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

She was not distraught, not weeping, or at least, not recently. Not, apparently, deranged. Four days in that closet to sort through her thoughts had left her composed, but for a certain tightness in her voice, a faint vibrato of fear or anger. Ingrey looked around the bare hall, glanced at Ulkra. УTake us to where we may sit and speak. Some place apart. In the light.Ф
УUmЕumЕФ After a momentТs thought, Ulkra gestured them to follow. He did not, Ingrey noticed, hesitate to turn his back upon the girl. This prisoner did not fight or bite or scratch her jailers, it seemed. Her pace, following him, was steady. At the end of the next passage, Ulkra waved to a window seat overlooking the back side of the keep. УWill this do, my lord?Ф
УYes.Ф Ingrey hesitated, as Lady Ijada gracefully swept her skirts aside and seated herself on the polished boards. Should he retain Ulkra, for corroboration, or dismiss him, to encourage frankness? Was the girl likely to become violent again? The unbidden picture of Ulkra crouching in the corridor above this one, waiting in the dark for screams to stop, troubled his mind. УYou may go about your tasks, housemaster. Return in half an hour.Ф
Ulkra frowned uncertainly at the girl, but bowed himself out. BolesoТs men, Ingrey was reminded, were out of the habit of questioning the sense of their superiorsТ orders. Or perhaps it was that any who dared were got rid of, one way or another; and these were the remainder. Residue. Scum.
A little awkwardly, for the short length of the seat forced them uncomfortably close together, Ingrey sat beside her. His presumption of prettiness, he decided, had been inadequate. The girl was luminous. Unless Boleso had gone blind as well as mad, she must have arrested his eye the moment it fell upon her. Wide brow, straight nose, sculpted chinЕa livid blotch darkened one cheek, and others ringed her fair neck, a pattern of plum-colored bruises. Ingrey lifted his hands to lie lightly over them; she flinched a little, but then bore his probing touch. BolesoТs hands were somewhat larger than his own, it appeared. Her skin was warm under his fingers, fascinating, transporting. A golden haze seemed to cloud his vision. His strangling grip tightenedЧhe whipped his hands away, his gasp masked by hers, and clenched them on his knees. What was thatЕ?
To cover his confusion he bit out, УI am an officer of the Royal Sealmaster. I am charged to report to him all I see and hear. You must tell me the truth of all that happened here. Begin at the beginning.Ф
She sat back, her startled glance altering to a piercing regard. He caught her scent, neither perfume nor blood but grown woman, and, targeted by that gaze, for the first time wondered what he looked likeЧand smelled likeЧto her. Riding reek, cold iron and sweat-stained leather, chin dark-stubbled, tired. Weighed with sword and knife and dangerous duties. Why did she not recoil altogether?
УWhich beginning?Ф she asked.
He stared at her for a blank and stupid instant. УFrom your arrival here at BoarТs Head, I suppose.Ф Was there another? He must remember to return to that question.
She swallowed, possessed herself, began: УThe princess had started out in haste for her fatherТs hall, with only a small retinue, but she was overtaken by illness on the road. Nothing out of the usual, but her monthly time brings her dire headaches, and if she doesnТt rest quietly through them, she becomes very sick. We turned aside to this place, for it was as close as anything, and besides, Princess Fara wished to see her brother. I think she remembered him from when he was younger and lessЕdifficult.Ф
How very tactful. Ingrey could not decide if the turn of phrase was diplomacy or dry wit. Caution, he concluded, studying her closed and careful expression. Wits, not wittiness, kept close about her.
УWe were made welcome, if not to her custom, then to this placeТs ability.Ф
УHad you ever met Prince Boleso before?Ф
УNo. IТve only been a few months in Princess FaraТs service. My stepfather placed me there. He saidЧФ She stopped, began again. УEverything seemed usual at first. I mean, for a lordТs hunting lodge. The days were quiet, because the prince invited her guardsmen out to the hunt. Prince Boleso and his men were very boisterous in the evenings, and drank a great deal, but the princess did not attend, being laid down in her chambers. I took down complaints from her of the noise twice, but I was little heeded. They set the dogs on a wild boar theyТd caught alive, out in the courtyard beneath her window, and made bets on the fight. BolesoТs huntsman was very distressed for his hounds. I wished Earl Horseriver had been thereЧhe could have quelled them with a word. He has a deadly tongue, when he wishes. We bided here three days, until the princess was ready to travel again.Ф
УDid Prince Boleso court you?Ф
Her lips thinned. УNot that I could tell. He was equally obnoxious to all his sisterТs ladies. I knew nothing of hisЕregard, supposed regard, until the morning we were to leave.Ф
She swallowed again. УMy ladyЧPrincess FaraЧtold me then I was to stay. That this might not have been my first choice, but that it would do me no harm in the long run. Another husband would be found for me, after. I begged her not to leave me here. She would not meet my eye. She said it was no worse a barter than any, and better than most, and that I should look to my own future. That it was just the womanТs version of the same loyalty due from a man to his prince. I said I did not think most men wouldЕwell, IТm afraid I said something rude. She refused to speak with me after that. They rode away and left me. I would not beg at her stirrup, for fear the princeТs men would mock me.Ф Her arms crossed, as if to clutch a tattered dignity about her anew.
УI told myselfЕmaybe she was right. That it would be no worse than any other fate. Boleso wasnТt ugly, or deformed, or old. Or diseased.Ф
Ingrey couldnТt help checking himself against that list. At least he did not match any of the named categories, he trusted. Though there were others. Defiled sprang to mind.
