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

Kothar, stared back at the standing mummy.

"Great Eldrak," a man breathed.

A hollow voice murmured, "Call not on Eldrak of the Seven Hells. He
listens not to carrion such as you. He is my friend, as are all the ancient
gods." There was an illusion of vast distance behind the voice of the
cadaver that stood on rotting feet and showing the whiteness of bones
protruding through its burial garments.

A mercenary screamed and would have run except that the dead thing
held him as he held the giant Kothar flat upon the ground. Terrifying
laughter lifted into its throat as it began to glow with inner green fire.

The eerie radiance became brighter, and as it pulsed throughout the
ancient grave, Kothar felt energy flow into his body. His wounds closed
over, his blood caked and hardened, and anger rose into his brain like a
madness. He stirred, he moved his hand, he rose upward.

On his feet he looked at the dead thing without fear, though with
revulsion. It gleamed with verdant brightness, illuming the death chamber
and the mercenaries in their mail shirts and metal helmets, with swords
naked in their hands.

"Slay them," said the lich, and Kothar leaped.

His broken sword was still sharp. It could cleave through flesh and mail
and leather, it could slay. The mercenaries tried to fight, but it was as if
they moved in sleep, slowly and without a sense of danger. Their faces
showed green from the pulsing dead thing, and their eyes bulged with the
horror in their brains.

The shattered steel drove deep, again and again.

When he was finished, seven men lay dead between the iron door and
the forest. Kothar stood panting over them, staring down at his red blade.

The forest was quiet; not even a jay chattered from its leafy deeps. The
Cumberian drew a deep breath. It was as if the green pulsations had
reached out and touched all life within the wood, and as it had touched, it
had slain.

"Let drop the sword, Kothar," said the hollow voice.

He did as it commanded, without thought. He turned and stared back
into the dark tomb and saw the dead thing standing in the darkness,
rotted and ugly in its cerements. The green brilliance was fading slowly. It
was just a corpse, a corpse that walked and spoke and seemed to be alive.

"Who are you?" Kothar growled.