"Modesitt, L E - The Hammer of Darkness" - читать интересную книгу автора (Modesitt L E)

No shadows has the noon; no darkness has the night,
And no man wears a shade in that eternal light.
The night has not a star; the sky has not a sun,
Nor is there dusk nor dawn to which a man can run.
No breakers crash at night, nor fall on sand unlit.
No lightning flares the dark where coming years might fit.
No dawn will break like thunder; no eve will crash like
surf.
No shadows seep from tombs to mark its golden turf.
And if that's so, then why does darkness stalk the sky,
And only one god cast a shade to those who die,
And only one god cast a shade for those who die?
V
The overhead is pale yellow. The color is the first thing he
notices. That, and that he is on his back, stretched out on a
railed bed of some sort.
The second observation is that he wears a loose yellow
robe, nothing more, that is hitched up close to his knees.
There is no pillow, no sheeting, just a yielding surface on
which he lies. He lifts his head, which aches with the pain he
associates with stunners. Kryn's guard had missed, but not
Boreas.
"You'd think you'd learn, Martin," he mutters.
You'd think you'd learn, Martel.
He scans the room. No one else is present. The portal is
shut. A single ted light on the panel next to the portal is lit.
The unlit light, he presumes, is green.
The railing lowers with the touch of a lever, and Martin
swings his legs over the edge and eases himself into a sitting
position. Rubbing his forehead with his left hand, he contin-
ues the survey of his quarters.
"Wonder if I'm being monitored."
Wonder if I'm being monitored.
Besides the bed, there are two chairs, a low table rising out
of the flooring between them, a higher bedside table, an
opaqued window screen, and a closet. The sliding doors of
the wardrobe/closet are half open, and Martin can see that his
few belongings have been laid out on the shelves or hung up.
The travelbag is folded flat on the top shelf.
He shakes his head, winces at the additional pain the
movement generates, and studies the room silently.
No speakers, no inconsistencies in the walls that could con-
ceal something.
As he lowers himself to the floor the room wavers in front
Of his eyes.
"Not again!" He recalls the paratest that led to his confine-
ment, that test which seems so distant, even though just days
past.
Not again! The echo pounds into his skull.
Slow step by slow step, he covers the meter or so from his