"Bujold, Lois McMaster - Chalion 3 - The Hallowed Hunt" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bujold Lois McMaster)

УYes, well, IТm not surprised, you know. Did you look, afterward, at what you did to those poor chains?Ф She held out an exasperated hand. Curious as to her strength, he grasped her hand and wrist with both hands. She leaned back like a sailor hauling on a rope, and he wallowed up.
As they made their way out under the portico into the autumn sun, Ingrey asked, УAnd what guidance did you receive for all your prayers, lady?Ф
She bit her lip. УNone. Though my thoughts are less disordered, so a little quiet meditation did that much good at least.Ф Her sideways glance at him was enigmatic. УSomewhat less disordered. ItТs just thatЕI canТt help thinking aboutЕФ
He made an encouraging noise of inquiry.
She burst out, УI still canТt believe that Hallana married Oswin!Ф
а
THEY FOUND IJADAТS WARDEN IN THE TAPROOM OF HER INN. SHE was sitting in the corner with Rider Gesca, their heads bent together, tankards and a platter with bread crumbs, cheese rinds, and apple cores on the table between them. The walk up the warm street had loosened IngreyТs stiff muscles a trifle, and he fancied he strolled rather than limped over to them. They looked up, and their talk ceased.
УGesca.Ф Ingrey nodded toward the platter, reminded that he had not eaten yet. УHow is the food, down here?Ф
УThe cheese is excellent. Stay away from the beer, thoughЧitТs gone sour.Ф
IjadaТs eyes widened, but she forbore comment.
УAh. Thank you for the warning.Ф He leaned over and nabbed the last bread crust. УAnd what have you two been finding to talk about?Ф
The warden looked frightened, but Gesca, with a hint of challenge, merely said, УIТve been telling Ingrey stories.Ф
УIngrey stories?Ф Ijada said. УAre there many?Ф
Ingrey controlled a grimace.
Gesca, grinning at the encouragement, said, УI was just telling the tale of how HetwarТs train was attacked by those bandits in the forest of Aldenna, on the way home from Darthaca, and how you won your place in his household. It was my good word in the sealmasterТs ear that did it, after all.Ф
УWas it?Ф said Ingrey, trying to decide if Gesca was gabbling nervously or not. And if so, why.
УWe were a large party,Ф Gesca continued to the women, Уand well armed, but this was a troop of outlaws who had fled to the forest and grown to over two hundred men, mostly by the addition of discharged soldiers and vagabonds and runaways. They were the plague of the country round about, and we likely looked rich enough that they dared to try us. I was right behind Ingrey in the van when they fell on us. They realized their mistake soon enough. Astonishing swordplay.Ф
УIТm not that good,Ф said Ingrey. УThey were bad.Ф
УI didnТt say good, I said astonishing. IТve seen swordmasters, and youТre not, nor am I. But those bastard moves of yoursЧthey should not have worked, butЕWhen it became apparent that no one would best you if you had room to swing your steel, one bear of a fellow closed on you in a grapple. I was maybe fifteen feet away at the time, and I had my own troubles, but stillЧyou tossed your sword in the air, grabbed the fellowТs head, snapped his neck, caught the sword descending, and turned and beheaded the bandit coming up behind you. One continuous move.Ф
Ingrey had no memory of the moment, though he recalled the attack, of course. The beginning and the end of it, anyway. УGesca, you are making up tales to swagger with.Ф Gesca was near a decade older than Ingrey; perhaps the staid middle-aged warden seemed a less unlikely object for dalliance to him.
УHa. If I were making up grand lies for swagger, IТd tell them on myself. At that point, the rest turned and ran. You hewed down the slowestЕФ Gesca trailed off, not completing the story. Ingrey suddenly guessed why. He had come back to himself while methodically dispatching the wounded. Red to the elbows, the blood smell overpowering. Gesca, face appalled, gripping him by the shoulders and crying, Ingrey! FatherТs tears, man, save some for hanging! He hadЕnot exactly forgotten that. He had merely refrained from revisiting the memory.
Gesca covered his hesitation by taking a swig of beer, evidently remembered its taste too late, and swallowed anyway. He made a face and wiped his lips. УIt was at that point that I recommended to Hetwar that he make your place permanent. My thinking was purely selfish. I wanted to make sure that you never ended up on the opposite side to me in a fight.Ф Gesca smiled up at him, but not with his eyes.
IngreyТs return smile was equally austere. Subtlety, Gesca? How unlike you. What are you trying to say to me?
The ache from his head blow day before yesterday was returning. Ingrey decided to repair to his own inn to find food. He bade the warden to her duty, instructing the women to lock their chamber door once more, and withdrew.
CHAPTER SEVEN
A FTER FORAGING A MEAL OF SORTS IN HIS INNТS COMMON room, Ingrey returned to his chamber to fall across his bed once more. He was a day and a half late fulfilling the Reedmere dedicatТs prescription of rest for his aching head blow, and he apologized humbly in his heart to her. But for all his exhaustion, in the warming afternoon, sleep would not come.
