Читать книгу The Hidden City - David Eddings - Страница 15

It was snowing in the mountains of Zemoch, a dry, brittle snow that settled like a cloud of feathers in the dead calm air. It was bitterly cold, and a huge cloud of steam hung like a low-lying fog over the horses of the army of the Knights of the Church as they plodded forward, their hooves sending the powdery snow swirling into the air again. The preceptors of the militant orders rode in the lead, dressed in full armor and bundled in furs. Preceptor Abriel of the Cyrinic Knights, still vigorous despite his advanced age, rode with Darellon, the Alcione Preceptor, and with Sir Heldin, a scarred old veteran who was filling in as leader of the Pandions during Sparhawk’s absence. Patriarch Bergsten rode somewhat apart. The huge Churchman was muffled to the ears in fur, and his Ogre-horned helmet made him look very warlike, an appearance offset to some degree by the small, black-bound prayer book he was reading. Preceptor Komier of the Genidians was off ahead with the scouts.

‘I don’t think I’ll ever be warm again,’ Abriel groaned, pulling his fur cloak tighter about him. ‘Old age thins the blood. Don’t ever get old, Darellon.’

‘The alternative isn’t very attractive, Lord Abriel.’ Darellon was a slender Deiran who appeared to have been swallowed up by his massive armor. He lowered his voice. ‘You didn’t really have to come along, my friend,’ he said. ‘Sarathi would have understood.’

‘Oh, no, Darellon. This is probably my last campaign. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.’ Abriel peered ahead. ‘What’s Komier doing out there?’

‘Lord Komier said that he wanted to take a look at the ruins of Zemoch,’ Sir Heldin replied in his rumbling basso. ‘I guess Thalesians take a certain pleasure in viewing the wreckage after a war’s over.’

‘They’re a barbaric people,’ Abriel muttered sourly. He glanced quickly at Bergsten, who seemed totally immersed in his prayer book. ‘You don’t necessarily have to repeat that, gentlemen,’ he said to Darellon and Heldin.

‘I wouldn’t dream of it, Abriel,’ Bergsten said, not looking up from his prayer book.

‘You’ve got unwholesomely sharp ears, your Grace.’

‘It comes from listening to confessions. People tend to shout the sins of others from the rooftops, but you can barely hear them when they’re describing their own.’ Bergsten looked up and pointed. ‘Komier’s coming back.’

The Preceptor of the Genidian Knights was in high spirits as he reined in his horse, swirling up a huge billow of the dustlike snow. ‘Sparhawk doesn’t leave very much standing when he destroys a place,’ he announced cheerfully. ‘I didn’t entirely believe Ulath when he told me that our broken-nosed friend blew the lid off the Temple of Azash, but I do now. You’ve never seen such a wreck. I doubt if there’s a habitable building left in the whole city.’

‘You really enjoy that sort of thing, don’t you, Komier?’ Abriel accused.

‘That’s enough of that, gentlemen!’ Bergsten cut in quickly. ‘We’re not going to resurrect that worn-out old dispute again. We make war in different ways. Arcians like to build forts and castles, and Thalesians like to knock them down. It’s all part of making war, and that’s what we get paid for.’

‘We, your Grace?’ Heldin rumbled mildly.

‘You know what I mean, Heldin. I don’t personally get involved in that any more, of course, but –’

‘Why did you bring your axe along then, Bergsten?’ Komier asked him.

Bergsten gave him a flat stare. ‘For old times’ sake – and because you Thalesian brigands pay closer attention to a man who’s got an axe in his hands.’

‘Knights, your Grace,’ Komier mildly corrected his countryman. ‘We’re called knights now. We used to be brigands, but now we’re behaving ourselves.’

‘The Church appreciates your efforts to mend your ways, my son, even though she knows that you’re lying in your teeth.’

Abriel carefully covered a smile. Bergsten was a former Genidian Knight himself, and sometimes his cassock slipped a bit. ‘Who’s got the map?’ he asked, more to head off the impending argument than out of any real curiosity.

