from a safer distance. The narrow passage made it impossible for them to see us or hit us and their ammunition was wasted.

Elric told us to keep the storm troopers diverted. He limped to the edge of the battlements and looked up into a night sky which boiled with dark cloud stained by an orange moon. He lifted the sword. It began to blaze again with black fire. Elric, in his ruined armor and torn silks, burned with the same flame as he lifted his skull-white face to the turbulent heavens and began the singing of a rune so ancient its words were the voice of the elements, the wind and the earth.

A few more shots from the tower. A cautious storm trooper emerged. I killed him.

Dark shapes roamed the sky now. Sinuous shapes slithered their way amongst the clouds.

Elric had drawn strength from his victims. He stood silhouetted against the battlements, sword in hand, screaming at the sky.

And the sky screamed back at him.

Like sudden thunder, there was a bang, and the sky began to bubble and crack. Forms emerged from the distance. Monstrous flying creatures. Reptiles with long, curling tails and necks, slender snouts and wide, leathery wings. I recognized them from my nightmares. The dragons of Melnibone, brought to my own realm by Elric's powerful sorcery. I knew Gaynor had hoped to recruit these dragons to his cause. I knew he had almost defeated Elric in the ruins of Imrryr. I knew he had found the hidden caves and sought to wake Elric's dragon kin. He had been successful. But he had not understood that the dragons would refuse to serve him. Blood for blood; brother for brother. They served only the royal blood of Melnibone. And that blood, by a trick of history, Oona and I shared with her father.

Two huge beasts circled the tower in the orange moonlight. Young Phoorn dragons, still with the black and white rings around their snouts and tails, still with feathery tips to their wings, they had not grown to the size of their elders, whose life spans were almost infinite, as dragons spent most of their time asleep.

Elric was weakened by his incantation, but his spirits were rising. "I prepared for this. But I had also expected to have the Grail with me when I summoned my brothers." Melniboneans claimed direct kinship with the Phoorn dragons. In another age they had shared the same names, the same quarters, the same power. In ancient history, it was said dragons had ruled Melnibone as kings. Whatever the truth, Elric and his kind could drink dragon venom, which killed most other creatures. The venom was so powerful that it ignited in the air as soon as it spewed from the dragons' mouths. I knew all this, because Elric knew it.

I knew the language of the dragons. We greeted them affectionately as they landed their huge bodies delicately on the tower. They were steaming and shaking with the turbulence of their journey through the multiverse. They opened their huge red mouths, gasping in the thin air of this world. Their vast eyes turned to regard us. Expectant, benign, their monstrous claws gripped the stone battlements as they balanced there. The patterns of their scales, subtle and rich purples and scarlets, golds and dark greens, glistened in the moonlight. They were very similar in appearance, one distinguished by a blaze of white above its nose, the other with a blaze of black. Their great white teeth clashed when they closed their mouths, and on the edges of their lips, their venom constantly boiled. These were the beasts of the Siegfried legend, but far more intelligent and considerably more numerous. The Melniboneans had made many studies of dragons, detailing all the various kinds, from the snub-snouted Erkanian, nicknamed the batwing, to these long-nosed hibernating Phoorn, whose relationship with us was oddly telepathic.

Holding his side, Elric approached the nearest dragon, speaking to her softly. Both dragons were already saddled with the pulsing Phoorn skeffla'a, a kind of membrane which bonded with the dragon above its shoulder blades, giving it the ability to travel between the realms. The skeffla'a was one of the strangest productions of Melnibonean alchemical husbandry and one of the oldest.

Their names were simple, like most names given to them by men-Blacksnout and Whitesnout. Their names for themselves were long, complicated and utterly unpronounceable, detailing ancestry and where they had journeyed.

Elric turned to me. "The dragons will take us to Gaynor. You know how to ride?"

I knew. As I now knew most things connected with my dop-pelganger.

"He's still in this world. Or at least certain aspects of him are. He could have exhausted himself and no longer have the power to travel the moonbeam roads. Whatever the reasons, the dragons can take us to him."

"To Morn," said Oona. "It must be Morn. Does he still have the Grail?"

"It's not something we'll know until we catch up with him ..." Elric's voice trailed away as he was overcome with pain. Yet he seemed slightly stronger than a few minutes earlier. I asked him how badly he had been shot and he looked at me in surprise. "Klosterheim shot to kill. And I am not dead."

"I should also have died from Klosterheim's gun," I told him. "The wounds were very evident. I lost an enormous amount of blood. But the wound has now almost vanished!"

"The Grail," said Elric. "We've been exposed to the Grail and haven't known it. So it is either on Gaynor's person or hidden somewhere back there."

Hess's face emerged from the doorway. He ordered his men to stop shooting. His face bore an expression of sincerity, of urgency.

