"Emil Petaja - The Prism" - читать интересную книгу автора (Petaja Emil)

tropical-close sun lifted into the heat of day; a sibilant wind sang through
the natural flutes among the soaring swaying trees.
When they reached the diminished forest's rim and a wide upland
clearing bisected the rearing tangle of verdure, they, could see the cliffs.
The cliffs! High as heaven itself. Unassailable, they were taught by the
Care Women, even before their tough cranky fight-instructors took over.
The cliffs were to dream on, a fanciful ever-fogged tableland which bespoke
the unattainable, the forever unknown, a place to look up at with awed
eyes and gaping mouth and wonder and never know or expect to know.
And now—just at this incredible moment!—the fog that never went
away did. Briefly, so briefly that it must have been illusion. And there it
was! The fabled castle of the Princess!
They stood there, gawking and gurgling.
Then it was gone.
Kor swallowed the thing that had leaped to his throat. “I—I never
doubted it was there. We all worship the Princess and wear her banner on
our hearts, yet not all of the Helden believe in her. But I did! Always! And
now that I know she is real and I have seen her castle I'm going up there!”
Atlan cried out and slapped his shoulder in a plea for sanity. “Kor!
Nobody has ever made it up that cliff! See how it beetles out! There are no
holds. It's like polished flint. Forget it!” He added in a low growl, “I still
think it was just an illusion. We dreamed it.”
Kor took his hand. “Goodbye, friend.”
“Hey! Not now!” Atlan cried. “Think on it! Let your brains struggle for
sense!”
“Now is as good a time as any.”
“What'll I tell Liti?”
“Tell her—” Kor shrugged; for a moment the must in his lake-blue eyes
wavered. “Tell her I had to go. After all, this is our life, here in the Forests.
To challenge. To fight. To die.”
“But you're our leader, Kor!”
“You will lead, Atlan. Until I return.”
“Return! You know—”
“Farewell, comrade.”
Kor left Atlan scowling and blinking among the bracken; he did not look
back.

***

Questions seethed in his head while he moved out of the brush-spotted
field and onto rocky terrain in the direction of the cliff-foot. It would take
him the best of an hour to reach the scarp itself, and while his long legs
carried him toward destiny and death his brain wrestled with a thousand
strange thoughts—the kind of thoughts most of the Helden had no time for
or rejected out of hand. Thoughts like: where did the people of Vicaria
come from? Early in life he had seen the animals of the Forests give birth
to their young. Not so the Helden, nor as far as he knew anything about it,
did the peoples of the other Kingdoms. The Deevs. The albino cave-folk.
The nightmarish Dracs. Or—Circe of the Palaces of Unendurable Pleasure.
No. It wasn't like the mammals of the Purple Forests at all, suckling their