"Naomi Novik - Temeraire 04 - Empire of Ivory" - читать интересную книгу автора (Novik Naomi)

gently in the wind and went billowing down after them, threads trailing from the torn edges. A moan went
through the other Prussian soldiers still clinging desperately to the harness, and after it followed a low
angry muttering in German.

Any gratitude the soldiers might have felt for their rescue from the siege of Danzig had since been
exhausted: three days flying through icy rain, no food but what they had crammed into their pockets in
those final desperate moments, no rest but a few hours snatched along a cold and marshy stretch of the
Dutch coast, and now this French patrol harrying them all this last endless night. Men so terrified might do
anything in a panic; many of them had still their small-arms and swords, and there were more than a
hundred of them crammed aboard, to the less than thirty of TemeraireтАЩs own crew.

Laurence swept the sky again with his glass, straining for a glimpse of wings, an answering signal. They
were in sight of shore, the night was clear: through his glass he saw the gleam of lights dotting the small
harbors all along the Scottish coast, and below heard the steadily increasing roar of the surf. Their flares
ought to have been plain to see all the way to Edinburgh; yet no reinforcements had come, not a single
courier-beast even to investigate.

тАЬSir, thatтАЩs the last of them,тАЭ Calloway said, coughing through the grey smoke that wreathed his head, the
flare whistling high and away. The powder-flash went off silently above their heads, casting the white
scudding clouds into brilliant relief, reflecting from dragon scales in every direction: Temeraire all in black,
the rest in gaudy colors muddied to shades of grey by the lurid blue light. The night was full of their wings:
a dozen dragons turning their heads around to look back, their gleaming pupils narrowing; more coming
on, all of them laden down with men, and the handful of small French patrol-dragons darting among them.

All seen in the flash of a moment, then the thunderclap crack and rumble sounded, only a little delayed,
and the flare dying away drifted into blackness again. Laurence counted ten, and ten again; still there was
no answer from the shore.

Emboldened, the French dragon came in once more. Temeraire aimed a swipe which would have
knocked the little Pou-de-Ciel flat, but his attempt was very slow, for fear of dislodging any more of his
passengers; their small enemy evaded with contemptuous ease and circled away to wait for his next
chance.

тАЬLaurence,тАЭ Temeraire said, looking round, тАЬwhere are they all? Victoriatus is in Edinburgh; he at least
ought to have come. After all, we helped him, when he was hurt; not that I need help, precisely, against
these little dragons,тАЭ he added, straightening his neck with a crackle of popping joints, тАЬbut it is not very
convenient to try and fight while we are carrying so many people.тАЭ

This was putting a braver face on the situation than it deserved: they could not very well defend
themselves at all, and Temeraire was taking the worst of it, bleeding already from many small gashes
along his side and flanks, which the crew could not bandage up, so cramped were they aboard.

тАЬOnly keep everyone moving towards the shore,тАЭ Laurence said; he had no better answer to give. тАЬI
cannot imagine the patrol will pursue us over land,тАЭ he added, but doubtfully; he would never have
imagined a French patrol could come so near to shore as this, either, without challenge; and how he
should manage to disembark a thousand frightened and exhausted men under bombardment he did not
like to contemplate.

тАЬI am trying; only they will keep stopping to fight,тАЭ Temeraire said wearily, and turned back to his work.
Arkady and his rough band of mountain ferals found the small stinging attacks maddening, and they kept