"I must talk to you," he said. "I must know what all this means. What kind of heroes are you? The heroes of Alfheim? Have we conjured our ancient legendary Teutonic world back in all its might and glory? Thor? Odin? Are you-?"

The dragons had impressed him.

"I regret, Your Excellency," I said, "that these are dragons of oriental origin. They are Levantine dragons. From the wrong side of the Mediterranean."

His eyes widened. "Impossible."

Oona helped Elric adjust his skeffla'a on Blacksnout's back. She climbed up behind him, signaling to me to take the other dragon, Whitesnout.

"Let me come with you!" Hess was pleadingly eager. "The Grail-I am not your enemy."

"Farewell, Your Excellency!" Elric sheathed Stormbringer and wrapped his hands around the dragon's reins. He seemed to regain his strength with every passing moment.

I climbed into the dragon saddle with all the familiarity of one born to the royal line. I was full of a wild, unhuman glee. Alien. Faery. Though I would have scoffed at such an idea a short while earlier, now I accepted everything. There is no greater joy than riding through the night on the back of a dragon.

The massive wings began to beat. Hess was driven back, as if by a hurricane. I saw him mouthing something, pleading with me. I almost felt sympathetic to him. Of all the Nazis, he seemed the least disgusting. Then I saw Goring and the storm troopers burst out onto the roof. The air was once again alive with popping bullets. They were no danger to us. We could have destroyed the tower and all within it by releasing a few drops of venom, but it did not occur to us. We were convinced Gaynor had the Grail and if we could catch him in time it would soon be ours.

The exhilaration of the flight was extraordinary! Elric led the way through the air on Blacksnout's back, while Whitesnout followed. I had no need to control my dragon, though I knew intuitively how to do so.

Every anxiety was left behind me on the ground as the mighty wings beat against the clouds, bearing us higher and higher, farther and farther west. Where? To Ireland? Surely not to England?

England was my country's enemy. What if I were captured, still in the vestiges of my SS uniform? It would be impossible to convince them of my true reasons for being there!

I had no choice. Blacksnout, with Elric and Oona, flew with long, slow movements of her wings, gliding above the clouds ahead of me, sometimes casting a faint shadow. She flew steadily and Whitesnout, her junior by a year or two, let her lead. As the light grew stronger, the markings of the dragon's wings were clearer. They were like gigantic butterflies, with distinct patterns of red, black, orange and glowing viridian, far different from the green and yellow reptiles of picture books. The Phoorn dragons were creatures of extraordinary grace and beauty with a sense about them that they were wiser than men.

Whenever the clouds parted, I could see the patterned fields and nestling towns of rural Germany. They had known little of direct strife for more than a century and were secure in Hitler's assurances that no foreign bombers would be allowed to enter German airspace.

I wondered if Hitler would be able to keep his promises. My guess was that he would begin relying on magic as political and military means failed him. He seemed like a man riding a tiger, terrified of where it was taking him yet unable to jump clear because of the momentum at which he was moving.

Or a man riding a dragon? Did I think Hitler helplessly caught up in events because I myself was carried along by monumental realities?

Such speculation soon left my head as I relished the beauty of the skies. The smell of clear air. I was so enraptured that I hardly heard the first droning behind me. I looked back and down. I saw a carpet of airplanes, so thick, so close together, that they seemed at first to be one huge bird. The droning was the steady sound of their engines. They were moving a little faster than we were, but in exactly the same direction.

I could not see how any country, especially depleted, weary Britain, could stand against such a vast aerial armada. Nothing like it had been assembled in the world's history. The only equivalent sea force had been the Spanish fleet, massed to attack England during Elizabeth's reign. England had been saved that time by a trick of the weather. She could expect no such good fortune now.

I had seen whole civilizations destroyed since this adventure had begun. I knew that the impossible was all too possible, that peoples and architecture could disappear from the face of the earth as if they had never existed.

Was I, by some ghastly coincidence, about to see the last of England, the fall of the British Empire?

What I had so far seen was a squadron of Junkers 87s-the famous Stuka dive-bomber, which the Luftwaffe had traditionally used in their first attacks on other countries. But as we flew on, obscured by the cloud separating us from the air fleets below, I saw waves of Messerschmitt fighters, squadrons of Junkers and Heinkels, relentlessly moving towards an already battered Britain that could not possibly produce the numbers or quality of aircraft to combat such an invasion.

Was this why Gaynor was leading us to the west? So that we might witness the beginning of the end? The final battle whose winning would ensure the rule of the Lords of the Higher Worlds on earth? And would those same lords remain at peace? Or would they immediately begin to fall upon one another?

Were we on our way to Ragnarok?

The planes passed. A strange silence filled the sky.

As if the whole world were waiting.

And waiting.

