David Gemmell - Sipstrassi Tales 04 - The Last Guardian

VIP免费

2024-12-03 0 0 593.61KB 184 页 5.9玖币

侵权投诉

THE LAST GUARDIAN

This novel is dedicated with love to my children Kathryn and Luke who, thankfully, are still too

young to know what fine people they are.

FOREWORD

There was no doubt in my mind about what happened to Jon Shannow when he rode into the

mountains, wounded and alone. He was dying. And Jerusalem beckoned.

Yet once the novel was published reader reaction was immediate. How long to the next Shannow

story? In those days reader's letters did not arrive in bulging post bags and I was able to answer

all of them. The answer was simple: Thank you for your letter, and I am glad you enjoyed Jon

Shannow's tale, but he is dead. There will be no more adventures.

I sent just such a response to a fan in Liverpool. He knew better and wrote back immediately. 'No

he's not! No way!'

It was a real shock - as if he knew something I didn't. I showed the letter to one of my test

readers. Her amused response was 'Hey, maybe he's right. You don't know everything, Dave.

You're only the author.'

From that moment I started wondering about Shannow. Could there have been some miracle on

the mountain?

At around the same time I received a number of reviews for Wolf In Shadow. Some were very

good, some were indifferent, but one was downright vile. One of the lines in it struck me

particularly. I dread to think of people who look up to men like Jon Shannow. The writer was

named Broome.

Twenty years of journalism had taught me not to over-react to criticism. A writer's work is not his

child. It is just work. A work of love and passion, but a work nonetheless. Even so I wanted to

react in some way. All the characters in my novels are based on real people, and I thought it

would be a neat response to use a character named Broome, a man passionately opposed to

violence who would loathe the hero, but be drawn into his world. It was in my mind that he

would be a cannon fodder character, of little conscquence, who would die early. But, as with so

much in the magical world of creative writing, events did not - as you will see - turn out anything

like I had planned.

It took only one more little nudge to push me into a second Shannow novel. I was driving home

one night, listening to the radio, when the haunting lyric of a new song struck home like an

arrow.

The singer was a brilliant new American artiste named Tracy Chapman, and the song spoke of

racism and riots, and the appalling violence that has sadly become commonplace in the

impoverished inner cities of America. One line had immense power for me...

Across the lines who would dare to go...

I knew who would dare.

I got home around 2 am and immediately switched on the word processor. I had no idea how to

get round the obvious death of my hero in the first book, and did not wish to write a prequel. In

the end I used the simplest device there is. I began with the words:

But he did not die.

David A. Gemmell

Hastings, 1995

3301

SOUTH OF THE PLAGUE LANDS - 2341 AD

But he did not die. The flesh around the bullet wound over his hip froze as the temperature

dropped to thirty below zero, and the distant spires of Jerusalem blurred and changed, becoming

snow-shrouded pine. Ice had formed on his beard and his heavy black, double-shouldered topcoat

glistened white in the moonlight. Shannow swayed in the saddle, trying to focus on the city he

had sought for so long. But it was gone. As his horse stumbled, Shannow's right hand gripped the

saddle pommel and the wound in his side flared with fresh pain.

He turned the black stallion's head, steering the beast downhill towards the valley.

Images rushed through his mind: Karitas, Ruth, Donna; the hazardous journey across the Plague

Lands and the battles with the Hellborn, the monstrous ghost ship wrecked on a mountain. Guns

and gunfire, war and death.

The blizzard found new life and the wind whipped freezing snow into Shannow's face. He could

not see where he was heading, and his mind wandered. He knew that life was ebbing from his

body with each passing second, but he had neither the strength nor the will to fight on.

He remembered the farm and his first sight of Donna, standing in the doorway with an ancient

crossbow in her hands. She had mistaken Shannow for a brigand, and feared for her life and that

of her son, Eric. Shannow had never blamed her for that mistake. He knew what people saw

when the Jerusalem Man came riding - a tall, gaunt figure in a flat-crowned leather hat, a man

with cold, cold eyes that had seen too much of death and despair. Always it was the same. People

would stand and stare, first at his expressionless face and then their eyes would be drawn down to

his guns, the terrible weapons of the Thunder Maker.

Yet Donna Taybard had been different. She had taken Shannow to her hearth and her home and,

for the first time in two weary decades, the Jerusalem Man had known happiness.

