The Chronicles of Corum (50 page)

"I pray it is true."

Corum went to bed that night, for he felt unnaturally weary. The main fear was for Lady Jane and he could not help but feel she had made too little of the incident. At last he slept, but was awakened shortly after midnight.

It was Jhary and he was dressed, with his hat upon his head and his cat upon his shoulder. "The time has come,"

he said, "to come to time."

Corum rubbed at his eyes, not understanding the dandy's remark.

"Bolorhiag is here."

Corum swung himself from the bed. "I will dress and come down directly."

When he descended the stairs he saw that Lady Jane, wrapped in a dark cloak, her white hair unbound, stood there with Jhary-a-Conel and a small, wizened man who walked with the aid of a staff. The man's head was disproportionately large for his frail body, which even the folds of his priest's gown could not hide. He was speaking in a high, querulous voice.

"I know you, Timeras. You are a rogue."

"I am not Timeras in this identity, Bolorhiag. I am Jhary-a-Conel . . ."

"But still a rogue. I resent even speaking the same tongue as you and only do so for the sake of the lovely Lady Jane."

"You are both rogues!" laughed the old, beautiful woman. "And you know that you cannot help but like each other."

"I only help him because you have asked me to do so,"

insisted the wizened man, "and because he may one day admit that he can help me."

"I have told you before, Bolorhiag, that I have much knowledge and hardly any skills. I would help you if I could, but my mind is a patchwork of memories 

—fragments of a thousand lives are in my skull. You should have sympathy for a wretch such as I."

"Bah!" Bolorhiag turned his twisted back and looked at Corum with his bright blue eyes. "And this is the other rogue, eh?"

Corum bowed.

"The Lady Jane requests me to ship you out of this age and into another where you will be less bothersome to her," Bolorhiag went on. "I will do it willingly, of course, for her heart is too kind for her own good. But I do no favors for you, young man, you understand."

"I understand, sir."

"Then let us get about it. The winds blow through and may be gone again before we can set our course. My carriage is outside."

Corum approached Lady Jane Pentallyon and took her hand, kissing it gently. "I thank you for this, my lady. I thank you for your hospitality, your confidence, your gifts, and I pray that you will know happiness one day."

"Perhaps in another life," she said. "Thank you for such thoughts, and let me kiss you now." She bent and touched his forehead with her lips. "Farewell, my elfin prince ..."

He turned away so that she would not see that he had noticed the tears in her eyes. He followed the wizened man as he hopped toward the door.

It was a small vessel he saw on the gravel outside the house. It was hardly large enough for three and had plainly been designed to take one in comfort. It had a high, curved prow of a substance neither wood nor metal but much pitted and scored as if it had weathered many storms. A mast rose from the center, though there was no sail furled on the yard.

"Sit there," said Bolorhiag impatiently, indicating the bench to his right "I will sit between you and steer the craft."

After Corum had squeezed himself into place, Bolorhiag sat next to him and Jhary sat on the other side of the old man. A globe on a pivot seemed the only controls of the quaintly shaped craft, and now Bolorhiag raised his hand to salute the Lady Jane, who stood in the shadows of the doorway, then took the globe between both palms.

Again Corum and Jhary bowed toward the door, but now the Lady Jane had disappeared altogether. Corum felt a tear form in his own good eye and he thought he knew why she did not watch them leave.

Suddenly something shimmered around the mast and Corum saw that it was a faint area of light shaped like a triangular sail. It grew stronger and stronger until it resembled an ordinary sail of cloth, bulging in a wind, though no wind blew.

Bolorhiag muttered to himself and the little craft seemed to move and yet did not move.

Corum glanced at the Manor in the Forest. It seemed framed in dancing brightness.

Daylight suddenly surrounded them. They saw figures outside the house, all around them, but the figures did not appear to see them. Horsemen—the soldiers who had searched the house the day before. They vanished. It was dark again and then light and then the house was gone and the boat rocked, turned, bounced.

"What is happening?" Corum cried out.

"What you wanted to happen, I gather," snapped Bolorhiag. "You are enjoying a short voyage upon the seas of time."