In the distance we began to hear the steady, mechanical thunder of guns and bombs, the shriek of fighters and tracer bullets. Away to our east, we saw oily smoke rising from erupting orange flame, saw flares and exploding shells. Blacksnout banked in a long graceful turn into the morning sun and soon the sound of warfare was behind us. England could not last the day. The war against Europe was as good as won. Where would Hitler turn his attentions next? Russia?

I mourned England's passing with mixed feelings. Her arrogance, her casual power, her easy contempt for all other races and nations, had all been there to the end. These qualities were what had led her to underestimate Germany. But also her courage, her tenacity, her lazy good nature, her inventiveness, her coolness under fire, all these had been invested in her great warships, those fighting islands in miniature, each its own small nation. Those men of war had ruled the world and defeated Napoleon on sea, while together we had defeated him on land. A bloody, piratical nation she might be, ready to boast of her own coarseness and brutality. But her heroes had earned their power through their own determination, by risking their own lives and fortunes. And not a few of those great men had been great poets or historians. If she were decadent now, it was because she no longer possessed such men of integrity and breadth of vision.

This was her day of reckoning. The day to which all great imperial nations come eventually-Byzantium and Carthage, Jerusalem and Rome. Unable to conceive of their mortality, they know the double bitterness of defeat and slavery. Hitler had rein-troduced slavery throughout his empire. The British, who had led the world in abolishing that dreadful practice, would again know the humiliation and deep misery of forced labor. Even as she set her national vices aside and called upon her virtues, the Last Post was sounding for her freedom and her glory. She would go to her defeat proving that virtue is stronger than vice, that courage is more prevalent than cowardice and that the two can exist together at a moment to which we can point years later as examples of the best, rather than the worst, that we can be. And show how virtue made us stronger and safer than any cynicism ever could. Why was that a lesson we had to learn over and over again?

Such philosophical meanderings while experiencing the physical exhilaration of riding on a dragon! What a typical thing for me to be doing! But I could not help grieving for that great country which so many Germans thought of as their natural partner, the best that they themselves could be.

Water now. Calm, blue sparkling water. Green hills. Yellow beaches. More water. Lazy sunlight, as if the world had never been anything but paradise. Little towns seemed to have grown from the earth itself. Rivers, woods, valleys. The distinctive domestic beauty of the English shires. What would become of all this once Germany crushed British air power and "Germanified" the world into a comic-opera version of its heritage? The bleak, black cities they all loathed, of course, were defending this tranquillity, this ideal, against the tyranny which, in the name of preserving it, would destroy their way of life forever.

So powerful were my feelings that I wished I was back facing the dangers of Mu Ooria. That would have been easier. Had Gaynor really destroyed that gentle race and left only a few survivors?

Over the sea again, gentle in a southerly breeze, to a tiny green spot looking scarcely more than a hillock, jutting out of the water and lapped by white-topped waves. The leading dragon banked again and circled the island, which was about half a mile across. I saw a Tudor house, a ruined abbey, a white peninsula, like a rat's tail, which served as a natural quay. No people were gathering to see us; nothing suggested the place had been occupied for a long time. The center of the island was topped by a grassy hill which bore a ragged granite crown of stones, marking it as the site of an ancient place of ritual. At one time, long ago, those stones had stood straight and formed a combined observatory, church and place of contemplative study.

And so we came to the Isle of Morn, to Marag's Mount, "whence all the pure virtue of the English race came so long ago," as their epic explorer poet Wheldrake put it. One of the great holy places of the West with a history even more ancient than that of Glastonbury or Tintagel. As the dragons landed gracefully upon Mom's pure white sandy beach, and the sea beat like a warning drum upon the rocks, I knew why Gaynor was here.

Morn was one of the great places of power which even the Nazis acknowledged, though its founders were Celts, not Saxons. The Isle of Morn, where all the old races of the world sent their scholars to exchange ideas and discuss the nature of existence, the differences and similarities of religions, in that Silver Age before the Teuton explosion. Before the violence and the conquest began.

To Morn had come bishops, rabbis and Muslim scholars, Buddhists, Hindus, Gnostics, philosophers and scientists, all to share their knowledge, At the abbey below the hill they had met regularly. An international university, a monument to good will. Then the Norsemen had come in their dragonships and it was over.

I climbed down from my dragon, scratching her neck under her scales, and thanking her for her courtesy. I removed the skef' fla'a, folded it and tucked it inside my shirt. Oona stumbled towards me, still finding her land legs in the soft, white sand. She pointed to the headland. There, at anchor, sat a German U-boat with two sentries standing guard on her low, water-washed decks.

A coincidence? The scouts for the invasion fleet? Or had Gaynor arranged for it to be here, to use it to escape, if need be? But why? He had not known we could follow him. It seemed an elaborate precaution to take on the mere chance of being found here.

Whatever the reason, the Nazi U-boat offered no immediate danger. I doubted they would have believed the reality anyway. Dragons rarely come ashore on small islands in the middle of the Irish Sea.

