"Jack Williamson - The Legion of Time" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williamson Jack)

Gyronchi. And she must be destroyed."

Her voice fell, and Lethonee looked at Lanning, over the giant crystal, her white face filled with a tender and almost
childish concern.

"Or else," she finished, "she will destroy you, Denny."

Lanning looked at her a long time. At last, hoarse with a sudden emotion, he said: "Whatever is going to happen,
Appointment at the River 13

I'm willing to help—if I can. Because of you. But what—what am I to do?"

"Beware of Sorainya!" Those words were bugle notes, but then her voice dropped appealingly. "Denny, make me one
promise. Promise you won't fly tomorrow."

"But I'm going to!" Lanning protested. "Max—he's the instructor—says Barry and I can solo tomorrow, if the
weather's right. I couldn't miss it."

"You must," said Lethonee.

Lanning met her violet eyes. A surge of unfamiliar feeling swept away some barrier between them. He looked into her
very heart—and found it beautiful.

"I promise," he whispered. "I won't fly."

"Thank you, Denny." She smiled and touched his hand. "Now I must go."

"No!" Alarm took Lanning's breath. "I don't know half enough. Where you are, really. Or how to find you again.-You
can't go!"

"But I must." A shadow fell on her face. "For Sorainya could follow me here. And if she finds that the crisis turns
indeed on you, she will strive to take you—or even destroy you. I know Sorainya!"

"But—" Lanning gulped. "Will I see you again?"

"Your hand is on the wheel of time," she said, "and not mine."

"Wait!" gasped Lanning. "I—"

But the fire of a million sunlit prisms had burst again from the jewel in her hands. Lanning was momentarily dazzled,
blinded. And then he was alone in the room, speaking to vacant air.
Dream—or reality? The question racked him. Could she have been an actual person, come across the gulf of time from
the remote possible future? Or was he crazy? Dazed, he picked up the little gray book, and reread a paragraph of Wil
McLan's:

"To an external observer, gifted with four-dimensional senses, our quadraxial universe must appear complete, fixed,
and forever unchanging. The sweep of time is no more than the hand of a subjective watch; it is no more than the
intangible ray of consciousness, illuminating human experience. In any absolute sense, the events of
14 The Legion of Time