"David Freer - The Forlorn" - читать интересную книгу автора (Freer Dave)

cold became suddenly intense. It felt as if it was burning into him. He screamed.

Wakefulness was instantly with him. He clapped his hand to his mouth. Had anyone below heard him?
Peering fearfully through the tiny hole he had drilled with a rusty nail, he realized that it didn't matter if they
had heard his scream. Half the city must know exactly where he was now.

The central keep of the Patrician's palace was a hollow tower, a hundred feet tall. Girdling it was a
crenellated balcony, constantly guarded. The only way onto its roof was in a roped basket pulled up the
center of the tower. Heavy caskets went up, and precious little ever came down. Perched like a single
stalk of wheat stubble on the keep's roof was the treasury. Or used to be. Now the dream of every thief
in Port Tinarana was bursting through the roof of the library. No one would come up the stairway for a
while, because a torrent of coins was running down it.

Coins pushed aside the plank and came spilling into Keilin's hideout. Instinctively he grabbed gold
wheels from among the brass and copper, and thrust them into his pockets. He was rich! He was rich!
He would . . . His mind checked . . . halted. He would be lucky just to bealive in ten minutes' time. A
whole sea of money wouldn't help him. If he stayed hiding here they'd find him sooner or later. Perhaps
he could still run.

The coins left him no room to get out from under the bookcase, so he lifted it, tipping it over. He ran
across the shifting coin floor to the window. Perhaps if he went up to the roof and down the drainpipe . .
. His first glance told him that this was a futile hope. It was bright daylight, and people were rushing
toward the building. His second, more intent look, made him nearly freeze with horror. Most of the
crowd were surging toward the doors of the library. Behind him he could hear the screaming and fighting
on the stairs. But what had frightened him was the tableau at the far window.

It was Kemp. A dead lamp-oil seller sprawled on his cart, a sluggish stream of blood still oozing from his
back. The Guard-Captain was pouring yet another amphora of glistening yellow lamp oil in through the
broken window. Keilin stepped back. He could perhaps mingle with the money-crazed hoard on the stair
and escape. At the moment he doubted if they'd notice him if he were green, ten feet tall, with horns on
his head. He had to get out before Kemp set fire to the place.

Then his eye was caught by something among the coins and scattered jewels. It was enough to halt him,
midflight. For a moment Keilin thought it was his own, and clutched at the jewel around his neck. His
pendant was still there . . . was this jewel the same? No, not quite. Itwas the same oily black, with the
myriad of shifting colors seemingly within it, but it was smaller, and set on a broad golden ring instead. He
hastily stooped and picked it up. And suddenly he heard the high-pitched whine again. It came from the
roof. A section of masonry fell in a shower of purple sparks, and a platelike craft dropped through after
it. Keilin did not wait to see the hooded passengers. He dived for the shelter of the chimney, a moment
before the searing purple blast.

He was falling face-first down the chimney, the newly found jewel still crushed tight in his fist, as cold as
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his neck amulet had ever been. He didn't see the suddenly materialized marble tombstone that felled the
hooded assassins. From their oddly crumpled bodies seeped a puddle of greenish ichor, disappearing
into the coins. But he did hear the terrified scream of "FIRE!"