"Lumley,.Brian.-.Titus.Crow.2.-.Transition.Of.Titus.Crow" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lumley Brian)
'Very rarely,' he answered, 'do mathterth bathe ... in lithard pool.'
'Is it taboo, then?' I asked. As a stranger in Elysia I hardly wished to go against the grain.
'Not taboo, but
'You mean the masters frown upon it?'
'Not mathterth . . . lithardth!'
'But you didn't mention this be - '
'For you,' he cut me off, 'ith different.' Then he lifted up his voice and boomed deafeningly across the pool what must have been some sort of explanation of my presence. I caught only the name 'Tiania' in all he said. By the time the echoes of that dragon-cry had died away, however, the play was on again in full swing, and some of the younger lithards splashed over to us as I slid from Oth-Neth's saddle into the blue crystal waters.
One of these young ones, big as myself, covered with a soft velvet leather the color of marble, kept pace with me as 1 slipped easily into the motions of a powerful crawl. Closer he came, eyeing me intently, then he dived down beneath me to lift me up bodily sprawled across his neck. High out of the water he tossed me, letting me fall back with a splash. Indignant, I rose to the surface, only to find the bawling infant undergoing a thorough booming tirade from a vast and blotchy matron.
'No, no!' I cried at once. 'He was only having fun.' Oth-Neth, paddling over like some gorgeously painted
Loch Ness monster, translated loudly. From out near the center of the pool there came a noisy and concerted booming from an audience of more mature lithards.
'They approve of you . . . Tituth Crow!' Oth-Neth informed me. 'Now you bathe. I go ... fetch robes.' Without another word he sank down into deeper waters, to emerge a moment or two later in a breathtaking fountain of spray. His great wings unfolded in the air and he was off, lifting ponderously at first, then more certainly, finally climbing to the sky and disappearing in tufted clouds and rosy sunlight.
So there I was, left alone for the duration to the tender mercies of the strange lithards, and never could I have imagined that to bathe in a pool of dragons might be such wonderful sport! No sooner had Oth-Neth taken his departure than a pair of young beasts came to me from the middle of the lake, hoisting me up out of the water and bearing me bodily to where a host of adult males and females splashed and cavorted. I became the ball in a game of catch, but such was the gentleness of the friendly lithards that I received not even the smallest bruise.
Then, tiring of hurling me through the air one to another, they formed a floating bridge of arched necks along which I ran, while one of them splashed and boomed after me in the water, trying to dislodge me from each successive scaly perch. Finally slipping from a great neck, I swam to the bottom of the pool, staying there for many minutes to study the decorative beds of freshwater oysters with their huge black pearls. As I rose in a slow spiral to the surface, two young adults grabbed me. They were males, booming in turn what were obviously questions, in answer to which I could only shake my head. A pity that all the lithards were not versed, like Oth-Neth, in English. Then one of the lithards thrust his head beneath the
surface of the lake, whipping it out an instant later to display bulging eyes and panting, lolling tongue. He repeated this performance, but on the second occasion when he withdrew his head he plainly suffered no discomfort whatever. The whole thing had been a mime and now I knew the creature's meaning: he had asked me whether or not I found any difficulty in staying under water for long periods. In answer I allowed myself to sink slowly down into crystal depths, tickling scaly legs and staying down until my two new friends came after me. For this was one of the benefits of having a custom-built body, as it were. I needed lungs only for talking, and who wants to talk under water?
Plainly the two young lithards wanted me to follow them when they set off down toward the deepest part of the lake, their great rear legs sending them speeding into silent fathoms. Then, when they noticed how far behind they were leaving me - their speed was quite phenomenal - they circled back to grab me with their small forelegs and carry me effortlessly along between them. Down we went, down to depths I had not suspected, and in through a sunken portal whose interior was lit with a mother-of-pearl radiance. This glowing light apparently sprang from shoals of tiny organisms that swam in that entryway, luminous clouds that parted like opening curtains to allow us access to the mysteries beyond.
Deeper still we swam, through waters strangely warm and growing warmer, until suddenly the narrow neck of the channel opened into a great cave. There we surfaced, emerging into air in a cavern whose domed ceiling, adorned with sparkling stalactites, covered an area of what must have been at least an acre. Globes of artificial light hung near the ceiling, invisibly suspended in the air, sending down a dappling of green and mauve rays to give
the place an appearance of soft contours and quiet, submarine shades.
We emerged from the pool onto a wide shelf where rested several matrons whose task, I soon saw, was the tending of hundreds of huge eggs - dragonspawn! The eggs rested in rows in hollows all along the sandy shelf, each perfect oval perhaps nine inches long and each one beautifully speckled in blue and gold. Under the watchful eyes of the matrons my lithard friends guided me down a path between the rows of eggs. Soon we stopped where the two dragons crouched to admire a pair of gold-flecked ovals, their subdued and reverent booming hinting to me that they must be the respective fathers of these hatch-lings-to-be. After a minute or two of what seemed to me rather proud and boastful booming together, nevertheless undertaken in lowered tones, my friends indicated that it was time to go. I kneeled to touch the speckled surfaces of the eggs just once, to feel their smoothness, then the lithards led the way back past the matrons and again we entered the water, returning through the narrow neck of the cave to the surface of the lake.
