'He believes he has the power to do it without his army. For he has the white sword and he has the cup. These he believes contain the power of Law, and he believes the power of Law will give him the Grey Fees.'
'Even I know that's madness! ' I began to walk unsteadily to where the Melnibonean was still lying. Now, however, he had the air of a man experiencing ordinary sleep. 'What can we do to stop him?'
'There's a chance, ' she said quietly, 'that he cannot be stopped. Just by introducing those two great objects of power into the Grey Fees he could unbalance the entire multiverse, sending it spinning to its eternal destruction and all living, feeling creatures with it.'
'One man?' I said. 'One mortal?'
'Whatever happens, ' she said, 'it is predicted that the fate of the multiverse shall depend upon the actions of one mortal man. That encourages Gaynor. He thinks he is the mortal chosen for that honor.'
'Why should he not be?'
'Because another has already been chosen, ' she said.
'Do you know who it is?'
'Yes.'
I waited, but she said no more. She leaned over her father, testing for his pulse, checking his eyes, just as I had earlier. She shook her head.
'Exhausted, ' she said. 'Nothing else. Too much sorcery, even for him.' She rolled up a cloak and put it under his head. It was a strange, rather touching gesture. All around us was death and destruction. Spilled blood was everywhere, yet Elric's daughter behaved almost as if she kissed a child good night in its own bed.
She picked up Stormbringer and resheathed it for him. Only then did I realize I still held Ravenbrand in my hand. Oona had found Elric's sword where Gaynor had hurled it when it turned on him and instead of giving him strength, burned up what remained of his energy.
'Well, ' I said, 'at least we have the stolen sword back.'
Oona nodded reflectively. 'Yes, ' she said, 'Gaynor must change his plans.' 'Why didn't Stormbringer feed off him earlier?'
'By betraying Miggea, he also lost her help. He seemed to think he would be able to keep it, in spite of her being a prisoner. She has to be able to exert her will in order to aid him, and he ensured that she could not.'
I heard a mumble and looked to where Elric lay. He stirred. His lips formed words, tiny sounds. Troubled sounds. The sounds of a distant nightmare. Oona laid her cool hand upon her father's forehead. The Melnibonean immediately breathed more regularly and his body no longer twitched and trembled.
When, eventually, he opened his eyes, they were full of wise intelligence.
'At last, ' he said. 'The tide can be turned.' His hand went to the handle of his runesword and caressed it. I had the feeling she had somehow communicated everything that had happened to him. Or did he get it telepathically from me? 'Perhaps it can be, Father.' Oona looked around her, as if seeing the signs of battle for the first time. 'But I fear it will take more resources than we can summon now.'
The Prince of Melnibone began to rise. I offered him my arm. He hesitated, then took it with an expression of profound irony on his face.
'So now we are both whole men again, ' he said. I was impatient with this. 'I need to know what unique qualities that staff or cup or whatever it is and that white sword have. Why are we fighting for possession of them? What do they represent to Gaynor?'
Elric and Oona stared at me in some surprise. They had concealed nothing deliberately from me. They had simply not thought to tell me.
'They exist in your own legends, ' said Oona. 'Your family protected them on your plane. That is your traditional duty. According to your legends the Grail is a cup with magical properties, which can restore life and can only be beheld in its true, pure form by a knight of equally true and pure soul. The sword is the traditional sword which bestows great nobility upon its wielder, if used in a noble cause. It has been called many names. It was lost and Gaynor sought it. Klosterheim got it from Bek. Miggea told him that if he bore both the black sword and the white and took them, together with the Grail, into the Grey Fees, he would be able to set his will upon existence. He could re-create the multiverse.' I found this incredible. 'He believed such nonsense?'
Oona hesitated. Then she said: 'He believed it.'
I thought for a moment. I was a twentieth-century man. How could I give any credibility to such mythical tomfoolery? Perhaps all I was doing was dreaming after hearing some overblown piece of Sturm und Drang. Was I trapped in the story of Parsifal, The Flying Dutchman and Gotterdammerung all at the same time? Of course it was impossible to pursue such logic. Not only had I been party to Elric's past, his entire experience of the sorcerous realms, but I recollected everything I had seen since escaping from the Nazi concentration camp. From the moment my sword clove the cliff of Hameln, I had accepted the laws of wizardry. I began to laugh. Not the mad laughter I'd offered Gaynor, but natural, goodhumored self-mockery.
'And why should he not have done?' I said. 'Why should he not believe anything he chooses?'
Chapter Nineteen
Beyond the Grey Fees
We must follow Gaynor, ' said Oona. 'Somehow we must stop him.'
'His soldiers are scattered or destroyed, ' I said. 'What harm can he do?'
'A great deal, ' she said. 'He still has a sword and the Grail.'
Elric confirmed this. 'If we are swift, we could stop him reaching the Grey Fees. If we do that, we shall all be free of his ambitions. But the Fees are malleable-subject to human will, it's said. If that will is complemented with Gaynor's new power ...'
Oona was striding for the tunnel. She disappeared into the shadows. 'Follow me, ' she said. 'I'll find him.'
We mounted wearily, Elric and I. Each of us had a black runesword at his belt. For the first time since this affair started, there was real hope we could capture Gaynor before he did further damage. Perhaps I was stupid to believe that the ownership of a sword conferred a sense of self-respect upon me, but I now felt Elric's equal. Not just the sword, but what I had done with it made me proud to ride beside the gloomy Prince of Ruins in pursuit of a kinsman still capable of destroying the fundamental matter of existence.
That I should feel self-respect as a result of killing almost half-a-score of my fellow human beings was a mark of what I had become since my capture by the Nazis. I, who in common with most of my family, abhorred war and was disgusted by mankind's willingness to kill their own so readily, in such numbers and with such abandon, was now as thoroughly blooded as any of the Nazis we fought here in the world of Mu Ooria. And the strongest thing I felt was satisfaction. I looked forward to killing the rest.
In a way the Nazis' rejection of traditional humanism led to their appalling fates. It is one thing to mock the subtle infrastruc-tures of a civil society, to claim they serve no purpose, but quite another to tear them down. Only when they were gone did we realize how much our safety and sanity and civic wellbeing depended on them. This fascist lesson is learned over and over again, even into modern times.
Emerging from the tunnel with guttering torches we saw ahead of us one of the panthers awakened by Elric's sorcery. The beast turned bright knowing eyes on us. It was leading us through the caverns, searching, I was certain, for my cousin Gaynor.
Was the panther Oona? Or was the beast mentally controlled by my doppelganger's daughter? Mystified, we could do nothing save trust the beast as it padded ahead of us, occasionally looking back to make sure we followed.
I was half expecting another ambush from a furious Gaynor. My cousin would be considering his revenge on us already. But I soon realized he would no longer be flinging an army into the Grey Fees. His army had been destroyed.
As if to demonstrate this destruction, the panther led us straight through Gaynor's camp. The big cats had done their work swiftly and efficiently. Ruined troog bodies lay everywhere, most with their throats torn out. The savages had also been attacked, but clearly a great many of them had fled back to their own territories. I doubted if Gaynor would be able to raise another army from their ranks.
