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

community had sprung up. A Healer's schola and several other Deryni groups
had also moved in, including a religious community which founded a church
and primary school dedicated to Saint Camber.
Water trade also became firmly established, as was almost inevitable, given
Nyford's fine, well-sheltered harborтАФthe last in the mouth of the vast Eirian
estuary. A group of Forcinn Michaelines organized a sea-service out of Nyford,
hiring on as pilots for the river ships which plied the waters north to Rhemuth,
and west, well into Llannedd lands, and east into the Mooryn, as well as on
their native sea.
Deryni business acumen had built a thriving river town on the ruins of a far
less successful Deryni venture; but human neighbors of lesser resourcefulness
gradually felt mere resentment and jealousy shift to blind hatredтАФan attitude
fueled by the increasingly rigid anti-Deryni stance of many churchmen and
high-ranking nobles. It was symptomatic of the attitude in much of Gwynedd,
though never so blatant or so strong elsewhere as in Nyford. As the taunt of
mere existence grew, pricked from time to time by the spurs of occasional
Deryni arrogance, not to mention Deryni dominance of most of the area's
economy, human sensitivities were increasingly irritated. It had been a grave
error of judgment to concentrate so many Deryni in so localized a place. When,
in the heat of a particularly severe summer, tempers had seethed with the
rising temperature and humidity of the Nyford delta, little was needed to spark
the fire of violence.
Nyford had burned for a day and a night, but not before rampaging humans
had put to death all the Deryni and Deryni sympathizers who could be found.
Deryni-owned or piloted ships were burned to the waterline where they lay at
the quays, after being robbed of their cargoes. Deryni shops were vandalized
and looted, their proprietors usually dying in the process.
The schola was brought down stone by stone, after all its pupils and masters
were put to the sword or clubbed to death. Many of the dead were no more than
children. Saint Camber's-at-Nyford, church and school, was desecrated and
torched, after the sacrilegious murder of the brothers and sisters of the order
which had founded it, most of them not even Deryni. The piles of bodies lining
the streets fueled fires whose smoke besmirched the clean skies above the delta
for most of a week.
Shaking his head, Camber dropped his gaze for just an instant, knowing he
had tried every plea and argument possible on this particular point, both with
the king and with the myriad Deryni and human lords with whom he daily
came into contact. Cinhil understood the problem of balance and order
between the races, though he had been only marginally successful at
maintaining it; his human ministers were not so understanding. Camber's sigh,
as he raised his face to the king's once more, was one of a man momentarily
weary even beyond his years.
"Sire, I certainly cannot dispute history," he said softly. "These young
firebrands are playing right into the hands of their worst enemies, but they
don't see that. They see only that they seem to have no function in a
non-Deryni regime."
"That isn't true."
"I know it isn't. But that's what they think. They equate the King's Law with
human law. They see no place in it for Deryni."
"Well, damnit, they'd better see, or soon there really won't be a placeтАФand