"Janet Morris - Crusaders In Hell" - читать интересную книгу автора (Morris Janet E)

was a shore and a sea and an island off that shore, an island belching steam
and gouts of flame from its central peak-the destination of the caravan
Gilgamesh had left behind on the flat. Pompeii was the name of the island, and
whatever awaited there, neither Eternal Life nor Eternal Death was among its
secrets.
Gilgamesh knew This because he was the man to whom all secrets had been
revealed in life, and some of that wisdom clung to him even in afterlife.
"To the Land of the Living," Enkidu took up his chant once more in stubborn
defiance of the murky sea and burning isle before them, "the lord Gilgamesh
set his mind."
As if it made any difference to Fate what Gilgamesh wanted, now That Gilgamesh
was consigned to Hell. Enkidu's mind had been poisoned by the woman with the
caravan, by nights with her and the thighs of her and the lips of her which
spoke the hopes other heart: That there was a way out of Hell.
So now Enkidu sought a way out of Hell through tunnels; through the
intercession of the Anunnaki, the Seven Judges of the Underworld whom
Gilgamesh had seen in life; through perseverance and even force of arms. Myths
from the lips of a woman had seduced Enkidu and put foolish hopes in the heart
of Gilgamesh's one-time servant and beloved friend - hopes that were, with the
possible exception of intercession by the Anannali (whom Gilgamesh had seen
and knew to exist), entirely apocryphal.
If Enkidu and Gilgamesh had not so recently quarreled and parted, if Gilgamesh
had not missed his friend so terribly when they did, the lord of lost Uruk
would have argued longer and harder with Enkidu. He would have refused to join
the caravan. He would have stamped out Enkidu's vain and foolish hope of
escape from Hell.
He should have done all those. But there was no one in the land like Enkidu,
no one else who could stride the mountains at Gilgamesh's side, whose stamina
was as great, whose heart was as strong, whose hairy body pleased Gilgamesh so
much to look upon.
There was no companion for Gilgamesh but Enkidu, no equal among the ranks of
the damned. Thus Gilgamesh put up with Enkidu's foolish hopes and hopeless
dreams. Enkidu was not the man to whom all secrete had been revealed.
Only Gilgamesh was that man. Only Gilgamesh had known the truth in life. the
truth had less value, here in afterlife. It had no more value than the carcass
of a feral cat or a rutting stag or a rabid demon - all of which Gilgamesh had
slain while hunting in the Outback. It had no more value than the skins he cut
from those carcasses as he had in life. It had no more value than the flesh
beneath the skin of those animals, dead while he dressed their carcasses, dead
while he ate - when he must - their flesh.
But not dead. Death was rebirth here. Death was forever elusive. Death was
merely a hiatus - and a short cut to the teeming cities of Hell's most
helpless damned, among whom Gilgamesh could not breathe.
In Hell's cities, Gilgamesh felt like the lion caged to please the king. In
Hell's cities, his limbs grew weak and his spirits low.
This city before them now was no exception. It dried the chant in Enkidu's
throat. It dried the blood in Gilgamesh's veins. Pompeii, the caravanners
whispered, had come whole to Hell, so purely iniquitous were its very streets.
Its dogs had come. Its dolphins had come.
Its whores had come. Even Pompeii s children had come to Hell.