"Lyndon Hardy - The Master of Five Magics" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hardy Lyndon)

fenders' longbows, huddled in tight balls, exposing no arm or a leg as a target.

With each volley of the rockthrowers, the answering fire from the manchicolations and loopholes in
the castle's walls would cease, and the men in the field would creep a little closer, their
scaling ladders and belfries dragging behind them. From high on the keep, Alodar could see that,
long before the clusters reached the outer wall, they would converge into a single continuous ring
of attackers.

"Yes, it would take a large force to break through to us," he finally agreed, "but Iron Fist has
never fallen to assault."

"It takes more than stone and iron to defend this mound," the sergeant said. "Muscle pulls tight
the bowstrings and swings the broadswords, and at last muster we numbered fewer than two hundred
fighting men. Two hundred for over half a mile of wall."

He shook his head with lips pulled into a tight line of disapproval. "A mere two hundred, because
Vendora wanted to flaunt her might along the southern border. Almost every garrison in Procolon
stripped to nothing, so that those petty border kingdoms think to stop their raids and return to
bickering among themselves. Hah, I wonder if those raids seem so important to her now? Fully
provisioned, we could withstand anything that Bandor could throw at us. As it is, only the great
height and thickness of these walls have saved her crown and pretty neck this long."

"But her miscomputation was no worse than mine," Alodar said, spreading his palms outward. "How
would anyone but a sorcerer surmise that one of her most faithful vassals would suddenly lose his
reason and plunge through that gap hi the west, just when she was here? The gates clanged shut on
noble and craftsman alike who happened to be here, and none claim to have foreseen it."

"Yes, it is strange," the sergeant said. "The ferocity of the attack, the way he drives his men on
with no regard for their exhaustion. I have heard it whispered about more than once at night that
Bandor has lost not his reason but his will. Like a mere craftsman, he has been possessed."

Alodar blinked with surprise, but before he could reply be was interrupted by one of the
observers.

"He has found a spot and is signaling for us to proceed."

"Sweetbalm, luck is with us today," the sergeant exclaimed, jumping his thoughts back to the task
at hand. "Start bringing up the beams and lashings."

Alodar stepped to the stand and released the splinter from the clamp. Holding it at arm's length,
be dropped his hand a fraction of an inch. The basket sank correspondingly, and the wheel again
started to spin. He retraced his steps, and it shot across the sky to hover directly overhead.
Finally, as he lowered the splinter, it settled gently onto the floor of the bartizan. Again the
giant crank was a blur as the wheel spun, but it turned not nearly as fast as when Morwin had
first propelled it.

Alodar rapidly recited another incantation, virtually indistinguishable from the first. When he