Zelazny, Roger - Amber 02 Guns Of Avalon

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lay upon the silent forest, and this was good.

I was perhaps fifty pounds underweight and still occasionally ex-

perienced double vision, but I was improving. I had escaped the

dungeons of Amber and recuperated somewhat, with the assistance

of mad Dworkin and drunken Jopin, in that order. Now I had to find

me a place, a place resembling another place--one which no longer

existed. I located the path. I took it.

After a time, I stopped at a hollow tree that had to be there. I

reached inside and drew forth my silvered blade and strapped it to

my waist. It mattered not that it had been somewhere in Amber. It

was here now, for the wood that I walked was in Shadow.

I continued for several hours, the unseen sun somewhere behind

my left shoulder. Then I rested awhile, then moved on. It was good

to see the leaves and the rocks and the dead tree trunks, the live

ones, the grass, the dark earth. It was good to smell all the little

smells of life, and to hear its buzzing/humming /chirping sounds.

Gods! How I treasured my eyes! Having them back again after

nearly four years of blackness was a thing for which I lacked words.

And to be walking free...

I went on, my tattered cloak flapping in the morning breeze. I

must have looked over fifty years old, my face creased, my form

sparse, lean. Who would have known me for what I was?

As I walked, walked in Shadow, moved toward a place, I did not

reach that place. It must be that I had grown somewhat soft. Here is

what happened--

I came upon seven men by the side of the road, and six of them

were dead, lying in various stages of red dismemberment. The sev-

enth was in a semi-reclined position, his back against the mossy

bole of an ancient oak. He held his blade across his lap and there

was a large wet wound in his right side, from which the blood still

flowed. He wore no armor, though some of the others did. His gray

"Sir, I thank you," he said as he passed it back. "I only regret it

were not stronger. Damn this cut!"

"I've some of that, too. If you're sure you can handle it."

He held out his hand and I unstoppered a small flask and gave it

to him. He must have coughed for twenty seconds after a slug of

that stuff Jopin drinks.

Then the left side of his mouth smiled and he winked lightly.

"Much better," he said. "Mind if I pour a drop of this onto my side? I

hate to waste good whisky, but--"

"Use it all, if you have to. On second thought, though, your hand

looks shaky. Maybe I'd better do the pouring."

He nodded, and I opened his leather jacket and with my dagger

cut away at his shirt until I had exposed the wound. It was nasty-

looking, deep, running from front to back a couple inches above the

top of his hip. He had other, less serious gashes on his arms, chest,

and shoulders.

The blood kept oozing from the big one, and I blotted it a bit and

wiped it clean with my kerchief.

"Okay," I said, "clench your teeth and look away," and I poured.

His entire body jerked, one great spasm, and then he settled down

to shivering. But he did not cry out. I had not thought he would. I

folded the kerchief and pressed it in place on the wound. I tied it

there, with a long strip I had torn from the bottom of my cloak.

"Want another drink?" I asked him.

"Of water," he said. "Then I fear I must sleep." He drank, then his

head leaned forward until his chin was resting upon his breast. He

slept, and I made him a pillow and covered him over with dead

men's cloaks.

Then I sat there at his side and watched the pretty black birds.

He had not recognized me. But then, who would? Had I revealed

myself to him, he might possibly have known me. We had never

I had sailed, had begun this walk toward Avalon.

Centuries before, I had lived there. It is a long, complicated,

proud and painful story, and I may go into it later on, if I live to

finish much more of this telling.

I was drawing nearer to my Avalon when I came upon the

wounded knight and the six dead men. Had I chosen to walk on by,

I could have reached a place where the six men lay dead and the

knight stood unwounded--or a place where he lay dead and they

stood laughing. Some would say it did not really matter, since all

these things are possibilities, and therefore all of them exist some-

where in Shadow.

