"Paul Kearney - The Sea Beggars 2 - This Forsaken Earth" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kearney Paul)

The boy named Rol considered this. The evening light off the Wrywind Sea set his red-gold hair alight
in a momentary kinship of color. His eyes were green as amethyst, pale as the shallows of a tropical
lagoon. He was nine years old, and his arms were wrapped around his filthy, scabbed knees. An urchin
with the face of an archangel.

тАЬWhen did God leave the world?тАЭ he asked the old man.

тАЬEons ago. Before even the first of the Lesser Men opened his eyes, in the time of the Old World, before
the New was born.тАЭ

тАЬHow do you know all this, Grandfather?тАЭ

The old man indulged in another one of his silences. He thumbed down the glowing whitherb in his
black pipe with one horny thumb, long burnt past sensibility. Behind him, in the west, the dying sun
ignited a gaudy cauldron of fire on the brim of the horizon. In the shadow of the headland the waves
reached languidly for the black rocks below, caressing the same stone that in winter they would pound
with white fury.

тАЬOur people have always known these things,тАЭ the old man said at last, reluctantly. He turned rheumy
eyes upon the bright young face beside him, and smiled. In that instant it was possible to see that in his
youth he, too, had been beautiful.

тАЬThe Dennifreians? Why do farmers and fishermen keep all this lore to themselves? WhyтАФтАЭ

тАЬFor the last time, Rol, you and I, and Morin and Ayd who watch over you, we are not from Dennifrey.
We come fromтАФelsewhere.тАЭ

тАЬSo you say. But where, Grandfather?тАЭ The boyтАЩs face had hardened into stubbornness as all childrenтАЩs
will at the wheedling of some secret knowledge.

His grandfather puffed thoughtfully on his pipe, and stared up at the first stars that had come chasing the
sunset. He seemed to be looking for something in the empurpling sky, and when he found it he pointed
with one brown, corded arm. тАЬSee that star there?тАЭ

тАЬThe one that flashes blue? ThatтАЩs Quintillian. BionarтАЩs Guard they call him too. Set your course by him
and youтАЩll come in the end to Urbonetto of the Wharves, the Free City.тАЭ

Grandfather smiled. тАЬWell done. But he was once called something else. Or-Desyr he was to me, when I
was as young as you are now. DonтАЩt you be telling that to no one now. ThatтАЩs a secret, the name of our
star, for us alone to know.тАЭ

The boy nodded solemnly, deflated because the secret had been so small a thing as a name that meant

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nothing to him. And whom could he tell?

тАЬYou said we were not from Dennifrey,тАЭ he pointed out sulkily. тАЬWhatтАЩs a star got to do with that?тАЭ