Heldin unbuckled one of his saddle-bags, his black armor clinking. ‘What did you want to know, my Lord?’ he asked, taking out his map.

‘The usual. How far? How long? What sort of unpleasantness up ahead?’

‘It’s just over a hundred leagues to the Astellian border, my Lord,’ Heldin replied, consulting his map, ‘and nine hundred leagues from there to Matherion.’

‘A hundred days at least,’ Bergsten grunted sourly.

‘That’s if we don’t run into any trouble, your Grace,’ Darellon added.

‘Take a look back over your shoulder, Darellon. There are a hundred thousand Church Knights behind us. There’s no trouble that we can’t deal with. What sort of terrain’s up ahead, Heldin?’

‘There’s some sort of divide about three days east of here, your Grace. All the rivers on this side of it run down into the Gulf of Merjuk. On the other side, they run off into the Astel Marshes. I’d imagine that we’ll be going downhill after we cross that divide – unless Otha fixed it so that water runs uphill here in Zemoch.’

A Genidian Knight rode forward. ‘A messenger from Emsat just caught up with us, Lord Komier,’ he reported. ‘He says he has important news for you.’

Komier nodded, wheeled his horse and rode back toward the army. The rest of them pushed on as it started to snow a little harder.

Komier was laughing uproariously when he returned with the travel-stained messenger who had chased them down.

‘What’s so funny?’ Bergsten asked him.

‘We have good news from home, your Grace,’ Komier said gaily. ‘Tell our beloved Patriarch what you just told me,’ he instructed the messenger.

‘Yes, my Lord,’ the blond-braided Thalesian said. ‘It happened a few weeks back, your Grace. One morning the palace servants couldn’t find a trace of the Prince Regent anywhere at all. The guards tore the place apart for two straight days, but the little weasel seemed to have vanished entirely.’

‘Mind your manners, man,’ Bergsten snapped. ‘Avin’s the Prince Regent, after all – even if he is a little weasel.’

‘Sorry, your Grace. Anyway, the whole capital was mystified. Avin Wargunsson never went anywhere without taking a brass band along to blow fanfares announcing his coming. Then one of the servants happened to notice a full wine barrel in Avin’s study. That seemed odd, because Avin didn’t have much stomach for wine, so they got to looking at the barrel a little more closely. It was clear that it had been opened, because quite a bit of wine had been spilled on the floor. Well, your Grace, they’d all worked up quite a thirst looking for Avin, so they decided to open the barrel, but when they tried to pry it open, they found out that it had been nailed shut. Now nobody nails a wine barrel shut in Thalesia, so everybody got suspicious right away. They took some pliers and pulled out the nails and lifted the lid – and there was Avin, stone dead and floating face down in the barrel.’

‘You’re not serious!’

‘Yes, your Grace. Somebody in Emsat’s got a very warped sense of humor, I guess. He went to all the trouble of rolling that wine barrel into Avin’s study just so that he could stuff him in and nail down the lid. Avin seems to have struggled a bit. He had splinters under his fingernails, and there were claw-marks on the underside of the lid. It made an awful mess. I guess the wine drained out of him for a half an hour after they fished him out of the barrel. The palace servants tried to clean him up for the funeral, but you know how hard wine-stains are to get out. He was very purple when they laid him out on the bier in the Cathedral of Emsat for his funeral.’ The messenger rubbed at the side of his face reflectively. ‘It was the strangest funeral I’ve ever attended. The Primate of Emsat kept trying to keep from laughing while he was reading the burial service, but he wasn’t having much luck, and that got the whole congregation to laughing too. There was Avin lying on that bier, no bigger than a half-grown goat and as purple as a ripe plum, and there was the whole congregation, roaring with laughter.’

‘At least everybody noticed him,’ Komier said. ‘That was always important to Avin.’

‘Oh, they noticed him all right, Lord Komier. Every eye in the Cathedral was on him. Then, after they put him in the royal crypt, the whole city had a huge party, and we all drank toasts to the memory of Avin Wargunsson. It’s hard to find something to laugh about in Thalesia when winter’s coming on, but Avin managed to brighten up the whole season.’

