"Andre Norton - Witch World - Warlock of the Witch World" - читать интересную книгу автора (Norton Andre)

knowing what lay here. We meant no more than to find a refuge.”

“Yet you have wrought disturbances.” She picked up a pebble and tossed it into the
lake. It splashed and ripples sped across the surface. “You have done things which could
awake old evils. You would draw in the Krogan.”
“Not I alone,” I protested. “We shall stand together, all of us!”

“I do not think that Orias and the others will agree. No.” She shook her head. Her
hair, which seemed to dry very quickly in the open air, fanned out in a silver net about
her. “You have had your journey here for naught, outlander.”

Then she took a step, a leap, and the water closed about her.
But she had the right of it. When we were ferried back to the plumed island in the
morning the warn-sword was as Ethutur had planted it, untouched, bearing no added
cords of agreement. Nor was Orias there. We faced an empty throne and the feeling that
it was better for us to be gone from territory where we were not wanted.



III
“WHAT DO WE NOW?” I asked when the silent Krogan had brought us back to the
swamp shore and were gone again into the lake before we could voice any farewell.

“Naught,” Ethutur replied. “They have decided to remain neutral. I fear they will not
find that so easy.” He spoke absently and I saw that he watched the hills about us with a
scout’s eye.

I followed his gaze. There was nothing to see, or was there? The sun shown as it had
the morning before, and the country appeared empty. Then I saw a black speck wing
across the sky and behind it another.

“Mount!” Ethutur’s voice was urgent. “The Rus fly. Indeed there must be a beating
of the borders now!”
Shapurn and Shil, who trotted under my weight, picked a careful way along that
nearly dry stream bed. But they were swifter than in their coming. I drew a deep breath.
The corrupt miasma of the swamp still clung. I glanced at my boots to see if the slime
spotted them, though we had wiped ourselves with withered grass.
No such traces on me, yet that breath of rottenness grew stronger as we rode. I
watched the rises which fenced this water way. A man who has gone often to war, such as
we knew along the border, develops senses of warning. The sun was hot and strong, yet a
shadow stretched to touch us. I set my helm on my head in spite of the heat, threw the
ends of its mail scarf about my throat. Also I loosened the sword which was a weight
against my thigh.
Ever it seemed to me that that stench grew stronger, brought to us with every small
puff of wind which found its way into that narrow ravine. No longer did Ethutur carry the
warn-sword before him. Rather it was fastened to his belt, since his mission as envoy was
done; he freed the stock of his force whip, holding it ready in his hand. It was as if an
enemy massed unseen upon the heights above us.
 Yet there was nothing we could see: Only the smell and the warning within us. I
marveled at the speed with which the Renthan bore us through that place which was a