BagiraNat: переводы

→“Sookie,” he said. “Why are you wearing a tablecloth?”

→More important, I wasn’t sure how compatible fairy physiology was with human medical techniques—enough that humans and fairies could crossbreed, I knew, which argued that human first aid would be all right, but still . . . Dermot groaned and rolled over to his back. I put a towel under his head just in time. He winced.

→With a wad of sterile wipes, I cleaned away the blood on his head so I could inspect the damage. It looked bad, but I had expected that; head wounds always do. At least this wasn’t bleeding much at all anymore. While I was working on Dermot’s head, I was having a fierce inner debate about calling an ambulance. I wasn’t sure the ambulance crew would be able to get in without Hod and Kelvin’s interference—no, that couldn’t be a concern. Bill and I had gotten over here without being stopped.

→I was getting pretty damn sick of coping with the huge shawl, which unwound at the most inconvenient moments. I wondered briefly how Indian women coped, but I just couldn’t take the time to dress until I’d helped Dermot.

→With the Benelli in my hand I felt much better, and I grabbed the first aid kit to take up with me. I hobbled up the stairs to kneel again by my greatuncle.

→It was still there, and I let myself savor a moment of relief. I was lucky the men hadn’t stolen it. Their search must have been cursory. I’m sure they would have spied something as valuable as the shotgun if they hadn’t been looking for something much larger—me.

→But he made it down the stairs, and I heard the door slam behind him. In case he lost his control, I hurried down the stairs to lock both back doors so at least I’d have a little warning if he returned. I glanced through the living room to make sure the front door was locked, as I’d left it. Yes. Before I returned upstairs to Dermot, I went to fetch my shotgun from my front closet.

→“I’m going to check to see if they’ve left,” he said, lurching toward the stairs. Even his body was at war with itself. Clearly, his every instinct was telling him to drink blood somehow, some way, from the two tasty, tempting donors at hand, while his mind was telling him to get the hell away before something awful happened. If I’d had a spare person around, I’m not sure I wouldn’t have thrown him to Bill, I felt so sad for him.

→For a second, I was sure Bad Choice time was upon me. The worst choice would have been letting Bill bite Dermot. The next worst would have been letting Bill bite me, because with the intoxicating scent of fairy in the air I wasn’t sure he’d be able to stop in time. As all this flashed through my mind, Bill was struggling to master himself. He managed . . . but only by the thinnest of threads.

→“I’m so hungry,” he whispered, his eyes swallowing me. “Feed me, Sookie.”

→“You have to go,” I said, though I wanted to apologize so badly it made me shake. The look on Bill’s face was awful. Anger, craving, the struggle for self-control . . .

→“No, you wouldn’t stop. Back off, Bill! Leave!” But his face dipped lower, closer to Dermot’s head. I hauled off and slapped Bill as hard as I could.

→“I could just lick it clean,” Bill said, his dark eyes fixed on the wound with yearning.

→“Back away,” I said. “Back away. Go downstairs now.” The odor of fairy blood, intoxicating to a vampire, must seem as though it were filling the attic to Bill.

→“I know,” I said, surprised. “He’s fae.” I circled around to kneel on Dermot’s other side. I was in a position to see Bill’s face.

→Bill was hunched stiffly over the still figure. Without turning to me he said, “I can’t give him my blood,” as if I’d demanded it.

→Dermot was unconscious on the attic floor by the sander he’d rented, which was on its side and switched off. He had fallen forward, so I figured he’d had his back to the door with the sander running when they’d come in the house. When he’d realized he wasn’t alone and switched off the sander, it had been too late. His hair was clotted with blood, and the wound looked horrible. They’d been carrying at least one weapon, then.

→I stepped into my house clumsily. I was having trouble managing my wrapping, the umbrella, my purse, the bag containing the bottled blood, and my bare feet. I could hear Bill moving through the house, and I knew when he found something because he called, “Sookie!” in an urgent voice.

→We both pulled up to the back door, but while I was still gathering my grocery bag and my purse, Bill was out and into the house. I had a second’s worth of worry about how I was going to dry out my car before I made myself focus on the crisis at hand. I thought about what had happened to the fairy woman Cait, and concern about car upholstery left my head with gratifying speed.

→Bill eyed the broken plastic of the milk jug, and I wondered which one I’d hit, Hod or Kelvin.