"Sheri S. Tepper - Jinian Stareye" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tepper Sherri)

11

'I'm afraid to."

'Can it hurt us?'

'Quite frankly, Peter, I haven't any idea. Reason says no. My skin says yes. I barely made it out of there
this time.'

'You stay here,' he said, patting me fondly on my head as he might have petted a tame fustigar. He
stepped back the way we had come, leaving me with my mouth open. I swallowed, choked, started to go
screaming after him, then thought better of it. Peter often did things I was afraid to do. Then my fear for
him overcame my fear for myself, and I went roaring after him, usually quite unnecessarily. Just now
there was something I had wanted to do that would take a few moments alone. There might be no better
time later.

Peter had Shifted inside the maze. If his Talent worked there, then mine would probably work close by.
Not my Talent of understanding languages, but my Wize-ardly one. There was a spell I'd been saving, a
multiple one Murzy had taught me early on, telling me not to use it save in times of great need. It was a
combination spell used to find appropriate destinations. Not particular ones, you understand, but
appropriate ones. Murzy called it a blood, dust, and total trust spell. Nothing needed but a drop of my own
blood on a roadway and total faith that what I would ask lay in the will and purpose of the art. The
problem with it would be, she had said, its tendency to pull other creatures into it with me. Just as the

file:///G|/Program%20Files/eMule/Incoming/Sheri%20S.%20Tepper%20%20-%20Jinian%20Stareye.html (6 of 172) [10/18/2004 3:49:35 PM]
 file:///G|/Program%20Files/eMule/Incoming/Sheri%20S.%20Tepper%20%20-%20Jinian%20Stareye.html

road would be connected to many other roads, so the spell would connect me to many other things.
Considering the puzzle the Maze presented, I thought it worth the risk. Our chances of finding what we
needed on our own seemed very remote. So, I plopped myself down on the green edge of the path and
made myself concentrate. It was hard. Something about the place made concentration difficult, words
hard to remember.

'Day or night, dark or light,' I prayed, gulping a little,

12

shutting everything out except those words, 'lead me to the place I need to be. Bright the Sun Burning,
Night Will Come Turning, Road's Dust to Find It, Heart's Blood to Bind It.' I used the edge of my star-eye
to cut a finger, dropped the blood on a thirsty patch of bare road, then sat very quietly, letting the words
flow through me until all my parts understood them.

It always seems to take a long time. Actually, it doesn't. Within moments, I was worrying about Peter
again. There was only time for a modest fret before he emerged from the Maze, somewhat untidily. 'I
Shifted,' he announced. 'To stay out of the way. Something enormous fell. It made a noise like some huge
being screaming in agony, a great metallic clamor. It killed several whats-its, then after a little while it
was gone and everything was just the way it had been originally. It goes on over and over, like some one-
act play at a festival. Performances every few minutes.'