"Lee, John - Unicorn Saga 04 - The Unicorn Peace UC" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lee John)

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chaptep 1

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e was alone in darkness. Around him were the
sounds of rustling and sighing. Not darkness, he real-
ized; utter blackness. No nightmoon; not even a dusting
of stars. He stood stock still; did not dare to move as
the pricklings of alarm coursed up his spine. He reached
out with his senses. The sounds seemed to come from
everywhere at once, an omnipresent and suggestive sib-
ilance. There was a strong odor of loam and growing
things, but nothing more. Something brushed against
his face and he shied violently, would have cried out,
but no sound came. I'm dreaming, he thought. This is
nothing but a dream. It didn't help. He was afraid.

He forced himself to reach out. His hand encountered
stalks, or what he surmised were stalks. Moving up, he
felt leaves and then something fuzzy. It was well above
his head and he was a shade over eight feet tall. He
took a deep breath; only a dream. It reminded him of
the jungle area on the Island at the Center. Could the
Guardian have pulled him back, all these years later, to
punish him for his destruction of the Outlanders? The
Guardian was capable of it, but he knew, instinctively,
that he had not. With that came the realization of what
this place must be. He was out on the Alien Plain. With
the knowledge came light. Not centered, like a dawn,
or spilling down, like the sudden unveiling of the night-
moon, but a seeping in from all quarters.

He was mewed up in grasses, tall and seemingly im-

2 + JOHN LEE

penetrable. Good hunting country for wild warcats, he
thought, and shivered. There was menace in the air, its
source, in part, the feeling of being closed in. That, at
ieast, he could do something about. He nailed around
him, breaking the thick stalks, seeing the tops sag
abruptly. The amorphous light grew stronger. He started
forward, striking with his arms as if they were reversed
sickles. He noticed that he was wearing his habitual blue
robe. Could be worse, he thought with a flash of grim