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Swallowing Darkness :: Гамильтон Лорел
Страница: 197 из 242" I had to concentrate on keeping all of us free of theillusions. Even shouting would make me stumble.
Dawson never questioned me. He simply yelled out my order, "Shoot the ones in armor! Fire!"
Immortal warriors who had seen more centuries than any of us would ever dream of fell before our weapons. They fell like dreams brought down to earth. They couldn't cloud the minds of the men, and without their illusions to stop the soldiers from firing, we mowed them down.
Dilys stood, all in yellow, glowing like she had swallowed flame, and it had filled her skin and her hair, and blazed out of her eyes. She wore no armor of any kind. Her dress looked as if she were expecting to walk down some marble staircase to a ball. But where the warriors fell, their magical armor pierced by human ingenuity, she stood. The bullets seemed to hit a wavering glow, like heat off a summer road. The bullets hit, hesitated, then melted, in little spurts of orangey light.
"What is she?" Dawson said, beside me.
"Magic," I said. "She is magic."
"What kind of magic?" Hayes asked.
"Heat, light, sun. She's a goddess of the summer heat." I'd always wondered what she'd been before she fell from grace. Most of the really powerful ones hid their pasts, some out of shame for power lost, others for fear of enemies who had retained more power settling old scores. But as I had returned Siobhan's illusions to her, so apparently I had given Dilys, or whatever her real name was, back her heat.
Others of the armored warriors had hidden behind her wavering shield. They huddled around her as they were supposed to huddle around me, but I would never burn like that. I was not sun, but moon.
In that moment, I didn't want to kill her. I wanted her to come back to me. I wanted her to be one of my court. I wanted the summer's heat to warm us all.
I called, "Dilys, we are all Unseelie. We should not be killing each other."
She spoke in a voice that held an edge of roar, and I realized it was the sound of some great fire, as if her very words burned. "You say that because your human weapons cannot harm me."
Hayes flinched beside me. She whispered, "It hurts to hear her speak."
"Not as much as it would if the princess wasn't shielding us all," Dawson said.
He was right. The glamour that protected them from the illusions was also saving them from the full force of that burning voice. She wasn't fire, she was the heat of sun. It fills the fields with life, but too much of it and the fields wither, die, and become lifeless dust.
You needed water and heat for life.
Dawson never questioned me. He simply yelled out my order, "Shoot the ones in armor! Fire!"
Immortal warriors who had seen more centuries than any of us would ever dream of fell before our weapons. They fell like dreams brought down to earth. They couldn't cloud the minds of the men, and without their illusions to stop the soldiers from firing, we mowed them down.
Dilys stood, all in yellow, glowing like she had swallowed flame, and it had filled her skin and her hair, and blazed out of her eyes. She wore no armor of any kind. Her dress looked as if she were expecting to walk down some marble staircase to a ball. But where the warriors fell, their magical armor pierced by human ingenuity, she stood. The bullets seemed to hit a wavering glow, like heat off a summer road. The bullets hit, hesitated, then melted, in little spurts of orangey light.
"What is she?" Dawson said, beside me.
"Magic," I said. "She is magic."
"What kind of magic?" Hayes asked.
"Heat, light, sun. She's a goddess of the summer heat." I'd always wondered what she'd been before she fell from grace. Most of the really powerful ones hid their pasts, some out of shame for power lost, others for fear of enemies who had retained more power settling old scores. But as I had returned Siobhan's illusions to her, so apparently I had given Dilys, or whatever her real name was, back her heat.
Others of the armored warriors had hidden behind her wavering shield. They huddled around her as they were supposed to huddle around me, but I would never burn like that. I was not sun, but moon.
In that moment, I didn't want to kill her. I wanted her to come back to me. I wanted her to be one of my court. I wanted the summer's heat to warm us all.
I called, "Dilys, we are all Unseelie. We should not be killing each other."
She spoke in a voice that held an edge of roar, and I realized it was the sound of some great fire, as if her very words burned. "You say that because your human weapons cannot harm me."
Hayes flinched beside me. She whispered, "It hurts to hear her speak."
"Not as much as it would if the princess wasn't shielding us all," Dawson said.
He was right. The glamour that protected them from the illusions was also saving them from the full force of that burning voice. She wasn't fire, she was the heat of sun. It fills the fields with life, but too much of it and the fields wither, die, and become lifeless dust.
You needed water and heat for life.