"Holly Lisle - Secret Texts 3 - Courage Of Falcons" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lisle Holly)

Ian said, "He won't change, Ulwe. He likes himself as he is. I know himтАФI've known him since we were both children, though he's older than me."
"Everything I feel from him is terribleтАФexcept for what he feels when he thinks of me. I touch the road and I can feel his love. It's real. I can feel it." She rested a hand on his arm and looked directly into his eyes. "How can that one bit of goodness survive in the midst of so much evil?"
Ian brushed the dirt from his hands and turned to face Ulwe. He held both her hands and said, "I'm going to tell you something that will be hard for you to hear. But you have to understand. Will you lis-ten and let me finish?"
She looked at him with wide eyes. "Yes."
"Very well. The daughter that Crispin loves is a tiny, helpless, perfect baby he sent away a long time ago. He holds that picture in a place in his mind that is never touched by the rest of his life. It's like . . . like a beautiful place that you only saw once, for just a moment, and never forgot. Do you know a place like that?"
She nodded.
"Good. You keep that place safe in your memory and cherish it,
and for you it is always perfect. The day is always clear and lovely, the
temperature always just rightтАФand when you look at that memory, it
never disappoints you. So you can love it." Ian sighed. "If you were to
go back to that place right now, it would be different. And the longer
you stayed, the more different it would become. Sooner or later the
weather would grow cold. Flowers would die, rain would fall, storms
would blow down the branches of the trees. A fire might rush through and change everything. The place would be the same, but it wouldn't mean the same thing to you anymore. Your cherished memory would be erased. What you had in its place would depend on you. You are a good person, so you would probably find a way to love the real place as much as you loved the memory."
Ulwe was watching his face with the intensity of a hawk watching a mouse. "But my father is not a good person."
"No. He isn't."
"And I'm not a tiny baby anymore."
"No. You aren't."
"I've already done things that will disappoint him."
"Have you?"
She arched an eyebrow and smiled a half-smile, and for just an instant, she looked very old. "I chose to let Ry bring me to all of you, when I could have easily hidden and waited for my father to arrive and claim me. I wasn't ready to meet him. And I'm still not. Somehow, I don't think knowing that will make him very happy."
"You're probably right."
She stood up, a determination on her face that he found almost frightening in its intensity. "Life is full of difficult choices, isn't it?" she said.
He almost laughed, thinking about the quandary he'd been pondering before she joined him. "Life is full of hellish choices."
"He'll be coming after me soon, Ian. He's gone home, but not because he's defeated. I can feel his ... fury. He's gone home because he thinks he can get help there. He thinks of a brother and a cousin . . . of people who owe him favors ... of magic. He will use everything in his reach to come after me. He intends to destroy everyone and everything that stands in his way."
Ian's blood chilled at that thought.
Ulwe said, "I have things to do here. But so do you. They need you here, more than they know."
She left without another word, and he looked after her, unsettled.
She was a frightening childтАФshe couldn't read minds, but she could read paths. She'd found him in his hiding place, something he hadn't even thought about until that moment. She'd known he was thinking about moving onтАФshe'd sought him out not just for her own comfort but because she had something to tell him that would change his plans.
She was as alone in the world as any child could beтАФher mother dead, her father someone she needed to fearтАФand still she managed to be brave and fierce. And kind.
And she was his blood. His kin. Perhaps he could be a father to her, to replace the monster she dared not love too much.
He returned to the weeds, but his thoughts wandered down the mazy paths of the future, looking for signs that would point him in the right direction.
Chapter 25
Did he listen?" Alarista turned from the window and carefully let herself down into a well-padded chair.
Ulwe nodded. "I feel that he'll stay."
"Good. The zanda says we must not let him leave." She closed her eyes and rubbed her hands over her frail arms, hating the papery feel of her skin, the stiffness of her joints, the sluggishness of her blood that left her cold even while she sat in the sun, out of the wind.
Ulwe brought her a blanket and helped her wrap it around her shoulders.
"Can you feel your father now?"
"Not really. He is off the road and so am IтАФthe stream no longer connects us."
"We need to go back to the road, then. I need to know if any Falcons come yetтАФand I need to know what your father is doing, and .\" Alarista's voice trailed off to nothing. She hated her bodyтАФ that it could be so frail and useless that a simple walk to the road that began just outside the compound could defeat her.
"If you want to sleep for a while, I'll wait," Ulwe said. "Or I can go now, and check, and come back to tell you. I know what Falcon
magic feels like now. If any Falcons are coming to us who are not hidden by their shields, I'll be able to find them for you."
"Please. I fear we have so little time. I'll . . . just rest here while you're gone."
Ulwe nodded. "I'll bring you something to eat when I come back."
"I'm not very hungry."
"I know. But Dughall says you have to eat anyway."
"Bring me some fruit. It doesn't hurt my stomach the way other things do."
"I'll find you some lovely fruit." Ulwe gave her a bright smile and ran out the door.
Alarista looked after her, wistful. Being with Ulwe, she missed her own youthтАФthe boundless energy, the unquenchable hope, the certainty that somehow she would find solutions to every problem. Adulthood shined an ugly light on such childish optimismтАФat that moment she faced a problem that would probably be her death. If other Falcons did not answer the call that she had put out, and quickly, she would have to be the third in Dughall's and Kait's thath-bund, and the strain of that would kill her.
She didn't fear deathтАФHasmal waited for her beyond the prison of her flesh, and she yearned for her return to him with an impatience she shared with no one. But she feared that if she died too soon, the task she had to completeтАФthe task that no one else could accomplishтАФwould remain undone. Then her life would be a failure.