"A. E. Merritt - Dwellers in the mirage" - читать интересную книгу автора (Merritt A. E)

glowing.

"By Zarda!" he said. "Whatever you have forgotten, it is not your sword


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play! A warrior you left us, a warrior you have returned!"

He dropped upon a knee, bent his head: "Pardon, Dwayanu! I have been
sent for you. It is time to go."

A heady exaltation began to take me. I dropped the swords, and clapped
him on the shoulder. He took it like an accolade. We passed through the
corridor of the spearsmen and over the threshold of the great doorway.
There was a thunderous shout.

"Dwayanu!"

And then a blaring of trumpets, a mighty roll of drums and the clashing
of cymbals.

Drawn up in front of the palace was a hollow square of Uighur horsemen,
a full five hundred of them, spears glinting, pennons flying from their
shafts. Within the square, in ordered ranks, were as many more. But now
I saw that these were both men and women, clothed in garments as
ancient as those I wore, and shimmering in the strong sunlight like a
vast multicoloured rug of metal threads. Banners and bannerets, torn
and tattered and bearing strange symbols, fluttered from them. At the
far edge of the square I recognized the old priest, his lesser priests
flanking him, mounted and clad in the yellow. Above them streamed a
yellow banner, and as the wind whipped it straight, black upon it
appeared the shape of the Kraken. Beyond the square of horsemen,
hundreds of the Uighurs pressed for a glimpse of me. As I stood there,
blinking, another shout mingled with the roll of the Uighur drums.

"The King returns to his people!" Barr had said. Well, it was like
that.

A soft nose nudged me. Beside me was the black stallion. I mounted him.
The Uighur captain at my heels, we trotted down the open way between
the ordered ranks. I looked at them as I went by. All of them, men and
women, had the pale blue-grey eyes; each of them was larger than the
run of the race. I thought that these were the nobles, the pick of the
ancient families, those in whom the ancient blood was strongest. Their
tattered banners bore the markings of their clans. There was exultation
in the eyes of the men. Before I had reached the priests. I had read
terror in the eyes of many of the women.