"Mage Storms 01 - Storm Warning" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lackey Mercedes)

prolong one's life. Eventually the body itself became too tired to
sustain life any longer;

even banked fires dwindled to ash in the end. Charliss' rumored
immortality was one of many myths he himself propagated.

Useful rumors were difficult to come by.

The dull gray throne sat in the midst of an expanse of black-veined
white marble; the Emperor's robes, the exact color of fresh-spilled
blood, and the yellow gems in the crown, were the only color on the
dais. Even the walls and the ceiling of the dais-alcove, a somber
setting for a rich gem, were of that same marble. The effect was to
concentrate the attention of the onlookers on the Emperor and only the
Emperor.

The battle-banners, the magnificent tapestries, the rich curtains-all
these were behind and to the side of the young man who waited at the
Emperor's feet. Charliss himself wore -robe with dagged sleeves,
trews, and slate-gray velvets, half Court-boots, made on the same looms
as the crimson robes;

in his long-ago youth, his hair had been whitened by the wielding of
magic, and his once-dark eyes were now the same pale gray as an
overcast dawn sky.

If the young man waiting patiently at the foot of the throne was aware
of how few years the Emperor had left to him, he had (wisely) never
indicated he possessed this dangerous knowledge to anyone. Grand Duke
Tremane was about the same age as Charliss had been when Lioth bestowed
his power and responsibility on Charliss' younger, stronger shoulders
and had retired to spend the last three years of his life holding off
Death with every bit of the concentration he had used holding onto his
power.

In no other way were the two of them similar, however.

Charliss had been one of Lioth's many, many sons by way of his state
marriages; Tremane was no closer in blood to Charliss than a mere
cousin, several times removed. Charliss had been, and still was, an
Adept, and in his full powers before he ascended the Throne. Tremane
was a mere Master, and never would have the kind of mage-power at his
personal command that Charliss had.

But if mage-power or blood-ties were all that was required to take the
Throne and the Crown, there were a hundred candidates to be considered
before Tremane. Intelligence and cunning were not enough by
themselves, either; in a land founded by stranded mercenaries, both
were as common as snowflakes in midwinter. No one survived long in
Charliss' court without both those qualities, and the will to use both