"Dave Duncan - The Seventh Sword - 2 - The Coming Of Wisdom" - читать интересную книгу автора (Duncan Dave)

young for a Fourth. He seemed no older than herself, but perhaps that was just
his carefree mannerтАФhe chattered. Random had been a Third. Few in any craft
advanced beyond that rank.
"How can you tell how far you were brought?" Quili asked.
"Shonsu could tell. He knows everything! And we didn't come all in one jump. He
woke at the first oneтАФI think he must sleep with both eyes open." Whoever Shonsu
was, Adept
DAVE DUNCAN
11
Nnanji seemed to regard him with more respect than he did the Goddess. "I woke
at the thirdтАФthe cold woke me." The swordsman shivered. "We came from the
tropics, you see."
"What are tropics, adept?"
"I'm not sure," he confessed. "Hot lands. Shonsu can explain. But the Dream God
is very high and thin there. He got wider as we jumped north. And lower. You can
see seven separate bands here, right? When we started, he was fainter and most
of the arcs too close together to separate. And we moved east, too, Shonsu says.
The rain only came with the last jump."
Shonsu must be a priest, she decided. He certainly did not sound like any
swordsman she had ever heard of.
"How could he possibly know about going east?"
"The starsтАФand the eye of the Dream God! It happened about midnight, and dawn
kept coming closer and closer. You'll have to ask Shonsu. He says it's still the
middle of the night in Hann."
Harm! "You've been to Hann, adept?"
He glanced down at her, surprised at her reaction. She could see well enough now
to tell that his face was filthy, smeared with dirt and grease. "Well, not Hann
itself. We were trying to cross to Hann, from the holy island."
"The temple!" she exclaimed. "You were visiting the great temple, then?"
Adept Nnanji snorted. "Visiting it? I was born in it."
"No!"
"Yes!" He grinned hugely, big white teeth gleaming. "My mother was near her
term. She went to pray for an easy labor, andтАФwhoosh! There I was. They only
just had time to get her into a back room. The priests thought it might almost
rank as a miracle."
He was teasing her. Then the grin grew even wider. "My father had put six
coppers hi the bowl, and if he'd made it seven, he says, then I'd have been born
right there, in front of the Goddess Herself."
That was pure blasphemy, but his grin was irresistible. Quili laughed in spite
of herself. "You should not joke about miracles, adept."
"Perhaps." He paused and then spoke more humbly. "I've
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THE COMING OF WISDOM


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seen a lot of miracles in the last two weeks, Apprentice Quili. Ever since
Shonsu arrived."