Spying Oth-Neth on the far bank, I first said farewell to my new friends and then swam over to him. While drying myself in the sun I told the lithard what I had seen below the lake.
'You thingularly honored,' he answered. 'The Cave of Hope ... it ith for lithardth alone!'
'The Cave of Hope?'
'Then why are you here?'
'Thak'r-Yon gone . . . ecthplode when thun nova. Elder Godth have pity on lithardth. Bring here. But Elythia ith not Thak'r-Yon.'
When I was dry at last, Oth-Neth handed-me a pair of
soft boots, dark silk trousers straight out of the Arabian Nights, and a light cloak of some golden material whose wide fastenings crossed my body to buckle into the belt of my trousers. The collar of the cloak was decorated with large brass studs inset with black buttons. Oth-Neth explained the purpose of these studs: they were antigrav-ity devices by means of which the wearer of the cloak might control himself in marvelous flight. Then the dragon pointed out similar studs and buttons set in his own harness, within reach of his short forelegs.
All lithardth fly with . . . antigrav. The Elder Godth gave . . . when they brought uth from doomed Thak'r-Yon. Thak'r-Yon had low grav. But you try cloak . . . later. Now, Tiania ith waiting.'
'But my beard.' I tugged at the untidy growth. 'And my hair. I was never very vain, but to appear before a goddess . . .'
'Ah, yeth. Forgot,' he replied, drawing from his harness pouch a small jar of cream and a silver comb. The cream was a most efficient depilatory; my face was soon clean and smooth and I was able to set about combing the knots and tangles out of my hair. Finally, and before I could stop him, Oth-Neth produced a tiny spray and liberally doused me with a faint, not unpleasant perfume.
As I jumped into the saddle I said, 'Well, if I wasn't "thmelly" before I most certainly am now!' At which Oth-Neth threw back his head and boomed jovially. He sobered quickly.
'One more thing,' he said. 'Tiania not goddeth but. . . one of Chothen.'
"The Chosen?'
'Chothen of the Godth!' Then, and without a single further word, the great lithard stroked the row of studs set in his harness and bounded into the sky in a fanning of leather wings.
2 Tiania
(From de Marigny's recordings)
There are times in a man's life, no matter what previous wonders he has known, when the feeling comes that everything is a dream and he must pinch himself to wake up. I had known this feeling before, when faced with horrors too grotesque to be real - though they were! -and again on a number of occasions when realization of marvels beyond words had suddenly burst upon me.
Now it was this dragon-ride of mine toward a destiny I knew had called me all the days of my life - the feel of my healthy, strong body, alive and burning bright, seated in the saddle of a fabulous beast snatched straight out of Chinese mythology; a journey more fantastic than dreams themselves. I was actually riding a dragon through the skies of an alien world, enroute to the household of Tiania, Chosen of the Gods in her sky-floating, garden-girt castle high in the cotton clouds of Elysia!
Down below, the fields formed a giant patchwork quilt on which some child of the djinni had thrown his toy cities of crystal, with yellow and silver ribbons for roads and bright pieces of broken mirrors for lakes and pools. I laughed with the heady exhilaration of it all, and Oth-Neth laughed too, baring his teeth and booming into the tiny clouds that flew apart at the unspoken command of his thrumming wings.
Then ahead I spied an island in the sky. It was literally that, an island, a massive slab of rough rock floating in a sea of air. It looked for all the world as if it had just crashed down from some titanic cliff in space, except that its topside was planted with lush grass, trees and flowers,
and its precipitous edges were walled and grown with orchid-sprouting creepers. And set back in a garden of fountains and pools, where strange lilies exhaled exotic perfumes, there rose a granite-walled, wide-windowed ornamental castle. Sweet-smelling stables stood at the rear, close by a clover field in which a group of sated dragons slumbered in the shade of mighty trees. The household of Tiania. A world of its own that looked down upon Elysia even as the great soaring birds of the upper air look down upon the fields and cities of Earth.
We alighted first on a cobbled path before the outer walls; with a single bound Oth-Neth carried me in beneath a high archway, coming to a halt in a tiny courtyard. Trembling suddenly, filled with emotions and passions that blazed within me as they never blazed in my Earth-youth, I got down from Oth-Neth's back and stood waiting ... I knew not what for. Intricately wrought and inscribed glass doors stood open in the granite face of the inner wall; beyond them a maze of mosaic-adorned rooms strewn with cushions glowed in the beams of sunlight striking through a thousand tiny crystal windows all set about the wider casements.
With a sudden snort of impatience and a toss of his dragon's head, Oth-Neth thrust me awkwardly forward. Numb though my legs felt, at least I found them answering my commands, sufficiently to allow me to walk in through the glass doors to the maze of mosaic rooms. Behind me the doors silently closed; one by one the crystal windows, large and small, glowed, then turned opaque; from somewhere a chiming music as of faerie bells and sighing strings faintly sounded. Now the light grew dim, until quite suddenly the vaulted ceiling glowed with a fluorescence which, while faint, seemed to act upon and fill the maze of rooms with sparkling wineglass translucency.
I stood still, not daring to move lest I ruin the magic by
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