‘What kind of wine was it?’ Patriarch Bergsten asked gravely.

‘Arcian red, your Grace.’

‘Any idea of what year?’

‘Year before last, I believe it was.’

‘A vintage year,’ Bergsten sighed. ‘There was no way to save it, I suppose?’

‘Not after Avin had been soaking in it for two days, your Grace.’

Bergsten sighed again. ‘What a waste,’ he mourned. And then he collapsed over his saddlebow, howling with laughter.

It was cold in the Tamul Mountains as Ulath and Tynian rode up into the foothills. The Tamul Mountains were one of those geographic anomalies which crop up here and there, a cluster of worn-down, weary-looking peaks with no evident connection to neighboring and more jagged peaks forested by fir and spruce and pine. The gentler slopes of the Tamul Mountains were covered with hardwoods which had been stripped of their leaves by the onset of winter.

The two knights rode carefully, staying in the open and making enough noise to announce their presence. ‘It’s very unwise to startle a Troll,’ Ulath explained.

‘Are you sure they’re out there?’ Tynian asked as they wound deeper into the mountains.

Ulath nodded. ‘I’ve seen tracks – or places where they’ve tried to brush out their traces – and fresh dirt where they’ve buried their droppings. Trolls take pains to conceal their presence from humans. It’s easier to catch supper if it doesn’t know you’re around.’

‘The Troll-Gods promised Aphrael that their creatures wouldn’t eat humans any more.’

‘It may take a few generations for that notion to sift down into the minds of some of the stupider Trolls – and a Troll can be fearfully stupid when he sets his mind to it. We’d better stay alert. As soon as we get up out of these foothills, I’ll perform the ceremony that calls the Troll-Gods. We should be safe after that. It’s these foothills that are dangerous.’

‘Why not just perform the ceremony now?’

Ulath shook his head. ‘Bad manners. You’re not supposed to call on the Troll-Gods until you’re up higher – up in real Troll country.’

This isn’t Troll country, Ulath.’

‘It is now. Let’s find a place to camp for the night.’

They built their camp on a kind of stair-stepped bench so that they had a solid cliff to their backs and a steep drop to the front. They took turns standing watch, and as the first faint light of dawn began to wash the darkness out of the overcast sky, Tynian shook Ulath awake. There’s something moving around in the brush at the foot of the cliff,’ he whispered.

Ulath sat up, his hand going to his axe. He cocked his head to listen. Troll,’ he said after a moment.

‘How can you tell?’

‘Whatever’s making all the noise is doing it on purpose. A deer wouldn’t crash around like that, and the bears have all denned up for the winter. The Troll wants us to know he’s there.’

‘What do we do?’

‘Let’s build up the fire a bit – let him know that we’re awake. We’ve got a touchy situation here, so let’s not move too fast.’ He pushed his blankets aside and rose to his feet as Tynian piled more limbs on the fire.

‘Should we invite him in to get warm?’ Tynian asked.

‘He isn’t cold.’

‘It’s freezing, Ulath.’

That’s why he’s got fur. Trolls build fires for light, not heat. Why don’t you go ahead and get started with breakfast? He’s not going to do anything until full daylight.’

‘It’s not my turn.’

‘I have to keep watch.’

‘I can keep watch as well as you can.’

‘You wouldn’t know what to look for, Tynian.’ Ulath’s tone was reasonable. It usually was when he was talking his way out of doing the cooking.

The light grew gradually stronger. It was a process that is always strange. A man can be looking directly at a dark patch in the surrounding forest and suddenly realize that he can see trees and rocks and bushes where there had been only darkness before.

Tynian brought Ulath a plate of steaming ham and a chunk of leathery-crusted bread. ‘Leave the ham on the spit,’ Ulath told him.

Tynian grunted, picked up his own plate, and joined his friend at the front edge of the rocky shelf. They sat and kept watch on the birch forest that ran down the steep slope beneath them as they ate. ‘There he is,’ Ulath said gravely, ‘right beside that big rock.’

