"Gardner F. Fox - Kothar 01 - Kothar Barbarian Swordsman" - читать интересную книгу автора (Fox Gardner F)

would ascend the throne.

He toyed with the idea of walking into the royal palace in some sort of
disguise and throwing Red Lori over a broad shoulder and making off with
her. His large white teeth showed themselves as his lips drew back in an
amused grin. Hai, but that would put a bee in her thick red hair!

Suddenly he staggered, recovering his balance with an effort. His
wounds had become an agony, of a sudden.

In his eyes, sky reeled dizzily with ground, and death swooped low
above the corpses cluttering the wide Plain of Dead Trees, reaching out
invisible talons to sink them in his flesh. His throat was dry—gods of
Thuum!—what he would give for one lone sip of water!—and the pain of
his wounds made him shudder, every now and again.

He was angling his feeble steps toward a corner of the forest, the great
dark weald that stretched from Phalkarr as far as distant Abathor, for in
between those boles and beneath those low hanging branches was his only
hope of hiding. The mercenaries of Lord Markoth should have spotted him
by this time, they should have raised the howl of pursuit. No doubt they
were running for hounds to follow the trail of his riding boots. He tried to
stop the flow of blood, for the drops were arrows beckoning all to follow,
but the task was too great for his reddened hands and fingers.

He leaned against a tree, breathing deeply.

I must run like the wounded deer from the hunters, or else I too shall be
stretched out flat upon the ground, my wrists and ankles fettered, and I
shall be flayed, as is the custom of the Lord Markoth with his enemies.

The thought was a goad in his ribs, urging him forward. A red
handprint, the spill of bloody drops, were the signposts which would show
the way. Ah, well, it could not be helped. He was wounded. He had fought
hard and long this day to bring victory to the cause of Queen Elfa, and
where men fought so desperately, men knew the bite of steel.

The agony of his flesh, the uneasiness in him at the thought of torture,
drove him staggering through the underbrush, ducking to avoid a leafy
branch, reeling aside from a thick treetrunk directly in his path. In the
distance he heard a voice cry out halloo. They had found his red blood
trail!

They were coming fast, fresh with renewed vigor, unwounded and eager
to win the silver deniers Lord Markoth would pay for his body so his
skinners could flay the skin from it. He could imagine their hard faces and
their bulging muscles as they loped along the trail of blood-drops from his
body.

Kothar ran on and on.