"Moon, Elizabeth - Deed Of Paksenarrion - 02 - Divided Allegiance V1" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moon Elizabeth)

By the time Macenion was satisfied that their campsite was safe, Paks felt she could not move another inch. They had managed to secure the pack cover in the upwind gap. Snow drifted against it quickly, and now—so Macenion said; Paks had not gone back out in the wind to see—covered it several feet deep. The other end of the shelter was still open; they had nothing large or strong enough to block it. Macenion wanted to form blocks of snow, but finally gave up when Paks simply stared at him, exhausted. He managed to light a small fire of the wood they had packed along, despite the wind that still gusted in and out of their overhang. Paks helped steady their smallest pot above it. She thought longingly of hot food, hot mugs of sib. But the snow that finally melted and boiled was hardly hot enough to warm her.
"It's the cold demons," explained Macenion. "They're jealous of their territory; they hate the warm-bloods who come up from the plains. So they steal the heat from fire, up on these heights."
Paks drank the lukewarm sib, and decided she might never be warm again. Marching in a cold rain now seemed like a pleasant excursion. Only a few feet away, the wind whirled veils of snow past their shelter. She huddled in every scrap of clothing and blanket she could find. But as the afternoon wore away, she regained both strength and warmth. The horses, too, seemed to recover. Paks gave them some of the warm water, and dampened Star's grain. Macenion claimed that elven horses didn't need such coddling, but Paks noticed that Windfoot tried to push Star away from hers. She poured warm water on the pile of grain Windfoot had been ignoring, and the horse ate eagerly. Macenion glared, but said nothing more. He ventured outside several times, trying to judge the weather. As the light faded, he reported that both snow and wind were lessening.
"We might get through tomorrow, if the drifts downhill on the other side aren't too bad. It'd be easier without the beasts—"
"You wouldn't leave them!" said Paks, horrified.
"No, of course not. We need the supplies. But we can walk over drifts they'll stick in. Anyway, get what sleep you can. If we can get out tomorrow, it will be early—as soon as it's light. Ill watch tonight—I'm more used to the cold and the height."
Paks resented his usual tone, but was too tired to resist. She fell quickly into a light doze, waking as Macenion replenished the fire. She squinted around the shelter. The horses stood head-to-tail near the rock wall; she could see the firelight reflecting from Star's eyes. Hardly man-high, the ledge of rock overhanging them glittered as if it were fall of tiny stars. Paks blinked several times, and decided the rock itself had shiny fragments to catch the light. Firelight turned the snowdrifts into glittering gold and orange—pretty, she thought, when you didn't have to be out in it. She snuggled deeper into her blankets, took a long breath, and slid back into sleep.
Macenion's choked cry brought her hallway out of her blankets before her eyes were open. She had her sword in hand. He stood rigid beside the fire, mouth open. Paks tried to see beyond him, to the outside. Nothing but a wavering dark. She glanced back at the horses. Both of them were alert, heads high, nostrils flared. Star's ears were back; Windfbot's tail was clamped tight. Paks began to untangle herself from the blankets as unobtrusively as possible: she felt they were both easy targets, in the firelight
It was then she saw the pale blue glow of eyes.
"Paksenarrion!" Macenion's whisper was hoarse and desperate.
"I'm awake," she said softly. What, she wondered, had eyes like that? Farther apart than human eyes, that was all she could tell. Big eyes.
"Paks, it's a—" he choked, and then recovered. "It's a snowcat."
"Holy Gird," said Paks without thinking. When she realized what she had said, she wished she'd kept quiet.
"What?" asked Macenion.
Paks felt herself blushing in the dark. "Nothing," she said. "Now what?"
"Can't you see it?"
"No—nothing but eyes."
"I don't know what we can—" Macenion's voice suddenly sharpened. "Paks! Your ring!" For a moment Paks had no idea what he meant. Macenion spared a glance at her, furious.
"Your ring, human! Your special ring," he went on. Paks nodded, then, stripped off her glove to touch it.
"But are you sure it will work? Maybe the thing—the snowcat—will just go away if we let it alone."
As if in answer to that suggestion, the glowing eyes moved closer. Now Paks could see a suggestion of the body's outline, a long, powerful catlike form, crouching as if to spring.
"You fool!" cried Macenion. "It knows we're here! It's about to jump. Stop it! Hold it!"
