The Enchantress of World's End
- Автор: Картер Лин Спрэг
- Серия: Gondwane Epic #2
- Год: 101
- Язык: английский
- Год: DAW
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «The Enchantress of World's End». Краткое содержание книги:
Gondwane... When all the kingdoms of all the peoples of Earth had come and gone and new ones arose, it was on Gondwane they created their ephemeral glories.
On Gondwane, amid the turmoil of the last wars and the last quests and the last efforts of scientists and alchemists, there arose one final hero, the mighty Ganelon Silvermane.
The saga of Ganelon is the telling of master fantasist Lin Carter. And it is in the story of the Scarlet Enchantress that Ganelon first found the meaning of manhood.
The Illusionist affably accosted the nearest of the Chxians who stood staring at the strangers curiously, if not disapprovingly.
“Tell me, my good man, is there an inn nearby where weary travelers can find a meal and lodgings for the night?” The Chxian nodded and replied, in neutral tones, that the nearest might be found on the south side of the bazaar square. Thanking him, the old magician led his companions to the threshold of the establishment which termed itself, in sober brown-painted letters, “The Hospice of the Twelve Cardinal Virtues.”
“Come, come, you two, stop staring about apprehensively, and let us enter,” he said testily.
Within they found a long, low-ceilinged room with tables and oaken benches neatly arranged before a cheerfully-crackling fire on a stone grate. The plaster walls were painted a solemn gray and the wooden rafters were neatly blackwashed; but the odors of meat turning on a sizzling spit were appetizing and the taproom, despite its lack of color or ornament, seemed snug and comfortable enough. A plump, sober-faced innkeeper assigned them rooms for the night at a remarkably low fee and set dishes before them laden with hot meat, brown bread and fresh fruit, together with large mugs of a spiced drink which turned out to be an extremely mild ale whose alcoholic content was virtually nil. Tasting the meat, Ganelon found it a choise cut, but almost tasteless.
“Come, innkeeper, have you no spices to enliven the flavor?” he grumbled. The placid-faced Chxian stared at him wide-eyed.
“Spices heat the blood and are a toxic moral influence,” he said primly. “Solid, nourishing fare is the best.”
“Aye, and this ale is excessively bland, by my troth,” the girl knight grimaced after tasting it. The innkeeper shrugged.
“Strong drink unhinges the reason and makes quarrelsome the temper,” he replied, almost tonelessly, with the air of one repeating a maxim which frequent reiteration had made all but meaningless. “You will find the beverage wholesome and filling, mistress, I am sure.”
The Illusionist munched on the tough meat and took a swallow from his mug. He then glanced around at the somber room, whose only note of cheer came from the crackling fire. A number of soberly-dressed Chxians sat about conversing in a monotone, sipping their mugs, paying little or no attention to the Outlanders beyond a single, wide-eyed glance at Xarda’s bare legs and Ganelon’s skimpy loincloth.
“Your taproom seems remarkably quiet tonight,” the Illusionist complained. “Can none of these fellows give us a merry tune on lute, pipe, or tambourine?”
The innkeeper turned a cold eye on him. “Song and dance,” he said, with a slight, fastidious shudder, “are cankers which devour the moral fiber of sinful men. We Chxians abhor the loose morals and ethical decay of foreign realms; sobriety, a clear head, and a quiet, respectable tongue are high among the virtues we celebrate. Your rooms are ready.” And with that, and a slight, disapproving sniff, he turned on his heel and left them to then: own devices.
“Hmm,” the Illusionist grumped. “A dour lot, these Chxians! Well, let them be as glum and solemn as they please, so long as they let us be. Eat up children, drink deep, soft beds await our weary, toil-worn limbs!”
“Let’s hope so,” said Ganelon Silvennane gloomily.
Their three rooms were small and bare, devoid of furnishing, save for a narrow bed, a small table bearing a candle-stub in a pewter dish, and a chamberpot. The rooms were identical, even to the frowning placards on the walls which bore stern injunctions against licentious behavior such as “CONTINENCE LEADS TO QUIET SLUMBER” and “A CHASTE BED IS A RESTFUL BED.” The beds themselves, mere cots, were hard and uncomfortable. Nevertheless, weary and well-fed, they were ready to retire.
Ganelon had accompanied the Bazonga to the stables at the rear of the hospice; finding the stalls too small to contain the huge creature, he had tethered her to a zooka-zooka tree in the courtyard. He came clumping up the stair to their adjoining rooms after the termination of this task with a wide grin on his habitually grim features.
“What’s so funny, my boy?” inquired the magician.
“The innkeeper,” chuckled Ganelon. “I tied the Bazonga bird to a tree in the courtyard and asked the innkeeper if she would be safe there for the night on account of thieves. Thieves! I thought he would fall in a dead faint at the very suggestion. It appears that here in Chx thievery is about as rare as leprosy, and regarded with much the same degree of loathing!”
Chuckling, they bade each other good-night and turned to their respective rooms.
Night fell. The immense, cracked orb of the Falling Moon rose over the edges of Gondwane to flood the Supercontinent with silver light. And, with the coming of darkness, a most peculiar change came over the sober, respectable, Galendil-fearing people of Chx.
“Ganelon? Hsst, you great oaf, wake up!”
The giant blinked awake to find the supple, half-naked form of the Sirix Xarda bending over him, shaking his shoulder.
“What’s happened—trouble?” he grunted, sitting up and reaching for the Silver Sword.
“Can’t say,” hissed the girl knight enigmatically. “Come take a look out of the window!”
The giant obediently clambered out of the cot and crossed the closet-sized room to peer out at the street below through glassy panes. What he saw from the window brought a rumble of astonishment to his lips.
By night, the streets of the Scarlet City were transformed into a fantastic carnival of revelry. Colored paper lanterns were strung across the streets, swinging gaily in the breezes. And through these streets, which by day were so exceptionally sober and respectable, surged a motley throng in gaudy festival garments. Most of the revellers carried flasks and bottles from which they drank heavily, the heady vapors of strong wines and brandies rising to the nostrils of Silvermane and Xarda. Musicians led the dancing throng with the patter of drums, the jingle-thump-jingle of gay tambourines and the tootle of pipes. Giggling bands of young children, naked except for flower-wreaths, fondled each other in doorways, while beneath every streetlight voluptuous women with unbound hair, their rounded limbs completely devoid of clothing, undulated to a hip-waggling dance.
“Great Qal-en-dil!” Silvermane gasped.
“You said it,” the girl knight grinned. “Look down the alley there!” Ganelon followed her pointing finger to see a nude woman enthusiastically volunteering her services to five or six partially-unclothed men, in a complicated multi-embrace of considerable anatomical ingenuity. He gasped again, coloring faintly. “And there!” the girl pointed. A band of looters, having smashed in the windows of a shop, were busily emptying it of every last movable object. He stared out over the city, his amazement growing. Five masked bandits were quarreling over the plump purse of a lone quarry who stood helpless before then* drawn knives while they squabbled. A bit further on a fat man sprawled, drunk and snoring, in a doorway while two stark naked, grubby-faced, grinning urchins relieved him of his purse, headgear, cloak and buskins. Further off, over the city, the sound of smashing windows came to them, the scuffle and thud of innumerable bar-room brawls, and a whiff of smoke from several burning buildings was evident. Snatches of wild carnival music, drunken song, and street-corner fights, drifted to them on the evening breeze.