Читать книгу World Enough, and Time - FastPencil Premiere - Страница 8

THEY ran for two hours, first south, then east, then southwest. They made it to the seaside as the moon dipped under the horizon and ran through the salty surf for an hour before finding a place where a tumble of rocks spilled into the ocean from the cliffs above. Up this stony spine they climbed, leaving no trail. They walked east again, along creek beds and game paths for still another hour, not resting until they found a cave at the edge of a small wood, just as the false dawn fluttered her eyes. They slept until late morning.

The evening cool burned off slowly. When Josh awoke, he found himself nestled along Beauty’s furry belly, curled against the cold. He stood, shaking off sleep, then stood still cocking his head, listening for anything the forest might be able to tell him.

The forest said much. The wind in the treetops was from the west, bad for tracking. A wood-pecker rapped out a lunchtime tune. A chorus of crickets entertained themselves. Audience-shy, they halted their performance if anyone showed up for the show. The lighting was dappled greens and browns. Joshua never tired of it.

He took out some paper from one of his Scribe-tubes and assiduously covered it with small script from his quill, recording the events that had led them to this point. He tried to set the record in this way at least once a day, though he knew the Word was forgiving of lapses. When the writing was done, Joshua rolled up the paper and returned it to the Scribe-tube secured inside his boot. “The Word is great, the Word is One,” he said.

Beauty arose, shook all over, and managed to provoke a jay into squawking at him for a full minute. When the blue, mad Bird finally flew off self-righteously, Josh looked over to Beauty and said, “Well?”

“Well, we need not worry about Jarl’s toads. If they pick up our trail, it will not be soon. We will be quit of this land.”

“That’s only half a well,” said Joshua. “We’re on a cold trail ourselves.”

“We know they headed south,” said the Centaur.

“South is a big place.”

“We could head direct for Ma’gas where the Griffin lives.”

“We don’t know they’re going there. And I’d rather catch up before they get that far.”

Beauty agreed. “I think we will do best to follow a trail between the brothel and the Forest of Accidents.”

Josh looked doubtful. “That’s more east than south. Why that way?”

A brown Rabbit ran up, sniffed at some clover, and began to chew. Beauty stretched his hind legs one at a time.

“Griffins dislike walking, and Vampires hate work of any kind. These two have a cart full of Humans to drag along now that their muscular friend is dead. They will be wanting help.”

Josh nodded. “And another Accident is their best bet.” Beauty rubbed his rump against the bark of a crusty old oak. “I can see them bickering while they walk. ‘You pull, you old bat.’ ‘No, you pull, you miserable Bird, it’s my turn to fly.’”

Josh laughed. “We could get ahead of them and volunteer to pull the wagon.”

“We already pulled Jarl’s hounds off their scent.”

“Maybe they could find other things for us to do. Draw their water, plant their crops…”

“Slit their throats,” suggested Beauty.

“Slit their throats,” Josh agreed.

“Surrre,” came a voice behind them. They spun around, Beauty rearing, Josh crouching low. Sitting serenely in a puddle of sunlight, feet tucked under her, eyes half closed, was Isis, the black Cat from the brothel.

“Isis,” said Josh.

“Who is that?” demanded Beauty.

“The Cat in the house last night. Remember? She warned us about Jarl’s men, in the windmill.”

“Why is she here?”

Isis stood up, padded over to Josh, leaned her back against his leg, and purred.

Beauty shook his head. “Dumb animals do love you.”

Whereupon Isis arched her back, fluffed up to twice her size in fur, and hissed viciously at the Centaur. Beauty raised his eyebrows. Isis quieted, looked sulky, and growled, “Foool.”

“Got a bit of Human blood in her, I’ll wager,” Beauty laughed. Then, more seriously: “I do not like how easily she found us, though. Or how silently she crept.”

“Why did you come?” Josh asked the little creature.

Isis looked down, then up. “We’rre yourrr girrrrl,” she said. She flopped over on her back, played wildly with Joshua’s boot-string for a few seconds, then rolled onto her side, resting her paw lightly on his toe.

The two hunters laughed. Josh stooped down and scratched the Cat’s belly. She had a delicious spasm around his hand, brought her hind legs up and kicked wildly at his arm, bit him on the back of the wrist, and jumped away. She then stood calmly preening herself as if nothing had happened.

