[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
the sympathetics. That was not altogether a wise move. Although the remaining
dancers and rollers stopped almost instantly, the sympathetics were favorable
to fear. The crowd surged forward unevenly, like animals about to stampede.
The rods were lifted. The crowd came to a nervous halt.
The Black Man s right arm, bent at his side, moved a little, feeling for
contact. He leaned a little to the left to balance the weight of the force
pencil.
A deacon toward the center of the line turned suddenly on the man beside him,
rubbing his elbow. His whisper was audible: Watch out, you clumsy fool! The
other deacon turned on him as suddenly. You bumped me!
A similar altercation started toward the end of the line. There were more
angry words. Others joined in. Then actual pushes, shoves, raised fists,
threats for deacons were not trained to be as gentlemanly as priests.
And still the imp of discord moved among them, setting them against each
other. The sympathetics, as favorable to anger as to fear, played their part.
Fists struck out. The line of deacons tied itself into a struggling knot of
men, each enraged against the rest. Some dropped their rods. Others used them
as clubs.
This mysterious brawl, and the fact that a way of escape now lay open, was
enough for the fear-
skittish crowd. In a great ragged wave it poured out of the Cathedral.
Chapter 8
UP from the black infinite abyss of sleep shot the archpriest Goniface.
First a dream. A dream so deep, so primal, that it lacked vision and sound.
Horror. A writhing in darkness that was himself. Restraint. Himself struggling
futilely against it. Deep, pricking pain.
Something essential being cut from him, to be used against him. It was his
secret, his one and only weakness. It could destroy him. A spasm of
convulsive, futile and horrorstricken writhing.
Then a more definite dream. He wandered among the corpses of those he had
killed because they knew his secret. Very white and stiff and still they
seemed, each laid out on its table under a glaring light, and he felt very
safe. Then, three tables away, one sat up suddenly. An immature girl with
dark hair streaming over her marble shoulders. She pointed at him and her
mouth opened and she said, Your name is Knowles Satrick. You are the son of a
priest. Your mother was a Fallen
Sister. You have transgressed the most jealously enforced law of the
Hierarchy. You are an impostor. He ran toward her, to force her down again
and shut her mouth. But just as his fingers touched her, she slipped away from
him. Around and between the tables he pursued her. Some were overturned. He
stumbled over his mother s corpse. Around and around. Staggering.
Gasping. And still she eluded him, crying all the while in a loud voice, Drag
Page 45
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
down the archpriest
Goniface! His name is Knowles Satrick! His father was a priest! And the
mouths of all the corpses opened and they began to cry loudly, Knowles
Satrick! Priest s son! until the whole world was screaming it at him and
there were a thousand hands upon him. And suddenly he was a boy again, and his
mother was bitterly muttering, Priest s son! to shame him.
Then memories, close to the surface of awakening. The white, upturned face of
his half sister, Geryl, with the dark hair streaming upward around it, as she
fell from the bridge into the dark, distant torrent below. His secret wholly
safe at last. Then the Apex Council Chamber and the solidographic miniature of
a mature woman, whose face wore that same expression of hate and implacable
purpose as he had glimpsed on the face of that immature girl, as she fell
toward the torrent. The same face. Geryl. Sharlson Naurya. His secret come
alive.
Then illusion. He was where he should be, in his chamber at the Sanctuary.
Gray darkness let him see the outlines of the room and silhouetted, at the
foot of his bed, a grotesque anthropoid shape, skinnier than any monkey, but
furry-seeming. Only for a moment was it visible. It dropped out of sight, and
there came the faintest pattering of tiny paws.
Then complete wakefulness. He sat up, breathing a little heavily, his eyes
refamiliarizing themselves with the shape of his room, putting every object in
its right place in the semidarkness.
Odd, how that last brief dream had reproduced the outlines of his room almost
as they were in reality. But there were dreams like that. Perhaps the rural
priests, with their talk of furry things which squatted on their chests, had
been responsible for that last dream-imagining.
He fancied a slight pain in his back another dream echo.
Unpleasant, that memories of his past deeds should sometimes pry their way
into his dreams.
But that was the way the human mind was constituted. Nothing could ever be
wholly forgotten.
And what difference did it make? The secret of his birth was no longer of
great importance. It had been, when he was a First Circle priest. But now he
was too powerful to be dragged down, or even seriously endangered, by any such
accusation.
Still, if Geryl had actually escaped, and if Geryl were Sharlson Naurya, and
if the Moderates got their hands on her, they could make it embarrassing for
him. Best that Deth should find her and put her out of the way.
