The Sinners of Erspia
- Автор: Бейли Баррингтон Дж.
- Год: 2011
- Язык: португальский
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «The Sinners of Erspia». Краткое содержание книги:
There were six of them, including Gauzewing and Flit.
“You asked to see one of our gnome prisoners,” Flit said.
Laedo nodded. He wanted to question a representative of this reputedly skilled race.
“The elders see no objection. However, wingless as you are..."
Two fairies unrolled a long mat which one of them had been carrying. It was made of wooden slats linked together, and was gaily coloured red and blue. At each corner was a thong. Four fairies stationed themselves one to a corner, placing a thong over one shoulder.
“It would take you a long time to walk to where the prisoner cages are,” Flit said. “We will carry you on this litter. We use it for transporting sick and injured people."
Laedo blinked and swallowed as he imagined himself borne through the air on the flimsy mat. He tried to estimate the impact velocity if he tumbled from a height in this gravity. Still enough, he guessed, to cause death or serious injury.
Or would the fairies simply zoom down and catch him as he fell?
It was not something he cared to put to the test. “I don't have wings,” he said, “but I can fly. Wait here for a minute."
Like any spaceship, the exterior of the projector station was studded with footholds and handrails. Laedo clambered up these until he came to the port of his cargo ship. Inside, he went to the equipment store room and found one of two gravpacks, strapping it to his back like a satchel.
Back at the port, he put a hand on the control knob on the chest strap and soared gently up and forward.
Flying with a gravpack was simplicity itself. The knob controlled the degree of ‘lift’ or inertial push, enabling one to rise or sink in a gravity field. To go forward, one leaned forward. To go back, one leaned back. To turn, one simply—turned.
Playfully he rotated, dipped and rose, showing off in front of the fairy people before setting himself down on the grass. They didn't seem as impressed as he would have thought, but simply shrugged and rolled up the litter again.
“I don't know how you do that, but very well,” Flit said. He paused. “It's just as well the gnomes don't have anything like it. Our one big advantage over them is that we can fly and they can't."
“I doubt if they'll get that clever,” Laedo responded.
Suddenly he noticed Histrina's reaction. The girl was enthralled. She didn't know about gravpacks, of course.
He turned to her. “Histrina,” he said firmly, “I want you to stay here until I get back. I would prefer it if you stayed in the station, but in any case I don't want you to go wandering off. Do you understand?"
She pouted. “I want to come. Show me how to fly like you just did."
“There isn't another gravpack,” Laedo lied. “Stay here, I won't be long."
He followed the fairies as they flittered into the air. It was easy to keep up with them. They flew with arms dangling and bodies aslant, much as he did. The enormous trees fell away below. From a height the forest canopy looked like a panorama of hills, dells and meadows, all covered in a frizzy moss. Here and there were clearings and glints of streams.
The fairies did not seem to tire as their wings bore them onward. They seemed able to fan their wings indefinitely. At length, they dipped, and as they neared the tree cover Laedo saw a cleft in the foliage which would not easily have been visible from higher in the air. Through this the flying party slipped, then went spearing and side-stepping among the boughs, making for the shadowed depths.
Soon they were on the ground, walking the bank of a rippling stream. Despite the size of the trees—or perhaps because of it—there was no gloom. Sufficient sunlight filtered through to dapple the forest floor with glowing, dancing spots.
A cave of branches opened up: not a clearing as such, but a domed hollow matted with boughs end foliage. Laedo wondered whether this was deliberate camouflage. Did the gnomes in the world above possess telescopes?
About a dozen cages were set in the hollow. In them, figures huddled. Flit led Laedo to the nearest one.
And so, for the first time, he saw a gnome.
An uglier creature was hard to imagine. The gnome was short, no taller then the fairies, but it was squat and round, almost ball-shaped, giving an impression of compact strength. It had bulbous, muscular limbs.
Its naked skin was an angry red, as if it had been scalded, and was covered in warts. As for the face, with its bulging eyes and pointed ears, it was a fanged grimace.
The gnome clambered to his feet on seeing the two, and shook the bars of his cage with a defiant snarl, while along the line his fellows did the same.
Laedo hoped the cage was strong enough to withstand the creature's frustration. He stood pensively, thinking of what had been wrought to produce such a travesty of a human being. To think that human stock had been intentionally modified to produce this result displeased him.
Evidently Klystar had delved into human mythology to produce both fairies and gnomes. Traditionally the latter were miners and skilled metal-workers. For all their ugliness and ferocity, the gnomes could perhaps prove useful to him.
Politely he asked, “Do you have a name?"
The gnome replied in a thick, rasping voice.
"KILL ALL FAIRIES! THIS LAND WILL BE OURS!"
“Hmm,” said Laedo.
Admittedly, it was not a promising start. He studied the leering face in front of him, and found that it was actually possible to discern a family resemblance with the fairies and with the other Erspians such as Histrina, despite the grotesqueness of that resemblance. It strengthened his belief that the Erspia worlds had been stocked from a relatively small number of original settlers.
Flit responded to the gnome's taunt with a superior smile, and wandered away to join his fellows.
Such innocence was touching. How could he be sure that Laedo was not, after all, in league with his enemies?
Laedo edged closer to the cage and caught a whiff of the creature, a smell like rotten potatoes. He spoke quietly. “Look at me. You will see that I am not a fairy. My face is different. I am taller. I have no wings."
The gnome pulled a face and looked puzzled.
“If you're not a gnome you're a fairy,” he grunted flatly.
Laedo let it pass. “Is it true you have good metal-workers in Gnomeland?” he asked. That was what the fairies called the upper world. “Can you make any shape in metal?"
Once again the gnome seemed to be puzzled by what Laedo was saying. “Yes!” he boasted finally. “We can make anything! We are not like those useless fairies who cannot make anything at all, except in wood, and do not deserve their world. There are metal ores here! They rightly belong to us!"
Despite their belligerence, Laedo began to sense a workmanlike intelligence in these squat, solid beings.
Metal-work seemed to be an obsession with them.
It could be just what he needed.
He lowered his voice yet further, ducking his head.
“Don't repeat what I'm saying. Do you want to go back home?"
Suspicion and incomprehension glared from the gnome's bulbous eyes. “Uh?"
“Do your people know how to make steel?"
The gnome nodded.
“There's something I want made. I have nothing to do with the fairy folk. I come from a different world altogether—one you know nothing about. If I free you and return you to Gnomeland, can you get this thing made for me?"
The squat creature made no response to the talk of other worlds, if the idea penetrated his brain at all.
He thought for a moment, then made a gesture to one side, swivelling his eyes.
“My comrades, too."
“I can't manage that,” Laedo said. “I'm not even sure I can get you away."
“The fairies are returning,” the gnome muttered, coming close to the bars of his cage. “If you do what you promise, then we shall see."