"Michael Moorcock - The Dreamthief's Daughter" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moorcock Michael)

 This book is a work of historical fiction. In order to give a sense of the times, some names of real people or places have been
included in the book. However, the events depicted in this book are imaginary, and the names of nonhistorical persons or events are
the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance of such nonhistorical persons or events to actual
ones is purely coincidental.
Copyright © 2001 by Michael Moorcock and Linda Moorcock All rights reserved.
Aspect® name and logo are registered trademarks of Warner Books, Inc. Warner Books, Inc., 1271 Avenue of the Americas, New
York, NY 10020 Visit our Web site at www.twbookmark.com } A Time Warner Company
Printed in the United States of America First Printing: April 2001 10 987654321
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Moorcock, Michael.
The dreamthief's daughter : a tale of the albino / Michael Moorcock.
p. cm.
ISBN 0-446-52618-5 I. Title
PR6063.O59 D74 2001
823'.914—dc21 00-043836
Book design by H. Roberts Design
For my god-daughter, Oona von B And for Berry and Co.
Author's Note
On May 10, 1941, a few months after Britain had unexpectedly won the crucial Battle of Britain and at
last stopped the Nazi expansion, Rudolf Hess, Hitler's deputy and his oldest remaining friend within the
Nazi hierarchy, flew to Scotland on his own initiative. He had crucial information for Churchill, he said.
Arrested, he was interrogated by MIS, British military intelligence. What he told MIS was immediately
suppressed. Certain files have since disappeared. Some existing files have still not been made public.
Hitler attacked the Soviet Union on June 24, 1941. Many believe that Hess was appalled by Hitler's
decision and was trying to make a final bargain with Churchill. Churchill never permitted a meeting with
Hess, who died in mysterious circumstances in 1987.
Book One
Sleep, and I'll steal your silver; Dream, and III steal your soul.
-wheldrake, "The Knight of the Balance"
Chapter One
Stolen Dreams
My name is Ulric, Graf von Bek, and I am the last of my earthly line. An unhealthy child, cursed with
the family disease of albinism, I was born and raised in Bek, Saxony, in the early years of the century. I
was trained to rule our province wisely and justly, to preserve the status quo, in the best traditions of the
Lutheran Church.
My mother died giving birth to me. My father perished in a ghastly fire, when our old tower was
partially destroyed. My brothers were all far older than I, and engaged mostly in military diplomacy
abroad, so the estate, it was thought, would be my responsibility. It was not expected that I would wish
to expose, any longer than necessary, my strange, ruby eyes to the light of common day. I accepted this
sentence of virtual imprisonment as my due. It had been suffered by many ancestors before me. There
were terrible tales of what had become of twin albino children born to my great-grandmother.
Any unease I had in this role was soon subdued as, in my questioning years, I made friends with the
local Catholic priest and became an obsessive fencer. I would discuss theology with Fra. Cornelius in the
morning and practice my swordplay every afternoon. All my bafflement and frustrations were translated
into learning that subtle and dangerous art. Not the sort of silly swashbuckling boy-braggadocio nonsense
affected by the nouveaux riches and ennobled bürgermeisters who perform half-invented rituals of
ludicrous manliness at Heidelberg.
No real lover of the sword would subject the instrument to such vulgar, clattering nonsense. With
precious few affectations, I hope, I became a true swordsman, an expert in the art of the duel to the
death. For in the end, existentialist that I am, entropy alone is the only enemy worth challenging, to