"Simon R. Green - Nightside 1 - Drinking Midnight Wine" - читать интересную книгу автора (Green Simon R)

feast in the ghostly remembrance of what had once been a seventeenth-century eating place, The
Three Gables, sharing secrets in loud, carrying voices and deciding men's fates with a laugh and a
shrug and a careless quip. King Mob still held sway in the town centre, as men and women long dead
rioted over the changing fortunes of the cloth trade. And all across the town there were flaring
lights and voices in the earth, and unnatural creatures flying on the night winds.
Business as usual, in Bradford-on-Avon, in Mysterie.
Jimmy Thunder looked up at the full moon, and nodded hello. He'd always been on good terms with
the Moon, unlike some of his predecessors, though her skittish ways made her difficult to
understand and dangerous to know. But you never knew when you might need a friend. The town was
jumping tonight, and the Reality Express was fast bearing down on the station. Jimmy let his sight
slip out of Mysterie and back into Veritie, as the big black train came roaring in, right on time.
The Waking Beauty had hired Jimmy Thunder to investigate the matter of the Reality Express, and
Jimmy had nodded politely and said of course he would, no problem, because no one said no to the
Waking Beauty if they knew what was good for them; not even a god. She hadn't offered to pay, and
he'd known better than to ask. He was just building up credit that he might some day need to
redeem. The Waking Beauty was older than the town, and the town was very old indeed. She hadn't
volunteered why she was suddenly interested in the Reality Express, or what he was supposed to be
looking for. A lot of people disapproved of it, for all kinds of reasons, but as yet no one had
actually got around to doing anything about it. The trade in refugees between the two worlds
wasn't exactly illegal, but it did tend to undermine the status quo. And a lot of people had a
great deal invested in maintaining the status quo. No one had any idea who owned or operated the
Reality Express, and those foolish enough to go looking for answers tended not to come back. So it
was just there, a service for those who needed it.
Jimmy didn't even know who drove the damned train.
It irked him that he was working for nothing. Normally he charged all that the traffic could bear,
on the grounds that, after all, even gods had to eat; and because he lived in horror of some day
being required to get a proper job. His few remaining worshippers would have been only too happy
to provide him with everything he might need or desire, but that was a dangerous road to start
down. He didn't want to become dependent on his worshippers. It would have given them a measure of
control over him, and Jimmy Thunder took pride in being his own man. Or god.
With a roar and a cry and a blast of escaping steam, the great black train finally slowed to a
halt beside the opposite platform. Jimmy stood very still in the deepest of the shadows, but his
eyes missed nothing. Steam billowed out onto the narrow platform like low fog, as doors began
opening down the length of the carriages, their slamming sounding loudly on the night like a long
roll of applause. People stepped slowly down onto the platform, looking confusedly about them,
unsettled to be suddenly only human. They clung together in little groups, all wide eyes and
chattering mouths, finding what comfort they could in the familiar proximity of old friends or
enemies.
The magical world is like an overlay on the real world, and though the real cannot see the
magical, it can sometimes still be affected by it. But there has always been traffic between the
two, mostly from Mysterie to Veritie, as beings of various kinds exchange the gaudier joys of
magic for the more secure bedrock of reality. And there have always been those with a foot in both
worlds, like Jimmy Thunder and the Waking Beauty. Many apparently ordinary people and things cast
powerful shadows in Mysterie, and, of course, vice versa.
There are always those willing to leave magic behind so that they might live out normal, finite
lives in Veritie. Some come to be free of their responsibilities, some to escape the obligations
of their particular natures. But just lately there had been whispers that Something Bad was coming
to Mysterie. Something awful and unstoppable, that would put an end to the old familiar dance of
magic and reality. Jimmy had heard the rumours, and mostly discounted them. There were always
rumours. But still people packed the carriages of the Reality Express and paid their fare with