"Feist,.Raymond.E.-.Serpentwar.1.-.Shadow.Of.A.Dark.Queen" - читать интересную книгу автора (Feist Raymond E)

part of a fifth.' With a note of finality in his voice, he said,
'No jatar remains intact. These last are gathered from
remnants of the Seven Hordes.'
Jarwa resisted the impulse to surrender to despair.
Forty thousand riders and part of another ten thousand.
That was all that survived from the Seven Great Hordes
of the Saaur.
Jarwa felt blackness grip his heart. How he remembered
his outrage when word came from the Patha Horde
of the priests' defiance and refusal to pay tribute. Jarwa
had ridden for seven months to lead personally the final
attack against Ahsart, City of Priests. For a moment he
felt a stab of remorse cut deep into his soul; then hesilently chided
himself: could any ruler have known that
the insane priests of Ahsart would destroy everything
rather than let the Saaur unite the world under one
ruler? it had been the mad high priest, Myta, who had
unsealed the portal and let the first demon through.
There was small comfort in knowing that the demon's
first act was to capture Myta's soul for torment as he
ripped his head from his body. One Ahsart survivor had
claimed a hundred warrior priests had attacked the one
demon as it devoured Myta's flesh, and none had survived.

Ten thousand priests and loremasters alongside more
than seven million warriors had died holding the foul
creatures at bay as they battled from the farthest border
of the Empire to its heart, in a war spanning half a world.
A hundred thousand demons had died, but each one's
destruction was paid for in dear blood, as thousands of
warriors threw themselves fearlessly at the hideous

creatures. The loremasters had used their arts to good
effect at times, but always the demons returned. For
years the fighting had continued, a running battle past
four of the nine oceans. Children had been born in the
Sha-shahan's camp, grown to young adulthood, and died
in the fighting, and still the demons came. The loremasters
looked in vain for a means of closing the portal
and turning the tide of battle to the Saaur.
From the other side of the world they had fought their
way back to Cibul, as the -demon army poured through
the portal between worlds, and now another portal was
being opened, offering hope for the Saaur: hope through
exile.
Kaba pointedly cleared his throat, and Jarwa forced
away regret. Nothing would be gained from it; as his
Shieldbearer had said, there was no choice.
'Jatuk,' Jarwa said, and a young warrior stepped forward, '
Of seven sons, one to rule each horde, you are the