"Watt-Evans, Lawrence - 03 - Sword of Bheleu" - читать интересную книгу автора (Watt-Evans Lawrence)

"Kill the humans!"
They were with him now; the overman-god laughed, and the sword flamed over his head. He plunged it down, slamming the point into the threshold of the Baron's mansion; the stone step exploded into red-hot splinters, spraying up around him, but leaving him unscathed. The shards that landed inside the building set a dozen small fires on the wooden floor.
"Go, then! Kill and burn!"
The answering shout was wordless; the overmen turned away and ran with drawn weapons at the dwindling crowds in the surrounding streets. Garth laughed again, raised the sword, and swept it in an arc through the air; wherever it pointed, flame erupted. In seconds every building around the marketplace was ablaze. He strode forward into the square; behind him, the mansion flared up suddenly. He turned and gestured with the sword; the Baron's home was lost in a roaring curtain of flame. In moments it collapsed inward, falling into its own cellars; behind it, through the flames, Garth could see the King's Inn, where the so-called Forgotten King dwelt. He flung the fiery might of the sword outward toward it, as he had toward the other structures, but nothing happened. Again he tried, calling aloud, "I am Bheleu!"
The inn remained unharmed. He made a third and final attempt, willing all the god's available power to flow along the blade and strike at this resistance.
The tavern still remained untouched. Reluctantly, Garth gave up. He turned back to the buildings around the square; those, at least, behaved properly, flaring up like lit torches at his slightest whim. He laughed, and marched out into the village, spreading fire and destruction, but his dark joy was marred by his strange failure with the King's Inn.
The villagers scattered and hid before the onslaught of the overmen. Most took refuge in their homes or in the ruins that ringed the village.. A few fled into the wilderness beyond the walls. None managed to put up an organized defense. Some found weapons; many barricaded their doors and windows. None had the foresight and ability to gather the townsmen so that their greater numbers could be of use against the overmen.
The overmen marched in small parties from door to door, smashing in barricades and butchering those who resisted. Where the resistance was too strong to be dealt with easily, warbeasts were called in. In all of Skelleth the only weapons that might have been effective against the great hybrids were buried in the burning ruins of the Baron's mansion. The animals served the overmen as battering rams, as armor, and as instruments of terror.
The humans who surrendered were spared, in most cases, and taken prisoner; the prisoners were gathered in the market square, guarded by four overmen and four warbeasts. A few overmen were too full of bloodlust and fury to restrain themselves, and some villagers were slain whether they surrendered or not, but generally even those individuals calmed down after a single such incident apiece.
Garth was the exception. As darkness descended, he strode laughing and screaming through Skelleth, killing every human he saw, burning every building he passed with the unnatural flames from the sword. Even the other overmen kept well away from him. He needed no warbeast to batter down barricades; a single blow from the sword shattered any defense set up against him. He seemed to take delight in killing those who could not fight back; he left the burning, dismembered corpses of women and children behind him.
It was full night when he came to one house where the door and shutters had been reinforced with steel. He was unable to carry through his first intention of burning his way in; when the wood had crumbled to ash, the metal still held. With a cry of "I'a bheluye!" he struck at the steel with the sword. Sparks showered, but the blade did not penetrate. He struck again, and this time the door exploded inward in a shower of twisted fragments.
There was no one in the room beyond; he stepped in and looked about. Even to his hazy, berserk mind, it was obvious that someone had locked and barred the door he had just destroyed. That meant that there was a prospective victim somewhere in the house. He decided to find this person.
The kitchen was empty; the back door and rear windows were locked and bolted. That left the upper floors. Garth found no stairs, but a ladder led through a trap in the ceiling.
The second floor was a single large chamber, furnished in a style that was luxurious by the standards of Skelleth, if ordinary enough in more fortunate places. A single bed stood against one wall; furs covered part of the floor, and hangings were on each wall. Tables and chairs were scattered about. Like the rooms below, it was unoccupied. Another ladder led upward.
With a snort, Garth climbed the second ladder, awkward with the great sword in his hand, and found himself in an unfurnished garret. There was a window at each end. The window at the back stood wide open; on either side of the window were stacked cages that held cooing birds. In front of the window stood a dour old man garbed in dark red.
