The Dragon in the Sword (2 page)

At first I seemed to be adrift in a formless ocean of colour and light which swirled in every direction. Gradually I realised that what I witnessed was something of the entire multiverse. To a degree at least I was perceiving every individual layer, every period, at once. Therefore my senses were incapable of selecting any particular detail from this astonishing vision.

Then I became aware that I was falling, very slowly, through all these ages and realms of reality, through whole worlds, cities, groups of men and women, forests, mountains, oceans, until I saw ahead of me a small flat island of green which offered a reassuring appearance of solidity. As my feet touched it I smelled fresh grass, saw little clumps of turf, some wild flowers. Everything looked wonderfully simple, though it existed in that churning chaos of pure colour, of tides of light which constantly changed in intensity. Upon this fragment of reality another figure stood. It was armoured all of a piece, in chequered yellow and black, from crown to heel, and its face was visored so that I could see nothing of the creature within.

I knew him already, however, for we had met before. I knew him as the Knight in Black and Yellow. I greeted him, but he did not answer. I wondered if he had frozen to death within his armour. Between us there fluttered a pale flag, bereft of insignia. It might have been a truce flag save that he and I were not enemies. He was a huge man, taller even than myself. When we had last met we had stood together on a hill and watched the armies of Humanity fighting back and forth across the valleys. Now we watched nothing. I wanted him to raise his helm and reveal his face. He would not. I wanted him to speak to me. He would not. I wanted him to reassure me that he was not dead. He offered no such reassurance.

This dream was repeated many times. Night after night I begged him to reveal himself, made the identical demands I had always made and received no response.

Then one night there came at last a change. Before I could begin my ritual of requests the Knight in Black and Yellow spoke to me…

– I have told you before. I will answer any question you put to me
. It was as if he continued a conversation whose beginning I had forgotten.

– How can I rejoin Ermizhad?

– By taking passage on the Dark Ship.

– Where shall I find the Dark Ship?

– The ship will come to you.

– How long must I wait?

– Longer than you wish. You must curb your impatience.

– That is an insubstantial answer.

– I promise you it is the only one I can offer.

– What is your name?

– Like you, I am endowed with a great many names. I am the Knight in Black and Yellow. I am the Warrior Who Cannot Fight. I am sometimes called The Black Flag.

– Let me see your face.

– No.

– Why so?

– Ah, now, this is delicate. I think it is because the time has not come. If I showed you too much it would affect too many other chronologies. You must know that Chaos threatens everything in all the realms of the multiverse. The Balance tilts too heavily in its favour. Law must be supported. We must be careful to do no further harm. You shall hear my name soon, I am certain of that. Soon, that is, in terms of your own time span. In terms of mine ten thousand years could pass…

– Can you help me return to Ermizhad?

– I have already explained that you must wait for the ship.

– When shall I have peace of mind?

– When all your tasks are done. Or before there are tasks for you to do.

– You are cruel, Knight in Black and Yellow, to answer me so vaguely.

– I assure you, John Daker, I have no clearer answers. You are not the only one to accuse me of cruelty…

He gestured and now I could see a cliff. On it, lined at the very edge, some on foot, some on mounts (not all by any means ordinary horses), were rank upon rank of fighters in battered armour. I was close enough, somehow, to observe their faces. They had blank eyes which had become used to too much agony. They could not see us, yet it seemed to me they prayed to us—or at least to the Knight in Black and Yellow.

I cried out to them:
Who are you?

And they answered me, lifting their heads to chant a frightful litany.
We are the lost. We are the last. We are the unkind. We are the Warriors at the Edge of Time. We are the ravaged, we are the despairing, we are the betrayed. We are the veterans of a thousand psychic wars
.

