"Karl Edward Wagner - Ravens Eyrie" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wagner Karl Edward)

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Raven's Eyrie
Karl Edward Wagner




Prologue
The child awoke at the sound of her own scream. A thin
scream, imbued with the fever that parched her throat. And still a
scream tight with the terror of her dream. Its echo hung on the
bare-timbered walls of her narrow room as she bolted from her
damp pillow.
Her fever-bright eyes stared wide with fear as they darted
about the room's shadowy corners. But the phantoms of her
nightmare, if nightmare it was, had receded. Klesst brushed the
clinging tendrils of red hair from her moist forehead and sat up.
Through the greenish bull's-eye glass of her lattice window she
could see the declining sun, impaled upon the reddened fangs of
the mountains. The late autumn night would close quickly, and
the darkness of her nightmare would surround her. And this was
the night when the Demonlord walked the earth...
Shivering despite her heightened temperature, Klesst dropped
back against the straw mattress. "Mother!" she called plaintively,
wondering why her outcry had not brought someone to her side.
"Mother!" she called again. She longed to call Greshha's name,
but remembered that the stout serving woman had been sent
away from the inn for the night. Greshha had not wanted to leave
her. Not when she was sick, not on the night of her birthday. Not
on this night. It was cruel of her mother to send her away,
Greshha whom she looked upon as her nurse. Smiling Greshha,
Greshha of warm hands and soft bosom. Not hard and cold like
Mother.
Greshha would have answered her cry. It was cruel of Mother
to ignore her like this.
"What is it, Klesst?" Mother's frown regarded her warily from
the doorway. She had heard no footsteps on the thick boards of
the long hallway. Mother moved so silently always.
"I'm thirsty, Mother. My throat feels so hot. Please bring me
some water."
How pretty Mother was... Her long black hair brushed down
the sides of her face, clasped at her nape, and let fall over her
shoulder and down her left breast. Under her shawl, her straight
shoulders rose bare from her wide-necked blouse of bleached
muslin, full-sleeved and gathered at her wrists. Her narrow waist
was cinched by a wide belt of dark leather, crisscrossed with