УI did not realize how mad heТd grown until theyТd left, and then it was too late.Ф
УThen what happened?Ф
УAt nightfall, they brought me to his chamber and thrust me within. He was waiting for me. He wore a robe, but under it his body was naked and all covered over with signs drawn in woad and madder and crocus. Old symbols, the sort you sometimes still see carved on ancient wooden foundations, or in the forest where the shrines once stood. He had his leopard tied up in a corner, drugged. He saidЧit turned outЧit seemed he had not fallen in love with me after all. It wasnТt even lust. He wanted a virgin for some rite he hadЧfound, made up, I am not sure, he seemed very confused by this timeЧand I was the only one, his sisterТs other two ladies being one a wife and the other a widow. I tried to dissuade him, I told him it was heresy, dire sin and against his fatherТs own laws, I said I would run away, that I would tell. He said heТd hunt me down with his dogs. That they would tear me apart as they had the pig. I said I would go to the Temple divine in the village. He said the man was only an acolyte, and a coward. And that he would kill anyone there who took me in. Even the acolyte. He was not afraid of the Temple, it was practically the property of kin Stagthorne and he could buy divines for a pittance.
УThe rite was meant to catch the spirit of the leopard, as the old kin warriors were supposed to do. I said, it could not possibly work, nowadays. He said, heТd done it before, several timesЧthat he meant to capture the spirits of every wisdom animal of the greater kinships. He thought it was going to give him some sort of power over the Weald.Ф
Ingrey, startled, said, УThe Old Weald warriors only took one animal spirit to themselves, one in a lifetime. And even that risked madness. Miscarriage. Worse.Ф As I know to my everlasting cost.
Her velvety voice was growing faster, breathless. УHe hauled the leopard up by its strangling cord. He hit me and threw me down on the bed. I fought him. He was muttering under his breath, spells or raving or both, I donТt know. I believed him, that he had done this beforeЧhis very mind was a menagerie, howling. The leopard distracted him in its death throes, and I wrenched out from under him. I tried to run, but there was nowhere to go. The door was locked. HeТd put the key in his robe.Ф
УDid you scream for help?Ф
УI suppose so. I scarcely know. My throat was raw, after, so I suppose I must have. The window was hopeless. The forest beyond seemed to go on forever, in the night. I called on my fatherТs spirit, on his god, for my aid, out of the dark.Ф
Ingrey couldnТt help thinking that in such an extremity Lady Ijada would call on her proper patroness, the Daughter of Spring, the goddess to Whom virginity was sacred. It seemed very strange for a woman to call on Her Brother of Autumn. Though this is His season. The Lord of Autumn was the god of young men, harvest, the hunt, comradeshipЧand war. And the weapons of war?
УYou turned,Ф said Ingrey, Уand found the hammer handle under your hand.Ф
The hazel eyes widened. УHow did you know?Ф
УI saw the chamber.Ф
УOh.Ф She moistened her lips. УI struck him. He lunged at me, orЕor lurched. I struck him again. He stopped. Fell, and did not rise. He wasnТt dead yetЧhis body spasmed, when I was groping in his robe for the key, and I nearly fainted. I fell to the floor on my hands and knees, anyway, and the room darkened. IЕitЕFinally, I got the door unbarred and called his men in.Ф
УWere theyЧwhat? Angry?Ф
УMore frightened than angry, I think. They argued forever, and blamed each other, and me, and whatever they could think of. Even Boleso. It took them ages to decide to lock me up and send a courier.Ф
УWhat did you do?Ф
УI sat on the floor, mostly. I was feeling very unwell. They asked me such stupid questions. Had I killed him? Did they imagine heТd bludgeoned himself? I was glad for my cell, when they finally put me in it. I donТt think Ulkra ever noticed I could bar its door from the inside.Ф
Ingrey wondered. In the most neutral voice he could muster, he said, УDid Prince Boleso complete his rape?Ф
Her face lifted; her eyes glinted. УNo.Ф
Truth rang in that voice, and a kind of rocky triumph. In the uttermost extremity, abandoned by all who should have protected her, sheТd found that she need not abandon herself. A powerful lesson. A dangerous lesson.
In an equally flat tone he asked, УDid he complete his rite?Ф
This time, she hesitated. УI donТt know. I am not sureЕwhat his intent was.Ф She gazed down into her lap; her hands gripped each other. УWhat will happen next? Rider Ulkra said you would take me in charge. Where to?Ф
УEasthome.Ф
УGood,Ф she said, with unexpected fervor. УThe Temple there will surely help me.Ф
УYou do not fear your trial?Ф
УTrial? I defended myself! I was betrayed into this horror!Ф
УIt is possible,Ф he said, still very level-voiced, Уthat some powerful people will not care to hear you proclaim so. Think. You cannot prove attempted rape, for one thing. A half dozen men could testify that you appeared to go to Boleso willingly.Ф
УCompared to fleeing into the woods to be eaten by the wild beasts, willing, yes. Compared to bringing a brutal death on anyone who tried to help me, willingly.Ф She stared at him in sudden incredulity. УDo you not believe me?Ф
УOh, yes.Ф Oh, yes. УBut I am not your judge.Ф
She frowned, a glint of white teeth pressing into a lower lip gone pale. In a moment, her spine straightened again. УIn any case, if the rape was not witnessed, the unlawful rite was. They all saw the leopard. They saw the secret drawings on the princeТs body. Not assertions, but material things, that any man might reach out and touch.Ф
Not anymore. If not innocent, she was an innocent, Ingrey had no doubt. Lady Ijada, you have no idea what you are pitting yourself against.