"Esther M. Friesner - Puss" - читать интересную книгу автора (Friesner Esther M)

by boldly taking what must be willingly offered. For this, in time, they forfeit the
rebirth that is our right. Masters of many skins, slaves of a single life that even a
clever mortal may someday steal away, they can be truly killed. Therefore they live
with fear. Therefore they slay as many mortals as they can. They are the ones who
have earned us all the name of monster. We are brought up to condemn them out of
hand. We know how close we ourselves tread to the paths of darkness they have
chosen.
And yet this mortal mask of his with its evil, exciting beauty made me burn.
I drank the blood he offered because it was offered. Hat and sash and silly boots
lay cast aside, the dagger clattered to the floor. I watched his eyes grow wide and
warm as I bloomed unclothed into the princess' guise. "You are an artist, little
Cousin," he said, the sharp planes of his face crinkling with a badly mimed boy's
mischief.
"This?" My hands cupped the weight of the princess' brown-tipped breasts. "No
artistry here; it is not original."
"No?" He sounded disappointed. "I had hopedтАФ"
"So few of us create. Surely you know that much, even shut away here?" I went
on. "We are all apes and magpies."
A shadow of storm fell across his face. "That is not so." The question my eyes
sent him gained the further answer, "I own shapes that never were made in this
papery-dull world."
It seemed to matter to him. I knew I could not take him in open combatтАФnot with
Change his good, obedient hound and me locked in this body. Still, the sword aside,
there are venoms. You have only to know into which cup you must drop the fatal
dose.
"I should like to see that," I said.
In a room small and dark, lit by a single brazier's light, he showed me. I sat
cross-legged on a silk rug that tickled my thighs and I had a low table with a glass
bubble of wine at my elbow. He stood across the cupped coals from me, playing the
showman.
 "Scales," he said, and raised a gold goblet to his lips. At once his lower limbs
fused, blue satin ending in a muscular coil of serpent's body which itself ended
oddly in a peacock's full-fanned tail.
I nodded, impressed, but careful not to let it show. He saw only polite
acknowledgment in my eyes and lost his smile. There was another small table, twin
to mine, on his side of the fire. It held besides the empty goblet two rock crystal
bowls awash in red. "Claws," he muttered, and drank one of them dry.
The beast he became had a human face, a lion's forequarters, and the hindparts of
a dragon. Emerald horns curled from its head, and its talons were all keen obsidian.
"Oh," I said. "How charming."
An enraged roar burst from the monster's throat, then broke into unintelligible
rumblings. He lapped the second crystal bowl empty and was his man-shape again.
"You do not find these forms original enough for your taste, Cousin?"
I let my laughter walk the wire between indifference and scorn. "You have lived
too long alone," I replied. "The mortals have crammed their scribblings and
daubings with a host of patchwork creatures like these."
"I suppose you could do better."
I shrugged. "We may never know." I indicated the empty vessels.
"Is that all?" Hands on hips, he grinned. "Then a bargain, Cousin. One more
attempt for me to impress you out of hand, and if that fails then I shall take you to