Grand Conspiracy. Janny Wurts

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ clenched jaw, torn screaming inside by the insidious progression of the spell. Lirenda remained unmoved throughout, her diction as carved frost while the crystal came alive at her bidding. Hard bars of light beamed from the quartz point. These fell and diffused a spectral mask over the unformed features of the child. The dichotomy burned: through the light-cast image of Arithon’s face, a sleeping boy’s innocence, forced passive under ties of cold sorcery. In despair born of horror, Elaira stood witness as the webwork of whorled power matched spell rune to set seal, then sank like ribboned wire under blameless skin and bone, there to seed the slow elements of change.

      Small differences which would not conform over time struck her now with wounding impact. As if in this one, trapped moment of existence, she must relive each nuance of Arithon’s form and measure the particulars anew: these grubby boy’s hands would mature to match the broad, sturdy frame of the herder stock of his birth; fingers that would never spin the filament of bardic melody from the wire of a lyranthe’s string. The unmarked right forearm and small, callused palm, to stay unmarred by the welt from the light bolt which had seeded the geas of Desh-thiere’s curse. The wrists and the ankles that would remain unscarred, never torn by the welded shackles and chain imposed by the blood feud with s’Ilessid begun on the worlds beyond West Gate. Elaira could but ache for the discrepancies that enemies would miss in the engrossing, blind fervor of hatred.

      Through revulsion that mounted into lacerating pain, she knew that Arithon’s likeness could never make even a second-rate substitute for the character that was the living man.

      Long before the finish, when the flare of blue light sealed the ending cipher, her eyes spilled shamed tears. Undone at long last by her pity for the boy and her remorse for the suffering her decision must come to cast upon the grown man, Elaira knelt with blinded eyes. The hot bloom of power extinguished in the heart of the crystal; the small star of light vanished from the center of Fionn Areth’s forehead. Elaira knew the critical moment was past. The shapechange to replicate Arithon’s appearance had been accomplished beyond any chance of reprieve. Years might elapse before this night’s work reached completion, but the final outcome was set.

      Grief for that irrevocability lanced her. Sickened for the part her vows had forced her to play, Elaira missed the odd look of riveted fascination Lirenda fixed on the template image of the Shadow Master still imprinted within the focal matrix of the dimmed quartz.

      The portrait was one drawn by love, in each accurate detail a true map of Arithon’s character. Through the interval while Elaira recovered herself, Lirenda beheld the features of the man as few others living had seen him. Hooked to inadvertent, rapt fascination, she strove to brand the s’Ffalenn likeness in mind for a later, more leisurely study.

      Night by then had waned to the charcoal hour before dawn. The moon rode the horizon like yellowed ivory, with all but the brightest stars faded. The grasses lay rimed and bearded with new frost, and the wind dropped, leaving the air gripped fast in a stilled and penetrating cold.

      Elaira awakened to the fact she was shivering. ‘We should be gone before the herd dogs awaken.’

      Lirenda stirred, gathered up the chill quartz, and folded the supporting rods. ‘We can’t abandon the boy to find his way home.’

      Galled that anyone should think her so callous, Elaira stood up. ‘I’ll carry him. A veiling of stayspells over the house would be a kindness as I take him inside. The wife’s goodman sleeps lightly, and there’s a crippled old sheep dog who sleeps on the rug by the hearth.’

      ‘No doubt the stair squeaks as well?’ Lirenda said, scornful.

      ‘They’ll have a ladder,’ Elaira corrected. ‘These are simple folk, who trust a dog before locks and keys to safeguard their threshold.’ She shook out damp leathers and knelt to gather up the sleeping child. ‘The cottage that has stairs isn’t found on these moors. Babes sleep with their mothers until they’re old enough to climb.’

      ‘Well, don’t leave your jacket behind out of pity,’ Lirenda dismissed, an acerbic lift to her brows. ‘I’d prefer that nobody knows we were here.’

      ‘Don’t worry.’ Elaira straightened up, a set to her jaw that betrayed her cutting distress. ‘The last thing I want is to acknowledge our night’s work to anyone with a conscience.’

      She turned toward the hay byre, the boy’s limp form cradled awkwardly in her arms. His face was his own. No trace showed yet of the profile he would bear at maturity. Through the course of those years, Elaira resolved, she would be far from Araethura. And she had misjudged, when she warned her senior that she would get puking drunk. The sickness inside her need not wait for spirits. Once Fionn Areth was tucked safely back in the loft with his sleeping siblings, she was going to snatch shelter in the nearest thicket and heave her guts inside out.

      She reached the cottage doorway, churned-up with self-loathing that made her long for oblivion. As she freed a stealthy hand to raise the string latch, she wondered whether the boy would ever learn that his face was the gift of Koriani intervention, or if he would someday come to know the s’Ffalenn prince he was designed to decoy to captivity.

       Autumn 5653

      Daybreak

      Still infirm, confined by her weakness to her wide bed in the Capewell sisterhouse, the ancient Prime Matriarch receives word from her lane scryer that the first step in the plan to take Prince Arithon captive is in place; Lirenda’s task in Araethura is accomplished, and Fionn Areth’s transformation a sealed future …

      Clad in muddy leathers and a green reek of bog mire, the craggy Sorcerer, Asandir, rummages through Sethvir’s pantry at Althain Tower; over rinds of molded cheese, stale bread, and one forlorn sack of rice that hosts a new litter of field mice, he makes disposition to Luhaine, ‘Since I can’t survive on air and conundrums, that settles our dispute. You’ll stay. I’ll go to Caithwood and serve due redress against townsmen who believe trees can burn for the cause of misguided politics …’

      Just returned from an errand in the Kingdom of Havish, Mearn s’Brydion, youngest brother and envoy of the clanborn Duke of Alestron, makes landfall at Middlecross; informed there that Prince Lysaer plans a royal inspection of the Riverton shipyards, he smiles in sharkish pleasure, then chooses to play the advantage of timing and let his demand for an inquiry coincide …

      Autumn 5653

       II.

       Infraction

      Asandir thumped back the lid of the battered wooden clothes chest, which held the few personal effects he kept at Althain Tower. Craggier, and cross-grained as beached driftwood from the harrowing events that had taxed him to infirmity last season, he chose a formal cloak of heavier wool, a deep enough blue to be taken for black, with borders edged in bands of silver foil ribbon. The rich color brought out his lingering pallor.

      To Luhaine, attendant upon his preparations like a cloud of morose, glacial air, the detail became the caustic reminder of a convalescence cut short by necessity. ‘You know you ought to be resting.’

      Asandir paused. Recovery had СКАЧАТЬ