Чтение онлайн

Chapter Two

Wreathing like a white cloud, a dense mist covered the river valley in the early twilight before the dawn. Weak wafts of an unsteady wind, periodically tearing the pale shroud, could not be of much avail, and the yacht was mostly drifting with the current. The mainsail fluttered again, and Andreas slowly rotated the steering-wheel, peering into the distance ahead, keeping to the midstream.

"Would you like some tea?" Lynette went out of the lower deck door, two big wooden tankards with carved floral ornamentation in her hands, and came up to him. She looked rested and fresh, no more sorrows of yesterday.

"Yes, thanks!" he took a tankard gratefully.

"Tell me about Grey Knights," mere curiosity sounded in her words.

"We are just a group of dreamers who rejected vanity life to become noble and fair. Not only Elves can keep spiritual values of goodness," no pathos in his level tones, as if just musing aloud on ordinary things, he tried the steaming tea.

"An exact contrary to other knights," she was thoughtfully holding her tankard in the both hands, "due to my long friendship with Elves, I have always wanted anything more than the prevailing petty mode of living."

"We dream that somewhere, maybe in El Dorado, we shall find a blissful splendid land," his stare became a little detached from reality. "Rainbows above majestic waterfalls, rainbows at fountains near sunlit palaces where good-natured people dwell…"

The river made a bend and began to carry the yacht by a massive rocky island separated from the bank with a narrow channel. On the high sheer cliffs an immense dark-grey castle silhouetted vaguely through the mist veil, yellowish flickering of torches on watchtowers, many yachts and big boats at the stony embankment.

"The town inhabitants are surely taking refuge over there," she murmured, "this unassailable fortress can stand any siege."

"Shall we make a stop to see your parents?" Andreas looked at her sympathetically.

"No, we shall not! They can do without me perfectly well," no definite emotions in her quiet but resolute reply, she dispassionately turned away from the castle and gulped the tea.

The rising sun dispelled the mist and shone a great city situated at the estuary where the river was inflowing into a sea. Granite and marble edifices, magnificent palaces and imposing mansions occupied the horizon.

"Ariadna, the main city of this continent," Jim went out onto the deck together with Iven, "the trade centre with many portals."

"We have to visit the human world," Lynette made a decision, "to find any hint about the El Dorado location."

"Really, their computers are not bad, as well as television," Iven agreed, "though, they use those excellent things mainly for filth."

"Last year I bought a laptop to watch only good films," Lynette remarked.

The city was approaching. Ships of different sizes standing along wharfs, two or three frigates under full sail far away at sea, ferry boats plying between the banks.

After the mooring at a fixed gangboard, a sturdy construction of dark wood at one of the piers, Lynette and Andreas left the yacht. Green and lilac suits of Elves, florid attires of men, hauberks of Dwarfs, multifarious crowds in the cobbled streets and squares paved with granite slabs. Green standards with stylized golden trefoils at flag-posts, steel-clad guardians on patrol.

"Dryads!" Lynette exclaimed seeing three pretty young women resembling one another like sisters. Pallid skin but merry eyes, curly hair. White summer frocks were adorned with blue and violet wild flowers.

"Oh! Hello, Lynette!" one Dryad chattered joyfully, "why didn't you come yesterday? We had weaved a new dress for you!"

"Hello, Martina! Certainly I will buy it, but later," Lynette assured calmly, "trolls appeared in this world."

"Ah!" the girls gaped in frightened astonishment, "we have to warn other Dryads and Elves, our relative folk!"

"Elves already know! Go home, but avoid the eastern castle way!" Lynette recommended.

"Don't worry, here we have our own portal. See you!" the Dryads flitted away in hurry, nearly running, and disappeared among the multicoloured crowds.

Lynette and Andreas turned to an arcade flanked with small shops, booths of merchants, tables laden with goods. Clothes and footwear, carpets and utensils, baskets with fruit, many purchasers, a sale in full swing.

"Going to the human dimension? wish to exchange currency?" some sly Dwarf emerged from the throng, smiling ingratiatingly, his luxurious hauberk sparkled with rubies on the collar. He gave Andreas three greenish banknotes for a small round piece of silver and evidently became glad of the deal.

"You will need cloaks, it is rather cold at the other side," one more tradesman offered, dark coats hanging on a clothes-tree behind him, and he wore a garment of the same kind himself.

"Anyhow, we can hide our swords under them," Andreas took out another silver coin to pay, "people get nervous at the sight of weapon there."

Walking away from the shops and booths they threw their new dark-blue cloaks, loose and quite long outer clothing, over their shoulders.

"How do you earn a living?" she resumed to bate her curiosity.

"Travelling merchants eagerly hire Grey Knights as guardians," he replied, "and I get employed from time to time."

"As for me, I embroider tapestries, my granny taught me that fine skill."

They came up to a comparatively not very large bluish-white marble building at the arcade end. A broad staircase, thick high pillars supporting the moulded pediment above the open entrance.

A shady hall was dimly lit with an opalescent flare in the space under a high archway in the opposite wall, a slow whirl of soft light smoothly twinkling and flickering, not dazzling at all. Panoplied imperturbable guardsmen were standing still along the blue incrusted walls.

"Would you make a voluntary donation to the Ariadna municipality?" one knight inquired politely. A small lacquered table had a bronze tray with a mass of copper coins on it, Lynette and Andreas added some money to the heap, entered the archway and plunged into the portal hand in hand.

The shining flooded the air around them, they could see each other but neither walls nor floor slabs of that corridor. Within a few steps they found themselves in one more hall which looked like a vast grey basement. No decorations, no visible guard, observation video cameras in the corners and above an artless but neat stony staircase leading up to the exit. The lock clicked, the metal door got open in front of them, and they came out into an early evening street of another city.