Jonathan Strahan - Swords & Dark Magic - The New Sword and Sorcery

Still the ship gathered speed, trembling urgently from side to side. Every timber protesting, it dipped at an even steeper angle, rocking horribly, threatening to throw Nauha from the bunk. Again she clung to the albino. He murmured, “Cymoril,” and held her in those white arms with gentle strength. How could one so apparently sickly own such power? She moved against him. This was not the first time he had cried out the name of his betrothed, slain, albeit accidentally, by his own hand. In his sleep, he steadied her.

The ship bucked again. Now, suddenly, there was the sensation of falling, falling as the ship plunged over the edge, falling forever, it seemed, until with a massive crash, which made her feel every bone in her was smashed, the Silela Li struck an unyielding mass.

Nauha bit her lip. They had hit a reef. There could be no other explanation. The ship was breaking apart. The Silela Li moved rhythmically up and down as if in the grip of a monster. Nauha could no longer silence the long, full-throated scream which burst from her body. Certain that they were destroyed and were rapidly sinking, she reconciled herself for death, but Elric’s arms tightened a little more and, when she opened her eyes, she could see through the gloom that he was amused. Was this how he accepted their fate? Why was she reassured?

Then the water became strangely quiet. Were they sinking? The ship gentled into an easy forward motion. Elric closed his eyes. A faint smile touched his lips, as if he’d read her thoughts. Overhead she heard men’s urgent voices, full of relief, calling orders and responses. Suddenly Elric swung out of the bunk and began to unscrew the covers over the cabin’s only porthole, letting in silver light which made his body almost invisible to her. Cool, sweet air crept through the ship. Did she hear a seabird?

“Where are we?” Then she secretly cursed herself for her inanity. He did not answer but moved away from the porthole, becoming a shadow. Eventually he spoke. His voice was soft, his tone almost formally polite.

“We’re where you did not expect to be. On the underside of the world. Which the people who dwell here call the World Above. I’m not greatly experienced in this, but I think we had an easy transition. There are still several hours to dawn. Best sleep some more.” He touched her face, perhaps making a small spell, and she obeyed.

Later, dozing, she heard a tap at the cabin door and Moonglum called from the other side. Elric rose to answer, letting her cover herself before opening the door to the redheaded Elwherite, who stood there grinning, his arm around Cita Tine. She was pretty, with steady, daring eyes and a firm mouth. Moonglum had met her in the Steel Womb the night before they embarked. Cita Tine was short and sturdy, with a dancer’s figure and muscles. She had black hair and eyes, a dark skin typical of her people. She seemed most relieved of all. No doubt she too had expected to die as the ship fell. Now she breathed in the sweet, cool air blowing through the ship and she cocked her head merrily, hearing the oars being unshipped and thrust into choppy water. There came a snap as the wind took a sail. From somewhere came the smell of frying meat. Overhead a dozen voices called at once. Everyone aboard had an air of astonishment, of disbelief that they survived. Even Nauha’s moody lover was apparently more light-headed than usual as he made his excuses and called for warm water.

When they had bathed and dressed, Elric and Nauha joined the others in the big public gallery where passengers and ship’s officers took their meals. Besides the two priestesses and Elric’s party, there were six more passengers of the merchant class, more than a little shaken by their recent experience, exchanging excited descriptions of their night. Only one other was not evidently a merchant, for he sat a little apart from the rest, wrapped up in a dark red sea-cloak, as if against a cold only he experienced. Saturnine, incommunicative, he showed only a passing interest in his fellow passengers. Like most of the others, he was bound for fabled Hizss. The previous night, he had eaten quickly and retired. Moonglum had glanced at him once or twice, but Elric’s interest in mortals and their affairs was casual at best. He ignored the passenger as thoroughly as he did the rest, giving his attention only to Moonglum, who had a trick of amusing him, and to Princess Nauha, for whom he had an unusual regard.

“And so here we are!” Moonglum munched on his bread, looking out of the nearest porthole at the calm sea. “I owe you an apology, Prince Elric, for I did not wholly believe your assertions of another world beneath our own. But now it is demonstrated! Our plane is not flat but egg-shaped. And here we are alive to prove it! While I do not understand by what supernatural agency the ocean remains upon the surface of the egg, I have to accept that it does…”

A deep-throated laugh from one of the merchants. “And do your folk believe, as some of mine do, that there are other eggs, scattered across the ether, of all sizes, some of which resemble our own, Master Melnibonéan? With people dwelling on them, of commensurate dimensions, perhaps existing within other eggs, those eggs contained within still more eggs and so on?”

“Or perhaps,” smiled another, “you do not believe any of our worlds to be egg-shaped, and think they are instead round, like the nuts of the omerhav tree?”

Elric shrugged, sipping his own yellow breakfast wine and refusing to be drawn into their conversation. As usual, Moonglum was more gregarious and curious. “So some philosophers are convinced, I understand, amongst the intellectuals of my own country. Yet none has yet explained how the waters remain spread upon the surface of these worlds, nor indeed how ships sail on them or how we are able to stand upon the decks and not float like pollen into the air.”

The saturnine man raised his head, suddenly alert, but when neither Moonglum nor Elric elaborated, returned his attention to his food.

Cita Tine, the tavern girl, giggled. “My people have known of the sea passage between the two worlds for centuries. Our young men come to seek their fortunes here. We grew wealthy as a result of that knowledge and learned to build ships like this one, able to withstand the massive pressures on their hulls, and so we came to negotiate the passage.”

The captain, seated at the far end of the table, put a cautionary finger to his lips. “Best say no more, girl, or our secrets become common property. We’re rich only while most folk believe this side of the world to be legend.”

“But my companion here has been this way before,” declared Moonglum. “Which is why I was ready to take the risk of it. And swear that oath of silence, of course, before we set sail.”

“I was not aware, sir…” The captain raised an enquiring eyebrow at Elric. But the albino did not respond, merely dropping his gaze to look at his own pale hand gripping his wine cup. “What proposed your first visit, sir, if I might ask?” The captain made cheerful, casual conversation. “Trade? Curiosity?”

For the sake of his companions, Elric made some effort. “I have relatives here.”

He had, he thought, been unusually loquacious and egalitarian. The captain did not pursue his theme.

Later, as they took the fine air on deck, staring out over what seemed an infinity of rolling blue white-tipped water, Princess Nauha said to him: “I shall be curious to meet these relations. I had no idea Melnibonéans lived elsewhere than the Dragon Isle.”

“They are relatives,” he told her, “but they are not of Melniboné and never were. Nor wished to be.”

The ship sailed smoothly on, through unchanging weather, across that undisturbed ocean, beneath strange stars, and Elric, in the days that followed, grew increasingly taciturn. Even his friends, save Nauha, took to avoiding him.