"Rachel Pollack - Immortal Snake" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pollack Rachel)

World was forever and unchanging, so was Immortal Snake. He existed
always, only shedding his skin when GodтАЩs writing in the stars and planets
told the Readers to bring the Snake to renewal. Immortal Snake was
forever, and there was no before and after.

Still, time passed, or at least turned, and lesser creatures grew old
and died, and the seasons replaced each other, and the Sun would return
after a number of days to the same place in the sky. Though the years were
not numbered their length was understood, 360 days, just like the 360
degrees of the circle, for wasnтАЩt Immortal Snake, like heaven, a great circle
without beginning or end? In between the years there were five extra days,
placed there by the Living World to allow people a moment outside their
duties. Every four years there would be another day before the Sun could
return to its place, but nothing that happened that day was ever written
down, and so it did not exist.

In this manner of counting, three years passed, 1080 days plus
fifteen extra, plus one that no one would remember. Through all this,
Immortal Snake celebrated his power. Every night he hosted elaborate
parties, with teams of competing chefs from countries conquered by the
Army of Heaven. Sometimes the parties featured dramas of the SnakeтАЩs
glory, or paeans to his sexual potency. The guests, who often included
heads of state, were given costumes to wear, or assigned various comical
tasks, such as the imitation of farm animals.

During the days Immortal Snake usually slept late, and when awake
would sometimes fidget, or yell at his slaves or advisors. In the early days
he liked to stare at the crowns and jeweled swords presented at his
ascendancy, or play with the puppets or mechanical animals given along
with the more traditional gifts. Over time, however, these things began to
bore him. He even tired of the slave girlsтАЩ adoration and turned, to
everyoneтАЩs surprise, to his ministers, and the dry voices he used to ridicule.
He began to ask questions and every now and then make suggestions.
Then, at night, satisfied with his contributions, he would give himself to
parties.

In this same period Broken by Heaven stayed almost entirely within
her official rooms in the second ring of the Nine Rings of Heaven and Earth.
SheтАЩd painted gray paint over the murals that once filled the walls, sheтАЩd
removed the lacquered tables, the carved chairs, the gold and enamel
plates, the bed that had stood high in the room under a canopy painted with
clouds. Heaven had broken her and sheтАЩd ordered the bed destroyed,
replaced with a simple mattress on a low wooden platform. She would eat
only the plainest food, boiled vegetables and rice without sauce, served on
lumpy white plates.

Every morning the young women who attended her laid out elaborate
dresses for her in hope that some heroic god might have entered her
dreams to drive away the demons who had possessed her ever since her
brother had become Immortal Snake. She ignored them and dressed only