Any of my brothers and sisters--with the possible exceptions of

Gerard and Benedict--would not even have given a second glance. I

have become somewhat chickenhearted, however. I was not always

that way, but perhaps the shadow Earth, where I spent so many

years, mellowed me a bit, and maybe my hitch in the dungeons of

Amber reminded me somewhat of the quality of human suffering. I

do not know. I only know that I could not pass by the hurt I saw on

the form of someone much like someone who had once been a

friend. If I were to speak my name in this man's ear, I might hear

myself reviled, I would certainly hear a tale of woe.

So, all right. I would pay this much of the price: I would get him

back on his feet, then I would cut out. No harm done, and perhaps

some small good within this Other.

I sat there, watching him, and after several hours, he awakened.

"Hello," I said, unstoppering my canteen. "Have another drink?"

"Thank you." He extended a hand.

I watched him drink, and when he handed it back he said, "Ex-

cuse me for not introducing myself. I was not in good manner..."

"I know you," I said. "Call me Corey."

He looked as if he were about to say, "Corey of What?" but

thought better of it and nodded.

nodded.

"Good show. What am I going to do with you now?"

He tried to see my face, failed. "I do not understand," he said.

"Where are you headed?"

"I have friends," he said, "some five leagues to the north. I was

going in that direction when this thing happened. And I doubt very

much that any man, or the Devil himself, could bear me on his

back for one league. And I could stand. Sir Corey, you'd a better

idea as to my size."

I rose, drew my blade, and felled a sapling--about two inches in

diameter--with one cut. Then I stripped it and hacked it to the

proper length.

I did it again, and with the belts and cloaks of dead men I rigged

a stretcher.

He watched until I was finished, then commented:

"You swing a deadly blade. Sir Corey -and a silver one, it would

seem. . ."

"Are you up to some traveling?" I asked him.

Five leagues is roughly fifteen miles.

"What of the dead?" he inquired.

"You want to maybe give them a decent Christian burial?" I said.

Screw them! Nature takes care of its own. Let's get out of here.

They stink already."

"I'd like at least to see them covered over. They fought well."

I sighed.

"All right, if it will help you to sleep nights. I haven't a spade, so

I'll build them a cairn. It's going to be a common burial, though."

"Good enough," he said.

I laid the six bodies out, side by side. I heard him mumbling

something, which I guessed to be a prayer for the dead.

I raised him in my arms and set him on the stretcher. He

clenched his teeth as I did so.

"Where do we go?" I asked.

He gestured.

"Head back to the trail. Follow it to the left until it forks. Then go

right at that place. How do you propose to...?"

I scooped the stretcher up in my arms, holding him as you would

a baby, cradle and all. Then I turned and walked back to the trail,

carrying him.

"Corey?" he said.

"Yes?"

"You are one of the strongest men I have ever met--and it seems I

should know you."

I did not answer him immediately. Then I said, "I try to keep in

good condition. Clean living and all."

"...And your voice sounds rather familiar."

He was staring upward, still trying to see my face. I decided to

get off the subject fast.

"Who are these friends of yours I am taking you to?"

"We are headed for the Keep of Ganelon."

"That ratfink!" I said, almost dropping him.

"While I do not understand the word you have used, I take it to

be a term of opprobrium," he said, "from the tone of your voice. If

such is the case, I must be his defender in--"

"Hold on," I said. "I've a feeling we're talking about two different

guys with the same name. Sorry." Through the stretcher, I felt a

certain tension go out of him.

"That is doubtless the case," he said.

So I carried him until we reached the trail, and there I turned to

the left.

He dropped off to sleep again, and I made better time after that,

taking the fork he had told me about and sprinting while he snored.

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摘要：

layuponthesilentforest,andthiswasgood.Iwasperhapsfiftypoundsunderweightandstilloccasionallyex-perienceddoublevision,butIwasimproving.IhadescapedthedungeonsofAmberandrecuperatedsomewhat,withtheassistanceofmadDworkinanddrunkenJopin,inthatorder.NowIhadtofindmeaplace,aplaceresemblinganotherplace--onewhi...

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Zelazny, Roger - Amber 02 Guns Of Avalon

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