Английский язык с М. Муркоком

Occupying themselves chiefly with remote, intellectual pastimes, the family of Prince Khlonskey had had no contact with other Vadhagh folk for two hundred years and had not seen a Nhadragh for three hundred. No news of the outside world had come to them for over a century. Only once had they seen a Mabden, when a specimen had been brought to Castle Erorn by Prince Opash, a naturalist and first cousin to Prince Khlonskey. The Mabden — a female — had been placed in the menageries where it was cared for well, but it lived little more than fifty years and when it died was never replaced. Since then, of course, the Mabden had multiplied and were, it appeared, even now inhabiting large areas of Bro-an-Vadhagh. There were even rumours that some Vadhagh castles had been infested with Mabden who had overwhelmed the inhabitants and eventually destroyed their homes altogether. Prince Khlonskey found this hard to believe. Besides, the speculation was of little interest to him or his family. There were so many other things to discuss, so many more complex sources of speculation, pleasanter topics of a hundred kinds.