"Gray, Julia - Guardian 05 - Alyssa's Ring" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gray Julia)

reverted to a helpless, fearful infancy. These were the only times Terrel ever saw him cry.
'I'll go to him,' the healer said, untangling himself from the blanket that was twisted round his legs.
Taryn nodded, and the look on his face made the need for haste all too clear.
The damp chill of the night air wrapped itself around Terrel like a cloak as he stumbled past the dying embers of their campfire, and he was uncomfortably aware that autumn had begun its gradual decline into winter. Sleeping in the open would soon no longer be an option, and the journey ahead of them would become more hazardous as the weather closed in. But those problems lay in the future. Just now, Terrel had more immediate concerns.
With Taryn at his heels, he hurried across to the small, leaf-strewn hollow where the boy's father had chosen to lay their bedrolls. Their fellow travellers were also awake now, obviously aware of the disturbance, but no one spoke, knowing that Terrel needed to concentrate. Above them, as serene as ever, the full White Moon rode across the heavens, looking down on the feverish activity of humankind with a certain disdain. Even as he knelt beside his patient, Terrel couldn't help wondering briefly if the moon's influence had coloured his own dream - or helped to precipitate Nomar's illness.
The man Terrel had come to regard as a friend was a few years older than the healer. His slender build and gaunt face disguised a sinewy strength of both body and mind, and he was normally in excellent health. The only exceptions to this were the vicious headaches that afflicted him every so often, striking without warning and with devastating affect. Apart from the crushing pain that made Nomar claw at his cheeks and temples, the attacks induced a kind of delirium in which he obviously saw and heard things that were imperceptible to anyone else. He muttered and gasped in response, occasionally shouting something aloud, and all the time his face betrayed horror and despair. Terrel believed that it was as if Nomar were trapped in a tortured form of sleep from which it was impossible to wake, a nightmare that could only end when it had run its course. Occasionally Nomar said something intelligible, but neither his son nor the healer had ever been able to make sense of these disjointed utterances - and in the exhausted calm after the storm of pain, Nomar either could not or would not explain his words.
Even as he clasped his friend's hot trembling hand, Terrel knew that his healing efforts would be defeated, just as they had been on every previous occasion. Although he could help Nomar deal with the physical torment of his ailment - Terrel had always understood pain and the ways of controlling it - he could never locate the source of the illness, let alone attempt to heal it. It was too deeply ingrained, hidden within the shifting planes and surfaces of Nomar's waking dream. Terrel could follow its trail only so far, retracing its passage through that ravaged inner world, but he always came to a dead end, or found himself trapped in an endless loop, unable to progress. His healer's instincts made him want to persevere, obstinately hunting for a solution to a problem that, in his heart, he knew to be insoluble. But in the end, all he could do was accompany his friend throughout the ordeal, protecting him where he could, and hoping that in the process he did nothing to prolong the agony. If he could not find a cure, he could at least offer comfort.
'We were never going to use it,' Nomar declared, his eyes glittering as they stared sightlessly up at the night sky. 'I thought . . .' The rest of his words were lost as his voice became an inarticulate mumble, his lips working rapidly but without purpose. A trickle of saliva ran from his mouth, and his tortured body writhed.
'Easy now,' Terrel said softly. 'I'm here.' He had no need to speak aloud - on some level, Nomar was already aware of his presence - but the words seemed to have a soothing effect nonetheless. His patient's limbs grew quieter, the muscles relaxing slowly, and his face lost a little of its terror.
'Will he be all right?' Taryn asked anxiously. 'Eventually,' Terrel whispered. 'We just have to ride this out. Like before.' The pain was still gouging at Nomar's skull, but that was something the healer could deal with. The underlying nightmare went on, shadows within shadows. 'I've never seen him this bad before,' Taryn said. 'He'll be all right,' Terrel reassured the boy. 'Let me concentrate now.'
'Leave the healer to his task.'
