"2569-50" - читать интересную книгу автора (Jerome Bigge - Warlady 7 - The Dularnian Queen)2569 A.D.! THE DULARNIAN QUEEN AN ADVENTURE IN THE SECOND DARK AGE OF MAN By Jerome B. Bigge Chapter Fifty "I am a woman `driven' by `ambition'," Darlanis spoke to Sharon as the two shared lunch together. "One I fear who will have much to `answer' for when she faces Lys," the Empress smiled as Sharon nodded back, well aware too that Darlanis "believed" in such things with an unshakable "faith" that allowed for no "doubts". Whether or not such things were "true" Sharon didn't know, but she did know that Darlanis believed them to be TRUE... "The world is better because you have lived," Sharon spoke. There would never be another Empress like this fantastic beauty. "I am thankful that I have the friends that I do," Darlanis smiled back. "Without you, Lorraine, I would have `little' now." "You `have' your husband," Sharon pointed out, Prince Serak having stayed with the ship so that he might return to the Nevada lands, where he now assisted his father the King, in ruling them. Both Darlanis and Serak had found such "separations" helpful too. "Serak and I have our `problems'," Darlanis smiled back, the smile on Sharon's lips leaving no doubt that she "knew" of them. Darlanis was not the sort of a woman who made a "good wife", al- though she was loving and "good in bed", and extremely beautiful. On the other hand she was also a woman who had her own ideas on things, things that had caused "rocky spots" in their marriage. "Men and women had those problems in my time," Sharon said. "The centuries have changed us little," Darlanis smiled. "Is there `anything' we can `do' for Maris?" Sharon asked. "Her fate is in the hands of LYS, I fear," Darlanis replied. "There are `those' in Dularn who do not wish her back," the Queen of Orgon replied thoughtfully, her eyes meeting Darlanis'. "I prefer Maris Marn as Queen of Dularn to any other," the Empress answered in level tones, the "implications" not "missed"! ***************************************************************** "Good sailing weather," I said to Diane as she stood there. "I think you made the `right' decision," she answered me, adding "your majesty" as an afterthought as I stood there then. "There will be `those' who will accuse of me of ....," I an- swered thoughtfully, well aware of "what" would be said in Arsana when word of our adventures reached the ears of my political ene- mies. On the other hand did we want to give the Japanese our own technology without knowing to what "use" they might put it now? There had been those too who had spoken against Lorraine for just that. I recalled too the "opposition" Bob Simmons had met in the construction of the Diana, especially from the High Priestess... There was much to be said for not building the weapons of the past once again. We needed to learn to live in peace, not rein- vent the weapons of the past in order to kill more quickly... "You are not `Lorraine', and we don't `need' another," Diane answered, looking out over the bow at the blue green ocean ahead. "Life I think was better before we learned how to build these new sorts of weapons that can kill more swiftly at more distance..." Her words reminding me of how she'd lost her foot to Tara's can- non, another "example" of the "military technology" of the past. "I think you are `wise' beyond your years," I smiled back. "Perhaps I have had a good teacher," she now smiled back. ***************************************************************** "I think you fail to give yourself `credit' for the kind of person that you are," Sharon said to Darlanis as they finished up their lunch there in Porlan. "And I think in a lot of ways you are truly the `Queen of Light' that the Priestesses have referred to," she added, meeting Darlanis' beautiful eyes with her own. Sharon's palace, while "small", was quite tastefully laid out. A slave girl knelt waiting to be of service and to clear the table after they were done, her dark eyes missing little of things. "Perhaps of your `love' for me," Darlanis replied back. "Another Empress would have killed," Sharon answered her. "It is not a thing I am `proud' of doing," Darlanis replied. "You taught me the `meaning' of being a ruler," Sharon said. "I seriously considered giving up the Empire," Darlanis re- plied. "Allowing it to slip from my grasp instead," she added... "You would not have been Darlanis had you done so," Sharon smiled, well aware too that her back was scarred from the whip. That this woman before her, this "Empress" had done the