"Ann Durand - Flight of the Gryphon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Durand Ann)

towered over her. She waited, shaking, on the table while the elders chanted their verses to alert the
takatak. Apart from the elders, families alone were allowed to witness the spectacle…and then, only as
long as they heeded instructions to join the chanting. Katera watched her mother and father, their faces
ashen, as they mouthed in horror the words to beckon the beast that would approach and seize their
daughter.

The wind beat into her face as the takatak approached with its black wings bent and pumping, its long
shadow falling over the entire company. Dust and leaves swirled around her feet as the huge bird
descended upon Adrella, screeching through its crooked beak. Adrella cringed before the beast as it
clinched its talons onto the harness around her back. Then she rose within its grasp crying softly, her silky
hair reaching for the ground over bare arms. A cool, gusty wind whipped at her spullera and sent it
thrashing around her legs.

Katera listened to her mother's choking sobs as Adrella rose above the trees. They watched, unable to
look away, until the thick ashy clouds surrounding the summit of Kan Mountain swallowed the dark
takatak and the small figure of Adrella beneath it. The final sacrifice was not for them to see, and like the
others before, it would remain a mystery to the villagers of Parallon. Katera swallowed hard and
followed her parents home, numbly placing one foot in front of the other. Her sister and only sibling, who
had held the most cherished part of her, was gone.

Chapter One
Two Years Later

The ringing in Katera's ears grew louder, and she knew the Voice would soon break through. She pulled
the long, narrow Shalpacan wrap off her shoulders and cinched it around her head, but it didn't help. The
ringing was inside, in her mind. She shook her head vigorously, hoping to spin off the whispers that had
begun, but it was as if they were tethered to her thoughts, springing away and bouncing back again.

Katera, listen. The Voice was deep, urgent.

"No!"

The time draws near. You must prepare.

"Leave me alone!"

You have been Summoned.

"No. I'm not going. I won't go."

I await you. You must obey.

Katera flung her wrap to the ground and tore down the steep hill toward the river, sliding over the barren
spots where the soil was loose. Her silken waistband caught on the branch of a bush and unraveled from
her waist as she continued her wild trajectory down the slope.

Every year, several of the village girls were targeted, but never, in the ten terrible years that Askindon
had ruled over her people in the village, had he targeted the same family twice. Two years after her sister
had disappeared into the sky, the Summons had arrived for Katera. She had dared to believe this fate
would escape her. She had dared to think that she'd been pardoned from this doom in exchange for the