The Scourge of Thracia

Начало книги

An eagle circled the azure sky, eyes scouring the slopes of the Haemus Mountains for prey, hunger gnawing at its belly. As if helping the eagle in its search, the warm summer wind strengthened and skirled around the craggy grey spurs of rock, buffeting the jagged silvery peaks and combing through the hardy foliage clinging to the slopes. Yet this yielded only spoors, puffs of dust or shuddering bushes where rodents had fled from sight, alert to the danger. Then the eagle spotted a hardy mountain goat, balanced precariously on the edge of a scarp to chew on the rough pasture there. But the goat was vigilant and already it was backing away towards an overhang under which its kids sheltered. There was no easy meal to be had here, so the eagle glided on to the south, its shadow tracing along the ridge path that rose towards the heart of the mountains. Here, at the highest point of the range, nothing moved. The zephyrs keened and the eagle felt its strength waning as it sought out something, anything. .

Читать дальше →