"Laurell K. Hamilton - A Lick Of Frost" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hamilton Laurell K)

Upon the broken, crumbling battlement,

Upon the breathless starlit air,

Upon the star that marks the hidden pole;

fix every wandering thought upon

That quarter where all thought is done:

Who can distinguish darkness from the soul.
From "A Dialogue of Self and Soul" by W.B.Yeats

(The Winding Stair, 1933)




TO JONATHON, WHO WALKS THE STAIR WITH ME.



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS


The staff: Dark, Mary, and Sherry. Chaos would ensue without them.

Charles, who requested not to be Chief Security Officer as I put in the last acknowledgement, but to be
Head Grunt. I should have remembered that his highest official rank had been sergeant. Sergeants work
for a living; they are not officers.

My writing group; The Alternate Historians: Tom Drennan, Rett MacPhearson, Deborah Millitello,
Marella Sands, and Mark Sumner. Insanity ensues with or without them, but with them, it's much more
fun.


A LICK OF FROST
CHAPTER 1



I WAS SITTING IN AN ELEGANT CONFERENCE ROOM IN THE TOP of one of the gleaming
towers that make up part of downtown Los Angeles. The room's far wall was almost entirely of glass, so
that the view was nearly agoraphobic. They're predicting that if the big one, the big earthquake that is,
hits this section of L. A. will be eight to fifteen feet deep in glass. Anything on the streets below will be cut
to pieces, crushed, or trapped underneath an avalanche of glass. Not a pretty thought, but it was a day
for ugly thoughts.

My uncle Taranis, King of Light and Illusion, had pressed charges against three of my royal bodyguards.