"Zelazny, Roger - Amber 09 - Knight Of Shadows" - читать интересную книгу автора (Zelazny Roger)

in encouraging the woodwinds, and a great gout of fire came loose from the
Fountain, fell upon him, washed over him, and passed on down into the ground.
Flashy, though I didn't quite see the point...
His slow descent continued, as if someone in the sky were trolling for
crocodiles. I discovered myself holding my breath as his feet neared the ground,
in sympathetic anticipation of the eased pressure on his neck. This, however,
did not come to pass. When his feet reached the ground, they passed on into it,
and his descent continued, as if he were an occulted hologram. He sank past his
ankles and up to his knees and kept going. I could no longer tell whether he was
breathing. A soft litany of commands rolled from Jasra's lips, and sheets of
flame periodically separated themselves from the Fountain and splashed over him.
He sank past his waist and up to his shoulders and slightly beyond. When only
his head remained visible, eyes open but unfocused, she executed another hand
movement, and his journey into the earth was halted.
"You are now the guardian of the Fount," she stated, "answerable only to
me. Do you acknowledge this?"
The darkened lips writhed.
"Yes," came a whispered reply.
"Go now and bank the fires," she ordered. "Commence your tenure."
The head seemed to nod at the same time it began sinking again. After a
moment only a cottony tuft of hair remained, and an instant later the ground
swallowed this, too. The line of force vanished.
I cleared my throat. At the sound Jasra let her arms fall and turned toward
me. She was smiling faintly.
"Is he alive or dead?" I asked, and then added, "Academic curiosity."
"I'm not really certain," she responded. "But a little of both, I think.
Like the rest of us."
"`Guardian of the Fount,'" I reflected. "Interesting existence."
"Beats being a coatrack," she observed.
"I daresay."
"I suppose you feel I owe you some gratitude now, for my restoration," she
stated.
I shrugged.
"To tell you the truth, I've other things to think about," I said.
"You wanted an end to the feud," she said, "and I wanted this place back. I
still have no kind thoughts toward Amber, but I am willing to say we're even."
"I'll settle for that," I told her. "And there is a small loyalty I may
share with you."
She studied me through narrowed eyes for a moment, then smiled.
"Don't worry about Luke," she said.
"But I must. That son of a bitch Dalt--"
She continued to smile.
"Do you know something I don't?" I asked.
"Many things," she replied.
"Anything you'd care to share?"
"Knowledge is a marketable commodity," she observed, as the ground shook
slightly and the fiery tower swayed. "I'm offering to help your son and you're
offering to sell me the information on how to go about it?" I inquired.
She laughed.
"If I thought Rinaldo needed help," she said, "I'd be at his side this