The Paths of the Air

Начало книги

The night had been still and cold. The approaching dawn had brought a rise in temperature and now, as the first faint silvery light appeared in the eastern skies, mist rose in spiralling wisps and curling folds from the lake in its shallow valley.

The track around the lake was clear of vegetation but only a few paces back the undergrowth began, dense and dotted with stands of birch and alder. The leaves had fallen but the thickly growing bracken still provided rust-red cover. Boar made their heads-down, single-minded, trotting progress through the undergrowth; roe deer stood, heads raised and checking for threat, before resuming their browsing.

It was not only animals who were making use of the Vale’s cover.

Suddenly, silently, a tall figure appeared. One moment there was nothing; the next it was there, standing quite still in thigh-high bracken, its outline shimmering in the mist like some phantom of the woods. Very slowly it turned its head, as if making sure no human eyes observed its movements. Then, apparently satisfied, it stepped fluidly through the bracken and emerged onto the path.

Читать дальше →