"David Eddings. Pawn of prophecy queen of sorcery magician's gambit (The Belgariad, Part one)" - читать интересную книгу автора

silver.
Through snow and mist they crossed into Mallorea and came at last to
Cthol Mishrak. Finding a secret way into the city, Belgarath led them to
the foot of the iron tower. Silently they climbed the rusted stairs which
had known no step for twenty centuries. Fearfully they passed through the
chamber where Torak tossed in painhaunted slumber, his maimed face hidden
by a steel mask. Stealthily they crept past the sleeping God in the
smoldering darkness and came at last to the chamber where lay the iron
cask in which rested the living Orb.
Cherek motioned for Belgarath to take the Orb, but Belgarath refused.
"I may not touch it," he said, "lest it destroy me. Once it welcomed the
touch of man or God, but its will hardened when Torak raised it against
its mother. It will not be so used again. It reads our souls. Only one
without ill intent, who is pure enough to take it and convey it in peril
of his life, with no thought of power or possession, may touch it now."
"What man has no ill intent in the silence of his soul?" Cherek asked.
But Riva Iron-grip opened the cask and took up the Orb. Its fire shone
through his fingers, but he was not burned.
"So be it, Cherek," Belgarath said. "Your youngest son is pure. It
shall be his doom and the doom of all who follow him to bear the Orb and
protect it." And Belgarath sighed, knowing the burden he had placed upon
Riva.
"Then his brothers and I will sustain him," Cherek said, "for so long
as this doom is upon him."
Riva muffled the Orb in his cloak and hid it beneath his tunic. They
crept again through the chambers of the maimed God, down the rusted
stairs, along the secret way to the gates of the city, and into the
wasteland beyond.
Soon after, Torak awoke and went as always into the Chamber of the Orb.
But the cask stood open, and the Orb was gone. Horrible was the wrath of
Kal-Torak. Taking his great sword, he went down from the iron tower and
turned and smote it once, and the tower fell. To the Angaraks he cried out
in a voice of thunder. "Because you are become indolent and unwatchful and
have let a thief steal that for which I paid so dear, I will break your
city and drive you forth. Angarak shall wander the earth until Cthrag
Yaska, the burning stone, is returned to me."
Then he cast down the City of Night in ruins and drove the hosts of
Angarak into the wilderness. Cthol Mishrak was no more.
Three leagues to the north, Belgarath heard the wailing from the city
and knew that Torak had awakened. "Now will he come after us," he said,
"and only the power of the Orb can save us. When the hosts are upon us,
Irongrip, take the Orb and hold it so they may see it."
The hosts of Angarak came, with Torak himself in the forefront, but
Riva held forth the Orb so that the maimed God and his hosts might behold
it. The Orb knew its enemy. Its hatred flamed anew, and the sky became
alight with its fury. Torak cried out and turned away. The front ranks of
the Angarak hosts were consumed by fire, and the rest fled in terror.
Thus Belgarath and his companions escaped from Mallorea and passed
again through the marches of the north, bearing the Orb of Aldur once more
into the Kingdoms of the West.