"Flint, Kenneth C - Gods of Eire 02 - Champions of the Sidhe UC" - читать интересную книгу автора (Flint Kenneth C)

I believe you," the boy said with great seriousness.

Five, six, seven, eight apples spun in a circle, flying at a dizzying speed high above Giila's head as he juggled for an enthralled audience of children.

The clown was willingly entertaining them, bringing smiles

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CHAMPIONS OF THE SIDHE

to faces so long marked by fear and pinched by hunger. So eager for his diverting tricks were they that, even though they were nearly starved, the food lay forgotten on their plates as they watched and laughed.

Cilia ended his performance at last by throwing the apples, one by one, to each child.

"Enough for now," he said. He held up his hands at their disappointed cries, promising, "I'll do more later, but only if you eat up all of that food!"

They fell to the task with a will, and he moved away from them, toward the rest of the company.

The children were grouped at one side of the circular room. The adults sat at low tables set around a central hearth. This was the largest of the ringfort's houses, the one used as a meeting hall for the inhabitants. It was a barren place, stripped of all the fine de Danann ornamentation. A tiny fire was the only spot of cheer.

As Gilla joined them, the Dagda was just concluding his account of the recent uprising at Tara. His booming voice and colorful speech made it a most gripping tale.

"And the people of Tara joined together to defeat the Fomor garrison," he was saying. "Under Nuada they are now organizing an army at Tara to challenge the rest of the Fomor in Eire and drive them all out."

"So Nuada has become our High-King once again," said the leader. "I cannot believe that Bres has finally been deposed."

"It was Lugh here who discovered that Bres was in league with the Fomor to destroy us, that he was half-Fomor himself!" the Dagda said proudly, clapping a massive hand to Lughs shoulder. "Why, it was even his work that saw Nuada restored." He leaned across the table toward the other man to add emphatically: "I tell you, Febal, he is truly the one that the Prophecy said would come one day to lead us to freedom from the Fomor."

"I believe what you say," said Febal, eyeing Lugh with great interest. "I felt the power of a great champion in him when he appeared in our fort."

The modest young warrior tried not to look as abashed as he felt in this praising.

"Then you'll join us?" urged the Dagda. "We must gather every de Danann who can fight."

The man shook his head doubtfully. "My friend, I don't know. We are not warriors. We never have been. We came to

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Eire to live in peace, to farm and herd and feel a oneness with a land of our own. We cannot fight."

"It's because you will not fight that this land is not your own," Lugh put in. The young man's voice was quiet, but urgent and truthful and carrying a force within it that claimed the attention of all present. "You will never have anything that is truly yours until you choose to earn it."

"Perhaps," Febal agreed. "But perhaps Bobd Derg is right."

"My son?" bellowed the Dagda angrily. "You'd listen to the whining of that coward and leave Eire?"

The leader looked over to the children. "At least our families were safe in Tir-na-nog. It was a place of peace and happiness."

"Listen to me, Febal," said Lugh. "If you return to the Four Cities, you will become as you were, children of Queen Danu's people, never a people of your own."