But then had come the brigands and the war-makers and finally the Hellborn. Shannow had gone

against them all for the woman he loved, only to see her wed another.

Now he was alone again, dying on a frozen mountain in an uncharted wilderness. And, strangely,

he did not care. The wind howled about horse and man and Shannow fell forward across the

stallion's neck, lost in the siren song of the blizzard. The horse was mountain bred; he did not like

the howling wind, nor the biting snow. Now he angled his way through the trees into the lee of a

rock-face and followed a deer trail down to the mouth of a high lava tunnel that stretched through

the ancient volcanic range. It was warmer here and the stallion plodded on, aware of the dead

weight across his back. This disturbed him, for his rider was always in balance and could signal

his commands with the slightest pressure or flick of the reins.

The stallion's wide nostrils flared as the smell of smoke came to him. He halted and backed up,

his iron hooves clattering on the rocky floor. A dark shadow moved in front of him ... in panic he

reared and Shannow tumbled from the saddle. A huge taloned hand caught the reins and the smell

of lion filled the tunnel. The stallion tried to rear again, to lash out with iron-shod hooves, but he

was held tight and a soft, deep voice whispered to him, a gentle hand stroking his neck. Calmed

by the voice, he allowed himself to be led into a deep cave, where a camp-fire had been set within

a circle of round flat stones. He waited calmly as he was tethered to a jutting stone at the far wall;

then the figure was gone.

Outside the cave Shannow groaned and tried to roll to his belly, but he was stricken by pain and

deep cold. He opened his eyes to see a hideous face looming over him. Dark hair framed the head

and face and a pair of tawny eyes gazed down at him; the nose was wide and flat, the mouth a

deep slash, rimmed with sharp fangs. Shannow, unable to move, could only glare at the creature.

Taloned hands moved under his body, lifting him easily, and he was carried like a child into a

cave and laid gently by a fire. The creature fumbled at the ties on Shannow's coat, but the thick

paw-like hands could not cope with the frozen knots. Talons hissed out to sever the leather thongs

and Shannow felt his coat eased from him. Slowly, but with great care, the creature removed his

frozen clothing and covered him with a warm blanket. The Jerusalem Man faded into sleep - and

his dreams were pain-filled.

Once more he fought the Guardian Lord, Sarento, while the Titanic sailed on a ghostly sea and

the Devil Walked in Babylon. But this time Shannow could not win, and he struggled to survive

as the sea poured into the stricken ship, engulfing him. He could hear the cries of drowning men,

women and children, but he could not save them. He awoke sweating and tried to sit. Pain ripped

at his wounded side and he groaned and sank back into his fever dreams.

He was riding towards the mountains when he heard a shot; he rode to the crest of a hill and

gazed down on a farmyard where three men were dragging two women from their home.

Drawing a pistol, Shannow kicked his stallion into a run and thundered towards the scene. When

the men saw him they flung the women aside and two of them drew flintkcks from their belts; the

third ran at him with a knife. He dragged on the reins and the stallion reared. Shannow timed his

first shot well and a brigand was punched from his feet. The knife-man leapt, but Shannow

swung in the saddle and fired point-blank, the bullet entering the man's forehead and exiting from

the neck in a bloody spray. The third man loosed a shot that ricocheted from the pommel of

Shannow's saddle to tear into his hip. Ignoring the sudden pain, the Jerusalem Man fired twice.

The first shell took the brigand high in the shoulder, spinning him; the second hammered into his

skull.

In the sudden silence, Shannon sat his stallion gazing at the women. The elder of the two

approached him and he could see the fear in her eyes. Blood was seeping from his wound and

dripping to the saddle, but he sat upright as she neared.

'What do you want of us?' she asked.

'Nothing, Lady, save to help you.'

‘Well,' she said, her eyes hard, 'you have done that, and we thank you.' She backed away, still

staring at him. He knew she could see the blood, but he could not - would not - beg for aid.

'Good day to you,' he said, swinging the stallion and heading away.

The younger girl ran after him; blonde and pretty, her face was leathered by the sunlight and the

hardship of wilderness farming. She gazed up at him with large blue eyes.

‘I am sorry,' she told him. 'My mother distrusts all men. I am so sorry.'

'Get away from him, girl!' shouted the older woman, and she fell back.

