Текст книги "Days of Blood & Starlight"
Автор книги: Лэйни Тейлор
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Текущая страница: 27 (всего у книги 27 страниц)
EPILOGUE
The Kirin caves. Two uneasy armies seethe and roil. Only the sprawl of the caverns keeps the peace, by keeping them apart.
The Misbegotten claim to feel the sickness of hamsas even through stone. The revenants, enraged by the cold calculations writ black on the knuckles of their enemies, will not desist from pressing their palms against the walls that divide them. It is not a good beginning. Each army burns to hack off the others’ hands and hurl them over the drop into the ice chasms below.
Akiva tells his brothers and sisters that the magic of the marks doesn’t penetrate stone, but they don’t want to admit it. Every hour he wishes Hazael were here. “He would have them all playing dice together by now,” he tells Liraz.
“The music helps, at least,” she says.
She doesn’t mean the music of the caverns. The wind flutes haunt them all, waking beast and angel both from nightmares more alike than they could ever imagine. The Misbegotten dream of a country of ghosts, the chimaera of a tomb filled with the souls of their loved ones. Only Karou is soothed by the wind music. It is the lullaby of her earliest life, and she has been surprised by deep and dreamless sleep these two nights they have spent here.
Not tonight, though. It is the eve of battle, and they are gathered, several hundred altogether, in this largest of the caverns. Mik’s violin fills the space with a sonata from the other world, and they are all quiet, listening.
Common enemy, their commanders have told them. Common cause.
For now, anyway. It is implied or believed that soon this will change—revert—and they will be released to once more freely pursue their hate as they always have, chimaera against seraphim, seraphim against chimaera. The hope—Karou’s, the Wolf’s, Akiva’s, and even Liraz’s—is that their hate will turn to something else before that day comes.
It feels like a test for the future of all Eretz.
Zuzana’s head is on Karou’s shoulder, and Issa is on her other side. The Wolf isn’t far; Ziri has grown easier in his new body, and, lying back on his elbows beside the fire, he is elegant and exquisite, the former occupant’s cruelty absent from his face unless he remembers to try to put it there, and his smiles no longer seem learned from a book. Karou feels him looking at her, but she doesn’t look back. Her eyes are pulled elsewhere, across the cavern to where Akiva sits at another fire with his own soldiers around him.
He is looking back at her.
As ever when their eyes meet, it is like a lit fuse searing a path through the air between them. These past days, when this has happened, one or the other would turn quickly away, but this time they rest and let the fuse burn. They are filled with the sight of each other. Here in this cavern, this extraordinary gathering—this seethe of colliding hatreds, tamed temporarily by a shared hate—could be their long-ago dream seen through a warped mirror. This is not how it was meant to be. They are not side by side as they once imagined. They are not exultant, and they no longer feel themselves to be the instruments of some great intention. They are creatures grasping at life with stained hands. There is so much between them, all the living and all the dead, but for a moment everything falls away and the fuse burns brighter and nearer, so that Karou and Akiva almost feel as if they are touching.
Tomorrow they will start the apocalypse.
Tonight, they let themselves look at each other, for just a little while.
… to be continued
A
CKNOWLEDGMENTS
Whew.
It always comes as a relief to get to this page, because it means I have finished a book—a thing that gets easier in some ways over time, but not in all ways. Every story is its own challenge, and in the middle I find myself relying on the quote “It always seems impossible until it is done.” Because it does. (I didn’t know who said that until just this moment when I googled it, and now that I know it was Nelson Mandela, finishing a novel doesn’t seem like such a big accomplishment after all. Thanks a lot, Nelson Mandela.)
Ha. But truly, it is an accomplishment, and I owe deep thanks to some wonderful people:
First and best, my husband, Jim Di Bartolo, who is not only my earliest and most crucial reader, but also my fort holder-downer and slack picker-upper when I am struggling to balance writing with life. My books would not be what they are without you, and neither would my life, which I would not trade for any other life, real or fictional, not for anything. Thank you for the happy!
Clementine, age two, who, when I left in the mornings to write, would call after me, “Say hi to Karou!” Look, my little Pie, I finished the ham! Very soon, I would like to write a book for you.
Always, my parents, for everything they’ve always done to help me be me. I am so lucky to have you.
My agent, Jane Putch, friend and partner. I truly would be lost without you. Thank you.
With my arms flung as wide as they will go, a huge thanks to the amazing teams at Little, Brown Books for Young Readers in the U.S. and Hodder & Stoughton in the U.K. for parallel amazing publishing experiences that make this all twice as much fun. At Little, Brown, thanks especially to Alvina Ling, editor extraordinaire; Lisa Moraleda, Bethany Strout; Victoria Stapleton; Melanie Chang; Andrew Smith; Megan Tingley; Stephanie O’Cain; Faye Bi; the design team; and everyone else who squeezed the publishing schedule to within an inch of its life to accommodate my pace and get the book out on time (ish). I’m sorry for any stress I have caused. Thanks also to Amy Habayeb and the rights team—getting the foreign editions in the mail is one of my favorite things!
