Black Jade. David Zindell

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СКАЧАТЬ be his. Through him would flow the great soul force, the deepest fires of the world. Such a force, Valashu, can be used either for great evil or great good.’

      He went on to say that, ultimately, this angel fire could be used to destroy whole universes, as the Ieldra were sometimes forced to do, or to create new ones.

      He finished speaking and poured himself yet another cup of tea. And I said, ‘If what you’ve told us is true, then the Maitreya would possess the valarda in much greater measure than I.’

      ‘Perhaps. But I should say rather than possessing the valarda, the Maitreya, in his essence, is valarda, for he would be as a window letting in the light of all things.’

      Above us, the twelve round windows filled with the faint sheen of the stars. The dome above us seemed to catch the exhalations of the Seven as they looked at me.

      ‘The Maitreya,’ I said to Abrasax, and to everyone, ‘must be able to draw forth the light from the Cup of Heaven. And we must find him before Morjin does.’

      Master Virang’s discipline was meditation, not mind-reading, but I sensed that he exactly echoed Abrasax’s thoughts as he asked me, ‘Do you seek the Shining One to keep Morjin from using the Lightstone or for more personal reasons?’

      ‘Both,’ I told him truthfully.

      Two flames, I thought, burned inside my heart. The first was reddish-black, and would destroy me if I let it. The other flame was as blue as the sky and connected me to all the lights of the heavens.

      ‘If we are to help you, we must be sure of you,’ Master Storr told me again. ‘Sure, at least, that you can use the valarda for good, and not ill. Will you allow us to test this?’

      I nodded my head as I looked at him. ‘If you must.’

      ‘Good,’ Master Storr said. ‘Then please stand up.’

      I did as he asked, and moved off to the side of the tables beneath the chamber’s dome. The Seven gathered around me. Each of them held one of the Great Gelstei out toward my chest.

      ‘Ah, just don’t make him disappear,’ Maram called out from his cushion below me.

      Abrasax smiled at this as his open hand showed a little colored sphere. So it was with Master Yasul, Master Matai and the others of the Seven. Each of them, especially Master Storr, gazed at me intently. I felt their eyes pierce me like hot needles at many places through my body. Their hands, now glowing with the radiance of their crystals, seemed to reach inside me and open me to the whirls of light up and down my spine.

      ‘It burns, does it not?’ Abrasax said to me. His eyes filled with concern for me even as his crystal flared with a white luster. ‘Your belly is where you feel it, isn’t it? All your hatred of the Red Dragon?’

      Deep within my belly, down behind my navel, the red flame raged hot as molten stone. For a moment, I perceived it as Abrasax did: as red as burning blood and shot with streaks of orange darkening to black, like smoke. I sensed that it would soon kill me, if I let it.

      ‘There is a saying,’ Abrasax told me. ‘Words as old as the stars: “If you would be freed from burning, you must become fire.”’

      With that, the crystals of the Seven glistened in a rainbow brilliance. Wheels of fiery light whirled along my spine in colors to match the hues pouring from their crystals. The red flame in my deepest part built hotter and hotter. It might, I knew, burn up the whole world with my hellish hate if I let it. It consumed me, now, almost, being drawn up into my chest with every beat of my heart. But there, too, gathered the other flame, pure and blue, like Arras and Solaru and the brightest of the stars.

      If you would be freed from burning, you must become fire.

      I closed my eyes then, and I felt the hot flickers of the red flame feed the blazing of the blue. I willed this to be. It grew brighter and brighter. I did. My whole being, out from my center into my arms and legs, feet and hands, fairly shimmered and sang with a surging new life. And then, in a rush of joy, a fountain of violet flame seemed to shoot up through my belly, heart and throat, flaring to pure white as it filled the bright, black spaces behind my eyes. For an endless moment I did disappear, into a fire so brilliant that it touched the whole world with an infinite light.

      At last, I returned to myself. I sensed a quickness of breath and rushing blood inside Abrasax, and I opened my eyes to see as he did. And I gasped in astonishment. For the auras of the Seven and Atara and Kane, and all those in the room, impinged on each other, and flowed, swirled and shimmered in a cloud of light. This living radiance seemed to be drawn to me as water to an opening in the earth and to change hues as it brightened into a numinous and dazzling glorre. I drew my sword then, and held it pointing up toward the apex of the dome. Alkaladur, too, blazed with this perfect color.

      ‘Fire, indeed,’ Abrasax said.

      Then he put away his gelstei, and so did Master Storr and the others, and the auras of everyone gathered there vanished from my sight. But my sword’s silustria continued burning with an ineffable flame.

      ‘Do you see?’ Abrasax said, to Master Virang and Master Storr. ‘Do you see? It is as Master Juwain told about Prince Valashu.’

      Everyone watched as the glorre illuminating my sword slowly faded to a silvery sheen. I sheathed Alkaladur as I looked at Abrasax.

      ‘That is enough of testing for one night,’ he said, smiling at me.

      Master Storr looked down at Maram swigging his tea and said, ‘But what of the others?’

      ‘Valashu is their leader,’ Abrasax told him. ‘As he goes, so go they. If he can overcome the worst of himself as he has here tonight, then I believe that they will, too.’

      ‘You speak of him,’ Master Storr said, eyeing me, ‘almost as if he is the Maitreya!’

      ‘No, Valashu is not the Shining One,’ he said. ‘But I believe their fates are interwoven, as threads in a tapestry. Surely it is upon the Prince of Elahad to lead the way to him. Do you agree, Master Matai?’

      The Master Diviner, standing across from me, smiled at Abrasax. And then, in turn, as Abrasax queried the other masters, each of them gave his assent. Even Master Storr reluctantly nodded his head.

      ‘I suppose we must trust Valashu and his friends,’ he affirmed.

      In the end, I thought, either one has faith in another or not.

      ‘Yes, we must trust them with all our power to trust,’ Abrasax said. ‘And give them all our help. All the signs point one way.’

      ‘Ah, but which way?’ Maram asked as he fingered his beard. ‘That is the question of the moment, is it not?’

      Abrasax smiled at this, then called out, ‘Master Matai – will you show us the parchment?’

      The Seven moved back over to the empty table, and my friends and I gathered around them. Master Matai produced a large, yellowed parchment, which he unrolled and laid upon the table for all of us to examine. On its glossy surface were inscribed a great circle and various symbols marking the position of the planets and stars at the hour of my birth. It was, I saw, a copy of my horoscope, which Master Sebastian of the school in Mesh had prepared scarcely СКАЧАТЬ