"Chris Roberson - Companion to Owls" - читать интересную книгу автора (Roberson Chris)

The necromancer seemed to tense, and his finger tightened on the pistolet's trigger. Before the hammer
fell, though, his eyes suddenly went wide, and he screamed like one of the revenants he'd exorcised over
the previous days; an inhuman, primal howl. He staggered to one side, arms flailing before him, and fell
over the side of the ledge, tumbling down to the Roof, hundreds and hundreds of feet below. He
disappeared from view into a foggy haze, as clouds passed below.
North was still on his knees, the Draconce still in his gore-coated hands, and he could not imagine what
had come over the necromancer. What had saved the Roofman, in the last instant--fortune, or the
providence of unknown gods? Then his nostrils caught a musty scent of mould and rot, and he could hear
on the thin wind a tune he thought he might have known, when he was very young, and bore another
man's name. Wispy cirrus clouds, almost like veils, passed by the corner of his eye, and then he was left
alone.
****
North descended to the Roof, a slow journey of days, back to his shack on the leeward side of the
western cupola. He cleaned and polished the Draconce, and set it up on the mantle over his stove. He
watched it, in the flickering light of the guttering candles, and that night, he dreamt of the woman of the
high steeple in her gauzy veils, and, for a brief time, at least, he wasn't alone. m

(c)Copyright 2006 by Chris Roberson