‘Oh, yes,’ Tynian replied. ‘I see him now. He blends right in, doesn’t he?’

‘That’s what being a Troll is all about, Tynian. He’s a part of the forest.’

‘Sephrenia says that we’re distantly related to them.’

‘She’s probably right. There aren’t really all that many differences between us and the Trolls. They’re bigger, and they have a different diet is about all.’

‘How long is this likely to take?’

‘I have no idea. As far as I know, this has never happened before.’

‘What’ll he do next?’

‘As soon as he’s sure we know he’s there, he’ll probably try to communicate in some way.’

‘Does he know that you speak Trollish?’

‘He might. The Troll-Gods are acquainted with me, and they know that I run in the same pack with Sparhawk.’

‘That’s an odd way to put it.’

‘I’m trying to think like a Troll. If I can get it right, I might be able to anticipate what he’s going to do next.’

Then the Troll shouted up the hill to them.

‘What did he say?’ Tynian asked nervously.

‘He wants to know what he’s supposed to do. He’s very confused.’

‘He’s confused? What about me?’

‘He’s been told to meet us and take us to the Troll-Gods. He doesn’t have any idea of our customs or the proper courtesies. We’ll have to guide him through this. Put your sword back in its sheath. Let’s not make things any worse than they already are.’ Ulath stood up, being careful not to move too fast. He raised his voice and called to the creature below in Trollish. ‘Come to this child of Khwaj which we have made. We will take eat together and talk of what we must do.’

‘What did you tell him?’

‘I invited him to join us for breakfast.’

‘You did what? You want a Troll that’s no more than a few feet from you to start eating?’

‘It’s a precaution. It would be discourteous of him to kill us after he’s taken food from us.’

‘Discourteous? That’s a Troll out there, Ulath.’

‘Just because he’s a Troll doesn’t mean that he has bad manners. Oh, I almost forgot. When he comes into camp, he’ll want to sniff us. It’s polite to sniff him as well. He won’t smell very nice, but do it anyway. Trolls do that so that they’ll recognize each other if they ever meet again.’

‘I think you’re losing your mind.’

‘Just follow my lead, and let me do the talking.’

‘What else can I do, you clot? I don’t speak Trollish, remember?’

‘You don’t? What an amazing thing. I thought every educated man spoke Trollish.’

The Troll approached cautiously, moving smoothly up through the birch forest. He used his arms a great deal as he moved, grasping trees to pull himself along, moving with his whole body. He was about eight and a half feet tall and had glossy brown fur. His face was simian to a degree, though he did not have the protruding muzzle of most apes, and there was a glimmer of intelligence in his deep-sunk eyes. He came up onto the bench where the camp lay and then squatted, resting his forearms on his knees and keeping his paws in plain sight. ‘I have no club,’ he half-growled.

Ulath made some show of setting his axe aside and held out his empty hands. ‘I have no club,’ he repeated the customary greeting. ‘Undo your sword-belt, Tynian,’ he muttered. ‘Lay it aside.’

Tynian started to object, but decided against it.

‘The child of Khwaj you have made is good,’ the Troll said, pointing at their fire. ‘Khwaj will be pleased.’

‘It is good to please the Gods,’ Ulath replied.

The Troll suddenly banged his fist on the ground. ‘This is not how it should be!’ he declared in an unhappy voice.

‘No,’ Ulath agreed, dropping down into a squat much like the Troll’s, ‘it is not. The Gods have their reasons for it, though. They have said we must not kill each other. They have also said we must not eat each other.’

‘I have heard them say it. Could we have misunderstood them?’

‘I think we have not.’

‘Could it be that their minds are sick?’

‘It is possible. We must still do as they tell us, though.’

‘What are you two talking about?’ Tynian asked nervously.

‘We’re discussing philosophy,’ Ulath shrugged.

Tynian stared at him.

‘It’s fairly complex. It has to do with whether or not we’re morally obliged to obey the Gods if they’ve gone crazy. I’m saying that we are. Of course my position’s a little tainted by self-interest in this particular situation.’

