"Tanya Huff - Death Rites" - читать интересную книгу автора (Huff Tanya)

Vree felt Bannon clutch her arm, fingers digging into flesh. Ravens didn't fly at night.

The ravens had gone from the window when Vree and Bannon reached the commander's room. They'd
left two bodies behind them, silently and efficiently dispatched when there'd been no other way to move
on. Hiding the bodies had taken more time than the killing.

Commander Jolan's small room had been set up like a command tent, her bed shoved up against one
wall, less important than the map table and the strategies planned on it. She slept with one hand thrown
up over her head, the paler skin on the underside of her arm defining her place in the dark.

She wasn't alone.

A silent crossing from door to bedside. The edge of Vree's dagger slid through the soft tissue of the
throat too quickly for pain, found the spine, slipped between two ridges of bone, and ended it.

The commander's companion was considerably younger, probably Bannon's age. He opened sleep-
blurred eyes at exactly the wrong time.

Vree tossed a small square of leather stamped with a black starburst onto the bed. The Emperor's first
order had been carried out and his point had been made. Treason could not hide from the blades of Jür.

Now, they had to get the barbican over the gate with only the soft shadows between moonset and dawn
to hide them.

Bannon glanced out the window and grinned. "We take the high road," he said softly.

Measuring the distance between the window and broad top of the fortress' encircling wall, Vree nodded.
The only guards were in the barbican. No point in wasting soldiers on a patrol when there was only one
possible point of attack.

There was no room on the ledge to stand and jump. There was no room on the ledge for three ravens
either but Vree didn't have time to worry about that now. She slid out, feet first, then gripping the ridge
of stone, braced her feet against the wall, knees up beside her ears.

One breath, two…

Push off.

Turn in the air.


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It had been a long night. She landed hard and too close to the edge. Training threw her weight back
before her brain acknowledged the danger and sucking air between her teeth as her elbow slammed into
stone, she rolled into the vee of shadow between wall and parapet.

Bannon's landing was messier still, but she grabbed his waistband and yanked him down beside her. He