"L. E. Modesitt - Recluce 04 - The Chaos Balance" - читать интересную книгу автора (Modesitt L E)

V

NYLAN STEPPED FROM the smithy, even before Blynnal rang the chimes for the midday meal, squinting
as the snow-reflected glare cascaded around him.
"Frigging bright," mumbled Huldran as she stumbled out into the light after the smith.
"Sun and snow." The smith nodded and began to walk downhill. Despite the comparative warmth and
the disappearance of the snow and ice cover from the south side of the rocky cairns and some
sections' around the canyon mouths, he hadn't seen any signs of snow lilies. Did that mean they'd
have more spring snows? Or had the guards done something in their cultivation to kill off the
lilies?
Nylan didn't know. There was so much that they had yet to learn about this world. The
similarities to Heaven-type worlds helped, but there were certainly differences, like the
semideciduous trees that looked H-norm, but had green leaves that turned gray and curled up around
the branchlets that held them. Only about half the leaves fell every year.
And the reference to Cyador had surprised Nylan. Ryba had intimated that the place was almost a
throwback to the white demons of Rationalism, but again, in almost two years no traders or locals
had mentioned Cyador. He'd never even heard the name before, and that kind of surprise bothered
him. Had Ryba gotten another vision? He had begun to wish long before that her visions were not so
devastatingly accurate.
"Did you ever hear the name Cyador?" he asked Huldran.
"Before the Marshal mentioned it the other day? No. Maybe the healer had, but no one else had,
either, except for Ydrall, but she came from coins."
"What did Ydrall know?"
"Not much more than Daryn, except that they don't let traders in and that they keep their women
locked up. They have trading stations at the borders-or they used to. Lornth had problems with


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Cyador years ago, and there hasn't been much trading since. Ydrall didn't know what kind of
problems, though."
A culture even harder on women than Lornth and those of the lands bordering Westwind? He shook
his head, then rubbed his chin. He really needed a shave. He didn't care for the local bearded
look at all, but shaving with a blade, a real dagger-edge blade, had taken some learning, and not
a few cuts along the way. Of course, some of the local recruits had wondered if he was actually a.
man, since he didn't have a beard-as if hair made the man. He snorted.
As they reached the outer end of the causeway to the tower, Blynnal appeared and used the
wooden mallet to hammer out a rough melody on the chimes that had replaced the old triangle. She
wore a burlaplike apron over her gray trousers and tunic, and a jacket thrown over everything. The
brunette smiled shyly at Nylan. "I do not have the touch of the healer, not with the songs, but I
try."
"You have the touch with the food," the smith-engineer responded. "And we're all very thankful
for that."
"It is good to have so many people who like what I cook. Dyemeni-he never liked anything." Her
eyes went to Nylan. "Would that all men were like you." Then she smiled again. "Today, we have the
noodles with the hot sauce, and the flat bread."
"Good." Nylan inadvertently licked his lips. When Blynnal said food was hot-it was spiced hot