‘Can it not speak?’ the Troll asked, pointing at Tynian. ‘Are those bird-noises the only sounds it can make?’

‘The bird-noises pass for speech among those of our kind. Will you take some of our eat with us?’

The Troll looked appraisingly at their horses. ‘Those?’ he asked.

‘No.’ Ulath shook his head. ‘Those are the beasts which carry us.’

‘Are your legs sick? Is that why you are so short?’

‘No. The beasts can run faster than we can. They carry us when we want to go fast.’

‘What kind of eat do you take?’

‘Pig.’

‘Pig is good. Deer is better.’

‘Yes.’

‘Where is the pig? Is it dead? If it is still alive, I will kill it.’

‘It is dead.’

The Troll looked around. ‘I do not see it.’

‘We have only brought part of it.’ Ulath pointed at the large ham spitted over the fire.

‘Do you share your eat with the child of Khwaj?’

Ulath decided not to explain the concept of cooking at that particular moment. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘It is our custom.’

‘Does it please Khwaj that you share your eat with his child?’

‘It is our thought that it does.’ Ulath drew his dagger, lifted the spit from off the fire and sawed off a chunk of ham weighing perhaps three pounds.

‘Are your teeth sick?’ The Troll even sounded sympathetic. ‘I had a sick tooth once. It caused me much hurt.’

‘Our kind does not have sharp teeth,’ Ulath told him. ‘Will you take some of our eat?’

‘I will.’ The Troll rose to his feet and came to the fire, towering over them.

‘The eat has been near the child of Khwaj,’ Ulath warned. ‘It is hot. It may cause hurt to your mouth.’

‘I am called Bhlokw,’ the Troll introduced himself.

‘I am called Ulath.’

‘U-lat? That is a strange thing to be called.’ Bhlokw pointed at Tynian. ‘What is it called?’

‘Tynian,’ Ulath replied.

‘Tin-in. That is stranger than U-lat.’

‘The bird-noises of our speech make what we are called sound strange.’

The Troll leaned forward and snuffled at the top of Ulath’s head. Ulath suppressed a strong urge to shriek and run for the nearest tree. He politely sniffed at Bhlokw’s fur. The Troll actually didn’t smell too bad. Then the monster and Tynian exchanged sniffs. ‘Now I know you,’ Bhlokw said.

‘It is good that you do.’ Ulath held out the chunk of steaming ham.

Bhlokw took it from him and stuffed it into his mouth. Then he quickly spat it back out into his hand. ‘Hot,’ he explained a little sheepishly.

‘We blow on it to make it cool so that we can eat it without causing hurt to our mouths,’ Ulath instructed.

Bhlokw blew noisily on the piece of ham for a while. Then he crammed it back into his mouth. He chewed reflectively for a moment. Then he swallowed. ‘It is different,’ he said, diplomatically. Then he sighed. ‘I do not like this, U-lat,’ he confided unhappily. ‘This is not how things should be.’

‘No,’ Ulath agreed, ‘it is not.’

‘We should be killing each other. I have killed and eaten you man-things since you first came to the Troll-range. That is how things should be. It is my thought that the Gods are sick in their minds to make us do this,’ He sighed a hurricane sort of sigh. ‘Your thought is right, though. We must do as they tell us to do. Someday their minds will get well. Then they will let us kill and eat each other again,’ He stood up abruptly. ‘They want to see you. I will take you to them.’

‘We will go with you.’

They followed Bhlokw up into the mountains all that day and half of the next, and he led them finally to a snow-covered clearing where a fire burned in a large pit. The Troll-Gods were waiting for them there.

‘Aphrael came to us,’ the enormity that was Ghworg told them.

‘She said that she would do this,’ Ulath replied. ‘She said that when things happened that we should know about, she would come to us and tell us.’

‘She put her mouth on our faces.’ Ghworg seemed puzzled.

‘She does this. It gives her pleasure.’

‘It was not painful,’ Ghworg conceded a bit dubiously, touching the cheek where Aphrael had kissed him.

‘What did he say?’ Tynian asked quietly.

