Michael Moorcock: The Fortress of the Pearl

"Do you accuse us!" A veiled woman was outraged. "You who have caused us so much trouble? You, who are of the blood of that degenerate unhuman race which couples with beasts for its pleasures and produces"-she pointed at Elric-"the like of you!"

Elric was unmoved. "Did Manag Iss tell you to be wary of me?" he asked quietly.

"He said you had the Pearl and that you had a sorcerous sword. But he also said you were alone." The Other cleared her throat. "He said you brought the Pearl at the Heart of the World."

"I have brought it and that which contains it," said Elric. He bent down and tugged the velvet free of his bundle to reveal the corpse of Lord Gho Fhaazi, his face still contorted, the great lump in his throat making it seem as if he had an enormously enlarged Adam's apple. "Here is the one who first commissioned me to find the Pearl."

"We heard you had murdered him," said the Other with disapproval. "But that would be a normal enough action for a Melnibonéan."

Elric did not rise to this. "The Pearl is in Lord Gho Fhaazi's gullet. Would you have me cut it out for you, my nobles?"

He saw at least one of them shudder and he smiled. "You commission assassins to kill, to torture, to kidnap and to perform all other forms of evil in your name, but you would not see a little spilled blood? I gave Lord Gho a choice. He took this one. He talked so much and ate and drank so copiously I thought he might well have succeeded in getting the Pearl into his stomach. But he gagged a little and I fear that was the end of him."

"You are a cruel rogue!" One of the men came forward to look at his would-be colleague. "Aye, that's Gho. His colour has improved, I'd say."

This jest did not meet with the leader's approval.

"We are to bid for a corpse, then?"

"Unless you wish to cut the Pearl free, aye."

"Manag Iss," said one of the veiled women, lifting her head. "Step out, will you, sir?"

The Sorcerer Adventurer emerged from a door at the back of the hall. He looked at Elric almost apologetically. His hand went to his knife.

"We would not have a Melnibonéan spill more Quarzhasaati blood," said the Other. "Manag Iss will cut the Pearl free."

The leader of the Yellow Sect drew a deep breath and then approached the corpse. Swiftly he did what he had been ordered to do. Blood poured down his arm as he held up the Pearl at the Heart of the World.

The Council was impressed. Several of the members gasped and they murmured amongst themselves. Elric believed they had suspected him of lying to them, since lies and intrigues were second nature to them.

"Hold it high, Manag Iss," said the albino. "It is this that you all desired so greedily that you were prepared to pay for it with what was left of your honour."

"Be careful, sir!" cried the Other. "We are patient with you now. Name your price and then begone."

Elric laughed. It was not pleasant laughter. It was Melnibonéan laughter. At that moment he was a pure denizen of the Dragon Isle. "Very well," he said, "I desire this city. Not its citizens, not any of its treasure, nor its animals, not even its water. I would let you leave with everything you can carry. I desire only the city itself. It is, you see, mine by hereditary right."

"What? This is nonsense. How could we agree?" *

"You must agree," said Elric, "or you must fight me."

"Fight you? There is only one of you."

"There is no question of it," said another Councillor. "He is mad. He must be put down like a crazed dog. Manag Iss, call in your brothers and their men."

"I do not believe it is advisable, cousin," said Manag Iss, clearly addressing Lady Iss. "I think it would be wise to parley."

"What? Have you turned coward? Has this rogue an army with : hun?"

Manag Iss rubbed at his nose. "My lady..."

"Call in your brothers, Manag Iss!"

The captain of the Yellow Sect rubbed at one silk-clad arm and he frowned. "Prince Elric, I understand that you force us to a challenge. But we have not threatened you. The Council honestly came here to bid for the Pearl..."

"Manag Iss, you repeat their lies," said Elric, "and that is not an honourable thing to do. If they meant me no harm, why were you and all your brothers standing by? I saw almost two hundred warriors in the grounds."

"That was a precaution only," said the Other. She turned to her fellow Councillors. "I told you I thought it was stupid to summon so many so soon."

Elric said evenly: "Everything you have done, my nobles, has been stupid. You have been cruel, greedy, careless of others' lives and wills. You have been blind, thoughtless, provincial and unimaginative. It seems to me that a government so careless of anything but its own gratification should be at very least replaced. When you have all left the city I will consider electing a governor who will know better how to serve Quarzhasaat. Then, later perhaps, I will let you back into the city..."

"Oh, slay him!" cried the Other. "Waste no more time on this. When that's done we can decide amongst ourselves who owns the Pearl"

Elric sighed almost regretfully and said: "Best parley with me now, madam, before I myself lose patience. I shall not, once I have drawn my blade, be a rational and merciful being..."

"Slay him!" she insisted. "And have done with it!"

Manag Iss had the face of a man condemned to more than death. "Madam..."

She strode forward, her conical hat swaying, and tugged the sword from the scabbard. She raised the blade to behead the albino.

He reached out swiftly. His arm was a striking snake. He gripped her wrist. "No, madam! I am, I swear, giving you fair warning..."

Stormbringer murmured at his side and stirred.

She dropped the sword and turned away, nursing her bruised wrist.

Now Manag Iss reached for his fallen blade, making as if to sheath it, and then, with a subtle movement, tried to bring the weapon up and take Elric in the groin, an expression of resignation crossing his terrified features as the albino, anticipating him, sidestepped and in the same action drew the Black Sword, which began to sing its strange demonic song and glow with a terrible black radiance.

Manag Iss gasped as his heart was pierced. The hand that still held the Pearl seemed to stretch out, offering it back to Elric. Then the jewel had rolled from his fingers and rattled on the floor. Three Councillors rushed forward, saw Manag Iss's dying eyes and stepped backward.

"Now! Now! Now!" cried the Other, and, as Elric had expected, from every cranny of the Meeting House, members of the various sects of Sorcerer Adventurers came, their weapons at the ready.

And the albino began to grin his horrible battle-grin, and his red eyes blazed and his face was the skull of Death and his sword was the vengeance of his own people, the vengeance of the Bauradim and all those who had suffered under the injustice of Quarzhasaat over the millennia.

And he offered up the souls he took to his patron Duke of Hell, the powerful Duke Arioch who had grown sleek on many lives dedicated to him by Elric and his black blade.

"Arioch! Arioch! Blood and souls for my lord Arioch!"

Then the true slaughter began.

It was a slaughter to make all other such events pale into insignificance. It was a slaughter that would never be forgotten in all the annals of the desert peoples, who would learn of it from those who fled Quarzhasaat that night-flinging themselves into the waterless desert rather than face the white laughing demon on a Bauradi horse who galloped up and down their lovely streets and taught them what the price of complacency and unthinking cruelty could be.

"Arioch! Ariochl Blood and souls!"

They would speak of a white-faced creature from Hell whose sword poured with unnatural radiance, whose crimson eyes blazed with hideous rage, who seemed possessed, himself, of some supernatural force, who was no more master of it than were his victims. He killed without mercy, without distinction, without cruelty. He killed as a mad wolf kills. And as he killed, he laughed.