"Christopher Stasheff - Rogue Wizard 08 - A Wizard and a Warlo" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stasheff Christopher)

groaning in toil."
"The orbital survey doesn't show any castles on hilltops," Alea snapped, "and
you did it yesterday. It shows only temples-and there aren't even any cities
around them."
"Well, some of the towns are rather large," Magnus. said, "and there's one of
them for every province, with villages around it."
"You're seeing provinces where they don't exist! It takes more than a river or a
mountain chain to make a political division."
"Still, I'd prefer to think of them as Neolithic city-. states."
"When your `cities' are scarcely more than large towns?" Alea said scornfully.
"Athens wasn't much more, by modern standards," Magnus said judiciously, "and it
governed the farms and villages all around it."
"Just because most of the land is cultivated doesn't mean the towns govern the
countryside. You might as well say the temples on top of those round hills rule
the farmers! After all, they build their houses round as the hills, don't they?"
Magnus stared at her. "What a remarkable insight! Here I'd put it down to
standard Neolithic architecture, but you're right! They're building the houses
in imitation of the holy hills!"
Alea made an impatient, dismissive gesture; she wasn't fishing for compliments
at the moment. "That's beside the point. What matters is that whatever form of
government those people have, it works for them! They're well fed and well
housed. Why wouldn't they be happy?"
"Because they might not be free," Magnus said: "If a girl has to marry whomever
the priests tell her and a boy can never leave the county in which he was born,
can they ever be content?"
"Yes, if the girl happens to love that man and the boy is happy where he is!"
Alea shot back. "Sometimes the priests do have insight, you know."
"Sometimes," Magnus agreed. "I can see you might think they're too well-off to
be worth a visit, but something bothers me about the setup. It's probably right,
but possibly wrong, very wrong. There have been civilizations before this that
nourished their people's bodies well but left their souls starving. These people
may be prosperous but miserable."
"Probably! May be! We're traveling a hundred light-years for something that's
possibly wrong! What if we get there and learn that everything's fine?"
"I'll rejoice," Magnus said. "But we might land and find the people in rags with
aristocrats lording it over them. Either way, someone should care enough to find
out what has happened to these people over the centuries."
"Why? What could we do about it? Even if we bring back word, who would care?"
"True, all the descendants of their relatives will have died long ago." Magnus
sighed. "And only historians would be interested. But I can't help worrying that
we may find them exploited unmercifully; as in so many other lost colonies. I'll
always regret not going there if I don't find out."
"If! If!" Alea threw up her hands in exasperation. "Are we to spend the rest of
our lives jaunting about the galaxy chasing an `if?"
"I know it seems a waste of our time and effort," Magnus said ruefully, "but
anything could have happened to them." He forced a smile. "They might even have
developed a shining Utopia with the answers to the questions that torture all
souls."
"It's the hunger that tortures the bellies and the brutality of the masters we
should be worrying about-and we've no reason to think these people have either!"