"Katherine Kerr - Deverry 06 - A Time Of Omens" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kerr Katherine)

prince and suggested to his subconscious mind that he had difficulty in speakingтАФthough in nothing else.
He also suggested that on a simple cue, the difficulty would vanish. Once he removed the ensorcellment,
the suggestion took effect, and the prince whoтАЩd always held forth like the hero of an ancient epic now
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stammered as he struggled to find the right words to express a simple, routine thought. All of the silver
daggers swore in amazement and said that they wouldnтАЩt recognize him themselves if they didnтАЩt know
better, but they, of course, thought that the prince was merely acting a part.

Which in a way he always was, or, what was perhaps worse, the prince always lived his part in the
strange epic that they were composing not with their words, but with their lives. At times, when he
remembered the happy, charming little lad that Maryn once had been, Nevyn felt like a murderer. Over
the years he had trained the prince so well that heтАЩd stripped away all trace of the ladтАЩs individuality,
pruned and sheared him as ruthlessly as a gardener in the kingтАЩs palace shapes an ornamental hedge or
splays a climbing rose over its trellis in order to torture it into an unnatural form. It was hard to tell at
times whether Maryn was larger than life or smaller, a grand hero out of the Dawntime or a picture of a
hero such as a Bardek illuminator would draw, all ink lines and thin colors. Either way, the kingdom
needed him, not some all-too-human and complex man who would use the kingship rather than the
kingship using him. Nevyn could only hope that in some future life either he himself or the Lords of Wyrd
would make it up to Prince Maryn for slicing his personality away like the peel of an apple.

First, of course, they had to get the lad and his councillor safely to Cerrmor before he could be any kind
of king. Nevyn figured out a way to hide himself, too. Since there had to be some reason for an old man
to be traveling with a mercenary troop, he decided to pass himself off as a jewel merchant whoтАЩd paid
the troop a fee for allowing him to ride in the safety of their numbers. He knew enough about precious
stones to bring this ruse off, and since Casyl had given him what few royal jewels there were to take to
the Cerrmor princess, he could use them as his stock-in-trade. The real danger now lay in their desperate
need to keep up these ruses. Since working dweomer leaves obvious tracks on the etheric and astral
planes for those who know how to look for them, Nevyn could use no dweomer at all until the prince
was safely in Cerrmor territoryтАФnot one single spell, not even lighting a fire or scrying someone out.
HeтАЩd also asked the kings of the elements to keep their people away from him and the prince, which
meant that he was deprived of any danger warning that the Wildfolk might give him, too. After two
hundred years of living wrapped round by dweomer, he felt naked, just as in one of those hideous
dreams where you find yourself being presented to the High King only to realize that your skirts or brigga
have somehow been left behind at home.

In the morning they had a more mundane problem to worry about, or at least, Nevyn profoundly hoped
that it was mundane. They woke to a slate-gray sky and a western wind that smelt of spring rain, and just
afternoonthe storm broke. Although the rain held steady, the wind dropped in a few hours. Nevyn agreed
with the captain that theyтАЩd better keep riding as long as the roads were passable. What troubled him
was wondering if the storm was a natural phenomenon or if some dark dweomerman had called it up.
There was nothing he could do to find out without giving their ruse away, and much less could he fight
back with dweomer.

That evening, when he shared a cold dinner with Caradoc, he had to force his eyes away from the
campfire lest he start seeing the Wildfolk in it. Since the captain was wrapped in a black hiraedd of his
own, they had an unpleasant meal of it until Nevyn decided to ease CaradocтАЩs mood.