"George R. R. Martin - In the House of the Worm" - читать интересную книгу автора (Martin George R R)

mumbling its death rattle, when Annelyn had found it. The boy had watched, terrified, while the creature's
six gangling limbs trembled fitfully (and briefly) and the moist sunken pools of flesh that the grouns had
instead of eyes roamed back and forth, without purpose. When the carcass had been quite still, Annelyn
had charred it with his torch, then dragged it back to the burrows of the yaga-la-hai.

Groff shook his head. ├втВм┼УThey seldom come past the grounwall,├втВмтАв the bronze knight said. ├втВм┼УDuring
the last years of my hunting, they seldom came at all. The Meatbringer must truly go deep.├втВмтАв He
smiled. ├втВм┼УBut so shall we."

"We?├втВмтАв It was Vermyllar.

Groff nodded. ├втВм┼УI am not averse to help, and Annelyn's idea is a good one. We will learn the
Meatbringer's secrets before we kill him.├втВмтАв He waved his ax in a broad gesture. ├втВм┼УDown the stair."
The doorway loomed pitch-black and ominous, and Annelyn began to feel nervous. It was one thing to
impress Riess and Vermyllar with his bold plan to descend to groun country, but no doubt in time they
would have talked him out of it. Perhaps the three of them would have fallen upon the Meatbringer here
├втВмтАЭbeyond the light, true, but only a short way, and Annelyn had been here before. But to actually go
down...

It was Vermyllar who protested. ├втВм┼УNo,├втВмтАв he said. ├втВм┼УI'm not going any deeper than this.├втВмтАв He
looked at Annelyn. ├втВм┼УYou kill the Meatbringer, or Groff can kill him, or Riess if he can, but he'll be just
as dead without me along as with me. I'm going back."

"Down the stair,├втВмтАв Groff said sternly. ├втВм┼УI'll have no desertions."

Vermyllar stood fast. ├втВм┼УMy grandfather is a son of the Manworm,├втВмтАв he said. ├втВм┼УI do as I
please.├втВмтАв To Annelyn and Riess he made the sign of the worm, then with his torch in hand he started
back the way they had come.

Groff made no move to stop him. ├втВм┼УDown the stair,├втВмтАв he repeated after Vermyllar's light had
vanished behind a curve of the wall. They hurried to obey.

Down. The worst of all possible directions. Down. Where the grouns lay. Down. Away from light. Yet
they went, and Annelyn remembered that even at the best of times, he disliked stairs. He was lucky, at
that. Riess, holding the torch, had to go first.

At the foot of the stair was a narrow landing with two bricked-in doors, another gaping entrance to the
still, cold shaft, and another stair. Down. There was another stair beyond that. Down. And another
beyond that.

Finally they emerged. ├втВм┼УPut out the torch,├втВмтАв Groff said. Riess complied.

They stood clustered on one end of a slender metal bridge that spanned a cavernous chamber a hundred
times the size of the Chamber of Obsidian. Far, far above was a vast roof of glass panes (each of them
the size of the one behind the Manworm's pit, Annelyn thought) set in a latticework of black metal. The
sun loomed over it, with its oceans of fire and plains of ash, so they did not need the torch.

There were other bridges, Annelyn saw├втВмтАЭfive of them; slim threads that swung from one black wall to
the other, above a pool of some sluggish liquid that stirred and made noises just below their feet. And
there was a sixth, or had been, but now it was shattered, and the twisted ribbon of its span hung down