"Shirley Meier & S. M. Stirling - Fifth Millenium 01 - Shadow's Daughter" - читать интересную книгу автора (Meier Shirley)

be careful, even when you walk with me."

"I will, Papa." She held tight to his hand and walked onto the
dusty grass of the park as if she were grown up, instead of
running ahead like she wanted to.

The park was a small patch of grass with a few trees along the
streets and the stream, and lilacs around the Shrine. Across the
park the Sneykh tributary gurgled to itself, on its way down to
Chas Lake. It was a shallow creek cascading from the Dark
Lord's Temple in the northern cliff wall of the City. The Sneykh
was usually dirty because the Dark Lord's priests sacrificed into
the water. The other stream, the Byeliey, ran out of the
Ladyshrine on the south cliff wall, and was carefully kept clean.

"Tell me the best story again, please," Megan said. Papa sat
down on one of the wood benches of the shrine and took her on
his lap, and Megan hugged him looking over his shoulder at the
white fountain with the statue of Koru. She's so beautiful, she
thought.

"Szyzka Lane," Papa began, "is a street with Middle Quarter
ways of thinking, hanging on to the First Quarter's skirts with its
fingernails so it doesn't slide any farther down the rift. It's the
sort of street that, every morning, blinks its shutters, looks
around, and wonders vaguely where its grandeur has
disappeared to overnight. It's the sort of place where quiet
people live quiet lives, away from the notice of the Prafetatla
above and the thieves below. We have nothing that either of
them wish to steal and when the riots come, we pull in our heads
and wait until they're gone. We didn't always have riots,
Megan-mi."

"Tell me, Papa." She didn't understand it all, but she liked
sitting on his lap, hugging him when he had time like this, on a
rest-day at Hand'send. She loved feeling his big arms around her
so she'd be safe and cozy.

"The Zarizan, the Young DragonLord, Ranion, is the only
Heir. His father the Dragon, the Woyvode, was harsh, ruthless,
the very spirit of Prafetatla before he grew old and weak, but he
cared what happened to us, here and in the other lands. The
Kievir nearest the young Lord, Dark One notice him, cares for
himself and his own zight, or pride, and nothing else. When the
Old Dragon fell ill the first time, the Four-days War happened
with the Thanes. No protection was offered us, no retaliation for
people persecuted. That was when pogrom began along the
Thanish borderтАФ"

"Which is why