"A Big Hand for the Little Lady" - читать интересную книгу автора (Friesner Esther M)

A Big Hand for the Little Lady
Esther M. Friesner




It was just another night in Hrothgar's hall, high Heorot, and the bloodstains on the plank floors hardly showed at all. Men sat at the long boards, drinking and swapping lies. Mead, beer, and wine flowed freely, most of it down the gullets of those warriors who'd stayed in noble Hrothgar's service long enough to have seen too many of their comrades die at the hands-if they were hands-of the fen-dwelling fiend the scops named Grendel. (How the scops ever got close enough to the hellspawned monster to learn his name without being themselves devoured remained a mystery.)

While the doughty Danish warriors sopped up enough liquor to float a longship, serving wenches passed between the feasting boards, refilling cups and drinking horns while at the same time slapping down or encouraging the attentions of the men, as they pleased. Among this lot there was one young woman who stood out from the rest, though not even the most nimble-tongued harper could ever say that she stood above them.

"Well, woodja looka that, Hengest," said one of Hrothgar's men, staring across the hall through booze-bleared eyes. "They got kids serving in here now?"

His seatmate gave him a comradely thwack in the head. "Thass no kid, Wulfstan, you beetle-brain. Thass m' sister, Maethild."

"Uh." Wulfstan squinted at the doll-like woman threading her way through the maze of tables. The other wenches towered over her, as did some of Hrothgar's boarhounds. It wasn't that she was a dwarf, although Hengest could have told Wulfstan that the girl had borne more than a few crude gibes from would-be wits who wanted to know where she kept her hammer or asked to see her treasure hoard. (In the latter cases, Maethild generally contrived to lay hold of a something heavy and hammer home a few free lessons in manners.) She was as sweetly formed a woman as the Lady Frey had ever blessed: hair of gold, eyes like a windswept summer sea, trim waist, and thighs that could crush a full keg of autumn ale between them. She was simplyЕ short. She balanced a heavy jug of beer on her shoulder as effortlessly as if it were made of cloud instead of clay, sometimes using it to beat aside too-familiar hands.

"You washed 'er wrong," Wulfstan said at last. "She shrunk."

Hengest bellowed with laughter and thumped Wulfstan on the back. "I like you, Woofspam," he slurred. "I don' got a lotta friends here yet 'cos I jus' come south to get into Hrothgar's service. See, I'm hopin' I'll be the one to killa monster that's been makin' all you Ring-Danes slink outa this fine hall ev'ry night so's he won' eatcha. Ol' Hrothgar, he'll pile a ton o' treasure on the man does that, and that man's gonna be me. But I like you. I like you a lot. Tell ya what: If you don' get eat up an' I killa monster, you marry Maethild. Deal?"

Wulfstan gave the diminutive maiden another long stare. "Well, she looks cheap to feed. 'Kay. Deal." The two men shook on it, and both of them fell off the bench backwards in the process. Hengest was the first back on his feet. He bawled out his sister's name.

One of the serving women reached down to tap Maethild on the shoulder. "You're wanted."

"I know." Maethild gave her brother a look of disgust which the other wench misinterpreted.

"Look, if you don't want him bothering you, drop that jug where it matters. I've been watching you; you don't have any trouble handling these trolls."

"That's no troll; that's my brother."

"He is?" The wench looked from tiny Maethild to titanic Hengest, mystified. "Are you sure?"

"Different fathers," Maethild replied. "Mine was a swordsman, his was a scop."

"A swordsman? Your father was the swordsman?" The wench was even more baffled by this sliver of family history.

"A short swordsman," Maethild replied tersely, and stomped across the hall, thumped the jug down on the board, gave her brother a killing look and snapped, "What?"

"Now, Maethild, be nice," Hengest soothed. "We don' wan' 'nother thing like wha' happen' in Healfdan's hall."

"Huh?" Wulfstan blinked. "Wuzza hoppen Healfdan's hall, hey?"

"Nuthin'." Hengest was suddenly embarrassed.

"I'll tell you what happened in Healfdan's hall," Maethild replied pertly. "Healfdan was my brother's former lord, a windbellied braggart. His way of telling a woman to hold her tongue was to give her a couple of healthy slaps. He heard me speaking my mind to my brother and he didn't care for my tone of voice, so he tried teaching me my place." She showed her teeth. "Once. They call him Healfdan of the Seven Fingers now."

Wulfstan's lower jaw dropped. Hengest writhed with the shame of having so unsuitable a sister. " 'S why we come here," he mumbled into his beard. "After what she did to Healfdan, we hadda run. I couldn't fight all of his men myself."

"Who asked you to?" Maethild demanded. "If you'd only have given me a sword-"