"Asprin, Robert - Thieves' World 12 - Stealer's Sky" - читать интересную книгу автора (Asprin Robert)

blanket of clouds above.

Peace and prosperity had come to Sanctuary, the Hell-Hound thought,
but it was like the indeterminate cloud cover which hung over the city.
Would the sun burn through and bathe the town with warmth and light,
or would the clouds thicken and darken into a storm?

A soldier could only watch and wait . . . and adapt.

NIGHT WORK

Andrew Offutt

Hanse believes in very little and perhaps nothing. Therefore he's always ready for anything,
particularly the unexpected. It's a trait that has served him well. Because he has to be a
pragmatist. Shadowspawn is a pragmatist. ЧStrick
Wisdom is the ability to believe only what you have to.

Чthe Eye

Shadowspawn ranged through Sanctuary like a hungry tiger on the
prowl.

His real name was Hanse and Hanse was mad. Better put, he was
angry, but he was mad, too, in a manner of speaking: mad with anger.
Shadowspawn was hardly the first or the last person to be driven into a
sort of madness by anger. He had done heroic deeds: he had broken into
the manse of that sorcerer and stolen the earring that saved Nadeesh's
life and enabled Strick to buy the Vulgar Unicorn from the old physician.
And then by all gods, by the will of Injustice HimselfЧthat evil gnomish
dwarf who was left hand of ever-fickle Lady ChanceЧthe heroic Hanse
had been hit by a stagger spell, punched by three big toughs, drugged,
bound, gagged, and popped into a big cloth bag. He had been hauled
down to the dock, hauled onto a ship, and dumped into its hold. Destina-
tion: slavery, in the Bandaran Isles.

Yet that did not happen. The next time Shadowspawn emerged from
the shadowless sack and saw light he was in the murky keep of that most
sinister of men, Jubal. Jubal had bought him. True, after some smirking
and sneering and taunting Jubal had freed him, but not as an act of
decency or in exchange for the pitiful price the crime lord had paid. Oh,

NIGHT WORK 399

no. He had named a ridiculous sum, close to sixteen pounds of gold, and
Hanse's only choice had been to agree. A ridiculous, monumental sumЧ
five hundred pieces of gold! Ridiculous!

Ole Jubal, Hanse thought, must have been thinking with his nose, not
his brain. And he wants to take over peacekeeping in Sanctuary. Right.