Now Then (v1.0) - John Brunner by Unknown Author

Author:Unknown Author
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-07-21T00:00:00+00:00

“So!” said the enchanter Manuus, leaning back in his chair with a chuckle. “So!” he said again, dropping the cover—made of bat’s skin as fine and soft as silk—over his scrying glass. “-Well, well, well, well, well!”

V

At the head of the council table—which, because the weather was oppressive, he had caused to be set out under the sycamore trees in the Moth Gardens—the Margrave of Ryovora sat, frowning terribly.

Before him, the table stretched almost a hundred feet, in sections that were joined so cleverly the over-arching trees could admire their reflections intact in the polished top. Nothing spoiled the perfection of this table, except the purplish sheen it had acquired from the heavy close air now filling the city.

To right and left of him, ranked in their chairs, sat the nobility of Ryovora, men and women of great individual distinction—the merchant-enchanters, the persons of inquiring mind, the advisers, the thinkers, the creators, all those to whom this city owed its fame and reputation.

The Margrave spoke, not looking at those who listened.

“Tell us what has taken place in your quarter of the town, Petrovic.”

Petrovic, a dry little man with a withered face like an old apple, coughed apologetically and said, “There are omens. I have cast runes to ascertain their meaning. They have no known meaning. Milk has been soured in the pan four mornings running in my quarter of the town.”

“And Ruman?”

Ruman was a man built like an oak-tree, whose thick gnarled hands were twisting restlessly in his lap. He said, “I have slaughtered animals to divine what may be read in their entrails. I agree with Petrovic—these things have no known significance. But two springs under the wall of the city, which have not failed in more centuries than we can discover, are dry this morning.”

“And Gostala?”

Gostala was a woman with a queenly bosom and a queenly diadem of white hair plaited around her head. She said, “I have watched the flight of birds each morning for seven mornings, and also at sunset. The results are confused. But a two-headed lamb has been born in a village near by.”

“And Eadwil?”

Eadwil was hardly more than a boy; his chin was innocent of a beard. When he spoke, his voice was like a reed pipe—still, men respected his precocious wisdom. He said, “I have analyzed the relative situations of the stars and planets, and am driven to the hypotheses that either we know nothing at all or some unknown heavenly body is influencing the calculation. A comet, perhaps. But yesterday lightning struck three times out of a clear sky, and— and, Margrave, I’m frightened!”

The Margrave nodded and made a comforting gesture in the air. He said, “But this cannot be the whole story. I move that we—here, now, in full council—ask Him Who Must Know.”

Eadwil rose to his feet. He was small, not yet having completed his growth. On his youthful lips trembled a sob, which he stoutly repressed and shaped into words.

“I demand your permission to withdraw, Margrave,” he said. “It is well known how Him Who Must Know treats those in—in my condition.

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