"Alan Dean Foster - Humanx 1 - Midworld" - читать интересную книгу автора (Foster Alan Dean)

26

Reader finally asked, recovering from Bom's unex-
pected pronouncement. "You said nothing of this to
anyone."

Bom shrugged, tried to sound casual about it. "No
one rushed to ask me about it."

"If it was not a demon, this thing you say you
saw, then what was it?" asked Losting suspiciously.

Bom hesitated. "I do not know. I had but the
briefest glimpse of it as it fell through the world-
but see it I did!"

Losting sat back in his place, his muscles rippling
in the firelight, and smiled at those near him.

"Come, Bom," prompted Joyla, "either you saw
the thing or you didn't."

"But that is exactly it," he protested. "I was falling
myself. I saw it, yet did not. As the breaking sounds
and shaking of the world reached its peak, I saw a
flash of deep blue through the trees. Shining bright
blue, like that of an asanis."

"Maybe that's what you saw, a drifting asanis
bloom," Losting said with a smirk.

"No!" Bom spun to glare angrily across at his rival.
"It was that color, but brilliant, deep, and too . . .
too sharp. It threw back the light."


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"Threw back the light?" wondered Reader. "How
could this be?"

How could it? They were all staring at him, half
wanting to believe he had seen something that was
not a demon. He struggled to recall that instant of
falling, that glimpse of alien blue among the branches.
It caught the light like an asanis leafтАФno, more
like his knife when it was polished. His eyes roved