"Bradley,.Marion.Zimmer.-.Darkover.-.Clingfire.3.-.2004.-.A.Flame.In.Hali" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bradley Marion Zimmer)

An idea formed in Eduin's mind. Gesturing to Saravio to follow, he strode toward the crippled farmer.
"That was courageous of you to speak so to a Comyn lord," he said, pitching his voice so that all around could hear him.
The farmer narrowed his eyes. Adrenaline and color drained from his features. His one good shoulder hunched, as if he would slink away.
Eduin restrained him with a gentle touch on the arm.
"It is a black day for all of us when a man cannot speak the truth or demand justice."
"Whether he will receive or not it is another matter," Saravio added.
Eduin stepped into the open area in the center of the street. With a simple twist of the ambient psychic energy, he cast a glamour about himself, so that he drew all eyes to him. He could speak in a whisper, and every word would be remembered.
"Whether or not he will take what is his due is yet another," Eduin said. The men around him were as clear to his laran as if they had shouted their feelings aloud. Anger and curiosity surged above their ingrained fear.
The farmer rubbed his withered shoulder with his good hand, as if measuring his own human power against the sorcery that could create such a weapon as clingfire.
"What's the use? What can any of us do against the mighty lords? And what will befall my children if I'm arrested, without even the few poor reis I now earn?"
One of the men muttered, "What are we to do? They feast while our children starve." Around him, the other men and women nodded. Their eyes glowed with eagerness.
"And why is that?" Eduin asked. "What gives them the right to take the best of everything for themselves? Are they gods, to decide who shall live and who shall die? Do they burn with the clingfire they command?"
"No!" a woman with a pock-marked face cried. "We starve! We burn!" Her simmering anger flared suddenly.
"I'll hear no more of this treason," a grizzled fellow with one eye patched said, drawing back. Although his cloak was as dirty and ragged as any, he held himself like a soldier. "I fought for King Carolin, who brought an end to Rakhal's reign of terror. Now he and Varzil, him they call the Good, they've got this Compact, they say, that will end these terrible wars forever. Let hon-
est soldiers fight as they can, and leave the wizards to their own."
"Do you really believe that the high lords will give up their best weapons?" the woman rounded on him. "That they care a filthy reis about the likes of us?"
"Hold your tongue, woman," the grizzled man rumbled, gesturing toward Saravio and Eduin. "The King's worth a hundred of the likes of them, and if he says he will bring peace to all these lands, that's what I'll hold to."
"Let us speak more of this," Eduin said urgently. "But not here in the open, for their spies are everywhere. Meet us tonight in a safe place-the inn called The White Feather."
"Aye, we know the place," one of the other men, a farmer by his clothing, said. "The folk there are honest enough, or as much as any can be in these times."
Quickly, Eduin set a time. He scanned the dispersing group with his mind. Hope flared in them, an excitement beyond what he'd expected. Someone had gently fanned the embers of resentment into exhilaration.
Saravio.
The red-haired man stood with unfocused eyes. Eduin picked up the ripple of laran power emanating from his mind, and was monitor enough to sense the almost euphoric response in the crowd.
Eduin spoke to Saravio several times before the other man seemed to hear him. Saravio blinked, as if rousing from a sleep, and showed no sign that anything out of the ordinary had occurred.
"We must make preparations at The White Feather," Eduin said. "The innkeeper's wife will surely remember you with favor."
"How could she not?" Saravio said as they made their way back through the mazework of narrow streets. "Yet, I do not see what purpose a secret meeting will serve. These are poor, ignorant folk. Useless."
"Useless to the great lords in their palaces, certainly.
Perhaps even to you or me," Eduin paused for dramatic effect. "But not to Naotalba."
As he'd expected, Saravio jerked alert at the name.
Eduin rushed on. "She brought me to you, didn't she? Just as she has now brought these men-this army."
"Naotalba's army? But, Eduin-these are not soldiers. They dress in rags. They have no weapons, no training. What could they possibly do?"
"That is the wrong question, my friend. It is rather what Naotalba can do with them. Do you doubt her power?"
They turned down the street, slightly broader than the rest, which would bring them to The White Feather. Saravio tripped on a cobblestone that had been turned on its end in the muck, jutting upward. Eduin caught his elbow, steadying him.
"I am her servant, always," Saravio declared. "It is not for me to question her ways."
"It is glorious to walk in the path of Naotalba," Eduin intoned. He despised himself for pretending a devotion he did not feel, to feed Saravio's delusions.
Once, Eduin had prayed to Zandru, Lord of the Seven Frozen Hells. Most Comyn honored Aldones, Lord of Light, fair Evanda, or the Dark Lady, Avarra. What did it matter which one he invoked if the cause was right? He remembered the woman of Saravio's vision and shivered inwardly. She could be dark or light, hope or despair, depending upon which aspect of the myth he drew upon. She was imaginary, a dream image, nothing more. Surely he need not fear such a thing....
At the mention of Naotalba, Eduin felt an answering ripple of psychic energy from Saravio. For a moment, he allowed himself to enjoy it. It would be a simple enough thing to block the sendings, to keep himself unaffected while those around them felt whatever Saravio sent them. Pleasure ... pain ... elation ... fury ...
"Naotalba's army," Saravio murmured. He halted at
the threshold of the inn and bent his head reverently. "Here it begins."
Naotalba's army, Eduin repeated to himself. A few desperate refugees tonight, perhaps, but tomorrow, their numbers would swell. An army, indeed. One to topple even the Keeper of Neskaya Tower.
5
The flush of pleasure on the face of the innkeeper's wife at seeing Saravio faded when Eduin explained what they wanted.
"The back room? For a private meeting?" She looked from one to the other. Fear lurked behind the bruise-colored hollows around her eyes. The skin of her neck hung in loose folds and her apron, although clean, had been worn almost to tatters and looked several sizes too large for her.
Eduin caught a fragment of her thoughts, the worry about how much ale might be drunk and how much bread eaten, how much she might be able to charge without overstepping the bounds of gratitude.
"We cannot pay you for the room," Eduin said in his most soothing tones, "only for food and drink, but if that is not enough-"
Saravio nudged the woman's mind. "No, no!" she cried, clearly distressed. "What must you think of me? How could I take payment from the man who did so much for my Nance?"
Before Saravio could mention the glories of Naotalba's service, Eduin pulled him away. Saravio was all
too eager to stop whatever he was doing to praise his goddess, without any regard to urgency.
"We must make plans for tonight," he told Saravio as they made their way back to their tiny rented room. "These people are frustrated and angry. They lack direction or leadership. Left on their own, they will spend their strength uselessly and then scatter like chaff upon the wind."
Saravio went to the small brazier and poked through the bed of cold embers for any unburned bits of charcoal. "Naotalba's foes are many and we are but few. Yet her might will prevail. This much she has promised me."
Eduin chose his next words carefully. "Listen to me, my friend. There is more at stake than extolling Naotalba's name. She has sent us to transform the world."