"Katherine Kerr - Deverry 06 - A Time Of Omens" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kerr Katherine)

haunt clearly visible as it drifted across the room and began scrabbling again at a loose board between
floor and wall. Nevyn could see, too, that it was making the snuffling noise inadvertently, rustling and
lifting dead leaves and other such trash as it passed by.
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“What’s under there? Let me help. You don’t have the hands to dig anymore.”

The presence drifted to one side and gave no sign of interfering as Nevyn came over and knelt down.
When he drew his table dagger and began to pry up the board, the haunt knelt, too, as if to watch.
Although that particular board was somewhat newer than those around it, still the rotted wood broke
away from its nails and came up in shreds and splinters. Underneath, in a shallow hole in the ground, was
an oblong box, about two feet long but only some ten inches wide.

“Your treasure?”

Although it was faint now, a bare wisp of smoke in the firelight, the thing shook its head no and lifted
both hands—imploring him, Nevyn thought, to forgive it or do something or perhaps both. When he
reached in and lifted the box, some weight inside lurched and slid with a waft of unpleasant smell from the
crack around the lid. Since he considered himself hardened to all forms of death, Nevyn threw open the
lid and nearly gagged—not from the smell, this time, but from the sight. Crammed inside lay the corpse of
an infant boy, preserved with some mixture of spices and liquids. Only a few days old when it died, it had
been mutilated in the exact same way as the corpse nailed to the palisade.

Since the box brought a lot of dust up with it, the haunt kneeling nearby looked briefly solid, or at least
its face and hands were visible as it tossed its head back and threw up its arms in a silent keen.

“Your child?”

It shook its head no, then slumped, doubling over to lay its head on the ground in front of him like a
criminal begging a great lord for mercy.

“You helped kill it? Or—I see—your friends were going to kill it. You protested, and they made you
share its Wyrd.”

The dust scattered to the floor. The haunt was gone.

For some minutes Nevyn merely stared at the pitiful corpse in its tiny coffin. Although he’d never had the
misfortune to see such mutilations before, he’d heard something about their significance—some
half-forgotten lore that nagged at the edges of his memory and insisted that he examine the corpse more
carefully. Finally he summoned up ail his will and took the box over to the fire where there was light to
work in, but he got bits of rag from his saddlebags to wrap his hands before he reached in and took the
mutilated pieces of the tiny mummy out. Underneath he found a thin lead plate, about two inches by four,
much like the curse-talismans that ignorant peasants still bury in hopes of doing an enemy harm. Graved
on it were words in the ancient tongue of the Dawntime, known only to scholars and priests—and some
words that not even Nevyn could translate.

“As this so that. Maryn king Maryn king Maryn. Death never dying. Aranrhodda ricca ricca ricca Bubo