"Tad Williams - Memory Sorrow & Thorn 1 - The Dragonbone Chair" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williams Tad)

The rusty brown ink, concocted of lambsfoil, hellebore, and rue тАУ as well as some
redder, thicker liquid тАУ is dry, and flakes easily from the thin pages. The unadorned skin of
a hairless animal, the species unprovable, forms the binding.
Those holy men of Nabban who read it after NissesтАЩ passing pronounced it heretical
and dangerous, but for some reason did not bum it, as is usually done with such texts.
Instead, it lay for many years in Mother ChurchтАЩs near-endless archives, in the deepest,
most secret vaults of the Sancellan Aedonitis. It has now apparently disappeared from the
onyx casket which housed it; the never-gregarious Order of the Archives is vague as to its
present whereabouts.
Some who have read NissesтАЩ heretical work claim that it contains all the secrets of
Osten Ard, from this landтАЩs murky past to the shadows of things unborn. The Aedonite
priest-examiners will say only that its subject matter was тАШunholy.тАЩ
It may indeed be true that NissesтАЩ writings predict the what-will-be as clearly тАУ and,
we may presume, eccentrically тАУ as they chronicle the what-has-been. It is not known,
however, whether the great deeds of our age тАУ especially, for our concern, the rise and
triumph of Prester John тАУ are included in the priestтАЩs foretellings, although there are
suggestions that this may be true. Much of NissesтАЩ writing is mysterious, its meaning
hidden in strange rhymes and obscure references. I have never read the full work, and most
of those who have are now long dead.
The book is titled, in the cold, harsh runes of NissesтАЩ northern birthplace, Du
Svardenvyrd, which means The Weird of the Swords...тАЭ

тАУ from The Life and Reign of King John Presbyter
by Morgenes Ercestres
 PART ONE: Simon Mooncalf

The Grasshopper and the King
On this day of days there was an unfamiliar stirring deep inside the dozing heart of the
Hayholt, in the castleтАЩs bewildering warren of quiet passages and overgrown, ivy-choked
courtyards, in the monkтАЩs holes and damp, shadowed chambers. Courtiers and servants
alike goggled and whispered. Scullions exchanged significant glances across the washing
tubs in the steamy kitchen. Hushed conversations seemed to be taking place in every
hallway and dooryard of the great keep It might have been the first day of spring, to judge
from the air of breathless anticipation, but the great calendar in Doctor MorgenesтАЩ cluttered
chamber showed differently: the month was only Novander. Autumn was holding the door,
and Winter was trudging in.
What made this a day different from all others was not a season but a place тАУ the
HayholtтАЩs throne room. For three long years its doors had been shut by the kingтАЩs order,
and heavy draperies had cloaked the multicolored windows. Even the cleaning servants
had not been permitted to cross the threshold, causing the Mistress of Chambermaids no
end of personal anguish. Three summers and three winters it had stood undisturbed. Today
it was no longer empty, and all the castle hummed with rumor.
In truth, there was one person in the busy Hayholt whose attention was not fixed on
that long-untenanted room, one bee in the murmuring hive whose solitary song was not in
key with the greater droning. That one sat in the heart of the Hedge Garden, in an alcove
between the dull red stone of the chapel and the leafless side of a skeletal hedge-lion, and
thought he was not missed. It had been an irritating day so far тАУ the women all busy, with
scant time to answer questions; breakfast late, and cold into the bargain. Confusing orders
had been given to him, as usual, and no one had any time to waste with any of his
problems...