The Skrayling Tree toa-2

by Michael John Moorcock

  The only lighting in the warren of cobbled streets and apart-ments came from the taverns and dwellings themselves. Behind the oiled vellum of windows, the candles and lamps gave the twilit town a sepia look. I searched for a seamen's hostelry Friar Triste-lunne had told me of. The smell of ozone was strong in my nostrils, as was the smell of fish. I was hungry for some fresh octopi, which Melniboneans had always eaten with great respect. The creatures possess intelligences greater than most mortals. Certainly their flavor is considered subtler.

  My own Melnibonean appetites and impulses were forever at odds with the ideas I had inherited from my human companions. Cymoril, while she was alive, never knew that cannibalism disgusted me. She had taken her place at the ritual tables without a thought. I derived very little pleasure in the arts of torture cultivated by Melniboneans for thousands of years. For us there were formal methods of dying as well as of killing.

  As a youth I began to doubt the wisdom of these pursuits. Cruelty was scarcely a trade, much less an art. My fears for Mel-nibone had been practical. I had lived and traveled in the lands of the Young Kingdoms. I understood how soon they must overwhelm us. Had that been the reason that I had joined the ranks of my enemies? I dismissed this guilt. I had no time for it now. I found the tumbledown, straw-roofed shingle building with a

  dim fish-oil lamp illuminating a sign that read in old Cyrillic Odysseus's, which was either the name of the owner or of the hero with whom he wished to be associated. The tavern had declined a little since the Golden Age.

  Not trusting the Dalmatians, I dismounted from Solomon to lead him into the tavern. It stank of stale wine and sour cheese. The straw on the floors had not been replaced in months. There was a dead dog in one corner. The dog offered the advantage of attracting most of the flies and covering up the worst of the smells. The majority of the other customers were collected at a bench playing backgammon. A couple of men who sat talking quietly in the corner farthest from the dog attracted me. They had the filthy fair hair of the typical Danish pirate, arranged in two greasy plaits which had enjoyed as much of their meat gravy as they had. But they seemed in good humor and spoke enough kitchen Greek to make themselves understood. Clearly they were not disliked, for the landlord's girl was relaxed with them and told a joke which had them all laughing until they saw me a little more clearly.

  "Nice horse," said the taller, his eyes narrowing a little, though he tried to disguise his expression. I was familiar with the response. He had recognized me as the Silverskin. He was wondering if he was going to find out what it was like to contract leprosy. Or have his immortal soul turned to roughage.

  "I'm looking for a boy to keep an eye on him," I said. "He might even be for sale." I held up a silver Constantine. Shadow rats appeared from everywhere. I selected one and told him the Constantine was his as long as the horse was safe and well groomed. If he knew of a likely customer he would get a commission. Then I stared into the unhappy faces of the Vikings and told them I was looking for a man named Gunnar the Luckless. The men understood this subtle snub. "He's called Earl Gunnar the Wald, and he has a liking for good manners," said the younger, clearly wishing he had not been put in this position. They were Leif the Shorter and Leif the Larger.

  As the boy took away my horse to the ostler's, I turned to one of the serving women and ordered a skin of their best yellow wine.

  I, too, I said, appreciated good manners and would feel snubbed if they did not join me. The group with the backgammon board, hearing us speaking Norse, displayed only a passing interest in me, having identified me as an outlander. I heard one of them refer to me as Auberoni and was amused. I was no king of the fairies. The men were Venetian fishermen who had settled here recently and clearly had never heard of II Pielle d'Argent or his sword, which was still known in Venice as II Corvo Noir after its legendary maker, who had not actually forged the sword but had made the fanciful hilt. A large body of opinion believed the sword had taken its first soul from Corvo.

  I dusted off the crusader's surcoat I still wore and joined the wary lads, Leif and Leif, who typically had hands as carefully groomed as their hair was greasy. I supposed if they ate mostly with their fingers, there was a point to keeping them clean. Needing neither to shave nor, in the conventional sense, pass feces, few Melniboneans were familiar with beards or urinals. Many human habits remain deeply mysterious to us.

