"Brunner,.John.-.Traveler.In.Black.V1 (2)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Brunner John)

"A long time ago, sir," Eadwil answered with a deprecating smile. The two children on his shoulders giggled, and one of them tried to catch hold of the traveler's staff, almost lost his balance, and righted himself with the aid of a pat from Eadwil's broad soft hand.
"May I ask what brought about your change of residence?" the traveler murmured.
"My change of employment," Eadwil shrugged, again nearly dislodging the more venturesome boy. "You spoke of me as a merchant enchanter; so I was! But when the decision was taken, many years ago, to let rational thought rule Ryovora and put an end to conjurations there, certain consequences followed. For myself I have no regrets; there was a geas upon me which made my feet glow red-hot when I walked, and now nothing worse attends a long tramp like today's than an occasional blister. And these my grandsons too -hey, you little nuisances?-they'd not be here today if I'd continued to submit to the other main restriction which purchased my powers." He rubbed the boys' backs affectionately, and they responded by pulling his ears.
This was quite true, as the traveler was aware. Eadwil had postponed the growing of his beard until unusually late in life by making the trade on which his command of magic had been founded.
"So there came an end to my conjuring of fine silks and spices, of rare wines and exotic perfumes!" Eadwil pursed his lips. "And there were, one must confess, certain persons in Ryovora who felt the lack of these luxuries and accused us retired enchanters of-ha-hm!-betraying them. Therefore I removed to Barbizond. It's a fair city in its way, and even though the local customs are not wholly to my taste, here they do at least have scores of enchanters of their own, so that no one plagues me to be about magical doings. . . . You have late news of Ryovora, sir? For it comes to my mind that I've heard nothing from my old home in quite a while."
The traveler shook his head and gave a wry smile. "It's a fair span since I set foot there. Indeed, I was hoping you might be able to give me certain information which I lack, rather than vice versa."
Eadwil looked politely downcast at being of no help; then one of the boys grew impatient and started to fidget.
"Home?" said his grandfather, and laughed indulgently. "Very well-old Harpentile is in no state to notice that we failed to attend his burying. Good day to you, sir," he added to the traveler. "It's been pleasant to renew our acquaintance, and I greatly hope you find someone who can aid you in these inquiries where I failed you."
"As you wish, so be it," said the traveler under his breath, and a great weight seemed to recede from his heart.

II

That accomplished, there was no more to 'do than sit and wait until the course of fate worked itself out. The traveler took a chair at a curbside tavern; with his elbows on a green table-top, protected from the rain by a pink umbrella, he watched the passers-by and wondered in what guise his helper would come.
The avenue grew crowded as the day wasted. Horsemen in gay jerkins with armor clanking at their saddlebows came by, challengers in some tourney for the hand of an heiress; also there were pedlars, and wonder-workers possessed of a few small tricks-for which they had paid excessively, to judge by their reddened eyes, pocked cheeks, limping gait or even womanly-shrill voices. . . . No wonder, the traveler reflected, Eadwil felt his grandsons were the better bargain.
Women, too, passed: high-wimpled dames attended by maids and dandling curious unnamable pets; harlots in diaphanous cloaks through which it was not quite possible to tell if they were diseased; goodwives with panniers of stinking salted fish and loaves of bread and sealed jars of pollywogs for use in the commonplace home enchantments of this city.
And children likewise: many naked, not necessarily from poverty but because skin was the best raincoat under Barbizond's light continual shower, others in fantastical costumes to match their parents' whims- helmets of huge eggshells, bodices of leaves glued like scales and breeches made to resemble plant-stems in springtime. With spinning windmills, toy lances, tops, hoops and skipping-ropes, they darted among the adults and left a trail of joyful disorder.
There was no joy in the heart of the traveler in black-only a dulled apprehension.

