"Greg Keyes - Age of Unreason 3 - Empire of Unreason" - читать интересную книгу автора (Keyes J Gregory)

you want?тАЭ he demanded. тАЬWhat do you devils really want?тАЭ

тАЬOnly the one thing I asked. Have I ever asked for anything else? Any reward
for my services?тАЭ

тАЬIt isnтАЩt one thing. ItтАЩs everything. I know you now.тАЭ

тАЬI doubt that. But, very well, if you insist on dying.тАЭ

Peter pulled something from his pocketтАФa small cube with a circular
depression in the top. It was humming, a single clear note.

The angel paused. тАЬWhat is that?тАЭ

тАЬSomething a friend gave me. A wise friend, as it turns out.тАЭ He placed a
sphere the size of a musket ball in the depression, and a shriek cut through the
fabric of the universe. Peter felt it in his bones. The angel felt it, too, and
dripped fire into PeterтАЩs veins, even as a wind came that tore it apart, each
feather dissolving into a line of smoke.

The death of the angel did not stop the pain. A wave of agony crested over
PeterтАЩs head and dragged him under; and suddenly he had no weight at all, as
if he were falling from a height with no end.



file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Keyes,_J_Gregory_-_[Age_of_Unreason_03]_-_Empire_of_Unreason_(V1)_[html].html (5 of 427)22-12-2006 16:07:31
EMPIRE OF UNREASON




Red Shoes jerked awake to find himself already on his feet. He swayed there
for a moment, trying to remember where he was, but the otherworld sight was
still wrapped around him, making the trees, the earth he stood on, the stars
themselves too strange to recognize.

He found his pipe and a pinch of Ancient Tobacco and lit it from an ember that
had strayed from the remains of the fire. The warm, musky smoke
strengthened the breath in him and curled from his nose. Gradually the world
came clear.

He was Red Shoes, war prophet and miracle maker of the Choctaw people, and
he stood on an earthen mound in the Natchez country, near the Great Water
Road. The moundтАЩs top was as broad as a village, and around it lay swamp, the
underworld kissing the earth from beneath.

A soft cough came behind him, and he turned to regard Skin Eater.

Skin Eater was a Natchez man, a descendant of the Sun, his dark skin mottled