A word from Elric, and the great beasts were airborne again, arrowing to the upper regions of the air where they would wait out of sight.

Pausing only for a few moments, we struck inland through the cobbled streets of the deserted village, past the great Hall where Morn's independent Duke had ruled until 1918 and which was now boarded up, past a surviving farm or two which had no doubt been evacuated at the outbreak of this war, and up the winding lane which led to the top of the grassy hill and the ring of stones.

So far nothing was unusual about the place. Squabbling gulls cruised the waves and hovered in the air. Blackbirds sang in windswept trees, sparrows hunted in the overgrown hedgerows, and in the distance the surf drummed reassuring rhythms.

With some effort we climbed to the crest of the island where the granite standing stones leaned like old men, one against the other. Their circle was still complete.

We were approaching the stones, when I noticed a strange milky light flickering faintly from within. I hesitated. I had no stomach for further supernatural encounters. But Oona urged us on.

"I knew he would have to come here if we defeated him at Bek," she said. "He hopes to contact Arioch. But I think I'll have a surprise for him."

Oona led the way into the center of the stones. Beyond, the sea was very calm. Perfect weather for an invasion, I thought. I looked for the U-boat, but it wasn't visible from this point.

The translucent light washed around our feet and legs like surf. "Draw your swords, gentlemen," she said. "I will need their energy."

We obeyed her. This beautiful young girl and the confidence she radiated fascinated us. She held up her bow staff and then dipped it into the opalescent substance, drawing it up like paint and describing extraordinary geometric patterns in the air, linking one stone to another until they were crisscrossed with a cat's cradle of pearly, sparkling force.

At the same time Oona spoke. She murmured and sang, making spells. There was a sense of urgency about her movements and her voice.

Lights began to zigzag wildly until I was thoroughly confused and blinded. She took Ravenbrand from me and described a large oval with it. The oval undulated and formed a tunnel in the light. Walking along the tunnel of light towards us, I saw a figure.

Fromental!

The Frenchman strolled into the circle of stones as if looking for a good place for a picnic. To confirm this intention, he held in his hand a covered basket. He was completely unsurprised to see us and greeted us with a cheerful wave. Stepping into the stone circle, a crimson light surrounded him, wrapping around him like a bloody coat. It flared and was gone. The milky web also disappeared. A stink of something old and hot remained. I recognized the smell but did not know why.

"Am I in time?" he asked Oona.

"I hope so," she said. "Did you bring her?"

Fromental lifted the basket. "Here she is, Lady Oona. Shall I take her out?"

"Not yet. We have to be sure he is coming. He will get here somehow. As will Arioch. Gaynor expects to meet Arioch at the Stones of Morn. They have been here before."

"My Lord Arioch is with us now," said Elric quietly.

Elric's whole manner changed. He sensed his master's presence in the circle. He spoke rapidly, urgently.

"My Lord Arioch. Forgive us for this intrusion. Give us your good will, I beg, for the sake of our ancient covenants. I am Elric of Melnibone and our blood is bound to the same destiny."

A voice, sweet as childhood, spoke from the air. "You are my mortal offspring. You represent my interests in other realms, but not in this one. Why are you here, Elric?"

"I seek revenge upon an enemy, my lord. One who serves you. Who offered you this portal."

"One of my servants cannot be your enemy."

"One who serves two masters is nobody's friend," Elric replied.

The voice, whose warmth embraced and comforted like an old, loving relative, chuckled.

"Ah, bravest of my slaves, sweetest of my succulent children. Now I remember why I love thee."

My throat filled with bile. Being in the invisible creature's presence was almost physically unbearable. Even Oona seemed unwell. But Elric was if anything more relaxed than usual, even tranquil. "I am destined to serve thee, great Duke of Hell. The old pact is between my blood and thine. The one who dubs himself Knight of the Balance has already betrayed one Lord of the Higher World, and I know he would betray another."

"I cannot be betrayed. It is impossible. I trust nothing. I trust no one. I imprisoned Miggea for him. And this was to be my pay-ment. This is a rich, delicious realm. There is much in it to relieve my boredom. Gaynor swore loyalty to me. He would not dare try my patience further."

"Gaynor's loyalty is to Law before Chaos." I heard myself speak. My voice was a kind of echo in my own skull and sounded like Elric's. "And I assure you, Duke Arioch, I owe you no loyalty. It is not in my interest to allow you to enter my realm. Your forces already destroy too much. But I can offer you the means of claiming your payment from Gaynor."

Arioch was amused. I glimpsed the outline of a golden face, the most beautiful face in the multiverse, and I loved it. "Those are not my forces, little mortal. They are the forces of the Lady Miggea. They are the forces of Law who make war against your world."

"Gaynor wishes you to oppose them?"

