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That was because both of them were dumb animals, Simna knew, though he was
loath to point it out. Grumbling, he hoisted his pack and water bags and
followed along.
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A Triumph of Souls: Journeys of the Catechist, Book 3
Maybe he was worrying needlessly, he told himself. Maybe the demon had been
having a little fun at their expense. Skawpane might prove to be a quaint, if
isolated, little oasis of a community, its dusty streets shaded by palm trees,
its inhabitants serene and content with their lot. Believing this, wanting to
believe it, he marched along beside his tall companion with a renewed feeling
of confidence. Even if he was wrong and his hopes were to prove unrealized,
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how bad could it be? A town was a town, with all the familiar urban baggage
that implied.
When they finally reached the municipal outskirts, he saw that he was only
partially correct. Skawpane was a community, all right.
But it was no oasis.
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A Triumph of Souls: Journeys of the Catechist, Book 3
XVI
 Do we have to go in there? Simna stood atop the smooth-surfaced, rounded
boulder of yellow-white sandstone looking across the flat, hardscrabble plain
that separated the travelers from the first outlying structures.
Ehomba did not squint as he contemplated their imminent destination. He was
used to the sun.  Unless you want to chance running out of water before we
reach the mountains. I have seen men who tried to reach the coast of Naumkib
from the interior but ran out of water before they found a stream or village.
Even those who had not yet been located by scavengers were unpleasant to look
upon.
 A fine choice, the swordsman grumbled. Resigned, he started down the gentle
slope.  Hoy, maybe they ll have cold beer.
After a last, speculative glance, Ehomba followed and caught up to him.  Do
you really believe that?
 No, Simna confessed,  but here lately I find that I prefer refreshing
delusions to the reality of our actual surroundings.
Skawpane turned out to be less appalling from a distance. From the disgusting
state of the dirt streets that ran with dull green putrescence to the sewer
grates designed to carry off flash floods of mucus, the act of merely walking
quickly degenerated into a detestable activity. No edifice rose to a height of
more than three stories, perhaps because of the lack of suitable building
materials. Storefronts were fashioned of skin tanned to woody toughness by the
repeated application of hot blood and salt water. The origin of these skins
was a question the travelers by mutual unspoken consent decided not to ask.
Sidewalks rose a foot or more above the abominable streets. Instead of wooden
slats, their planks were fashioned of split bones with the rounded side facing
downward. Larger bones such as scapulae had been made into gleaming white
shutters that flanked windows of thinly stretched corneas. Occasionally a
poorly fashioned pane would blink desperately, reflecting its organic origin.
There were tall, narrow chimneys made of interlocking vertebrae, though what a
home or shop would need with a chimney and fireplace in such a hellish climate
Ehomba could not imagine. Troughs of liquid sulfur stood outside several of
the establishments. Standing patiently at their hitching rails and nuzzling
the noxious, toxic brew they contained were a diversity of infernal steeds.
The herdsman saw desiccated horses whose pointed ribs protruded from their
sides and whose lower incisors pierced their upper jaws like the tusks of
bastard babirusas. All had prominent, protuberant eyes that shone with the
madness that resided within.
Nor were they the only mounts secured or occasionally spiked to the railings.
One storefront they passed had a pair of enormous, hirsute hogs roped to a
trough at which they rooted ferociously. When these glanced up to espy the
travelers, they strove hard to break their bonds. In so doing they exposed
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A Triumph of Souls: Journeys of the Catechist, Book 3
mouthfuls of long, sharp teeth that seemed to belong to some other animal. The
saddles fastened to their backs were small and narrow, with disproportionately
high pommels. What their riders looked like the visitors could only imagine.
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Across the street three elephantine orange-green slugs lay melting in the sun.
Their glutinous bodies renewed themselves as they liquefied and they emitted
an odor so foul that it rose above all the other myriad stinks that afflicted
the noisome concourse. In place of saddles they wore simple handgrips that
were buried deep within the slimy flesh itself. Once more, their riders were
thankfully conspicuous by their absence.
That did not mean that the streets were devoid of denizens. While Skawpane
would never pass for a bustling metropolis, neither was it a ghost town though
ghosts shared the streets and fronting establishments with the rest of their
fellow citizens. In addition to reddish demons who might have been related to
the prospector they had encountered out in the layered hills, there were
demonic folk of every stripe and color. Some were dressed in styles that would
have been considered shocking in cities as far apart as Lybondai or Askaskos,
but which in their current surroundings seemed perfectly appropriate.
Others were content with plainer attire.
The population was a mélange of all that was disturbing and horrific, a
veritable melting pot of the diabolical. Besides demons and ghosts there were
less familiar phantasms, from towering, spindly brown creatures with bulging
pop eyes to winged horrors boasting circular mouths that covered their entire
black faces. The crows that haunted the tops of buildings and pecked at offal
in the streets had membranous wings like bats, and sickly toothed beaks that
looked fragile enough to crumble at a touch.
A flower-crowned, tentacled horror lazing in a rocking chair made of human
bones tracked their progress down this boulevard of horrors with organs that
were not eyes. Next to where its feet would have been if it had had feet, a [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]