"Kurtz, Katherine - Heirs of Saint Camber 02 - King Javan's Year" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kurtz Katherine)

“How long?” he whispered, searching the Healer’s eyes.
“However long he has, prolonging his suffering cannot be justified,” Oriel murmured, “for he cannot possibly recover. I have his pain controlled for now, and his sleep is one of Healer’s crafting, not the drugs he has been taking; but I cannot hold this for very long.”
“And if you do nothing?” Javan said.
Oriel bowed his head. “He wanted desperately to see you, my prince-and that he should be able to speak to you a final time without his mind clouded by the drugs that can give him ease. I have promised that I will make that possible-though it means that your final exchange with him will not be entirely private, for I cannot maintain my controls at a distance. I-will try to be as unobtrusive as possible.”
Javan swallowed with difficulty. “I-see. And when we have spoken? When he has told me what he wishes me to know?”
“Then I have promised that I will give him ease,” the Healer said, not looking at him. “It will not be a fatal dose, for I may not, by my Healer’s oaths; but I will give him peaceful sleep until he-until he quite literally drowns in the fluids that are filling his lungs.” He swallowed, as if feeling those fluids encroach upon his own lungs. “But he will not suffer anymore. It is the best ease I can offer him, once he has unburdened his soul to you.”
Tears were filling Javan’s eyes, and he had to blink hard to regain control.
“Has he unburdened his soul to a priest?” he asked quietly. “I saw that they’d brought the Blessed Sacrament outside. Has he received the Last Rites?”
Oriel’s lips compressed beneath his faint smudge of moustache as he shook his head. “He said that there is no priest in Rhemuth from whom he will accept them. A few hours ago, while he slept, both archbishops came and anointed him anyway and gave him conditional absolution, but he has absolutely refused to receive Communion from them or any of their priests. Perhaps you can reason with him.”
Javan ducked his head, remembering how often he had been obliged to accept Communion from Hubert, loathing the man but forcing himself to separate the man from the Sacrament he dispensed. That Alroy finally was taking a stand on this point spoke much of his moral courage, however belatedly it was being manifest. At least on that point, Javan thought he might be able to ease Alroy’s mind.
But first he must discover his brother’s mind, on which there were far more pressing concerns than the outward token of a peace with the Maker Whom he very shortly would behold. Drawing deep breath, Javan dared to take Alroy’s limp hand in his, pressing its back tenderly to his lips before glancing across at Oriel.
“Wake him, please,” he said softly. “And I shall rely upon your holy vows as a Healer to ensure that what passes between the king and myself does not go beyond this room.”
Nodding, Oriel passed one hand across the king’s closed eyes, withdrawing then to let the fingertips of both hands rest lightly against the bare right shoulder. Alroy stirred at that touch; but as the grey eyes fluttered open, no pain in any part of their regard, they sought only Javan’s. The fever-flushed lips parted in a relieved smile, and the hand in Javan’s tightened, weak in strength but fierce in joy and thanksgiving.
“You came,” he breathed. “Rhysem said he’d bring you, and he did!”
“He did,” Javan agreed. “Or actually, Charlan did-though it was Rhysem who was brave enough to send him. Shall I call him over?”
Faintly Alroy’s head turned back and forth on the pillow, his eyes never leaving Javan’s.
“No, there will be a little time yet for him,” he whispered. “Oriel has promised me. But first I wanted to give you our father’s ring and the Eye of Rom. They belong to the King of Gwynedd-and I am king no longer.”
“No! You are king, so long as you live!” Javan whispered fiercely. “I will not take them while you live, Sire!”
Alroy closed his eyes briefly and smiled. “Sire. I shall never be that now, shall I? But you must be. Promise that you shall be the king I should have been, that everything we all have suffered will not have been for nothing.”
“I promise,” Javan whispered, bowing his head over his brother’s hand.
“And if you will not yet take the ring-which I did not receive until after our father’s death-then at least take the Eye of Rom. It would mean much to me, to see you wear it as our father used to do.”
To this compromise, at least, Javan could raise no real objection, for Cinhil himself had passed the Eye of Rom to his heir while still alive, just as Alroy now desired to do. Still, Javan’s hands were trembling as he gently removed the stone from his brother’s ear; and tears were streaming down his face by the time he threaded its golden wire through his own earlobe and fastened it. He had given his own earring to Oriel before making the exchange, indicating that Oriel should fasten it back in Alroy’s ear, and the king smiled faintly as he lifted a wasted hand to brush the little hoop of twisted gold wire.
“A prince again,” he murmured. “ ‘Tis better thus.” The grey gaze lifted to take the measure of the tawny ruby now gracing Javan’s right ear.
“One other thing,” he said after a few seconds, when he had looked his fill. “Something happened to us, the night our father died. Did you ever find out what it was?”
Javan dared a quick glance at Oriel, but the young Healer was bowed as if in prayer, at least appearing to be oblivious to what was being said. Anyway, if he could not trust Oriel, his cause was lost already. And he did not want to deny his dying brother what little he knew.
