"Gray, Julia - Guardian 01 - The Dark Moon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gray Julia)

Whether this admirable arrangement is due to mere good fortune or to some divine influence upon nature is beyond the scope of this treatise. However, the movement of the islands allows them to escape the rigours of geological and astrological disturbances that must plague other, less fortunate lands.
Were those 'disturbances' now somehow affecting the islands? Terrel wondered. And if so, why?
He went on reading for a long time, until his eyes grew weary and one of the candles guttered out. Although he had not found anything that would explain the abnormal earthquake, he had at least reconfirmed his belief in the nature of the Floating Islands. Whatever Alyssa said now, she would not be able to shake his conviction that the book's arguments - which were plausible and precise - were correct.
Terrel put the volume back on its shelf, snuffed out the remaining candle, and waited for his eyes to adjust to the almost complete darkness of the windowless room. Then he climbed the ladder and closed the trap door. Retracing his route back to the south wing, he emerged to find Elam waiting for him.
'Where've you been all day?' The boy looked weary, but there was a gleam of excitement in his eyes.
'Reading,' Terrel answered. Elam had never displayed any interest in the library, even though Terrel had often offered to show it to him.
'Lucky you. Some of us had to work,' Elam said, but without rancour.
'Did Ahmeza get you?'
'No, I escaped her clutches, but then Ingo dragged me off to help him cut wood.' The northern part of the estate was forested, and provided fuel for the kitchen and winter fires.
'And?' Terrel prompted, knowing that his friend's mood would not have been caused by the enforced collection of a few logs.
'That balcony wasn't the only thing the quake brought down,' Elam responded. 'Part of the fence round the Necropolis has fallen to pieces, and I was the only one who noticed.'
'So?'
'We could explore!' Elam exclaimed. 'Haven't you ever wondered what's up there?'
'It's only some old tombs.'
'Then why is it out of bounds?'
No one had ever told them as much, but the rusting iron fence, which was topped with nasty spikes, and the heavy locks on the only gate, had been eloquent enough. And the sides of the hill within the fence were so overgrown with low trees and shrubs - all of which seemed to bristle with thorns - that it amounted to another, jungle-like barrier. Only in winter, when the foliage was less dense, was it possible to catch a glimpse of stonework at the top of the slope.
'There's nothing up there,' Terrel said, trying to hide the unease he felt at the idea of entering that realm of the dead.
Elam was not fooled, and grinned eagerly.
'If you're scared, we can take Alyssa with us,' he said. 'If there are any ghosts, she can talk to them and tell them we're friendly.'
'She won't want-'
'She's already agreed,' Elam stated triumphantly.
Terrel had no choice now. He knew that he would find it unbearably humiliating if Elam and Alyssa went without him - even though he didn't think they'd find anything interesting.
'All right,' he mumbled. 'When?'
'As soon as we can get away. There's a rumour going round that Ziolka might be replaced soon, and we don't know what the new man will be like.'
The implication that their limited freedom might be further curtailed was not lost on Terrel.
'We'd better have some adventures while we still can,' Elam added, grinning.

Chapter Four

Their chance came the very next day. The news brought from Makhaya was clearly preoccupying Ziolka and his staff, and as a result Terrel and his friends found themselves left to their own devices. Taking advantage of this piece of luck, they set off as if heading for the lake, then turned north and skirted round the edge of the estate until they reached the far side of the hill. It was here that a section of the iron fence had collapsed - which would allow them to climb the slope without any possibility of their being seen from the house. Elam led them through the long grass and bracken to the spot where a small landslide had gouged away a section of the hill, destroying part of the fence in the process. Here they paused, already warm from their circuitous walk and the steadily rising heat of the day.
'Are you sure you still want to do this?' Terrel asked, looking at the dense undergrowth in the forbidden territory ahead of them.
'Of course,' Elam replied scornfully. 'No one up there's going to be any danger to us.'
'That doesn't mean we have the right to disturb them.'
'I doubt they'll even know we're there. Being dead means you don't generally notice very much.'
'There are no bad feelings here,' Alyssa stated in her dreamy fashion.
Elam raised his eyebrows and stared at Terrel as if to say 'You see! Even she agrees.'
'You'd know that if you listened properly,' Alyssa added.
All Terrel could hear were the songs of a few birds, and the faint rustling of leaves.
'Come on then,' he said, knowing that this was an argument he couldn't win. He wasn't even sure he wanted to; a little of the excitement that was obviously affecting Elam had belatedly rubbed off on him.
They clambered over the newly fallen boulders and loose soil, passed the twisted ends of the remaining fence, and entered an alien world. Any human influence had been lost long ago; even if this had once been an orderly graveyard, it was a wilderness now. Elam led them in single file, threading their way through rowan, ash and blackthorn, while trying to avoid the worst of the gorse and brambles. Their progress was slow and frustrating, with thorns snagging on clothes and scratching skin. On several occasions the undergrowth became so thick that they had to backtrack and try another route, while various birds scolded them from the branches above.
'I hope this is worth it,' Terrel said as he carefully disentangled himself from the latest thorns caught on his sleeve.
'Me too,' Elam muttered. The adventure had evidently begun to lose some of its appeal for him.
'We're nearly there,' Alyssa said.
'Where?' Elam queried. 'Oh!'
He had not even seen the tomb until he practically bumped into it. The monument was built of stone and had once been intricately carved, but the surfaces had been eroded to such an extent that the decorations or lettering were now nothing more than a random pattern of indentations. Even so, its size and solidity were impressive, and once the three friends had edged their way past it, they could see several more tombs dotted about the hillside.
The air about them was now perfumed with the heady scent of summer flowers. There were lots of rose bushes, which had run wild everywhere, and several other blooms that Terrel could not identify but which all added bright flashes of colour to the scene. Amid this floral profusion, the tombs lay in a state of disrepair, but by the time the trio had gone a little further they had forgotten about the graves. As they neared the top of the hill the trees thinned out, and in a glade at the summit was the most curious building any of them had ever seen.
It consisted of a single storey, built low to the ground -which was why they had not been able to see it from below. The roof of the square structure supported what had evidently once been a semi-spherical dome of some kind. This dome had split open and a good part had presumably fallen in, leaving a jagged shape like the edges of a broken eggshell. It gave the place a desolated, neglected air.
'Funny sort of tomb,' Elam remarked.
They had stopped on the edge of the clearing, and even though nothing more than bracken and furze lay between them and the building, they were all a little reluctant to move closer.
'It must've been for someone important,' Terrel guessed. 'It's much bigger than any of the others.'