"Robin McKinley - The Door in the Hedge" - читать интересную книгу автора (McKinley Robin)

might otherwise have been; arid perhaps that touch lay gently on the people themselves. But for whatever
reason, the land had been lived in for hundreds of years, and the people built their houses and barns and
shops, and tilled their fields, and worked at their crafts, and married and ... had children.
There was some commerce between them and less enchanted countries, and it was often observed
that if you dared buy anything from that land, it lasted longer or tasted better or was more beautiful than
its like from other origins; but the market for these things was limited because the commoner sort of
mortal often found that things from that last land were a little hard to live with. They preyed on your mind;
you had the feeling that they were breathing if you turned your back on them. Even a loaf of bread from
that strange wheat could give you uncanny dreamsтАФor insights into your neighbor all the more unnerving
because they were accurate.
But its true people didnтАЩt care; and as some left it, others came, having tasted its wine, perhaps, or
worn a cloak woven from its flax, and felt themselves somehow transformed, if only a little bitтАФjust
enough to make them restless, enough to make them come and see the strange living land themselves.
And some of these looked long, and settled; and it, whatever it was, crept into the eyes of those who
stayed, and into their blood, so they could not bear the thought of leaving, whatever dooms might hang
over them if they remained.
There was something else, never discussed, and shunned even in the farthest secret reaches of the
mind, but still present. No family was ever ended by the faeriesтАЩ attentions. The first-born were rarely
taken; usually they were the secondтАФor thirdтАФor fourth-born. And never more than one child from a
family disappeared, even if the entire family was spectacular in its beauty and charm and general
desirability. This meant that the worst never quite happened; the spirit and will were never quite broken.
And in that uncommonly beautiful land, living under that particular sky, it was difficult if not impossible
not to recover from almost anything but death itself.
But this narrow boon, this last hope not quite betrayed, was not talked aboutтАФnot because of the
simple dreadfulness of being grateful that only one child is forfeit. No, there was something else which cut
even deeper: the omniscience indicated by the faeriesтАЩ choice. First children were, in fact, sometimes
taken, and how could the invisible thieves know in advance that more children would be born? Or that
some sudden sickness would not take away the one or two that remained? But these things never
happened; the faeries always knew. It wasnтАЩt something that those who had to live with it found
themselves capable of thinking about. There were always the other things to think about, the good things.
Perhaps it came out even in the end; perhaps even a little better than even. The land was peaceful,
and evidently always had been; even the history books could recount no wars. When there were storms
at harvest time or sullen wet springs when the seeds died underground, somehow there was always just
enough left to get everyone through the winter. And childless couples who desperately wanted children
did eventually have oneтАФor perhaps two; and if the faeries snatched one, they were still one better off
than they had once feared they would remain. And so the years passed, and one generation gave way to
the next, and the oldest trees in the oldest forests grew a little taller and a little thicker still; and the fireside
tales of a family became the legends of a country.
But that same time that changed a quiet story into a far-striding legend changed also the people who
told and retold it. The world turned, and new stories rose up, and the legends of the old days faltered a
little, or turned themselves in their course to keep up with the lives of their people, and the lives of
great-grandchildren of those they had first known. Perhaps even the immortal ones beyond the borders
of this last land felt the change in some fashion: for that they ventured at all, and for whatever reason, into
mortal realms risked them to some sense of mortal lives and cares. Perhaps.

Part One
THE FAERIES had never been much noted for stealing members of the royal family of that last
kingdom, perhaps because that family was more noted for its political acumen and a rather ponderous
awareness of its own importance than for lightness of foot and spirit or beauty of face and form. But the
current QueenтАЩs own sister, her twin sister, on the eve of their seventeenth birthday, had been stolen; and