"Eternal Champion - 05 - The Skrayling Tree" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moorcock Michael)

safety. In spite of the wind, the mist was thicker than it had been! The young
albino was soon lost in it. We heard a few garbled words, watched white shadows
gathering on the shore as the setting sun vanished, and then all was grey. There
was a heavy smell of ozone. The keening fell away until the water lapping
against the canoe was the loudest sound. I heard Ulric's
breath rasp as he drove the paddle into the water like an automaton, and I did
what I could to help him. Events on the island had occurred too rapidly. I
couldn't absorb them. What had we seen? Who was that albino boy who looked so
much like me? He could not be my missing twin. He was younger than I. Why was my
husband so frightened? For me or for himself?
The cold, ruthless wind continued to pursue us. I felt like taking my paddle and
battering it back. Then the fog rose like a wall against the wind which roared
and beat impotently upon this new impediment.
Though I felt safer, I lost my bearings in that sudden fog, but Ulric had a much
better sense of the compass. With the wind down, we were soon back at our old
mooring. The tide was almost full, so it was easy to step from the canoe to the
house's little jetty. With some difficulty we climbed the wooden staircase to
the first deck. I felt appallingly tired. I could not believe I was so exhausted
from such relatively brief activity, but my husband's fear had impressed me.
"They can't follow us," I said. "They had no boats."
In the bright modern kitchen I began to feel a little better. I whipped up some
hot chocolate, mixing the ingredients with obsessive care as I tried to take in
what had just happened. Outside, in the darkness, there was nothing to be seen.
Ulric still seemed dazed. He went around checking locks and windows, peering
through closed curtains into the night, listening to the sound of the lapping
tide. I asked him what he knew, and he said, "Nothing. I'm just nervous."
I forced him to sit down and drink his chocolate. "Of what?" I asked.
His sensitive, handsome face was troubled, uncertain. He hesitated, almost as if
he were going to cry. I found myself taking him by the hand, sitting next to
him, urging him to drink. There were tears in his eyes.
"What are you afraid of, Ulric?"
He attempted to shrug. "Of losing you. Of it all starting again, I suppose. I've
had dreams recently. They seemed silly at the time.
But that scene on the island felt as if it had happened before. And there's
something about this wind that's come up. I don't like it, Oona. I keep
remembering Elric, those nightmarish adventures. I fear for you, fear that
something will separate us."
"It would have to be something pretty monumental!" I laughed.
"I sometimes think that life with you has been an exquisite dream, my broken
mind compensating for the pain of Nazi tortures. I fear I'll wake up and find
myself back in Sachsenhausen. Since I met you I know how hard it is to tell the
difference between the dream and the reality. Do you understand that, Oona?"
"Of course. But I know you're not dreaming. After all, I have the dreamthief's
skills. If anyone could reassure you, it must surely be me."
He nodded, calming himself, giving my hand a grateful squeeze. He was flooded
with adrenaline, I realized. What on earth had we witnessed?
Ulric couldn't tell me. He had not been alarmed until he saw what appeared to be
his younger self at the window. Then he had sensed time writhing and slipping
and dissipating and escaping from the few slender controls we had over it. "And
to lose control of time-to let Chaos back into the world-means that I lose you,