With an exclamation of delight, Garth recognized him. This was Darsen, the rabble rouser, the troublemaker. This was the old man who had blamed Garth for the death of Arner the guardsman months ago and almost incited a riot; this was the man who had begun the battle by shouting, "Kill the overmen!"
This would be fun, the overman thought; this man would die slowly. Garth advanced upon him, the sword held ready in his hands.
Darsen had been facing the window, clutching something in his hands; now, as he turned to face the approaching overman, he flung the object out the window. Garth saw the bird flapping wildly, catching itself in midair. He paid it no attention; pigeons had nothing to do with him. If the old man chose to spend his last pain-free moments playing with birds, that was his privilege.
The human tried to duck under the sword and slip past Garth, but did not make it; the overman's left hand released the hilt and grabbed the collar of the red robe. The last thing Darsen saw before pain forced his eyes shut was Garth's face, grinning broadly, teeth gleaming red in the light of the glowing jewel.
Outside the window, the bird was flying westward, toward Dыsarra.


CHAPTER EIGHT

The nightly sacrifice was done; this had been a sunset ritual, simpler and quicker than the midnight ceremonies used on special days. The victim's death had been relatively easy, and there had been no elaboration.
Haggat wondered whether such sacrifices were actually worth doing; did Aghad take pleasure in every murder? There was little real hatred in such slayings, little of the pure, dark emotion the god fed upon. Some stranger dragged from his bed had been killed; how did that help the cause of fear, of hatred, and of loathing? It did not truly increase the worshippers' hatred of their fellow Dыsarrans; if anything, he suspected it helped assuage their anger. It probably did little to increase the city's fear; the people had long since become accustomed to such random deaths and were much more frightened at present by the White Death, the plague that was loose in the city.
The sacrifices were traditional, though, and there was no real reason to stop them. They were no great drain upon the cult's resources, and the worshippers did enjoy them. His personal acolyte certainly did; she had been quite enthusiastic tonight, he thought. It was amusing to see the change that had taken place in her over the recent weeks. She had been a timid little thing at first, awed by her close contact with the then high priest, frightened at being given to Haggat, the temple's seer.
She had had reason to be frightened, since tales of Haggat's idea of pleasure were common among the cultists. But she had discovered that she could survive his amusements and even enjoy some of them. With the death of his former master and Haggat's elevation to high priest, she suddenly found herself second in the cult's hierarchy. That position she enjoyed completely.
Now, as he had expected, she had prepared his special chamber; the scrying glass was gleaming, freshly polished, and the candle was lighted. She knelt by the doorway, awaiting his appraisal of what she had done.
He saw nothing wrong and made a sign of dismissal; she prostrated herself, then backed stiffly out of the room, closing the door behind her. He knew she would be waiting in his bedchamber when he was done with the glass.
There was no hurry, however; he enjoyed using the glass as much as he enjoyed his less savory pursuits. He picked up the crystal globe and held it so that the image of the candle flame distorted within it.
When last he had used the glass, he had seen the overman Garth entering a tavern in Skelleth. It would be interesting to see what had become of him in the hours since. He concentrated on the globe.
The image of the flame grew and twisted, and then reddened.
That was unexpected; Haggat knew of no reason the image should be red. He wondered if the interference he had become familiar with was taking some new form. He tried to clear and strengthen the contact.
The crystal sphere was flooded with blood-red light. Two faces appeared, both etched in black and crimson. One was inhuman, eyes gleaming brightly; the other was a man, his face twisted in pain and terror. Haggat recognized them both, Garth and Darsen.
The high priest was surprised and confused. What was going on in Skelleth? Why was Darsen frightened? Why were the two of them anywhere near each other? Darsen was one of the more competent agents of the cult of Aghad and he certainly knew better than to confront so dangerous an opponent directly. He had been instructed to observe the overman and to do what he could to annoy and inconvenience him, to stir up fear, anger, and hatred. Had he gotten careless and provoked the overman openly?
A moment later it was plain that Darsen's terror had been justified; Haggat could still see nothing but the two faces, but he knew death when he saw it. Darsen was dead. The cult had lost its only agent in Skelleth.
