"Mercedes Lackey - Owl Mage 1 - Owlflight" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lackey Mercedes)

even with that caution they had brought in some incredible prizes. Darian had often gone with them, for
during the winter they would both be out together for weeks at a time. He loved the Forest, and even at
its most dangerous, he had never been as terrified of it as the villagers were now. It was right to be
cautious around the Forest, but it was stupid to be afraid of it - after all, it wasnтАЩt the Forest that was so
dangerous, it was the things living in it, and as long as you were careful, there was nothing to worry
about! Any fool could see that!
And how could anyone let fear blind him to so much of wonder and beauty?
тАЬDari, listen,тАЭ his mother would whisper, and he would cock his head to listen for the new
sound that had caught her attention - perhaps the liquid trill of a new bird (or was it a tervardi?) -
or the bell-like tone of a hammer-jay. Whatever it was, once he caught it, he would look to her,
and see the pleasure shining in her eyes as she listened, too. Then she would tell him what it was
they had just heard, and spin him tales of the little lives of the creatures of the forest, tales far
more wonderful than anything in those dusty books the villagers thought so important.
тАЬDari, look,тАЭ his father would say, pointing to something wonderful - a soaring hawk, the
sunset light glowing red and orange on a towering cloud, a doe with a fawn only minutes old. And
then his father would show him how to follow the hawk and watch it stooping to a kill, what the
fiery sunset portended in the way of weather, and how to find the fawn when she hid in the
grasses to doze while her mother went off to drink or graze. He would stand an excited witness to
the hawkтАЩs victory, sit in quiet contentment until the last red rays of the sunset faded into blue
dusk, or creep up to whisper to the fearless fawn, being careful not to touch it lest its mother scent
him and reject it, even though his hands itched to stroke its soft pelt.
He still loved the Forest, loved the green silences, the huge trees, the sounds of it. He couldnтАЩt
get anyone else in the village to see what drew him there; when he tried, they looked at him with
suspicion and even a little fear, just as they had looked at his parents.
But he could have borne even that, if he still had them. Dad - Mum - why didnтАЩt you come
back? Why did you leave me alone? Why did you let the Forest take you away from me?
The pain returned, greater for having been bottled away beneath his anger and rebellion. His eyes
flooded with tears, his throat knotted, and he pounded his hand against the bark of the tree until his
knuckles were raw and scraped. Loneliness filled him until there was no room for anything else, except
for anger at the insular villagers who hadnтАЩt even bothered to mount a search party when his parents
didnтАЩt return. It didnтАЩt matter to these fools that the exotic furs his Mum and Dad brought back had been
the only thing that kept traders coming to the village! Oh, no - because they went out into the Forest,
everyone was just certain that something would follow them back into the village, something too big and
monstrous to get rid of! There hadnтАЩt been a particle of evidence that something like that had any chance
of happening, but it didnтАЩt matter; his Mum and Dad had been watched like criminals every time they
came back from a trapping run. And theyтАЩd felt it; how could they not have? So they would go back out
more and more often, spending less and less time in the village. And maybe that was taking on too much
risk in the middle of the mage-storms. Maybe that was why, after an agony of waiting, he knew that they
wouldnтАЩt come home this time.
TheyтАЩd left him behind because there was going to be another mage-storm coming, and Justyn
and some of the others had persuaded them not to risk his safety along with their own. HeтАЩd protested,
but theyтАЩd slipped off during the night, leaving him with the innkeeper as they usually did. By the time he
woke up the next morning, they were gone, and the wind and snow had obliterated their trail. HeтАЩd tried
to follow, but had been forced to turn back.
He waited and waited, going out every day to watch for them, sure each dawn that he would see
them coming in laden with their prizes.
But this time he had watched in vain, for they didnтАЩt return.
Darian was left to the village to care for, and it hadnтАЩt taken them long to figure out how to
dispose of him. Within a day or two of being certain that DarianтАЩs parents were never returning, the
village elders had quickly apprenticed him to Justyn. Justyn had long been after his parents to bind Darian