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Naked Empire :: Goodkind Terry
Страница: 73 из 495"Essentially, they were attempting to use color in order to help people born without eyes… to see."
From Kahlan's understanding of magic and of history, this was fundamentally different from even the most malevolent experiments to alter people into weapons. Even in the most vile of these instances, they were attempting to take away some attribute of their humanity and at the same time add to or enhance an elemental ability. In none of it were they trying to create that which was not there at all.
"In other words," Kahlan summed up, "they failed."
Richard nodded. "So, here they were, the great war was long over and the Old World-those who had wanted to end magic, much like the Imperial Order-was safely sealed away beyond the barrier that had been created. Now they find out that the birth rate of those carrying the gift of wizardry is plummeting, and that the magic engendered by the House of Rahl, the bond with his people designed to stop the dream walkers from taking them, has an unexpected consequence-it also gives birth to the pristinely ungifted, who are an irreversible break in the lineage of magic."
"They have two problems, then," Kahlan said. "They have fewer wizards being born to deal with problems of magic, and they have people being born with no link at all to the magic."
"That's right. And the second problem was growing faster than the first. In the beginning, they thought they would find a solution, a cure.
They didn't. Worse, as I explained before, those born of the pristinely ungifted, like Jennsen, always bear children the same as they. In a few generations, the number of the people without the link to the gift was growing faster than anyone ever expected."
Kahlan let out a deep breath. "Desperate indeed."
"It was becoming chaos."
She hooked a loose strand of hair back. "What did they decide?"
Richard regarded her with one of those looks that told her he was pretty disturbed by what he'd found.
"They chose magic over people. They deemed that this attribute- magic, or those who possessed it-was more important than human life." His voice rose. "Here they took the very thing they fought the war over, the right of those who were born the way they were-in that case people born with magic-to their own lives, to exist, and they turned it all around to be that this attribute was more important than the life which held it!"
He let out a breath and lowered his voice. "There were too many to execute, so they did the next best thing-they banished them."
Kahlan's eyebrows went up.
From Kahlan's understanding of magic and of history, this was fundamentally different from even the most malevolent experiments to alter people into weapons. Even in the most vile of these instances, they were attempting to take away some attribute of their humanity and at the same time add to or enhance an elemental ability. In none of it were they trying to create that which was not there at all.
"In other words," Kahlan summed up, "they failed."
Richard nodded. "So, here they were, the great war was long over and the Old World-those who had wanted to end magic, much like the Imperial Order-was safely sealed away beyond the barrier that had been created. Now they find out that the birth rate of those carrying the gift of wizardry is plummeting, and that the magic engendered by the House of Rahl, the bond with his people designed to stop the dream walkers from taking them, has an unexpected consequence-it also gives birth to the pristinely ungifted, who are an irreversible break in the lineage of magic."
"They have two problems, then," Kahlan said. "They have fewer wizards being born to deal with problems of magic, and they have people being born with no link at all to the magic."
"That's right. And the second problem was growing faster than the first. In the beginning, they thought they would find a solution, a cure.
They didn't. Worse, as I explained before, those born of the pristinely ungifted, like Jennsen, always bear children the same as they. In a few generations, the number of the people without the link to the gift was growing faster than anyone ever expected."
Kahlan let out a deep breath. "Desperate indeed."
"It was becoming chaos."
She hooked a loose strand of hair back. "What did they decide?"
Richard regarded her with one of those looks that told her he was pretty disturbed by what he'd found.
"They chose magic over people. They deemed that this attribute- magic, or those who possessed it-was more important than human life." His voice rose. "Here they took the very thing they fought the war over, the right of those who were born the way they were-in that case people born with magic-to their own lives, to exist, and they turned it all around to be that this attribute was more important than the life which held it!"
He let out a breath and lowered his voice. "There were too many to execute, so they did the next best thing-they banished them."
Kahlan's eyebrows went up.