"David,.Peter.-.Sir.Apropos.1.-.Sir.Apropos.Of.Nothing" - читать интересную книгу автора (David Peter)

brute as any common highwayman or any member of the Thugs' Guild, and he also
had a string of mistresses in various towns and villages. He frequented the
whores' tent, which was usually set up at the outskirts of an encampment during
a campaign. More than one tart had supposedly come away from the amorous
encounter with bruises to show for it when Granite was impatient with his own .
. . performance. The mighty knight, you see, had a bit more trouble wielding his
sword off the battlefield than on, if you catch my drift, and that difficulty
translated to welts for those who couldn't easily overcome his problems.
I, however, had no such difficulties.
The Lady Rosalie, "heeding" her husband's suggestions to improve her riding
abilities, took to the stables more and more frequently to get in practice time.
Well . . . allegedly, that was the reason. But an intended hour of riding would
end up an hour of conversing with me as I groomed and tended to the horses while
she laughed and giggled and watched me perform my duties with a sort of doe-eyed
fascination. I knew exactly where matters were taking us, and did absolutely
nothing to deter them in their course.
One day she asked me to accompany her on a jaunt, since her husband had gone to
deal with a minor uprising in the nearby city of Pell, and she was concerned
lest bandits be wandering the roads. This, of course, wasn't her major concern.
We rode several miles away from the good king's stables, chatting about
trivialities, nonsense, and just about everything except for what really
occupied our thoughts. By the lakeside, on a cool morning, nature took its
course.
Let us just say that she did not ride exclusively sidesaddle.
I'm sure that I provided little more than an amusement to her, a dalliance. The
obvious conclusion was that she was using me to get back at her husband, to make
him jealous. But I doubt that was the case, because siccing the green-eyed
monster upon Granite could only have fatal consequences. Rosalie may not have
been the most polished apple to fall off the tree, but she was most definitely
not suicidal. Maintaining a shroud of secrecy over our relationship heightened
the likelihood of her keeping her pretty head on her shoulders. Besides, when
you get down to it, isn't it the very illicitness of an affair, the forbidden
nature of it, which makes it so exciting? Even pedestrian sex can be elevated to
new heights when one isn't supposed to be having it.
That was probably what kept it going. Old Granite had made very clear to all and
sundry that he thought very little of his wife's mental prowess. He considered
her something of a twit. But twit or not, she ably concealed the existence of
her tawdry little escapades (and I say that with only the fondest of
recollections and greatest esteem) from this great warrior who thought himself
one of the most canny and discerning of men.
Consequently, when it all came crashing down, it landed with a most pronounced
thud.
The Pell situation, which started as something rather inconsequential, began to
spiral out of control. Granite made a tactical error, you see. There had been a
hard core of individuals utterly opposed to pouring more tax money into the
king's coffers. I couldn't blame them, really. Most of the money paid in taxes
didn't go into providing resources for public works, but instead either lined
the pockets of key knights, or served to fund foreign wars that most of the
peasants never heard of and didn't care about.
The hard core of individuals were endeavoring to organize protests, even