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.That was one, and he quickly dispatched another, andAgony flared in his side not the distant pain of the Gray-body, but real pain,pain that touched the body and soul of the Gray-Khan and he turned to face thesource.Page 240ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlHad he been so mistaken?Had the Nameless finally come to his senses?No it was another of the flickering little reds.They were small, but theywere clever, and they worked in packs, like the dogs that they were.While hehad been dispatching one, another had snuck up into the blackness behind him,and he could feel the strength drain from his Gray-body.He drew strength from his total self, and spun about, sending this one intoblackness with a dispatch and a fury that almost surprised himself.No.There was no surprise.There was just darkness, and the reds hiding in it,and the white incandescence of the Nameless couldn't dispel it.Like a pack ofwolves, they would nip at him, satisfying themselves with bite after biteuntil they brought him down.No.That would not be.It could not be allowed to be.It* * *It always reminded Bear of the wine.There was something almost indecent about how good it felt to join himselfwith the Nameless.And, of course, something more.But it always reminded Bear of the wine.Father had always insisted that decent wine was the right thing forCommunion it was wrong, Father had always said, for the Blood of the Lamb tobe some insipid squeezings, barely aged enough to be called wine; it should beat least a decent vintage, properly casked and aged in good wood, whose tastewould remind all who partook of the sacrament that God's power could turn ahumble grape into something with at least a hint of wonder in it.Mother would always laugh at Father's arrogance and presumption if thesacrament itself wasn't wonder enough, then even the finest of bottle-agedBurgundian cabernet would hardly be sufficient, would it? She was under theimpression that the baronial purse would not last long if he were to take thatroute, but if he insisted, perhapsDammit, if he was going to provide the wine for the Fallsworth church and hewas obligated to support the church, in case she had forgotten he could damnwell decide to give the faithful a taste of decent wine, couldn't he?And so it would go.Mother and Father loved their arguments, and never worriedabout the effect that they might have had on young ears listening in.Intrigued by all the talk, David and Matthew and Michael David had been theinstigator, even though he was the youngest of the three had snuck out atnight and taken the winding path to the winery and into the cellar, late atnight, and swallowed mug after mug from one of the barrels that had been setaside for the church.All been discovered in the morning, brought before Father, and quite properlyand thoroughly thrashed for it, of course.But there had been a moment, just a moment, in between, as he recalled, hisfourth and fifth mug, that a sense of peace had descended on him before thepassing-out that night, and the shaking-awake, and vomiting, and the thehangover, and the thrashing of the next day a moment.Or maybe a Moment.He couldn't have described it to anybody else.It was a moment not just ofpeace and relaxation, and perhaps the illusion of clarity, but ofconnection connection with his drunken brothers in a way thatDavid, the odd duck of the family, had never really had, before or since;connection with serenity, with peace, with the uncovered dirt of the cellarfloor, with the trees that had provided the wood for the barrel he leanedagainst, with.with everything.Drawing the Nameless was like that.Always.He was One not just with the Nameless, not just with the rough bark of thetree beneath which the Nameless had sat but with everything.Page 241ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlIt wasn't intoxicating, just as that moment with the wine hadn't beenintoxicating; it was clarifying.The blurred shapes dashing across the courtyard in pursuit of their quarrydidn't slow in their mad pace, but became sharp and clear.One of the men, theRed Sword glowing above his head in the dim light of the dawn, had a quirk inhis thick eyebrow, as though it had grown over an old scar; another's mouthwas wide in fear that should have had him trembling, but didn't.None of thestones of the gravel-strewn courtyard was just a stone, but each had its ownshape, its own identity, different from all the others.And then there was Gray and the Khan.He didn't pity either of them it wasonly right that they be precisely as they were, the two of them, and thetwo-as-one, and though he would have cut them down, without anger or hatred,if that had been proper, it wasn't.it wasn't clear now.The only thing that didn't gain clarity was the blur of the Wise or maybe itwas otherwise? Maybethe Wise really was of an indeterminate shape, never quite coalescing intosomething sharp-edged and substantial?It was all so sharp and real that it was all he could do not to dive into theindividuality, the uniqueness of each stone, of each blade of grass that hadworked its way through the gravel, reaching for the sun.But, of course, that was not was required [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]