"Brian Daley - The Starfollowers Of Coramonde" - читать интересную книгу автора (Daley Brian)

Yardiff Bey was slammed to his knees, by no force he could see. Without his
will, his hands came up to rend the front of his robe, in mourning and
contrition.
"List us your failures," came a disembodied command, "and number your faults."
He was cast headlong on the cold floor, held as a doll beneath a man's boot
would be held, by the stacked, murderous weight of the will of the Masters of
Shardishku-Salama. He sobbed for breath that wouldn't come, and that weight
retreated the merest bit. He knew a meager flicker of triumph; he hadn't been
condemned out of hand, and so had the opportunity to say on. He brought his head
up a degree, neck trembling with effort.
"Waste not the tool," he strained, "before h mends its errors. Let me make my
reparations." He slumped again, drawing breath only with horrible exertion. He
felt, by tingling of images not quite seen on his inner eye, that the Five were
conferring.
The air was suddenly icy, carrying thick, infernal stenches. There was a new, an
overwhelming Presence in the Fane. The sorcerer recognized its awesome savagery.
His patron, Amon, a chief among demons, had come, after ignoring all previous
pleas. Before Amon, even the Masters were silent, deferential in their
intangible, unmistakable way.
When the demon spoke, words lashing like whips, the walls of the huge Fane shook
in the lightlessness.
"More vainglorious plans, unworthy one? Are my agents in Salami to be twice
fools, and trust you a second time?" Amon asked. "List me your failures. You had
the whole of Coramonde hi your grasp. Your puppet-son was enthroned over the
most important country in the Crescent Lands. You had the rightful Heir
Springbuck trapped, along with the wizard Andre deCourteney and his enchantress
sister Gabrielle. How was all that dashed asunder?**
Yardiff Bey groped for response. "IтАФI sent the dragon Chaffinch against them, oh
Lord. He should have slaughtered them easily. But they had with them the alien
Van Duyn . . ."
3
He faltered for a way to tell it. "You know there are other universes, mighty
Amon, Realities sprouting from alternatives, like leaves from a tree. Van Duyn
is from another, and from it he and the deCourteneys plucked soldiers, and a
metal war-machine to slay Chaffinch.**
"Your first failure," thundered the demon. "Masters of Shardishfcu-Salamd,
witness it now!"
Yardiff Bey's senses jolted, as Amon conjured up those events again . . .
Through the eyes of Ibn-al-Yed, mask-slave to Yardiff Bey, they saw the castle
where Springbuck, the deCourteneys and their little band were at bay. Ibn-al-Yed
had only to keep them confined until the sorcerer sent the dragon Chaffinch.
But there was a disturbance in the air, a pushing-apart of the boundaries
between worlds. A lumbering, drab-green vehicle came roaring into the meadow.
From it a man emerged, confusion manifest on his face, some odd black implement
cradled under his arm.
It was, in certainty, a trick of the deCourteneys. The Druid who'd accompanied
Ibn-al-Yed called up an air elemental, to undo it. But as the were-wind ripped
at him, the stranger brought up his implement. There were bright, stuttering
explosions. Druid and horse toppled, dead, pierced with holefr by the
otherworldly weapon.