Страница 27 из 186
And then the weariness came on his limbs, and he sat, still possessed of his little dignity, while his limbs loosed, and he began to yield. They did this to him when they wished to handle him. They wished so now.
But this time the limbs alone failed, and consciousness did not.
The dying sun was sinking, and the engorged moon rose over the marshes by the river, touched the catacombs of the common hills and the Lotus Dome of the seventh.
It was the hour.
The procession left the port, a slow line of the servants of Ginar, bearing the recording devices, bearing a black plastic coffin. They crossed the bridge of featureless statues; by the time the last rim of the diseased sun was sinking, they were treading the ways of the catacombs, where laborers watched like statues, fearing, perhaps, for the direst dreams sometimes spilled beyond, and worked terror even here, a miasma from the Palace that infected even the City. They reached the first of the gates, and crossed the field of ruin; reached the second, and passed to the Way of the Thousand Steps, and up that height to the third. There the servants stayed, and set down the apparatus, and the coffin. Belat took up the apparatus, struggling with the weight; the Keepers and lords took up the coffin and bore it further, within the forbidden perimeters of the Lotus Palace, where only the privileged might go.
And victims.
Some, brought here, struggled at the last; some cried or cursed. This one did not, drugged, but not too far: Belat was sure of that. The coffin went ahead through the lotus-stem hall, and Belat walked last, incongruously like a mourner, head bowed with his load, panting after the measured steps of the Keepers who bore the case—into the inmost hall, of the lily-pad ceiling and the Lotus Throne.
The dreams were prepared. The apparatus which wasthe Lotus Dome was soon to be engaged. And the Tyrant would have his precious surprise, a manic netang. . . a trap neatly laid, even legally: a primitive mind this, without the softness of the dreamtrippers who were his usual gifts, the addicts of the First Colonies who fell into his hands and disappeared, seeking the ultimate thrill—and finding it here, themselves become material for the City and its dreams, recorded, sold in turn, to lure others.
Not this time. . . this time a surprise for his majesty Elio DCCLII, one which might serve a double turn. Belat's breath came short with more than the burden he carried, and his skin had a deathly clamminess; he gri
Revenge, on the one hand, for the terrors he had suffered; and most of all—a new Tyrant to trade with, one more manageable, whereby he could keep his post. No more threats. No more humiliations. There were no more talents such as Elio's here—or the earlier assassinations would have succeeded. A manageable tyrant. . . well worth the price and risk. Or on the other hand. . . gratitude, if that word had currency here. Pleasure, a hunt the Tyrant would much savor. And ask another, and another, until he died.
In either case a dream of special flavor, a unique prize which was his alone. Delicious murder, the wild netangwith his savagery among these hunters, primitive i
Or the death of a Tyrant of this city, with all its sensitive agonies, for when Elio should falter, they would all turn on him, all.
And the machines would capture it for him.
There was no fighting, as there had been none before. They bore him where they chose, to do what they chose. He wept in his narrow prison. . . not violent weeping, only the helpless flow of a tear down his cheek, but his body was paralyzed and he could not wipe it away. It shamed him, but he had encountered many shames since he lost his name and himself.
He felt movement, knew himself carried, had perceived them near water, in a closed echoing place, climbing. . . perhaps to hurl him to his death; but that seemed a small act after all the others. Now he heard echoes as of some great cavern. . . smelled thick scents of rot and of flowers, where before the climbing the air had been cold and clean.
Perhaps he had already died. He was no longer sure.
Belat bowed, smiled at the great Tyrant, who lounged on the Lotus Throne, in the inmost chamber of stone flowers. The whole court was about him, fantastical in their array, their painted skins and kohl-rimmed eyes, their nodding plumes and gossamer robes. . . like living flowers about the stone lotus-stems and golden fishes.
The boy Tyrant moved his fingers, which flashed amethyst from jeweled nails. The Keepers set down the coffin before him on the floor, opened it, exposing the brown, still body within. A whisper of displeasure went up, disappointment, but the tribesman's eyes opened, and glared, and a titter of anticipation ran round the room. Elio leaned forward on his throne, elbow against a lily-petal arm, chin propped on fist. His amethyst-dusted lids blinked; rouged lips smiled; and Belat who had gone rigid with fear—relaxed and smiled as well. The Tyrant flicked that look in his drection and the smile froze.
"The agreement, majesty."
"Haste," the boy said.
Belat made haste, found himself a corner the disdainful lords and ladies allowed, set up his recorder, hands trembling in anxiety. He did not share the dreams—observed only. When he had made the few adjustments, he made feverish speed to shield himself, to inject into his veins a stimulant that would keep him as much as possible—awake. He observed. When he entered into the dreams at all, it was always as a mere spectator, distant: he was not, himself, an addict. He preserved that remoteness as he valued his life, for the dreamtrippers were not without humor.
Elio smiled, amethyst-lidded eyes intent upon his prize. Others of his lords and ladies gathered close about him, a pastel ring of painted faces intent to stare at the tribesman within his coffin, savoring what they saw.
The boy Tyrant moved his hand once. The lights in all the dome dimmed. A second gesture. The apparatus engaged.
He stood. He could move agate, and that sudden freedom shocked him. He was knee-deep, naked, in rotting marsh. The whole world was flat and the sun was barely able to provide a murky twilight.
"It's the end of the world," a voice whispered within him. "Where all the land has worn away. It's old."
A birdhovered against the sickly disc of the sun, watching.
He tried to walk, but there was nowhere to walk to, for the marsh stretched as far as the eye could see in all directions, and he had no memory of how he had got there. The flatness was sinister. He walked toward the sun, that being the only object there was in all the world, walked until he tired, and stopped, still knee-deep in water.
A movement brushed against his ankle. He started and looked down. A serpent with amethyst scales, bright in all that brown, wound round his calf and lifted its head against his thigh—stared at him with wise and knowing eyes.
"I am young," it said.
No, he thought, refusing such madness, and it was a brown bit of weed. He stood in a cave, where water dripped in blackness. He moved, and his steps echoed in far darkness. The cold bit into him. There was water before his feet, and fish hung glowing in it, and upon the wall, a worm spun a glowing web.
"It's the heart of the world," the voice whispered. "And it's hollow." Water fell, plopped in tinkling echoes. Something moved, and breathed, and came toward him, dragging vast bulk among the rocks, which rattled and shifted in the dark.
"I have no heart," it said.