The Sword & Sorcery Anthology

by David G. Hartwell

  He cried: “Stormbringer! Stormbringer, unite with your brother! Come, sweet runeblade, come hell-forged kinslayer, your master needs thee...”

  Outside, it seemed that a wailing wind had suddenly sprung up. Elric heard shouts of fear and a whistling sound. Then the covering of the wagon was sliced apart to let in the starlight and the moaning blade quivered in the air over his head. He struggled upwards, already feeling nauseated at what he was about to do, but he was reconciled that he was not, this time, guided by self-interest but by the necessity to save the world from the barbarian menace.

  “Give me thy strength, my sword,” he groaned as his bound hands grasped the hilt. “Give my thy strength and let us hope it is for the last time.”

  The blade writhed in his hands and he felt an awful sensation as its power, the power stolen vampirelike, from a hundred brave men, flowed into his shuddering body.

  He became possessed of a peculiar strength which was not by any means wholly physical. His white face twisted as he concentrated on controlling the new power and the blade, both of which threatened to possess him entirely. He snapped his bonds and stood up.

  Barbarians were even now running towards the wagon. Swiftly he cut the leather ropes binding the others and, unconscious of the nearing warriors, called a different name.

  He spoke a new tongue, an alien tongue which normally he could not remember. It was a language taught to the Sorcerer Kings of Melniboné, Elric’s ancestors, even before the building of Imrryr, the Dreaming City, over ten thousand years previously.

  “Meerclar of the Cats, it is I, your kinsman, Elric of Melniboné, last of the line that made vows of friendship with you and your people. Do you hear me, Lord of the Cats?”

  Far beyond the Earth, dwelling within a world set apart from the physical laws of space and time which governed the planet, glowing in a deep warmth of blue and amber, a manlike creature stretched itself and yawned, displaying tiny, pointed teeth. It pressed its head languidly against its furry shoulder—and listened.

  The voice it heard was not that of one of its people, the kind he loved and protected. But he recognized the language. He smiled to himself as remembrance came and he felt the pleasant sensation of fellowship. He remembered a race which, unlike other humans (whom he disdained) had shared his qualities—a race which, like him, loved pleasure, cruelty and sophistication for its own sake. The race of Melnibonéans.

  Meerclar, Lord of the Cats, Protector of the Feline Kind, projected himself gracefully towards the source of the voice.

  “How may I aid thee?” he purred.

  “We seek one of your folk, Meerclar, who is somewhere close to here.”

  “Yes, I sense him. What do you want of him?”

  “Nothing which is his—but he has two souls, one of them not his own.”

  “That is so—his name is Fiarshern of the great family of Trrrechoww. I will call him. He will come to me.”

  Outside, the barbarians were striving to conquer their fear of the supernatural events taking place in the wagon. Terarn Gashtek cursed them: “There are five hundred thousand of us and a few of them. Take them now!”

  His warriors began to move cautiously forward.

  Fiarshern, the cat, heard a voice which it knew instinctively to be that of one which it would be foolish to disobey. It ran swiftly towards the source of that voice.

  “Look—the cat—there it is. Seize it quickly.”

  Two of Terarn Gashtek’s men jumped forward to do his bidding, but the little cat eluded them and leaped lightly into the wagon.

  “Give the human back its soul, Fiarshern,” said Meerclar softly. The cat moved towards its human master and dug its delicate teeth into the sorcerer’s veins.

  A moment later Drinij Bara laughed wildly. “My soul is mine again. Thank you, great Cat Lord. Let me repay you!”

  “There is no need,” smiled Meerclar mockingly, “and, anyway, I perceive that your soul is already bartered. Goodbye, Elric of Melniboné. I was pleased to answer your call, though I see that you no longer follow the ancient pursuits of your fathers. Still, for the sake of old loyalties I do not begrudge you this service. Farewell, I go back to a warmer place than this inhospitable one.”

  The Lord of the Cats faded and returned to the world of blue and amber warmth where he once more resumed his interrupted sleep.

  “Come, Brother Sorcerer,” cried Drinij Bara exultantly. “Let us take the vengeance which is ours.”