The commanding voice came out of the darkness as Terrel closed his eyes, and he knew that Faulk would stay with Taryn for as long as necessary. In the meantime, he had work to do. He let himself sink deeper into the other man's world, arid- tried to make sense of the chaos around him. He fought a hundred minor battles, pushing back darkness and unnatural pain, restoring equilibrium where he could, though he knew that his strategy was merely defensive. This was a war he could not win.
'Don't cry,' Nomar breathed, his distress obvious. 'I wish . . .'
Terrel tried to follow the patterns of thought, of memory, but failed, as so often before. Although there were different voices here, each linked to a separate Set of emotions, they were all intertwined and he couldn't untangle them, no matter how hard he tried.
'It's for the toast,' Nomar stated clearly, then screamed, the harrowing sound changing slowly into a mirthless laughter that was even more chilling. Terrel caught glimpses of love and hatred, fear and hope, guilt and revulsion; brief flashes of colour, of sounds and smells; a face; drops of liquid sticky on his skin; a dark labyrinth; the sudden shock of cold water. This was the signal that the end was in sight, that the worst was over. Terrel had no idea how much time had passed, but his own legs -especially the one that had been twisted from the time of his birth - were cramped and numb. He opened his eyes to see the first glimpses of dawn along the eastern horizon.
'Paradise,' Nomar mumbled, then added something that Terrel couldn't hear.
'Is it over?'
Terrel looked up to see Faulk's imposing bulk looming over him.
'It's over. He's sleeping now. Is Taryn all right?'
'He fell asleep about an hour ago. Shall I wake him?'
'No. Let him rest a while longer. We're not in any fit state to set off just now.'
Faulk nodded, and offered Terrel his hand. The healer took it and allowed himself to be pulled to his feet, grimacing as needles of pain spiked through his bones and the blood began to flow back into his legs. Faulk eyed him thoughtfully but made no comment. He was not one to use words unnecessarily.
'We'll wait for sunrise at least.' Even as Terrel spoke, he was groaning inwardly at the prospect of starting to walk again. And yet he knew he would. He had no choice. A tiny sliver of hope remained in his heart, and until this was extinguished completely, he would go on.
Terrel had been travelling for so long now that he could scarcely remember a time when he had stayed in any one place for more than a few days. Havenmoon, the madhouse in which he'd spent the first fourteen years of his life, seemed to belong in another realm. More than a decade had passed since he had left the only home he had ever known. During that time he had seen and experienced more than he could ever have imagined when as a child he had sat in his secret library and dreamt of the world outside the asylum's walls. But now his journey was coming full circle. Regardless of whatever else fate had in store for him, Terrel had sworn to return to Havenmoon. The reason for his determination was simple. Whether she was dead or alive, that was where Alyssa was.
'Do you have any brothers or sisters?' Taryn asked.
Terrel hesitated before answering, then nodded. One of the few things he knew about the boy was that he was an only child - and a lonely one.
'I have a twin brother.'
'Really?' Taryn said enviously.
'But I've never met him.'
The boy looked confused.
'Then how do you know .. .'
'I've been told about him,' Terrel said. 'And I dream about him sometimes.' And that's only part of it, he added to himself. The whole story was far too complicated to tell now.
'Does he look like you?'
'No,' Terrel replied, then changed the subject. 'How's your father doing?'
'All right. He's asleep.'
Terrel had called an early halt to their journeying that day. Even though they hadn't gone as far as he would have liked, Nomar had obviously been close to collapse. The healer had been exhausted too after his night's work, and so when they had found a suitable campsite - at the foot of a steep and stony path that led up into the hills - he had decided to leave the climb until the next day.
More from habit than necessity, Faulk had scouted the surrounding area, fixing the lie of the land in his mind and identifying ways to defend their camp from any threat. Lawren had taken advantage of the last of the daylight to do a little hunting, and Roskin had collected the wood for the fire beside which Terrel and the boy now sat.
'Thank you for stopping when you did,' Taryn said quietly. 'I don't think my father could have gone on much longer - and he hates it when we slow you down.'
'I was glad to stop myself,' Terrel replied truthfully, wondering once again at the formal way Taryn referred to Nomar. He always spoke of 'my father', never 'papa' or 'dad'.
