Wet Grave, page 34
Past the rocks the road turned, falling away steep before him into dry abysses of yellow air that seemed to magnify everything like crystal. He saw below him a long dun landscape splodged with thorny green, broken here and there with anemic trees, feathery with autumn. Mountains gouged the sky southward to his left, black rock meringued with marble white, trailing drifts of white smoke. Farther off to the south and west the noon sky glared silver in sheets of water, fringed with green that was darker still.
January felt he could see every tile of every roof of the city that rose, it seemed, from the heart of the lake, red and blue and gilt; could name every horse and cow, every burro and child and pig in the thatch-roofed villages that lay between dry rangeland and endless, gleaming acres of bird-skimmed marsh. Could distinguish every voice of those multi-tongued bells one from another, as they sent forth over the lands their eternal message: each soul, no matter whose, is equally cherished, equally precious in the sight of God.
Behind him he heard cursing—German, English, Spanish—and the jangle of harness-ware. A long whip cracked as the men righted the coach. He supposed he should go back. Padre Cesario would need his arm looked at, before the wound turned nasty. And it wasn't beyond the realm of possibility that the bandits would return, and he was out of sight of the others. But for a long time he only stood, looking down over that high, barren valley, watching the geese and the ducks, the hawks and the vultures, free as the angels of Death in the jeweled air.
WET GRAVE
A Bantam Book
PUBLISHING HISTORY
Bantam hardcover edition published July 2002
Bantam mass market edition / May 2003
Published by Bantam Dell
A Division of Random House, Inc.
New York, New York
All rights reserved
Copyright © 2002 by Barbara Hambly
Map by Jeffrey L. Ward
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2001043401
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law. For information address: Bantam Books, New York, New York.
Visit our website at www.bantamdell.com
Bantam Books and the rooster colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
eISBN: 978-0-553-89753-1
v3.0
Barbara Hambly, Wet Grave
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January felt he could see every tile of every roof of the city that rose, it seemed, from the heart of the lake, red and blue and gilt; could name every horse and cow, every burro and child and pig in the thatch-roofed villages that lay between dry rangeland and endless, gleaming acres of bird-skimmed marsh. Could distinguish every voice of those multi-tongued bells one from another, as they sent forth over the lands their eternal message: each soul, no matter whose, is equally cherished, equally precious in the sight of God.
Behind him he heard cursing—German, English, Spanish—and the jangle of harness-ware. A long whip cracked as the men righted the coach. He supposed he should go back. Padre Cesario would need his arm looked at, before the wound turned nasty. And it wasn't beyond the realm of possibility that the bandits would return, and he was out of sight of the others. But for a long time he only stood, looking down over that high, barren valley, watching the geese and the ducks, the hawks and the vultures, free as the angels of Death in the jeweled air.
WET GRAVE
A Bantam Book
PUBLISHING HISTORY
Bantam hardcover edition published July 2002
Bantam mass market edition / May 2003
Published by Bantam Dell
A Division of Random House, Inc.
New York, New York
All rights reserved
Copyright © 2002 by Barbara Hambly
Map by Jeffrey L. Ward
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2001043401
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law. For information address: Bantam Books, New York, New York.
Visit our website at www.bantamdell.com
Bantam Books and the rooster colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
eISBN: 978-0-553-89753-1
v3.0
Barbara Hambly, Wet Grave