Beauty pawed the ground. “Your following is faithful, Joshua. But we must go.”

Isis stopped her preening. “Nooo.”

“We’ve got to go, Fur-face,” explained Josh. “We’re after the Vampire whose room you were in last night.”

Isis opened her eyes coyly. “Ohhh,” she purred.

Beauty pricked up his ears. Josh said, “You know something about them? You know where they went?”

The Cat nodded.

“We are not taking a Cat on a hunt,” warned Beauty.

“But she may know something,” said Josh. “She already helped us at the brothel, and she found us here, so she’s obviously got a good nose. Besides, she’s sneaky. That may come in handy.”

Beauty looked skeptical. “It will be dangerous, little Cat. Are you ready for that?”

“Surrre,” she swaggered, strutting between them.

“It would be easier for you back at the brothel,” added Josh.

She raised her eyebrows, turned her head to he side, and spoke, as if to the rock that lay in the path, “We’rrre borrred.”

“And you know which way the Vampire is headed?”

She shrugged a Yes, as if being asked to repeat herself didn’t deserve further comments.

“Then let’s go,” said Josh.

Isis leapt up on Joshua’s chest. Involuntarily his hands came up to hold her there. She hissed in a low sultry voice, “Kissss,” and licked his lower lip. Then she leapt down, ran ten yards into the forest, and stopped and looked back at them, her pupils dilated with dark excitement. Josh and Beauty stared into the subtle strangeness of her Cat face, and realized the same thing at that moment: staring back at them were black round pupils in blue round irises, curving eyelids with black eyelashes. Eyes that were not Cat-eyes, but were Human.

Isis turned and ran Cat-fast into the forest. Josh and Beauty ran after her.

“You there, what are you doing?” the Vampire demanded. He had long black hair, and his name was Bal.

Dicey shook her head bleakly. She was too frightened to speak. Bal strode over to her and pulled her roughly off the floor of the cave. No one else moved. Rose stood still a few feet away, holding a rock behind her. It was in her mind to bash the Vampire’s head in if it looked like he was going to hurt Dicey.

Bal looked at the ground where the young girl had been sitting. He saw she’d found a piece of chalk, and had been writing a sentence over and over on the stone. He read aloud: “WORD SAVE US. WE ARE FREE.” He laughed, tore the chalk from Dicey’s trembling hand and inserted his own block letters in her writing, so it now read: WORDS ENSLAVE US. WE SCARED. FREEDOM IS AN ILLUSION. He laughed again and walked back among the milling Vampires.

Rose moved close to Dicey. “It’s okay, it’s over now,” Rose whispered, but Dicey couldn’t stop shaking, couldn’t tear her eyes off the marking on the floor and the way Bal had twisted her words.

Bal was shouting orders to the assembled creatures now. A griffin stood at the Vampire’s side, sharpening his broken beak on a stone. “All right,” Bal called, “time to move out. Get the prisoners and be quick about it, Ice take you. We split up at Southmarsh and rendezvous at the other side of the forest. Step lively, you bloats. Uli, give that Accident a hand.”

The Accidents and Vampires began herding the Humans into the covered tumbrils. Some of the Vampires exchanged words in the high-frequency beeps they used only when under stress, or very excited. These sounds were inaudible to most other creatures, but not insensible: they caused fear and distraction. Even a sluggish Accident would step lively to get out of range of the signals.

The dispersal continued. Rose held on tightly to Dicey and Ollie to keep them together in the confusion.

Dicey couldn’t stop shivering.

The woods were lovely, dark, and brief. Josh, Beauty, and Isis left them quickly, continuing east and north.

The area was hilly, covered with a thick brown-purple heather that scratched their legs but had a wonderful spring smell. An exaltation of larks passed flying east - a good omen. Vernal flowers tested the air, and the breeze was a gentle laughter. All in all, a good day for journeying.

And nobody loved an adventure better than Isis. She was positively exhilarated. She’d race ahead through brier and short grass, outdistancing the other two by a hundred yards. Then some movement or vapor would catch her eye and she’d hunker down, poised, staring intensely at the occult perception. Her back legs would rev up and she’d pounce – have it out with the bramble or grasshopper or molecule she’d focused on. Then Josh and Beauty would catch up and Isis would run ahead.

