Read Online Dragon Dance by John Christopher - Free Book Online Page A

farther north. And what about this?”
    There was a twig attached to the fruit, and the twig had a leaf. Brad plucked and smelled it.
    â€œFresh.”
    â€œSo how do you account for it?”
    â€œI wish I knew,” Brad said. “It’s all crazy. Those flowers blooming outside. . . . None of it makes sense.”
    Simon had followed him to the table. In the bowls he saw cherries and pomegranates, yellow berries he did not recognize, purple plums. With a feeling of recklessness, he took a plum and bit into it: juice ran down his chin.
    â€œTastes great,” he said.
    Brad was staring at the apple. “It just can’t be real. There’s no way you can have cherries and apples ripe at the same time.”
    Simon finished eating the plum and tucked the stone away behind the bowl. He felt more hungry rather than less. He took a small bowl and filled it with the food on display. Brad, after some hesitation, followed suit. There were chopsticks and a flask containing wine. They ate and drank, and Simon refilled his empty bowl.
    Brad had put his down and was staring round the room with a puzzled, almost angry look.
    â€œIt’s not some kind of illusion,” he said. “You can’t eat illusions. So what is it?”
    â€œDoes it matter? We didn’t eat better even in Cho-tsing’s palace.”
    Suddenly, though, Simon felt a chill of apprehension. It was like being in a fairy story—the vast mansion at the mountain top, no one in evidence, tables laid for a feast. . . . That was the kind of scene, he remembered, which usually ended badly, when the giant returned, or the troll, or the wicked witch.
    â€œThere has to be an explanation,” Brad said.
    He told himself it was a long time since he hadbelieved in fairy stories; at the same time, he wished Brad would stop fussing about it. He said brusquely: “It can wait till morning. I’m dead beat.”
    He unrolled one of the mats and lay on it. Something else was odd, he realized; although there was no sign of heating, it did not feel cold. He decided against mentioning that to Brad, in case it brought on another fit of speculation. Anyway, he was very tired. Weariness soon dragged him down into sleep.
    â€¢Â Â â€¢Â Â â€¢
    In this dream, Simon was once more back in the time before the fireball, resting on a river bank on a drowsy summer’s day. The voice crept into the dream. It was low, lulling, scarcely distinguishable from the sound of the breeze in the willows. Gradually it grew closer and louder. He could tell it was a man’s voice, though he could not make out what it was saying. He became aware of something else, too—hands on his wrists, gentle but firm, holding him.
    He was in some twilight state between sleep and waking. He heard tinkling music, a pattern of notes rising, then falling. The voice began to take on meaning.
    â€œThere is nothing to fear. Be at peace. Bid second mind be still. Be at peace. There is nothing to fear. Be at peace, be at peace. . . .”
    He had a sense of time having stopped; or perhaps of it being caught up in a loop, with notes and words repeating, forever and ever. He felt he was slipping into something unknown and unknowable, like a rudderless boat drifting downstream. Towards what—an open lock, a weir? Uncertainty became doubt, suspicion, fear. His mind shut tight against the voice.
    â€œBe at peace. There is nothing to fear.”
    He resisted still, on the edge of panic but refusing to surrender. He had an image of a small animal caught in a trap, wire tightening round it as it struggled. He would not give in. Then somehow the image changed: the small animal was being lifted from its confinement by strong but gentle hands.
    â€œThere is nothing to fear. . . .”
    And, unaccountably but wonderfully, it was true. Fear went, like a cloud from in front of the sun. The voice was stronger and gave him