"Avatar 2" - читать интересную книгу автора (Avatar)

The thought sobered her instantly. She picked up the translation, scrolling
through a few pages. She

opened the book's front cover again, looking at the strangely flowing symbols.
No author's mark.

Ro's voice, the open worry on her face. Colonel, I'm not prone to leaps of
faith, you probably know that, but everything in that book has come true.
Everything.

Kira concentrated on the translation, moving back to the text that Ro had
shown her, considering her security chief's credibility as the words skipped
by. Whatever the difficulties between them, Ro had presented her findings
clearly, her deductions sound: Istani Reyla had brought a book of Bajoran
prophecy to the station and hidden it, perhaps because she knew that someone
wanted to take it from her. The as yet unidentified killer had stabbed her for
the bag she carried, and had almost certainly fallen to his death believing
that he had the book. All of this suggested that the artifact was extremely
important

Kira wasn't sure about a lot of things when it came to her new security
officer, but Ro's intelligence had never been in question. Nor had her reading
skills.

Kira read the marked passage again; according to the padd, it was the last
complete prophecy. Pages from before and after the text were gone, ripped from
the book.

. . . with the Herald attendant. A New Age for Bajor will begin with the birth
of the alien Avatar, an age of Awareness and Understanding beyond what the
land's children have ever known. The child Avatar will be the second of the
Emissary, he to whom the Teacher Prophets sing, and will be born to a gracious
and loving

world, a world ready to Unite. Before the birth, ten thousand of the land's
children will die. It is destined, but should not be looked upon with despair;
most choose to die, and are welcomed into the Temple of the Teacher Prophets.

Without the sacrifice of the willing, the Avatar will not be born into a land
of peace. Perhaps the Avatar will not be born at all; it is unclear. That ten
thousand is the number, it is certain. Ten thousand must die.

Kira read it again, then closed her eyes. There were over a thousand
documented prophetic writings accepted by the Vedek Assembly and the Chamber
of Ministers as having been influenced by the Prophets, easily several
thousand more that had been rejected; Istani Reyla would surely have taken it
before the Assembly, if she'd actually believed that it was real. Or to a
vedek, at the very least. Ro could have read exaggerated importance into a few
vague predictions . . . and even as complicated as a twenty-plus-millennia-old
book would be to create, it surely wasn't impossible.