-
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
eyes. She didn't struggle or glance away. She returned his stare, and a
reflection of his crim-son orbs glinted in her dark eyes.
He released her as swiftly as he had grabbed her. "I had hoped to take you by
surprise, before you had the chance to erect your defenses. I should have
known that you never let your defenses down."
Nefron didn't respond.
"One of Mimses's Incarnates came to me not an hour ago," Akhnaton said
conversationally. "He re-ported he had found the sack of suet dead by
stran-gulation. He mentioned the female newcomer. Your name figured
prominently, as well."
Nefron still refused to speak.
Akhnaton sighed. "I will not miss Mimses. Nor will I divert my attention to
finding either the woman& or your other conspirators in whatever in-trigue you
have schemed. I will say only this and I urge you to believe it if anything
happens to dis-rupt today's ceremony, before, after or during, I will hold you
responsible, even if you are not. You will die a particularly undignified
death."
Nefron finally spoke, a contemptuous edge to her voice. "Like mother like
daughter."
Akhnaton's face twisted into an ugly scowl of sudden rage, then quickly
composed itself into a mocking smile. Softly, intimately, he said, "You know
me so well, daughter. Now, get out of my sight."
file:///G|/Program%20Files/eMule/Incoming/Ja...athlands%2040%20-%20Nightmare%2
0Passage.html (266 of 287) [12/29/2004 1:03:55 AM]
Axler,_James_-_Deathlands_40_-_Nightmare_Passage
THEY WERE SOME of the grimmest, most bleak and hopeless hours Ryan
Cawdor had ever known.
He mingled with the crowd flowing and eddying in the compound. His jaw muscles
ached with the strain of keeping a half-witted, vacant grin frozen on his
face. He allowed wine to be poured on him, garlands of flowers hung around his
neck and drunken women to plant slobbery kisses on his lips. He kept moving,
constantly shifting, sometimes joining in with a snatch of ludicrous song,
moving his lips to the lyrics he didn't know.
Always he kept watch for an animal-headed In-carnate. He assumed the worst,
that Mimses's body had been discovered or that Fasa had been released from his
cramped confinement. Regardless of the ri-otously festive mood in the city,
the newcomers would be sought out.
As the afternoon staggered toward sunset, Ryan found it more and more
difficult to keep the fire of hope and courage burning inside of him. He had
believed he had lost Krysty before, but to death, the inevitable dark embrace
no one could truly escape. The possibility that she was enraptured, seduced by
the charismatic
Hell Eyes, was almost too agonizing for him to consider.
Ryan had called him a mutie with an attitude, but that was so far from the
truth it wasn't even a lie. He realized he couldn't truly comprehend exactly
what he was.
He wondered if the last Neanderthal had felt the same way when he snarled at
the smooth, intelligent countenance of the first Cro-Magnon, understanding on
a deep, visceral level he had met not only his superior but the symbol of his
extinction.
Ryan tried to dispel the notion. A superhuman Hell Eyes might conceivably be,
but he was still driven by ordinary human emotions, still weakened by human
frailties.
He joined a clot of people near the open gate and relaxed into them, allowing
Page 146
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
himself to carried by the current out of the compound. Already a considerable
number of Aten's citizenry clustered around the base of the pyramid. He looked
up toward its apex and saw the capstone resting on a platform made of wooden
timbers. The sun shone from its crystal-shot surface in a thousand dancing,
file:///G|/Program%20Files/eMule/Incoming/Ja...athlands%2040%20-%20Nightmare%2
0Passage.html (267 of 287) [12/29/2004 1:03:55 AM]
Axler,_James_-_Deathlands_40_-_Nightmare_Passage sparkling pinpoints.
From what he had overhead in the crowd of cel-ebrants, the pyramidion had been
rolled into place right at sunset, by a select crew of laborers evi-dently
purified, as Fasa had said. When the time came, men with huge mallets would
knock the sup-porting timbers out from under it, and the capstone would settle
atop the monument and imbue Pharaoh and his bride with the power of the gods.
The crowd was large and noisy around the mon-ument, and a band of musicians
strolled among them, the stuttering whine of flutes and the bleat of horns
lifted above the beat of drums.
Ryan stayed deep within the jostling, singing and laughing throng, refusing to
acknowledge his grow-ing claustrophobia. He had spent too many years in the
wild, unpopulated places of Deathlands to be comfortable in crowds. He kept
consulting the po-sition of the sun, willing it savagely to sink. Like he
expected, it ignored him.
He continued to shuffle around, past and with the people. He ceased to think
about much of anything except to keep his feet from being trod upon.
Suddenly, the music stopped and the tempo of the crowd's voice quieted. Ryan
dully looked up and saw a pastel mixture of oranges, yellows and muted reds
spreading across the sky. Silence seemed to de-scend on the crowd as if a
giant bell jar had dropped over it. The wind hissed eerily through the sand.
A new sound began, a steady squeak underscored by a dry, castanetlike [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] - zanotowane.pl
- doc.pisz.pl
- pdf.pisz.pl
- matkadziecka.xlx.pl