"Katherine Kerr - Deverry 08 - A Time Of Justice" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kerr Katherine)

'Don't you call me a slut.' Vyna's voice was dangerously level.

'I will!' said Squinty Eyes. 'Slut! Slut! Slut! Leaving your baby behind you!'

Scarlet with rage Vyna charged, grabbing the maid's hair with one hand and slapping her across the
mouth with the other. Shrieking, the third lass joined in, all of them pulling each other's hair and scrabbling
with their nails at each other's faces. Jill ran forward and intervened just as the cook came waddling and
yelling out of the kitchen. While the cook bellowed for peace Jill grabbed the pair of lasses and knocked
them apart so hard that they cowered back by the wall. Vyna stood sobbing, her dress torn, the tears
running down her face.

'My thanks, silver dagger,' the cook said. 'As for you two, get on with your work. You've tormented the
lass enough, and I'm sick to my guts of hearing it.тАЩ

Jill caught Vyna's arm and led her to a private spot among the various huts and storage sheds. Snivelling,
the lass wiped her face on her apron and stammered out thanks.

'Most welcome. I hate seeing two against one in a fight.'

'They've been on me and on me ever since I came here. Don't they know how much it ached my heart to
give up my baby? I miss him every day, but I had no choice.'

'Where did you leave him? With your kin?'

'I didn't. My Mam wouldn't take me in.' Vyna stared down at the ground, and her voice dropped. 'But I
was lucky, I suppose. I used to work in another dun, and the lady gave me the coin to put my baby in
fosterage to a farmer's wife she knew.тАЩ

'I see. It wasn't Cadlew's dun, was it?'
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'It wasn't. What made you think so?'

'Oh, just an idle wondering. He and the tieryn seem such close friends.'

'They are, but they'd never notice the likes of me. Here, my thanks again, but I've got to get back to my
work.'

She turned and ran across the ward, dodging among the huts as if to hide from Jill and the world as well.

Jill went upstairs to the women's hall, which rilled half of the second floor of the broch, a spacious sunny
room with two Bardek carpets on the polished wood floor and a profusion of chairs and cushions
scattered about. Ylaena and the dowager Slaecca sat together near a window, sewing on an
embroidered coverlet that draped both their knees - part of Ylaena's dowry, Jill assumed. Jill bowed to
the dowager and knelt beside her chair.