"Ann Maxwell - Fire Dancer 1 - Fire Dancer" - читать интересную книгу автора (Maxwell Ann)

bowed condescendingly in front of her.

“Your three-week bondling suggests that you move your smooth, cheating ass out of here,” he
said very softly. “That disappearing act cost the crowd a lot of credits.”

Unhappy voices swelled and broke around Rheba like angry surf. Deliberately, she looked only at
Jal, ignoring the crowd edging in around her. “You first, Trader,” she said, pointing to a nearby
exit.

“And leave your back uncovered? Bad tactics, smoothie.”

“Turning my back on you would be worse. Move.”

Jal pushed through the crowd, breaking an uneasy trail for Rheba. The crowd surged and ebbed
restively. Eight steps from the exit, a gray figure crowned with lime-green curls leaned out of the
crowd. The woman yelled something in a language Rheba did not know. Obligingly, Jal
translated the obscenities for Rheba. She ignored the incident until a gray hand poked out of the
crowd. The gun grasped in the gray fingers needed no translation.

Rheba’s foot lashed out, kicking aside the weapon. It went off, searing a hole through someone
else’s flesh and the black stone floor. The crowd erupted into a mob that had neither head nor
mind, simply rage and weapons looking for excuses to be used.

She fought grimly, sucking energy from the casino’s lights, weaving that energy into finger-
length jolts of lightning. People close to her screamed and tried to push away, but the mob had
become a beast that ate everything, even its own young. The people who went down were
trampled. Those still standing did not seem to care about the bodies thrashing beneath their feet.

Rheba kicked and shocked a narrow trail to the exit, leaving a wake of tender flesh, until she
stepped on something slippery and went down. She screamed, air clawing against her throat,
calling Kirtn’s name again and again. Her hands and arms burst into incandescence as frantic
flames leaped from her fingertips to score the legs of people trampling her.

A questing Bre’n whistle split the chaos. Rheba poured all her desperation into her answering
whistle. She tried to get to her feet, knowing Kirtn could not find her at the bottom of the
churning mob. A brutal heel raked her from forehead to chin, sending her down in waves of
dizziness.

Abruptly, the mob parted. Kirtn appeared in the opening, shouting her name. Furiously he tore off
pieces of the mob and fed it to itself until he created a space where he could lift her to safety.
When he saw her bruised, bleeding body, his face became a mask of Bre’n rage.

“Burn it down,” he snarled. “Burn it!”
Energy scorched through Rheba as the Bre’ns rage swept up her emotions. Overhead, high on the
casino’s arched ceiling, she drew a line of violent fire.

The Black Whole’s “nonflammable” draperies, decorations and games had not been made to
withstand the anger of a fire dancer goaded by a Bre’n. The ceiling became a white hell. Instantly
casino force fields went down, allowing exits in all directions. The mob fragmented into
frightened people seeking the safety of Nontondondo’s cold autumn streets.