Occasionally they passed a totem or a fetish – a pile of bones, a mask of feathers – constructed by some local shaman to ward off passing evil. These affected Isis in strange ways. Some she would approach cautiously, on tiptoe, and sniff all around while some she ignored entirely. One she hissed at, and unceremoniously urinated on it. Josh and Beauty treated them all with equal disinterest – the only significance to them of such signs lay in their state of disrepair, which reflected how long it had been since interested locals had been around.

They soon crossed a great plain where craters pocked the land. Many battles in many wars had been fought in this area between the sea and the Forest of Accidents. These large holes they passed were scores of years old, for they were smooth and filled with soft yellow grass.

At the end of the plain they came to a rise which they climbed easily. It was topped by a plateau upon which they rested a minute. The plateau was perhaps fifty feet wide and one hundred feet long, affording a grand view of the plains they’d just left and the valleys beyond.

At one end of the long table of rock was a small square hut of rusted steel, chipped paint, and broken glass. They walked up to it and stared inside. It was empty. Beside it was a mound of sun-bleached bones. Atop the door of the hut was a series of strange white markings on a faded green board. The travelers stared at the marks a few moments. Beauty turned to Josh and said, “Scribery.”

Josh nodded. “It says ‘Toll booth’.”

Beauty furrowed his brow and tilted his head. “But what is the meaning?” he repeated.

Joshua pursed his lips. “I think this was a road once.”

Beauty snorted. “It seems a lot of effort was expended to go a short way.”

Josh nodded. Isis pointed down the hill. Josh and Beauty followed the direction of her paw, and saw three hundred yards in the distance, two tiny figures pulling a cart. In an instant Beauty was running at a full lope, Josh not far behind.

When they were one hundred yards short, they saw the two creatures look up, shout, break away from the cart, and begin running. Beauty galloped down and headed them off, his bow taut. Joshua covered the creatures’ retreat. Everyone stopped.

It was not the Vampire and the Griffin, though. It was an Elf and a Rool, quivering with fear. Joshua walked over to the cart they’d been pulling, looked inside: dishes, flowers, a rocking chair, colored fabrics. He walked back as the Elf was saying, “Are you going to kill us?” The Rool, covered in soft amber fur, wouldn’t open his eyes.

Josh relaxed. “No, we won’t kill you.”

“How are you called?” asked Beauty, lowering his bow.

The Elf was only two feet tall, but wore high-heeled boots to try to look larger. “I am Fofkin,” he said. “This is my friend, Rool.” Rool kept his eyes closed. Rools were all named Rool, because nobody could tell them apart – not even other Rools, it was said.

“You give us a wicked scare,” Fofkin went on. “Our people are taken by demons, our home is sacked. We run all day and mourn all night.”

“Rooooool,” cooed Rool, like a wounded dove. His eyes stayed closed.

“We beg your pardon,” Beauty bowed. “We have lost our own and seek them now.”

“What manner of creatures did this to you?” asked Josh. “Was it a Vampire and a Griffin?”

Fofkin jumped a foot in the air and sat in the grass. “A Vampire, yes. He’s in charge. But no Griffin. Three others. A big Lizard, a Sphinx, and a Faceless one.” He shuddered. “The Sphinx lives right up there, in that little shack up on the flats. He eats anybody who wanders by. I think it’s the Vampire who puts him up to this terrible mischief. Poor Mary.”

The Rool curled up into a big ball of fur and rolled over next to Fofkin. The little Elf petted him tenderly.

“Your people,” said Beauty. “Are they Elves and Rools?”

Fofkin shook his head. “Humans, every one. Every one is drug off in a cart and pulled away. Poor Mary.” A tear dawdled down his cheek.

“Rool,” came the muffled sound from inside the ball of fur.

“Which way were they headed?” Josh asked softly.

“South,” said the Elf.

Isis strolled up, sat down, began licking her belly. Joshua looked down at her. “You still know where you’re taking us?” he asked.

“Surrre.”

There was a faint humming above them, and Josh looked up to see the red-and-gold Flutterby hovering excitedly over their heads. Isis leapt straight up, six feet in the air from a sitting position, took a swipe with her paw, and almost bagged the Flutterby with one blow. As she landed on her feet in a crouch, Josh swatted her backside with the flat of his hand. “You leave that Flutterby alone,” he scolded. Isis looked ready to spring again. The Flutterby gained altitude.

Beauty laughed. “Dissent among your minions.” The Flutterby settled on Josh’s shoulder.

