"Roger Zelazny - Dragons" - читать интересную книгу автора (Zelazny Roger)

cloak as he dashed from the hall.

". . . Be very quick about it!" said Belkis, flaming. "Or
I will take this place apart, stone by stone, and drag you out
by your whiskers like a rat from a brick heap!"

Mister Gibberling was back in record time. While he was
gone, though, Belkis ate three roasted pigs and a dozen
chickens with dumplings. Then he roared again and scorched the
ceiling and charred the throne.

"You have them now?" he asked.

"Yes, yes! Right here! See?" "Very good. You are coming
with me now."

And with that, he seized Mister Gibberling's cloak in his
talons and flew out through the great double-door at the end of
the hall, through which the Honor Guard sometimes entered on
horseback. He took him high into the sky and they both vanished
from sight.

"I wonder where he is taking him?" asked the third adviser.

"It is probably better not to think about it," said the
first.

"We'd better get to work cleaning up this mess," said
William.

Chapter 7

AND THEY FLEW far beyond the kingdom, and Belkis pointed
out to Mister Gibberling that there were other kingdoms, and
that there were rivers and lakes and other mountains, and
valleys and plateaus and deserts, and ports and pastures and
farms and granaries, and ships on the ocean and armies in the
fields.

Every now and then he would say, "Are you getting that all
down on paper?" and Mister Gibberling would answer, "Yes! Yes!"
and he would scratch away with his quill and record all of the
places which really existed in those spots where he had always
been accustomed to write HERE THERE BE DRAGONS.

Much later, they returned. Belkis set Mister Gibberling
down in the courtyard, perching himself upon the wall like some
great, red-green bird.

"Have you learned your lesson?" he asked.