  He and Elric sprang from the wagon, but the two others were not quite so quick to respond.

  Terarn Gashtek and his men confronted them. Many had bows with long arrows fitted to them.

  “Shoot them down swiftly,” yelled the Flame Bringer. “Shoot them now before they have time to summon further demons!”

  A shower of arrows whistled towards them. Drinij Bara smiled, spoke a few words as he moved his hands almost carelessly. The arrows stopped in midflight, turned back and each uncannily found the throat of the man who had shot it. Terarn Gashtek gasped and wheeled back, pushing past his men and, as he retreated, shouted for them to attack the four.

  Driven by the knowledge that if they fled they would be doomed, the great mass of barbarians closed in.

  Dawn was bringing light to the cloud-ripped sky as Moonglum looked upwards. “Look, Elric,” he shouted pointing.

  “Only five,” said the albino. “Only five—but perhaps enough.”

  He parried several lashing blades on his own sword and, although he was possessed of superhuman strength, all the power seemed to have left the sword so that it was only as useful as an ordinary blade. Still fighting, he relaxed his body and felt the power leave him, flowing back into Stormbringer.

  Again the runeblade began to whine and thirstily sought the throats and hearts of the savage barbarians.

  Drinij Bara had no sword, but he did not need one, he was using subtler means to defend himself. All around him were the gruesome results, boneless masses of flesh and sinew.

  The two sorcerers and Moonglum and the messenger forced their way through the half-insane barbarians who were desperately attempting to overcome them. In the confusion it was impossible to work out a coherent plan of action. Moonglum and the messenger grabbed scimitars from the corpses of the barbarians and joined in the battle.

  Eventually, they had reached the outer limits of the camp. A whole mass of barbarians had fled, spurring their mounts westwards. Then Elric saw Terarn Gashtek, holding a bow. He saw the Flame Bringer’s intention and shouted a warning to his fellow sorcerer who had his back to the barbarian. Drinij Bara, yelling some disturbing incantation, half-turned, broke off, attempted to begin another spell, but the arrow pierced his eye.

  He screamed: “No!”

  Then he died.

  Seeing his ally slain, Elric paused and stared at the sky and the great wheeling beasts which he recognized.

  Dyvim Slorm, son of Elric’s cousin Dyvim Tvar the Dragon Master, had brought the legendary dragons of Imrryr to aid his kinsman. But most of the huge beasts slept, and would sleep for another century—only five dragons had been aroused. As yet, Dyvim Slorm could do nothing for fear of harming Elric and his comrades.

  Terarn Gashtek, too, had seen the magnificent beasts. His grandiose plans of conquest were already fading and, thwarted, he ran towards Elric.

  “You white-faced filth,” he howled, “you have been responsible for all this—and you will pay the Flame Bringer’s price!”

  Elric laughed as he brought up Stormbringer to protect himself from the incensed barbarian. He pointed to the sky: “These, too, can be called Flame Bringers, Terarn Gashtek—and are better named than thou!”

  Then he plunged the evil blade full into Terarn Gashtek’s body and the barbarian gave a choking moan as his soul was drawn from him.

  “Destroyer, I may be, Elric of Melniboné,” he gasped, “but my way was cleaner than yours. May you and all you hold dear be cursed for eternity!”

  Elric laughed, but his voice
shook slightly as he stared at the barbarian’s corpse. “I’ve rid myself of such curses once before, my friend. Yours will have little effect, I think.” He paused. “By Arioch, I hope I’m right. I’d thought my fate cleansed of doom and curses, but perhaps I was wrong...”

  The huge horde of barbarians was nearly all mounted now and fleeing westwards. They had to be stopped for, at the pace they were traveling, they would soon reach Karlaak and only the gods knew what they would do when they got to the unprotected city.

  Above him, he heard the flapping of thirty-foot wings and scented the familiar smell of the great flying reptiles which had pursued him years before when he had led a reaver fleet on the attack of his home-city. Then he heard the curious notes of the Dragon Horn and saw that Dyvim Slorm was seated on the back of the leading beast, a long spearlike goad in his gauntleted right hand.

