JК
The Floodgate :: Каннингем Элейн
Страница: 14 из 212Congratulations on your escape. Never will I understand the impulse to cage birds for the sake of their songs!"
"I quite agree," the bird said in a clear, approving tone. "Fortunately, this enlightened opinion seems to be common hereabouts. I come and go as I like."
Andris fell back a step. Many of Halruaa's birds could chatter like small, feathered echoes. Even sentient birds were not all that rare. He'd just never expected anyone at the Jordaini College might keep such a retainer.
"This is an unexpected pleasure, my small friend. Might I ask what brings you here?"
The bird sidled several steps closer. Its head craned this way and that, as if to reassure itself that no one might over-hear. "A message."
"A message? From whom?"
"Just read the books."
"The books?" Andris said blankly.
Pink and yellow wings rustled impatiently. "Hidden under the mattress. Read them, put them back."
The bird was gone. It didn't fly away; it was simply… gone.
Consternation filled Andris. This was a wizard's work, and serious work at that! Stern laws forbade the jordaini to use magic, or to have any magic used on their behalf. A blink bird might be either a natural beast or a conjured image, but both were forbidden.
That knowledge didn't stop him from looking under the mattress. He picked up an ancient tome bound in thin, yellowed leather. The pages within were fine parchments aged to pale sepia and covered with faded writing. Andris took the book over to the window and began to read.
With each page he turned, he crept farther from the window, as if he could distance himself from the horrors revealed. He held in his hands the journal of Akhlaur! The deathwizard's own hand had written these runes, turned these pages.
Andris's skin crawled. His sick feeling intensified as he considered the book's bindings. No animal yielded leather so thin and delicate. The skin had once been human, or more likely, elf.
Suspicion passed into certainty as he read on. Precise little runes and neat, detailed drawings related with matter-of-fact detachment atrocities beyond Andris's darkest dreams. Elves had been the necromancer's favorite test subjects, and none had endured so much as the girl-child Akivaria, more conveniently known as Kiva.
Andris felt like a man gripped by the mosquito fever-burning with wrath, yet racked with numbing indecision. This book held secrets that could destroy the jordaini order if they became known. Now, he knew.
As he had told Matteo, with knowledge comes responsibility.
"I quite agree," the bird said in a clear, approving tone. "Fortunately, this enlightened opinion seems to be common hereabouts. I come and go as I like."
Andris fell back a step. Many of Halruaa's birds could chatter like small, feathered echoes. Even sentient birds were not all that rare. He'd just never expected anyone at the Jordaini College might keep such a retainer.
"This is an unexpected pleasure, my small friend. Might I ask what brings you here?"
The bird sidled several steps closer. Its head craned this way and that, as if to reassure itself that no one might over-hear. "A message."
"A message? From whom?"
"Just read the books."
"The books?" Andris said blankly.
Pink and yellow wings rustled impatiently. "Hidden under the mattress. Read them, put them back."
The bird was gone. It didn't fly away; it was simply… gone.
Consternation filled Andris. This was a wizard's work, and serious work at that! Stern laws forbade the jordaini to use magic, or to have any magic used on their behalf. A blink bird might be either a natural beast or a conjured image, but both were forbidden.
That knowledge didn't stop him from looking under the mattress. He picked up an ancient tome bound in thin, yellowed leather. The pages within were fine parchments aged to pale sepia and covered with faded writing. Andris took the book over to the window and began to read.
With each page he turned, he crept farther from the window, as if he could distance himself from the horrors revealed. He held in his hands the journal of Akhlaur! The deathwizard's own hand had written these runes, turned these pages.
Andris's skin crawled. His sick feeling intensified as he considered the book's bindings. No animal yielded leather so thin and delicate. The skin had once been human, or more likely, elf.
Suspicion passed into certainty as he read on. Precise little runes and neat, detailed drawings related with matter-of-fact detachment atrocities beyond Andris's darkest dreams. Elves had been the necromancer's favorite test subjects, and none had endured so much as the girl-child Akivaria, more conveniently known as Kiva.
Andris felt like a man gripped by the mosquito fever-burning with wrath, yet racked with numbing indecision. This book held secrets that could destroy the jordaini order if they became known. Now, he knew.
As he had told Matteo, with knowledge comes responsibility.