"Duncan, Dave - Seventh Sword - 02 - Coming Of Wisdom" - читать интересную книгу автора (Duncan Dave)

She returned the laugh with relief. "Not one."
"And you haven't seen any sorcerers recently, I suppose?"
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THE COMING OF WISDOM
So he did know about the sorcerers! "Not recently, adept..."
He sighed. "Well, if it's safe, then we must have been brought here to meet someone. Like Ko."
"Ko?"
"Have you never heard the epic How Aggaranzi of the Seventh Smote the Brigands at KoT He sounded shocked. "It's a great tale! Lots of honor, lots of blood. It's very long, but I'll sing it for you when we have time. Well, if there's no danger, then I'd better go back and report. Come on!"
He took her hand and began to lead her down the road. His hand was very large, his grip powerful; but his palm felt oddly soft, unlike the hands of the farm workersЧor even her own hands, these days.
Strangely, she did not feel nervous at being hauled into the unknown by this tall and youthful stranger. She stumbled in the ruts. He muttered, "Careful!" but he slowed down. There were three stream crossings on the trail, and she could barely see the stepping-stones, but he could, and he guided her.
"You were brought by the Most High, adept?"
"We were! The sailor says he's never heard of a ferry being taken before. We've come a long way, too! Very far!" He sounded satisfied, not awed at all. Of course the River was the Goddess, and any ship might arrive at an unexpected destination if it bore a Jonah, someone She wanted elsewhere. Free swords were notorious Jonahs, always being moved by Her Hand. Such manifestations of Her power happened too frequently to be truly miracles, but they were not something that Quili could ever regard as lightly as this brash young swordsman seemed to.
The trees thinned out, the valley widened to admit grayness, and now she could see better. He was even taller than she had thought, lanky and astoundingly young for a Fourth. He seemed no older than herself, but perhaps that was just his carefree mannerЧhe 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 oneЧI think he must sleep with both eyes open." Whoever Shonsu was, Adept
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Nnanji seemed to regard him with more respect than he did the Goddess. "I woke at the thirdЧthe 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 starsЧand 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, andЧwhoosh! 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
seen a lot of miracles in the last two weeks, Apprentice Quili. Ever since Shonsu arrived."
"He's your mentor?"
"Well, not just at the moment. He released me from my oaths before the battle ... but he says I may swear to him again."
Battle?
"Watch this puddle!" Nnanji let go her hand and put his arm around her, guiding her by a muddy patch. But he kept his arm there when they were past, and the light was quite good now. She began to feel alarmed. She was glad of the protection of her cloak. She had rarely spoken to a Fourth before and certainly never been hugged by one. He was smiling down at her, being very friendly. Very.
There were few free men close to her age on the estate, only two unmarried. They all treated her with awed respect, because of her craft, and they had nothing to talk about anyway, except the crops and the herds. She had forgotten what real conversation was like. But she had never had a real conversation with a man, only with other girls, her friends in the temple, years ago. He was speaking to her as an equal. That was flattery, and she was worried by how good it felt.
Why would the Goddess send such a filthy swordsman? It was not only his face* Now they had reached the bottom of the gully. Ahead of them lay the River, stretching away to the eastern horizon, brilliant below the cloud. Color was returning to the World, The sun god would appear in a few moments. Rain was still falling, but gently, and she could see water streaking the dirt on the. swordsman's bony shoulders and chest. Even his kilt...
Quili gasped. "That's blood! You've been hurt?"
"Not mine!" He grinned again, proudly. "Yesterday we had a battleЧa great feat of arms! Shonsu did six and I drained two!"
She shivered, and his arm tightened around her, so she could not break loose. She pulled her cloak tight. This intimacy was appalling behavior for a priestess, but that steely grip gave her no choice. Kandoru had never held her in public this way. He had expected her to walk one pace behind him.
"You... you killed two men?"
"Three, yesterday. Two in the battle, but earlier I had to challenge for my promotion, and one of them chose swords
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instead of foils. He was trying to scare me, so I killed him. I didn't like him much, anyway."
She began to laugh, and then stared up with growing horror and belief at his satisfied smirk. Two of the swordmarks on his forehead were swollen, obviously new. His hair was black and greasy, but there were patches of red showing through the filth. His eyes were pale, the lashes almost invisible, and the runnels of clean skin washed by the rain were very light-colored. Apparently this murderous, callous youth was normally a redhead. The black in his hair had been applied deliberately, and then it had smeared all over him.