It was as if I had given them a signal, an opportunity to express their terrors, their longings and their agony of centuries. They chanted in a single cold, melancholy voice. I felt that they had been standing on the cliff’s edge for eternity, speaking only when asked my question. Their chant did not pause but grew steadily louder…

We are the Warriors at the Edge of Time. Where is our joy? Where is our sorrow? Where is our fear? We are the deaf, the dumb, the blind. We are the undying. It is so cold at the Edge of Time. Where are our mothers and our fathers? Where are our children? It is too cold at the Edge of Time! We are the unborn, the unknown, the undying. It is too cold at the Edge of Time! We are tired. We are so tired. We are tired at the Edge of Time…

Their pain was so intense I tried to cover my ears. –
No!
I screamed. –
No! You must not call to me. You must go away!

And then there was silence. They were gone.

I turned to speak to the Knight in Black and Yellow, but he, too, had vanished. Had he been one of those warriors? Did he lead them, perhaps? Or, I wondered, were they all aspects of a single being—myself?

Not only could I not answer any of these questions, I did not really wish to have the answers.

I am not sure if it was at that point, or at some later time, in another dream, that I found myself standing upon a rocky beach looking out into an ocean shrouded in thick mist.

At first I saw nothing in the mist, then gradually I perceived a dark outline, a ship heaving at anchor close to the shore.

I knew this was the Dark Ship.

Aboard this ship, dotted here and there, orange light glowed. It was a warm, reassuring light. Also I thought I heard deep voices calling from the deck to the yards and back again. I believe I hailed the ship and that she responded, for soon—perhaps brought there in a longboat—I was standing on her main deck, confronting a tall, gaunt man in a soft leather sea-coat which reached below his knees. He touched my shoulder as if in greeting.

My other recollection is that the ship was carved, every inch of her, with peculiar designs, many geometrical, many representing bizarre creatures, entire stories or incidents from all manner of unguessable histories.

– You’ll sail with us again
, the Captain said.

– Again
, I agreed, though I could not recall, just then, when I had sailed with him before.

Thereafter I left the ship several times, in several different guises, and pursued all manner of adventures. One came to memory sharper than the others and I even remembered my name. It was Clen of Clen Gar. I remembered some kind of war between Heaven and Hell. I remembered deceit and treachery and some kind of victory. Then I was aboard the ship again.

– Ermizhad! Tanelorn! Do we sail there?

The Captain put the tips of his long fingers to my face and touched my tears. –
Not yet
.

– Then I’ll spend no more time aboard this vessel…
I grew angry. I warned the Captain he could not hold me prisoner. I would not be bound to his ship. I would determine my own destiny in my own way.

He did not resist my leaving, though he seemed sad to see me depart.

And I was awake again, in my bed, in my chambers at the Scarlet Fjord. I had a fever, I believe. I was surrounded by servants who had come at my shouting. Through them pushed handsome, red-headed Bladrak Morningspear, who had once saved my life. He was concerned. I remember screaming at him to help me, to take his knife and release me from my body.

– Kill me, Bladrak, if you value our comradeship!

But he would not. Long nights came and went. In some of them I thought I was upon the ship again. At other times I felt I was being called. Ermizhad? Was it she who called? I sensed a woman present…

But when I next set eyes upon a fresh visitation it was a sharpfaced dwarf I saw. He was dancing and capering, apparently oblivious of me, humming to himself. I thought I recognised him, but could not remember his name. –
Who are you? Are you sent by the blind captain? Or do you come from the Knight in Black and Yellow?

I seemed to have surprised the dwarf, who turned sardonic features on me for the first time, pushed back his cap and grinned.
– Who am I? I had not meant to have you at a disadvantage. We were old friends, you and I, John Daker.

– You know me by that old name?
As
John Daker?

– I know you by all your names. But you shall be only two of those names more than once. Is that a riddle?

– It is. Must I now find the answer?

– If you feel you need one. You ask many questions, John Daker.

– I would prefer it if you called me Erekosë.

– You’ll have your wish again. Now, there’s a straight answer for you, after all! I’m not such a bad dwarf, am I?

– I remember! You’re called Jermays the Crooked. You are like me—the incarnation of many aspects of the same creature. We met at the sea-stag’s cave.

I recalled our conversation. Had he been the first to tell me of the Black Sword?

