"Sheri S Tepper - The End of the Game_txt" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tepper Sherri)

I remember sleepily asking her what they were called, the little Elators. She shook her head, laughing.

УI call them nerve transmitters,Ф she said. УYou might call them nerve Elators, if you like.Ф After that, I often thought of the little Elators in me, swift as storm, carrying their messages between my head and my fingers or toes.

During my slow recovery, I remembered what Mother had said to Murzy. УSheТll get better or she wonТt, and thatТs all anyone can expect.Ф There was nothing unusual in her attitude or tone, neither more nor less interest about me than might have been there at any time previously. It was just then, every sense sharpened by the fever and the pain, that I understood the meaning of it. The meaning was, УJinian will die or she wonТt, and who cares?Ф

I think I cried over this. ThereТs a vague memory of Murzy holding me on her lap in the rocking chairЧme, a big girl of nine or tenЧas though I were an infant. Later it didnТt seem so important. It was just the way things were, as thunder is loud or lightning unselective. No point arguing with the thunder or threatening the lightning. Just seek cover and wait. ThatТs probably how many young ones survive childhood. Seek cover and wait.

The next thing I remember especially is when Murzy look me on an expedition. All the old dams were going out to pick herbs and fungi, bitty here, bitty there, to last us the cold season when nothing would be growing. Our teacher was off on a trip to visit his relatives up near Harbin. The boys were off into the hills, and when Murzy suggested to Mother I be let go with them, she said, УOh, take her, Dam Murzy. Take her for heavenТs sake. Now if Garz and Bram would get themselves off, weТd have some peace around here.Ф Considering Mother was the one who usually disturbed whatever peace anyone else might have, I thought this was a bit overstated and started to say so. I hadnТt been disrupting anything and was in a mood for considerable self-justification toward this woman who had not even cared whether I died. Murzy, however, caught me by the back of my jerkin and bore me out of the room on a flood of УThank you, maТamТsФ. Next thing I knew I was in the wagon with six dams and the horses clattering us off down the road to the forest.

ItТs a bit difficult to tell just what happened next, because it was and it wasnТt much. We went on for a bit on the road, with the old ones singing the funny song about two lovers in a briar patch and all the odd rhymes to the last line, УAnd he scratched it!Ф Then we turned into the forest road and they fell quiet. Three of them got down from the wagon. We came to the forest bridge.

Forest bridge is a small high wooden one, curving up from one rocky mossy wall to another rocky mossy wall over the tinkly torrents of Stonybrook. There are ferns in the walls, and a cool, wet smell even on hot afternoons. So ...

One old woman, I think it was Tess Tinder-my-hand, whispered something into the air, then set foot on the bridge, stamping her foot, so, just a little. Bridge drummed, bowom. Second old woman whispered, set her foot, bom bom bowom. Third old woman set foot on the bridge, bom bom bowom wommmmm. And then quiet. Horses quiet. Wagon quiet. All the old women quiet, waiting. I crept down from the wagon, bunwit still, sneaky, crept out onto that bridge. Old women set their feet, bom bom bowom wommmm, and just when the echo was starting to come up from below I set my foot down quick, and the echo came wom wom bawom bom bom with a sound of laughter in it. I kept right still then, listening while the laughter went on. There was something living down there, under the bridge. Then the old women began singing about Larby Lanooly, and old Murzy shook up the horses to come over the bridge, in a rum-a-rum-a-rum of hooves, and we got back in the wagon and that was that.

When we came to the groves, though, old Murzy look me by the hand to each of the old women, putting my hand in each oneТs old hand, saying, УWelcome our sister, our child, for today she begins upon the Way.Ф When IТd done it with all six of them, she took me aside, speaking to me for the first time without the baby-talk УthaТs, as she would to a grown-up person. УJinian, girl,Ф she said, УyouТve the wize-art. In part, at least, and none know whether the whole will come until it comes. Now you must promise me something or the sisters and IТll be gone come night and come not nigh you again.Ф

УWhere will you go?Ф I remember I asked this, more curious about that than about what she might say next.

