"Troy Denning - Forgotten Realms - The Cormyr Saga 03 - Death of the Dragon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Denning Troy)

The bark was engraved with a spiral of sinuous, somehow menacing glyphs. The runes seemed new,
powerful, and-not good. The roots of the tree were exposed in all their tangles by a crude and recently dug
burrow. The loose earth was simply flung aside as if a huge dog or hunting cat had dug swift but clumsy
paws into the soil and torn at it. The hole was a ragged oval, just large enough for a man to crawl down.
Alusair stepped back, then to one side, peering in. Every tree bore similar runes, and a hole had been dug
under each of them.
Heavy breathing and the scrape of boots came at last. Orcs were ascending the mossy trail behind her.
Alusair rolled her eyes and strode quickly forward, following the clear path Cadimus had left for her.
The trail continued to climb and the dark, recently disturbed earth now began to display strange
treasures for her inspection. There was a metal scepter of swirling, clearly elven design, yet dead and dark
as no elf would have made it. Stones that should have been gleaming gems were dingy and clouded, and the
metal itself was as dull and gray as forge lead. Beyond the scepter was a sword, also of splendid shape. It
too seemed somehow... drained.
That was it. There were more blades beyond, and a coffer and a quiver, then something that must have
been a staff of great magical power or ornate ceremonial significance. Everything was gray, dull, and
lifeless, as if all power and beauty had been stolen out of them.
The Steel Princess frowned down at them as she hurried on. Had this been an elven burial ground or a
treasure cache? What manner of creature would know where to find, or dare to despoil, either?
"Gods," she whispered aloud to herself, "Cormyr was such a simple place when I was a child. When did
it grow so many unfolding mysteries?"
As if in reply, and startling her with its suddenness, a voice sang out of the trees ahead. Haunting and
mournful, the liquid but sometimes harsh song was that of an elf maiden who was neither friendly nor gentle
as she shaped words Alusair could not understand.
If there'd been no orcs right behind her, the Steel Princess would have backed swiftly away from that
sound. As it was, the iron taste of fear was suddenly in her mouth, and she felt again that eerie stirring of
hair rising all over her body. Well, at least she was fully awake now.
The song swelled, and she made out a few of its words. There was the name Iliphar, then the word
shessepra, which humans had mangled into "scepter" and something that sounded like haereeunmn, which
was in several old elven ballads sung by master bards when they visited the court, and meant, more or less,
"all things of elves."
It was repeated. Something of a refrain, then, about Iliphar's scepter giving him power over all things
elven. The voice was unearthly, achingly beautiful, yet as menacing as the hiss of a serpent. Alusair found
herself shivering in time to its soaring.
Her hurrying feet brought her around a bend, and face-to-face with more than a hundred orcs. These
were black, hulking snortsnouts of the most powerful sort, with battle-rings on their tusks and a cruel
welcome glittering in their porcine eyes.
Their leader, a mighty orc almost twice as tall as the sort of tusker Alusair was used to slaying in the
Stonelands, whose much-battered breastplate was studded with grinning human skulls, was grinning at her
as one large, grubby finger rubbed along the glyphs of the largest tainted tree Alusair had yet seen. The
song was coming from the runes the orc was touching, each one flickering ever so slightly at the chieftain's
touch.
"Well met, Princess," the orc hissed. The scuffle of boots told Alusair that her pursuers were coming up
behind her. "Or should I say, my next meal!"
The orc chieftain's roar of laughter rose to join the eerie song as the Steel Princess snarled and sprang
to one side, snatching at the magic she carried at her belt. She was going to die here, horribly, if she didn't-
Almost lazily the orc chieftain moved one arm, dark muscles rippling, and a blade as long as Alusair
stood tall flashed end over end across the space between them.
Alusair ducked away, but the blade seemed to follow, curving down.
A sudden sharp, clear pain pierced her shoulder like fire. She'd taken an arrow in that shoulder once and
had managed to forget just how sickening it had felt. This was worse. She set her teeth and twisted away