The Dragon in the Sword (42 page)

I was alone.

I looked down at the two halves of the sword, at the anvil. Both seemed to have sustained enormous forces. It was as if they had melted yet held their shape. I was not sure why I had this impression.

I stirred the hilt of the sword with my foot. For a moment I was tempted to pick it up, but then I turned aside with a shrug. I wanted no further business with swords, or magic, or destiny. I wanted only to go home.

I left the harbour behind me. I walked amongst the miserable ruins of the Eldren town. I remembered such destruction. I remembered when, as Erekosë, Champion of Humanity, I had led my armies against a town similar to this, against a people called the Eldren. I remembered that crime. And I remembered another crime, when I had led the Eldren against my own folk.

Somehow, however, the pang of guilt I had known since then was no longer present. I felt that all was now redeemed again. I had made amends and I was whole.

Yet I still knew the loss of Ermizhad. Would I ever be united with her?

Later, towards evening, I found myself again on the quayside, looking out towards the setting sun. Everything was silent. Everything was calm. Yet it was a solitude I did not relish, for it was the result of an absence of life.

A few seabirds wheeled and called. The waves slapped against the stones of the quay. I sat down on the Iron Round, again contemplating the two shards of the Dragon Sword, wondering if perhaps I should have gone with the Eldren, back to their own world.

And then I heard the sound of horses behind me. I turned. A single rider, leading another steed. A small, ill-formed fellow, all in motley. He grinned at me and saluted.

“Will you come a-riding with me, Sir Champion? I would relish the company.”

“Good evening to you, Jermays. I trust you have not brought me further news of destiny and doom.” I climbed into the saddle of the horse.

“I never cared much for those things,” he said, “as you know. It is not my business to play an important part in the history of the multiverse. These past times are perhaps the most active I have seen. I do not regret it, though I should have liked to have witnessed Sharadim’s defeat and the banishment of Chaos. You performed a mighty task, eh, Sir Champion? Perhaps the greatest of your career?”

I shook my head. I did not know.

Jermays led the way from the quay and along the shore of the sea, beside the white cliffs. The sun made the sky a wonderful deep colour. It touched the sea. It made all seem permanent and unassailable.

“Your friends have gone now, have they?” he asked as we rode. “Dragon to dragon, Eldren to Eldren. And von Bek, what sort of dynasty will he found, I wonder? And what sort of history will come out of all that went on here? Another cycle must begin before we shall get any hint of the fate of Melniboné.”

The name was familiar to me. It stirred the faintest memory, but I dismissed it. I wanted no more of memories, whether they be of past or future.

Soon it was night. Moonlight was pure silver upon the water. As we rounded a headland, with the tide rolling at our horses’ feet, I saw the outline of a ship at anchor in the little bay.

The ship had high decks, fore and aft, and its timbers were carved with all manner of baroque designs. There was a broad, sweeping curve to her prow and her single mast was tall, bearing a single large, furled sail. I could see that on each of her raised decks the ship had a wheel, as if she could be steered from stern or prow. She sat lightly on the water, like a vessel awaiting fresh cargo.

Jermays and I rode our horses through the shallows. I heard him cry: “Halloo, the ship! Are you taking on passengers?”

Now a figure appeared at the rail, leaning on it and apparently staring out over our heads towards the cliffs. I saw at once that he was blind.

A red mist had begun to form in the water about the ship. It was faint and yet it seemed to stir not with the movements of the sea itself, but with the movements of the dark vessel. I looked out across the ocean, but the moon was hidden behind clouds and I could see little. It seemed that the red mist was growing.

“Come aboard,” said the blind man. “You are welcome.”

“Now we must part,” said Jermays. “I think it will be long before we meet again, perhaps in another cycle altogether. Farewell, Sir Champion.” He clapped me on the back and then had turned his horse and was galloping back through the water to the shore. I heard the hoofs thumping on sand and he had vanished.

My own horse was restless. I dismounted and let him go. He followed Jermays.

I waded through the water. It was warm against my body. It had reached as high as my chest before I could catch hold of a trailing ladder and begin to climb aboard. The red mist had grown thicker now. It obscured all sight of the shore.

The blind man sniffed the air. “We must be on our way. I am glad you decided to come. You have no sword now, eh?”

“I have no need of one,” I said.

He grunted in reply and then called out for the sail to be unfurled. I saw the shadows of men in the rigging as I followed the blind captain to his cabin, where his brother, the helmsman, waited for us. I heard the sail crack down and the wind tug urgently at it. I heard the anchors raised. I felt the ship pull suddenly and roll and swing out to sea and I knew that once again we were sailing through waters which flowed between the worlds.

The helmsman’s bright blue eyes were kindly as he indicated the food prepared for me. “You must be weary, John Daker. You have done much, eh?”

I stripped off my heavy leathers. I sighed with relief as I poured myself wine.

“Are there others aboard tonight?” I asked.

“Of your kind? Only yourself.”

“And where do we sail?” I was reconciled to whatever instructions I might be given.