"I have no interest in his wishes, only his actions. He merely offered me an opportunity. It is in my nature to oppose Law. "

"Then our interests are the same," I agreed. "But we cannot strike the same bargain with you that Gaynor struck."

"Gaynor promises me an entry into your realm. By means of his magic and his wisdom. You will not do the same for me?"

"No, master." Elric. "We do not have the means. The great object of power is lost to us."

"Gaynor will bring it here." "

"Perhaps," said Elric. He spoke with respect but also with the firmness of one who regarded himself the equal of Gods. "Master, you have no rights in this realm."

"I have rights in all realms, little slave. Nonetheless, I grow tired of this game. I appear to be playing against my own self-interest. As soon as Gaynor brings the key, I and my armies will pass through to bring unbridled Chaos to a bored little world. Miggea's forces are without the guidance of a vital mind. We shall soon defeat them. Your fears are unnecessary."

"And if Gaynor does not bring the key, Your Excellency?" said Oona, gazing levelly up at the golden head.

"Then Gaynor is mine. Mine to eat. Mine to regurgitate whenever I choose. Mine to drink. Mine to piss. Mine to tickle. Mine to kiss. Mine to shit and mine to fart. Mine to take his heart. Mine to clothe with iron shoes. Mine to dance. Mine to bruise. Mine to use." The achingly beautiful lips smacked like a troll's in a fairy tale. I began to wonder if it were only Miggea of Law who grew senile amongst the Lords of the Higher Worlds. Could the whole race of gods have grown too old to have any clear idea of their desires or interests? Was the multiverse in the hands of such creatures? Was our own condition reflected in theirs?

Fromental, meanwhile, followed none of this. We spoke a language completely alien to him. He looked from Oona to me, eyebrows raised, asking a silent question.

Elric saw something and pointed. Without a thought, he folded both hands around Stormbringer's hilt.

Gaynor, still in his armor but looking somewhat the worse for wear, appeared on the white beach. Had the U-boat brought him to Morn? He clearly could not see anything within the stone circle and thus believed himself to be alone. He was swordless, apparently with no weapons. And he had no cup with him either.

We took a certain pleasure in watching Gaynor advance.

He paused before entering the circle. He peered in. We remained invisible to him. Ocher light filled the spaces between the stones.

"Master? Lord Arioch?"

Arioch's voice was a gentle invitation. "Enter."

Gaynor stepped through.

And found all his enemies awaiting him.

He turned in startled fury. He tried to step back out of the circle, but he was trapped.

"Have you brought me the key, little mortal?" Arioch spoke again with a delicacy suggesting he tasted each syllable before he released it into the air.

"I could not, sire." His attention was more on us than on the Lord of the Higher Worlds. "The thing has a mind of its own ..."

"But it is your duty to control it."

"It cannot be controlled, my lord. It has a will, I swear, if not intelligence."

"But I told you all that, little mortal. And you assured me you had the means of gaining control. That is why I helped you. That is why I imprisoned Lady Miggea for you."

Elric laughed as Gaynor's confidence ebbed. "I came for more help," said our enemy almost pathetically. "A little more. But why? How . . . ? These are your enemies, my lord. They who would oppose you."

"Oh, I think they have shown me rather more respect, Prince Gaynor, than I have received from you. You seem to think it possible to lie to a Lord of the Higher Worlds. You seem to think I'm some bottle imp to give you as many wishes as you desire. I am no such thing! I am a Duke of Hell! I have ambitions which go far beyond your imaginings. And my patience is ended. How shall I punish you, little Prince?"

"I can bring you through, my lord, I swear. I just have to return to Bek. Mighty forces even now rise to dominate this realm. Hour by hour they gain more territory, more power. Only you, through me, can defeat them, my lord."

"I have no interest in saving this realm," said Arioch in regal astonishment. "I just wished to play with it for a while. Now my only pleasure, little Gaynor, will be to play with you."

Oona turned to Fromental and snatched the basket from his hands. She reached into it and lifted out its contents.

It appeared to be a miniature model. An intricate ivory cage made of thousands of tiny bones from which a tiny voice raged.

Miggea, still trapped, was furious.

"How did you do that?" I asked Oona in astonishment.

"It is not difficult. Scale is the only thing that varies from realm to realm. Each realm, as I explained to you, is on a slightly different scale, which is how we are able to navigate between them and why we are not immediately aware of their existence.

"I arranged for Lieutenant Fromental to bring her here. Miggea is very powerful, but quite thoroughly imprisoned. Given her own volition she would soon adjust her scale to the realm in which she finds herself. I do not have the power to release her. Only the one who imprisoned her can do that."

"You have brought another of these creatures to my world?" This seemed the height of irresponsibility to me. "To war against the one already here? To turn the whole planet into a battlefield?"

"You will see," said Oona. "But you must all leave the circle now. First, give me your sword."

Against all sense I handed her Ravenbrand. Then Elric, Fromental and I stepped outside the Stones of Morn.

