"Clayton Emery - Lost Empires 03 - Star of Cursrah" - читать интересную книгу автора (Emery Clayton)

whizzed over their heads. It struck the giant's chest and hung a moment before flopping to the ground.
Amber wondered if this was some Calishite miracle, like the rains of frogs and blood she'd read about
in Mulak's Tales to Be Remembered.
Hakiim knew better and screamed, "Reiver!"
Vision clearing, Amber saw her bony friend teetering atop a wagon piled with baskets of wet, shiny
fish. With two hands the thief snatched up fish big and small and chucked them at the giant
bodyguard. Amber laughed with gleeтАФuntil a bewhiskered talam smacked her ear.
"Hey," she complained, "watch it!"
"Make way," bellowed a voice commanding authority. "Make way for the Nallojal."
"Sword of Starlight!" yelped Hakiim. "We forgot the sailors."
A dozen sailors and marines shouted and shoved through the marketplace. All wore the caleph's
bright pinks and yellows. Sailors wore fork-tailed fish badges pinned to their headscarves, while the
marines bore fierce waxed mustaches and turban-wrapped helmets of white cork with brass bills.
Urging them on was a red-faced rysal, a naval officer with a plumed turban.
"All citizens stand fast," the captain bawled as if into a gale off the Singing Rocks. "We come to
arrest that thief and his cronies."
Every head in the marketplace turned, a meadow of bright headscarves and the polled heads of
slaves, to see Reiver stick slimy thumbs in his ears and waggle his fingers at the navy. Laughter and
cheers burst from the crowd, then applause as the young thief back flipped off the cart and hit the
ground running.
 Slithering through the crowd, with Amber and Hakiim hot at his heels, Reiver hopped up a side
street. Abruptly he whirled into another alley. Amber pattered around the corner and blinked. High
walls and miles of laundry strung overhead made the space dark after the blazing street. Still, she
could see well enough to know that they had run into a dead end.
"Look at our gutter rat," Hakiim said, shoving her to keep going.
Reiver was halfway up a wall. As Amber reached his bare feet, she saw that the bricks in the rear
wall of the alley were irregular, once badly patched. With toes strong and supple as fingers, Reiver
scaled jutting edges and grabbed an iron balcony. Like a blond spider, he swung over the railing and
smirked down at his friends. Amber, used to hard work, scrambled up the corner, though she had to
kick to find the nearly invisible cracks with her soft boots.
Left below, Hakiim wailed, "I can't climb that!"
As Amber grabbed the iron fretwork, a ragged rainbow unfurled past her. Gaining the balcony,
Reiver handed her a length of multicolored cloth. It was the thief's kaffiyeh, untwined.
"Grab hold, Amber," he said, then called to the alley, "Hak, latch on!"
"It'll tear," the young woman objected.
"No, it's got cod line woven into the fabric," Reiver told her. "Old thief's trick!"
Amber seized a hank of headscarf. Despite the flimsy look, four stout fishing lines ran its length.
Cloth might tear in spots, but the headscarf would easily bear a man's weight. Reiver was certainly full
of surprises.
In the alley below, Hakiim wrapped folds of tattered cloth around his wrists, then grunted as Amber
and Reiver yanked him off his feet. The dark youth's feet windmilled as he dangled, then kicked harder
as a dozen burly sailors thundered into the alley.
"Hey!" he shouted. "Haul faster!"
Reiver almost dropped his burden for laughing, so Amber had to snag Hakiim's wrist and drag him
belly-down over the railing. Never graceful, the late arrival tumbled onto his shoulder.
Below, sailors and marines milled in their war party. The puffing captain mopped his face with a
linen handkerchief, his plume bobbing, and shouted, "Come down hereтАФpuff!тАФin the name of the
Caleph!"
"In the name of Reiver, Son of No One, I send my regrets!" crowed the thief.
Amber blinked as a knife winked in Reiver's hand. Whisking the keen blade left and right, he