“Oh, nowhere of any great importance. You have no sword, I note.”

“Your brother has already remarked upon that. I left it broken on the quayside in Barobanay. It is useless now.”

“Not quite,” said the Captain, joining me in a goblet of wine. “But it will need to be reforged. Perhaps as two swords, where it was once one.”

“A new sword from each part. Is there enough metal for that?”

“I think so. But that will not concern you for a while, at any rate. Would you sleep now?”

“I am tired,” I said. I felt as if I had not rested for centuries.

The blind captain led me to my old, familiar bunk. I stretched myself out and almost immediately I began to dream. I dreamed of King Rigenos and Ermizhad, of Urlik Skarsol and all the other heroes I had been. And then I dreamed of dragons. Hundreds of dragons. Dragons whom I knew by name. Dragons who loved me as I loved them. And I dreamed of great fleets. Of wars. Of tragedies and of impossible delights, of wizardry and wild romance. I dreamed of white arms locked around me. I dreamed again of Ermizhad. And then I dreamed that we had come together again at last and I awoke laughing, remembering something of that dragon song which the Eldren women had sung.

The blind captain and his brother the helmsman stood there. They, too, were smiling.

“It is time to disembark, John Daker. It is time for you to go to your reward.”

I got up, then. I was dressed only in a pair of leather breeches and boots. But it did not feel cold. I followed them out into the darkness of the deck. A few yellow lamps gleamed here and there. Through the red mist I saw the suggestion of a shoreline. I saw first one tower and then a second. They seemed to be spanning a harbour.

I peered through the darkness, trying to distinguish details. The towers looked familiar.

Now the helmsman called to me from below. He was in a small boat waiting to carry me to land. I bade farewell to the Captain and I climbed down to the boat, seating myself on the bench.

The helmsman pulled strongly on his oars. The red mist grew dimmer still. It seemed close to dawn. The twin towers had a bridge spanning them. Elsewhere were thousands of lights gleaming. I heard the mournful hoot of what I thought at first was a great water-beast. Then I realised it was a boat.

The helmsman shipped his oars. “You are at your destination now, John Daker. I wish you good fortune.”

Cautiously I stepped onto the slippery mud of the shore. I heard a drone from above me. I heard voices. And then, as the helmsman disappeared back into the red mist, I realised that I had been in this place before.

The twin towers were those of Tower Bridge. The sounds I heard were the sounds of a great modern city. The sounds of London.

John Daker was returning home.

EPILOGUE

M
Y NAME IS
John Daker. I was once called the Eternal Champion. It is possible I shall bear that name once again. For now, however, I am at peace.

By summoning up this identity—the original, if you will—I was able to resist and ultimately defeat the powers of Chaos. My reward for this action is that I am allowed to resume my life as John Daker.

When called by King Rigenos to be Humanity’s champion, I had been discontented with my life. I had seen it as shallow, without colour. Yet I have come to realise how rich my life actually is, how complex is the world I inhabit. That complexity alone is worthy of celebration. I understand that life in a great city of my world’s twentieth century can be just as intense, just as satisfactory as any other. Indeed, to be a hero, forever at war, is to be in some ways always a child. The true challenge comes in making sense of one’s life, of imbuing it with purpose based on one’s own principles.

I still have memories of those other times. I still dream frequently of the great battle-blades, the chargers, the massive fighting barges, the weird creatures and the magical cities, the bright banners and the wonder of a perfect love. I dream of riding against Chaos, of bearing arms against Heaven in the name of Hell, of being the scythe which cut Humanity down… But I have discovered an equal intensity of experience in this world, too. We have merely, I think, to teach ourselves how to recognise and to relish it.

That is what I learned when I faced the Archduke Balarizaaf, Princess Sharadim and Prince Flamadin at The World’s Beginning, when we struggled for the Dragon Sword.

It is ironic that I saved both myself and those I cared for by recalling, at the crucial moment, my identity as an ordinary mortal. There are subtle dangers to the rôle of hero. I am glad I no longer have to consider them.

So John Daker has returned home. The cycle is complete; the saga finds a form of resolution. Somewhere, doubtless, the Eternal Champion will continue to fight to maintain the Cosmic Balance. And in his dreams, if nowhere else, John Daker will recall those battles, as he will sometimes recall a vast field of statues, all of which seem to bear his name… For the present, however, he need take no further part in battles, nor wonder at the significance of that field.

I still long, of course, for my Ermizhad. I shall never love anyone as I loved her. I believe I must surely find her, not in some bizarre realm of the multiverse, but here, perhaps in this city, in London. Does she look for me, even now, as I search for her? It surely cannot be very long before we are reunited.

And when that time comes there is no sword forged, in this world or any other, which will divide us!

We shall know peace.

Though our span of years be those of ordinary human beings, they will be our own years. We shall be free of all cosmic designs, free of destinies and grandiose dooms.

We shall be free to love as we were always meant to love; free to be the flawed, finite, mortal creatures which from the first was all we ever wished to be.

And, for those years at least, the Eternal Champion will be at rest.

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