"Barbara Hambly - Darwath 5 - Icefalcons Quest" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hambly Barbara)

could be seen talking with one of his scouts, a thin young man with white hair done up in elaborate crests
and braids, like an egret in mating time; the young man pointed back toward the hills. "Even without
wizardries, the camp is on high ground with no cover around it."
"We're talking about the Empty Lakes People. Two arrows."
"You're prejudiced," sniffed Cold Death. "On the other hand, it is the Empty Lakes People. I say dawn."
Despite the camp's favorable position, Vair na-Chandros seemed to share the Icefalcon's apprehensions.
The tracks of a hundred and thirty -five mounted warriors probably would have that effect, even if one
didn't know of Barking Dog's proclivity for midnight raids.
The men slung chains between the wagons and drove the sheep into the enclosure. From the eaves of
every wagon roof, and on poles set around the perimeter of the camp, the expedition's bald-shaved
priest hung demon-scares of glass and beads, such as the Icefalcon had seen on the waists and necks
and house eaves of nearly everyone in the southern lands.
Most of these amulets were of only limited efficacy-southerners being overly concerned with demons,
which could, at most, frighten you in a dark place-but the Icefalcon had been aware all day of a faint
nervous edginess, an awareness of being watched.
From the slight rise where he and Cold Death lay, he observed the men as they erected a large square
tent against the side of the biggest blue-roofed wagon. Still he saw nothing of any mage, or any thing to
tell him of Vair's intent. "Do they seek to blot out light from within?" he breathed as they draped the tent
inside and out with layer after layer of black cloth. "Will they drape their fires, too, that they be not seen?"
The matter was overseen by a stocky white man, bald-shaved as Bektis' clones and the priest were, but
with a small trim fair mustache. He had the animal stride of one trained to fighting, and the Icefalcon
recognized, when he took off his heavy leather jacket, the triple scarlet belt around his waist and chest
that in the southern lands marked a professional Truth-Finder.
He passed into the tent, and came out, and went in again. When he emerged a second time, Vair crossed
to him and spoke to him for some time, then gave instruction of some kind to a thin tall elderly man with
long white mustaches, who seemed by the ribbons on his clothing and the gilded spikes of his helm to be
his second in command.
White Mustaches shook his head and shook his head again. Whatever it was that Vair willed him to do,
after speaking to the Truth-Finder, at last he assented. As the men were building their cook fires and
unrolling blankets the Icefalcon saw him going about the camp, pausing now by one warrior, now by
another, speaking to them with his arm around their shoulders, nodding, his face grave. This Vair did,
too.
The bison at the foot of the hills duly stampeded into the distance. The hunters came back to camp with
three deer. The sky turned a thousand livid shades of gold and salmon, mad ensanguined glories that had
begun in the Year of Two Earthquakes, the year before the Summerless Year.
Gil had explained to the Icefalcon that the colors of the sky had to do with the world growing colder and
the movement of the Ice in the North, and why there had been no summer the year before last, but her
explanation had left the Icefalcon with little more than a conviction that the Ancestors in charge of the sky
had inexplicably become fond of reds and golds.
As for the Ice in the North, it had always moved a few feet, sometimes many yards, a year. What was
the point of telling over the memories of one's Ancestors, if not to know things like that?
Darkness came. The men in the camp were experienced in warfare and stayed away from the fires
themselves, even with the winds that quested the prairie like hungry ghosts.
The Icefalcon saw them glance, every now and then, at the square black tent against the side of the tall
wagon, from which no light issued. Sometimes after so doing a soldier would make a sign of blessing in
the air.
In the coulee the brush flickered in little stirrings against the flow of the wind. Something like smoke
curled close to the earth among the cottonwoods, and above the glitter of the water there, but when one
looked at it straight there was nothing.
A crack of saffron showed where the tent flap and inner curtains were raised. The reflections sparked a