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.He flailed as he lost his balance,tumbled off his horse and fell heavily to the ground.As Paul dashed past, the lion knight was already clambering to his feet, pulling a huge andunpleasant looking mace from a strap on his saddle.“A good one – oh, very good, you must admit!” said the white knight.He did not seem to bepreparing any defense as the red knight approached.“But he’ll kill him!” Paul hesitated, then took a tentative step back into the clearing as the redknight swung his cudgel and smashed his opponent out of his saddle and onto the damp earth.Gally grabbed his sleeve and yanked him hard, almost pulling him off his feet.“Leave them togo at it! Come on, governor!” He darted down the hill again, this time retaining his grip onPaul’s sleeve.Paul had no choice but to follow stumblingly after him.Within moments theclearing was hidden in the trees behind them, but they could hear grunting, cursing, and aponderous clang of metal on metal for some time.“He rescued us!” Paul gasped, when they had stopped for a moment to rest.“We can’t just leavehim to the.”“The knight? Who gives a toss?” Gally tossed his damp hair out of his face.“He’s not one of us– if he snuffs it, he’ll be back again.In the next match.”“Back? Next match?”But the boy was running again.Paul staggered after him.The shadows were long and angular.Afternoon was fading quickly, the sun just resting on thespine of the hills.Paul grabbed at the boy for support when they stopped and almost draggedthem both to the ground.“Can’t.” he panted.“.Rest.”“Not for long.” Gally seemed tired also, but far less so than Paul.“The river’s just over the rise,but we’ve still got to follow it a ways before we reach the border.”Paul set his hands on his knees, but could not unbend his waist and stand straight.“If.if thosetwo are fighting.why.we.running.?”“Because there were others – you saw them on the hill.Redbreasts.Foot soldiers.But they canmove steady and quick when they want to, and they don’t need to stop and wheeze their gutsout.” He slid to the ground.“Catch your breath, then we got to move fast-like.”“What did you mean before? About the knight dying?”Gally rubbed his face, leaving streaks of dirt like primitive face paint.“Them all, they just goround and round.They fight and fight until one side wins, then it starts all over again.This is thethird match since we came here, that I remember.”“But don’t people get killed?”“ ’Course they do.But only till the end of the match, as they call it.Then everything starts upagain.They don’t even remember.”“But you do, because you’re not from here?”“Suppose.” The boy frowned, then grew thoughtful.“Do you think maybe all the little’uns, Bayand the rest, will be back the next time? Do you think?”“Has it ever happened before? Have you.lost any of your little’uns that way, then had themcome back?”Gally shook his head.“I don’t know,” Paul said at last.But he thought he did know.He doubted that whatever magicprotected the natives of the Eight Squared extended to outsiders.When he could stand upright again, Gally led them on.After a short trek through thick forestthey pushed through a spinney of twisted trees and found themselves looking down a long grassyslope to the river.Paul had no chance to savor the view.Gally led him down to within a fewhundred yards of the water’s edge, then turned them toward the ridge of hills.They walked asquickly as they could across the sparse, sandy meadows, the sun’s orange glare in their eyes untilthey passed into the shadow of the hills.Paul stared out at the river and the dim breakfront of trees that ran along its farther bank.Justbeside them the shadowed water seemed full of blue-gleaming depths; behind them, outside theshadows in which they stood, it seemed to smolder in the sunset light like a long ribbon ofmolten gold.Somehow, the river seemed at once both more and less real than the landscape ittransected, as if a feature from one famous painting had been inserted into another.He slowed for a moment, suddenly aware of a cloud of partial memories that had gradually beenmaking themselves more and more a part of his thoughts.Famous painting? What would that be?Where had he seen or heard of such a thing? He knew what it meant without quite being able tovisualize anything that would correspond to the idea.“Hurry yourself, governor.We want to be in the caves by dark or they’ll find us.”“Why don’t we just swim across the river to the other side?”Gally turned to glare at him [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]