"Janet Morris - Silistra 3 - Wind from the Abyss" - читать интересную книгу автора (Morris Janet E)

name. There, perhaps, lies the greatest irony of all, that I named myself anew
after Estri Hadrath diet Estrazi, who in reality I had once been. And perhaps
it is not irony at all, but an expression of Khys's humor, an implied
dissertation by him who structured my experiences, my very thoughts, for
nearly two years, until his audacity drove him to bring together once more
Sereth crill Tyris, past-Slayer, then the outlawed Ebvrasea, then arrar to the
dharen himself; Chayin rendi Inekte, cahndor of Nemar, co-cahndor of the Taken
Lands, chosen son of Tar-Kesa, and at that time Khys's puppet-vassal; and
myself, former Well-Keepress, tiask of Nemar, and lastly becoming the
chaldless outlaw who had come to judgment and endured ongoing retribution at
the dharen's hands. To test his besting, his power over owkahen, the
time-coming-to-be, did Khys put us together, all three, in his Day-Keepers'
cityтАФand from that moment onward, the Weathers of Life became fixed: siphoned
into a
XI
Xll
Janet E. Morris
singular future; sealed tight as a dead god in his mausoleum, whose every move
but brought him closer to the summed total, death. So did the dharen Khys
bespeak it, himself. . . .
In Mourning for the Unrecollected
The hulion hovered, wings aflap, at the window, butting its black wedge of a
head against the pane. Its yellow eyes glowed cruelly, slit-pupiled. Its white
fangs, gleaming, were each as long as my forearm.
I screamed.
Its tufted ears, flat against its head, twitched. Again and again, toothed
mouth open wide, it battered at the window, roaring.
Once more I screamed, and ran stumbling to the far wall of my prison. I
pounded upon the locked doors with my fists, pressing myself against the wood.
Sobbing, I turned to face it.
The beast's ears flickered at the sound. Those jaws, which could have snapped
me in half, closed. It cocked its head.
I trembled, caught in its gaze. I could retreat no farther. I sank to my
knees, moaning, against the door frame.
The beast gave one final snort. Those wings, with a spread thrice the length
of a tall man, snapped decisively, and it was gone.
When it was no more than a speck in the greening sky, I rose clumsily,
trembling, to collect the papers I had strewn across the mat in my terror.
They were the arrar Carth's papers, those he had forgotten in his haste to
attend his returning master's summons. : 1
2 Janet E. Morris
I knelt upon my hands and knees on the silvery pile, that I might gather them
up and replace them in the tas-sueded folder before he returned.
Foolish, I thought to myself, that I had so feared the hulion. It could not
have gotten in. I could not get out. It could not get in. Once I had thrown a
chair at that impervious clarity. The chair had splintered. With one stout
thala leg, as thick as my arm, had I battered upon that window. All that I had
accomplished was the transformation of chair into kindling. The hulion, I
chided myself, could have fared no better.
Hulions, upon occasion, have been known to eat man flesh. Hulions, furred and