“There was a ritual that night in Father’s chapel,” he said softly, himself only able to recall scant images of what had occurred. “Tavis drugged us, on Father’s orders, but the Deryni were behind it. You knew that Father had magic from the Deryni, didn’t you?”
Alroy’s eyes searched his brother’s face, wanting to believe, but doubtful. “I’d heard rumors, over the years. I know he always seemed to know when we weren’t telling the truth. Did he really have magic?”
Javan nodded. “That’s what Bishop Alister told me. He was involved with what happened that night. Also Rhys and Father Joram and the Lady Evaine.” He glanced down, still unable to connect exactly with what had happened-though Evaine had told him, at their last meeting, that he would remember when the time was appropriate. He wondered if that would be today, once Alroy was gone.
“Anyway, it wasn’t their ritual that night; it was Father’s,” Javan went on. “And it had something to do with-preparing us to receive his power-or at least setting its potential. I-think it was supposed to surface in you, as the heir, once he was dead.” He searched his brother’s eyes. “But it never did, did it?”
Alroy swallowed and shook his head weakly. “Life might have been a lot easier if it had,” he whispered.” If I’d even been able to Truth-Read-”
“I think it was the drugs the regents gave you,” Javan said, to shift any sense of guilt away from Alroy and onto the former regents-whose actions might well have prevented Alroy from coming into his magic, for all Javan knew. “If they hadn’t kept you drugged all the time-”
Alroy closed Ms eyes briefly, shaking his head again. “It doesn’t matter now,” he whispered, stifling a slight cough. “They did, and I didn’t. Do you-do you think it will pass to you, once I’m gone?”
Nodding wordlessly, Javan squeezed his dying brother’s hand. “Some of it already has,” he whispered. “I don’t think it was supposed to, but it did. It started soon after Father died. Tavis thought I might have gotten primed for it by working with him for so long. I got accustomed to having him put me into trance when he’d use his Healing to work on my foot. Shields were the first thing we discovered. We found that out the night after his hand was cut off. I didn’t know what I was doing, but I wanted to help. I put myself totally into his power that night, to do with me as he needed. And he-was able to pull energy from me, past shields that neither of us had even suspected were there.”
“Shields. . . “ Alroy barely mouthed the word, his grey eyes wide with wonder and a little fear.
“I know,” Javan went on. “It all scares me, too. I’ve gotten much stronger since then. Alroy, I have powers almost like a Deryni. If I’m careful, I can control some humans.” He hazarded a quick grin. “I used to do it to Charlan all the time, once I found out how. It’s dangerous, though, if anyone found out.”
Alroy swallowed hard, stifling another cough, and glanced uneasily at Oriel, still bowed deep in trancing beside him.
“He knows some of it,” Javan whispered, answering the unasked question. “No one else does, other than the Deryni working directly with Father Joram.”
“What about Rhysem?” Alroy whispered, looking beyond the bed where Rhys Michael guarded the door.
Javan shook his head. “There was no way to tell him. And it only would have made things more dangerous, once I was away from Court.”
“But you’re back now,” Alroy said anxiously. “And you do intend to stay, don’t you?”
Javan smiled faintly. “I’m not meant to be a priest,” he said, “though I think I understand now what Father was giving up in accepting the crown. In any case, the seminary’s been a grand place to hide, these past few years-and to acquire a useful education while I gave myself time to grow up. I’d hoped it would all be in aid of helping you rule, as one of your ministers; but I suppose I guessed, deep inside, that it wasn’t going to happen. Murdoch and his cronies were never going to let you rule.”
“That’s why they kept me drugged,” Alroy whispered, closing his eyes briefly. “Just enough to take the edge off any resistance or independent thought. I knew, after a while-but there wasn’t anything I could do about it.
“I’ve foiled their plans, though, haven’t I? At least I’ve given you time. You’re four years older than I was when I became king. You won’t need to have regents. And you’re onto them. You won’t be as gullible as I was.”
Javan bowed his head, blinking back new tears. It was senseless to pretend that Alroy was not dying.
“I-hope I’ll have better luck,” he murmured. “God, how I wish there were something I could do for you.”
Alroy swallowed noisily, tears swimming in the shadowed eyes. “You’ve done it, just by being here,” he whispered. “I’m glad it was in time. Oriel has-has promised that I don’t have to suffer any more. But stay with me ... please. Even if I seem to be far, far away before the end, somehow I’ll know you’re there. It isn’t that I’m afraid, though I do wish ...”
His voice trailed off, and Javan leaned closer to peer into the clouded grey eyes.
“You do wish what?” he breathed.
“It would have been a comfort to receive the Sacrament one last time,” he murmured, not looking at Javan. “But I won’t receive it from Hubert. That would be sacrilege.”
The coughing bout that started this time was one that Oriel could not muffle, and he stirred from his Healer’s trancing to help Javan shift the king onto his side, where Alroy still coughed uncontrollably until Oriel sent him plummeting into unconsciousness.