deed too! "I may `answer' some day to Lorraine too," Darlanis said. The Imperial Warlady was due to have her baby quite soon now too, Sharon knew, Darlanis nodding to the slave girl as she knelt to one side, the wench now getting to her feet, approaching them then, aware that they spoke of things she dared never to "repeat" if she valued her life. Queen Sharon being "strict", but "fair". "I am very fortunate to have known you both," Sharon smiled. "I think the `same' of both you and Lorraine," Darlanis grinned back, pushing back her chair and getting up from the ta- ble, the slave girl swift to clear things away for her mistress. The Empress' glittering golden attire seemingly "fitting" on her. "I sometimes `wonder' about Princess Tara," Sharon said as she now joined Darlanis at a window that overlooked the city, looking up into the azure eyes of this woman she thought of much as a daughter thinks of her own mother. A woman from a time five centuries from her own era of the 20th Century, a woman conceived upon the body of a woman of another world, the ruddy planet Mars! "Perhaps she was but the `tool' of another," Darlanis mused. "What was it `like' when you saw the `EVIL ONE'?" Sharon asked, aware from what she'd heard now that Darlanis had done so! "I learned the `meaning of fear'," Darlanis smiled back. "I think for the first time in my life I saw something that I could only flee in terror from, a `horror' like no other," she added... Still vivid in the Empress' memory was the vision of that great spider like thing forming in the sky overhead while she and Queen Maris of Dularn fled for their lives aboard Lorraine's airplane knowing as they fled that even the airplane couldn't fly fast enough to allow them to escape that awful horror from another plane of existence that the witches had "invited" into this one! "`The Warrioress may know fear, but she will not allow her- self to submit to it," Sharon smiled back, seeing Darlanis nod... "I fear neither man or beast, but `that' ...," she replied, leaving Sharon to fill in the rest of her sentence as she might. "Let is hope then that it never enters our universe again," the young Queen of Orgon now smiled back at her Imperial Empress. "There is the `prediction'," Darlanis spoke, Sharon nodding. "It `came', and the Priestesses drove it back," she replied. It had taken a "weapon" unknown since the time of the great War! "Perhaps it was not `prepared' for what it faced," Darlanis spoke softly, looking out over the city of Porlan, the great riv- er that the city used as a harbor that led to the ocean beyond. "In the `prediction', it was said that Tara was `responsi- ble'," Darlanis answered, turning, looking about the room then. "Perhaps the `prediction' was for a `future' we no longer face," Sharon ventured, wondering if what Lorraine had "seen" there on Mars had been REALITY or just some sort of an illusion? "LYS is infallible," the tall golden beauty replied then, but your step mother might have been a bit `confused' at times." "You do have a `daughter'," Sharon pointed out in reply. "The girl that Pussycat `bore' for me?" Darlanis spoke. "The one who will become `Domino Tremaine'," Sharon said. "The woman was brain damaged," Darlanis hotly retorted then. "But you buried her remains as `your' daughter," the young Queen smiled back. Darlanis nodding, her eyes not meeting hers. The Empress had attempted to avoid letting it be widely known, it being feared by Darlanis that "more" might be made of it than the Imperial ruler of California wished. Sharon also suspected that it was possible that Darlanis feared becoming too emotionally at- tached to the little blonde girl, who had been cloned from one of her own ovums several years before. The girl now being raised in the Imperial Palace by the former slave girl Lynn, who Darlanis trusted to raise the girl properly, although the girl herself was well aware of course that Darlanis was her own true mother here. "I am perhaps fighting against `what will be'," the Empress answered thoughtfully. "Trying to `prevent' a future that I know will be regardless of what I do," Darlanis continued on then to Sharon as the young Queen of Orgon nodded in reply back at her... Sharon well aware of Darlanis' own secret true feelings on this. "Only the Priestesses can travel through time," Sharon said. "Perhaps that is what they `believe' too," Darlanis smiled, the "implications" of her words not missed by the young golden haired Queen there at her side. "I fear we know little of things to be regardless of what Tais may think," Darlanis now concluded. 