"Terry Goodkind. Faith of the Fallen (англ.)" - читать интересную книгу автора

He picked up his big leather over-belt with its gold-worked
pouches and cinched it over the magnificent tunic.

"When you're the leader, everything is your fault."

Kahlan knew the truth of that. She thought to dissuade him by
taking a different tack.

"What form did this vision assume?"

Richard's piercing gray eyes locked on her, almost in warning.

"Vision, revelation, realization, postulation, prophecy . . .
understanding--call it what you will, for in this they are all in one the
same, and unequivocal. I can't describe it but to say it seems as if I
must have always known it. Maybe I have. It wasn't so much words as it was
a complete concept, a conclusion, a truth that became absolutely clear to
me."

She knew he expected her to leave it at that. "If it became so
clear and is unambiguous," she pressed, "you must be able to express it in
words."

Richard slipped the baldric over his head, laying it over his
right shoulder. As he adjusted the sword against his left hip, light
sparkled off the raised gold wire woven through the silver wire of the
hilt to spell out the word TRUTH.

His brow was smooth and his face calm. She knew she had at last
brought him to the heart of the matter. His certainty would afford him no
reason to keep it from her if she chose to hear it, and she did. His words
rolled forth with quiet power, like prophecy come to life.

"I have been a leader too soon. It is not I who must prove myself
to the people, but the people who must now prove themselves to me. Until
then, I must not lead them, or all hope is lost."

Standing there, erect, masculine, masterful in his black war
wizard outfit, he looked as if he could be posing for a statue of who he
was: the Seeker of Truth, rightfully named by Zeddicus Zu'1 Zorander, the
First Wizard himself-and Richard's grandfather. It had nearly broken
Zedd's heart to do so, because Seekers so often died young and violently.

While he lived, a Seeker was a law unto himself. Backed by the
awesome power of his sword, a Seeker could bring down kingdoms. That was
one reason it was so important to name the right person-a moral person-to
the post. Zedd claimed that the Seeker, in a way, named himself by the
nature of his own mind and by his actions, and that the First Wizard's
function was simply to act on his observations by officially naming him