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lovely than Ecooma, He picked up a third crystal. Spart  Esparta  stood
among a group of young human women, seated on marble benches in a small stone
amphitheater. The women wore short white dresses tied around the waist; Spart
wore a long black gown and her hair was tied up in a bun with sparkling gold
thread. She was speaking to the women, and they laughed now and then as if
surprised and delighted. Though her
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Bear, Greg - Songs of Earth and Power Vol. 1 - The Infinity Concerto beauty
was more subtle than that of Ecooma or Elanare, to Michael she seemed the most
beautiful of all.
Gone were their distortions of face and frame, rolled back by time. He gently
laid the third crystal in the box and reached for a fourth. The one he picked
revealed a man and a Sidhe female from the waist up, arms around each other.
The man was ruddy-skinned, with a thick brown-black beard, wry intelligent
eyes and a sharp short nose. The Sidhe's facial features were so evocative and
familiar that Michael was sure he must have seen her before, however
impossible that was.
They were Aske and Elme, the crystal informed him, and there was good reason
for their portrait to reside in the glass box. They were the mother and father
of the Crane Women, and of seven other Breed children whose pictures resided
in other crystals.
He put the crystal down quickly, his arm hairs tingling with premonition. He
quickly searched the rest of the hut for sani and spotted a pouch resting on a
small wooden table near the door. He hastily sprinkled some of the contents
into his palm and saw the unmistakable golden flakes he needed. He poured the
flakes back into the pouch and re-tied the knot.
Now that he had found what he needed, Michael felt a sudden tingle of panic.
He looked around to see if he had disturbed anything, knowing there was no way
to conceal his invasion from the Crane Women.
Hopeless. They would catch him, and what would they do?
He fumbled at the door latch and pulled it open sharply to leave 
And jumped back with a yell. There stood Bin, covered with mud and blood, his
eyes wild and mouth gaping wide as if in agony. Black blood oozed from the
corner of his mouth and dripped from his hands, spotting his sepia
. He made small whining noises deep in his chest like a hunted animal.
Michael retreated into the hut, horrified, his throat constricting. Bin rolled
his eyes back and twisted his head horribly.
"Michael, oh, Michael," he groaned. "What have I done?"
His body contorted and he raised his hands in supplication. Then he
straightened and ran. Michael went to the door and looked after him as he
leaped the stream and ran past the limits of Halftown.
Nare, Spart and Coom walked onto the mound from the opposite direction,
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skirting the piles of rock and bone and staring at Michael in the doorway of
their hut. He slipped the pouch into his pocket surreptitiously.
Spart motioned for him to leave. She put her arm around his shoulder and
walked him to his own hut, then stopped and turned him to face her.
"Was he hurt?" Michael asked, swallowing. "What happened to him?"
"You have witnessed Biri's shame," she said. "You must tell no one. He has
survived his test."
"What test? For the priesthood?"
"Yes," Spart said, her expression unusually grim. "Tarax sent Biri's favorite
horse across the border. Bin hunted it down and slaughtered it. When he
recovers, he will be ready to serve Adonna." She focused her eyes on his and
frowned, releasing his shoulders. "What you have, what you know& you will use
it wisely?"
"I will," he finally said after swallowing hard twice.
The Crane Women entered their hut and shut the door behind them. Michael
stared across the grasslands, tears on his cheeks, wondering if he would ever
again feel like a whole person.
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Bear, Greg - Songs of Earth and Power Vol. 1 - The Infinity Concerto
Chapter Twenty-Four
Contents - Prev / Next
The snow fell quickly, leaving behind a blank white page on which was lightly
sketched the horizon, Halftown, the huts and. a few gray gaps in the clouds.
The stream was dark and shiny gray, with a thin layer of ice projecting from
each bank. Little ice-blades sliced the smoothly rushing water.
Michael stood on the bank and watched the stream. The falling snow seemed to
calm him. His discipline isolated him from the cold. His mind felt just as
isolated from reality, aloof. If he had done wrong, he thought, it was through
no fault of his own. He was involved in a situation for which he was totally
unprepared, in the face of which he was of necessity immature.
The pouch of sani rested in his pocket.
Bin sat outside his own hut, head bowed. The Sidhe hadn't spoken once, hadn't
eaten. Coom had washed his hands and face and wrapped a reed blanket around
him.
There had been some peremptory training for Michael that morning  a run with
the stick across the fields, while Spart paced him and checked his skin
temperature with long, black-nailed fingers. He had thrown a shadow for Coom,
skilfully enough to delay her catching him by a few seconds. He had blanked
his aura of memory well enough to prevent Spart from in-seeing. All this, as
the snowflakes careened slowly down like drunken, frozen dandies, oblivious to
the dark emotions around them.
"I'm going to Euterpe," he told Coom, who squatted outside the Crane Women's
hut, keeping an eye on
Bin as she pounded a rock to powder with a harder rock. She nodded.
He left the book in the rafters of his hut. He wasn't expecting trouble, but
if any came, the book wouldn't help and he didn't want to lose it or see it
damaged.
The road seemed longer, extended by the whiteness. When he came to Euterpe the
town was as private and closed-down as a sleeping face. He walked through
deserted streets, glancing at brick walls and tile roofs, worn-out wicker
baskets piled in a heap, carts carrying buckets of frozen human waste. He saw
everything as if for the last time. The sensation of fatedness was strong,
emphasized by his numbness. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]