The Painted Man
The stunning debut fantasy novel from author Peter V. Brett.The Painted Man, book one of the Demon Cycle, is a captivating and thrilling fantasy adventure, pulling the reader into a world of demons, darkness and heroes.AS DARKNESS FALLS, THE DEMONS RISEFor hundreds of years these creatures have terrorized the night, slowly culling the human population. It was not always this way. Men and women did not always cower behind protective magical wards and hope to see the dawn. Once, they battled the demons on equal terms, but those days, and skills, are gone.Arlen Bales lives with his parents on their isolated farmstead until a demon attack shatters their world. He learns a savage lesson that day: that people, as well as magic, can let you down.Rejecting the fear that kills as efficiently as the creatures, Arlen risks another path in order to offer humanity a last, fleeting chance of survival.
Читать The Painted Man онлайн беплатно
THE PAINTED MAN
PETER V. BRETT
HarperCollinsVoyager An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd. 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF
Published by HarperVoyager 2008
Copyright © Peter V. Brett 2008
Peter V. Brett asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
Map by Andrew Ashton © HarperCollinsPublishers 2008
Internal artwork by Lauren Cannon
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the authorâs imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks
HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication
Source ISBN: 9780007276134
Ebook Edition © December 2008 ISBN: 9780007287758 Version: 2017-10-16
To Otzi, the original Painted Man.
Contents
Map
The great horn sounded.
Arlen paused in his work, looking up at the lavender wash of the dawn sky. Mist still clung to the air, bringing with it a damp, acrid taste that was all too familiar. A quiet dread built in his gut as he waited in the morning stillness, hoping that it had been his imagination. He was eleven years old.
There was a pause, and then the horn blew twice in rapid succession. One long and two short meant south and east. The Cluster by the Woods. His father had friends amongst the Cutters. Behind Arlen, the door to the house opened, and he knew his mother would be there, covering her mouth with both hands.
Arlen returned to his work, not needing to be told to hurry. Some chores could wait a day, but the stock still needed to be fed and the cows milked. He left the animals in the barns and opened the hay stores, slopped the pigs, and ran to fetch a wooden milk bucket. His mother was already squatting beneath the first of the cows. He snatched the spare stool and they found cadence in their work, the sound of milk striking wood drumming a funeral march.
As they moved to the next pair down the line, Arlen saw his father begin hitching their strongest horse, a five-year-old chestnut-coloured mare named Missy, to the cart. His face was grim as he worked.
What would they find this time?
Before long, they were in the cart, trundling towards the small cluster of houses by the woods. It was dangerous there, over an hourâs run to the nearest warded structure, but the lumber was needed. Arlenâs mother, wrapped in her worn shawl, held him tightly as they rode.
âIâm a big boy, Mam,â Arlen complained. âI donât need you to hold me like a baby. Iâm not scared.â It wasnât entirely true, but it would not do for the other children to see him clinging to his mother as they rode in. They made mock of him enough as it was.
âIâm scared,â his mother said. âWhat if itâs me who needs to be held?â
Feeling suddenly proud, Arlen pulled close to his mother again as they travelled down the road. She could never fool him, but she always knew what to say just the same.
A pillar of greasy smoke told them more than they wanted to know long before they reached their destination. They were burning the dead. And starting the fires this early, without waiting for everyone to arrive and pray, meant there were a great many. Too many to pray over each one if the work was to be completed before dusk.
