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

Jorkas shrugged, sheathed the sword, and took up his instrument again. His horse-legs bore him cantering away down the lane, and when he was out of sight around the bend his counter-tenor voice was once more heard raised in song.
"Thank you, sir," Bernard said to his rescuer, wiping his face and not unduly surprised to find he had been perspiring. "I must confess I was not prepared to meet anything like that in this quiet lane."
The black-clad one smiled, a faraway look in his eyes. "I have rendered some small service," he said matter-of-factly. "And I would add a smidgin of advice to it, too. If you expect nothing and everything, you will do well."
Bernard settled his jacket more comfortably around his shoulders and blinked several times in succession "Well, sir, taken whichever way, I cannot see your advice proving unsound. Particularly if this neighborhood is populated by more amazing freaks such as Jorkas!"
"Yes, he. bears the imprint of chaos, does he not?" said the man in black. "He is left over, so to speak. He is fairly harmless; things have by-passed him, and his power grows small."
"The power of that sword, had it reached its target, would have been quite sufficient to dispose of me, Bernard pointed out. "Has he escaped from some- some fantastic menagerie?"
"He has rather endured from a period of absolute confusion," was the reply, which though apparently meaningful served not at all to lessen either Bernard's puzzlement or his alarm. He decided, nonetheless, to forego further inquiry into the matter, and to revert to his major preoccupation.
"Can you, sir, tell me where lies the London road?"
"I can," said the other with a chuckle. "But it would be of small help to you if I did, since you cannot come to it from here. No, listen to me, and I will give you directions which will eventually bring you where you wish to be."
Since that was the best the black-clad man was willing to offer, Bernard had perforce to nod his acceptance.
"Go forward from here," said his mentor, "until you reach three twisted alder-trees standing alone in a meadow. You will recognize them readily enough. Stand before them and bow your head three times, and then take the path around them. In a little while it will bring you to a city. And whatever you do, do not speak with a woman in clothing the color of blood. Otherwise I cannot answer for the consequences."
"What nonsense!" thought Bernard to himself. But since he had no choice he thanked the other civilly and went on circumspectly down the lane.

The three alder-trees poked up, white and gnarled, from the grass of the promised meadow, like the fingers of a skeleton. Bernard hesitated, looking about him. He felt foolish to be going to do what he had been advised to do. Still, as far as he could tell no one was watching him, and the straightforward logic of common sense had long ago informed him that he was not at present in a location where common sense was greatly prized.
He was troubled, though, that he could see no sign at all of a road beyond this point, so that unless he did what he had been told, and it-ah-worked, he would have to retrace his path, with the concomitant prospect of a second encounter with Jorkas. For that he had no stomach. Accordingly he bowed his head three times, and was amazed to find that he was standing on a clearly-defined path. Which, he likewise noticed, led nowhere except around the alders.
Well, the black-clad man had said he should take the path which led around them. He turned to his left and strode resolutely along the circular path, hopeful of getting somewhere eventually.
At his third turn, when he was feeling truly embarrassed by his own silliness, he looked towards the alder-trees again and saw a very beautiful woman standing among them. She had a face of perfect oval shape, skin like mother-of-pearl and hair blacker than midnight. But she was gowned from shoulders to ankles in a dress that was red as blood.
She spoke to him in a musical voice, sarcastically. "And where do you think your circumambulations will carry you, my foolish friend? Did no one ever inform you that walking in circles takes you nowhere? Why not go forward? See!"
She raised her right arm, on which golden bracelets jangled, and when Bernard followed her pointing fingers he saw a city clustered around an enormous tower, the top of which resembled an onyx and the shaft of which resembled agate.
A strange sort of city! Yet at least a habitation, not a stretch of deserted countryside. He was half-minded to make hastily towards it, and yet felt a vague foreboding. There was an aura about that city ...
He spoke to the air, to himself, not to the woman in red, and said, "The man who saved me from Jorkas advised me not to speak with a woman in a dress the color of blood. I assume this advice extends to not following any suggestion she may make to me." Doggedly he continued his rotatory progress, while the woman's laughter tinkled irritatingly in his ears, and was rewarded on his next circuit to see that she had gone. Somewhere. Somehow.
Moreover, another city was in "sight, and this was not so disturbing. Its towers were of gold and silver, and although the sky about it was of an electrical blue shade that seemed to presage nothing less familiar than the advent of a storm.
"There, perhaps," reasoned Bernard, "I may escape this conglomeration of cryptic non-meaningful events, and may even track down someone who can tell me how to get home."
He struck out across the meadow, and shortly came to a good though dusty road, which led straight towards the city with the gold and silver towers. Determined to reach it in the least possible time, he thrust the road behind him with feet that now began to ache more than a little.
"So!" said the enchanter Manuus, leaning back in his chair with a chuckle. "So!" he said again, dropping the cover-made of bat's skin as fine and supple as silk -over his scrying-glass. "Well, well, well, well, well!"

