"Holly Lisle - Hunting the Corrigan's Blood" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lisle Holly)

distract me at all from my pain.

I hurt—but such plain words cannot convey the depth of my agony. Fire stabbed through my right side,
a fire that burned hotter and more horribly with every breath I took. I'd had broken ribs before, and I had
them again. Whoever did this to me had fractured most of the bones in my right ribcage. My right hand
throbbed, and when I tried to move it, the fingers didn't respond. Perhaps my attackers jumped on it until
they felt the bones give way and grind themselves into pulp. If that wasn't what they did, it was what it
felt like they had done. A million needles buried themselves deep in my thighs; my lower legs throbbed
as if they had swollen beyond the capacity of the flesh to stay together and as if they would now burst.
My left leg was bent so that my knee jammed into the metal wall behind the corpse, while my broken
right leg twisted backward at an angle so acute the shards of my lower femur poked forward from above
where my kneecap should have been like fingers trying to claw their way out my swollen, tattered flesh.

I wondered if Badger would ever find me. I didn't think he would find me alive. Not anymore. But I
didn't want him never to know what had happened to me.

I beat my head against the metal door jammed up against my right side, and listened to the booming
echoes thundering away into a cavernous, uncaring silence beyond. The first time I came around, I'd
pounded myself into a stupor trying to get free or to get someone's attention. But whoever had grabbed
me had made sure I wasn't getting out on my own… and equally sure that no one would wander along
and rescue me.

My attempts at screams for help came out as throaty little whimpers, my thunderous head-banging left
nothing but unbroken silence in its wake, and finally, with my head throbbing and flashing lights
whirling behind my eyelids, I gave in and let darkness descend.

Giggling woke me.

The corpse was staring at me, but now she was awake, too. The warmth of our tiny cell hadn't done her
any good.

"You're dead," she told me. "Just like me. Now that we're both dead, they're going to come back and
break your bones and suck out your marrow. They're going to eat your body, and drink your blood, and
beat drums with your bones."

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 Lisle, Holly - Hunting the Corrigan's Blood



Delightful. It was so nice to have company.

"Nobody's going to rescue you," she told me, and her grin grew wider. "It's too late for that. You and I
will never tell our secrets."

I knew all about my secrets; I hadn't planned on telling them anyway. But I did wonder what hers were. I
tried to ask her—subvocalized around the gag, but she just laughed at me.

"That's why we're here. We had such juicy secrets."