"David Drake - Old Nathan (2)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Drake David)

"Did your mother tell you that, Cullen Ransden?" Old Nathan said softly. His skin formed layers, hot and
prickly on the outside while the inner surface froze against his flesh as hard as the ice on which Satan
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shivered in Hell. "And did she tell ye besides how thet came t' be her business?"

The younger man could have been blasted by a thunderbolt without the hair prickling up more sharply on
his head and arms. He struck with the suddenness of reflex and the skill of long years' practice with the
blacksnake whip in his hand.

It was a measure of what lay at Ransden's core that the target his instinct chose was the ton of muscle
that was Spanish King rather than the sparse old man who looked unable to stand the very wind of a
blow.

The whip, long enough to drive a team of four span, curled out and around Old Nathan as if it were
really the snake its braided leather mimicked. Ransden could flick a fly from an oxen's ear without
touching the beast itself, but this time he aimed to cut. The crackling end of the whip touched Spanish
King at the base of the tail, where the hair gave way to the bare skin of the bull's anus.

Rather than bolting like a startled cow or an

ox broken to the whip and yoke, Spanish King reacted as a predator might have. The bull spun, questing
for the presumed horsefly with a clop of his square incisors. Old Nathan ducked and lurched sideways to
avoid the bull's sweeping horns. The four-inch hickory hitching post that Spanish King swatted in the
other direction with his haunches broke off even with the ground and clubbed Ellie on its way to thudding
against the cabin's log forewall.

King danced back, hooves splaying, as his eyes searched for the horsefly which had escaped him at the
first attempt. "When I find her!" the bull bellowed, referring to the horsefly. "When Ifind her!" His tail
lashed. Blood welling from the whip-cut began to dribble along the appendage in dark red streaks.

As the old man and the woman sprawled, Bully Ransden dropped his whip. He lunged for the porch but
had to back hastily away as Spanish King stepped between, tossing his head over either of his shoulders
in turn.

The cunning man took a pinch of dust between his right thumb and forefinger as he lay on his opposite
hand and hip. "Ransden!" he called.

***

The younger man glanced instinctively toward his name. Old Nathan blew the dust at his face, though at
four yards distance none could actually have reached the Bully. He sprang back anyway and fell,
clutching his eyes and shouting, "I'mblind, damn ye!"

The cunning man scrambled to his feet, sweeping up the hat he had dropped in dodging. His bull was
pacing smartly down the road, striding at a rate half again that of his normal walk. He kept switching his
tail and looking behind him, searching for the horsefly he was still convinced had stabbed him.