– We were old friends, Sir Champion, but you failed to remember me then, just as you fail to remember me now. Perhaps you have too much to remember, eh? You have not offended me. I note you appear to have lost your sword…

– I shall never bear it again. It was a terrible blade. I have no further use for it. Or for any sword like it. I recall you said there were two of them…

– I said that there were sometimes two. That perhaps it was an illusion; that there was in fact only one. I am not sure. You bore the one you shall call (or have called)
Stormbringer.
Now, I suppose, you seek
Mournblade.

– You spoke of some destiny attached to the blades. You suggested my destiny was linked with theirs…

– Ah, did I now? Well, your memory’s improving. Good, good. It will be of some help to you I am sure. Or perhaps not. Do you already know that each of these swords is a vessel for something else? They were forged, I understand, to be filled, to be inhabited. To possess, if you like, a soul. You’re baffled, I can see. Unfortunately I’m fairly mystified myself. I get intimations, of course. Intimations of our various fates. And those are frequently mixed up. I’ll confuse you and very likely myself also if I continue in this vein! I can already see you are unwell. Is it merely a touch of physical sickness or does it extend to your brain?

– Can you help me find Ermizhad, Jermays? Can you tell me where lies Tanelorn? That is all I wish to know. The rest of it I do not care for at all. I want no more talk of destiny, of swords, of ships and strange countries. Where is Tanelorn?

– The ship sails there, does it not? I understand that Tanelorn is her final destination. There are so many cities called Tanelorn and the ship carries a cargo of so many identities. Yet all are the same or some aspect of the same personality. Too much for me, Sir Champion. You must go back aboard.

– I do not wish to return to the Dark Ship.

– You disembarked too soon.

– I did not know where the ship was bearing me. I was afraid I would lose direction and never discover Ermizhad again.

– So that was why you left! Did you think you had found your goal? That there was any other way of finding it?

– Did I disembark against the Captain’s will? Am I being punished for that?

– It’s unlikely. The Captain’s no great punisher. He is not an arbiter. Rather he is a translator, I would say. But all that’s for you to ascertain for yourself once you return to the ship.

– I do not want to be aboard that Dark Ship again.

I wiped a mixture of tears and perspiration from my eyes and it was as if I had wiped Jermays from my vision, for he had gone.

I rose and clad myself, yelling for my old armour. I made them put it on me, though I could scarcely hold myself steady on my feet. Then I ordered a great sea-sled harnessed with the mighty herons trained to pull it across those salty, undulating plains, those dying oceans. I snarled at those who would follow me. I ordered them to go back to the Scarlet Fjord. I refused their friendship. I sped from the sight of all humankind, into the brine-heavy night, my head lifted back as I howled like a dog and I cried for my Ermizhad. There was no response. I had hardly expected any. So I called instead to the Captain of the Dark Ship. I called to every god and goddess I could name. And lastly I called to myself—to John Daker, Erekosë, Urlik, Clen, Elric, Hawkmoon, Corum and all the others. I called lastly to the Black Sword itself, but I was received by a most terrible, unkind silence.

I looked into the faded light of dawn and thought I saw a great cliff lined with gaunt warriors. It was those same warriors who had stood upon the edge of that cliff for an eternity, each one with my face. But I had seen nothing but clouds, thick as the ocean on which I sailed.

– Ermizhad! Where are you? Who or what will take me to you?

I heard a sly, unpleasant wind whispering near the horizon. I heard the flap of my herons’ wings. I heard my sea-sled thump upon the surface of the waves. And I heard my own voice saying that there was only one thing I could do, since no power would come to my aid. It was, of course, the reason I had come out here alone. Why I had clad myself in the full battle armour of Urlik Skarsol, Lord of the Frozen Keep. –
You must throw yourself in to the sea
, I said. –
You must let yourself sink. You must drown. In dying, you will surely find a fresh incarnation. Perhaps you will even be taken back to Erekosë and be reunited with your Ermizhad. After all, it will be an act of faith even the gods cannot ignore. Perhaps it is what they are waiting for? To see how brave you are prepared to be. And to see how truly you love her
. And with that I let go the reins of those massive birds and prepared to dive into the horrible and viscous ocean.