"Elizabeth Haydon - Rhapsody 5 - Elegy for a Lost Star" - читать интересную книгу автора (Haydon Elizabeth)

"What in the name of every ridiculous evil god that never existed
happened here?"
An ugly light came into the giant Sergeant's amber eyes.
"Birthday party got a little out o' hand, sir," he said, his voice sharp
with sarcasm. "So sorry. Won't 'appen again." As the cords in the king's
neck tightened, Grunthor tossed the cart aside. "You might want ta pose
that question to that 'arpy glassmaker you brought in 'ere to build the
tower windows. Oh, no, wait! Can't do that."
 The king's eyes narrowed in rage that was tempered with panic. "Why
not?"
The Sergeant crouched down and grasped another massive rock, lifted,
and heaved it angrily into the dray sled.
"Because Oi cut the bitch's head off'er shoulders," he snarled as the
small boulder bounced against the earthen floor with a resounding thud.
"Then Oi tossed it in a crate and shipped it back to the assassin's guild in
Yarim, from whence she had come in the first place." He watched without
sympathy as the fury in his sovereign's eyes muted into realization. " 'Afs
right, sir, the artisan you 'ired in Sorbold to build yer bloody glass tower
turned out to be the mother of all assassins, the mistress of the Raven's
Guild." He wiped his forehead with the back of his wrist and indicated the
destruction around him. "This was the lit'le present she left just for you.
We're findin' all sorts of other traps, lots o' nice surprises-"
"The Child?" Achmed demanded, sounding as if he were strangling.
Grunthor exhaled deeply. "Safe, for now," he said more calmly, the
latent anger in his voice gone. "Oi combed every inch of the tunnel down
to 'er chamber; appears that it was broached, but only a few feet of it.
The assassin didn't 'ave time to get down there, by sheer bleedin' luck.
But if Oi was you, sir, Oi'd be careful not to insult any ridic'lous gods that
never existed, as they apparently been watchin' yer back in a major way."
"Now there's a terrifying thought." Achmed crossed the broken hallway
and stopped before the thinning pile of rubble. "How?"
"Picric acid. Apparently she 'ad it shipped in from the guild while you
were gone. In a liquid state it's stable, but explodes when it dries. She 'ad
it annealed into the glass of the dome; kept a wooden cover over it ta
keep the sun off. But Shaene and Rhur-both dead, by the by-pulled the
cover; the sun 'it it square on, the 'eat dried the enamel, and-well, you can
see the rest." The Sergeant ran the toe of his enormous boot through the
grit of the floor.
"Except the Sickness-lots o' dysentery and a lot of Bolg bleedin' out
their eves. That seemed to come with it."
Without a word the Firbolg king turned and left the scene of the
destruction.
"Oh, by the way sir," called Grunthor as Achmed disappeared around
the corner, "welcome 'ome."
The tunnel down to the chamber of the Sleeping Child began in Achmed's
bedchamber, its entrance secreted in a trapped chest at the foot of his
bed. It took him only a moment to ascertain that each of the guardian
traps, deadly locks he had set himself, had been serially disarmed, their
triggers sprung with an expertise he had not witnessed since his own
assassin training at the hands of an undisputed master a lifetime before.