“Looks like it’s made up its mind to follow us,” said Josh. “I guess we’ll have to call it something.” The Flutterby smiled demurely and hummed.

“How about Humbelly?” suggested Beauty. Isis kept a dour eye fixed on the gentle bug.

“Humbelly it is,” agreed Josh, and tossed the creature back into the air, where it fluttered giddily all around.

They bid good journey to Fofkin and Rool, wished them well, and set off once more east in the direction Isis led them. Humbelly bobbed playfully over Joshua’s head. Isis swatted and jumped at the dancing wings, but to no avail, until she finally just purred “Whorrre” under her breath, and ignored the silly creature entirely.

In the early evening they came upon a sign. Wheel tracks from a heavy cart, mingled with the foot and claw prints of the animals they wanted. Isis almost touched her nose to one of the prints, sniffing intently at its meaning. Finally she lifted her eyes to Joshua’s and nodded her head.

They followed the trail due east for several miles. At the edge of a pine grove the tracks were joined by those of another cart and other animals. Here they all turned southeast for a while until they were met by still a third set of wheels.

The terrain was becoming rocky. It was increasingly difficult to distinguish whose prints were whose. In addition, some tracks would disappear where an animal had flown away, some walked off, and some joined up. It was a confusing melee. At the north rim of a quarry still almost a mile from the Forest of Accidents, the three wagons split in three different directions. Despite intensive sniffing and study by Isis, Josh, and Beauty, it was impossible to tell which set of tracks belonged to the cart carrying Rose, Dicey, and Ollie.

After much debate, they decided to follow the trail going east, at least until they could decipher more about the animals in that group. They hadn’t gone more than a half-mile, though, when they saw the bodies.

Two bodies, lying still and pale behind a furze bush. One was the nude figure of a young woman, the other a man. She was smooth, red-haired, vulnerable, beautiful. He had no hair at all. Both were lifeless. Josh walked up to the woman first, and felt for a pulse; then, the man.

“Nothing. Cold as earth,” he said. Isis smelled the woman’s foot and backed off.

Joshua looked at the motionless face. She couldn’t have been more than twenty, yet there was something about the face that bespoke age - reason, depth. It was more than the distance and darkness that color the mask of death; it was subtler, it was…

She opened her eyes. “Help me,” she whispered.

Isis laid her ears back and Beauty shuffled in the dust. Josh picked the woman’s head up off the ground, and as his fingers cupped the back of her scalp, he felt a slow trickle of oily liquid oozing out a small nozzle that was almost flush with the skin.

“You’re not Human,” he said in surprise.

“I’m Neuroman,” she whispered. “Help me.”

“How?” he asked.

“The quarry back there. At the bottom of the north slope, under a slab of white granite with a red vein in the shape of a J. You know what a J is?”

Joshua hesitated, then nodded. “I can read,” he said. In some places, people were burned for being able to read.

“There are two containers there.” She faltered and closed her eyes. “Bring them to me.”

Josh got up and ran back to the quarry, slid down the north grade, and found the J-veined rock. Under it were two steel pint cans. Stenciled on each was the word HEMOLUBE. And in small black letters underneath it read: Grade AAA. U.S.P.

Josh grabbed the cans and scrambled back up. He sprinted over to the supine woman. Isis sat on her haunches, watching. Beauty was kneeling down, feeling the woman’s forehead. “Cold,” he said. Humbelly sat in the grass at a distance, her wings moving slowly up and down.

The woman, aware of Josh’s return, opened her eyes and said softly, “Roll me over. Fill me up.”

Josh rolled her on her belly and parted her hair. On the back of her head a small valve was open, only slightly bigger than a spigot on the can. Josh punctured this with the point of his knife and carefully poured the viscous red fluid from the can into the hole in the back of her head. When the can was empty, Josh closed the head-valve with a snap.

The figure turned over and sat upright. “I’m alive,” she said.

Joshua took a step back. “Who are you?”

“My name is Jasmine.” She paused. “I owe you my life.”

“You don’t owe me anything. I do what I do.”

She had a feeling and smiled. “Quickly. Fill Ishmael with the other can.”

Josh rolled the lifeless man over on his belly and poured the viscous liquid from the other can into the spigot at the back of his head. Nothing happened, though. The man remained still as the earth.

