"Amber Short Story 03 - Blue Horse Dancing Mountains (b)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Zelazny Roger)

hurricane.
Cautiously, I continued my advance, winding up on my belly, peering
amid branches at the two old men. Both regarded the invisible cubes of a
three-dimensional game, pieces hung above a board on the ground between
them, squares of their aerial positions limned faintly in fire. The man
seated upon the ground was a hunchback, and he was smiling, and I knew him.
It was Dworkin Barimen, my legendary ancestor, filled with ages and wisdom
and godlike powers, creator of Amber, the Pattern, the Trumps, and maybe
reality itself as I understood it. Unfortunately, through much of my dealing
with him in recent times, he'd also been more than a little bit nuts.
Merlin had assured me that he was recovered now, but I wondered.
Godlike beings are often noted for some measure of nontraditional
rationality. It just seems to go with the territory. I wouldn't put it past
the old bugger to be using sanity as a pose while in pursuit of some
paradoxical end.
The other man, whose back was to me, reached forward and moved a piece
that seemed to correspond to a pawn. It was a representation of the Chaos
beast known as a Fire Angel. When the move was completed the lightning
flashed again and the thunder cracked and my body tingled. Then Dworkin
reached out and moved one of his pieces, a Wyvern. Again, the thunder and
lightning, the tingling. I saw that a rearing Unicorn occupied the place of
the King among Dworkin's pieces, a representation of the palace at Amber on
the square beside it. His opponent's King was an erect Serpent, the
Thelbane--the great needlelike palace of the Kings of Chaos--beside it.
Dworkin's opponent advanced a Piece, laughing as he did so. "Mandor,"
he announced. "He thinks himself puppet-master and king-maker." After the
crash and dazzle, Dworkin moved a piece. "Corwin," he said.
"He is free again."
"Yes. But he does not know he is in a race with destiny. I doubt he
will make it back to Amber in time to encounter the hall of mirrors. Without
their clues, how effective will he be?"
Dworkin smiled and raised his eyes. For a moment, he seemed to be
looking right at me. "I think his timing is perfect, Suhuy," he said then,
"and I have several pieces of his memory I found years ago drifting above
the Pattern in Rebma. I wish I had a golden piss-pot for each time he's been
underestimated."
"What would that give you?" asked the other.
"Expensive helmets for his enemies."
Both men laughed, and Suhuy rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise.
Dworkin rose into the air and tilted forward until he was parallel to the
ground, looking down on the board. Suhuy tended a hand toward a female
figure on one of the higher levels, then drew it back. Abruptly, he moved
the Fire Angel again. Even as the air was burned and beaten Dworkin made a
move, so that the thunder continued into a roll and the brightness hung
there. Dworkin said something I could not hear over the din. Suhuy's
response to the probable naming was, "But she's a Chaos figure!"
"So? We set no rule against it. Your move."
"I want to study this," Suhuy said. "More than a little."
"Take it with you," Dworkin responded. "Bring it back tomorrow night?"
"I'll be occupied. The night after?"