  The dragon spiraled downward and its great bulk came to rest on the ground thirty feet away, its leathery wings folding back along its length. The Dragon Master waved to Elric.

  “Greetings, Prince Elric, we barely managed to arrive in time I see.”

  “Time enough, kinsman,” smiled Elric. “It is good to see the son of Dyvim Tvar again. I was afraid you might not answer my plea.”

  “Old scores were forgotten at the Battle of Bakshaan when my father Dyvim Tvar died aiding you in the siege of Nikorn’s fortress. I regret only the younger beasts were ready to be awakened. You’ll remember the others were used but a few years past.”

  “I remember,” said Elric. “May I beg another favour Dyvim Slorm?”

  “What is that?”

  “Let me ride the chief dragon. I am trained in the arts of the Dragon Master and have good reason for riding against the barbarians—we were forced to witness insensate carnage a while ago and may, perhaps, pay them back in their own coin.”

  Dyvim Slorm nodded and swung off his mount. The beast stirred restlessly and drew back the lips of its tapering snout to reveal teeth as thick as a man’s arm, as long as a sword. Its forked tongue flickered and it turned its huge, cold eyes to regard Elric.

  Elric sang to it in the old Melnibonéan speech, took the goad and the Dragon Horn from Dyvim Slorm and carefully climbed into the high saddle at the base of the dragon’s neck. He placed his booted feet into the great silver stirrups.

  “Now, fly, Phoorn brother,” he sang, “up, up and have your venom ready.”

  He heard the snap of displaced air as the wings began to beat and then the great beast was clear of the ground and soaring upwards into the grey and brooding sky.

  The other four dragons followed the first and, as he gained height, sounding specific notes on the horn to give them directions, he drew his sword from its scabbard.

  Centuries before, Elric’s ancestors had ridden their dragon steeds to conquer the whole of the Western World. There had been many more dragons in the Dragon Caves in those days. Now only a handful remained, and of those only the youngest had slept sufficiently long to be awakened.

  High in the wintry sky climbed the huge reptiles and Elric’s long white hair and stained black cloak flew behind him as he sang the exultant Song of the Dragon Masters and urged his charges westwards.

  Wild wind-horses soar the cloud-trails,

  Unholy horn doth sound its blast,

  You and we were first to conquer,

  You and we shall be the last!

  Thoughts of love, of peace, of vengeance even were lost in that reckless sweeping across the glowering skies which hung over the ancient Age of the Young Kingdoms. Elric, archetypal, proud and disdainful in his knowledge that even his deficient blood was the blood of the Sorcerer Kings of Melniboné, became detached.

  He had no loyalties then, no friends and, if evil possessed him, then it was a pure, brilliant evil, untainted by human drivings.

  High soared the dragons until below them was the heaving black mass, marring the landscape, the fear-driven horde of barbarians who, in their ignorance, had sought to conquer the lands beloved of Elric of Melniboné.

  “Ho, dragon brothers—loose your venom—burn—burn! And in your burning cleanse the world!”

  Stormbringer joined in the wild shout and, diving, the dragons swept across the sky, down upon the crazed barbarians, shooting streams of combustible venom which water could not extinguish, and the stink of charred flesh drifted upwards through the smoke and flame so that the scene became a scene of hell—and proud Elric was a Lord of Demons reaping awful vengeance.

  He did not gloat, for he had done only what was needed, that was all. He shouted no more but turned his dragon mount back and upward, sounding his horn and summoning the other reptiles to him. And as he climbed, the exultation left him and was replaced by cold horror.

  I am still a Melnibonéan, he thought, and cannot rid myself of that whatever else I do. And, in my strength I am still weak, ready to use this cursed blade in any small emergency. With a shout of loathing, he flung the sword away, flung it into space. It screamed like a woman and went plummeting downwards towards the distant earth.

  “There,” he said, “it is done at last.” Then, in calmer mood, he returned to where he had left his friends and guided his reptilian mount to the ground.

  Dyvim Slorm said: “Where is the sword of your forefathers, King Elric?” But the albino did not answer, just thanked his kinsman for the loan of the dragon leader. Then they all remounted the dragons and flew back towards Karlaak to tell them the news.

