"Daniel Keys Moran - Armageddon Blues" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moran Daniel Keys)

The child was five Coldtimes, and she knew no better; the nighttime glow of the Burn beckoned, and she
went.

The Clan of Hammel, migrating through the Big Desert by the Waters, pressed on. It was death to enter
the Burns. They knew they would never see Marchand again.

Three days later Marchand d'Loria y ken Hammel staggered out of the darkness, past the Clan's sentries
and into the ring of campfires. Dilann, her daughter, was clutched in her arms.

Marchand died the next morning.

To the awe of the entire Clan, Marchand's daughter survived. Before Dilann's sixth birthday, the Clan, or
what was left of the Clan after the desert trek, had reached the forests by the Big Waters of the North
Coast.

What was left of the Clan prospered. Dilann became known as Dilann d'Arsennette, the lady of the fires.
Only one of Dilann's three children survived to adulthood. All three of Dilann's children were mutant, as
was to be expected of the offspring of one who had survived the banked fires of Armageddon.

The child who lived was a girl, Rhia, tall and fair and strong.

Her eyes were bright silver.

Dilann's grandchildren, every one, had silver eyes.

DATELINE 1917 GREGORIAN.


Verdun, France: the western front.

When Georges was a younger manтАФnot a young man, no, but youngerтАФthe world had gotten together
for a while and declared a social event called the Great War, the War to End All Wars, and later, World
War One. (Rumors to the contrary, there was no American aviator named Snoopy, famed for his duels
with the Red Baron. That all came later.)

Georges Mordreaux, through some bad timing on his part and the jealousy of the husband of a wife,
found himself in the middle of this silly conflict, yes sir.

What should have been his last thought, as the German soldier came up out of the rain-soaked trench,
bayonet in hand, was That's amuddy bayonet, as though it could possibly make any difference whether
he was killed with a clean bayonet or a dirty one. (Georges was a perfectionist of sorts; even when it was
in style, some years in his future, he refused to drink his milk out of a dirty glass.)

Georges came to some hours laterтАФso the overhead sun, peeking cautiously through gray clouds,
informed him. He was being dragged away from the front. All around he saw the rest of the French army,
retreating methodically and with great haste. Georges's corporal, Henri, who was nineteen and who,
Georges later heard, became a hero taking a hill that nobody gave a damn about anyway, saw that
Georges's eyes were open, and motioned to the soldier holding Georges's right arm to drag him the rest
of the way to his feet. Georges stumbled a few steps over the ragged, shell-torn ground, before gaining
his balance.