"Kate Elliott - Crown of Stars 2 - Prince of Dogs" - читать интересную книгу автора (Elliott Kate)

"Where are your parents, then?" asked the man. "Why were you not taken to safety, if the others
were?"
Anna shrugged, but she saw her brother hunch down as he always did, because the misery still
sank its claws in him although she did not recall their parents well enough to mourn them.
"They're dead four summers ago," said Matthias. "Our da drowned when he was out fishing, and
our ma died a few months later of a fever. They were good people. Then we went to our uncle. He ran,
when the Eika came. He never thought of us. I ran back to the house and got Anna, but by then there
was fighting everywhere. You couldn't even get to the cathedral where most folk fled, so we hid in here.
And here we stayed."
"It's a miracle," murmured the man. Out of the night's silence came sudden noise: dogs barking
and a single harsh call, a word neither child understood. The man started noticeably. "They come 'round
in the middle night to count us," he said. "I must go back. I won't betray you, I swear it on Our Lady's
Hearth. May Our Lord strike me down with His heavenly Sword if I do any such thing. I'll bring more
food tomorrow, if I can."
Then he was gone, retreating into the night.
They relieved themselves quickly in one of the stinking pits filled with dung and water, and
paused after to look up at -the strangely clear sky, so hard a darkness above them that the stars were
almost painful to look upon. They heard the dogs again and Matthias shoved Anna onto the ladder. She
scrambled back up, and he came up behind her and closed the trap. After a hesitation, but without
speaking, they devoured the rest of the cheese and bread-and waited for tomorrow.
THE next night, long after sunset, the man came again and tapped on the door softly and said, "I
am your friend."
Cautiously, Matthias opened the trap and peered down. After a moment he climbed down. Anna
followed him. The man gave them bread and watched silently as they ate. She could see him a bit more
clearly tonight-the moon was waxing, and its quarter face slowly swelled, bubbling toward the full. Not
particularly tall, he had the broad shoulders of a farmer and a moon-shaped face.
"What are you called?" he asked finally, hesitantly.
"I am called Matthias, and this is Anna, which is short for Johanna. Our ma named us after the
disciplas of the blessed Daisan."
The man nodded, as if he had known this all along or perhaps only to show he understood. "I am
called Otto. I am sorry the bread was all I could bring. We are not fed well, and I dare not ask the others
for a share of their portion. I don't know if I can trust them, for they're no kin of mine. Any one of them
might tell the Eika in return for some reward, more bread perhaps."
"It is very kind of you to help us," said Anna brightly, for she remembered that their ma had
always told her to' be polite and to be thankful for the gifts she received.
The man caught in a sob, then hesitantly touched hei hair. As abruptly, he backed away from her.
"Or perhaps like me, the others would gladly help, if only it meant find ing a way to see two more brought
free of the savages. It isn't as if the Eika play favorites. I've never seen them seek to turn their slaves
against each other by handing out special treatment. They despise us all. All are treated the same Work
or die."
"Is it only here," asked Matthias, "in the tanneries, thai they've brought slaves?"
"They've opened up the smithies, too, though they've no one trained here in blacksmith's work.
But we're slaves and expendable." His voice was hard. "It's fortune's chance I was sent here to the
tanneries, though it stinks like nothing I've smelled before. It's whispered that at the forge men are burned
every day and the Eika as likely to slit a burned man's throat as to let that man heal if he can't get up and
keep working. I saw those Eika. I saw one pushed into a fire. It didn't burn. The heat left no scar on its
body. They don't have skin, not like us. It's some kind of hide, like a snake's scales but harder and
thicker. Dragon's get." He hawked and spat, as if to get the taste of the word out of his mouth. "The
spawn of dragons and human women, that's what they say, but I don't see how such an unnatural
congress could take place. But we should not speak of this in front of the child."