  The Vikings probably thought me some effete Byzantine affecting Oriental manners. They had enough respect for my reputation, however, and showed me perfect courtesy. Renowned for their love of poetry and music and fine workmanship, Vikings enjoyed cultured living and hospitality. These two sea-

  robbers, though they served under one of the most evil captains known, were well informed and told me they had discussed deserting Gunnar for crusading or working as mercenaries in Byzantium. But they had no real choice. Their fate was to sail with Gunnar until the Valkyries came to carry them to Valhalla. They found a boy to run to Gunnar.

  By the time we finished the skin, there came a stirring and a chorus of greetings. Earl Gunnar had arrived.

  He hated to show his face. They said his wounds were so hideous he could not bear to look on his own features. I was surprised at the baroque workmanship of his mask, fashioned like a gryphon's head with an open, threatening mouth, but where the gullet would be was a face of silvered steel. Of Eastern origin, the helmet's crest had been cleverly crafted in silver and pewter: gryphon ascendant. But it was my own face I saw when I first looked at him. He was coming towards me, striding with dangerous inelegance.

  Gunnar the Doomed was a bear. He was twice my width and slightly taller. I could imagine this terrifying figure on the bridge of his ship. He wore fine-woven plaids and linens and, like all his kind, his hands were girlishly tended. Hanging down over his shoulders his hair showed a little grey. With his well-

  trimmed, flowing locks, his rich clothing and knee-high doeskin boots, he could have been a Danish noble of the previous century. There was a generally archaic air about the man. It had been a hundred years since the last Vikings had gone on raiding expeditions.

  The Norse sailors most reminded me of my old friend, the bluff, direct and solidly realistic Smiorgan Baldhead of the Purple Towns. As an individual Gunnar struck me as Smiorgan's opposite. There was something unwholesome about him. He affected the rough manners of a nobleman too long in the company of brutes. Yet he was a real diplomat. He knew enough not to threaten me. Instead he preferred to charm me. He ordered another skin of Bulgar wine and had it brought to the table where I still sat with his men. I could, of course, read nothing from the face, completely covered by the mirrored steel of the helmet. There were dark cavities in the mask. Through two of these he stared at me. Through another he fed himself tiny scraps of some kind of meat he carried in his hand. Otherwise he had the familiar manner of those who do not know me. He kept a little distance between us on the chance that I was actually a leper. Courteously I refused his wine. I had drunk my fill, I said. "I have some business with you, Earl Gunnar."

  Gunnar shrugged. "I'm not a merchant, and my ship is not for hire."

  "You are an adventurer, like myself, and your ship is your own. I'm not here to hire you, Earl Gunnar. A man like yourself does not strike me as one who would sing to another's tune no matter how sweet the melody."

  "You've come overland, have you? Where from? Constantinople? Did you ride through the Devil's Garden?"

  I told him that I had. He nodded. He sat back in his chair, that more-than-

  enigma tic mask regarding me with some interest. "So you saw all those massive heads. You'd think they were alive, eh? I saw something like them when I sailed with the Rose on her twin-hulled ship The Either/Or. We passed an island which marked the boundaries of that people's empire. Huge eyes staring from these stone faces. An island of giants. We did not go closer." Gunnar had a certain witch-sight. No ordinary mortal would have seen those stones for what they were. I held my own counsel and let Gunnar continue.


  "So you know me by my reputation, as I know thee, Sir Sil-verskin. And it pleases you to flatter my pride. Yet you know I do indeed work for hire on occasions. So, while I appreciate your courtesy, I'd be as happy to get down to business, if we have any, as not. I sail on the morning tide, and my crew is already aboard, save for these two, whom I came to find." He paused. Taking a reed from within his jerkin he placed one end in his wine cup and the other in the aperture in his mask. He sipped delicately. "My destination's already determined."

  "I understand that also." I dropped my voice. "North and west to the World's Rim?"

  He was too canny a captain to respond immediately. "You know more than I do, Sir Silverskin. We are merely setting sail for Las Cascadas to find fresh crewmen. Winter approaches, and at this time we normally go down to Zanzibar, where we take an interest in the slave trade. It's a poor business, but there are few other ways for an independent captain to make a living in these oversettled times."