It seemed she was in the Witchcraft. Did the Witchcraft, then, know of her
relationship to him and plan to use her against him? If that were true, why
had she been spirited away? What good was she, except to accuse him openly of [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl wyciskamy.pev.pl
the sympathetics. That was not altogether a wise move. Although the remaining
dancers and rollers stopped almost instantly, the sympathetics were favorable
to fear. The crowd surged forward unevenly, like animals about to stampede.
The rods were lifted. The crowd came to a nervous halt.
The Black Man s right arm, bent at his side, moved a little, feeling for
contact. He leaned a little to the left to balance the weight of the force
pencil.
A deacon toward the center of the line turned suddenly on the man beside him,
rubbing his elbow. His whisper was audible: Watch out, you clumsy fool! The
other deacon turned on him as suddenly. You bumped me!
A similar altercation started toward the end of the line. There were more
angry words. Others joined in. Then actual pushes, shoves, raised fists,
threats for deacons were not trained to be as gentlemanly as priests.
And still the imp of discord moved among them, setting them against each
other. The sympathetics, as favorable to anger as to fear, played their part.
Fists struck out. The line of deacons tied itself into a struggling knot of
men, each enraged against the rest. Some dropped their rods. Others used them
as clubs.
This mysterious brawl, and the fact that a way of escape now lay open, was
enough for the fear-
skittish crowd. In a great ragged wave it poured out of the Cathedral.
Chapter 8
UP from the black infinite abyss of sleep shot the archpriest Goniface.
First a dream. A dream so deep, so primal, that it lacked vision and sound.
Horror. A writhing in darkness that was himself. Restraint. Himself struggling
futilely against it. Deep, pricking pain.
Something essential being cut from him, to be used against him. It was his
secret, his one and only weakness. It could destroy him. A spasm of
convulsive, futile and horrorstricken writhing.
Then a more definite dream. He wandered among the corpses of those he had
killed because they knew his secret. Very white and stiff and still they
seemed, each laid out on its table under a glaring light, and he felt very
safe. Then, three tables away, one sat up suddenly. An immature girl with
dark hair streaming over her marble shoulders. She pointed at him and her
mouth opened and she said, Your name is Knowles Satrick. You are the son of a
priest. Your mother was a Fallen
Sister. You have transgressed the most jealously enforced law of the
Hierarchy. You are an impostor. He ran toward her, to force her down again
and shut her mouth. But just as his fingers touched her, she slipped away from
him. Around and between the tables he pursued her. Some were overturned. He
stumbled over his mother s corpse. Around and around. Staggering.
Gasping. And still she eluded him, crying all the while in a loud voice, Drag
Page 45
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
down the archpriest
Goniface! His name is Knowles Satrick! His father was a priest! And the
mouths of all the corpses opened and they began to cry loudly, Knowles
Satrick! Priest s son! until the whole world was screaming it at him and
there were a thousand hands upon him. And suddenly he was a boy again, and his
mother was bitterly muttering, Priest s son! to shame him.
Then memories, close to the surface of awakening. The white, upturned face of
his half sister, Geryl, with the dark hair streaming upward around it, as she
fell from the bridge into the dark, distant torrent below. His secret wholly
safe at last. Then the Apex Council Chamber and the solidographic miniature of
a mature woman, whose face wore that same expression of hate and implacable
purpose as he had glimpsed on the face of that immature girl, as she fell
toward the torrent. The same face. Geryl. Sharlson Naurya. His secret come
alive.
Then illusion. He was where he should be, in his chamber at the Sanctuary.
Gray darkness let him see the outlines of the room and silhouetted, at the
foot of his bed, a grotesque anthropoid shape, skinnier than any monkey, but
furry-seeming. Only for a moment was it visible. It dropped out of sight, and
there came the faintest pattering of tiny paws.
Then complete wakefulness. He sat up, breathing a little heavily, his eyes
refamiliarizing themselves with the shape of his room, putting every object in
its right place in the semidarkness.
Odd, how that last brief dream had reproduced the outlines of his room almost
as they were in reality. But there were dreams like that. Perhaps the rural
priests, with their talk of furry things which squatted on their chests, had
been responsible for that last dream-imagining.
He fancied a slight pain in his back another dream echo.
Unpleasant, that memories of his past deeds should sometimes pry their way
into his dreams.
But that was the way the human mind was constituted. Nothing could ever be
wholly forgotten.
And what difference did it make? The secret of his birth was no longer of
great importance. It had been, when he was a First Circle priest. But now he
was too powerful to be dragged down, or even seriously endangered, by any such
accusation.
Still, if Geryl had actually escaped, and if Geryl were Sharlson Naurya, and
if the Moderates got their hands on her, they could make it embarrassing for
him. Best that Deth should find her and put her out of the way.
It seemed she was in the Witchcraft. Did the Witchcraft, then, know of her
relationship to him and plan to use her against him? If that were true, why
had she been spirited away? What good was she, except to accuse him openly of [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]