"Kay, Guy Gavriel - Last Light Of The Sun" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kay Guy Gavriel)

had nothing to do with Thorkell. He was pursuing his own feud with
Halldr and the town, not his father's. You exiled a murderer (twice a
murderer) if need be. You didn't condemn his freeborn son to
years of servitude and a landless fate for the father's crimeЧand
expect him to forgive. A man without land had nothing, could not
marry, speak in the thringmoot, claim honour or pride. His life and
name were marred, broken as a plough by stones.

He ought to have killed Halldr. Or Arni Kjellson. Or someone. He
wondered, sometimes, where his own rage lay. He didn't seem to
have that fury, like a berserkir in battle. Or like his father in drink.

His father had killed people, raiding with Siggur Volganson, and
here at home.

Bern hadn't done anything so . . . direct. Instead, he'd stolen a
horse secretly in the dark and was now heading, for want of
anything close to a better idea, to see if woman's magicЧthe
volur'sЧcould offer him aid in the depths of a night. Not a brilнliant
plan, but the only one that had come to him. The women would
probably scream, raise an alarm, turn him in.

That did make him think of something. A small measure of
prudence. He turned east towards the risen moon and the edge of
the wood, dismounted, and led the horse a short way in. He looped
the rope to a tree trunk. He was not about to walk up to the
women's compound leading an obviously stolen horse. This called
for some trickery.

It was hard to be devious when you had no idea what you were
doing.

He despised the bleak infliction of this life upon him. Was unable, it
seemed, to even consider two more years of servitude, with no
assurance of a return to any proper status afterwards. So, no, he
wasn't going back, leaving the stallion to be found, slipping into his
straw in the freezing shed behind Kjellson's house. That was over.
The sagas told of moments when the hero's fate changed, when
he came to the axle-tree. He wasn't a hero, but he wasn't going
back. Not by choice.

He was likely to die tonight or tomorrow. No rites for him when that
happened. There would be an excited quarrel over how to kill a
defiling horse thief, how slowly, and who most deserved the
pleasure of it. They would be drunk and happy. Bern thought of the
blood-eagle then; pushed the image from his mind.

Even the heroes died. Usually young. The brave went to Ingavin's
halls. He wasn't sure if he was brave.