The places at the tables before the tavern filled with customers, until only one was left-the second chair at the table where the traveler waited. Then, to the instant, appeared a curious bewildered figure from the direction of the city gate: a pale-faced, wild-haired man in a russet cape, clinging to a pitiful bag of belongings as though to a baulk of timber in an ocean of insanity. Time had etched his brow with suffering, and the traveler knew him the moment he clapped eyes on him.
Abreast of the tavern the stranger stopped. Enviously his eyes scanned the delicacies placed before the customers: fragrant stoups of wine, mounds of mashed fruit stuck with silver spoons, crisp sheets of the moon-bark that only this city's enchanters knew how to conjure across the freezing gulf of space without spoiling. Huddling his bag under his arm, he felt in his script for money, and produced one solitary copper coin.
Hesitant, he approached the traveler in black. "Sir, by your leave," he muttered, "will this purchase anything at your tavern here?" And proffered the coin on a trembling palm.
The traveler took it and turned it over, and was at pains to conceal the shock he felt on seeing what name the reverse of the coin bore.
Ys!
A city in Time so great and famous that rumors of it had crossed the tenuous border of chaos, running ahead of those who bore its news until the stories were magnified beyond believing, until there were prophecies caused by the recirculation of those rumors through one corner of eternity and back to Time ahead of reality.
"No?" said the stranger sadly, seeing how long the black-clad one spent staring at his only money.
"Why-!" the latter exclaimed, and rubbed the coin with his fingertips, very lightly. "I should say so, friend! Is it not good gold, that passes anywhere?"
"Gold?" The stranger snatched it back, almost dropping his shabby bag in his agitation, and scrutinized it incredulously. Through the coppery tarnish gleamed the dull warm yellow of precious metal.
Without more ado he slumped into the vacant chair at this table, and a waggle-hipped servant-girl came to his side. "Food and drink!" he commanded, letting the miraculous coin ring on the table. "I starve and I'm clemmed with thirst-therefore be quick!"
Eyes twinkling, the traveler regarded his new acquaintance. "And how are you called, sir?" he demanded.
"Jacques of Ys is my name," the other sighed. "Though truth to tell I'm not overmuch inclined to add my origin to my name any longer."
"Why so?"
"Could you wish to be shamed by connection with a cityful of fools?"
"Considering the matter with due reflection," said the traveler, "I think-no."
"Well, then!" Jacques ran his long bony fingers through his already untidy hair; the water had been trying to slick it down, but half an ocean would have been unequal to the task. He was a gaunt man, neither old nor young, with burning grey eyes and a bush of tawny beard.
"So in what way are the folk of Ys foolish?" probed the traveler.
"Oh, once they were a great people," grunted Jacques. "And that's where the trouble started, I suppose.
Once we had a fleet-and not on any land-locked lake, either, but on Oceanus itself, mother of storms and gulls. Also we had an army to guard our trade-routes, skilful money-changers, wise counselors . . . Ah, Ys was among the noblest cities of the world!"
"I believe I've heard so," the traveler agreed.
"Then your news is stale, sir!" Jacques thumped the table. "Listen! There came changes-in the times, in the weather, in the currents of the sea. To be expected, I say, for did not Heraclitus teach us all things flow? But soft living and much ease had stolen the brains out of the people's heads! Faced with the silting-up of our great estuary, did they go to it and build dredgers? They did not! Faced with a landslide that closed our chief silk-road, did they send scouts to locate another way? They did not! Faced with long winters that killed our autumn wheat in the ground, did they sow barley or the hardy northern oat? They did not!"
"Then what did they do?" the traveler inquired. "If anything."
"Fell first to moaning and wringing their hands, and lamenting their sad fate; then, when this proved unfruitful and incapable of filling the granaries, turned to a crowning imbecility and invoked the impossible aid of magic. I see you scowl, sir, and well you may, for all the world knows that magic is a vain and ridiculous snare laid by evil demons in the path of mankind."
This was a stubborn and unobservant fellow, clearly; with his hand closed around a coin that veritable magic-and no petty domestic hearth-spell, either-had turned from copper to gold, he could still make such an assertion. He would not care for this domain in which he now found himself. Still, there was no help for that.
"And to what purposes tended their research in- ah-magic?" the traveler asked.
"To bring back the great days of the past, if you please," said Jacques with majestic scorn, and on the last word crammed his mouth full from a dish the serving-girl placed before him.
While he assuaged his hunger, his companion contemplated these data. Yes, such an event as Jacques had described would account for the paradox of Ys reversing the cosmic trend and exchanging Time for eternity and its attendant confusions. But there must have been a great and terrible lust in the minds of very many people for the change to be brought about; there must have been public foolishness on a scale unparalleled in the All. Thinking on this, the traveler felt his face grow grim.
Reaching for his staff, he made to depart, and Jacques glanced up with his cheeks bulging. Having swallowed frantically, he spoke, "Sir, did I intrude on your meditations? Your pardon if-"
"No, no! You merely recalled me to some unfinished business. You are correct in your description of the people of Ys. They are fools indeed. So do not-if you will take my advice-go back there."
"Where else shall I go, then?" Jacques countered, and for a second despair looked out from behind his eyes. "I set off thinking no place could be worse than my home-town had now become-yet on this brief journey I've seen wonders and marvels that make me question my own good sense. I met a creature on the road that was neither man nor beast, but a blending; I saw a shining sprite washing feet like alabaster in a cloud rimmed with rainbows; and once when I bent to drink from a stream I saw pictures in the water which . . . No, I dare not say what I thought I saw." "That would be the brook called Geirion," said the traveler, and appended a crooked smile. "Don't worry- things seen there can never become real. The folk round about go to the brook to rid themselves of baseless fears."
Jacques glanced over his shoulder at the motley crowd and shivered with dismay. "Nonetheless, sir, I'm not minded to remain in this peculiar city!"
"It would be more comfortable for you to adapt to the local customs than to go home," the traveler warned. "A certain rather spectacular doom is apt to overtake Ys, if things are as you say."