  I opened my palm and showed him what was there. "Give me a berth on your ship, Earl Gunnar, and I'll tell you more about this."

  It was not in his nature to hesitate.

  "The berth is yours," he said. "We sail on the first tide."

  CHAPTER NINE

  Pielle d' Argent

  Darkling dragon, reiver's pride,

  Rides nigh upon the turquoise tide.

  His weird-drenched wave

  Snail bear him to a rich retreat.

  Darkling dragon, reiver's pride,

  Lord of the Last, destined to die.

  In Woden's waves he'll find no grave

  His death's pre-written on his own black blade.

  LONGFELLOW, 'Lord of the Lost"

  A little before dawn I was down at the harbor looking over the long, slender ship lying against the dock. Solomon had been sold for a fair price to a Greek merchant who had some fancy to show himself off as a knight. I threw in the surcoat for good measure. At least he could pretend to fellow Christians to have been a crusader. Solomon would be making his way home to Lombardy shortly after we sailed. If he was lucky, the merchant would not be on the stallion's broad and cunning back.

  Narrow, seemingly delicate, yet full of sinewy power even at anchor, The Swan pulled eagerly at her traces, haughty and confident as her namesake. I heard Gunnar had bought her from the impoverished Greenlanders who had made her but lacked the skills to sail her.

  I admired the lines of the ship. Her fine, beaky figurehead might deliberately have been a cross between a swan and a wyvern. She had the swan's calm stateliness, but also an air of menace, which had something to do with the rake of her deck, the set of her mast.

  In the old Viking manner there were shields strapped to the rail above the board which ran between the rowing benches and the shutbeds where men could store their goods and get sleep when utterly worn out. I knew that many Vikings preferred to sleep at their oars and had developed ways of hanging over the great, golden sweeps to find the total rest of the thoroughly exhausted. But half the shield spaces were empty. I suspected they were not filled by born Norsemen.

  I waited patiently near the gangplank as the sea-raiders arrived. They represented most nations, from Iceland to Mongolia. "By Ishtar," murmured a Persian, seeing me, "Gunnar's more desperate for men than we knew." Some of the races I did not recognize at all, but there were tall, thin East Africans, a couple of burly Moors, three Mongols and a mixture of Greeks, Albanians and Arabs. All of them had the grim look of men who knew violence more thoroughly than peace. Settling in to the ship, some of them took places by shields they had clearly acquired from the dead. The two Ashanti had brought their own long shields. Others had no shields at all. There was a miscellaneous mixture of weaponry. If ever a crew was born to sail a ship into the realms of Chaos, it was The Swan's.

  Out on the far horizon something moved. I glanced up. Mel-niboneans were also a seafaring people, and I had their way of scanning the ocean out of the corner of my eye. One of the Mongols ran up the mast like a rat to yell out his urgent fear.

  "Venetian war galleys. Making good speed."

  Gunnar came brawling down to the dock, half a dozen whores and hounds forming a living train behind him, shouting orders which were followed like thoughts by his obedient men. He took a moment to turn his faceless head to me and yell "We sail for Las Cascadas. We'll be safe there. Come aboard. If we can't strike a bargain, I'll set you off on the island." He swung his heavily cloaked body up over his rail and headed for the stern.

  Las Cascadas was a notorious rock in the western Mediterranean with a single port. It was still some days' sail away, and we had the Venetians, possibly the Turks, perhaps the Byzantines, the Italians and the Caliphates to deal with, all of whom claimed authority over these seas. Gibr al Tairat itself was not so thoroughly untakable, but Las Cascadas's harbor was so well protected no enemy fleet could hope to enter. Any attempt to attack by land was thwarted by the steep, volcanic cliffs which rose sheer from the water. As a result the place had become a refuge for every corsair on the Red Coast and beyond and had its own queen, the infamous pirate known across the seafaring world as the Barbary Rose, whom Gunnar boasted of sailing with. Her strangely named twin-prowed ship was unmistakable and had been built apparently by shipwrights the Rose had brought with her from the South Sea Empire, which few European navigators even believed existed. Only the two tattooed giants, who still served the she-

  captain, knew the secret of making such vessels.