‘Aphrael came here and talked with them,’ Ulath replied. ‘She even kissed them a few times. You know Aphrael.’

‘She actually kissed the Troll-Gods?’ Tynian’s face grew pale.

‘What did it say?’ Ghworg demanded.

‘It wanted me to say what you had said.’

‘This is not good, Ulath-from-Thalesia. It should not talk to you in words we do not understand. What is its name?’

‘It is called Tynian-from-Deira.’

‘I will make it so that Tynian-from-Deira knows our speech.’

‘Brace yourself,’ Ulath warned his friend.

‘What? What’s happening, Ulath?’

‘Ghworg’s going to teach you Trollish.’

‘Now, wait a minute –’ Then Tynian suddenly clapped his hands to the sides of his head, cried out and fell writhing into the snow. The paroxysm passed quickly, but Tynian was pale and shaking as he sat up, and his eyes were wild.

‘You are Tynian-from-Deira?’ Ghworg demanded in Trollish.

‘Y-yes.’ Tynian’s voice trembled as he replied.

‘Do you understand my words?’

‘They are clear to me.’

‘It is good. Do not speak the other kind of talk when you are near us. When you do, you make it so that we do not trust you.’

‘I will remember that.’

‘It is good that you will. Aphrael came to us. She told us that the one called Berit has been told not to go to the place Beresa. He has been told to go to the place Sopal instead. She said that you would understand what this means.’ He paused, frowning. ‘Do you?’ he asked.

‘Do we?’ Tynian asked Ulath, speaking in Trollish.

‘I am not sure.’ Ulath rose, went to his horse, and took a map out of his saddle-bag. Then he returned to the fire. This is a picture of the ground,’ he explained to the enormous presences. ‘We make these pictures so that we will know where we are going.’

Schlee looked briefly at the map. ‘The ground does not look like that,’ he told them. He squatted and thrust his huge fingers down through the snow into the dirt. ‘This is how the ground looks.’

Ulath jumped back as the earth under his feet shuddered slightly. Then he stared down. It was not so much a map as it was a miniaturized version of the continent itself. ‘This is a very good picture of the ground,’ he marveled.

Schlee shrugged. ‘I put my hand into the ground and felt its shape. This is how it looks.’

‘Where is Beresa?’ Tynian asked Ulath, staring in wonderment at hair-thin little trees bristling like a two-day growth of beard on the sides of tiny mountains.

Ulath checked his map and walked several yards south to a shimmering surface covered with minuscule waves. His feet even sank slightly into Schlee’s recreation of the southern Tamul sea. ‘It is right here,’ he replied in Trollish, bending and putting his finger on a spot on the coastline.

‘That is where the ones who took Anakha’s mate away told him to go,’ Tynian explained to the Troll-Gods.

‘We do not understand,’ Khwaj said bluntly.

‘Anakha is fond of his mate.’

‘That is how it should be.’

‘He grows angry when his mate is in danger. The ones who took his mate away know this. They said that they will not give her back to him unless he gives them the Flower-Gem.’

The Troll-Gods all frowned, puzzling their way through it. Then Khwaj suddenly roared, belching out a great, billowing cloud of fire and melting the snow for fifty yards in every direction. ‘That is wickedness!’ he thundered. ‘It is not right to do this! Their quarrel was with Anakha, not with his mate! I will find these wicked ones! I will turn them into fires that will never go out! They will cry out with hurt forever!’

Tynian shuddered at the enormity of that idea. Then, with a great deal of help from Ulath, he explained their disguises and the subterfuges those disguises made possible.

‘Do you in truth look different from how you looked before, Ulath-from-Thalesia?’ Ghworg asked, peering curiously at Ulath.

‘Much different, Ghworg.’

‘That is strange. You seem the same to me,’ The God considered it. ‘Perhaps it is not so strange,’ he amended. ‘Your kind all look the same to me,’ He clenched his huge fists. ‘Khwaj is right,’ he said. ‘We must cause hurt to the wicked ones. Show us where the one called Berit has been told to go.’