"Katherine Kerr - Deverry 02 - Darkspell" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kerr Katherine)

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Rather than returning to his weeding, Nevyn went back to his chamber after he left the King. His heart
was troubled, wondering if Glyn were meant to rule as the only king in Deverry, hoping that such was his
Wyrd, yet knowing that the future was closed to him. After he barred the door to ensure that he wouldnтАЩt
be disturbed, he stood in the center of his small chamber and imagined that his right hand held a sword of
blue fire. Slowly he bent his will to the image until it lived apart from his will, no matter where he turned
his attention. Only then did he use it to trace a circle of blue fire around him, imaging the flames until they,
too, lived of their own will.

Laying aside the sword, he sat down in the center of the leaping, glowing circle and built up before
him the mental image of a six-pointed star, glowing also with gold fire, a symbol of the center and balance
of all things, and the source of the true kingship. Invoking the Kings of the Element of Aethyr, he stared
into the hexagon formed in the center of the interlaced triangles and used it to scry the way clumsier
dweomerfolk use a stone or a mirror.

The visions came cloudy, barely forming before they dissolved, thrown together and torn apart like
clouds in a high wind, and he saw naught there of GlynтАЩs Wyrd. Even in the Innerlands, the currents were
troubled, the forces out of balance, the light shadowed. For every kingdom or people, thereтАЩs a
corresponding part of the Innerlands -people think of it as a place, which will do for an image -thatтАЩs the
true source of the events that come to the kingdom on the outer plane, just as every person has their
secret and undying soul, which determines what that person calls his will or his luck. The Deverry folk
saw wars raging between ambitious men; those men saw themselves as the authors of their actions;
Nevyn saw the truth. The petty squabbles of would-be kings were only symptoms of the crisis, like the
fever is only the symptom of the disease, a painful thing in itself, but not the true killer. Out on the
Innerlands, the dark forces of Unbalanced Death were out of control, sweeping all into chaos, with only a
handful of warriors who served the Light to pit themselves against them. Although Nevyn was only the
humble servant of those Great Ones, he had his own part of the war to fight in the kingdom. After all, a
fever may kill a patient if itтАЩs allowed to burn unchecked.

Now, mind that you never think of these forces of Unbalanced Death as persons, some sort of evil
army led by beings with a recognizable soul. On the contrary, they were forces as natural in their own
way as falling rain, but out of control like a river in flood tide, swelling over its banks and sweeping farms
and towns before it. Every people or kingdom has a streak of chaos in its soul, weaknesses, greeds,
small prides and arrogances, which can be either denied or given in to. When indulged, they release
energy - to use a metaphor - which flows to the appropriate dark place in the Innerlands. So it was with
Deverry in that troubled time. The forces were swollen and sweeping down, exactly like that river.

Nevyn was simply unsure of how far he could intervene on the physical plane. The work of the
dweomer is subtle, a thing of influences, images, and slow inner working. Direct action in the world is
normally so foreign to a dweomer-master that Nevyn was afraid to intervene until the time was exactly
right. A wrong action, even to the right end, would only score another victory for Chaos and the Dark.
Yet it ached his heart to wait, to watch the death, the sickness, the suffering, and the poverty that the
wars were spreading across the kingdom. The worst thing of all was knowing that here and there were
the evil masters of the dark dweomer, gloating over the suffering and sucking up the power released by
the Chaos tide for their own dark ends. Their time will come, he reminded himself, for them is the dark at
the end of the world, the curse at the end of the ages of ages.

But he as servant couldnтАЩt send them to the dark before their time, any more than he could see if Glyn
would someday rule a peaceful kingdom in Dun Deverry. With a sigh, he broke off his fruitless