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A Kiss Of Shadows :: Гамильтон Лорел
Страница: 204 из 338I felt how tiny I was, how vast the world, but it wasn't a lonely feeling. I felt for that moment embraced, whole. Wanted.
Barinthus's hand fell back without touching me. His voice hissed and slurred like water over sand. "If I'd known you could do this, I would not have feared for you."
I laughed, and the sound was joyous, free. I opened further, like a door thrown wide open. No, as if the door, the wall it sat on, and the house it was held inside of, melted into the power.
Barinthus caught his breath sharply. "By the Earth's grace, what have you done, Merry?" He never used my nickname.
"Sharing," I whispered.
Galen came up to us, and the power opened to him without any thought from me. The three of us stood there filled with the night. It was a generous power, a laughing, welcoming presence.
The power moved outward from me, or maybe I moved forward through something that was always there, but tonight I could sense it. Siobhan moved forward, and the power did not fill her. The power rejected her. Siobhan's magic was an insult to the Earth and that slow cycle of life because Siobhan stole that life, rushed death to the door of someone or something before their time. For the first time I understood that somehow Siobhan stood outside the cycle—that she was a thing of death that still moved as if it lived, but the Earth did not know her.
The power would have welcomed Cel, but he thought that first brush was my doing and he guarded himself against it. I felt his shields crash into place, holding him behind the metaphysical walls, safe and unable to share in the bounty offered.
But Keelin did not close herself away from it. Perhaps she didn't have shields enough to build her walls, or perhaps she didn't wish to. But I felt her in the power, felt her open to it, and heard her voice spill out in a sigh that mingled with the wind.
Keelin walked to the end of her leash, raising each of her four arms wide to the welcoming night.
Cel jerked her back by the leather leash. She stumbled, and I felt her spirit crumble.
I reached a hand toward her, and the power, though it wasn't mine to control, spilled outward, surrounded Keelin. It pushed at Cel like water pushes at a rock in the center of a stream, something to go around, to ignore. The push made him stumble back, the leash fell from his hand. His pale face raised to the rising moon, and stark terror showed on that handsome face.
The sight pleased me, and it was a petty pleasure. The generous run of power flexed around me like a mother's hand tugging on the arm of a naughty child.
Barinthus's hand fell back without touching me. His voice hissed and slurred like water over sand. "If I'd known you could do this, I would not have feared for you."
I laughed, and the sound was joyous, free. I opened further, like a door thrown wide open. No, as if the door, the wall it sat on, and the house it was held inside of, melted into the power.
Barinthus caught his breath sharply. "By the Earth's grace, what have you done, Merry?" He never used my nickname.
"Sharing," I whispered.
Galen came up to us, and the power opened to him without any thought from me. The three of us stood there filled with the night. It was a generous power, a laughing, welcoming presence.
The power moved outward from me, or maybe I moved forward through something that was always there, but tonight I could sense it. Siobhan moved forward, and the power did not fill her. The power rejected her. Siobhan's magic was an insult to the Earth and that slow cycle of life because Siobhan stole that life, rushed death to the door of someone or something before their time. For the first time I understood that somehow Siobhan stood outside the cycle—that she was a thing of death that still moved as if it lived, but the Earth did not know her.
The power would have welcomed Cel, but he thought that first brush was my doing and he guarded himself against it. I felt his shields crash into place, holding him behind the metaphysical walls, safe and unable to share in the bounty offered.
But Keelin did not close herself away from it. Perhaps she didn't have shields enough to build her walls, or perhaps she didn't wish to. But I felt her in the power, felt her open to it, and heard her voice spill out in a sigh that mingled with the wind.
Keelin walked to the end of her leash, raising each of her four arms wide to the welcoming night.
Cel jerked her back by the leather leash. She stumbled, and I felt her spirit crumble.
I reached a hand toward her, and the power, though it wasn't mine to control, spilled outward, surrounded Keelin. It pushed at Cel like water pushes at a rock in the center of a stream, something to go around, to ignore. The push made him stumble back, the leash fell from his hand. His pale face raised to the rising moon, and stark terror showed on that handsome face.
The sight pleased me, and it was a petty pleasure. The generous run of power flexed around me like a mother's hand tugging on the arm of a naughty child.