"Lawrence Watt-Evans - Dragon Weather" - читать интересную книгу автора (Watt-Evans Lawrence)

understanding of what a dragon was, and he didnтАЩt
remember anything about venom. тАЬI thought
dragons breathed fire!тАЭ he said.
тАЬWell, they do, after a fashion,тАЭ Grandsir said.
тАЬOr so IтАЩm told. But the older stories, the ones from
the early days of the Years of Man, say that
dragonflame isnтАЩt so much fiery breath, as some
people would have it, but a spray of burning venom,
like a snakeтАЩs spit of poison. Except dragons
somehow set their poison ablaze, and thereby spit
flame.тАЭ
тАЬOoooh!тАЭ Arlian shivered at the thought. It
seemed somehow more real to know that dragonfire
was burning venom, rather than some sort of
magical breath. It made dragons seem more like
actual beasts, rather than spirits, or illusions like
the little images the village sorcerer sometimes
conjured up.
тАЬWhether itтАЩs the truth or not I canтАЩt say,тАЭ
Grandsir continued, тАЬbut there are stories, very old
stories, so old I donтАЩt know where they came from,
that say that sometimes the venom doesnтАЩt catch
fire properly. ItтАЩs still deadly poison, of course, a
poison that will burn the flesh from your bonesтАФbut
supposedly it quickly loses some of its virulence
when once itтАЩs been sprayed, and a mixture of this
dragon venom and human blood is said to bestow
long life on anyone who drinks it. Very long life.
There are tales of men who lived centuries after
surviving dragon attacks in which blood from their
wounds was mixed with dragon venom and then
swallowedтАФthough many of them had been horribly
mutilated in the attacks, their faces burned away,
arms or legs lost, so that such a life would hardly be
a blessing.тАЭ
Arlian shivered again. He looked at the clouds.
The dragons seemed so terrible that it was hard,
sometimes, to believe that they were ever real.
Everyone knew they were real, though, or had
been once, at least. The dragons had ruled all of the
Lands of Man, from the eastern sea to the western
wilderness, from the Borderlands in the south to the
icy wastes of the north. People had resisted their
rule sometimes, fought great wars against the
dragons, but to no availтАФuntil one day, about seven
hundred years ago, when the dragons had all gone
away, leaving humanity free.
ArlianтАЩs mother said the dragons had all died,
perhaps of some plague, but most people insisted
they were still alive, deep in their caverns, and