УAway,Ф she said flatly, and I believed her. УNow listen. What we tell you is secret. What we teach you is secret. What you learn from us is secret. You do not talk about it. Not to your mother, not to any in the Demesne. Not to your lover, come that time, or your husband or child, come that time as well. To one of us, yes, if you see the star-eye and hear the proper words. Otherwise, never.Ф

Well, I had no lover, that was sure. And I wasnТt inclined to tell anyone at the Demesne anything important, nor Mother anything at all, important or not. So I gave her my hand and promised, she putting the little star into it as I did so.

УAlways keep this safe, Jinian. It is a sign to tell any Wize-ard anywhere that you are one of us, a sister in the Way, but most times you donТt go dangling it out where the world can see it and ask questions. Long time ago it was called the Eesty sign, and some still call it that. So, if one of us asks are you Wize-ard, or are you star-eye, or do you carry the Eesty sign, it all means the same thing. Do you hear me, Jinian?Ф

I said I did. It made TessТs gift more precious than ever, and I took to polishing it every night on my nightgown when I went to bed. However, just then I wanted to know about what had just happened.

УWhat was it, there at the bridge?Ф I asked.

УBridge magic, child. Calling up the deep dwellers. One of the ten thousand magics, and not the simplest. We learn a simpler one today, herbary, and see you pay attention.Ф

I did my best. I certainly never forgot what they taught me that afternoon. Rainhat root, pounded with the seeds of shivery-green, when the seeds are still in the pod and the root taken on the same day, will bring a sleep no power is proof againstЧno, not even Healing. УA day, a drop,Ф said old Tinder-my-hand. УTwo days, two drops. Drink a flagon of it, and a man will sleep a year and starve while asleep, for in this sleep he will not swallow nor shit nor pee nor aught but barely breathe, girl.Ф

УIt sounds ... dangerous,Ф I said.

УIt sounds useful,Ф she corrected me. УMay come a time youТd like Mendost to be asleep for a few days? Well? But never for anything small, girl. We donТt use the wize-art for small things.Ф

So I learned the formula for sleep, and another very complicated one for making people or creatures fall in loveЧthat one had sixteen ingredients that had to be mixed in the right order and the right quantitiesЧand yet another for reducing temper. Murzy caught my eye and reminded me, УNot for anything small, Jinian. Put that thought right out of your head,Ф so I stopped thinking of putting it in MotherТs tea. Still, it would have been an improvement.

Herbary isnТt really secret. There are books, often not even hidden away, where you can find out about it. So it doesnТt matter if I say some things about it. YouТll notice I donТt tell what the sixteen ingredients are. Murzy says it wouldnТt be wize at all. But I can tell the story without telling the truly secret things. Besides, some of them arenТt truly secret anymore since the changes.

After that, I spent a great deal of time with the sisters. Murzy. Tess Tinder-my-hand. Margaret Fox-mitten. Bets Battereye. Cat Candleshy. And Sarah Shadowsox. And Jinian Footseer. Seven of us, which is the usual number. I have talked of them as though they were all equally old, but Tinder-my-hand was oldest, white-haired and frail, forgetful a bit at times and at others so quick it surprised you. Murzy and Bets were next oldest, alike enough to be sisters, both full of bustle and no-nonsense. Cat was dignified and knife sharp, dark hair drawn up in a braid crown. Sarah had wild red-brown hair and eyes like a mountain zeller, all soft caution. They were about middle-aged, I suppose, thirty or so. Margaret Foxmitten was tall and thin as a whip and not much older than Mendost, and she could be more beautiful than Eller when she chose, but there was something forbiddingly elderly about her, for all her soft skin and shining hair. When she sat in the dust of the courtyard, husking fruit or chopping grain, no one would have looked at her twice. It was a kind of disappearing, of invisibility, and Murzy suggested I would do well to learn it. I seemed to be disturbingly visible whenever I was present, and I decided I was just too young to bring it off.

Time went on. Jeruval got his TalentЧIСve honestly forgotten what it was. Pursuivant, I think. He went off, then, to Game with some Demesne or other until he got tired of it or got killed. Poremy still had a year or so to go before he could expect to get his Talent, if any, and Flot perhaps two years. It comes, usually, around the fifteenth or sixteenth year, though IТve been told Witchery comes earlier than that and Sorcery much later. I was about thirteen years old, just getting my breasts and woman-times. ThatТs when Murzy told me to get myself ready for a trip.

I heard her talking to Mother.

Overheard.