Shannow nodded. 'She probably has good reason,' he said. ‘I am sorry I cannot stay and help you

bury these vermin.'

'You are wounded. Let me help you.'

'No. There is a city near here, I am sure. It has white spires and gates of burnished gold. There

they will tend me.'

There are no cities,' she said.

‘I will find it.' He touched his heels to the stallion's flanks and rode from the farmyard.

A hand touched him and he awoke. The bestial face was leaning over him. 'How are you feeling?'

The voice was deep and slow and slurred, and the question had to be repeated twice before

Shannow could understand it. 'I am alive - thanks to you. Who are you?' The creature's great head

tilted. 'Good. Usually the question is what are you. My name is Shir-ran. You are a strong man to

live so long with such a wound.'

'The ball passed through me,' said Shannow. 'Can you help me to sit?'

'No. Lie there. I have stitched the wounds, front and back, but my fingers are not what they were.

Lie still and rest tonight. We will talk in the morning.'

'My horse?'

'Safe. He was a little frightened of me, but we understand each other now. I fed him the grain you

carried in your saddlebags. Sleep, Man.'

Shannow relaxed and moved his hand under the blankets to rest on the wound over his right hip.

He could feel the tightness of the stitches and the clumsy knots. There was no bleeding, but he

was worried about the fibres from his coat which had been driven into his flesh. It was these that

killed more often than ball or shell, aiding gangrene and poisoning the blood.

'It is a good wound,' said Shir-ran softly, as if reading his mind. 'The issue of blood cleansed it, I

think. But here in the mountains wounds heal well. The air is clean. Bacteria find it hard to

survive at thirty below.'

'Bacteria?' whispered Shannow, his eyes closing.

'Germs ... the filth that causes wounds to fester.'

'I see. Thank you, Shir-ran.'

And Shannow slept without dreams.

Shannow awoke hungry and eased himself to a sitting position. The fire was burning brightly and

he could see a large store of wood stacked against the far wall. Gazing around the cave, he saw it

was some fifty feet across at the widest point and the high domed ceiling was pitted with fissures,

through which the smoke from the fire drifted lazily. Beside Shannow's blankets were his water

canteen, his leather-bound Bible and his guns, still sheathed in their oiled leather scabbards.

Taking the canteen, he pulled clear the brass-topped cork and drank deeply. Then in the bright

firelight he examined the bullet wound in his hip; the flesh around it was angry, bruised and

inflamed, but it looked clean and there was no bleeding. Slowly and carefully he stood, scanning

the cave for his clothes. They were dry and casually folded atop a boulder on the other side of the

fire. Dried blood still caked the white woollen shirt, but he slipped it on and climbed into his

black woollen trousers. He could not buckle his belt on the usual notch, for the leather bit into his

wound, bringing a grunt of pain. Still, he felt more human now he was clothed. He pulled on

socks and high riding boots and walked to where his stallion was tethered at the far wall.

文档加载中……请稍候！
如果长时间未打开，您也可以点击刷新试试。

下载文档到电脑，查找使用更方便

5.9 玖币 0人已下载

立即下载 VIP免费下载

摘要：

THELASTGUARDIANThisnovelisdedicatedwithlovetomychildrenKathrynandLukewho,thankfully,arestilltooyoungtoknowwhatfinepeopletheyare.FOREWORDTherewasnodoubtinmymindaboutwhathappenedtoJonShannowwhenherodeintothemountains,woundedandalone.Hewasdying.AndJerusalembeckoned.Yetoncethenovelwaspublishedreaderreac...

展开>> 收起<<

David Gemmell - Sipstrassi Tales 04 - The Last Guardian.pdf

共184页,预览5页

还剩页未读，继续阅读

声明：本站为文档C2C交易模式，即用户上传的文档直接被用户下载，本站只是中间服务平台，本站所有文档下载所得的收益归上传人(含作者)所有。玖贝云文库仅提供信息存储空间，仅对用户上传内容的表现方式做保护处理，对上载内容本身不做任何修改或编辑。若文档所含内容侵犯了您的版权或隐私，请立即通知玖贝云文库，我们立即给予删除！

David Gemmell - Sipstrassi Tales 04 - The Last Guardian

相关推荐

开通VIP享超值会员特权

作者详情

相关内容

热门标签

举报选择: