"The Paths of Darkness 1 - The Silent Blade" - читать интересную книгу автора (Paths of Darkness)

R.A.Salvatore
The Silent Blade

(Forgotten Realms novell. Path of Darkness. Book I)

PROLOGUE

Wulfgar lay back in his bed, pondering, trying to come to
terms with the abrupt changes that I had come over his life.
Rescued from the demon Errtu and his hellish prison in the
Abyss, the proud barbarian found himself once again among
friends and allies. Bruenor, his adopted dwarven father, was
here, and so was Drizzt, his dark elven mentor and dearest
friend. Wulfgar could tell from the snoring that Regis, the
chubby halfling, was sleeping contentedly in the next room.
And Catti-brie, dear Catti-brie, the woman Wulfgar had
come to love those years before, the woman whom he had
planned to marry seven years previously in Mithral Hall. They
were all here at their home in Icewind Dale, reunited and
presumably at peace, through the heroic efforts of these
wonderful friends.
Wulfgar did not know what that meant.
Wulfgar, who had been through such a terrible ordeal over
six years of torture at the clawed hands of the demon Errtu,
did not understand.
The huge man crossed his arms over his chest. Sheer
exhaustion put him here in bed, forced him down, for he would
not willingly choose sleep. Errtu found him in his dreams.
And so it was this night. Wulfgar, though deep in thought
and deep in turmoil, succumbed to his exhaustion and fell
into a peaceful blackness that soon turned again into the
images of the swirling gray mists that were the Abyss. There
sat the gigantic, bat-winged Errtu, perched upon his carved
mushroom throne, laughing. Always laughing that hideous
croaking chuckle. That laugh was borne not out of joy, but
was rather a mocking thing, an insult to those the demon
chose to torture. Now the beast aimed that unending
wickedness at Wulfgar, as was aimed the huge pincer of
Bizmatec, another demon, minion of Errtu. With strength
beyond the bounds of almost any other human, Wulfgar
ferociously wrestled Bizmatec. The barbarian batted aside the
huge humanlike arms and the two other upper-body appendages,
the pincer arms, for a long while, slapping and punching
desperately.
But too many flailing limbs came at him. Bizmatec was too
large and too strong, and the mighty barbarian eventually
began to tire.
It ended-always it ended-with one of Bizmatec's pincers
around Wulfgar's throat, the demon's other pincer arm and its
two humanlike arms holding the defeated human steady. Expert