"04 - The Chaos Balance.palmdoc.pdb" - читать интересную книгу автора (Modesitt L E)

It's a lot harder to build something and live with the pain."
"How you build is important, too," the engineer answered.
"I built you and the guards an honest tower. An honest bath house. An honest smithy. Honest stables. Even the beginning of an honest metaled road to the rest of the world. You built with deception. You deceived me. You deceived Istril, Ayrlyn, and Siret. And, in the end, however long Westwind lasts, that deception will bring down your work."
"You won't change, Nylan. You're just as deceptive as I am The difference is that I recognize it, and you won't." Ryba stood, waiting for Nylan to take Dyliess. "What I build will last, and only your name will remain, a vague legend about a mighty mythical smith, and that will be because I had Ayrlyn write a song about you."
"You have an answer for everything, don't you?"
"So do you," she answered. "Take Dyliess. Sing to her, and I will tell her you did. Yes, I will. For her sake, not yours." Nylan stepped forward.
"Ah . . . ooo .. ." Dyliess stretched her arms out to her father, looking up, a blanket wrapped around her waist and legs. Nylan picked her up, cradling her against his shoulder, and rocking back and forth, holding her tightly. Ryba slipped to the door. "I'll be back in a while." Still holding his silver-haired daughter, Nylan walked toward the trundle bed he had made and looked down. He stepped back across the smoothed plank floor to the rocking chair, where, cradling her against his shoulder, he sat down and began to rock . . . gently.

"Oh, my dear, my dear little child,
What can we do in a place so wild,
Where the sky is so green and so deep
And who will rock you to sleep?
Your daddy is leaving; he's going away
There's only a cradle and nothing to say,
but when the stars shine over the western sky,
try to remember that he once said good-bye."

The tears rolled down the smith's cheeks, and his vision, his superb day and night vision, showed him nothing. Nothing at all.
In time, he finally stood, laid the sleeping Dyliess in her cradle, and returned to his quarters to gather everything together.
With a last look at the sleeping child, he started down the steps, loaded with all his gear, moving slowly to avoid tripping over the blade at his waist. The one in the shoulder harness would be easier to use, far easier, once he was mounted. Some of the customs of Candar made sense-usually those having to do with arms.
As he trudged down to the fourth level, Siret glanced up after slipping on a work tunic. Her eyes took in all that Nylan carried, and, with a quick look to the bed where Kyalynn sat wrestling with a crude stuffed bear that Hryessa had made, Siret hurried across the wide planked floor to the stairs.
The engineer paused.
"Nylan? You're leaving, aren't you?" Her deep green eyes caught his.
He nodded.
"I could see it coming. Nothing you do pleases her."
He shrugged. "I'm not like Gerlich. I won't be back, not that way."
"You won't be back. This world needs you."
He blinked, not expecting such a comment.
"Ryba will fight the world. She will make the men who rule come to her and be defeated-but they won't. They'll let us rule the mountains, and let the truly unhappy women come to us." She smiled bitterly. "I've thought about it. People don't think I do, but I do ... a lot. The Marshal . . . and especially you . . . gave me that."
"Me?" Nylan was feeling totally confused, wondering what else he had done that he hadn't seen.
"I watched you, Nylan. You don't talk much about why you do what you do. You do it. You push yourself, and ... people take, and they take. I started asking why. So . . ." She shrugged, and her eyes were bright. "I had to tell you that I am grateful for all you've given ... to let you know I wasn't like so many of the others." After a moment she swallowed. "Westwind is too small for you, and you're not full Sybran so you can leave here."
"I'm not looking forward to the heat," he said, trying not to choke up, and wondering if his decision to leave were such a good one after all.
"The healer's going with you, isn't she? Some guards will suffer. And the children." Her eyes darted to the bed where Kyalynn looked down at the bear that lay across her chubby legs.
"Istril, Llyselle, even you have some of the talent." He smiled wryly. "You'll be able to do as well as we can, if you can't already."
"We'll manage, but we'll never be as good. But I knew that it had to happen. Relyn said it would."
"Relyn? He's been gone since the battle." Not that Nylan hadn't wondered about the one-handed man, especially after Blynnal had turned up pregnant-but Nylan had been the one who advised Relyn to leave before Ryba found a way to eliminate the former Lornian noble because he'd found religion.
Nylan snorted to himself. The idea that he-a former angel ship's engineer-was the prophet of a new faith of order was almost ludicrous. Even more absurd was Ryba's contention that Relyn's preaching such a faith would undermine Westwind. Not so absurd had been her intent to remove Relyn in the chaos that followed the great battle-except Relyn, warned by Nylan, had slipped off into the night.
"Ryba said that he has already been preaching his new gospel of order." Siret looked around. "I heard her talking to Saryn. Tryssa-she was one of the last new recruits to reach us before the snows-she was talking about the one-handed prophet in black who forecast the fall of the old ways and the rise of order. He's also preaching about building a Temple of Order."
"Great." Nylan glanced up the steps.
"He said that, sooner or later, you would have to leave, and that the healer would go with you." Siret smiled sadly. "I listen, you know?"
"I know." He shook his head. "But everyone seems to know what I'm doing before I do." Then he added. "Thank you. I didn't stop to have you make me feel good."
"I know. You're a good man, a good person."
He dropped his eyes. Much as he appreciated the compliment, Nylan knew he wasn't that good. If he were, so many things would have turned out differently. "Where's Istril? I should say good-bye."
"She took Weryl out earlier. She was taking him on a ride. She had so many things I wondered if she were leaving, but she said she'd be back." Siret frowned. "She never lies. But she looked sad. I wonder if she knew you were leaving."
"I don't know." Istril knew a lot, a lot that the wiry guard didn't voice.
"You need to go. You need to say good-bye to Kyalynn." She darted across the room and scooped up their daughter, bringing her back to him.
As Nylan hugged his daughter, his tears bathed them both, and he wanted to rage-against fate, against Ryba, against himself. Why was it that everything had so high a price?
He finally eased his silver-haired daughter back to her mother. "Take care of her."
"I will. And I will make sure she knows who you are. A man and not a legend."
He half-walked, half-stumbled down the rest of the stairs and out the main door. Perhaps some guards watched, but Istril was not among them, nor Weryl, and he saw none of their faces as he forced himself up the road to the stable.