Paks thought she could see a twitch in that long tail, like the twitch she had seen in the mousers at the barn, the last instant before they sprang on a rat. She pressed her thumb hard on the ring and thought "Hold still, cat." She wondered if those words would work.
"Are you?" asked Macenion hoarsely.
"Yes," said Paks. "How long does it—"
"As long as you concentrate. Keep holding it."
Paks tried to concentrate. She wished she could see the snowcat better. Macenion turned to rummage among his things. She was afraid to look sideways at him, lest the cat jump. She forced her eyes back to the shadowy cat-form. Suddenly light flared around her, and she jumped.
"Don't look," said Macenion harshly. The light was clear and white, brilliant enough to show true colors. Now she could see the snowcat clearly. Its body was man-long; it would stand almost waist-high on her at the shoulder. As Macenion had said, its fur was white and blue-gray, patterned with dapples that reminded Paks of snowflakes enlarged. The ears bore long tufts of white, and it had a white beard and short ruff. The eyes, despite the blue glow they'd shown before, were amber in Macenion's spell-light.
"Macenion, it's beautiful. It's the most beautiful—"
"It's spelling you," he said firmly. "It seems beautiful because it's trying to use magic on you."
"But it can't be. It's—" she stopped as Macenion came forward into her field of view. "Macenion, what are you doing?"
"Don't be silly, Paks. I'm going to kill it."
"Kill it? But it's helpless—it can't move while I—"
"That's right. Just keep holding it still. It's the only way I have a chance—"
"But that's not air—it's helpless—" Paks let her concentration waver, and at once the snowcat moved, shifting in a kind of constricted hop, as she caught her control back. She was distracted again by this evidence of her power and its limitations, and the cat managed to rear, swiping at Macenion's head with one massive paw. He ducked, and Paks forced the cat to stillness again.
"Damn you, human! Hold that beast, or we're both dead. Worse than dead—you remember what I told you!" Macenion glared back at her, then turned, raising his sword.
Paks felt a wave of fear and pain sweep through her mind. It was wrong, terribly wrong—but what else could she do? "Macenioo—" she tried again, staring into the snowcat's huge amber eyes. "It's not right—"
"It's not right for us to end up soul-bound to a snowcat, no," he said roughly. "It's easy enough, though, if you forget yourself one more time. If that's what you want, go ahead."
Paks looked down, biting her lip. She could not watch, and then she thought she must. The snow cat made no resistance—could make no resistance—but it could cry out, in fary and pain, and so it did. That wailing cry, ending in an almost birdlike whistle, brought tears to her eyes. She blinked them back. He came back to the fire almost jauntily.
"A snowcat. That's quite a kill, even if you don't think it was fair. Ill just take the pelt before it freezes—"
"No." Paks glared at him.
"What d'you mean, no? Snowcat pelts are nearly priceless, it's so rare to take one—you noticed how careful I was not to damage it when I killed—"
Paks erupted in fury. "By the gods, Macenion, I wonder if you ever tell the truth! You dare pride yourself on kilting a helpless animal? It might as well have been a sheep trussed up, for all the courage and skill it took—"
"I didn'tnotice you out there—"
"You told me to stay here—"
"I told you to hold it still. You could have helped me, if you were able to hold more than one thought in mind at a time. As it was you nearly killed me—"
"I!" Paks flourished her own sword. She noticed with some satisfaction that Macenion backed up a step. "I but tried to save your honor and mine—not that I would have thought an elf would care so little for it—"
"You know nothing about elven honor, human!" Macenion seemed to swell with rage. "You are my travel companion, oath-bound to defend me—as I defended you just now—against all dangers. As for the snowcat having no defense, it was trying to spell you the entire time."
Paks felt her anger leak away into the cold. Had she been half-spelled? Had she nearly failed her oath because of it? Macenion took quick advantage of her hesitation. "I don't blame you," he said more quietly. "You are human, unused to magicks of any kind, and this may be the first magical beast you've seen." She nodded unwillingly. "It would have killed all of us, and feasted many days while our souls were enslaved to it, if we had not managed to kill it. Or send it away." He cocked his head and gave her a sly grin. "If you'd been quick enough thinking, o lover of animals, you might simply have sent it away."
"Sent it—it would have gone?"