Read Online Paragaea by Chris Roberson - Free Book Online Page B

Balam this was a brief respite, a momentary return to civilization; for Leena, it was like stepping once more into another world.
    To Leena's eyes, the city seemed like something out of the days of the czars. Hieronymus explained the surroundings as best he could—the people, the buildings, the conveyances—but after the green monotony of the jungle trails, she found it difficult to take it all in at once.
    The honor guards of the Laxarian Hegemon marched in their rank and file through the wide avenues, escorting some minor princeling on his business, pneumatic rifles slung on their shoulders. Airships passedoverhead, bound for the northern reaches of the Sakrian plains, or to the far shores of the Inner Sea. Caravans gathered in large squares, heading out across the flat lands to the other Cities of the Plains, bearing passengers and goods. Presbyters, cenobites, and mendicants wandered the streets, each preaching their own flavor of salvation, each ignoring the others. Temples, money houses, stables, and inns lined the avenues and byways. Near the city center stood a large theater, a sporting arena, a library—each larger than the last. There were mounted police on their patrols, and cutpurses and sneak thieves skulking in the shadows. There were men and women in every hue of skin imaginable, and small scatterings of dog men, laughing raucously. A figure with the body of a woman and the head and paws of a cat caught Balam's eye, but hissed with her shoulders arched as he walked past. In the shadow of a nameless temple, a bent figure with scaled, hairless skin, large eyes, and a double slit for a nose recited strange poetry, perched on one leg, while at his feet a smaller snake-creature with scales of yellow flecked with violet caught the coins tossed by passersby.
    Leena, threading her bewildered way through this swirling insanity, had no choice but to accept it all. No longer could she question the reality of her situation. However she had come here, she was in a world not her own, and it was her most pressing duty to return home and report what she had learned.
    â€œShall we pause for victuals?” Hieronymus asked, pointing out a row of food stalls along a narrow promenade.
    â€œNo,” Leena barked, eager to press ahead. “Answers first, eating after.”
    â€œFair enough,” Hieronymus answered, and guided her by the elbow on through the crowds. “Don't forget, Balam,” he said to the jaguar man following close behind, “that you owe me a drink.”
    The outlaw prince of the jaguars growled, low in his throat, but did not answer.
    In the eastern quarter of the city, they came to the Scholarium, a large edifice surmounted by three domes. They passed through animmense oaken door, with bronze cladding, engraved with astronomical symbols and mathematical formulas. The air within was heavy with age, dust lanced in the air by shafts of sunlight.
    Beyond the doors was a long arcade, hung on both sides with ancient banners. On each banner was embroidered an intricate symbol of angles and curves, a different one for each. Their meaning escaped Leena, though they reminded her somewhat of atomic notations, somewhat of circuit diagrams.
    â€œMy earliest tutor was an alumnus of the Laxarian Scholarium,” Balam said, his voice rumbling softly near her ear. “The Scholarium is given over to the study of thaumaturgy, the art of effecting change in the surrounding world.”
    â€œWhat my heathen friend means,” Hieronymus added, at her other ear, “is that this place is dedicated to natural philosophy, what you might term science, though its practice and execution here might differ from that which you would recognize.”
    An ancient, bent man wearing heavy robes and an unlikely hat ambled across the timeworn floor towards them, a look of inquisitiveness etched on his open face. His skin was the color of ebony, and what little hair he had was stark white, the shade of