"Michael Moorcock - Corum 2 - The Queen of the Swords" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moorcock Michael)

right eye and for the somewhat grim twist to his lips. Then, too, there was the
alien hand which strayed often to his sword-hilt, visible when he pushed back
his scarlet robe.
This left hand bore six fingers on it and seemed encased in a jewelled
gauntlet (not so - the 'jewels' were the hand's skin). It was a sinister thing
and it had crushed the heart of the Knight of the Swords himself - my lord
Arioch of Chaos - and allowed Arkyn, Lord of Law, to return.
Corum certainly seemed a being bent on vengeance and he was, indeed, pledged
to avenge his murdered family by slaying Earl Glandyth-a-Krae, servant of King
Lyr-a-Brode of Kalenwyr, who ruled the South and the East of the continent once
ruled by the Vadhagh. And he was also pledged to the Cause of Law against the
Cause of Chaos (whose servant Lyr and his subjects were). This knowledge made
him sober and manly, but it also made his soul heavy. He was also unsettled by
the thought of the power grafted to his flesh - the Power of the Hand and the


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Eye.
The Margravine Rhalina was womanly and beautiful and her gentle face was
framed by thick, black tresses. She had huge dark eyes and red, loving lips.
She, too, was nervous of the sorcerous gifts of the dead wizard Shool, but she
tried not to brood upon them, just as earlier she had refused to brood upon the
loss of her husband, the Margrave, when he had been drowned in a shipwreck while
on his way to Lywrn-an-Esh, the land he served and which was gradually being
covered by the sea.
She found more to laugh at than did Corum and she was his comfort, for once
he had been innocent and had laughed a great deal, and he remembered this
innocence with longing. But the longing brought other memories - of his family
lying dead, mutilated, dishonoured on the sward outside Castle Erorn as it
burned and Glandyth brandished his weapons which were clothed in Vadhagh blood.
Such violent images were stronger than the images of his earlier, peaceful life.
They forever inhabited his skull, sometimes filling it, sometimes lurking in the
darker corners and merely threatening to fill it. And when his revenge-lust
seemed to wane, they would always bring it back to fullness. Fire, flesh and
fear; the barbaric chariots of the Denledhyssi - brass, iron and crude gold.
Short, shaggy horses and burly, bearded warriors in borrowed Vadhagh armour -
opening their red mouths and bellowing their insensate triumph, while the old
stones of Castle Erorn cracked and tumbled in the yelling blaze and Corum
discovered what hate and terror were. . .
Glandyth's brutal face would fill his dreams, dominating even the dead,
tortured faces of his parents and his sisters, so that he would often awake in
the middle of the night, fierce, tensed and shouting.
Then only Rhalina could calm him, stroking his ruined face and holding his
shaking body close to her own.
Yet, during those days of early summer, there were moments of peace and they
could ride through the woods of the mainland without fear, now, of the Pony
Tribes who had fled at the sight of the ship Shool had sent on the night of
their attack - a dead ship from the bottom of the sea, crewed by corpses and