"Jane Lindskold - Lord Demon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lindskold Jane)

for our comings and goings. The son has not yet decided whether to give the bottle to his wife or to keep it on the table, wh
he enjoys looking at it. I had no opinion at the moment, and so stayed out of the matter.
Letting myself out of the garage's side door, I strolled off in the directionтАФseveral blocks awayтАФof Tony's Pizza Heave
It was a starry but moonless night, crisp and breezy. I knew that something was wrong when, as I passed one of the tow
small parks, I scented blood and pizza on the air. And demon.
I faded. I moved with absolute silence. All of the ways I have learned to inflict death and pain over the years rose up an
came with me. At that moment, I was one of the most dangerous things on the planet.
. . . And I saw the tree and them.
They had hung him from it, upside down, from a lower branch and punctured him in many places, whence they drank. W
their nasty little teeth, they tore off pieces on which they dined.
I drew nearer. There were six altogether around poor O'Keefe's dead and dangling carcass. They were two feet tall,
yellow-eyed, portly, and solid. Their complexions ran from green through gray to yellowish. Their claws were short and sh
discarded pizza box lay on the grass nearby.
"How do you like your human?" one asked, talking around some slobbersome gobbet.
"Better than pizza," replied another.
"Hey, try a slice with some pepperoni before you knock it," said a third.
I raised my hands, appearing within the circle of fire which now rose about us. From their waists down, all six of them w
turned to stone. They squeaked like guinea pigs and, one by one, their gazes were drawn to my blazing countenance.
"Uh-oh. It's one of the big guys," said the nearest.
"Hey, boss," ventured another. "We can't pay the proper obsequies with our legs all stiff like this. Good joke, though. Ha-
Turn back now?"
I reached out and picked up the one who had just spoken, his voice going silent as the rest of him stiffened. Then I squee
enlarging my hands until I held but fistfuls of gravel. These I tossed into the air, watching them burst into flame and fall as
small firestorm, the ashes burning away in a small wind that rose as they neared the earth. I gave the creature no possibilit
any sort of regeneration.
"Hey, we sorry," cried one.
"Yeah. What we do?" said another.
I reached out and pulverized the second one, making the world a richer place by its absence. The others squealed again.
"Silence! I want stupid demon talk I ask for talk!" I ordered. "You be shit-brained spoilers of everything you touch. Not w
nothing most of the time."
"Right, we not important at all," agreed another. "Little shits, like you say. You one of the big bosses. We no mean get in
way. Let us go. We be your slaves forever and ever. You say 'shit,' we eat shit, you laughтАФ just like that. Want us hit ene
rub feet, bring wineтАФ whatever you want."
I blackened him to ash, and the others cowered.
The fourth finally turned his head toward O'Keefe.
"The man," he said at last. "You do this because we kill the manтАФno?"
"At last," I said, "someone asks why."
"Yes, sir," said the fourth. "He your human?"
"That's right."
"Maybe your servant many years?"
"You begin to understand."
"We no know. We just little shit-brains, like you say. If you be little dickheads like us, you still wouldn't destroy great lord
property. May be shithead, but not fools. We sorry."
"Yeah," said the fifth. "We sorry big bunch now we know. Let us go andтАФ"
I turned him to dust and watched the tiny fire tornado he became burn itself to nothing. I looked back at the fourth one, w
looked quickly away, saying nothing.
"You are smarter and more polished than the others. As Confucius said, the form is more important than the content. Yo
knew O'Keefe not and can feel nothing for him, yet you know what is right to say of this man."
"Me too!" said the sixth (and remaining) demon, I ignored him.
"You cannot completely help being what you are," I said. "Yet you have dwelled in palaces," I said to the fourth, "and you