"02 - Faery Lands Forlorn 1.0" - читать интересную книгу автора (Duncan Dave)

The dagger'll open them. Not the ones on the ground. Them up there."
"I couldn't climb those trees!" Rap protested loudly. Changing direction and
trudging toward the nearest palms, Little Chicken ostentatiously flexed his
thick shoulders and spat on his hands. He welcomed any chance to demonstrate
Rap's inferiority-which was what Rap had expected.
"Quick!" he said, grabbing Thinal's bony shoulder to stop him following. "Tell
me! Little Chicken insists he's my trash, but-"
"Oh? You're a slaveowner'7"
Rap felt his face grow hot. "Not my idea! He thinks it's his duty to look after
me-feed me, and even dress me. Not much else. I know he'll defend me in a
fight."
Thinal peered at him slyly. "Who wiped the imp?"
Rap's stomach heaved at the memory. "He did. Yggingi drew his sword and
threatened me. He ignored Little Chicken, I suppose because he knew that goblins
aren't dangerous." Little Chicken had taken the proconsul from behind,
body-slammed him, applied a brutal headlock, and then slowly sawn through his
neck with the stone dagger. Even while that had been happening, though, Yggingi
had been trying to reach his fallen sword and Rap had kicked it out of the way.
So he had been an accomplice.
After a couple of hard gulps, he added, "But I don't know if he was defending me
then, or avenging all the goblins Yggingi killed. He won't run errands. "
Thinal nodded, frowning at the sand. "He wasn't gentle with Darad. That hurt-I
know! All this because you wouldn't torture--"
"Yes. Darad has goblin tattoos-"
"Don't tell me!" Thinal pulled a face.
"But he must know! Little Chicken's waiting for some signal or other, from the
Gods. When he gets that, then he's released from bondage and free to kill me, as
slowly and painfully as he can."
"They're a gruesome pack." Thinal picked his nose for a while in silence. "I
ought to know, Rap ... but I don't. Darad wasn't interested in the slave thing.
"
"He enjoyed the alternative?"
Thinal shuddered. "Yes. Gods! I still dream about what he did to that boy.
Trouble with Darad, he's been banged on the head so often a lot of his details
are fuzzy to me. To him, too." He pondered a while longer. "I think ... it may
be something like saving your life. Yeah! Never let the goblin save your life. "
Rap started to laugh. The little thief looked at him in surprise, realized what
he had said, and grinned ruefully, again showing his irregular teeth.
The conversation was cut off by a yell from Little Chicken. Faun and imp ran
across to where he was sitting in the sand at the base of a tree, cursing
intently. He had badly scraped his belly and one thigh, and seemed also to have
twisted an ankle when he landed. His opinions on palm trees were fortunately
being expressed in dialect so broad as to be unintelligible even to Rap.
Thinal walked along to another tree nearby and flowed up it like a squirrel. In
seconds he had reached the top and was twisting off coconuts. Little Chicken's
tirade died away and he glared up disbelievingly at the despicably weedy imp.
Then he glared even harder at Rap's smirk.
Burglars had their uses.

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