"Cooper, Susan - Dark is Rising 02 - The Dark is Rising" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cooper Susan)

The man shrugged, tearing wolfishly at his bread, and the woman, her face invisible behind the edge of an enveloping shawl, went away again with her basket. John Smith swung the horseshoe out of the fire to sizzle and steam in a bucket of water.

'Get on, get on,' said the rider irritably, raising his head. 'The day grows. How much longer?'

'Your iron will not be hurried,' said the smith, but he was hammering the shoe in place now with quick, sure strokes. 'Done!' he said at last, trimming the hoof with a knife.

The red-haired man led his horse round, tightened the girths, and slid upwards, quick as a jumping cat, into his saddle. Towering there, with the folds of his dark robe flowing over the flanks of the black horse, he looked like a statue carved out of night. But the blue eyes were staring compellingly down at Will. 'Come up, boy. I'll take you where you want to go. Riding is the only way, in snow as thick as this.'

'No, thank you,' Will said. 'I am out to find the Walker.' He heard his own words with amazement. So that's it, he thought.

'But now the Rider is abroad,' the man said, and all in one quick movement he twitched his horse's head around, bent in the saddle, and made a sweeping grab at Will's arm. Will jerked sideways, but he would have been seized if the smith, standing at the open wall of the forge, had not leapt forward and dragged him out of reach. For so broad a man, he moved with astonishing speed.

The midnight stallion reared, and the cloaked rider was almost thrown. He shouted in fury, then recovered himself, and sat looking down in a cold contemplation that was more terrible than rage. 'That was a foolish move, my friend smith,' he said softly. 'We shall not forget.' Then he swung the stallion round and rode out in the direction from which Will had come, and the hooves of his great horse made only a muffled whisper in the snow.

John Smith spat, derisively, and began hanging up his tools.

'Thank you,' Will said. 'I hope - ' He stopped.

'They can do me no harm,' the smith said. 'I come of the wrong breed for that. And in this time I belong to the road, as my craft belongs to all who use the road. Their power can work no harm on the road through Hunter's Combe. Remember that, for yourself.'

The dream-state flickered, and Will felt his thoughts begin to stir. 'John,' he said. 'I know it's true I must find the Walker, but I don't know why. Will you tell me?'

The smith turned and looked directly at him for the first time, with a kind of compassion in his weathered face. 'Ah no, young Will. Are you so newly awake? That you must learn for yourself. And much more, this your first day.'

'First day?' said Will.

'Eat,' said the smith. 'There is no danger in it now that you will not be breaking bread with the Rider. You see how quickly you saw the peril of that. Just as you knew there would be greater peril in riding with him. Follow your nose through the day, boy, just follow your nose.' He called to the house, 'Martha!'

The woman came out again with her basket. This time she drew back her shawl and smiled at Will, and he saw blue eyes like the Rider's but with a softer light in them. Gratefully, he munched at the warm crusty bread, which had been split now and spread with honey. Then beyond the clearing there was a new sound of muffled footfalls in the road, and he spun fearfully round.

A white mare, without rider or harness, trotted into the clearing towards them: a reverse image of the Rider's midnight-black stallion, tall and splendid and without marking of any kind. Against the dazzle of the snow, glittering now as the sun re-emerged from cloud, there seemed a faint golden glow in its whiteness and in the long mane falling over the arched neck. The horse came to stand beside Will, bent its nose briefly and touched his shoulder as if in greeting, then tossed its great white head, blowing a cloud of misty breath into the cold air. Will reached out and laid a reverent hand on its neck.

'You come in good time,' John Smith said. 'The fire is hot.'

He went back into the forge and pumped once or twice at the bellows-arm, so that the fire roared; then he hooked down a shoe from the shadowed wall beyond and thrust it into the heat. 'Look well,' he said, studying Will's face. 'You've not seen a horse like this ever before. But this will not be the last time.'

'She's beautiful,' Will said, and the mare nuzzled again gently at his neck.

'Mount,' said the smith.

Will laughed. It was so obviously impossible; his head reached scarcely to the horse's shoulder, and even if there had been a stirrup it would have been far out of reach of his foot.

'I am not joking,' said the smith, and indeed he did not look the kind of man who often smiled, let alone made a joke. 'It is your privilege. Take hold of her mane where you can reach it, and you will see.'

To humour him, Will reached up and wound the fingers of both hands in the long coarse hair of the white horse's mane, low on the neck. In the same instant, he felt giddy; his head hummed like a spinning-top, and behind the sound he heard quite plainly, but very far off, the haunting, bell-like phrase of music that he had heard before waking that morning. He cried out. His arms jerked strangely; the world spun; and the music was gone. His mind was still groping desperately to recover it when he realised that he was closer to the snow-thick branches of the trees than he had been before, sitting high on the white mare's broad back. He looked down at the smith and laughed aloud in delight.

'When she is shod,' the smith said, 'she will carry you, if you ask.'

Will sobered suddenly, thinking. Then something drew his gaze up through the arching trees to the sky, and he saw two black rooks flapping lazily past, high up. 'No,' he said. 'I think I am supposed to go alone.' He stroked the mare's neck, swung his legs to one side, and slid the long way down, bracing himself for a jolt. But he found that he landed lightly on his toes in the snow. 'Thank you, John. Thank you very much. Good-bye.'