"Mithgar - Hel's Crucible - 02 - Into The Fire" - читать интересную книгу автора (McKiernan Dennis L)

Another mile down the road they found a frozen horse, one leg broken.

"Hmm," mused Loric. "A mystery this."

"How so?" asked Tip.

"If this is the frozen man's horse, then he went onward instead of turning back toward Dael."

"He might have been confused," said Beau. "Lost in the storm. Or so chill that he had no wits."

"Mayhap," growled Bekki, "yet I think instead he was fleeing."

Tip's eyes widened. "Fleeing? Fleeing what?"

Bekki gestured at the animal. "See the frozen hair? Lather turned to ice, I think. The horse mayhap was running when he broke a leg. And who would run a horse on ice but a fleeing man? Too, its throat is not cut, and so I ask, who would leave behind a broken-legged horse alive and in pain? Someone fleeing, that's who. Someone running in panic."

"Yes, but still you haven't answered Tip's question," said Beau. "What was the man fleeing from?"

Bekki shrugged and looked southeasterly along the road and then muttered, "Mayhap he was fleeing the city of Dael."

The next day they came upon another frozen man, and then another, and then three together, all of them covered with snow and ice and frost. And as the five rode onward, more and more frozen corpses were encountered, the road littered with the cold deadЧmen, "women, childrenЧsome clearly had been travelling afoot while others had been rid ing, and still more were found frozen in carts and wains horses lying blizzard-slain and rock-hard as well. And al were heading northwesterly along the road, a road which led to Mineholt North and nowhere else.

As the five now rode onward, Loric turned to Phais "Refugees?"

She nodded grimly. "Bekki I deem grasped the truth o it when he saw the very first man; he was fleeing the cit; of Dael, as I ween were these others."

'"But what's in Dael?" asked Beau, looking about in trepidation. "I mean, why would they run?"

Loric turned up his gloved hands. "We cannot answer that question until we arrive, Beau."

"Perhaps we ought to skirt the city altogether," said Tip "I mean, if something perilous is thereЧa Gargon or suchЧ"

"Oh my," gasped Phais, looking at Loric, "mayhap in deed it is a Draedan."

"Gargon, Draedan, Ghath," growled Bekki, "we shouk draw near enough to know." He gestured southward "Somewhere my sire and the rest of the Allies hie after Squam, and we need to warn all if a Ghath strides Dael."

Reluctantly Loric nodded. "Bekki is right. We need toe see for ourselves what may lie therein. And if needs be warn Coron and DelfLord and Chieftain and Prince alike.

Tip pulled his bow from its saddle scabbard and took an arrow in hand. "Fetch out your sling and bullets, Beauf we're riding into Dael."

They sat atop the hill and looked eastward down the fall of land toward where the city of Dael should have been Yet they saw nought of what they expectedЧa riverport town surrounded by high stone wallsЧbut a mass of snow covered rubble instead. Not a whole structure stood, though here and there a damaged wall or stark chimney reared up where a building had been. Broken battlements surrounded the wrack, the high stone bulwark breached, ruptured, smashed in a hundred places, cleft with great wide gaps. And a chill wind swirled through the gapes and among the ruins beyond.

"Lor'," breathed Beau, surveying the destruction, "what could have caused this? The Horde?"

Phais shook her head. "Nay. They were in flight, our allies after. They had not the time to do such."

"A Gargon?" asked Tip, his heart thudding.