"Lee Killough - The Leopard's Daughter" - читать интересную книгу автора (Killough Lee)

"Keep silent."
Her stomach plunged. Without help tracking her opponent, she was lost. If only she could answer the
leopard's riddle.
Wait. She held her breath. Was that breathing and footfall behind her under the gibbering of wachiru?
She spun toward the sound.
The half-man arrowed foot-first out of the moonlight, kicking for her stomach. Jeneba leaped
sideways, not quite in time to avoid the blow entirely. It caught her with enough force to knock her on her
back, gasping for air. She landed rolling, however, and the wachiru, diving to pin her, found only dust.
Jeneba scrambled at him, seeking a hold of her own but he rolled away, too... vanishing yet again.
Even so she jumped to her feet relieved, listening to the hop of his foot. Could that be the answer, using
leopard hearing to track him? She would not even have to become less Dasa. Her ears followed his
bounding progress behind her once more. When she turned, however, she realized that that still gave her
no indication how he would attack. She needed more than hearing.
A shadow flickered over her. Looking up, Jeneba found the wachiru arcing above her, silhouetted
against the moon. For a moment, though he was landing on her, she could only stare, lightning flashing in
her head. Shadow! Of course! A thing born of Mala-Lesa, Mala the moon and Lesa the sun, for those
bodies of light certainly saw wachiru when men could not!
She flung herself sideways barely in time to avoid being knocked flat.
The half-man snarled at missing her a second time, but he landed like a cat and rebounded straight at
her. They went down on the ground together, each straining to find a hold on the other. He was like a
snake, either sliding away from her or kicking loose with his powerful leg. On the other hand, her oiled
skin gave him no grip on her, either.
Jeneba squirmed free and back-flipped onto her feet to wait expectantly, crouching. Sure enough, the
wachiru bounded up, turned, and disappeared... except not entirely. A pool of shadow remained. Night
sight made the shadow as sharp to Jeneba's eye as though cast by bright sun. She followed the rasp of
his breathing, just audible above the noise of her own, and the thump of his foot, but watched the shifting
pool where the moonlight did not reach.
He tried circling behind her, time and again. She pivoted, following each of his bounds, evading each
tentative move toward her.
The wachiru voices fell silent, except for one which hissed, "Witch!"
Her opponent's voice came out of the air. "Running is not winning."
Jeneba sidestepped another rush. No, it was not. Only pinning won. She might have just one chance at
him, though. After that, certain she could see him, he would be prepared for her. Keeping her distance,
Jeneba plotted strategy, then took a deep breath and watched the shadow, praying silently to Mala and
the buffalo.
The shadow moved, broadening subtly in a way that told Jeneba the half-man was crouching to spin
and spring. She moved as he began the turn, leaping forward and catching him around the neck from his
off-side. He turned his chin into her elbow as she had done, but before he could grab her arm, she caught
his wrist with her other hand and leaned backward.
His spring, already begun, helped her lift him off his feet The momentum kept them moving. The
wachiru cried out, but Jeneba flung them on until her back arched in a reverse bow with her and the
wachiru's heads touching the ground behind her.
No sooner had they touched, however, than she rolled toward her arm around his neck and dumped
him face-down on the ground. Her arm slid free to join her other hand cranking on his arm. Her knees
landed on the nape of his neck and in the middle of his back.
Beyond them wachiru voices shrilled again and Dasa voices shrieked in glee. Jeneba barely heard
them. Under her, the half-man bucked with a violence that needed all her concentration to fight. She had
his arm twisted up behind him, but the muscles in it bulged and rippled until the clay painting his skin
cracked and flaked and with agonizing slowness, the wrist started to slip through her grip. She gritted her
teeth, hanging on with all her will.