2569 A.D.! THE DULARNIAN QUEEN AN ADVENTURE IN THE SECOND DARK AGE OF MAN By Jerome B. Bigge Chapter Fifty "I am a woman `driven' by `ambition'," Darlanis spoke to Sharon as the two shared lunch together. "One I fear who will have much to `answer' for when she faces Lys," the Empress smiled as Sharon nodded back, well aware too that Darlanis "believed" in such things with an unshakable "faith" that allowed for no "doubts". Whether or not such things were "true" Sharon didn't know, but she did know that Darlanis believed them to be TRUE... "The world is better because you have lived," Sharon spoke. There would never be another Empress like this fantastic beauty. "I am thankful that I have the friends that I do," Darlanis smiled back. "Without you, Lorraine, I would have `little' now." "You `have' your husband," Sharon pointed out, Prince Serak having stayed with the ship so that he might return to the Nevada lands, where he now assisted his father the King, in ruling them. Both Darlanis and Serak had found such "separations" helpful too. "Serak and I have our `problems'," Darlanis smiled back, the smile on Sharon's lips leaving no doubt that she "knew" of them. Darlanis was not the sort of a woman who made a "good wife", al- though she was loving and "good in bed", and extremely beautiful. On the other hand she was also a woman who had her own ideas on things, things that had caused "rocky spots" in their marriage. "Men and women had those problems in my time," Sharon said. "The centuries have changed us little," Darlanis smiled. "Is there `anything' we can `do' for Maris?" Sharon asked. "Her fate is in the hands of LYS, I fear," Darlanis replied. "There are `those' in Dularn who do not wish her back," the Queen of Orgon replied thoughtfully, her eyes meeting Darlanis'. "I prefer Maris Marn as Queen of Dularn to any other," the Empress answered in level tones, the "implications" not "missed"! ***************************************************************** "Good sailing weather," I said to Diane as she stood there. "I think you made the `right' decision," she answered me, adding "your majesty" as an afterthought as I stood there then. "There will be `those' who will accuse of me of ....," I an- swered thoughtfully, well aware of "what" would be said in Arsana when word of our adventures reached the ears of my political ene- mies. On the other hand did we want to give the Japanese our own technology without knowing to what "use" they might put it now? There had been those too who had spoken against Lorraine for just that. I recalled too the "opposition" Bob Simmons had met in the construction of the Diana, especially from the High Priestess... There was much to be said for not building the weapons of the past once again. We needed to learn to live in peace, not rein- vent the weapons of the past in order to kill more quickly... "You are not `Lorraine', and we don't `need' another," Diane answered, looking out over the bow at the blue green ocean ahead. "Life I think was better before we learned how to build these new sorts of weapons that can kill more swiftly at more distance..." Her words reminding me of how she'd lost her foot to Tara's can- non, another "example" of the "military technology" of the past. "I think you are `wise' beyond your years," I smiled back. "Perhaps I have had a good teacher," she now smiled back. ***************************************************************** "I think you fail to give yourself `credit' for the kind of person that you are," Sharon said to Darlanis as they finished up their lunch there in Porlan. "And I think in a lot of ways you are truly the `Queen of Light' that the Priestesses have referred to," she added, meeting Darlanis' beautiful eyes with her own. Sharon's palace, while "small", was quite tastefully laid out. A slave girl knelt waiting to be of service and to clear the table after they were done, her dark eyes missing little of things. "Perhaps of your `love' for me," Darlanis replied back. "Another Empress would have killed," Sharon answered her. "It is not a thing I am `proud' of doing," Darlanis replied. "You taught me the `meaning' of being a ruler," Sharon said. "I seriously considered giving up the Empire," Darlanis re- plied. "Allowing it to slip from my grasp instead," she added... "You would not have been Darlanis had you done so," Sharon smiled, well aware too that her back was scarred from the whip. That this woman before her, this "Empress" had done the deed too! "I may `answer' some day to Lorraine too," Darlanis said. The