"Diane Duane - Feline Wizards 1 - The Book Of Night With Moon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Duane Diane)

out of the blackness in front of you, pattering, rustling, they come. First, just a few. Then ten of them, a
hundred of them, more. Hurrying, scattering, humpily running, their little wicked eyes gleaming dull red
in the light from far behind you, they flow at you like darkness come alive, darkness with teeth, darkness
shrilling with hunger: the rats.
There is more than hunger in those voices, though, more than just malice in those eyes. Their screams
have terror in them. They will destroy anything that gets between them and their flight from what comes
behind them, driving them; they'll strip the flesh from your bones and never even stop to enjoy it. Backing
away, hissing, you see the huge dark shape that comes behind themтАФwalking two-legged, claws like
knives lashing out in amusement at the shrieking tats, the long lashing tail balancing out behind: high
above, the blunt and massive head, jaws working compulsively, huge razory fangs gleaming even in this
dim light: and gazing down at you through the darkness, the eyesтАФthe small, gemlike, cruelly smiling
eyes, with your death in them: everything's death.
Seeing this, you do the only thing you can. You run.
But it's not enough....
-=O=-***-=O=-
She was sound asleep when the voice breathed in her ear. There was nothing unusual about that: They
always took the method of least resistance.
Oh, fwau, why right this minute?
Rhiow refused to hurry about opening her eyes, but rolled over and stretched first, a good long stretch, and

file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry%20kru...7%20-%20The%20Book%20Of%20Night%20With%20Moon.htm (4 of 271)23-2-2006 17:12:44
 THE BOOK OF NIGHT WITH MOON

yawned hard. Opening her eyes at last, she saw the main room still dark: her ehhif hadn't come out to open
the window-coverings yet. No surprise there, for the noisemaker by the bed hadn't gone off yet, either.
Rhiow rolled over and stretched one more time, for the call hadn't been desperately urgent, though urgent
enough. Please don't let it be the north-side gate again. Not after all the hours we spent on the miserable
thing yesterday. Au, it's going to take forever to get things going this morning....
She stood up, stretched fore and aft, then sat down on the patterned carpet in the middle of the room and
started washing, making a face as she began; her fur still tasted a little like the room smelled, of cheese
and mouth-smoke and other people from the eating party last night. Rhiow's mouth watered a little at the
memory of the cheese, to which she was most partial. She had managed to wheedle a fair amount of it out
of the guests. Normally this would have left her with a somewhat abated appetite in the morning, but
getting a call always sharpened her stomach, and more so if she was asleep when the call came: it was as if
the urgency transmitted straight to her gut and there turned into hunger.
Probably some kind of sublimation, Rhiow thought, scrubbing her ears. And a vhai'd nuisance, in any
case. She leaned back, bracing herself on one paw, and started washing the inside right rear leg.
Well, at least the timing isn't too abysmal. The others will be up shortly, or else they won't have gone to
bed at all: just fine either way.
Rhiow finished up, putting her tail in order, and then stood and trotted through the landscape of disordered
furniture, noting drinking-vessels left under chairs, a couple of them knocked over and spilled, and she
paused to pick up half a dropped cracker with some of that pink fish stuff on it. Salmon paid, she thought
as she munched. Not bad, even a night old. She gulped the last bit down, licked a couple of errant specks
of it off her whiskers, and looked around. I wonder if they left the container out on the counter, like those
others?
But there wasn't time for that: she was on call. The bedroom door was shut. Rhiow started to rear up and
scratch on it, then sat back down, having second thoughts: if she wanted both breakfast and an early start,
it was smarter not to annoy them. She looked thoughtfully at the doorknob, squinting slightly.
It took only a second or so to clearly perceive the mechanism: friction-dependent, as she knew from
previous experience, but not engaged. The door was merely pushed shut and was sticking a little tighter at