"Prisoner of the Horned helmet" - читать интересную книгу автора (Silke James)

Four

It was sundown before the Barbarian reached the bottom of the gorge. A family of vultures was already at work on the bits and pieces of bodies protruding from the wreckage of the bridge. The birds eyed him angrily, screeched and flapped about making a show of their gore-specked beaks and neck feathers. He kept coming and they took flight, winged back up the narrow gorge, almost beautiful in the fading orange light.

The birds came to rest on the remnant of bridge, then looked back down, their beaks dripping.

The Barbarian found his axe and picked it up. The handle was broken off a foot short of the head. He moved to the first body, drew a knife, bent over, then hesitated as if sensing life. Then he saw it.

Twenty feet away, a serpent colored with gold, brown and black diamonds slithered down a large rock towards a dead arm protruding from a pile of fallen timbers. A Sadoulette, the mother breed of the python. It was not yet fully grown, but big enough to have a squad of Kitzakk scouts for supper.

The reptile approached the arm, saw the Barbarian and coiled back, nostrils flaring. It appeared more than willing to wrestle for its dinner, then suddenly lost all confidence, slithered up the rock and tumbled awkwardly out of sight.

The Barbarian listened to the sounds of crunching gravel and breaking grass made by the retreating reptile, grunted with contempt, then glanced around again. Nothing moved. Nothing made a sound. He searched through the rubble of the bridge, shoved timbers aside, found the source of what he sensed.

Soong lay on his side, jackknifed over a rock. He still lived, barely breathing with short, wet gasps. One eye was smashed closed. The other watched fearfully as the Barbarian lifted his short-handled axe and moved for him. As the shadowed face of the Barbarian loomed close, Soong’s eye opened wide, white with wonder, and the axe struck.

The dark savage checked the other bodies, but they were dead. What remained was work for vultures and ants.

He stripped each body and made a blanket from their leather tunics. He heaped their armor and weapons along with his broken axe and helmet on the blanket, tied them in a bundle. He drank from the stream in animal fashion, and washed most of the dry blood and gore off his body. Then he picked up the bundle, heaved it to his back, and started down a narrow trail beside the stream.

The family of vultures watched until the man-animal had vanished around a bend, then glided down and came to rest on broken timbers beside the naked dead bodies. They eyed them warily, then the largest screeched, leapt on Yat’s back driving his claws into the flesh, and stabbed his pointed beak at a shoulder muscle.

The other vultures screamed and moved for the meat. There was a loud crack of breaking wood. The vultures, screeching, took flight. Above them, a heavy timber broke loose from the remains of the bridge. It tumbled through the air, hit the side of the cliff and dislodged several large rocks. A small avalanche followed, and covered the birds’ dinner.

Reaching the sky, the vultures looked down and cried out in rage, then flew off, still complaining.