"Clayton Emery - Netheril 02 - Dangerous Games" - читать интересную книгу автора (Emery Clayton)

away and dashed around the long table.
Sunbright had sunk his sword into another insect by sheer instinct, but he'd lodged it in the chitin
behind the beast's round head and the keen hook had fetched up again. As the barbarian yanked and
twisted desperately, another flea crashed into his chest, knocked him loose of his weapon. Sunbright
was slammed on his back, winded. Grappling the beast, he only cut his fingers on its sharp claws.
Candlemas worked as fast as he could. He touched a flea before him on two spots on its back. The
chill touch rippled through the beast where the hands touched, like an icicle hammered through its
body. The creature's back end was frozen solid while the front legs scrabbled to whirl and attack. It
would die shortly, Candlemas knew, but he skipped backward, for those living claws could still rip.
Circling, cursing, he swung wide of the struggling insect and laid hands on the bug on Sunbright's
chest. A touch at head and rump froze the monster instantly. The blinded Sunbright hissed as his
fingers were frosted from the periphery of the spell. The bug fell with a clatter, small legs snapping
like frozen twigs.
Candlemas scanned the room quickly. Hadn't there been a third—still alive?
He grunted as the bulky beast crashed into his back. Candlemas flopped atop Sunbright, who'd
been uncoiling upright. The men banged heads, then the bug crushed Candlemas's face to the stone
floor. His hands locked under him still retained magic, and Candlemas felt ice frost his rough smock
and belly. Greedy mandibles gnawed at the back of his bald head. "Get it off! Get it off me!"
A gutty grunt answered, and Candlemas saw a big iron-ringed boot sail by. Leather thudded into
the flea's belly and flipped it over. Sunbright followed, grappling madly like some drunk. He stepped
square on Candlemas's rump before he stamped down hard on the insect's gut to pin it. The gasping
wizard winced at the crunching, tearing noises, rolled far enough to see Sunbright, still blind, ripping
wriggling legs and claws off the insect like dead branches.
When the last pair of legs had been yanked off, a red-bathed Sunbright reared back and rubbed at
his eyes with his wrists. "Thank Selune! I can see! But gods above, it stings!"
Candlemas pushed upright, cast about wildly for more insect enemies. But apart from the de-
limbed one writhing impotently on the floor, all were dead, some drilled through, some frozen solid,
some chopped to hash. Bug parts and smashed pots lay everywhere. Candlemas himself was wrapped
in torn and spattered clothing, while Sunbright was painted head to toe in bug guts and blood, some of
which was his own. His long shirt and goat-hide vest hung in tatters. Gasping, he pawed his red eyes
clear and blinked painfully.
Sunbright asked, "What were you saying?"
Candlemas sank on his hams on the floor of his ruined workshop and found himself in a puddle of
ice water, the last vestiges of his chill touch spell. He sighed, "I said, it's nice to be home."
*****
Stumping across the filthy, littered floor, Candlemas pulled tassels to ring faraway bells. Despite
seeping wounds, fiery pain, and swollen eyes, Sunbright saw first to his weapon, scrubbing ichor from
the blade and touching up the edge with a stone plucked from a belt pouch.
Harvester of Blood was Sunbright's weapon, his father's sword, forged in some unknown southern
land. The shank of the sword was as wide as three fingers, but the tip swelled to a curved and brutal
edge where the backside was cut away to a deep hook. A good blade for slaughter and mayhem: wide-
pointed for stabbing and driving home damage, heavy-nosed for lopping and slashing, back-barbed for
sinking into an enemy's vitals, then causing terrible damage twisting and ripping out. A weapon to
destroy man or beast or pit fiend, and Sunbright had killed them all in his adventures since leaving the
tundra. One reason he'd survived was because he always honed Harvester's edge before tending to his
own wounds.
Before long, a clutch of lesser wizards and black-and-white-clad maids swirled in, wondering when
their master had returned and exclaiming at the wreckage and wounds. Candlemas ordered the lot to
shush, demanded hot water, rags, and brooms. Within a few moments, sculleries were stuffing bug
carcasses out the window, mopping up blood and sweeping up crockery. Two wizards blathered