“Too far gone,” said Jasmine softly. She inspected the can Josh had used on him. It was dented, with a small crack. “Or maybe this Hemolube was just contaminated.”

Beauty interrupted softly. “Who did this to you?”

“A Vampire and a Griffin, they thought Ishmael and I were Human. Left us for dead when they found out we weren’t, like the others.”

“What others?”

“Six others, in a carriage, tied together. All Humans.” She stopped. “Were they your people?”

“Most likely.” Josh stared into the distance.

“Well, then,” said Jasmine, standing. “Let’s get them.”

She found her caftan behind a log – camo-colored, of elegant design, a flowing yet nearly indestructible fabric – and put it on. Only then, when she was no longer naked, was Joshua aware of her sexuality, like ungrounded electricity. Beauty noticed it too, but ever the gentleman, he looked away.

The sun dipped its last light under the crest of the hills, putting everything in a somber cast. In the quiet of the moment, Isis cocked her ears and jerked her head left. The others looked in the same direction, but saw nothing. The black Cat sped off to the top of a long rise of rocks. In a few seconds she raced back to where the others stood.

“Yarrrrl,” she growled.

Josh ran silently with Isis to a niche in the rock pile and peered over it across the western plain.

Walking slowly toward them, a quarter-mile distant, were a dozen of Jarl’s soldiers sniffing at Joshua’s trail. Five appeared to be Bears, two were Ursumen, the other three Joshua couldn’t discern. He ran back to the others.

“JEGS,” he said. “Too many to fight. Time to run.”

“I dislike this running from,” Beauty said distinctly.

Jasmine looked from face to face, finally looking at Beauty. “When I was young, two hundred fifty years ago, there was a truth well known. It was said that for every thing, there is a season. Your fight, I think, isn’t with these soldiers.”

Josh and Beauty looked back toward the rise, where Jarl’s Elite Guard would be in a few minutes, and then ahead at the Forest of Accidents looming in the near east.

Jasmine spoke again. “I know a place to wait and think. A sanctuary, a friend’s hideaway. In the Forest.”

She held their faces in hers. They looked at each other. She knelt beside the man she’d called Ishmael and placed a hand on his forehead. “Good-bye, I,” she said, and looked at the others. “His nickname was I. That’s what people called him.” She took a moment to remember her friend, then began running toward the Forest. “Come on,” she shouted over her shoulder.

They followed her at a trot. By the time they reached the edge of the wood a minute later, night had fallen hard.

In the Forest, a blackness filled the air, deeper than any thought - a blackness without form. Shapes could be imagined in the night, differentiated only by subtle, textural variations. Here, a glossier black, there, more flat, and over there a thickening in the blackness: wet rocks in a stream, a cluster of young trees, an animal.

Occasionally through the matte of clouds that was the sky, a fleck of starlight escaped, but it was caught in the web of vines and branches that filled the forest. No light this night. Just cold, with the color of snow in a deep cave.

No sound rattled the leaves or clicked the stones. No rodent skittered, no tail slapped, no thing moved. Except once - perhaps the flapping of a great bird that could be heard high above the fringe of the farthest trees. But this noise, if it even existed, was quickly absorbed by the faint stale wind and carried into the depths of the wood.

So black, cold, quiet, still. A sense of breath lost, or held, of a momentary pause in the flow of things, of…

A pure, low, demented cry tore the fabric of this weave. It was a blind, inhuman sound, terrible and brief.

The five animals stopped, listened, and held their breaths. This wood concealed Accidents.

“It’s not far,” whispered Jasmine. Beauty held an arrow drawn.

They tiptoed across a game path into a thicket. The night and the smell of moist earth surrounded them, like different kinds of overgrowth. Another noise, in another direction, made them all turn their heads at once. Something rustled. There was a click.

A blast of light flooded to the left. Josh involuntarily brought his arm up to shield his face. Beauty raised his bow at this illumination that broke the substance of the night as they realized it was a door being opened in a huge boulder. A figure stood in the doorway, silhouetted by the lamps in the room beyond. Jasmine walked up to the dark figure in the rock.

“Is Lon here?” she asked.

“Whom shall I say is calling?” said the form in the doorway. But as soon as he saw her face clearly, he ushered the five fugitives in, closing the door behind them. Outside, no trace of door remained. Only the mossy boulder, half buried in the jungle-thick forest.