Datlow, Ellen (ed) - After / Датлоу, Эллен (ред) - После [2012, epub, ENG]

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IT STARTED WITH A TOOTHACHE. The Arkle had it, in one of the great hollow fangs at the front of his mouth, that would have been simple canines before the Overlords changed him, in the process of turning him into a Ferret. Not that The Arkle was entirely a Ferret. He’d escaped from the dorms when he was eleven, so he still looked mostly human. A very thin, elongated human, with his face and jaw pushed out so that it wasn’t quite a snout but you could tell it would have been one if he hadn’t gotten away. The Arkle also had a taste for blood. Not the full-on blood-lust the Ferrets had, because he could control it. But when the Family killed a chicken to roast, he would cut its throat over a bowl and drink the blood down like a kind of pre-dinner cocktail. Sometimes he put parsley in the cup, as a garnish. Or, as he said, for those extra vitamins. The Arkle didn’t eat a lot of greens. He was one of the younger members of the Family. He’d come out of the city four years before, more dead than alive, his body covered with sores and his gums receding from malnutrition. He’d lasted almost six months on his own after escaping from the dorms, which was no mean feat, but he wouldn’t have lasted much longer if he hadn’t been lucky enough to have been found by Gwyn, on one of the latter’s last foraging expeditions into the city fringe. . . .