The little we could see became a shadow play. The dark, lounging presence of Duke Arioch, the swift, elegant figure of Oona placing the cage of bone on the ground. Gaynor transfixed. Oona then touched the cage with the point of my sword. I heard Arioch's voice, faintly booming. "Well, my lady, it seems it is no longer in my interest to hold you captive."

A noise like splitting flint.

A terrible crack.

Something began to boil and writhe and grow within the circle. Something which cackled and squealed with idiot laughter and pushed against whatever force the stone circle held. Miggea, having escaped the cage, now sought to escape the circle.

The stones shook. They might have been dancing. Then they were still, straight, waiting. They looked to me as they must have looked when the first Druids newly erected them. Tall, white granite, flashing in the light from the sun.

Suddenly a figure of unstable fire stood before us, caught in the circle, writhing uncontrollably, screaming silently out at us. Gaynor's face was burning. His whole body was in flames. Burning with a million conflicts generated in his ungenerous heart. And there he was again, standing beside himself, still flaming, still screaming. He was begging us for something. Could it have been forgiveness? Or merely release? Another dancing, burning figure, and another, until they made a full circle within the circle.

From above, the shadowy golden face of Duke Arioch smiled and whistled as if watching a puppet show, and the senile, drooling, cackling creature that had once been one of Law's greatest aristocrats poked at Gaynor's twisting body, which changed shape and size, became many versions of itself, then one, then fragmented again. I heard his screams. They were like nothing else I had ever heard in all my life.

Arioch and Miggea tugged at him, breaking off pieces of his many identities in their struggle. They played with him as cats might play with a cricket. There was little animosity between them. All their hatred was directed at Gaynor, stupid Gaynor, who had thought he could play one of them off against the other.

He begged them to stop.

I was close to begging for the same thing! A thousand Gaynors filled the circle. A thousand different kinds of pain.

Oona regarded this with quiet satisfaction, in much the same way she might look upon a piece of domestic handiwork and congratulate herself.

"He cannot bring himself back to his archetype," she said. "It is the only way we survive. A sense of identity is all we have. At this moment all Gaynor's many

identities are in conflict. He is being disseminated throughout the multiverse. The convergence Gaynor sought to use for his own selfish ends has proved to be his undoing."

"Too many!" Arioch swore. "You promised me the power of Law. I already possess the power of Chaos. Where, fractured Gaynor, is the Grail?"

The replies were various, multitudinous, horrifying. "She has it!" was the only coherent phrase we heard.

Then Gaynor was gone.

Miggea was gone.

Arioch's voice was a satisfied, luscious whisper. "The Grail is still there. At my point of entry, where he promised to bring me through."

Monstrous lips smacked.

And then Arioch, too, disappeared.

Between them, he and Miggea tore Gaynor into a million psychic shreds.

A rustling, like an autumn wind, and sorcery was gone from that realm. The old stones pushed their way up through ordinary grass. A bright sun shone in the sky. The surf washing the white beach was the loudest sound we had ever heard. I turned to Fromental. "You struck this bargain with Oona when you met her at Miggea's prison?"

"We did not know exactly what we would do with Miggea, but it was useful to have her in portable form." Fromental winked. "Now I must return to my friends. Tanelorn is saved, but they will want to know the rest of this story. I am sure we'll meet again, my friend."

"And the Off-Moo? Do you know their fate?"

"They have another city, that is all I know. On the far shore of the lake. They went there. Few were killed."

With the air of a man who had urgent business, he shook hands with me and walked back to the shore. A skiff with two seamen waited for him, offering him a salute as he got into the boat. I had made the wrong presumptions about the U-boat. Fromental had sent it ahead of him. He waved to us again and was then rowed quickly over to the U-boat. Perhaps I would never know how he managed to send a captured goddess to us by submarine!

As I watched the conning tower disappear below the waves, my attention returned to the depressing realities of my own realm. Where a conquering air fleet was ensuring that Adolf Hitler would soon control the world.

I reminded Elric that my work was unfinished. If the Grail was still at Bek, perhaps I could find a way of using it against the Nazis. At the very least it should ultimately be returned to Mu Ooria.

The dreamthief's daughter smiled at me, as if at an innocent. "What if the Grail always belonged at Bek?" she said. "What if it was lost and the Off-Moo were merely its temporary guardians? What if it decided to return home?"

I scarcely took this in as something else dawned on me. I looked urgently to Elric. "Klosterheim!" I cried. "Both of us survived his bullets because we were in the presence of the Grail and did not know it! The Grail works against dissipation. Gaynor could not have performed his magic with it on his person. The Grail's still there. But that means everyone who was in its presence survived. Which means Klosterheim could even now be in possession of the Grail."

