"Jennifer Fallon - Second Sons 01 - The Lion of Senet" - читать интересную книгу автора (Fallon Jennifer)

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PART ONE

OMENS




Chapter 1



From the top of the cliffs the world appeared bathed in blood. The dawn was ruddy, stained crimson by
the red sun as it began to set in the west, chased out of the sky by the larger, brighter, yellow sun on the
eastern horizon. The scarlet clouds hung heavy and thick and tasted of ash. There had been an eruption
somewhere, Tia realized, as she stopped to study the view. No wonder Neris had gone missing.
Eruptions always had that effect on him.

The heat was oppressive, despite the overcast sky. On this world with two suns, it never truly cooled
down.

Except during the Age of Shadows.

Tia wiped the sweat from her brow and looked down toward the river. From the cliff top the delta
spread out before her; a confused network of channels and sandbars constantly shifting with the moods
of the fickleSpakanRiver. The water was muddy and sluggish; it reminded her of a series of veins and
arteries, bleeding into the lighter waters of the Bandera Straits. There was little vegetation. The line of
smoking volcanoes that marred the northern horizon spewed out their smothering ash often enough to
ensure that everything struggled to survive here in the Baenlands. To the west, Tia could just make out
the patchwork fields where their few crops fought to thrive in the ash-choked soil, and beyond them the
fields of Ranadon poppies, the only thing that grew around Mil with any enthusiasm.

Behind her, a few faint wisps of thin smoke from the houses of the settlement drifted upward, hanging
motionless in the still air for a moment before being swallowed by the cumbrous clouds.

The silence was complete. Even the wind that normally howled through the delta had taken a moment to
catch its breath. Tia looked along the rim of the cliff to her left. In the distance she could just make out
Neris, perched perilously close to the edge.

With a sigh, she began to walk toward him, making no attempt to hide her approach. She didnтАЩt want to
startle him.

It took her nearly half an hourтАЩs walk over the rough, stony ground to reach the man perched on the
edge of the precipice. The solitary figure did not move as she neared. His hair hung long and untended
down his back, and it looked like heтАЩd been wearing the same shirt for a month. For a brief, irreverent
moment, Tia was glad that there was no breeze. He wasnтАЩt a pleasant creature to be downwind of when