"John Marco - Tyrants and Kings 2 - The Grand Design" - читать интересную книгу автора (Marco John)

sent off their missiles, while on the ground war wagons lumbered on their
metal tracks, grinding the earth to pulp. Inside the iron tanks, teams of gunners
pumped kerosene fuel into the needle-noses of flame cannons and blasted
away at the unyielding stone of Goth.
The war machines of Nar were at work.
General Vorto pulled off a gauntlet and tested the wind with a finger.
Southeasterly and strong, he determined. Too damn strong. A curse sprang to
his lips as he pulled his metal glove back on. So far, the Walled City didn't
seem to be softening from his attack, nor had the winds abated to cooperate.
It had only been a few hours since he'd begun his attack but he was already
growing impatient—not a good trait for a general. He ground his teeth together
in frustration, and watched as the city of Goth withstood all he could throw
against it.
"Resist, then," he grumbled. "Soon we will have the ram in place."
Nearby on the hillside, the gunners of a modified acid launcher awaited their
general's orders. They had loaded the first cannister of Formula B hours ago,
when they'd first arrived around the city. Vorto had hoped the wind might
cooperate, but the breeze had picked up and so the order to fire had never
come. There were five more such launchers in the hills around Goth, all
primed like this one, all awaiting Vorto's order to fire. Vorto blew into his
hands to warm them.
"They are strong ones," said the general to his aide, the slim and dour-faced
Colonel Kye. "I've underestimated them. They have a stomach for siege, it
seems. I would have thought Lokken weaker than this."
"Duke Lokken is weak," corrected Kye. He had a rasping voice that Vorto
had to strain to understand, the result of a Triin arrow through his windpipe.
"When the dawn comes he will see what's out here waiting for him, and he will
surrender." The colonel smiled one of his sour smiles. "I am optimistic."
"Yes, you can afford to be," said Vorto. "I cannot." He pointed toward the
city's towering walls, thick with archers ignoring the bombardment. "Look.
See how many men he has? He could hold out for weeks in there. And these
damned winds . . ." Vorto halted, mouthing a silent prayer. God made the
winds, and he had no right to curse them. He confessed his sin, then turned
his attention to the giant launcher sitting nearby. Ten cannisters of Formula B
waited beside the magazine, ready for loading. The bellows that would propel
the cannisters was swelled with air. It groaned with the sound of stretched
leather. Vorto reached down and picked up one of the cannisters. His gunners
gasped and inched away. The general held the cannister up to inspect it,
turning it in the pulsing rocket light. The cylindrical container was no bigger
than his head. Inside it, he could feel liquid sloshing around. There were two
chambers in the cannister, one full of water, the other loaded with Formula B,
the dried pellets the war labs had synthesized. Upon impact, the cannister
would shatter and the components would mix. Any small breeze would do the
rest.
Theoretically. Formula B had never been tested in the field. Bovadin had
fled Nar before its perfection, leaving a handful of tinkerers behind to finish
his work. Formula A had proved too caustic to transport, even in its dry state.
But Formula B, the war labs had assured Vorto, was perfect. They had tried it
on prisoners with remarkable results, and they were sure fifty cannisters of the
stuff would be enough to wipe out Goth.