"02.Planeswalker" - читать интересную книгу автора (McGough Scott)

At first Urza couldn't distinguish the two forces, as
an observer might not have been able to distinguish his
army from Mishra's. But as he looked, the lines of battle
became clear. One side had its back against the cavern and
was fighting for the freedom of the plains beyond the
hollow plateau. The other formed an arc as it emerged from
the narrow defile that was the only way to those plains,
meaning to crush its enemy against the cliffs. Blinding
flashes and plumes of dense smoke erupted everywhere,
testaments to the desperation with which both sides fought.
Urza strained his eyes. One force had to be the Thran,
but which? And what power opposed them?
During the moments that Urza pondered, the defile force
scored a victory. A swarm of their smaller artifacts
stormed the behemoth that anchored the enemy's center. It
went down in a whirlwind of flame that drove both forces
back. The defile force regrouped quicker and took a bite
from the cavern force's precious ground. A mid-guard cadre
from the defile brought rays of white light to bear on the
behemoth's smoldering hulk. Soot rained and the hulk glowed
red.
Caught up in the vision, Urza began to count, "One . .
. two . . ."
The hulk's flanks burst, and all-too-familiar segmented
wires uncoiled. Tipped with scythes, the wires slashed
through the defile cadre, winnowing it by half, but too
late. The Thran pow-erstones completed the destruction of
the Phyrexian behemoth.
Millennia after the battle's dust had settled, Urza
clenched his jaws together in a grimly satisfied smile. Ebb
and flow were obvious, now that he'd identified the Thran
and their goal: to drive the Phyrexians into the cavern
where, presumably, they could be annihilated.
It was, as the Argoth battle between him and Mishra had
been, a final battle. Retreat was not an option for the
Phyrexians, and the Thran offered no quarter. Urza lost
interest in his own time as the shadow war continued. The
Phyrexians assembled behind their last behemoth, charged
the Thran line on its right flank and very nearly broke
through. But the Thran held nothing back. As ants might
swarm a fallen bit of fruit, they converged upon the
Phyrexian bulge.
Again, it became impossible to distinguish one force
from the other.
Urza counted to one hundred and ten, by which time
there was no movement within the shadows. When he reached
one-hundred and twelve, the shadows brightened to desert-
noon brilliance. Reflexively, Urza shielded his eyes. When
he lowered his hand, there was only snow. The pain in his
skull was gone. He entered the cavern thoroughly sobered by