At the Gates of Darkness. Raymond E. Feist

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СКАЧАТЬ somewhere behind the clouds the sun was lowering toward the horizon. ‘He knew I was engaged on important business, and yet he has left no apparent means of contacting him; that is most unlike Pug. It’s as if he’s…’ Jim shrugged.

      ‘Distracted?’ offered Amirantha.

      ‘More,’ said Jim. ‘He’s distant in a way that troubles me.’

      ‘I don’t understand.’

      Jim smiled slightly. ‘I don’t expect you to. I hardly know the man well, despite our tenuous kinship.’

      ‘Kinship?’

      Jim said, ‘My great-grandmother was his foster daughter.’

      Amirantha raised his eyebrows in slight surprise. ‘Tenuous by blood perhaps, but otherwise?’

      ‘We are not close. It is a long story, a family matter, and really not pertinent to the discussion at hand.’

      Amirantha shrugged. ‘Perhaps, but we have ample time to fill. Enlighten me.’

      Jim stared off into the darkening afternoon gloom and said, ‘While Pug and I may not be close, I do know a great deal about him; his role in Kingdom politics has been significant, since long before I was born.’

      ‘Obviously,’ agreed Amirantha. ‘Given the rank and status of those who have visited here since I was first made aware of the Conclave’s existence.’

      ‘So in my other duties to the Crown, I’ve been required to study a great deal of history, much of it penned by my own forbearers. I know Pug to be a man of strong convictions and one who pays attention to detail. He is not the sort to let important things slip by. Yet lately…’ Jim took a deep breath.

      ‘I assume you mean this,’ Amirantha said, indicating the cold, nearly empty castle around them with a wave of his hand.

      ‘I would have expected the man I knew, the one I studied, to have begun reconstruction on the villa at once, defiantly, to let his enemies know that they would not prevail.’

      Amirantha nodded, pursing his lips in thought. He remained quiet for a moment, then asked, ‘How much time do you think his enemies spend studying him?’

      Jim inclined his head slightly as if conceding the point.

      ‘Would it not seem, given what has happened here, that Pug knows he’s under a great deal of scrutiny? By such accounts, his enemies have been coming at him for years, in one form or another.’

      ‘Only if you assume that there is a single intelligence behind the series of assaults on this world going, yes. But that can only be an assumption.’

      ‘A better one,’ observed the Warlock, ‘than thinking that this land has been beset by a string of coincidental afflictions.

      ‘I may not be a master of magic on Pug’s scale, but I know enough about the other realms to suspect this is not a series of random occurrences.’ He paused, and Brandos recognized his expression. Amirantha was frustrated. ‘Over the last year I’ve heard frequent reference to things such as the Pantathian Serpent Priests, the Riftwar, the Great Uprising, and all the rest of it; enough of them to believe there is one agent behind all of this, one intelligence that has targeted this world, perhaps this very nation, even perhaps this island, for reasons known only to them; but irrespective of those reasons, the consequences for this entire world are bound to be dire.’

      ‘I agree,’ said Jim, ‘but explain your reasons.’

      ‘The Pantathians exist in the distant mountains to the west of my home, yet stories of them travel; they are a strange race, and their obliteration has been assumed numerous times, yet they linger.

      ‘They serve an ancient hate, a female idol they call “the mother of us all”. They kill without remorse any who refuse to serve her.

      ‘The Emerald Queen, whose army savaged my homeland before travelling half-way around the world to come to the Kingdom, was a demon in disguise.’ Suddenly Amirantha became animated. ‘Do you have any notion of how remarkable that is?’

      Jim shook his head.

      ‘I will bore you with a long lecture some other time—’

      ‘And he will,’ interjected Brandos.

      ‘—But demon possession on that level, of a powerful magic user…It’s unknown to those of my calling.’

      Jim said, ‘I still don’t see the connection.’

      Amirantha seemed to fight for words. ‘I can’t explain. It’s as if I’m on the edge of understanding something important, but I’m not quite there yet. But it’s more than a feeling, Jim.’ He looked at Brandos and said, ‘Am I usually prone to leap to conclusions, Brandos?’

      Brandos shrugged, then realized it wasn’t the time for more japes; it had been a serious question. ‘No, you’re occasionally too convinced of your own brilliance, but you are hardly rash.’ He paused, and then added to Jim. ‘He’s miscalculated and almost killed us several times, but at those times he was wrong, not impetuous. If he says he’s on the edge of understanding something huge, I’d believe him.’

      ‘Well, then,’ said Jim Dasher. ‘Is there any way I can help?’

      ‘Only if you can supply me with more information than I’ve been privy too lately.’

      Jim was silent for a long moment as he stared out into the fading light.

      Brandos cleared his throat and said, ‘I’m going to go inside; I will ask Samantha to rustle up something for you to eat. I imagine you’re hungry.’

      Jim smiled. ‘Thank you, Brandos. That would be wonderful.’ After the old fighter had left, Jim said, ‘He should be a diplomat.’

      Amirantha laughed. ‘Hardly, but he can be discreet at times.’

      Jim paused, then said, ‘Very well. I expect that Pug will ask you to listen to my report anyway, as you are the demon expert.’

      Amirantha nodded. ‘That elf, Gulamendis, is the only being I’ve met who knows as much, possibly more.’

      Jim looked uncomfortable. ‘Those Star Elves make my skin itch. But they’re a matter for another time.’ Jim told the Warlock what he had witnessed in the distant Jal-Pur desert and when he was finished, he asked, ‘What do you think?’

      Amirantha said, ‘I think we need to find a way to fetch Pug back here as soon as possible.’

      ‘Why?’

      Heading back towards the keep, Amirantha said, ‘Come with me.’

      He didn’t wait to see if Jim followed, but hurried inside. He glanced around the common room and asked the four younger magicians there, ‘Where is Jason?’

      One of them pointed towards a door that led to a small room Pug occasionally used as a private office. Amirantha went to the door, knocked once and then opened it. Jason sat behind the tiny desk in the former storage room, squinting at a paper under the dim glow СКАЧАТЬ