"Sorcerer's Son" - читать интересную книгу автора (Phyllis Eisenstein)

“I don’t know of another.”

“You can stop at home on your way. Rest. Replenish yourself. I can think of a few favorite foods you can’t have tasted in quite some time. I’ll even welcome your friend, if he’s still with you by then.”

Cray shook his head. ‘I’m not coming home, Mother. I’ll take a different route.“

She looked up at him. “Another route? But any other route would be longer.”

“Once at home,” he said, “it would be very hard to leave again. Even if you didn’t cook any of my favorite foods.” He smiled, hoping the expression would prompt an answer from her lips, but it did not. “I know you understand, Mother.”

She lowered her eyes once more. “I understand. Do you plan to pass north or south of Spinweb?”

“South, I think. We have come some distance south already, and we can strike directly east from here.”

“To the south, where the forest thins, there is a great swamp. Both men and roads have entered and never emerged. You must detour far around it, unless you have an excellent map.”

“I have no map at all,” said Cray. “I was hoping that you could provide me with one.”

“I am no mapmaker,” she said.

“Perhaps not, but I’d guess you know one.”

Her fingers paused, stilling the needles. “Human roads and settlements have little interest for a sorcerer. And demons need no maps.”

“A demon of the air could easily make a map,” said Cray. “What of the sorcerer who sent Gallant for me? He has many such demons, and he has dealt fairly with you

before.”

“He has. But he does no favors. He would have to be paid.”

“Give him something that belongs to me, then. Tapestries from my room, the rug, the coverlet. I don’t care.”

“You don’t care,” she murmured. “Because you’ll not be using any of it again.”

“Please, Mother. Do this for me.” He reached out toward her with an open, pleading hand.

She sighed heavily. “Of course. Have I ever denied you anything?”

“Thank you, Mother.”

“Stay where you are a day or two. The map shall come to you.” Her image faded away, and the web became just a web strung between two bushes, bellying gently in the morning breeze.

Cray fumed to Sepwin. “I have hurt her terribly,” he said. “After so many years, she was still hoping that he might be alive.”

“As you were,” replied Sepwin.

Cray nodded. “At the very least, I never expected the trail to be so short.”

Sepwin shrugged. “He was young, and youth usually means inexperience. He was pitted against a better man. And an angrier one, if we can believe the old man’s tale.”