Garth dropped the corpse, and Darsen's dead face vanished from the image in the globe. Haggat could not make out the overman's surroundings, even now, but only his face, hellishly red.
Garth looked up, and it seemed as if those baleful eyes, almost glowing in the red light, met Haggat's. The Aghadite knew that was impossible; only the greatest of sorcerers could detect a scrying spell. Still, those crimson eyes seemed to be watching him. Disconcerted, he let his concentration slip and lost the image of the rest of Garth's hideous face. He saw only the eyes.
Then a third red glow joined them, and Haggat drew back in shock and horror. What was that? He seemed to sense something dark and brooding in it, something beyond his comprehension. The new glow grew, and Garth's eyes faded. The crystal was suddenly hot in Haggat's hands, intensely hot; he dropped it.
It did not merely shatter when it hit the floor; it exploded, showering sparks and red-hot gobbets of glass in every direction. Miraculously, nothing caught fire, but Haggat would not have noticed if it had; he was staring at the burns on his palms.
This was powerful magic indeed! Could the so-called Sword of Bheleu truly be linked to the god of destruction himself? He had not seriously considered that possibility before. He knew of no device linking its user to Aghad, and had seen no reason to think other gods would provide what his own did not. He had dismissed such claims as superstition, or boasting, or an intimidating bluff.
This overman, however, seemed to have power of an order only divine intervention could explain. In that case, it would not be safe to use ordinary measures against him. Garth had defied the cult of Aghad and slain its high priest. For that he must die horribly; that could not be altered. Methods could be changed, however, and where Haggat had previously planned to use the cult's own elaborate system of spies and assassins to torment and eventually kill Garth, he now thought that might be unwise. It would be better to turn another enemy against the overman and let the two destroy each other, allowing the Aghadites to assess their power, and leaving the survivor weakened so that the cult might then handle him directly.
Furthermore, he knew exactly the right enemy to use for this purpose; an enemy of his own, an enemy he had long sought vengeance upon.
The priesthood had not been his first choice for a career; as a youth he had set out to become a sorcerer and had served several years as a wizard's apprentice. His master, a very great magician, had mistreated him, insulted him, abused him, and withheld secrets from him. His frustration and anger had fed upon each other and grown in him until finally, one night, he had demonstrated decisively how well he had learned his lessons and how much his master had underestimated him. The demons he conjured took more than an hour to finish pulling the old wizard to pieces.
It was only after the demons had done their work and been sent away that he learned one of the facts his master had concealed from him-the existence of the Council of the Most High, a secret society of magicians of every kind that sought to limit and control the knowledge and use of the arcane arts. His late master had been a member and had carried a spell that alerted his fellow councilors the instant he died.
The killing of one of their number was something the Council did not condone under any circumstances. They destroyed or confiscated all Haggat's belongings, placed a geas upon him that severely limited his magical abilities, cut out his tongue to prevent him from revealing any of his forbidden knowledge or reciting incantations, and then dumped him before a temple of Aghad, the god of treachery and ingratitude, among other things.
Aghad was also, as Haggat had known even then, a vengeful god, and he had willingly entered the priesthood in the hope of eventually gaining the revenge he had sworn. Though he rose steadily in the cult's hierarchy, due largely to the little magic he still retained, vengeance had eluded him; he had been unable to convince the cult to take action against the Council. Even now, when he had become absolute ruler of the Aghadites, he had not yet attempted anything. He knew that the Council was too powerful and too well-informed to be attacked without much careful planning and preparation. Its members included virtually all the most powerful wizards of the northern lands, and to defeat such a confederation would require great stealth and skill-or equal power.
He had assumed that no equal power existed in the world, but now, he thought, this enchanted sword that the overman called Garth carried might be just such a power. It angered him to think that the weapon had lain unused in Dыsarra, a few hundred yards from his own temple, without his knowledge. It could well have been there, offering countless opportunities for theft, since he first came to the city. He had been unaware of it until this overman came along and blithely stole it, wiping out Bheleu's cult in the process, defiling Aghad's temple, and spreading the White Death in the marketplace.
Now, though, Garth and the Council of the Most High would both pay for their temerity in defying him. He needed merely to turn one against the other. Certainly one or the other would be destroyed, and he could then deal with the survivor.