"Katherine Kurtz - Camber 3 - Camber the Heretic" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kurtz Katherine)

allow another weakling to sit on the throne? Gwynedd needs a warrior king."
"Gwynedd needs a king who is wise," Jebediah countered. "If he also
happens to be a warrior, that is fine. But it is not required. Your father is no
warrior, and he has done well enough."
"My father." The boy snorted with a dejected derision. "Aye, he is no warrior.
Would that he were, and had been, from the beginning. But, no, he must
abandon his vows and be neither prince nor priest, and accursed by God. If he
had not, I would not be thus, with the sign of God's displeasure for all to see!"
With that, he jerked his deformed foot from Tavis's grasp and tried to hide it
behind the other one, turning his face away and knuckling angry tears.
Jebediah, aghast at what he had just heard, looked at Tavis for some
explanation.
"My lord, have you been filling his head with these mad tales?"
"It is not I who teach him history or religion, my Lord Deryni Marshal," Tavis
said bitterly. "Please leave us. Haven't you upset His Highness enough for one
afternoon?"
Jebediah could find nothing to say to that. As Tavis stood and gathered the
crippled prince in his arms, to carry him away from the eyes which now stared
from every part of the room, Jebediah felt like a monster. He watched them go,
wondering how he was going to explain this to Cinhil and, even more, to
Camber.
But at that moment, Camber's thoughts were far from the princes and from
Valoret. As he and Joram followed Jesse up the outside stairs from the
castleyard, into Ebor's great hall, he reviewed in his mind the little he had
gleaned thus far about the situation for which Rhys had called him.
It was unusual for Rhys to ask directly for his help, for Camber had never
really been able to learn any of the Healer's Art which Rhys had mastered so
well and so many years before. Camber had been considered a great
non-healing adept, and Alister was not unaccomplished himself; but neither
aspect of the man who now nodded greeting to Gregory's various servants and
retainers could compare with the specialized abilities of a gifted Healer like
Rhys.
And yet, if Rhys had somehow managed to take away Gregory's Deryni
powers, then that was, indeed, a subject of great interest, both to Camber and
to the part of him which was Alister. It was a thing which could touch all
Deryni. Camber had never heard of such a thing happening, except in
occasional head injuries which were so severe that other functions were also
impaired; and in those cases, function could almost never be restored, and the
patient surely died. Nor had he ever read of such a thing, though over the years
he and Evaine had worked with some very ancient documents, indeedтАФrecords
which sometimes spoke of many wondrous things not normally thought of as
falling within even a Deryni's abilities. The ancient texts said nothing about
taking away a person's powers deliberately.
Jesse led them up a winding turnpike stair for nearly two floors, then
doubled back through a narrow gallery walkway which skirted along the length
of the hall and overlooked it. At the end of the passage, a heavy, metal-studded
door stood ajar.
The earl's great, tapestry-hung bed could be seen through another arched
doorway across the entry-room, the green-clad figure of Rhys sitting wearily on
a chair beside the sleeping Gregory while Evaine stood behind him and