"Michelle West - Winter Death" - читать интересную книгу автора (West Michelle)

him. And she had a gift, as well, a...clear understanding of people." She hesitated,
and Kayla felt it again, that low current beneath the words that seemed to move in
a different direction from their surface. "A clearer understanding than perhaps most
of us have." She waited.
Carris said nothing, but he did clear his throat.
"We've brought a few things that the village will find useful," he said at last,
looking to just one side of her face, as if his dark and graceful gaze had become
suddenly awkward. "Magda often asked for aid for the rough times, andтАФandтАФ
she made it clear what was needed. There are medical herbs and unguents here,
there are potions as well; there are bandages and cleansing herbs, as well as honest
tea. There's salted, dried meat in the second bag; a lot of it, which might help. The
harvest in the mainland has been...poor this year. There's also some money in the
last bag."
"You shouldn't be telling me this," Kayla said quietly. "You should talk to
Widow Davis; she's the mayor hereabouts, or what passes for one. She'll know
what to do, and she'll be very grateful to you both."
They exchanged another glance.
"Well, then, maybe you'd better call for the Widow Davis after all."
Kayla smiled politely. "If you think she isn't already on her way, you don't know
Riverend all that well."

But Kayla knew something was wrong.
The Widow Davis did, indeed, arrive; she scattered the children with a sharp
inquiry about the current state of their chores, and an even sharper glance at the
children who had the temerity to tell her they wanted to stay with the Companions,
and then eyed the saddlebags the Heralds carried with an obvious, and deep,
suspicion.
"Kayla, go mind the children. If you can't teach them to heed their duties, no one
can. I'll deal with the strangers."
Kayla felt her jaw go slack, but she hid the surprise that had caused it as she
nodded to the widow and retreated. These were Heralds, not medicants, and she
had never heard the Widow Davis be rude to a Herald before. She was glad that the
children had been sent back to their work.
She did not see the Heralds leave, but when she had time to glance outside again,
they were gone, the white of their uniforms, and the white of Companion coats,
little glimpses into the heart of winter, a hint of the future.
And when she at last tucked in for bed, she fought sleep with a kind of dread that
she hadn't felt since she had slept in the arms of her own mother, at a time of life so
far removed it seemed centuries must have passed. The nightmares had been strong
then; they were strong now.
Many of the village children dreamed. They found a place in her lap when they
wished to make sense of all the things that occurred only after they closed their
eyes, and she had spent years listening, with both wonder and envy, to the
hundreds of broken stories that occupied their dreamscapes.
Not so her own.

She had two dreams.
 There was a black dream and a white dream, set against the mountain's winter.
As a child, the black dreams were frightening, bewildering; she would wake from
sleep to search for her mother; it never took long. Her mother would come,