"Meredith Ann Pierce - Firebringer 2 - Dark Moon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pierce Meredith Ann)

a place in the Ring of Warriors. Upon the death of his royal grandsire, Jan had seen his own
father declared the king and himselfтАФbarely half-grownтАФmade battle-prince.
During time of peace, Korr the king would have ruled the herd, but because the unicorns
considered themselves at war, it was to Jan, their prince, that the Law gave leadership. His
peopleтАЩs bitterest enemies, the wyverns, dwelt far to the north, in sacred hills stolen from the
unicorns many generations past. Vengeful gryphons held the eastern south, barely a dayтАЩs flight
from the great Vale in which the exiled herd now made its home. And hostile goat-footed pans
inhabited the dense woodlands bordering the Vale.
Such were the uneasy times during which this young prince came to power. I am his chronicler,
and yestereve I spoke of his warriorтАЩs initiation, during which the goddess Alma marked him,
tracing a slim silver crescent upon his brow and setting a white star on one heel in token that one
day he must become her Firebringer, long prophesied to end his peopleтАЩs exile and lead them
triumphant back to the Hallow Hills.
Tonight, I resume my tale little more than a year after JanтАЩs accession: it was the afternoon of SummerтАЩs
Eve. The morrow would be Solstice Day, when thriving spring verged into summer. Jan stood on a
lookout knoll high above the Vale, rump to the rolling valley below, black eyes scanning the Pan Woods
spilling green-dark to the far horizon, beyond which the Gryphon Mountains rose, flanking the Summer
Sea.

1.
Solstice
Cloudless sky soared overhead, blue as the sweep of a gryphonтАЩs wing. Breeze snuffed and gusted
through the dark unicornтАЩs mane, warm with the scent of cedars sprawling the slope below. Sun hung
westering. Jan shifted one cloven heel and sighed. He was not on watchтАФno sentries needed this time of
year: gryphons never raided past first spring. But the herdтАЩs losses had been heavy that season in fillies
and foals carried off by formelsтАФthe great blue gryphon femalesтАФto feed their ravenous newly hatched
young.
Brooding, the prince of the unicorns surveyed the folds of the Pan Woods before him. It was not the
number of recent raids which troubled him most, but their manner. Always in springs past, wingcats had
come singly, at most in mated pairs. This year, though, many of the raids had included more than two
gryphons. A few had even consisted solely of tercelsтАФmale gryphonsтАФno female at all. Jan snorted:
clearly at least some of the springтАЩs forays had had little to do with a formelтАЩs need to feed her chicks.
тАЬAlma,тАЭ the young prince whispered, and the wind stole the name of the goddess from his teeth. тАЬAlma,
tell me what I must do to defend my people.тАЭ
Only silence replied. JanтАЩs skin twitched. With his long flywhisk tail, he lashed at the sweatsipper that
had alighted on his withers. Vivid memory came to him of how, only the year before, the goddess had
marked him with fire, granted him the barest glimpse of his destinyтАФand spoken not a word to him since.
Standing alone on the lookout knoll, he felt doubt chill him to the bone. He wondered now if the voice of
Alma and her vision had been nothing but a dream.
A twig snapped in the undergrowth behind him. Jan wheeled to spot a half-grown warrior emerging
from the trees. Pale dusty yellow with dapples of grey, the other shook himself, head up, horn high. Jan
backed and sidled. Like a fiercely burning eye, the copper sun floated closer to the distant horizon. The
other snorted, ramped, then whistled a challenge, and the prince sprang to meet him. Horns clattered in
the stillness as they fenced. A few more furious strokes, then the pair of them broke off. Jan tossed his
head. Grinning, the dappled half-grown shouldered against him. The prince eyed his battle-companion
Dagg.
тАЬPeace!тАЭ Dagg panted. тАЬWhat brings you brooding up onto the steeps so close to dusk?тАЬ
Jan shook himself and nickered, not happily.
тАЬGryphons.тАЭ
Again his shoulder-friend snorted, as though the very thought of gryphons stank.