Imperial Warlady was due to have her baby quite soon now too, Sharon knew, Darlanis nodding to the slave girl as she knelt to one side, the wench now getting to her feet, approaching them then, aware that they spoke of things she dared never to "repeat" if she valued her life. Queen Sharon being "strict", but "fair". "I am very fortunate to have known you both," Sharon smiled. "I think the `same' of both you and Lorraine," Darlanis grinned back, pushing back her chair and getting up from the ta- ble, the slave girl swift to clear things away for her mistress. The Empress' glittering golden attire seemingly "fitting" on her. "I sometimes `wonder' about Princess Tara," Sharon said as she now joined Darlanis at a window that overlooked the city, looking up into the azure eyes of this woman she thought of much as a daughter thinks of her own mother. A woman from a time five centuries from her own era of the 20th Century, a woman conceived upon the body of a woman of another world, the ruddy planet Mars! "Perhaps she was but the `tool' of another," Darlanis mused. "What was it `like' when you saw the `EVIL ONE'?" Sharon asked, aware from what she'd heard now that Darlanis had done so! "I learned the `meaning of fear'," Darlanis smiled back. "I think for the first time in my life I saw something that I could only flee in terror from, a `horror' like no other," she added... Still vivid in the Empress' memory was the vision of that great spider like thing forming in the sky overhead while she and Queen Maris of Dularn fled for their lives aboard Lorraine's airplane knowing as they fled that even the airplane couldn't fly fast enough to allow them to escape that awful horror from another plane of existence that the witches had "invited" into this one! "`The Warrioress may know fear, but she will not allow her- self to submit to it," Sharon smiled back, seeing Darlanis nod... "I fear neither man or beast, but `that' ...," she replied, leaving Sharon to fill in the rest of her sentence as she might. "Let is hope then that it never enters our universe again," the young Queen of Orgon now smiled back at her Imperial Empress. "There is the `prediction'," Darlanis spoke, Sharon nodding. "It `came', and the Priestesses drove it back," she replied. It had taken a "weapon" unknown since the time of the great War! "Perhaps it was not `prepared' for what it faced," Darlanis spoke softly, looking out over the city of Porlan, the great riv- er that the city used as a harbor that led to the ocean beyond. "In the `prediction', it was said that Tara was `responsi- ble'," Darlanis answered, turning, looking about the room then. "Perhaps the `prediction' was for a `future' we no longer face," Sharon ventured, wondering if what Lorraine had "seen" there on Mars had been REALITY or just some sort of an illusion? "LYS is infallible," the tall golden beauty replied then, but your step mother might have been a bit `confused' at times." "You do have a `daughter'," Sharon pointed out in reply. "The girl that Pussycat `bore' for me?" Darlanis spoke. "The one who will become `Domino Tremaine'," Sharon said. "The woman was brain damaged," Darlanis hotly retorted then. "But you buried her remains as `your' daughter," the young Queen smiled back. Darlanis nodding, her eyes not meeting hers. The Empress had attempted to avoid letting it be widely known, it being feared by Darlanis that "more" might be made of it than the Imperial ruler of California wished. Sharon also suspected that it was possible that Darlanis feared becoming too emotionally at- tached to the little blonde girl, who had been cloned from one of her own ovums several years before. The girl now being raised in the Imperial Palace by the former slave girl Lynn, who Darlanis trusted to raise the girl properly, although the girl herself was well aware of course that Darlanis was her own true mother here. "I am perhaps fighting against `what will be'," the Empress answered thoughtfully. "Trying to `prevent' a future that I know will be regardless of what I do," Darlanis continued on then to Sharon as the young Queen of Orgon nodded in reply back at her... Sharon well aware of Darlanis' own secret true feelings on this. "Only the Priestesses can travel through time," Sharon said. "Perhaps that is what they `believe' too," Darlanis smiled, the "implications" of her words not missed by the young golden haired Queen there at her side. "I fear we know little of things to be regardless of what Tais may think," Darlanis now concluded. |
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