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Isle Of The Dead :: Zelazny Roger
Страница: 85 из 110I fancied that I also detected a movement of sorts at the place where the rail guarded the end of the courtyard that overlooked the waters. Human eyes are not as acute as a Pei'an's. Green Green had said he'd seen Shandon clearly after crossing over the waters.
I felt her pulse as I stood there above one of Illyria's larger veins or smaller arteries, and the power came into me and I sent it upward.
Soon the drizzle became a heavy downpour, and when I lowered my upraised hand the lightning flashed and the thunders skated round and round in the tin drum of the sky. A wind, sudden as a springing cat and cold as the Arctic's halations, struck me in the back and shaved my cheeks as it passed.
Green Green cried out again. From somewhere off to my right, I think.
Then the heavens began to sizzle, and they sent down rains so heavily that the chalet vanished from sight and the isle itself faded to a gray outline. The volcano was the faintest of sparks above the water. Soon the wind raced by like a freight train and its howling joined with the thunders to create a perpetual din. The shores of Acheron lengthened and the waters were buffeted until they moved, in waves like the ones we had received, back in that direction from which they had come. If Green Green called out again, I could not hear him.
The water ran in rivers through my hair, down my face and neck. But I did not need my eyes to see. The power enfolded me and the temperature plummeted; the rain came in sheets that cracked like whips now; the day grew dark as night. I laughed, and the waters rose up in spouts and swayed like genies, and the lightflings ran their gauntlets again and again, but the machine never said "Tilt."
_Stop it, Frank! He will know you are here!_ came the thoughts, addressed to that part of me which Green Green wished to address.
_He does already, doesn't he?_ I might have replied. _Take cover till this is over. Wait!_
And as the waters came down and the winds went forth, the ground began to rock beneath me once again. The spark that hovered before me grew and glowed like a buried sun. Then the lightnings walked about it; they tickled the top of the isle; they wrote names upon the chaos, and one of them was mine.
I was thrown to my knees by another shock, but I stood again and raised both arms.
... And then I stood in a place that was neither solid, liquid nor gaseous. There was no light, nor was there darkness. It was neither hot nor cold. Perhaps it lay within my own mind, and perhaps not.
We stared at one another, and in my pale green hands I held a thunderbolt at port arms.
I felt her pulse as I stood there above one of Illyria's larger veins or smaller arteries, and the power came into me and I sent it upward.
Soon the drizzle became a heavy downpour, and when I lowered my upraised hand the lightning flashed and the thunders skated round and round in the tin drum of the sky. A wind, sudden as a springing cat and cold as the Arctic's halations, struck me in the back and shaved my cheeks as it passed.
Green Green cried out again. From somewhere off to my right, I think.
Then the heavens began to sizzle, and they sent down rains so heavily that the chalet vanished from sight and the isle itself faded to a gray outline. The volcano was the faintest of sparks above the water. Soon the wind raced by like a freight train and its howling joined with the thunders to create a perpetual din. The shores of Acheron lengthened and the waters were buffeted until they moved, in waves like the ones we had received, back in that direction from which they had come. If Green Green called out again, I could not hear him.
The water ran in rivers through my hair, down my face and neck. But I did not need my eyes to see. The power enfolded me and the temperature plummeted; the rain came in sheets that cracked like whips now; the day grew dark as night. I laughed, and the waters rose up in spouts and swayed like genies, and the lightflings ran their gauntlets again and again, but the machine never said "Tilt."
_Stop it, Frank! He will know you are here!_ came the thoughts, addressed to that part of me which Green Green wished to address.
_He does already, doesn't he?_ I might have replied. _Take cover till this is over. Wait!_
And as the waters came down and the winds went forth, the ground began to rock beneath me once again. The spark that hovered before me grew and glowed like a buried sun. Then the lightnings walked about it; they tickled the top of the isle; they wrote names upon the chaos, and one of them was mine.
I was thrown to my knees by another shock, but I stood again and raised both arms.
... And then I stood in a place that was neither solid, liquid nor gaseous. There was no light, nor was there darkness. It was neither hot nor cold. Perhaps it lay within my own mind, and perhaps not.
We stared at one another, and in my pale green hands I held a thunderbolt at port arms.