Читать онлайн «Pattern-Master»

A brilliant talent unique In speculative fiction, multiple Hugo and Nebula winner Octavia Butler is the creator of extraordinary novels that combine the cultural vision of Alice Walker and Terry McMillan with the cosmic scope of Ursula K. Le Guln and Doris Lesslng. Powerful, thought-provoking, and filled with white-knuckle suspense, this is one of her classic novels…

PATTERNMASTER

The combined mind-force of a telepathic race, Patternist thoughts can destroy, heal, rule. For the strongest mind commands the entire Pattern and all within it. Now the son of the Patternmaster craves this ultimate power. He has murdered or enslaved every threat to his ambition—except one. In the wild, mutant-infested hills, a young apprentice must be

hunted down and destroyed because he is the tyrant’s

equal…and the Patternmaster’s other son. son. son. son.

************************************

Prologue

Rayal had his lead wife, Jansee, with him on that last night. He lay beside her in his huge bed, secure, lulled by the peacefulness of the Pattern as it flowed to him. The Pattern had been peaceful for over a year now. A year without a major Clayark attack on any sector of Patternist Territory. A luxury. Rayal had known enough years of fighting to be glad to relax and enjoy the respite. Only Jansee could still find reason for discontent. Her children, as usual.

“I think tomorrow I’ll send a mute to check on our sons,” she said.

Rayal yawned. He found her too much like a mute herself in her concern for her young. The two boys, aged twelve and two, were at school in Redhill Sector, 480 kilometers away. She would have gone against custom and kept them near her at the school in Forsyth, their birth sector, if he had let her. “Why bother?” he said. “You’re linked with them. If there was anything wrong with them, you would be the first to realize it.

“Because I’ll be able to see them through the mute’s memory when he comes back. I haven’t seen either of them for over two years. Not since the youngest was born. ”

Rayal shook his head. “Why do you want to see them?”

“I don’t know. There’s something … not wrong, but… I don’t know. ” He could feel her uneasiness influencing the Pattern, rippling its vast interwoven surface. “Will you let me send a mute?”

“Send an outsider. He’ll be better able to defend himself if the Clayarks notice him. ” Then he smiled. “You should have more children. Perhaps then you would be less concerned for these two. ” She was used to his mocking. He had said such things to her before. But this time she seemed to take him seriously. He could feel her attention on him, focused, aware even of his smile, though she could not see him in the darkness.

“You want me to have children by one of your outsiders?” she asked.

He looked toward her in surprise, his mind tracing the solemnity of her expression. She was calling his bluff. She should have known better. “By a journeyman, perhaps. ”

“What?”

“Have them by a journeyman, or at least an apprentice. Not an outsider. ”