Swords & Dark Magic: The New Sword and Sorcery

The warriors were brave and experienced, but they were completely demoralised from the moment Elric struck them—a ghost from their own pasts—a whirlwind of black, vampiric death, its howling rune-blade an image of their own legends, its blazing crimson eyes haunting all their nightmares. And with their leader gone, and in the certain presence of their own Prince of Chaos, the demon lord Arioch, who was one of their shared pantheon, they had no stomach for fighting their kind. It took the Lady Fernrath to speak to Elric in the High Tongue of the Phoorn, reminding him of who and where he was, to urge him to lower his sword and look wonderingly around him at the piled corpses, the bodies of all those who had gone to feed himself and Stormbringer. So many damned souls! And then the albino knew a kind of grief. But it was not for the dead slavers that he wept.

While Elric wept, there came another wave of amber-armoured soldiers. At first it seemed they had rallied, but they were in obvious disarray. Many had lost their weapons and, seeing that their comrades were captured, threw themselves on the mercy of their former booty, who promptly stripped them of their arms and put them in chains. For the moment, the air was free of arrows. Clearly, the archers had been called to another part of the fort to reinforce Addric Heed’s army. But who could be attacking?

Suddenly Elric looked up to hear the constant rolling thunder moving first towards them, then away again, while the alabaster walls shook and shivered, and small showers of stone and plaster fell from ceilings and walls.

Leaving the others behind to guard the ancient Phoorn and to organise themselves and their prisoners, Elric and Lady Fernrath stalked warily to the nearest stair and began to climb. As they reached galleries with windows which looked out on other windowed galleries, they could see that all the way to the top of the great fort, a terrible fight had been taking place and dead soldiers in amber armour lay everywhere. The sound of thunder was beginning to subside. The sky was clearing and the sun turned clouds to pale gold. From above, Elric heard his name being called.

“Elric! My lord! We thought you dead!”

The albino stopped and looked up. At length, he saw through a smashed window in the gallery above a broad, redheaded face grinning down. The face was Moonglum’s.

Slowly, the madness deserted Elric and in something close to joy he ran through the galleries until he found his friend. Princess Nauha stood with Moonglum and also Cita Tine, the tavern wench. All were armed with bloody swords and bore the familiar look of war-wolves who had fought a long, exhilarating fight. And then, as if Insensate Fate could not contain this level of coincidence but must burst and spread it across the multiverse, there appeared the nuns of Xiombarg, smug as nuns are who have pleased themselves by some deed of virtue, to report that all was settled as justice demanded.

“Our lady answered us and we reached an agreement,” declared one as she straightened her unwieldy crown.

“Agreement?” Elric knew that the Gods of the Balance rarely made bargains not to their advantage.

Then Cita Tine was calling out. “Where? The slaves? Are they still in the pens?”

Elric shrugged. “Some are. Others set off through the forest.” He was puzzled by her interest.

She sheathed her blades and peered down. Then she moved away in the direction from which Elric and the Lady Fernrath had come.

Elric turned enquiring eyes on his friend. Moonglum sighed and scratched his head. “That’s why she came with us. Her plan all along was to sell valuables here and use the money to buy her husband back from the traders. He was taken a voyage ago.”

Elric frowned. “So—?”

“Aye. She used me and now she’s off to see if her spouse survived.” Moonglum sighed. “Still, for a few weeks, I have to say, she was happy to have me as his substitute.” He cast a hopeful eye upon one of the acolytes, who moved closer to her colleague. And he sighed again.

“So Xiombarg’s the cause of all this destruction?” Elric wiped other men’s life-stuff from his face.

“We fought hard and well, but we could not have succeeded without her ghastly help.” Nauha stepped closer, “We certainly enjoyed a little sword work of our own.” She noticed that blood was crusting on both her blades and, glancing around her, saw a useful cloak. Bending, she ripped the garment away from its former owner and began to wipe first one sword and then the other.

“Addric Heed?” asked Fernrath, looking about her at the devastation. “Does he live?”

“After a fashion,” said the Princess of Uyt. “Knowing your relationship, I begged him spared. But I was almost too late. Xiombarg—”

“Where is he?”

Nauha frowned, thinking. “Two floors below and…” She shook her head. “Two to the left. His banners and his horse are there. He barely lives, however. Xiombarg was eating him.”