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

they were enough to destroy the young man whose mind was not prepared to hold so
much horror. Had he met her waking thoughts, death would have been mercy.
Ordinarily, the peasants would have guarded the secret of this unlucky boy as closely
as they did the location of the cursed cave. But how often did they host a man of magic,
the emperor's own pet sorcerer come on a wanderer's holiday from great Rome itself?
Opportunities were few, in this rough land, and not to be missed. Could the gracious
magician try to heal the boy? They could not offer much, but if he would name a priceтАж
The price he named was not the one he took. He gave the lad a semblance of health
that lasted only until he was a week's journey away from the village; a shell that crumbled
in upon itself because there was nothing of the boy's self left to sustain him. The monster
had devoured the rest without even knowing she did so, without waking.
But if the peasants cursed Vergilius for a charlatan, they should also have blessed him
for a savior. They would lose no more of their number to the dreaming nightmare. The
cave was empty, the magician paid in full. He had set them free.
And when will you set me free, Magician?
"When?" Vergilius stroked a beard he no longer had. "When you are less fearsome, less
deadly."
I, fearsome? You do not seem to fear me, Magician.
"I am only one."
TrueтАж
"Not all men are like me, to face you and subdue you when all your powers are awake."
Did you? The question was as casual as the caress of an April breeze. More insistent
came the next thought: Answer in truth, Magician! What is the real reason you refuse to
let me go? Her head thrust up sharply, breaking his sorcerous hold. He saw cold hate
flash in her eyes. Let me go. While you still can.
He tightened the spell's grip, felt her pushing back against it with all her power. Sweat
dewed his face and body, chilled him in the cool wind blowing in from the sea. The
emerald ring on his left hand paled to the color of dying grass. From all the cities he had
seen and the lost lore he had studied, he called up a new measure of strength and hurled
it against her.
She battled a moment longer, then broke. All her limbs collapsed under her, and she
crouched submissively at his feet, head bent, face burrowed deep between her forepaws.
The sorcerer laughed, and whirled the lion-form back around him like a golden cloak.
While the sphynx mewed and moaned with fear, a strange note of teasing invitation
seemed to run beneath her protests. Vergilius' pale yellow eyes saw her flanks quivering
in anticipation. Her song vibrated in the magician's ears, rippled down his body, set his
every muscle humming until he loosed a triumphant roar and leaped upon her. Spells of
shielding splashed out to veil the sight and sound of their wild coupling from any who
might happen to pass by.
But who would wander in these marshes? Who would turn aside from the highway that
led so straight and true to the waiting city of dreams?
Who? The question touched the sorcerer's mind as he slept in the motel bed, human
again. Afterimages of love-making came creeping into his mind, timid and tentative as
midnight mice. What was that harsh smell on her breath? What was that dark red stain
dappling the fur beneath her breasts?
A seabird, the reassuring answer came. She must have caught and killed a gull. There
is good hunting in the marshes, and she was born a hunter.
The sphynx leaned over the sleeping magician. Her wings were gone, her lion's body
melted away into the cold, white, graceful shape of an ordinary woman. Resting her
weight on hands instead of paws, she bent over her lover and her captor to breathe away