Everywhere now was what appeared to be clouds of dark gray. The sail continued to strain at the mast. The unfelt wind continued to blow. The boat moved on, with its inventor in his black robe muttering over his globe, steering it this way and that.

Sometimes the gray clouds would change color, become green or blue or deep brown, and Corum would fed peculiar pressures upon him, find it difficult to breathe for a few moments, but the experience would quickly pass.

Bolorhiag seemed completely oblivious of these sensations and even Jhary gave them no special attention. Once or twice the cat would give a faint cry and cling closer to its master, but that was the only sign that others felt the discomforts that Corum felt.

And then the ship's sail went limp and began to fade.

Bolorhiag cursed in a harsh language of many consonants and spun the globe so that the ship whirled at a dizzying speed and Corum felt his stomach turn over.

Then the old man grunted in satisfaction as the sail reappeared and filled out again. "I thought we had lost the wind for good," he said. "There is nothing more aggravating than being becalmed on the time seas. Hardly anything more dangerous, either, if one is passing through some solid substance!" He laughed richly at this, nudging Jhary in the ribs. "You look ill, Timeras, you rogue."

"How long will this voyage last, Bolorhiag?" said Jhary in a strained voice.

"How long?" Bolorhiag stroked the globe, seeing something within it that they could not see. "What meaningless remark is that? You should know better, Timeras!"

"I should have known better than to begin on this voyage. I suspect you of becoming senile, old man."

"After several thousand years I am bound to begin to feel my years." The old man grinned wickedly at Jhary's consternation.

The speed of the ship seemed to increase.

"Stand by to turn about!" shouted Bolorhiag, apparently quite mad, almost hysterical. "Ready to drop anchor, lads! Date ahoy!"

The ship swung as if caught by a powerful current. The peculiar sail sagged and vanished. The gray light began to grow brighter.

The ship stood upon an expanse of dark rock overlooking a green valley far, far below.

Bolorhiag began to chuckle as he saw their expressions.

"I have few pleasures," he said, "but my favorite is to terrify my passengers. It is, in part, what I regard as my just payment. I am not mad, I think, gentlemen. I am merely desperate."

The Seventh Chapter
 The Land of Tall Stones

Bolorhiag allowed them to disembark from his tiny craft.

Corum looked around him at the rather bleak landscape.

Everywhere he looked he saw in the distance tall columns of stone, sometimes standing singly, sometimes in groups.

The stone varied in color but had plainly been put there by some intelligence.

"What are they?" he asked.

Bolorhiag shrugged. "Stones. The inhabitants of these parts raise them."

"For what purpose?"

"For the same purpose that makes them dig deep holes in the ground—you will discover those as well—to pass the time. They cannot explain it any other way. I understand that it is their art. No better or worse than much of the art one sees."

"I suppose so," said Corum doubtfully. "And now perhaps you will explain, Master Bolorhiag, why we have been brought here."

"This age corresponds roughly with the age of your own Fifteen Planes. The conjunction comes soon and you are better here than elsewhere. There is a building which is occasionally seen here and which has the name in some parts of the Vanishing Tower. It comes and goes through the planes. Timeras here knows the story, I am sure."

Jhary nodded. "I know it. But this is dangerous, Bolorhiag. We could enter the Vanishing Tower and never return. You are aware that—?"

"I am aware of most things about the tower, but you have little choice. It is your only means of getting back to your own age and your own plane, believe me. I know of no other method. You must risk the dangers."

Jhary shrugged. "As you say. We will risk them.".

"Here." Bolorhiag offered him a rolled sheet of parchment. "It is a map of how to get there from here. A rather rough map, I am afraid. Geography was never my strong point."

"We are most grateful to you, Master Bolorhiag,"

Corum said gracefully.

"I want no gratitude, but I do want information. I am some ten thousand years away from my own age and wonder what barrier it is which allows me to cross it one way but not the other. If you should ever discover a clue to the answer to this question and if you, Timeras, ever pass through this age and plane again, I should want to hear of it."

"I will make a point of it, Bolorhiag."

"Then farewell, both of you."

The old man hunched himself once more over his steering crystal. Once more the peculiar sail appeared and filled with the unfelt wind. And then the little ship and its occupant had faded.

