"Jack vance - Tschai 2 - Servants of the Wankh" - читать интересную книгу автора (Vance Jack)

sounds. Reith flew low, sometimes brushing through the tops of black tree-ferns.
Sliding across the ridge the raft blundered at head-height through an encampment
of capering creatures in voluminous white robes, apparently men. They dodged and
fell to the ground, then screaming in outrage fired muskets after the raft, the
erratic course of which presented a shifting target.
All night they flew over dense forest, and morning revealed more of the same:
a black, green, and brown carpet cloaking the Aman Steppe to the limit of
vision, though Traz declared the steppe ended at the hills, that below them now
was the Great Daduz Forest. Anacho condescendingly took issue, and displaying a
chart tapped various topographic indications with his long white fingers to
prove his point.
Traz's square face became stubborn and sullen. "This is Great Daduz Forest;
twice when I carried Onmale among the Emblems,* I led the tribe here for herbs
and dyes."
Anacho put away the chart. "It is all one," he remarked. "Steppe or forest,
it must be traversed." At a sound from the engine he looked critically aft. "I
believe that we will reach the outskirts of Coad, not a mile farther, and when
we raise the housing we shall find only a heap of rust."
"But we will reach Coad?" Ylin-Ylan asked in a colorless voice.
"So I believe. Only two hundred miles remain."
Ylin-Ylan seemed momentarily cheerful. "How different than before," she said.
"When I came to Coad a captive of the priestesses!" The thought seemed to
depress her and once more she became pensive.
Night approached. Coad still lay a hundred miles distant. The forest had
thinned to a stand of immense black and gold trees, with intervening areas of
turf, on which grazed squat six-legged beasts, bristling with bony tusks and
horns. Landing for the night was hardly feasible and Reith did not care to


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arrive at Coad until morning, in which opinion Anacho concurred. They halted the
motion of the raft, tied to the top of a tree and hovered on the repulsors
through the night.
After the evening meal the Flower of Cath went to her cabin behind the
saloon; Traz, after studying the sky and listening to the sounds of beasts
below, wrapped himself in his robe and stretched out on one of the settees.
Reith leaned against the rail watching the pink moon Az reach the zenith just
as the blue moon Braz rose behind the foliage of a far tall tree.
Anacho came to join him. "So then, what are your thoughts as to the morrow?"
"I know nothing of Coad. I suppose we inquire as to transportation across the
Draschade."
"You still intend to accompany the woman to Cath?"
"Certainly," said Reith, mildly surprised.
Anacho hissed through his teeth. "You need only put the Cath woman on a ship;
you need not go yourself."
"True. But I don't care to remain in Coad."
"Why not? It is a city which even Dirdirmen visit from time to time. If you
have money anything is for sale in Coad."