Elric paused. I sensed that he was reluctant to stay in this dream. He wanted to rejoin Moonglum and continue his adven-turings in the world he understood best. At last he said, "Klosterheim, too, has earned my vengeance. We'll go back to Bek." He paused, laying a long-fingered hand on my shoulder. For a moment he was a brother.

When we returned to the beach the dragons were already waiting for us, as if they knew we needed them. They were rattling their quills and skipping with

impatience from one huge foot to the other. The sun flashed off their butterfly colors dazzling all around. They were young Phoorn, capable of flying halfway around the world without tiring. They yearned to be aloft again.

We unrolled our skeffla'an and saddled our dragons. Climbing onto their broad backs, we settled ourselves in the natural indentations which could, on a Phoorn, take up to three riders.

With a murmur from Elric, still the great dragonmaster, bright reptilian wings cracked and moved the heavy air, cracked again and took us into the afternoon sky with the steady beat of rowers across a lake. They increased speed with each mighty flap, tails lashing and curling to steer us through the rushing currents of the air. With necks stretched out and great eyes blazing, they scanned the cloud ahead. Ancient firedrakes.

We skimmed the sea, then swept gracefully upwards until we were flying east over the gentle wooded hills and dales again, back towards Germany.

This time Elric took a slightly different course, going farther south than I might have expected, perhaps to witness the devastation of the proud hub of Empire in defeat. He, too, understood the peculiar ambivalences of owing allegiance to a dying empire.

But now there was some extra purpose to Elric's flight as he led us down through the clouds and into the late afternoon light-to where an aerial dogfight was in progress. Two Spitfires wheeled and climbed as their guns blazed at an overwhelming pack of Stukas. The German planes had been deliberately fitted with screaming sirens to make them sound more deadly. The air filled with their dreadful Klaxons, but the Spitfires, with extraordinary lightness and maneuverability, gave back their best.

Elric was shouting as he urged his dragon down. I heard his voice faintly on the wind as I followed him. After the incredible exhilaration of our dive, Blacksnout turned her long head, narrowed her great yellow eyes, and snorted.

She snorted acid fire.

Fire struck first one Stuka and then another. Plane after plane went down in an instant as the dragon swept the squadron with her terrible breath. I saw looks of astonishment on the thankful faces of the Spitfire pilots as they banked upwards and flew as fast as they could into the cloud.

The few surviving Stukas turned to seek the relative safety of the high skies, but Elric ignored them. We flew on.

Ten minutes later we came upon a great sea of Junkers bombers. It struck me that their crews were my own countrymen. Some of them could be cousins or distant relatives. Ordinary, decent German boys caught up in the nonsense of militarism and the Nazi dream. Was it right to kill such people, in any cause? Were there no other alternatives?

Whitesnout followed her sister down the hidden air trails. Their tails cracked like gigantic whips, venom frothed and seethed in their mouths and nostrils. Our dragons fell upon their prey with all the playful joy of young tigers finding themselves in a herd of gazelle.

Guns fired at us, but not a single shot struck. The dragons' steely scales deflected anything that hit them. For the gunners it was impossible-they must have thought they were dreaming.

Down we went and all I saw were Nazi hooked crosses, a symbol which stood for every infamy, every dishonor, every cynical cruelty the world had ever known. It was those crosses I attacked. I did not care about the crews who flew under such banners. Who were not ashamed to fly under such banners.

Down I dived. Whitesnout's venom seared from her mouth, blown by red-hot air generated in one of her many stomachs. The flaming poison struck bomber after bomber, all still with their loads. They blew into fragments before our eyes.

Some of the planes tried to peel away. Some dropped their bombs at random. But again the dragons circled. Again the planes were destroyed. The few that remained turned tail and raced back towards Germany. What story would they tell when they returned? What story would they dare tell? They had failed, however they explained it.

And thus we gave birth to a famous legend. A legend which took credit for the victory of the RAF over the Luftwaffe. The legend which many believed turned the course of the war and caused Hitler to lose all judgment and perhaps what was left of his sanity. A legend which proved as powerful, in the end, as the Nazi myth unleashed on the peoples of Europe. Ours was the legend of the Dragons of Wessex, which came to the aid of the English in their hour of need. A legend which elevated British morale as thoroughly as it crushed German. Even the story of the Angel of Mons from the first world war was not as potent in its time as the legend of the Dragons of Wessex. King Arthur, Guinevere and Sir Lancelot, it was said, all reappeared. Flying on the fabulous beasts of ancient days, they came to serve their nation in its hour of need. The story would eventually be suppressed, as Hess was to discover. The legend was so powerful that propaganda resources of both nations were devoted to promoting or denying it.

By the time we flew home to Germany, we had destroyed several squadrons of bombers and innumerable fighters. The Battle of Britain had turned significantly. From that moment on, Hitler acted with increased insanity as his predictions lost credibility. From that moment on, his famous luck wholly deserted him.

