"Dave Duncan - The Seventh Sword - 2 - The Coming Of Wisdom" - читать интересную книгу автора (Duncan Dave)

Incredulously Nona said, "A married woman? It's all right?"
Quili paused to drag up memories of lessons in the temple. But she was sure.
"Yes. It's quite all right. Not any swordsman, but with a free sword it's all
right. He is on the service of the Goddess and deserves all our hospitality."
Kandoru had always said that it was a great honor for a woman to be chosen by a
free, but when Quili had known him he had been no longer a free sword. He had
been a resident swordsman, limited to one woman, limited by age; limited also by
failing health, although sometimes he had sounded as if that had been her fault.
"Kol'o won't like it," Nona muttered. She had not been married long.
"He should," Quili said. "If you have a baby within a year, it can have a
swordsman fathermark." She heard them all hiss with sudden excitement. She was a
city girl and expected to know all these things. She was also their priestess;
if she said it was all right, then it would be all right. Swordsmen never raped,
Random had insisted. They never had to.
"Really? A whole year? How soon?"
Quili did not know, but she glanced up at Nona's face. The flicker from the
dying rush lights was too blurred to show expression. If she were pregnant, men
that wasn't showing, either. "Hold on to it for a couple of weeks, and I'll
testify to the facemarker for you."
Nona blushed, and that did show, and the others laughed. They had little to give
their children, these humble folk. A swordsman fathermark would be worth more
man much gold. To a girl it would mean a high brideprice. To a boy, if he were
nimble, a chance for admission to the craft. Even a young husband would swallow
his pride for those and talk of being honored, whatever he truly felt. The laugh
broke the tension. Good! Now they would not flee in terror or unwittingly
provoke violence.
But Quili had to go and meet the swordsmen. She shivered and clutched her cloak
tighter yet. Suddenly she realized that
6 THE COMING OF WISDOM
she had met only one swordsman in her whole lifeтАФKandoni, her murdered husband.
The rain might be faltering. Dawn was certainly close, the^ eastern sky
brightening. The roosters were in blatant competition now. Leaving the
twittering women, Quili splashed off along the road. One way led to the manor,
the other to the River and the jetty. Beyond Salimono's house and the dam, the
track dropped swiftly into a little gorge, and into darkness.
She went slowly, hearing the slap of her shoes in puddles, trying not to imagine
herself tumbling into the stream and arriving at the jetty all covered in mud.
Going to meet swordsmen ... She should have brought one of the rush lights.
Why would swordsmen be coming here?
They might be coming by chance, but few ships or boats came downstream, because
southward lay the Black LandsтАФ rough water and no inhabitants. It was even less
likely that swordsmen would have come upstream, from the north, for that way lay
Ov.
They might be coming to avenge Kandoni. Swordsmen were utterly merciless against



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