The House of Sacrifice. Anna Smith Spark

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ peaceful. Bury them in a hole and piss on them and curse Marith Altrersyr. Drink herself senseless and pay someone to slit her throat.

      The first, almost certainly. That’s what most of the women had done. Twice before.

      That’s not fair, Tobias thought. Not fair. She’s got every right to make the best of her crapped-on ruined wound of a life.

       Chapter Eleven

      Turain! The land fell away sharply, the plain of the Isther river opening up, black earth and rich fields before the desert and the mountains rose again. Groves of white oleander. Peach trees. Dates. Golden plump wheat. Ah, gods, the smell was mouthwatering. The wind blew up from the south scented with ripe fruit, everyone drooled as they breathed it in. The river lay a wide silver ribbon, fat, smooth and sleepy, worn out from rushing through the mountain slopes. It is good here, Tobias thought. Really bloody nice. Turain smiled at them on the horizon. Not a very big city. Maybe even just a large town. Not much to look at, either, said someone who knew someone who knew some bloke. Grey and square and low, houses with narrow windows, gloomy inside and out. It had been sacked and pillaged and burned and smashed up and basically completely annihilated a surprisingly large number of times. So it had very, very, very, very strong walls. Not like they weren’t short on old stone.

      ‘Is it really worth the amount of pain it’s going to take to take it?’ Snigger. ‘Stupid question, yeah.’

      The whole army sat and looked down on it. It sat and looked up at them back. The land around was completely empty. Abandoned villages, no people, not even a stray goat. Everyone and everything had fled inside the city. You got very, very, very, very strong walls, you’re hardly likely to do much else, are you?

      ‘They’d have been better off staying outside it, I’d have thought, myself,’ Tobias said conversationally to Lenae. ‘Those walls are like an insult to him.’

      ‘Never seen a city the Army of Amrath can’t break to tiny bits!’ a passing soldier shouted, riding past them leading a squad all in silver helmets, all mounted on beautiful white horses with gold saddle cloths. ‘Gravel, we’ll make of those walls. Use them as a grindstone for their defenders’ bones.’

      ‘Cowards, cowering there behind their walls! We’ll teach them the cost of cowardliness!’

      Oh my eye, didn’t Lenae look impressed.

      Tobias made a face after them. ‘Yup. As I was just saying. Only in a less naff way.’

      The siege train got itself ready for action. The army went down into the plains and brought back a feast of ripe, slightly ash-stained fruit. Wonder the people of Turain hadn’t burned the fields themselves, in all honesty. But maybe they had too much pride for it. Or too much misplaced hope. Marith ordered the dragons out to soften up the city a bit. Everyone sat on the mountain slopes munching peaches and drinking date wine, to watch. Dazzling. Impressive. The red dragon had a great turn of speed on it, turned in the air on a penny, had this neat trick of rushing over, spinning around, rushing back so quick its fires almost seemed to meet. The green dragon was slower: it came down low, tore at the buildings with its claws as well as burning them with its breath. The people of Turain did pretty well against them, considering, loosed off various big missiles that did nothing, surprise surprise, but looked impressive and must have made everyone involved feel slightly better about things. Some mage bloke blasted light around: the spectators applauded politely when the green dragon shot up into the sky with one wing on fire, howling. Like watching a wrestling bout, you kind of wanted it to be a bit more of a matched fight. Support the underdog, like, for a while at the beginning. Not so interesting if the other side just caved from the off.

      ‘Date?’ Tobias asked Lenae. She shook her head, her mouth stuffed with peach. Juice running all sticky down her chin. Yeah. Nice to look at.

      The mage bloke got the green dragon again, hurt it. Big groan rang over the mountainside. Gods, thought Tobias, gods, don’t tell me something’s actually going to go one up on him?

      The green dragon and the red dragon met in the air. Quick conflab. Flew down over the city together. ‘Come on! Come on!’ the spectators all shouting. Underdog forgotten. Cheer of ‘Yesssss!’ as the mage sent up a blast of light that was abruptly snuffed out. Widespread applause. A curtain of fire came down over half the town.

      The dragons seemed to decide that was game over. The place was indeed looking pretty well scorched and bashed up. They flew off overhead into the mountains, to oohs and aahs as they came low over. Nasty smell from the green one’s injured wing.

      ‘I’ll have a date, now, thanks,’ said Lenae. She got up. ‘That was amazing. When do you think we’ll go in?’

      Weird, really, looking at the city, thinking this time tomorrow it was going to be rubble and human mince. The whole army lining up there, waving their sarriss around, marching back and forward pointlessly so King Marith can feel good about himself, knowing this time tomorrow they could be dead and there’s absolutely nothing any of them can do to make it any different.

      Tobias sauntered off to use the nearest latrine trench. Most of the camp followers didn’t, filthy ignorant bastards, but. Pleasing, as always, that all the practical advice he’d given Marith about latrines had paid off. A lot of soldiers were squatting there with him, fresh from helping to chuck big rocks around and gasping with relief. All the fruit they’d been eating was, uh, having something of an effect.

      ‘Lovely display,’ said Tobias. Seemed apposite to say something, when you’re shoulder to shoulder with a bloke hearing the sound of his shit come out.

      ‘You what?’

      Wait, no, not the— Oops, gods. Disgusting mind, you have, mate.

      ‘He means the siege, obviously,’ bloke on the other side of him said. And: thank you. Someone with a clean train of thought. Face burning, Tobias shuffled himself to sort of facing him.

      ‘Clews, man!’

      Pause. ‘Uh, do I know you?’

      Porridge boy. Yeah?

      Oh, wait, no, he doesn’t know me. Can’t really say, ‘No, you don’t, but I wept over you, just recently, cause you reminded me of the life I fucked up.’

      ‘He’s a camp follower,’ the man who’d thought he was talking about the men lined up shitting said. ‘They know all our names, the camp followers do. Idolize us.’ Big, strong, solid-looking man, flashy hair, expensive cavalryman’s boots … some of the camp followers probably did know his name, yeah. He probably paid them extra if they screamed it.

      ‘Pathetic, they are, camp followers,’ Clews said. Sneer in his voice. Trying to make his voice sound loud and strong. ‘Men camp followers! Cowardly. Should be soldiering.’

      Don’t rise to it, ignore it, you know what he’s doing, he’s a boy, it’s only bugging you because … ‘I was a soldier,’ Tobias said. ‘I spent years soldiering, I’ll have you know.’ Killed more men than you’ve had hot meals – for the love of all the gods, don’t say that, don’t. The cavalryman was grinning at them both, still crouching over the latrine trench. He’s got you right riled up, Tobias, this kid, and you know why, and just finish your crap and walk away.

      ‘Got scared, did you?’ Clews said.

      Tobias СКАЧАТЬ