"Stephen Lawhead - Byzantium" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lawhead Stephen)

with the shock of the cold water on naked skin. It was all I could do


to keep my teeth from clashing, and my jaws ached with the effort. I


could no longer feel my legs or feet.




Ice formed in the still places among the rocks at the river's edge and


in my wet hair. My breath hung in clouds about my head. High above,


the stars shone as flame-points of silvery light, solid as the
iron-hard winter ground and silent as the night around me.




Again, and yet again, I poured the freezing water over my body,


enforcing the virtue of the penance I had chosen. "Kyrie eleison..."




I gasped.




"Lord, have mercy?




In this way, I held my vigil, and would have maintained it thus if I


had not been distracted by the appearance of two brother monks bearing


torches. I heard someone approaching and turned my stiff neck to see