At Hodder, massive thanks to Kate Howard and Eleni Lawrence and the rest of the team. Everything you do blows me away.
And thanks, lastly, to the readers of Daughter of Smoke & Bone for such marvelous enthusiasm and support. There is no motivation quite like the excitement of readers, and it has been a truly amazing year. From the depths of my heart, I hope you like this one, too.
XO
Contents
WELCOME
DEDICATION
MAP
CHAPTER 1: THE GIRL ON THE BRIDGE
CHAPTER 2: ASH AND ANGELS
CHAPTER 3: MISS RADIO SILENCE
CHAPTER 4: NO MORE SECRETS
CHAPTER 5: A STRANGE MOON WORD
CHAPTER 6: THE VESSEL
CHAPTER 7: PLEASE NO
CHAPTER 8: THE END OF AFTERMATH
CHAPTER 9: TEETH
CHAPTER 10: HIVE
CHAPTER 11: THE UNFATHOMABLE WHY
CHAPTER 12: I FEEL HAPPY
CHAPTER 13: ASYMMETRY
CHAPTER 14: THIS DESOLATION OF ANGELS
CHAPTER 15: FRACTURED
CHAPTER 16: THE INHERITORS
CHAPTER 17: THE PAIN TITHE
CHAPTER 18: ARISEN
CHAPTER 19: PARADISE
CHAPTER 20: A COUNTRY OF GHOSTS
CHAPTER 21: SCARED ENOUGH
CHAPTER 22: THE TOOTH PHANTOM
CHAPTER 23: PRIESTESS OF A SANDCASTLE
CHAPTER 24: ANGEL-LOVER
CHAPTER 25: ENEMY QUEUE FORMS HERE
CHAPTER 26: GRIEVOUS HARM
CHAPTER 27: GREAT WILD HEART
CHAPTER 28: THE WORST KIND OF SILENCE
CHAPTER 29: THE DEVILS WILL STILL BE THERE IN THE MORNING
CHAPTER 30: A POOR JUDGE OF MONSTERS
CHAPTER 31: TALLY
CHAPTER 32: DEATH RULED THEM ALL
CHAPTER 33: THE SHADOWS THAT LIVE
CHAPTER 34: CELEBRATION
CHAPTER 35: ROLES TO PLAY
CHAPTER 36: FEEL LIKE SMILING
CHAPTER 37: SUICIDE
CHAPTER 38: THE INEVITABLE
CHAPTER 39: TASK NUMBER ONE
CHAPTER 40: WRONG
CHAPTER 41: MAD ALCHEMY
CHAPTER 42: LUCKY ZIRI
CHAPTER 43: AN AMUSING STORY
CHAPTER 44: SOME LUXURIES
CHAPTER 45: DEAD
CHAPTER 46: UN-ALIVE
CHAPTER 47: ASSASSINS AND SECRET LOVERS
CHAPTER 48: FASCINATING GUEST
CHAPTER 49: A TRUE SMILE
CHAPTER 50: LIKE JULIET
CHAPTER 51: THE BETTER TO KILL YOU WITH
CHAPTER 52: A SUMMONING OF BIRDS
CHAPTER 53: HEROES
CHAPTER 54: RECOGNITION
CHAPTER 55: THE EMPEROR’S PROWESS
CHAPTER 56: A SURPRISE
CHAPTER 57: A BASKET OF FRUIT
CHAPTER 58: HONEY AND VENOM
CHAPTER 59: SWEET GIRL
CHAPTER 60: THE NEW GAME
CHAPTER 61: A LOT OF DEAD AKIVAS
CHAPTER 62: CHAIN
CHAPTER 63: LUCK FRICTION
CHAPTER 64: A NICER NUMBER
CHAPTER 65: BEAST REQUIEM
CHAPTER 66: KILL THE MONSTER. CHANGE THE WORLD.
CHAPTER 67: THE ONLY HOPE IS HOPE
CHAPTER 68: SIRITHAR
CHAPTER 69: SCRATCHING
CHAPTER 70: LONG LIVE THE EMPEROR
CHAPTER 71: THE PIT
CHAPTER 72: A SAD WASTE OF PAIN
CHAPTER 73: THE SCREAM
CHAPTER 74: THE CURE FOR ENNUI
CHAPTER 75: IT WAS NEAR AND IT WAS WINGS
CHAPTER 76: DEAD WEIGHT
CHAPTER 77: TO LIVE
CHAPTER 78: THE ANGEL AND THE WOLF
CHAPTER 79: DONE
CHAPTER 80: THE DECEPTION
CHAPTER 81: VEINS OF CHANCE
CHAPTER 82: TOP THREE REASONS FOR LIVING
CHAPTER 83: GOOD-BYE
CHAPTER 84: APOCALYPSE
EPILOGUE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
COPYRIGHT
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2012 by Laini Taylor
Map copyright © 2012 by Jim Di Bartolo
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
Little, Brown and Company
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First e-book edition: November 2012
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ISBN 978-0-316-21540-4