It was no good dashing about arranging all in secret for IjadaТs midnight escape if she refused to mount and ride away. She must be persuaded. If her secret beast was discovered, would they burn her? He imagined the flames licking up around her taut body, evil orange caresses, igniting the oil-soaked shift such prisoners were dressed in to speed their agony. He visualized her swinging from a hemp rope and oak beam, in vicious, senseless parody of an Old Wealding sacrifice hanged from a sacred forest tree. Or would the royal executioners allow her a silk rope, like her leopard, in honor of her kin rank? Though the old tribes, lacking silk, had used rope woven from shimmering nettle flax for their highest born, he had heard. Think of something else. But his thoughts circled in dreary morbidity.
They had begun as messengers to the gods, those willing human sacrifices of the Old Weald. Sacred couriers to carry prayers directly to heaven in unholy hours of great need, when all mere spoken words, or prayers of the heart or hands, seemed to fly up into the void and vanish into a vast silence. Like mine, now. But then, under the generations-long pressure from the eastern borders, the tribesТ needs had grown, and so had their fears. Battles and ground were lost; woes waxed and judgment slipped; quality gave way to quantity, in the desperate days, and heroic holy volunteers grew harder to find.
Their ranks were filled by the less willing, then the unwilling; at the last, captured soldiers, hostages, kidnapped camp followers, worse. The sacred trees bore a bumper crop. Children, Ingrey had heard, in some of the Quintarian divinesТ favorite gruesome martyr tales. Enemy children. And what benighted mind places the name of enemy on a bewildered child? At the very least, the Old Wealding tribal mages might have reflected on what prayers that river of sacrifice had really borne to the gods, in their victimsТ weeping hearts.
Think of something useful, curse it. IjadaТs tart words in the temple seemed to bore into his skin like biting insects. You wonТt have to stand up to anybody, nor speak dangerous truthsЕ Five gods, what power did the fool girl imagine he had in Easthome? He himself lived on sufferance, under HetwarТs shielding hand. Ingrey lent that hand a palpable force, yes, but so did the rest of HetwarТs household troops; lent, perhaps, a more unique and subtly useful air of uncanny threat, but in the sealmasterТs web of authority he was surely a minor strand. Ingrey had never distributed favors, and so now had none to call in. If he had any chances at all to rescue or redeem Ijada, they would end when the cortege entered the city gates.
His thoughts were growing worse, he was uncomfortably aware, but not wider. At length, he dozed. It wasnТt a good doze, but it was better than the writhing that went before.
а
HE WOKE AS THE AUTUMN SUN WAS GOING DOWN, AND TOOK himself again to IjadaТs inn to invite her to evening prayer.
She cocked an eyebrow at him, and murmured, УYou are grown pious, of a sudden.Ф But at his tight-lipped look of anguish, she relented and accompanied him to the temple once more.
When they were on their knees before the BrotherТs altarЧboth the MotherТs and the DaughterТs chambers were full of Red Dike supplicants againЧhe began under his breath, УListen. I must decide tonight whether we ride or bide tomorrow. You cannot just drift into disaster with no plan, no attempt even to throw some rope to shore. Else it will become the rope that hangs you, and it drives me half-mad to picture you dangling as your leopard did. I should think youТd both have had enough of hanging.Ф
УIngrey, think,Ф she returned in as low a voice. УEven assuming I could escape unseen, where would I go? My motherТs kin could not take me in or hide me. My poor stepfatherЧhe hasnТt the strength to fight such high foes, and besides, his would be among the first places theyТd look for such a fugitive. A woman, a stranger, aloneЧI would be utterly conspicuous, and a target for the vile.Ф She had taken thought, too, it appeared.
He drew a breath. УHow if I came with you?Ф
A long silence; he glanced aside to see her face gone still, staring straight ahead, wide-eyed. УYou would do that? Desert your company and your duty?Ф
He set his teeth. УPerhaps.Ф
УThen where would we go? Your kin could not take us in either, I think.Ф
УI cannot imagine going back to Birchgrove for any reason. No. We would have to get out of the Weald altogether, cross the borders. To the Alvian League, perhapsЧslip into the Cantons over the northern mountains. Or to Darthaca. I can speak and write Darthacan, at least.Ф
УI cannot. I would be your muteЕwhat? Burden, servant, pet, paramour?Ф
Ingrey reddened. УWe could pretend you were my sister. I could swear to regard you with that respect. I wouldnТt touch you.Ф
УHow very enticing.Ф Her lips set in a flat line.
He paused, feeling like a man crossing river ice in winter and hearing a first faint cracking sound coming from under his feet. What did she mean me to make of that remark? УIbran was your fatherТs tongue, presumably. Do you speak it?Ф
УA little. Do you?Ф
УA little. We could make for the Peninsula, then. Chalion or Ibra or Brajar. You would not then be so mute.Ф There was work for swordsmen there, too, Ingrey had heard, in the interminable border wars with the heretical Quadrene coastal princedomsЧand few questions asked of foreign volunteers, so long as they signed the Five.
She vented a long sigh. УIТve been thinking, this afternoon, about what Hallana said.Ф
УWhich? She talked a great deal. Clouds of chatter.Ф
УLook to her silences, then.Ф