"David Zindell - Requiem of Homo Sapiens 01 - The Broken God" - читать интересную книгу автора (Zindell David)

strangely he had never been so alive. He held himself quiet
and still, listening to the wind beating through the trees and
over the mountains. He heard a voice whispering that his
membrum's red bulb must be exposed to the cold air, just as
the man within must finally shed his childlike skin of wishes
and certitude and come to know the world as it really is. That
was the way of all life, he heard the voice say. Life was
always lived with death close at hand, and it was continually
shedding death even as it made itself over to be born anew.
To live, I die, he told himself.
And inside him, despite the pain, at the centre of his
deepest self was just sheer joy at being alive. In some sense,
he would always be alive, no matter the killing coldness of the
wind or fatal illnesses or any of a thousand other fates that
he might suffer.
'Danlo!' the Beast howled out. Tour blood is red and flows
like a man's!'
Danlo listened to his deep breathing as other cuts were
carved into his flesh, tiny cuts up and down the length of his
membrum. He realized that it was Soli making these cuts and
rubbing various coloured powders into them. The cuts would
fester and then heal, and soon his membrum would be like that
of any other Alaloi man: long and thick, and decorated with
dozens of green and ochre scars.
'Danlo, are you ready now?'
He felt something soft being wrapped around his membrum; it
felt like feather moss held in place with a newl skin.
'Danlo, you must gather your strength for the journey.' a
voice called out of the darkness. Then the Beast stood above
him, gripping a gobbet of flesh between its bloody
31
claws. This piece of meat will sustain you. Open your mouth
and swallow it without chewing.'
Danlo did as he was told. Like a baby bird, he opened his
mouth and waited. Suddenly, he felt the raw bit of meat pressed
into his mouth, back against his tongue. He swallowed once,
convulsively, and he tasted fresh warm blood.
'Danlo, this is the skin of your childhood. It will
impregnate you like a seed. From the child grows the man. Are
you ready to be a man, now?'
Again Danlo swallowed against the hot salty slickness of his
own blood.
'Danlo, wi Ieldra sena! Ti ur-alashareth. The ancestors are
coming! It is time for you to go over now.'
His eyes were now calm and clear, and he looked up at the
stars to see a million points of light streaming toward him.
'Danlo, you may turn your head.'
Danlo blinked his eyes slowly. He turned and there was Soli
standing over him. He was dressed as usual, in his winter
furs; the terrible Beast was gone. 'You have done well,' he