As the tireless dragon bore me back to Bek, I mourned. I endured the anguish of my own conscience. Though the cause had been right, I had still made war on my own people. I understood all the reasons why I should have done it, but I would never, for the rest of my life, be fully reconciled to this burden of guilt. If I survived and peace was restored, I knew I would meet some mothers whom I would not be able to look in the eye.

The joy of victory, the thrill of the flight, was tempered by a strange melancholy which has remained with me ever since.

By the time we reached Bek, the place was evidently deserted. There wasn't a guard in sight. Hitler and his people had left in disgust and everyone else had made haste to disassociate themselves with the place. There was nothing left to guard.

The place was oddly still as we landed on the battlements and cautiously made our way down into the old armory.

Scenes of mayhem were everywhere. Blood was everywhere. But no corpses. And no cup.

Where was the Grail? All the evidence indicated it was never removed from Bek. But did Klosterheim somehow take it?

Oona gestured to me to wait for her as she slipped away into the deserted castle.

I felt Elric's hand on my shoulder again, an affectionate brotherly gesture.

"We must find Klosterheim." I turned and started to make my way back up the stairs.

"No!" Elric was emphatic. "What? It's my duty to follow him," I said. "I'll follow Klosterheim," said Elric. "If I'm successful you'll never see him again. I'll return to Melnibone. These young dragons have done good work and must be rewarded." "And Oona? Your daughter?"

"The dreamthief's daughter stays here." With a cold crack of his cloak he turned his back on me and strode for the steps leading from the chamber. I wanted to ask him to return. I had much to thank him for. But, of course, I had served him also. We had been of mutual help. I had saved him from eternal slumber and he had turned the tide of war. The Luftwaffe was crushed. By the courage of a few and with the help of a powerful legend.

Britain would gather strength. America would help her. Eventually the fascists would be ousted from power and democracy restored.

But before that moment came, the blood of millions would be spilled. It was hard to see who would win anything from that terrible conflict.

I looked helplessly around at our old armory. So much violence had taken place here. How would it ever feel like home to me again?

How much I'd lost since Gaynor's first visit to Bek! When he tried to get the Raven Sword from me in order to kill my doppel-ganger's daughter! I had certainly lost a kind of innocence. I had also lost friends, servants. And a certain amount of self-respect.

What had I gained? Knowledge of other worlds? Wisdom? Guilt? A chance to turn the tide of history, to stop the spread of Nazi tyranny? Many yearned to be able to do that. Circumstances of blood and time had put me in a position to change the course of the war in favor of my country's enemy.

The guilt grew more intense as Allied bombing increased. Cologne. Dresden. Munich. All the beautiful old cities of our golden past gone into rubble and bitter memory. Just as we had blown the memory and pride of other nations to smithereens and defiled their dead. And all for what?

What if this pain, this pain of all the world, could be stopped? By the influence of one object? By the thing they called the Runestaff, the Grail, Finn's Cauldron-the object that created a field of serenity and balance all around it. Sustaining its own survival and the survival of the multiverse.

Where was it, this panacea for the grief of nations?

Where was it, but in our own hearts?

Our imaginings?

Our dreams?

Had all I experienced in Mu Ooria been a complex but unreal nightmare into which the dreamthief's daughter lured me? An illusion of magic, of the Grail, of unending life? Once I was in no doubt of the Grail's properties or of its power for good. But now I wondered if the thing actually was a power for good? Or was it self-sustaining and not interested in questions of human morality?

Was Gaynor right? Did the Grail demand the blood of innocents to be effective? Was that the final irony? No life without death?

Oona came through the ruined doorway, a shaft of sunlight behind her. She had found her bow and arrows where she had hidden them.

She looked at me and realized that Elric, was gone.

She ran for the old staircase.

"Father!"

She disappeared up the steps before I could reach the door. I called after her, but she ignored me or did not hear.

I went up the stairs rapidly, but something made me slow when I reached the top of the tower and the narrow corridor which led to the roof. I moved reluctantly and looked out at the battlements where Elric held his daughter in a tender embrace.

Behind him the dragons muttered and stamped, anxious to be aloft again. But Elric was slow to leave. When he lifted his face those troubled eyes were weeping.

I watched him place a gentle kiss on his daughter's forehead. Then he strode over to the impatient Blacksnout and stood scratching the great beast under her scales. With a quick, graceful movement, he climbed into his saddle and called in his musical voice, called to his dragon sisters.

With a massive crash of wings the two great reptiles mounted the evening air. I watched their dark shapes circling against the great red disk of the setting sun.

They banked with slow grace into a dark shadow and were suddenly gone.

Oona turned, dry-eyed, her voice unnaturally low. "I can see him anytime I choose," she said. She held something in her hand. A small talisman.

"In his dreams?" I asked.

She stared at me for a moment.

Then I followed her inside.