"Nancy Varian - Berberick - Dalamar the Dark" - читать интересную книгу автора (Varian Nancy)

basin held in the hand of a statue of Quenesti-Pah, the goddess offering
comfort. A golden finch settled on the rim of the basin, bright feathers
already changing to autumn dress.
Dalamar did not walk alone there. A cleric passed him on the path. The tall
young elf nodded greeting to him, a lord by the look of him, high-headed and
comfortable. His robe of white samite gleamed in the morning light. Silver
thread embroidered the sleeves, and upon his finger a ring shone, a silver
dragon whose eye was a bright amethyst. A cleric of E'li, no doubt come on the
business of the Temple.
Dalamar returned the absent, silent greeting in kind, in no mood to tug the
forelock or wish anyone the blessings of E'li. The cleric went round the north
side of the garden and through an arched gate. Beyond lay the private garden
of the lord and his family. This one was confident of his welcome.
Dalamar went into the dark kitchen where the cross-eyed cook stood scowling,
fair certain what his own welcome would be. Waves of heat greeted him,
rippling in the air, the heat of the night's baking still trapped in the
cavernous stone room.
"Aye, there he is," growled the cook, a woman so thin it seemed she was but
flesh stretched too tightly over bitter bones. "Lord Eflid promised me I'd
have you this morning early, Master Mage. Now where have you been, eh? Out
running again . . . ?" Her voice became as the voice of an insect buzzing,
nothing to pay heed to, and Dalamar walked past her through the kitchen and
into the oven room where the scent of years of baking clung to the walls with
stubborn, yeasty persistence.
Dalamar knelt on the floor before the first broken tile. He pressed his hands
together, feeling the tingling of magic as he gathered up the words of a
spell, stone-heal. The smell of the kitchen faded. He dropped into a state of
being none but a mage could know, that state of touching power from gods, of
taking it and shaping it and using it to his will. The cook's voice receded,
words growing thin, like mist rising to sun.
"... Who he thinks he is, some ragtag little mageling out of the Servitor
District... never did teach him his manners or how to behave among his betters
... never should have given him the white robe-never. Too far above himself,
that's what..."
The spell words invoked the bright energy of magic, that energy sparkling in
Dalamar's blood, warming his heart, lending him power only mages and gods
knew. This was all that mattered, magic and nothing more. For it, he would do
everything.

*****

The red dragon drifted in the midday sky, slipping effortlessly from updraft
to downdraft, one current to another. Wide wings spread, long tail moving like
a ship's rudder, Blood Gem traversed the sky, the first of the highlord's
dragons to sail out over the aspen forest of the Silvanesti. He looked down
through the canopy of trees and saw the silver threads of rivers running.
Along the great Thon-Thalas, he saw towns, small and large, their buildings
like smudges on the land. Here, in these little towns, they did not build so
much with stone. Here they built with wood. He opened his jaws wide to grin.
So much tinder, he said to the rider upon his back, the long-legged human