"S. M. Stirling - Dies the Fire 02 - The Protector's War" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stirling S. M)

The Protector's War
Dies the Fire Book 02

by S. M. Stirling


ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thanks to Wayne Throop, a valiant laborer in the handwavium mines and the
unobtanium smelter, for help with technical explanations; to Harry Turtledove
for a Monty Pythonesque remark which gave me a flash of inspiration (or at
least that's what I call it) and some excellent advice on how to integrate a
subplot; to John Whitbourn (author of the excellent Downslord series and much
else) and Steve Brady, for help with dialects; to Steve Brady again for going
all around Robin Hood's barn, or at least Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire,
helping with research; to Kier Salmon, for once again helping with the
beautiful complexities of the Old Religion; to Don Ware for information on
Brownsville, which appears-somewhat fictionalized-in the book; to Melinda
Snodgrass, Daniel Abraham, Emily Mah, Terry England, George R.R. Martin, and
Walter Jon Williams of Critical Mass, for help and advice. And thanks to
Dominic Duncan, of the Santa Fe Best Buy, for rescuing this book from a total
hard-disk failure!
Special thanks to Heather Alexander, bard and balladeer, for permission to use
the lyrics from her beautiful songs, which can be-and should be!-ordered at
www.heatherlands.com. Run, do not walk, to do so.
Thanks to Arthur Conan Doyle, Leslie Anne Barringer, Rafael Sabatini and a
long and honorable list of tellers of tales, of knights and banners and
derringdo.
I try my poor best to follow in the hoofprints of their destriers.

All mistakes, infelicities and errors are of course my own.


CHAPTER ONE

Woburn Abbey/Aspley Wood/Rasta Bob's Farm Bedfordshire/Buckinghamshire,
England
August 12th, 2006 AD-Change Year Eight

I've been here before, John Hordle suddenly realized, his thumb moving over
the leather that covered the grip of his bow.

The moon was up, and it glittered on the ruffled surface of the water to his
left, where swans and ducks slept or swam lazily. But there was still little
light under the three tall yews and the big oak; the night around him was
still save for night birds, the whoo-whit of tawny owls and the screech of the
barn type. Seven armed men lay grimly silent behind brush and waist-high
grass, watching the great country house a quarter mile to the northeast.
Candles and lantern lights flickered and blinked out behind the windows as the
servants and garrison sought their beds. The pale limestone of it still glowed