The Mad God's Amulet
- Автор: Муркок Майкл
- Серия: The History of the Runestaff #2
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: Фэнтези
Электронная книга - «The Mad God's Amulet». Краткое содержание книги:
Members of the Order of the Badger were coming in, bearing huge iron chains, a brazier, hammers, and rivets.
Hawkmoon, Yisselda, and Oladahn struggled as the badgers bound them, but soon they were forced down to the floor by the weight of the iron links.
Then the red-hot rivet nails were hammered home, and Hawkmoon knew that no human being could possibly hope to escape such bonds.
Baron Meliadus came to look down at him when the work was done. "We'll journey by land to the Kamarg and from there to Bordeaux, where a ship will be waiting for us. I regret I cannot offer you a flying machine-we are using most of them to level the Kamarg."
Hawkmoon closed his eyes; the only gesture he could make to display his contempt for his captor.
Bundled into an open wagon the next morning, the three were given no food before Baron Meliadus's heavily guarded caravan set off. From time to time Hawkmoon caught a glimpse of his enemy, riding near the head of the column with Sir Huillam d'Averc by his side.
The weather was still stormy and oppressive, and a few heavy drops of rain splashed on Hawkmoon's face and fell into his eyes. He was so heavily bound that he could barely shake his head to rid it of the moisture.
The wagon bumped and jerked away, and in the distance the Dark Empire troops were marching against the city.
It seemed to Hawkmoon that he had been betrayed on all sides. He had trusted the Warrior in Jet and Gold and had had his saddlebags stolen; he had trusted D'Averc and found himself delivered into the hands of Baron Meliadus. Now he sighed, not sure that even Oladahn would not betray him, given the opportunity…
He found himself slipping almost comfortably into the mood that had possessed him months before after his defeat and capture by Granbretan when he had led an army against Baron Meliadus in Germany. His face became frozen, his eyes dull, and he ceased to think.
Sometimes Yisselda would speak and he would answer with an effort, having no words of comfort because he knew that there were none that would convince her. Sometimes Oladahn would try to make a cheerful comment, but the others did not reply, and eventually he, too, lapsed into silence. Only when, from time to time, food was pushed into their mouths did they show any signs of life.
So the days passed as the caravan trundled southward towards the Kamarg.
They had all anticipated this homecoming for months, but now they looked forward to it without joy. Hawkmoon knew he had failed in his chosen mission, failed to save the Kamarg, and he was full of self-contempt.
Soon they were passing through Italia, and Baron Meliadus called out one day, "The Kamarg we'll reach before a couple of nights have passed. We are just crossing the border into France!" And he laughed.
Chapter Ten
THE FALL OF THE KAMARG
"SIT THEM UP," said Baron Meliadus, "so they can see."
On horseback, he leaned over to look into the wagon. "Get them up straight," he told his sweating me who were wrestling with the three bodies still clad in armor and made heavier by the great weight of chains about them. "They do not look well," he added. "And I thought them such hardy spirits!"
D'Averc rode up beside Baron Meliadus, coughing, hunched a little in his saddle. "And you're still in poor condition, D'Averc. Did not my apothecary mix you the medicine you asked for?"
"He did, my lord Baron," D'Averc said weakly,
"but it does me little good."
"It should have done, the mixture of herbs you had him put in it." Meliadus returned his attention to the three prisoners. "See, we have stopped on this hill so that you could look at your homeland."
Hawkmoon blinked in the midday sunlight, recognizing the marshlands of his beloved Kamarg stretching and shining away to the horizon.
But closer he saw the great, somber watchtowers of the Kamarg, the strength of the Kamarg with their strange weapons of incredible power, whose secrets were known only to Count Brass. And camped near them, a black mass of men, like so many million ants ready to sweep in, were the gathered forces of the Dark Empire.
"Oh!" sobbed Yisselda. "They can never withstand so many!"
"An intelligent estimate, my dear,'' said Baron Meliadus. "You are quite right."
He and his party had come to a rest on the slopes of a hill that led gradually down to the plain where the troops of Granbretan massed. Hawkmoon could see infantry, cavalry, engineers, rank upon rank of them; he saw war engines of enormous size, huge flame cannon, ornithopters flapping through the skies in such numbers that their shapes blotted out the sun as they passed over the heads of the onlookers. All manner of metals had been brought against the peaceful Kamarg, brass and iron and bronze and steel, tough alloys that could resist the bite of a flame-lance, gold and silver and platinum and lead. Vultures marched beside frogs, and horses beside moles; there were wolves and boars and stags and wildcats, eagles and ravens and badgers and weasels. Silk banners fluttered in the moist, warm air, bright with the colors of two score of nobles from all corners of Granbretan. There were yellows and purples and blacks and reds, blue and greens and flashing pinks, and the sun caught the jewels of a hundred thousand eyes and made them flash, malevolent and grim.
"Aha," laughed Baron Meliadus. "That army I command. If Count Brass had not refused to aid us that day, you would all be honored allies of the Dark Empire of Granbretan. But because you resisted usyou will be punished. You thought your weapons and your towers and the stoic bravery of your men was enough to stand against the might of Granbretan. Not enough, Dorian Hawkmoon, not enough! See-my army, raised by me to commit my vengeance. See, Hawkmoon, and know what a fool you and the rest were!" He flung back his head and laughed for a long time. "Tremble, Hawkmoon-and you, too, Yisseldatremble as your fellows are trembling now within their towers, for they know those towers must fall, they know the Kamarg will be ashes and mud before tomorrow's sunset. I will destroy the Kamarg if it means sacrificing my entire army!"
And Hawkmoon and Yisselda did tremble, though it was with grief at the threat of the destruction foreseen by mad Baron Meliadus.
"Count Brass is dead," said Baron Meliadus, turning his horse to ride to the head of his company, "And now dies the Kamarg!" He waved his arm. "Forward. Let them see the carnage!"
The wagon began to move again, bumping down the hill road to the plain, its prisoners propped in it with stricken faces and miserable eyes.
D'Averc continued to ride beside the wagon, coughing ostentatiously. "The Baron's medicine's not bad," he said at length. "It should cure the ills of all his men." And with that enigmatic pronouncement he urged his horse into a gallop to reach the head of the column and ride beside his master.
Hawkmoon saw strange rays flash from the towers of the Kamarg and strike into the gathered ranks that came against them, leaving scars of smoking ground where men had been. He saw the cavalry of the Kamarg begin to move up to take its positions, a thin line of battered Guardians, riding their horned horses, flame-lances on their shoulders. He saw ordinary townsfolk from the settlements, armed with swords and axes, coming in the wake of the cavalry. But he did not see Count Brass, he did not seen von Villach, and he did not see the philosopher Bowgentle. The men of the Kamarg marched leaderless to this last battle.