Monsted The Raging Rapids

Monsted The Raging RapidsMonsted A Pastoral Landscape after a StormMonsted A Winding Stream In SummeMonsted On the River
Common sense argued that an assault against this estate required teamwork, that one man couldn’t jump the wall, deceive the electronic security measures, disable the guards, and breach the house. That was Bruce Willis on the big screen. That was Tom Cruise in makeup. That was Channing Manheim playing a role from the dark side. That wasn’t anyone real.If a coordinated team of kidnappers had gotten inside Palazzo Rospo, however, there would be more his mouth, the discovery that he’d pinched tongue with teeth when he dropped to the ground, the throb just now arising in the bite.A flutter of foliage spun him around, and he brought the pistol toward the sound.Not foliage. Wings. Through the jungle, high above the pathway, flew a flock of brightly colored parrots, blue and red and yellow and the iridescent green of certain strange sunsetsthan one gunman squeezing off [575] short bursts of suppressing fire. They would have chopped at Ethan with one, two, three fully automatic carbines. Uzis or worse. By now he would be down, dead, and dancing in paradise.When silence persisted after the third brief volley, he rose from cover and eased warily through the ferns, between the palms, to the edge of the pathway.In any jungle movie, stillness like this always signaled the wilderness-savvy characters that villainy in one form or another had stepped into the natural world, silencing cricket and crocodile alike.Green-juice smell of crushed vegetation rising from underfoot.Muffled voice of a heating-system fan purring in the walls.A gnat, a midge, hovering in the air before him, hovering.Taste of blood in