"Robin Hobb - Tawny Man 3 - Fool's Fate" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hobb Robin)

ROBIN HOBB тАУ THE TAWNY MAN III тАУ FOOLтАЩS FATE

Prologue
BATTLING FATE

The White ProphetтАЩs premise seems simple. He wished to set the world in a different path than the one it had
rolled on through so many circuits of time. According to him, time always repeats itself, and in every repetition,
people make most of the same foolish mistakes theyтАЩve always made. They live from day to day, giving in to
appetites and desires, convinced that what they do does not matter in the larger scheme of things.
According to the White Prophet, nothing could be further from the truth. Every small, unselfish action nudges
the world into a better path. An accumulation of small acts can change the world. The fate of the world can
pivot on one manтАЩs death. Or turn a different way because of his survival. And who was I to the White Prophet?
I was his Catalyst. The Changer. I was the stone he would set to bump timeтАЩs wheels out of its rut. A small
pebble can turn a wheel out of its path, he told me, but warned me that it was seldom a pleasant experience for
the pebble.
The White Prophet claimed that he had seen, not just the future, but many possible futures, and most of them
were drearily similar. But in a very few cases, there was a difference, and that difference led to a shining realm
of new possibilities.
The first difference was the existence of a Farseer heir, one who survived. That was me. Forcing me to survive,
dragging me away from the deaths that constantly tried to eliminate me so that timeтАЩs wheels could jolt back
into their comfortable ruts, became his lifeтАЩs work. Death and near-death swallowed me, time after time, and
each time he dragged me, battered and bruised, back from the brink to follow him again. He used me
relentlessly, but not without regret.
And he succeeded in diverting fate from its preordained path into one that would be better for the world. So he
said. But there were people who did not share his opinion, people who envisioned a future without a Farseer
heir and without dragons. One of them decided to ensure that future by ridding herself of the fool who stood in
her way.

Chapter 1
LIZARDS

Sometimes it seems unfair that events so old can reach forward through the years, sinking claws into oneтАЩs life
and twisting all that follows it. Yet perhaps that is the ultimate justice: we are the sum of all we have done
added to the sum of all that has been done to us. There is no escaping that, not for any of us.
So it was that everything that the Fool had ever said to me and all the things heтАЩd left unsaid combined. And the
sum was that I betrayed him. Yet I believed that I acted in his best interests, and mine. He had foretold that if
we went to Aslevjal Island, he would die and Death might make another snap of his jaws at me. He promised to
do all in his power to see that I survived, for his grand scheme to change the future required it. But with my
latest brush with death still fresh in my memory, I found his promises more threatening than reassuring. He had
also blithely informed me that once we were on the island, I would have to choose between our friendship and
my loyalty to Prince Dutiful.
Perhaps I could have faced one of those things and stood strong before it, but I doubt it. Any one of those things
was enough to unman me, and facing the sum of them was simply beyond my strength.
So I went to Chade. I told him what the Fool had said. And my old mentor arranged that when we sailed for the
Out Islands, the Fool would not go with us.

Spring had come to Buckkeep Castle. The grim black stone edifice still crouched suspiciously on the steep
cliffs above Buckkeep Town, but on the rolling hills behind the keep, new green grass was pushing
optimistically up through the standing brown straw of last yearтАЩs growth. The bare-limbed forests were hazed
with tiny green leaves unfurling on every tree branch. The wintry mounds of dead kelp on the black beaches at