"Rawn, Melanie - Dragon Star 2 - Dragon Token" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dragon Stories)

Tallain nodded mutely. From the corner of his eye he had seen Kazander and Visian walking methodically down the rows of wounded. They stopped every two paces and stabbedЧonce to the right, once to the left, as precisely as surgeonsЧthrough the heart.

Pol's order. This was not the work of the man he'd known, nor the boy Sionell had once loved. Tallain wanted out. Away. Now.

"Thank you. Once you have him, send him to me at Feruche." Pol put on his gloves again. "Keep your levies at Tiglath for the time being. I won't need you for some while yet, and there's no room at Feruche to house them anyway. Oh, and you might start thinking about what portions of Cunaxa should be added to what young Jeren inherited from Jahnavi at Tuath. I'm afraid we'll be a

is the only thing that matters. Without it, what we do and how we do it become demons to claw at our mindsЧ

"Tallain, you look as bad as I feel," Pol said.

He looked at his prince. "I'm fine. We'll start off now, by your leave."

"I understand." Pol smiled, and the weariness was like another scar on his face, like the one on his cheekbone. "If I get down from this saddle again, I'll fall down and not get up again for two days." He glanced at the sky, his gaze blank. After a moment he nodded and said, "Birioc is headed northwest, more or less toward Tuath. He's got twenty men with him. Don't lose him in the canyons. Take him tomorrow or the next day and then go home, Tallain. And be sure to give Meiglan's love to Sionell."

He didn't like hearing his wife's name on Pol's lips. Nodding once more, he wheeled his horse around and signaled to his captain to call assembly.

"We're going hunting," he told the man. "And then we're going home."



CHAPTER NINE





The emissary from Prince Laric of Firon rode out of Fessada at a gallop, new snow fountaining beneath her horse's hooves. Camanto, elder prince but not Fessen-den's heir, watched from a tower window and grinned to himself. He'd had no need to be present at the recent audience; he was so certain of what had been said that he could have set it to music.

In fact, he mused as he went back to his maps and rosters, all this would make a rather fine ballad series. He'd have to find a bard with a sense of humor when he commissioned the songs.

Later in the morning he put himself by way of encountering his brother's wife in the garden, where she always went when she was furious. As Arnisaya was possessed of a volatile nature, she spent quite a lot of time there.

And so it was today. Camanto lingered in the arcade for a moment, admiring her delectable curves as she strode along swept gravel paths between snowy hillocks. She'd been rather a scrawny little thing when she'd married Edirne; motherhood had improved her figure, if not her temper.

He strolled around the perimeter of the garden, where bare roses drooped beneath the weight of last night's snow. Eventually she turned for another path, and saw him.

"Camanto! Have you heard the latest idiocy?"

He took her arm. "SuccinctlyЧmy father has refused Laric permission to cross the Ussh and march through our lands on his way to save his princedom."

"And do you know why?" She snorted. "Because

Laric is a kinsman of the High Prince, and if the Vellant-'im find out we helped him, they might attack us!"

"Thin, I'll admit," Camanto said. "Actually, my father is afraid that Fessenden will become what Meadowlord always wasЧa convenient battleground. Yarin must know Laric's coming. If he's smart, he'll already have sent troops south to watch the most likely routes."

"To battle his own prince? His brother-by-marriage?"

"Of course not. Against the Vellant'im, of course."