"Gordon R. Dickson - The Last Dream" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dickson Gordon R)

тАЬOh, thatтАЩs where heтАЩs wrong, though. You couldnтАЩt trust dragons to stick by you in a bicker. And what
if your enemy had dragons of his own? They wouldnтАЩt fight each other. No. No.тАЭ

They fell silent. They had moved away from the grass onto flat sandy soil. There was a sterile, flinty
hardness to it. It crunched under the hooves of Clarivaux, at once unyielding and treacherous.

тАЬGetting darker, isnтАЩt it?тАЭ said Jim, finally.

The light was, in fact, now down to a grayish twilight, through which it was impossible to see more than a
dozen feet. And it was dwindling as they watched. They had halted and stood facing each other. The light
fled steadily, and faster. The dimness became blacker, and blackerтАФuntil finally the last vestige of
illumination was lost and blackness, total and complete, overwhelmed them. Jim felt a gauntleted hand
touch one of his forelimbs.

тАЬLetтАЩs hold together,тАЭ said the voice of the knight. тАЬThen whatever comes upon us, must come upon us
all at once.тАЭ

тАЬRight,тАЭ said Jim. But the word sounded cold and dead in his throat.

They stood, in silence and in lightlessness, waiting for they did not know what. And the blankness about
them pressed further in on them, now that it had isolated them, nibbling at the very edges of their minds.
Out of the nothingness came nothing material, but from within them crept up one by one, like blind white
slugs from some bottomless pit, all their inner doubts and fears and unknown weaknesses, all the things of
which they had been ashamed and which they had tucked away to forget, all the maggots of their souls.

Jim found himself slowly, stealthily beginning to withdraw his forelimb from under the knightтАЩs touch. He
no longer trusted Nevile-SmytheтАФfor the evil that must be in the man because of the evil he knew to be
in himself. He would move awayтАж off into the darkness aloneтАж

тАЬLook!тАЭ Nevile-SmytheтАЩs voice cried suddenly to him, distant and eerie, as if from someone already a
long way off. тАЬLook back the way we came.тАЭ

Jim turned about. Far off in the darkness, there was a distant glimmer of light. It rolled toward them,
growing as it came. They felt its power against the power of lightlessness that threatened to overwhelm
them; and the horse Clarivaux stirred unseen beside them, stamped his hooves on the hard sand, and
whinnied.

тАЬThis way!тАЭ called Jim.

тАЬThis way!тАЭ shouted Nevile-Smythe.

The light shot up suddenly in height. Like a great rod it advanced toward them and the darkness was
rolling back, graying, disappearing. They heard a sound of feet close, and a sound of breathing, and
thenтАФ

It was daylight again.

And S. Carolinus stood before them in tall hat and robes figured with strange images and signs. In his
hand upright before himтАФas if it was blade and buckler, spear and armor all in oneтАФhe held a tall