And as they moved the room itself began to shake. They heard Voilodion Ghagnasdiak screaming.

"The tower! The tower! This will destroy the tower! "

Elric looked up from the last corpse. It was true that the tower was swaying wildly from side to side like a ship in a storm.

Jhary-a-Conel pushed past the dwarf and entered the room of death. The sight seemed obnoxious to him but he controlled his feelings. "It is true. The sorcery we have worked today must have its effect. Whiskersto me! "

The thing on Voilodion Ghagnasdiak's face flew into the air and settled on Jhary's shoulder. Elric saw that it was a small black and white cat, ordinary in every detail save for its neat pair of wings which it was now folding.

Voilodion Ghagnasdiak sat crumpled in the doorway and he was weeping through sightless eyes. Tears of blood flowed down his handsome face.

Elric ran back into the other room, breaking his link with Corum. He peered through the window slit. But now there was nothing but a wild eruption of mauve and purple cloud.

He gasped. "We are in limbo! "

Silence fell. Still the tower swayed. The lights were extinguished by a strange wind blowing through the

rooms and the only illumination came from outside where the mist still swirled.

Jhary-a-Conel was frowning to himself as he joined Elric at the window.

"How did you know what to do?" Elric asked him.

"I knew because I know you, Elric of Melnibone"just as I know Erekose there-for I travel in many ages and on many planes. That is why I am sometimes called Companion to Champions. I must find my sword and my sack-also my hat. Doubtless all are in Voilodion's vault with his other loot."

"But the tower? If it is destroyed shall we, too, be destroyed?"

"A possibility. Come, friend Elric, help me seek my hat."

"At such a time, you look for a-hat?"

"Aye." Jhary-a-Conel returned to the larger room, stroking the black and white cat. Voilodion Ghagnasdiak was still there and he was still weeping. "Prince Corum-Lord Erekose-will you come with me, too."

Corum and the black giant joined Elric and they squeezed into the narrow passage, inching their way along until it widened to reveal a flight of stairs leading downward. The tower shuddered again. Jhary lit a brand and removed it from its place in the wall. He began to descend the steps, the three heroes behind him.

A slab of masonry fell from the roof and crashed just in front of Elric. "I would prefer to seek a means of escape from the tower, " he said to Jhary-a-Conel. "If it falls now, we shall be buried."

"Trust me, Prince Elric, " was all that Jhary would say.

And because Jhary had already shown himself to possess great knowledge Elric allowed the dandy to lead him further into the bowels of the tower.

At last they reached a circular chamber and in it was set a huge metal door.

"Voilodion's vault, " Jhary told them. "Here you will find all the things you seek. And I, I hope, will find my

bat. The hat was specially made and is the only one which properly matches my other clothes...."

"How do we open a door like that?" Erekose asked. "It is made of steel, surely! " He hefted the black blade he still bore in his left hand.

"If you link arms again, my friends, " Jhary suggested with a kind of mocking deference, "I will show you how the door may be opened."

Once again Elric, Corum and Erekose linked their arms together. Once again the supernatural strength seemed to flow through them and they laughed at each other, knowing that they were all part of the same creature.

Jhary's voice seemed to come faintly to Elric's ears. "And now, Prince Corum, if you would strike with your foot once upon the door...."

They moved until they were close to the door. That part of them which was Corum struck out with his foot at the slab of steel-and the door fell inward as if made of the lightest wood.

This tune Elric was much more reluctant to break the link which held them. But he did so at last as Jhary stepped into the vault chuckling to himself.

The tower lurched. All three were flung after Jhary into Voilodion's vault. Elric fell heavily against a great golden chair of a kind he had once seen used as an elephant saddle. He looked around the vault. It was full of valuables, of clothes, shoes, weapons. He felt nauseated as he realized that these had been the possessions of all those Voilodion had chosen to call his guests.

Jhary pulled a bundle from under a pile of furs. "Look, Prince Elric. These are what you will need where Tanelorn is concerned." It seemed to be a bunch of long sticks rolled in thin sheets of metal.

Elric accepted the heavy bundle. "What is it?"

"They are the banners of bronze and the arrows of quartz. Useful weapons against the reptilian men of Pio and their mounts."

"You know of those reptiles? You know of Theleb K'aarna, too?"

"The sorcerer of Pan Tang? Aye."

Elric stared almost suspiciously at Jhary-a-Conel. "How can you know all this?"

"I have told you. I have lived many lives as a Friend of Heroes. Unwrap this bundle when you return to Tanelorn. Use the arrows of quartz like spears. To use the banners of bronze, merely unfurl them. Aha! " Jhary reached behind a sack of jewels and came up with a somewhat dusty hat. He smacked off the dust and placed it on his head. "Ah! " He bent again and displayed a goblet. He offered this to Prince Corum. "Take it. It will prove useful, I think."

From another corner Jhary took a small sack and put it on his shoulder. Almost as an afterthought he hunted about in a chest of jewels and found a gleaming ring of unnamable stones and peculiar metal. "This is your reward, Erekose, in helping to free me from my captor."

Erekose smiled. "I have the feeling you needed no help, young man."

"You are mistaken, friend Erekose. I doubt if I have ever been in greater peril." He looked vaguely about the vault, staggering as the floor tilted alarmingly.

Elric said: "We should take steps to leave."

"Exactly." Jhary-a-Conel crossed swiftly to the fat side of the vault. "The last thing. In his pride Voilodion showed me his possessions, but he did not know the value of all of them."

"What do you mean?" asked the Prince in the Scarlet Robe.

"He killed the traveller who brought this with him. The traveller was right in assuming he had the means to stop the tower from vanishing, but he did not have time to use it before Voilodion had slain him." Jhary picked up a small staff coloured a dull ochre. "Here it is. The Runestaff. Hawkmoon had this with him when I travelled with him to the Dark Empire...."

Noticing their puzzlement, Jhary-a-Conel, Compan ion to Champions, apologised. "I am sorry. I sometimes forget that not all of us have memories of other careers...."

"What is the Runestaff?" Corum asked.

"I remember one description-but I am poor at naming and explaining things...."

"That has not escaped my notice, " Elric said, almost smiling.

"It is an object which can only exist under a certain set of spatial and temporal laws. In order to continue to exist, it must exert a field in which it can contain itself. That field must accord with those laws-the same laws under which we best survive."

More masonry fell.

"The tower is breaking up! " Erekose growled.

Jhary stroked the dull ochre staff. "Please gather near me, my friends."

The three heroes stood around him. And then the roof of the tower fell in. But it did not fall on them for they stood suddenly on firm ground breathing fresh air. But there was blackness all around them. "Do not step outside this small area, " Jhary warned, "or you will be doomed. Let the Runestaff seek what we seek."

They saw the ground change colour, breathed warmer, then colder, air. It was as if they moved from plane to plane of the universe, never seeing more than the few feet of ground upon which they stood.