Corum stared thoughtfully at the huge, mysterious stones.

Jhary had unrolled the map. "We must climb down this cliff until we reach the valley," he said. "Come, Prince Corum, we had best start now."

They found the least steep part of the cliff and began to inch their way down it.

They had not gone very far when they heard a shout above them and looked up. It was the little wizened man and he was hopping up and down on his stick. "Corum!

Timeras or whatever pseudonym you're using! Wait!"

"What is it, Master Bolorhiag?"

"I forgot to tell you, Prince Corum, that if you find yourself in extreme danger or distress within the next day—and only the next day—go to a point where you see a storm which is isolated. Do you hear?"

"I hear. But what—?"

"I cannot repeat myself, the time tide changes. Enter the storm and take out the witch knife given you by the Lady Jane. Hold it so that it traps the lightning. Then call upon the name of Elric of Melnibone and say that he must come to make the Three Who Are One—the Three Who Are One. Remember that. You are part of the same thing. It will be all you need to do for the Third—the Many-Named Hero—will be drawn to the Two."

"Who told you all this, Master Bolorhiag?" Jhary called, clinging to the rock of the cliff and not looking down.

"Oh, a creature. It does not matter who told me. But you must remember that, Prince Corum. The storm—the knife—the incantation. Remember it!"

Corum called, half to humor the old man, "I will remember."

"Farewell, again." And Bolorhiag stepped back from the cliff top and was gone.

They climbed down in silence, too intent on finding holds in the rock face to discuss Bolorhiag's peculiar message.

And when, eventually, they reached the floor of the valley, they were too exhausted to speak, but lay still, looking up at the great sky.

Later Corum said, "Did you understand the old man's words, Jhary?"

Jhary shook his head. "The Three Who Are One. It sounds ominous. I wonder if it has any connection with what we saw in Limbo?"

"Why should it?"

"I know not. Just a thought which popped into my brain because it was empty. We had best forget that for a while and hope to discover the Vanishing Tower. Bolorhiag was right. The map is crude."

"And what is the Vanishing Tower?"

"It once existed in your own realm, Corum, I believe—in one of the Five Planes, but not yours. On the edge of a place called Balwya Moor in a valley much like this one which was called Darkvale. Chaos was fighting Law and winning in those days. It came against Darkvale and its keep—a small castle, rather than a tower. The knight of the keep sought the aid of the Lords of Law and they granted that aid, enabling him to move his tower into another dimension. But Chaos had gained great power then and cursed the tower, decreeing that it should shift for all time, never staying more than a few hours on any one plane. And so it shifts to this day. The original knight—who was protecting a fugitive from Chaos—was soon insane, as was the fugitive. Then came Voilodion Ghagnasdiak to the Vanishing Tower and there he remains."

"Who is he?"

"An unpleasant creature. Trapped in the tower now and fearing to step outside, he uses the tower to lure the unsuspecting to him. He keeps them there until they bore him and then he slays them."

"And that is whom we must fight when we enter the Vanishing Tower?"

"Exactly."

"Well, there are two of us and we are armed."

"Voilodion Ghagnasdiak is very powerful—a sorcerer of no mean skill."

"Then we cannot conquer him! My hand and eye no longer come to my assistance."

Jhary shrugged. He stroked his cat's chin. "Aye. I said it was dangerous, but as Bolorhiag pointed out, we have little choice, have we? After all, we are still on our way to find Tanelorn. I am beginning to feel that my sense of direction returns. We are nearer Tanelorn now than we have been before."

"How do you know?"

"I know. I know, that is all."

Corum sighed. "I am weary of mysteries, of sorceries, of tragedies. I am a simple . . ."

"No time for self-pity, Prince Corum. Come, this is the way we want to go."

They followed a roaring river upstream for two miles.

The river rushed through a steep valley and they climbed along the sloping sides, using the trees to stop them from falling down into the white rapids. Then they came to a place where the river forked and Jhary pointed to a place where it was shallow, running over pebbles. "A ford. We need yonder island. That is where the Vanishing Tower will appear, when it appears."