'He's scared that one day you'll go on without him,' the boy added softly.
'I'll only do that if I have no choice,' Terrel said, deciding that he deserved an honest answer. 'I'd much rather have the two of you with me.'
'Really?' Taryn exclaimed, looking pleased.
'Really,' Terrel replied.
In the past, Terrel had always resisted travelling in company when his bargain with fate forced him to move on. He had made friends and accepted hospitality in the various places to which he'd been drawn - in Macul, Misrah and on the island of Myvatan - but in between times, since he'd become a seasoned traveller, he had preferred to journey alone, beholden to no one, fearing that other people would slow his progress or interfere with his mission. However, recent events had changed his attitude.
The closer he came to his own homeland - and although he did not know the distances involved, every instinct told him that he must be near now - the more trouble he saw all around him. An atmosphere of uncertainty and suspicion seemed to pervade the whole planet, brought about by the continuing oddities in the sky - the inexplicable changes in the orbits of the moons, the strange coloured lights and clusters of shooting stars - combined with the more immediate problems of frequent earthquakes and unusually violent weather. In such circumstances, the arrival of a stranger, especially one whose appearance was as peculiar as Terrel's, was bound to cause unease, and the fact that he was now part of a group - even such a disreputable-looking, disparate company - meant that he had not been singled out for unwanted attention. Moreover, his fellow travellers provided him with a degree of protection, practical help and companionship. Although Terrel was grateful for all that, in truth he was not entirely comfortable with any of them, and it was impossible for him to trust them completely. He found it hard to accept their sometimes glib explanations as to why they had chosen to go with him - and the suspicion that each of them had obscure reasons of their own for making the journey was inescapable.
The four men and the boy had been with Terrel for some time now, but in spite of this the healer didn't know a great deal about any of them. Each, for his own reasons, had been reticent about their past. Terrel was closest to Nomar, but he knew little of his history, not even what had happened to Taryn's mother. Any questions regarding her - or any other family connections - had either been ignored or deflected in a manner that made clear Nomar's need to keep his secrets. Terrel could respect that. He had a few secrets of his own.
Although the healer was younger than all but one of the adults in the party, there had never been any doubt about his leadership. From the outset, Terrel had made it abundantly clear that he would not allow them to divert him
from his purpose. They could travel at his pace or not at all. And they'd go where he decided. They had all accepted these conditions readily enough and, while Terrel had been glad to take their advice on occasions, no one - not even Faulk, who was clearly a man more used to giving orders than obeying them - had ever disagreed with any of the healer's decisions. There were times when Terrel thought of them as his followers, as if he were the leader of some strange pilgrimage - and this was something he found distinctly embarrassing.
The greatest test for each of his companions had come when the healer had chosen to reveal his eventual destination. Here, in the divided land known as Kenda, there were several legends about the Floating Islands - just as there had been in Macul. Most of the tales revolved around the idea that normal life was impossible on land that moved, endlessly traversing the great Movaghassi Ocean. Some said that no one could possibly live under such conditions, others that only barbarians could survive that way, while a few claimed that existing in such an inherently unstable environment must render its inhabitants insane. Terrel knew that all these claims were untrue, but he couldn't prove it - and knew better than to try. Although at one time he'd made no secret of his destination, he had learned to be more circumspect with strangers. The varying degrees of surprise shown by his companions had faded as he'd told them something of his homeland and now, while they were still curious, no one questioned the wisdom of his plans.
In spite of his weariness, Terrel lay awake for some time that evening. The air felt damp on his skin, but to his relief the weather remained mild. The night sky was completely blanketed in cloud, so that the darkness was almost total. The passage of the moons was invisible, but Terrel still sensed their presence. He was acutely aware of them constantly now, more than he had ever been before. It was as though something inside him - some internal sensor -was able to detect their phases and relative strengths, 'seeing' their shapes, from crescent to circle, without the need of his eyes. He saw their varying influences not only in the world around him, but also in his own reactions and emotions. And in his dreams.