"Ann Maxwell - Concord 3 - Name of a Shadow" - читать интересную книгу автора (Maxwell Ann)

“Is this person Sharnn?”
“No.”
Kayle smiled, but his eyes were lit by something close to anger. “Is this another Sharnn game? The
Carifil sift and resift races, looking for mental gifts, and then a Sharnn who has never been off-planet
offers us the rarest gift of all. A finder. But this finder is not Sharnn.” Kayle swore in the hissing phrases
of his native tongue. “My patience is gone, pattern-man,” he said disdainfully, turning away. “When I next
look, you would do well to be gone, too. I speak now as a Nendleti, not a Carifil.”
Ryth did not move. Even his cape was still.
“And I speak as a Sharnn. F’n’een did not die on Skemole.”
Though Kayle’s muscles bunched beneath his orange robe, his voice was calm. “Every member of
the Second Contact team died on Skemole.”
“F’n’een survived.”
“Impossible. The Carifil searched—and mindsearched—for survivors. Only two bodies were found.
We found those who had assassinated the team. All dead. Very dead. Suicides. They knew the Concord
penalty for murdering a Second Contact team.”
“F’n’een survived.”
“No. I knew her mind. I was the union for the Carifil mindsearch. I balanced the minds that searched,
held them together. They did not sense F’n’een, She is dead.”
“F’n’een’s mind rolled back upon itself. Regressive shock. Her mind became unrecognizable and/or
unreachable. The Carifil even have a name for that state. Q-consciousness.”
Kayle, his back still turned, said nothing.
“When she emerged from q,” continued Ryth, “she had changed, a change forced by hatred and the
need to survive.”
“Go on,” said Kayle, his voice husky.
“Was F’n’een capable of killing?”
Kayle laughed shortly. “She was Malian. Raised in the code of darg vire—vendetta to the death.”
“A team member who died was her husband/mate/lover,” said Ryth, his voice as soft as the liquid
movements of his Sharnn cape. “If F’n’een survived, what would she do?”
“Darg vire,” said Kayle, his husky voice clipped again.
“Yes. And twenty-three Skemoleans died. Not suicides. She is on Malia now. She is the Sandoliki
Ti.”
Kayle’s body jerked subtly, but he did not turn to face the soft-voiced Sharnn who had become his
tormenter.
“Are you telling me this so that I may die again when my mind-daughter dies again?” asked Kayle
angrily.
“The Sandoliki woman is a finder.”
Kayle’s hand flexed in a gesture of negation. “Then she is not F’n’een. A gift as rare as that would
have been discovered during her Contact training.”
“F’n’een—the Sandoliki woman—had not even entered her first maturity when you knew her. Some
gifts develop only with time. Or severe stress.”
Kayle said nothing, but his bright robe moved in sudden jerks.
“Whoever the Sandoliki woman is or is not,” said Kayle harshly, “she can’t be allowed to die when
Malia dies. Her gift and her genes are too valuable.”
“Yes ...”
Something in the quality of Ryth’s simple agreement brought Kayle slowly around. His orange glance
flicked over to a wall where various times on the planet Vintra were coded in light.
“You interest me, Sharnn,” said Kayle at last. “If I survive tonight, I’ll take you to Malia.”
“If it’s a question of survival,” said Ryth, “perhaps I should come with you.”
 Kayle smiled like a predator. “Yes, Sharnn, perhaps you should.”
Kayle stripped off his outer robe, reversed it so that orange was replaced by somber tones of purple,