  Zarozinia saw her lord riding the first dragon and knew that Karlaak and the Western World were saved, the Eastern World avenged. His stance was proud but his face was grave as he went to meet her outside the city. She saw in him a return of an earlier sorrow which he had thought forgotten. She ran to him and he caught her in his arms, holding her close but saying nothing.

  He bade farewell to Dyvim Slorm and his fellow Imrryrians and, with Moonglum and the messenger following at a distance, went into the city and thence to his house, impatient of the congratulations which the citizens showered upon him.

  “What is it, my lord?” Zarozinia said as, with a sigh, he sprawled wearily upon the great bed. “Can speaking help?”

  “I’m tired of swords and sorcery, Zarozinia, that is all. But at last I have rid myself once and for all of that hellblade which I had thought my destiny to carry always.”

  “Stormbringer you mean?”

  “What else?”

  She said nothing. She did not tell him of the sword which, apparently of its own volition, had come screaming into Karlaak and passed into the armoury to hang, in its old place, in darkness there.

  He closed his eyes and drew a long, sighing breath.

  “Sleep well, my lord,” she said softly. With tearful eyes and a sad mouth she lay herself down beside him.

  She did not welcome the morning.

  The Adventuress

  JOANNA RUSS

  This is the tale of a voyage that is of interest only as it concerns the doings of one small, gray-eyed woman. Small women exist in plenty—so do those with gray eyes—but this woman was among the wisest of a sex that is surpassingly wise. There is no surprise in that (or should not be) for it is common knowledge that Woman was created fully a quarter of an hour before Man, and has kept that advantage to this very day. Indeed, legend has it that the first man, Leh, was fashioned from the sixth finger of the left hand of the first woman, Loh, and that is why women have only five fingers on the left hand. The lady with whom we concern ourselves in this story had all her six fingers, and what is more, they all worked.

  In the seventh year before the time of which we speak, this woman, a neat, level-browed, governessy person called Alyx, had come to the City of Ourdh as part of a religious delegation from the hills intended to convert the dissolute citizens to the ways of virtue and the one true God, a Bang tree of awful majesty. But Alyx, a young woman of an intellectual bent, had not been in Ourdh two months when she decided that the religion of Yp (as the hill god was called) was a disas
trous piece of nonsense, and that deceiving a young woman in matters of such importance was a piece of thoughtlessness for which it would take some weeks of hard, concentrated thought to think up a proper reprisal. In due time the police chased Alyx’s coreligionists down the Street of Heaven and Hell and out the swamp gate to be bitten by the mosquitoes that lie in wait among the reeds, and Alyx—with a shrug of contempt—took up a modest living as pick-lock, a profession that gratified her sense of subtlety. It provided her with a living, a craft and a society. Much of the wealth of this richest and vilest cities stuck to her fingers but most of it dropped off again, for she was not much awed by the things of this world. Going their legal or illegal ways in this seventh year after her arrival, citizens of Ourdh saw only a woman with short, black hair and a sprinkling of freckles across her milky nose; but Alyx had ambitions of becoming a Destiny. She was thirty (a dangerous time for men and women alike) when this story begins. Yp moved in his mysterious ways, Alyx entered the employ of the lady Edarra, and Ourdh saw neither of them again—for a while.

  Alyx was walking with a friend down the Street of Conspicuous Display one sultry summer’s morning when she perceived a young woman, dressed like a jeweler’s tray and surmounted with a great coil of red hair, waving to her from the table of a wayside garden-terrace.

  “Wonderful are the ways of Yp,” she remarked, for although she no longer accorded that deity any respect, yet her habits of speech remained. “There sits a red-headed young woman of no more than seventeen years and with the best skin imaginable, and yet she powders her face.”

  “Wonderful indeed,” said her friend. Then he raised one finger and went his way, a discretion much admired in Ourdh. The young lady, who had been drumming her fingers on the tabletop and frowning like a fury, waved again and stamped one foot.

  “I want to talk to you,” she said sharply. “Can’t you hear me?”

  “I have six ears,” said Alyx, the courteous reply in such a situation. She sat down and the waiter handed her the bill of fare.