"John Dalmas - Yngling 1 - The Yngling" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dalmas John)

leaned into the oars, their brawny backs wet with
sweat. Through the blue sky moved flocks of small
white clouds. The sun sparkled off millions of facets
of sea surface, making Nils's eyes squint against the
glitter. A low shore, featureless at first in the
distance, drew gradually nearer, becoming low dunes
backed by rolling heath. Woods of stubby oaks took
form in some of the hollows. Nils J├дrnhann had never
seen the sea before, nor oak woods, and stood
absorbing the beauty and novelty.
A break appeared in the dunes and became
the mouth of a stream that flowed out of the heath. A
short distance up the stream, on its south side, a
town became visible past the shoulder of a dune. A
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lookout called down from the mast, and the stroke
strengthened as the oarsmen began a chant, for this
was their homeplace.
When the ship was tied to the wharf of
oak timbers, the oarsmen became stevedores, and under
the captain's direction began to unload the pine
planks that made up their cargo. A movement caught
the captain's eye and he turned to see his passenger
approaching. The captain was a big man, but this
fellow was bigger-more than a hundred and ninety
centimeters tall, he judged, with muscles
impressively thick and sinewy even to one accustomed
to the sight of brawny oarsmen. His corded torso was
bare and brown beneath the simple leather harness
that supported his sword belt. Soft deerskin breeches
were wrapped close around his calves by leather
strips, and his callused feet were bare. A necklace
of wolves' teeth hung on a thong across his thick
chest and the skin of a wolf's head was laced onto
his steel cap. Straw-colored braids hung to his
shoulders. Obviously a warrior of the northmen, and a
new one, the captain thought, noting the sparse soft
beard and mustache so out of character with the
physique.
Nils addressed the captain. "Will you
hire me to help unload cargo?"
"When did warriors start hiring out as
labor?" the captain asked.
"When they have spent their last coin
for passage and need something to eat."
"All right. One krona when the cargo is
all on the wharf, if you work well and make no
quarrels. Otherwise, nothing, and the arrows of the
town wardens if there is trouble." The captain