Image of the Beast by Philip José Farmer

Author:Philip José Farmer [Farmer, Philip José]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction, Fiction, General
ISBN: 9781902197241
Google: 4eW-L_tdIjkC
Amazon: 1902197240
Publisher: Hachette UK
Published: 2007-11-29T00:00:00+00:00

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CHAPTER 19

Childe took one step forward. There was still no sound except that which his mental ear heard. It was a crackling, as if the intrusion of a new mass had bent a magnetic field. The lines of force had been pushed out.

The rapier held point up, he advanced toward the enormous log on the bed. The noiseless crackling became louder. He stooped and looked under the frame. There was nothing there.

Something heavy struck him on his back and drove him face down. He screamed and rolled over. Fire tore at his back and his hips and the back of his thighs, but he was up and away, while something snarled and spat behind him. He rounded the bed and whirled, the sword still in his hand although he had no memory of consciously clinging to it or of even thinking of it. But if his spirit had unclenched for a moment, his fist had not.

The thing was a beauty and terror of white and black rosetted fur, and taut yellow-green eyes which seemed to reflect the ghastly light of the candles, and thin black lips, and sharp yellow teeth. It was small for a leopard but large enough to scare him even after most of the fright of the unexpected and unknown had left him. It had hidden in the cavity of the log, crouching flattened on top of Igescu until Childe had come close to it.

Now it crouched again and snarled, eyes spurting ferocity, claws unsheathed.

Now it launched itself over the bed and the coffin. Childe, leaning over the baron's body, thrust outward. The cat was spitted on the blade, which drove through the neck. A paw flashed before his eyes, but the tips of the claws were not quite close enough. Childe went over backward, and the rapier was torn from his hand. When he got up, he saw that the leopard, a female, was kicking its last. It lay on its right side, mouth open, the life in its eyes flying away bit by bit, like a flock of bright birds leaving a branch one by one as they started south to avoid the coming of winter.

Childe was panting and shaking, and his heart was threatening to butt through his ribs. He pulled the sword out, shoving with his foot against the body, and then climbed upon the oaken frame. He raised the sword before him by the hilt with both hands. Its point was downward, parallel with his body. He held it as if he were a monk holding a cross up to ward off evil, which, in a way, he was. He brought the blade down savagely with all his weight and drove it through the skin and heart and, judging from the resistance and muted cracking sound, some bones.

The body moved with the impact, and the head turned a little to one side. That was all. There was no sighing or rattling of breath. No blood spurted from around the wound or even seeped out.

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