V

At the head of the council table-which, because the weather was oppressive, he had caused to be set out under the sycamore trees in the Moth Garden-the Margrave of Ryovora sat, frowning terribly.
Before him, the table stretched almost a hundred feet, in sections that were joined so cleverly the overarching trees could admire their reflections intact in the polished top. Nothing spoiled the perfection of this table, except the purplish sheen it had acquired from the heavy close air now filling the city.
To right and left of him, ranked in their chairs, sat the nobility of Ryovora, men and women of vast individual distinction: the merchant-enchanters, the persons of inquiring mind, the thinkers, the creators, all those to whom this city owed its fame and reputation.
The Margrave spoke, not looking at those who listened.
"Tell us what has taken place in your quarter of the town, Petrovic."
Petrovic, a dry little man with a withered face like an old apple, coughed apologetically and said, "There are omens. I have cast runes to ascertain their meaning.
They have no known meaning. Milk has been soured in the pan four mornings running in my demesne."
"And Ruman?"
Ruman was a man built like an oak tree, whose thick gnarled hands were twisting restlessly in his lap. He said, "I have slaughtered animals to divine what may be read in their entrails. I agree with Petrovic-these omens have no known significance. But two springs under the wall of the city, which have not failed in more centuries than I can discover, are dry this morning."
"And Gostala?"
Gostala was a woman with a queenly bosom and a queenly diadem of white hair plaited around her head. She said, "I have watched the flight of birds each dawn for seven days, and also at sunset. The results are confused. But a two-headed lamb has been born in the village of Dunwray."
"And Eadwil?"
Eadwil was hardly more than a boy. His chin was innocent of a beard and when he spoke his voice was like a reed pipe; still, one must respect his precocious wisdom. He said, "I have analyzed the relative situations of the stars and planets, and am driven to the hypotheses that either we know nothing at all or some unknown heavenly body is influencing events. A comet, perhaps. But yesterday lightning struck three times out of a clear sky, and-and, Margrave, I'm frightened!"
The Margrave nodded and made a comforting gesture in the air. It didn't help much. He said, "But this cannot be the whole story. I move that we-here, now, in full council-ask Him Who Must Know."
Eadwil rose to his feet. On his youthful lips trembled a sob, which he stoutly repressed.
"I request your permission to withdraw, then," he said. "It is well known how He Who Must Know deals with those in-uh-my condition."
The Margrave coughed and nodded approval of the discreet reference. Eadwil owed some of his precocity to the postponement of a major upheaval in his physiology, and the elemental they were considering found virgins vulnerable to his powers.
"Agreed," he said, and Eadwil departed, sighing with relief.
Before they could proceed with the business before them, however, there was a rustling sound from far down the table, and a voice spoke like the soughing of wind in bare winter woods.
"Margrave, I suggest otherwise."
The Margrave shifted uncomfortably in his chair. That was Tyllwin who spoke, a figure as gaunt as a scarecrow and as thin as a rake, who sat among them by courtesy because no one knew where he had come from or how old he was, but everyone knew he had many and peculiar powers which had never been put to use. Just as well, maybe. Whenever Tyllwin spoke, untoward events followed. The Margrave saw with alarm that several blossoms on nearby trees were withering.
"Speak, Tyllwin," he muttered, and braced himself.