"John Norman - Gor 06 - Raiders of Gor" - читать интересную книгу автора (Norman John)

marsh spears. Almost at my side stood the blondish girl I had first seen, she
who
had been primarily effectual in my capture, herself acting as the bait, the
lure to
which I had been drawn. She stood proudly beside me, straight, her shoulders
back, her chin high, as does a free woman beside a miserable slave, naked and
kneeling. I was conscious of her thigh at my cheek. Over her shoulder were
slung the four birds she had caught in the marches; their necks were now
broken and they were tied together, two in front and two over her back. There
were other women about as well, and here and there, peering between the
adults, I could see children. тАЬHe is either of Port Kar,тАЭ she said, shifting
the gants on her shoulder, тАЬor
he was intending to be of Port Kar, for what other reason would one go to Port
Kar.тАЭ
For a long time Ho-Hak said nothing. He had a broad head, with a heave,
calm face.
I heard the squealing of a domestic tarsk running nearby, its feet scuttling
in the woven rence of the island, as on a mat. A child was crying out, chasing
it.
I heard some domestic marsh gants making their piping call. The
wandered freely on the island, leaving it to feed, then returning later. Wild
marsh
gants, captured, even as young as gantlings, cannot be domesticated; on the
other had, eggs, at the hatching point, gathered from floating gant nests, are
sometimes brought to the island; the hatchlings, interestingly, if not
permitted to
see an adult gant for the first week of their life, then adopt the rence
island as
their home, and show no fear of human beings; they will come and go in the
wild as they please, feeding and flying, but will always, and frequently,
return to
the rence island, their hatching place; if the rence island, however, should
be
destroyed, they revert entirely to the wild; in the domesticated state, it
will
invariably permit themselves to be picked up and handled.
There were several reasonably important looking individuals gathered
about, and, as it turned out, these were headmen from various other rence
islands in the vicinity. A given rence island usually holds about fifty or
sixty
persons. The men from several of these islands had cooperated in my pursuit
and capture. Normally, as I may have mentioned, these communities are isolated
from one another, but it was now near the Autumnal Equinox, and the month of
SeтАЩKara was shortly to begin. For rence growers, the first of SeтАЩKara, the
date of
the Autumnal Equinox, is a time of festival. By that time most of the yearтАЩs
rence
will have been cut, and great stocks of rence paper, gathered in rolls like
cord
wood and covered with woven rence mats, will have been prepared.