  The black-and-gold sails of Venice were slightly larger on the horizon now. The tide was beginning to run our way, and I squeezed into a space between the mast and the deckhouse, marveling at the efficiency of these seamen. With a single woollen sail, they could get a ship into battle order in moments.

  The oars bit the water as Gunnar roared the beat. We leaped out of the harbor, oblivious of everything but escape. Dhows and wherries scattered as we shot through the outer walls and into open sea, oars and sail combining to bring the ship about as Gunnar himself stood at the steering sweep, making adjustments with the touch of his hand, the balance was so beautiful. The unshipped oars moved in amazing uniform, like a neatly choreographed dance, and The Swan darted like a live thing under our feet, thrusting out into the deep water long before the Venetians saw us. We were already running for the Mediterranean, and unless they had laid a real trap for us there, we might even leave them behind completely. Once we were seen to reach the safety of Las Cascadas, any other pursuers would give up. Earl Gunnar had always made a point of staying on good terms with the Caliphates.

  Two-masted, slave-rowed, heavy in the water and clumsy fore and aft, built more for endurance and protection than attack, the Venetian ships needed good weather and great luck even to keep pace with us. We quickly saluted farewell as our glorious pursuers fell below the horizon. Then we ran down the Illyrian coast and, with oars at full speed, sail bellying with a powerful southwester, rounded the Italian peninsula with a strong wind for Sicilia and the Tyrrhenian Sea, where we ran into a small flotilla of black-sailed ships expectantly lying in wait for us. Two brigantines and a brig.

  Gunnar stood on his own bridge holding his sides and jeering with laughter as we sped by the lumbering vessels. "Three!" he shouted. "Three ships! Only three to catch The Swan! Your wealth makes you stupid!" He then turned to me. "They insult us, eh, Sir Silverskin."

  It was clear he felt a bond with me which I did not share. I was exhilarated by the ship's performance. Gunnar, however, continued to act as if being overtaken by the Venetians were imminent. Like me he had learned not to relax too soon.

  Later that night he finally gave the order to slow oars. His men slept instantly over their sweeps. Almost at her own volition The Swan continued to glide through the water. Gunnar planned to hug the Numidian shore all the way to the Magreb. In the west, only a few miles of sea separated the coast from Las Cascadas.

  Gunnar joined me in the prow, where I had found a little solitude and was looking up at the
great splash of the Milky Way, staring at stars which were at once familiar and unfamiliar. I had wrapped myself in my deep indigo oilskin cloak. Golden autumn touched the ocean. I remembered the story told to Melnibonean children of the dead souls who walk the star-roads of the Milky Way, which we called the Land of the Dead. I was, for some reason, thinking of my father, the disappointed widower who blamed me for my mother's death.

  Gunnar made no apology for interrupting me. He was in good spirits. "Those fat merchant bastards are still wallowing their way around Otranto!"

  He clapped me on the back, almost as if feeling for a weakness. "So are you going to tell me how you think you know my plans? Or am I going to throw you overboard and put you out of my mind?"

  "That would be ill-advised," I said. "But also impossible. You know I am effectively immortal and invulnerable."

  "I won't know that until I put it to the test," he said. "But I do not believe you are any less mortal than myself."

  "Indeed?" I saw no point in quarreling with him. He recognized the token I showed him. The ring which seemed fresh-minted.

  "Aye, Elric Sadricsson, I know you from King Ethelred's time, when he paid you with that ring for your aid against the Danes. But the ring's far more ancient, eh. I thought the Templars had it now."

  "Ethelred ruled a century and a half ago," I said. "Do I seem so old? I am, as you know, not a well man."

  "I think you are much older than that, Sir Templar," Gunnar said. "I think you are ageless." There was a sinister note to his voice, a mocking quality which irritated me. "But not invulnerable."

  "I think you mistake me for Luerabas, the Wandering Albanian, whom Jesus cursed from the tomb."

  "I know for a fact that story's nonsense. Prince Elric of Mel-nibone, your story is far from being finished. And far from judgment."

  He was trying to disturb me. I did not show him he had succeeded. "You know much for a mortal," I said.