Грег Фаршти - ''ЗАГAДКА ВЕЛИКИХ'' ГЛАВА 8 | Текст песни

• Тексты песен
• Грег Фаршти
• ''ЗАГAДКА ВЕЛИКИХ'' ГЛАВА 8

The first thing Tarduk noticed was that it was hot. Really hot. That made no sense; the last thing he remembered was being beneath the River Dormus, about to be frozen solid by rapidly advancing ice. The second thing he noticed was that his mouth was full of sand. He was face down in the stuff. That ruled out lying on the banks of the Dormus, since there was no sand there.

With a little reluctance, he lifted his head. He was in the desert, surrounded by ruins. It looked like there had been some huge battle here not long ago.

Tarduk got to his feet and swayed, overcome by a wave of dizziness. When it passed, he started looking around. Right away, he saw Crotesius and Kirbold. Both were unconscious, but alive and apparently uninjured. Kirbold was lying next to a big chunk of stone, half-buried in the sand. It had writing carved on it. Tarduk cleared away the sand and read: 'Atero Arena.'

What? thought Tarduk. It can't be. When we left to go north, the Atero Arena was whole, the Tournament was about to start. What could have done this?

Tarduk searched the ground frantically for some clue. He saw Glatorian armor and weapons scattered all around, obvious signs of a struggle. And one thing more: a Skrall shield, planted in the ground like a victory banner.

That was it, then. The Skrall had attacked Atero and destroyed it. And now... what? Were they attacking the villages? Or had they perhaps gone north to find the same place of power he had been seeking? He had to find out.

Words rang in his head, then. Someone, not long ago, had said to him, 'Rock is already unyielding. Give it the power of the Great Beings to wield and no world is safe.' But who had said that, and where?

He had a vague memory of an archway, a slab of stone, and someone speaking to him. And then he walked into the archway and... suddenly it all came back to him, a flood of memories surging into his brain. Yes, he had been underwater with Crotesius and Kirbold. They had been captives of the Element Lord of Water. Then the river began to turn to ice, as the Lord of that element attacked. The Water Lord had been forced to flee, and moments later, the air bubbles that had kept the Agori alive vanished as well. But they would freeze long before they drowned.

Desperately, the three started swimming for shore. Even as they did so, they could feel a disturbance in the water coming from upriver. Tarduk turned and saw a huge black shape racing toward them underwater. As it got closer, he saw it was a massive slab of rock. He barely had time to register that before he was flying up and out of the water, along with his two friends. Tarduk landed hard on the muddy shore. He turned in time to see three pillars of rock retreating into the water. The next moment, there was the sound of a great impact, and shards of ice flew up from beneath the river. The huge rock had smashed the oncoming wave of ice to bits.

Tarduk stood up. At first, he thought he must have hit his head when he landed. Standing before him was a mirror image of himself made from rock. But when it spoke, it was not his voice, but the unmistakable tones of a Skrall...

Грег Фаршти еще тексты